1944-06-21

[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Monday, June 19, consideration in committee of bill No. 133, to amend the Aeronautics Act-Mr. Michaud1 -Mr. Bradette in the chair.
On section 1-New heading inserted.
Mr. GREEN:: This bill is described as an act to amend the Aeronautics Act. In fact the
[Mr. Woodl
bill contains the domestic policy of the government with respect to civil aviation, not only for the remaining years of the war but also, and primarily, for the years that follow; therefore it puts into effect a permanent air policy for Canada. Once that policy is instituted it will be difficult and costly to change. I believe that the policy will have to be changed, and to-day I propose to point out in what respects it is ill-advised. I suggest to the members of the committee, to the press of Canada and also to the people of Canada, that they scrutinize this bill very carefully before it is put on the statute book.
In the first place the policy is ill-advised in that it makes a minister a dictator of civil aviation in Canada. I say that for several reasons. The bill amends the Aeronautics Act. Under that act wide and drastic powers are given to the minister named therein. The Aeronautics Act is chapter 3 of the revised statutes of 1927. It was passed just after the last war, at a time when we were just beginning to find out things about civil aviation. I do not propose to read any portions to the committee to-day, but as it originally stood the minister referred to was the Minister of National Defence; the act was to be administered by the defence department and it refers to various things having to do with military aviation. But I think that the powers as they stood in the original act are much too drastic for present conditions. Yet all these powers are now to go to the minister who becomes the dictator of civil aviation of Canada. He is to have all these powers except one; he is not to do the actual licensing of flying lines; that power is given to the new air transport board.
Another,reason why I suggest a minister is being made a dictator is that under this measure he is being given even further powers. For example, sections 9 and 10 of the bill give the minister power to order the making of very broad investigations with regard to airways; of course the new air transport board is authorized to make those investigations for him.
A third reason why I think the bill gives powers that are too dictatorial is that at the present time the board of transport commissioners licenses all commercial flying services.
I hold in my hand the report of the board for the calendar year 1943. Hon. members will find at page 10 this statement with regard to air transportation licences:
Eight applications for new licences were granted and nine licences were surrendered for cancellation. At December 31, 1943, a total of sixty-five licences were in force, composed of nine international between Canada and the United States, six interurban in Canada and fifty bush services in northern Canada.

Aeronautics Act
All these licences have been issued by the board of transport commissioners. Under the new bill, however, licences are to be issued by the air transport board. That is provided in section 12 (1) but-and this is a very important point-the issuing of any licence is expressly made subject to the approval of the minister. In other words the new board cannot issue a licence without the approval of the minister in person.
Finally subsections 8 and 10 of the same section provide that in certain cases there may be an appeal from the new board to the minister. At present there is an appeal from the board of transport commissioners to the Supreme Court of Canada on questions of law, a proper judicial appeal, and then of course to the privy council. In addition the cabinet, described as the governor in council, have power to review any decision of the board of transport commissioners. That is all changed now; that is all done away with in the case of aviation. The appeal now is to the minister in person.
So I say that in effect this bill makes a minister of the crown the dictator of civil aviation in Canada; and while the bill mentions the Minister of Transport as the new dictator, in section 2 it goes on to say:
... or such other minister as the governor in council may from time to time designate. . . .
Well, the other night the Minister of Munitions and Supply explained to us that this new dictator is not to be the Minister of Transport but is to be the Minister of Munitions and Supply himself. He gave some reasons for that, but in effect the Minister of Transport is being by-passed and these dictatorial powers are being given to the Minister of Munitions and Supply. On June 6 I asked the minister a question in that connection; it will be found at page 3601 of Hansard, as follows:
In effect it makes the minister a dictator in respect of all the airways in Canada, does it not?
The minister gave a very significant reply:
Perhaps so; but who would you suggest should be dictator?
Then I said:
I do not think there should be a dictator, myself.
So that I say this bill is ill-advised, in the first place because it makes the Minister of Munitions and Supply or some other minister the dictator of civil aviation in Canada,
Then it is ill-advised in that with its twin, bill No. 101, which is described as an act to amend the Transport Act, it takes away all
the jurisdiction of the Board of Transport Commissioners of Canada over civil aviation. In other words it removes the protection the Canadian people now have in respect of one of the principal methods of transportation, by virtue of the powers of this independent board of transport commissioners, functioning on a judicial basis. That protection now is being taken away from the Canadian people in respect of aviation.
The board of transport commissioners is not perfect. As hon. members know, formerly it was called the board of railway commissioners, and on the whole it has done a pretty good iob for the Canadian people. It has held sittings in all parts of Canada. I know we in British Columbia found it a very good thing to have this dominion board come out and actually hear witnesses and get our side of the story, instead of sitting here in Ottawa ruling on something only half understood, three thousand miles away from the Pacific coast. In many cases the board of railway commissioners has been a protection to the people of British Columbia and, I suggest, to the people of the maritimes as well, those of us who are farthest away from the centre of things here in Ottawa. The board has built up a good name for itself; it has a good standing with the Canadian people. The way it works is well understood, and by and large I think it has given satisfaction. In 1938 it was renamed the board of transport commissioners. Hon. members will find the change made in the Transport Act, which is chapter 53 of the statutes of 1938. That act sets out the principles on which the board is to function. For example, section 5 reads:
Before any application for a licence is granted for the transport of goods and/or passengers under the provisions of this act, the board shall determine whether public convenience and necessity require such transport, and in so determining the board may take into consideration, inter alia-
Then it goes on to point out all the things the commissioners have to consider:
(a) any objection to the application which may be made by any person or persons who are already providing transport facilities, whether by rail, water or air, on the routes or between the places which the applicant intends to serve on the ground that suitable facilities are or, if the licence were issued, would be in excess of requirements, or on the ground that any of the conditions of any other transport licence held by the applicant have not been complied with;
There is no such provision in the new bill. This new air transport board is not subject to any direction such as I have read from the present Transport Act. Then paragraph (b) reads:
Aeronautics Act

(b) whether or not the issue of such licence would tend to develop the complementary rather than the competitive functions of the different forms of transport, if any, involved in such objections;
In other words the board had to try to make transport services complementary. There is no such direction contained in the present bill. This new air transport board is virtually given carte blanche to do what it pleases. Then paragraphs (c) and (d) read;
(e) the general effect on other transport services and any public interest which may be affected by the issue of such licence;
(d) the quality and permanence of the service to be offered by the applicant and his financial responsibility, including adequate provision for the protection of passengers, shippers and the general public by means of insurance.
What we have now under the Transport Act is an independent board, which cannot be shoved around by any government or any minister. Perhaps that is one of the reasons that the control of civil aviation is being taken away from that board. Just about a year ago a decision was rendered in connection with air transport between Victoria and Vancouver. Canadian Pacific Air Lines had a passenger service already operating, and the board refused to allow Trans-Canada to put in another duplicating service. That decision may or may not have been right, but in any event it was reached by the board of transport commissioners after a fair hearing of all parties concerned, and I suggest that is the sort of procedure we should have in Canada. I have here the proceedings of the standing committee on railways and shipping for Monday, March 27, 1944, in which this very hearing was mentioned by Mr. Symington, president of Trans-Canada Air Lines, who said at page 21:
The situation under the present law is that the board of transport commissioners decide on public necessity and convenience, and they said *that in their judgment the passenger service was sufficiently served by the Canadian Pacific Air Lines and that therefore they would only grant us the mail privilege in so far as that local traffic was concerned. That was the finding of the board.
Mr. Symington said elsewhere in these proceedings that in his opinion that decision had been reached after a fair hearing.
But this bill sets up a new air transport board. Once it becomes law we shall have two boards, the board of transport commissioners, dealing with other forms of transportation services, and the air transport board, dealing with air transportation. The minister himself admitted that the functions of the two boards were different. I asked him a question in that
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connection on June 6. Those questions and answers are reported as follows at page 3604 of Hansard:
Mr. Green: In other words, the air transport board is to be directly under the minister?
Mr. Howe: Correct.
Mr. Green: The minister said that that, as I understand it, was not the position of the *board of transport commissioners.
Mr. Howe: That is correct, yes. The board of transport commissioners is a judicial body equivalent to a court, and its duty is to administer an act. That board has no function beyond the administration of the act-a wholly judicial function. This is a board which is both judicial and advisory.
Which, I submit, is trying to place this new board on both sides of the fence at once. No provision is contained in bill 133 for the exercising of judicial discretion by the new board. No provision is contained against discrimination. There is no provision for having hearings at which other interested parties may appear. I submit, Mr. Chairman, that this new air transport board cannot be a judicial body. I repeat, therefore, that my second objection to the bill is that it removes from the Canadian people the protection they now have in the form of an independent board with jurisdiction over a vital method of transportation in Canada.
The bill is ill advised also in that the powers given to the new board are too drastic. For example, section 13 of the bill gives the board this power:
The board shall review all licences respecting commercial air services issued under part III of the Transport Act, 1938, or under part VII of the Air Regulations, 1938, prior to and in force at the time of the coming into force of this part, and may cancel or suspend any such licence as it sees fit.
That is directly opposed to the procedure followed in 1938 when the Transport Act was passed. Section 5 of that act protected a licencee who had obtained a licence, before the new act was passed.
Then, in subsection 7 of section 12 we find that this new board may issue licences differing from the licences applied for. That is another very wide power. In section 11 it is given very wide powers to make regulations. In section 14 further dictatorial powers are given. True, they are in the shape of directions to the board. The section reads as follows:
Every licence issued under part III of the Transport Act, 1938, or under part VII of the Air Regulations, 1938, prior .to and in force at the time of the coming into .force of this part shall be deemed to be a licence issued under section 12 of this act, but every such licence, if not cancelled or suspended by the board under section 13 of this act-

Aeronautics Act
Which I have just read.
-shall cease to ibe valid on or after the termination, as fixed by order in council, of the war in Europe which commenced on the 10th day of September, 1939.


Mr. HOWE:: There is a rather important misprint in the bill, which I believe I should call to the attention of the committee. The expression "on or after" should be "one year after".


Mr. HANSON (York-Sunbury):: That does not alter the sense of it.


