1944-04-18

OFFICIAL REPORT


[Stage Direction]
Housie of Commons ^Debates
[Stage Direction]
Tuesday, April 18, 1944


[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 72, for the relief of Alfreda Elsie Hatch Carpenter.-Mr. Maclnnis.
Bill No. 73, for the relief of Rachel Segal Kaparofsky.-Mr. Factor.
Bill No. 74, for the relief of Paul Lapointe. -Mr. Factor.
Bill No. 75, for the relief of Vera Grace Percy Moore.-Mr. Factor.
Bill No. 76, for the relief of Jean Fernand Georges Robitaille.-Mr. Maclnnis.
Bill No. 77, for the relief of Marie Stella Gisele Payette MacRae.-Mr. Gray.
Bill No. 78, for the relief of Horace Henry Chapman.-Mr. Hazen.
Bill No. 79, for the relief of Florence Berger Bassin.-Mr. Casselman (Grenville-Dundas).
Bill No. 80, for the relief of Roland Edouard Levert.-Mr. Macdonald (Brantford City).
Bill No. 81, for the relief of Alice Robert Rajotte.-Mr. Hill.


Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to
direct attention to a paragraph which appears in a brief statement on the policy of commonwealth relations which was issued by the Hon. Mr. Bracken last night and which appears in the press of the country to-day. The paragraph to which I wish to direct attention is the following:
The Prime Minister has uaid that Lord Halifax asked us to make a "commitment", to fall in line, in any event, with a common policy for the common-wealth in all matters of our external relations.
I wish to say that at no time in any place have I made the statement that Lord Halifax asked us to make a commitment on the lines which are set forth in that statement, and I challenge Mr. Bracken, from wherever he may be-


Mr. HANSON (York-Sunbury):: Don't
worry about that. You will know where he is soon enough.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I challenge Mr. Bracken to give to this house, through his deputy the leader of the opposition, if he is his deputy as leader of the Progressive Conservative party, the statement which will justify the words which Mr. Bracken has used. I ask Mr. Bracken and I ask my hon. friend the leader of the opposition now or anyone else on the opposite side of the house to point out, in Hansard or in any public address or in anything that I have said anywhere, the statement that Lord Halifax had asked us to make a commitment with respect to matters of external affairs.
I have read Mr. Bracken's statement. In other particulars the statement or this press release appears to me to be but a belated reproduction of the policy I expressed to this house on January 31 last. I should not be doing my full duty if I did not again draw to the attention of this house and the country the fact that Mr. Bracken's attitude in not entering this House of Commons to debate on the floor of this house the great issues of the day, and to substantiate the statements which he has made outside, amounts to noth-thing more or less than a contempt for parliament itself and for parliamentary institutions. I hope that in this country through public opinion or otherwise, we are not going to permit indefinitely the affairs of the nation to be discussed in a way that may be taken as official and responsible by individuals who have no seat in any part of the country, rather than as between representatives of parties in the House of Commons who are face to face with each other and have to answer on this floor for the statements which they make.


Mr. GORDON GRAYDON (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker, I would say to the Prime Minister that he has strained himself pretty far in trying to find an issue upon which

Commonwealth Relations

he could again make some reference to the leader of the Progressive Conservative party. He has on nearly every occasion-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Mr. SPEAKER:: Order.


Gordon Graydon: I shall have to appeal to you again, Mr. Speaker, for protection respecting my position as leader of the opposition. I used last night the word ''bully"; I hope I shall not have to use it again, because all I am doing and shall continue to do is to demand my rights-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Richard Burpee Hanson: A mechanical majority!


Gordon Graydon: -in putting our position before the country. The overwhelming majority in the house of this Liberal party, and the no less overwhelming minority outside, are totally inconsistent.


An hon. MEMBER:: You will find out.


Gordon Graydon: Mr. Speaker, am I to be allowed to continue or not?


Thomas Vien: Order.


Gordon Graydon: I did not interrupt the Prime Minister when he made his statement, and he has been gentlemanly and polite enough not to interrupt me as I have been making mine. Perhaps his followers might take an example from him.
Time after time the Prime Minister has attempted to find some inconsequential reason or basis for directing an attack upon the leader of the Progressive Conservative party.


An hon. MEMBER:: Who is he?


Gordon Graydon: He is doing it again now. I do not know whether the Prime Minister is slipping, but it seems to me that in his really great day as a statesman he would not have attacked Mr. Bracken on quite so inconsequential a basis as he did to-day. Apparently this is the phrase he objects to:
The Prime Minister has said that Lord Halifax asked us to make a commitment, to fall in line, in any event, with a common policy for the commonwealth in all matters of our external relations.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Does my hon. friend say that that statement is true?


Richard Burpee Hanson: Just keep quiet.


Gordon Graydon: The Prime Minister has made his speech.


Mr. MACKENZIE (Vancouver Centre):: The third leader is speaking now. How many leaders have you got there?


Gordon Graydon: Perhaps I, too, could get into this debate between the hon. member for York-Sunbury and the Minister of Pensions and National Health (Mr. Mackenzie). But what I want to say is this. The Prime Minister knows very well that the actual effect of the statement he made on a previous occasion was the effect which is conveyed by the statement made here by Mr. Bracken. He is cavilling, as he often does in times of adversity and trouble, at certain words which are used, but the Prime Minister cannot avoid the consequences, either by questioning me, or Mr. Bracken, or anyone else; because there are the facts, and the facts remain to be read by the public from time to time. The public are getting a little tired-
Mr. .FRASER (Northumberland):	-of
Bracken.


Gordon Graydon: I would say to the hon. member for Northumberland, you people are not so tired but that you want him closer to you than ever.
So far as the public are concerned they believe, and I think properly so, that the job of prime minister of this country is, as my right hon. friend told us so eloquently and forcibly on a previous occasion in this house, in the midst of the war-time period to keep his eye and the government's eye on the ball, as Mr. Churchill suggested. If he does this he will have a large enough job on his hands: perhaps so much of his time will be occupied with the war that he will have to keep both eyes on the job of winning the war, and not one eye on trying to make plans for John Bracken or anybody else. I rise at this time only to say to the Prime Minister that I am amazed and appalled that he should pick such an inconsequential thing as this, the matter of mere wording in a statement as an excuse to make another attack on the floor of this house upon a great Canadian, who-and I say this without unnecessarily reflecting upon the Prime Minister-will measure up to the stature of any living Canadian.



INCOME TAX


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1943 BETUBNS
On the orders of the day:
Mr. G. Iv. FRASER (Peterborough West): I desire to direct to the Minister of National Revenue a question of very urgent importance, particularly in the riding which I represent. In order to explain it more fully I shall, if I may have permission, read this letter:
We would ask that you endeavour to obtain an extension in connection with the filing date

Rules of the House
of T-l General 1943 income tax forms. As it stands at present, the last day for filing this return is April 30.
This office is swamped with clients, who are unable to complete their returns, and with experienced help unobtainable, it is impossible to handle the rush by April 30 with our present staff. This condition is general.
I have similar letters from a number of other people in Peterborough. It is impossible for them to run down to Kingston, over seventy-five miles away, and secure advice from the income tax office there; and Peterborough, being a large industrial city, contains a great number of income tax payers.
I wonder if the minister could extend the time for filing this return?
Hon. C. W. G. GIBSON (Minister of National Revenue):: The date for filing the returns is set by statute at April 30. Every year we get requests from people who have left to the last minute the completion of their return and find difficulty in preparing the return in the last few days. Individuals have from January 1 to April 30-four months-in which to get their return completed and filed. Nearly always, no matter what date is set, there are requests for extensions. But there is no intention of extending the time for filing the return, although an extension has been granted until August 31 for the payment of the balance owing on last year's tax.


Mr. FRASER (Peterborough AVest):: In regard to that, may I say just a word. The minister has said that these people have had since the first of January. I wish to correct him. Many of those who have to pay income tax have not had their proper returns from the firms until a few weeks ago.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Richard Burpee Hanson: If the Prime Minister has recovered his lost temper, may I venture to ask him a question on the business of parliament and the house. There has'been on the order paper since March 7, under the heading "Motions", the following item:
Further consideration in committee of the whole of the report of the special committee on the revision of standing orders.
I had intended to ask before the Easter recess as to when this item was to be disposed of, but, hoping that the government would call the order, I refrained from doing so. I 100-134J
am now impelled to do so because of the leading editorial in yesterday's Ottawa Journal, in which, I think it is fair to say, the writer commends at least three of the major recommendations of that special committee and calls attention to the failure to implement the report of the committee. I now ask the Prime Minister if he will be good enough to designate a day when we can discuss this important matter. I do. not like to feel that the labours of that committee have been lost.
I desire to say, sir, if I may be permitted, that under your able chairmanship this committee did a lot of good work. It did not go so far as many people thought we ought to go, but the reason is quite plain-that we desired to protect the rights of certain minorities in parliament, and therefore we could not bring ourselves to recommend to the house that substantive rights which it has taken generations to acquire should be taken away. But we have, I think, brought down recommendations which are of great value and of vital importance, and I am therefore asking the Prime Minister if he would be good enough to arrange for a date when we can dispose of this report.
Right Hon. \V. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister):	Before I answer my hon.
friend's question, may I say just a word with respect to what he said in introducing it. My hon. friend was not in the house last night, or perhaps I would not have to repeat what I am about to say.. I drew attention last night-


Richard Burpee Hanson: I was
home ill last night.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: My hon. friend will realize that I should be the last not to understand why he would not be here in the evening. However, in a moment he will see the point I am making. I find it necessary at times to call attention to what I would describe as the tactics of the official opposition, and a part of their tactics is to create the impression that from time to time I lose my temper in this house.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Perish the thought! We did not have it this afternoon!


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I was going to say that I mentioned last night that on any occasion when the opposition take exception to what has been said by the government and begin to lecture the government they become very sensitive if we reply, they seem to feel that while they have the right to criticize, we have no right to take exception to their criticism, and when we do take exception to their criticism it is suggested that I have lost my
Rules of the House

temper. I just want to make it clear, because I hear this phrase repeated over and over again, each time I begin to reply to hon. gentlemen opposite, "It is too bad, but the Prime Minister has lost his temper." That is part of their stock in trade. It is a pretty low order of stock at that. I am going to make it clear that when the press of hon. gentlemen opposite quote in headlines these expressions about the Prime Minister losing his temper, when there is no possible ground for a statement of the kind-


Richard Burpee Hanson: That's
good.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: -except it be so to exaggerate as to make a situation ludicrous, while it may be all right to make these statements for the entertainment of the house, I do hope the public will not be misled by manoeuvres of the kind.
As to the more serious part of my hon. friend's observations, I am not sure whether the last part was really what his utterance was intended in the main to convey.


Richard Burpee Hanson: I give you my assurance it was.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I thought perhaps he hoped he was getting in a shot for his party when he used the first expression on getting up.


Richard Burpee Hanson: I would
not be without guile in that respect.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: My hon. friend is the most guileless creature in the house. But may I say that, with regard to the rules of the house, I share his view that we ought to take advantage of the work done by the committee, which I think was efficient and helpful, and have its report considered at a very early day. I would suggest Monday of next week.


Richard Burpee Hanson: I am afraid I cannot be here.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Then I should be very happy to suggest-


Richard Burpee Hanson: Any day
following.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Tuesday, then. And please now do not ever afterwards say that I have not tried to meet the wishes of the opposition.


Richard Burpee Hanson: True cooperation.



HOUSING


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. S. H. KNOWLES (Winnipeg North Centre):: I should like to direct a question either to the Acting Minister of Finance (Mr. Ralston) or to the Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Finance (Mr. Abbott). I do so by request of the Winnipeg city council, made to me last Friday at a meeting of the council's committee on housing conditions. I may say, Mr, Speaker, that I was asked to raise this matter in the hope that it might obviate the necessity of the Winnipeg city council sending a delegation to Ottawa to wait on the government. My question has to do with the government's house conversion plan. In view of the serious shortage in houses in the city of Winnipeg, is consideration being given to extending to Winnipeg the benefits of this plan? Further, may I ask if the government will reply to the representations of the Winnipeg city council in this matter at an early day?


Mr. D. C. ABBOTT (Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Finance):: My hon. friend, I assume, did not have an opportunity to give me notice of the question. I shall have to ask him to let it stand as a notice and I will endeavour to reply on Thursday.


Mr. D. G. ROSS (St. Paul's):: May I direct a question to the Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Finance? In view of the critical situation in Toronto and other cities, so far as housing is concerned, seeing that thousands of families there face eviction in a short time-and the situation is getting worse- will the government immediately, or as soon as possible, bring in its low-cost housing legislation so that something can be done to meet the emergency in that city with the least possible delay? Will the government also arrange for priorities in man-power and material to correct the situation?


Douglas Charles Abbott: I do not know whether that is a question or not. It is matter of government policy which will be announced in due course.



LABOUR CONDITIONS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. A. WT. ROEBUCK (Trinity): May I direct a question to the Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Labour? In the wartime labour relations regulations there is provision

United Nations Agreement
for an arrangement with the provinces, and I understand that negotiations have been in progress with regard to the adoption of these, regulations by the provinces. Will the parliamentary assistant make a statement as to the progress accomplished?
Mr. PAUL MARTIN (Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Labour):: The hon. member for Trinity was kind enough to give me notice of the question, and I am in a position to answer it.
To date, an agreement with one province, the province of Ontario, has been negotiated by the Minister of Labour for Canada providing for the administration of the wartime labour relations regulations. P.C. 1003, with respect to the certification of bargaining representatives for employees in industries covered by section 3, subsection 1 (b) and (c) of the regulations. Under the terms of the agreement a provincial labour relations board has been established to administer the regulations, the board being composed of a chairman, three representatives of labour organizations and three representatives of employer organizations.
In respect of the remaining eight provinces, negotiations of agreements are being very actively pursued. We are assured by all provinces, with three exceptions, that agreements will be completed bringing non-war industries ordinarily within provincial jurisdiction under the regulations. In the case of Alberta and Nova Scotia, I think I may say we have every reason to believe that the same course will be followed.
In the province of Quebec a provincial board will be established on a representative basis to administer the dominion regulations with respect to war industries; non-war industries will continue to be dealt with under the provincial legislation enacted prior to the coming into force of the wartime labour relations regulations, P.C. 1003.



UNITED NATIONS


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Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister) moved the second reading of bill No 84, for carrying into effect the agreement for united nations relief and rehabilitation administration between Canada and certain other nations and authorities.
Mr. VICTOR Q.UELCH (Acadia): Any measure whereby Canada can help in the rehabilitation of the devastated areas of the world, on as equitable basis as possible, will receive the full support of this group; nevertheless we do view with alarm certain suggestions that are being made-and I am not referring to mere rumours-that UNRRA is being used for the purpose of imposing undesirable economic conditions upon the nations benefiting under this measure. That mistake was made after the last war, and if it is made after this one it will be breaking faith with those people who have made the supreme sacrifice in this war. I say that for this reason: The winning of the war is not the final objective. It is a major objective that will have to be attained in order that we may go on to the final objective, which is the introduction of a peace that may have some permanency attached to it. The only type of peace that can have any permanency attached to it is one based upon Christian principles, one that will make it possible for the peoples of the world to live in the greatest degree of security and freedom from fear. If this is not done, if we allow discontent and poverty to exist in any part of the world, we are allowing an ember to smoulder that may in time burst into flame, thereby enveloping the world in another conflagration.
I wonder if we still stand by the declaration of principles known as the Atlantic charter. Do we still stand fully by sections 4 and 5 of that declaration? I wish to quote them now and to refer to one particular item of these sections. Section 4 is as follows:
They will endeavour, with clue respect for their existing obligations, to further the enjoyment by all states, great or small, victor or vanquished, of access, on equal terms, to the trade and to the raw materials of the world which are needed for their economic prosperity.
Fifth, they desire to bring about the fullest collaboration between all nations in the economic field with the object of securing, for all. improved labour standards, economic adjustment, and social security.
Section 4 states that this objective is to apply with respect to nations great or small, victor or vanquished. Apparently the agreement known as UNRRA has to a certain extent departed from that principle. While the agreement may not have departed from it, the resolutions passed at Atlantic City apparently have done so; because I read a statement in the United States newspapers the other day to the effect that at Atlantic City the British delegates, supported by the delegates of the United States and China, moved a resolution to the effect that enemy territory should pay for relief to the fullest possible extent. That motion was defeated, and the motion that Germany should pay to the full extent was passed. I notice that the Parliamentary Assistant to the Prime Minister (Mr. Claxton), stated yesterday that a resolution was adopted at Atlantic City providing that countries which are able to pay for relief
United Nations Agreement
[Stage Direction]
would pay for it. Then one immediately comes to the conclusion that those nations that cannot pay will receive it as a gift; but on the other hand, according to the resolution that was passed at Atlantic City, we now find that Germany will have to pay in full.
I am not one who is easily swayed by emotion about the rights of defeated nations. However I believe we must all agree that if in Germany after the war there is mass starvation amongst the people, amongst the women and children of that country, all they can do is to pay to the fullest extent possible; and if they are unable to provide sufficient relief for the people by paying to the fullest extent possible, then apparently we are going to deny them the necessary relief to take care of these people. It appears to me that that is a departure from the declaration of principles known as the Atlantic charter.
There is another matter connected with the resolutions passed at Atlantic City that has caused me a great deal of concern. It seems to me that some of these resolutions definitely limit the scope of the agreement known, as UNRRA. UNRRA stands for the international relief and rehabilitation administration. The words "relief" and "rehabilitation" are used. According to resolution 12 I understand that the second "R" has in reality been struck out of UNRRA. I make that statement because I have read words to that effect in a number of United States periodicals. I should like to quote some of the statements that have been published. In the Christian Science Monitor of March 16 reference is made to resolution 12 passed at Atlantic City, and the following statement appears:
The task of rehabilitation must not be considered as the beginning of reconstruction. It is co-terminous with relief.
The Wall Street Journal of March 20 made this statement:
As defined by UNRRA and Congress, rehabilitation does not signify reconstruction.
The Economist of Dec. 4 said:
The decision has been reached to take the second "R" out of UNRRA.
Therefore apparently UNRRA now merely stands for relief. It does not stand for rehabilitation of the devastated areas. According to the press, forty-one resolutions were passed at Atlantic City. Hon. members of this house have not been in a positon to find out what is contained in those resolutions. The statements in the press regarding resolution 12 show' that the powers of UNRRA have been definitely curtailed. It seems to me that before the house is asked to pass upon this bill, the members should be given a chance

to see what is in the resolutions passed at Atlantic City which definitely curtail the operation of UNRRA.
Unless devastated countries can get supplies of raw materials and machinery with which to start their industries they will continue to need relief for many years. Apparently UNRRA does not make any provision for providing the raw materials and machinery necessary to enable industry in those devastated countries to provide exports in return for their imports. One may well ask how the devastated areas can ever produce the necessary exports to pay for their imports. Is it to be a condition of receiving help under UNRRA that these nations shall become a party to the proposals for an international currency? It might be said that that is one way by which these nations can receive the necessary help. In that regard it is interesting to note section 4 of the Canadian proposals of the tentative draft proposals-
The establishment of an international monetary organization is no substitute for the measures of international relief and rehabilitation w'hich will be required as the war draws to its conclusions and afterwards; and in the view of the Canadian experts any monetary organization which is set up should not be called upon to finance transactions of this nature.
Therefore according to the Canadian experts these international monetary proposals will not be a method by which the devastated areas can be rehabilitated or by which reconstruction can be put into effect. Again I ask, by what means are those nations to receive the necessary help to put themselves on a selfsupporting basis? Apparently the only alternative left to them, since it is not to be done under UNRRA, is long-term loans. When we recall the history of that type of policy, when we remember how for sixty years before the last war England made large and long-term loans to foreign nations and lost in the neighbourhood of sixteen or seventeen billion dollars as a result of those loans being repudiated; when we recall-and I am speaking from memory now-that the United States lost in the neighbourhood of eleven billion dollars on foreign loans between the two wars, I think we should agree that that is not a sound policy. Moreover, a policy of that type can result only in international friction. When money is lent to- a nation to build up its industries, the policy works fairly satisfactorily until the time comes when the debtor nation seeks to repay the loan. When it attempts to ship its imports in payment of the interest and principal, the creditor nation immediately objects to receiving those imports because it brings about unemployment within its own country; indeed a high tariff barrier is erected

United Nations Agreement
in order to make it impossible for the debtor nation to ship its goods in. The result, of course, is international friction and repudiation. I think most people will agree that to a very large extent this policy was responsible for the war of 1914, and to a certain extent for the war we are fighting today. If we are not going to use long term loans; if we are not going to use the international monetary proposals to provide this help, and I insist we should not, then I think the only sound and logical way to provide it is either under lend-lease or mutual aid. I believe the mutual aid bill should become a definite part of UNRRA, so that help may be given to bring about the rehabilitation and reconstruction of the devastated industries.
In the past this group has always given full support to the principle of mutual aid, and similar measures. We have given that support entirely on moral grounds. We have taken the stand that we are in this war with the other united nations and that it is our moral obligation to pool our resources in order to unite them against the enemy. We feel also that these policies should be continued after the war to extend help to those nations which have suffered as a result of enemy action. If such assistance is not given; if we allow those nations to remain on a standard of bare subsistence, in a state of relief, then I do not think it can be said that we are laying sound foundations for a world peace. Certainly it will not be a peace based on Christian principles. Therefore I should like the minister to explain just to what extent the resolutions passed at Atlantic City have made UNRRA a relief proposal.
Mr. M. J. COLDWELL (Rosetown-Biggar):: Mr. Speaker, I find myself to a very large extent in agreement with the hon. member for Acadia (Mr. Quelch), who has just taken his seat. I do not follow him in all his arguments, but I think we should go very carefully into the principle of this measure both now and when it is in committee. We are quite prepared to give not only full but enthusiastic support to the united nations relief organization in so far as it will assist in the rehabilitation of the nations now under the heel of Hitler or suffering from the extremities of war, and in placing the world on a saner, sounder footing than we have known in the past. Before we finally adopt a measure of this description, however, which is so wide in its implications, I believe we should have full discussion and a clear understanding of it. Since the war began it has become somewhat customary in this house to take for granted that Great Britain, the United States, and latterly Russia, the great powers, would
more or less decide most matters; then we would get the decision and to all intents and purposes fall in line with what had been decided. I think that policy is wrong. We should give the great powers all the cooperation we can, but we should not forget that there may be circumstances in which the interests of the smaller nations may not be altogether the same as those of one or more or all of the great powers.
The principle of this bill, as I see it, and it so states, is to enable the government of Canada to give effect to an agreement for the establishment of a united nations relief and rehabilitation administration.; and the method proposed in this bill is to empower the governor in council to do whatever may be proper and expedient in order to give effect to that agreement. Although when the bill was brought down the house was more or less under the impression that it was mainly for the purpose of authorizing an interim payment of $10,000,000, the adoption of this measure will in effect give the government very wide powers in regard to the agreement and the policies to be carried out thereunder.
I followed with some interest the remarks of the hon. member for Acadia, and I want to emphasize what he said in regard to the purpose of the bill. As I see it, when this relief and rehabilitation organization was first set up most people thought it would be not merely a temporary relief organization but quite largely a reconstruction body. As the hon. member for Acadia has already pointed out, however, and as has been pointed out in certain newspapers, we seem to have departed from what many hoped to be the basic idea behind this organization. For example, President Roosevelt sent a message to congress last November, I think on November 15, in which he said that the agreements provided only a framework for giving first aid to the liberated areas. This work would be only a beginning of the tremendous job of aiding the war victims; the liberated peoples themselves would have to assume the greater part of this task. Other machinery and measures would be necessary to solve the long-range problems of reconstruction, but UNRRA could only lay a foundation for reconstruction. The latter part of what I have just said was the interpretation placed upon the remarks of President Roosevelt at that time in an editorial appearing in the London Times of November 16, 1943. The purpose of UNRRA, as I understand it, is definitely limited; I quote the words:
. . . provide assistance in the resumption of urgently needed agricultural and industrial production, and the restoration of essential services.
United Nations Agreement

It seems to me that the desire is more or less to limit the activities of this organization to urgently needed industrial and agricultural production; and various statements that have been made would seem to indicate that this now has become the main purpose of the united nations relief and rehabilitation organization.


