1944-01-31

DEBATES-RESIGNATION OF PARLIAMENTARY REPORTER (FRENCH)

Mr. SPEAKER:: I have the honour to inform the house that the Clerk has received the resignation of Hector Benoit, Esquire, Parliamentary Reporter, French, House of Commons, which has been accepted subject to ratification by the house, and I have directed the Clerk to lay on the table of the house the correspondence and my recommendation in relation thereto.



DIVORCE


[Stage Direction]
Mr. GEORGE BLACK (Yukon) moved for leave to introduce bill No. 2, to amend the Divorce Jurisdiction Act, 1930.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. G. K. FRASER (Peterborough West):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the Minister of Finance, under whose administration the wartime prices and trade board comes, a question with respect to an item that appeared in the Montreal Standard of Saturday. It says that a new plan by which Quebec farmers will be allowed to slaughter and sell their animals themselves in future has been adopted by arrangement with the wartime prices and trade board.
Does this arrangement apply also to Ontario and the other provinces?


Hon. J. L. ILSLEY (Minister of Finance):: shall have to look into the newspaper report and see whether there is any truth in it. I do not know whether there is or not.


Mr. HANSON (York-Sunbury):: True
enough. I confirmed it this morning.



GOVERNOR GENERAL'S SPEECH


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Friday, January 28, consideration of the motion of Mr. L. D. Tremblay for an address to His Excellency the Governor General in reply to his speech at the opening of the session.
Mr. GORDON GRAYDON (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker, this afternoon I shall have to ask the indulgence of Your Honour and of the house if I follow my notes more closely than I have been in the habit of doing. I am anxious to condense my remarks and deliver them in the minimum amount of time, in order to set an example that perhaps may be followed by the house in time to come.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh!


Gordon Graydon: I was looking at the other side of the house when I said that.

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When I rose, sir, to take part in a similar debate a year ago I raised my voice in protest against the time lost in the house in the traditional and extended congratulations which are usually showered upon the mover and the seconder of the address. In parliament, as in many other phases of our national life, we have to make up our minds to leave some of the habits of yesterday behind. These are days of change and reform and having this in mind I hope that the mover (Mr. Tremblay) and the seconder (Mr. Tucker) will fully understand and appreciate the motive which lies behind my comparative silence with respect to their very excellent efforts. Were they not both members of His Majesty's armed forces, I would have refrained from creating another precedent in this debate. Both of them are comparatively young men; both of them have served with distinction in two wars. That in itself constitutes a word of tribute more eloquent than my words could convey.
It is appropriate that the first point I cover in this address should be the war. It is not yet won. True, we have reached the stage where the fear of losing it has been to a large extent removed, but with the most serious fighting and the heaviest casualty lists yet to come, it is in my opinion utter nonsense to talk as though the war were practically over. Would to God it werel
Mere words will fail to appraise appropriately the contribution of Canada's armed forces at sea, on the land and in the air. Their magnificent part in the pulverization of vital German industries; their heroic fight in Sicily and Italy; their daring exploits on the oceans of the world, have added a new lustre to Canada's already great reputation among the nations of the globe. It can be safely said -I should say, proudly said-that the Canadian armed forces rate second to none among the war's very best participants.
Labour, agriculture, industry and business generally have made on the civilian front a giant contribution towards the winning of the war, but the brunt of our effort is being carried by those in our armed forces. Our contribution as civilians, however great, suffers in contrast to theirs. When this war is over, this Canada of ours which has been ready to give and to pay heavily to win the war must equally be prepared to do the same thing for the establishment and the maintenance of peace and for the rehabilitation of our armed forces. '
It is difficult to say what the general terms of the speech from the throne mean for the veterans of this war. Only close scrutiny of
the legislation proposed will give any indication of how far the government is prepared to go. When our men and women come back they will be thrown into competition for a livelihood in our nation with those who have been receiving a very much larger share of the national income than our fighting forces. Let me therefore impress upon the government the necessity of giving to our discharged men and women sufficient aid and support to put them on better than an even basis so far as cash is concerned so that they will have a fair chance in the competitive struggle for a fuller and more abundant life. Our forces have not been niggardly in their sacrifices for us. Let us not be niggardly with them when it comes our turn to pay.
The government has never been too frank with the people of Canada with respect to the conduct of the war. It is high time it was. Our people are demanding satisfactory and straightforward answers to these questions:
(1)	What does the abandoning of the seventh and eighth divisions in Canada mean?
(2)	What does it involve?
(3)	Why were these two additional divisions constituted in the first place?
(4)	What were the underlying reasons for the change?
(5)	What is being done with our big home defence army?
(6)	Is it going overseas?
(7)	Is it going to remain in Canada and if so, is its personnel to be directed back to civilian activities?
Recently the three chiefs of the navy, army and air force were transferred overseas. Does this mean that the government believes that all danger to Canada has been largely removed? If so, why the necessity for the maintenance of this big home defence army? Even at this late date it is essential that the whole story of the home defence army's constitution and its present and future role should be explained fully and frankly by the government to this house and to the people of Canada.
Canadians, too, are confused as to what is going on overseas. Why was the Canadian Army constituted as it was in the first place? Whose idea was it? If the plan was good, why was it abandoned? If it was bad, why was it approved in the first place?
Many rumours are in circulation regarding the resignation of General McNaughton. Public interest demands that the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) should at once give a full and frank explanation of the facts in this regard, letting the chips fall where they may.
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The Prime Minister has stated that he is going to attend, at an early date, a conference of British commonwealth prime ministers. There are strong, but we hope not irreconcilable, views abroad in Canada with respect to our position in the commonwealth and with respect to our relations with the world at large. It is unfortunate that the speech from the throne mentions only the latter.
It is well that the views of all sides should be carefully weighed and considered. The views of the government would be particularly welcome, but it is not our intention to embarrass our own Prime Minister, or the representatives of other parts of the commonwealth, by tossing controversial issues into this debate when common sense indicates that every effort must be made to secure a united front in a united Canada in a greater and more powerful British commonwealth.
A very noticeable omission from the speech from the throne which justified curiosity_ is the failure to mention the burning question of post-war civil aviation. There is no single economic subject fraught with such important effects and ramifications of a world-wide character which is so vital to Canada as commercial aviation. People are asking if we are to be pawns in the great international game. Are we to stand by inactive in this field while the United States, Great Britain, Russia, China, Holland, Sweden, Free France, and many other countries, determine what our part is to be in the international scheme?
Canada is playing a dangerous game. Canada cutting in at the last minute will be of little use. Already official reports from United States sources are saying that the northwest route through Canada is credited with considerable glamour, but little commercial importance. In other words, they are already seeking to discount our geographical advantages.
Canada has earned a place in aviation far greater in importance than her proportion of operated air routes. The commonwealth air training plan, the vast distribution of arctic and sub-arctic landing fields, the weatherreporting facilities and other advanced operational achievements warrant her claiming an important role in all international post-war aviation deliberations. Yet, for some strange reason, the speech from the throne remains silent on this tremendously important subject.
The Minister of Munitions and Supply (Mr. Howe) has recently attended a commonwealth air conference in London; and he should be in a position to inform this house and this country where Canada stands in any agreements or proposed agreements that have been entered into or discussed. To
tMr. Graydon.]
what extent are we collaborating with the United Kingdom on this important matter? How far have negotiations proceeded with the United States?
There is grave and general concern throughout Canada that delay and inertia on the part of the government may lead to our position becoming, in the critical period ahead, nothing more than a point of geographical convenience when final arrangements have been concluded. Our people want to know and to be assured that full and beneficial use will be made of the vast and strategic ground facilities now available in Canada. How is the superior knowledge and experience of our trained people to be utilized to the greatest advantage; and what benefits are we to reap from our favoured position as the most economical trade route between industrial centres in the United States and the markets of Europe and Asia? Parliament is entitled to have, at a very early date, a full report on this vital matteT.
In agriculture, opportunism and a series of short-run moves are still being substituted for a definite, comprehensive, long-term policy. John Bracken's Lethbridge bill of rights for Canadian farmers has had some effect upon the government's indecisive agriculture position-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Don't
laugh.


Gordon Graydon: That is rather a hollow
laugh, but I cannot blame the hon. members for that. I am going to repeat this, because I know it is of tremendous interest to all:
John Bracken's Lethbridge bill of rights for Canadian farmers has had some effect upon the government's indecisive agricultural position; and, as in the case of our Winnipeg platform, parts of our policy will, no doubt, be adopted. Why did the' government wait until after a call from Canada's next prime minister to adopt a policy of putting a floor under the prices of agricultural products?
It is extremely significant that the government should have waited until after it had been in power for ei^ht years, and until fhe plan had been incorporated as part of the Progressive Conservative agricultural policy, before undertaking to establish floor prices for farm products. What Canadian farmers will want to know is why the government did not see fit to adopt this price floor policy during those pre-war years when the prices which they actually received were only a fraction of what they were justly entitled to and of prices ruling to-day.

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During the period this government has been in power, the annual average cash price received for No. 1 Northern wheat, basis Fort William, was as low as 62 cents a bushel; that of No. 2 oats, 29 cents; that of No. 2 barley, 40J cents and that of rye, 40J cents. The prices received at the farm were, of course, very much lower than this. Annual average egg prices were down to 17i cents. Prices received for hogs, butter fat and cheese were, at certain times, just about one-half as high as those ruling to-day; while good steers sold for as little as one-third of their present value. If reasonable floor prices are needed at present and in the future, they were no less necessary in the earlier years of this administration's tenure of office. Farmers were just as entitled to reasonable floor prices in peace time as they are now in the later period of the war.
I shall not now go over each of the thirty points enunciated by our leader at this time. I shall refer only to two of these planks, leaving the others until a more detailed examination of the agricultural policy can be made in the house.
Here is point No. 8:
To bring about an expansion of our export markets and thereby higher standards of living generally, we shall be prepared, in accordance -with the principles of the Atlantic charter, to progressively lower the barriers to trade; we shall set up a special export agency charged with the responsibility of promoting international trade, maintaining and expanding export markets for primary products, ensuring that domestic prices shall not be depressed because a small surplus may happen to result in making low export prices apply to both; and developing a positive programme of international collaboration, on the part of both exporting and importing countries, with a view to furthering the exchange of commodities and better international understanding and goodwill.
I mention also point No. 21, which deals with the increasingly important matter of agricultural research. A brief debate took place on this subject in the house last session. I now call upon the government to establish at once a national network of efficiently staffed research laboratories in order that agriculture will have at least as efficient research facilities as industry itself.
The government's policy respecting our production and export of bacon to Britain has been one of pronounced instability, fraught with sudden and frequent changes and guided by hindsight, rather than foresight. Various pronouncements of the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner) and his department, ostensibly designed to guide our farmers in the matter of future production, have served only to create serious uncertainty and considerable bewilderment. The variation of the arrangements with Britain regarding bacon has resulted in disappointment and dissatisfaction on the part of the agricultural population of Canada. Since the last session of the house, the wholesale slaughtering of brood sows and the general disintegration of the whole bacon industry have belatedly forced the government to give hog bonuses. The irreparable damage already done is a clear indication that these bonuses were long overdue.
Canadian farmers are willing and ready to produce enough hogs to meet Britain's bacon needs. But they quite properly feel that, if they do, the government should go at least part way to stabilize their position. This is but one of many striking examples which indicate the urgency for a forthright, vigorous, agricultural policy for this dominion.
Let the farmers of Canada contrast the single reference to agriculture in the speech from the throne with John Bracken's Lethbridge bill of rights for agriculture, and let them form their own conclusions as to where their friends in public life are. The speech from the throne and the government policy generally is bleak and barren when contrasted to the masterly programme for the relief of agriculture and the liberation of rural people as envisaged in the Lethbridge speech. It is significant that the only useful reference to agriculture in the speech from the throne was taken from John Bracken's address at Lethbridge itself.
Labour will look in vain in the throne address for either sympathy or a broad national labour policy. Not a single concrete proposal is to be found which would indicate that there are plans on foot to give labour its rightful position in the national partnership. High-sounding phrases about safeguarding the basic standard of living and standardizing wages and salary are poor and lame excuses for a government which should have established long before this a national labour code for Canada. The farmer is now having company; labour is joining him in that great group of forgotten men in the dominion.
This government embarked upon a programme of war production without adequately consulting labour or inviting it to share the responsibilities of administration, but let me caution the government that no programme of rehabilitation and reconstruction can succeed without the active cooperation of the labour movement.
Schemes for providing social security are not effective substitutes in themselves for higher earning power and continuous employment. All these plans can do is to spread the national income more evenly. There is grave danger that they may collapse and that inflation will result unless the national output of consumer's
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goods is maintained at a higher level than ever before. Let us remember that the first and foremost concern of labour is jobs and lots of them with good wages and good working conditions. The incentive to produce must never be allowed to weaken or else the administration of these grandiose schemes of social insurance will be like trying to spread an ounce of butter on an acre of bread-their benefits will hardly be felt.
Surely labour has a right to expect better consideration than the treatment accorded under the wartime wages control order, P.C. 9384, and by labour I mean to include organized labour, unorganized labour and that great section of salaried workers whose wages or salaries have been frozen by the government while their taxes and maintenance charges have been continually increasing. Why did the government not submit this wages control order to parliament by way of legislation, so that the people's representatives could express an opinion on it before it became law? Among other things this order, passed a month or so before parliament met, provided for the incorporation of the cost of living bonus into the wage rate structure and, at the same time, denied to labour that fundamental principle of British justice which declares that a man is innocent until he is found guilty. Against the provisions of this order labour has been rasiing its vigorous voice, and beside labour this Progressive Conservative party stands and joins in their chorus of protests. Why does the government continue studiously to ignore the leaders of labour and deny them a place in the formulation of policies affecting labour? Let us not forget that labour has its rights as well as its responsibilities and obligations. It has fulfilled its obligations at all times and will continue to do so in the future, but it must be also given its rights.
There is talk that the government is going to bring in a labour code wherein the jurisdiction of the federal government will apply to war industries only. This has not been announced because it is a matter of government policy, which apparently has not been quite completed. If this is so, the government is making a colossal blunder in flying in the faces of eight out of nine provinces in Canada who are in favour of a natidnal code covering all industry. The w'hole project is thoroughly impracticable. Men and women working in a plant, partly on war orders and partly on peace-time work, will find themselves under different codes. People engaged in the same type of work, one producing for war and the other producing for peace, will find that their fMr. Gravdon.l
conditions are regulated by different authorities altogether. The rapid change and transition from war-time activities to peace-time pursuits in itself will show how completely impossible the. whole policy must be.
Labour and management must press forward in the future as two great and harmonious partners, under legislation designed to give justice to both. I call upon the government to cease this endless bickering in labour matters; and let us have a code covering all our industries. Then let labour and management sit down together and perfect that partnership which we know is possible, but towards the accomplishment of which no all-out effort seems to have been made.
The government has recently set up a War Assets Corporation, constituted for the purpose of disposing of war materials classified as surplus or obsolete. In the disposal of such material the greatest care and caution must be exercised. At the end of the war, surplus goods will include raw materials, and any indiscriminate disposal of these might vety easily lead to the creation of monopolies by those obtaining them. Before the selling process gets under way, I believe that a judicial inquiry should be made into the details of materials purchased, cost prices and use made of them in so far as crown assets of Canada are concerned. The operations of the corporation should be carried out openly. The Canadian people are entitled to know whether value has been received for materials for which they were so heavily taxed. A report should be submitted for the scrutiny of the people of Canada, detailing value received for material classed as obsolete or surplus, and giving information as to the use to which it is being put.
In the war-time economy, many small businesses have been squeezed out of existence. The small storekeeper, the man running the little enterprise, the farmer and others, have suffered. The little fellow should have an equal opportunity to obtain the materials to be disposed of by the War Assets Corporation. It is the job of the government to give every opportunity possible to these people for expansion and prosperity in the post-war period.
It is true that the speech from the throne speaks of the establishment of an industrial development bank to assist in the preparation for the transition of industry from war to peace. I hope that the little man of Canadian business will get the same kind of treatment as big men when this bank swings into operation. There will be some lifting of eyebrows by the farmers of Canada when they find that the principle of credits as envisaged by the setting up of this bank has not been