Howard Charles Green: It just postpones the hanging for one year. I say the principle of automatically cancelling all those licences is dead wrong.
This brings me to my fourth objection to the bill. I say it is ill-advised in that it provides that no licence to operate a commercial air service can be issued to any person or any company engaged in transport by means other than aircraft. That provision is contained in section 12(2), which reads:
No such licence shall be issued in respect of a commercial air service, owned, leased, controlled or operated by any person who is engaged in the transport of goods or passengers for hire or reward by means other than aircraft unless

And here is a peculiar proviso which gives the government wide powers by virtue of which it can play favourites in this business-

unless the governor in council is of opinion that it is in the public interest that such licence be issued.
That means that no license can be issued, either to a railway company or to a shipping, bus or trucking company. It cannot be issued to any person or corporation engaged in any other type of transportation. That, again, is a complete about face since 1938, when the minister-the same minister-introduced the Transport Act. Section 3(2) of the Transport Act expressly states that the board of transport commissioners are to try to make all means of transportation in Canada complementary. The section reads as follows:
It shall be the duty of the board to perform the functions vested in the board by this act and by the Railway Act with the object of coordinating and harmonizing the operations of all carriers engaged in transport by railways, ships and aircraft and the board shall give to this act and to the Railway Act such fair interpretation as will best attain the object aforesaid.
Air transport is now to be divorced completely from all other forms of transportation. In that connection one might well ask the question: How are these two boards going to get along together? One board is dealing with railways and shipping and the other deals
with air transportation. How are they going to coordinate? Here is the minister's formula for that difficulty, as it is found at page 2192 of Hansard. He was asked that question, and replied:
I presume if there is any serious interference between rail and air traffic, the two boards can compare notes and work out their problems jointly. There will be no- super-board coordinating all traffic.
That is the extent of coordination and harmonizing that there will be, once this bill becomes law.
In a statement on civil aviation, made some weeks ago, the minister said very frankly that his policy was to put all transport companies out of the air business. That means that Canadian National Railways is going to be right out of Trans-Canada Air Lines. The railway company has done a splendid job of operating Trans-Canada Air Lines; in my opinion the coast-to-coast service is excellent. Yet we are told that now the Canadian National Railways and Trans-Canada Air Lines are to be separated. Then, too, Canadian Pacific Air Lines is to be taken away from the Canadian Pacific Railway; by the act the railway company will have to divest itself of its air lines-air lines which were developed following an announcement of government policy. Here we have a sudden right-about-face in government policy. Both these lines have been built up over a period of years, and I think in both the Trans-Canada and the Canadian Pacific Air Lines we have had efficient operation. There are many communities which depend upon these air services. For example, there is the service from Vancouver to the Yukon, which is flown by Canadian Pacific Air Lines. Then there is the service up into the Mackenzie river, also flown by Canadian Pacific Air Lines. There is the service from Montreal to Quebec, down to the Saguenay and along the north shore of the St. Lawrence, also flown by Canadian Pacific Air Lines. They give good and efficient service, and the people in those communities are entitled to the certainty of continued good service.
Take the service from Vancouver to the Yukon. We do not propose to sit back and see that line wiped out and replaced with perhaps inefficient service because the government or the Minister of Munitions and Supply decides upon a new policy. That is not fair to the people served by that air line. Either the Trans-Canada will have to take it over and render efficient service, or some other provision will have to be -made. The minister referred to the Mackenzie river service the other day. He was asked whether it was the
Aeronautics Act

intention to have Trans-Canada fly that service, and at page 2191 of Hansard he gave this answer:
... at the moment there is no route down the Mackenzie river, and it is not .the intention of Trans-Canada to operate a service in that area.
These operations from Vancouver to the Yukon, along the Mackenzie river and down the St. Lawrence river are not the type of service referred to by the minister as being small operations; nor are they taxi services, as the leader of the C.C.F. called small operations the other day. They do not come under that category. Yet the minister has said that only small operations will be tolerated in Canada.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I never said that.


Richard Burpee Hanson: That is the effect of it.


Howard Charles Green: The minister is reported on page 1573 of Hansard as follows:
The government believes that feeder line operations, and pioneer lines into our northland, can best be developed as small operations.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Developed.


Howard Charles Green: We will take it as "developed."


Clarence Decatur Howe: The Mackenzie river service was developed privately as a small enterprise.


Howard Charles Green: It has grown beyond that stage. The air service from Vancouver to the Yukon has grown far beyond that, and much better service is being given now than was given under that scheme.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I said they would be developed as small enterprises. If they grow into large enterprises, so much the better.


Howard Charles Green: The effect of government policy is to discourage all expansion, because a small operator would have no certainty of his position in the future. If he grows too large, or if the minister does not like the way he is doing business, or thinks that he is getting too big or giving competition, then he will just be snuffed out or taken over. That certainly is no way to build up air lines in Canada. In effect under this government policy there is a sword hanging over the head of every small operator of an air route.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Name the small operators.


Howard Charles Green: There will be many small operators as soon as the war is over, as soon as gold mining opens up.


Clarence Decatur Howe: A sword is not hanging over their heads; they are not in existence.


Howard Charles Green: If they develop at all a sword will be hanging over their heads. The leader of the C.C.F. expressed his point of view on this bill very clearly the other day when it was up for discussion. At page 3963 of Hansard he is reported as having used these words:
I have no doubt that even if people do succeed in setting up privately owned airways in this country and elsewhere it will be only a short time before governments will be compelled to take them over and operate them as great public transportation systems. So that in order to avoid the difficulties which otherwise are bound to arise in the future let us establish now our own publicly owned and publicly operated airways system.
If the C.C.F. get into power all airways will be acquired by the government. They are entitled to that opinion, but we think they are wrong. By bringing in this air policy the ministry are simply playing into the hands of the C.C.F. They are travelling along exactly the same lines, and I suggest to hon. members who are supporters of the government that they read bill No. 133 carefully before they support it in this house.
Finally the bill provides that the government may subsidize air operations. Section 16 reads:
The governor in council may authorize the minister to enter into a contract with any air carrier for the grant of such assistance, financial or otherwise, as may be specified by the governor in council payable out of moneys to be appropriated by parliament for that purpose.
In other words, power is being given to the minister, subject of course to the governor in council-


Clarence Decatur Howe: And to parliament.


Howard Charles Green: It does not say that; it says "governor in council".


Clarence Decatur Howe: It says "appropriated by parliament for that purpose".


Richard Burpee Hanson: All money has to be appropriated.


Howard Charles Green: That is the old alibi, but actually it can be done without parliament being here at all. The governor in council merely has to approve the actions of the minister. That means that any favourite of the government may obtain a subsidy. When the Industrial Development bank bill was under debate it was suggested that it be used to help in the financing of these airways. Why cannot it be done in that way? Why cannot these air operators get their financial assistance, the same as anyone else, from the Industrial Development bank instead of the cabinet taking power to grant subsidies to these companies?

Aeronautics Act
I submit that this bill is ill advised in these five respects. I think some other steps should be taken. I have no objections to there being drastic control; it may be that there should be proper controls to prevent lines from being brought together unduly, from being built up, from being amalgamated, but certainly this bill goes much too far. It is a tragedy. Canada should encourage the building up and the expanding of air traffic. We need a bold air policy, and the policy under this bill is not a bold policy; it is a step backward.
Young Canadians are gaining a name for themselves as airmen in this war, just as they did in the last war. The commonwealth air training plan has been conducted with such success in Canada. Before the war we had a remarkable development of flying into the north country. This country should lead in the development of air routes. We should develop every single agency, Trans-Canada, Canadian Pacific and any other operation, instead of trying to throttle civil aviation in Canada with such a bill as this.


Clarence Decatur Howe: This debate has taken an extraordinary turn in producing contradictory debate. First we had it from the hon. member for Lake Centre (Mr. Diefenbaker) as well as from the hon. member for Vancouver South (Mr. Green) that the government is being made a dictator of policy.


Richard Burpee Hanson: The
minister.


Clarence Decatur Howe: All right, the minister; but the minister is a part of the government and therefore the government is involved.
May I point out that the alternative is to set up a bureaucracy, and the hon. member for Lake Centre spent ten minutes the other night denouncing bureaucracies. Someone must have the responsibility for issuing franchises for air lines, and ever since confederation the government has taken responsibility in the matter of issuing franchises for every type of transportation. It has granted railway franchises-


Richard Burpee Hanson: No. Parliament did, not the government.


Clarence Decatur Howe: The government of the day makes the recommendation.


Richard Burpee Hanson: The company proceeds to get a charter by way of a private bill, asking for the right to go on, and parliament decides. Can the minister not distinguish between the two?


Clarence Decatur Howe: I do not know that there is a great deal of difference.


Richard Burpee Hanson: I agree, but there used to be a difference.


Clarence Decatur Howe: The purpose of this bill is that the government of the day shall be responsible for the administration of Canada's air policy. I believe that that is a sound principle, and I am astonished that there is not general agreement on that point. The Aeronautics Act, which is being amended, went even farther in centralizing authority, because the minister had the sole authority under that act for the granting of licences.


Howard Charles Green: But that was taken away by .the Transport Act.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Yes, in certain particulars, in 1938, and I am coming to that. I will admit at once that the minister is the authority in policy matters, and through him the government of the day takes responsibility. I make no apology for that.
I point out that the board now being established has much wider powers than were given to any administrative board which has dealt with air matters in the past. The board of transport commissioners is bound by the Transport Act and is concerned chiefly with railway problems. The effect of the administration by the transport board was this. In 1938, when the act was passed, there were a great number of independent air operations in this country. Four years later there was only one independent air operation. Every other air operation in the dominion was owned and controlled by the railway companies.
My hon. friend speaks of decisions and mentioned one particular decision of the transport commissioners. That decision was perfectly correct under the Transport Act, but was it in the best interests of Canada? At a time when Canada is extremely short of aviation equipment and -when the travelling public requires transport by air as never before, the board ruled that Trans-Canada Air Lines must operate from Vancouver to Victoria with empty seats, because there was another air operation connecting the two centres. The fact that the other operation was overcrowded and could not begin to handle the traffic, and could not obtain planes sufficient to carry the traffic, did not weigh with the board.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Was not an appeal provided for?


Clarence Decatur Howe: The decision was not appealed. But was it in the public interest?


Howard Charles Green: Why was it not appealed?


Richard Burpee Hanson: It could have been.
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Clarence Decatur Howe: Who would consider it of importance?


Howard Charles Green: Trans-Canada.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Trans-Canada Air Lines is a creature of the government; why should it appeal from the decision of a government board?