Paul Joseph James Martin: The director himself said so.


Mr. COLD WELL:: I think that is quite right. I am not sure, but I believe some slight amendment was made to the original proposal last autumn which also conveyed the same impression. In fact clause 11 of resolution 12, which was passed at the conference, says:
The task of rehabilitation must not be considered as the beginning of reconstruction-it is coterminous with relief. No new construction or reconstruction work is contemplated, but only rehabilitation as defined in the preamble of the agreement. Problems, such as unemployment, are important, but not determining factors. They are consequences and, at the same time, motives of action. The administration cannot be called upon to help restore continuous employment in the world.
So that this has a limited effect. But while criticizing the limited effect of the organization I do not wish for a moment to convey the impression that in any respect we are opposed to Canada's participating to the fullest extent in this great relief and rehabilitation project. My prime purpose in drawing this matter to the attention of the house is to urge that, so far as Canada is able, we endeavour to widen the scope. I believe that is what the hon. member for Acadia had in mind. I would urge that we endeavour to widen the scope of this measure, so that it may be applicable to a larger number of people and lay a framework for comprehensive international planning.
Unlike hon. members to my left, I am not so much alarmed by some of the rumours that are going around. I feel that an organization in which we have associated powers with such diverse economic ideas and economic aims as have the United States and the Soviet Union, affords a measure of protection to those of us who might otherwise feel that an attempt would be made to use this relief and rehabilitation organization as a club to impose upon the world any particular type of social, financial or economic system. I readily agree that such a danger might lurk within some such organization. But it seems to me that when we find associated within the organization, and participating in its activities, nations with such diverse economic and social views, adequate protection is ensured.
I should like to make one further statement about the widening of the powers of relief afforded under this measure. The settlement
[Mr. Coldwell.l
of peoples and the assistance given to peoples are largely confined to certain groups. For example, as I read the agreement, Chinese refugees will not participate to the same extent as will refugees from Europe. I believe we should see to it that so far as possible we treat all peoples alike, and bring all within the benefits of this measure.
Canada's contribution to UNRRA, amounting to one per cent of our national income, would, if our income were the same as that of last year, amount to about $90,000,000. Is that about the correct amount?


Mr. CLAXTON:: The amount is not known. It may be $75,000,000.


Thomas Miller Bell: I am making my estimate from last year's figures.


Brooke Claxton: It is for the year ending June 30, 1943, and that makes the calculation rather difficult for us.


Major James William Coldwell: For purposes of this discussion we will say the amount, mainly in goods, would be a maximum of $90,000,000. During the war we have given to Great Britain, and latterly to the united nations, a gift of a billion dollars' worth of supplies a year. The amount may be less this year, but it will still be a substantial sum. I have always felt that we in Canada have an obligation to the peoples who have been under Hitler's heel and who have endured the scourge of war. That was brought to my attention as it was never brought before when the parliamentary party visited Great Britain two years ago. Only this morning we heard a lady say how tired of blackouts, and of the other conditions which caused them great misery and distress, the people of Britain were becoming.
We in Canada have been probably the most fortunately situated of all the peoples engaged in the war-perhaps, indeed, of all the peoples on earth. We have not within our own borders seen the scourge of war. We have had to make very few sacrifices of any kind. Our rationing has been such that we have had a plentiful. supply even of the rationed commodities. And it seems to me that as a Christian and a democratic country we have an obligation to other peoples who have suffered because of the war. I know that at the moment, because of the difficulties con-nect.ed with sending food to the suffering peoples of Europe, and the danger that such food would be used merely to assist Germany -indeed, might even prolong the war-no attempt is being made to feed many of the starving women and children in Europe. When the war is over we must endeavour to see to it that as a Christian country, in the exercise

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not of individual but of national Christian charity, we take our proper share in caring for these peoples. In this measure we are doing the least that could be expected of us.
I should like to see more being done.
From the earliest possible moment I should like to see this programme administered by the civilian organizations. Provision, it is true, is made for that, but Canada should endeavour to see to it that the programme is not used in any way whatsoever as a sort of military tool for the preservation of order. As I said a moment ago, because of the peoples who are associated under the UNRRA agreement I do not. think we need fear that it will be used as a political weapon to promote any particular type of political establishment in countries released from Hitler.
There are other points I should like to advance, but I believe they might be discussed more properly as we proceed with the bill. While we offer these suggestions, we welcome the measure. We welcome the setting up of this organization, in an attempt to feed the distressed peoples, and to do other things for them as well. We believe this measure is a step in the right direction. It is our hope that it may be the foundation of a finer type of world citizenship, in which the world may be considered more of a unit in relation to the production and distribution of the good things with which it is endowed. Canada should feel that she has some responsibility for the nutrition, the social and health conditions of the natives of the islands of the seas, and of other parts of the world, realizing that no nation can be permanently prosperous, happy or progressive unless it joins with other nations in bringing progressiveness, health, nutrition, prosperity and adequate standards of life to all peoples. If we have learned one thing from these two wars, it is I believe that none of us can live alone, that we are all part of a great world community, and that what injures one part of the community will inevitably injure all.
Mr. LIGUORI LACOMBE (Laval-Two
Mountains (Translation): Mr. Chairman, I am not in agreement with the views of the hon. members who have preceded me regarding the discussion of the resolution that is now before us. If the government had taken the necessary action to protect the family, and promote education, agriculture, commerce, civilian industry, and in a word the whole economy of the nation, they would not introduce such a measure today. Despite our warnings and protests, they have disorganized the home, not only in permitting but in encouraging as much as they could the employment of 100-135
mothers in war industries. That is one of the most grievous mistakes that the government have made. They have struck at the very heart of society, of which the family is the living cell. Through widespread propaganda they have enlisted thousands and thousands of women. They have spent for war more than fifteen billion dollars. They have given billions of dollars of the ratepayers money to nations which are a hundred times wealthier than Canada. They have, through their action and their mistakes, brought about the great exodus of young farmers toward the cities or kept those young men in the army to the prejudice of argiculture which is so necessary to the army and the civilian population. They now want to spend ten more millions in gratuities and gifts. When will there be an end of such squandering? Taxes and loans cannot go beyond a certain limit. Have we not had a surfeit of broken pledges? War . expenditures are reaching terrific proportions. Those who have recently heard the governor of the Bank of Canada have been struck with consternation. That is a bottomless pit in which our whole economic structure is being engulfed. But that does not trouble the government. They keep on spending billions and billions. They launch loans with endless figures. Our economic status would be so easy to maintain, if only the government would administer with thrift, and protect our families, our trade, our agriculture, our industries and our whole economy. It would be so easy if only we stuck to a policy of common sense. You can build up all the departments in the world, all you will do is aggravate the situation, if you are not reverting to a policy based on sound economics and social justice.
At the very moment when the government is ready to squander public funds and to plunder the treasury, as well as to rehabilitate everything, they promote delation in Canada. They have ruled that, under penalty of fine or gaol, I will have to denounce my own son or my employee to military authorities, if my son or employee has not complied with the wartime rules and regulations or the mobilization act. Here is an infamous and abject measure, worthy of spies and traitors. And it is the situation in all its bitter reality. The government is bound to show the citizens how to become adept at felony and treachery. The overburdening debt, the unbearable taxes, the billions that they spend as if it were their own money, the ten. thousand million and over loans that are following one another; all that is nothing at all. The government exact the blood-tax, and in the most hypocritical and brutal way. Mr. Chairman, never has the Borden government, which was

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pilloried for twenty-five years by the Liberals, shown such extravagance. Never did the Conservative government thus pledge the whole economic future of the country. The cost of the last war was slightly over one billion dollars. And I still hear the death sentences pronounced against the Borden government by a howling mob, tragic jokers of whom I find here a few survivors and a few disciples worthy of such deceit.
The Borden government had set up in all constituencies of the country exemption boards for essential farm workers. Not a single one was enlisted against his will. To-day, notwithstanding the deferments granted, the farmer is called over and over again to appear before medical revision boards. This is how the money intended for the prosecution of the war is spent, in part, either in gifts to wealthy and powerful nations or in useless appeals by certain classes of men called up by the armed forces and in medical examination fees, or for the maintenance of the most incompetent bureaucracy and the most haughty and ignorant boards of all times. Let the government continue on the rock-strewn path where they have ventured and they soon will have to answer to the people whom they have betrayed.
I said a moment ago that during the last war not a single farmer was enlisted against his will. What has happened under the present government?
As early as the late summer of 1940, all young farmers were required to report to military camps for one month of training. This period was later extended to four months. Heaven knows how many of these youths are still in the army. There are thousands and thousands of them. Let us not compare the present conscription set up to that of the last war. I know something of it since I was conscripted during the previous armed conflict. The Borden government was more sincere and more honest than the present administration. When they enacted conscription, it was not in a disguised and dishonest manner as the government of to-day has done. Our present government have violated all their promises and undertakings. Therefore, although I may be favourable to certain parts of this resolution, I can neither vote for it as a whole, nor for a single cent of the ten million dollar appropriation requested.


Mr. GASPARD FAUTEUX (St. Mary):: Mr. Speaker, on January 6 last, Mr. Eugene Staley, member of the staff of the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration, made a statement in such eloquent
[Mr. Lacomhe.l
and at the same time concise and expressive terms, that I feel I cannot do better than open these remarks by quoting it:
More than five hundred million men, women and children are under the despotic rule of the axis in the occupied areas of Europe, Asia and the islands of the sea. Some are starving; many more are suffering from serious malnutrition. Malnourished people are an easy prey to disease. Supplies of clothing, and soap, both essential not only for comfort but also for the prevention of disease, are seriously depleted in the occupied areas. Millions of people-refugees, prisoners of war, labourers forced to work for the axis war machine, are separated from their homes. Estimates of the number of such "displaced persons" run to twenty million in Europe alone, and to forty million in China.
A little later, at the end of February, Mr. Abraham Feller, general counsel of the same organization, said:
When the guns cease firing in Europe and in Asia, the world will have before it an appalling spectacle of human misery and material devastation. There is little need to paint this spectacle for this audience, to marshal the statistics of horror, or to pile adjective upon adjective in the attempt to describe what is really indescribable. You know full well that the hunted, and the homeless, the refugee, the forced labourer, the men and women in concentration camps, the mothers who witness the gradual starvation of their children, that all these hostages of the enemy must be freed and redeemed.
The reactions of men and women to such statements as these can be divided into three broad general classes:	"How awfully sad,"
"So what?" and "What can be done about it?" The first group I should be inclined to dismiss once and for all as hopeless. I may be wrong in that, as I may very well be terribly wrong in regard to many other things. Still, feeling as I do about group No. 1, I will set them aside. If anyone else knows what to do about them, I shall be glad.
The second group is perhaps at the present time the biggest, and it is, as I will try. to show later, our greatest difficulty and our biggest task to convince those people that this is a matter which intimately concerns them in their business, in their jobs, in their private family life.
The third group may be subdivided into those who ask, "What should they do about it?", those who ask "What should we do about it?", and the perhaps rather limited number who at once begin to wonder, "Is there anything that I can do about it?" In the latter category were the men who put their heads together and burned their last ration of mid-

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night oil, devising the programme which is to be carried out, if all goes according to plan, by the organization now generally known by the shortened title of UNRRA. Most of us, however, are still young enough to remember vaguely what our professors in logic and philosophy told us about the dangers of reasoning from the particular to the general. As UNRRA is definitely a particular phase of a very general problem, I think, therefore, we would be well advised to take a brief glance at the general problem first, and then with that in view, give detailed attention to this particular phase.
UNRRA is destined to be a sort of connecting link between what we are at the present moment doing to win the war and what we hope to do to win the peace, and to create such a peace that we shall have no losers, nothing but winners all over the world. We shall never be able to agree as to the connecting link unless we can agree on the big problem to whiqh it leads.
The after-war problem divides into two sections, one that will face us at home, and one that has to be dealt with abroad. These are really just two different phases of the one and only problem, but we may have difficulty in getting all our people, or all the people of other countries, to realize it. If China's problem is that her people are starving because they cannot get grain, and if Canada's problem is that her people are starving because they cannot get rid of their grain, there is a direct association between the two problems. But it is hard to get a mining prospector in North Bay to realize that he may be down and out and unable to find a fresh grubstake, because a million people are starving along the Yangtze valley; nor would it be easy to get the starving Chinese to realize that the fact of a mining slump in northern Canada was \n any way responsible for their plight.
And yet, if we are to get a solution of this problem, we must have all the countries of the world participating in it. Otherwise, it will not work. Because as soon as one little wheel goes out of gear, the whole clockwork goes wrong. And we cannot have Canada cooperate whole-heartedly in a world-wide programme unless and until the big majority of about five million adults in this country have agreed, on it. And to get them to agree, even on the general principles, you must make them understand the definite economic relationship between the starving Chinese in the Yangtze valley or, if you like, a million starving workers in Czechoslovakia, and the unemployed miner in Sudbury or a down-and-out prospector on the shores of Great Bear lake.
Those of us who realize the intensely growing interrelation between national and intema-100-1351
tional problems the world over, however, realize that the victim nations, the ravaged nations, must be helped back on their feet, because there is not a chance in the world of Canada going ahead to steadily increasing happiness and prosperity if half of Europe is in the depths of economic misery and despair.
As an American writer, addressing these words to citizens of his own country, has well said:
The cost of participating with the united nations in civilian relief, in comparison with the cost of any alternative course, is almost insignificant. One consequence of failing to do so would be the lengthening and protraction of the period of paralyzed and stagnant trade. Each month that European and Asiatic markets are unable to buy our goods costs us millions of dollars. The second consequence is that fighting would not stop with the armistice.^ We would be setting the stage for world war No. 3.
It is in the light of these considerations that some forty-four nations, belonging to the group we know as the united nations, met at the White House at Washington and signed the agreement whereby was created the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration, the destiny of which is to follow up the armed forces in their advance in Europe and in the far east, and bridge the gap between enemy occupation and independent, prosperous civilian administration.
UNRRA does not propose to take on the huge problem of creating a stable world, a world in which peace will prevail, the world which President Roosevelt was looking forward to when he spoke recently of a "common determination to build for the future a world of decency, and security and above all, peace." That is a problem for which we must prepare, but which cannot be handled now. The essential factors in the problem are not yet known. Many of them will not be known until the enemy has ceased to be the invader and the conqueror anywhere in the world; until he has become the invaded, the conquered, the beaten dog asking for mercy and relief. UNRRA is created to deal with the immediate problem of bringing urgent needed relief to peoples who have just been freed from the conqueror's yoke.
At the great conference which representatives of the united nations held at Atlantic City to lay the foundations of this work, the scope of UNRRA's activities was defined in a resolution which I will read to you;
The supplies and services of which the administration will seek to ensure the provision fall under four heads:
1.	Relief supplies: essential consumer goods to meet immediate needs, such as food, fuel, clothing, shelter, medical supplies.
2.	Relief services, such as health and welfare, assistance in earing for and maintaining records of, persons who, by reason of war, have been
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displaced from their homes and in agreement with the appropriate governments, military authorities or other agencies, in securing their repatriation or return.
3.	Rehabilitation supplies and services: materials (such as seeds, fertilizers, raw materials, fishing equipment, machinery and spare parts) needed to enable a recipient country to produce and transport relief supplies for its own and other liberated areas.
4.	Rehabilitation of public utilities and services, so far as they can be repaired or restored to meet immediate needs.
In this way, UNRRA will follow closely on the heels of AMG, the allied military governments, which organization, military in nature, provides for the peaceful administration of territory which has just been relieved of enemy occupation, seeking to make use, whenever possible, of the then existing local authorities and local civilian organization. UNRRA will step in only when the military authorities think it wise, and only in full cooperation with them, to take over the job of bringing to the civilian population what they most urgently need.
As soon as the military authorities hand over the problems of the civilian population to UXRRA, there will be certain things that will have to be done immediately. It may be presumed that the military authorities and the AMG have already been busy with the work of distributing free rations of bread, possibly some supplies of clothing. The military doctors and hospitals have done some of the most urgent medical work among the undernourished, physically feeble civilian population. They, however, must pass on to immediately needed work in face of the enemy. UNRRA must now get down to the task of seeing that the civilian population can be permanently and regularly supplied with what it needs and, still more important, put as quickly as possible in a position to supply itself. I stress that last point seriously-"put in a position to supply itself.''
One thing we do not want to do in Europe or in Asia, under any circumstances, is to establish any sort of w'orld-wide system of direct relief. I have no need, I am sure, to go into any details, before this house, as to the evils of direct relief. We know too much about it already. But I may take a moment to point out that when you face a people that has been in practical slavery for four or five years, and has had its moral and physical resistance lowered by persistent malnutrition, unsatisfactory housing, insufficient clothing and brutal terrorization, it would not be a difficult thing to educate them down to a condition of permanent dependence by just handing things out to them and accustoming them to look to the overseas Santa Claus to keep fMr. Fauteux.l
on sending them manna from heaven. We know how easy it was to educate Canadians down to that standard, so I am casting no stones from my glass house when I say that it would be still easier to do so with peoples who have been through the agonizing experiences of the past few years in Europe or Asia.
We must feed them for a few days and then start them feeding themselves.
Let us consider now the situation likely to face us when we liberate a section of, say, Europe from German domination. If the Germans have had time to retreat slowly, we shall find everything useful destroyed. Millions of people will want water, clean, sterile water safe for drinking, and be unable to obtain it because their waterworks plants will have been destroyed. UNRRA will not be able to build brand new aqueducts and filtration plants for them. But it will, with their help and ours, be able to fix them up with temporary equipment to bring them water from reasonably safe sources, and with chlorination equipment to render the water bacteriologically safe, until such time as they themselves can acquire adequate equipment and rebuild their water plants. When that time comes, if the liberated peoples have a reserve of American or Canadian dollars stored away somewhere, perhaps a reserve in this country that has been stored here since the early days of the war, they will buy the machinery they need in this country and UNRRA will simply give all the help it can to see that they get delivery as quickly as possible; may perhaps provide them with technical help and guidance in rebuilding their plants.
If the country recently delivered from enemy hands was an industrial one, its industries will probably have been wrecked, either deliberately by the enemy or by the actual fighting from house to house and street to street. They will need some machinery at once to get their industries going again, either for industrial production or, alternatively, as part of the united nations war industry producing war equipment. And later, if they are not to be dependent on us for ever for their supply of machinery, we must see that they get the machine tools with which to start making their own machinery.
Their farm lands have lain idle for years. They have in many places undergone the scorched-earth policy twice, or even oftener. Either we resign ourselves to sending them farm produce for an indeterminate period, which would be "direct relief" again, or else we must get their farms back into production quickly. The latter proposal implies getting them supplies of seed, of fertilizer and of farm

