1946-08-22

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Fireman's labourer, $1,140-81,200 to $1,200-$1,380.
Fireman, 81,140-81,260 to $1,200-81,380.
2.	Increases due to the revision of salaries indicated in the answer to question No. 1 are applicable to all stationary engineers and firemen in the public service in Canada.
3.	Recommendations for the above increases are now being made by the Department of Public Works for each individual case; that is, pay certificates are being forwarded to the chief treasury officer for revision in pay.
4.	During the past few years it has become increasingly difficult to obtain the services of sufficient heating staff and therefore practically every member of the staff has worked some overtime during the heating seasons.
Questions
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5.	These men were paid for such overtime by compensatory leave in lieu thereof. Such time was granted whenever possible, mostly during the summer when the heating plants were closed down.
6.	The average prevailing rates of pay in private industry in Ottawa area are as follows:
Engineers, $100 to $130 a month.
Firemen, $85 a month.
7.	Only as to increased salaries given in answer to question No. 1.
8.	The recommendations for stationary engineers were made by the civil service commission on May 16, 1946, and approved by order in council P.C. 137/2867, dated July 10, 1946, and those for firemen on May 2,1946, and approved by order in council P.C. 17/2990, dated July 18, 1946.
^OFFICIAL SECRETS ACT-MISS AGATHA CHAPMAN
Mr. BENTLEY:: 1.	When will a decision be reached by the law officers of the crown regarding the action to be taken concerning allegations against Miss Agatha Chapman made by the royal commissioners appointed by order in council P.C. 411 of 1946 in their final report?
2.	Why has no action been taken similar to that against other persons accused by the royal commission?
3.	If a decision regarding Miss Chapman's case has already been reached (a) what is that decision; (b) what action does the minister propose to take on the basis of that decision;
(c)	when will that action be taken?
Mr. ST. LAURENT: Perhaps I might be allowed to answer this question orally. With regard to the first part of the question I cannot say just on what date final decision will be taken. I discussed the matter again yesterday with the deputy minister of justice. There has been no difference between the course followed in this case and the course followed in other cases. Before charges are laid the deputy minister of justice wishes to have the opinion of outside counsel who will, if a prosecution is instituted, conduct the proceedings. Three of the senior counsel who had been retained for other prosecutions were sought to take charge of this one, or at least their offices were communicated with. It so happened that all three were away on holidays. Then there was a canvass made and it was found that many more lawyers are away at this time than members of parliament. It was with some difficulty that we were able to select a junior counsel to whom the whole of the papers were referred. The day before yesterday the deputy minister received a report from him which is a complete analysis of the facts and which it is desired to have checked by senior counsel The deputy min-

ister told me that the senior counsel he had in mind, who had been spoken to some time ago about this case, would foe back from his vacation on Labour day. No time will be lost in taking such action as may be appropriate, as soon as the ordinary procedure followed by the department can be carried out.
I think that answers the other two paragraphs as well. The second asks why no action has been taken similar to that taken against other persons accused by the royal commission. I believe the explanation I have given answers that. The third paragraph asks if a decision has been made and, if so, what that decision is. A definite decision has not yet been reached, for the reasons I have given, but I can assure my hon. friend that I am as anxious as anyone can be that all these matters be disposed of promptly and in the regular way.



SALES OF LIQUOR

Mr. NICHOLSON:: What were the per capita sales for liquor by provinces for the last fiscal year?


Mr. MacKINNON:: Note.-The figures below based on sales as reported by the provincial liquor boards or commissions, are. not comparable figures of liquor consumption by residents of the various provinces for the reasons stated below:
Per Capita Sales of Alcoholic Beverages in Provincial Fiscal Years ending in 1945 (Computed from sales by provincial liquor control boards and extra liquor board sales (i.e., by Breweries, etc.) where permitted)
Sales per Head of
Population
Nova Scotia	
$30	80New Brunswick	
23	34Quebec	
21	27Ontario	
25	70Manitoba	
20	79Saskatchewan	
16	12Alberta	
24	90British Columbia	
30	941.	The consumption of liquor by tourists is considerable and is heavier in some provinces than others.2.	The figures for certain provinces, e.g., Nova Scotia and British Columbia are inflated because of the accumulation of service personnel in these provinces in 1945.3.	The methods of accounting are not uniform as between the various provincial liquor boards.
Motor Vehicles
4.	There is considerable variation in methods of sale in the different provinces. In some provinces the figures represent sales to final consumers only; in others they represent sales to intermediaries as well.
5.	The provincial fiscal years vary, hence the figures do not refer to identical periods of time.



JAPANESE-REPATRIATION-MENTAL HOSPITAL PATIENTS

Mr. MacINNIS:: 1. Under what authority was Kosho Matano sent to Japan?
_ 2. Of the fifteen persons of Japanese origin in mental hospital in British Columbia who were sent to Japan at their own request, how many were (a) Japanese nationals; (b) naturalized Canadians; (c) Canadian born?
3. How was the request for repatriation obtained from these fifteen mental hospital patients?


Mr. MITCHELL:: 1.	Upon his own request for repatriation under the provisions of P.C. 7355 of December 15, 1945.
2.	(a) 12; (b) 3; (c) nil.
3.	A request was made to the provincial mental hospital authorities in each case by the repatriate and subsequently affirmed to officers of the Department of Labour and the said hospital authorities.



QUESTION PASSED AS ORDER FOR RETURN


Mr. DANIEL:: What is the total amount paid by government-owned companies since their inception for (a) advertising; (b) publicity, including publicity personnel ?



UNITED NATIONS


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On the orders of the day:
Mr. GORDON GRAYDON (Peel):: I
should like to ask the Acting Secretary of State for External Affairs if any invitation has yet come to the Canadian government to attend the sessions of the second part of the general assembly at New York, which I understand is called for September 23. At the same time may I ask if any suggestion has come to the government from that organization that the sittings of the general assembly be postponed until such time as the Paris peace conference has reached some degree of finality?
Right Hon. L. S. ST. LAURENT (Acting Secretary of State for External Affairs): To the first part of the question I think the answer should be in the affirmative. What has been received by the Canadian government is official notification from the secretary general that the second part of the general assembly will convene in New York on September 23. It is not couched in the terms of an invitation, but it is an official notification to members of the general assembly of the date for the resumption of the meeting. To the second part of the question the answer is no; no suggestion of postponement has been made to the Canadian government.


Gordon Graydon: May I express the hope that if the general assembly is to convene on the date indicated, it will not follow the example of the early days of the Paris peace conference, because I do not think a world which is seeking peace could stand two performances of that kind going on at the same time.
Mr. ST. LAURENT: I am sure publicity will be given to the views expressed by the hon. member, and I hope proper notice will be taken of them.



MOTOR VEHICLES


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On the orders of the day:
Mr. R. W. MAYHEW (Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Finance):: Yesterday the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Low) asked the following question:
Was the Ford Motor Company authorized to increase the price of Ford tractor repair parts by 20 per cent on or about August 3?
The answer is that as a result of price increases in the United States, the wartime prices and trade board passed order No. 638 allowing importers of farm machinery, after written authorization from the administrator of farm and construction machinery and municipal service equipment, to increase their June 14, 1946, maximum prices by the exact amount of increase in their landed cost. Under the terms of this order, on July 22, 1946, the Ford Motor Company of Canada Limited at Windsor was authorized to increase wholesale prices of imported tractor repair parts by 20-55 per cent. Dealers buying such parts for resale are not permitted to add the same percentage increase to retail price, but are restriced to an increase equal to the actual dollar increase in cost.
War Assets



QUESTION OF CONTINUANCE OF SUBSIDY OF 55 CENTS PER 100 POUNDS

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On the orders of the day:
Robert Wellington Mayhew: Yesterday the hon. member for Churchill (Mr. Moore) asked a question with regard to the subsidy on milk. No change is contemplated in the government policy announced by the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner) on May 16 last, namely that the producer milk subsidy will be discontinued on September 30 next.
Control of the prices of milk and cream was transferred from the wartime prices and trade board to the provincial milk boards, effective June 1, 1946.


Mr. SENN:: I understood the Minister of Agriculture to tell the house the other day that the matter was under advisement, and that a decision had not been reached. Does the parliamentary assistant mean, then, that a decision has been reached, and that there will be no further subsidy on milk?


Hon. DOUGLAS ABBOTT (Acting Minister of Finance):: I will answer that question. The answer is yes



WAR ASSETS


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On the orders of the day:
Mr. G. J. McILRAITH (Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply):: Yesterday the hon. member for Peterborough West (Mr. Fraser) directed an inquiry as to the procedure to be followed with respect to certain questions he had sought to place on the order paper and which had been directed to the committee on war expenditures and economies. I have had an investigation made as to these questions, and find that they have been answered in that committee.


Gordon Graydon: Have the answers been published?


George James McIlraith: Part of them are
printed and part are not yet printed. As far as I know, the last issue of the proceedings of that committee is not yet available in printed form.


Gordon Graydon: May I ask if that printing is to be done at once?


George James McIlraith: Oh, yes, I understand so. It is likely to be in at any time. It is in the hands of the printers.


Gordon Graydon: There is not much use in answering questions unless the answers are published.


George James McIlraith: Unfortunately sometimes there is some delay in the printing.


Mr. FRASER:: May I ask if the questions answered are those dealing with the armed services or those dealing with war assets?


George James McIlraith: Both.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: That is wonderful.



FEED GRAIN


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On the orders of the day:
Mr. MATTHEW MacLEAN (Cape Breton North-Victoria):: Some days ago I wrote the Minister of Agriculture concerning the shortage of hay and grain in Cape Breton. As I have not received an answer to my letter, Mr. Speaker, with your permission I shall direct the question to the acting minister.
This year the hay and grain crops on Cape Breton Island are about one-third of the average, owing to a very dry season, and the farmers will be compelled to kill a large number of their cattle unless hay and grain can be obtained elsewhere. My question is, will the government assist the Cape Breton farmers to obtain the necessary feed for their cattle by paying all or part of the freight rates on this feed from Ontario and Quebec, or wherever the hay and grain may be obtained, since the farmers are not able to pay these costs themselves?


Hon. JOSEPH JEAN (Solicitor General):: I take notice of the hon. member's question and will have the matter examined at once.



FIELD MARSHAL MONTGOMERY


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On the orders of the day:
Mr. JEAN-FRANCOIS POULIOT (Temis-couata): Mr. Speaker, before the orders of the day are called may I refer to press dispatches to the effect that General Montgomery is coming to Canada in sealed quarters on board ship, that he will be the guest of the Canadian government while he is here, and that he follows a very strict diet. I wonder if the Canadian government has got in touch with the imperial government so that General Montgomery may follow strictly the same diet in Canada that he follows elsewhere, in order to avoid an intra-imperial crisis?

Industrial Relations
Hon. IAN A. MACKENZIE (Minister of Veterans Affairs): In reply I would say it would be a good thing if some members in the house were in sealed quarters.


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Mr. Speaker, may I draw the attention of the Minister of Trade and Commerce to a return just brought down, giving on a per capita basis the consumption of liquor by provinces. The file has been denuded of the figures for Prince Edward Island. I wonder if the minister would check that.


James Angus MacKinnon: I am sorry if there is no figure for Prince Edward Island. I shall check it.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Does it mean that they do not consume liquor there?


James Angus MacKinnon: I do not think that is correct, no.


Mr. POULIOT:: That question has no relation to mine.



INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Wednesday, August 21, consideration of the motion of Mr. Lalonde for concurrence in the second report of the standing committee on industrial relations.
Mr. NORMAN J. M. LOCKHART (Lincoln) : Mr. Speaker, when the house adjourned last night at seven o'clock, at which time there was some slight interruption to deal with the continuity of business in the house, I was speaking about the forty-hour week, and there is reference in the press to-day to certain labour demands across the country in this respect. I said then that I thought it was ill-conceived, and referred to the fact that the 48-hour week provision had been placed on the statute books of Ontario as recently as January 1 of this year. I expressed the opinion that it should have been tried out for at least a period of time before any attempt was made to drop hours of labour down to forty hours per week.
Much criticism has been launched against the so-called ten-cent pattern credited to the provincial board, and approved at least in theory by the present government. Let me
say here that I am just as definitely opposed to rigid patterns such as the 40-hour week as I am to the ten-cent wage pattern which has been criticized, and especially at a time when the country faces a crisis. In my opinion it is ill-conceived 'to try to force the forty-hour week, in the light of many complications which have arisen. If hon. members will bear with me for only a few minutes I shall endeavour to show how this reduction of hours works out, and will illustrate by citing one case which I know is common to many thousands across Canada, in connection with the working out of the 48-hour week. This is not a hypothetical case, but one within my own personal experience.
I have in my files a considerable number of letters from small employers, which I shall not attempt to read. However, the particular instance I have in mind concerns an employer who has from forty to fifty employees. Long before the war this man assisted financially some seven or eight of his employees to get small houses. He lent them small amounts of money, and allowed them to use their-
Mr. SPEAKER:: Order. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. member, but I must point out there is so much noise in the chamber that it is disagreeable not only to the hon. member who has the floor, but also to those who want to listen.