Howard Charles Green: Trans-Canada did not make the application. I understand it was made by a municipality.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I think it was made by Trans-Canada Air Lines.
There is a departure in policy involved in this amendment, and that is that, in future, transport by air will not be bound by the rules of surface transportation. It will be allowed to develop separately from surface transportation. That I think is sound. It has been found to be sound in other countries. I know of no other country where control of aviation is in the hands of surface carriers. I know of countries where such control is expressly forbidden.


Mr. DIEFENBAKER:: What countries?


Clarence Decatur Howe: The United States, for
instance.


John George Diefenbaker: Subject to qualification under their aeronautics act.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Tell me one surface carrier that has control of aviation in tihe United States. I can tell you of several that were ordered to divest themselves of air operations.


John George Diefenbaker: Which ones?


Clarence Decatur Howe: The Boston and Maine railroad had an air service between Montreal and Boston, and the railway company was ordered to divest itself of control of that air operation.


Richard Burpee Hanson: The railways are operating an air line to Moncton.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I might also mention the Pennsylvania Central, which was also ordered to be divested. I can mention another company, a shipping line, which was operating an air service across the Atlantic. It has recently been ordered to divest. My hon. friend should not be too sure of his facts. If he can tell me of one company in the United States-


John George Diefenbaker: I am speaking
about the statutes.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Their statute is similar in form to this statute, of which my hon. friend is complaining.


Mr. ADAMSON:: A shipping company is
still operating the American Export Line.


Clarence Decatur Howe: That operation has been purchased by American Air Lines, I am told.
This board has wider powers than ever were given to any previous aviation authority. The board is not bound by existing legislation. It is given the right to develop its own jurisprudence. It is given the authority of licensing, subject to an appeal to the minister in case the applicant for the licence desires to appeal, just as there is an appeal from the board of transport commissioners to council. It is intended that the board will not be simply a judicial board. It will interpret the law in matters brought before it, and also it will assist the government in actively developing aviation.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Acting in an advisory capacity?


Clarence Decatur Howe: In an advisory capacity, and I would like to make that clear, because some hon. members have said that the board should make the policy. I think that would be going too far. I doubt if it would be a wise step to take. It certainly is not the policy of the Liberal government, whether or not hon. gentlemen opposite wish to make it their policy to set up administrative boards independent of parliament.


Richard Burpee Hanson: No one has
ever suggested that.


Howard Charles Green: I did not suggest that the board should make policy. I said that the board could not do two things, that it could not, on the one hand, advise the minister and, on the other hand, be a judicial body.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I suggest that it can. It can advise the minister on certain matters, and can very well exercise a judicial function also, and will do so.


Howard Charles Green: Is it not supposed to rule, between two applicants, for instance?


Clarence Decatur Howe: It can advise the minister.


Howard Charles Green: The board has no judicial
function at all where there is a dispute between two applicants?


Clarence Decatur Howe: The government makes the decision-


Howard Charles Green: Then the board has nothing to do with it at all.


Clarence Decatur Howe: My hon. friend may be interested in knowing how the situation has developed in the past. He told of the number of applications which had been granted by the board of transport commissioners but he did not say to whom they had been granted.

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Howard Charles Green: I simply read from the report. I was not trying to conceal anything.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Of the 62 applications granted, I rather think that 61 were granted to one applicant. I doubt whether that is just the way in which this government wishes aviation to develop in this country.


Mr. COLDWELL:: Who was the one
applicant?


Clarence Decatur Howe: I cannot say at the moment. My hon. friend speaks of subsidies. New air operations in this country have always been subsidized. Lines have been subsidized in the past by the post offices. High mail rates have been given to initiate a service, in the expectation that as the service prospered the postal rates could be reduced. That has usually happened.


Howard Charles Green: Is that not to be done in the future?


Clarence Decatur Howe: No. The post office object to that and quite properly. The post office takes the view that there is no reason why the postal revenues of the country should be used to subsidize an air operation. The policy in the future will be that the postal rate will be fixed at a reasonable figure from the postal point of view and, if an additional subsidy is required, the funds will be voted by parliament. The board will investigate and make a recommendation, after due consideration of the facts and, if the government is satisfied that a subsidy is required to bring the line into operation, that subsidy will be voted by parliament.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Is it not true that the postal subventions were given in the first instance to Trans-Canada, and at a high rate, in order to ensure immediate operation?


Clarence Decatur Howe: Yes.


Richard Burpee Hanson: There is no doubt about that.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Certainly. That is the point.


Richard Burpee Hanson: (York-Sunbury) : That may or may not be a good policy, but I want to have the fact established.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I have said that every operation has been subsidized in its initial stages.


Richard Burpee Hanson: By that method.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Operations have been subsidized by the post office. What I am saying is that the purpose of this bill is to change the method, and I think a much more scientific as well as a fairer method, a method more in keeping with the supremacy of parliament, is being adopted.


Richard Burpee Hanson: It leaves it to the whim of the minister to play favourites if he wants to.


John George Diefenbaker: I have seen some reference in the United States press to the effect that the solution there seems to be the adoption of the rule that all first-class mail shall be delivered by air. Has consideration been given to that question?


Clarence Decatur Howe: There is nothing in this bill to that effect. That question is outside the scope of the bill.
I do not know that I have anything more to say at this time, but while I am on my feet I might give the information requested by the hon. member for Lake Centre with regard to applications for franchise. I believe the question was as to how many applications there had been to the board of transport commissioners between April 1, 1943, and1 March 31, 1944, for licences for transport by air. There have been sixteen applications in that period. I might give the list: Canadian Pacific Air Lines, between points in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia; Canadian Pacific Air Lines in Ontario and Quebec; other points in Ontario and Quebec; other points in Ontario and Quebec, Canadian Pacific Air Lines; another for Canadian Pacific Air Lines, for points in Manitoba; another, Canadian Pacific Air Lines, for points in Ontario; Canadian Pacific Air Lines, for points in British Columbia; Canadian Pacific Air Lines, for points in Quebec, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia; another for Canadian Pacific Air Lines, for points in Ontario.
There is an application for Inter-City Air Lines Registered, Montreal, for points in Quebec and' Ontario, and the second by the same applicant, for points in Ontario. There is another for Vancouver Island Air Lines Limited, for points in British Columbia, twenty-six routes; another by Greyhound Lines, between British Columbia and Alberta, nine routes; another, Grey Coach Lines Limited, Toronto, for routes in Ontario, eleven routes; another for Sky Lines Express Limited, Edmonton, for points in Quebec and Ontario; another by M. & C. Aviation Company Limited, Prince Albert, for points in Saskatchewan and Manitoba.


John George Diefenbaker: What points in Saskatchewan?


Clarence Decatur Howe: I have not the information.


Richard Burpee Hanson: All refused?


Clarence Decatur Howe: All held in abeyance.


Richard Burpee Hanson: At the
request of the minister?


Clarence Decatur Howe: Quite.
Aeronautics Act


Richard Burpee Hanson: Yes.


Mr. COLD WELL:: Since our view has been brought into the picture this afternoon, I wish to say what we believe. We believe that the air lines should be entirely under government control. That does not exclude the possibility of the taxi lines being operated by private individuals or by private local companies.


Mr. MacNICOL:: What does the hon. member mean by taxi lines?


Leslie Gordon Bell: A great deal of stress
is placed on the young airmen who will be coming back from the war, and the opportunities they will have. The list read by the minister indicates that this country is being entirely sewn up now, if the government permits, by the Canadian Pacific Air Lines, and the battle in parliament to-day is a battle -between those of us who believe that the most efficient service can be run by the nation and those who want the Canadian Pacific to get in on the ground floor.


Howard Charles Green: I rise to a point of order,
and a question of privilege. There is an inference-


Richard Burpee Hanson: An imputation.


Mr. REID:: There certainly is.


Howard Charles Green: -that I was speaking for the Canadian Pacific, and I ask that it be withdrawn and withdrawn quickly, because it is absolutely untrue. My hon. friend and his party are very free in throwing around abuse of that kind.


Richard Burpee Hanson: And they are pretty thin-skinned when anything is thrown at them.


Major James William Coldwell: I have nothing to withdraw. What I suggested was-


Richard Burpee Hanson: On a point of order, Mr. Chairman-


The CHAIRMAN:: The hon. member for
Rosetown-Biggar is speaking.


Richard Burpee Hanson: But I rise to a point of order.


Major James William Coldwell: I am speaking to the
point -of order.


Richard Burpee Hanson: You did
not raise one.


Major James William Coldwell: I am speaking to the point of order.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Have I
the floor, Mr. Chairman? The hon. member

for Rosetown-Biggar raised no point of order; he went on with his argument and stated that he withdrew nothing. On the point of order, the hon. member for Vancouver South (Mr. Green) has stated in effect that what the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar has said is an imputation against his motives and his honour. I agree with him and I think the membership of the committee will agree with him. The hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar must withdraw that imputation against the honour of a private member of this house. I ask the committee to sustain the honour of the member for Vancouver South.


Major James William Coldwell: I did not make any
reference to the hon. member for Vancouver South-


Richard Burpee Hanson: The inference is there.


Major James William Coldwell: -either directly or by inference. I repeat what I have said, that the battle in this parliament at the present time appears to me to be a battle between those of us who believe in public ownership and those who believe that the Canadian Pacific Railway Company should be enabled to get in on the ground floor. That is an expression of opinion to which I am entitled.
Mr, GREEN: On a point of order


Joseph-Arthur Bradette: The hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar has the floor; he is speaking to a point of order.


Major James William Coldwell: That, I say, is an opinion to which I am entitled, an opinion which I may express. It reflects on no one. It is, as I see it, a statement of fact.


Howard Charles Green: It so happens that I opened the debate this afternoon and so far I am the only one who has spoken on the subject. Now the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar says that the debate to-day is a dispute between those who believe in the interests of the nation and those who are speaking for the Canadian Pacific Railway Company. That is an imputation which no member of this house should have to face. If a member representing a great constituency is to be faced with that sort of attack the minute he rises to discuss any bill, then there is no use at all of a parliament in Canada. It shows you what we are faced with if the C.C.F. ever get into power. I submit to you, Mr. Chairman, that the hon. member should withdraw.


Thomas Reid: On a point of order-


Major James William Coldwell: I referred to nothing that had been said this afternoon.

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Richard Burpee Hanson: You did
refer to to-day.


Major James William Coldwell: This debate has been on for several weeks and I am giving my opinion of this debate which I have gleaned over these weeks.