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machinery. It may also imply help in organizing locally, so that farm machinery sent over from this continent may be used collectively on many farms.
Again, millions of people have been taken from one part of Europe and carted away to other parts, hundreds of miles away from home, to work in German munition factories. These people want to be sent home as soon as possible. A big organization will be needed, in which UNRRA will cooperate with local authorities in sorting them out. But they cannot be sent home until transportation facilities are available, and the enemy will have pulled up the railways, destroyed the rolling stock or stolen it. The military authorities will repair enough to make the railways usable for military purposes. UNRRA will help the local civilian authorities in completing the repair job, so that people may be transported back to their homes, when and if it becomes geographically possible. To that end we shall have to provide them with rails, locomotives and rolling stock to begin with, and later machine tools with which to make more locomotives and rolling stock for themselves. If this sort of thing is not done on a systematic basis, with proper organization carefully worked out in advance, it has to be done anyhow, sooner or later, by someone, and will cost the whole world, Canada included, a hundred times more when done later and by hazard.
A practical example of how the presence of a well prepared organization can work wonders by prompt intervention is found in the case of the Tunisian olive crop, which was saved, soon after the allied troops entered that country, by the intervention of the Office of Foreign Relief and Rehabilitation, a United States agency which preceded UNRRA. The crop was on the verge of being lost because the olive farmers had no cloths to spread on the ground, to catch the olives as they were shaken from the trees. The American agency had big stocks of cloth in North Africa accumulated for supplying clothing and the like in relief operations. They brought this cloth out and put it at the disposal of the olive farmers, and the crop was harvested. That saved, for the markets of the world, an enormous supply of olive oil-not a small matter in view of the shortage of vegetable oils these days. From the pressing of the olives there remained a residue of fat which was available for the making of soap. In North Africa the local soap industry depends on the olive industry for its fats. Skin diseases are very prevalent in North Africa, and one of the most urgently needed supplies to combat them is plenty of soap. So that if the olive crop had not been saved, many cargo
ships would have had to be diverted from the transport of war supplies to cart soap and disinfectant supplies to North Africa; the shortage of vegetable fats in North America would have been still more acute than it is, and a large part of the agricultural population of North Africa would have been in the depths of despair from the failure of its crops. That is only a very small example of the things that UNRRA will have to do when the enemy troops begin rolling back in Europe and Asia and conquered populations become free again.
Now, the natural question that arises in everyone's mind, I suppose, is "What is it going to cost us?" Since in the opinion of the highest authorities in forty-four fighting nations it is a question of whether democratic civilization survives or not, some people might be inclined to say that the cost does not matter. We have to pay or go under. Or they might look at it like the women in a recent cartoon, "Quit looking at those income tax papers. We can't afford it anyhow." But the most intriguing feature of that, to my humble mind, is that we can easily afford it; in fact, it is a mere bagatelle. I have seen official figures to the effect that the united nations will subscribe together about two and a half billion dollars to carry out this work of providing the victim nations with their immediate needs, and helping them get on their feet and become able to take care of their own needs. That figure is based on the decision taken at the Atlantic City meeting, that participating nations should tax themselves one per cent of their national revenue for the year ending June 30, 1943. I understand Canada's contribution is to be between $70,000,000 and $90,000,000.
After all, I recall that Canada has on two occasions contributed a billion dollars to the cause of the united nations. And I have yet to meet a Canadian citizen who is one cent worse off for it. I have yet to find a Canadian who was better off in the years when Canada did not give anything to that cause than he is now, unless misfortune has hit him from some other source entirely unconnected with war finance. The dominion government is having as hard a time preventing people from spending their money foolishly and unpatrio-t.ically to-day as it ever had before the billion dollar annual contributions were inaugurated. There seems to be a general feeling that if the Dominion of Canada had kept two billions of dollars in its own coffers, the people would not have had any more money to spend, Canada would not have been any richer; nobody would have been any richer, and nobody would have been any better off. How that works out, not being a trained economist-, an international banker or a chartered account-
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ant, I do not know. I am quite prepared to concede that perhaps the economists, the bankers and the accountants do not know either. All the other sciences have outrun their exponents to such an extent that the leading men of science have little or no idea how they accomplish the marvels of science which they do accomplish. I read the other day that no one in the medical world really knows how penicillin and the sulpha drugs accomplish their wonders. They only know that they do. As good old Galileo said: "Se muove." It may be contrary to all sense and reason, but it wrorks. And I suspect that the science of economics has also progressed so far ahead of the economists that they do not know how it works, and are having a hard time realizing that it does work.
It is, of course, an interesting point, that the annual billion dollars was never given in money and that the $70,000,000, or $90,000,000 will also never be given in money. According to the Atlantic City agreement, the contributing nations are supposed to provide only ten per cent of their contribution in available foreign exchange. The remainder will be spent in the contributing country, buying the goods which that country produces and which UNRRA will need for the relief of newly-delivered nations. That means that a great deal of Canada's contribution will in reality be in grain and flour. Now the grain is already in the elevators. It is only a few years ago that farmers in the west were going bankrupt and stevedores in Montreal were on relief because we could not get rid of this grain. All right; now we are going to get rid of it. Should we not be happy? The farmers do not have to get the money for the grain; they have it already, or at least, if not money, they received its equivalent in credit when they sent their grain to the elevators. No doubt the government may have to strike from the credit side of its books an entry concerning millions of dollars which it credited to the farmers for having delivered the grain. Of course the government has to pay interest on that money, because when it gave credit to the farmers somebody gave credit to the government and now holds government bonds. But does anyone suggest that the government will be any less able to pay three per cent interest on $90,000,000 because it blacked out a debit entry in that amount in its books as against a number of farmers?
Without knowing all the technique of the science of economics, nevertheless I have a shrewd suspicion that disaster is more likely to hit the Canadian economic equilibrium through a too sudden cessation of gifts of two billion dollars a year than through the introduction of any single $90,000,000 gift into the

dominion budget. Let me point out in more serious vein, however, that this is a measure of immediate military necessity, a contribution toward winning the war now as well as a step toward winning the peace afterwards. A high official of the organization has explained the military needs in this way:
The advancing United States armies must have stable civilian conditions in their rear. Troops must be protected from epidemics of disease, which can originate in a malnourished population lacking adequate clothing, soap, medicines or means of repairing and restarting their own equipment for producing those things. The more quickly local production can be revived in liberated areas, the less will be the strain on military supply lines and the more adequate will be the materials and equipment that can be made available to our men at the fighting front. This will save the lives of our soldiers and shorten the war. Also the fact that prompt aid is known to be forthcoming to liberated peoples will encourage and inspire those still unliberated, increase their resistance and further weaken the enemy, hastening his ultimate military collapse. If a well planned and well organized and previously announced programme of relief and rehabilitation helped to shorten the war by only one week, the straight dollars and cents savings would be a tremendous return on the investment, not to speak of the much more important matter of the lives of our soldiers and of civilians that would be spared.
Then there is the long-range economic effect on supplying countries of helping people to help themselves. People always forget that helping other people to produce helps them to consume. In the long run, helping the farmer in central Europe to grow his own wheat again may make him independent of Canada's wheat, but by that time he will have become a considerable purchaser of Canada's newsprint, automobiles, farm machinery and heaven -knows what else. Helping the people of central China to get on their feet and produce goods of world marketability will enable them to vary their rice diet with wheat bread and other cereals, and to buy from us the surplus wheat which central Europe perhaps will not want. The more every single part of the world is prosperous, producing and consequently consuming, the happier, busier and more prosperous every other part of the world must be in consequence.
I would not venture to offer advice, because I do not care to give advice or make suggestions to my betters, but my own reaction to this problem would be that never again can we take the attitude that if one wheel of the watch breaks down we must make all the rest of the watch go slow in order to accommodate it, and must concentrate on preventing the broken wheel from being repaired. If we want the mechanism of the world to work efficiently we must all cooperate to the limit in helping to rectify anything

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that goes wrong in any part of the world, because a break-down in the machinery at one point must in the long run do harm to all the rest of the machinery. Or, as Hon. Francis B. Sayer has wisely expressed it-and with this quotation I think I should conclude these remarks-
The issue before every nation of the earth to-day is whether or not the peoples of the world can learn to work constructively and whole-heartedly together for human progress and welfare. If humanity, with its proud dreams and high visions, can in the world of reality find no better way of settling its differences than by war, humanity is doomed. The present struggle has made manifest to all that totalitarian war aided by modern war has become so deadly and can be organized on so world-wide a scale, unless humanity exterminates war, war will exterminate humanity.
In other words, if the nations of the world will not learn to hang together they will hang separately. If we can learn to cooperate in the common interest of the whole world; if we can get the idea through to every day labourer in every Canadian city that his next week's wages depend largely upon the fate of a million peasants in central China or a hundred thousand shoemakers in Czechoslovakia, then we can build the kind of world of which President Roosevelt dreamed.
To the realization of that end UNRRA is merely a first halting step. UNRRA is significant because it is the first sharing of a major task which has both military and post-combat implications, the first sharing on a really international basis. Not only do all the united nations participate as members of UNRRA; the associated nations participate also. But if we dare not undertake it, God help us all.


Mr. G. H. CASTLEDEN (Yorkton):: Mr. Speaker, the feature of Bill No. 84 to which there is the greatest objection is, I think, contained in that sentence in the explanatory note which states that the method proposed is to empower the governor in council to do whatever may be proper and expedient, or whatever it may think proper and expedient, for giving effect to the said agreement. I should like to read some of the powers and functions of the administration, as contained in article I of the agreement. Turning to page 2 of the bill we find that this administration shall have power to-
. .	. acquire, hold and convey property, to
enter into contracts and undertake obligations, to designate or create agencies and to review the activities of agencies so created, to manage undertakings and in general to perform any legal act appropriate to its objects and purposes.
Then I read section 2 of that article:
Subject to the provision of article VII, the purposes and functions of the administration shall be as follows:
(a)	to plan, coordinate, administer or arrange for the administration of measures for the relief of victims of war in any area under the control of any of the united nations through the provision of food, fuel, clothing, shelter and other basic necessities, medical and other essential services; and to facilitate in such areas, so far as necessary to the adequate provision of relief, the production and transportation of these articles and the furnishing of these services. The form of activities of the administration within the territory of a member government wherein that government exercises administrative authority and the responsibility to be assumed by the member government for carrying out measures planned by the administration therein shall be determined after consultation with and with the consent of the member government.
(b)	To formulate and recommend measures for individual or joint action by any or all of the member governments for the coordination of purchasing, the use of ships and other procurement activities in the period following the cessation of hostilities-
And I would ask the house to notice that the powers of the administration extend into the post-war period.
-with a view to integrating the plans and activities of the administration with the total movement of supplies, and for the purpose of achieving an equitable distribution of available supplies. The administration may administer such coordination measures as may be authorized by the member governments concerned.
(c)	To study, formulate and recommend for individual or joint action by any or all of the member governments measures with respect to such related matters, arising out of its experience in planning and performing the work of relief and rehabilitation, as may be proposed by any of the member governments. Such proposals shall be studied .and recommendations formulated if the proposals are supported by a vote of the council, and the recommendations shall be referred to any or all of the member governments for individual or joint action if approved by unanimous vote of the central committee and by vote of the council.
Canada is in a favoured position, so far as providing some of the essentials of relief are concerned, and she is anxious and willing to do her share in the relief and rehabilitation of a war-torn world. She is just as anxious and just as willing to do that as she is to find out the causes of wars, and to prevent their recurrence. Perhaps some of those basic causes may be found in the fact that the good things of the world have not been democratically spread around among the various peoples. We may learn a great deal from UNRRA. It is my belief that this should be done democratically. That being so, why do we have to perform our part in UNRRA by order in council? Does the government wish a continuation, in the post-war period, of the powers and controls it now has? Surely it will be realized that the War Measures Act was made necessary by the exigencies of war, when
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immediate action, was essential. I can see, too, that in certain phases of post-war activities there may be necessity for direct orders in council. But surely they should be brought before the House of Commons, and approved. Only those of an urgent nature should be passed, and even then a full explanation should be given-not just a report.
Surely the government does not fear the people in a matter such as that of providing relief and food for other nations. This democratic principle must be maintained, or we are fighting in vain. The dangers of a continuation of .order-in-council government are too great to be ignored, and Canadians will not tolerate its continuance into peace time.


Mr. J. G. DIEFENBAKER (Lake Centre):: Mr. Speaker, may I begin by stating that 1 know of no legislation to come before parliament which represents a more forward step in international relations than does the setting up of the united nations relief and rehabilitation organization to be ratified under the provisions of this measure. For the first time in all history nations are collaborating with a view to removing the causes of suffering and future wars in all parts of the world. For the first time since the beginning of the war; indeed, for the first time in history do we find the Soviet Union joined with other united nations, as well as with nations associated with the united group, in an effort to assure that when the sacrifices of the war are at an end. and when territories are retrieved, or taken back prior to the actual conclusion, of hostilities, the responsibilities for the rehabilitation of peoples occupying distressed countries shall rest upon the signatories to this agreement.
As I see it, this measure represents a pattern of principles which might very well lead to the establishment of universal peace, through collaboration and cooperation. It assures post-war rehabilitation. I repeat it is the first time that the united nations and those associated with them have joined in the dedication of their respective nations to the principle that the welfare of all nations is the responsibility of all others.
I feel that we in this parliament have the opportunity and privilege of participating in implementing the arrangements which were made by the forty-four governments concerned, whereby will be established the first step to the parliament of man, the dream of generations of mankind, whereby international plans will be adopted having as their purpose the attainment of universal peace.
As I listened to the hon. member for St. Mary (Mr. Fauteux), particularly to the eloquent peroration to his speech, my mind r-Mr. Castleden.]
went back to 1937 when, as a member of the Vimy pilgrimage, I sat with others in historic Westminster hall in London and there heard the then Prime Minister, Mr. Baldwin, expressing his hope that the future of the world would be one of peace, but with the warning that unless peace could be maintained civilization did not deserve to live and would perish.
It is my belief that this legislation represents the greatest step forward made within the last two years, a period of momentous events, and one which all will hope will culminate in a great world organization. There are. however, some matters in connection with the agreement concerning which I should like to have some information. I believe no one couia be better qualified to give that information than the parliamentary assistant to the president of the privy council (Mr. Claxton), who was privileged to participate in the conference from which flowed the agreement now under discussion.
As the hon. member for Yorkton (Mr. Castleden) has said, Canada has a great interest in the implementing of the united nations relief and rehabilitation administration. It is set out in the preamble of the agreement that the purpose is that of granting "aid and relief from their sufferings, food, clothing and shelter, aid in the prevention of pestilence and in the recovery of the health of the people." In order to assure the type of life these peoples are to have under this agreement, the greatest contribution that can be made will be that of supplying agricultural products. For that reason Canada's interest, in an economic way, is considerable. Under the provisions of the agreement contributions are to be made by the various nations. The United States will make an estimated contribution of from 11,400.000,000 to $1,500,000,000; the United Kingdom one of between $300,000,000 and $400,000,000 and Canada one of between $75,000,000 and $90,000,000, making a total amount of from two to two and a half billions of dollars available, in the main, for the supplying of food and supplies to peoples in liberated territories.
The situation is well set forth in a booklet, "A Greater Canada among the Nations," by Mr. Lionel Gelber, wherein he says:
When the guns are silenced, the gigantic agricultural resources with which Canada has been blessed will play a decisive part in feeding the hungry multitudes of Europe and Asia. As a matter of fact they should be second in importance only to those of the United States.
I think, Mr. Speaker, we should have the assurance of the government that in so far as Canada's contribution is concerned, the contribution of food products, and not currency, should be one of prime consideration. The

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set-up is that a committee on supplies, of which a Canadian representative is chairman, will be in charge of distribution and of general policy regarding the provision and transport of supplies. We should have the assurance of the minister that Canada's contribution, apart from her currency contribution, shall *be, in the main, agricultural products.
I read on now from the point at which I stopped a moment ago:
Freedom from want in this sphere has two aspects. There is the short-run aspect of immediate relief and the long-run aspect of elevating the whole level of nutrition all oyer the earth. That the principle of mutual aid would be extended by Canada to relief, the short-run aspect, was announced on January 27, 1944. It was the other, the long-run aspect, which the representatives of the united nations assembled to discuss at their first general conference in Hot Springs, Virginia, from May 18 to June 3, 1943.
He goes on to point out that a Canadian was made chairman of an interim committee on food and agriculture and says:
This was an acknowledgment of her leadership-
That is of Canada's leadership.
-in the domain of food relief and nutrition. This clearly exemplifies the new, dynamic role she is getting ready to discharge in the postwar world.
For that reason I again repeat that Canada should be- assured that the contribution that we shall make will be, in the main, one of agricultural products, to the end that our farmers will be assured in the post-war period a security of opportunity in world markets for Canadian agricultural products.
During the past year large amounts have been expended in connection with Mutual Aid. According to the last figures that I have seen, approximately $600 million has been expended for assistance under the Mutual Aid act. I think we should have a statement from the government as to the expenditures that have already been made under Mutual Aid and, in particular, as to the extent to which agricultural production has figured in the distribution that has already been made.
This bill is important as a stepping-stone on the road to peace as an indication of the degree of collaboration that there is between the united and associated nations. I was pleased last night to hear the parliamentary assistant say that in the conference that took place, which resulted in the agreement being signed, where difficulties might very well have arisen as between the great powers and the small powers, a spirit of sincere collaboration characterized the assembled representatives of those nations.
I intend now to refer to some of the sections of the bill with a view to securing information in regard to them. As I read the agreement, in its purport, it sets up a new type of league of nations, designed on a functional basis to assure the rehabilitation of the devastated occupied countries. It sets up a most powerful central committee composed of representatives of China, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States of America. The dominating authority is the director general. We hear much to-day, Mr. Speaker, of the necessity for the sovereign nations giving up some of their sovereignty, but this is the first time, to my knowledge, that that has actually been done. It indicates something of the advances toward wider collaboration which have been made among the united nations and those associated with them since the outbreak of war. It indicates something of the sacrifices that they intend and are willing to make in the interests of world collaboration.
I read from article IV of the agreement:
The executive authority of the united nations relief and rehabilitation administration shall be in the director general, who shall be appointed by the council on the nomination by unanimous vote of the central committee. The director general may be removed by the council on recommendation by unanimous vote of the central committee.
Great, powers are placed in the hands of this director general. Once he is appointed by unanimous vote of China, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom and the United States of America, he cannot be removed except upon a unanimous vote of the central committee.
It may be noted that the organization as detailed in the agreement is more elaborate, more complicated, and more extensive than that which set up the League of Nations some twenty-five years ago.
Under paragraph (c) of section 2 of article I the purposes and functions of the administration shall be, among other things:
(c) To study, formulate and recommend for individual or joint action by any or all of the member governments measures with respect to such related matters, arising out of its experience in planning and performing the work of relief and rehabilitation, as may be proposed by any of the member governments. Such proposals shall be studied and recommendations formulated if the proposals are supported by a vote of the council, and the recommendations shall be referred to any or all of the member governments for individual or joint action if approved by unanimous vote of the central committee and by vote of the council.
This provision gives wide and, if I may say so, ambiguous powers, and I would ask the parliamentary assistant to explain their nature and intent. To what extent do these powers thereby granted interfere with or
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abrogate the powers of this parliament and of the parliaments or other representative institutions of the other participating countries?
Then I refer to article V, section 1, which provides for contributions. It says, "Each member government will contribute to the support of the administration", and then follow a few words which are inapplicable. "The amount and character of the contributions... will be determined from time to time by its appropriate constitutional bodies." What does that mean? Does that mean that each of these forty-four signatory countries will determine for itself the amount of its contribution, that there will be no control as to the contribution which shall be made by nations, whether in accordance with population, resources or other considerations? That section by itself may have within it the germ of uncertainty and might, unless classified, very well cause dissatisfaction among the participating nations, in that it leaves to each nation the right of determining for itself the amount of its contribution. One can well picture the situation when the war is over and the influence of a common dedication to common ideals is ended; then difficulties and jealousies may arise, when one nation makes as its contribution an amount less than that of another nation with equal or almost equal resources and population.
As to the general principle of this bill, while it grants very large powers to the governor in council, discussion with regard to that phase may well be left until the bill is in committee. Personally I believe that altogether too wide powers are being granted under this bill, and that the exercise of authority should, as soon as the war is over, rest with parliament, not with the governor in council. I can appreciate the fact that during the war, when immediate action is necessary, the governor in council might well have to exercise the powers it has, whether under the War Measures Act or otherwise; but why should those powers be continued after the end of the war is something I find it difficult to understand. I realize that in taking this view one does not earn the popularity of the government. But to-day in this country there is an ever-increasing practice of surrendering on the part of parliament to administrative boards, to the governor in council, to bodies independent of parliament, rights which should be exercised by parliament, and although that tendency may be justifiable in time of war, it certainly cannot be justified in time of peace. As far as this bill is concerned, if I have the opportunity I shall move an amendment providing that the authority of the governor in council shall be applicable only during the period of 
the war and not beyond the termination of hostilities. In referring to the end of the war I do not mean the signing of the peace treaty, for to-day we all believe that the signing of a peace treaty may be removed four, five or even ten years beyond the end of hostilities, and by the end of the war I mean the actual conclusion of hostilities so far as Canada and the British commonwealth are concerned.
In saying what I have, I do not want it to be understood that I do not support the principle of the bill. Heartily I give my support to the first step which this parliament has made to the realization of the ideal of all the centuries, the achievement of peace, by each nation assuming as its responsibility the welfare of all other nations. It was stated in a recent issue of the magazine Foreign Affairs that this agreement represents the beginning of the international set-up which we shall see in the world after the war, whereby the nations comprising the council under UNRRA may establish in their various spheres of influence their own national police force, collaborating together instead of. having an international police force, whereby the peace of the world will be assured.
This bill is one which, if properly administered, will do much toward affording a laboratory wherein the nations of the world will be able to work out a post-war plan for international security and economic welfare. For Canada to have the privilege of participation is a great honour. For Canada there are economic possibilities as well, if the government is prepared, in the administration of this legislation, to assure that our contribution shall be, in the main, one of agricultural production, whereby Canadian farmers, when the war is over, may have a share in the greater international trade which we believe will be established when the principles of the Atlantic charter are implemented.


