1946-05-31

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. HUMPHREY MITCHELL (Minister of Labour):: Mr. Speaker, yesterday on the orders of the day the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell) asked a question concerning communication between Japanese repatriates now at Vancouver awaiting transportation to Japan and local persons. It was anticipated that these repatriates, who are groups from Ontario, Manitoba and Alberta, would go on board ship within a day or two after reaching Vancouver. However, there has been a few days' delay in the arrival of the second ship in Vancouver, owing to the necessity for completing ship repairs, and it has been necessary to provide for the housing of these people in the immigration sheds at Vancouver in the meantime.
There are a number of people in Vancouver who want to talk to these repatriates, and it has been found desirable to make orderly arrangements to limit communication of this nature to responsible parties who have legitimate reasons. We have appointed an officer for this purpose, and all reasonable requests are being met. It must be remembered that the supreme allied commander in Japan has prescribed strict limitations on the types of currency, securities for money, and nature of personal property which can be taken on board ship, and the government is responsible to see that these provisions are complied with. Priority in time of staff and repatriates at Vancouver is being given to the carrying out of these provisions. I may say that the first ship is in dock in Vancouver to-day, and repatriates are being placed on board.



LABOUR CONDITIONS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. CLARENCE GILLIS (Cape Breton South):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply based on a telegram which I have received from the steelworkers union in Sydney, a copy of which I have sent to him. Was it on the fuel controller's orders that operations at the Sydney plant in the production of steel have been drastically curtailed? If so, can the minister give the house any valid reason why conditions in a section of the country which is badly affected by unemployment should be further aggravated by this order?


Hon. C. D. HOWE (Minister of Reconstruction and Supply):: As a result of an order of the fuel controller, coal suitable for conversion into coke has been moved to St. Lawrence ports to relieve a very serious lack of domestic fuel. This situation has resulted from the coal strike in the United States. Every hon. member will appreciate that if any considerable body of labour goes on strike, other bodies of labour are affected. That is the situation in this case. It has been necessary to take coke from another steel plant in order to relieve an urgent demand for domestic fuel. I hope the situation is reasonably temporary, but as long as the emergency lasts it will be necessary to continue this diversion.


Clarence Gillis: Has there been a curtailment of steel production in other plants across the country?


Clarence Decatur Howe: Yes, particularly at Sault Ste. Marie. Coke taken from that plant is resulting in a limited curtailment of steel production. The curtailment is entirely in connection with the production of steel rails, which happens to be a form of steel which is not urgently required. I understand that the production of steel rails has been curtailed at Sydney and Sault Ste. Marie to provide coke for domestic purposes.



TEXTILE STRIKE AT CARLETON PLACE, ONT.

Mr. W. G. BLAIR (Lanark):: I should like to ask the Minister of Labour a question. Will he make a statement on the Carleton Place textile strike?


Humphrey Mitchell: A commissioner has already been appointed to conciliate the dispute upon the
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request of the minister of labour for Ontario, and I think it would be wise if we said nothing, awaiting his efforts to settle the dispute.



LUMBER INDUSTRY-STRIKE IN BRITISH COLUMBIA-FOOD CONTAINERS

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. GROTE STIRLING (Yale):: May I ask the Minister of Labour whether he is able to make a report on the efforts being made to get the box factories in British Columbia working again?


Humphrey Mitchell: I am hopeful that I shall receive a report from Chief Justice Sloan to-morrow on his efforts to conciliate the dispute.



VETERANS AFFAIRS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. IV. A. TUCKER (Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Veterans Affairs): Mr. Speaker, on May 21 last the hon. member for Queens (Mr. McLure) asked the following question:
Are veterans who own or purchase their own farms entitled to priority in purchasing farm machinery and do they receive the ten per cent special discount?
The answer is as follows: Veterans establishing themselves without assistance from the Veterans' Land Act can obtain a certificate of identification from any office or field man of the Veterans' Land ilct. Implement companies have agreed to give preferred treatment to all veterans presenting this certificate, and so far this has worked out very well in so far as machines available are concerned. They are not, however, entitled to any discount but implement dealers in many cases have voluntarily granted discounts.
[Stage Direction]
The house in committee of supply, Mr. Macdonald (Brantford City) in the chair.

[Stage Direction]
200. Departmental administration, $422,774.
Mr. NICHOLSON:: In view of the fact that these estimates will not be before the house for another year, I was hoping that the minister would have been able to hold out more hope to the committee as to the intention of his department to cooperate with provinces which are prepared to discuss with the federal government plans for the future. It was demonstrated during the war that the health of the Canadian people was a matter of national concern. In order to wage war effectively it

was found important to recruit healthy men and women and provide them with the very best medical, dental and hospital facilities. Many of these young men and women, for the first time in their lives, were able to have the most up-to-date treatment in times of illness. Many of them have now been discharged from the armed forces and are returning to various parts of Canada which have not the facilities which they enjoyed while in the service. Young men and women from my area, for example, left a district in which we now have three dentists to serve 57,000 people, or one dentist for 19,000 people. In the service, whether in the army, navy or air force, there *was one dentist to every 500. It is going to be very difficult to explain to those discharged from the forces how Canada during the war from 1939 to 1945 was able to supply one dentist for 500 people when both before 1939 and after 1946 these young people will have to live in communities so sadly lacking in these facilities.
The situation is nearly the same so far as medical personnel are concerned. In my area we have ten medical doctors serving a population of 57,000, which works out at one doctor for 5,700 people. In the very excellent report which has been presented, prepared by the Canadian medical procurement and assignment board, is given an analysis of the supply of doctors and dentists across Canada. It shows a very wide variation. In Prince Edward Island there is a doctor for 1,659 people, and the figures for the other provinces are: Nova Scotia, 1,450; New Brunswick, 2,136; Quebec, 1,206; Ontario, 1,068; Manitoba, 1,438; Saskatchewan, 2,078; Alberta, 1,626; British Columbia, 1,168.
It seems strange that in Saskatchewan we have the lowest ratio of doctors per thousand of people of any province in Canada; yet we recruited more doctors .per thousand than any other province. I am happy to say that many doctors from other provinces are now turning longing eyes to Saskatchewan with a view to practising there. It would be very difficult for Saskatchewan to provide out of her own resources the medical, hospital and dental services -which the service personnel received during the war, and so I think this is a matter of national concern. In Ontario you have paved roads and good telephone communication all over the province, so that a doctor can answer a call at a few moments' notice, and in that province there is one doctor to 1,068 people. But in Saskatchewan we have very few miles of paved road, a very small mileage of gravel road, and huge distances to cover, and we have only one doctor for 2,078 people. Up in the northern area where I live we have

Supply-Health and Welfare
only one doctor for 5,700 people. It must be recognized therefore that this is a national problem and that the people living in these remote areas should have made available to them the type of services that Canada can provide.
The table regarding the number of dentists is similar. In Prince Edward Island there is one dentist to 4,272 people, and the figures for the other provinces are:	Nova Scotia,
4,345; New Brunswick, 6,442; Quebec, 4,134; Ontario, 2,587; Manitoba, 3,881; Saskatchewan, 6.095; Alberta, 4,945; British Columbia, 2,743. This works out at an average of one dentist for 3,477 people. In the armed forces there was one dentist for every 500 people. Young men and young women in the prime of life in the armed forces would normally require a minimum of work done on their teeth, and yet they had one dentist for 500 people, whereas the average for Canada is one dentist for 3,477. Obviously there is something wrong. The federal department of health should at this stage be prepared to indicate the pattern that might be followed, and also make it clear that the department is prepared to go along with any province that will proceed to introduce a programme to meet our needs. I realize that it would be impossible in any part of Canada to have the ideal set>-up next year or the year after, because it takes many years to train doctors and dentists. But we should be proceeding in the field of health in exactly the same way in which we proceeded in the field of defence during the war. Disease is an enemy that we should be worrying about. I will mention two of our most serious problems.
In the publication entitled "Health, Welfare and Labour"* a reference book prepared for the dominion-provincial conference,, on pages 14 and 15 we have statistics in connection with the death rate from tuberculosis. Only two provinces in Canada are giving complete and free treatment for tuberculosis, namely Saskatchewan and Alberta.


Mr. JOHNSTON:: Alberta comes first.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: No, Alberta does not have to come first. Alberta did not introduce free treatment as soon as it was introduced in Saskatchewan. I cannot take credit for the free treatment in Saskatchewan for the C.C.F. government, because the service has been provided for many years. We in that province found twenty-five years ago that it was good business to spend money on preventing the spread of tuberculosis and providing free treatment for all those who suffer from it, and for many years we have had one of the lowest death rates in the world. If you leave
the Indian population out of the picture, in 1943 Alberta had a slightly better record than Saskatchewan; the death rate in Alberta was 18-2 as compared with 18-3 in Saskatchewan. But consider Manitoba, right next door to us, where you have a similar group of people under similar climatic conditions, but where they have not been as progressive in dealing with this problem: there, the average between 1938 and 1942 was 48-2 as compared with 28-7 in Saskatchewan. If you consider the death rate among Indians you have the shocking figure of 1421 in Manitoba. I am not proud of our figure for Saskatchewan, namely 752. It is away out of line with what it should be in a modern civilized society.
During the war I visited the United States hospital at Churchill, Manitoba, and talked with some of the doctors there who had made emergency flights to visit some of the Indian communities. They said, "You Canadians should be ashamed of yourselves for tolerating the conditions which prevail in many of these Indian communities where the original settlers in Canada have been denied medical, hospital and dental services." They said, "We understand you spend large sums of money in sending medical missionaries to China, India and Africa. That is a fine gesture, but why have you not been concerned about providing hospital, medical and dental services for your own Indian population?" I find from the analysis made by the department that in the past the provinces have not been able to deal with the problem adequately, and it is not too much to expect that grants should be made available to provinces which carry out a scheme which complies with the minimum set by the federal authority. More beds are needed in most of the provinces; and I think, until the federal authority takes a greater interest in this disease, we are not going to be able to show for all Canada statistical results such as we have in Saskatchewan.
I should like also to refer to the pages of this publication which deal with the analyses in connection with, mental diseases. Practically every province in Canada is very short of facilities for mental patients. I find that in most provinces there is an excess of the daily average population over the bed capacity in mental hospitals, as shown on page 23 of the report, running to as high as 61 per cent in British Columbia, Again our statistics for Saskatchewan are not satisfactory; we have a very large number of patients there in proportion to the number of beds available, but plans are now being made to correct that condition. In Saskatchewan we are trying to face up to these problems.
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The premier of the province is the minister of public health; and on the resources which we have available they are trying to establish new patterns. I was interested in seeing in the last number of Health an article entitled "Winged Samaritans", by Christian Smith, telling of the air ambulance service provided by the Saskatchewan department of health. In the article it says:
It is believed to be the first government-operated service of its kind on this continent. Courageous bush pilots have dashed into the subArctic on mercy missions.
So far as the writer knows, it is the first time that any government or department of health have provided this service. Last night I had guests in for dinner-a young chap back from the navy, and his wife, who is a trained nurse. She was telling me that her brother, a former R.C.A.F. officer, owes his life to the service of this Saskatchewan air- ambulance. The taxpayers of Canada, according to a figure quoted by the former minister of national defence for air, spent approximately $28,000 on training him to be a navigator. He had served his country faithfully, and after discharge became critically ill at his home at Wadena, Saskatchewan, last winter, and there was no hope for his recovery unless he could get away to the city. He was unable to make the trip by train, but in a few hours the air ambulance was sent down, the trip was made safely, and while he has not yet completely recovered it is felt that he owes his life to this service. I do not know how many lives have been saved by this air ambulance service; but there is no reason why the people of this country, who made that kind of provision for casualties during the war, should not be prepared to provide it for citizens in peace time.
I remember being at the Dafoe airport during the war. I was going through one of the finest small hospitals one could expect to find, where the patients were receiving the very best of care. One of the patients was not .-esponding as rapidly as might be expected, and while I was there the air ambulance came in from Winnipeg. Nobody asked how much it cost to bring that ambulance from the city; the only questions asked were, "Is there an air ambulance available?" and, "Is there something which can be done in Winnipeg which cannot be done in Dafoe?" The answers were, yes, and this young airman's life was saved through his being transported to a city which, by air, is really quite close. I think the federal department of national health should be prepared to give some assistance to all isolated localities in Canada where the local authorities would be prepared to cooperate in providing air ambulances for sick people.
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I think the federal authority might also be expected to make grants to try out some experimental work in new fields. Last winter I visited in Oakland, California, the Kaiser hospital, an institution which has done such a spectacular job during the war. There were about 80,000 workers in the shipyards for whom complete medical and hospital services were available at the hospital. Doctor Garfield, who is in charge of the hospital, in one of the articles he prepared for the medical association explained that this was not a very popular project with the members of the medical profession; they frowned on any form of group practice where doctors worked on a salary. The scheme embodied three major principles: free treatment, group practice, and adequate facilities. It is true that the doctors who were working on salary were not receiving as much as many of them would have received in private practice during the war, but they were getting salaries of from $5,000 to $15,000 a year, and they were working approximately an eight-hour day. Of course a doctor, if he was in the middle of an operation, did not put away his instruments when the eight hours had passed, but on the whole they worked around a 48-hour week. They had some time for golf and fishing, and they worked as members of a team. They had adequate facilities.. They built hospital accommodation to care completely for the eighty thousand who were working there, and the patients, the members of the staff and the people in the community were loud in their praise of this type of project. I cannot see any reason why the federal department of health should not be prepared to make substantial grants to the provinces that are ready to do experimental work in fields such as I have suggested. I suggest that before these estimates are brought down for another year, the minister endeavour to work out some technique whereby the provinces that are prepared to take seriously the analyses and recommendations made by the federal government during the last four or five years in the general field of health may be given some assistance so that we shall have experimental work carried on in the several provinces.


William Gourlay Blair: I am very much interested in the remarks of the hon. member for Mackenzie, particularly as they concern the question of tuberculosis. I congratulate the province of Saskatchewan on the work they have done in regard to tuberculosis. Their programme is at least twenty-five years old; but the hon. gentleman stated that the only free treatment given was in Alberta and Saskatchewan.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Complete.

Supply-Health and Welfare


William Gourlay Blair: I should like to point out to him that Ontario has been for some time holding chest clinics in towns throughout the province. A chest clinic with complete X-ray equipment comes to my own town twice a year. Appointments are made through doctors, and everyone caring to go, or cases referred by doctors to the clinics, will have diagnosis made, and in the event of their being tubercular' they are taken care of in the sanatoria of the province. At the present time also, in Ontario, mass surveys are being carried out. People in the towns in my constituency are being X-rayed. Next week 4,300 will be X-rayed in my own town, without cost to them. There is a shortage of beds, but that is being taken care of.
The hon. member also pointed out some of the benefits derived from practising medicine in Saskatchewan. I would never have believed that such a condition existed. I cannot believe that doctors are getting $15,000 a year and working forty-eight hours a week.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: That is in California.


William Gourlay Blair: Does the hon. gentleman suggest it is so in Saskatchewan?


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Not yet.


William Gourlay Blair: Does he hope it will be? I should like to ask the hon. gentleman what would happen in case his wife were ill.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: They have a large staff of fifty or sixty doctors working as a group in the X-ray clinic in Oakland. The doctors do not lay down their instruments in the middle of an operation. If a doctor works sixteen hours one day he does not come to work the next day. They organize their work in such ' a way that the doctors put in approximately forty-eight hours a week.


William Gourlay Blair: That would be impossible in a rural district where one doctor has charge of the district.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: This is in Oakland.


William Gourlay Blair: Often a doctor in a large area will work twenty hours a day as an hon. member suggests.
There is one question I should like to discuss this afternoon. In going over the estimates I find little in the way of grants for public health research. This is something that has been neglected in Canada. Little research has been carried out by the dominion, and very little by the provinces. The high incidence and high mortality in certain diseases would indicate that they constitute problems which should be subjected to intensive research. If Canada has reached the status of a nation, the responsibilities of a nation in the protection of the health of its
citizens should be undertaken by the state. That applies to research, which I am especially considering this afternoon.
In the closing days of the previous session, during the discussion of the health estimates, I inquired of the Minister of National Health and Welfare as to the research being carried out in Canada at the present time.. He replied that it was being carried on by universities, hospitals, institutes, "and the like", with assistance from the national research council. This is far from an ideal situation, as it is only by advancing our knowledge that effective or preventive treatment can be accomplished.
Let us consider the disease of cancer. Cancer kills one in every eight people in Canada. In view of this serious situation, Ontario is at present carrying on a campaign for subscriptions to the Ontario cancer fund, to be used for the purpose of dealing with this dread disease. In Canada the King George V silver jubilee cancer fund, raised in 1935, amounted to $500,000. From 1937 to 1940,_ $14,000 was paid out of that fund each year to the cancer committee of the Canadian Medical Association. In 1940 it was agreed that half of the grant should be paid to the association. In 1942 the grant to the association was reduced to $7,000. I would like to point out that this is a cancer fund raised by the citizens, and not money voted by the government for cancer research or treatment. It was, however, pointed out by the minister that cancer research is being carried on in England and the United States, and that if we were to do anything effective "we would have to do it on a large scale as we do not wish to duplicate the work being done in other countries." It would seem from this reply that our attitude in Canada is to wait and follow the results of research in other countries. This suggests the question, do we wait, in Canada, until a cure has been discovered? It would seem to be the attitude of the department, in spite of the fact that this disease is responsible for the death of one in every eight people in Canada. Everyone is acquainted with the long course of the disease and the terrible suffering it causes.
I have had pathetic requests from all over Canada for research in respect to arthritis. Almost every member has had such requests, though possibly I got more than my share. It is a disease of long duration; it has been called Canada's No.. 1 crippler-. The cause is not known. No accurate records are available, but the number of sufferers from this disease is estimated at from 100,000 to 400,000, and it accounts for a greater number of days lost than from any other chronic ailment except nervous and mental diseases. Sir Kingsley Wood, British Minister of Health, says, "Rheumatism

Supply-Health and Welfare
among insured males is responsible for 16 per cent of the total sickness and disablement." In Canada there is only one hospital equipped for specialized treatment of arthritis, and they accept only seventy-five paying patients. Millions of dollars are spent annually by patients for treatment, but it continues to cripple and deform, and those afflicted suffer untold agonies. Apart from the loss to the industrial life of the nation, the outlook for those afflicted is dark, suffering as they do from a disease without any known cause or effective treatment. Under present conditions there is as yet no ray of hope to brighten their lives. No work is being done by the national research council regarding this disease.
The seventh cause of death for all ages in Canada is tuberculosis. It is the first cause of death for the age group 15 to 45. Thirty thousand Canadians died of tuberculosis in the years 1939 to 1943. Saskatchewan has carried out a campaign to control this disease within the province for many years. Ontario has a very active campaign at the present time, and mass X-rays of the population are being conducted. Not only is there a very high mortality rate, but owing to the fact that it is so easily transmitted from an infected to a healthy person, every means should be taken to arrest the disease. The high death rate in Canada calls for investigation and research.
Last fall I asked the minister certain questions regarding maternal and infant mortality. There is no research being carried on; it is largely confined to educational programmes. The high infant mortality rates in Canada are much higher per one thousand live births than in England, United States, Australia or New Zealand. In a young and growing nation such as ours we cannot afford to lose such a high percentage of our future citizens. As regards maternal mortality, our rates are comparable to Australia, slightly below the United States, but not as good as New Zealand, England and Wales. These facts would indicate that we are remiss in our duty if further investigation is not made into the cause of these high mortality rates.
According to the statement made by the minister last December, research in Canada is carried on in institutions such as the Banting institute, Toronto; the Connaught laboratories, Toronto; McGill university, and other hospitals and laboratories. He also stated at the last session that research at present is not a function of the federal government, and not very much function of the provincial governments. It may therefore be called nobody's child at the present time.
Let us take, for example, one institution, which I had occasion to visit a week or so ago. I became interested in the marvellous 
work being carried on in this hospital, the neurological institute of Montreal. Patients are admitted for neurosurgery from all over Canada, and in fact all over the world. They had patients from Palestine, from Arabia, from every country of the world. The outstanding results in neurosurgery obtained during the last war are largely the result of the research, carried on by Doctors Cone and Penfield; and not only does this institution do its own work, but it trains young surgeons in neurosurgery. After three of four years' training these young surgeons go out all over Canada, in fact all over the world, to carry on this work. It is one of the finest institutions of its kind; yet it has been starved financially. It would be a dire calamity if this institution were forced to close its doors and the research should have to be discontinued for lack of funds. It has done much for the cause of humanity.
It is true that the demand for research will entail the expenditure of money. But we might very well curtail expenditures in other matters, as there is no problem we face which is more important than the health of . the people.
One Sunday in February I listened with much pleasure to a radio address of the minister, in the course of which the minister said-this is as close as I could get to it:
One measure of a nation's greatness is the efficiency with which it cuts disease and death rates. We have been satisfied too long with the provision of hospitals for the care of those who should not be ill and the provision of charities for those who should not be poor.
I fully agree with the minister's statement, but I should like to point out to him that in Canada we are doing very little to elimin- . ate the diseases responsible for the highest percentages in our death rates. The suffering of those afflicted by a disease such as cancer should in itself be sufficient to stimulate more concentrated research for knowledge of causes and cures.
The standard of our Canadian universities rates very high among educational institutions in the world. Our medical colleges and the science faculties of our universities are graduating many students who are anxious to carry on research and are capable of doing it. It is an unfortunate fact that on graduation many of them are forced to leave this country and become citizens of the United States where there is a broader field and more lucrative positions are available so far as scientific investigation is concerned.