Thomas Reid: On a point of order, my point is that the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar has thrown an aspersion, or put a false interpretation upon what I said. I said the other night that I would oppose this bill, and the hon. member in his speech has practically said that because we are opposing it I am in favour of the Canadian Pacific Railway Company. That is one of the subtle speeches that is made and put across the country as propaganda. I repeat I said that I would oppose this bill and I gave my reasons for so doing. The hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar has not dealt with the bill, nor has he warned the country of the danger that there would be in giving the government or any government the powers that are contained in this bill. All that he said was that if we vote against this bill we are in favour of the Canadian Pacific Railway Company. I wish to deny that because it is unfair.


Joseph-Arthur Bradette: On the point of order, I feel that it is a matter of interpretation. I do not think any point of order or question of privilege arises.


Thomas Reid: There is a misstatement of fact.


Major James William Coldwell: May I proceed?


Howard Charles Green: I appeal your ruling, Mr. Chairman.


Clarence Decatur Howe: May I call the attention of the Chair and of hon. members to the undertaking that governs Wednesday sittings? If the leader of the opposition were in his seat he would agree with me in this. The undertaking was that there were to be no divisions on Wednesday afternoon.


Richard Burpee Hanson: This is not that kind of division.


Major James William Coldwell: Mr. Chairman, I do not ivant to delay the proceedings of the committee. If the hon. member for Vancouver South feels that I made any imputations against him personally, and if it would facilitate the business of the committee I shall withdraw that personal imputation.


Howard Charles Green: I do not want any withdrawal to facilitate the business of the committee. If there is to be a withdrawal it has to be an absolute one.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Unqualified.


Joseph-Arthur Bradette: Is the withdrawal
accepted now?


Richard Burpee Hanson: If it is unqualified, yes.


Major James William Coldwell: I made an unqualified withdrawal.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Nobody heard it.


Major James William Coldwell: If the hon. member thinks there was any imputation-


Howard Charles Green: He does.


Major James William Coldwell: If he does, then I withdraw.


Mr. CHURCH:: It has to be by leave of the committee.


Mr. CHEVRIER:: The Chairman has something to say about it.


Major James William Coldwell: If I may proceed, I wish to say that as far as safeguarding these young men are concerned I think the list read by the minister this afternoon shows conclusively that an attempt is being made to gather up these franchises while the war is on. The franchises that have already passed into the hands of the Canadian Pacific Air Lines Limited have been pioneered by men who to-day no longer own those franchises or air lines. It is impossible for a young man, no matter how well trained he may be as a flyer, or for any combination of young men that I can conceive of, on returning from the war to be able to purchase the necessary equipment to operate an air line efficiently. The very fact that those air lines have already passed out of the hands of those who pioneered them is substantiation of what I say, namely, that the equipment for air lines is so costly that only a wealthy corporation or a group of individuals can possibly operate a great air service in this country. The alternative with which we are faced in Canada is, I repeat, whether a private corporation, powerful in itself, shall be permitted to obtain a monopoly of the new franchises that may be granted, or whether this great natural monopoly shall remain in the hands of the people where such monopoly properly belongs.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Will the hon. member tell us why it is a natural monopoly? It is not so in the United States?


Major James William Coldwell: It is a natural monopoly in Canada.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Your ipse dixit does not prove it, you know.


Major James William Coldwell: If the hon. member for York-Sunbury will just remain silent for a moment-
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Richard Burpee Hanson: I am
asking a civil question. If you do not want to answer it, or cannot answer it, all right.


Leslie Gordon Bell: I am answering it. It is a natural monopoly.


Richard Burpee Hanson: That is an assertion; that is not an answer.


Leslie Gordon Bell: No small concerns can enter it without a franchise. A franchise is required to operate an air line.


Richard Burpee Hanson: That is not an answer.


Leslie Gordon Bell: Any organization which uses the air for which a government franchise is given is receiving from the people a monopoly to use that particular air route or air line.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Not
necessarily.


Major James William Coldwell: In the past this country has given away its resources, has given away the right to operate great lines of transportation. I think this parliament ought to safeguard the Canadian people against the exploitation that may accrue from any monopolistic group in this country. We surely have had enough of the control of vital facilities by a few individuals and by powerful corporations to warn us to safeguard the rights of the people at this time, in regard to both aeroplane services, and if I may interject, the airwaves which comprise the radio and the television services of this country. I wish to support this particular bill very warmly.


Thomas Langton Church: I wish to offer some objections to this particular bill, having been one of those who has been interested in this subject in two wars and during the long depression. Those who are opposing the government on this particular measure serve no big interests. I believe I speak for my colleagues as well as myself in this committee when I say that we serve no big interests. So far as this bill is concerned our minds are free. I have always been a public ownership man. I cannot support the first clause of this bill. My remarks will be brief; I offer my opposition now and I shall not offer any objection to the other clauses.
The time has gone by when anyone can offer any criticism about what the opposition has been doing in connection with civil aviation. We serve no big interests. Some of us have suffered in the battle against big interests, and we are prepared to suffer again. I am not for the kind of public ownership that is envisaged by this particular bill, because I believe it would be a fatal policy for the people of this

country at the present time. This bill is drawing a red herring across the trail in the darkest hour of the war, when the invasion has started on the continent and when it is known, as was announced by the great Prime Minister of Great Britain the other day, that they need every plane possible, that they need all the crews and personnel possible for war purposes. How then can the minister give effect to the first clause of the bill at this time? It is beclouding the war issue; it is causing a great deal of dissatisfaction in the country.
This particular industry, if properly applied, would be the greatest source of employment we could have after the war for our young war pilots; but the war is not over yet, far from it. I object to the red herring which has been drawn across the trail to divide our railroads and other forms of transportation, because it is interfering with the war effort.
I believe that the policy proposed will be one of sounding the death knell to all progress in civil aviation in Canada.
I have opposed the principle of this particular bill, bill No. 133. I also oppose the allied bill, to amend the Transport Act, because I am opposed to transferring jurisdiction over commercial aviation from the board of transport commissioners to some other unknown body, especially when the war is at its darkest hour. In the second place, under the present statute every order made by the board of transport commissioners, whether with regard to railways, telephones, express companies or any other function, may be appealed to the governor general in council. That right is eliminated in this new proposal. True it is. under the new bill an appeal may be made from the new air board to the minister.
Section 1 of this bill provides for the establishment of an air transport board, to do what? To advise the minister. On what? On matters in connection with the development of a system of civil aviation. Then it gives the new board another function, making it a licensing and regulatory body with respect to commercial air service. I do not find any judicial or semi-judicial powers conferred upon this body. It is purely a board of regulation; it will be a board of convenience for and subservient to the minister, and nobody will be able to get a licence under section 12, for the board can grant licences only with the approval of the minister. No matter how well qualified a company may be to obtain a licence, the final determination of its rights will be made, not by the board but by the minister himself. I believe that is a fatal mistake, and simply means that by this bill we are setting up a board for purely air local purposes, all dressed up and no place to go.

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A further objection is that the board has no functions to perform. There will be nothing to regulate. We have, during the war and some time after it, no planes, no crews, no personnel. We have been almost begging the United States for planes, and have not received any. They grabbed the Pacific, and if we do not look out they will grab the Atlantic too. In connection with this question of public policy in relation to aviation, the minister forgets all about an empire air scheme. Surely, after spending a billion dollars in this country on the empire air training plan we should be able, after the war by unity in peace in the empire, to get something for the development of civil aviation within the empire, but under the new bill we are not doing anything to set up a commercial commonwealth air board in order to plan empire air routes for the future. Since the visit to England of the Minister of Munitions and Supply the United States under-secretary of state, Doctor Bearle, has also visited that country. He went there simply to discuss aviation matters with the United Kingdom, not with the dominions, but a discussion first between Great Britain and the dominions would have been better. Our young men who are flying all over the world will be very much disappointed with some of these policies. This board will be only clerical and advisory, with nothing to regulate. You cannot regulate a monopoly, and under this measure you are going to set up a monopoly in Canada for all time, at the same time ignoring any empire or international schemes. Of course Russia almost shudders at the mention of the word "international." They have their own plans and policies and, notwithstanding what the minister says, they have made at Moscow a bilateral agreement with Britain for after the war, regarding this very important matter. Britain entered into that agreement because she found us so helpless when it came to *making any agreement along the lines suggested by Mr. Curtin and Mr. Fraser, when they threw out the life-line to Canada last January in the shape of an offer to have a concerted empire scheme, which has been long overdue. By means of empire coordination, cooperation and collaboration it was hoped that there might be an empire air policy by means of which these great dominion premiers could get to Canada in a day or so and discuss the problems which will have to be dealt with after the war. Washington almost shudders at the mention of any international policy. My hon. friends to the left, of the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation, all along have been praising an international policy, but our first duty is to those at home, to our own
family. Let us map out first a policy that will appeal to the empire and the dominions -an empire air scheme first. Then, when you have an empire policy, you can move into the larger sphere of operations as an empire into the international field.
As it is constituted to-day, I do not believe the T.CjA. is a publicly owned body. I am absolutely opposed to the kind of public ownership we see in connection with that enterprise. It is my opinion that these two bills should be sent to a committee of the house, just as the Railway Act is revised by a committee of the house. That Act, like the Bank Act, until recently was amended every ten years. In 1917 a railway committee sat on it for four months hearing deputations. If it had not been for the war the Railway Act would have been revised in the same way long ago all along the line. The other day the Minister of Finance had important bills, the Bank Act and two other bills, first sent to a committee. After all, what are our committees for? Here we have a minister of the crown going over the heads of the dominions and of the mother country, right at the darkest hour of the war with the invasion in progress. What kind of policy is that? We shall make no progress in civil aviation, one of our greatest problems, in that way. As I said recently, I believe the T.C.A. should be reorganized right from the president down. If we want a national system under public ownership, let us have at the head of that system someone who has been a public ownership man. I have a great deal of respect personally for the president of T.C.A., but he is connected with twelve or fifteen companies which are absolutely opposed to the principle of public ownership.
The other day this matter was discussed at some length in both the British House of Commons and the House of Lords. The defects of our empire air system were pointed out. The announcement of this bill in Britain and the dominions has not only caused an air muddle in the dominion; it has caused an air muddle in the mother country, with the result that the Lord Privy Seal, Lord Beaverbrook, was at a loss to say just what Britain's policy is in regard to this matter. As was pointed out by those who spoke during that debate, at the present time we ought to confine ourselves to our military purposes until we know the decision of the great battles confronting us. Lord Beaverbrook, when asked where the planes, aircrew and personnel for civil aviation were to be obtained, did not know, and the critics in the House of Lords, urging an empire plan, said:
What is the use of all this shadow-boxing? Why don't we come to the real issue, that there
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are no aircraft, there is not any personnel, there are not any flying crews, there is no ground staff? . . . Two days this -house has -been sitting discussing a line to South America when we know that we have not got any available aircraft, that we have not got any crews and that we have not got any personnel.
I believe that in bringing up this question now we are interfering with the war effort, along the lines I have suggested. Commenting on the position the London Sketch in May last said:
Two important aspects of the future of civil aviation were raised in the House of Lords yesterday by the Duke of Sutherland: first, the desirability of private -initiative and enterprise in the aeronautical field, and, second, the need for the government now to make up its mind to support flying clubs and to reserve a number of war-time aerodromes for private flying.
With the return of peace a new air age will come into being. An air generation, founded by war, already exists, and there are large numbers of potential recruits who will be eager and should be enabled to take to the air. This new age of air-minded Britons will best be fostered by an unfettered development of the aeronautical industry, for there will -be a heavy demand for light aircraft suitable for private flying. America still leads the world in private flying, but there is no reason why Britain, too, should not begin to prepare for the expected new phase in aviation. It is by no means too early for the government to indicate to the industry and the public its intentions towards the inevitable .post-war demand for popular flying.
Canada is now deciding upon a policy of isolation and a small nation policy of separation. I am sorry I cannot join in the hymn of praise which the minister uttered, and which was echoed by other members in the committee on railways and shipping, for the T.C.A. in the early days of this session. I am sorry I cannot join in that hymn of praise of Trans-Canada Air Lines as at present-administered.
Speaking in the House of Lords the Duke of Sutherland, an aviator, said:
An empire policy for post-war private flying is an urgent military, social and commercial necessity.
I believe that what he has said is true. I have referred to this matter many times this session in opposing a monopoly in connection with civil aviation, and contending that the air should be free for all under drastic regulation. My submission is that there should be no more of a monopoly in civil aviation than in connection with design. No doubt, immediately after the war, improved aircraft for the transportation of passengers, emergency foods and many other articles will be absolutely necessary, because, when the war is over, the railways and other forms of transportation will be choked. So that it will be