Mr. LOCKHART:: Mr. Speaker, when the side discussions end, I shall proceed. I was pointing out that I have on my files much evidence to support what I am about to say. Before the war this particular employer, whom I have known for thirty or thirty-five years, had forty or fifty employees on his payroll, and he had assisted at least seven or eight of them in securing small houses. He lent them small amounts of money and did many other things for their assistance. He allowed them to use his trucking equipment in the erection of those houses. Long before this so-called blue-plan for hospital care became known, this man had worked out a scheme under which his employees would contribute a small amount per week, and he matched their contributions dollar for dollar in order to provide social security for them. I could go on at length, setting out the various things he did to help them. The employees were permitted to control the payment of this money. At times when there were hospital emergencies, doctors' bills, the arrival of children in the families, dental care and many other obligations, $25 or $50 was always available through that fund. The fund was set up in trust, and the expenditures were controlled by the employees. The employer did all sorts of things like that. Needless to say the esprit
Industrial Relations

de corps in that plant was good, and, what is more, the employer and his employees were drawn more closely together by these arrangements.
I thought of this when I listened to one hon. member who said, I believe it was in connection with the steel strike at Hamilton, that Mr. Brockington had to introduce the head of the industry to the head of the union. This kind of thing shows the necessity of getting closer together. In the case I have cited the employees were working from 52 to 54 hours per week. The employer called in his men and he said, "From January 1 you will be working only 48 hours a week, but we are going to continue to give you the same take-home pay. This is going to cost us from $8,000 to $10,000, but we will do our best to absorb the added expense." He continued, and I have correspondence to confirm what he said, "Remember we expect your hundred per cent cooperation. We have had to work largely under ceiling prices with the goods we distribute, and the added cost for labour will come out of our profits. Our turnover must be kept up, or our earnings will decrease." That was the conversation about which he has written. He said, "If we work together perhaps it will work out; we ire willing to do our part." He added one filing more which is very significant. He said, 'If our turnover decreases and our earnings are depleted, it will become necessary because of this reduction to 48 hours to put on five or six more men in order to get out the work." It was pointed out that this would mean increased overhead. I think this goes to show the position in which the small employer is placed. The men rallied around the employer and everything went well for a few months. Then this present unrest-this is the part I want to emphasize-started to creep into the ranks of these forty to fifty men, and trouble started. I have a letter yesterday setting out the details. Four or five of the men said that they were going to work only 40 hours a week from now on. There was' a reduction from 52 to 54 hours to 48 hours a week; but what is going to happen when the 40-hour week is put into effect?
Our whole system of employment is being disrupted by these tactics. This employer also writes that his truck drivers have become dissatisfied. An organizer has come in trying to get them into the track drivers' union or something. These drivers have dropped into their old habits of stopping at the beer parlour and taking on a few glasses of beer. This man's overhead is piling up and he writes me that yesterday he posted a notice that as of September 1 there will be a reduction of

five per cent in wages. This is made necessary because earnings have been going down. This is an example of the vicious circle that is created by this sort of thing, and I am convinced that it is illustrative of thousands of similar cases across the country. If these things do not work out it, in the end, will reflect upon the workers themselves. It is high time that an opportunity was given for a general discussion of the whole matter.
I should like to say just a word about law and order. The public are becoming exasperated at the flagrant violations of the laws of our land by all parties concerned. You hear talk of this on the streets and on the trains. Public opinion is demanding some action, and is holding the governing parties responsible for the maintenance of law and order. The most definite criticism falls in the lap of the federal government who are responsible for the setting up of the wartime prices and trade board, the regional war labour boards, the national war labour board and all other government bodies. This is the result of their policy. That is what the people are saying.
I am trying to discuss this thing without rancour or prejudice; I am trying to be fair and present the case as I know it. That is what is being said on the streets. The people say, "If our laws are wrong, let the federal government correct them and then see that they are enforced." Make no mistake about it; the public are not going to be hoodwinked much longer with this kind of thing. Employer and employee are insisting that it stop at once.
As I say, I am trying to express myself without prejudice. My sympathies are with the employers as well as with the employees. They all have their problems. They are being made to suffer because of a lack of cooperation between the controlling bodies. Nothing will be gained by setting up industrial relations committees unless all the conflicting interests are prepared to sit down and inject into their discussions a little bit of the milk of human kindness. I have simply tried to show by giving one example, and I could give many-I could recite some of my own personal experiences-how this thing works out.
I hear someone say, "Oh, you will not get anywhere with that sob stuff, with that sympathetic strain; it is a fight to the finish." That is what many are saying. That fight to the finish will ruin our very economy, and that is what I am alarmed about. I have talked with many union men and with many employers, especially during the last weeks when the committee was sitting, and I know that they are alarmed. With the consent of the house I should like to give a short summary.

Industrial Relations


James Horace King: Has the hon. gentleman unanimous consent?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Go ahead.


Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: I should like to recite a personal experience that occurred last Sunday morning which I think indicates what is in the hearts and minds of the people. A mother of four children ranging from six to fifteen years of age came to me last Sunday morning. She told me that she was desperate because her husband had become a different man during the last few months. She said, "I do not know whether this is the result of the war or not. He was always a faithful husband and took care of his family. We had our home nearly paid for from his earnings in one of the industries, and we weie very happy and proud over what we had accomplished." She said, "He seems to have been influenced in some way, something that I cannot lay my finger on. He does not seem to care whether his wife and family are provided for. He has said to me, 'I am not going to work any more than forty hours from now on, and I am going to have certain wages. If I don't get a certain amount of wages I am not going to work.' " This woman said to me, "I don't know what's come over this husband of mine, Mr. Lockhart. We are heading for disaster in my family. I understand there is a committee at Ottawa dealing with this question, and I am just giving you my personal experience. This husband of mine and his employer years ago used to work and live harmoniously together, and in those days he spoke highly of his employer. But someone has changed, Mr. Lockhart, and I am inclined to think that it is my husband who has changed at heart." That is just a humble woman's presentation of what is in the hearts and minds of people as a result of this sinister agitation that is going on all across this country.
The industrial relations committee have made a good report. They have done all they could. They carried on rational discussions under able guidance, and they have brought in their recommendations. If the government will only act upon them, those recommendations can form the basis of something valuable that can be done to improve labour relations. They represent the consensus of thirty-five men who worked conscientiously on that committee studying the situation, and if the government will live up to their responsibility, they will read, mark and inwardly digest the committee's report. I certainly will approve that report. I plead with all the factions who are involved in this terrific struggle for supremacy and who are putting forward formulas, be
they ten cents an hour increase or the forty-hour week-I plead with them: Stop, please, in the interests of the great public, in the interests of that poor mother with four children who is worrying her life out over her social insecurity. I say:	Stop flying at one
another's throats like pet bulldogs. Let us sit down and see if we cannot work out something to preserve our way of life, which at the present moment we are fighting to maintain.


Mr. WILLIAM IRVINE (Cariboo):: Mr. Speaker, I am not going to follow the argument of the hon. member for Lincoln (Mr. Lockhart) but I hope he will not therefote assume that I agree with what he says. I most heartilj'' disagree with his point of view, but since it is only fractional in relation to the main issue I shall not spend time in replying to his argument now.
The question before this house is concurrence in the report of the industrial relations committee, which was appointed to investigate one of the major problems of modern civilization. There is no greater problem confronting Canada to-day or confronting any other capitalist nation on earth than this question of industrial strife, practically open warfare between the employers and the employees. It is not a new occurrence; it is not born of the war. It has been growing constantly for over two centuries, and as the problem develops and becomes more and more acute, strikes are more frequent and more violent, and so the problem grows.
I am sorry that I cannot support the report of the committee. While the committee may have done some fairly good work, I think on the whole it was a complete failure. It spent most of its time, and properly so, in investigating the steel strike. But it has shown fear or a lack of interest in bringing forward any solution or any suggestion of a solution for the steel strike or any other strike.
Several hon. members have said that the committee's chief value has been in the education which has been imparted to the public on industrial relations. I would just like to know, sir, what education that was. It imparted none to me, and I fail to see what it could have imparted to anyone else.
The hon. member for Calgary West (Mr. Smith) gave I think the most lucid and comprehensive review of the entire proceedings of that committee. I was amused by his definition of industrial relations. I think there must have been some confusion in his mind between that natural impulse of human nature to improve the conditions of life and the means by which life is made possible,
Industrial Relations

and the real industrial warfare of modern civilization. At any rate his concept of industrial relations and of industrial unrest was put forward by analogy when he told us that when you saw a savage of the rough stone age fashioning a tool out of rock, that was industrial unrest; and when you saw some who had made a superior mousetrap, that also was industrial unrest. Well, we can stand a good deal of that kind of industrial unrest, I may tell my hon, friend. But the kind of industrial unrest which this committee was to deal with was a very different kind of unrest from the making of stone tools or the making of a mousetrap or anything else that may be implied in that analogy. The problem has been greatly accelerated by the very principle to which the hon. gentleman referred, namely, that every discovery and every new invention in our technological advance has but increased industrial unrest and made it more difficult for a large section of the public to live, whereas it should have made it much easier for them to live, and to live on a very much higher standard.
The hon. member for Calgary West quoted Mr. Conroy to the effect that all the world is going socialist or communist, and the hon. member for Calgary West agreed with that view. It seems that he thought the situation which threatened to terminate in socialism or communism so desperate that the Conservatives called a caucus, and the result of that Conservative caucus was the proposal of the hon. member for Calgary West which resulted in the committee's taking over this inquiry into industrial unrest. The hon. member proceeded to review the evidence; and without following him step by step in that review I immediately rushed to his conclusion, which was that nothing was proven: that was his conclusion. After all the investigation it has resulted in nothing. He said that he was not convinced that a case had been made out by Mr. Donald Gordon for a ten cent maximum increase in wages, but while he was not convinced that a case had been made out, he was so desperately afraid there might be something in it that he was utterly paralyzed and took no action in the committee on the matter. Apparently a majority of the committee did likewise. He was equally convinced that labour had failed to make out a case, and so "not proven" was the verdict of the hon. member for Calgary West in his summing up of the evidence before this committee.
Now, Mr. Speaker, I want to ask, was it not possible to prove, could not the committee have got the evidence to prove, that $33.60 a week, the amount asked by labour now on

strike, was the minimum required for the preservation of health and self-respect? Was it not possible to provide the evidence which would prove whether that amount was too great, or too little, or sufficient? Again: was it not possible to prove that the industry could or could not pay the amount of increase asked by the striking steel workers? If it was possible to prove these things in that committee, I say that the committee reported too soon; it reported before the evidence was in, and it reported "nothing proven".
I say also, sir, that if the steel industry cannot pay $33.60 a week to the workers in that industry, Canada cannot afford to have a steel industry. The committee.was the only body that ever considered the issue in which there was any semblance of representation of the public, and it was for them to say whether we can afford that industry or not if it cannot pay that amount of wages. It will not do for hon. members to try to cram communism into this issue. It would have been laughable, were it not so tragic, that various hon. members should try to raise the communist bogy and the socialist bogy in connection with this clear-cut industrial dispute. I wish that those hon. members who are afraid of socialism and afraid of communism would realize that the kind of thing they are saying and the kind of thing they are approving will lead to the downfall of their present system; and they might thank socialists in this corner for being ready to take over when they are through, because they are going to be through.


Mr. JAQUES:: That will be too bad for the C.C.F.


William Irvine: They are going to be through. I do not understand the significance of my hon. friend's remark about its being too bad.


Norman Jaques: It will be a sorry day for
them if that happens.


William Irvine: Perhaps he is not quite
aware of what he said himself, so we will let it pass. But I want to advance some reasons why the committee should have inquired also whether or not the steel companies should have been granted an increase of $5 a ton on pig iron. As I see it now, there are a great many reasons which would go to prove that the company should never have been permitted to get that increase. Surely the matter should have been inquired into and the proofs found. Naturally that increase would mean higher prices on all products in which steel is used. Increased prices would mean more inflation; and if the government and' the companies are so much afraid of inflation, why do they take the steps which lead directly to it? An in-

Industrial Relations
crease in the price of steel would lead to a demand by the workers for a corresponding increase of wages to absorb the increase in price which they would have to pay, and so, on would go the march towards the inflation which the government and the companies appear to be so much afraid of.
I would say next that the progressive improvement in tons per hour and' yields of civilian goods by these companies since the war ended would indicate that their income can be sufficiently large without any increase in the prices at all. Stelco, for example, from 1940 to 1944 was in the excess profits brackets, and if it had not been for very extensive use of the legal devices provided for companies to evade extraordinarily heavy taxation it would have paid very heavy income tax indeed.


Mr. McCANN:: It did, too.


William Irvine: 
Mr. SMITH (Calgary West):: There are at least one hundred pages of evidence on that.


William Irvine: Yes; I am going to show my hon. friend that the people who could give the proper evidence were not even called. When you want to find out the costs of a company's operation you call the company directors or its management to tell j7ou. When you want to know the cost of living you should call the wives of the striking steel workers to tell you how much it costs to keep five children in school, to feed them, to clothe them, to educate them and to look after the homes.


Mr. BURTON:: They are worried only about the widows and orphans afterwards.


William Irvine: If that was investigated I find no evidence of it, apart from the interjection of the hon. member for Calgary West. If the question of wages was investigated then I want to know from him whether it was proven or disproven. Was S33.60 a week shown to the committee to be too great an increase in wages? It was not.


Mr. BLAGKMORE:: It was not even
attempted. .


William Irvine: I noticed that the hon. member for Lethbridge made that point very clear in his speech on this vital question. The issues were never touched at all, yet the company's figures were accepted and the company's increases given without question either by the board in question or by the committee. This committee, which was a complete failure, either should never have been appointed, or should be sent back to do its job properly. The house must endorse its failure or insist on results. I do not know which alternative the house will decide, but. I certainly am going to vote against what it has done so far. If it should go back to try it over again, I shall be glad to see it have the opportunity.
The submission of the steel companies for a price increase should be reexamined. If the wartime prices and trade board does not undertake it, then the committee on industrial relations should carry on the investigation.
When men strike for a slight increase in wages one hears a great deal of talk about the public interest, but I wish to point out that the public is quite as much interested when the price of steel is increased, quite as much interested when the price of gasoline is increased, as they are in the case of a wage increase. I suggest to you, sir, that that is a matter for public hearing. That public hearing should be demanded by the house from now on in the case of every company which comes asking for an increase in prices.

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As I said a few moments ago, industrial strife, which is now politely called "unrest," is of long standing, and it is growing progressively worse, because a strike anywhere affects people everywhere. We are so completely tied together in a network of industrial relations that when a strike takes place in one part of the country it affects practically all other parts of the economy. Also strikes are brought about more rapidly in these days because the effect of invention and technological progress is to speed up the cycle of production, and without a corresponding speeding up of the cycle of consumption there must be industrial chaos.
Of course the public interest cannot be ignored. A strike in a basic industry such as steel if it continues for any length of time, will most assuredly cause a shut-down in other industries. In addition, the public is interested because it wants goods, it wants to be served, and it does not want to see anything stop that service. But let me say, sir, that as well as having an interest in them the public must, accept some responsibility for these things. It is all very well for us to say that in the interests of the public, industry must go on no matter what happens. I would say that the public has a responsibility to see that industries go on, but it also has a responsibility to see that industries must not be allowed to continue to go on at the expense of the sweat and blood of the working people in it.
In reviewing the proceedings of the committee's study of the strike I cannot find that any attempt was made to deal with the causes of strikes generally, other than to say that apparently they are something which comes out of the head of a communist, that there are no real economic causes. Any committee which is going to find a formula for a situation of this kind surely must go a little deeper in its studies than this committee went. If strikes and industrial unrest are to be brought to an end, surely the causes of these things must be determined by any committee which inquiries into them.
I suppose it would not be well received by the house if at this time I were to give my views as to these causes. I shall refrain from doing so at this time in the hope that on some future occasion I shall have a better opportunity; but I cannot refrain from a criticism of the committee for failing to search for and find that cause, since the matter was referred to it. The economic causes of all strikes of the past and all that will happen in the future were not touched at all; therefMr. Irvine.]
fore we can hardly expect any formula of real value until these causes have been brought to the surface and removed.
I think I may conclude by saying that the large corporations in question in this strike have a very great influence on government.
I do not mean only on this government as a Liberal government; I mean on any government. Their economic position in the country is so powerful that they would have a similar influence on any government as long as that power remained in their hands. To make clear what I mean, I would say I have been looking over the great network of leading industrial and financial institutions of whose board the directors of the Steel Company of Canada and the other steel companies are members. After looking over that network I would say that the government of Canada could not successfully float a major loan without its assistance. If the government should find it necessary very shortly to float a major loan to absorb the surplus money which there are no goods to offset, or if the government should find it necessary to launch into great public undertakings for the winning of the peace as we did for the winning of the war,
I say that without the assistance of these directors and the companies they direct, that loan could not be successful. Therefore I say that the directors of these companies are part of the invisible government of Canada, and the invisible government is more powerful , than the visible government.
Before I sit down, Mr. Speaker, I say this session should not close until this steel strike is settled. There is nothing to be gained by merely approving the report of this committee. That will settle nothing. It will not even touch the subject. The situation is serious and is very likely to become more serious. Other great strikes are looming up. The industry of Canada is threatened with paralysis. This house represents the public of Canada, the common people of Canada. This parliament and this government have responsibilities which they must discharge. I say it would be criminal folly to pass this by lightly or to close this hQuse before this matter has been settled, whether that is done by sending the committee back to work or bv the government accepting a new policy and announcing it in this house, and going forth to put it into operation. That is largely for the government to decide, but that it should be decided one way or the other, and that this house should remain in session until this matter has been settled, I have not the slightest doubt in the world.