Mr. KNIGHT:: When the committee rose last night we were discussing the formation of a standing committee on public health


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and welfare. If I remember rightly, the hon. member for Eglinton included the subject of social security.


Mr. FLEMING:: And housing.


Robert Ross (Roy) Knight: Public health and welfare and social security are matters which surely deserve the attention of any Canadian citizen. Certainly they are of sufficient importance to engage the attention of a standing committee of this house. There is in this country an aroused social consciousness in regard to public health, as evidenced by the success of and the interest taken in campaigns against venereal disease and cancer.
In the province from which I come, Saskatchewan, as my colleague the hon. member for Mackenzie has pointed out, much attention is being paid to these things at the present time. The government of that province has been criticized for the heavy expenditures on matters of health; but so far as I am concerned I am proud that four times as much has been allotted in the current budget for expenditures of the department of health as was allotted by any former administration. The opportunity, and I may say the need, for welfare work has been enormously increased in Canada by the recent war. I myself have been for some years connected with family welfare work, and I am amazed at the number of problems which arise in connection with returned service personnel. Wars always increase there maladjustments and produce the emotional upheavals which cause social disease. While I am on the subject may I point out that there is a great dearth of trained family welfare and social workers, and agencies have been compelled to carry on understaffed and without benefit of persons properly trained.
Social security has a distinct bearing upon public health and welfare. There is a lot of truth in the statement that social security would spell the doom of a great many of our social diseases. It is my opinion that the time which hon. members of this house might devote to the study of this subject in committee would be time well spent.
I should like to draw the attention of this committee to two or three things which I think should be studied by such a committee. I believe these matters have already been drawn to the attention of the government by the Canadian Welfare council. On their behalf, as well as on my own, I should like to put some of them on record.
First, a national council in the welfare field might well be set up to compare with the present Dominion council of health. Such a council might synchronize and correlate the work of the various provinces. Of this there
is much need. A national point of view would increase the general standard, and progressive action in one province, of which we have some examples already, would stimulate the action of other provinces along social service lines.
The second point is the confusion of residence-and I am thinking in regard to family welfare work in particular-in respect of eligibility for municipal assistance. When a person moves from one municipality to another he loses his right to assistance. He is nobody's child and so becomes a problem. I have in mind a case which was drawn to my attention last winter. A woman and her three children were living in a shack, and the only thing they had on which to live was the children's allowance which they were receiving from the government. The reason was that her husband, who previously had been a very good farmer, refused to cooperate in any war work; therefore he had been spending a period of three years in gaol or in work camps. This woman, unable to cope with the problems which she had on the farm-unable, for instance, to pull water out of a deep well for the cattle-moved into the city of Saskatoon. When her resources were depleted she became dependent upon the allowances of her children. It is an actual fact that nobody had any responsibility for her. The city, of course, had no responsibility, because she had not been long enough in residence. The province said they could not do anything for her unless she were to move back to the municipality whence she had come, and the municipality whence she had come said exactly the same thing. But the woman had not a dollar; she could not move anywhere, and if she did go back there she would have nowhere to live and nothing to eat.
In the same connection I might mention the case of a person taking temporary employment somewhere else, in a different town or province. What we appear to need is a channel cutting through which will enable people to move to different parts of the country in pursuit of their livelihood without jeopardizing their right to the social assistance they would have received in their former place of residence if such had become necessary.
Another matter is the consideration of methods of preventing people from escaping responsibility to their dependents by moving from their accustomed domicile.	It is a
problem with which we have had to deal in connection with some returned men. I was glad to see that the government of Saskatchewan passed a bill enforcing in Saskatchewan
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maintenance orders made in England, Northern Ireland and all His Majesty's dominions. There was need for such legislation.
Another matter with which I think the committee might well deal is the giving of encouragement to young people who wish to join the. nursing profession or to take up family welfare work. I think perhaps the government missed certain opportunities when they released so many girls from the armed services following the end of the war, girls who would have made excellent material for such work because they had undertaken certain basic training.
So, sir, for the reasons I have stated, I wish to go on record as being heartily in support of the formation of a special committee of this house to study the subject.


Mr. CHURCH:: Supply-Health and Welfare

partment of health is the most talkative health department I know of in the world, through radio, films and advertisements. What are we going to do about it?
Another matter relates to the schools for our rising generations. I remember when we had to carry on a long fight supported by the Toronto Telegram, to have medical inspection in the public and separate schools of our city, and the health department had to provide nurses to visit the homes and the people. This was a most commendable work, but the whole cost was placed on the taxpayers. I believe the department has done some good work but I submit the time has come when there should be more actual direct aid by bonus or subsidy in this connection.
The government is spending billions of dollars to-day, but in the days of Sir Charles Tupper, in 1896, the Conservative government was able to run the country on $36,000,000. Our population has not gone up more than a couple of million since that time. Before the war we got on with about $400 million for civil government, but now the cost of government has gone up by geometrical and arithmetical progression. There are many things we are going to need. If we are going to have a health department, let us have a health department, not some kind of a skeleton health department where they just make speeches and travel all over the civilized world. Let us have an up-to-date health department that will provide hospitals and other relief for our sick, for our mothers and infants, for the whole of our population. Let us have a real national health scheme, not a skeleton scheme that gets nowhere and does nothing.
Take cancer and many other diseases which affect the human race. What is being done in Ottawa about them? They are doing a lot of talking but when you get down to brass tacks you find that the universities and hospitals have had to do most of the work. Public health is too big a quetsion to be mixed up in politics. If this department is kept in politics there will be very little done.
I hope something will be done to provide more hospital accommodation and to help the municipalities in the work they are doing and relieve the heavy burden upon the taxpayers.
I have been speaking only of our own health department, but I think I can speak for the health departments in the surrounding municipalities. They are similarly situated and are doing grand work. The health officers of our cities work very hard for very small remuneration. I do think that at a time when we are spending so much in making hand-outs for breakwaters and all that kind of thing we should have a little pin money to hand back to 
the taxpayers who are paying the cost of all this. Something should be done to provide more nurses in Canada by releasing them from the services, which would not suffer any now. What are we doing with 20,000 of the forces in Germany? The United States is going to quit; and when the appropriate vote comes up I can give eight or ten reasons why we should reduce it and let a lot of these nurses come home.
I am very much surprised that we are voting $11,000,000 for national health and welfare in addition to the $285,000,000 baby bonus authorized by statute. I am not objecting to this if the money is properly distributed, but I know some well-to-do people who are getting the children's allowance, yet the old age pensioner gets pin money only and has to pass a means test.


Mr. LOW:: Mr. Chairman, I should like to take a few minutes of the time of the committee to say a few things about -health policy in general, and more particularly to make a plea on behalf of the more than 400,000 Canadians who are afflicted with the crippling disease of arthritis. Some weeks ago I placed on the order paper a resolution which I hoped would be discussed, and I had hoped too that there would be a full-dress debate on this whole question of arthritis, because I feel that now is the time to begin to focus the attention of the public on this terrible disease and the widespread suffering it has been causing for some years.
During the past twenty years public attention has been centred on ways and means of combating such terrible killer diseases as tuberculosis and cancer. Public health bodies, medical men and governments over the Dominion of Canada have publicized their efforts and have combined their efforts so well that at the end of twenty years we now see that most excellent results have been attained through their efforts. To-day if tuberculosis and cancer are taken in time a cure can be found for them. This has been the result of the intensive efforts that have been made to deal with these diseases, and also the fact that public opinion has been aroused and demands that something be done.
But while our efforts have been directed towards combating the killer diseases, I am afraid we have neglected diseases such as acute rheumatism, and especially arthritis, which have afflicted and crippled about 600,000 people altogether in Canada. The hon. member for Lanark spoke about arthritis, and I appreciate what he said, but I should like to repeat this much. So far we have found no means of treatment; we have not even deter-

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mined as yet the cause of arthritis. That ought to be enough, it seems to me, to spur us on to intensified effort. I am sure that much can be done in the next few years to alleviate the sufferings of arthritics if public health bodies and medical men will concentrate public attention on this disease. The only real attempt in Canada to give follow-up treatment and bring relief to arthritis sufferers has been made at Banff, Alberta, and even that has been entirely inadequate to meet the needs of the people.
As a matter of general policy it seems to me that the governments in Canada should concentrate first upon diseases which require long and costly treatment; those for which so far there has been found no cause, those which require intensive and careful investigation to find the cause, especially those which are proving such a scourge among the Canadian people. The reason I say that is this. Diseases like poliomyelitis, cancer, tuberculosis and arthritis can, because of their long and costly treatment, impoverish families. I have seen such impoverishment. We saw poliomyelitis, for example, strike in a family in Alberta during the height of the scourge that we had just a few years ago, and attack perhaps one or two of its members, and the family itself through the long and costly treatment required lost its entire property. This is a matter of grave concern, and it is time that the federal government stepped in and gave some assistance to prevent such impoverishment. That is why in Alberta we did start out several years ago by assisting in the treatment of tuberculosis, poliomyelitis-or infantile paralysis, as it is more commonly known-and cancer, through providing free government treatment and hospitalization as well as after-treatment and care for the sufferers from these diseases. We did this chiefly because we felt that no family should be allowed to be deprived of home and property and become impoverished by the long and costly treatment required to bring about a cure of these diseases. The result so far has been very good. Not only that; by focusing the attention of medical men and public health societies and organizations upon these diseases we have begun to find cures and the most effective treatments, which to-day are being extended free to the people of Alberta.
Now, it seems to me, is the time to extend our operations and to take in the field of arthritis. A substantial sum of money ought to be set aside by the government of Canada for that purpose, to be placed at the disposal of trained investigators, technicians and research workers who would combine their, 63260-130J
efforts with those of the research council in one all-out attempt to find the reason for arthritis which creeps upon and cripples people as it does, and to find a cure for it as quickly as possible. I do not mean the expenditure of just ten or fifteen thousand dollars. It seems to me that hundreds of thousands of dollars should be spent for this purpose, and this is the government that should do it. When the cure has been found, or the most successful treatment ascertained, the provincial governments through their own health departments can apply the cure or treatment successfully, and, I am sure, relieve the suffering of many hundreds of thousands in Canada. I would urge upon the government, and upon the minister particularly, that he see to it that a substantial amount of money be set aside this year, and that work be initiated at the earliest possible moment on this dread disease arthritis.


Mr. SMITH (Calgary West):: Mr. Chairman, I rise principally to ask the minister, when he makes a statement on arthritis, to make it as complete as possible, and, if he will and if he can, to let us know something about the hospital to which the hon. member for Peace River referred, the one at Banff, which to my own knowledge has effected some amazing cures. To help him with his research I am going to give him an experience of my own; I have some excellent information for him. I have received 102-letters on this subject of arthritis; in fact there were so many coming in that I dictated a form, which I will read to the committee:.
I have your letter respecting arthritis.
For the additional reason that I am suffering from it myself, you may rest assured that I will do all I can.
At the same time I was receiving, as we all did, hundreds of postcards on the subject of everybody being retired, women at the age of fifty-five and men at the age of sixty, at $60 a month. Being my own secretary, and not being very efficient, I got some of my arthritis letters in envelopes addressed to people who -wanted $60 a month, and I will now read a reply I received yesterday, and in which the minister will find, I am sure, the cure for arthritis:
Dear sir:
After receiving your letter of 18th April, 1946, I have carefully scanned the card which I mailed (copy enclosed) to you, and to date I have been unable to find any reference to arthritis, so am wondering if you are trying to have some fun at the old lady's expense or if your stenographer mixed letters.
Since I have never had arthritis I cannot speak from experience but I have always heard , that if you were thoroughly stung by bees it

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would cure the disease, so why not hunt a good apiary and stir up the tenants of two or three lively swarms of bees and of course you will then get stung and be able to speak from experience as to whether the rumoured cure is a success or not, and I wonder if you would be stung any worse at that, than the people of Canada have been in electing some of the present members of the house of parliament, of course present company is always excepted.
I am enclosing the second chapter of our serial which is being issued by card.
Now, haying become an authority, I should be glad to join in the research work. I will not undergo the test myself.
But, seriously, would the minister mind, when he does make his statement, if he and the department have knowledge of what is being accomplished at the seventy-five bed institution in Banff referred to a moment ago, where excellent work has been done in affording relief to friends of mine.


Mr. MATTHEWS (Kootenay East):: When the estimates of this department were before us last session, the minister concerned, if my memory serves me correctly, received more bouquets and verbal compliments than all the rest of the ministers combined. I am -not at all afraid of these compliments having tgone to his head, but I do hope that they went to his heart, because if there is one [DOT]department of government more than any other which needs a heart it is the Department of National Health and Welfare.
[DOT] 1 have long believed that the health of the 'people should constitute a first charge on [DOT]nny government, and I should like to say =a word or two in support of what has been rsaid by the hon. members for Lanark and Teaoe Biver with regard to the need of those who suffer from arthritis.
I am sure that the prevalence of arthritis in Canada to-day has not been recognized either by the public or by the government as it should have been. It is a most serious disease, and one which makes an appalling drain on the efficiency and well-being of our people. There may be those who, reading these debates, will say that we have a medical profession and it is their business to look after this kind of thing. I am prepared to pay the highest form of tribute to the men and women of the medical profession, but I am sure that there is a task here which is beyond the abilities of our medical practitioners of to-day; I believe it is a problem which requires research and definite legislative action now. Up to the present time our health programme and proposals have been incomplete in not having recognized the need to deal with this disease which is so prevalent among our people.

A little while ago. the hon. member for Lanark said that we might have in Canada from 100,000 to 400,000 suffering from this disease. Those who have made a close and detailed study of it, people who are chiefly concerned about it, tell us that there are at least 690,000 cases of arthritis in Canada, all of them calling for relief. Here I would like to point out that there- are twice as many sufferers from arthritis as there are from heart disease, ten times as many as those who suffer from tuberculosis, and seven times as many as those who suffer from cancer. On Friday, September 14, 1945, the late Harry Leader, then member for Portage la Prairie, made an impassioned appeal in this house on behalf of those who suffer from the dread disease of cancer. I for one heartily concur in the appeal which he made; but, as I have already said, there are seven times as many arthritis patients as there are sufferers from cancer. Many of these, we hope, will be eventually cured, for it is admitted that early diagnosis and proper treatment will avoid crippling and in most cases effect a cure. Even where the case is well advanced and treatment obtained late in the progress of the disease great benefit is still possible. I have had personal experience of this. At the moment I am thinking of a lady in my constituency who spent several years in bed, a helpless cripple. We were able to get her to the Banff Hot Springs hospital under the care of a splendid physician, with the result that-after many months of careful theatment she returned to her home and her family, not cured one hundred per cent but certainly greatly benefited and able to walk. In other words, as a result of the rest and the treatment she receeived she is now enjoying a new lease on life. Before I left for Ottawa she begged me with tears in her eyes to make an appeal on behalf of those in Canada who suffer from arthritis as she has done.
I understand that in Sweden something worth while has been done along the lines for which I am appealing; for Sweden has no less than nine hospitals, each containing sixty beds-that is, 540 beds exclusively devoted to the treatment of arthritis. Naturally we are interested in what has been accomplished thereby. Reports reveal that sixty per cent of the patients three years after leaving the hospitals have returned to and are actively engaged in their former occupations, and the condition of another eighteen per cent is-so improved' that they need no further treatment.
Against this splendid showing of Sweden what is the picture in Canada? Here, as has already been stated, we hare one hospital con-

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taining about seventy-five beds which are set apart for arthritics, but let it be clearly noted that these are for paying patients exclusively. Then where do the poor and the needy come in? Well, they don't come in at all; they just stay outside and continue to suffer until death brings relief to them. During the war years this country suffered great shortages of labour owing to war needs, and drastic legislation was introduced to remove various bottlenecks; yet all the time this particular disease and others continued to remove workers from their place in industry.
In order to strengthen my appeal I should like to read an item from the press relating to this matter. The following appeared in the Nanaimo Free Press of Friday, July 27, 1945:
A number of local people, many of whom have been victims of arthritis, are banding together in order that suitable representations may be made at the August 6 dominion-provincial conference at Ottawa regarding the growing need for combative measures in new legislation. They urge that this disease, termed "Canada's No. 1 crippler," should receive No. 1 priority rating on the conference agenda. The present means of battling arthritis are said to be wholly inadequate, with the result that its menace to public health increases at an alarming rate. It is a disease which causes great suffering, deformity and eventual incapacity, doing incalculable damage and causing immeasurable loss to the economic, social and domestic welfare of Canadians. Statements are to the effect that Canada now has 600,000 persons afflicted by this dread disease. Medical practitioners do an heroic best to offset its activity, but are handicapped by lack of suitable hospitals and equipment. Authorities now concur that in a majority of eases hospitalization is essential, including specialized treatments. Day to day observation and corrections are said to curb progress materially. Canada has but one hospital where such treatment is at present available. It is the mineral springs hospital at Banff and of this hospital Doctor Lowenstein of New York, arthritis specialist, recently said in an interview:
"The work that is being done in this hospital in combatting arthritis rates among the best on the continent and merits a new and better building with the very best of facilities. The combination of treatments used here is exceptional. and the results are excellent."
It is being urged that some provision be made in the national health bill for similar hospitals to be made available in every province.
We take pardonable pride in our national war effort. We recognized the tremendous forces that were arrayed against us, and we marshalled our forces against the threat to our way of life. We spared neither time nor effort nor money to achieve victory on land, on the sea and in the air, yes, and on the home front. We addressed ourselves to the task that was before us and, by the grace of God, we won. To-day I am asking that we recognize the fact that in Canada we have other enemies to fight and other victories to win. The battle against arthritis will challenge
our mettle, and here I would suggest some definite lines of action: First, that the national health bill should make provision for treatment of arthritis through special grants to the provinces for the erection of adequately equipped hospitals; second, that such hospitals be made available at Canada's famous mineral springs hospital, the mineral waters of which are invaluable in the treatment of arthritis ;[DOT] and third, that where suitable existing military hospitals are to be found, with their furnishings and equipment, those in each province should be allocated to the care of chronic rheumatism. I suggest this for the consideration of the minister, in the hope that something will be done for this very needy class of our citizens.