of the utmost importance that there be close cooperation and mutual understanding between Great Britain, the United States and the dominions.
I have opposed the creation of any monopoly in Canada. Canada should try to take the lead in the field of design. We should prepare an air policy for the next twenty-five years- but we shall not do it through this bill. Fundamental changes will occur in the future. Aviation in Canada is yet only in its infancy. Research, design and experimentation will be more important than ever. In Canada and in the empire we are on the threshold of a grand new age which will revolutionize aeroplane construction and the development of aeroplane engines. In this field high speed is essential to supremacy. Problems of all sorts arise; science and research will provide even lighter alloys and new types of wings, engines and parts which will withstand various climatic conditions the world over. I do not at the proper time, after the war, oppose a regulatory body. The time is not now.
This particular bill, as I see it, provides no functions for the said board to transact. There is no appeal to the governor in council as in the Railway Act. In my opinion this measure is too much Washington-minded. In our dealings with aviation we have been surrendering to Washington too much of commercial initiative, political and social security initiative, economic initiative and aviation initiative. That is what we are doing, instead of staying within the British empire, as part of a family, the mother country of which has supported us through thick and thin. For that reason I am opposed to the bill.
In conclusion, I would draw particular attention to section 17, which sets out powers subject to international agreements. There are no international agreements, although the mother country has been seeking to make them. Section 17 states:
The powers conferred by this part on the minister shall be exercised subject to any international agreement or convention relating to civil aviation to which Canada is a -party.
What happened in England? Great Britain refused to adopt the proposal of Canada respecting an international body. The result is that there is no international body or association to-day. Both Washington and Moscow shuddered at the thought of it.
If the minister had postponed his decision until after the war the whole matter might have been considered by a select committee. The timing is bad. This is an important matter, and one which should not be considered

Aeronautics Act
until the war is over. No change should be made until that time, for the reasons I have given.
The minister is simply drawing a red herring across the trail. At the present time both railways are choked with traffic; they are doing magnificent work, and at this time should not be interfered with. I admit that Trans-Canada Air Lines has done good work, as have the rival feeder and other companies. These matters should be left alone until the war is over, and the matter can be settled within the empire, first. Then we can move into the international field.
Toronto sends its own members to this House of Commons-a fact which is sometimes forgotten. It is the leading public ownership city on the North American continent. That city has invested very large sums of money in its street railways and radial railways and buses, and the city bought out the Niagara power companies with the province for $32,000,000 and got control of the power companies at Niagara falls. The federal government is reaping the benefit of Toronto's cheap power activities, and no department of government reaps a greater benefit from it in the province than does the one headed by the Minister of Munitions and Supply.
Application was made a short time ago by the Toronto transportation commission for a new form of local service, and helicopter sen-vices, but it was not considered favourably. Surely something should be free. At present a breath of air is about the only thing left that is free. Evidently we are still permitted to breathe air; there is no law to stop that. And yet, by this measure the government is abolishing all possible chance of freedom in the air for civil aviation and for rail and surface transport or for ocean navigation services to continue civil aviation.
The government is about to set up, under the bill No. 133, a new regulatory body-a board all dressed up, with nothing to regulate. They will have nothing to do except to draw their salaries, and all that kind of thing. This is the wrong time to proceed, and the bill should be withdrawn, or at least postponed for a year. If it and several other bills are not postponed we shall be here until Christmas. This bill ought not to be placed before the House of Commons-some of these new utopia bills in the sky, these new dreams of what is to happen-a new heaven and a new earth here after the war. When we get down out of the clouds with a few of them, probably we shall be able to prorogue in about six weeks, since the state has no money of its own for them except what the taxpayer gives it. If we do what I have suggested, I hope that
when this bill reaches another place they will see that it is left over until next year. Let us leave it until the war looks better, and until we have an empire air scheme. Let us not enter into an international busy-body programme, or be Washington-minded when we deal with this measure.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Chairman, I should like to refer to certain statements made by the minister, particularly those dealing with the powers of the air transport board. The minister made the statement that the board provided for in this bill has greater powers than the board set up under the Transport Act. I again refer to the powers held by the board under that act, as they are set out in section 13 (4) to (5). The power of that board was absolute. Within the ambit of the policy in the statute the board was all powerful. The minister has suggested that the air transport board should not have the power to determine policy. No one on this side of the house has ever suggested it. The policy is set out in the statute, and will have to be carried out by the board.
Under section 12 the minister is setting up a board responsible to him and under his direction. If parliament passes this bill it will be harnessing that board with powers which cannot be used because the board will be hobbled by the prejudices of the minister. In other words, a body having all the outward appearances of possessing powers is being set up, but it is able to exercise that power, as was said by the hon. member for Vancouver South, only with the approval of the minister. I entirely disagree with that principle.
It is my intention to move an amendment to section 12, when the opportunity arises, to delete the words "subject to the approval of the minister". The minister stated that this board has the power of the aeronautics board in the United States. Apparently a reading of that act was not a prerequisite to the drafting of the present bill. The aeronautics act of the United States gives power to the board it sets up to licence and control. It provides for the setting up of an air safety board to bring in the necessary regulations touching on safety, etcetera. It declares for a principle which we on this side of the chamber are not ashamed to declare for, that in the operation of the airways there should be an encouragement of competition to the extent necessary to ensure sound development of an air transportation system properly adapted to the needs of foreign and domestic commerce. That is the basis upon which the aeronautics act of the United States is premised.
I believe that the air transport board should have the power to regulate and control the

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COMMON?
airways to assure that competition will be maintained. Its purpose should be to control and protect the Canadian people against monopoly privilege, while at the same time promoting expansion or development, either by public or by private ownership, so far as feeder lines are concerned. When I look over this bill all I can conclude is that the Minister of Munitions and Supply wishes to place himself in such a position that, while pretending to be a servant of parliament, he will in fact under this legislation be master of the air development of this country. I have seen too much evidence of a cavalier disregard of the rights of parliament on the part of the minister to be willing to allow him to have the power which he asks for under this bill.
Gradually year by year we are permitting encroachments to take place on parliamentary procedure. We are losing our rights. Under the War Measures Act everybody legislates but parliament. Carry this bill into effect and you will carry into the days of peace the power now conferred on the executive under the War Measures Act. I cannot understand how there could be a better set-up for those who would centralize government than legislation such as this. The minister asks for almost unlimited powers under the war assets corporation bill. He will ask for like powers under the transport bill, and he asks for the extraordinary powers of this bill. I for one will not vote for the principle of a bill which will allow a minister of the crown., uncontrolled, to determine who shall have the right in this country to develop aviation.
It has been suggested that transportation companies are to be refused the right to operate air lines in this dominion because experience in other countries has shown that they are unable to do so satisfactorily. Under the United States act that right is granted with the consent of the board. Within recent months the entire trend in Great Britain has been to permit the interurban airways to develop in conjunction with the railway and transportation companies. Only recently a discussion took place in the House of Lords with regard to the international situation, and there was strong support for the view that steamship companies, having international relationships, should receive consideration in this development.
The reason given for all this is that the men coming back from the war should have an opportunity to bid in on these various air routes. There is no one who has better knowledge of the profits made by companies operating feeder or independent routes than the minister. He is reported as follows on page 1572 of Hansard of March 17:

The first year of the war saw a sharp curtailment in gold mining operations, particularly those in remote areas, with the result .that traffic for these independent air lines was sharply curtailed. I think I can say that the operation of these air lines, many of which were financed by public subscription, had never been profitable.
If they have never been profitable, what about the possibility or the probability of the men returning from overseas being able to enter the business, particularly when the establishment of an air line with only one aeroplane of the dimensions required means an outlay of from $200,000 to $250,000? We must make provision for our men when they come back from overseas. It is estimated that there are 225,000 men in the air force of this country, and the highest estimate, made by Doctor Weir, of the number of those men who can be employed in civil air services is 25,000. It has been estimated in, the United States that in order to retain one-fifth of the men in their ground and aircrew it will be necessary that at least fifteen per cent of the ton miles now hauled on the railroads be hauled by the airways.
What we need is jobs for these men. Are they going to get jobs when they come back from overseas and apply for an air route which will require a quarter of a million dollars to set up? Are they going to enter into a business which according to the minister was never profitable before the war? I am one of those, who after the last war had an interest in a small air company. Year after year we put money into it but we never got any dividends. Finally there was an accident or two and that was the end of the company.
I submit that the men coming back from overseas will have a greater prospect of securing a degree of employment in aviation if we permit the development in this country of private air routes while preventing mergers and monopoly. The minister has never given any explanation for his change of viewpoint since 1938 when he believed that it was necessary for the railway corporations to operate the airways. After five or six years he has changed his mind. What has been the reason for that change? No one has ever been able to get an answer from the minister. Has it been antagonism against any one railway company?