Industrial Relations


Mr. MITCHELL:: May I just say to my hon. friend that if we have many more speeches like that, strikes will never be settled.


William Irvine: If my hon. friend made that interjection for my benefit, then I have to retort that if we have many more ministers of labour like my hon. friend we shall never have anything but strikes.


Mr. F. E. LENNARD (Wentworth):: Mr. Speaker, I have followed this debate very carefully, because while I was not a member of the industrial relations committee, I represent a riding which surrounds Hamilton and takes in about one-third of that city, territorially. I do not propose to take up the time of the house in abusing other hon. members or answering their arguments, but I do not agree with some of the remarks made by the hon. member for Cariboo (Mr. Irvine). I want it clearly understood that I hold no brief for capital. I am not a member of the Hamilton Club. I am not being dictated to by anyone, and I never have been; my record shows that. But law and order must be maintained in the city of Hamilton as well as every other part of Canada; and that law and order must be maintained and safeguarded by every sincere and honest trade unionist. The laws of this country must be upheld. On August 14 I was quoted in the press, in connection with the disturbances at Hamilton, as follows:
"This rabble has done more to damage the case of labour in Canada than anything that has happened in several years . . . The disturbances at Hamilton city hall last week were outrageous and I blame it mainly on the mayor, Sam Lawrence. I want it clearly understood that I am in favour of trade unions but I believe that strikes should be conducted in an orderly manner and I do_ not believe that the intimidation which is going on at Hamilton should be permitted. It savours very much of Moscow and I think it is being directed from there."
Mr. Lennard referred to more than 2,000 men who have shown they are not in sympathy with the strike, by remaining on work at the works of the Steel Company of Canada. Because of the violent tactics of the strikers these men are besieged within the company's property and are unable to pass between their homes and their work. "Under our system of government that condition should never be permitted to occur," Mr. Lennard declared.
That was my honest opinion on August 14. and it is most certainly my opinion this morning. The following morning, August 15, I received a telegram from one Eamon Park, a representative of the United Steelworkers of America, which began as follows:
Your inflammatory speech to-day completely misrepresents Hamilton and its citizens. Police officials here do not agree that state of lawlessness exists.
63260-327i
Now I wish to refer to an item which appeared in the Hamilton Spectator of August 16:
Commenting on last Thursday's disturbance at city hall, Alfred Stratford, president of local 504, united electrical workers, declared:	"The
people of Hamilton have nothing to be ashamed about. Controller Nora Frances Henderson lost a few locks of her hair. You won a great victory with your demonstration of solidarity. If it had not been for that demonstration, he said, Controller Henderson would have succeeded in having a request made for the entry of provincial police.
Now listen to this:
The public, he declared, "scared certain members of council and they voted against their own convictions in voting against the controller's motion."
If that is not terrorism and intimidation, then I do not understand the laws of this country nor the English language. This general shut-down in Canada, if it is not halted, will create disastrous conditions that will make the general strike of 1919 in Winnipeg seem very insignificant. It took Winnipeg years to recover. The present situation, if it is not settled soon, will affect at least the greater part of Canada, and could put industrial centres back some twenty years. In the present dispute some labour leaders, in my opinion, are not interested in ten cents or twelve cents of any other figure. Their principal interest is in the check-off and in creating a dictatorship in this country.	Their interest is in
forcing men to join a union against their will, and in my opinion this is so undemocratic it should never be tolerated. The C.I.O. is much more interested in disrupting our economy, in substituting the hammer and sickle for the union jack, and in creating a dictatorship, than in doing anything for the workingmen; and the sooner the people of Canada realize that and get on with the production of the many things that are urgently required, the better.


William Irvine: What is the hon. member quoting from?


Frank Exton Lennard: I did not interrupt you; so just hold your horses.


William Irvine: What is the hon. member quoting from?


Frank Exton Lennard: I am not quoting from anything; I am just saying what I think.


William Irvine: What are you reading?


Frank Exton Lennard: I am only reading for a minute or two, and I have seen you read for half an hour.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Who wrote this for you?
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Frank Exton Lennard: I never interrupt any hon. member in the house, and I do not want to be interrupted by members of that group-not "party."


The ACTING SPEAKER (Mr. Golding):: Let us not have these interruptions.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: On a point of order-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Sit down.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Is there not a rule in the house which says that speeches should not be read?


Humphrey Mitchell: Mr. Speaker, let us be
fair about this. Let the hon. member not be too self-righteous, because I have seen him read speeches.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: I beg your pardon; you have not.


Gordon Graydon: They would have been better if they had been read.


Humphrey Mitchell: Let us be fair about it. The hon. member may not agree with what is being said. This is something the hon. member does.


Mr. SINCLAIR (Vancouver North):: The leader of the C.C.F. party is the best reader in the house.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: When did you see me read my speech?


Gordon Graydon: Let us have less hypocrisy.


William Henry Golding: I'must ask hon. members not to interrupt.


Frank Exton Lennard: Mr. Speaker, I do not mind the interruptions. But I was merely following my notes, and I would also assure the hon. member that I have never yet, by those who know me, been accused of having anything written for me by anybody.
In conclusion, sir, I repeat that no one is more favourable to unions than I am. But let men have freedom of choice and freedom of association. Let them run their unions without outside interference, and we shall have far less unrest in this country.


Mr. H. G. ARCHIBALD (Skeena):: Mr. Speaker, I am going to emulate the hon. member who preceded me (Mr. Lennard), by being brief. There are only one or two points I wish to bring up, inasmuch as I sat through the sittings of the committee.
When the committee was appointed a crisis existed in the economy of the country. It dealt first with the steel strike in Hamilton. All other negotiations in connection with wages ceased in the major strikes across the
(Mr. Nicholson.]
countiy. In other words it was generally recognized that if this committee came out with a recommendation, it would apply all across the board. But during the meetings of the committee, any time we ever got near to coming out with a formula for settlement, it was brought to our attention in a very forceful manner that the committee had not been set up to settle anything. In other words, when negotiations had ceased all across the board, pending the adoption of some formula by that committee, all the committee did in the last five weeks in the light of present-day events was to dangle a carrot in front of the workers' noses. Now they have not even the carrot to sniff.
So far as I am concerned, if at any future time I have anything to do with such a committee I will first go out and tell the workers of this country, "Beware of it; pay no more attention to parliamentary committees". If in a crisis such as this a parliamentary committee representing parliament itself has no power whatsoever when all other machinery has broken down, then I say this country is getting into a pitiful state.
Throughout the meetings of the committee the point which was brought to my attention most forcibly was that labour was dealt with as though it were a cost factor in production- nothing more and nothing less; that the question was considered from the point of view that the laws of this country must be applied when private interests are in danger. It was not a case of the law coming down and dealing equally with one person as against another. The law comes down to protect the formula that labour is a cost factor in production.
Time and again the question w'as asked, "If markets fall and if profits go down, will you accept a lower wage, in view of the fact that at the present time in the face of rising costs you are demanding a rising wage? In other words when production becomes too great will you accept a smaller wage?" Well, if that line of argument continues under our present basis, the powers that be are going to find, to their sorrow, that labour is not just a cost factor m production, but that it is a social force. After we had sat for five or six weeks in the committee, trying to solve present problems, a minister of the crown says in the house that strikes have got to the point where they will solve themselves. In other words, what you are doing is allowing natural forces in society to drift; nothing "is", it is always "becoming".
When you say that strikes are getting to the point where they will solve themselves, and when a Minister of Labour says that we do not need the type of legislation we are

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asking for and that we should have the same relationship as they have in Great Britain, where employees and employers recognize each other-if you admit that, you will also have to admit that we shall have to go through the history of British labour-capital relations. For all we know, we may be at that point in Canada which Great Britain had reached in 1926-and you will have a general strike on your hands.
Labour at the present time recognizes that the key point is Steleo. If the boss wins there, it means that they have the entering wedge to wreck the whole labour movement in this dominion. And labour, recognizing that, will be forced to use its economic strength; because labour is better educated in this country than it ever was before. They recognize it, from coast to coast, and they will pull thp pin on all industry. And remember this, that when a general strike breaks out it is not only an economic strike; it is a political force. Immediately it transforms itself into that, whether there be agitators then or not. Labour is forced to recognize that it is up against a state force-a state force that is saying, "You are a cost factor in production, and nothing more." When that comes out, what happens is that labour becomes politicized; it becomes a political force. Who gains control of that political force, we do not know. One thing we do know is that they will act in their own best interests, either slowly or with a great deal of speed as the case may be. That is the position labour is facing to-day. If a general strike is to come through the development of an unconscious drift in these affairs, I as a trade unionist and a member of the House of Commons will have to support it, inasmuch as it has been caused by the stupidity of government.


Mr. STANLEY KNOWLES (Winnipeg North Centre):: Mr. Speaker, the attention of the house should be called once again to some simple and straightforward truths about the matter we are now discussing. The industrial relations committee was asked by this house to deal with the present industrial unrest in Canada. While the terms of reference of the committee did not refer specifically to steel, it was clearly understood that therein was the most critical issue facing the country, and accordingly the committee devoted practically the whole of its time to the dispute with the steel companies. Surely it was the job of the committe to come to grips with that issue and make a report that would somehow settle the matter, but the simple fact is that the committee did not achieve a settlement of that dispute, nor has it made in its report to the house any recommendation that deals with the
basic issue. The report contains in a platitudinous way some recommendations that are all to the good, but those recommendations are offset, at least in the view of some of us, by the recommendation in clause 6 which organized labour regards as a retrograde step.
I listened a moment ago to the hon. member to my right, with whose general position I do not agree, and I heard him speak most strongly in support of labour unions being permitted to run their own affairs without outside interference. I for one am not satisfied that the wording of clause 6 of the report will not violate that very principle. The recommendations of the report are either platitudinous or questionable. Further, the report has the outstanding liability that it does not deal with the basic issue in the steel dispute, the question of wages, whether the ten cent straitjacket is to be applied or whether higher levels are to be agreed to.
For this house merely to indulge in the oratory we have had for the last two or three days and to concur in this report would in my view be a failure on its part to do its duty. If we go home without making some definite decision, then the members of this house will be partly responsible for the situation which now obtains.
There are two things which this House of Commons should do. First, it should register a protest over the failure of the committee to do its job. I listened to the glowing accounts of harmony in the committee, the praise of the chairman and all that, but the simple fact is that there is before us no recommendation from the committee with reference to the matter at issue, namely wage rates in steel. As I say, one of the things that we in this House of Commons must do is to protest in the most effective way we can against the failure of the committee to do its job.
The other thing which I feel this House of Commons should do at this time is to place the responsibility clearly where it lies, namely, on the shoulders of the government. If we merely concur in this report and go home, we shall have provided an out for the whole situation, and it can then go on from bad to worse. It is my intention before resuming my seat to move an amendment to the motion before the house, designed to give this house an opportunity to do two things; to register its protest against the failure of the committe to do its job. and to call upon the government to accept its responsibility and measure up thereto.
When I speak of government responsibility it is pertinent to ask in what way that responsibility lies. As has teen pointed out by the leader of this group and by others who
Industrial Relations

have spoken, that responsibility stems from the statement made by the Minister of Labour just before this strike broke out with reference to the ten-cent ceiling. I know we have had lots of argument as to the significance of it, but there it stands. That statement is being looked upon as government policy, a straitjacket or ceiling on wage increases. I shall not repeat the effective argument that was made yesterday by the leader of this group, the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell), with respect to the completely unscientific nature of that ten-cent ceiling. We simply cannot understand the position of the government and its experts and officials who have gone into this matter in making that kind of proposal.
I suggest that government responsibility stems not only from the ten-cent ceiling which the minister gave but-


Humphrey Mitchell: Why can the hon. member not be decent and fair? I have never said anything about a ten-cent ceiling. I know it is all right for political purposes to say these things, but I am not going to take it f-rom my hon. friend or anybody else in this house. I never said any such thing.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Will the minister say that he has agreed that wage increases might be made in an amount greater than ten cents?


Humphrey Mitchell: I will say this to my hon. friend, if he wants me to make a speech, which I am not going to do at the moment. I will answer him when I make my speech. I know what he wants to do. The hon. member for Calgary West (Mr. Smith) took a statesmanlike view of the matter, but my hon. friend wants to play politics-that is all he wants to do-with industrial disputes. Let me say to my hon. friend that if ever he is unfortunate enough to have responsibility, and if he takes that attitude, well, God help the country.