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extended by the government to cover their situation as well. The government has followed in many instances the Winnipeg platform, but it has failed to adopt one very important plank in that platform, and that is the proposal for a central farm bank. Why cannot agriculture be treated as well as industry in connection with credit facilities provided by the government?
National selective service earned for itself the title of "Canada's greatest war-time muddle". For quite some time it had no real competitor; but to-day its position in this regard is being seriously challenged by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. The C.B.C. has lost the confidence of the people of Canada. I wish that statement were not true. I have been one who has believed that public ownership of our broadcasting facilities, working alongside our private stations, could be made a satisfactory method of handling this vital and delicate means of communication. To-day public ownership in this field is being so seriously threatened that I am expressing grave concern that unless something is done right now, we are apt to have a complete collapse of the whole structure which was so well established in the earlier days of radio.
The government has consistently let radio matters drift in Canada. For years there has scarcely ever been a full board of governors sitting at one time. In one instance, the government permitted a vacancy to stand for eighteen months without filling it. To-day we have the spectacle of two governorships vacant for three months; and of even more importance is the fact that there has been no general manager since early last fall when Doctor J. S. Thomson went back to Saskatchewan university. There has been talk of legislation to improve the corporation's structure; but the speech from the throne gives no hint that this is in prospect.
To the recommendations of the radio broadcasting committees from year to year the government has turned a deaf ear in connection with many of their proposals. The fact is that radio is looked upon as Canada's most important departmental orphan. Its constitution has never been properly clarified, and nowhere is there confidence in those directing its affairs. In the middle of this massive muddle, a second network has been put into operation. In some quarters this move is being viewed with grave concern, largely perhaps because there is no confidence that the present structure of the C.B.C. is in a position satisfactorily to direct anything in the nature of new works.
The question has been raised in the press that the C.B.C. has gone "commercial". If it
has, a number of very important points are at once raised, points which concern not only the press of Canada but the citizens of this dominion as well. The government deserves 'he just condemnation of an outraged public for its lackadaisical happy-go-lucky policy which has allowed this corporation aimlessly to drift into comparative uselessness, instead of directing its course into a field of greater and increasing public service. There is not a minute to be lost. Let the government act at once.
The rehabilitation of those in our armed forces, in our war plants, in industry and agriculture, will call not only for the greatest ingenuity on the part of the government, but as well for the same patriotic fervour on the part of our people as has characterized them in the conduct of the war. Our nation has, of its own free will, raised billions of dollars for its security and defence. When the war is over it can scarcely be less interested in the security of the individuals who comprise our nation, and especially of those who have assisted so vitally in the defence of our security. Canadians have experienced full employment, and our service men and women will be and should be satisfied with nothing short of that when hostilities cease. The wheels of industry must be kept turning; but production must be deflected from the demands of war to the demands of peace, from goods of destruction to the necessary peace-time consumable commodities. Into the flow of employment resulting from such a transition, preferred places must be found for the men and women out of our armed services. Our veterans, men and women, will not be content with blueprints, plans and promises. They will demand effective action. They have not been remunerated on any elaborate scale for the invaluable service they have been rendering us; and they are fully entitled to every opportunity which will assist in making them contented and satisfied citizens of a grateful country.
Second in importance to the paramount consideration of winning this war as quickly and conclusively as possible is the obtaining of full and gainful employment for all our people who are able and willing to work.
To achieve this objective, hand-outs by the federal government will be neither a sufficient nor a satisfactory solution. The dole has gone forever. The cooperation of business and industry will be essential if full employment for our people is to be achieved and especially if it is to be maintained. In a recent estimate, the Minister of Labour (Mr. Mitchell)
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has revealed that to-day two million Canadians are in jobs whioh did not exist before the war broke out and most of which will terminate when the war is over, or before. Thus it should be very easily realized that the employment problem facing our country cannot be solved by an incomplete uncoordinated effort.
If the methods of the government to mobilize and utilize our man-power for war are to be the criterion for its effort to meet and solve the post-war employment problem, little hope for success can be held out to our people. Despite the optimism of the Minister of Labour, the operation and administration of national selective service has been a bitter and disillusioning experience for the Canadian people. The government sought and were accorded unlimited powers for the full mobilization of our man-power; they obtained all the necessary-and perhaps some unnecessary -machinery. But they lacked thg will and the courage to put it into effective operation at the proper stage of our man-power difficulties.
It is well to recall that in the pre-war period, agriculture, industry and business provided ninety-five per cent of the employment of Canada. And it is only with the cooperation of agriculture, industry and business that long-range plans for the reconstruction period and after can be effective. The people of Canada 'have accepted with good grace the curtailment of their freedom for the purpose of winning this war. In our peace-time economy they will demand fair wages, fair prices for farm and factory products, and above all freedom to run their own lives. Bureaucracy must go.
Hampering and unnecessarily restrictive measures upon industry and business will do nothing to advance the achievement of full employment. It is well and readily recognized and accepted by the vast majority of Canadians that there must be adequate controls designed to prevent the growth of monopolies and cartels. The Progressive Conservative party stands resolutely against this usurpation by private industry of the place of public power, but will continue to fight to the last ditch in the interests of the small business man, the farmer and the worker. Our belief is that plans should now be in progress which will give all business, all industry, big or little, including agriculture, its legitimate place in our economy, with reasonable opportunity for prosperity in the future.
There is little evidence in the speeches made recently by the Minister of Pensions and National Health (Hon. Mr. Mackenzie) and
CMr. Graydon.]
the Minister of Munitions and Supply that any well thought-out or coordinated plan to meet the employment problem has been concluded. Speaking in Vancouver on December 18 last-and I might say this is not all he said at that time-the first mentioned minister had this to say:
We propose having in readiness a great programme of public-assisted enterprise, public works, development projects of all sorts, so that there may be a bridge on which we can cross the gap between war and peace.
Important words, those. In the same day, speaking in Toronto, the Minister of Munitions and Supply stated:
With our post-war planners thinking in terms of public works and government dole, is it any wonder that the advocates of socialism are finding many disciples?
This is scarcely a striking example of the cooperation and coordination which the government will have to exercise in the solution of post-war employment.
No team work there, and not in agreement with what the Minister of Pensions and National Health said on the subject, the first subject with which he dealt at that time. I suggest that there should be established a new department of government that will integrate all aspects of our economy in its transition from war to peace, problems such as industrial reconversion, readjustment of war workers, demobilization of soldiers, and post-war employment. All the plans for the transition from war to peace must perfectly mesh.
Let there be no mistake; a reemployment division of selective service will not be enough. This war is likely to end in the way it started, that is, in consecutive cycles, not suddenly and abruptly, as did the last great war. And this means that we must be ready now to meet the problems of the .aftermath as they arise. The speech from the throne would seem to indicate that the government sees the end of the war in sight, and our entry at a not too far distant date in the era of transition from war to peace. The people of Canada have been very patient in their submission to the greatest network of bureaucratic controls this nation has so far experienced. I charge the government that they have exceeded the limits of vital war necessity and urgency in their rush towards bureaucratic government. The present administration has gone to such lengths in encouraging bureaucracy that our democratic form of government is actually in peril. At this stage of the war's development there cannot any longer be any real necessity for our citizens tolerating the continuance in toto of such a system, which might easily be perpetuated into our peace-time economy.

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The rights and privileges of parliament as the trustee and servant of the people which, under the stress of war, have practically ceased to exist must be fully and promptly restored. I believe that our present Prime Minister, in 1935, strangely enough when attacking another government, laid his finger on the most critical spot relative to his own administration now. This is what he said, at page 36, volume 1, of Hansard, 1935:
I have said that one of the supreme efforts of this administration has been stealthily to alienate the authority and control of parliament, to take power into its own hands and away from parliament with respect to many of the important affairs of the nation.
No words of mine could more adequately be utilized in criticism of the present administration than the Prime Minister's own language nn that occasion.
To show how far bureaucracy has gone, let us look at the legislative products since September 1, 1939. I recognize that perhaps this is not the proper yardstick to apply, but it is at least the yardstick which generally indicates the trend. Parliament since that time, the beginning of the war, passed statutes covering 838 pages, a total of 369 thousand words. Proclamations, orders in council, war orders and regulations covered a total of 5,791 pages, with a total of 2,895,500 words. It is a shocking situation and fraught with danger if parliament does not now take the reins of government into its own hands and seal the doom of bureaucratic government. The people are tired and sick of it all. Our party has already declared itself, and I again emphasize that declaration:
The watchwords of the future must be decentralization, not centralization; cooperation, not state dictation; expanding production, not scarcity; and widening areas of trade, not restrictive practices. The alternatives are continued chaos, on the one hand, or regimentation on the other-chaos with its frustrations, or regimentation with its deadening effect on the impulse to produce, its inevitable tendency toward dictatorship, and the certainty that all material increase will be skimmed off to nourish a growing bureaucracy.
No patriotic citizen of Canada would ask the government, in the midst of urgent war expenditures, to lower the general level of taxation. No such request has yet been made, and I am not making it to-day. No such request is likely to be made. Nevertheless if there shall be some lessening of governmental expenditures in the days ahead, I call upon the administration to give consideration to relieving the small wage-earner in the lower brackets from the comparatively heavy taxation which at present he must endure. He is not kicking. That great section of our
population only kicks when they can endure things no longer. It would seem, however, that some relief might properly be given to these people if expenditures are on the down grade and the war pressure is being somewhat lifted. The whole question of the relationship between absenteeism in industry and the income tax should be the subject of much more serious consideration than the government seems to have given the subject to date. Let us not be small as a parliament when we deal with the little men of our nation. Our little men are the biggest assets our country has.
And, speaking of income tax, I want to raise my voice in vehement protest against the complicated methods and procedure used in gathering the taxes from our people. Two things must be wrong, having in mind the confusion among our citizens. Either the incidence of our income tax system is inadequate and impractical, or else the forms on which the returns are made should be altered and changed and simplified. I think nearly every hon. member will agree with me when I say that a lot of people in Canada simply throw up their hands in holy horror and confusion when they see an income tax return. Unless all our people are going to turn into accountants there will be conflict and confusion so long as the present system of levying taxation and making returns in connection with it is followed. People are not nearly so concerned about paying taxes as they are hopelessly confused as to how the taxes are computed. Let us unwind the red tape which surrounds the income tax and make it simpler for the citizens of Canada. Why make a Chinese puzzle out of one of the most important parts of our national business?
Last session I pointed out in vain the necessity for sweeping away a lot of our legislative cobwebs. The Prime Minister thought that war time was not a good time to consider any changes in house rules and procedure, so I lost my case. Rut, like a lot of other judges who have subsequently found themselves wrong in both facts and law, the Prime Minister has seen fit to now accept my suggestion. He and the nation have, however, lost a year in the meantime; for only now are we to have a special parliamentary committee to see how the House of Commons rules and procedure can be modernized and brought up to date.
Frankly, I have been disgusted and discouraged over the unbusinesslike way in which parliament has been conducting itself. I think the country feels the same. If this nation is to take its part in a new order in a new world, surely it is not too much to expect that parliament shall give a lead in that direction. None
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Mr. Gray don

of us is wholly blameless for this state of affairs, but surely that is an additional reason why we should seek to reform .both parliament and ourselves. We may as well be frank. My remarks last year on the debate on the address were perhaps too long. The Prime Minister himself, I recall, rebuked me at that time for the length of my speech, and then, proceeding to ignore his own advice, he spoke for an hour and a quarter longer than I did. I hope that on this occasion he will follow the advice he gave me at that time and that we shall both show parliament and the country that we are capable of condensing our remarks.
Our system of setting up committees is outmoded and outdated, and we do not operate very well the system we have, either. For proof of this, let us look at our session which has just ended and which covered the major part of 1943. The standing committee on agriculture and colonization did not sit until 115 days had elapsed from the opening of the session. The radio broadcasting committee did not commence its business until 123 days had elapsed from the opening of parliament, while the war expenditures committee began its closed door sessions 171 days after parliament had convened. One of the last things parliament did last session before its adjournment was to set up this war expenditures committee, which should have been convened many months before.
I should observe, I think, at this point that this committee's usefulness was gravely impaired by the fact that the government majority in the committee insisted upon its subcommittee deliberations being in camera. It is about time that the lid was blown off these in-oamera sessions of the war expenditures committee. It is little short of a national disgrace that the people of Canada should not know something about the investigations of these contracts.' I am opposed to the whole system of pulling down the blinds, closing the shutters and locking the doors when public contracts are being investigated.
As a matter of curiosity and concern I checked up the details in relation to the meetings held by standing committees from 1936 to 1943 inclusive. In those eight years the committee on agriculture and colonization sat in only six of the eight years-that is, it sat only for short times in six out of the eight years-for a total of seventy-one days in die eight years. Yet during that period agriculture passed through one of the most critical and trying stages in its history.
To give some idea as to the outmoded system exemplified by standing committees, I draw the attention of this house to the industrial and international relations committee. It has not sat since 1936, although labour
TMr. Graydon.l
and foreign affairs have constituted, m the meantime, two of the most important matters of national concern. It is hard to imagine that work could not be found for this very important committee during that wdiole period of time.
Then, again, why should two major matters be lumped together under the umbrella of one committee, while a separate committee sits for such subjects as debates, printing, standing orders and privileges and elections? Four separate committees for these subjects and only one committee to cover the whole area of labour and international relations. The whole thing does not add up. The whole thing does not make sense.
I hope that the new committee will commence its work with courage and determination to see that parliament, its methods, its rules and its procedure are taken out of the mothballs, dusted off, and made to work efficiently for the people of Canada.
To our left and much too far to the left for most people in Canada sits a group in the house to which I desire to direct a few remarks this afternoon. They will not be abusive remarks, because we have to learn in this country that our enemies at the moment do not happen to be Canadian, and, furthermore, that only by calm analysis and the utilization of light rather than heat in dealing with party programmes and policies will this nation get anywhere in the end. I have never cared for violent public denunciations of political parties or their supporters, but I take this opportunity of denying what seems to be an implied claim by the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation party that they have some monopoly on the will and desire of citizens generally in Canada to see this nation reaching her maximum national stature. No group or no party has a right to make such an implied claim. The Progressive Conservative party yields to none in its desire and, if I may say so, in its capacity, to achieve that objective.
Our party stands for a programme of rational reform, as opposed to a policy, on the one hand, of rigid reaction, and a policy, on the other hand, of reckless revolution. Our party stands pledged to remove the abuses and reform the present system. We will go right up to the precipice on the pathway of rational reform with the C.C.F. or any other party, but at the edge of the precipice we must part company with those who would lose their balance and plunge headlong over the cliff into the unfathomable depths of chaos and revolution below.
Our party stands for a policy of expanding production as the basis of prosperity. Our

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job, as we conceive it, is to distribute abundance rather than ration scarcity. The economic organization of yesterday was unable to achieve or to sustain that expanding production without which full employment could not be acomplished. State socialism can never achieve it; for socialism is rigid, centralized and coercive. The only hope of a steadily expanding national income lies in the cooperation of the state with all organized enterprise, whether it be private, cooperative or government-owned. As our party sees it, the government must join with those engaged in industry, commerce, agriculture and finance to plan for full, steady and growing production, and complete employment with as little loss of individual freedom as possible. Our party is out to free Canada from the bonds of bureaucracy, while socialism, in our opinion, can only plunge Canada further into the underbrush of red tape and administrative controls.
The policy of the C.C.F. is, to say the least, an elastic one. It stretches all the way from the Pacific coast, where its leader there calls loudly for the militant, revolutionary kind of socialism, with a few policemen and gaols thrown in for good measure, to the easygoing but relatively harmless pie-in-the-sky theories of the hon. member'for York South (Mr. Noseworthy). The variation of opinions in the C.C.F. party constitutes a danger signal for the people of Canada, who are anxious to know which way the party is going. Not much wonder the vast majority of farmers in Canada are looking with suspicious eyes upon this movement which never seems to be able to make up its mind how long it would let the farmer mind his own business were it ever to achieve power.
It is a favourite political pastime of some C.C.F. leaders to refer to the "old-line parties". I have no objection if they want to make it singular, because one of the boasts of the present Prime Minister is that Liberalism dates back so far. But Progressive Conservatism cannot truthfully be tied up with any old-fashioned policies or doctrines. From the Winnipeg convention emerged a new policy, and a new leader. Actually, many are of the opinion that old-fashioned parties now in Canada are the Liberals and the C.C.F.'s. Apart altogether from age, however, the C.C.F. party has developed certain characteristics which brand it as a typical old-line party to-day.
I thought that the old days of presenting political promises to the electors of Canada in bushel baskets had gone forever. There was a time not many years ago when people looked down upon the public man who made a speech full of promises. They almost ostracized from society the man who would issue a pamphlet
full of promises. That branded the politician as an old-fashioned old-timer in the field. But those days are back again and, strangely enough, ushered in by the party that likes to call itself the herald of the new order. Not only are the promises made in speeches and in pamphlets; but so great has been the volume of promises to the Canadian people that the C.C.F. have had to call in the bookbinders to assist. With all this plethora of promises to swallow, the citizens of Canada will be fortunate if they escape several attacks of acute political indigestion before the next general election. Canada has witnessed nothing like it since confederation. Let Canadians be certain that the cures now being prescribed for our national ills are not worse than the ills they are designed to cure.
The Progressive Conservative party has taken the initiative from one end of the country to the other in the battle against socialism. We are recognized as the main spearhead of Canada's fight against it. When this time comes, we shall call upon all those who oppose socialism, with all its regimentation and bureaucracy, to follow the leadership of John Bracken and the Progressive Conservative party. By that means, and that means only, can Canada stay on the safe road towards rational reform.
It is pretty generally acknowledged throughout the dominion that the present tired, weary administration has lost the confidence of the people of Canada. To look over the present House of Commons and contrast it with the present state of public opinion makes this Commons appear little short of a dream chamber. The government right now controls this parliament by what the Prime Minister in 1935 under parallel circumstances called a "mechanical majority." The weakness of the present administration throughout the country is admitted by its own friends. In its own good time it will be compelled to throw the torch of leadership and responsibility. That torch I predict will be caught by a vigorous Progressive Conservative party led by its able and experienced leader John Bracken, who will be called to save this nation from the chaos of socialism and disaster.
The speech from the throne may properly be said to be a combination of the Winnipeg platform, John Bracken's reform speeches, a death-bed repentance, and several dying declarations. It lacks the real crusading reform spirit to be found in either the Winnipeg manifesto or Mr. Bracken's subsequent addresses, but the effect of both of these factors can be seen in many parts of the throne address. The character of the speech indicates that the
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Prime Minister has momentarily taken an eye off the war and is now looking over his broken-down political fences.
I was under the impression that the present Prime Minister did not like reform programmes ushered in close to the time of a general appeal to the public. My belief was based upon the Prime Minister's words as found in his address as leader of the opposition in a similar debate to this in 1935, when the then administration brought down its reform for security plan. On that occasion the present Prime Minister, standing where I am to-day, had this to say:
In other words, I want votes, that is why the Prime Minister to-day brings in this programme of social reform so-called, on the eve of an election. . . .
Looking at the speech from the throne, I have come to the conclusion that his policies are a sort of omnium gatherum. They are intended to take in a little of everything he can discover in anybody's policy.
How applicable the Prime Minister's words of 1935 now become in relation to the present speech from the throne. I toss them back to the Prime Minister as an appropriate comment on the present government's programme, and I repeat the Prime Minister's own words:
. . . his policy is intended to take in a little of everything he can discover in anybody's policy.
And I go further along the pathway then chosen by the present Prime Minister when he urged upon another prime minister at that time to bring down at once the legislation forecast in the speech from the throne, in order that it may receive the careful scrutiny and consideration of the elected representatives of the people.
Let us get this programme down out of the clouds to where we can see what it really is. It may well be that these lofty high-sounding phrases mean very little in the way of reform to the Canadian people. I hope that it will prove more than a smoke-screen to blind the electors so that they cannot see the tragic failure of this government's administration. The government has done some attractive political window-dressing. Let us see now what they have on the shelves inside. What is on the shelves is what counts. Let the government bring forward its measures so they can be judged by what they are, not by what the government hints they may be. No speech from the throne in itself ever accomplished anything for the Canadian people. All the vague generalizations this one contains will accomplish nothing either. Let us have the measures which the government proposes. They alone can do anything for Canada. Then 
we shall see wherein the government's plans are adequate or inadequate to meet the challenging problems of these days.
Turning to the speech from the throne, this is what we find:
Mutual aid for destitute populations! No one opposes that. Let the measure be brought down.
Expansion of world trade? No thinking person but supports that. . Bring forward the measure, not a promise.
National security and enduring peace by international cooperation! Brave words that have become hackneyed by over-use. No one in the world but prays for that. Bring down the bill.
A national minimum of -social security, full employment, a higher standard of nutrition, more adequate housing, social insurance against unemployment, accident, ill health, old age and death of the bread-winner! Why has the government let eight years pass by without these? No one opposes these principles. Introduce the bills so that they may be enacted into law.
Rehabilitation and reestablishment of returned soldiers! Transformation of war-time to peace-time economy, insurance against social and economic hazards! Let us have, not words, but specific proposals. Adequate plans will find no objectors.
War service gratuities! By all means, and as quickly as our parliamentary system will permit, and let us err on the side of generosity when we are doing it. Tax modifications! This government seems to know how to modify them only one way-upwards for all, which has led to absenteeism by many, even when maximum production is needed as never before.
Expansion of trade commissioner service 1 A belated admission of previous failure. Research activities 1 The government's record in this respect is one of lost opportunities.
Housing plans! Health insurance! How long have these been promised, now to be resurrected in an election year? I suggest that the government bring in the legislation as soon as possible.
More generous old age pensions! We are in favour, but the government's repentance in an election year carries no sense of confidence.
A minimum of well-being for the children of the nation by family allowances! After two decades of opportunity to do so the government now in its dying days makes a preelection bid for votes. There is a problem to be met in the care and health and training of children, and it should be met without
TANUARY 31, 1944	'29
The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
delay. Until we see the legislation, however, we are unable to tell whether or not this high national purpose will thereby be achieved. Let us have the bill forthwith.
Floor prices for agricultural products! The government in this, as in other matters, will be judged by its actions, not its promises. Not until the fifth year of war did fair treatment for agriculture occur to them. They let many agricultural prices remain at less than half what they are to-day for long periods after they came into power. What will the wheat growers, who got sixty cents a bushel or less for their wheat, and live stock men, who suffered equally, and dairy farmers, who were producing cheese and butter and milk and eggs far below the cost of production- what will all these think of a government which waited eight years to suggest a floor price, and then only after our party had proposed it? Nearly every agricultural commodity has, within the life of this government, sold at less than half of to-day's figure. Why no floor price till the government is threatened with defeat? .
Our criticism of this government in these matters is that for eight years it has not brought forward enough progressive social or agriculture or labour legislation, and only now, in an election year, comes forward with these dying declarations.
Not as a challenge to the general principles of this overdue programme announced by the government in the speech from the throne but rather as a protest against certain grave omissions therein, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Lake Centre (Mr. Diefenbaker) the following amendment:
That the following words be added to the address in reply to the speech from the throne:
"We respectfully submit to Your Excellency that this house regrets that Your Excellency's advisers have:
(a)	Failed to make adequate provision and to implement promises already made for the immediate needs and employment of the men and women of the armed forces on demobilization;
(b)	Failed to provide adequate measures . whereby agriculture can make its maximum
war- and peace-time contribution through a stable and effective long-term programme;
(c)	Failed to establish such a national code for labour as will ensure maximum production and give to labour its rightful place in our national partnership; and failed to provide for the correction of the unfairly coercive and restrictive clauses in the 1913 wartime wages control order;
(d)	Failed to lessen bureaucratic controls and regimentation and to recognize and restore the supremacy of parliament; and failed to halt the continuing infringement of provincial rights and the centralization of authority.


Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, my hon.
friend, the leader of the opposition (Mr. Graydon), when he began to address the house this afternoon, craved its indulgence because, as he said, he intended to follow very closely the notes which he had before him. I must crave the indulgence of the house if I attempt to speak without any notes. To tell the truth I have not had time to write out a lengthy speech, nor have I had the good fortune of having others who would write it for me. What the house and the country will be particularly interested to know is whether the speech to which we have just listened is that of the hon. leader of the opposition, whom I see immediately opposite, or whether it is the speech of the leader of the Conservative party.


Gordon Graydon: Is the Prime Minister serious? I know he was indulging in a little humour at the beginning of his speech, and I do not want to answer him if it is one of those humorous quips of his; but I cannot imagine that he is serious in what he is saying. However, if he wants an answer to what he has said I shall be glad to give it to him. I made the speech myself, and any speech given in this house by me has been prepared by myself. I want the Prime Minister to accept that statement, because I do not want him or anyone else to make any insinuations with regard to any leader. I do not think it becomes the Prime Minister of Canada.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I am much obliged to my hon. friend for the statement he has just made, because I would repeat that what I think the people of Canada are interested in particularly, what hon. members are interested in, is not the views of my hon. friend or his qualifications for preparing orations, but the views of the leader of the Conservative party in this country. We have opposite a great party that over a year ago chose a new leader, and the country is anxious to know the views of that leader. It is anxious to have those views expressed in this parliament. May I say at once, since my hon. friend has brought the name of Mr. John Bracken into the debate this afternoon, and has spoken of John Bracken's bill of rights, of the Winnipeg convention at which John Bracken was elected, and much else connected with John Bracken, that I believe not only hon. members of this house but the people of Canada generally are anxious to see John Bracken in person, and if he is to continue as leader of his party to see him in this House of Commons.
Apart from all else, as the leader of this House of Commons, I have a certain obliga-
30 [DOT]	COMMONS
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tion to the house to see that long and honourable traditions are maintained. I would draw the attention of hon. members and of the country to the extent to which in Canada we are departing from the spirit of representative parliamentary institutions. It may come as a surprise to some to learn that though we are now in the fifth session of the nineteenth parliament, during all that time since this parliament opened, the great party opposite has not had a leader in the House of Commons.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Oh! That is pretty tough on me.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: No. My hon. friend was not leader; he vras acting leader.


Richard Burpee Hanson: I was the leader until I retired.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: My hon. friend acted very well at times and sometimes very badly.


Gordon Graydon: I suppose that applies to the Prime Minister too.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: The hon. gentleman was not leader of the Conservative party. May I draw this further fact to the attention of the house. The Conservative party, or the Progressive Conservative party, or whatever name it went by at the time, has not had a leader elected to the House of Commons during the life of this parliament. There have been two ieaders of the party who have not been returned to this House of Commons during this parliament. The late Hon. Doctor Manion was the leader of the party at the time of the last election. Doctor Manion was defeated. My hon. friend (Mr. Hanson, York-Sunbury) has said he acted as leader until the party was in a position to choose a leader. Then the party chose a leader. As was expected under our system of government where all who take a part in parliamentary proceedings are supposed to represent the people, are supposed to have a constituency which they represent, the leader first chosen, Right Hon. Arthur Meighen, went before the people in his capacity as leader, asking to be returned for a constituency that he might take his seat in this House of Commons. He was defeated; he was not returned, and the party continued on without its leader in the House of Commons. That lasted for thirteen months. Then we had this Winnipeg convention at which John Bracken was elected, and at which he began to put forth bills of rights or other documents of high importance to legislative bodies. But up to the present time John Bracken has not found a seat. He represents

nobody so far as representation in this House of Commons is concerned. I say-


Gordon Graydon: That would be more applicable to my right hon. friend than to Mr. Bracken.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I beg the hon. gentleman's pardon. I say, standing here speaking for the rights of the people in their parliament, that the only man who has a right to speak in the name of the people as a leader is one who occupies a seat in this parliament or who has received the approval of the electorate, giving him the right to speak as a representative. The fact that Mr. Bracken sat in a provincial legislature for a number of years does not entitle him to be regarded as a representative of the people of Canada at this time in dealing with the public affairs of this parliament; much less does it entitle him to put forth bills of rights and have those bills of rights quoted in this House of Commons when he himself is not here to stand up for them.
May I direct the attention of my hon. friend, since he has referred to a "bill of rights," to the fact that the Bill of Rights was an important statute enacted for the purpose of securing to the Commons of Britain, and to the parliament of Britain, its rights and privileges. One of the rights and privileges of free people is that there shall be a free parliament, and that their representatives shall sit in that parliament to determine the laws and policies that are to govern. What is to become of parliamentary institutions if we begin to substitute for membership in the House of Commons itself, or in parliament itself, some form of absentee leadership? That is a new development in the political life of our country-absentee leadership over a period of years.
My hon. friend knows that so far as this side of the house is concerned we have been prepared to facilitate the entry of Mr. Bracken into the House of Commons-


Gordon Graydon: As you did for Mr. Meighen.
. Mr. MACKENZIE KING: The people expressed their opinion.


Richard Burpee Hanson: No, no.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I may say that any leader who cannot obtain a seat is not one who ought longer to claim the right to lead a political party.	'


Gordon Graydon: My hon. friend was in exactly that position.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: 1 am just directing attention to the change that is coming over the spirit of our political institutions when

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
it begins to be the custom to have leaders of parties, who claim they are to be at the head of an alternative government after a general election, direct their followings from outside parliament altogether.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Your friend Mitch Hepburn did that, did, he not?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: He is no
example.


Richard Burpee Hanson: He was your friend then. .


William Lyon Mackenzie King: That makes the position of my hon. friends worse and worse.


Mr. PERLEY:: He succeeded.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: However, this is not a joking matter. It is not for me to say what road, either to success or to ruin, the hon. gentlemen opposite should take as we approach a general election, but it is for me in my position as leader of this House of Commons to point out that the place for the leader of a political party which hopes to be in a position to form a government, is in the House of Commons in the position of leader of the opposition.
May I here direct attention to the per-tinancy of what I have just said. Parliament has given to the position of leader of the opposition a place of exceptional significance and importance. There has been assigned by statute to the leader of the opposition a position which places upon him certain definite obligations, one of which is to be in parliament and to watch the administration, to criticize the administration fairly, and presumably also to make known what alternative policies he would present to those which are being proposed. He draws a salary similar to that of the members of the government. Now, I submit that parliament never intended that that position should be occupied by someone acting in the place of the leader of the party, however amiable and delightful he himself might be. Considering the importance of the great questions which have to be decided in this parliament this year, I hope that before very long the leader of the Conservative party opposite will find it possible-if it is possible at all for him to do so-to get into this House of Commons and let us have the opportunity to debate these questions face to face.
May I point out also the invidious position in which I am placed if I venture to take issue with anything that Mr. Bracken may say; immediately it will be said that Mr. King is saying something in the absence of the person who has made the statement. Well. I wish to say what I have to say to Mr. Bracken in his
presence, and I want that presence to be here in the House of Commons. I hope hon. gentlemen opposite will believe that the government is most sincere when I say, on behalf of the government, that if, in any way, we can facilitate Mr. Bracken's entry to this House of Commons at an early stage in this session we shall be happy to do so, because I believe the people of this country have the right to see, not how Mr. Bracken performs in matters of political organization outside this house, but how he conducts himself in matters of debate here when the house is in session.
I have said what I have said because my hon. friend attached so much importance in the course of his remarks to Mr. Bracken and his bill of rights. With much of what my hon. friend has otherwise said I am in accord. He did endorse in many directions a large part of the proposed legislation which is put forth in the speech from the throne.


Gordon Graydon: Look where it came from.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: My hon. friend now says, "Look where it came from". But he does not deny he has endorsed much of what the government has proposed to this parliament, and for that I wish to thank him.
I should like to congratulate the mover and the seconder of the address. My hon. friend the leader of the opposition (Mr. Graydon) said he was going to save time and cut short his remarks in that particular. It is one of the traditions of the House of Commons that when hon. members speak at the opening of a session some cognizance should be taken of the manner in which they speak on such an important occasion. I for one, being rather fond of preserving traditions where they are worthy of preservation, have great pleasure this afternoon in complimenting most warmly both the hon. member for Dorchester (Mr. Tremblay) and the hon. member for Rosthern (Mr. Tucker) upon their splendid utterances in moving and seconding the address in reply to the speech from the throne. The leader of the opposition has drawn attention to the fact that, for some years, both hon. gentlemen have been members of this house, that both are veterans of the last war, that both are on active service in the present war, performing useful service in our country, and that both have regretted that for reasons which are apparent they do not find it possible to serve overseas. However, each has been setting a fine example to others by the manner in which he has sought to serve the country's interests both in parliament and in the armed forces. These hon. members are similar in the respects which I have mentioned. They are similar also in another respect which is important at this time. They
32	COMMONS
The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
are the fathers of fairly large families, and as such are in a position to speak not only as veterans on such matters as demobilization and rehabilitation of the forces, but, also as heads of families on the significance of the social legislation which is proposed in the speech from the throne. I am glad they have expressed themselves so strongly in favour of it.
There is one other point I should like to mention in regard to these two hon. gentlemen. One comes to us from the province of Quebec; he is of a race and religion different from that of the other hon. gentleman, who comes to us from the prairie provinces. In the speeches delivered by these two hon. gentlemen, however, we find that unity-unity in diversity-which is perhaps the greatest of all the outstanding features of our country. We are a united country, though we may have diverse elements; and our unity could not have been better exemplified than it was in the two admirable addresses which were delivered on Friday last.
This afternoon the leader of the opposition began his remarks, quite rightly, by emphasizing the fact that the war is continuing, and that it was or should be the most important of all consideration^ before us at this time. Later, however, in the course of his remarks my hon. friend said that he thought either the speech from the throne or the government itself had given evidence of a belief that the war would be over somewhat soon. May I immediately take exception to any statement of the kind. I wish I could say to this House of Commons that I believed the war was nearing an end. It is perfectly true that conditions are much better than they were a year ago. We have great reason to be thankful for the tremendous gains which have been made in the course of the past year; that the Germans have been driven out of Africa; that Italy has surrendered unconditionally; that the Italian fleet is now under the control of the allied powers; that Sicily has been successfully invaded and liberated, and that Italy has been invaded. We can be thankful that the Russians have had such great successes, and also that on the other side of the world the United States, Australian, New Zealand and British forces have had the great successes which they have achieved up to the present in their battles against the Japanese. But it remains true as far as both Germany and Japan are concerned that to-day these countries still occupy a very considerable proportion of conquered territory, and that the fighting is still taking place on that conquered territory. In Europe, while Russia is making a magnificent fight, the Germans are still on

Russian soil. In Italy, while the British, United States and Canadian forces, and others allied with them, are making a magnificent fight, the Germans still are in possession of the greater part of that country. At the present time Germany is surrounded by a group of conquered countries which serve as outer defences to her immediate territory. Those countries which have been overrun are providing Germany at present with resources which she needs, in the way of man-power, food and raw materials. Their peoples are being made to work and to serve the interests of Germany, which itself remains a perfectly intact fortress. Similarly in the orient Japan controls the many countries and islands which she has taken from the Netherlands, the British and others, and Japan is being supplied with labour and materials in a way which helps to serve her ends and needs.
So, Mr. Speaker, while we have great reason to be thankful for the progress which has been made, it would be wrong to assume that there is like reason to believe that there will be an early conclusion to this war. I have' followed the progress of the war, I think, as closely as any man in Canada, and I am sure I am only giving the experience of others who have sought to follow it closely, as well as my own, when I say that I have been surprised at how long it has 'taken, in the light of the expectations that have been cherished, to reach the different objectives that have been attained along the way. Let me remind hon. members here of what their views were at the time Africa was invaded by the United States armies, and at the time the British were fighting along the north coast of that continent. It was thought first that it would be a matter of only a few weeks before the Germans and Italians were driven out, then of a few months, but as it turned out a very much longer time was required. When this house adjourned last July our forces, along with British and American forces, had entered Sicily. We thought it was going to be a matter of only a short time until Sicily and then Italy were conquered. Certainly when the Italian mainland had been successfully invaded by the allied forces it was felt that it would be only a short time until Rome would be in the possession of the allied powers. Well, Rome is not yet under allied control, -and no one can say how long the Italian campaign- may last.
We know that in all probability Europe is to be invaded from the west as well as the east and south, but does anyone realize how difficult that invasion is going to be? I want this afternoon to leave 'that thought, above all others, with bon. members of this house. As I

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
see it, our country, in common with Great ' Britain and the United States, is facing as appalling a situation as these countries have faced at any time. I do not wish to exaggerate the difficulty of invading Europe, but I do wish to draw attention to the fact that invasion means not merely a successful landing of troops on the continent of Europe and the combined action of different armed forces, but also that once men are on the soil of Europe they have to be maintained there. And they will have to be maintained with supplies brought, in large part, from this continent, across the Atlantic. I need not go into details, because I think hon. members have a pretty clear conception of what the facts of the situation will be. But I do say at once to the House of Commons and to the people of Canada that I am far from believing there is going to be an early conclusion to this war. For that reason I believe parliament must continue to make the winning of the war its first and main objective. '
Listening to my hon. friend this afternoon I must say I was surprised, particularly when he dwelt at such length upon matters pertaining to general elections compared with the time he devoted to the present situation in Europe.


Gordon Graydon: I was going by the speech from the throne.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Well, my hon. friend has his own responsibility.


Gordon Graydon: So does the Prime
Minister.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: He has his own responsibility.


Gordon Graydon: The speech from the throne was filled with everything except the war.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: My hon. friend spoke on his own responsibility, and it was for him to do what I am seeking to do now, namely, to impress the house with the importance of winning the war, before all else.
My hon. friend has just said that he was following the speech from the throne. May I repeat to the house the paragraph which I believe to be the most important appearing in the speech from the throne. It is in these words:
The winning of the war clearly remains the first of all objectives. My ministers believe it is their duty to see that Canada's war effort is firmly maintained until the enemy is defeated in Europe and in Asia. They believe the government's primary task, and the primary duty of the Canadian people, is to concentrate on the prosecution of the war. Our fighting men must be assured that there will be no 100-3
diversion from this vital task and no relaxation of Canada's war effort. Till the war is won, the policies of my government will continue to be shaped to that end.
That is the policy of the present administration. In so far as it lies within our power, we intend, in the house, to endeavour to concentrate on measures relating to the winning of the war, until the war is won-and not, I pray, to devote our time to too great consideration of matters which may be more concerned with the winning of elections than with the winning of the war.
Before proceeding further, may I say, so that hon. members may know exactly where the government stands in relation to elections, that I have already made clear to the people of Canada, in an address last September, at a time when members of different parties were saying that we were going to have a general election before the end of the year, that so far as I was concerned, and so far as the government was concerned, we hoped to carry through to the end the trust which had been given to us by the Canadian people, when they returned us to power, a trust that we would put forth the utmost effort in the winning of the war, and direct the affairs of Canada to that end. We intend to do that. Unless prevented, in some way which it would be impossible to control, from carrying on the affairs of government as they must be carried on if we are to win the war, we intend to continue with that work, and not to interrupt it by any general election until the war is won. The people of Canada do not want a general election at this time of war. Our men fighting overseas do not want an election, if it can be avoided, until after victory is achieved, and we are in a position to welcome them and all our armed forces home as a victorious army.
A prime minister is placed in a very difficult position when he is asked to give any undertaking to the country that he will not, in any circumstance, have a general election. It is running counter to the spirit of British institutions, when as regards the time of an appeal to the people any government binds itself in any final way. For that reason I have found it necessary, as I do to-day, to say that situations may arise in which it will be impossible for the government to carry on, with the authority it should have in a time of war. Some questions might arise which, would make it necessary that an appeal to the people be made to settle an issue, and get on with the work of winning the war. I see no reason for either at the present time. I have no desire for and no thought of seeking to find an issue of the kind. What I am determined to do, if



The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
God gives me health and strength, is to stay in thie position I am in at the present time until this war is won. Then, if circumstances warrant, the people will be given their full rights and powers to decide as to what administration they may wish to have in office during the next parliament, whether they wish the present administration to be returned to office or some other to take its place.
I have not forgotten the fact that there is a constitutional limitation upon the duration of a parliament. But this parliament may continue, I believe, until June of next year, if that should be necessary-the war continuing, meanwhile. And, short of that, I repeat it is the intention of this administration, with the cooperation of members of parliament generally, to carry on with the prosecution of the war to the utmost limit of our power.


Gordon Graydon: May I ask the Prime
Minister one question?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Yes.


Gordon Graydon: If I understood him correctly, on another oocasion he said he was opposed to any extension of the life of parliament; is that so?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Yes, I am
opposed to parliaments extending their own terms of office. I think one of the greatest mistakes made in this country was the extension by one parliament of its own term of office. I cannot say what situation might exist a year or more hence, at which time it might be necessary for parliament carefully to weigh all aspects of the situation.. But, certainly, unless there are very strong reasons to the contrary, I would wish to see no extension of the term of parliament, and to see the people secured in their full rights to return to this House of Commons for the period allotted under the constitution the government they wish to represent them.
I have made this statement mainly in the hope hon. members will realize that so far as possible their first duty is to cooperate with the government in getting on with war measures. I am sure they will so regard the situation.
Before saying a further word, however, I should like to join in what has been said by the leader of the opposition respecting our armed forces, what we in Canada think of our fighting men and the part they have taken in the war. It is difficult to realize that to-day some of the men who are serving overseas have spent no less than five of their Christmas seasons away from home. If one stops to think what that means in the way of privation to men who have the great duties

and responsibilities which all of them have, one will appreciate what is owing to these men. I do not confine my remarks to the men who have been longest in the forces- naturally they are very much in our minds- but I say that this parliament of Canada is prouder than words can express of the manner in which the men and women in the armed forces of Canada have bome their part in this titanic struggle.
I do not speak merely of the growth of the forces. We know how the navy has expanded, as well as the army and the air force. We know what has been done in the way of the production of munitions and supplies of all kinds. I am not thinking of quantities or numbers; I am thinking of individual human lives and of what each life in the fighting forces of Canada to-day represents in the way of personal hardship endured and service given to our country.