Paul Joseph James Martin: Mr. Speaker, in speaking for a few moments on this matter, I feel I should start where the hon. gentleman who has just spoken concluded. He began his speech by saying that the conference which provoked this bill was perhaps the most momentous conference since the war began, in terms of setting up some measure of permanency in the international organization of the world; and he concluded his speech by saying that if the opportunity was afforded him he would move an amendment to make the provisions of the bill applicable only for the duration of the war.


John George Diefenbaker: No, Mr. Speaker, if I may be permitted-only in so far as the powers conferred on the governor in council to act independently of parliament.



IS, 1944

[Stage Direction]
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Gordon Graydon: He wanted to get rid of
red tape and bureaucracy; that is all.


Paul Joseph James Martin: Even allowing for the refinement that the hon. gentleman has made, in view of the importance which he attached to the measure he will see how wholly negative the application of the bill would be if it were to be restricted simply to the duration of the war.


Gordon Graydon: He did not say that.


Paul Joseph James Martin: He did commend the bill as a step in the right direction. He took the same view as that taken by the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell), who said that Canadians above all should be the first to give support to this kind of measure. He added that Canada was heavily endowed with the resources of nature and that our standard of living was sufficient to place us in the first line of those who should give support to this bill. I would say to the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar, if he were in his plaee at the moment, that I trust he will repeat that remark instead of making many of the statements he has made throughout the country, sometimes in depreciation of this country's position in terms of its standard of living and in terms of what it affords in the way of opportunity to the masses of our people. I agree with him, of course, that Canada should lead as one of the great supplying nations of the world in regard to a measure of this sort.
It seems to me that the significant thing about the organization set up at UNRRA, to which this bill is related, is that it represents the collective effort of the united nations. At the conclusion of the last war the same kind of relief was provided through what might be called a one-man organization, the organization headed by Mr. Hoover. That was an effective organization, but it was subject to all the dangers of that kind of organization, and particularly subject to undue political influences, which this time, because this represents a collective effort, will not, I trust, apply.
The criticism levelled by.the hon. member for Acadia (Mr. Queleh) and by the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar in particular, in their two carefully considered statements, was that the bill, and that UNRRA itself, did not go far enough. It was intended merely to apply now to relief and not, as formerly understood, to relief and rehabilitation. What should be remembered is that the bill, as did the conference, deals with a situation which has to be faced at the moment, and while long-term programmes are desirable, the important thing is to deal with situations as they arise. Every hon. member
knows the need for food and clothing, *''e need for health and medical supplies in Europe, and this is something which requires emergency action, and not action based upon the long term, although that, too, will be needed.
But just as the Hoover programme, just as the efforts of Doctor Nansen and others, prior to the setting up of the League of Nations, were gradually integrated so as to become a part of the League of Nations and of collective organizations generally, so it may be presumed,
I think, that this work now begun in the emergency stage will become part of the permanent international organization contemplated in the speeches we have had by the leaders of the three great powers and by our own Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King).
The hon. member for Lake Centre, when appraising the event, might have gone a step farther and praised the contribution made by Canada at UNRRA. He was not wholly correct in saying that UNRRA was the first of the patterns for the future organization of the world. He was perhaps correct in giving it a high place. Perhaps we should give the first place, though possibly not in terms of ultimate balance, to the food conference held at Hot Springs, which certainly did assist in setting the pattern. But UNRRA was, as has been said, a significant conference. It was, during the war, an attempt to set up what every thinking man and woman in this country and throughout the world must hope will ultimately be established among the nations, and Canada played a very special part at UNRRA.
I do not believe that this debate should conclude without some reference to the contribution made by Canada. The house will remember that some time ago, in the enunciation of the government's foreign policy, the Prime Minister laid down the principle which has come to be recognized and used as the principle of functionalism in international affairs. That principle was recognized at UNRRA and had much to do with the successful operation of the conference, and it is only significant, it is only fair, I think, to say that the Prime Minister's parliamentary assistant (Mr. Claxton) played a notable part at that conference, as indeed did Mr. Pearson, now our minister-counsellor at Washington, who has come to be recognized as one of the important men at conferences wherever members of the united nations now meet. So that I agree with the hon. member for Prince Albert-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Paul Joseph James Martin: -the hon. member for Lake Centre (Mr. Diefenbaker) rather, the
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hon. gentleman who hopes to be the member for Prince Albert, in his appraisal of the significance of UNRRA. The world is a contracted one; the world is an interdependent one, and having in mind the tremendous sacrifice of treasure and property, as well as of man-power on the part of this country and of all other nations, we must regard this matter as one of the greatest importance. We are now going to build, I trust, successfully an organization among the nations of the world by which we shall again attempt to minimize the occasion of w'ar. Now is the time to begin, and we have begun it in an auspicious way through the conference that has led to our considering this bill. In discussing this measure, therefore, I do so with the thought that Canada has not shirked its responsibility, first of all, toward the starving peoples of Europe and Asia; and more particularly has she played a leading part in the building [DOT] up of an international organization without which in the long run we cannot hope to avoid the mischief of war.


Stanley Howard Knowles: I should like to join for a few moments in the favourable comments that have been made concerning UNRRA. I share in the thrill, if I may put it in that way, that has already been expressed, that in the midst of this war definite steps are being taken to meet the problems of the immediate post-w'ar period. I also share in the thrill that something definite is being accomplished by way of getting together a large number of the nations of the world.
One might say that the endeavour to think in these terms goes back even farther than has been suggested by previous speakers. Some hon. gentlemen may think back farther than I do, but just now I am reminded that it was a significent moment when President Roosevelt coined the phrase "united nations" and suggested that we should think in the terms implied in those two words.
What I rose particularly to say is this. I hope that we in this house will realize the long-term significance of what we have done to meet the emergency of the present war, and what we are now doing to meet the emergency of the immediate post-war period. In connection with both of these situations we have recognized the need of joining together in a united effort. That united effort, so far as the war is concerned, has not been confined to military matters; it has gone into the whole field of things economic and is very well expressed in the mutual aid legislation of the United States and of this country. In these acts we have accepted the principle that every country should contribute what it

has to meet the need of the moment. That is the principle upon which we have acted in this conflict, and it is playing a very real part in the victory we are sure to win. Similarly we are now carrying that principle into the immediate post-war period. We are conscious of the importance of providing food and other necessities to people who will be in dire need at that time. The whole idea underlying UNRRA is that the countries which have the goods should supply them and that they should be made available where they are needed. It is quite clear that this is the acceptance of the principle of world economic planning, and it is being accepted to meet an emergency in the immediate post-war period. As I see it, it is unwise to stress the word "emergency" too much. I look back to the thirties and feel that that period was just as much a period of emergency as the one through which we are now passing, except that we did not look at it in that way. Similarly I feel that the period after the immediate post-war period is over will likewise be a time of emergency in the sense that there will be with us a pressing problem, namely building up the kind of world we hope will come out of our present sacrifices. I hope that when that time comes we shall not discard the principles we have accepted and found to work so well in the war and in the immediate post-war period. In other words, one of the reasons why I am pleased with the development of UNRRA and am glad to join in the complimentary remarks that have been made is that I feel we are laying down a principle and establishing a foundation upon which we can build in the distant future after the immediate postwar years are over.
When that day comes it seems to me that we must think in terms of planning the world's production in the light of the productive capacities of the various areas and countries of the world and also in the light of the needs of all the people of the world. If we can carry the principle underlying UNRRA into a creative effort of that kind, future generations will look back and perhaps regard the setting up of this administration as even more significant than we realize at the present time. Therefore, without any hesitation I express my support of the general principle underlying UNRRA and consequently the general principle underlying this bill.
Nevertheless, I regret that the last speaker found it so difficult to understand the objections made by the two previous speakers to the continuance into the post-war period of the order-in-council technique. I hardly need to defend the hon. member for Lake Centre (Mr. Diefenbaker). He can do it fairly well

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himself. But as I listened to his remarks I did not understand that he wished this legislation to terminate with the rear. As I understood it, he was asking that when the war terminates the measure be altered or that we make provision now so that at that time matters connected with UNRRA will have to come before this parliament for its approval. I share the view in this connection expressed by the hon. member for Lake Centre and by the hon. member for Yorkton (Mr. Castleden).
I shall mention one or two things contained in the agreement which has been made a schedule to the bill and which I feel should not be left as matters to be dealt with exclusively by order in council. For example article X refers to the possibility of a country withdrawing from UNRRA. I do not feel that that power should be vested solely in the governor in council. We in this parliament, after we pass the bill, as we shall I am sure, are expressing our approval of this general principle, and as I have indicated, the extent to which I hope it will go in the years that lie ahead. On that basis I feel that the power to withdraw from UNRRA should not be a matter left to the governor in council. It is a matter that should be referred to this parliament.
I refer also to article VIII, which deals with amendments that may be made to the agreement. As the bill now stands before us, these amendments can be concurred in on behalf of Canada by our representatives under the direction of the governor in council. When we pass the bill in that form we are for all time, at least so long as the measure remains in force, conferring wide powers. I feel that these two examples, articles VIII and X, are matters which it would be well to reserve to this parliament. As a matter of fact, so far as these two matters are concerned, I see no reason why their control should not be left in the hands of parliament as a whole even now; here there is no necesity of waiting until the war ends.
I shall not take up the time of the house to go into other points in the bill or in the agreement, but I do feel that that point has been well taken. When the war ends I believe that we should give consideration in matters of this kind to the policy of bringing more of these important decisions to parliament instead of leaving them to the governor in council.


Paul Joseph James Martin: The hon. member should consider section 3 of the bill.


Stanley Howard Knowles: The parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Labour is referring me to article III. If he wishes me to consider it
he is likely to invite me to make some comment about subsection 3 of article III, although perhaps I should not go into that at this time. In view of the importance that Canada as an agricultural nation will play in the whole setup of UNRRA, I feel that we may have some criticism to make of the policy of confining the central committee to so few nations, namely, the four great powers named in the agreement. If we are to move in the direction of a really united effort in UNRRA with respect to the war and the post-war period, and the future world we are trying to build, I believe we shall have to get over the notion that the four largest powers are going to run things for us. I am in accord with the sentiments expressed by the leader of this group on a number of occasions, namely, that Canada as the largest of the small nations should give a lead in seeking to make a place for these small nations in councils and administrations of this kind. I believe we should help to bring other small nations into the realization that there is a place for them in the councils of the world that we are seeking to establish, not just as inferior powers, but as equals.
At this time I should like to express my support of the functional technique to which reference has already been made to-day. We of this group have no hesitation in endorsing something that is good, no matter the source from which it comes. We believe on that basis we have something good here in that it is not simply a case of waiting until the war is over and then trying to draft something idealistic, but that we are here setting up an administration to deal with a specific matter. In so doing we are taking a definite step in the direction of achieving world peace. It was on that basis that some of us were pleased with the sort of thing the government was trying to do a short time ago in connection with post-war civil aviation. I shall have something to say about that a little later on to-day, if we come to deal with matters under the Minister of Munitions and Supply (Mr. Howe). So it is with other matters, particularly those relating to trade, to the production of foodstuff and the necessities of life-seeing to it that they are made available to the people who need them, planning with respect to our raw materials, and so on. The more we move in that direction, the more shall we remove the occasion for war and make possible the better world which we hope will come after this struggle is over.
Therefore, Mr. Speaker, I conclude my remarks by repeating that I hope we in this house will realize that the principle of united effort, which is good for the winning of the
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war, which in UNRRA we recognize to be good for the immediate post-war period, likewise is good for the building of a better world after the immediate post-war period is over.


Brooke Claxton: Mr. Speaker, the bill we have been
discussing will authorize the government to carry out the provisions of the agreement entered into by forty-four united nations and associated powers to establish the united nations relief and rehabilitation administration. All the speeches that have been made this afternoon properly emphasized the importance of that agreement; and with the possible exception of the speech of the hon. member for Laval-Two Mountains (Mr. Lacombe), I think all speakers agreed in principle with the agreement and the legislation. If it would meet the convenience of hon. members, perhaps when we are in the committee stage, I might answer specific questions that have been brought up in regard to details.
I suggest that UNRRA is of special significance as the first effort in the history of forty-four nations to join together to carry out a great human purpose; and as the first organization to be set up to represent the united nations and associated powers it carries our collaboration a further step forward in working together to lay the foundations of peace. The liberation of territories occupied by the enemy must be and will be carried out by the combined actions of the soldiers, sailors and airmen of the united nations in defeating the enemy in the field. The relief of liberated populations is a military necessity, and in the first instance will be carried out by the allied military authorities, who will decide when the time has come for UNRRA to take over the administration of relief.
The work of UNRRA represents the first step in the path from war to peace. It will provide relief for those nations that cannot help themselves. The purpose of UNRRA is to help nations help themselves. UNRRA is designed to fill an urgent, immediate, shortterm need. We are planning now to bridge the gap between starvation and survival for tens of millions of people who have been crushed under the heel of the enemy, and to assist in restoring to their homes the twenty million persons in Europe alone who have been displaced by war. The object of UNRRA is to serve humanity, but the result will be in the interests of every country, including Canada. It is in the interests of every country that each should be restored to health and strength at the earliest possible moment. In helping the people of Europe and Asia to establish

themselves, we shall be helping to restore conditions in which trade can be carried on as the basis of the prosperity of all nations. The work UNRRA will do will help to restore relations between nations that have been isolated by war. In providing assistance to liberated countries, we shall be assisting ourselves in a very real sense, by providing employment for those in Canada who produce the goods which will largely make up our contribution.
The agreement establishing UNRRA was tabled on January 28, and is printed as an annex to the bill. For the origin of that agreement, however, we must go back to September 24, 1941, when the interallied relief requirements committee was set up in London. The extent of the problem already had impressed the representatives of the allied governments with the necessity for starting to plan to meet it. In the last war relief had been administered under the supreme economic council set up after the armistice. The chairman of the food committee was the Hon. Herbert Hoover, who was also food administrator of the United States. He had direct charge of the administration, and the work of relief was largely carried on by the United States. Its costs were met by gifts from governments and individuals totalling $377,000,000, by purchases totalling $520,000,000, and by loans of $1,423,000,000. In [DOT] addition, credits were allowed direct to allied governments by the United States.
Difficult as was the programme after the last war, no one can have any doubt but that it will be very much more difficult after this war. Reports from enemy occupied countries show that the actual conditions of destruction, starvation and undernourishment exceed our worst imagination; and as the war goes on, those conditions will get worse. Their full extent will depend upon how quickly we can beat the enemy, how bitterly the enemy carries on his resistance, and to what extent he pursues a scorched earth policy as he is fought back.
The interallied relief requirements committee made a final report on June 30, 1943, in which it estimated that 23,000,000 tons of food would be required to be imported into Europe in the first six months after the armistice, and that excludes the requirements of the Soviet Union. Of this some 14,000,000 tons would have to be brought from overseas. Reliable reports indicate that some 20,000,000 persons who have been displaced from their homes must be restored to them, and that is one of the tasks with which UNRRA is charged. That is the situation in Europe alone, and the task of UNRRA is to deal with countries liberated from the enemy, wherever they are.

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This cannot be the job of any one nation, but must be the task of all nations who wish to serve humanity.
To bring about common action an agreement was drafted, and the draft was circulated by the United States government in its note of June 9 last. That note was printed in the Votes and Proceedings of this house of June 18, 1943. Representations were made to the government of the United States by various governments, with the result that the agreement was substantially changed in some particulars. It was signed by forty-four nations at the White House on November 9. At the signing President Roosevelt said:
The people of these forty-four nations include approximately eighty per cent of the human race, now united by a common devotion to the cause of civilization and by a common determination to build for the future a world of decency and security and above all peace.
In a sense UNRRA constitutes an international community chest for a purpose which is urgent and limited. Once the agreement was signed, no time was lost in organizing the administration. The first meeting of the council was held at Atlantic City the day following the signing, when all forty-four nations were represented. During the next three weeks, from November 10 to December 1, the work of laying down lines of policy and organizing the administration was pressed forward in a spirit of cooperation reflecting the common desire of the participating nations to meet a great human need.
The result was that forty-one resolutions were unanimously adopted, laying down lines of policy and setting up the administration. Many of these resolutions make recommendations to the member governments. The purpose of the bill is to authorize the government to carry out such of the recommendations as are appropriate, and otherwise to implement the agreement and any resolutions of the council or committees of UNRRA. The moneys to be spent on UNRRA remain completely under the control of parliament, and this bill applies only for an appropriation of $10,000,000 out of the war appropriation mutual aid bill for 1943.
No small part of the success of this meeting was due to the able chairmanship of the Hon. Dean Acheson, Assistant Under-Secretary of State of the United States. In his closing speech he said:
We have reached agreement upon a practicable programme, of defined scope, fully possible of achievement in action. A general purpose has been translated into a definite plan.
We have formulated for submission to the lawmaking bodies in our countries a workable plan for financing our programme-a plan, the fairness and practicability of which we believe will commend it to those in authority.
We have devised a procedure for ascertaining and meeting needs, which fits into the existing procedures for supplying the materials needed in the prosecution of the war and which assures fairness and expedition in the supply of liberated area^
Finally, we have chosen the men to lead us in the continuing cooperation without which this work cannot succeed, and w'e have provided for an international, organization to administer the policies laid down.
The first meeting of the council of UNRRA showed that forty-four nations could look at the problem of relief, not only as a European problem but as a world problem affecting every nation whether occupied or not. The results of the council showed that the united nations and associated powers could work together effectively without domination by the great powers and without obstruction by the small. It also showed that Canada had a definite contribution to make not only as one of the principal supplying nations in the world but also in the work of international organization. She received recognition by being made chairman of the very important committee on supplies and also a member of the regional committee for Europe.
As one of the members of the Canadian delegation, and as a member of the house I should like to pay a special tribute to a class of people we are often apt to forget in our discussions. I have in mind particularly the leader of the delegation, Mr. L. B. Pearson, who has a standing throughout the world today which would be hard to match in any country. As one moves around, and meets the representatives of all the nations, he finds that Canada has a reputation and a standing hard to equal. In no small measure that is due to the character and the capacity of the men in our Department of External Affairs- and in this connection I should like particularly to mention Mr. L. B. Pearson.
Since the Atlantic City meeting the executive has been organized under Governor Lehman, the director-general. It has its headquarters in Washington, but a considerable organization is already established in London under the deputy director general for Europe, Sir Frederick Leith Ross. A Canadian, Mr. Van Gelder, is deputy director general in charge of administration at Washington, and other Canadians are serving on the staff there.
It has already been announced that the second meeting of the council will be held at Montreal on the 23rd of June, and the Prime Minister expressed the feeling of all Canadians when he extended a most warm welcome to the administration.	.
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UNRRA is a partnership of the nations which stands for civilization to help all humanity. President Roosevelt said, "Nations will learn to work together only by actually working together."	[DOT]
Canada is a fortunate country. Our cities and ports and fields have not been bombed and scorched. Our people have not been tortured. starved, enslaved and shot. Canada is one of the most fortunate countries on the face of the earth with greater resources for her population than any other. Providence has been generous to Canada, and our position gives us opportunities and gives us responsibilities to match our opportunities.
The hope may be expressed that the house will be unanimous in the acceptance of this bill and show that all Canada is united in willingness to do our share in helping humanity.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, bill read the second time and the house went into committee thereon, Mr. Bradette in the chair.
Section 1 agreed to.
On section 2-Power to carry out agreement.
Major James William Coldwell: I would ask the parliamentary assistant what steps had been taken to ensure that there will be adequate supplies. The united nations food conference had a great deal to say about that last summer. Have any plans been worked out to ensure that we have all supplies required for this particular purpose? I have in mind, of course, that at the conference there was some discussion as to the necessity for some of the more favoured nations, including ourselves and the United States, continuing rationing for a time in order to ensure that food supplies would be available for the nations to which we shall make these contributions when the war is over.
The stocks of wheat are going dowm, and the supplies of animal products are becoming shorter all the time. Has there been some discussion between these two groups with respect to providing adequate supplies to meet the requirements of this objective?


Brooke Claxton: The UNRRA agreement provides that the director general, in assessing supplies requirements, shall consult with intergovernmental authorities. In this instance those intergovernmental authorities are the combined food board, the combined production and natural resources board, and the shipping board. As hon. members are aware, on those boards are representatives of the United Kingdom and the United States, with Canada as the only other member of the combined food board and the combined production and resources board. Those boards are charged with

the duty of allocating supplies of commodities in short supply. UNRRA will be a claimant on the boards for supplies. In this way the whole global picture involving supplies to the military authorities and to civilian countries wall be surveyed in one place, by one set of authorities. Those authorities have not any final say, but they make recommendations which are usually effective.
Already there have gone forward from . UNRRA and from the military authorities requirements for the supplying of relief; and the administration is discussing with the combined boards the sources of supplies which will be approached. I believe the hon. member for Lake Centre, who referred to the use of agricultural products, need have no further assurance, because the fact stands out that for some time after the end of the war there will be a shortage of foodstuffs throughout the world. Our farmers can grow everything they have any capacity to grow, in confidence they will find a ready market for their products.