Clarence Decatur Howe: Mr. Chairman, I ask the hon. member to withdraw that insinuation, which has been made several times. Why insinuate that there is any antagonism?


John George Diefenbaker: I do not insinuate. I ask whether there has been.

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Clarence Decatur Howe: A neat way of insinuating.


John George Diefenbaker: And the answer is
still not a negative from the minister. He does not deny it. He said that I should withdraw something that I asked a question about, but he does not deny antagonism.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I deny it now. Is my hon.
friend satisfied?


John George Diefenbaker: The minister has
now denied it, but I had to ask the question several times to get that denial. I am glad to have it now.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Your insinuation is still on
the record.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Chairman, we
must develop the airways of the north. Can we develop them unless they are going to be profitable? The minister said that these were never profitable.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I made no such statement.


John George Diefenbaker: The minister says
that he made no such statement. I quoted from Hansard a moment ago his exact words.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Where is the word "never" in there?


John George Diefenbaker: The minister sometimes forgets, just as last evening he forgot that a couple of months ago he stated in this house that he had told the board of transport commissioners not to issue a licence to a company between Saint John and Halifax. When faced with his own statement last night he used words to the effect that if he had been so reported in Hansard, that was his answer. I referred a moment ago to his use of the word "never." At page 1572 of Hansard the minister said:
I think I can say that the operation of these air lines, many of which were financed by public subscription, had never been profitable.
There are his exact words-they had never been profitable. Now if in the conditions before the war, when there was a tremendous mineral development in the north, these air lines had never been profitable, is there any reason to believe that they will be any more profitable now than they were then?
The minister added that the reason for the emergency action of the Canadian Pacific Air Lines in taking over certain smaller companies was that:
With the curtailment of traffic before mentioned, these small operators were faced with the necessity of either finding a buyer or closing down.
If these air lines could not be operated profitably by private industry which found it
100-254$
necessary to get out of the field or close down, can the government be expected after the war to continue to operate these lines in outlying portions of the country?
Another criticism of the essence of this bill is that it will deny to bus line companies and the like the right to operate helicopter services between neighbouring towns and points which are too close together to permit of the ordinary airways service. It will deny it because the government in the interests of its own political survival cannot enter into transactions or propositions such as this unless assured that there will be a reasonable return from them. The minister in reply to the hon. member for Peterborough West said that helicopters could not be utilized to-day, that they were still in the experimental stage. I have before me an authoritative work entitled "The Air Future," by Burnet Hershey, which sets out the position of helicopters and envisages the day not very far distant when the United States of America alone within ten years after the war will have a million helicopters in use. I quote:
Helicopters able to travel between 120 and 140 miles an hour and carry from twelve to twenty passengers are not beyond reasonable expectations.
Then later on:
Even before the end of the African campaign, American and Northeast Airlines had filed applications with the civil aeronautics board for authorization to operate helicopter air mail services from the rooftops of more than 400 post offices and railroad stations in the eastern states.
I submit that if we adopt the plan of the minister in this legislation, denying to transport companies and the like the right to operate air lines, we shall in fact retard the development of air traffic in this country, and at the same time we shall not be assuring employment to a large number of the men returning from overseas.
Again I refer to the terms of the bill itself. I ask the membership of this house this question. Do we realize what the implications of this proposed legislation are? It places the minister in the position of being the boss of aviation, where every individual and every returned soldier, everybody in this dominion, must comply with his wishes, and be subject to his whims and prejudices. Otherwise they will not receive a licence.
So far as government policy is concerned, it must be directed by the minister and the policy has been set forth in the bill, that no licence, if this is accepted by parliament, shall be issued for a commercial air service that is owned, leased, controlled or operated by any
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person engaged in the transport of goods, and secondly, that no person shall have an air franchise unless he is adequately equipped and able to conduct a safe operation. These are matters of policy. They rest with the government, but in my opinion, within the ambit of government policy, the granting of licences should rest with a body uncontrolled by the minister; or why set up a body? Is it simply to go through the motions, to take the responsibility and have no power to act as it will?
Now as to the subsections which provide for an appeal, subsections 8 to 10 of section 12. If the minister says that a certain individual or a certain corporation shall not receive a licence, then, regardless of his reasons, that person or corporation is denied the opportunity to have a licence. The minister has said in effect that a person whose rights to licence are denied can appeal to the minister, and under the bill, provision is made for an appeal from the. hired man to the hired man's boss, after the hired man has refused a licence, having acted under the direction of the boss. I submit that the principle embodied in section 12 will curtail the development of airways in this country. It will mean that the development of our airways will not rest on the needs of aviation facilities, but will be strictly under the control of the minister.
The passing of this bill in its present form will be an abdication by parliament of its powers in that absolute power will be given to a minister, uncontrolled in any way, to dictate who shall be the recipients of the right to operate an airway licence in this country.
Let me place this viewpoint before you, Mr. Chairman. Suppose a person well qualified to operate an air route, the person best qualified to operate it, a person unconnected with a corporation, should apply for a licence, and there were other applicants less qualified. The minister will have the right to say to the board, "You will give that licence to the least qualified of these three." I submit that to allow a minister that power is to emasculate the board that is set up. In effect the bill confers powers on the board and then hobbles it by placing the minister in control of its actions. Never has there been any legislation in this parliament that would set up such a board and at the same time make the minister the absolute boss of it. As far as the minister is concerned, he intends to administer the power conferred on him fairly and squarely, without prejudice in any way, but it is not the individual that is in issue; it is the principle. Give that power that the minister has under this bill to a minister in another government in the future and that minister can throttle the right to develop aviation in this country. I ask

the minister to reconsider section 12, subsection 1, by deletion of the words "subject to the approval of the minister," which occur in the paragraph that will enact that the board may issue to any person applying therefor a licence to operate a commercial air service-, and second, by deletion of subsection 2 thereof, so that the matter will rest with the board to determine who shall have licences.
Too often the minister feels that when we analyse legislation such as this there is some personal feeling. Far from it. There is a principle at stake. Parliament is asked for the abdication of its power; it is asked to confer on an individual powerful rights, without any control of the fair and just carrying out of those rights. As the hon. member for Vancouver South so well pointed out, under the old act there was an appeal from the transport board, so far as rail transportation was concerned, to the courts of the country. There the aggrieved could secure a measure of justice.


Clarence Decatur Howe: An appeal to the courts on points of law, and an appeal to the governor in council on points of policy.


John George Diefenbaker: That is perfectly
true, an appeal on points of law, but still an appeal. Under this bill there is no right of appeal to the courts. There is no right on the part of the individual aggrieved to have his rights determined without favour. Anarchy begins when there is denial of recourse to the courts. Injustice has its inception when any individual is endowed with absolute power without control and without regard to the rights of the individual. I appeal to the minister to reconsider this matter. These powers are too great to confer on an individual. We allow individuals the exercise of great powers in time of war. We accept centralization of authority in the executive. But with all the force at my command I intend to resist the extension of the centralization of authority in an individual or an executive. Where the individual is denied an appeal to the courts if aggrieved, I intend to insist, as far as I am concerned-even if I am the only member to do so-that democratic rights shall be upheld and that we remove the cloak of obscurity that hangs about these measures in order that the people may know, at all events, that there is a definite trend in the direction of and in extension of executive power in respect of which the individual is denied the right of appeal to the courts.


Richard Burpee Hanson: The minister must not think for a moment that because we use strong language in denouncing the underlying principles of the bill there is

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anything personal in respect of himself. Let that be made clear at the very beginning. I would make this preliminary observation to the minister, having regard to the political situation in this country at the present time. This legislation is socialistic. I ask this question: Is this an attempt to outbid the rising power of socialism in Canada? Is this bill not the negation of everything that a Liberal party ought to stand for?


Mr. MACKENZIE (Vancouver Centre):: By no means.


Richard Burpee Hanson: All right.
I think if I took the time I could demonstrate that.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Define your own objectives.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Well, I will refer back to 1919 when the Canadian National Railway Act was set up, before I was here and before the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Mackenzie) was here.
I would ask the hon. gentleman to read the speeches of D. D. McKenzie and other leading Liberals, speaking on this side at that time, in relation to the setting up of the Canadian National Railways. I would ask him to read the speeches of Roch Lanctot of Laprairie and Napierville, who offered to give away the Canadian National Railways for a dollar. Let him read those speeches and see what the attitude of the Liberal party was at that, time toward the amalgamation of the roads being taken over.
Liberalism, if I understand the subject matter correctly, means the liberty of the subject, the liberty of the citizen to engage in private enterprise; and some Liberals have belonged to the school of laissez-faire-at least Liberals in the old country have belonged to the school of laissez-faire, and we all know what that means. I admit that Liberalism in this country has often taken strange bypaths, but that is merely in passing. This bill is socialistic in its tendencies, and has regard to the political trend of the time. If you do not believe me, page the Minister of Agriculture.


Mr. GIBSON:: Or Mr. Bracken.


Richard Burpee Hanson: It is playing exactly into the hands of those who would nationalize in Canada all great major undertakings. I do not believe the people of Canada desire that.


Clarence Decatur Howe: This bill nationalizes nothing.


Richard Burpee Hanson: The tendency of this bill is toward nationalization and
socialism. The minister's denial does not make it otherwise. The mere assertion of a negative does not prove anything. I would ask the minister to let me proceed with the thesis I am trying to develop. I warn the minister against legislative trends of this sort. We heard the hon. member for Broadview (Mr. Church) boasting a few moments ago that he was all for public ownership within certain ambits, and I am reminded that all the public ownership corporations that are set up in this country by the provinces, under the guise of commissions, escape the obligations that are imposed upon me as an individual taxpayer; and the trend is extending into the old Conservative province of Quebec. I ask myself the question: Who is to make up the nine or ten millions of income tax that will now be lost to the public treasury of the country by reason of ' the recent conversion in the province of Quebec of the Montreal Light, Heat and Power company? You and I.