Charles Edward Johnston: Those who have spoken previously have given a clear outline of the conditions that need rectifying. I recall that in the last parliament the then member for Swift Current, Mr. Graham, gave us an excellent account of the work which was done at Banff Springs hospital in connection with the cure for arthritis, and he spoke with reference to the treatment of members of his own family. At that time the minister stated that they were giving every consideration to this problem. I am sure that the members of this committee will be extremely disappointed if the minister gets up and makes what I was going to call the old routine statement that the department is giving the matter consideration, because that was over two years ago. Surely the department, having listened to the former member for Swift Current and to other members of this house relating certain experiences-we have had one to-day from the hon. member who has just taken his seat-will propose something concrete. It is not sufficient to say, after two years of warning from members on all sides of the house, that we are still 'investigating the subject. The country at large demands something more than that. The people demand action, because in the final analysis the disease takes a greater toll than the war itself and it is something that should be considered most carefully. I hope that in the time at his disposal the minister will make a definite statement to the house assuring us that the department is making progress, and will indicate the extent of that progress, so that the people throughout the country will receive some encouragement, especially those suffering from this terrible disease of arthritis.


Mr. McKAY:: I wish to make several observations with regard to one of the great scourges of mankind. It is tragic indeed that man will rally against the menace of war but will largely ignore his greatest, most elusive
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and most unrelenting enemy, cancer. More than 65,000 Canadians died of cancer during the five years of the war. There were somewhat less than 40,000 fatal casualties as a direct result of enemy action. War is always a terrible tragedy when a nation loses its youth in conflict. I suggest however that Canadians are fighting a war every day against cancer; so far it has been a losing battle, and our casualties are increasing from year to year. But I believe that we can win that war if we go about it seriously in an all-out struggle to destroy this terrible menace.
Millions are spent in Canada on tobacco, liquor and the luxuries of life where only hundreds are spent to fight cancer, something much more deadly than the bullets of either the Hun or the Jap. There is still a long road to travel before our cancer research laboratories are adequately equipped to widen the field of human knowledge in regard to this dreadful disease. There is a lack of free cancer clinics, except in Saskatchewan, where one of two clinics handled five thousand cases for free diagnosis and treatment last year. Next to the diseases of the heart and arteries cancer kills more Canadians than any other malady. It is the No. 2 killer of men and women in Canada. According to the Canada Year Book 13,417 people died of this dread disease in 1941. By 1943 the number of deaths aad increased to 14,135 persons. Whether this increase is due to a more accurate diagnosis of the disease or not is difficult to ascertain; but the fact remains that more Canadians died of cancer in 1943 than in 1941. Authorities state that in six persons over the age of forty one dies of this disease.
An examination of the estimates of the Department of National Health and Welfare shows and appropriation for tuberculosis control but none for cancer control, despite the fact that there are less than one-half as many deaths form tuberculosis as from cancer. There should be a vigorous educational campaign to inform the general public about this disease. Knowledge is a powerful weapon in the fight to control any disease. It is a primary step. Generations of victims have either had the true nature of their illness concealed from them or have concealed it from their own families. Its appearance was thought to be a death warrant.
To-day enough is known by scientists about cancer to assure us that many lives can be saved by proper diagnosis and early treatment. It remains only for this information to be made available to the public so that the dangerous curtain of rumour, the halftruths and erroneous information can be torn aside.

Last month was set apart as a cancer month by the Canadian cancer society. This is a most commendable move. The purpose in doing this was to stimulate research, treatment and education in the field of cancer. The public appears woefully ignorant of certain facts about this disease. According to a poll conducted by the Canadian institute of public opinion more than one-half of our adult population believe cancer is incurable, or do not know whether it can be cured or not. Medical authorities have long insisted that the disease can be cured in the great majority of cases if treated in the early stages. About one-third of our population still believes cancer to be a contagious disease despite the fact that surgeons agree it is not. Most amazing of all, the survey conducted by this institute revealed that two-thirds of our adult population do not know any of the early symptoms of this disease. It seems to me that this is sufficient proof of the great need of a widespread educational programme.
I would suggest that as a supplement to the cancer month campaign just concluded, the Department of National Health and Welfare should conduct the most vigorous educational campaign to inform the public about cancer every day of the year by utilizing the facilities of the radio, the motion picture theatres, our schools and the press. This country must do all in its power to save from the clutches of this disease many people who through lack of kqowledge of its- early symptoms are doomed to a life of misery which all too often ends in horrible death.


Mr. BLACKMORE:: Before proceeding with what I was about to say I think I should say a word, or two for the sake of the C.C.F. representatives from Saskatchewan. The hon. member who just took his seat recklessly remarked that there was a scarcity of cancer clinics in all the provinces but Saskatchewan. May I submit to him that he knows Saskatchewan, but he does not know the other provinces half so well; and if he will just talk for Saskatchewan and let those from the other provinces talk for their provinces I believe he will not misrepresent and mislead the people.


Eric Bowness McKay: Are there any cancer clinics in Alberta?


John Horne Blackmore: There are four, and they have had them for four years.


Eric Bowness McKay: How many did you treat last year?


John Horne Blackmore: Every person who has cancer in Alberta can come to a cancer clinic and get free treatment until he is cured or

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until he dies. You cannot surpass that anywhere. I suggest to the hon. C.C.F. members that they are" so enthusiastic over their new' , government in Saskatchewan that they just do not try to give the rest of us credit for what we do. I just say that in a kindly way. Remember, there were social credit reformers in action in Canada several years before the C.C.F. got in action, and they were really doing things too.
I should like to say that the idea of having a health department in Canada is a good one. We feel glad that the health department has been organized. In our group we are satisfied that the total appropriation has been increased $63,221,407.73 since last year. This all indicates a sound attitude on the part of the dominion with respect to health and welfare in Canada. We recognize that under the British North America Act the responsibility for health services is primarily a provincial responsibility; but let it be borne in mind that this particular type of service is exceedingly costly, and that most of the provinces in Canada are very short of money and are limited in their resources with respect to getting revenue. It may be said that the dominion is likewise. That is not entirely so, because the whole power over financial policy in this country is centred in the Dominion of Canada, and is exercised by that dominion to the utter exclusion of all provinces. If any province undertakes to do anything in the way of progressive financial operations the dominion instantly rushes in and disallows its measures and declares them ultra vires, and all the rest of it. Therefore the dominion must take responsibility; if they will not let any province go ahead then the dominion has to go ahead. That is about all there is to say on that point.
In Alberta we have progressive ideas with respect to finance. We are positive they will work; the dominion is positive they will not work, but we notice that the dominion are very chary about giving them a chance to w'ork. So once more may I say that the dominion simply must find the money where the goods and services are available in the country.
I should like to urge upon the newly established Department of National Health and Welfare in Canada that it do not endeavour to duplicate the work which is being done by the provincial governments. There are two or three departments in Ottawa that seem to look over the whole field of activity, and endeavour to dabble in everything, that which the dominion ought to take care of and that which should be looked after by the provinces. The result is a duplication which
brings about waste and also destroys motivation, and has further undesirable consequences. The dominion should supplement the work of the provinces. I am not saying or implying for a moment that this is not the ideal of the present minister. The dominion should take the lead in coordinating the work of the provinces by calling regular conferences of provincial health ministers to decide upon desirable national objectives and the means of attaining them.
The main task of the federal department should be, first of all, to determine how to provide adequate grants in aid to the provinces to enable them to provide health services which they consider advisable. I think it will be found by each successive minister of health in Ottawa that the provinces will have progressive ideas of their own with respect to the kind of health services they desire. The records of Alberta and Saskatchewan already indicate the truth of what I am saying. The dominion does not need to undertake to tell any province what it is desirable to do. What the dominion needs to do is show the provinces how to do those things which they think desirable. Any deficiency on the part of the provinces does not arise from their inability to see what it is good to do, but from their financial inability to do the things they desire.
Another thing the dominion government must do is determine how to raise the Canadian standard of living. It may be argued by the minister that this certainly is not the business of public health departments in this country, but I am not so sure about that. What is the use of telling people the baby needs orange juice when in so large a percentage of cases throughout the dominion the parents are unable even to buy the baby the milk it needs, let alone orange juice. This would seem to indicate that the very first thing necessary is to set up or develop in Canada a system under which all those who are prepared to do their share of service in the dominion may obtain the means with which to discharge their responsibilities to their children as they come along, and to just as many of them as come along. I believe we can safely state that in this country one-third of the total population are in receipt of incomes so low as to render them unable to maintain a standard of living involving the bare necessities of life. In an age in which we have seen such a great development of scientific and mechanical skill; when we have such great power and other resources, that is a serious reflection upon the government which continues in operation in charge of the nation. Canada is
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no exception. I believe the United States has a record far more blameworthy than that of Canada. But in dealing with this whole situation it is well to remember that there must be something radically wrong in the way the affairs of great nations like Canada and the United States are being managed to-day, or with the system under which they choose to operate, if we are unable to provide a full one-third of the people of our countries with the bare necessities of life. Until we learn how to remedy that problem, governments can expect a great deal of difficulty with regard to ill health.
If they propose to raise the standard of living, provision must be made for fair prices for goods, fair wages, and employment. Once more the minister may say that has nothing to do with his department. Well, if that has nothing to do with the minister's department, then the minister has not the power to deal with the health problem in Canada.
Very soon the question will be raised: where is the money coming from? I do not propose to go into any details with respect to that matter; probably I should be out of order if I did; but long before this debate is over we shall see the minister rise time and again and shall hear him remind us that he has not at his disposal limitless funds, and that he will be unable to do many of the things he would like to do because he simply cannot get the money. Before ever the minister says these things I am going to agree that it will be impossible to get from the people of Canada,, by taxation, enough money to do the things that need to be done in order to guarantee the Canadian people a proper standard of health. Yet the money must be found.
I agree entirely with the remarks of the other hon. members who have preceded me, that the first responsibility of a government in a country like Canada is the health and wellbeing of the people. The people are the greatest natural resource of any country. Let the people be weak; let them be unhappy; let them be unhealthy, and the efficiency of the country is immediately greatly impaired. Our problem ought not to be one of finance in this country; our problem ought to be one of goods and services. For example, if we want to know whether or not we can provide a dentist for every five hundred people in the country, let us say, as was suggested, the only question we need to ask is, are we raising enough young men and young women who are willing to go into our universities and acquire skill as dentists in order to provide a dentist for every five hundred people-if that should be the desirable number? The

answer would have to be, yes. unquestionably. It could not be answered otherwise, when we are afraid of unemployment and have experienced unemployment to such an extent as it has been experienced in Canada within the last fifteen years. If it is held desirable that there should be hospitals all over the country in order to care for people who are unfortunate, the only question we ought to ask ourselves is, can we get the lumber, the bricks and all the other things which are necessary to build enough hospitals? Can we manufacture the instruments required to perform the operations which will be necessary? Again the answer undoubtedly must be, yes, we can. Then these requisites which enter into the providing of a suitable standard of health for the country certainly are physically possible. If then, there is anything wrong, unquestionably it must be in the matter of finance.
Let the minister weigh that with great care. The other day, just as I was going out of the chamber he made a remark-of course not just because I was going out-about letting our money go to pot, or something of that sort. In making a remark of that kind the minister did not indicate the kind of vision a man of his age, in a responsible position such as he holds, should have, because he was entirely overlooking the physical possibilities of this country, its resources in manpower and materials. He was overlooking the fact that where the resources of a country in man-power and materials are such as to render it possible to provide a given standard of living in that country, then it ought to be able to have that standard of living; and if the financial system will not enable the countiy to have that standard of living something must be done with the financial system. Otherwise it , will automatically "go to pot." I do not wish to emphasize this over much, but we might as well have the cards laid on the table at the beginning of this debate, because before we are through there will be plenty of talk about money. Practically every person who rises in his place is going to demand or ask for some special kind of service which will cost money.
I suggest that the minister should not spend any of his time in the house bewailing the failure of the dominion-provincial conference. It seems there was a carefully laid out plan some months before the dominion-provincial conference took place to tell the country that if these provinces would only come together and humbly consent to allow the dominion government to have all the power it wanted, to take away from the provinces anything it wanted to take away, then thus and so would be possible; but if the said provinces should

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not be cooperative in this respect, then all these fine dreams would be impossible of realization. I say, Mr. Chairman, that was not a very healthy thing to do. Since the dominion-provincial conference met we have noticed a tendency on the part of ministers to get up and whine about it, to say in effect, oh, we could have done this and this and this if the provinces had only consented to let us destroy the British North America Act, or take away their taxing powers, or do this, that and the other that the dominion wanted to do. I suggest that the minister do not do that; I suggest that he do not tell us that the dominion-provincial conference has to succeed in order that he may do the things that he needs to do.
The whole question is whether Canada can produce the goods and services necessary to attain the standard of living we desire. The standard of living we desire in this respect is a high standard of health and welfare. The only answer that can possibly be given is that we can provide the goods and services. Then then only conclusion that can follow is that we can provide the money and are going to provide the money whether the provinces consent to give up their taxing powers or not. That does not enter into the matter.
There is only so much money that can be taxed from the Canadian people. What the dominion gets from the people, the provinces cannot get. The provinces want, need and can use all the revenue that they can raise. It may be that there are certain companies so strong and so dominion-wide in their operations that no province can sufficiently tax them. If that is the difficulty, let the dominion come in behind the provincial taxing power with the power of the dominion. Then it will be found that the company concerned will see fit to obey the provinces. There should be no difficulty in that respect. All the money which the dominion could collect, if the dominion had the power to collect all the money, can certainly be collected by the provinces with the dominion's assistance. That is an aspect of the whole question which, for some strange reason, has never been emphasized in all the discussions entered into by dominion cabinet ministers, from the Prime Minister down.
I would advise the dominion cabinet ministers to forget their schemes for the centralization of power in Canada. Let them cease whining about the naughty provinces that have the wisdoni and courage to insist on maintaining their provincial power as given them by the British North America Act. let the minister lead out in exploring the possibilities of modifying our financial system.
Let him learn how to make our financial system reflect the facts of Canadian production and productive capacity. Let him learn how to make the Canadian financial system distribute the goods and services Canadians are able and willing to produce. Then the minister will find that he can obtain plenty of money to enable Canadians to have the healthful and abundant standard of living which is essential if we are to have a healthy and happy people. He will be able to find plenty of money to provide a system of health services federally supported but provincially and municipally administered, a system of health services that will cure all the curables and rescue all the unfortunate.


Mr. GREEN:: Mr. Chairman, will' the
minister make a statement regarding rheumatic diseases which have been referred to by many hon. members? I have nothing further to add except to say that ways and means should be adopted across Canada to fight the inroads of these diseases. This matter was dealt with by the British Columbia legislature this spring when a recommendation was brought in by the select standing committee on social welfare and education, which read as follows:
Arthritis-Your committee recommends that, in view of the serious social and economic problems involved in the increasing incidence of arthritis and other rheumatoid diseases in Canada, the provincial government press the federal government for the establishment of the widest research facilities and the gathering together of all available information from all parts of the world as to the causes, treatment, and prevention of these diseases.
Further, that the provincial government on its own initiative should take steps to provide more facilities for diagnostic service, to increase facilities in existing hospitals for the more advanced methods of treatment for both indoor and outdoor patients, and the development of rest homes at suitable locations where all sound measures to help arthritis might be applied.
I have no doubt the minister has had this subject in mind for some time, but when he spoke earlier in the session I gathered that he was not convinced that it was necessary to do something at an early date. On page 420 of Hansard of April 1, 1946, hon. members will find reported an oral answer by the minister to some questions asked by the hon. member for Swift Current (Mr. Bentley). The minister pointed out that the associate committee on medical research of the national research council had been unable to do anything with regard to these rheumatic diseases during the war. He then went on to say:
The committee is. however, prepared to give consideration to applications for assistance in any project that gives promise of adding to knowledge regarding the cause methods of prevention



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or treatment of arthritis in the same way it does to other medical research projects. No such application is pending at the present time.
In the following .paragraph he dealt with the question of grants. Apparently a suggestion had been made that a grant be made to the Canadian rheumatic diseases association, but the minister said that he had been advised by the ministers of health of the different provinces that that association was not in a position to be given a grant at the present time. That may or may not be the case, but the answer the minister gave on April 1 caused me to have some doubt as to whether he realized how much people were concerned about this disease. I think it would be helpful if he would make a statement this afternoon.