Stanley Howard Knowles: I am not impressed by the adjective "statesmanlike" that is applied to hon. members who agree with you, or with the phrase "playing politics" that is always applied to an hon. member who happens to disagree with you; they carry no weight whatsoever as -far as I am concerned. In my view the position that we in this group are taking is the responsible position, and that is something the government has failed to do. I want to tell the minister-I am glad to know he is listening-that there is another basis for stating that in my view the responsibility for the troubles we are having, particularly at Hamilton, rests upon the government. I have no doubt that he will get to his feet before I am through with

this. Yesterday on the orders of the day the hon member for Vancouver East (Mr. Maclnnis) asked the Minister of Labour a question arising out of a telegram that he had received. He asked the minister whether or not he was behind the action of the management of the steel company in driving trucks in and out of the plant despite potential injury to life and limb. The minister's reply was to the effect that every man's home was his castle and that he'regarded the right to go in and come out of a place of work in the same light. I do not take issue with that general statement, but the fact is that th'e kind of statements the minister has been making have had the effect of encouraging strike-breaking. Furthermore, they have had the effect of discolouring the situation as it exists at Hamilton. I was on the long-distance telephone to Hamilton myself about a quarter of an hour before the house met this morning. We have had telegrams continually and have kept in as close communication as we possibly could with Hamilton, and the information that is given to us is that at no time have the picket lines around that plant prevented ingress or egress of individuals in a normal orderly way. The trouble arises when large groups are moved in or out in a provocative manner, and I cannot help but notice the strange coincidence of these incidents taking place just now when this matter is being debated in the House of Commons. Many an individual I am told has gone in or out of the plant, and if individuals were to go in and out in an orderly way the workers who are inside the plant could come and go as much as they wish. The minister and the government generally by their attitude are helping to create the impression, and the press is responsible for it as well, that there is a group of lawless people among the strikers at Hamilton who are acting in such a way as to prevent the movement of people in and out of the plant without danger of bodily harm.
There are two reasons why the workers who are inside the plant at Hamilton do not want to come out. One is, of course, that they would not like their faces to be seen by their fellow workers. Any worker or trade unionist will know what I mean by that. The other reason that keeps these workers inside the plant is the triple pay they are receiving. When questions are asked about that, the minister's reply every time is to the effect that these people cannot get out, that they are kept in the plant by lawless strikers so-called, and that, I take it, is the reason why the government winks at this triple pay because it is thought that these men are com-

Industrial Relations
pelled to stay inside the plant. If the minister would be what he sometimes says he is, impartial; if he would not forever colour thing's against the workers, but give an honest statement of the situation as it stands, you would not have the kind of trouble that is there now. I suggest that the government's unwillingness to do anything about this triple pay underlines its responsibility for the present situation. The plant is now under government control. This means that the government, which has its wage ceiling policy, is a party to these greatly enhanced wage rates which the men inside are receiving. If that triple pay were stopped and it were generally known that the picket lines consist of individual persons between whom people can pass in and out, you would have the men coming out of that plant and going home in a normal way. Once they no longer were receiving triple pay, and once they had passed by the gaze of their fellow workers who are out on strike, some of them would not go back. That would make the situation a little more difficult for the company, but at least it would keep the law.
The situation is tense, but the kind of provocation that is going on at the present time involves the government in a responsibility on two counts. One is the general statement of government policy-the ten-cent limit-and the other is that the plant is now under government control, through a controller whose policies are provocative. When this situation obtains one cannot be surprised at questions, inflammatory questions if you wish so to describe them, being raised in the minds of labour. It is said that the purpose of the government is to uphold the price ceiling, but it is awfully hard to convince labour that that is the purpose of the government when in the steel industry itself a price increase of So a ton was granted. It is said that the thing the government fears most is inflation, and the Minister of Labour himself is most vigorous in his statements about the fear of inflation. Yet the situation as it is being allowed to develop is a much greater threat of inflation than a wage increase would be, even a greater increase than the steelworkers are asking. These professed motives seem so hollow to the workers, for the reasons I have indicated, that they get the notion . that there must be some other purpose-that either the government is deliberately out to weaken the position of the organized workers, or that it is being used by those who have such ideas. In that connection let me say that the Minister of Labour a few days ago tabled the Card report in this house. As he knows, there were objections to the tabling of that report on the dispute between the
international typographical union and certain newspapers, but the minister tabled it, despite the objections, at the request of the hon. member for Calgary West (Mr. Smith). I have before me a telegram from Miami, Florida, where the international typographical union is holding its eighty-eighth convention, which telegram contains a copy of a protest to the Minister of Labour signed by the Canadian delegates at that convention, protesting against the tabling of that report.


Mr. MACKENZIE:: On a point of order,
Mr. Speaker, it is completely out of order to cast reflections upon the proceedings of this house from an outside source.


Stanley Howard Knowles: I had better read the telegram.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I object. The rule
is specific. The hon. gentleman cannot quote a dispatch from an outside source reflecting upon the proceedings in this house.


Stanley Howard Knowles: It does not reflect on the house. It reflects on the minister.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: That is the same
thing.


Humphrey Mitchell: I know what is in the
back of my hon. friend's mind. I received the same telegram.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Yes, this is a copy of the one he received.


Humphrey Mitchell: Mr. Finch, I am informed, is an organizer for the typographical union. He read the Card report himself, and indicated that he had no objection to its being made public. I have the same kind of wire as that to which my hon. friend refers.


Stanley Howard Knowles: But this wire is signed
by Mr. Finch himself.


Humphrey Mitchell: I have wired him too.


James Horace King: According to the rules
of the house, an hon. member is not allowed to read messages coming from outside the house reflecting on the proceedings of the house. The hon. member knows that it is a privilege to be a member of the House of Commons, and the opinions expressed in the house should come from the members themselves. The idea is not to have expressions used in a debate which come from one who is not a member of the house.


Mr. MacINNIS:: Mr. Speaker, I would like to have that rule quoted because it is the first time in the sixteen years that I have been in the house that I have heard that objection raised. It may be there is such a rule in
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Beauchesne's Parliamentary Rules and Forms, but I have never heard of its being invoked in this house until now.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: That is the rule, just
the same.


James Horace King: I shall be very glad to
give the standing order to the hon. gentleman in a moment.


Angus MacInnis: Mr. Speaker, when you
rule a member out of order, the rule on which Your Honour bases his decision must be quoted.


James Horace King: The hon. gentleman is
perfectly right, but he will understand that it is not always possible for a member to have in his hands the document from which he would like to quote, and the Speaker of the house may be in the same position.


Angus MacInnis: But surely, Mr. Speaker, if you have not the order in your hand you cannot ask a member to sit down because of what is just in your mind. ,


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: The Speaker can
always rule.


James Horace King: I would refer to standing order 306, Beauchesne, second edition:
306. It is not in order to read articles in newspapers, letters or communications emanating from persons outside the house and referring to, or commenting on, or denying anything said by a member or expressing any opinion reflecting on proceedings within the house.
The rule is very clear, and I hope it will give satisfaction to the hon. gentleman.


Angus MacInnis: There is no "standing
order" 306.


An hon. MEMBER:: Citation 306.


Angus MacInnis: I was told that citations do not mean anything in this house.


James Horace King: It is under standing order 41.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Marginal rule 306.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Might I, to save time, say that I do not agree with the ruling, but I will accept it because it is really unnecessary to read the telegram. It is pretty evident from this discussion that the minister would not like it on record.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: That is not fair. I want that withdrawn at once. The minister made no objection. I made objection as leader of the house on a question of the rules. The minister did not object and the hon. gentleman should in fairness withdraw the remark, if he is a sport.


James Horace King: I would ask the hon.
member who has the floor to be satisfied with the ruling made by the Speaker, and not to make any reflection on the leader of the house.


Humphrey Mitchell: I insist on my hon.
friend withdrawing that remark. I have no objection to anything he might say with respect to my department-


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Within the rules of
the house.


Humphrey Mitchell: -within the rules of
the house. But he knows the rule as well as I do. I know he is trying to prove a bad case.


An hon. MEMBER:: So you prejudge it again.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Do the rules permit the minister to accuse me of playing politics with industrial disputes? If he will withdraw that, I shall have no objection to withdrawing my suggestion that he did not want this on the record.


Humphrey Mitchell: I still insist that my hon. friend withdraw his imputation.


Mr. MARTIN:: Withdraw unreservedly.


Stanley Howard Knowles: I think what I said is pretty mild. But if the minister will stop accusing me of playing politics when I am taking a responsible position, I am willing to call it square.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Withdraw.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: The minister was
right, and you are wrong.
Mr. KNOW'LES: The telegram had to do with the Card report. May I now read from the Card report?


Arthur Leroy Smith: No; withdraw first.


Humphrey Mitchell: Why not be a decent sport, and withdraw? I will put it on that level if it will satisfy my hon. friend.


Mr. COLD  WELL@: The minister said he would put it on the same level as you suggested.


Stanley Howard Knowles: All right; that is agreed.


Humphrey Mitchell: I would ask my hon. friend to be decent and withdraw it.


Stanley Howard Knowles: The report which was tabled in the house-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Withdraw.

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Stanley Howard Knowles: I am reading from a report tabled in the house.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, the hon. gentleman implied that my colleague the Minister of Labour (Mr. Mitchell) did not want this telegram produced. That is a reflection upon a minister of the crown, and I want it withdrawn.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Well, I withdrew it about three times.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: No, my hon. friend did not. He said he "agreed" but he did not withdraw specifically, without reservations.


An hon. MEMBER:: Withdraw.


James Horace King: I would ask the hon. member to comply with the rules of the house and be kind enough to withdraw that remark.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, I bow to your ruling and withdraw the statement. The report which was tabled in this house, known as the Card report, includes in it this remark:
Curing the sittings of the commission I said to the international representative that perhaps the ITU was getting too strong for its own good, and that in this dispute it appeared to me to be more interested in strengthening its own position than it was in looking after the interests of the members of the local union.
In another place in the Card report tabled by the minister, he said:
. . . I am afraid Labour may without realizing it become so strong that they overlook entirely the fact that those with whom they deal must be treated fairly.
Now, Mr. Speaker, it is ideas such as that being ' put in reports of government commissioners and tabled in this house by a minister which arouse the suspicion of organized labour that the government is of the opinion that labour is getting too strong in certain places and that it is time something should be done about it.
The morning session is just about gone, and I have said that I intend to move an amendment. I wish to do so at this time, before one o'clock. As I indicated earlier, the motion before the house is as follows:
That the second report of the committee on industrial relations, presented to the house on Saturday, August 17, 1946, be now concurred in.
I move in amendment, seconded by the hon. member for Mackenzie (Mr. Nicholson):
That the words "be now concurred in" at the end of the question be deleted and the following substitued therefor: "be not now concurred in, but .that this house record its opinion that the responsibility for Canada's present industrial unrest lies with the government. Further, this house calls on the government for a change in its labour policy and for the settlement of existing disputes on a basis of satisfactory wage
adjustments and union security, with a view to the resumption of full employment for the welfare of the entire country."


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Mr. Speaker, I should like Your Honour during the luncheon recess to consider the question that this is a complete negative and is therefore out of order. I have not got the rules under my hand at the moment, but in my judgment the amendment is not in order, and I would like Your Honour to be good enough during the recess to consider whether it is in order or not.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, will you permit other members to speak to the point of order raised by the leader of the house, before you give your ruling?
At one o'clock the house took recess.
The house resumed at three o'clock.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Is it the intention of Your Honour to rule on the point of order raised by the Minister of Veterans Affairs (Mr. Mackenzie)?


James Horace King: I am ready to give my ruling. If the hon. member has a few words to say before I give my ruling I have no objection to hearing them.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Before you make your ruling I wish to call your attention, Mr. Speaker, to the citation on the basis of which I drafted my amendment. I trust that I may have an opportunity to conclude my remarks after the point of order has been settled.
The citation to which I call Your Honour's attention is citation 340 of Beauchesne's Parliamentary Rules and Forms, third edition. Citation No. 339 is the one which says that a direct negative, though it may be covered up by verbiage, is out of order. I believe that was the citation to which the Minister of Veterans Affairs referred. But citation No. 340 reads:
An amendment to alter the main question, by substituting a proposition with the opposite conclusion, is not an expanded negative and may be moved.
My contention is that my motion offers a substitute or alternative proposition to the one before the house. I admit that it would have the opposite conclusion in that its acceptance would mean the rejection of the report'; but on the basis of the citation I submit that it should be regarded as in order.


James Horace King: The motion under debate is one to concur in a report of a special committee of the house, and the amendment is as follows:



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That the words "be now concurred in" at the end of the motion be deleted and the following substituted therefor:
"be not now concurred in, but that this house record its opinion that the responsibility for Canada's present industrial unrest lies with the government. Further, this house calls on the government for a change in its labour policy and for the settlement of existing disputes on a basis of satisfactory wage adjustments and union security, with a view to the resumption of full employment for the welfare of the entire country."
When a motion is made for concurrence in a report from a select committee, it is competent for the house to adopt it, reject it, refer it back to the committee with or without instructions, or decide that consideration of the report will take place "this day six months," as the hon. member can see by referring to Beauchesne's Parliamentary Rules and Forms,. third edition, which cites a decision given by Mr. Speaker Rhodes on May 22. 1919, and reported at page 689, and at page 203. It will be noted that the amendment does not come within the limitation of the rule cited. Moreover the amendment raises a question which can be raised only by a distinct motion after notice, as the hon. member may see by referring to the decision rendered by Mr. Speaker Glen on May 21, 1940, as reported at page 647. For these reasons I rule the amendment out of order.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, for the reasons which I indicated previously I am of the opinion that my motion was in order, but I have no alternative but to accept your ruling on the amendment, which I take it is not now before the house.
I have just one or two comments to make, and I shall conclude my remarks. After an interjection that was made this morning by the minister I felt that I should say one more word about this question of responsibility. It is frequently said that in this debate some speeches are statesmanlike but others display irresponsibility. It is precisely because we feel there has been irresponsibility on the part of the government with respect to dealing with this whole question that we are putting up this fight at the present time.
The dispute has gone on now for a good many weeks; it is curtailing the economy of the country; it is resulting in all sorts of shortages, which are serious, with reference both to the building of houses and to other matters, and it is tending to bring about inflation. Therefore we feel very keenly that the house should call upon the government to face more seriously its responsibilities in this matter. Since there is no amendment before the house but only a motion made by the chairman of the committee, I move, seconded

by the hon. member for Mackenzie (Mr. Nicholson) an amendment to the motion within the terms of the citation which Your Honour has just read and within similar provisions found in citation 570 of Beauchesne's Parliamentary Rules and Forms, third edition, which citation reads as follows:
When the motion to concur is proposed the report may be referred back to the committee for further consideration or with instruction to amend it in any respect.
That seems to be quite clear. It is parallel to the citation which Your Honour read a moment ago. Let me repeat it for emphasis:
When the motion to concur is proposed-
That is what we have before us, the motion of the hon. member who is the chairman of the committee, for concurrence in this report. I continue with the citation:
-the report may be referred back to the committee for further consideration or with instruction to amend it in any respect.
Therefore I move:
That the words "be now concurred in" at the end of the question be deleted and the following substituted therefor:
"be referred back to the committee with instructions to amend it so as to recommend specific changes in the wage and labour policy of the government which would enable the settlement of existing disputes on a basis of * satisfactory wage adjustments and union security."
I submit, Mr. Speaker, that this amendment is clearly within the terms of the rule which Your Honour has just read with respect to the other amendment which is not now before the house. I submit also that it presents the house with the crux of the issue in the steel strike which is now before us, and I urge the house to support this amendment.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I rise to a point of order. After consideration Your Honour ruled the former motion of the hon. gentleman out of order. It was on exactly the same principle as the proposed amendment. I suggest that this new amendment is out of order, for the reasons I gave before the luncheon recess.