Mr. MARTIN:: There is a cut in consumer rates.


Richard Burpee Hanson: They cut consumer rates by the amount of relief from taxation. Of course, they could cut consumer rates, and the corporation would long ago have cut consumer rates if it had been relieved of onerous taxation, which very properly it was not relieved of. But what happens? It is merely passed on to the general body of taxpayers in this country, and you and I who do not live in those communities have to pay an increased proportion. That is merely by way of passing.
I think the minister ought to be given perhaps a cursory sketch of the history of the control of transportation in Canada. He has not lived in Canada as long as some of us have, and he may not know that down to 1904 there was no public body in Canada charged with the control of transportation rates and conditions in this dominion. In the year 1904 this parliament, as a matter of government policy under the direction of the late Hon. Andrew G. Blair, set up a board of railway commissioners; and I believe it is the chief claim to fame of Mr. Blair that he fathered the idea of a government appointed judicial body having jurisdiction delegated to it by parliament-not as a bureaucracy, as t'he minister would suggest, by inference at all events, but as a body removed and free from political considerations, to look after the control of the railways in the interests of the state. Mr. Blair became the first chairman. What was the position previously? The rail-
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way companies were chartered, and may still be chartered, if they are intra-provincial, by the provinces as well as by the dominion; but if they are interprovincial they can be chartered only by this parliament. So far as the provincial railways are concerned tihe control of their rates has always been vested in the executive council of the different provinces-at least that is the position in my province, and I assume it is so in other provinces, although as a matter of fact it is merely an academic question and has no practical application at the moment because nearly all the railways of this country are now within the jurisdiction of the federal authority.
Previously to 1904 the control of rates with respect to railways under the jurisdiction of the federal authority was in the hands of the governor in council. I recall that one of the first subject matters I had to study when I came to parliament after the election of 1921 was the question of the suspension of a special statutory rates set up by the minister of railways in the year 1897 in consideration of certain concessions given by the government of the day to the Canadian Pacific Railway for the building of the Growsnest Pass branch. At that time we had the spectacle of statutory rates being embalmed in the rate structure of the Canadian railways. Could anything be more injudicious than embalming static statutory rates in a freight rate structure? That was the position in 1904, and ever since that time this question of rates, except in so far as circumstances have had to be applied to alter certain conditions that arose during the war, the control of operations and other jurisdiction so far as railways are concerned was in a judicial body which had wide powers, and which I venture to suggest over forty years of experience has shown was never abused but on the contrary enured to the benefit of the body politic. My recollection is that from 1904 to 1917 the functions of the board of railway commissioners were employed more particularly in protecting the people of Canada against the railways, and from 1917, because of war-time conditions and the greatly increased cost of operating, wages and otherwise, the board was protecting the railways against the aggression of the electors. At least that was so, and that was the situation in 1921; but speaking generally the system functioned admirably. On questions of law there was an appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada, as the minister has correctly stated, and on questions of fact to the governor in council of Canada. I have not delved into the records at all but I think they will show that that appeal was not often taken. It was exercised sparingly, and most 
frequently on questions of fact the decision of the board of railway commissioners was affirmed by the governor in council.
So much for the setting up of the board of railway commissioners, which I deny was a' bureaucracy in any sense of the word. It was a judicial body, and the public and the governments of the day had a good deal of satisfaction in watching their operations and decisions. So far as I recall those boards were headed by chairmen of the highest character, men of judicial ability who took a great pride in doing the work that they were called upon to do, and who built up a system of jurisprudence which I think has been a pattern for similar bodies in this country. We adopted that system because there had been established in the United States the interstate commerce commission, a more or less similar body Which I believe has functioned to the complete satisfaction of the people of the neighbouring republic.
I now come to the question of domestic civil aviation. I desire to apply, if I may, some of the principles that have been established by forty years of use of the judicial policy incorporated in the act relating to the board-of railway commissioners. Civil aviation is of comparatively recent origin. I recall that the late James A. Richardson and his associates established, if I remember correctly, the Canadian Airways. That was a body that had the blessing of the governments of this country. It was a private enterprise. A substantial amount of private capital was invested in it, and lost, chiefly, I think, because of the fact that the Canadian people were not then air-minded.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Because your government closed it down in 1930.


Richard Burpee Hanson: The minister can make a cheap gibe at me, but I am not going to reply in kind. Our government had to meet circumstances as they arose in a very trying time, and times that were not of our making. Whether we were right or wrong does not alter the situation. The fact of the matter is that Canadian Airways was an attempt on the part of private enterprise to enter a new field of transportation in this country, and it did not survive. I do not suggest for a moment that the minister believes that governmental action was the 'cause of its death. At all events When the ifnihister entered this federal area in 1938 he himself encouraged the policy of private enterprise, but because of the amount of the capital required, because of the size of the country, because of the magnitude of the undertaking then under review, it was felt

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that only strong and important bodies could go into this business of transcontinental airways.
But private enterprise was encouraged; that was the policy of the government, and I think I can say without fear of successful contradiction that from that day down to a comparatively recent time the administration opposite encouraged private enterprise to go into the field of aviation. Had it not been for the nature of the huge undertaking, much more would have been done than was done by private enterprise. In any event I think it is incontrovertible that when the small lines reached the end of their tether because they could not make any money and could not pay their way, the government of the day, which was the present government, unquestionably encouraged the taking over of those lines by Canadian Pacific Air Lines. I do not think there is any doubt about that. They invested a large sum of money in those lines, which I believe is now in danger. However, I have had no communication with Canadian Pacific Air Lines, and I am not dealing with that aspect at all to-day.
In 1938, then, we had a policy set up of quasi-private enterprise, shall I say, of course aided by governmental subventions without which it never could have been started. There were substantial and generous subventions from the Post Office Department, and I am not sure that the minister is wrong when he suggests that in a given case these subventions should take another form. I am inclined to agree with that part of the bill which suggests that if public aid is required it should not be in the form of swollen post office subventions, because I believe the revenues of the Post Office Department are being unduly loaded with expenditures that are not justified from an operating, departmental view. However, I have no doubt there are two schools of thought in that regard. I have not investigated the matter mathematically, and I am not sure which school is right, but I am not condemning the minister's point of view in that Tegard.
Then suddenly, after the Canadian people and particularly the youth of Canada had become air-minded,'we had a right-about-face on the part of the administration, and this bill is the result. I venture to say to this committee and to the country that we have never been given, at any time or at any place, a satisfactory reason for the change in policy. The government sold its policy on this matter to the house and the country in 1938; now it has changed its policy, and it must justify that change in policy at the bar of public opinion. If it was right then it is wrong now;
if it is right now it was wrong six years ago. Not once, as far as I can recall, has the minister justified his right-about-face in regard to this question of public policy.
On the question of public policy I assert, as was asserted by my colleague a few minutes ago, that on questions of policy the government of the day must, of course, have the last word; but because the government asserts a policy does not by any means carry with it the conviction that such policy is right. No board of aeronautics; no governmental judicial body such as has been set up in relation to railways, has the right to determine public policy. That is the function of the executive, supported by parliament; but once that function has been discharged the duty of the executive should cease, and the operation of carrying out the policy should be vested in a judicial body which would be free from political control. That, I believe, has been the history of the railway commission and should be the pattern for dealing with aeronautics in this country. What have we here? We have an emasculated board of aeronautics which is to be set up under this bill, which has nothing whatever to do with policy but which is purely advisory, and that is the most you can say for it. It is true that in the bill the minister has gone through the form of giving this body certain authority. Section 8 provides that it may make rules for the regulation of its proceedings and the performance of its functions and duties under this measure. That means it can draw up a set of by-laws, and that is all it means; it may make rules for the orderly carrying out of the business within its jurisdiction. Then section 9 provides:
Subject to the directions of the minister, the board shall from time to time make investigations and surveys relating to the operation and development of commercial air services in Canada. . . .
This board has no independent function delegated to it by parliament. It is a puppet of the minister, and I use that word in no derogatory sense; it is a term very commonly used to designate people in the category in which the membership of this board will find themselves, in that they cannot move without the nod and the authority, express or implied, of the minister. It does not take a board to make explorations, investigations and surveys. Competent departmental officials can perform these functions. The minister might as well have gone the whole way and reserved the whole power to the department in question. The board is given a power not with respect to policy but with respect to making recommendations in reference to any investigation or sur-
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vey it may make, and to advise the minister in the exercise of his duties and powers under this measure in all matters relating to civil aviation. Under that provision I suppose they are to be, in a sense, a board of experts who tender their advice, which may or may not be accepted. Nothing could be much more innocuous than a board of this nature, set up to do the bidding and will of the minister if they will, but if they do not conform to his desires then their reports go into the waste-paper basket unless he chooses to adopt them. Of course that is no kind of judicial board at all. It is not an administrative board. That is merely an advisory committee that could be set up without any legislation. As far as sections 8 and 9 of the bill are concerned, I believe "innocuous" is the right term for them. There is a further question in section 10:
The iboard shall from time to time make recommendations to the minister with reference to any investigation or survey made by it. . . .
And so on. That is in the same category as section 9. Then section 11 empowers the board, subject to the approval of the governor in council, to make certain regulations. In this case the governor in council is the minister, because this board will report to the minister, and if he does not see fit to recommend these regulations to the governor in council for enactment they die then and there. Any report the minister may make to the governor in council either pro or con, favourable or unfavourable, will, of course, be given either the approval or the disapproval of the governor in council. The minister still remains the head, the neck, the shoulders and everything else, so far as the board is concerned.
Someone has said that he will be a dictator. The minister's reply to that is that somebody has to be a dictator. I do not think anyone has to be a dictator in respect of a great utility, such as aviation in this country. Let us put it on a plane analogous to the manner in which our railways are controlled in Canada, md that will be suitable to the people. The oeople of Canada will never again allow the control and operation of ralways in their country to fall back into the hands of a min-.ster of railways, or a minister of transport, whatever you wish to call him, as existed prior to 1904.
Here is a government inviting parliament, commanding its followers, to put aviation in exactly the position the people of Canada would reject in connection with railway transportation. I submit that in respect of the principle involved the two cases are analogous. If it is a proper principle that the railways shall be controlled in the manner I have indicated-perhaps inadequately-then it is