Hon. BROOKE CLAXTON (Minister of National Health and Welfare):: Mr. Chairman, it is desirable that I say something at this stage on the various subjects which have been raised this afternoon. I am grateful to hon. members for their suggestions and comments and I want to tell them that I share many of the views that have been expressed. One general observation may be made with regard to much of what has been said this afternoon. Under any construction of the British North America Act, if the suggestions for action were carried out it would mean that the federal government would be taking action which ordinarily would be found to come within the constitutional jurisdiction of the provinces. At the same time that these suggestions are made we have other suggestions that there should be no duplication of the work done in the provinces. I find that almost every suggestion that has been made would have been met had the health proposals of the dominion and the agreement, of which they formed a part, been accepted and put into operation.
With regard to research, I would ask the committee to consider seriously whether they regard general medical and health research as an ordinary function of the federal government. At the present time we have two laboratories at Ottawa doing research work in connection with virus diseases, immunization and other health problems, including those relating to the Food and Drugs Act, and nutrition, but so far it has not been considered n proper function of the department to undertake fundamental medical research. One reason is that that kind of research is usually best carried on in connection with clinical opportunities which are to be found most frequently in la:ge centres where they have hospitals in

association with teaching institutions. That is not invariably the case, but it is so in many instances.
I would point out that the actual number of personnel qualified to do competent research work in Canada is definitely limited. I might call to the attention of the committee an observation made by Surgeon-General Thomas Parran of the United States public health service, when appearing before a committee of the house of representatives in the United States in connection with a bill to provide more money for cancer research. Surgeon-General Parran said that there are not as yet enough properly-trained cancer research workers even to begin the programme that was suggested. That is an important limiting factor on the volume and quality of research work that can be done in any locality at any time. It may be that in order to increase the total volume of research work in Canada we shall have to start further back and to provide fellowships to permit young doctors and technical experts to enter into research work and to train themselves by attendance at research and teaching institutions.
In this connection, too, I would point out that we have had the advantage of discussing the matter with representatives of the ministry of health of Great Britain, and the United States public health service as well as with officers of various foundations engaged in medical and health research. We have had several of those officers here at various times, and we have also entered into discussions with committees of the Canadian medical association and had interviews with many of the leading research workers in Canada, all in an effort to determine the proper field of research activity for the federal government.
Ever since the department was created on the 13th of October, 1944, barely eighteen months ago, this subject has been receiving continuous consideration and it still is receiving continuous consideration. But when you ask for action I must tell you that so far we have not been able to see any way in which action could be taken which would be likely' to produce favourable results and which lies within what has so far been regarded as the proper scope of activity of the Department of National Health and! Welfare. Since 1938 the national research council has had an associate committee on medical research and it has granted assistance to many people and to >
many institutions in connection with medical research.


Charles Edward Johnston: In what particular cases?

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Brooke Claxton: In a great number of
different cases.


Charles Edward Johnston: Have any been in the special field of arthritis?


Brooke Claxton: I believe there have been.


Charles Edward Johnston: Can the minister tell us what they are?


Brooke Claxton: I would have to get that from the research council.


Charles Edward Johnston: Would the minister try to do that?


Brooke Claxton: Yes, I will try to do it. The national research council has been established by parliament as the principal agency of the federal government to carry on research. My predecessor and I have discussed with the council whether or not that function of the national research council should extend to medical research. We have decided that medical research should be assisted through the national research council rather than through the Department of National Health and Welfare. We came to that conclusion because we felt that it was desirable that practically all support of research by the federal government should be coordinated through one institution. The national research council has done magnificent work in assisting medical research relating to the prosecution of the war, but to a very great degree its assistance to medical research in connection with diseases not associated with the war had to be suspended because of the shortage of doctors and technicians in Canada. The pressure on the available personnel in connection with the war really exhausted all their possibilities of rendering useful service in any other field. But that has now changed, and with the demobilization of men from the armed forces, together with the continued output from the medical schools, it is expected that the medical research division of the national research council will be called on to assist in a very much larger number of research projects of various kinds.


Mr. KNOWLES:: Is there any liaison between the council and your department?


Brooke Claxton: I was just going to say that that does not mean that our department is not interested, because we are definitely interested and we are in continuous consultation with the research council just as it is in consultation with us. The deputy minister of national health and welfare is also a member of the associate medical committee of the research council.
I ask hon. members if that is not the sensible way to do it rather than to try to set up a duplicating institute of research for the federal government. In view of the resources available in Canada, it is our view that the best way to do this job is to assist in programmes of research being carried on in the places which can carry it on and are carrying it on and have the equipment and the trained research workers.


John Horne Blackmore: You are entirely right.


Brooke Claxton: If we are wrong I certainly should like to know it, because then we might have to make some changes.


Stanley Howard Knowles: The way is all right, provided that full use is made of it.


Brooke Claxton: 1 wish to say, too, that that is the way it is handled in the United Kingdom. The ministry of health there is a large ministry compared with anything we have in Canada because it renders direct service to the people; they have not a federal constitution. It has very great resources of personnel; it spends very large sums of money, and yet I understand that medical and public health research work is not carried out through the ministry of health but through the medical research council which does not come under the ministry of health but under three committees of the cabinet of which the minister of health is a member, but which report to the president of the council. I have had opportunities of discussing this with Sir Wilson Jameson, chief medical officer of the ministry of health, a distinguished public servant who came out on our invitation to discuss matters with us; also with Mr. Attlee and the president of the council. They have reached this conclusion based on their much longer experience in the field of public health than this department has had.
In the United States research work is carried on by the United States public health service in fields particularly related to public health. We do a certain amount of that work ourselves, either in our department or in other departments of the government. In addition, in the United States the public health service carries on cancer research through the national cancer institute which is located at Washington. I visited it and went all over the building with the director, and if hon. members of this committee could see the kind of equipment that is needed to organize research on cancer I think they would appreciate something of the nature and magnitude of the task before us. Cancer research is also carried on in the United States by a number
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of teaching special institutions and institutes where large sums of money are spent, just as they are by the imperial research institute in the United Kingdom.
If I might develop the question with regard to cancer research for a moment or two, we know there is a very great deal of work being carried on in the field of cancer research. There is free interchange of experience and knowledge as they accumulate. If we were to start to establish an institute of the kind they have in Washington we would have to develop not only a great plant, which would duplicate the equipment there, but a trained staff which it would take years to gather. Then, if we accelerated our activities, we would be abreast of where the Americans are in this kind of project. That is not the only kind of cancer research.


John Horne Blackmore: Would it not be worth doing, though?


Brooke Claxton: We in Canada have great scientists, great doctors, great research workers whose names are known throughout the world. Canada holds second place to no other nation in these fields. Where we can proceed most intelligently is to see that anyone who is reasonably qualified to do research work gets the assistance necessary to enable him to do it, and, in addition, we could give some scholarships or see that scholarships were given in order to increase the number of research workers qualified to work in Canada.
This brings me to the King George silver jubilee cancer fund, to which the hon. member for Lanark referred in his interesting and helpful speech. To that fund, which was raised in 1935, a substantial contribution was made by the federal government. It was set up under a trust deed, and the trustees have full power to spend the money from the fund as they may wish. The hon. member for Lanark referred to what I said last night and gave from my speech last year the expenditures which have been made so far and which have been almost entirely on educational work carried on either by the cancer committee of the Canadian medical association or the Canadian cancer society. In no year has more than $14^000 been spent. The expenditure was made in that way on the advice of the cancer committee of the Canadian medical association, because the trustees could not see how during the war money could be intelligently spent on research in cancer in addition to the money which was available from other sources. But that situation is changing. The trustees have been meeting; we have examined the whole situation, and we have had a number of sessions with representatives of the Canadian
fMr. Claxton.l
cancer society and the cancer committee of the Canadian Medical Association, as well as the others I mentioned earlier. In consequence, not only are we going to give assistance again this year-one year more-to the Canadian cancer society in connection with its educational work, but we shall hold out the possibility of making grants to those who want to do research work in this field. In addition, we hope to establish a number of fellowships to train research workers.
While these developments have been going on, we have been having active discussions in an informal way with various provincial ministers and deputy ministers. There has been, the most general kind of cooperation; and I hope very shortly to call a meeting of those interested at which the fields of activity of the various organizations interested in cancer control work will be defined as well as they can be without putting them in straitjaekets. The objective will be a programme of work in cancer, using all means, which will mobilize all the resources that can be mobilized within Canada and to see to it that we do everything possible to find the cause and the cure of cancer.
There are four ways in which money can be spent in work in connection with cancer. The first is in the education of the public, to which the hon. member for Weyburn referred. That is necessary. It is necessary that it be brought home to people that if they have any of the symptoms-a lump or a tumour or a persistent sore throat or any of the other things-they should consult their doctor; and a large part of the money so far spent by the Canadian cancer society has been spent in just that work. We believe that organizations like the Canadian cancer society can carry on that work effectively. If there is a general desire that the federal government should go into the work of publicizing the need of early discovery and diagnosis and treatment of cancer, that certainly will be considered, because I believe we could do an effective job in that field, but it would remain -with the house to say whether that is a proper activity for the federal government to undertake.
The second way is the training of doctors to specialize in the diagnosis and treatment of cancer. As I believe hon. members know, there are only three established methods of treating cancer: radium, X-ray, and operation. As yet, there are no other established cures. These are effective only if used early enough. It seems to me that this work of enabling doctors to improve their own ability in this field can best be done by the establishment

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of fellowships, by work through the Canadian cancer society, the Canadian medical association, through hospitals, teaching institutions, clinics, the provision of refresher courses, and the like. Certainly the federal government should not enter into that field at all.
The third way in which cancer work can be aided is by improving facilities for the treatment of cancer. That, it seems to me, is peculiarly a matter of provincial responsibility.
The fourth way is in research and the training of workers to do research. I have already mentioned this in relation to the subject of research, and I have nothing further to add to what I said in that connection. But I think I might say this. I am informed that it is a generally held opinion among those who are competent to say that it is unlikely that up to this day anyone who is really competent to do research in cancer has been held up for lack of funds. That is substantially true, though there may be exceptions.


Charles Edward Johnston: What about Doctor
Davidson in Winnipeg?


Brooke Claxton: 
Charles Edward Johnston: The minister can say whether there has been any report as to the: success of the treatment.


Brooke Claxton: 
Mr. CASTLEDEN:: Have you made any surveys in that field yet?


Brooke Claxton: Yes; we have made extensive surveys and have plans laid out which will substantially improve the services rapidly.


George Hugh Castleden: Are reports of these surveys available?


Brooke Claxton: As the hon member knows, a committee on Indian Affairs has been set up. I understand it is the intention of the committee to call officers of this department before it, and we shall make available all the information we have. When we come to surveys of some conditions among the Indians and Eskimos we still may have fairly sketchy material, but we shall make available all we have. While the results of our plans will not be spectacular at once, I hope that in a few years it will be possible to make substantial improvements in the health and welfare of our Indians and Eskimos.
Several hon. members have referred to the need for cooperation in this field. In my first speech in this connection I think I said, that cooperation was essential, as I have said the same thing to every other organization I have met in connection with the work of the department-. It has been my privilege to be invited to attend the annual meeting or other meetings of practically every organization working in' the field of health on a nation-wide basis across Canada. I have welcomed these opportunities and have gone to all these meetings with the hope of creating confidence and of establishing the foundation for real collaboration as well as cooperation. I believe that the general statements made by the officers of these associations have on every occasion, been supported by their members, and that their reciprocal promises of cooperation have shown by their works.
During the eighteen months that the department has been in existence, we have had, with very little exception, nothing but the heartiest and warmest cooperation from everyone working in the field. That applies to the
provincial officers, to the municipal officers and to the members of all professional and voluntary associations. This is one field in which there can be no room for competition. It has more than enough for everyone to do, and we have not failed to seek the assistance of everyone possible to make the best contribution we can to the work which we and they have in hand, namely, to see to it that as far as lies within our power we shall improve the health and welfare of the people of Canada.


Clarence Gillis: I listened with a great deal of interest to the minister, and I have no doubt that he meant everything he said, but after listening to him I am reasonably sure that he is not going to get very much activity in the field of medicine in this country until the government- are prepared to tackle two problems. First, they have to face up to the British North America Act and get away from this business of passing the buck to the provinces. That is one stumbling block which will offset about 75 per cent of what the minister had to say to us this afternoon. I do not wish to leave any doubt in his mind as to whether he is getting improvement or not when he makes the kind of statement and paints the kind of picture with regard to the future of health in Canada that he has done this afternoon.
Second, there is another problem that the government will have to face up to. They are going to have to tackle the drug manufacturers of the North American continent. There is a straight monopoly in drugs. The medical profession is largely hampered in putting on the market drugs that are already available in a form in which they could perform some service, because the drugs are pigeon-holed, curtailed, and kept off the market by the drug monopoly which exists on this continent. These are two things which will completely hamstring everything the minister had to say this afternoon.
I am not going to go into the matter of health in Canada. I think it is well known, and it- leaves much to be desired; but the federal government will have to face up to the two questions I have just mentioned.
With regard to this question of research the minister's statement also left me rather cold. He outlined so much machinery he is going to set up that his department will be completely fenced in, and he will not be able to break out of that ring. There is too much of it. It is like a committee. If you get twelve men on your committee, particularly if you include two lawyers, and want the committee to do a specific piece of work, the twelve men
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start arguing and fighting and you get nothing done. If you boil it down to a couple of men, they will perhaps do something and ' bring in some sort of comprehensive report.
I am going to mention one specific matter on this question of research, following the point raised by the hon. member for Vancouver South. He asked the minister a specific question with regard to arthritis; what was being done and could be expected to be done. He gave the minister a golden opportunity to make a long speech, but he wound up without giving the committee very much information as to what would be done on the question of arthritis. The minister would lead me to believe, in his discourse to the committee, that he is pinning his hope on research to be conducted in Canada and the United States, and is not going beyond the borders of those two countries.
In June, 1944, as the Minister of Veterans Affairs will remember, I raised the question of arthritis in this house and pointed out that a drug known as ACS had been perfected in Russia which was guaranteed to cure arthritis and allied diseases. At that time I asked the minister if he would make some inquiries into the matter, pointing out that arthritis was responsible for the loss of more man-days in industry in this country than any other disease, and that, in addition, a large number of our ex-service personnel, particularly from the first war, were badly crippled, that our hospitals were filled with them. The Minister of Veterans Affairs, always cooperative, did what he could at the time by way of making inquiries and informed me that he could get very little information on the matter. Well,
I took time off to write the Soviet embassy in Ottawa, who referred me to the Mission of Alliance of Red Cross and Red Crescent societies of the U.S.S.R. in the U.S.A.


Mr. MACKENZIE:: I was referred there also.


Clarence Gillis: I wrote Professor V. Lebedenko, the representative in the United States of this organization, who replied on July 6, 1944, as follows:
A shipment of the anti-reticular cytotoxic serum is expected in the near future from Professor Bogomolets. Professor Bogomolets, however, in informing me of the shipment, asks that this shipment be restricted to laboratory and experimental use until such time as whatever research institute receives the serum is able to prepare a product identical with the original. Only after that time can it be prepared and released for general consumption.
It seems to me that the Canadian government or a responsible research institute should be able

to request a quantity of the serum from Professor Bogomolets through the Soviet legation for similar use in Canada.
Hoping that you will find this information useful . . .
Shortly after receiving that letter I saw in the Globe and Mail of July 10, 1944, an editorial commenting on this very question, from which I should like to read a short extract:
Gifts from Russia
While Britons and Canadians are sending relief supplies to the stricken people in Russia, the English-speaking nations are in turn receiving gifts from the Soviet Union. There has come from Russia, for example, the unique dandelion from which natural rubber can be produced and it is now being experimented with here and in the United States and England. Russia also sent recently a serum which may prove a potent w'eapon against rheumatism, arthritis, childbed fever, cancer, high blood pressure and perhaps also mental disease. This serum, known as ACS, is now being tested in a clinic by Lord Horder, chairman of the empire rheumatism council.
That is definite and specific information. I was surprised at the statement this afternoon by the minister of health. I did not expect the Minister of Veterans Affairs to get very much information on the subject back in 1944, because the drug was still in Russia and apparently the matter was in the embryo stage. But nearly two years have elapsed, and a Department of National Health and Welfare has been set up, with a minister and an adequate staff. The minister pointed out that it had a research department, and that research into various diseases was being carried on by the research council in cooperation with his department. If this drug known as ACS has the potential medical value indicated in the editorial I read; if it has been made available to the rheumatic council in Britain, through the chairman of that council, why has not something been done by the department and the research body in Canada to make that drug available to the people of this country?


Brooke Claxton: May I answer that question at once?


Clarence Gillis: Certainly.


Brooke Claxton: More than a year ago we looked into that question, and I was advised there was nothing at all in it. I was advised of that by representatives of the Russian government as well as by the other people who had looked into it.


Clarence Gillis: You were advised by representatives of the Russian government? I should be very much obliged if, before these estimates are passed, the minister would make available to this committee any correspond-

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ence he may have had with representatives of the Russian government, stating that this drug had nothing in it at all. It was widely ballyhooed through Reader's Digest, through editorials and so forth, and the Canadian people were led to hope that they would receive some relief from this source. I received at least a hundred letters from people across this country inquiring as to the merits or demerits of this drug, and I should like to see some official statement by the Soviet people to the effect mentioned by the minister. I do not doubt his word at all, but personally I am not convinced. I think the drug manufacturers on this continent are too much concerned about profits and too little concerned about the health of the people, and that is why I do not feel like taking that statement at face value.


An hon. MEMBER:: Oh, no.