Stanley Howard Knowles: On the point of order, I suggest that the citations you mentioned before do not cover this amendment at all. This resolution is clearly and positively provided for in the very citation Your Honour read; that is, citation 570.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: The rule of parliament is obvious; that is, that an expanded negative is not allowable. The motion of the hon. gentleman now is in exactly the same terms as the motion he moved before the luncheon recess-that the report be not concurred in. There is one way for parliament

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to express its wishes, and that is to vote for or against concurrence in the report of the committee. This motion is that the report be not now concurred in, which is an expanded negative and therefore against the rules of the house.


Mr. HANSELL:: I do not have Beauchesne with me, and I cannot quote from Beauchesne-


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: May I send Beauchesne to you?


Ernest George Hansell: Thank you, but it is a bulky volume. I am not going to quote any citation; I am simply going to appeal to the common sense of members of parliament. Surely it is within the rights of this house to send a report back to the committee for reconsideration and revision, and that is all the amendment says, Beauchesne or no Beauchesne.


Mr. COLDWELL:: Mr. Speaker, I think the rule in citation 570 is perfectly clear on this point, that when a motion to concur is proposed the report may be referred back to the committee for further consideration or with instructions to amend it in any respect. That is exactly what this amendment does.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: But that has been ruled upon already. That is my point.


Major James William Coldwell: I do not think there is any doubt about it; we have the right to refer a report back to the committee.


Mr. REID:: Does not the amendment contain a specific direction? It does not merely refer back the report; it says what the committee must do.


Major James William Coldwell: Listen to citation 570 again:
When the motion to concur is proposed the report may be referred back to the committee for further consideration or with instruction to amend it in any respect.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: But the house has ruled on the point to-day.


Mr. GILLIS:: If I may say a word on the point of order, the Minister of Veterans Affairs (Mr. Mackenzie) contends that the house has already ruled on this amendment, and that the principle of this amendment is exactly the same as the principle of the first amendment. That is not correct. The first amendment cut out the report completely and referred the whole matter of labour disputes to the government.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: May I interrupt? The language of the first amendment, which was ruled out of order by Mr. Speaker, was that 63260-328)
the report be not concurred in. In the amendment now proposed the language is the same; that the report be not concurred in.


Stanley Howard Knowles: That is only the preamble.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: No, that is an expanded negative, according to the rules of the house.


Clarence Gillis: The preamble may be in the same language, and it is necessary that it should be; but the principle is not the same. One amendment was to cut out the report and send the matter back to the government.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: The words are the same.


Clarence Gillis: Under this amendment the committee has not completed its work, in the opinion of this group, and we are merely referring the report back to the committee with instructions to complete the work the committee was set up to do, which is a completely different principle.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: An expanded negative.


Stanley Howard Knowles: May I ask for the attention of the Minister of Veterans Affairs to this point? Both amendments are the same in this sense, that they both ask for the deletion of the same words, and that seems to be as far as the minister has read. I am sure he can read further than that. It is in what is substituted for the deleted words that there is a radical difference-.


James Horace King: Order. The hon. member who moved the amendment said, and he was perfectly right, that in my ruling quoting Beauchesne I stated that when a motion is made for concurrence in a report from a select committee it is competent for the house to adopt it, reject it, refer it back to the committee with or without instructions, or decide that consideration of the report -will take place "this day six months." However, I would call the attention of the hon. member to Beauchesne, third edition, citation 407:
An instruction is a motion empowering a committee to do something which it could not otherwise do, or to direct it to do something which it might otherwise not do.
The amendment proposed by the hon. member is to refer the report back to the committee in order that the committee may do something which he suggests should be done. The committee had power to do that before it presented its report to the house, but the committee did not do it. So according to citation 407 of Beauchesne I believe the motion is out of order.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, would you permit me to read the rrst of citation 570-
Industrial Relations


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Stanley Howard Knowles: On the basis of citation 570 I appeal your ruling.


James Horace King: I must ask the hon. member to resume his seat. The hon. gentleman will admit that I have had to be pretty severe in the past in requiring hon. members to abide by the rule that decisions of the speaker are not debatable. I have not permitted other hon. members to contravene that rule, and I cannot permit the hon. member to do so.


Stanley Howard Knowles: With all due respect, Mr. Speaker, I appeal your ruling.
Mr. SPEAKER put the question as follows:
The question before the house is an appeal from a ruling given by the Speaker on the amendment proposed by Mr. Knowles, seconded by Mr. Nicholson:
That the words "be now concurred in" at the end of the question be deleted and the following substituted therefor:
"be referred back to the committee with instructions to amend it so as to recommend specific changes in the wage and labour policy of the government which would enable the settlement of existing disputes on a basis of satisfactory wage adjustments and union security."
The motion was declared out of order because it was in the form of an instruction empowering a committee to do something which it already had the power to do. ,


Mr. BELZILE:: I was paired with the hon. member for Nanaimo (Mr. Pearkes). Had I voted I would have voted to sustain Your Honour's decision.


Mr. TREMBLAY:: I was paired with the
hon. member for Vancouver South (Mr. Green). Had I voted I would have voted to sustain Your Honour's ruling.


Mr. LEGER:: I was paired with the hon.
member for Haldimand (Mr. Senn). Had I voted I would have voted to support Your Honour's ruling.


Mr. STUART (Charlotte):: I was paired
with the hon. member for Lambton West (Mr. Murphy). Had I voted I would have voted to support Your Honour's ruling.


Mr. BRACKEN:: I was paired with the
Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King). Had I voted I would have voted against Mr. Speaker's ruling.


Gordon Graydon: I was paired with the
Minister of Finance (Mr. Ilsley). If I had voted I would have voted against Your Honour's ruling.


Mr. CASSELMAN:: I was paired with the Minister of Transport (Mr. Chevrier). Had I voted I would have voted against Your Honour's ruling.


Mr. JACKMAN:: I was paired with the
hon. member for Bellechasse (Mr. Picard). Had I voted I would have voted against Your Honour's ruling.


Mr. CHARLTON:: I was paired with the
hon. member for St. Ann (Mr. Healy). Had I voted I would have voted to sustain Your Honour's ruling.


Clarence Gillis: I was paired with the hon.
member for Inverness-Richmond (Mr. McGarry). Had I voted I would have voted against Your Honour's ruling.


Mr. ROWE:: I was paired with the hon.
member for Quebec AVest and South (Mr. Parent). Had I voted I would have voted against Your Honour's ruling.


Norman Jaques: I was paired with the hon.
member for Matapedia-Matane (Mr. Cote). Had I voted I would have voted against the speaker's ruling.


Norman Jaques: Mr. Speaker, I was not a member of this committee, but I should like to make a few general remarks on the subject of industrial relations and unrest. First of all, I should like to say that I have no intention of trying to embarrass the Minister of Labour (Mr. Mitchell). Whether or not we agree with him, I think we all feel, or at least we should feel
that he has a most responsible position and is carrying out a very thankless task. I do not profess to be a labour expert, so my remarks are going to be quite general in character. I have always felt that the Minister of Labour has the most difficult job in the government, and I think he comes in for more criticism than almost any other minister. This criticism is mainly by those who not only do not occupy positions of responsibility but have never occupied responsible positions. As I say, whether or not we agree with him he is entitled at this time to the sympathy of the house and the country at large.
It was the hon. member for Calgary West (Mr. Smith) who opened the debate, and I have heard most of the speakers who followed him. My object in rising now is to speak on behalf of that section of labour which is more or less silent.
I gathered from remarks of previous speakers that labour is socialist or at least in favour of socialism. The C.C.F. group certainly assume that, but I have no real means of finding that out for myself, except that a year ago at the general election, if I remember aright-and correct me if I am wrong-the socialist candidates lost every deposit east of Winnipeg but one. That is to say, industrial Canada, the Canadian workers, when they had an opportunity to vote secretly, registered in no uncertain way the fact that they do not want to be under a socialist economy in Canada.


Mr. PROBE:: You would not like to bet that that will last, would you?


Norman Jaques: At the present time I am not making any comments on that. I merely state it as a fact. The reason I think that the Canadian workers have not yet fallen for socialism is that they value their individual freedom too much. I would like to make it perfectly clear that I am just as much a friend of labour as anyone in this house, and I certainly would fight for the right of the workers to strike. But it seems to me that if things continue as they are going to-day it is only a question of time when immediately there is a strike the government will be asked or told or commanded to step in and settle the strike. That is not my idea of freedom. Surely if it is the workers' right to strike, it is the workers' right to settle a strike, unless it happens to be that if the strike continued there would be a national emergency such as was created this summer when the railway men in the United States struck. But generally speaking I respect the workers' right to strike as their most valuable freedom. Once they lose that, it seems that their freedom is gone.
The end of socialism is, of course, complete government ownership and government con-
Industrial Relations

trol, and wherever you have that, there can be no strikes and there can be no unions in the sense that we know them. Therefore I defend the right of the workers to contract out. I defend the right of everybody to contract out. If they do not like a job or a situation it is their privilege and their right to contract out of it and not to be compelled to accept conditions which they do not care to accept.
There is no doubt that there is and has been in the Liberal party and in the Conservative party a trend towards socialism. So far as the Liberal party is concerned I put it down to the fact that the economic advisers of the Liberal party are and have been for a considerable time recruited from the-London school of economics, which is purely a socialist training school. It was founded by Fabian socialists and it was financed by German international finance. That London school of economics has supplied the economic advisers at the present time and for some time past for the Liberal party. I read an editorial on a speech made by the Hon. Mr. Crerar the other day in the senate. He seemed to regret the passing of the old-time Liberalism. Well, where you have Liberal policies founded on the ideas of such men as Harold Laski, Mr. Rasminsky, Doctor Marsh and the rest of the London school of economics, you certainly do have a departure from the old Liberal school.
I should like to make a few remarks on a free economy. These ideas are not new, but they are worth repeating, and they are certainly pertinent to the subject under discussion.
If free to do so producers always try to sell dear and consumers always try to buy cheap. These instincts are as old as the human race and I suppose they will continue to the end of the chapter. For example, every workingman, who is a producer in the sense that he sells his labour, naturally sells his labour for as much as he can get for it. The wife of every workingman is a consumer and if she is a good housewife she tries to buy as cheaply as possible, or at least she sees to it that she gets either the most or the best for her money. When prices fall, consumption is stimulated but production is discouraged. At what level will most goods be produced and consumed? When you have a rise in prices, production is stimulated but consumption is discouraged. But for every commodity every day of the year there is a point where production and consumption meet one another on an- equal basis. That point can only be determined as a result of the day to day transactions of millions of buyers and sellers meeting and doing business freely with one
[Mr. Jaquea.l
another. This is the point of greatest production and greatest consumption, and this is economic democracy. Whenever governments or monopolies of producers or of labour fix prices, rents, dividends or wages above or below' that free meeting point, production and consumption get out of balance and we get what we have to-day, a general economic paralysis. It stands to reason that the millions of individuals who comprise the nation can judge for themselves what prices they will pay for how many and what kind of goods they want, and consequently how many goods should be produced. Everybody knows that, and each individual is the. only person who can know it. Every individual knows what he wants, and every individual knows what he wants to pay, and the individual is the only person who can know that; everybody else can only guess. That is the free market; and whenever governments interfere to control a free market, whether it be in the field of production, consumption or labour, the result is always the same, a loss of human liberty and human happiness and satisfaction. The only alternative to the free market is an iron control over every phase of the nation's life by the gestapo and the concentration camp, and that is the history of socialism, applied socialism as it has worked out in Europe, the only place in w'hich it has been worked out. In a free market, if one charges too much and buying falls off, competitors will charge less or offer a better product and so take the market away from him. A free market is a democratic market; it is a continuous meeting where every citizen every day votes with his or her dollars what he wants and what he wants produced. His dollars are always looking .for the best bargain, that is the best and the most for the least expense. This forces the producers to offer the best or the most for the money, or go out of business to make room for those who do. The result is an ever-rising scale of living, and that is why the freer the country the higher its standard of living, and that is why the living standards are low in dictator countries; that is the reason to-day for the tie-ups in such industries as building. All the way down the line, industry is held up because producer and consumer cannot meet in mutual agreement as buyer and seller but must wait on the dictates of some bureaucrat who has no real or personal interest in the matter.
So much for a free economy. I believe the sooner we get back to a free economy the sooner we shall bring real prosperity and happiness to the people of Canada.

Industrial Relations
A few words about the communist influence in industrial unrest. As I say, I was not a member of this committee, so my remarks do not apply specifically to this committee. I am making general remarks which I can back up with statements by people in authority. I should say, of course, that labour is very largely international to-day, and certainly most of the Canadian labour unions are either controlled by or affiliated with the labour unions of the United States. If that is incorrect perhaps the Minister of Labour (Mr. Mitchell) will correct me.
Let me quote the Attorney General of the United States, speaking this summer to the Canadian Bar Association:
No one but a crackpot can be deluded by what we see going on to-day. One of the greatest dangers in my opinion to the civil liberties of our fellow citizens, and one which should be taken literally by all the members of our profession, is the method of communism and fascism to shackle democracy by indirection. We know there is a national and international conspiracy to divide our people, to discredit our institutions, and to bring about disrespect of our government. We know full well what communism and fascism practise,-sometimes one taking the cloak from the other. We know that in the black bible of their faith they seek to capture the important offices in the labour unions, to create strikes and dissensions, and to raise barriers to the efforts of lawful authorities to maintain civil peace. I am told that in the councils of many labour unions, wherein deliberations are screened from the public, identical tactics, staged with acute skill, are used to disrupt, disconcert proceedings in the hope that the communists or fascists-for I see no difference in them-may achieve final power. Small groups of radicals, well coached in a prearranged plan, are using party line methods in identical activity so that they can speak to the people as a whole, not in open avowal of their aims, but with the voice of the honest working man. No country on earth and no government can long endure this vicious attack. I say to you that they are driving law enforcement in this country to the end of its patience. They are driving good Americans to the end of their patience.
That was the statement of Attorney General Thomas Clark, of the United States of America. Then there is a statement I should like to read which I take from the committee of un-American activities of the Congress of the United States, printed in Washington, 1946, page 48:
A majority of ill-informed members of industry, finance, education and religious institutions sneer at the power and progress of the communist party in the United States. These same individuals often point out that the communist party is a legal party and not a member of a subversive movement and is merely the expression of a small alien minority. To indicate the extent to which these persons have been misled by the propaganda agencies operating under the guidance of communists and fellow travellers in America, we present the statement made by Joseph Stalin, nominal head of
the communist party in Russia and the dominant figure of the movement throughout the world.
This is Premier Stalin's statement:
"I consider that the communist party in the United States of America is one of the few communist parties to which history has given decisive tasks from the point of view of the world revolutionary movement. The revolutionary crisis has not yet reached the United States, but we already have knowledge of numerous facts which suggest that it is aproaching. It is necessary that the communist party should be capable of meeting the moment of crisis fully equipped to take the direction of future class wars in the United States of America. You must prepare for that, comrades, with all your strength and by every means you must constantly improve and bolshevize the American communist party. You must forge real revolutionary leaders of the proletariat who will be capable of leading the millions of American workers towards the revolutionary class wars."
This statement has never been repudiated and is officially recorded on page 17 of house report No. 2 of the 76th Congress.
The real communist threat is not from the few members of the communist party who are honest enough to declare their true colours, but from the innumerable what I call "fellow-travellers". They remind me of the unfortunate people who carry typhoid. They do not have the disease themselves, but they spread it. There are a lot of people who may not be communists in the full sense of the word, but they spread a lot of communism.
The hon. member for Calgary West said something about the spread of socialism and communism, but I did not hear him say anything about stopping the spread of it. He did complain of the newspapers. He said they were always ready to strangle the birth of a new idea. I have not heard any new ideas expressed in this debate. There is nothing new in socialism. It is as old as slavery. The hon. member for Calgary West comes from the province which did give birth to a new idea.