Major James William Coldwell: I had this in mind: is it not the duty of the government or, if you like, the house, to see to it that our people are kept aware of the fact that we shall require large quantities of food, not only now but after the war, and particularly quantities of protective foods such as meats, dairy products and the like?


Brooke Claxton: I think there is something in what the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar has said. However, we do not know yet how short supplies will be, nor have we had yet any demand from UNRRA, or any indication as to the kind of supplies she will need from us. We may assume that the largest in quantity will be wheat, and after that various kinds of foods, and even protective foods of which we may have a surplus at that time.


Major James William Coldwell: Are there not two points of view regarding that? Cereals are grown more rapidly than live stock, and it is thought by some that we might be called upon to provide protective foods while Europe is growing cereals and preparing to rebuild her live stock. Are there not two points of view on that?


Mr. STIRLING:: There is only one point of view, Mr. Chairman, namely, that it is six o'clock.


Major James William Coldwell: I had overlooked that.
At six o'clock the committee took recess.

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After Recess
The committee resumed at eight o'clock.


Mr. MacNICOL:: Before asking one or two questions with reference to the bill, I wish to endorse what has been said by some other members, that it is to be hoped that the power to issue orders in council will not be used when parliament is in session.
Referring to the schedule. In article I, section 1, it is stated:
The administration shall have power to acquire, hold and convey property. . . .
Will the parliamentary assistant explain what circumstances are likely to occur wherein property would have to be bought, and if such property would be bought in Canada; or does the section refer only to property to be acquired in the occupied countries; what would be the nature of the property, and for what would it be used?
In the same article, section 2, paragraph (a), it is stated that the purposes and functions of the administration shall be-
To plan, coordinate, administer or arrange for the administration of measures for the relief of victims of war in any area under the control of any of the united nations through the provision of food, fuel, clothing, shelter and other basic necessities, medical, and other essential services. . . .
First, would Malta be deemed an area eligible to receive assistance under this programme? If any part of the British empire outside the British isles themselves deserves assistance, I would think it would be Malta, which has given an example to the world of endurance of a blitzkrieg the like of which no other area outside London has suffered. I should like to know particularly as to the position of Malta in this connection. Last Saturday was Malta tag day in Toronto and I saw many people "chipping in" for Malta. I do not know whether in any other part of Canada a tag day is being held for Malta, but I hope the government will do something in a special way for this brave little island, which has given an example of heroism that has thoroughly entitled it to the George Cross, the first award' of its kind, I believe, which has been made.
Also, would that portion of Egypt which suffered during the advance of the German army be eligible for assistance under the provisions of this bill?
In paragraph (b) of the same section reference is made to purchasing. What would likely be included in "purchasing"? This afternoon the hon. member for Lake Centre referred particularly, I believe, to food products, which come, of course, under paragraph (a). I r n
not sure whether he mentioned anything about machinery; I believe that someone did. The streets of these devastated areas will have to be cleared out; roadways will be needed for the transportation of food and supplies, and trucks will be required for distribution; also a certain amount of road machinery and, perhaps. building machinery and related equipment will be needed. Would all that material as well as food be purchased by the committee set up under this bill, or is food the only thing to be purchased?
Paragraph (c) of section 2 also relates to what I have asked. The distribution of supplies will require trucks and perhaps other transportation equipment. Will transportation equipment be purchasable under the terms o this bill? If so, I assume that Canada through its representatives will get its fair share of orders; we could not expect any more, and perhaps should not expect any less.
I wonder whether, in surveying the whole job which will have to be done after the war the council might say to Canada, "We will turn over to you the responsibility for Malta or the "blitzed" part of Egypt; France may be the responsibility of the United States, and Germany the responsibility of some other country." Is it possible that the work to be done will be divided in some such fashion among the different countries, so that each country will have an opportunity of doing a real job by itself, of course under the direction of the central committee?
Then, in article III, section 1, it is stated that "each member government will name one representative, and such alternates as may be necessary, upon the council ; that is, each of the member countries is to have one member of the council "and such alternates . Will each country name just one alternate; if more than one, upon what basis will alternates be named? Population, or ability to assist, or on what basis?
Section 2 of article III states:
The council shall be convened in regular session not less than twice a year by the central committee.
As I understand it, Canada will not ha\ e a representative on the central committee, since it consists of the four major members of the allied set-up, namely China, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom and the United States. Apparently this means that the Canadian representative would be called only twice a year. How would he exercise his influence in the general work of the council if he is called upon only twice a year to
attend?	.
Section Z of article III gives the composition of the central committee, namely representatives of the four major nations and the
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director .general, but the director general is not to vote. What will happen in case of a tie on any question or any number of questions?
Section 6 of article III makes reference to technical committees. They would be, I take it, engineering committees, consisting of men capable of laying out and building railroads; railroad engineers, men who design and lay aut tracks; also, perhaps, electricians. Would aach of the member nations have the privilege of supplying engineers in these various technical branches to assist in rebuilding? Perhaps those are all the questions I have to ask.


Brooke Claxton: The hon. member for Davenport asked first a question with regard to article I of the agreement.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Article II, subsection 1.


Brooke Claxton: I believe it was article I, subsection 1, in connection with which he referred to the administration having the power to acquire property, and he inquired as to what property that might refer to. I think it should be understood that the agreement generally creates UNRRA as a kind of international corporation or partnership, and it is intended that with the proceeds and contributions made by the member governments, as the act of their constitutional authorities, the administration will then buy where it can best buy the supplies that are needed. I should interpolate that it is provided in the financial resolutions that member governments will be asked to' contribute not less than ten per cent of their contribution in free exchange-money that can be spent outside their respective countries, but that the rest of their contribution can be given in the equivalent of their cash contribution in goods produced in their own country. Once that is done, however, whether the goods be contributed as equivalent of cash or whether they be purchased by the administration, they will become the property of the administration and will be handled by the administration, so that all the relief supplies acquired by UNRRA would belong to the administration and be distributed by the administration in accordance with policies laid down by the council. That is the reason for that provision in the agreement.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Would it refer to the purchasing of land or buildings?


Brooke Claxton: There is no intention of purchasing land anywhere. However, in an occupied country, the administration might have to acquire shelters for displaced persons, storehouses or something of that kind, but there is no intention of purchasing anything

of a permanent nature. The intention is to give relief, and provide measures for rehabilitation that will assist in giving relief.
The second question asked by the hon. member for Davenport was whether or not Malta would receive assistance under the agreement, and he referred there to article I, section 2, paragraph (a) of the agreement. Malta does not appear to me to qualify under the agreement, because, thank Providence and the fortitude of the people who defended Malta, it has never been occupied by the enemy and therefore will never be territory liberated from the enemy, whereas the agreement provides only for relief for territories so liberated. There is, however, another reason why Malta would not qualify for relief, and possibly this also applies to the case of Egypt, which the hon. member also mentioned. Under.financial resolution No. 14 adopted by the council it is provided in section 16:
It shall be the policy of the administration not to deplete its available resources for the relief and rehabilitation of any area whose government is in a position to pay with suitable means of foreign exchange.
The British government is the government which controls Malta, and the British government not only is in a position to pay but also is a very large contributor to the resources of UNRRA. So that on those two counts Malta would not qualify, and on the second count Egypt would not, though perhaps the case of Egypt may be less certain in view of the special position with regard to Great Britain. In any event, however, I should think Egypt would be regarded as a country which was able to pay.	.
The next question was with regard to paragraph (b) of section 2 of article I, and in that connection the hon. member asked what would UNRRA be purchasing. I think I have already answered that question. Ultimately all supplies made available for relief will be purchased by UNRRA, so that it will purchase everything it supplies, although in the great proportion of cases it will receive supplies in kind in the equivalent of cash that is contributed.


John Ritchie MacNicol: And food?


Brooke Claxton: Yes. As regards the articles that will be furnished by way of relief, that is covered partly by article I of the agreement, section 2, paragraph (a); and also by resolution No. 1 which was read this afternoon by the hon. member for St. Mary (Mr. Fauteux) and which perhaps I need not put on the record again. If I may read the headings, they cover (1) relief supplies; essential consumer goods, to meet immediate needs, such as food, fuel, clothing,

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shelter, medical supplies; (2) relief services, such as health and welfare, et cetera;
(3) rehabilitation supplies and services; materials (such as seeds, fertilizers, raw materials, fishing equipment, machinery and spare parts) needed to enable a recipient country to produce and transport relief supplies for its own and other liberated areas, and such technical services as may be necessary for this purpose; (4) rehabilitation of public utilities and services, so far as they can be repaired or restored to meet immediate needs such as light, water, sanitation, power, transport, temporary storage, communications, and assistance in procuring material and equipment for rehabilitation and educational institutions.
The next question was whether or not it would be possible for the responsibility attached to the giving of relief to be handed over to the different countries in a position to give that relief. In view of the further explanation I have given of the nature of the administration it will be seen that this would not be a convenient way of doing it, because these supplies will have to be put in ships, transported abroad and put down at the place where they have to be used, and it would not be possible conveniently to earmark supplies, sav, from Australia, going to Belgium or- any other country. The matter will be handled entirely by the administration in the best way it can without regard to the source of origin of the supplies.
The next question was with reference to article III, section 1, of the agreement, and that is as regards the position of alternates on the council. Section 1 reads:
Each member government shall name one representative, and such alternates as may be necessary, upon the council of the united nations relief and rehabilitation administration, which shall be the policy-making body of the administration.
On that council each nation has only one vote, and if a nation is not represented by its delegate or member his place can be taken by an alternate. At Atlantic City there were set up no less than four committees and sixteen subcommittees, and on each one of these subcommittees every nation had the right to be represented. Obviously one person could not attend all meetings, so that he named an alternate from his delegation to vote for his country in his place at that meeting.
The next question was with regard to article III, subsection 2, in which it is said:
The council shall be convened in regular session not less than twice a year by the central committee.
The council is the policy-making body. It meets twice a year in order to receive reports from the executive and to decide further questions of policy. It is then the duty of the executive head, that is the director general, to carry out these policies; therefore it is thought that there is no need for the council to meet oftener than twice a year. I think that provision has been borne out so far by the experience. There will be an accumulation of policy questions to come before the council at its next meeting in Montreal, but they will be dealt with in good time. A number of questions relating to supplies will have already been dealt with by the supplies committee. A number of questions have been dealt with by the regional committee for Europe. The central committee has power to make policy-making decisions in between meetings of the council. Therefore ample machinery is set up to deal with matters in an effective way and yet preserve the powers of the representative organs over policy. It would be interesting for the committee to learn that three meetings of the central committee have been held so far and seven meetings of the supplies committee.
The next question had to do with section 3 of article III and was as follows:	"If the
director general has not a vote, what will happen when the central committee splits two to two?" I have never been present at such a meeting; but when there are representatives of China, the United Kingdom, the United States and the Soviet Union present I should think they would not decide anything if they could decide it only on a vote of two to two. They will have at least a vote of three to one before they arrive at a decision. I should think that in a small committee such as the central committee, having to deal with matters of high policy, they would have to have three to one or else they would not act.


John Ritchie MacNicol: It is possible to have a vote of two to two.


Brooke Claxton: It is quite possible. There is no way of resolving that that I know of.
Finally the hon. member for Davenport asked a question with regard to the technical committees for which provision is made in section 6 of article III of the agreement. Those technical committees were provided for in resolution No. 26 adopted by the council and the committees are committees on agriculture, displaced persons, health, industrial rehabilitation and welfare. It is provided:
That such committees shall consist of such members of the council as^ indicate to the director general their intention to participate in the work of a committee or committees, or of alternates nominated by such members of the council as shall elect to do so. such alternates to possess special competence in the problems relating to the work of the committee to which they are nominated.
That, I think, answers the question.
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John Ritchie MacNicol: May I ask one more?
I had this question in my mind but I had forgotten the wording of it. Something was said this afternoon about the rehabilitation of industry in the various overrun countries. To rehabilitate an industrial plant would require the purchase of a large number of lines of machinery. Would that machinery be supplied under this legislation, and if so, how would the purchases be made? It would likely have to be purchased outside Europe with the exception of Sweden, Great Britain or Northern Ireland. It could be purchased there or in the United States or Canada.


Brooke Claxton: The rehabilitation of industries is dealt with by resolution No. 12 of the council. It is a very long resolution and perhaps I should not take up the tithe of the committee to read it. However, I shall say this: UNRRA does not undertake the job of reconstruction. It is established to do the immediate job of relief and rehabilitation in so far as that rehabilitation will enable the countries to help themselves to provide their own relief. When we come to purchases of machinery I can see that it would be very wise for the administration to assist in the repair of milling machinery in ports which will be bombed, so that instead of having to bring flour in sacks we can bring wheat in bulk and thereby bring about a very great saving. In those circumstances the administration would no doubt plan the repair of milling machinery; but when we get to the actual handling of that operation it must be remembered that UNRRA does not intend to take the place of any administration in any territory. Ordinarily it will deal through the government in that territory. We may assume that UNRRA will come into operation only after civil order has been restored, after which the military authorities would turn over the administration of relief to UNRRA. Therefore the taking over by UNRRA of the job of giving relief almost assumes that there will be a civil government in effective power there. That being so, UNRRA will deal with the civil government almost exclusively. It does not intend to set up a new civil service or bureaucracy or even distribution agencies everywhere throughout Europe and the far east. It will do only whatever is necessary in the existing circumstances, and as far as possible it will use the existing governmental and other agencies.


Grote Stirling: That leads me to a question I have wanted to ask. Can the parliamentary assistant outline the details of what he sees with regard to the future at the receiving end? I presume that when an 
occupied country has been relieved from the thraldom of the enemy that country's government in exile will return and take charge and, as the hon. member has just said, it will be the authority to deal with the receiving end and the distribution. I wonder whether a considerable time will not elapse before UNRRA can do any distributing? I do not know whether UNRRA is in touch with governments in exile at the present time, but even those governments when they return to their own countries will surely take a considerable time to look around. However, estimating even roughly what the requirements will be for the restoration of the people both materially and spiritually, what does the parliamentary assistant expect UNRRA to do in that regard?


Brooke Claxton: The situation as I understand it is this: The interallied war relief requirements committee was set up in London in September, 1941, as I described this afternoon. That committee included representatives of, I think, eight of the occupied countries. They were in close touch with conditions in their own country, and over a period of two years they worked out estimates of the requirements of their countries as they saw them. Those estimates were carefully considered by the committee and embodied in the report of the interallied relief requirements committee, which was dated June 30, 1943. That report is no doubt being used by the regional committee for Europe and by the UNRRA administration at Washington in working out estimates of relief requirements.
We have a good deal of material io go on by reason of the experience in North Africa, Sicily and Italy. All that has been carefully watched. There is close cooperation between UNRRA officials and the combined civil affairs committee of the combined chiefs of staff. They work out the over-all requirements for Europe on the assumption that she is liberated as of a certain date. These requirements are submitted *to the combined boards in order to ascertain whether and where the supplies are available. Now, all those estimates may be wrong. They may be made wrong by the enemy suddenly stopping, or they may be made wrong by the enemy bitterly resisting and pursuing a scorched-earth policy. They may vary, depending upon the time of year when a country is liberated, whether or not the harvest is in. But still they are the best estimates that can be worked out at the present time. On the basis of those estimates, constantly revised in the light of changed conditions, UNRRA is setting about procuring the supplies that will hr tr Dessary.

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Grote Stirling: Do these planned operations cover that part of Russia, for instance, which has been liberated? Do they cover those countries in eastern Europe which we hope will be released shortly, through the operations being carried on by Russia? When that occurs, will TTNRRA get busy in regard to those countries?


Brooke Claxton: I am not familiar with the exact situation in regard to relief in connection with the liberated territory of the Soviet Union. I do not know whether Russia has put forward any requests; I do not believe she has, to this date; but when they are put forward and when the nations are in a position to supply relief, it will be made -available to Russia either in accordance with the policies laid down in the resolution or in accordance with such other policies as the council may adopt.


Mr. REID:: I should like to ask the hon. gentleman one or two questions, and perhaps while I am on my feet I can put them all together, so that they may be answered in the same way. The first question has to do with the amount of money that is to be spent. Has any decision been arrived at or any estimate made as to the amount of money likely to be required from all countries, and in particular from this country? If a total sum has been arrived at, will a bill be introduced later this session in which that amount will be set out? Otherwise it would seem to me that if an emergency should arise at any time in the future we might not be in a position to meet it, because, as I read this bill, only some $10,000,000 can be used for this purpose.
That was one of the questions I had in mind, but I rose particularly to ask another question. Several committees will be set up under this administration. In the first place we have the council consisting of representatives of all countries signatories to the agreement, of which council Canada is a member. Then there is the central committee, which is to consist of representatives of China, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the United Kingdom and the United States of America, with the director general presiding without vote. It is true that the council must meet at least twice a year, but I would judge that the central committee is a very important body indeed, in that it can formulate emergency policies which, of course, later on must be referred to the entire council. The thought I have in mind is this. Where does Canada come in? Why is Canada not represented on the central committee? After all, we are beginning to take our place in world . affairs, and in my opinion the more we know
about Europe the better. I cannot understand why Canada should not have a representative on that central committee. If the minister would answer those two questions I think it would be of some help.


Brooke Claxton: 
Grote Stirling: She is also a member of the regional committee for Europe.


Brooke Claxton: Yes; that is quite right. While I am on my feet may I correct one statement I made last evening, when the hon. member for Lake Centre asked whether or not UNRRA was recruiting a staff for service abroad. I have checked up that point* and I find that UNRRA has just begun recruiting a limited number of people for
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service abroad. They are to commence a course in the United States on May 1, and are, 1 understand, limited to welfare and social workers and others of that class. They are to lome to UNRRA on the recommendation of such voluntary agencies as the Red Cross, and their salaries are to be paid by those agencies, while expenses of travel and maintenance will be paid by UNRRA. The position in regard to Canadians serving there is that as a result of the rather exceptional status of our voluntary agencies, most of which are in receipt of government aid, an arrangement has not been quite worked out as yet. I would suggest, however, that if any Canadians wish to serve abroad in that capacity, they should forward their applications now to the Department of National War Services, which can pass them on. In connection with administrative personnel, applications should be made to UNRRA headquarters at Washington, as I indicated last night.


Major James William Coldwell: I was going to ask the parliamentary assistant, who was present at the conference, what consideration was given by the conference to the recommendations contained in the report of the interallied postwar requirements committee. He will probably remember that in its report this committee submitted a number of questions, six in all, which I have before me and which were sent to the various allied governments. The report to which I refer was presented last June; but it was not until last November, when the meeting to establish UNRRA was held, that this report was made available to the public. I should like to place the questions on record, because they have a vital bearing on what we are discussing, and since we are approving the UNRRA agreement attached to the bill I think we ought to understand what should be done, what is being done and what is our responsibility in the matter.
The first question was:
i.	What arrangements are proposed for the procurement and distribution of supplies to meet requirements?
There we have a very important question, particularly in view of the dire need which exists in many countries. The other questions are:
ii.	What arrangements are proposed in regard to the allocation of shipping?
iii.	On what principles are supplies and shipping to be financed?
iv.	What arrangements are contemplated for restoring and controlling the inland transport system of Europe?
v.	On what basis are arrangements for field missions and essential services to be organized?
vi.	Is the need for restoring employment recognized as an essential part of any relief nrogramme?