Richard Burpee Hanson: And sacrifice.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: And sacrifice. I was coming to that in just a moment. I should like those who are in the armed forces to-day, whether they are serving at sea, in the air or on land, to know that they are first and foremost in the minds of the Canadian people. We want them to know that we are proud of their skill, of their endurance, of their achievements, and that we intend to see that they are not disappointed in the backing which they will expect to receive from the people's representatives in the House of Commons and members of the Senate of their country.
I have not the time to-day to go into many of the matters to which my hon. friend has referred. I agree with him that it is desirable that we should seek to reform in some particulars some of the things to which perhaps we have grown too accustomed. As my hon. friend has frankly stated, one of these is the length of speeches. I gladly accept his challenge made this afternoon and would say at once that I intend to make only a few remarks before concluding, except on one subject about which I am obliged to speak at a little greater length. I should like to see this House of Commons get down to business just as quickly as it possibly can. We have a heavy legislative programme.
In connection with the carrying out of our programme, it has been suggested that the rules of the house should be revised. As the leader of the opposition has pointed out, the government has decided to have a committee appointed immediately to undertake a revision of the rules and procedure. It is true that I

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
took exception last session to this committee being appointed on the score that I did not think it was wise in a time of war to revise the rules and procedure of the House of Commons. But I have since come to the conclusion that this war may be much longer than some of us believed at the time I made that particular statement, and I think it is as well that we should at once take cognizance of the necessity of making some revisions of our rules and procedure to enable iis the better to cope with legislation pertaining to the conduct of the war itself. I am prepared to say this afternoon that if hon. members are agreeable the government will, if necessary, interrupt the debate on the speech from the throne to enable committees to be appointed immediately. I am informed that the striking committee already has a list of the names of those who are to be on the standing committees, and we should therefore be in a position to have these committees constituted immediately. It is the intention of the government to have some of the committees that existed last session reestablished, namely, the committee on reconstruction and rehabilitation, and the committee on social security. I understand that the names of the members of those committees are ready to be presented to the house at any moment. There is also the committee on war expenditures and the committee on radio broadcasting.
A new committee having to do with the elections act is to be established in order to ensure adequate facilities for voting by members of the armed forces wherever they may happen to be.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Is it intended that the activities of that committee and the legislation to be brought down after it has made its report will be limited only to the taking of the soldier vote, or is there to be a general revision?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: No, it is a revision with reference to the vote of members of the armed forces.


Richard Burpee Hanson: That is
what we understood.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I think that covers the committees that the government has in mind reconstituting or appointing at the present time. Those committees may be appointed at once.
I have another suggestion which I should like to make to hon. members, and I hope they will consider it favourably. I am not putting it forward at the moment or until I learn at first-hand the sense of the house. I believe with members generally that much more of the work of parliament could and 100-3J
should be done by committees, and that we would save much general discussion if that were more largely adopted as a method of procedure. We have been accustomed to sitting just half a day on Wednesdays. I believe that we would make more progress during the session if one day in the week were reserved entirely for the work of committees. Members of parliament complain that they cannot serve on committees and watch proceedings in the house at the same time. I am sure it would be a convenience to members generally if there were one day which they could devote entirely to the work of the committees.


Gordon Graydon: Now that the right hon. gentleman has brought up this matter, has he given any thought to an alternative scheme under which the time of parliament could be utilized to better effect with a different division of work as between the committees and the house?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Yes, I have given a good deal of thought to it. One aspect to which necessarily I have had to give the most thought is how the government itself can adequately cope with the questions that come before it from day to day as the issues-become larger and more serious, with the war reaching the stage which it has reached at the present time. As horn, members know, the cabinet is obliged to meet every day. In addition there is the war committee of the cabinet which is concerned immediately with policy in respect to all the important matters that come up in connection with the war. Ministers of the crown cannot, I believe, give the time that is,needed for the careful consideration of the war and other measures that come before this parliament during a war session at. the stage the war has now reached without having some day which they can regard more1 or less as their own for purposes of careful consideration of the different measures. I believe that if, after all committees are appointed, it were generally understood that Wednesdays would be devoted to the work of committees, we would be serving alike the interests of parliament and the interests of the nation.


Richard Burpee Hanson: The Prime' Minister is suggesting that there should be no>
Wednesday sitting?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I am suggesting that for consideration. But that would not mean for a minute that the members will not be fully occupied. I think the public would understand that there will be plenty of work for all to do. It will result, I believe, in a.

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
fuller attendance in the house when we are dealing with important matters, and in much less discussion and help to avoid undue prolongation of the sessions.
I shall leave it to my colleagues in the government to take up other matters which have been referred to by my hon. friend (Mr. Graydon).
There is, however, one question which I shall necessarily have to deal with because it has become an issue in the country at the present time. The leader of the opposition stated that he noticed that the speech from the throne had to do with international organization-but that it made no special reference to what I presume he meant were the constitutional relations within the empire. My hon. friend himself made no statement on that important question. May I say to him that I think the country will wish to know where the Progressive Conservative party stands on the question raised of the relations of the different parts of the empire, as it will wish to know where the government stands and where the other parties represented in this house also stand.
May I say- that I hope the debate on the address will not be made the occasion for the discussion at length of matters that pertain to external affairs. There is an appropriate time for different subjects to be discussed. I would myself have preferred to say nothing whatever to-day on the matter to which I have just referred if it were not that statements have been made from sources I cannot ignore, and the country is expecting that I should make a statement of the government's position. But there will be during the course of the session an opportunity, when the estimates of the Department of External Affairs are before us, to discuss fully all matters of foreign policy, and I would hope that that would be the time at which such further discussion as may be necessary on some at least of these matters would take place.
I notice in a dispatch from Britain that on January 27 the question was raised in the House of Commons at Westminster as to whether the government did not think a debate on empire affairs at this stage was necessary in view of certain views recently expressed on empire relationship. The acting leader of the house, the deputy Prime Minister, Mr. Attlee, said that he thought such a discussion would not at that stage serve a useful purpose, and that other opportunities might come. I mention this simply that hon. members will see I am not taking a different view' in suggesting another time
[Mr. Mackenzie Kinir.l
for the discussion of foreign affairs than in the debate on the address. I am not seeking to rule out such a discussion, but I am seeking indirectly to shorten, if that is possible, the time that most certainly would be taken by such a discussion in the debate on the address.
The question that has come very much to the fore in the last few days is whether there is to be a common policy for all parts of the empire or commonwealth on foreign relations, defence and other matters-a single or common policy as distinct from each nation of the British commonwealth having its own policy on foreign affairs, on defence and on other matters. Let me say at once that, so far as consultation is concerned and cooperation in matters of foreign affairs, defence and the like, as between the different parts of the British empire or the British commonwealth of nations, whichever one prefers to call it, I feel that there cannot be too close consultation and cooperation. I feel that too great an effort cannot be made to ensure careful coordination of these policies, and for my part, wherever opportunity has presented itself in the past or may present itself in the future, I intend to do all that lies within my power to see that there is, among the different nations of the British commonwealth of nations, full consultation, cooperation and coordination, where possible, of all of these particular policies.
I have no very great fear that this consultation and cooperation will not take place. It has steadily grown during the past couple of decades. We have reached to-day an effective method of consultation and cooperation that has not been surpassed at any time in the history of the British empire. It is capable, I believe, in certain particulars, of further development. The whole development, I would say, has been towards perfecting arrangements for effective consultation and cooperation on all matters of eommon interest and concern.
The suggestion of an organization of the relations between the different self-governing parts of the empire or nations of the commonwealth which would help to centralize their activities is not a new one. It has been made time and again over many years in the past, and each time it has come up for consideration some assurance has been given, where it has been dealt with at imperial conferences or meetings of premiers, that the nations of the commonwealth need not fear in the least any invasion of their complete autonomy in shaping their own policies. I should like to give the house in succession the assurances that have been given at different imperial con-

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ferences. Here may I say that I regret that this question1 should come up at this time, because I do think, involving as it does discussion in the press, in public assemblies and elsewhere, it is to a very considerable extent taking the minds of the people off the immediate thing, which is the winning of the war. Why we need worry to-day about the form of organization which the empire is going to take after the rvar, I cannot understand. I think the thing to-day is to win the war, and when the war is won there will be plenty of time to consider what changes in organization, if any, may be necessary.
Just at this point, lest I should forget it,
. I have been asked the question at different times whether an address which was recently made in Toronto and which dealt with this particular subject had been brought to my attention before it was delivered. I wish to say to the house that I had no knowledge whatever of what was to be said or of what actually was said until after that particular address was made.
Near the close of the last war there was what was known as the imperial war conference of 1917. The suggestion was made by that conference that there should be a meeting for the purpose of considering constitutional relations within the empire. From that day to the present no conference that has been held in Britain lias sought in any way to attempt to form an organization which would deprive in any particular the different legislative bodies of the commonwealth of full control over their own affairs.
The first conference of prime ministers which was held after the war took place in 1921. At that conference-I believe that Canada was represented by the Right Hon. Arthur Meighen-the following resolution was passed:
The prime ministers of the United Kingdom and the dominions, having carefully considered the recommendation of the imperial war conference of 1917 that a special imperial conference should be summoned as soon as possible after the war to consider the constitutional relations of the component parts of the empire, have reached the following conclusions:
(a) Continuous consultation to which the prime ministers attach no less importance than the imperial war conference of 1917, can only be secured by a substantial improvement in the communications between the component parts of the empire. Having regard to the constitutional developments since 1917, no advantage is to be gained by holding a constitutional conference.
That was the view taken after the last war, in 1921, that no advantage would be gained by having a conference to deal with these particular questions of constitutional relations within the empire.
The next imperial conference came in 1923.
I was present at that conference, as one of the representatives of Canada. That conference had occasion to deal with questions of foreign relations, communications, signature and ratification of treaties, and matters of defence. The position taken by the conference in these matters is set out very clearly in the following statement, under "Foreign Affairs". After the conference had discussed foreign affairs at some length the statement concludes:
This conference is a conference of representatives of the several governments of the empire; its views and conclusions on foreign policy, as recorded above, are necessarily subject to the action of the governments and parliaments of the various portions of the empire, and it trusts that the results of its deliberations will meet with their approval.
There was this statement with regard to defence:
The conference gave special consideration to the question of defence and the manner in which cooperation and mutual assistance could best be effected, after taking into account the political and geographical conditions of the various parts of the empire.
The conference affirms that it is necessary to provide for the adequate defence of the territories and trade of the several countries comprising the British empire. In this connection the conference expressly recognizes that it is for the parliaments of the several parts of the empire, upon the recommendations of their respective governments, to decide the nature and extent of any action which should be taken by them.
The next conference came in 1926. I was also present at that conference. It was not until 1926 that any conference attempted to develop what might be known as a formula which would set out the existing relations between the different parts of the empire; but at that conference a committee, which was headed by the late Lord Balfour, did present a statement which was adopted by the conference, and which set out in the clearest manner possible the views of the different representatives as to interimperial relations. I read from the report of the conference of 1926:
All the questions on the agenda affecting interimperial relations were referred by the conference to a committee of prime ministers and heads of delegations, of which Lord Balfour was asked to be chairman.
The committee reported as follows:
We were appointed at the meeting of the imperial conference on October 25, 1926, to investigate all the questions on the agenda affectjng interimperial relations. Our discussions on these questions have been long and intricate. We found, on examination, that they involved consideration of fundamental principle* affecting the relations of the various parts of

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
the British empire inter se as well as the relations of each part to foreign countries. For such examination the time at our disposal has been all too short. Yet we hope that we may have laid a foundation on which subsequent conferences may build.
I quote further:
The committee are of the opinion that nothing would be gained by attempting to lay down a constitution for the British empire. Its widely scattered parts have very different characteristics, very different histories, and are at very different stages of evolution: while, considered as a whole, it defies classification and bears no real resemblance to any other political organization which now exists or has ever yet been tried.
There is, however, one most important ele-, ment in it which, from a strictly ponstitutional point of view, has now, as regards vital matters, reached its full development-we refer to the group of self-governing communities composed *of Great Britain and the dominions. Their position and mutual relation may be readily defined. They are autonomous communities within the British empire, equal in status, in no way subordinate one to another in any aspect of their domestic or external affairs, though united by a common allegiance to the crown, and freely associated as members of the British commonwealth of nations.
And a little further down:
Every self-governing member of the empire is now the master of its destiny.
I say, Mr. Speaker, that no words could be clearer than those in defining the present position; and I must say that the position as thus defined' is the position which this government accepts as the present one and which it desires to see maintained.
In regard to defence:
The conference gave much consideration to the question of defence, and to the methods by which the defence arrangements of each part of the empire could be most effectively coordinated.
In dealing with defence the first item that is set forth is this:
- The resolutions on defence adopted at the last session of the conference are reaffirmed.
The statement there of what was reaffirmed at the previous conference is:
The conference affirms that it is necessary to provide for the adequate defence of the terri, tories and trade of the several countries comprising the British empire. In this connection the conference expressly recognizes that it is for the parliaments of the several parts of the empire, upon the recommendations of their respective governments, to decide the nature and extent of any action which should be taken by them.
There was, I believe, a further conference in 1930 which was attended by Mr. Bennett. I have looked through the proceedings and am unable to see anything which in any way alters the force of the position that was taken at previous conferences in regard to interimperial relations. There was an economic
fMr. Mackenzie King.]
conference which was held in this city in 1932, but it did not touch the question of interimperial constitutional relations. There was a further conference in London in 1937, the year of the coronation. I had again the honour of representing Canada, along with others, at that conference. At that conference foreign affairs, defence and constitutional questions were all on the agenda for discussion. I have a copy of the report of the conference and this is what is stated with respect to foreign affairs and defence. The chairman made the following statement:
Though we shall discuss other important subjects, we are agreed that questions of foreign affairs and defence shall be our main subjects.
During the discussion emphasis was laid on the importance of developing the practice of communication and consultation between different governments as a help to the coordination of policies.
The conference recorded the results of its deliberations on the subject of foreign affairs, and this is the pertinent paragraph:
While no attempt was made to formulate commitments, which in any event could not be made effective until approved and confirmed by the respective parliaments, the representatives of the governments concerned found themselves in close agreement upon a number of general propositions . . . they declared their intention of continuing to consult and cooperate. . . .
And in the matter of defence-
The conference gave close attention to the subject of defence, and considered ways in which it would be possible for the governments concerned to cooperate in measures for their own security.
In the course of the discussions, the conference found general agreement among its members that the security of each of their countries can be increased by cooperation in such matters as the free interchange of information concerning the state of their naval, military and air forces, the continuance of the arrangements already initiated by some of them for concerting the scale of the defences of ports, and measures for cooperation in the defence of communications and other common interests. At the same time the conference recognized that it is the sole responsibility of the several parliaments of the British commonwealth to decide the nature and scope of their own defence policy.
At that conference I made a statement of Canada's position in regard to imperial conferences, and the place that they occupy in settling matters of policy. I will read it to the house because it is the position which, if I were attending a conference of prime ministers later in the year, as I may, I would wish to maintain at that time.
The task of an imperial conference has been well defined as that of considering whethey the several governments represented, while preserving their individual rights of decision and action, can coordinate their various policies in

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
such a way as to assist one another, and help forward the cause of peace. Its function is not to formulate or declare policy. The value of this, as of other imperial conferences, lies mainly in the free exchange of information and opinion; in furnishing the representatives of the several governments with more adequate knowledge of the problems, the difficulties, the aspirations, the attitudes of other members of the British commonwealth of nations; and in giving that direct and immediate understanding of the national and personal factors in the situation which cannot well be obtained by correspondence or indirect communication. With this further knowledge in their possession, the representatives of each government, in consultation with their colleagues and their respective parliaments, are in the best of positions to formulate policies on questions where cooperation is required.
It will be seen that at all the conferences I have mentioned, it was clearly stated that the governments and parliaments of the different countries represented would formulate and decide their own policies, that the conferences were for purposes of consultation to help to make cooperation more effective in the coordinating of policies. It was not for the conferences to formulate policies.
I wonder very much whether those who are speaking about more effective consultation, cooperation and coordination, begin to appreciate how much has been achieved in that direction, how completely there are existing throughout the British commonwealth of nations to-day most effective means of consultation and of cooperation in everything that affects policy, whether it is foreign policy or defence, or communications, or any other particular matter. Let me very quickly mention just what some of those means are.
In the first place there is the communication which takes place between the governments of the different countries. This government receives every day several communications from the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs bringing to our attention matters that are of concern to the different nations of the commonwealth. Our government communicates every day more or less, I think I can say every day, and sometimes sends several messages in a day, to the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs giving our views in these matters. There is direct communication between the prime ministers of the different nations of the commonwealth. The Prime Minister of Great Britain communicates direct with the Prime Minister of Canada, as he does with the Prime Minister of Australia and other nations of the commonwealth, and I communicate direct with him or with them when the situation is important enough to have these direct communications in addition to the messages which
are sent through the Department of External Affairs to the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs.
Then there is present in Ottawa a representative of the British government in the person of the high commissioner, formerly a very distinguished member of British cabinets. The high commissioner of the United Kingdom is in a position to communicate direct with the members of the government, with myself personally, as he does very frequently, or with officials of the Department of External Affairs, on matters on which it is desirable to have fuller information than that which is likely to come in formal dispatches. But more than that we have also our high commissioner in Great Britain, and our high commissioner is in a position to bring to the attention of the Prime Minister and other ministers of Britain matters on which we feel we should like to give fuller information than is contained in more formal communications. The practice has grown up during the present war of having the high commissioners of all parts of the British empire resident in London meet daily with the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs. He has present with him on most occasions a representative of the foreign office, and at these interviews which take place between the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs, who has been sitting in the cabinet at Downing street, there is communicated to the high commissioners what is important in reference to interimperial relations and matters of common concern with respect to the war.
A complete system of representation by high commissioners in different parts of the empire has grown up since the beginning of this war. Canada has had her high commissioner in Britain for many years, and we received the high commissioner from Great Britain for the first time in 1928. Since the outbreak of war, Canada has appointed high commissioners to all the self-governing dominions. We have our high commissioners in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Ireland and Newfoundland. These countries (except Newfoundland) have their high commissioners here in Ottawa.
In addition to that we have ministers or ambassadors in a number of the leading capitals. Our ministers are in touch with the ministers or the ambassadors there from other parts of the commonwealth and are in a position to gather a great deal of information which is communicated to the government at Ottawa, matters of common interest and concern; therefore, in all of these particulars there is from day to day the fullest and most complete kind of consultation.