An hon. MEMBER:: A miscarriage.


Mr. HERRIDGE:: A still-birth.


Norman Jaques: No, it is still living. The hon. member for Calgary West has gone out of his way to try to strangle that idea. Social Credit is a new idea and I say that it is the only answer to socialism. I should like to quote from an article by John T. Flynn in the Times-Herald of April 23, 1944. This article deals with what has come to be known as the "smear bund". It is the cover behind which the communists do their work. Their method, of course, is to smear anybody who is really active in opposing communism. This is a book which is called "Under Cover" and written by a man by the name of John Roy Carlson.
Industrial Relations

The article says that this book, due to unprecedented plugging, has sold nearly one million copies.


John Oliver Probe: The hon. member is not the author? This is not a sales talk?


Norman Jaques: No, I am not selling it, but I shall open the eyes of the hon. member if he is not entirely blind. Here are some notes I took from this article:
Who is the real author of "Under Cover", the well-known smear book? On the cover of the book is the name-John Roy Carlson, but who is John Roy Carlson? Where did the smear bund dig him up? The author of "Under Cover" admits using Carlson as a pen name. But Carlson is only one of several pen names. His real name is Avedis Boghos Derounian, an Armenian immigrant. The name of the author of "Under Cover" is given as Derounian, alias Carlson, alias Paige, alias Decker, alias Pagnanelli, et cetera. But the real author is the communist smear bund. By means of Carlson and other hired hands, such as Walter Winchell and using "patriot" as an alias, the bund's purpose is to smear, as agents of Hitler, any native Americans of untarnished reputation, loyalty and eminence who actively oppose communism and internationalism. In 1935 Carlson edited a communist sheet mainly to extol the bolshevik conquest of his native Armenian home, smearing all who did not agree with his employers. In 1938 he was hired by the anti-defamation league and later by the "Friends of Democracy" as one of their numerous pimps. He went around people suspected of anti-semitism, encouraged them to make slurring remarks and then reported the remarks to his blackmailing employers as samples of anti-semitism. He issued an antisemitic sheet of his own containing the vilest attacks on the Jews in order to needle people to say anything he could report to the alien racketeers who paid him.
"Under Cover" pretends to expose a number of subversive groups in America, but it never once mentions the activities of such people as those exposed by our own Royal Canadian Mounted Police. The very purpose of the book is to keep communist spies and agents under cover. The methods are the usual smear employed by communists and fellow travellers, and by the anti-defamation league. The technique is that used by all blackmailers-to compromise decent honourable people by associating them with those guilty of the offence with which they intended to smear their victims. In "Under Cover" the victims were the opponents of internationalism, communism, and the opponents of certain new dealers.

Carlson was hired by the "Friends of Democracy", operated by Rex Stout, former editor of the New Masses and Leon Birkhead, both active communist workers.
So much for John Roy Carlson. Blackmailers are rightly detested as most odious and dangerous criminals. They are character assassins preying on the respectable, but vulnerable, members of society. Private citizens are protected against blackmail by most severe and drastic penalties. Men in public life enjoy no protection against such blackmailers as the Carlsons, Winchells, and their employers, the communists, the anti-defamation league, the political zionist leaders, all working to defeat the ends of justice, freedom and Christianity, silencing or disarming their opponents by smearing them with fascism and anti-semitism. Honest and sincere patriots must face these blackmailers or abandon their principles.
To give you some idea of the extent of the activities of these subversive agents, let me quote the words of the national director of the anti-defamation league, referred to by Mr. Flynn in the article in the Times-Herald:
The programme of education we have developed covers every media for improving the human mind.
Improving the human mind!
In several fields which have engaged the league's attention we have developed the outstanding agencies of America. We have the greatest speakers' bureau ever organized in this country. We have the outstanding radio programmes in all the history of American radio.
Such as Walter Winchell I suppose.
We have the most effective book placement bureau in the entire nation.
Including "Under Cover." Finally, they have succeeded in organizing to convert the world to internationalism and totalitarianism, according to the doctrines of Karl Marx, the psychoanalysts and the political Zionists.


Mr. DEPUTY SPEAKER:: Order. I have hesitated to interrupt the hon. member, but in his opening remarks he stated that he was going to show the influence of communism in industrial unrest. I should draw his attention to the fact that the house is considering the report of the industrial relations committee. A general discussion of communism would not be in order at the present time, and I would ask the hon. member to relate his remarks to the motion now before the house.


Norman Jaques: My point in bringing up that matter is that all the speakers I have heard during this debate have ignored the

Industrial Relations
activities of the communists, and I hoped to show the extent of the communist movement in the United States and in Canada.


William Ross Macdonald: May I ask the hon. member to relate his remarks respecting communism to industrial unrest and the motion before the house. A general discussion of communism would not be in order at the present time.


Norman Jaques: I thought I had made the point that a great deal-I would not like to say how much-of the industrial unrest in North America, which would include Canada, is due directly to the propaganda and active work of communists. They work under cover, and I was trying to take off the cover in order to expose this thing for what it is. That was my only purpose, but now I am through with the communists.
Before I sit down I should like to be a little constructive. Having been a little critical so far I should like to close my remarks in a constructive way. I should like to reiterate something I said in an address not long ago, dealing with the solution of these problems of industrial unrest. I speak in the most general way, because I am not referring to any particular strike, such as the steel strike, or even to Canada alone. I am speaking of industrial unrest all over the North American continent or, if you like, all over the world. It is not a question of capitalism or socialism; of "cartelism" or communism. Capitalism of itself, is no cure for socialism, any more than socialism is the cure for capitalism; the blind cannot lead the blind. The truth lies between the extremes of right and left. It is not a question of peace based on full employment. We face a new age; not merely a machine age, but a power-machine age. That means an age of increasing leisure, not of increasing employment. We cannot reverse our program; we must not confuse means with ends. The real purpose of industry is to create goods and service, not jobs. As Ruskin said, "consumption is the crown of production."
We face an age of real plenty and, therefore, we cannot remain slaves of a money economy which was developed during the ages of real scarcity. We dare not prolong our orthodox, but obsolete, financial system of sound, scarce, money by creating artificial scarcities of goods. Our money must reflect facts, not fallacies. Dollars are economic ballots, and when we spend dollars we are voting for the reproduction of what we buy. In this way only can the people plan and obtain the goods and services they really want to 'have. But by their "planned economy' the socialists would dictate to the people what, when and
how much they should consume. Socialists condemn profit, but defend interest. The financiers and socialists-Shylock and Marx-[DOT] are monopolists; they plan to centralize the control of the production of money and of goods. If we are to have world peace, "foreign trade" must be regarded as trade, an exchange of what we cannot consume for what we cannot produce. Favourable trade balances are a fallacy, and the struggle to obtain them has been a main cause of wars in the past. If we are to be really free, all our citizens must be regarded as shareholders of the nation as a going concern and, as such, entitled to share in the national profits, distributed by means of national dividends. Taxation should not be imposed for revenue, but for the purpose of regulating the supply of money. Governments might lend but should never borrow. To say there is only so much money is equivalent to saying there are only so many tons, or miles. The poor are not poor because the rich are rich; that is another socialist fallacy. There is plenty for all. We have solved the problem of production, we must now solve the problem of distribution, or perish in the attempt. We cannot serve two masters; we cannot serve God and usury. If we value anything more than freedom we shall lose our freedom.


Mr. T. L. CHURCH (Broadview):: Coming from the industrial district in Ontario where the trade union movement in Canada started, I wish to say a few words this afternoon in connection with these proposals. Some have complained that the day is being wasted. That is not so. Peace in industry is the greatest problem facing this parliament. That is what parliament was called together to consider last March. Some of those to my left, the C.C.F., have been pleading the case for the farmer and agriculture, and in some respects it may be fairly said they forgot all about the industrial workers of the cities and towns of this country, who are employed in these heavy industries which have done so much for this country. This committee was appointed to establish peace in industry. That was a large order, because after every great war we have had the same dislocation of labour and of trade and industry and commerce. I would not be altogether prepared to say it was the fault of the government. In fact it would be very unfair to say that, because the textbook writers after all great wars have agreed for the last hundred years that this may or may not be so.
Hon. members on this side of the house have always been a trade union party, so far as I have known them. We are the only real
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protectionist party in the house-national protection for labour, protection for the farmers, protection for agriculture and for industry, protection for trade and commerce, for retail stores and for manufacturers of all kinds, and national production brought up to date to meet the spirit of the age and time. Our maxim has been: our own work for our own workmen; our own markets for our own products. Those are the two cardinal principles which have built up this country.
As an hon, member who entered this parliament several years ago, it is my belief that the committee deserves the thanks not only of the House of Commons but of the government of the country and of labour and industry for the work it did. I do not agree with everything contained in the report as far as it goes, because it is well known that after every great war there has been industrial unrest in Canada and the world over.
The committee was given power to call witnesses and to examine them on oath. The Addington administration in 1801 faced industrial strife and faced unrest. They faced it in the dark days of the industrial revolution in England. They faced it in that old town hall in Birmingham, which was somewhat destroyed a while ago, where John Bright and Joseph Chamberlain and all those great men and orators who had something to do with the redeeming the lot of the workers of that land, had their say. That was the condition at the time of Shaftesbury, in 1847in those days the intolerable conditions among the working classes after the industrial revolution in the thirties led to labour and social reforms all along the line. One has only to read Green's "History of England" to understand the terrible state of affairs in those days, a time when women, and children of only eight or nine years of age, were working down in the mines, taking out the coal, in a living tomb with disease rampant. Trades unionism was a blessing to the land.
The city of Toronto has been a pioneer in its relations with labour. We have a splendid body of manufacturers who developed the industrial side of the city, and who comprise some of our leading and most patriotic citizens. We have, on the whole, as heads of our labour movements sane and sensible labour men. I had to aid in settling about twenty or thirty strikes, large and small, following the last war and during it. I remember a strike of the old Toronto Street Railway, and during the strike I appealed to the greatest labour leader this continent ever produced, Mr. Samuel Gompers, who at that time was president of the American Federation of Labour. He came to our city and the strike was settled

in about half a day. He advocated that the strikers be law-abiding, that they carry out peaceful picketing, and carry out their other duties peacefully, in a lawful manner. He appealed to other classes in the community to use sanity, a spirit of good will and wisdom, not to make inflammatory speeches, not to attack industry, and not to attack the police force. He said that police officers were only doing their duty as they saw it in the various cities of our country.
I was police commissioner and chairman of the board for many years in Toronto, and I can say that we had very little of that kind of trouble. For many years in the house I have been advocating a national policy for labour in Canada and for peace in industry. The report of the committee deals with many important matters. Indeed I believe it is the most important labour document we have had since the days of'the Bennett administration. If there was one administration in this country which stood up for the industrial workers in the cities and towns of Canada and also for the white-collar workers; if there was one administration which was the pioneer of this type of document for the benefit of the working classes, it was the Bennett administration, which set up the committee on price spreads which investigated these matters and brought down an important report and led to splendid reforms to improve the lot of the toilers and of industry and private enterprise, the creator of employment.
We have had collective bargaining in Canada for some time; they had it in England after the last war and before it. I do not believe altogether in section 6. I appreciate fully what was said by my hon. friend and brother party member who has done so much of this work, the hon. member for Calgary West (Mr. Smith). I remember him when he was a student in our city, and I know he was interested in this problem even in those days. He is a most warm-hearted man, and one who takes part in many spheres of activity to aid the common man, for whom he has a profound sympathy. He is a man who deserves to be listened to, and one who has won the esteem not only of the people of western Canada but of people throughout the country. I agree with him when he claims "the right for every man to run his own life in his own way." That is what I have been contending for, and that is what the price spreads inquiry contended for. I would rather under section 6, see the chief electoral officer handle a vote in industry in this matter than the Minister of Labour who has had such a hard task after a gigantic war. We have a chief electoral