It has appeared to me, while listening to the discussion to-day, and also after reading the agreement which has been signed-and this is what I had in mind this afternoon when I was speaking about the need for widening the scope of this agreement-that very little attention has been given to some matters arising from the questions, which seemed to worry the interallied war relief requirements committee, when it reported to the allied governments in June of last year. Its report went on to say:
The allied governments may consider that these questions can best be settled by the united nations relief and rehabilitation administration, if and when it has been set up-
And it has now been set up.
-but the committee feels bound to stress the importance of clearing up these issues as soon as possible, so that definite plans may be prepared by the appropriate authorities.
It seems to me that the defect in the agreement is that we do not know how these plans are to be formulated. The director general has certain responsibilities, as outlined in the document attached to this bill. But how those duties are to be carried out ought to be, I think, a matter of close scrutiny by the nations that are parties to the agreement.
As a matter of fact, so far as production goes I would say that no arrangements which can be made for the acquisition of stock and the piling up of supplies can meet this situation in the years to come. I do not think we shall be faced with the problem for two or three years. It is my view that the rehabilitation of these devastated and scorched-earth areas will require a very considerable time, and the rehabilitation of other backward countries, in the economic sense, will require a very much longer time.
So far as I know, all we have in the report of the meeting attended last November by the parliamentary assistant is a reference in section 4 of resolution 22. I believe he has the resolution before him tonight. One of the functions of the committee on supplies is there set out as follows:
To cooperate with the director general and the established intergovernmental and governmental agencies in efforts to increase production and the availability of supplies.
As I have indicated, some anxiety was shown on that score in the inter-allied postwar requirements committee. They were not satisfied, unless because of the possibility of world shortage some real effort were made, and unless nations like Canada, where we have had ample supplies during the war, and where we have been short of very little in the way of basic foods, would consent not only to a

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continuation, of rationing of the protective foods, but perhaps even to an extension of rationing to some of the other foods which have not been rationed during the war. That is not necessarily my view, but I may say I believe it is probably the correct one. I am, however, simply quoting the opinion of the interallied post-war requirements committee, as indicated in its report. That was its view, and so far I have been unable to find that anywhere provision has been made for the kind of world-wide planning of the necessary production which the committee considered essential to meet the tremendous requirements of the post-war period.
We know to-day that there are many millions of people in Europe, to say nothing of the countless millions in China and in the far east, who are starving. In our own country we have watched our supplies of certain commodities, of which we had very large quantites two years ago, diminishing to the point where it is altogether likely that by the end of this crop year a very large percentage of that great surplus of cereals which we had on hand will have entirely disappeared, either because those supplies are required for bread foods, or because they are required for the feeding of live stock.
In Europe we know that food supplies have been wiped out, and probably for some time we shall have to replace the rye bread of eastern Europe with wheat from one or another of the wheat-producing countries. Yet, as I would judge from tire discussion I have heard to-day, there seems to be no plan of a worldwide sort for the building up of the required stocks of food and other supplies to meet the situation.
Before the dinner recess I was asking the parliamentary assistant about what was expected of Canada, both as a cereal-producing country and' as a source of protective foods. My understanding is that while cereals can be grown more rapidly on land in Europe that has been liberated and is in process of rehabilitation, the building up of European stocks of hogs and cattle will require a very long time. While our main obligation probably is still the thing which we can db best, namely the production of cereals, yet I do not think we should allow the idea to get abroad that we should in any way reduce our output of protective foods which requires also the conservation of feed grains.
Our lack of policy illustrates what I had in mind, namely, that there seems to be no method of achieving a plan to guide the producing nations. The united nations cooperate and set up some authority to recommend and advise-I know those words are
used in the document but that is all. It seems to me that is not enough. You can recommend and you can advise-but there is no one authority which can direct. I do not know how that can be achieved under the form or organization suggested. It is my view that a. great deal of consideration ought to be given to the problem. We know that the executive committee of UNRRA, if we may so describe it, consists of representatives of the major powers. But I share the view of the hon. member for New Westminster (Mr. Reid), that while perhaps we cannot expect to be on all the committees, yet Canada, as a producer of large quantities of the very things the world will need, ought to make her voice heard in a constructive manner. Otherwise when the war is over we may find that the world is short of the very essentials required to carry out the agreement which we are about to enter into, and which we are approving to-night.
As I said before, there seems to be no authority but to advise and recommend. Nowhere is there any authority-and I do not like the word "enforce", but in this instance I shall use it-nowhere is there any authority to enforce decisions regarding the planning of production. May I repeat that I do not like the word "enforce" but for lack of a better one I use it. I should like to know what consideration was given to the points I have raised when the agreement was reached by the signatory nations.


Brooke Claxton: The hon. member has
said that there is no authority to enforce the recommendations or decisions. In that he is quite right. It was not t-he plan of the united nations and the associated powers in signing this agreement to set up a world authority. I do not suppose they would have agreed to the signing of the agreement, had that been required of them. On the other hand there is ample and, I think, effective machinery provided, not only by the agreement but by the resolutions, for the assessment of requirements and to secure the allocation of supplies from the combined boards and for the purchase of supplies in so far as they are available. I refer to resolution No. 1, which sets out the procedure for dealing with requirements; resolution No. 17, which sets out the procedure dealing with supplies; resolution No. 2, which deals with the duties of the committee on supplies. Others will also be found indicating that there is ample machinery for the use of the administration.
With regard to the suggestion that Canada should have been a member of the central committee and play a rather large part in these affairs, I subscribe to the view, as hon.
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members may recall, that Canada has had a great opportunity. She has not failed to make use of her opportunity in UNRRA. She has a place there which is second only to the great powers. I ask hon. members to consider the fact that Canada is chairman of the committee on supplies; Canada is chairman of the interim food commission; Canada is a member of the regional committee for Europe; Canada is a member of the combined food board and is a member of the combined production and resources board. We can apply the functional principle too far. We cannot be on every board that there is in the world. Hon. members will, I hope, see that Canada has not only fair representation but also great opportunities, and her place is recognized by the nations.
In answer to the question with regard to protective foods, it is important to recall that cereals are the easiest means of providing energy, preventing starvation, and providing relief in the shortest possible time. We have had a good deal of experience in this through the provision of relief to Greece. Many Canadians do not realize that since August, 1942, we have been providing 15,000 tons of cereals a month to Greece. At Atlantic City I met the representative of the Swedish Red Cross who had charge of the administration of relief in Greece, and he told me, if I remember the figures correctly, that the wheat we provided enabled Greece to increase their food ration by 400 calories a day to over three million of the population and that it represented the difference between starvation and survival for half the population of Greece. Since that supply of wheat has been made available through Canada, other nations have made available other foods. The prime necessity for that kind of food having been filled by Canada, other nations are making available to Greece protective and other foods, while Canada herself is also making available some protective foods to Greece to-day. We have had that experience. We have found that the easiest way to provide relief is with cereals. But that, of course, does not eliminate other foods. I can assure my hon. friend that in the schedules of requirements that I have seen, the kind of consideration that he has mentioned has been kept in mind by some of the best qualified food experts and transportation experts in the world who are engaged in this work.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: Is the Red Cross handling that work in Greece?


Brooke Claxton: Yes. It is done by
Swedish and Swiss representatives for the International Red Cross and done, I am told,

with very great efficiency. I am informed that all the wheat we send reaches the people for whom it is intended.


Mr. SLAGHT:: One of the points on which I had intended to ask the parliamentary assistant for information was the one just raised by my hon. friend, as to whether or not the Red Cross with all its traditions, training and efficiency will be used as an agency in working out the details of the agreements under UNRRA. I do not find that in the agreement itself; I fancy it is a matter of administration.
It does seem to me-perhaps I should have said this on the second reading-that this bill is the most important piece of legislation which the Parliament of Canada has had to consider since we met in September, 1939, and declared war on Germany and that we would stand by the side of the mother country in this struggle. It is a piece of legislation of which any country which professes Christianity and a belief in the doctrines of the Sermon on the Mount may well be proud, because it is a declaration of those great principles carried into realistic effect for the purpose of clothing the naked and feeding the hungry. There is nothing but the greatest humanity behind the whole principle of this bill.
I endorse the view of my hon. friend the member for Rosetown-Biggar that this will not end in a year or two. I believe that we as one of the "have" countries are embarking upon an international programme which we shall be proud to carry on for many years to come for the benefit of the less fortunate "have not" countries. In that connection the committee may be interested in knowing something of the terrific and deliberate devastation that our gangster enemies are carrying out in European countries. I do not propose to give the committee any harrowing details. But in the early part of. March last, our allies the Russians, in defeating certain of the German army corps, came upon and took over a series of documents issued by the German high command which were startling in their disclosures of a deliberate policy of inhumanity by the German high command. I have in my hand a copy of the English edition of the Moscow News of Wesdnesday, March 15, 1944. It is published in Moscow, and I should like to read a very few extracts which will demonstrate the extent of the devastation wrought by Germany in European countries which we are hopeful and expect to relieve under the provisions of this bill. The quotas tion starts:
To the monstrous dossier of Hitlerite infamies new documents have been added, in which the executioners themselves reveal the methods by which they effected the terror that has come to be synonymous with Hitlerism.

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What are these documents about? In the first place, they contain secret directives for the extermination of Soviet people.
Secondly, apart from the general directives providing for wholesale extermination, these documents include orders and instructions for the slaughter primarily of Soviet leading workers and intellectuals.
The whole essence of Hitlerism in all its hideous nakedness is revealed in this meticulously thought-out programme for the extermination of nations.
The documents in our possession draw a frightful picture of the planned and deliberate extermination of the Soviet peoples. But are these plans any different from those which have been and are still being effected in the west, in southeastern Europe, in the north and wherever else the ominous swastika still flies?
One has but to recall the destruction of Rotterdam and Warsaw, the slaughter in Belgrade, Lidice, all the sanguinary activities of Himmler, Heydrich and other Hitlerite satraps in the occupied countries of Europe. Who can count the number of common graves in Poland or estimate the number of patriots in Norway, Holland, Belgium, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia and France brutally murdered or tortured to death?
Then this conclusion:
The peoples of occupied Europe are anxiously and impatiently awaiting deliverance.
Surely that is an inspiration for the passing of this bill, and a reason for recognizing that future expenditures will probably be on a serious scale. But when we can vote, as we did this year, $5,000 million for killing and destruction, surely $90 million for feeding the hungry is not too much. It does seem to me that Canada and the Canadian people, when we pass this bill, will be happier, happier in finding that we have appreciated a real duty. I recall a philosophy of life which was given to us by Robert Morrison, a member of the British delegation of the Empire Parliamentary Association who visited us last summer. In one of his addresses he left with us a thought which it seems to me the House of Commons may take when they conclude the passing of this bill, as I am sure they will. He put it in this way, "I searched for happiness, and happiness eluded me. I turned to service, and happiness found me." That applies, in my view, to nations as it does to individuals.


Mr. HANSELL:: I notice in the schedule to the bill, article III, sections 1 and 2, that the council is appointed by each of the member governments. It goes on to state that the council when assembled shall select its own chairman, and there are some provisions respecting the general constitution and the working of the council. But when we turn to section 3 we find that the central committee of the council has been already
selected, and that it consists of what I would term the "big four"-Great Britain, the United States, China and Russia. The central committee is already decided upon. It seems to me that this is putting the cart before the horse, and I should like the parliamentary assistant to enlighten us as to why the appointment or selection of the central committee is not left to the larger council when it meets, at the same time that it appoints its chairman.
I am in favour of the bill. I believe that we have a moral obligation to our fellow man, and that there must be a recognition that no human being should go hungry or cold. That is what I would like to term Christian humanism. Therefore I am favouring the bill, but I am not doing so without making one or two other observations which are not so complimentary to things that are related in a way to the principle of the bill.
I do not know how far I can agree with the hon. member for Parry Sound and the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar as to the length of time.it will take to rehabilitate the liberated countries. I understand it is provided that the united nations shall furnish about one-fifth of the cost of rehabilitation. In other words, the devastated countries will have to supply four-fifths of the agricultural products and other materials they require. I should be glad if the parliamentary assistant would throw some light on that, because if that is the case the bill is rightly called a relief bill, for that is all it is. It embodies a principle which we have recognized for a good many years, namely, that we have to give some sort of relief. We have tried relief schemes before. We tried them at home, but I do not think the governments in power in those days did a very good job of relief. While this, I know, is a slightly different matter, there seems to be a little irony about the fact that the very government which could not solve its relief problem internally now joins an international organization to try to solve the problem of the relief of the world.
While I am' on that point I wish to mention another matter which has given me a good deal of concern. It gives me concern when we set out to pass a bill like this and such bills as the billion dollar gift to Britain and the united nations mutual aid bill and so forth. Not so long ago we heard of the terrible starva/-tion in India. I mention this because India may be a little closer to us than some of the countries which have been devastated in this war. India is within the British commonwealth of nations, and if ever the rest of the British

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empire had a responsibility upon it, that responsibility was upon it last year. The Hindu is as much a human soul as any other human being in any part of the world, yet here in our own commonwealth, one of our own members was permitted to get to the point where thousands were starving and dying on the streets every day. Somebody has something to answer for there, and I do not know whether the parliamentary assistant has anything to say about that. He is a student of world affairs and I wish he would throw some light on it. I did read of course, after so many thousands had died upon the streets, that the Prime Minister of Canada offered to send them a shipful of wheat. That might be all right for the rest of them who were not yet dead, but we can sum it up by saying, once again, "too little and too late." We are asked to pass bills of this kind when such things are happening within our own empire, and that, I think, is something which should give us all considerable concern.
I am not very much disposed to favour international organizations. I think we must draw a distinction between international cooperation and international authority. I certainly believe in international cooperation, for as no man liveth unto himself, so it is true that no nation liveth unto itself; nevertheless, I am apprehensive when I think of the tendency of our times toward international control.
I am in favour of this bill, but I trust it is not the thin end of the wedge that is to be driven into our whole world scheme to let in further international organization that will control democratic countries from the top. I hope this is not one of the little cogs in the great big world machinery that eventually will be driven to squeeze from the sovereign people of Canada that which is their own sovereign right. The very moment anything comes up in this house that has any tendency to do that, then here is one who will not let it go by without voicing vigorous protest. However, this bill does not seem to me, at least on the surface, to contain those elements. It seems to me to be a bill whereby there is cooperation toward our fellow men in other parts of this unfortunate world.
Before I sit down I have somehing else to say with respect to the schedule and the signatories that are attached to it. As we all know, there are forty-four signatories representing forty-four separate countries. I notice very often throughout this document that one of the signatories has added a proviso before signing it. I cannot read all the languages but I can read a word or two here and there, and I think I am right when I say that every

one of these provisos is to the effect that this must not come into power until the signatory's own particular parliament or legislative authority has passed it. I am going to read those who have signed with that proviso:	Chile,
Columbia, Cuba, Ecuador, Ethiopia, Guatemala, India, Iran, Iraq, United Mexican States, Peru, Uruguay, and Venezuela.
I wish it to be noticed, and I am calling this to the attention of the committee, that all these thirteen signatories that refused to sign it as a contract, a binding force, until their own legislatures shall have passed it, were tiny countries. The reason I call that to the attention of the committee is this. Here is where the signatories of some smaller countries recognize the value of democracy. Now I say this, as I have said it before in this house. When certain trade agreements have been placed upon the doorstep of parliament the whole thing is signed, sealed and delivered before it ever comes to parliament, and what parliament is requested to is to play the rubber stamp, so that the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) can stamp us on that agreement.
That is the antithesis of true democracy. I may say too, by the way, that the big four, Great Britain, the United States, China and Russia, do not through their signatories make any such reservation. Our own minister at Washington, Mr. Leighton McCarthy, signed the agreement without any reservation whatsoever.	I am beginning to think that
democracy has gone from the shores of Canada. We have a government that is continually grinding out orders in council. The hon. member for Lake Centre (Mr. Diefen-baker) has shown that time and again by questions on the order paper, whereby we see that these orders in council have been ground out continually. Not only that, but now we find that certain agreements are entered into, and if they were not now ratified by this parliament it would mean a want of confidence in and a censure upon our government.
Here we find agreements signed, and after they are already signed the Prime Minister trots down to parliament and asks us to be good boys and ratify what he has done. I for one am going to protest against that. There is no reason in the world why an agreement of this kind should not have been entered into as a sort of preliminary step, with each signatory going back to his country and explaining the agreement to his government, and his government coming to his parliament or his legislature and saying to the people, "Is this what you want?" That is the way it should be done, and I am getting tired of this-


John Ritchie MacNicol: Everybody is.

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Ernest George Hansell: I mean, I am getting tired of this sort of thing.


An hon. MEMBER:: That is what he means.


Ernest George Hansell: I am not getting tired of myself.


John Ritchie MacNicol: We are all getting tired of order-in-conncil government.


Ernest George Hansell: The other day the Minister of Munitions and Supply brought down a very important matter. Now I have not got access to the caucus records of the Liberal party, but I will make a pretty good-guess that neither the international airways agreement nor the agreement at present before us was ever brought before the Liberal party as a whole. I will offer that as a good guess. I think I am right in my guess. Here are a few men sitting in Canada heading a government. They asked for the responsibility. The people have given it to them, given it to them as their servants; yet they go and do things in this way without first calling upon parliament for the advice of the people. That is my protest. Although I make that protest, I repeat I believe this is a good bill. It manifests the right spirit toward the unfortunate. I believe we should pass this bill, but let me add that I think, too, that we have reason to solve our internal problems as well..


Thomas Reid: I have two questions to ask-


Ernest George Hansell: The parliamentary assistant has not answered my question. Hansard would read a little better if the answers were given now.


Brooke Claxton: I do not know that at this time I can go into a discussion with the hon. member for Macleod on the wisdom or lack of wisdom of changing our long-established constitutional practice with regard to the execution of international agreements, a practice which we have taken with our inheritance of British parliamentary institutions from the United Kingdom, a practice which has worked well there and which I think has so far worked well here. However, I doubt if the reservation in an international agreement that it shall be subject to approval by a legislature is necessarily an effective test of a working democracy. There are other tests, and I think our democracy in Canada is able to stand comparison with that in any one of the countries which have that provision in their constitutions.
With regard to the first suggestion that the contributions of UNRRA would cover only one-fifth of the cost of relief, may I say I hope that the contributions of UNRRA will cover the whole cost of relief; but they will X00-1361
not cover the whole cost of feeding Europe or the far east. A great -deal of the food and supplies necessary to feed Europe will be supplied in Europe by Europeans working their own land. Under the agreement and resolutions passed in pursuance of the agreement part of the total cost of relief will be borne by the countries which are able to bear that cost themselves. At Atlantic City the French committee of national liberation indicated that France was such a country; that she would be prepared to pay for the cost of the relief furnished to her. In, all / probability the Netherlands, Belgium and perhaps Norway may be in the same position of being able to pay. Under the resolution the countries which are able to pay are to pay in so far as it does not interfere adversely with their international exchange position. The hope is that the cost of relief as relief will be borne by the contributions made by the nations.
With regard to the selection of the four nations of the central committee, I can only say that the agreement was delivered at Atlantic City after it had been signed by the forty-four nations the day before in the form in which it is. There must have been negotiations at the diplomatic level, which resulted in those four nations being selected. In connection with this agreement the argument can be advanced that there is a special reason why the supreme powers should have a special position, namely, that the administration of relief will take place as countries are liberated by the armed forces of the united nations, and those armed forces will principally be the forces of the four greatest powers. That liberation will be followed by allied military occupation and by the administration of relief by the allied military governments. During that whole period those powers will wish to have an effective say in affairs. But I point out that the central committee has power to make decisions relative to policy only between meetings of the council, and those decisions must be communicated to the members of the council, and are subject to review by the council. Therefore there is an effective check in that respect.
While I am on my feet may I reply to a question asked by the hon. member for Parry Sound. He asked what the position was regarding voluntary agencies such as the international Red Cross. The agreement provides in article IV, section 2:
Foreign voluntary relief agencies may not engage in activity in any area receiving relief from the administration without the consent and unless subject to the regulation of the director general.
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That is necessary in order to exercise control. At Atlantic City the council passed1 resolution No. 9 dealing with welfare services and volunteer relief agencies. I shall read section 2: That it shall be the policy of the administration to enlist the cooperation and seek the participation of appropriate foreign voluntary relief agencies, to the extent that they can be effectively utilized in relief activities for which they have special competence and resources, subject to the consent and regulation of the director general in accordance with article IV, paragraph 2, of the agreement.
Therefore the resolution expressly directs the director general to utilize the cooperation and assistance of such agencies. I understand that committees have been set up in the United Kingdom and in. the United States to coordinate the activities of such agencies.


Thomas Reid: While I realize this agreement has been signed and nothing that we do or say can alter it, yet the members of the House of Commons have a duty to examine the bill closely and to obtain the fullest information possible before it becomes law. I should like to ask the parliamentary assistant a question based on article I. In that article I see no mention made of the statement which appears in the preamble. I presume that the nations signing the agreement would pay little attention to the preamble. After the agreement is signed and it comes into effect, the governor general in council, and the council of nations will look to the articles themselves in the carrying out of the agreement. They will not look at the preamble. This is what the preamble says:
Being determined that immediately upon the liberation of any area by the armed forces of the united nations or as a consequence of retreat of the enemy the population thereof shall receive aid and relief from their sufferings, food, clothing and shelter, aid in the prevention of pestilence and in the recovery of the health of the people-
That part of the preamble is carried out in article I, but the following portion of the preamble is left out. I can see no mention of it at all. To me it is very important. I shall read it to the committee:
-and that preparation and arrangements shall be made for the return of prisoners and exiles to their homes and for assistance in the resumption of urgently needed agricultural and industrial production and the restoration of essential services.
It seems strange to me that although the preamble outlines the duties of the united nations, yet when it comes to the agreement itself that very important provision is left out. I think an explanation of that is due the committee.

The other matter I had in mind has to do with article IV, section 5. This is the section in which I am interested:
The director general-	[DOT]
Who, by the way, shall have the power to administer the agreement.
-shall make periodic reports to the central committee and to the council covering the progress of the administration's activities.
Then, Mr. Chairman, listen to this:
The reports shall be made public except for such portions as the central committee may consider it necessary, in the interests of the united nations, to keep confidential.
If there is one thing that has brought about great distress in Europe, it has been secrecy, and I thought we were heading into a new era when these reports would be open to the world, because surely there will be nothing to hide. Canada, however, is not a member of the central committee, and accordingly will have no say as to what parts of the reports should be kept confidential and what parts may be made public, and it seems strange that no protest has been made in regard to this section. I should like the hon. gentleman who is in charge of the bill first to answer the question I asked and then to give the reason why the director general should submit his reports to the central committee rather than to the council of nations.


Brooke Claxton: It is quite true that the words in the preamble to which the hon. gentleman made reference are not repeated in article I, but if the agreement is read as a whole I think it will be found that there are references throughout to services for the relief of victims of war and similar expressions which would be sufficient to carry over the expression in the preamble. I refer to section 2 of article I, which reads:
To plan, coordinate, administer or arrange for the administration of measures for the relief of victims of war in any area under the control of any of the united nations. . . .
Those who have been displaced from their homes are "victims of war".


Thomas Reid: Through the provision of food only.