Clarence Gillis: A United States senate committee made an exhaustive investigation into the drug traffic on this continent, and if hon. members care to take time they can go to the library in this building and read the report of that committee, together with the evidence presented before it. It is a most terrific indictment of the drug manufacturers of the continent of North America and of Great Britain.
At six o'clock the Speaker resumed the chair and the house took recess.
After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock. PRIVATE BILLS



SECOND READINGS

[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 142, for the relief of Thomas Bryson Beakes.-Mr. Maybank.
Bill No. 143, for the relief of Lila Edna Page Kennedy.-Mr. Maybank.
Bill No. 144, for the relief of Ernest Crete. -Mr. Stuart (Charlotte).
Bill No. 145, for the relief of Pauline Hellier Ivirsch.-Mr. Casselman.
Bill No. 146, for the relief of Wilfred Fields Benlow.-Mr. Emmerson.
Bill No. 147, for the relief of Thomas Allan. -Mr. Emmerson.
Bill	No. 148,	for	the	relief	of Martta
Haavisto Aaltonen.-Mr. Maybank.
Bill No. 149, for the relief of Rhona Gertrude Paikowsky Munn.-Mr. Maybank.
Bill No. 150, for the relief of Arthur Joseph Hubbard.-Mr. Emmerson.
Bill	No. 151,	for	the	relief	of Eleanor
Hibberd Howe.-Mr. Maybank.
Bill No. 152, for the relief of George Graver. -Mr. Maybank.
Bill No. 153, for the relief of Malcolm Ernest Bigelow.-Mr. Maybank.
[Stage Direction]
The house in committee of supply, Mr. Macdonald (Brantford City) in the chair.
Clarence Gillis: Mr. Chairman, when the committee rose at six o'clock I was making some observations on the estimates of the Minister of National Health and Welfare and pointing out what I thought was neglect on the part of his department in not checking more carefully on a possible source of relief for persons suffering from arthritis. During the course of my remarks the minister stated that they had information from two sources- he named someone in the Soviet Union as one -to the effect that this particular drug known as ACS had no medical value.
When I first saw reference to this particular drug I did not consider that the statement had emanated from any propaganda source within the Soviet Union. I saw it in the May, 1944, issue of Magazine Digest in an article written by Paul Winterton, Moscow correspondent of the News Chronicle. The story he wrote at that time would lead one to believe that there was definite and positive hope for relief from the afflictions of arthritis, by the use of this particular drug.
I should like to repeat what I said before six o'clock. If the story in connection with that particular serum was merely propaganda, I should like to know it. I think the people of Canada who took that as a possible source of relief from that particular disability should have their minds disabused of any idea they may have that the government has neglected to take up something which might afford relief to those suffering from arthritis.
I want to tell the minister that I appreciate his difficulties. He is head of a new department and, as I stated before, he has a whole lot of stumbling blocks to get over, not the least of which is the British North America Act. I was in hopes that the dominion-provincial conference would have decided the field of jurisdiction in these matters. I am convinced that until such time as the federal government has the taxing powers necessary to finance and to a large extent administer an adequate social security scheme across this country we are not going to solve the problem we are discussing here to-night, the health of the people of Canada. I hope that before many years have passed the federal government will measure up to its responsibilities. As long as you keep passing the buck from the
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federal to the provincial authorities you are not going to get anything done in connection with health matters. I want to know whether there is any possibility of relief for those suffering from arthritis.
There is another specific matter about which I should like the government to do something. When the Family Allowances Act was passed there was quite a lengthy discussion and the act was examined from all angles. I believe that was a step in the right direction because it has done a lot of good. However, in my opinion discrimination is being practised. When the bill was being discussed I asked the minister if it provided for payments to illegitimate children or other children being maintained in institutions, and the minister replied that in his opinion it did. But I now find that these allowances are not being paid to children maintained in institutions. If a child is either boarded out or adopted from an institution, its foster parents receive the family allowance. But the child who remains in the institution does not come within the scope of the Family Allowances Act. I contend that there is discrimination, because I understood that the act would be made applicable to every child born in Canada.
Illegitimacy is a social problem. A child unfortunate enough to be born under those circumstances should not be penalized for something for which he is not responsible. In looking over a recent isue of a very good paper, the Glace Bay Gazette-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Clarence Gillis: It is a good paper. The mine workers happen to own it themselves. An editorial contained certain figures with respect to this matter and showed that there had been an increase during the war. I am not going to give the figures, but the fact is that illegitimacy during the war years was not as high as it was in 1936. When you refer to the war years people say, "Oh, yes, there was war hysteria; people were uprooted; nothing was normal and that is merely the effects of .a war." The fact that it was higher in 1936 than it was during the war is proof positive that the war was not responsible.
This is a permanent social evil within our structure of society. Either it must be removed or the victims of it treated the same as other citizens of the country. Many people are too prone to look with scorn upon the girl who happens to get herself into that situation. Anyone who has any idea of conditions in the slums of our cities will agree with me when I say that at least ninety-five per cent of the girls who fall victims to this kind [Mr. Gillis.)
of thing do so because they were brought up in homes that were totally inadequate. There was not sufficient income in the home to provide most of these girls with a decent dress to wear, and most of them were unemployed. They did not have a decent pair of stockings ' to put on. They could not afford recreation of any kind, and if they had a boy friend they could not take him home because in the majority of cases they were ashamed of their homes through no fault of their parents because the order of society under which they lived did not enable them to provide these modern necessities. So that when a girl becomes a victim she is obliged, despite the fact that we have all these hospitals and all the medical fraternity-


Mr. REID:: Has the hon. member any statistics to bear out his statement that these transgressors come mainly from the poor?


Clarence Gillis: I did not say, from the poor.


Thomas Reid: From people who lived in poor houses and poor surroundings. I think the hon. member meant the poor in a broad sense.


Clarence Gillis: I think eighty-five per cent of the people of this country can be considered poor, and these victims come largely from that section of society.	[DOT]


Thomas Reid: I do not like the indictment.


Clarence Gillis: It is not an indictment at all. If they were not poor they would not go through the ordeal of having to go into a charitable institution.


Thomas Reid: I dispute that.


Clarence Gillis: Those who have sufficient means can avoid the possibility of being exposed. There are ways and means, if you can pay for it, that will enable them to do that. The fact of the matter is that those who are obliged to go through that ordeal come from homes where there are not [DOT] sufficient funds to cover up the transgression.
As I was going on to say, despite the fact that we have all these hospitals and all this research in medical science, a well-organized medical fraternity and standard hospitals from coast to coast, as the minister pointed out, when one of these girls falls a victim, and a victim, I repeat, of a faulty order of society, she is obliged to seek refuge in a charitable institution. The charitable institution is not maintained for profit. It is operated in all cases by people who are interested in doing something for those who are not able to do for themselves. There is practically no com-

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pensation for such people by way of salaries, and the institution is operated inadequately because of lack of funds.
Under the present scheme of things these institutions are the responsibility of the municipality and the province. The grants that are made by the municipalities are far too small. They have not the funds or the means of taxation to make large grants; and under the present set-up, where the federal government has invaded the fields of taxation of the province, the powers of the province to make adequate grants are restricted. Therefore we find these institutions operated on a charitable basis, and a large number of children are left in the institution because they cannot be boarded out. That is a burden which cannot be borne much longer by those who operate institutions of that kind. I have visited some of them and I know the terrific struggle they are making. I know that most of the doctors *who look after the patients in such institutions do it for nothing, and they should not have to. Practically no one connected with the institution receives anything by way of salary, and they all work long hours.
The time has come when the least the federal government can do, because this is a federal act and it is supposed to be applicable to all the children in Canada, and the federal government has the taxing powers necessary for the next eighteen months at least to collect the necessary funds, would be to make the act applicable to all children born in Canada. Despite the fact that for the past fifty or sixty years we have been trying to shift the responsibility from one to the other, the time has come when we must face realities, and I urge the minister to give reconsideration to living up to the statement that was made when the act was first brought down that the family allowance would apply to all children in Canada. The least that the federal government can do is to allow the five or six dollars for each child so that it may be properly fed and properly clothed and sent out in as healthy a state as possible. I do not think that is asking too much and I do not believe it would involve a large expenditure of money.
The minister may take the stand that these are private institutions. They are in a sense, but they were made'necessary because no other institution had been set up for the purpose of performing this function. They may be private, but they are not operated for a profit, and I think it would be carrying out an obligation on the part of the federal government as wall as a gesture of charity to extend the scope of the act to make it all-inclusive so far as the children in Canada are concerned.


Mr. McIVOR:: I may be living in past days, but I am convinced that some of the best cures for disease are those that are plainest, cheapest and most easily understood. I think the minister will agree with me-I am judging by his conduct-that the best kind of cure for disease is plain food and lots of it, and the right kind of things to drink.
Somebody has said that a fence at the top of a hill is better than an ambulance down in the valley; and good plain food, as the minister has proven, is a splendid prevention against disease. The stand that he has taken in the family allowance which enables children to have plenty of good food and to be properly cared for is the best cure for arthritis and all allied diseases. I think the minister is going to ask his experts to spend a good deal of their time in finding the cause of arthritis, tuberculosis, cancer and other diseases.
There are some members of the house who will agree with me that one of the causes of sickness is overwork. There are men in this house who, in the eyes of some people outside, may not be doing much work but who, nevertheless, are broken through overwork in this house.
In order to get good food every home should have somebody that is a real honest breadwinner who works every day and he should see to it that the boys and girls with whom that, home has been blest go to bed in decent time and do not use the things that will hurt their health. Any athlete knows-dear knows, I know well-that no boy or girl can smoke cigarettes and take care of his eyes, his heart, his stomach, his nervous system. I am sure the minister will pay some attention to this menace in the future.


An hon. MEMBER:: Smoking?


Daniel (Dan) McIvor: Preventives will be found in good food, lots of sleep and healthy exercise. May I say that there are some men in this house who would do well to take more healthy exercise and it is the duty of some of us to see that they get the opportunity. I hope that such opportunities will be available in future and that we shall enjoy recreation in a good, honest, humorous way.
I spent some time on a committee, trying to help the Minister of Veterans Affairs. It continued for two years, and experts were called from all over the world, from Australia, New Zealand, Great Britain, the United States and various parts of Canada. To-day we have a health insurance policy second to none in the world. It is on a contributory basis, and my attitude in that connection is that every man in health and strength who
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has a job-and many times it is his own fault if he has not a job-should contribute to his own future. Quite a while ago a former minister of labour sponsored a scheme of annuities which was a splendid insurance policy; I know of nothing in Canada of this kind which can beat it. I am sure that as soon as possible the government will put contributory health insurance into operation.
The information I get from heads of homes is that the family allowance is proving most effective as a preventive of disease. From the point of view of nutrition, the Speaker of this house and the Sergeant-at-Arms know that a good drink of wholesome milk to growing boys in the afternoon is a valuable contribution to the upbuilding of their health. My purpose in speaking this evening is to urge the minister to put emphasis on measures of prevention rather than to try to pick people up from the bottom of the valley when they have fallen victims to overwork or disease.


Mr. LAURENDEAU (Translation):: Having listened this afternoon to the statement made by the Minister of National Health, I think it behooves me to commend him for having based himself on scientific and especially on medical data in the account he gave of what he has done. I feel quite justified in paying him such a compliment because I am dealing with a branch of social science with which I am acquainted when I speak about medicine. I have also had the pleasure, later in the afternoon, to hear some of our opponents, a few C.C.F. and Social Credit members speak on the subject of medicine when they questioned the minister's statements connected with arthritis and rheumatism. I noticed that the minister did not say much on these questions when our hon. friends across the floor went to a great deal of trouble in explaining to him that those diseases should be placed on the same basis as cancer and tuberculosis. I regret to say to my hon. friends, who refer to arthritis as being a disease, that they should consider it as a syndrome rather than a disease. When they urge the Minister of National Health to make treatment available for those who suffer from arthritis they might as well ask him to provide for the treatment of all common diseases. Arthritis is not a disease, but as I said, a combination of medical syndromes; when a physician examines a person who suffers from arthritis, he may discover various ailments such as cirrhosis, nephritis and other diseases. Having practised medicine during twenty-six years, I know the terrible suffering caused by cancer. I rose to-night simply to ask the

minister to do everything in his power so that every bit of scientific knowledge and research may be used in our fight against so terrible a lisease.
Secondly, there is tuberculosis. Its causes are now known and that is a step in the right direction. On the other hand, from a practical point of view, we know absolutely nothing about cancer. The work of research should be continued in both those fields.
I want to challenge a certain statement, made by an hon. member opposite, from the scientific point of view. A C.C.F. member told us that a certain Russian serum sent to Canada and which had given results in Russia was kept from the Canadian people. From the point of view of the Canadian medical fraternity generally, such a statement is absolutely without foundation. The Canadian Medical association, indeed the medical profession throughout the whole world, is much too honest, much too interested in the welfare of all human beings to hid from a single group or nation, a scientific discovery that might be a blessing to all mankind. I do not believe that there is anything to the rumour, and it is unbelievable that this Russian discovery if it has any merit would not be welcomed by the government and the Canadian medical profession.
I want the public to understand that whenever Canadian medical men have made a discovery, whether it be of little or of momentous importance, it has always been given to the world and used for the well-being of mankind. I could quote several instances, but it is sufficient to glance through newspapers, without delving into medical subjects, to find out that as soon as insulin had been discovered by a Canadian physician it was made available to the whole world. The same may be said of penicillin. Then, if I may mention something more personal, there is the case of my own father who discovered a new abdominal operating technique. After he had submitted his new technique to the Canadian medical profession, an Italian physician requested detailed information in respect thereof; the details of the new technique were forwarded to the Italian medical men who have made use of it for the greatest benefit to mankind.
Mr. Chairman, on behalf of Canadian medicine, of the whole Canadian medical profession, in fact, I wish to protest. There is not the slightest doubt that, had Russia discovered a product for the relief of the victims of arthritis, the Canadian government, and the Canadian medical profession, could not have rejected it. To claim otherwise is going entirely too far, and I refuse to believe it unless I am given the most convincing proofs.

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I urge the Minister of National Health to help our rural population, especially in connection with hospitalization. The farmers' income is only sufficient to allow them to secure individual treatment from their family doctors, but it is inadequate to take care of hospitalization when needed. When an operation, a surgical intervention, is indicated, I ask the government to find some way of solving the problem of paying for hospitalization. Could not either the federal or the provincial authorities take care of this, I am not discussing the principle of this question; I am only pointing out the blunt fact that our farmers cannot afford to pay for hospitalization when an operation is needed. I ask the Minister of National Health to give them efficient help in cases of this kind.
In concluding, I wish to offer a suggestion. Preventive medicine is infinitely superior to curative treatments. The minister should give special attention to popular education in medical matters. Results are invariably better achieved through persuasion and conviction than through coercion and legislative action. The government should place in the hands of public organizations the means of educating the masses. Our citizens must be told that periodic examinations are essential. We should teach our people that every Canadian should pay a periodic visit to his physician, as some insurance companies require of their policyholders, who must be examined every year or every five years as prescribed by them. This way it is easier to discover certain diseases which would otherwise remain unknown until too late. Again I say, prevention is better than cure.


Mr. MERRITT:: This afternoon we had a most interesting discussion which to my mind has brought out two points of view. First of all, so many members have mentioned the pressing need for research into arthritis and cancer and have addressed their remarks to the minister that it would appear that many persons in the house and in Canada think this department is the one that should do medical research. Of course, I join with those members who have spoken in agreeing that medical research into such diseases as arthritis and cancer is of the utmost importance and is a matter upon which money can be well spent, but it is apparent from what the minister has said that any moneys which might be expended on such matters do not come within this vote.
I want to turn the discussion to something which arises when one discusses estimates, and that is the question whether expenditures are proper or not. It seems to me that we have to balance the urgent demand for the spending of larger sums against the almost equally
urgent demand for the elimination of unnecessary expenditures and therefore for the reduction in taxation which would then be possible.
Thinking that over, it struck me that these two points of view can be reconciled only if one determines that for any money that is voted value is obtained. That is how I proprose to approach the estimates. I want to make a few observations in particular about the estimates other than the statutory vote. Of the amount of about $11,000,000, $5,500,000 is referable to Indian affairs and the national film board, which hardly arise in this discussion. They are, I think, separate items. That leaves $5,500,000 being voted for national health and welfare, and I think the Canadian people would have believed that in that $5,500,000 there would be something for medical research, whereas in fact there is not.
The whole vote seems to be made up of three items: administration of certain statutes which come under the purview of the minister, such as immigration medical service, quarantine, leprosy and the Proprietary and Patent Medicines Act; social welfare generally, not in the field of research; and the item of publicity. Of that item of $5,500,000 of which I speak, roughly ten per cent is taken up in votes for publicity. I wish to lay before the committee what those particular votes are, because I am going to argue that while, of course, publicity has its proper place in the expenditures of this department, the amount for that purpose is so large that this money might very well either not be voted or, if voted to the department, be put to much better use so that we would get more value for what we spend, and thus the two points of view I mentioned at first might be reconciled.
Going through the estimates, I find that this year departmental administration gets an allotment of $50,000 for publicity. There is no change from last year and it represents no less than twelve per cent of the total expenditures on departmental administration. Turning to the health branch, I find that the administration of that branch is given $100,000 for publicity. That is no less than 50 per cent of the total vote to that particular branch and represents an increase of $80,000 in the publicity item. It is up five times. The third item, child and maternal hygiene, is $68,400, or 60 per cent of the total for that special department. The next subdivision is public health engineering, which has never had a vote before for publicity so far as I can find out. It is now granted $30,000 for publicity, which is 20 per cent of its total vote. Industrial hygiene is allotted $21,000 for publicity, or 20 per cent of its total vote. The civil service health division
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is granted 118,000 for publicity, which represents 10 per cent of its total vote. That item is down from last year. The nutrition service subdivision is granted $50,000 for publicity. That sum represents 28 per cent of its total vote. Venereal disease control is granted $5,000 for publicity, which represents 12 per cent of its total vote. The directorate of health insurance studies is granted $3,500 for publicity, which is eight per cent of all that goes to it.
Then we come to the dental health division which is granted $30,000 for publicity. This vote is up $28,000 from last year. The amount this year represent 50 per cent of the total vote for that branch. The same can be said of the mental health division. It receives $5,000 for publicity, which represents 20 per cent of the total vote for the branch. The blindness control division is given a small vote of $500. The percentage is negligible and I shall not quote it. The tuberculosis control division is granted $5,000 for publicity, which again represents 20 per cent of its total vote. The advertising and labels division gets $1,200 for publicity. That again is a small proportion of the total vote, and I have not the percentage figure. The Indian medical service receives a new vote of $10,000 for publicity. We shall deal with this when we come to the item, but it can be said that it is a little strange that medical assistance to Indians should require any vote for publicity.
I turn now to the welfare branch and we come first of all to branch administration. This branch gets $4,000 for publicity, or nine per cent of its total vote. The family allowances division gets $150,000 for publicity purposes this year, the same amount as last year. This is seven per cent of the total administrative expenses of the Family Allowances Act. The old age pensions division gets no grant for publicitjr. The national physical fitness administration is allowed $18,930 for publicity, which is a large percentage, namely 37 per cent, of its total vote. The total of all the items I have read out is $570,530. Over half a million dollars is being spent on publicity and advertising by this department out of a total vote of $5,500,000. Last year only $416,000 was spent on advertising and publicity. Therefore the total vote for that purpose is up $154,000 this year when, in my view, we should be doing everything we can to curtail expenditures.
The two other general observations I wish to make about the publicity vote are as follows. In the first place, this department has the second largest allotment for publicity of any department of government. It is ex-
'
ceeded only by the Department of Trade and Commerce. The other notable thing is that as one searches through the estimates one finds that very few of the subdivisions of the uepartment failed to put in a bid1 for their quota of this publicity vote.
If we turn to the department in its infancy we find that in the first annual report of the department for the year ended March 31, 1945, the total amount spent by the minister's department upon publicity was $165,570; quite a different sum from $570,000 this year. Of that total of two years ago, no less than $115,000 was spent in the control of venereal disease, whereas this year that vote for publicity is down to $5,000. Therefore we can see a tremendous and alarming increase of expenditures in respect of publicity in this department.
Before continuing on this question of publicity, may I say that the other interesting thing that arose this afternoon appeared in the statement made by the minister in which he outlined that he believed to be the proper scope of his department. Since he said that it was a new department last year and only just formed and in operation, I think it would be most interesting to all members of the committee if during this discussion the minister stated further what he believes to be the proper scope of the activities of the department. This afternoon he said that he believed the dominion government should assist programmes of research, and that research was carried on through the national research council. Naturally I agree with that statement of policy, but I believe that the people of Canada would have thought that the Department of National Health and Welfare, which is spending a large sum of money this year, would have had that task included in its vote. We should hear from the minister as to how the activities of the national research council and medical research are coordinated; whether the minister has any right to direct what research shall be conducted and any power of controlling or augmenting the funds which are granted to the national research council for medical research.
Since, however, medical research is not in his department I wish to continue with this matter of publicity and to ask the minister if he will give us his views upon the proper place of publicity in his department. I shall offer a few suggestions of my own before I sit down. It is my view that publicity certainly has its place, and in the course of my remarks I shall indicate one place where I think it is properly expended. But publicity