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
I should add that in addition to all of these communications which take place over the wires there are frequent visits by ministers from different nations of the commonwealth, particularly from Great Britain to Canada and frequent visits by our ministers to Great Britain. Scarcely a month goes by that we have not the honour of meeting either here or in Washington or elsewhere a minister of the British government who is on this continent on some important mission. Take the relations between Mr. Churchill and myself. I have had several meetings with Mr. Churchill since the war began, some of them at Washington, some in England and some here in Canada. All of this is a very much changed condition from what existed prior to the war. Means of travel have been so perfected that a minister can cross from Canada to Britain or vice versa in less than a day, and when any question comes up on which we feel it is necessary to have immediate personal consultation we arrange to see that personal consultation is brought about here or overseas.
I should add in addition to that what I think is most important of all, and it is an answer to those who talk about having some imperial council that is going to decide commonwealth policies. We have to-day a continuing conference of cabinet councils of the commonwealth, a continuing conference of cabinets of the commonwealth dealing with matters of common concern. Let me explain what I mean. When any question comes up that is of common concern to the commonwealth in whole or in part, a communication comes, say from London, if that is the source at which the question arises, to our government. A similar communication is sent to the premiers of other goverments of the commonwealth. Immediately I am in a position, as Prime Minister, to take that particular question before my colleagues in the cabinet; and when I give advice to the British government on any matter I am not giving advice by myself alone, in the atmosphere of London, but I am giving advice based on what judgment I am able to form after consulting with the members of the government from all parts of Canada, each of whom has his immediate responsibility to this parliament of Canada which has its responsibility to the people of Canada. I ask: how can conferences between cabinets be carried out more effectively than that?
The objection I have to going over to London to imperial conferences to try to settle policies, if that should be the object, is that I am at a complete disadvantage in those cir-

cumstances; and when I speak of myself it is quite impersonal; I am referring to anyone who holds the office of Prime Minister of Canada. The Prime Minister attending in London meets an entire cabinet. He may be entirely alone. He has not with him all his colleagues; he has with him very few colleagues, unless the business of his own country is to be neglected while he is away. More than that, however, he is without his expert advisers, who are much needed in dealing with great questions of peace or war. On the other hand every minister of the cabinet in London has his expert advisers, when a certain issue is up for discussion, either seated beside him or in an adjoining room, and he is in a position to command their views on any suggestion that may be made. Further, he is in a position to confer with all his colleagues and make his statement to the conference based upon opinions formed in that way. As I say, unless one is prepared to take with him colleagues and experts, and to allow the government of Canada to be carried on minus these responsible ministers and officials while an imperial conference is being conducted, one is not in a position to discuss matters as they should be discussed, and in the light of the responsibilities of the situation, as one would wish to discuss them.	~
But when, as to-day, we have this system under which every question brought up is discussed fully in the cabinets of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Great Britain; when views are interchanged within a very- short time, what more effective means could possibly be found of obtaining a consensus of view, an approach toward common policy, and a coordination of policies? I am one hundred per cent for close consultation, close cooperation and effective coordination of policy on all matters of common concern between the different nations of the British commonwealth. By all means let ub within the British commonwealth be as united as we possibly can in thought and action, but let us seek in regard to other countries also to effect a closer cooperation and coordination of policies, which wall make for the sort of world organization we hope to see prevail in future in this world.
This leads me to conclude with just a reference-


Mr. BLACKMORE:: Would the right hon. gentleman permit a question? Ever since Lord Halifax delivered his address I have been wondering what further elements of coordination or cooperative machinery he had in mind than those which the Prime Minister has out-

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
lined. Would it be asking too much to request that the Prime Minister give us some idea of what further might be required?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I would not care to attempt in any way to interpret the views of Lord Halifax, but in order to make the position quite clear I think I should say that Lord Halifax was speaking entirely for himself. I have been informed that he was not making any pronouncement on behalf of the British government. He was speaking as an individual who came to Canada to address a large organization in Toronto, and he gave his views on a subject which has been very close to his heart all through his lifetime. I believe a close reading of the address by Lord Halifax will show that in many particulars it has not been understood as he would wish to have it understood. Lord Halifax is a political philosopher as well as a very eminent statesman. He was reviewing the past century and the developments which have taken place during that time, and allowing his mind to travel into the next hundred years as to the possible changes that might be necessary in commonwealth organization. I do not think he meant to do more than put before the particular audience he was addressing, and through it before the public, certain thoughts which he believed it would be well to be considered by all of us who have the future in mind. But I think it was unfortunate, as it has certainly proved, that the speech should have been delivered at this particular time, because it has raised certain issues; and I am speaking here this afternoon very much against my own will in developing this theme at all. I am doing so only because the hon. gentlemen whom I am immediately facing, the leader of the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation (Mr. Coldwell) and the hon. gentleman who just interrupted me, the leader of the Social Credit party, have given their views on the subject which was brought up, and on that account I feel it necessary to give mine.


John Horne Blackmore: I am just wondering if perhaps the hon. gentleman from Britain was not expressing the very idea that has been outlined by the Prime Minister. The right hon. gentleman will remember that my comment was to the effect that the ideas expressed were good but that it was unfortunate he did not tell us how they might be put- into effect.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: One concrete issue in external policy has been raised not only by Lord Halifax but also by Field Marshal Smuts on which I feel that I should state my position. In this I am stating the position of the government on what was said in recent speeches by these two eminent public men. I shall read what I have to say on this matter, 100-4
because I feel the great importance of any utterances on matters of this kind at this time, but I think it well that the position of the government should be stated. I should like to have hon. gentlemen immediately opposite make an equally clear statement, some time during this session, as to their position.


Gordon Graydon: May I ask the Prime
Minister if he prepared the speech he is about to deliver?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Yes, I prepared this. These are my own views and the views of this government.
A concrete issue in external policy has been raised in recent speeches delivered by Lord Halifax and Field Marshal Smuts. It relates to the domination of certain great powers. Both speeches expressed the view that the future peace of the world depended on the attainment of an equal partnership in strength and influence between the great powers among the united nations. Both took the position that the resources and man-power of the British isles were too small to enable the United Kingdom to compete with the United States and the Soviet Union in power and authority after the war. Both, therefore, argued that it was necessary that the United Kingdom should have the constant support of other countries, in order to preserve a proper balance. Field Marshal Smuts thought that this might be achieved by a close association between the United Kingdom and "the smaller democracies in western Europe"; he had little to say of the place of the British commonwealth as such. Lord Halifax on the other hand declared:
Not Great Britain only, but the British commonwealth and empire, must be the fourth power in that group upon which, under Providence, the peace or the world will henceforth depend.
With what is implied in the argument employed by both these eminent public men I am unable to agree.
It is indeed true beyond question that the peace of the world depends on preserving on the side of peace a large superiority of power, so that those who wish to disturb the peace can have no chance of success. But I must ask whether the best way of attaining this is to seek a balance of strength between three or four'great powers. Should we not, indeed must we not, aim at attaining the necessary superiority of power by creating an effective international system inside which the cooperation of all peace-loving countries is freely sought and given?



The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
It seema to me not to be a matter of matching manpower and resources, or, in other words, military and industrial potential, between three or four dominant states. What we must strive for is close cooperation among those great states themselves, and all other like-minded countries. Behind the conception expressed by Lord Halifax and Field Marshal Smuts there lurks the idea of inevitable rivalry between the great powers. Could Canada, situated as she is geographically between the United States and the Soviet Union, and at the same time a member of the British commonwealth, for one moment give support to such an idea?
The Moscow declaration on general security forecast a system which would involve for its effectiveness, firm commitments by all peace-loving states to do their share in preserving peace. Britain, the United States and the Soviet Union were all represented at the Moscow conference. What would seem now to be suggested is that the prime Canadian commitment should be to pursue in all matters of external relations-"in foreign policy, defence, economic affairs, colonial questions and communications," to cite the words of Lord Halifax -a common policy to be framed and executed by all the governments of the commonwealth. I maintain that apart from all questions as to how that common policy is to be reached, or enforced, such a conception runs counter to the establishment of effective world security, and therefore is opposed to t'he true interests of the commonwealth itself.
We are certainly determined to see the closest collaboration continue between Canada, the United Kingdom and other commonwealth countries. Nothing that I am saying should be construed as supporting any other view than this. Collaboration inside the British commonwealth has, and will continue to have, a special degree of intimacy. When, however, it comes to dealing with the great issues which determine peace or war, prosperity or depression, it must not, in aim or method, be exclusive. In meeting world issues of security, employment and social standards we must join not only with commonwealth countries but with all likeminded states, if our purposes and ideals are to prevail. Our commitments on these great issues must be part of a general scheme, whether they be on a world basis or regional in nature.
We look forward, therefore, to close collaboration in the interests of peace not only inside the British commonwealth, but also with all friendly nations, small as well as great.


Gordon Graydon: I asked the Prime Minister questions respecting the home defence army, General McNaughton and the overseas structure. I take it the Prime Minister is going to wait until the Minister of National Defence (Mr. Ralston) provides an answer.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Well, unless I run wholly counter to the counsel given me by my hon. friend, not to take up too much time in the debate on the address, I cannot begin to run over the various subjects to which he referred in the course of his remarks. I believe the statement with respect to Canadian defence will be best given by the Minister of National Defence.


Gordon Graydon: I have no objection to that; I was just asking for information.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Matters respecting aviation will be best dealt with by the Minister of Munitions and Supply (Mr. Howe) who, as the house knows, has been giving special attention to those matters. I am not purposely avoiding them, but I simply wish the house to realize that I am not the government. This is not a despotism.


Gordon Graydon: Pretty close to it.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: It is not a one-man affair.


Richard Burpee Hanson: I would say so.


Gordon Graydon: I am not so sure about that.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: It represents
collective opinion-a consensus.


Gordon Graydon: Collective security.


John Horne Blackmore: Mr. Speaker, would you call it six o'clock?
At six o'clock the house took recess.
After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock. EXCESS PROFITS



LIMITATION FROM JANUARY 31 OF TAX ADVANTAGE IN RESPECT OF CHARITABLE CONTRIBUTIONS BY BUSINESS CONCERNS

James Lorimer Ilsley: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Lethbridge (Mr. Blackmore) kindly consented to my having two or three minutes in which to make a statement.
Evidence is developing that business concerns which are subject to tax at the 100 per

The Address-Mr. Blackmore
cent rate on excess profits are being solicited to make unusually large contributions to various non-profit organizations. The activities of these organizations while in many cases not charitable in the ordinary sense of the word are nevertheless classed as such for tax purposes. These contributions up to a point are allowed as deductions from profits for the purpose of computing tax, and under a 100 per cent tax rate on excess profits the main burden of the gift obviously falls on the dominion treasury and ultimately on the taxpaying public generally rather than on the business concern making the contribution.
It is therefore the intention of the government in the forthcoming budget to recommend to the house a safeguarding measure which will ensure that in the case of any contribution by a business concern, whether corporate or otherwise, to an organization classed as a charitable organization which is subscribed after to-day, that is January 31, 1944, the tax advantage in respect of such contribution shall not be greater than that obtainable by a comparable business concern which is not subject to tax at the 100 per cent rate on excess profits.
For example, in the case of the ordinary commercial or industrial corporation the tax 3 advantage in respect of such contribution will be limited to 40 per cent of such contribution, even if the corporation is subject to tax at the 100 per cent rate on its excess profits.



GOVERNOR GENERAL'S SPEECH


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. L. D. Tremblay for an address to His Excellency the Governor General in reply to his speech at the opening of the session, and the amendment thereto of Mr. Graydon.
John Horne Blackmore: Mr. Speaker, this may be the last session of parliament before a general election and, if so, it is the duty of all parties to make clear to the electorate where they stand on the fundamental issues of the day. Before declaring the stand of Social Credit and New Democracy I desire to say something about the other major parties in the house. May I turn first to the Liberal party. In the speech from the throne the Liberal government has published what looks very much like an election manifesto. Naturally the government desires to make this manifesto as attractive as possible, and it looks attractive. It is full of vote-getting promises. The only fault with the government's manifesto is that it is illusive and the people should instinctively recog-100-4J
nize it as such. It should not be possible to fool the people any more. In the last few years they have gone through too much.
The evidence seems to indicate clearly that the Liberal government will never be permitted to do anything which will hurt international finance and special privilege because international finance manifestly appears to be the boss of the Liberal party. The fact is that if you are going to help the people you must hurt international finance; that is, you must curb its activities. You must put an end to its doctrine of scarcity. You must cut excess profits and wipe out those instruments of scarcity, combines and cartels.
Should anyone doubt that the Liberal party is unable to escape from the control of international finance, let me give him an illustration to support- that conclusion. The government now asks the authority of parliament to commit Canada to participate in a plan of international organization which means a supranational government. This is a very natural thing for a servant of international finance to do. I and those I stand for are passionately against any plan which will mean the weakening of Canadian sovereignty and the strengthening of the authority of international finance. Such a plan will render Canada a hopeless victim of its machinations. Such a plan will also prepare the way for a third world war. I am against any proposal whioh will mean turning the soldiers of Canada into a police force to enforce the policies and programme of international finance. When Europe is set free, Europe must and will work out its own destiny. When Hitler and the Japanese are defeated, I say let us bring the boys home quickly.
Let. us take a look at the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation. The policy and programme of this party is as illusive in itself as that of the Liberal government. The C.CF. have two types of bosses. It has the Marxian socialist bosses who would impose socialism on Canada regardless of the consequences. Then it, has another kind of boss, the political strategist. His aim is power at any price. He figures things out in this way: Everybody knows that the people are heartily sick of the Liberal government, and the C.C.F. strategists plan to make that party a purely protest movement, When a man is asked, "Are you sick of the Liberal government?'' and he answers, "Yes", then the C.C.F. strategist will say, "Vote here".
The trouble with this plan is that the C.C.F. have now been ticketed with socialism. Surely the people of Canada do not want socialism. They must know that socialism means confiscation of savings and private rights and the regimentation of private liberties.
The Address-Mr. Blackmore


Mr. COLD WELL:: How ridiculous! Try to get some new ideas.


John Horne Blackmore: We are just unsmearing the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell). When he was out in the Red Deer riding he complained that they were attempting to smear the C.C.F.; we are endeavouring to unsmear them. The people must know that socialism and the socialization of business mean the socialization of everything else. It means a loss of their property; it means the end of private ownership, of farms, banks, pensions and insurance policies. The people of Canada are entitled to maximum security, but they are also entitled to full freedom. The policy of the C.C.F. will destroy the principle of freedom and replace it with bureaucracy. Fundamentally and economically there is no apparent difference 'between C.C.F. socialism in Canada and national socialism in Germany. Although the C.C.F. will take away a man's freedom it will never bring security. The policy of the C.C.F. means not security but chaos. We do not hear of the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation attacking international finance.


Mr. COLDWELL:: Who said so?


John Horne Blackmore: All we know is that it keeps fooling about with unimportant things, threatening socialization of industry and the banks. The reason for it all is that the doctrine and policy of the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation, in so far as it has a doctrine and policy, are based upon the outpourings of a gentleman called Karl Marx, who died about sixty years ago. It should be plain that Karl Marx did not know anything about the financial juggernaut of to-day or how to tame it.
But behind the Marxian fanatics and the political strategists are the rank and file of the C.C.F., and nowhere in Canada will you find more earnest people and better patriots than these. The common people of the C,C.F. party are just like the common people of any other party. They want security and freedom. They want an end to scarcity and the beginning of abundance. They do not want needlessly to smash anything. They do not want to change the present system for a new one if the old one when reformed will serve. All they want is results. And it is a fortunate fact that the C.C.F. rank and file are still free enough to upset their irrational leaders and follow along lines of practical reform.
Now what about the Progressive Conservative party? A year ago the Conservative party changed its name; but did it change its attitude to the people? There is no real evidence that it has done so, but we must be patient

and give it every chance to prove itself. I am still waiting and wondering. So also are the people of Canada, because the fact is that not only did the Conservative party add "Progressive" to its name, it elected a progressive as its leader. His name is John Bracken. John Bracken was a one-time friend of the common man.


Gordon Graydon: He still is.


John Horne Blackmore: What we want to know, what the people have a right to know, is this, is John Bracken still a friend of the common people? Have the vested interests or the Tory party broken John Bracken, or has John Bracken broken the vested interests?


Major James William Coldwell: And the Tory party?


John Horne Blackmore: Is the Progressive Conservative party just as it always was, a hireling of the big interests, or is it at last a people's party, free to really serve? John Bracken had a great chance a year ago. Perhaps that chance remains in this hour of national peril, when the claims of country so far outrank the claims of party. I call upon John Bracken to say where he stands.


Mr. KNOWLES:: Where does he sit?


John Horne Blackmore: I appeal to him to say that he stands against international finance and for the common man. It is to be earnestly hoped that without a day's needless delay John Bracken will declare, "I am a free man. The vested interests have no hold on me. I am against domination by international finance. I stand for abundance. I stand for the total use of the nation's resources. I promise that I will play my part to reform the old economic system so that it will have the power to put at the service of the people the full resources of Canada no matter what may be the reforms required. I stand for maximum production and for distribution upon the level of maximum production. I condemn the doctrine and system of scarcity; I denounce its supporters. I desire the vote and support of no men who put high profits for the few before plenty for the many. I will purge the Progressive Conservative party of such men."


Mr. DOUGLAS (Weyburn):: He will be
lonely.


John Horne Blackmore: If John Bracken will
pledge himself that way, then the mighty forces of monetary reform will know where he stands with respect to the common enemies of man.


Gordon Graydon: What will the hon. member do if he does that?

The Address-Mr. Blackmore


John Horne Blackmore: I will have to see him do it first.


Gordon Graydon: All right.