just as true that the control of aeronautics and the operation of companies, or whoever
may be fortunate enough to get licences, should be carried on in the same way as is done by the board of transport commissioners. I believe that when the people of Canada come to understand the tremendous powers vested in the minister designated-the Minister of Munitions and Supply-they will reject this bill, because they will know that it is capable of the greatest possible abuse.
The minister says that he will operate fairly, and I have no doubt that is his present intention. But let me put this case to him: In the face of an election one group of citizens comes to him with a proposal, and another group approaches him with another proposal in respect of the same subject matter. He must make the decision. What minister ought to allow himself to be placed in that position? I say that no minister ought to permit himself to be so placed.
Let me illustrate by referring to the granting of pensions by the Minister of Pensions and National Health. It is unthinkable that the Minister of Pensions and National Health should be authorized by parliament to grant pensions in individual cases. It is equally unthinkable that the Minister of Munitions and Supply, the minister designated by this bill, should be allowed to choose as between groups A, B, C and D as to which shall have a licence to operate an air route.
The Canadian people do not like this power of picking and choosing at the whim or, if you like, the prejudice of a minister. Or, yes, it may be the caprice of a minister. I point this out as a principle which ought to guide parliament in dealing with this matter. A minister ought not to allow himself to be put in a position where he will have to decide as between different applicants for licences. It is not fair to the minister, and by every test it is not fair to the people that the minister should have this power.
One board has issued licences to aviation corporations in this country. This new board is to have the power to override the decision of the present board, which is a branch of the board of transport commissioners. It can override a licence already given. The new board will have power to review all licences with respect to commercial air services issued under part III of the Transport Act, 1938, or under part VII of the air regulations of the same year, legislation set up under this very minister. What an incongruous position! Is parliament going to set up a new board to review the actions of a board which previously, by the will of parliament, was granted control over the issuing of certain licences? I think

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that is a terrible position. Here we have a right. of appeal, an overriding veto on a creature of a judicial or corporate nature the minister has already set up. Or, to be more exact, there is to be an overriding veto in a given case, if it is so issued, from the decision of a judicial board in which the minister himself, through parliament, vested full authority in connection with these licences.
I would ask the minister, when he replies, to give me an answer to that. Why is there a violation of a principle whereby one board of equal standing is to have power to review the activities of another board of similar standing, and probably without the hearing of any evidence at all? If there were a higher judicial authority, my argument would not prevail. But I have only to mention the lack of principle underlying the power given to this new board, without any reason, to review licences which have been issued.
Then, of course, there is the question of the licences themselves, a subject which has been debated to some extent. The board is not to issue licences. I know the bill says that the board may issue to any person a licence, but that provision is subject to an overriding stipulation that the minister must give his approval first. That does not leave the board to act as a free agent. Every consideration of public policy, public convenience and public demand, in the interests of right, justice and equity, might prompt a board to come to the conclusion that a licence should be issued. Yet that licence would be refused if the minister said "No", and there is no appeal from his decision.
There is a form of appeal-I venture to say it is just a hollow mockery-from the decision of the board. The only other mockery in government legislation which would be comparable is found in tire taxation laws of the dominion. I have run up against them lately-not on my own behalf, but for somebody else. I find that if a taxpayer in this country is dissatisfied with his assessment under the income tax or excess profits tax laws, he may file a notice of appeal. To whom does he appeal? He appeals to the very authority which imposed the tax in the first instance, namely the Minister of National Revenue. It is a travesty in the administration of justice that such should be the case, and I have urged upon certain persons in governmental authority that an amendment should be made at this parliament. Appeals from assessments under the income tax and excess profits tax laws should not be from Caesar to Caesar, from minister to minister, or from the minister who made the decision and the assessment to the minister who is acting in the capacity of an appellate court.
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I am satisfied that the conviction will be brought into the mind of every one who is listening that the system is all wrong. There should be an appeal to a judicial body and it should be an appeal on the question both of law and of fact. In principle it will be an appeal on the question of the interpretation of the statute. I suppose that here again the bureaucratic mind which is so much in evidence today is again prevailing. There is to be an appeal from a body dominated by the minister to the minister who dominated the body in the first instance. I do not think I could use more cogent language to condemn that provision of the statute if I were to stand here all night. I condemn the underlying principle of this bill. If hon. members will do themselves, not me, and the country the justice that they ought to do by reading and studying these provisions, I do not think one of them will vote for this section. I condemn the provisions that maintain the incongruity of keeping in the hands of the minister absolute, unthrottled, uncontrolled control of the operations of this board.
It is a farce to set up a board of this nature. A board of aeronautic engineers, under salary, under the minister's direction, could do all the work that this board is intended to do. I suppose it is being set up under the guise that it is an independent board, but it is nothing of the sort. From A to Z this will be a creature of the minister and nothing else. I had not intended to speak so long, but if [DOT] an amendment is moved to subsection 1 of section 12 to strike out the words "subject to the approval of the minister," I intend to vote in favour of it and endeavour to give this board some independence. Subsection 2 of that section provides:
No such licence shall be issued in respect of a commercial air service, owned, leased, controlled or operated by any person who is engaged in the transport of goods-
I am not just sure of the implication of that, but I desire to call the attention of the committee to the. overriding provision which follows:
-unless the governor in council is of opinion that it is in the public interest _ that such licence be issued.
Let us consider the implication of that.


Joseph-Arthur Bradette: I desire to inform the
hon. member that he has spoken for forty minutes.


Richard Burpee Hanson: I did not think I had, but if you say so I will sit down.


Joseph-Arthur Bradette: I kept the time and so did the assistant clerk.

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Richard Burpee Hanson: I kept the time also and I do not think you are right.


Joseph-Arthur Bradette: I kept the time, and
I always have it checked by the assistant clerk.


Richard Burpee Hanson: I kept the time.


Joseph-Arthur Bradette: Surely the Chair has the right to say when a member has spoken for forty minutes. It is not a duty that I exactly relish, but I am expected to perform it.


Richard Burpee Hanson: I think a member has some rights.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I want to protest most strongly and emphatically against the reflection made by the hon. member for York-Sunbury against the Chair.


Richard Burpee Hanson: I do not
intend to take a lecture from you or anybody else.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I am rising to a point of order.


Richard Burpee Hanson: I thought
the chairman was wrong, but if he says I am wrong, I am going to sit down.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I am rising to a point of order.


Mr. GRAYDON:: I think it is better forgotten.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Better not uttered.


Richard Burpee Hanson: There was no reason for you to intervene. -


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I am just as responsible as my hon. friend for the proper conduct of this debate.


Gordon Graydon: You take a pretty heavy responsibility at times.


Joseph-Arthur Bradette: I will ask hon. members to address the Chair; not for my sake, but a certain decorum must exist at all times in carrying on the debates of the committees of the house.


Mr. ROEBUCK:: may get back to a parliament of the old days when the members of this deliberative assembly controlled more of the public business of the country. But were my friends opposite to have their way, they would establish in aviation a permanent board of appointed controllers who would determine the future of the air in Canada.


Mr. HAZEN:: I do not like to see this bill pass without voicing my objections to some of its provisions. The hon. member for Trinity (Mr. Roebuck) referred to the fact that before a railway could be established the promoters had to come to this parliament to obtain an act. Under the present Transport Act, part III, I believe it is provided that before the existing transport board can grant licences to companies or persons to carry on aviation the governor in council shall state between what places in this country lines may be run or carried on. But once that is done, the transport board has absolute jurisdiction.


Arthur Wentworth Roebuck: I think that is substantially what I said.


Douglas King Hazen: I understood that the hon. member was making a wide distinction between the powers of railway companies and those of aviation companies or persons carrying on aviation. When this committee was last sitting on Monday evening, the minister said, as reported at page 3969 of Hansard, that the bill proposed to set up a board that had all the judicial or quasi-judicial functions of the board of transport commissioners, under the Transport Act, and that those functions were not subject to review by the minister. He went on to say that provision was made in the bill for an appeal to the minister in certain cases, just as there is provision for an appeal from the board of transport commissioners to the privy council.
If you will examine the transport commission's powers, which are contained in section 13 of the Transport Act, you will find that the commission was empowered to license aircraft to transport passengers or goods. They were given absolute power. The power was not limited. They did not have to obtain the approval of the minister before granting those licences. It was, I say, an absolute power. But when you come to examine this bill, you find that the powers of the board are limited. Its powers are restricted by section 12, subsection 1, which provides that it may issue licences only with the approval of the minister. The board is limited further in its powers to grant licences by section 12, subsection 4, of the bill, which provides that it cannot issue a licence until the minister issues an operating

certificate; to save time I will refrain from reading subsection 4, but in substance that is the provision it makes.
Many hon. members on this side have asked why the board's powers have been so limited, and I have not heard a satisfactory reply from the minister. As the hon. member for Lake Centre said the other evening, there are no safeguards in the bill against objectionable exercise or abuse of the minister's powers.
I do not mean by that, and I do not think he did, that the present minister would indulge in or exercise any powers that might be called abuses. Nevertheless, in my opinion, and as the hon. member for Vancouver South said, the bill confers dictatorial powers on the minister and that, I think, is objectionable.
But the conferring of these powers on the minister is not all that is objectionable in the bill. The bill provides for an appeal by an applicant who feels that he has not received a fair deal. But to whom is he to appeal? Who is to hear and decide on his grievance? The Minister of Transport, the man who has the say as to whether or not he gets the licence, is the man who is to judge whether or not his appeal will be allowed.
There is no principle of justice in such a proceeding, no principle on which such a proceeding can be justified. Under our system of democratic government, the men and women the voters of the country elect to parliament make the laws, and independent judges interpret and enforce those laws. We have been inclined at times to be rather slack in our duty in the making of these laws. We have been inclined at times, instead of making laws, to allow laws to be made by means of regulations. If such regulations are merely of an administrative nature, there is no great objection; but when laws are made by regulations which impose penalties, then there is great objection.
The laws of the dominion should be made in this chamber, with the suggestions and criticisms of members of parliament. We should not allow legislative boards or civil servants to carry out the duties we were elected to discharge, and members of parliament are negligent in their duty to their constituents as well as in their duty to the country if they permit the laws of the dominion to be made by regulations, the berms of which they do not know and which they have not passed on or approved.
But, sir, that is not the only objection to this bill. It is not only the matter of regulations that I object to, but the powers that are conferred on the minister, who can act as a court

Questions
of appeal and decide upon, grievances when he is in the first place the one who has already come to a decision as to whether or not a licence shall be granted.
Progress reported.


[Stage Direction]
At six o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Thursday, June 22, 1944