Brooke Claxton: Not only that; "through the provision of food, fuel, clothing, shelter and other basic necessities, medical and other essential services". Therefore I would suggest that this form of words is sufficient to carry over from the preamble the language to which the hon. member has referred. In further explanation I may say that the resolutions adopted by the council at Atlantic City make

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specific reference to dealing with the problem of displaced persons. I refer particularly to resolution No. 10, which gives in great detail recommendations as to the policies to be adopted by the administration.
In regard to article IV, in which it is provided that the central committee may prevent certain parts of any report from being made public, I should recall to hon. members the fact that probably this administration is going to operate while the united nations are still at war. I can imagine that reports are marked "most secret" which deal with the assessment of requirements in occupied countries, with sources of supply, with shipping schedules and similar matters which certainly should not be made public to-day. I suggest that is sufficient reason for putting this provision in the agreement.


John Ritchie MacNicol: A few moments ago the parliamentary assistant made reference to Russia, and that encourages me to ask what is going to happen to Roumania as far as UNRRA is concerned, after that country has been liberated by the Russians. Will Roumania, which was an enemy nation, be entitled to relief under this programme?


Brooke Claxton: The position of enemy
countries is dealt with in resolution No. 1, in part I, section 3, which reads:
If it appears necessary for the administration to operate in an enemy or ex-enemy area in carrying out the purposes of the agreement, it will do so only from such a time and for such purposes as may be agreed upon between the military command, the established control authority or duly recognized administration of the area on the one hand and the administration on the other, and subject to such control as the military command or the established control authority may find necessary; provided that the council approve the scale and nature of the operations it is proposed to undertake and the standard of provision, and that all expenses connected with such possible operations in an enemy or ex-enemy area should be carried by the enemy or ex-enemy country concerned.
That is part of the provision. At the time of the first meeting of the council in Atlantic City the war had not reached a stage where it was possible for the nations to work out in very great detail policies with respect to the treatment of enemy countries, but I think it may be safely assumed that at the meeting to be held in Montreal on June 23 this will be one of the auctions to come before the council for further attention. I should point out that it is not expected that UNRRA will operate in any field until after the military authorities have turned over to it the administration of relief, so that there is still some time for the working out of policies as well as for the accumulation of supplies.


Mr. ROEBUCK:: The success of this agreement will depend very largely upon the business ability with which the policies of the general committee are carried out, and I observe with some consternation the method of appointment and, worse, the method of disposal of the director general, who is to be the Pooh-Bah of the business end of this agreement. If we turn to article IV, under the heading "director general" we find that section 1 reads:
The executive authority of the united nations relief and rehabilitation administration shall be in the director general-
If you look through the other paragraphs you will see the very great powers that are placed in the hands of this individual, how he appoints subdirectors, who in turn take care of the rehabilitation, supplies and so on that are to be made available through the votes of the member nations. Then observe:
-who shall be appointed by the council on the nomination by unanimous vote of the central committee.
In other words, it is going to be difficult to select an individual who will receive the unanimous approval of the four members of the central council, but once he has run that gauntlet notice this:
The director general may be removed by the council on recommendation by unanimous vote of the central committee.
In other words, as long as this individual can retain one vote on the central committee, he is secure and can carry on the business of the united nations as he sees fit. Then observe:
The central committee of the council shall consist of the representatives of China, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America. . . .
The important thing in that clause is that Canada is not included, though in my judgment Canada has now achieved the status of nationhood and stands fourth in military and economic power. Possibly without the aid of Canada in the carrying forward of our present war effort the result attained might have been different. Canada's place in the post-war world, in the rehabilitation of the down-trodden nations, can scarcely be overestimated in importance; yet this council, which must be unanimous in the appointment of the director general who spends our money, does not include a representative of this country. I would be much better pleased with this agreement if Canada were represented on the central committee. I would also be better pleased and more hopeful of the successful outcome of this agreement were
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the director general subject to simply a majority vote in the retaining of his position. The position is not dissimilar to that occupied by Mr. Hoover following the last war. Those whose minds go back that far will remember that while Mr. Hoover achieved a great reputation. in the work he carried out, he was by no means free from criticism in the doing of that job.
It is a difficult job, and its success will depend upon the favour received from those who supply the money. That is not a democratic arrangement. I suppose, as the hon. member for New Westminster has said, that-this agreement has already been signed. As one hon. member opposite has already pointed out, it is rather too bad that agreements of this kind are completed and signed before deliberative assemblies, such as this one, have any chance to apply their combined wisdom, and bring out those little points of criticism which might otherwise be missed. It is too bad that we have adopted that method, and that we have followed it for so long. I do not criticize the procedure in this instance only. There is something to be said for the rule in the United States which requires ratification by the senate of any treaty entered into by the United States. So far as the senate of that country is concerned, I do not approve the two-thirds rule; but I do approve the regulation which makes it impossible for the executive to bind the nation by an agreement with outside nations, irrespective of and without reference to the . parliamentary institution of the country. It would be well if we changed the rule in Canada.


John George Diefenbaker: This afternoon I asked a number of questions, which the parliamentary assistant has not yet answered. One of my questions had to do with article V, section 1. With regard to that question I asked why it was that there was no equality, in so far as nations signatory to this agreement were concerned. Then, I should like to ask in connection therewith this question: If a decision is made by the central committee, and before ratification by the council, is that decision binding on the signatory members to the^ agreement? And in the event that a decision has been accepted by the council, is it then mandatory in its effect upon the members signatory to the agreement? '
Then I asked a question as to what expenditures had been made, to date, in connection with the Mutual Aid measure, and the distribution among those expenditures with respect to

the various commodities covered thereby, including agricultural and industrial commodities and the like.
I wish to return, too, to the question I asked last night in regard to appointments and recruitment of staff. At that time I asked what was being done in connection with the recruitment of staff to assist in the administration of the measure, once it becomes law. The answer given last night was that nothing was being done to that end. This evening the parliamentary assistant has pointed out that something has been done, and that a number of Canadians will shortly be trained for purposes of administration at a school to be convened in the United States. He said that appointments to administrative positions would be made on the basis of applications filed with the Department of National War Services. I should like to know under what authority that department is to have anything to do with the passing on of applications to the central authority. I would ask how it came to be named, and1 whether there is an order in council making provision for applications being considered by that department. To my mind it is a serious matter to find that appointments, so far as Canada is concerned, are not to be made by the civil service commission, but rather by a department of government. We would expect to find that the recommendations would pass through the commission to the central authority, or to Governor Lehman, who is charged with the responsibility of making those appointments. I should also like to ascertain how many Canadians will be sent over to take the course; and, as the scheme develops and becomes more or less all-embracing, has any estimate been made as to the number of Canadians who may be expected' to secure employment under the scheme? Is there any information as to the basis of their qualifications, or the basis upon which they will be chosen?


Brooke Claxton: The hon. member for Lake Centre first asked a question with respect to section 1 of article V in the agreement, and seemed to indicate that 'in some way that article laid down some basis of unfairness.


John George Diefenbaker: No; inequality.


Brooke Claxton: The article reads:
1. In so far as its appropriate constitutional bodies shall authorize, each member government will contribute to the support of the administration in order to accomplish the purposes of article I, paragraph 2 (a). The amount and character of the contributions of each member government under this provision will be determined from time to time by its appropriate constitutional bodies. All such contributions received by the administration shall be accounted for.

United Nations Agreement
There ia, I submit, no room for misunderstanding there. The member governments are to contribute what their constitutional authorities determine. At the meeting of the council a resolution was passed dealing with the matter of finance, in which the recommendation was expressed that nations in a position to do so should endeavour to contribute one per cent of their national income, estimated by themselves, as at June 30, 1943. If they wished to give more, they could give more; and if they wished, they could give less. But nations like the United States, the United Kingdom and, we hope, Canada, will conform to the one per cent target set forth in the resolution. But the extent of any contribution is left entirely to each nation. There is no possible room for misunderstanding, and I believe there is none among the nations.
Then the hon. member asked if the decision made by the central committee, under section 3 of article III, was binding on the council. The article itself, I should think, made that clear.


John George Diefenbaker: No; binding on the nations until ratified by the council.


Brooke Claxton: UNRRA cannot bind any nation. No resolution of the council or of the central committee, and no resolution of any organ of UNRRA can bind any nation. All they can do is to make recommendations. It is an administrative organization, set up to administer funds made available to it by the contributions of the nations concerned. They cannot bind any nation. All they can do is, through the appropriate organ, to make a recommendation; and a number of those recommendations have been made. If the central committee decided, as a matter of policy, to include a new country, let us say, in the scope of relief, and that decision was unsatisfactory to the member governments, it could be reconsidered at the next meeting of council, and reversed by a majority vote.
The hon. member asked a question in connection with the Mutual Aid legislation. This is not a Mutual Aid act, and I would submit that now is not the proper time to ask that question. That can be dealt with properly when the measure on the order paper for Mutual Aid comes up.
As to the number of Canadians who will be trained in the United States to work for the administration, and the other questions asked in that connection, I have already pointed out that UNRRA is to set up an international administration with a genuine international staff. Canada will not make any appointments to UNRRA in any way shape or form, either through the civil service commission, or the Department of National War Services or
any other department. But for purposes of convenience, if there are Canadians who would be interested in serving in work in the field and who have the necessary qualifications as welfare or social workers, they may forward 'their applications to the Department of External Affairs or to the Department of National War Services, and those applications will receive consideration. I understand that the actual appointments made will, however, be made by UNRRA itself, and the policies that are to be followed by UNRRA in making appointments have been laid down by the council.


John George Diefenbaker: That still does not answer the question as to what the qualifications are that have been laid down, or as to the number of Canadians shortly to take a course of instruction in the United States and the number who may ultimately be expected to be employed under this scheme.


Brooke Claxton: The number ultimately
expected to be employed under the scheme depends upon the action of the administration at its headquarters in Washington and also upon the development of the services in the field. I have not the slightest idea how many will be employed under the scheme or how many Canadians will be found suitable for employment under it. But I am sure that applications from Canadians will receive consideration.
With regard to the qualifications required, I may tell the committee with all frankness that I only learned about this by long distance to-day. It is being developed exceedingly rapidly, and that information will be made available at the earliest possible date.


George Hugh Castleden: I understood the parliamentary assistant to say that the administration will not have power to bind any member of the council by its action. I would ask him how he interprets section 1 of article 1, which reads:
The administration shall have power to acquire, hold and convey property, to enter into contracts and undertake obligations, to designate or create agencies and to review the activities of agencies so created, to manage undertakings and in general to perform any legal act appropriate to its objects and purposes.


Brooke Claxton: I interpret that in the sense in which the words are used there. The administration in that sense is in exactly the same position as an international corporation which has power to acquire property and make contracts. But it has not the power to bind Canada as a state to a course of action to which our own legislative authority has not agreed by our own constitutional practice. It has not the power to bind any country.
United Nations Agreement


George Hugh Castleden: Until the government has agreed to any particular line of action.


Brooke Claxton: That is this government acting. Once we act, that is our action, not the action of UNRRA.


George Hugh Castleden: That brings me to the point I had in mind. This government acts by order in council.


Brooke Claxton: This government in implementing the agreement acts in virtue of the statute.


George Hugh Castleden: That is this bill?


Brooke Claxton: Yes. In implementing the agreement the government may act by order in council, but the number of actions that will have to be taken by order in council on anything other than in connection with purchases and the like should be exceedingly few. The kind of action I envisage has to do with the purchase of supplies or the setting up of agencies to purchase supplies to make up our contribution to UNRRA, or to supply UNRRA with what it wants to buy from us. Apart from that I can hardly conceive of anything of a legislative nature having to be done in order to carry out the agreement. It is true that the government might have to grant certain rights similar to diplomatic immunity with respect to the communication of dispatches or for the travel of representatives of UNRRA. Apart from what I have said, I cannot conceive of any legislative action that would be required in Canada to carry out the agreement.


George Hugh Castleden: I would feel much better if the limitations were provided in the bill.


Brooke Claxton: We have to look at every piece of legislation with an eye to the purpose for which it was intended, and surely there is nothing alarming about the purpose for which this agreement is intended. If I judge the course of this debate, members in every quarter of the house are anxious to see us carry out what is necessary to be done to implement the agreement, and that is all the power that is sought here. I may tell the committee that the model of this bill was the Treaty of Peace Act of 1919. This is in substantially the same terms. I also point out that UNRRA is dealing with an emergency situation, and it is not expected that it wiil carry on for a great number of years. It is not expected that its operations will endure for probably more than three years after hostilities cease. That, I think, would be the minimum. That is one reason why those who drafted the agreement thought it desirable to fix the director general permanently in his

office, because otherwise you could not get a man of the character that was wanted, a man of the charcter of ex-Governor Lehman, who was chosen by the unanimous vote of all the forty-four nations.


Mr. NOSEWORTHY:: Is it not true that the only control that parliament can exercise over the administration of the legislation will be through the voting of the money that is required year by year, and that under the circumstances parliament will have very little choice but to vote the money? We certainly could not with any good grace refuse to vote our share of the money required for a purpose of this kind. Is it not also true that the governor in council is given authority up to the point where Canada's participation can be withdrawn through order in council, without the consent of parliament, as set forth in article X of the agreement?


Brooke Claxton: I do not think there is any possibility of Canada withdrawing. I am bound to admit that I am not competent to describe the kind of procedure that would be necessary to withdraw-whether it could be done by executive authority alone or would require the approval of parliament, I do not know. But I am fairly certain that no power given under this agreement affects whatever power the government has to withdraw from an agreement of this kind.
I submit again that I do not know of any other way of carrying out the provisions of this agreement. Parliament surely would not want to have brought before it fifteen hundred or two thousand orders dealing with the purchase of a hundred thousand bushels of wheat and various other matters of that sort. That is the kind of action that is to be taken under this power. In addition, there may be some other actions that may have to be taken, but, in so far as we can see, they will be of an administrative nature.


John George Diefenbaker: I still have not had an answer in regard to the employment of Canadians under this scheme. I do not want to refer to a subsequent section, but the parliamentary assistant for some reason does not seem to want to answer the question as to how many are going to take this course in the United States. If he does not know I will accept his answer.


Brooke Claxton: I have told the hon. member I do not know.


John George Diefenbaker: Will the information be furnished? I see in section 2 of the bill the following provision:
The governor in council may make such appointments ... as appear to him to be necessary. . . .

War Appropriation-Air Services


Brooke Claxton: I have assured the hon. member for Lake Centre that the governor in council is not going to make any appointments to the administration. It will not make a single appointment.


John George Diefenbaker: All right; we are not
going to split hairs over that.


Brooke Claxton: It is not a question of splitting hairs; it is a question of stating what the situation is.


John George Diefenbaker: Very well. How many appointments is it expected will be made in Canada to carry out the provisions of UNRRA?


Brooke Claxton: I do not know, and I never will know, because that is a question within the control of no one within Canada or of the Canadian government. It is a question within the control of the administration itself, which appoints the staff.


John George Diefenbaker: This is what the section states:
The governor in council may make such appointments ... as appear to him to be necessary. . . .
Not the council, nor Governor Lehman, nor anyone but the governor in council of Canada.


Brooke Claxton: My hon. friend has now
switched from dealing with appointments of people to work for the administration, to the question of possible appointees in Canada to work for Canada; and if I did not follow him earlier I am sorry. I am not in a position to say whether any appointments will have to be made to carry out the provisions of the agreement in Canada. So far as can be seen now, the arrangements between UNRRA and the Canadian government can be conducted through the ordinary channels and with existing agencies. It may be found necessary to appoint two or three people-perhaps a few more, but a very small staff-to handle the actual arrangements. I am not in the confidence of the government; but it might be anticipated, for example, that the arrangements between Canada and UNRRA would be conducted through agencies already existing such as the mutual aid board, the Department of Munitions and Supply, the Department of Agriculture, or the Canadian Wheat Board, and it may be that those agencies will be found quite sufficient. I am not in a position to go beyond that.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.	.
On section 3-Report to be laid before parliament.
Mr. GILLIS:: There is just a point on that.
I am in agreement with the hon. member for 100-137
ximis
New Westminster and the hon. member for Trinity; it is surprising to me to find that as important a contributor to this scheme as Canada will necessarily have to be is not represented on the central council. Is the parliamentary assistant in a position to inform the committee why Canada has no representation on that central council? I think we should have an answer.


Brooke Claxton: That question has been
dealt with, I think, three times, and I can give no further answer than I have already given. This agreement was an agreement of forty-four nations; it was worked out after it had been distributed on June 9, 1943, by the United States government, which was responsible for circulating it. Representations were made by various nations after that, and the agreement was signed in its present form. What diplomatic representations were made I am not in a position to say, and I do not think anyone would be.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Preamble agreed to.
Bill reported.
Mr. MACKENZIE (Vancouver Centre) moved the third reading of the bill.
Thomas Vien: Is it the pleasure of the
house to adopt the motion?


Grote Stirling: Next sitting. I suggest it is far more customary for a measure of this sort to stand on the order paper for one day.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I have not the slightest objection.
Motion stands.



WAR APPROPRIATION BILL


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Friday, March 31, 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. Usley-Mr. Bradette in the chair.

Hon. C. G. POWER (Minister of National Defence for Air):: On March 16, as reported at page 1539, my assistant placed on Hansard a certain number of answers to questions which had been asked during the course of
edition

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the discussion on the estimates of the Department of National Defence for Air, and some objection was taken. The hon. member for Yale said:
I suggest that these answers be allowed to go on Hansard and at some time convenient to the minister for air and to the minister for naval services, supplementary questions can be asked.
I assume that supplementary questions are to be asked on those matters which were placed upon Hansard that day.


George Hugh Castleden: If hon. members who are particularly interested in the questions referred to on that page are not here, I would point out that on February 29 the minister made a statement in regard to the closing of airports across Canada. He remarked, as reported in Hansard, at' page 1029:
We are not proposing a winding-up of the air training plan, even progressively, on the contrary we are providing, and have agreed with the United Kingdom for a continuation of the plan after March, 1945, the date on which the 1942 agreement expires, but a continuation with a reduced output, which reduced output will not be noticeable or in effect before eighteen months hence.
In the next column of the same page he said:
I have already stated that the Royal Air Force transferred schools will be the first to close, beginning about midsummer and running well into next year. With respect to others, there are many factors to be taken into consideration.
The minister mentioned about nine of them-whether the property is leased or owned, whether it is required for civilian purposes, such factors as travelling expense between types of schools, costs of operation, disturbance to civilian economy, geographical location, air training conditions, fog area or obscure visibility, air congestion, et cetera.
About two weeks later he announced the closing of about twenty-eight schools, including eight in Alberta and eight in Saskatchewan. I should like to know from the minister, first, what relation these various items listed on page 1029 of Hansard have as regards other training schools across Canada, and whether the reasons which are given on that page are those w-hich caused the closing of these schools in western Canada. Our experience in the west would lead us to believe that the conditions for flying training schools there were much superior to what they were in eastern Canada. Certainly the number of hours in which these schools are not operating because of air conditions or disturbance to civilian economy, obscure visibility or air 
congestion, would make us believe that the western area is the most favoured and suitable for air training.
The other question that occurs to us is this. With a plan of constant expansion continuing even until the late months of 1943, people are somewhat at a loss to understand the complete reversal of policy which necessitates the closing of twenty-nine of these schools across Canada, when we would have imagined that the plan would have worked to a certain level of peak production and then tapered off gradually. The continued opening of schools even late in 1943, followed immediately in 1944 by a reduction of about twenty-five per cent of the air schools in Canada, would seem to show a lack of planning there and, as I say, people are at a loss to understand it. Is there any statement which the minister can make in that regard?