John Horne Blackmore: Meanwhile no commitments!
The forces of monetary reform want to know where every Progressive Conservative stands with respect to financial Toryism, which is just fascism in thin disguise.
Now, where does Social Credit-New Democracy stand? It stands for abundance and against scarcity. It stands for maximum production and for distribution on the level of maximum production. It stands for total use of Canada's resources. It stands for the right of the people to that which Providence intends them to have. It stands against the power of finance which would deny that right. That is the issue in Canada and the world to-day. The issue is not communism against democracy, or socialism against capitalism. The issue is total use of the nation's resources for the benefit of the people against restricted use of resources for the benefit of big interests.
New Democracy, when war came, stood and stood alone for total use of resources in war. To-day New Democracy stands for total use of the nation's resources when peace comes. Right now the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) may say that the Liberal government has practised war-time total use. It is a fact that fear of Hitler drove the government reluctantly to require something approximating maximum production. It is equally true that fear of international finance will drive the Liberal government and its policies back to where they were before the war, that is to scarcity and limited production in the service of high profits. It is to be hoped that it will take more promising than the Prime Minister has time for, to make the people of this country forget that for nearly a generation this government has imposed on Canada the unjust and harmful rule of scarcity, at the direction of international finance.
How do we get total use of our resources for the benefit of the people? Let me put the issue in a word. The issue is freedom. Economic freedom means political freedom as well. There cannot be political freedom without economic freedom. There is a tragic lack of both kinds of freedom in the world to-day.
We are fighting the Japs and the Germans in the name of freedom. Let me suggest that in the name of freedom we fight as well our own unjust prejudices; for the lesson of Hitlerism is in vain if it fails to teach us tolerance and generosity. English-speaking democracy under its present leadership has yet to learn that
lesson. Here is crowning evidence to support my statement. Many years ago the Jews, responding to a religious and national, as well as a natural impulse, sought for themselves a new home in their old 'home in Palestine. English-speaking democracy encouraged the Jew to hope; they promised him support. That promise came before the Hitlerian massacres. The Jew, with millions of his countrymen tortured and dead, still hopes and looks to us to make his hopes come true.
Where in democracy are our charity and justice? Where is our Christianity if we let the Jew now hope in vain? I tell this house that the homeless Jew is a challenge to all the decencies that make what we are pleased to call our English-speaking civilization. We dare not refuse that challenge. This house should recognize this truth and this duty by an. appropriate resolution and should give leadership to all nations along the path of justice and fair play through the fulfilment of the long cherished dream of the establishment in Palestine of a national homeland for the Jews.
Now let me say a word as to how this nation is to get the total use of its resources. The problem is primarily a political one. You can meet the other problem when this country has elected a parliament pledged to put the interests of the people before the claims of international1 finance, pledged to make financially possible what is physically possible and desirable.
Reformers of the capitalistic system, when they speak of the reforms in that system necessary to ensure an equitable distribution of maximum production, are asked how they will do it. It is a question designed to confuse the people, because, when a sensible and sufficient answer is given, I have found that the answer is taken by the technicians of reactionary capitalism and bent and twisted out of its original shape. There is no difficulty in building the machinery which will ensure effective distribution, and I tell the house that the time has gone by when the reactionary capitalists should be able to make people believe that there is any difficulty.
Let me put the matter positively. I defy any member of this house to rise to his feet and say that it is not possible to devise means-whereby to distribute all that the system is able to produce, and to distribute it, too, without adding to the national burden any further debt or taxation, and without imperilling our freedom with regimentation. That challenge stands. Social Credit-New Democracy is not strong in parliament, but it is very strong in the sense that what it stands for is dear to the hearts of the vast majority of Canadians.
The Address-Mr. Blackmore

Social CrediGNew Democracy is not bigoted. It knows that country comes far ahead of party; it also knows very well that there is *but Short time left within which Canadians might effect reforms by the democratic way.
Let us members in this house bear in mind the danger that if the parliament of Canada will not give the people justice, then the people will seek justice in another way in spite of parliament. At this time of crisis it is the responsibility of all men of good will to forget their lesser loyalties, to forget the claims of party and of class, and to join together so that they may defeat the common enemy at borne, even as our soldiers are now joined together to defeat the common enemy abroad. The common enemy abroad is Germany and Japan. The common enemy at home is international finance, special privileges, the kind of big business that chokes the life out of every other kind of business.
It is in this spirit that I appeal to the really progressive members of the Conservative party, and over the heads of the Marxian fanatics and political strategists, I appeal also to the common people of the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation. I appeal to those Liberals who have been able to retain their freedom despite a lifetime of despotic political [DOT]rule. All honour to them! They will be made ^welcome to the company of free men. So let *us get together, forgetful of our minor differences, remembering only that it will take courage and good will on the part of all free men and women to save this country from The chaos which impends.
If my appeal should fall on deaf ears-I trust it will not-then the party of Social Credit-New Democracy will feel in duty bound to go on alone, confident that we shall swiftly grow in strength; for a party which has the honesty and courage to stand against international finance, and for the common man; against socialism, and for reformed private enterprise, in which money will no longer be master; a party which is proud to give its life if needs be in this just cause, is a party which will deserve to have behind it the overwhelming support of a country whose people are still free. Such a party will merit the overwhelming support of the soldiers of Canada; for a party which dared to declare, as this group did, for the total use of the country's resources when this war began, a party which dared to declare for equality of service and equality of sacrifice, should be believed by all of our soldiers when now it declares for the total use of the country's resources when peace shall be restored.
rMr. Blackmore.}
Why did the Liberal government not declare for total war when war began? Its bosses forbade it to do so. Why will the Liberal government not declare for total use of the country's resources now that peace is drawing near? Because its bosses forbid it. And, Mr. Speaker, they are the self-same bosses.
When our soldiers went overseas they imposed upon those who stayed at home a trust. That trust was to build for them a Canada henceforth free from want and unemployment, free from misery and preventable disease, a Canada of real security and happiness. For my part I accepted that trust and I mean to discharge it.
May I turn for a few moments to a consideration of some of the items in the speech from the throne. There arc several things in the speech from the throne which I believe ought to be given special consideration. The government in power has not dealt fairly with agriculture in Canada during the last year. Conditions are gradually improving in agriculture, but it seems to me that the Liberal party has to be forced every step of the way. They do not seem to have a broad, generous, long-range policy; they seem to have a niggardly, cheese-paring policy that concedes a point only grudgingly. I complained of the treatment of the wool producers last spring. The treatment of the lamb producers was a reflection on the intelligence or on the integrity of those who were in charge, and the treatment of the hog situation during this last year has been something to regret; the management of the beef situation casts no honour or credit on the government, while the way in which the beet sugar industry is handled in Canada is a reflection on the government and will be a cause for bitter remorse before this war is over. I do not believe one could persuade any unbiased or dispassionate individual to believe that the men who have had charge of the sugar policy of this country were acting with an eye to the interests of the people of Canada. The labour situation in Canada is far from what it should be. The wartime wages control order, 1943, P.C. 9384, is a most astounding piece of labour legislation bristling with obnoxious features which bear adversely and unfairly upon the workingmen from coast to coast. Our treatment of the returned men is far from reassuring with respect to the future. I find returned men everywhere are dissatisfied. In the first place there has been a removal of the insurance principle from the Pension Act. Very meagre allowances are given to men when they are mustered out of the service, and there is observable indecent haste in the discharge of men from hospital when they are suffering from the results of service.

The Address-Mr. Blackmore
The reconstruction and rehabilitation programme of the government is causing apprehension, if not consternation throughout this country. We hear of fine and ambitious plans for post-war rehabilitation but never a solitary word as to where the money is coming from to pay for these plans. Yet the plans are being prepared and promulgated by a government that insistently said before the war, we have not the money. And the same mentalities will commence to think after the war, we have not the money. There is a great deal more than political significance to this matter. It seems to me that the average Liberal, if I gauge him aright, thinks of nothing in the world but whether or not he can get back into power. Whenever a matter comes before him he seems to ask himself, will this particular measure bring me votes? He utterly disregards what may be the effect upon the morale of the country, what may be the effect ultimately upon the welfare of the Canadian people.
We hear a great deal about the conversion of war-time industries to peace-time uses. I believe the hon. Minister of Munitions and Supply (Mr. Howe) gave a rather impressive speech somewhere in the east in November, if I remember correctly. In that speech he said there was no reason at all why anyone should be unemployed in Canada after the war. I agree with him. There has been no reason why anyone should be unemployed in Canada since 1930. There certainly was no reason after 1935. But that does not deal wdth the matter at all. I will grant that we can easily reconvert munition plants in the main and prepare them to produce peace-time goods. The great question is, how in the world are you going to enable the people to buy the goods when they are produced? I am informed we had in Canada in 1939 a production of around three and a half billion dollars, and that during 1943 that production rose to roughly eight billion dollars. We are buying in the neighbourhood of $4,000,000,000 worth of goods with the taxpayers' money and with the money we borrow, and are giving it away. What are we to be doing after the war to correspond with the gifts we are so munificently conferring upon Hitler and the Japanese? I suppose if anyone were to suggest to anyone in this house that we could give $25 a month or something like that he would probably have nightmares for three nights or more. But that does not seem to disturb the mentality of those Canadians who are giving many times that amount to the enemy. The all-important problem after the war will be the selling of the goods. The government steers clear of that problem. I suppose government members will answer me immediately
and say, we are planning on export trade markets. Let it be borne in mind, Mr. Speaker, that when the war closes there will be sixty nations in this world all seeking for export markets, each one trying to sell more than it buys. Does the Liberal mentality find it impossible to conceive the absolute grotesqueness of that situation, or does it conceive that Canada, because of her economic strength, is going to be able to crow'd the other nations out of the markets and lay the foundation for another war? If everyone of those sixty nations operates under the system in vogue in Canada it will have a shortage of purchasing power within the nation which will be its most painful disability. Canada in this respect will be one of the foremost among them.
Until we learn how to adjust that shortage of purchasing power in the hands of the people, all talk of reorganizing the world on a peaceful basis is utterly idle.
In the speech from the throne we have the proposal to import goods in order to raise our standard of living. May I submit, Mr. Speaker, that the first task of the government is to enable the Canadian people to buy the goods that Canada can produce, buy a sufficient amount of them to raise their standard of living to the point where it should be. We should enable them to buy grains and grain products, vegetables, fruits, animal products and coal, building material and furni-. turn, shoes, clothing and machinery. All these things we produce abundantly in Canada. Why not arrange matters so that our people will be able to buy all they need of these things? Think what it would mean in this * country, a land literally flowing with milk and honey, if every Canadian were given by this parliament the assurance that, if he cooperated, never again would he go in need of the food, clothing, shelter, culture, education and recreatioa that Canada's fields and mines, her waters, forests and workshops stand ready to provide for him abundantly-if only he has the money with which to buy? Supply Canadians with purchasing power with which to buy their own goods and they will buy the imports they need; the government will not have to worry about imports at all.
Now I come to these social security proposals. The whole system offered by the government is merely a plan to tax Canadians into prosperity; no people can tax themselves into prosperity. The whole scheme constitutes an ambitious attempt to redistribute scarcity. There is no evidence of an expanding economy or that such has been contemplated. Such measures offer no possible means for attaining the total use of resources. Expand-
The Address-Mr. Caldwell

ing economy and total use of resources can be achieved only through the employment of debtr-free money. I submit once more to this house that the all-important thing for us to consider at this time is the feasibility of debt-free money with which we can cancel the debt which accumulates in this debt-creating system of ours, debt-free money with which we can distribute the abundance which God has given us the capacity to produce.


Major James William Coldwell: (Rosetown-Big-gar): Mr. Speaker, first allow me to join with those who have already extended congratulations to the mover and the seconder of the address, for their two interesting and able speeches. I want to deal tonight with a few problems which confront the Canadian people, but before doing so I should like to refer to the speech delivered this afternoon by the acting leader of the opposition (Mr. Graydon). I want to say at once that I agree with the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) when he suggests that the place for the leader of a political party is in this house. I venture to say that if Mr. John Bracken were to walk down the corridors of this building most of the members of this house would not recognize him, though he has been leader of the Progressive Conservative party for some fourteen months now. It is not that he has not had the opportunity, had he chosen to take it, of seeking a seat here. Sitting beside and behind me to-night are two new members from western Canada, both farmers representing rural [DOT] seats, one of them almost within a stone's throw of the legislative building where Mr. John Bracken has occupied a seat for twenty years. Had he chosen to avail himself of it the opportunity was there for him to try his luck, if you will, in obtaining a seat in this house, as he should have done; but of course, in spite of the boasting of the Progressive Conservative party, I would remind them that the provincial seat of The Pas, in the Manitoba provincial legislature, which was occupied for so long by Mr. John Bracken, was lost by his followers in that province, and that all the candidates in that by-election lost their deposit to the successful Cooperative Commonwealth Federation candidate.
I do not propose to comment upon what has been said this evening by the hon. member for Lethbridge (Mr. Blackmore). As I listened to him I was reminded of a verse which I have read, which runs, something like this: "I thank God I am not as other men."
I should like immediately to express the thankfulness which we share with all the people of Canada for the brightening prospects of 
a military victory in Europe, and for the preparations that have been made to overcome Japanese aggression. However, events in Italy and in New Guinea during the past few days warn us that we have a long and perhaps bloody road ahead. On our home front I think we ought to pay tribute to the splendid selfsacrifice of our farmers and their families and the efforts of the thousands of workers and office personnel who have produced vast quantities of food and material to back the attack. The achievements of women in many fields in Canada, too, have been no less striking than those to which I have just referred. Overseas the bravery, skill and fighting qualities of our service men and women are bringing results of which this nation may well be proud. Nor must we overlook the contribution of those who organized and trained the forces. Particularly may I mention the services of Lieutenant-General McNaughton, who was among the first in our commonwealth to prepare his army corps for the type of mechanized, scientific warfare which this great conflict has come to be. A fuller explanation of his recent retirement than has yet been given is awaited by both service personnel and large groups of our civilian population.
In spite of our military achievements, however, many Canadians have grave misgivings in regard to the future. The prosecution of the war and the shaping of post-war policy are inseparably bound together. Military and political warfare are inseparable parts of the same struggle for security and freedom. There is a grave danger that while we may be victorious on the field of battle we may lose the no less vital political warfare. There are ominous signs that attempts are being made to appease the fascists and reactionary groups that stand for a return to the pre-war status quo throughout the world. For months Franco has been placated, while he has maintained a division of men fighting our allies on the eastern European front. In Italy we have bolstered a discredited monarch and a former fascist general, while progressive Italians demand the formation of a government in which the Italian people can have confidence, under whose leadership the Italians could fight the common enemy. Throughout Europe, we are told, the courageous underground workers lack confidence in our intentions, as we continue to support discredited governing cliques and former monarchs who are obviously distrusted and disliked by their former subjects. Expediency may be the name but reaction is the substance. Nor can Canada escape some responsibility for this disastrous appeasement. As the fifth among the united nations, or first,

The Address-Mr. Coldwell
if you will, among the so-called smaller nations, Canada should exercise an influence commensurate with her military and economic power. Her failure to do so invites the judgment that our government is afraid of the social and economic implications of democracy at home and abroad. It is high time that our external relationships were brought under careful review by this parliament. It is time that we stripped some of the unnecessary secrecy that surrounds some of our foreign policy. I earnestly suggest that the standing committee on industrial and international relations- uneasy bedfellows-be split up into two committees, one concerned with labour and the other with international affairs. We need an informed public opinion to support intelligent national policies in these fields.
The speech from the throne states that the well-being of Canada is bound up with the restoration and recovery of world trade. While that is true, we must not allow a government to rely solely upon such trade for our own post-war recovery and well-being. Certainly the speech reveals little understanding of the means by which trade can be expanded in this modern world. As a first principle I suggest that the orderly planning of our internal economy is vital to domestic prosperity and to our ability to trade effectively; for effective trade surely means that we must accept and use the products of other countries in order that we may dispose of our own surpluses abroad.	,
There is no indication in the speech from the throne that the government appreciates the need of introducing planning into our trade relationships with other countries, as well as into our internal economy. Has our wartime experience of trade through government agencies taught us nothing? How can we plan trade on the basis of national need? Surely through the adaptation of methods of the bulk purchases and sales made now by national agencies. It is clear that bulk buying and selling on a national scale is surely foreshadowed by several nations including our own best customer, Great Britain. If we fail to use such boards as the bacon board and the wheat board, instead of reopening all kinds of private and speculative agencies, our foreign trade will languish. Perchance it will be strangled by a veritable jungle of tariffs, quotas, irresponsible cartels and emergency policies.
The speech from the throne, however, shows that the government has stolen some ideas from the C.C.F. programme. Unfortunately it is only petty larceny of which I can find it guilty. I wish it were of the grander
sort; for, after all, its social security programme lacks the necessary basis to sustain it. It suggests the building of a superstructure without laying the foundation of full employment, productivity and the actual means of distribution.
The central problem of our time is that of full employment. Social security measures, essential as they are, must remain inadequate until this central problem of full employment is solved. If we fail to make plans by which alone full employment can be obtained, the burden of new social security measures will fall upon the workers and farmers. The government fails to realize that fundamental economic and social change is the price of social security and of economic freedom. But even the social security measures proposed in the speech from the throne are not firm commitments. A study of the language used filled me, I must confess, with the suspicion that it was merely a pre-election document. If the government means what it seems to imply, let it put its programme on the statute books this session, and into full effect, before going to the country. The people are suspicious of death-bed repentances. They showed that in 1935, as our Conservative friends will remember.
And the Liberal party has, I submit, a bad record of neglected promises. Let me remind the house that.-in 1919, now a quarter of a century ago the Liberal party promised the people of Cam.da, among other things-and I shall quote (he exact words:
An adequate system of insurance against unemployment, sickness, dependence in old age, and other disability.
Now, after twenty-five years, with a spectacular loss of support across the country, it repeats its promise of long ago.
In all these years, what have we got?-an inadequate unemployment scheme in 1938, and some pre-death loans, called old age pensions. Therefore, when the speech from the throne says-and again I quote-
... a national minimum of social security and human welfare should be advanced as rapidly as possible-
-we in this house have a duty to demand: How soon? Another twenty-five years, perhaps. Actual legislation this session, before an election, is the only answer the house should tolerate.
But again I say all the social security measures contained in the speech from the throne leave untouched the central problems of our time, the problems of full employment and the proper distribution of goods and services. Furthermore, this scheme of social security cannot be achieved without an immeso
The Address-Mr. Coldwell

diate attempt to solve the grave constitutional difficulties of which we are all aware. These the present government has shelved and shirked.
A few years ago the dominion, and all but one of the provinces, had Liberal governments. Yet, no solution was found, even when the governments were basically as a party in agreement. How does the government face up to the constitutional problems now? Here is what the speech from the throne says:
.	.	. the working out of a comprehensive
national scheme, in which federal and provincial activities will be integrated and which will include nation-wide health insurance, will require further consultation and close cooperation with the provinces.
And then, note this:
My ministers will welcome opportunities for such consultation.
To use a slang expression, surely that is a prize example of passing the buck.
.No, that will not do. In the absence of an immediate dominion-provincial agreement, let this parliament enact the measure and invite the provinces to cooperate, much as we did in the case of old age pensions.
Those with good memories will recall a somewhat similar statement to the one 1 quoted from the speech from the throne a moment ago, one which was made by the present Prime Minister in April, 1930, when the depression was deepening. He said, as recorded in Hansard for that year, at page 1226:
In the absence of any representations indicating that there is an unemployment situation which the provinces cannot cope with, we have no right to say that there is any national unemployment situation in this country.
The time has come surely when the national government must assume the initiative in matters vital to the well-being of Canada. Above all, then, we urge the government to take action now. This social security programme, which the C.O.F. has done so much to popularize across the country during past years, is badly overdue. Other countries have had much of it for several generations. But again I warn that social security measures, desirable and necessary as they are, do not even pretend to solve the central problem of full employment.
Remember, that the present unemployment insurance fund, though nearly $180,000,000, would be a mere drop in the bucket if we failed to provide full employment for the million persons now employed in war industries, and the nearly 800,000 engaged in the armed services. The fund would only provide benefits for all those for less than eight weeks.

To rely upon social security measures to meet the post-war problem of full employment is in our opinion to court disaster. Therefore the proposals in the speech if put into effect, and they must be, can give only limited financial protection against a calamity which the government proposes nothing effective to prevent. On top of that it is questionable how much social security can be financed while the basic economic and monetary issues remain untouched. The truth is, of course, that health is more important that health insurance; work more important than unemployment insurance; rehabilitation more important than disability pensions; decent incomes and good homes more important than family allowances; independence more important than a dole. Health, work, rehabilitation, decent incomes, good homes, economic planning and social independence are the demands of the Canadian people, more particularly the demands of our sons and our daughters fighting the battles overseas. Yet the speech from the throne offers nothing to achieve these ends, so I am going to move, seconded by the hon. member for Vancouver East (Mr. Maclnnis) an amendment to the amendment as follows:
That all the words of the amendment be struck out and the following substituted therefor:
"We respectfully submit to Your Excellency that in the opinion of this house Your Excellency's advisers have failed to propose the fundamental social changes and economic planning which alone can hasten the winning of the war and make possible the establishment of a post-war Canada capable of providing full employment and complete social security."
The only positive approach to an economic problem to be found in the speech from the throne is the government's promise of aid to certain types of business, presumably in the hope that some crumbs may reach the people. We are told that there is to be an industrial development bank. Instead of bringing the banking, financial and monetary system under sooial ownership and control, the government proposes to establish a new institution which is apparently to assume the most risky and unprofitable part of the post-war credit operations. Instead of a financial system operating solely for the Canadian people, a new government bank is to be set up whose sole aim apparently is to aid certain types of private business.
For generations some of the leaders of the Liberal party-and I remember specifically the former Minister of Finance, the Hon. C. A. Dunning-urged the creation of an agricultural bank to assist our most neglected industry, but without avail. What agriculture asked for years ago, some businesses are about to get.