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officer, and all of us have had something to do with him. I believe he should be placed in charge of the balloting in industry. No matter what his politics are, he has always given each of us a fair and decent show. I believe the chief electoral officer would avoid government interference and so aid the Minister of Labour.
As a friend of labour, in some respects I am sorry to see this recommendation in section 6, because to a great extent these industrial disputes are matters for the consideration of the government. I have had experience with many such disputes, probably as many as any other hon. member now in the house-but perhaps not as many as the Minister of Labour, with his vast labour experience, because he was in the labour movement for many years, in two cities-Hamilton, and where he is now. I have followed his career with interest.
I can. tell you this, that we shall never have peace in industry in this country until we have a national policy for labour and for industry. I have, since 1922 advocated such a national policy of protection to solve all our economic problems from the Yukon to the maritime provinces. I have recommended a national policy for labour, a national policy which should provide protection bonuses, subventions and subsidies on grain, coal, steel, iron and other important commodities. I was almost alone in my advocacy at that time. Only in this way can labour hope to get a proper share of the returns in our peace-time economy; only in this way can industry and private enterprise get their fair share of aid.
I have always listened with great respect to the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell) the leader of the C.C.F., who said that the ten-cent limit would place labour in a straitjacket. No hon. member, no decent citizen, wants to see any man who works for his living placed in a straitjacket. I have great respect for the hon. member, but I do not think he or any other hon. member wants to see either labour or private enterprise in a straitjacket.
Some of our friends want a complete system of nationalization, socialization and public ownership. That works all right in connection with light, heat and power, and with some forms of transportation, but when it is expanded it cannot be successful unless it operates as a monopoly. That is the only way that public ownership, both past and present, of which I have long been an advocate, has been successful.
There have been better working conditions since I first entered the city council in Toronto.
Our friends sitting to the left are trying to pacify Europe. The hon.. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) went over to Russia to try to pacify the Russians and Marshal Stalin-and here we are in the 106th day of the session, but the government cannot pacify a few workmen. That is how it is in. some of the industries in the country. The hon. member went over to preach the gospel to Stalin and company-limited and unlimited. No doubt while he was over there he learned some of the new modern tricks in the political trade-because there are always some tricks to learn in this trade used by politicians. We are all politicians; some of us saw the sun, and some did not. The Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) is over there trying to pacify Europe. A whole carload of them has gone, including the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Claxton). He is in Paris, but he may show up in. Oslo or in almost any city of the seven seas. I think there is plenty of room for them, at home, to maintain peace in industry in this country, the most important problem before parliament.
A discussion of this matter is certainly not a waste of time, because these workers are people who pay taxes-taxes which are intolerable. I can tell you this, that I walked along streets in my constituency, and in the constituencies of the hon. member for Eglinton (Mr. Fleming) and other Toronto members the other night, and on those streets I saw members of the working classes shopping. It was raining pretty hard that night and the price ceiling had huge holes shot in it. Many of the people who came to this country only a few years ago are making fabulous sums out of the sale of vegetables and fruit, but the farmer is not getting it. The ceiling has been shot full of holes for the consumer, and prices are soaring on consumer goods of all kinds. It is well known that the price ceilings are connected economically with the wage ceilings, and that is one thing the committee had to consider in making its report. Where do we go from here after this report?
We are back to where we are kicking the football around again. We are in the football season now. The government kicked the football over to the committee on July 14 and we have now kicked it back. The onus of settling this strike is on the government as long as they are the government. I think the committee was very fair to the government because it was an exceedingly laborious task it had to do, it was a tiresome, wearisome and thankless task. I went into the committee two or three times and I saw it w'as a tiresome, wearisome and thankless job they were doing
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in trying to help the government out of the trouble they were in. All governments have had to face this situation after every war.
Where do we go from here, with this committee report, uniting price ceilings and wage control? The onus is back on the government. We would be wise as the House of Commons to wind up our business by Saturday night and give the government a chance to deal with this problem and settle this strike. We are just wasting our time here, and the minister is not able to deal with this important matter. The onus is on the government, not on the exodus or only those who are travelling the seven seas, but those who are home, the home guard. The home guard is dwindling. Those who have been left at home have to face the toughest job which this government has had for a long time, to wind up this session and to formulate a labour code that will work after such a terrible war and bring about peace in industry.
The onus is on the government so far as it is the government of the day to solve this problem. This problem is not going to be solved by adopting brass-band methods of conducting a strike inquiry or by intimidation of the workers and private enterprise, or by calling in the police. You will remember, Mr. Speaker, that trouble occurred in the city of Montreal a few years ago. The enforcement of federal laws should be placed in the hands of the Attorney General of Canada under section 91. It should not be necessary to tax real estate in order to provide a police force in Hamilton.
Another thing I cannot understand is that it was considered necessary by the steel industry and the labour union to treat this matter as a unit of industrial strife in the three plants. The conditions prevailing in Nova Scotia are different from those prevailing in Hamilton and Sault Ste. Marie. They are separate propositions all together. I think a great mistake was made in the unions handling it in this way. In Sault Ste. Marie and Hamilton they have cheap light, power and urban transportation and the cost of their carfares, water and civic services, and food is much less. In the maritimes they are faced with heavy freight charges, and then the system of taxation there is different. In Ontario there is cheap light and power available for almost every barn in the province, and we have cheap fares on our street cars. Domestic lighting is available for the home of the working man, and the cost of this service has been cut in three and four. For about 94 cents a unit a working man is able to light his house. Then they have extended the facilities for

cooking into the kitchens of the working classes of this province. In these disputes law and order should be maintained at any cost.
We had some trouble during the street railway strike and we had some trouble during the last war. But law and order must be maintained, as President Gompers said when we settled the street car strike. So far as this particular proposition goes, I sympathize with labour and I also sympathize with the employers as they are to-day. You must consider the cause and effect of these strikes. As I said before, business men are conscious of the heavy task that awaits them in reconversion so that Canada may recover quickly. Industry and labour in Canada have worked wonders in war, and can in peace also. Canada needs stability to speed the delivery of all classes of goods and meet market demands so as to aid peace-time economy in employment, supply civilian needs and restore as soon as possible living standards and defeat inflation and black markets. With the lessons industry learned in Canada in war, it should be much easier to work out reconversion. All irksome controls must go, and we must remove the shackles from industry, large and small. Business men must have complete freedom if they are to succeed under private enterprise. We should see an end to government controls and in that way give them more of a chance to provide full employment, and labour and capital a fairer share of our peace-time economy.
I am sorry to say that that has not happened, and one of the results is this strike. There is no doubt that the committee never should have summoned Donald Gordon or Mr. Brockington to handle matters such as this. I believe that the more the government kept away from it, the more chance there would be for the employers and employees to settle this question. On April 1, when I saw the unrest and that May day was coming, I asked this question:
What action has been taken by the government to set aside, by proclamation, some Sunday for a day of prayer for the promotion of peace in industry, in view of the need of reconversion in industry from war to peace economy.
The government replied that the suggestion was being noted, but that at present this did not appear to be a matter requiring action by the government. I notice they are adopting this programme in the mother country, and I am reminded of the town hall in Birmingham where John Bright and Joseph Chamberlain and others spoke shortly after the industrial revolution. I think this suggestion should be carried out on Labour day, a week from Sunday. The government should

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consider setting aside, Sunday, September 1, as a day of national prayer for the promotion of peace and industry and to urge the necessity of such industrial peace to aid reconversion in industry from war to peacetime economy and aid the production of all kinds of consumer goods. I hope such a proclamation will be issued. When a well-known Canadian divine was referring to the town hall in Birmingham he mentioned that a celebrated labour leader had once said that he never entered an industrial conference without engaging in a season of prayer. God's spirit was always invoked in order that satisfactory results might be obtained. I think there is a lot in that, especially in times like these.
There are many important matters that need consideration by parliament. These strikes are caused largely by the working classes not being able to get into decent houses. That is the result of this silly rental control policy. We see letter after letter in the newspapers-there were three or four in the Toronto papers last night-complaining about the condition of those who buy and cannot get into what they buy. That is one of the causes of this strike. Then these working people are faced with high food prices. The danger of inflation at the moment is due to a shortage of supplies. That shortage has been largely brought about by the war. The government has, in my opinion, had a different policy in different provinces in regard to a price ceiling on wages. In British Columbia, in the dispute which Mr. Justice Sloan settled, an increase of fifteen cents was granted. That was in April or May. Now in August in Ontario an increase of ten cents is offered. Mistakes have been made, undoubtedly, but the government is not the only one to make mistakes. Mistakes are bound to be made after every war. The government's determination to hold price ceilings at all costs, when holes were shot in the ceilings has been responsible for strikes and the demand for higher wages. The line was held for a time, but it was only held in the days of stress and strain by granting the wartime cost of living bonus, subventions and subsidies, and other temporary benefits at great cost to the country and industry and the consumer.
We should enforce what labour laws we have, and if they are not right we should amend them to meet modern conditions. A few months ago the subsidy of two cents a quart was taken off milk, and the prices of the produce which the market gardeners bring
into the cities are going sky-high, without any price regulation at all. No wonder there is a demand for higher wages.
So far as the report of the committee is concerned there are four cardinal things the committee forgot to remember: Never legislate against human nature; trust the people and they will trust you; always tell the people the truth; do not be afraid to tell.the people you have made a mistake. The people do not expect their leaders to be infallible or to be gods and I am glad that my hon. friend the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply (Mr. Howe) admitted the other night that he had had a change of mind. How can we develop the natural resources of this country when we have strikes continually occurring in basic industries like steel, coal, iron, base metals and everything else?
We have representatives over in Paris at the present time attending a conference about peace and disarmament. That is desirable, no doubt, but peace in industry at home is also sorely needed. After every war there is a lot of dislocation and all kinds of social problems to solve, which, if not solved properly, will cause strikes. Suspicion should be removed, suspicion not only abroad but also at home, because it tends to poison the thoughts in man. The removal of suspicion would aid industry and bring about stability, so that our people can go on confidently to better things. While not forgetting conferences abroad, let us have conferences at home for the very worthy object of peace in industry. Home should be the true place of peace and shelter from all injury, terror, want, doubt and unemployment. It is not home if it does not provide that.
Why should we reserve all our discussions on peace and security for Paris and the continent of Europe and forget about peace at home? Some of those who preached pacifism abroad failed to heed the cries for peace at home. Some of the best leaders of labour have uttered the same sentiments-not to forget peace at home-and I admire their courage, because these labour leaders are trying at the same time to carry out their duties to those they represent and that greater community their countiy.
I am urging all our citizens to plead for a truce in industrial strife. In the middle ages, when the whole of Europe was on fire, one part against another, men of good will strove in vain to get what the historians of the middle ages called a truce of God which would enable the people to settle their differences and live like brothers. I should like to see such a truce in this country to bring about peace in industry, so that we may remove all

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differences and join in unison with all our strength to lead the people of this country to a happier and better collective security at home.
Governments sometimes can do little. These reforms must come from the people themselves and from free enterprise. Labour and private enterprise should take off their coats and work out a solution, of their troubles, because they can do it better than the state can, Let them put the state out of their minds and get down to it to-day, so that we may have peace in industry in every corner of this country. A breach of peace in industry means suffering from employment. All that could be avoided if capital and labour tried to understand each other.
I have felt that it would be a real'help to employers and employees to have a neutral person preside at industrial conferences, some man well qualified by character and ability and with an independent outlook who would inspire confidence. A person of such standing I have found in practice has always enabled the two parties to get together with ease and freedom and with a hope of ultimate success. Not only have wages to be studied, but the relationship between price ceilings and wage controls must not be lost sight of. Industrial disputes should be the concern of statesmen, because such disputes follow after every great war. Trade in our country has always depended on initiative and free enterprise and the willingness of our people, men and women, to embark their savings in industry. The element of uncertainty after every great war in industry is a great problem.
I do not believe there is any royal road to the solution of industrial strife any more than there is any royal road to learning. The government have no doubt made mistakes, and thejr have come in for some criticism. So has the opposition, the C.C.F. and all other parties. This steel strike is already having a serious effect upon business, and I hope that we shall conclude our business here very rapidly so as to give the government a chance to bring this strike to an end as soon as possible.


Mr. J. G. L. LANGLOIS (Gaspe):: Mr. Speaker, I have listened attentively to the numerous speeches made on this subject, and I wish to offer my own views. They are, I must admit, far from being those of an expert in the matter.
In this debate so far, various opinions or suggestions have been made, some very constructive, others less so, but I do not think this problem can be solved by making speeches. What is needed is action without further delay.

The committee on industrial relations has made recommendations to this house, and in my opinion the most important of these recommendations is the one relating to a labour code. In this connection opinions seemed unanimous, and I hope that hon. members have given careful consideration to these suggestions. However, we must not forget the numerous angles of this problem.
The main obstacle to having a labour code is the result of our own constitution and is the conflict of jurisdiction between the various provinces and the Canadian parliament. The committee recommends that a dominion-provincial conference be called in order to draft legislation in this respect. I agree with this recommendation, provided that the provinces come here with a real desire for understanding, and I say this because our previous dominion-provincial conferences did not meet with great success.
The labour problem of this country is a national problem and, therefore, concerns as much the provincial legislatures of each province as it concerns the federal parliament. Each premier of each province should be ready to shoulder his responsibility in this respect. The strikes which affect our national economy to-day affect also all the provinces from British Columbia to the maritime provinces. I think, Mr. Speaker, that in the past there has been too much politics brought into the settlement of our national problems and in the discussions of our dominion-provincial relations. When the federal government wanted to make suggestions for the settlement of these problems, the provinces accused the federal government of attacking provincial autonomy.
A few days ago, the premier of Ontario, the Hon. George Drew, said in a public address that his government was seeking to have the federal government hold another dominion-provincial conference and he-Mr. Drew-was suggesting that this conference should deal also with our labour problems. The same suggestion has been made in the newspapers and by public men of this country, but I suggest that if the provinces want so much understanding between the federal government and the provincial governments they should, for once, themselves take the initiative. It is all very nice and good to say that it is up to the federal government to assemble the provincial ministers in a conference, but I do not think this initiative should come only and solely from this government. Why do the provincial ministers not get together on their own initiative and first agree among themselves before coming to Ottawa? Then, if the dominion-provincial