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is a dangerous thing to play with. In my opinion it must be strictly governed by the test that I suggested, namely, value for money.
I would ask the minister, as we come to these votes for publicity, to explain in each case what degree of efficiency he believes arises out of these grants for publicity purposes, and also if he does not think he would get more value in relation to the health of the Canadian people if he spent some of these funds in other ways. For instance, the hon. member for Lanark has brought up the need for money grants to aid in neurosurgery research in Montreal, and certainly we have heard enough about arthritis and cancer to make us realize that grants to bodies conducting that kind of research would be money well spent. So I say to the minister that in my view, particularly at a time when we need to review our expenditures, it is not sufficient to point out what is undoubtedly true, that from all the money spent on publicity some benefit will be realized. Rather he must go further, I suggest, and show that great benefit will be realized, greater benefit than would result if the money were applied elsewhere.
I wish to make one or two other observations on the matter of publicity, taking a very broad view. In the first place, as the minister has said, health and welfare is a provincial matter. I should like to hear from him what is the tie-up, in the expenditure of money for disseminating to the Canadian people information on public health and welfare, with each of the provinces. How are these expenditures coordinated with those of the provinces, to be sure that they are not advertising the same thing or perhaps even a slightly different thing, and that there is no duplication or overlapping in these expenditures? The second broad observation I would make is that direct advertising to the public is rather by-passing provincial health authorities, who have trained staffs in the field, and to me would seem prima facie to be not making the best use of this money which, if it is to be spent on publicity purposes, might be better spent by way of grants to the provinces for these purposes instead of indirect action by this government.
My next general observation is that I believe the percentage effect of advertising is probably remarkably low. In order that one may get the best results, surely one should particularize in one's advertising rather than generalize. To give a specific example, I want to point out that the sum of $68,000 is allotted for publicity in respect of child
and maternal care. It is my understanding that the booklet which probably represents most of that money is very useful indeed, and that it is doing a great deal of good in the field of child and maternal care in this country. That is the sort of advertising. which one can readily approve, where there is a clear need by an obvious class, and where it is almost certain that this class will be only too anxious to read and study and apply that publicity. On the other hand, as I understand it, the department gets out another booklet called the "Master Menu Pattern", which, if you please, is a bright little document telling the p'eople of Canada what food to take with them when they go on picnics in the summer, and how best to make use of that food. I have no hesitation whatever in saying that, in my view, money spent on the "Master Menu Pattern" is absolutely and completely wasted. I believe any persons in this country who go on a picnic know enough to take with them the food they want to eat, rather than the food described in such a booklet. That, I say. breaks a good rule of advertising, because it is offered to the Canadian people as a whole, while there is no demand for it and it is probably not read. In the army we had a "paper war", antf we know what we did with pieces of paper like this.
I want to give one further illustration of this generality that may destroy the usefulness of expenditures of this kind. I refer now to what I call paternalism in advertising, telling the Canadian people, in terms which a very simple-minded man could understand, just what they ought to do. In this connection I wish to read what is called a "filler", issued by the division of information services of this department. I believe it is issued to the newspapers, and it says it may be used at any time. It states:
Just because people have reached middle age, they should not give up all forms of exercise, say health authorities. An official of the Department of National Health and Welfare, Ottawa, states: "There is no reason why a person in the prime of life should abandon health-giving exercise. In fact, the evidence is all in favour of recreation at all ages. Of course, the family physician should be consulted, so that all may keep fit without strain at this most important time of life."
I do not know how much a filler costs, but I do say that this is paternalism in its worst form. Instead of promoting the health of this country, a thing like that is debilitating to the morale and to the mind; and I do not think any money spent on that sort of thing is well spent. In the first place, it is the most enormous platitude, and that is the best thing you can say for it. Another thing
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one could say, I suppose, is that it is a most outrageous blurb. There are more of these "fillers" which we can dish out during consideration of the estimates.
Another point I wish to make in connection with this question of publicity is that there is great danger of duplication. For instance, I have here in a file a calendar put out by the magazine Health, which tells you what you should eat every day. It gives you the right menu for Monday, for Tuesday, and so on. It is a very good thing, I am sure, but 1 think every hon. member knows that over a period of many years various magazines and periodicals have put out so many of these things, which are mutually contradictory, that adding one more to the lot will not make any difference.
The same thing might be said about the publication, "Canadian Health and Welfare Bulletin" put out by the department. I understand that this is printed, 50,000 copies in English and 25,000 copies in French, and is distributed free. I am sure all hon. members get a copy; I know I do. Just before these estimates were presented I got one and I read it. I also get a copy of the magazine Health, put out by a private organization which, I believe, receives some financial assistance under these votes.
Two of these magazines are unnecessary. Everything that goes into the departmental magazine could go into the other. The circulation of the departmental magazine could easily be added to the circulation of the private magazine, if there is not already duplication. The Department of National Health and Welfare should not be a printing and publishing office; it should be a Department of National Health and Welfare.
These are all the general observations I want to make, but there are some questions I should like to ask about vote 200, departmental administration. I wish the minister were in the chamber at the moment.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: He will be back at once.


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: I think I shall wait until the minister returns.


Mr. GAGNON (Translation):: I have listened quite attentively to the speeches of the hon. members for Lanark, Peace River, Weyburn and others, who have preceded me and I have found them most interesting. After hearing the views of those hon. members, I must say that I agree with those who feel that we should spend for protecting the health of Canadians as much if not more than we have spent for sending them to war.

However, while physical health is important, I believe that the spiritual sphere, which is still more important, should not be neglected. As an old latin proverb says: "Mens sana in corpore sano." That is why I claim that the primary duty of a government anxious to protect the true interests of the people, is to give them servants who respect and elevate them instead of degrading and debasing them. Doctor Chisholm, deputy minister of health, who is unable to distinguish between good and evil, does not deserve his present position and he should be replaced by some one intelligent enough to respect the faith of those who believe in God. It is a disgrace that we should have civil servants as devoid of moral principles as Doctor Chisholm and we should not hesitate, through decency and concern for public morals, to dismiss him so as to prevent him from spreading throughout Canada, with the government's approval, his subversive ideas and from flaunting his atheism. It is high time that consideration be given to the numerous petitions to the government requesting the resignation of Doctor Chisholm whose utterances are an insult to the decent citizens of this country.
No one can take as a pretext for avoiding action in this matter, the failure of the dominion-provincial conference. Let us dismiss General Chisholm and replace him by some one competent in the field of moral health as well as in those of physical health or social welfare. I think that such a reform is the one that is most urgent in the Department of National Health and Welfare, and I am sure that a considerable part of the population would be quite pleased if the minister complied with the requests that have recently been directed to him in this connection.


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: In order to relieve my rather solemn talk I should like to read another of these fillers. It reads:
Now is the time to substitute the fruit bowl for the cookie jar in Canadian kitchens, say Ottawa health authorities.
While the minister was out of the chamber I made some general observations with respect to the expenditure of money by his department for publicity purposes. It. will be noted that there is one item for $50,000 covering publicity and information. Then under the health branch there is another vote of $100,000 for publicity and information, and later on there is still another vote for $4,000. The total amount voted for publicity in connection with the administrative branches of the Department of National Health and Welfare is $154,000. Incidentally, that is the exact amount of the increase this year in connection with

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publicity. All other votes for publicity in connection with specific items for specific branches are in addition to this $154,000.
I consider that the members of this committee would be more prepared to approve these votes for publicity if they were earmarked specifically for definite purposes rather than being voted for general publicity purposes. For example, I think it would be better to increase the amount expended on publicity in connection with child and maternal hygiene and decrease the main vote by that much.
I am wondering if this $50,000 we are talking about would not be better spent if it were in the form of grants to organizations now covered by votes 233 to 242. These cover giants to the Canadian Welfare council; to the Canadian Red Cross society, which gets only $10,000; to the St. John Ambulance association, which gets only $4,050, and other grants. This money could also be used to good purpose to support some of the institutions mentioned this afternoon by the hon. member for Lanark.
In the light of the remarks I have made I should like to ask some specific questions about this item of $50,000 in vote 200. First, how was the similar vote of $50,000 expended last year? I should like that answered in some detail. I should like also if the minister could explain to the committee just what is the division of information services mentioned in the annual report of the department, and how it works.
Second, I should like to know how it is proposed to spend the $50,000 to be allotted this year. Upon what principles are these disbursements made? Is it under a scheme now laid down by the minister to attain specific purposes which he has in mind; or alternatively is it a reservoir into which all the departments may dip if they find they have exhausted the publicity vote specifically allotted to them; or alternatively again is it a fund available to publicize some new idea to be born in the department during the year but which has not yet been conceived?
Finally, is the expenditure of this money coordinated with provincial departments to prevent overlapping? I shall be glad to ask these questions, of which I know there are quite a number, individually, if the minister prefers.
Mr. LaCROIX: Are there any possibilities of securing bilingual forms in connection with the family allowances? Are they at the disposal of the public in different provinces?


Brooke Claxton: In every family allowance office,-and there is one in each province,-
forms are available in English and in French and correspondence is carried on in both English and French. So far as we can do it, we make the application forms for the family allowance available in both English and French in all the offices and in all the post offices, which is the other source from which the application forms can be got. Anyone can write in to the family allowance office for his province in French or in English and be replied to in the language in which he corresponds and receive a form in the language in which he wants to fill out his application.
Mr. LaCROIX: Does that apply to all the provinces.


Brooke Claxton: Yes.


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: Would the minister now answer my questions?


Brooke Claxton: The hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard has raised quite a few questions about publicity in connection with the administration of this department. In the first place, it should be said that the estimates are the amounts which the officers of the department who are experienced in such matters, after having consulted with their advisers, consider necessary to cover the field adequately. When these have been passed through the department and verified by the department, they appear as items in the estimates. This does not mean that the amount asked for will be spent in every case, but if we take publicity, for example, it means that in every case there is a programme of publicity designed or in course of preparation which would use some such amount if it is desirable to spend the money.
The work of public health is one which must be carried on a number of fronts at once. First, there is the devoted work of doctors and nurses; second, the provision of adequate facilities for treatment and care, hospitals and laboratories; third, the work of scientists and doctors in research; fourth, the work of public health authorities, provincial and municipal, supplemented by the federal; fifth, and perhaps most important of all, the work of public education.
The real gap in our performance, either as federal health authorities, provincial health authorities or municipal or voluntary health authorities, is not in our knowledge but in the difference between what we know and what we do. We now know enough about disease to wipe out most of the killing power of most diseases from which men suffer except cancer and arthritis. But tuberculosis and a great many other diseases could be wiped out
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completely with the knowledge we have. The difference between what we do and what we know is due just to the failure of public opinion to support the demands of health authorities and others for adequate assistance and adequate support. We must bring home to the people the fact that they can secure adequate help and assistance if they go to the doctor, take his advice and follow it soon enough. That is true also of the killer, cancer. So that I would say that to-day the greatest single failure of public health authorities is a lack of education and a lack of information. If we are to do anything in this field to bring what we know we can do up so as to match what we should do, that gap must be bridged by public information.
One of the most interesting things in this field is the demonstration given by the Metropolitan Life Insurance company over a great number of years. As far back as 1912 that company found that it was beginning to have interesting experiences in connection with public health education, so that instead of advertising insurance it advertised health. It has carried on that service ever since at great expense but at great profit, because its statistics show that there is a consistent difference between the records of the people to whom the advertisements have been directed and to whom its health service has been offered and the records of the rest of the population. It has shown the way in institutional advertising of that kind.
We are not going in for anything like that. The hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard has picked out the items and said that they represent about ten per cent of the controllable items in the total vote for this department. I am not sure about his figures, but I imagine that he has given the correct amount -ten per cent for education. I think that is a pretty fair figure. But I must say that we had it in mind that it was desirable to use a much bigger figure. There is a good deal to be said on either side about every advertisement.
The hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard was good enough to refer with commendation to the pamphlet "Mother and Child", of which more than a million copies have been circulated in Canada free. It has probably the greatest circulation of any single Canadian book except the bible. It was written by Doctor Couture for the department and widely circulated in both languages. Since that book has been distributed, infant and maternal mortality rates in Canada have improved. We do not claim credit for the improvement, but we do say that you cannot

have improvement unless people know what should be done. The greatest thing that should be done in most of these fields is to see the doctor in time and to follow his advice.
The hon. member has asked me to say how much of this programme has been discussed with the provinces. A very considerable amount of it has been, through an agency known as the Dominion Council of Health, which meets twice a year, where representatives of the provinces, the dominion and the public meet together for three or four days and decide on programmes, and a very considerable proportion of this has been discussed by them. There is always a danger in saying how much a province has approved a thing, because some time later it may turn out that the required authority was not forthcoming from the province to give the appropriate blessing to that particular project. All we can; do is consult with the officials and the ministers who are willing to consult with us. We have done that on every possible occasion; and I can assure the committee that the demands for expenditures by the dominion coming from the provinces are far greater than the expenditures we are providing for in these estimates.
Let us look at just one other possible^ comparison in this field. Perhaps it may not be so relevant; but if there is anything in the assertion I make that public information and education are important in the realm of health, then how important is it? Is it as important as advertising this particular brand or that particular commodity? The amount, if the total the hon. member says is right, as I assume it is, which we ask here as a possible expenditure would, I should think, judging from my experience in these matters, be a good deal less than half that sought for . the advertising of particular commodities by half a dozen or more Canadian industries. We believe that these expenditures pay dividends just as industrialists believe that their expenditures pay. We believe that these expenditures have paid dividends in the past. I can remember when tuberculosis caused the deaths of 200 out of' 100,000 Canadians, and I went as a small boy to the first antituberculosis exhibition in Canada, on Ontario street in Montreal. It was one of the first in the world, and was the beginning of a campaign of education, and from that campaign -has been produced the result that in forty years we have eradicated three-fourths of the former killing power of tuberculosis in Canada. I believe that we can do the same thing with other diseases and conditions, taking

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them one after another, and that also in the fields of nutrition and positive health and preventive medicine we can achieve still more.
With regard to the items for publicity, I would be glad to go into them if the hon. member wants to raise each one as it comes along. I would, however, ask him and the committee to consider that in working out the affairs of a department like this we are still understaffed; we have to do what we can with the people we can get, and we can lay out a programme and then find that it coincides with a victory loan or some other major national advertising campaign, so that it has to be postponed or dropped. It requires a good deal of flexibility in the arrangement of these things to make the most effective use of the money. I think we have done that. I have never 'heard any suggestion that any of the money was used for improper purposes.
The hon. member questioned this pamphlet about camping. We can show, for his testimony, I suppose, a hundred letters saying that it is a very good thing and asking for more copies. There are two opinions on most of these questions of publicity, but there are no two opinions, as I think the hon. member would be one of the first to agree, about the necessity for public education and publicity and information in the field of health. I respectfully represent to the committee that the total amount sought is not too large, having regard to the fact that some of these matters must be dealt with on a nation-wide basis if they are to have any effect. We endeavour to cooperate with the provinces and local agencies in every way we can; we will do the best we can with the money parliament allows us, and I believe it will pay dividends in the health of the Canadian people.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Chairman, there are a few words I should like to add to the discussion of this important matter. I regard as a very good sign the extent to which it has been argued by almost everyone who has taken part in the debate to-day that the health of our people should be a major concern of government. At times we hear theoretical arguments about the place of government in a democracy, and in such arguments there are those who contend that governments should interfere as little as possible with the affairs of the people. It is my view, however-and I think that view has been expressed by all who have spoken to-day -that in reality government is the collective effort of people in a democracy to make their own lives better and happier in every possible
way; and I suggest that there is no sphere of our human activity in which more can be done toward achieving that ideal than in the sphere of health. I hope we may look forward in the years that lie ahead in Canada to an increasing part being played by governments in helping to improve the health of our people.
I had thought to make some comments on the criticisms levelled at the expense of information and publicity by the hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard; but perhaps the minister has already given an answer which, I am sure, will carry weight with the hon. member who made the criticisms. After all, what we need is not less information but more of it. It is still true that the truth can help to make us free from a good many diseases and1 other afflictions of human life.
I should like to say a word about a subject which was before us a good deal this afternoon, that of research into a number of different diseases. I want to support those who have pleaded with the minister for all the assistance the government can give to research in connection with cancer, arthritis and other ailments which have been mentioned to-day. The minister, in replying, told us of the way in which the government prefers to carry on its research in the medical field, that is by having it done through a committee of the national research council on which this department is represented, and I think most hon. members who have spoken agreed that that is the better way to do it. But sometimes wTe find, in dealing with governments, that when two bodies are concerned with the same matter there is a little tendency to "buck-passing"; and my only hope is that having this way of doing it will not be an excuse for the minimum amount being done.
I was glad to hear the minister suggest that in the matter of public information and education he had tried to get more from the treasury board than they were prepared to grant. I hope that in this matter of medical research, if it is left to a committee of the national research council he will fight with all the vigour he has and instruct the members of his department to do likewise, to ensure that just as much as possible can be done, and not simply the minimum, in this field.
In connection with medical research, there is this point I would ask him to consider, that it be not done only in laboratories. As hon. members know, only two days ago I was myself a patient in an institution in this country which is quite famous. As a matter of fact it is located in the minister's constituency. I refer to the Montreal neurological institute
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which has a considerable reputation not only throughout Canada but in all parts of the world. One of the main reasons for the fame of that institution is that it is not merely a hospital or merely a laboratory, but an institution in which the two are combined. We have there an eight-floor building, four floors of hospital and four floors of laboratory and experimental work, and it was my privilege, while there, to be not only a patient in bed, but, as a friend of some of the doctors, to get around and learn something of the work that is done in that institution. It was impressed upon me how valuable it is, in research into the kind of questions with which that institution is concerned, to have patients of all types and for the doctors and fellows by whom research is being carried on to have a chance to see not only the things in the test-tubes upstairs but the patients downstairs as well.
That raises the whole question as to whether there should not be some way whereby the government might make a grant not only for research in the laboratories but for the hospital side of an institution such as that, so that they can have patients who will enable those working there to do the best kind of research possible. I learned, while there, of the plea that Doctor Penfield, the superintendent, has been making for money, terribly small amounts of money, so that they may be able to minister to the needs of people who go there from all parts of Canada, and may be able to do research not only in some of the diseases mentioned to-day but in some others of a neurological nature, which also afflict a great many people in Canada. I do not expect the minister, since we have the estimates before us-and that is usually what passes in this house-to come back, before his department is through, with a promise of something else. I do ask him, however, to give consideration to this phase of research, namely, that it shall include not only the laboratory but the clinical side as well.
I would be remiss in my duty as one who feels a considerable debt of gratitude to the institution from which I have just come if I did not take this opportunity of stating that their position should be considered by the government. The institution is located in a city, in one of the provinces, and it receives some help from that city and that province; but it serves the whole of Canada and, indeed, has spread the name of Canada throughout the world because of the kind of work done there. I know the minister concurs in what I am saying about that institution, and I hope that consideration will be given to its needs, for the relief of human suffering, relief that might

result from the expenditure of a very few thousand dollars in further research in the institution. The institution is already there and has its equipment; its need is sufficient money to make full use of it.
There are one or two other thoughts I would leave with the minister. When we-speak in terms of national health, for the most part we think of-curative and corrective measures, of hospitals and treatment. Yet we have come to realize in this day and age that preventive measures are of equal importance. I am not by any means a faddist in matters of this kind. In fact, in regard to what I am about to say, I realize that I have perhaps broken my own rule thousands of times. However, I am convinced that medical and scientific men have not yet scratched the surface of the whole question of nutrition and its effect in building sound health. I suggest that it should be the concern of government, which is the collective effort of the people of a democracy to make their own lives better, to do some real research in this whole field of proper foods. As has been said by others, the objective should be to make it possible for th,e people to get proper foods so that we might build up, in a generation or two, a healthier Canadian nation than we have so far known, and one that might not be prone to many of the ills that we have been discussing this afternoon and evening. This is one of the reasons, I confess, I did not follow very closely the thinking of the member for Vancouver-Burrard; for here is a field where, instead of laughing at the few suggestions that have been made with regard to balanced diets, we should encourage the government to go much farther in providing for 'research and information so that our people might take the lead in building health through proper diet and nutrition.
One other thought and I will conclude. I was interested in reading the remarks of the minister on behalf of Canada at the economic and social council of the united nations with respect to organizing the health of the world. As I read his remarks I was proud that he had taken the aggressive position that he did. It is important that we concern ourselves with the health not only of our own back yard but of the whole community and of the whole world. There is no freedom from disease for any of us until we rid the world of disease, and so I was proud of the aggressive stand which the minister took on behalf of Canada. I do not wish to detract from that compliment-I mean it- but it seemed to me that it was a different person who stood up in the house this afternoon and defended the government for not

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going farther and not acceding to the various requests made aggressively from this side during this debate. I would urge that the next time the minister appears in a meeting of the cabinet or of the treasury board in connection with these matters, he take on, not the character of one defending low expenditures. as he did this afternoon in defending failure to do this, that and the other * thing, but rather the character that he had when he spoke at the economic and social council. I would ask him to get in there and fight for the very best and the most aggressive programme for public health which it is possible for us to achieve.