The Address-Mr. Coldwell
The farmer is offered a price floor for staple farm products. What sort of floor and for what staple products? True, the C.C.F. has popularized the demand for a floor under farm prices, but any price floor must be related to the cost of the things the farmer buys and uses. In other words it must be a parity price, not a price which is merely a low minimum and out of relation to other prices. Again I warn that a parity price depends upon the extent to which the country is able to plan its economy. In other words parity prices like full employment depend upon our willingness to make fundamental economic changes. That the government and the official opposition will not do. Evidence of this unwillingness is to be found in various phrases in the speech from the throne.
We learn that there are to be "suitable tax modifications." If this means, as I rather suspect, reduction in the excess profits taxes or corporation taxes or taxes in the hig ler income brackets, then we shall strenuously oppose such measures. If on the other hand it means the release of purchasing power through the reduction of taxation in the lower brackets we shall be prepared to support it.
The C.C.F. contends that big business has profited too much out of this war, not too little. It may profit more through the activities of the new War Assets Corporation. This body will dispose of hundreds of millions of dollars worth of publicly-owned plant and machines, tools, stores, equipment and material, all at salvage prices. The cry goes up that the government-owned plants will be of little value when the war ends. Private business demands that they be disposed of so that their vested interests shall not be jeopardized. To my mind every effort should be made to utilize these plants to give more employment, more goods and services to the Canadian people. The policy of the government in this regard is the direct opposite to intelligent *economic planning and to the needs and I believe the will of the Canadian people.
How improvident this sort of policy is can be illustrated* by the announcement made in the house last Friday by the Minister of Munitions and Supply (Mr. Howe). For reasons not disclosed the government has expropriated the properties of the Eldorado Mining Corporation at a price of $1.35 a share, which incidentally is above the price of the stock quoted in Toronto last Friday. In justice to the foresight of our late leader, Mr. J. S. Woodsworth, it should be recalled that in May, 1932, Mr. Woodsworth urged that the valuable radium deposits on Great Bear lake should be brought under public ownership and dedicated to human welfare. He
stated that if we were to desire the property in the future we would pay a high price to the promoters whereas at that time the only man with a just claim was the prospector. His words were ignored, and so to-day expropriation will cost the people of Canada some millions of dollars. As I have said already, the price paid by the government is higher than the market value of the stock the day the deal was announced to this house.
The speech from the throne when taken in conjunction with the record of the government gives us little hope for effective measures to cope with the stupendous problems of the future. What the country needs is a definite and specific programme, not vague promises which is almost all the speech from the throne contains. The C.C.F. has committed itself to a full social security programme. What we have also done, and other parties have failed to do, is to provide the economic basis which will make such a programme possible and feasible. What should such a programme contain? First, this parliament should suggest a sum which the country is prepared to spend in the immediate post-war period. Last year, and I repeat the suggestion, I urged that we name five billion dollars as the target of expenditure in the first two years following victory.
First, there must be a concrete, comprehensive and good post-war housing programme instead of the pitiful nibbling at the problem suggested in the throne speech. We should state immediately that we will spend at least $500 million a year to provide adequate houses in town and country for the Canadian people. This vast opportunity to bring decency and comfort to every Canadian and to eliminate overcrowding and squalor is a challenge that we can meet only by the boldest attack. This of course is a means also of providing useful employment for thousands in many branches of industry.
Next must come a plan for rural electrification, to bring modem conveniences to every home in the country. Such a programme would lighten the burdens of rural life, raise standards of living, and-again-provide employment. Next comes the essential task of reestablishment of our service personnel. The reference to this in the speech from the throne is distinctly disturbing. Apparently the government views with satisfaction and complacency the totally inadequate measures already provided. I quote the words of the speech:
A broad programme has already been developed for the reestablishment of veterans of the present war, and for the care of disabled veterans and the dependents of our fighting men and merchant seamen.
The Address-Mr. Coldwell

During the period of demobilization the armed service personnel should be kept on full pay and allowances until they are absorbed permanently in remunerative employment. This is one promise that we must make now and carry out for the men and women in the services. Government-owned plants set up for the purpose of war production should be retained under public ownership and converted to peace-time production. Farm implements and supplies, prefabricated houses, commercial aeroplanes and other desirable goods could be produced in these plants. In fact, the farm cooperatives in the west are anxious to go into the production of some of these things. We should immediately make it possible for these cooperatives to acquire the necessary plant and should also make available to them credit for this purpose.
There is still room in Canada for great economic expansion, particularly in the Canadian north. This should be a planned public post-war development. Surveys made in Canada, particularly in regard to oil possibilities, and the experience of the Soviet Union in the development of similar territory, indicate there may be vast natural resources in Canada waiting to be tapped.
Another new field particularly suitable for western Canada is that of chemurgy. Organized research should be undertaken with a view to discovering and developing new uses for agricultural products.
Perhaps one of the most essential things is that we should immediately appropriate a large sum of money for the expansion of the work of the national research council and other public research groups. It is vital to retain for the public benefit the services of the scientists now engaged in research activities. This involves for them adequate remuneration and security. We have watched some of these brilliant young scientists enter the service of the research council, be kept on a pittance doing the scientific work for several years, and then picked up by some industry, given a laboratory, a good salary, and security; their brains, their skills and their inventive genius sometimes lost to the people of Canada and acquired by a private corporation. To my mind the remuneration given to the young scientists who have done so much in this war, under our research council, is nothing short of a public scandal.
All this necessitates, of course, the investment and expenditure of money. Thus since the charters of the banks are due for renewal the government should introduce legislation to bring the chartered banks under public ownership and control. This should be accom-

panied by a national investment board to direct savings into socially desirable channels; and who is there who will rise in his place and say that a government-owned banking system would not be infinitely safer than the privately-owned chartered banks were in 1931 and 1932 when the finance act of this country had to be amended by order in council to allow some of the banks to deposit securities otherwise not depositable, in order to get the necessary funds to meet their obligations to the public? Or who will say that a national investment board directing the savings of the people would not give more ample security to the people of Canada than the present speculative system under which we live?


James Lorimer Ilsley: Is not the hon. gentleman wrong in his statement about the banks?


Major James William Coldwell: I think not. I think, if the hon. gentleman will look it up, he will find an order in council to that effect.


James Lorimer Ilsley: No.


Major James William Coldwell: Well, we will look it up. I think it will be found that Mr. Bennett's government passed such an order in council in October, 1931.


James Lorimer Ilsley: Not in reference to the banks.


Major James William Coldwell: Well, what was it in reference to? The insurance companies?


James Lorimer Ilsley: Yes.


Major James William Coldwell: And the banks?


James Lorimer Ilsley: No.


Major James William Coldwell: Well, the insurance companies in any event.


James Lorimer Ilsley: And what was done there is not as is stated by the hon. gentleman.


Major James William Coldwell: I believe I am right, though.


James Lorimer Ilsley: It was a valuation of their
securities.


Major James William Coldwell: I will take the correction meantime.
Under the compulsion of war we have seen how national economic planning, however imperfectly administered, can immensely increase production and end unemployment. Judging from the throne speech this striking lesson has been completely wasted.
In short, what we need now is a concrete programme to maintain full employment, at all costs, and definite legislation for an adequate scheme of social security.
Before I sit down, Mr. Speaker, since this afternoon it was suggested that the parties in this house place on the record their views regarding the controversy which has arisen in this country in the last week-the Prime

The Address-Mr. Raymond
Minister did so this afternoon-I wish to place on the record, not the statement which I made last week, but a statement of the executive of the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation which perhaps carries more weight than a statement from a single person.


Gordon Graydon: I would sooner have yours.


Major James William Coldwell: Thank you very much. They are substantially alike.
The national executive of the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation endorses the statement which our federal leader, Mr. M. J. Coldwell, made public with regard to the recent proposals of Lord Halifax. Those proposals are unacceptable, not only because they are against the interests of Canada, but also because they are against the best interests of Britain, of the commonwealth, and of *world peace. The principles underlying these proposals seem to be empire isolationism and power politics. Such assumptions are contrary to the principles of the Atlantic charter. They are the present-day version of pre-war Tory foreign policy.
The Cooperative Commonwealth Federation believes that Britain with the other nations of the commonwealth can and should play a leading part in the establishment of the necessary international order after victory. Further, we believe that Britain herself has now an unprecedented opportunity of assuming a position of leadership in the world's march toward enduring peace based on collective security and international economic cooperation. Canada should at all times give full support to a policy which, based on the principles of the Atlantic cl nrter, will win the cooperation not only of the members of the commonwealth but equally <1 all other small and great peace-loving nations. Tile future international order, if it is to endure, must not be based on power groups, imd least of all on domination by a few great powers, but on full participation by all states in the processes of peace building andi in the machinery of political and economic cooperation.
This is the kind of foreign policy which the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation believes Canada and other members of the British commonwealth should pursue.


Thomas Vien: I would point out to the hon. member that his amendment lacks something which is required in an amendment. The amendment to the amendment proposes, "That all the words of the amendment be struck out and the following substituted therefor". The hon. member will have to correct that to read, "That all the words of the amendment after the word 'that' be struck out".


Major James William Coldwell: The amendment should have read, "That all the words after 'that' in the amendment be struck out and the following words substituted therefor". I am afraid I did not read that.


Thomas Vien: If the hon. member so desires, I will make the correction.


Major James William Coldwell: Thank you, sir.
Mr. MAXIME RAYMOND (Beauhamois-
Laprairie (Translation): Mr. Speaker, the few remarks which I intend to make in connection with the speech from the throne will not be lengthy. We shall have at some future moment an opportunity to discuss the various measures announced as soon as they are introduced and better understood.
Let us note first that the speech from the throne does not foreshadow an early end of the hostilities, and that, on the other hand, it gives us to understand that the Canadian people will be called upon to achieve a still greater war effort, especially through the extension to the United Nations of the mutual aid principle, which was at the outset a veiled formula used in describing the gift of billions of dollars to England.
I have already condemned and I still condemn such free gifts to a country that is wealthier than ours and more interested in the present conflict. I have condemned and I still condemn Canada's war effort, which is out of proportion with our resources. I said last year, and I repeat this year, that I cannot understand, in view of our geographical position, far from the scene of the conflict, with no possessions to protect outside America, that the chief aim assigned to Canada by the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) should be a war effort proportionately greater than that of any other allied country, regardless of post-war consequences.
On his return from a trip to England, in November last, the honourable the minister of munitions (Mr. Howe) told us again of the amazement with which our war effort was looked upon over there, and he explained how profitable it was for us to supply as an outright. gift the goods delivered to Great Britain, in order that we might retain the British market after the war.
Around the same time, unfortunately for our minister, the agricultural advisor of the British Embassy in Washington implied that after the war, England would buy her bacon from Denmark in exchange for her industrial products; Denmark, however, presented England with no gifts whatsoever, nor did she give her, simply as a donation, any of her merchandise.
On the other hand, according to a dispatch from London dated January 18th, Sir John Anderson informed the House of Commons that Great Britain would pay cash for some of her purchases in the United States.
They should stop trying to fool us so as to justify our gifts to a country wealthier than ours. After the war, England will act in her
The Address-Mr. Raymond

own interests. That is what we should do also.
In this war we have played and still play the part of a servant who is not consulted but who must take marching orders. London dictates, pledges herself, and we pay the price by going to ruin, and the Prime Minister is happy!
A few days ago, Lord Halifax paid us a visit to tell us what we should do after the war to safeguard the Empire's possessions. He forgets that we are living in America and that we are a neighbour of the United States. May I say that the policy of the Bloc Popu-Iaire Canadien takes its inspiration from this formula of Lord Tweedsmuir: "A Canadian owes his first allegiance not to the British Commonwealth, but to Canada". And we will act in our own interests, which happen to be in America.
For the first time since the declaration of war, the government seems to show some concern for the future. It is behind England, however, who gave that subject plenty of thought when the war had barely begun. The speech from the throne, as a matter of fact, is very promising, and in the field of promises, it even goes beyond the social reforms programme proclaimed sensationally by Lord Bennett, just before general elections in 1935. A sure sign that elections are coming.
Several social measures are announced. In the first place, we wish to go on record as opposing any encroachment upon the provincial rights, and we shall demand that in the enforcement of the laws provincial autonomy be fully respected.
In reading the speech from the throne, certain passages are noted which deserve particular attention. Thus, the government informs us that its ministers are determined, insofar as possible, to provide for the future. This is an admission that they had not up to now given any thought to the future of our people. Unfortunately we were too w'ell aware of this.
Further, it is stated:
The family and the home are the foundation of national life. To aid in ensuring a minimum of well-being to the children of the nation and to help gain for them a closer approach to equality of opportunity in the battle of life, you will be asked to approve a measure making provision for family allowances.
What a discovery on the part of the government! The Bloc Populaire Canadien deserves perhaps a share of credit for the announcement of this reform, inasmuch as since its formation, a year and a half ago, the welfare' of the family headed our programme.
[Mr. Raymond.*
Most of the social reforms announced were sorely needed'. I have long been advocating in this house, on behalf of the working man, a living wage,, a healthy home, means of properly bringing up his family, in a word social welfare legislation.
I shall confine myself to recalling my interventions on behalf of textile workers. The Turgeon investigation ordered by the government had revealed an intolerable situation. As the report was pigeonholed, in 1939, I called the attention, of the government to the recommendations of the investigating commissioner in order to remedy the situation and proposed a bill to implement the recommendations. The government managed to prevent it from going through the required readings. This is the concern which the government has shown for the working man.
From 1930 to 1939, the Bennett and King governments meted out direct relief to the people to prevent them from dying of hunger. From 1939 to this day, the war has filled the bill and for the post-war period, a taxation formula is being worked out to pay for the gifts we have handed out to nations wealthier than we are. To-day, it is sought, by new promises, to help forget past promises -that went unfulfilled; such a scheme does not work any more.
No matter how worthy the reforms proposed in the speech from the throne, one fact remains; it is that the government does not enjoy public confidence to such a degree that it could put them into effect. A proof of this statement is to be found in the result of the four by-elections held last August, when the candidates of the government were defeated in each of the four constituencies. Our people have had enough of unfulfilled promises. New promises on the eve of an election will not have the effect of restoring confidence in the present government.
Last year, when the Prime Minister blamed me for severing my connections with the Liberal party, he said that I did not do honour to the province of Quebec. I answered that, when the time would come for me to get the approval of the voters of Quebec, I would not dread their verdict.
The test has been taken in Stanstead and Montreal-Cartier, and you know the result.. The government candidates were overwhelmed by' the standard-bearers of the Bloc Populaire Canadien, in spite of the fraud resorted to by government officials.
In Montreal-Cartier, the Bloc Populaire candidate crushed the government nominee, and if the Labour-Progressive candidate polled 150 votes more than our man, it is only because thousands of fictitious names had been added

The Address-Mr. Raymond
to the voters' lists and other thousands of voters had been deprived1 of their electoral rights. The Labour-Progressive candidate was permitted to name enumerators to revise the lists while the Bloc Populaire representative was denied t'he same privilege. A royal enquiry should be held, for the parties responsible were in the pay of the government.
In a speech delivered in September last before the National Liberal Federation, the Prime Minister attacked the Bloc Populaire. It happened after the by-elections held in Stanstead and Montreal-Cartier, in the province of Quebec.
He claimed that our group had but a negative and destructive doctrine, that it was attempting to raise Quebec against the other provinces in order to win votes and secure influence by appeals to race prejudice. And hfe pictured us as a danger to Canadian unity.
His grounds for complaint should be noted. Our doctrine was negative and destructive, he said. Where does he find that? The Bloc Populaire was formed in September 1942. In my first address, delivered in October 1912, 1 stated as a principle that Canada, being a Christian country, should be governed like a Christian country, that our first concern would be the people. Consequently, we advocated a policy designed to protect and help the Christian family and its numerous children, and to facilitate their education and employment.
I advocated special consideration for public health, the elimination of slums, and a readjustment of salaries, so that our people might live under healthful conditions, and the heads of families might give adequate shelter and food to their children. I also advocated a revision of the taxation system that would take care of large families. Instead of increasing the tax burden which large families have to bear, we would have lightened it. We wanted and we still want, in short, to safeguard the family, which is the foundation of society.
How can the Prime Minister find anything destructive in such a policy? The speech from the throne even seems to have taken a leaf out of it.
In the field of foreign policy, we demand, for Canada, true sovereignty and the attributes of a sovereign state; true provincial autonomy; we demand a national anthem, a national flag, as all other dominions of the commonwealth; we demand that the Governor of Canada be a citizen of the country as in other dominions; we demand the discontinuance of appeals to the Privy Council and of recourse to the Westminster parliament in matters of amendments to the constitution.
We wish to make of Canada a truly sovereign nation.
I could keep this nomenclature up indefinitely but I refer you to the Bloc's programme which has been made public.
The Prime Minister added that the Bloc Populaire was attempting to raise Quebec against the other provinces in fomenting racial prejudice. It would be truer to state that it was the Prime Minister who attempted, on this occasion, to raise the other provinces against Quebec.	'
Is demanding that the constitution be adhered to and that Quebec be represented as it should, equivalent to raising the other provinces against Quebec or fomenting racial prejudice. If so, Mr. Godbout, who, last year, protested against the procedure of the Government in connection with the redistribution of seats, would be as much to blame as we are.
Is protesting against conscription equivalent to raising the other provinces against Quebec? Then the Prime Minister would have been guilty of the same crime in 1917, when he was opposing conscription while all provinces except Quebec were clamoring for it.
Is demanding that the rights of minorities be respected as guaranteed by the constitution, that provincial autonomy be not infringed upon, that we enjoy our legitimate share of government appointments, that the workers of Quebec receive wages commensurate with those paid in Ontario, equivalent to fomenting racial prejudice?
We have become accustomed to hearing the Prime Minister make an appeal for national unity every time he requests concessions on our part.
Our policy is clear and unequivocal. Our movement is national in its principles and it will remain national in its manifestations.