Charles Gavan Power: I have already made several statements with respect to the closing of these schools. I made a statement to the press on December 3 when the first closing of schools took place; I made a statement to the press and to the house on February 16 as a result of a meeting with the United Kingdom representatives, and I also made reference to the subject of the closing of schools in introducing my appropriation on February 29. Perhaps the concrete reasons were not sufficiently clear to the house, and with the permission of the committee it might be well for me to go over them again as briefly as I can.
What we must bear in mind first is that the purpose of the British commonwealth air training plan was to man all aircraft which the commonwealth produced and which were planned to be manned by men from the British commonwealth. That was number one. Number two was that the contract between the partners, signed in June, 1942, expires in March, 1945, when normally all schools would have been closed, because that is the expiry date of the contract. It must also be understood that Canada trains flyers not only for its own squadrons but for the whole of the British commonwealth. It has an unlimited commitment to train flyers.
In the course of its work under this agreement Canada, before the end of this month, will have trained its 100,000th aircrew. On March 31 we had trained 92,000, to which must be added 5,000 who belonged to R.A.F. schools before RA.F. schools became a part of what was called the combined training organization, and roughly the 3,500 whom we turn out every month.
The first intimation we received that there might be a curtailment in air training capacity

War Appropriation-Air Services
came in December. Up to that time we had already been told to turn out aircrew as fast as we could and as well as we could, and we did that. We fulfilled our contract. We fulfilled our contract so well that provision which had been made not only for expansion but for replacements was found to be adequate. When making provision, it is all very well to talk of planning, but it must be understood that planning in war, particularly planning the production of a certain type of human material, is somewhat more difficult than the ordinary planning for the turning out of shells or machines or something of that kind, and casualty rates must be taken into consideration. The high command figured that the casualties would be at a certain rate and they asked us to produce not only for expansion but for replacements up to that rate.
Fortunately, the allies obtained air superiority earlier than they had anticipated, with the result that the German air force is not so dangerous from the point of view of casualties as had been expected and that we have fewer losses in combat than were expected, particularly among pilots. We turned at one time, in 1941 and 1942, from combat with fighter pilots and fighter aeroplanes to heavy bombing. At that time heavy bombers usually carried a first and a second pilot, and it was decided by the higher command that they did not need a second pilot, so that they replaced him by a flight engineer or a wireless operator air gunner, and so on.
Most of our training originally was devoted to pilots. Now we find there is a surplus of pilots. When a bomber is shot down the loss is only one pilot; there are seven other members of the crew, but only one pilot. The German fighter air force have not been taking the heavy part in the fighting that was anticipated, and the result is that our casualties, thank God, have not been anything like what had been feared, so that at the present time there are more pilots trained than were expected. That is number one.
The margin that was allowed for is still there. It is not any indication that there is any intention on the part of the allies or on the part of the United Kingdom, where most of these aircrew go, that there shall be a slackening of the war effort. On the contrary, there is, first, the circumstance that we still have a surplus of pilots, and, second, that this year is to be the critical year of the war, and the United Kingdom and its allies are endeavouring to concentrate, so far as they can, all their fighting pow'er in the front line.
As this committee well knows, there is an immense training organization behind the
fighting line. This training organization can be pushed forward and utilized at the proper time.
As I said, there have been two changes. The first change took place in December when the Royal Air Force announced the desire to close a certain number of their establishments. St. Catharines in Ontario, Stanley in Nova Scotia, Caron in Saskatchewan, and Cap de la Madeleine in Quebec, were closed. All these except Caron were Royal Canadian Air Force stations. But in order to keep schools going in western Canada we closed R.C.A.F. stations in eastern Canada. Neepawa, which was an R.A.F. school, Estevan which was an R.A.F. school, North Battleford, Swift Current, Weyburn and Assiniboia were all to be closed, because the R.A.F. decided they wanted to bring their men home. By a reshuffle and by a shift of schools we decided to close the R.C.A.F. school in Moncton, because there was already certain congestion on that aerodrome owing to transportation work which was being carried on. We moved Moncton to Battleford, and we decided to close St. Hubert near Montreal, because there was also certain congestion there, and to fill the R.A.F. station in western Canada, Weyburn. Therefore there was no dislocation in western Canada; but we did close Stanley, Cap de la Madeleine, St. Hubert and Moncton in eastern Canada.
Then came the decision to hold an empire training conference in order to determine what was to be done after March, 1945. We have to hold a conference months in advance in order to lay out the plans for the purchase of aircraft, for the entrance into the scheme of trainees and so on, because aircraft cannot be purchased off the shelf. They must be ordered from eighteen months to two years in advance. Therefore we decided to have a conference with our other partners of the empire some time in the month of March. Before that, as a preliminary to the conference the air ministry asked if it would not be a good idea for the Right Hon. Mr. Balfour to come here to discuss these matters with us. He came here and after a certain amount of discussion announced to us that the United Kingdom government had decided to close a further number of their schools, in fact had decided to close all the R.A.F. schools properly so-called. They had decided to close them progressively during the course of the next year.


Gordon Graydon: How many would there be?


Charles Gavan Power: Oh, from twenty to twenty-five. He also advised us that the higher command had come to the conclusion that tb"

War Appropriation-Air Services
output of the plan should be reduced, beginning about fourteen to eighteen months hence. It must not be forgotten that a recruit entering the plan to-day, with the backlog that we have, in all probability will not strike the front line for from eighteen months to two years; therefore if we are to make preparations for closing this scheme progressively sometime it behooves us to begin reasonably early. It was decided at this conference that the air training plan would continue after March, 1945-that is number 1-but that it would continue at a reduced capacity with the output reduced about fourteen to eighteen months hence. Most of those schools will not close until between December 15, 1944, and January 1, 1945. Let us remember that. We are not closing the schools suddenly, as has been said in the committee; but we are advising the interested parties that this training scheme must begin to close up sometime and this sometime starts next fall.
I should like the committee to bear this in mind. I have never given these figures before but I presume I have to. I do not think there is any great secret about them now anyway. Whereas last year we produced about 39,000 aircrew, in 1944, the year in which we are closing the schools, we are going to produce 41,600, and with the 100,000 already produced we are going to have a substantial number of aircrew. There will begin to be a slackening up when these schools are closed and a slackening up in 1945; but I hope it will not be forgotten that at the present time we have a surplus. We are still producing at peak capacity or practically at peak capacity, and we shall be doing so up until the end of 1944. In order to slacken our capacity in 1945 we have to begin now. At the present time there are in the United Kingdom enough trained front-line aircrew for the expansion of all the squadrons required by the British commonwealth. Back of that we have all the replacements we require. We have all the men we need for 1944; with what is produced in 1944 we shall have the men required for 1945, and I presume with the backlog of the accumulation we shall have all the men required for 1946.
Now, I ask myself why we should continue training men in a hazardous occupation if they are not absolutely necessary, and why we should spend very large sums of money required for training? I have forgotten the amount it requires to train a pilot, but it is something over $20,000-


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: 

fMr. Power.]


Charles Gavan Power: Yes, $25,000 to train a pilot and a little more than that to train an observer.


Gordon Graydon: That covers overhead and everything.


Charles Gavan Power: That is the figure we have given. It costs somewhat less than that to train a gunner, and so on. I ask myself why we should continue training these men? After all we are contractors. We made a contract with the-United Kingdom and the people of the governments of the British commonwealth . to turn out aircrew in an unlimited quantity as long as they wanted them, but we cannot train men if they do not want them. To my mind it would be the height of absurdity, first of all, to risk the lives of these young men in the hazardous job of training and, secondly, to spend the people's money. That, I think, is the justification for the closing of the schools after it is no longer considered necessary by the higher command to train men. Do not forget we are not closing all the schools by any means because, I repeat, the air training plan will keep on after 1945.
There was some suggestion that there had been perhaps favouritism shown in closing schools in western Canada and in eastern Canada. Let us see what we have left in the way of flying schools. Prince Edward Island has three flying schools; Nova Scotia has three flying schools; New Brunswick has one; Quebec has four; Ontario has eighteen; Manitoba has eleven; Saskatchewan has six; Alberta has six, and British Columbia has four. With the exception of Ontario, where most of the recruits come from and where most of the schools were established in the early stages, the balance as between the provinces is fairly well kept.


Ernest George Hansell: The figures the minister
has given are for a certain type of school, are they?


Charles Gavan Power: Schools where flying goes
[DOT] on. Of the twenty-eight schools to be closed several are Royal Air Force schools. The Royal Air Force say they want to bring their schools home, and I cannot stop them from doing so nor can anyone else. If they want to bring their men home that is their business, and I do not think any of us can criticize them, for they know their business best. They have said they want to bring their schools home in order to bring their men closer to the front line, so as to bring greater power to bear during the critical year of the war. That is the reason they give, and I think that reason should be good enough for any of

War Appropriation-Air Services
The first of these schools is No. 31 O.T.U. at Pennfield Ridge; and in passing I may say that we have found it will be not only possible but necessary to keep that school open for another purpose, as a transport conversion unit. Recently, that is within the last two or three weeks, we have been advised that transport aircraft which were ordered two years ago, which were required for the purpose of transporting troops from one end of Canada to the other as part of the defence of Canada plan, aircraft which we were told not to expect until 1945, will be delivered in 1944. That is an indication that the United States aircraft industry is progressing far beyond perhaps what they themselves anticipated. The result is that we will be enabled to carry on the sort of training which I think will be best for our young men, particularly for the future; that is, training on heavy transports. In order to operate heavy transports one must have an aerodrome with a long runway. During the time we were somewhat anxious about the defence of Canada we decided to lengthen all the runways in the home war establishment in eastern Canada, and one of those was the runway at Pennfield Ridge. That school not only has a long runway; it has what I think they call a parallel runway, and from that point of view it is ideal for the purpose of carrying on with these heavy transports, these Liberators, which require a much longer takeoff and landing space than the ordinary aerodrome where we have been carrying on training with Ansons and similar planes, where the runways are something like 3,000 to 3,500 feet in length. So 'that Pennfield Ridge will not be closed. Another to be closed is No. 31 E.F.T.S. at Winton, Alberta; that is R.A.F. Another is No. 32 E.F.T.S. at Bowden, Alberta; that is R.A.F.


Gordon Graydon: Does the minister mean
that Pennfield Ridge will not be fully closed?


Charles Gavan Power: We will carry on training to about the same extent as hitherto in the R.A.F. schools. This was an R.A.F. school, an O.T.U. It is quite possible there will not be so many men there, or so many machines, but a Liberator carries a crew of seven or eight, whereas a Ventura, the machine they have been using, carried a crew of about four, so that I think it will balance up. There may not be quite so many men; I assume there are about 1,400 men at Pennfield Ridge at present, and perhaps when we take over there will be something like 1,000.
Then No. 31 bombing and gunnery school at Picton, Ontario, will be closed; No. 32 S.F.T.S., Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, will be closed; they are both R.A.F. schools. No. 34 S.F.T.S.,
Medicine Hat, Alberta, R.A.F., is to be closed; No. 36 S.F.T.S., Penhold, Alberta, R.A.F., is to be closed; No. 33 S.F.T.S., Carberry, Manitoba, R.A.F., is to be closed. All these schools will close between December 15 and January 1, so that there is nothing very sudden about it.
The following schools were devoted to the training of the Royal Navy fleet air arm, and they say they no longer require them. These were two R.C.A.F. schools: No. 12 E.F.T.S. at Goderich, Ontario, and No. 4 E.F.T.S. at Aylmer, Ontario.
The following had been R.A.F. schools prior to December 15, and were made R.CAT. schools' in the reshuffle of which I spoke, and under the new arrangement are no longer required: No. 39 S.F.T.S., Swift Current, Saskatchewan; No. 8 S.F.T.S. at Weyburn; No. 25, which was a former R.A.F. school, at Assiniboia, and No. 26, which was also a former R.A.F. school, at Neepawa.
Three of the schools to be closed are initial training schools. At present we have seven of these, and it has been decided that four will be sufficient to look after the reduced entries. The initial training schools are the schools to which the boys go before they start their actual flying experience, and the population of these schools is usually composed of young men beginning their training as pilots; at least these form the greater proportion of the population. It was decided to retain four schools of the seven, and it was thought best to divide them among the provinces. One was retained at Edmonton, Alberta; one at Regina, Saskatchewan; one at Toronto, and one at Victoriaville, Quebec. The three that are being abolished are at Saskatoon, Toronto and Belleville.
Of the remaining R.C.AE. schools three are elementary flying schools where we train only pilots. These are at Fort William, Windsor Mills and Regina; they are to be closed. Of the service flying training schools, where only pilots are trained, the following are to be closed: Yorkton, Brantford, Dunnville and Macleod. These are R.C.A.F. schools; they are devoted entirely to the training of pilots and will be closed in December or January.
There are four wireless schools in Canada and it was decided to close one. It was thought that in the interests of civilian economy and agricultural planning it would be advisable to hand back to Ontario the school at Guelph which that province had kindly placed at our disposal, and we are handing it back to Ontario sometime in September or October of this year. Two

War Appropriation-Air Services
bombing and gunnery schools will begin their closing sometime late in December, when we shall have reached a point in our training of gunners where we shall be on the verge of achieving a surplus.
What is to become of these schools? In my statement I mentioned what was the long-range situation, and it is a situation which will be faced by every locality in which a school is located. Eventually these schools will be turned over to the Surplus Assets Corporation for disposal, and I presume they will be handed over to the Department of Transport.


Gordon Graydon: The minister means the War Assets Corporation?


Charles Gavan Power: Yes; and in due course the War Assets Corporation will ask the different departments of government what use the schools can be put to. I presume, if no other department takes them on, eventually they will be handed ever to the Department of Transport, which looks after civil aviation.
For the moment we are not proposing to abandon any of these schools mentioned. In the first place, whatever our plans may be, we are certainly not going to abandon schools, when some eventuality might arise, because of which we might have to reopen them-not that I anticipate it, but simply because we want to make sure about that.
In the second place, we have some use for them. They will be utilized as aircraft storage units, which store and maintain aircraft required as stored reserves. They have an estimated service establishment of about 200. There will be aircraft holding units, which will hold aircraft being stored, and awaiting disposal by the War Assets Corporation. They have an estimated service establishment of approximately 100. There will be equipment holding units for storage of all types of R.C.A.F. equipment, which will have service establishment of about 175. There will be personnel holding units, because every now and then, particularly with these changes, and this reshuffling and shuffling, we find we must hold personnel between courses, and we have to put them somewhere. So that some of these units will be taken into personnel holding units for the storage of personnel awaiting another stage of training or, in some cases, awaiting embarkation, if they are backed up because of a shortage of shipping. There will be service establishments there of about 100.
Then there will be pre-aircrew education schools. Up to the present time a very large number of our men who come in have not

quite reached the educational standards required for aircrew. We have been sending them to universities for that training. From now on, however, we will take on that job, ourselves, and instead of sending them to universities we will train them in our own units which have been or will be left available. That is for the training of pre-aircrew personnel, by R.C.A.F. instructional staff which was formerly carried on by the universities. That requires a service establishment of about 100.
I wish to put on Hansard-and I might as well do so now-what is going to happen to them all. Pennfield Ridge will continue as a transport conversion unit. Edmonton, Alberta, which was known as No. 2 A.O.S. will become No. 2 wing headquarters to the Northwest Staging Route. That is a very congested airdrome.
Weyburn, 8 S.F.T.S., will become an equipment holding unit.
Belleville, which it was announced might be closed, will now follow on, until December, 1944, as a flight engineer school.
Saskatoon I.T.S. will be returned to the lessor. It belonged to the normal school and Bedford collegiate.
Fort William will become an aircraft holding unit.
Goderich will be an aircraft holding unit.
Windsor Mills will become an aircraft holding unit.
Assiniboia will become a pre-aircrew education school, for about 240 trainees.
Neepawa will become a pre-aircrew educational school with about 240 trainees.
Dewinton will become an aircraft holding unit.
Bowden will become a pre-aircrew educational school with about 240 trainees.
Regina will become a pre-aircrew education school with about 170 trainees.
Brantford will become an aircraft holding unit.
Dunnville will be an aircraft holding unit.
Macleod will become an equipment holding unit. There is a very good hospital there, so that it is probable that we will use it as a convalescent hospital.
Yorkton will become an equipment holding unit.
Aylmer will become a flight engineers' school.
Moose Jaw will become a personnel holding unit.
Carberry will become an equipment holding unit.

War Appropriation-Air Services
Medicine Hat will become an equipment holding unit.
Penhold will become a radio maintenance unit. That will be for radio mechanics, and the maintenance of radio equipment.
Mossbank will become an equipment holding unit.
Lethbridge will become an equipment holding unit.
Picton will become a pre-aircrew educational school, with about 600 trainees in it.
Guelph, as I said earlier, will be returned to the lessor.
Estevan will be an equipment holding unit.
Swift Current will be a pre-aircrew educational school.


Mr. GRAHAM:: What will be the number at Swift Current?


Charles Gavan Power: About 240 trainees at Swift Current.


Mr. SENN:: What service establishments
will be necessary at these aircraft holding units?


Charles Gavan Power: One hundred.


Joseph William Noseworthy: Is the department at the present time constructing, or completing the construction of any air fields?


Charles Gavan Power: I do not think so-well,
when I say that I do not think so, I should add that in all possibility there would be certain buildings to be completed. I do know of one, where the school was about to close, and where we had to put a roof on the building. We do that; in order to preserve the property it would have to be done. But orders have been given, generally, to close all works. It must not be forgotten, however, that so long as we are in operation, just as if we were operating a plant or a factory, we will keep that plant up to the highest possible capacity. I am not going to let the plant go down just because there is a possibility of closing in the near future. We are not undertaking any new works, but we are not going to let the plants go down to nothing.


Joseph William Noseworthy: Probably the minister will explain why, in a return brought down on March 23 in my 'name, regarding the airfield at Mount Pleasant, Prince Edward Island, it is stated that up until February 20, 1944, more than $2,702,000 had been spent, and that there were commitments to date of something over $4,000,000. Does that $4,000,000 imply that there is construction work to be done, or work that has already been done?
Mr. POWER r I would think, frankly, that might mean that work would be done, because I know Mount Pleasant is now in operation. The work must be pretty well completed by this time. But there is always work to be done before the thing levels out and becomes as good as we want it to be.


George Hugh Castleden: We are glad to have the minister's explanation, and I am sure it will do much to prevent further misunderstanding. In his remarks the minister did not say anything about the relative merits of schools in eastern and western Canada, so far as flying conditions are concerned.


Charles Gavan Power: I certainly have said many times in the house that if I had to start this plan over again I would prefer to go to western Canada. There is no question about that-except that certain operational training units might not be placed there, where it is important that the trainees become acclimatized to conditions somewhat similar to those which they will have to meet on the other side. But for ordinary elementary training, and perhaps for service flying training there is no question in my mind that the western prairies is the best country for it.


Ernest George Hansell: A great deal of concern has been registered in different parts of the country concerning the announcement that these air training schools were to be closed. Of course, if the war is soon to come to an end, and if that is the reason for the closing of the schools, the people may rejoice. On the other hand we do know that some are extremely concerned about the closing of the air schools and their concern is clearly from a business point of view. That must not be regarded as an indication that the people have selfish motives, but should be regarded only as an indication that they are interested in their business arrangements, and do not want to see them come to an end. Be that as it may, we recognize that it has to be done sooner or later. The question I would ask the minister is one that concerns many communities, and I would ask him to throw some light upon it. When the government desires to close certain schools, I should like to know the basis of their decision. For instance, the minister said that there were six student flying training schools in Alberta, and that four in Canada are to be closed, one of them being at Macleod. The question that is in my mind and in the minds of the citizens of Macleod is why that particular school has to be closed. I know that if the minister

War Appropriation-Air Services
announced that some other school had to be closed, the citizens of that community would ask the same question. What is the basis of the decision to close that particular school?
While I am on my feet let me say that I have had, as the minister would expect, a great deal of correspondence from people in the community of Macleod. I shall read only a paragraph from one of the letters to indicate that the people there are satisfied that the Macleod student flying training school is one of the best. The minister will know more about it and perhaps can confirm that opinion. Here is the paragraph:
Macleod No. 7 S.F.T.S. was one of the schools closed. Now the record of this station will stand any investigation, the flying hours are arri ong the highest, the health is exceptional, the upkeep has been small in comparison, the accidents have been almost nil, the surrounding country is level and lends itself to assisting forced landings; it is on the sewage system, the water is no problem, the lights are direct, everything would tend to make this station one of the easiest places to keep intact.
That is the tenor of most of these letters that I have received. Assuming that the Macleod training school is one of the best, I am wondering why that particular school should have to be closed.
Would the minister also mind telling me what are the six flying training schools located in Alberta?
I wish the minister would throw some light on this question of closing schools, because naturally the people of a certain town who have been informed that their school is one of the highest rating naturally ask why that particular school should have to be closed.


Charles Gavan Power: Every school has the highest rating. I do not know of any school that has not the highest rating. My hon. friend over here has a school in his constituency at Dunnville, an excellent school, but it was closed, and the same with the school at Goderich, an excellent school. The hon. member for Moose Jaw has had three schools in his constituency closed, at Moose Jaw, Caron and Mossbank, all excellent schools, but they are all closed just the same. We closed an elementary school, an excellent school too, in the constituency of the Prime Minister. I closed an elementary school in my own constituency once. It was an excellent school, with an excellent man in charge, but it was closed. We have to close them somewhere. The R.A.F. schools closed first, and we have to close something like an equivalent number. I do not know that there are many reasons I could give why one particular school should be closed more than another, except that the officers of the depart-
CMr. Hanjell.]	,
ment checked up and said that they thought it should be done. In some cases I intervened. I thought Brantford could stand the closing of its school without interfering with its economy because it is a manufacturing town where a lot of manufacturing is being done. Regina had two schools, and one had to be closed. The same with Saskatoon, where there were two schools. We closed down the I.T.S. and left the other, and so on all down the line. I cannot give my hon. friend any particular reason for the closing down of the school at Macleod any more than I could with respect to the school at Yorkton. I do not know that I should be asked to go into these details. They are all good schools-the training is good; the sewage is good; the people are good; everything is good.


Ernest George Hansell: I quite agree with the minister that they are all excellent schools and I am glad at least to hear that the sewage is good. That is not the question I asked. The question I asked was as to the basis of the decision to close certain schools. I agree that they are all excellent schools, but they cannot all be the best. There must be one a little better than some of the others, and of course the people of Macleod think theirs is just a little better than some of the others. I am asking the minister the question so that I can satisfy my constituents. When I asked him the basis of the decision to close down certain schools he said-and I do not think it was a slip-that his officials checked up. What did they check up? Was it the efficiency of the school or what? I am not suggesting that there is any favouritism one way or the other. I think everyone in the house will agree that the minister's department is one department that has been run with exceptional efficiency. We have trained a great air force in Canada and credit has to go to the minister. But again I ask him the basis of the decision to close certain schools.


Charles Gavan Power: The officers looked over the schools. There is sometimes the question of travelling from one school to another, and so on. I do not think there is any particular reason why the school at Macleod should have been selected rather than some other. I really do not know. The officers came to me with a list of schools which they thought ought to be closed and in certain cases I intervened for economic reasons; for instance, at Regina and Brantford where normally the schools would not have been closed at all, but I thought those places could better afford to have their schools closed down than some other places.

Canada-United States Relations


Ernest George Hansell: What are the six service flying training schools in Alberta?


Charles Gavan Power: They are at High River, Calgary, Claresholm, Vulcan, the wireless school at Calgary-that should not be' in, I made a mistake-I should have said five-and one at Pearce.
Item stands.
Progress reported.	[DOT]


[Stage Direction]
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned until Thursday at 3 o'clock p.m., pursuant to special order made Monday, February 21, 1944.
Thursday, April 20, 1944