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: I do not want to be unpopular with the hon. member or with any other hon. members to my left, nor do I wish to be too persistent in bothering the minister and his staff. I wish to say, however, that when I spoke of expenditures with regard to publicity and information, obviously a proper field for his department, all I asked was that we should have proof that we were going to get value for our money. I do not think that the simple spending of money in this department will necessarily bring the wonderful things about which the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre spoke. It must go to the right place. One of the right places is the institute in Montreal which he mentioned, but that is by the way. My specific question to the minister was on this vote of $50,000. Y ould he say whether that money will be spent under a scheme now laid down by him to achieve certain purposes? If so, what are these purposes? Or is it a general reservoir into which these sub-departments may dip if they run beyond their own particular publicity vote?


Mr. MacINNIS:: I am going to suggest to the minister a way in which this question could be answered. This vote is the same as the one we had last year. If the minister will give us a break-down of last year's vote, then I think we shall have the information that the hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard is seeking.


Brooke Claxton: The expenditure out of the vote of $50,000 which was provided last year is not yet available to me here for the year ended March 31, 1946. I might say that the expenditures to December 31, 1945, which is the last figure I have here, were $2,421.71. That left a considerable amount to be expended out of this vote. I think I can tell the hon. member that this vote is not earmarked for any particular purpose. It is there to be used for purposes which do not fall under any of the specific votes, but
are of such a nature that they apply to the department generally. The fact that the amount is set out does not, of course, mean that it will be fully spent. I think that gives the hon. member the answer he wants.


Donald Methuen Fleming: I have a question arising out of the answer just given. In view of the duty that is laid on the department to carry on the function of education and of the fact that an appropriation of $50,000 was provided last fall for that purpose, -what reason is to be given to the committee for the fact that only $2,400 has been spent on this important work?


Brooke Claxton: On what side of this question are my hon. friend and his party?


George Hugh Castleden: I agree with the minister in his remark this evening that our greatest problem is one of education. Where education is at its lowest ebb we have some of the worst records of health, and that bears out what he said. Where there is ignorance* we have fear, and where we have knowledge a lot of that fear disappears. There cannot be healthy people when the people are filled with fear. I recognize some of the difficulties of the minister in the operation of his department when there are nine provinces in each of which there is a department of health, and then more or less over and above these is the federal department. Would the minister explain how he decides how far his services shall go within each province? How does he spread his services? Does he spread the services in each province according to its need or according to the requests that have come in from the provincial governments, or does he carry on a sort of over-all service available to the provinces if and when they want it?


Brooke Claxton: I am afraid it would have to depend on the kind of service that was considered. If it were in connection with venereal disease control, then there is provision for the allocation of money and medicines on an agreed basis with the provinces.


George Hugh Castleden: How about your staff?


Brooke Claxton: If it is staff, then the family allowances staff, for example, is the staff which is necessary to do the job within each province. With regard to food and drugs laboratories, and inspection, the staff is located at points where they can do the job best through the country without regard to provincial boundaries. Apart from these two, we have not any staffs generally scattered through the country.
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George Hugh Castleden: I wondered, because I noticed that outside of the welfare branch, which I presume is doing most of the work with regard to the family allowances, the health branch have some 197 of a staff on a temporary and permanent basis, exclusive of Ottawa. The department has seen fit to put one temporary member of the staff in Saskatchewan. I did not hear Alberta complaining of the fact that they have only four. I could not understand why it was that the staff had been spread in a somewhat inequitable way.


Brooke Claxton: These would be food and drug inspectors.


George Hugh Castleden: They do not require them in Saskatchewan? Is that the idea?


Brooke Claxton: It is generally related to the population and activities of various kinds in the provinces, particularly in centres where food is manufactured and distributed. If the hon. member assures me that there is one in Saskatchewan I will take his word for it.


George Hugh Castleden: I have the department's report.


Brooke Claxton: I would not think there would be more than one there.


George Hugh Castleden: In your own report, which was issued this year, there appears at page 73 a list of the health branches in the various provinces. This shows that Nova Scotia has a total of sixty-four employes; Manitoba, twelve; British Columbia, forty-seven; New Brunswick, twenty-two, and Quebec, twenty-eight. They are spread out in that way, and it does seem rather inequitable, not that I am finding a . great deal of fault with the minister; but if he is carrying on separate services with regard to laboratory work and drugs, finding out whether drugs and medicines are up to standard or whether these people are working in connection with the provincial governments on their educational work or whether it is a matter of seeing that the physical fitness programme is being carried on in the provinces, or whatever the function is, then there should be a more equitable distribution.
There is the problem of industrial diseases. Of course, that does not affect Saskatchewan to the same extent as it does others, but there must be the same problem of nutrition and the educational work that is to be carried on should be required there. I suggest that the department should have someone there keeping in contact with what the province is doing. Saskatchewan has an ambitious programme of health. They are taking the lead

in the Dominion of Canada. At the present time the government is providing free medical services, free hospitalization, free medicine, and, where required and recommended by the medical men, free dental care for 25,000 people in the province who are old age pensioners or dependent under the children's allowance act of the province. If the present plans of the province materialize, for a small fee they are going to be given to every person, young or old, rich or poor in the province. I think that is something to which the present department of health could give a good deal of assistance in the way of advertising to show the people of Canada what can be done.
The other question that I wanted to ask the minister perhaps should be brought up under one of these other items. That is, among the important features of any health scheme are the medical men and social service workers and those who carry on the educational work, particularly in the preventive field. In that connection I was just wondering whether the minister could tell us if any encouragement is given in regard to the training of medical men throughout Canada. During the war special grants were made, I believe through the Department of Labour, for the training of these people. In peace time we still require these medical men; Canada is still short of trained people in these fields, particularly in the field of preventive medicine. We are looking forward to the day when we shall be paying our medical men to keep the people of Canada well, and when we shall give them proper remuneration for that work. Those of us who lived on the western prairies during the hard years of the drought saw the medical men doing splendid work, giving everything they had and getting very little for it. The idea of paying our medical men to keep us well seems to me a much sounder principle than to have people who become ill unable to pay their medical men and feel themselves not in a position to call them. Would it not be much better for every person to know that whenever they become ill they may call in the doctor and receive proper hospital and medical treatment irrespective of their ability to pay at the time? Very often the poorest families are the largest, and that is where care is needed and where we find the least money per capita being spent on the service most required. If the minister is aiming to establish a healthy Canada, it seems to me he will have to face that problem, of setting up within this country a form of state medicine under which our medical people will be paid to keep us well.

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Some of the figures across Canada in regard to certain diseases are alarming. Already in this debate statements have been made concerning health conditions among our Indians. When I think of some of the treaties that were signed with our red brothers, in which we said we would take care of them; then when I read some of the records in regard to the deathrate per 100,000 of population from tuberculosis in the various provinces, I hang my head in shame when I reflect what these people must think of those who made such promises to their forebears. For instance, I see that in Manitoba the death rate from tuberculosis is 1,421 per 100.000 among the Indians as compared with twenty-four among the white people. In Alberta it is 1.249-7 as compared with eighteen among the white people. The rate for all Canada is 757 among the Indians and forty-five among the white people.	-
The infant mortality rates in Canada, too, are such that we should hang our heads in shame. I notice that in some of the eastern provinces the rates are very high; and if this department is going to carry on an educational programme to better that condition, I should be quite satisfied to see only one of the minister's representatives in Saskatchewan and all the rest distributed throughout the other provinces where they are needed to carry on this work. The province of Alberta has, I think, four representatives of this department of the 197 in Canada outside of Ottawa. The infant mortality rates reveal that the figures for Quebec city are something like three times as high as those for some other cities. According to the report of the department, the rate in Vancouver and Calgary was twenty-nine, and it goes up from that figure as you go across Canada, taking in Hamilton, Victoria, London, Toronto, Saskatoon, Halifax, Ottawa, Regina and Windsor, where the rate is forty-six. The figure for Saint John, New Brunswick, is fifty; for Winnipeg, fifty-two; for Montreal and Verdun, sixty-one; for Three Rivers, seventy-one and for Quebec city, 104. Surely some big problem is involved there which will have to be faced, and I hope that in the course of his remarks the minister will inform the committee as to what plans he has in mind to deal with this situation.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Last evening, Mr. Chairman, I ventured several observations, to which the minister replied. If I may do so without wearying the committee I wish to go back to one or two of those matters, because in the
course of the last few minutes I think we have had light thrown on the answers given me by the minister last night.
First, I suggested that there was a distinct lack of information in the estimates as they have been laid before the house. I pointed out that we do not have before us the actual expenditures for the fiscal year ended March 31, 1946, at a time when we are being asked to approve estimates amounting to tremendous sums of money. Last evening I was told by the minister that the information would be forthcoming in due course in the public accounts. How many months must pass before the public accounts will be available we do not know, but certainly it will be long after the estimates now before the committee are disposed of. The public accounts will not be of the slightest assistance to us in reviewing the estimates now before us.
This evening we have dealt with one aspect of the estimates of the Department of National Health and Welfare, namely the expenditure on publicity and information. The hon, member for Vancouver-Burrard has pointed out that this item holds such importance in the estimates of this department that it totals over half a million dollars. But when we come to the first item, and seek, for this committee of the whole, information which any intelligent committee ought to have before it undertakes to approve a request for another 150,000 under the first item concerning publicity and information, the minister is not able to furnish the committee with the expenditure under this item last year. Here it is May 34, two montns after the close of the fiscal year, and we are told that it is not within the power of the minister to tell this committee what the expenditures under this item were during the fiscal year ended March 31, 1946. As a new member of this house, I say that that statement shocks me. We are asked to vote $50,000 on this item alone, and over half a million dollars on similar items scattered throughout the items for this department. On this first item alone it is not within the power of the minister to give the committee this information. It would not have surprised me if the minister had said, "I have not this information before me, but I shall have it for the committee on Monday." But the minister did not answer that he did not have the information; he answered that the information was not available.
If the committee of the whole is to have to do business in that way it might just as well fold up and decide to pass these items holus-bolus. A lot of general information, is not of the slightest value. We are sent here for a
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purpose; we are sent here to review estimates that total between three and1 four billion dollars. Are we not to be expected to apply even elementary business sense to a task of that kind? We asked for information about the expenditure last year under this item and we were told it is not available. We are now two months beyond the close of the fiscal year.
That is not all. Last night I suggested that it would be of -assistance to the house in discharging its duties in connection with these estimates if the House set up a committee of reasonable size which could get information first hand from the officials of the department. Surely the officials of the department are not made of fragile glass. They do not need to be insulated from members of parliament. Surely to goodness, we have a sense of responsibility and we can bear that sense of responsibility in mind when we are in committee. Why should it be so necessary to insulate these officials of the department from the members of the house, especially when it comes to seeking information which I say should be before us if this committee is to do its duty in connection with these estimates?
Last night I put forward the idea that there ought to be a standing committee on health, welfare and social security, which could review the estimates of this department, not with a view to depriving this committee of supply of its proper opportunities to consider the estimates but rather to supplement its work, to assist it and to get information first hand from the officials of the department. Apparently that was not approved by the minister. What do we find to-night? When the hon. member for Vaneouver-Burrard asked for information about these items, what was he told? In connection with the publicity items totalling half a million dollars he was told that they were put in-I think I am quoting the words of the minister-by the officials of the depatrment.


Brooke Claxton: That is not so at all.


Donald Methuen Fleming: That was the significance of the minister's remarks as conveyed to me, and I made an immediate note of them. Would it not be a good idea for the members, not in any spirit of hositility-I do not want anyone to get that impression at all-but with a view to discharging our duty, to get information and to apply our intelligence based on that information to a review of these estimates to see whether they are reasonable and should be passed and approved. How can we do that when we do not get information, when we are told that these items were put in by the officials of the department?

I should like very much to have an opportunity of asking the officials of the department about the method by which they arrived at these substantial figures. I should like to ask them, what are the programmes, the well thought-out and carefully integrated programmes which they ought to have had in mind, yes even as far advanced as the blueprint stage, long before they asked the minister to take the responsibility of going before the treasury board and asking for substantial amounts of money under the heading of information and publicity? Would that not be the responsible course? Would that not be a course that would permit this House of Commons to do its duty?
A word in conclusion about the general attitude toward this and other items in the minister's estimates. I tried to make it perfectly clear last night that we of the official opposition attach the utmost importance to the work of this department. I think I indicated that we had the view that there are no two more important aspects of government administration than health and welfare. Therefore, let no one say that it is in any spirit of hostility to health and welfare that we approach our duty with regard to these estimates. I indicated last night, and I repeat now, that in approaching these estimates we want information. We want to be sure that what is asked for here will represent the soundest application of the taxpayer's dollar, that the taxpayer is going to get value in good administration of health and good administration of welfare services for the dollar he is being asked to pay.
We are going to have the budget before us before very long, we hope. What are we to be told by the Minister of Finance when w-e come to discuss taxes? I think it is fair to say that if the minister recommends any reduction in taxation he will say that that can be done only to the extent that we are prepared to spend less. If he does not recommend any reduction in taxes he will probably say that he could not do so because the house has insisted on large expenditures for certain services that are considered by the house to be necessary. Would it not be helpful to the Minister of Finance; would it not be helpful to ourselves if we weighed in the light of common sense and in the light of information, which we do not seem to have at the present time, these expenditures that we are being asked to pass?
The hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre, speaking of the duty and functions of this department to provide and disseminate educational information throughout Canada,

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said that what we need is not less information, but more information. Those are true words, and if I might add to them I would say that what wre need is the best possible information. It is only when we get the best possible information that shall have the best application of the taxpayer's dollar. The minister has said, and rightly, that our health problem to-day is, in effect, to close the gap between what we know and what we do, that that is the way to meet the killers of humanity. I wonder how much this department is contributing to the elimination of those killers by this May "filler" issued by the department:
Better health and greater happiness for children are expected to result from wise spending of the family allowance it is stated by officials of the Department of National Health and Welfare, Ottawa. A family's basic needs include adequate food, clothing, shelter and medical supervision. Family allowance officials suggest that, when all these things have been provided, parents use what is left of their income on extras calculated to add zest to living.
Is it making the wisest application of the taxpayer's dollar, the dollar which the Minister of Finance may be trying to conserve when he brings in his budget, to tell the people of Canada to use the money paid out in family allowances to add zest to living? Is there a member of this house who thinks that is adding to the education or information of the people of Canada on necessary matters of health, to be told to use the remainder of the family allowances to add zest to living? I hope, Mr. Chairman, that is not a fair sample of the kind of publicity which is being issued by this department. I hope it is not a fair sample of the way in which the taxpayers are being called upon to contribute over half a million dollars to the publicity channels alone of this department.
I do not wish to prolong this discussion. I think the issue is perfectly clear. But I do want in all good part to say to the minister that we have important estimates of his department to review. We do not intend to approach them in any spirit of hostility, but we want to see the money spent wisely on health and welfare, and so far as we can be satisfied that the money is to be devoted to wise purposes we shall be back of his programme to a man. But we shall want a lot more information than we have yet been given.
I ask the minister now, with a week-end ahead of us, if before this committee proceeds to consider the detailed items of his estimates he will provide the house with information on all expenditures of his department for publicity last year; that is the fiscal 63260-132
year ended March 31, 1946, in all these branches in which we are asked to approve appropriations for publicity and information. In the second place, will he give the committee the expenditures made by this department during the fiscal year ended March 31, 1946, for publicity and information representing payments made outside of departmental salaries, that is to persons outside the department, and to whom these amounts were paid, and what the amounts were? I think the committee will receive that information with appreciation.
There has been enough said in all parts of the house, at least by those who sit on this side of the house, to make it clear to the minister that we want to see carried on a greatly extended programme of research. There is great hope in the realm of research, and if it comes to choosing between expenditures on research and expenditures on publicity of this kind I think it is the duty of the house to make it quite clear to the minister for his guidance and that of the government in future that we would rather see the money spent on research. Where money can be spent wisely on education, let it be spent, but spend it wisely.