Mr. FREDERIC DORIOX (Charlevoix-Saguenay):: Mr. Speaker, in rising to take part in this debate I wish to follow the tradition of congratulating the mover and the seconder of the address; but they will understand that I cannot agree with all that they said.
During the recess we have witnessed many important happenings, some of them having to do with our national life and others being closely connected with our external policy. One of the most important, beyond doubt, was the Quebec conference in August, 1943. I wish to offer the government my congratulations upon having chosen the city of Quebec, my own city, as the scene of this conference. I do not hesitate to say that the people of Quebec appreciated the choice of
The Address-Mr. Dorion

their capital for the holding of this historic meeting. I am sure that our visitors had an opportunity of getting to know our people and of learning that notwithstanding certain misinformation spread by some parts of the press, the people of the province of Quebec are as loyal as anyone else and especially as Canadian as anyone else. This conference also gave the people of Quebec an opportunity to manifest their fullest appreciation of those who, coming from abroad, do not attempt to overawe them or treat them as inferiors, as unfortunately happens much too often, but come as gentlemen. This appreciation extends particularly to the British Prime Minister and his colleagues. It was a great pleasure for our people to hear Mr. Churchill, his distinguished wife and charming daughter, speak to them fluently in their own language. I am sure that no one in Quebec will forget the speech delivered by Miss Churchill over the radio on August 27, when she said:
Je me rejouirai toujours d'etre descendue d'abord a Quebec. C'est ainsi qu'il faut arriver au Canada.
This may be translated: "I will always be delighted to have come down first to Quebec. It is the way one must come into Canada." But I must say, Mr. Speaker, that if our people were happy to receive such important personages, at the same time they were very sorry to notice the insignificant role played in this conference by our own government. Once more it was evident that our country does not possess the international status which would put it on the same footing as the other nations.
Another very important event I should like to recall is the appointment of Mr. Justice Thibaudeau Rinfret as chief justice of the Supreme Court of Canada. No doubt the government deserves our congratulations on this appointment, because Judge Rinfret was surely the man best qualified to fill such an important post. I am sure the people as a whole, as well as lawyers and others who have anything to do with the Supreme Court of Canada, learned of this appointment with great satisfaction.
Another event occurred which was not so important of itself but which became of some significance because of the declarations made on that occasion. I refer to the Liberal caucus held in Ottawa in September of last year. According to a report published in the Ottawa Evening Journal of September 28 the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King), addressing his friends of the Liberal party said, as he did this afternoon, that probably no general election would take place before the end of the war; but he added that some circumstances fMr. Dorion.)
might force the government to appeal to the country sooner. Among those circumstances was the following: any one of the opposition groups, or a combination of them, being able
so to impede the progress of business in parliament, or so misrepresenting and distorting government policy, as to make it next to impossible to carry on. I do not know if by this statement the Prime Minister intended to prevent the opposition groups from criticizing the government, but. if he did I think he made a mistake. On this point I should like to quote from an address delivered some time ago by the ex-president of the Canadian Bar Association:
Executive control of speech, particularly of speech in criticism of the executive, is fundamentally and completely incompatible with free institutions, whether the criticism be directed against the personnel,, policies or acts of that executive or of any board or commission appointed by it. In time of war everyone will recognize the propriety of restricting the dissemination of certain types of information or even of banning the expression of views calculated to injure the country's cause; but to attempt to ban or restrict criticism, however injudicious, of the conduct of the executive or its agencies, is an assault on the very citadel of freedom and the establishment in the seats of power of its deadliest enemy. After all, there are some principles the preservation of which is more important than the fate of any government.
I believe everyone who is interested in the safeguarding of democracy and of our parliamentary system must hold the same views.
The only other event I should like to mention is the result of the by-elections that took place in our province last August. Once more the government has been defeated and has been shown that it has lost the confidence of the people. The result of the elections in Stanstead and Cartier demonstrated that the opinion of the people of Quebec was the same in 1943 as it was in 1942, when I was elected for Charlevoix-Saguenay. These three by-elections in my province give evidence that the Liberal party has lost its grip on that province. This does not mean that any other political group would do much better, because knowing quite well the sentiment of our people I am sure I am right when I repeat what I said last session, that having been tossed for seventy-five years between "reds" and "blues" only to serve as stepping stones to power, without any advantage to themselves, the people of Quebec have become wary; and, though not sure of the political orientation they will ultimately adopt, have decided for the present to support men who, having broken with old ties, can offer them guarantees of sincerity and above all, unselfishness.

The Address-Mr. Dorion
I just said, Mr. Speaker, that the byelections in Quebec in 1943 proved abundantly that this government does not represent the sentiment of the people of Quebec or of the country. To support that statement I- should like to recall a declaration made by the Prime Minister himself on January 29, 1934, When he was leader of the opposition, and I quote from page 34 of Hansard for that year:
So the evidence from every side goes to prove that not only has the government lost the confidence of the country but it has lost confidence in itself. _ May I state further that no matter what majority it may have as a result of the number of hon. members returned at the time the government came into office, that majority no longer represents the opinion of the Canadian people. By-elections have expressed in no uncertain voice the opinion of our people. This government has lost the moral authority to govern. . . .
I repeat the statement. I say that having lost by-election after by-election in all parts of Canada during the last two or three years and the people having spoken so positively and so emphatically, it lias been made perfectly plain that the gouvemment has lost the moral authority to govern, and if it followed its duty it would resign, go to the people and allow them to speak. The Canadian people as a whole should be given an opportunity at a general election to express their view upon policies which up to the present they have been able to do only in part in by-elections.
I have no doubt that if the Prime Minister was right in 1934 we should not be too long to-day in repeating his own words; and a statement like this weighs more heavily on the eve of the very important journey which the Prime Minister is about to undertake. If we refer to statements made lately by most important statesmen, especially to the address delivered a few days ago in Toronto by Viscount Halifax, it is certain that at the next imperial conference there will be some discussions of very great interest for our country, and there may be some decisions which will bind the future of Canada. Is it logical, is it democratic when all the other prime ministers who will attend this meeting have received fresh mandates from their constituents-is it fair for the people of Canada to have, as their representative, the head of a political party which, according to his own words, does not represent any more the sentiment of the people. It may happen that in such a state of affairs Canadians will not consider themselves bound by the decisions emanating from this [DOT] conference.
It is true that we have a very fine speech from the throne, a speech which gives contentment to members of the Liberal party. But this is surely not enough to give the government authority to speak for the people of Canada. There will be much to say about the speech from the throne, and no doubt during the session we shall have an opportunity of
discussing in detail the legislation which will come out of it. I hope the government will submit to the house the measures announced in the speech, so that we can give them careful study. I hope, also, that all these measures will be discussed on their own merits with the greatest possible broad-mindedness, and that it will not give to anyone the occasion to raise discrimination against one province or another.
As regards our international policy, we heard not long ago that the government had decided to name ambassadors to some countries. There is no doubt that these nominations constitute another push, leading Canada to a greater independence. But there is always this deficiency in our system, namely that of being obliged to go to another country to amend our constitution. I hope, Mr. Speaker, in the course of the present session to have an opportunity to formulate to the house a project which will enable us to amend our own constitution, ourselves, taking good care, however, to preserve the rights of minorities and the spirit of the compact that gave birth to confederation.
If we appreciate the nomination of these
ambassadors, we must, however, deplore the fact that the government has not deemed it advisable to name one to the highest moral power on earth, the Vatican. I state that Canada should hurry to take her place among so many other countries with this international authority, the place on earth where problems are discussed and resolved with the greatest justice and equity. Are we aware of the fact that forty countries are represented at the Vatican? I have here the latest available list, and I think it is well known that those with ambassadors are Argentina, Belgium, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Germany, Spain, France, Italy, Peru, Poland. Those with legations are the following: Great Britain, Bolivia, CostaRica, Esthonia, Ecuador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Austria, Hungary, Ireland, Portugal, Roumania,, Santo-Domingo, San Marino, Salvador, Czechoslovakia, Venezuela, Yugoslavia, Malta, Liberia, Lithuania, Monaco, Nicaragua, Panama, Uruguay and Latvia. Everybody knows the President of the United States has his own personal representative. If so many countries find it to their interest to be represented there, wou)d it not be the same for Canada, and would it not be for her one of the best aids in helping her to play the role she is eager to play in the international field?
Therefore I am sure I would be reflecting the opinion of the great majority of the people in this country, Catholics as well as non-Catholics, in urging the government to decide as soon as possible upon the nomina-
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tion of an ambassador to the Holy See. This would surely be the greatest step toward the international status toward which we are heading. Furthermore I should like to tell the Prime Minister, when going to London, that at this imperial conference the finest task he could perform would be to sponsor participation by the Pope in the next peace conference. Since the beginning of the war we have been told we were fighting for democracy and Christian civilization. For us Canadians, we cannot aspire to anything other than the reestablishment of an enduring peace in the world. We cannot expect territorial possessions. We cannot expect much compensation. Therefore, if we wish to reach our end, if we wish to be true to ourselves and to others, we have nothing to do other than to see to it that all the necessary precautions be taken to have this time not twenty years' truce, but a real, everlasting peace. One of the most necessary precautions would most certainly be the attendance at the next peace conference of the most powerful moral authority, the greatest friend of neaee, the greatest advocate of the moral brotherhood of mankind. Moreover, this point of view is shared to-day by all those who really care for the welfare of mankind.
I should like to give as an example a quotation from Time of August 16, 1943. as follows:
"No matter what critics might say, it is scarcely deniable that the church apostolic, through the encyclicals and other papal pronouncements, has been fighting against totalitarianism more knowingly, devoutly and authoritatively, and for a longer time, than any other organized power. Benedict XY was expressly barred from Versailles by a clause in the secret treaty of London. But whether or not the Pope is present, the influence of the Catholic church's peace policy will be tremendous. Most Catholics and non-Catholies alike would agree that a peace that does not embody at least roughly, the papal position on fundamental social issues will bring not social peace but a sword. For when traditional justice fails, retributive justice supervenes.
(Translation.): Mr. Speaker, this opinion of the magazine Time on the participation of the Vatican in the future peace conference is shared by a great many people of all creeds, of all races and of all countries.
It is generally agreed that if peace had been better prepared in 1919, if the peace treaty had not been dictated by the international money powers nor based on the hatred of some prominent figures against certain Catholic countries of Europe; in other words if the peace treaty had been drafted with the cooperation of the greatest moral influence in the world, the Holy See, the world would probably have been saved the horrors of the present conflict.
fMr. Dorion.]
As long as this great international power, the Vatican, is deliberately left aside and excluded from international discussions, the suffering and unhappy peoples of the world will be offered only incomplete and insufficient remedies. The Church is a peacemaker by the very nature of its mission. Suffice it here to recall the many occasions on which the Roman pastors have been successful in putting an end to oppression, in preventing wars, and in securing truces, agreements and peace treaties.
In times gone by, the Pope was requested to act as arbitrator, and history shows that not once had a country any reason to regret having appealed to the Pope for adjusting its differences. One of the first instances where the European nations decided to exclude the Vatican from the discussion of international problems was the Hague convention of 1899. Notwithstanding the express demand of Czar Nicholas II of Russia, notwithstanding the insistence of Queen Wilhelmina, of Holland, notwithstanding the opinions of the experts in international law, the nations decided, on the suggestion of Italy, to exclude the Holy See from the convention. However, less than two years previously, the Seventh World Peace Congress, held in Budapest, under the chairmanship of General Turr, had expressed their gratitude to the Pope for his numerous peace interventions and had humbly and earnestly requested him to remain the champion of the great crusade for the fellowship of all men and to help the civil governments in their efforts toward peaceful mutual understanding.
Neither research congresses, even though independent of all confessional ties, neither the cabinets of reigning sovereigns, although divorced from the Church, could think of an international peace conference from which the Holy See would be excluded.
On August 24, 1898, Count Mouravieff, Minister of Foreign Affairs in Russia, carrying out the instructions of Nicholas II, invited the nations of the world1 to a disarmament conference. This invitation was conveyed to the Vatican on August 30, 1898, by Mr. Tcharykoff, resident minister of the Emperor of Russia appointed to the Holy See.
To this invitation, the Pope replied that he united wholeheartedly with the nations who wished to agree on terms of international peace. On January 16, 1899, the above-mentioned Mr. Tcharykoff sent a second message to the Holy See; it was a circular announcing the programme of the future conference.
Finally, on April 6, 1899, Queen Wilhelmina forwarded the official invitations to the various powers requesting their attendance at the

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meetings that were to take place at The Hague on, May 10 following. These invitations, signed by Monsieur de Baufort, Minister of Foreign Affairs for the Kingdom of the Netherlands, did not, however, reach the Pope, in spite of the wish of Queen Wilhelmina and of Czar Nicholas II.
The reason for this is that, during the first fortnight of February, 1899, Admiral Canevaro, Minister of Foreign Affairs for Italy, informed the Czar and The Hague that unless the Pope were excluded, Italy would not take part in the conference. In spite of the steps taken by the Czar, Italy's objection could not be overruled. A short time before the convention Berlin stepped in, warning the promotors that if one of the great powers kept aloof, Germany would do likewise. As the presence of Germany was absolutely necessary, Italy's pressure was heeded.
During that now famous convention, besides the decisions that were taken, resolutions were drafted for future meetings during which the various nations were to continue the work begun at The Hague. Not content with having succeeded in keeping the Vatican away from the convention itself, Italy objected to the insertion in these resolutions of a clause whose sufficiently general scope might later have opened the door to the Holy See's participation.
Having to face, in connection with the drafting of those resolutions which excluded the Pope, most of the other powers assembled at The Hague, Italy endeavoured to obtain the support of some of the greater nations represented at the convention.
Finally, her objection was endorsed by Great Britain's representative, and once more Italy was successful. However, Queen Wilhelmina, ever anxious to have the Vatican ratify the proceedings and the resolutions of the convention, decided, at the final sitting, to quote the letter which Pope Leo III had sent her in reply to the invitation she had extended to him. That letter expounded principles ' identical to those which Leo XIII had stated some time previously in a eonsistorial address delivered on February 11, 1899.
A few excerpts from that address deserve to be quoted:
Accordingly the church has never been and will never be more concerned about the propagation and the defence of the laws of justice and charity. It is for that purpose that tire church has worked in the whole world and no one can doubt that it has mollified barbaric nations, in imparting to them the love of justice, and that it has thus turned them from the ferocity of warlike customs to lead them to the arts of peace and civilization; to the lowly as well as to the powerful, to those who
obey as well as to those who give commands, it has imposed the obligation of observing justice and refraining from taking up arms for an unjust cause.
And further on:
It applies itself to requesting from God that, for the salvation and prosperity of nations, He should spare them the dangers of war. Accordingly, every time that the need has arisen and the circumstances have permitted, it has no greater concern than to use its authority with a view to restoring harmony and pacifying kingdoms.
The merit of the Hague protocols, those of 1899 and those of 190S, has been to create a remarkable classification of the rules of public international law; there is no doubt that they contain an accurate and able adaptation of the principles of natural law, in accordance with material conditions and the moral standards of modern societies. It is unfortunate that the legal work achieved at the Hague conferences should have remained as unknown and unappreciated as was the case in almost every country of the world and in almost every social circle.
The fundamental principles of the law of nations would have proved, I believe, less inefficient had they been more widely known, more appreciated and endowed with higher moral prestige. The belligerents could not have, without serious moral prejudice to their cause and their country, violated them as universally and as impudently as our enemies did during the last and the present war.
Had a representative of Leo XIII bee* present at the first Hague conference in 1899, and a representative of Piux X at the second in 1907, the decisions and resolutions of those conferences would have gained from the moral prestige that would have bestowed upon them the approval and even the cooperation of the Roman pontiff. In all the countries of the world, the principles of morale and justice arising from these decisions and resolutions would have been impressed upon the conscience of millions by the bishops in their pastoral letters and by the priests from the pulpit.
It is indeed not foolhardy to believe that the cooperation of the representatives of Leo XIII and Pius X at the two conferences of The Hague would have helped to make less ineffective this great work of pacification of peoples.
At the outbreak of the war of 1914-18, the Pope, faithful to his mission of peace, attempted to check what he was perhaps in a better position than anyone else to foresee as a catastrophe from which all peoples would suffer without deriving much benefit. After the conflict had broken out, he endeavoured
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to relieve as much as possible the sufferings of the devastated countries.
The humanitarian works of the Holy See during the last war were innumerable. Its interventions for the exchange of prisoners, for the care of the sick, for the distribution of relief are undeniable and when, in 1918, victory finally crowned the Allied efforts, why was the Pope once more kept away from the discussions which preceded the signing of the peace treaty? Here again the intervention of Italy is seen.
When in 1915 that country agreed to fight on the side of the Allied Nations, a secret treaty was signed between herself, France, Great Britain and Russia. The Italian ambassador in London, Marquess Imperali, upon instructions from his government, conveyed to the British Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Sir Edward Grey, to the French ambassador, Monsieur Cambon, and to the Russian ambassador, Count Bencken-dorff, a memorandum containing clause 15 w'hich read as follows:
France, Great Britain and Russia shall support Italy's opposition to any proposal tending to introduce a representative of the Holy See in any peace negotiations and in the settlement of matters arising from this war.
This document was signed on the 26th of April, 1915 by the four people I have just mentioned. Therefore, it is not surprising that in 1918 the Pope was not invited to attend the peace conferences of the Allied Nations.
Realizing these facts, is it not true that the instability of the Versailles Treaty appears less amazing? Moreover, why is it that on this page of history, the sacred name of Him from whom proceed all authority, all right and all justice, has not beeil inscribed? It was "in the name of the most Holy Trinity" that in the past the most solemn treaties were signed, those of 1815 as well as the treaties of Utrecht and Westphalia.
Christian institutions were convinced that God alone could put the finishing touch to human agreements to the extent that His spirit penetrated them. What wonderful success resulted from this policy of excluding the sovereign pontiff and of ignoring the rights of Providence 1
The treaty of Versailles has probably lasted for a shorter period of time than any other treaty in history. Is it not very evident that after the present war, when we must start from scratch, it will be absolutely necessary to rectify the mistakes made from 1899 to 1919 and ask the Pope to enlighten by his moral authority the nations which will have the task of drawing up the next peace treaty?
[Mr. Dorion.)
Is there not, at the present time, another secret treaty, another convention designed to keep the Vatican out of international discussions? I hope not, for such a state of things would simply be a repetition of a crime for w'hich we might have to pay very dearly.
It may be said in some circles, even among friends, that it is useless and ill-advised to protest against such an exclusion, for the powers that be have made up their minds to disregard our complaints.
I shall never accept this point of view; a great cause must be defended on the grounds that it is a just cause, and not on the grounds that it pleases everyone.
In closing, Mr. Speaker, I should like to quote a short extract taken from the radio message of His Holiness Pius XII broadcast to the Catholic world on Christmas day 1943:
Give to thirsting humanity a peace that will restore the human race in its own self-esteem and in that of history; a peace on whose cradle will shine not the vengeful glare of hatred and the instinctive unleashed desires of revenge, hut rather the resplendent dawn of a new spirit of universal union; this, strengthened by the supernatural help which is indispensable to the Christian faith, alone can succeed in preserving humanity, after this unfortunate war, from the unspeakable catastrophe of a peace based on false foundations, and consequently no more than an ephemeral illusion.
Monseigneur Deploige, rector of the University of Louvain, speaking at a conference on the Society of Christian nations, said:
To insure peace, in so far as that is possible in this world of ours, recourse to the church of Christ, the great educator of nations, would have been necessary. Indeed, when the task in hand meets so many obstacles the causes of which are buried deep in the human soul, why should the greatest power in the world, heir to the immortal promises of the God of Peace, why should this greatest power alone remain uninvited?
On motion of Mr. Roebuck the debate was adjourned.
On motion of Mr. Mackenzie (Vancouver Centre) the house adjourned at 10.15 p.m.
Tuesday, February 1, 1944