Mr. HANSELL:: Mr. Chairman, this is the first time that I have spoken on this department. I can assure you I have listened with a great deal of interest to those who have preceded me. It seems to me that the one great plea that has been made by all speakers is that the function of the Department of National Health and Welfare should be widened in its scope, that it should become more effective, that we should have more research, that other types of health service should be set up, and especially should we try to facilitate the cure of those who are suffering from such maladies as arthritis, cancer and other diseases which are looked upon as being more or less incurable.
I rise to mention what may appear to be a rather tiny thing but one which some speakers have overlooked. I refer particularly to the security of those sufferers, perhaps incurable, who because of their financial circumstances are thrown upon either charitable institutions or perhaps upon their civic governments to receive assistance in the form of relief, which, after all, is a pittance, or else have to rely upon the good graces of friends or perhaps their relatives who are not in a position to keep them. I think we could all cite a good many such cases. The minister may feel that this does not primarily come within his department, but his department is known as the Department of National

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Health and Welfare and the minister is due sooner or later to put through a measure of social security.
I had several cases brought to me last year, one that I am particularly well acquainted with. This young woman was afflicted with infantile paralysis, and it was found, after some considerable treatment through the programme of the Alberta government, that nothing much could be done for her because the disease had gone too far. She is one of ' the finest types of young women I have ever met. Her mother is a widow. This young woman wrote to me and said, "Mr. Hansell, what am I going to do? Is my widowed mother to keep me for the rest of my life?" That is only one case, but I am certain that it could be duplicated thousands and thousands of times in Canada.
I had another case of an epileptic woman. Her mother and father were on the old age pension. She said, "My only help is from my mother and father." I speak for these people because, while these cases may not be so numerous as others, and they are scattered throughout the length and breadth of this land, they have no organization. It is almost impossible for these incurables to bring into existence an organization that can present their case and mobilize public opinion behind them. Yet I suppose there is not a member of parliament sitting here to-night, or sitting anywhere else on this Friday night, who is not just as anxious about these cases as I am. I think we are all agreed that something should be done for them, and I plead on their behalf that something should be done for them. I know I have the support of parliament. I would ask the minister what he is prepared to do for them. Are they still to be considered as indigents, a word that has fallen into miserable disrepute? Are they to be considered as relief recipients, another term that has fallen into disrepute? Surely our country and civilization are worth more than that. I ask the minister what he or his government is prepared to do for these unfortunate people; I do not know what his answer is going to be.
Nearly everyone who has spoken to-day has raised his voice on behalf of patients afflicted with cancer, arthritis and rheumatic diseases. I am not going to repeat their pleas; I would just, add mine as one more voice, one more pleading voice, perhaps a "still small voice" that is "crying in the wilderness", but surely 245 voices all crying in the same wilderness should bring forth some results.
rMr. Hansell.]
I was particularly interested in the speech this afternoon .of the hon. member for Lethbridge. I really think he put the minister on the spot. As he was speaking I fancied he was a mind-reader and could almost tell beforehand what the minister's reply would be. When the -minister rose to reply to these pleading voices, I thought he was floundering around, probably because the hon. member for Lethbridge had stolen some of his thunder. When the minister had finished his reply I wondered whether I dared send out Hansard to these people who had written in asking us to lift our voices on their behalf. I could imagine the young woman whom I have referred to as an infantile paralysis case, the paralytic girl I have in mind, and a host of others getting copies of Hansard, looking at the index to find the Department of National Health and Welfare, turning over the pages anxiously to see what the government was going to do for them, and then reading the minister's speech.


Mr. SINCLAIR (Vancouver North):: And your remarks, too.


Ernest George Hansell: Yes, and my remarks too. What a disappointment they would have! I believe they would put Hansard aside and say, "Well, I suppose we shall have to await another election for a few more promises, and perhaps by the time I am an old woman"- or, an old man-"I may get an extra few dollars." It seems to me that that is all the minister's answer amounted to.
I appreciated what the hon. member for Lethbridge said as to what was the source of the minister's trouble, and I am confident that he was right. All of us want our people to be healthy; all of us want clinics to be established and research to be proceeded with. But it costs money. That is where the "sticker" is, and let us admit it; the minister does not know where to get the wherewithal to finance these projects. He said that the solution offered by this Social Credit group is a solution of "funny money." I believe Hansard will record that he made that statement- "funny money"-and of course he was not going to use that and put the economy of Canada into, I think he said, a "jackpot" or something like that.
Let me ask him one or two questions. How does he know that the money we would propose to get is funny money? And how does he know that if he used a few million dollars of national money, issued without debt to the taxpayer and the country, he would upset our

Supply-Health and Welfare
whole economy or put it into a jackpot or a cocked hat or whatever term he wants to use? How does he know?


Humphrey Mitchell: Ask yourself the same question.


Ernest George Hansell: My suggestion is this, try it and see. I am not saying that he should go to the Bank of Canada and say, "Mr. Banker, give us a billion dollars"; I am asking him to go there for a few paltry millions. We have been talking throughout the war years in terms of billions. Let him go and ask for $5,000,000.


Mr. PROBE:: Let him make it a little more than that.


Ernest George Hansell: Why, $5,000,000 is just chicken feed.


An hon. MEMBER:: Some chicken.


Humphrey Mitchell: Social Credit feed.


Ernest George Hansell: I expect my congregations in the churches where I preach to come forward with a little more than chicken feed. Let him try this; let him ask for $10,000,000. Surely that is only a drop in the bucket.
Do I understand that the Minister of Finance poked his head in the curtain and then pulled it back again?


Humphrey Mitchell: My hon. friend is just saying that to bolster up his speech.


Mr. ROSS (Souris):: That actually happened.


Mr. COLDWELL:: Yes, that actually happened.


Ernest George Hansell: I did not hear the Minister of Labour. When I was a boy we used to go out snaring gophers. We put the snare around the top of the hole; there we would stay for one minute, two minutes, five minutes, maybe fifteen minutes, and when that gopher put his head up through the hole we would pull, very often only to find that the gopher was a little faster than we were. I think that was the case with the Minister of Finance; perhaps he pulled his head in before I could pull the snare.
Let the government ask the Bank of Canada to bring in a little legislation which will issue, free of debt, about $10,000,000-surely that is not going to upset the whole economy of the country-and see what effect it has. I challenge them to do that and prove whether or not that money would be phoney money and whether the issuance of it would knock the economy of this country into a cocked hat. I challenge the minister to do that. Just a paltry $10,000,000, chicken feed.


Humphrey Mitchell: Why not make it $10 billion? If you want to be foolish, be foolish.
63260-132J	4 Q5


Ernest George Hansell: You would be afraid to do that. I would not want the minister to do it with a palpitating heart, fearing he is going to ruin the economy of the country. I am suggesting $10,000,000, mere chicken feed. I am suggesting that he pay it out for national health. That is not very much to spend for such a purpose. If he does not do it, this country should know that he regards the mighty and holy dollar as more sacred than the health and welfare of our children.
I think that is a good place to stop.


Eric Bowness McKay: Just one brief word before we pass this item. Since my speech on cancer this afternoon I have been making a brief examination of the annual report of the department of public health of Alberta, and from what I see there I have every reason to congratulate that province on the splendid progress it has made in developing cancer clinics. It was not my intention this afternoon to make any invidious comparisons between provinces, but I would say this. If there is to be a race between one province and another to see which develops the best cancer clinics, I am all for it. Saskatchewan has set up free clinics, free in very sense of the word, free diagnosis, free X-rays, free radium treatment and free surgical treatment, without any limits, for rich and poor alike.


Mr. IRVINE:: Free hospitalization?


Eric Bowness McKay: Yes, and free hospitalization, without limit and absolutely without cost. It is my hope that every province will do likewise in order to defeat this terrible scourge.


Major James William Coldwell: There is one thing I would ask the minister to do. It does not come within his department and the budget is no doubt being prepared. When it is brought down I hope the minister will use his influence with the Department of Finance to see if we cannot get invalid equipment brought into the country duty free. I know that certain types of chairs, bed-tables and so on, used by invalids, come under a fairly high rate of duty, and I think this is one place where it would cost the government very little and would bring a good deal of relief to people who have sickness in their families. I mean the placing on the free list of equipment of that type for the assistance of invalids. I will support any appropriation that is made to assist in the study of cancer, rheumatic diseases, sclerosis and those mysterious diseases which afflict so many people at the present time, but I would ask the minister if this might be kept in mind when the budget is brought down.


Grote Stirling: Surely the minister will reply to the request for information from the
Supply-Health and Welfare

hon. member for Eglinton. He has requested certain information which in the past in other departments has undoubtedly been forthcoming-the amount expended under the vote in 'the previous fiscal year. Surely the minister will comply with that request.


Brooke Claxton: In reply to the member for Rosetown-Biggar, as he probably knows, the Department of Veterans Affairs has succeeded in securing the entry of such equipment for veterans, and I have been greatly interested lately in receiving representations by the veterans themselves that they would be glad to see such equipment imported free into Canada for other than ex-soldiers. I shall be glad indeed to see every possible consideration given the representation. -
With regard to the questions of the hon. member for Eglinton, I have not, I hope, given the impression that I was not willing to give any information, or that I was finding it difficulty to give any. It is perfactly possible, given time, to secure information on any expenditure by the government; and when I gave the figure before, of the expenditure made under this vote of $2,421, that was the figure I had before me. Since then, however, I have sent out for further information, and I find that we have a figure for the period up to March 31, 1946 of a total expenditure for the year of $24,959.68. Also, I afn told that the unexpended balance at March 31, 1946, of $25,040.32 was committed for in part, although the accounts were not submitted and therefore not paid, and since the vote expired the amount due on the commitment will have to be paid out of the 1946-47 publicity vote. In this connection there is, as I explained, I hope to the satisfaction of the committee, quite a wide demand for a wide variety of publicity activities, which it is not possible to allocate under the different departmental heads such as nutrition, tuberculosis, venereal disease, child and maternal hygiene and the like, and it is necessary to provide for their general alloca-lion. This vote is used for that purpose. I shall be glad indeed to obtain from the treasury, as the figures become available, anything that my hon. friend wants. As he knows, every member is entitled to that and he will get it. It is just a question of availability at any particular moment. He must realize that it is not possible for one to carry with him into the house the breakdown of every expenditure up to date. I hope, therefore, that with that explanation it will be agreed that the item should pass; and in view of the interest he has taken, and which other hon. members have shown in these items, I shall endeavour to obtain the information

from the officers of the department and the treasury and have them available when these estimates next come before the house.
Just one further word. The hon. member seemed to suggest that the officers of the department were responsible for the estimates. He must know that the deputy ministers draw up the estimates after consultation with their officials, as a result of vreeks and months of work, having regard to what they plan, what they sp,end and what they expect to do, and in the light of the over-all position. It is then taken up with the minister and, when signed by him, is put before the treasury and then ultimately brought before parliament. I hope the hon. member did not suggest that there was anything wrong with officials putting forward estimates. There is no other way in which it can be done at the initial stage, but the estimates must, of course, be put forward by the deputy ministers, and by the ministers before parliament.
One word in reply to the hon. member for Macleod. I would be very glad indeed if I could give him all the assurances he wants, both on fiscal and other matters, but in regard to disability benefits we did have a debate in the house, and I indicated what I considered would be the right view at that particular moment, on that occasion. I do not think he would want me to go over it at this time; but I must say that I have, as everyone has, the utmost sympathy for the people who are afflicted as those are whom he had in mind. It is a question of what agency should look after them. If it is decided that it should be some agency other than that which it always has been, then I think it is something for the provinces and the dominion to agree to. Until that is done all we can do is to continue to administer the laws in accordance wnth the constitution.


Angus MacInnis: I am glad that my hon. friends to the right insisted on an explanation of the vote that was brought up by the hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard. When the minister gave the explanation that of the $50,000 vote he could account for $2,400 which had been expended up to December 31, 1945, I thought it was the most amazing answer that I had ever heard given this house over a period of fifteen years. So far as hon. members are concerned, these estimates are important or they are not. A mere item in the estimates does not mean anything to a member unless he has an explanation of what it is for. Indeed, a member should not pass such an item unless he knows what use is to be made of it.
I am not at all satisfied with the explanation given by the minister a moment ago as to how

Supply-health and Welfare
these estimates are arrived at. Surely he does not arrive at an estimate by saying or have someone from his staff say that we shall put down $50,000 for this and $25,000 for that and so on. Surely, when an estimate of $50,000 or of any amount is put down under any particular head there is before the minister a description, not a complete itemized account as to how it is to be spent, but at least an indication of what is to be done with it. It seems to me that is the only way that an item makes any sense when it comes here, and the only way in which the minister can make it real to the members of the committee. That is why I suggested, since this is a new department, that a break-down of the item of last year, which I insist the minister ought to have before him when he came into the committee, would be the easiest way to arrive at whether or not the money was well spent.
I do not want to draw any invidious comparisons between one minister and another. Certainly I do not wish to do that so far as the present minister is concerned. I did not take any part in the discussion of the estimates of the department which were before the committee for about a week. I am sure that those who did take part in that discussion found that they got about all the information they could be given, and I do not see any reason why we should not receive the same information from the department with which we are now dealing.
I wish to say a few words on the general subject which has been discussed to-night. I find it difficult to understand my Social Credit friends. If my memory serves me aright, I believe that one of them said in a public speech a few days ago that that country was governed best that wras governed least. If that is a good maxim to go by, surely we should not ask in the next breath that the minister of health or any minister should inject himself and his department into every phase of our economic, cultural and social life. Either we want a government to do things or we do not. I take the position which was taken a little earlier in the evening, perhaps in a different way, that the government is an agency of the people which does for the people collectively what they are not able to do for themselves individually. The moment our affairs reach the stage in any department where the collective will and the collective effort of the people can be mobilized to do the thing which individually we are no longer able to do for ourselves, then at that moment that thing is ripe for government action. Our health affairs have in many respects, perhaps not all, reached that stage. I do not believe-if I ever did, it was a wrong
belief-that health is a matter that can be maintained by doctors. I believe the more doctors you have, the more disease.
Some lion. MEMBERS: Oh, oh.


Angus MacInnis: The diseases of your grandparents and their parents were few and simple.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: We had no doctors.


Angus MacInnis: We had no doctors. When you multiply your doctors you multiply the number of diseases, and if you are not sick before you see a doctor you will be sick afterwards. That will continue to be the state of affairs until, as some hon. member said this afternoon, the doctor becomes an educator who will tell the people how to maintain health rather than try to cure people when through their bad habits they get into ill health.
There is not an hon. member in this chamber to-night who does not know that by his own actions he can make himself sick within the next day or so. He knows equally well-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Angus MacInnis: Every intelligent person knows that if he takes care he can preserve his' health and feel fit from day to day. I believe in public health. I believe that fresh air and the plentiful use of soap and water da more to promote health than anything else.


An hon. MEMBER:: Just water?


Angus MacInnis: I always insist on drinking water. That is why I keep my health. You cannot take it out of a bottle with a spoon or from a pill in a bottle or a box you carry in your pocket. If we and the minister are to deal with this matter effectively we shall have to work to get the cooperation of the provinces so that we can have a national health system. I thought under the then Minister of Pensions and National Health, with the efforts that were made in 1942 and, I think, in 1943-the fact that we were coming to an election in those days may have had nothing to do with it-we were really moving toward a national health system for Canada. I do not knowT why the thing has fallen down, why it is to be thrown away now after so much very good work has been done. The staff of the former department did excellent work, and we should carry on with that work, despite certain set-backs, until we convince the people of Canada that a national health system will pay for itself.


Mrs. STRUM:: I almost got shut out to-night by being a gentleman, and I am going to quit acting that way. I want to
Supply-Health and Welfare

say a few things under the general item which cannot be said under the item concerning child and maternal welfare, on which I intend to speak again. I wish to congratulate the minister on bringing to this country from England a distinguished person, Sir Wilson Jameson. It was a very great privilege to listen to him, and I only regret that all hon. members of this house did not attend the meeting in the railway committee room.


Mr. JACKMAN:: We were practically all there.


Gladys Grace Mae Strum: If you were I did not see you.


Harry Rutherford Jackman: I was amazed myself.


Gladys Grace Mae Strum: I thought it was a great advantage to have first-hand the plans of the government of Great Britain and the marvellous example they are setting the world. Here we have this devastated country, which had one-third of its homes damaged or destroyed, undertaking a great rehousing programme with public money.


Mr. GRANT:: We are giving them the money.


Gladys Grace Mae Strum: I am coming to that. They are undertaking subsidized housing, so that even the poorest people can live in decent houses even if they cannot pay economic rents. These people who are undertaking this terrific thing in housing are now undertaking a terrific thing in public health. I think this is the valuable thing the British people do. They meet a need and establish a precedent; that is the British tradition which I am proud to own. Here we have the British people, in the hour of their extremity, amid the ruins of their homes and their country, planning to supply forty million people with complete coverage, while we in this country, who did not have one home destroyed; who have more equipment and a greater production potential and greater wealth than we had before the war are still denying help to the poor arthritics, the victims of infantile paralysis, the victims of cancer, the victims of any one of a hundred other things which can kill y&u-and you will be just as dead. Here we are still saying we do not know where we are to get the money. I think we need education, but even more I believe we need some political education in this country, the sort of thing that will tell the people that Great Britain now has undertaken to own, in the name of all the people, the basic industries and to spend for the good of all the people the revenue
fMrs. Strum.]
derived from their operation. I have in my hand a clipping from the Ottawa Citizen containing a news dispatch dated May 14, 1946, from the London representative of that newspaper, outlining the objectives and the accomplishments of the Labour government of Great Britain. It says:
1.	Every man, woman and child will get free medical attention under a national health scheme and every general practitioner will be working for the state at an average salary of $4,500.
2,	Apart from this national health scheme, the social security of every Briton, regardless of financial status, will be guaranteed by the state from the day of his birth to the day of his death and including allowances to mothers before- the babies are born.
It goes on to say that England will now have state-owned and state-operated coal mines, and goes through the whole catalogue of resources of England from which the people will now enjoy the revenue. They will own the great public utilities of England; the revenue will go into the treasury and will be returned to the people in housing, in health and in well-being. That is the sort of education I am interested in. That is the sort of education I intend to carry on inside and outside this house as long as I am able to do so, because the people of this country need to be told that this government refuses to undertake the technique that will replenish the treasury so that adequate funds may be given to the Minister of Health and Welfare, who is now doing an execellent job, with the limited resources his party allows him to have, in looking after the health of this country.
I believe in public education. We have all kinds of voluntary organizations doing excellent work. For twenty years I belonged to the women's institutes of my province. For twenty years we circulated petitions and passed resolutions, until we were black in the face. We asked for better old age pensions, for mothers' allowances, for blood testing of both contracting parties before marriage, for free textbooks, for free cancer care. These simple, sensible human needs of the people we asked for again and again; we carried on public education, but it was not until our province got political education and elected a C.C.F. government that we got all these things. And we got them in one year. To-day our financial position is better than it has ever been in the history of the province, regardless of the fact that we had a severe drought last year. You need only consult the bond markets to see that our bonds have hit a new high. We have retired a sizeable chunk of the public debt, and our sinking fund is much greater than it was two years ago.

Questions
It is true that education is a necessary thing, but I did not notice any campaign of education about this time last year directed toward family allowances. I did not know of any widespread demand for them, unless it was from the party I represent, because ever since I was in New Zealand five years ago I have been talking about family allowances. We got family allowances, but I submit that the Prime Minister did a good thing for a bad reason. That was' not preceded by years of public education, either. So I submit that political education is the thing this country lacks most of all.
Item stands.
Progress reported.


[Stage Direction]
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Monday, June 3, 1946.