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conference later fails, this failure would not rest with the central government only, since the provinces, would have taken their share of responsibilities in calling the meeting.
I am sure that, if the provinces come here after having discussed matters among themselves, an understanding with the federal government will be much easier to reach, since the provinces will be unanimous and will have reached an agreement among themselves before conferring with the central authorities. Then politicians will not be able to go around and say that Mr. King's conference has failed, if a failure should occur; but the people of Canada will know that, if agreement is not reached, the fault rests with no particular political party or no particular government, unless one of these governments fails to envisage the problem in the light of the national interest. Up to now it seems to me that the provinces have prevented the central government from taking action to solve our national problems, on the grounds of provincial autonomy; but when the consequences of these unsolved problems appear they throw it into the lap of the federal government as they are doing to-day, and say, "settle them." I do not think this is the way to arrive at the solution of our "national problems. Let the provinces take the initiative now and see if they can do better than the federal government has done up to now.
If I may offer suggestions regarding this labour code, I would suggest that uniform legislation be drafted by the provinces according to their own views and ambitions first and submitted afterwards for discussion in a dominion-provincial conference and that, after an agreement is reached on the proposed legislation, various provincial governments make it law in their respective province. This will be one way to eliminate the conflict of jurisdiction, since this national labour code would be enacted by the various legislatures independently. We federal members were told during the debate on redistribution that we did not represent our respective provinces. We should, therefore, to-day leave the floor to our provincial representatives in this respect.
There has been much talk recently about the danger of spreading communism in this country, and it has been asserted that communistic activities are taking place in our labour unions. I think this assertion is true, and I would suggest that, in order to curb these activities, which, to my mind are most detrimental to Canada, labour unions of this country should be exclusively Canadian in character. In order to achieve this end, I respectfully submit that our proposed labour
code should recognize only exclusively Canadian unions and make it compulsory for any labour union to incorporate itself under our laws with definite powers and definite obligations also. I know that many are opposed to the incorporation of labour unions, but I think we should have had it a long time ago. We are criticizing the government for delegating its powers to boards or commissions, but we do not seem to realize that labour unions to-day have more authority in the labour field than the government ever had. We have recently seen examples of labour unions who defied the government, took the law into their own hands and dictated their wishes to the whole of the country. These same unions have no responsibility whatsoever, having no legal existence. I believe that bodies which control most of our national economy should be responsible bodies and should come within the provisions of our laws. If ever a delegation of powers was made it was when we permitted such unions to act in this country. Public bodies like individuals should abide by the laws of the country according to the great principle of our democratic world that everybody is equal before the law. Why make an exception in the case of labour unions?
I know some hon. gentlemen will object by saying that this will prevent our local organization from taking part in the international organization, for the welfare of workers all over the world. I do not think this will be the case, since our national unions or local unions could do just as they did before and contribute to the international labour organization, and I see no objection there.
Before closing these few remarks, I wish again to emphasize the importance of the national character of this problem and of the necessity for immediate action. Strikes are to-day paralyzing the whole economy of this country. It is not only one class of our society that is affected, but the whole of our national economy and the whole of our Canadian society. Let us, therefore, put aside, for the sake of our country, our individual views and opinions, and let us look at. the problem as a national one. It is the privilege of every citizen of this country to be either a regionalist or a provincialist or a federalist; but, above all, he has the duty of being a Canadian, and a Canadian before anything else. If individuals are not allowed to act, if their actions are prejudicial to and against the interest of the community, no prime minister, no government, no political party leader has the right to seek his own advantage or even the advantage of his province if his actions are detrimental to the country as a whole. I sincerely hope that if a dominion-provincial conference is
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called our governments will approach the problem with this principle in mind. Should some provincial premier or other government leader act otherwise, he may gain a temporary political success, but sooner or later his own people will reproach him for having lost sight of the general welfare and interest of his country.
Mr. LIGUORI LACOMBE (Laval-Two
Mountains) (Translation): Mr. Speaker, I shall keep the length of my remarks within the strictest 'bounds, because this session has lasted but too long.
Speeches can never 'bring, strikes to an end. Only an energetic government, able to do justice to employees and, employers, can stop disputes. Let the, government, after such lengthy discussion, at last find the means of settling the strikes which paralyse the economy of this nation. The workers are justified in demanding a salary commensurate with the increase in the cost of living,. Employers cannot be unaware of what it costs to-day to live. I should rather say to subsist, because I leave out of consideration any luxury, and even reasonable comfort.
If employers are aware of that situation, the government are still better acquainted with it. They should decide on a course of action with the determination that the present circumstances require.
There have been enough words; the need is for action. No one can be made to believe that there are no grounds for understanding, no middle course that would put an end to these disastrous strikes which deeply affect the whole population. There should be no attempt to shirk responsibilities and shift them upon others. The established authority has the duty to safeguard the well-being of the people. Its duty is to do justice to all and with the least possible delay. The more we have discussions, conferences and speeches, the more difficult the situation will become.
In concluding my brief remarks, I shall remind the government that the Canadian people expect them to find a prompt, energetic, fair and efficient solution of the labour and industrial problem. Idle discussions will settle nothing.
We have no need of a national labour code. Each province has its own legislation on labour and industrial matters and they have jurisdiction to legislate thereon. Owing to the war and to this transition period, the dominion government has exercised, and still exercises, prerogatives reserved to the provinces. It would be useless to call a dominion-
.Mr. Langlois.]
provincial conference for the purpose of discussing the advisability of enacting a national labour code. As I have said not long ago, Canada and the world are being killed with conferences and speeches. The truth of this statement is evidenced by this unrestrained verbiage which should be replaced by action. And what can be said about the series of amendments moved a few minutes ago in connection with concurrence in the report of the committee, if not that it is systematic opposition and pure obstruction.
A committee of the house was appointed with instruction to inquire into the grievances of the employees and the claims of the employers. After weeks of discussion and investigation that committee can still, like ourselves, notice the same conflicts between capital and labour. Strikes are becoming more and more numerous, while members of Parliament are holding forth at a daily cost of $35,000 to the public treasury. Economists, or at least those who pretend to be economists, talk and talk without the slightest regard for economy. Their greatest concern is publicity and political propaganda. But neither the workers nor the people of this country can afford to wait. The government can and must end strikes through fair, energetic and immediate action. They are able to do justice to all the parties to the dispute and free this country from those woeful conflicts between capital and labour.


Mr. ALISTAIR STEWART (Winnipeg North) (Text):: When the hon. member for Calgary West (Mr. Smith) was speaking the other day he read to the house a dispatch credited to the Canadian Press which told us that the picket lines at Hamilton had been opened, and that at least ten cars laden with men had gone into the plant. That statement was greeted with some jubilation in certain parts of this chamber. Perhaps those who applauded thought the picket lines had been definitely broken. Perhaps they believed the strike was over. But I say to this house if the strike is finished by smashing the union at Hamilton, then we are only on the verge of labour troubles unprecedented in Canada, and that is not a prophecy which will be very far wrong. Last April, when the increase of $5 a ton was granted to the manufacturers, labour was led to believe that in the $5 there was a certain amount for an increase in wages. The government would not tell the union how much was appropriated for wages; yet, as I say, the workers were led to believe that an amount w-as there. Because the government refused to tell the workers, we said then the government was sowing the seeds of

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a labour war in Canada, and1 in. effect that is what is happening. The government cannot shuffle away from the responsibility it has in this matter.
In committee on industrial relations I imagine many hon. members learned much. They learned, for instance, that organized labour in Canada, as in most other countries, has had to fight for its very existence. Unions have had to fight to be born, and once they were created, frequently they were smashed and destroyed either by recalcitrant employers, or by the actions of agents provocateurs, or perhaps by the very apathy of the workers themselves. But it would be a great mistake to believe that trade unions are not here to stay. Unfortunately some employers seem to be of that opinion. They remind me of King Canute trying to hold back the waves of the sea. Organized labour has grown tremendously in strength in the last ten years. It will continue to grow; but, as things are now, it can only grow because it fights. We are told that organized labour is militant. Of course it is. It has had to be militant because it is faced with an equal militancy on the part of employers, who in all too many cases are determined to smash the unions. That, I think, is borne out by the evidence which was submitted to the committee on industrial relations. I refer to page 3 of the brief of Mr. Hilton, who, as the house knows, is president of Steel Company of Canada. Before that committee this man said:
It is emphasized that the Steel Company of Canada has not been and is not opposed to collective bargaining nor is it opposed to the principle of trade unionism.
That was Mr. Hilton speaking out of one corner of his mouth. He was questioned by the hon. member for Vancouver East (Mr. Maclnnis), who asked:
I am a member of a trade union and have been since 1910, and it was never necessary in the company with which I worked, and it is not necessary in normal labour relations with organized trade unions, to get a court order to recognize the union. In a great many of the trade unions and companies that I know where there are labour relations it has not been necessary to get a court order, but in the company of which you are president the trade union was never recognized except by a court order or an order of the labour relations board? Is that correct ?
And Hilton said:
I think that is correct, yes.
That is the man who at one moment professes to believe in the principle of trade unions and the next minute admits he will not recognize them unless compelled to do
so by a court order. Then the hon. member for Vancouver East went on:
At your Canada works at Hamilton you had a board of conciliation under the Industrial Disputes Investigation Act in 11945?
A. You are asking me that question?
Q. Yes?	.	,
A. Yes, I believe that is right.
Q. Did that board of conciliation make a unanimous recommendation for a form of union security ?
A. It made that recommendation. I cannot tell you from memory whether or not it was unanimous.
Q. Did you accept the findings of the board? We will deal later with the question whether or not it was unanimous. Did the company, or did you accept for the company, the findings of the board of conciliation?
A. If you mean did we grant so-called union security at the Canada works we did not.
This, despite the unanimous recommendation of the board of conciliation. Then the hon. member for Calgary West asked a question:
You do not object to a voluntary check-off, do you?
A. I do.
Pursuing the matter further, Mr. Hilton said:
We sign a contract for one year at a certain wage rate, the next year it is going to be more. If you concede a revocable check-off this year, next year it will be something more; and it all leads up to a closed shop, which I do not approve of either.
Well, Mr. Hilton has the right to decide what he approves, but I do not think he has any right in the face of that evidence, to try to tell the workers in his plant that he believes in collective bargaining and is not opposed to the principles of trade unionism. It is true that to-day the dispute is over the question of an increase of fifteen cents, but fundamentally that fifteen cents is superficial to labour unrest in Canada. What we are in effect seeing, indeed what we are seeing, is the constant conflict we have had for so long between labour and capital as to who shall get what share of that which is produced. That is the fundamental aspect of the conflict before us to-day, and it is not one that will be resolved easily. Mr. Gordon, who appeared before the committee, had some ideas on the matter. At page 329 of the proceedings he was asked:
Now, it was quite evident that there was a certain amount in that $5 which had been allocated for wages.
His reply was:
No, not necessarily; that is the point I have been labouring to put forward. That was dependent entirely on the decision of the management of the steel company as to what profit level they were willing to operate on; and they could quite easily and quite reasonably have taken the attitude that they could not afford
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to pay anything for wages because they were not earning a profit amount anywhere near the amount which they ought to ibe earning by prewar standards in relation to the volume of production that they are now undertaking.
There we see the orthodox, conventional defence of the capitalist system. Mr. Gordon says management will decide what profit level they are willing to operate on. We admit that steel is a basic industry, that it is a vital industry. We admit that our economy will collapse unless we get steel; yet steel will be produced only when the operators themselves decide that they are going to produce it. That is a position of utter social irresponsibility, the sort of position we in this party have constantly condemned both in this house and outside it. To-day private enterprise has no sense. of responsibility at all to the community as a whole. It is concerned only with the making and the maintenance of its own profit position.


Mr. HOMUTH:: I suppose there are no decent people at all running industry in this country?


Alistair McLeod Stewart: There are quite a number of decent people running industry. Because a man believes in the capitalist form of economy is no reason for believing he is not decent. At times I believe the hon. gentleman himself is quite decent. May I repeat part of the same statement by Mr. Gordon:
. . . they were not earning a profit amount anywhere near the amount which they ought to be earning by pre-war standards in relation to the volume of production that they are now undertaking.
Here, surely, is a new gauge by which profits should be measured. During the war, in many cases, under the excess profits tax, the government decided that the capital invested was to be the gauge by which we would decide what profit should be paid. Now Mr. Gordon tells us it is his view-I do not say it is the government's view-that profits must have some relation to the entire productivity of the plant. In StelcO' there has been no increase in subscribed capital during the last few years; yet we are told that production is two and one-half times pre-war value. Surely, then, if production has been increased so much, and capital has remained as it was, the workers in the plant, those who are the producers, deserve a greater share of what has been produced.
Mr. Gordon apparently disagrees with that, but we in the C.C.F. would say that ours is the correct position to take. For too long those who have been- producing the essential needs in Canada have been exploited in precisely the same way, and capital has always been given the preferred position over human

beings. In effect, it boils down to this, that so far as those who are defenders of free enterprise are concerned-so. far as anybody is concerned; so far as economy is concerned, in industry-the owner lends his capital, but the industrial worker gives his life. There is that great difference, and the worker is not unduly reimbursed for what he gives. He starts in industry at an early age and, normally, if his health permits, he will carry through until he reaches the age of seventy, when he gets an old age pension. At times he may be laid off owing to unemployment. He may get two weeks holiday with pay, and very often without pay.
But the average worker in Canada cannot afford to stop work because, on account of the low wages he has been paid, he has no security. I mentioned in the house a few weeks ago that ndnetv-two per cent of workers in Canada who reached the age of sixty-five are penniless. And when we remember what their average wage is, we need not be surprised at that. After a man has brought up a family, clothed them, fed them, educated them, paid all the thousand and one expenses connected with raising a family, he will have very little left of his meagre earnings. Even if he got $33.60 a week he would have very little to put by for old age.
I would also say that it would be a mistake to assume that industry is the only sinner. Here is a case in point I should like to bring to the attention of the house, and particularly to the attention of the Minister of Public Works (Mr. Fournier). It casts a light over what I am saying. Here was a man employed by the government from 1896 to 1946. a man with excellent references. His employment as a labourer started at $1.50 a day, and gradually increased to $4. His wife is dead; he is a widower, and maintains in his home an invalid daughter. This year, when he had reached the age of seventy-nine, the government dispensed with his services, and in recognition of his fifty years in the department reimbursed him with a pension of $19.91 a month.
How can we expect industry to be any better than the government which sets an example like that, for the people of Canada? Organized workers in Canada do not want too much. All they want is some security, which is surely the right of every citizen. They want a 40-hour week, with no reduction in "take-home pay."
May I say to the Minister of Labour (Mr. Mitchell) that the price ceiling is being shot rapidly. I have just had word from British Columbia that to-day the regional war labour board out there approved1 a 15-cent increase

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in wages and a 40-hour week for the American Can Company. Things must be very dangerous for the price ceiling on the west coast, especially in view of the fact that perhaps the Dominion Bridge Company and Heaps Engineering will also get the same award.


Humphrey Mitchell: The hon. member said that the price control was being broken. I think he meant wage control.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: No;
I said "price", because if fifteen cents here will pierce the price ceiling, I am sure fifteen cents in British Columbia would. If we are to have that pattern there I think we should have it here.
The unions favour the 40-hour week with no reduction in "take-home pay", but they do not make that request from every industry. Organized labour is willing to modify its demands according to the ability of an industry to pay. But it is not going to take the unvouched word of the companies as to how much they are earning, and in that respect I do not blame them. The workers are asking, so far as union security is concerned, for the union shop and the check-off. The workers also ask -and I am sure the acting Minister of Finance (Mr. Abbott) knows this-for the maintenance of price control in Canada.
I should like to quote at this point something Mr. Gordon said. Although he corrected the interpretation later, nevertheless the idea *has gone out that this only is what he said.


Humphrey Mitchell: My hon. friend has said that price control was blown to bits, and now he says he is asking for the maintenance of it.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: I said the workers are asking for price control, and I said the government is blowing it to bits, despite the fact that the workers are asking for it. Just ask the worker who will shortly be required to pay three cents a quart more for milk, and see what he thinks about the price ceiling.
Mr. Gordon said, at page 295:
Any increase in cost is inflationary, as I said; inflationary in the sense that in increasing the cost you must increase the price.
That does not necessarily follow, and Mr. Gordon pointed it out later. Increases in cost can be absorbed in two ways, either by taking them out of profits or by increasing production. And that increased production in Canada is not going to take place unless we get the workers back to work again; yet the policy of the government to-day is designed to bring about that very inflation which it seems to fear.
Mr. Gordon made a further significant statement-and I am sorry to be picking on him
all the time, but he is responsible for these statements and also for the apparent attitude which the government is taking. He was asked these questions and gave these answers:
Q. Let us be clear about this; you indicated a little while ago that if certain things happened, if certain increases are allowed, there would be no use trying to continue the system of control of prices, that at a certain point you might just as well close up was about the way you expressed it. Was that right?
A. That is correct.
Q. All right, Mr. Gordon; where is that point? Do you know?
A. I do not know where that point is.
This merely substantiates the point made by the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell), the leader of this group, when he said there was nothing scientific in the principle of ten cents being the point above which we would get a complete smash in the economy. As Pat Conroy said, Donald Gordon was working on a hunch. I think anybody else's hunch is just as good as that of Donald Gordon, the man who is in charge of the wartime prices board in Canada.
There are certain other factors which the government must face. One of the most important is the suspicion, inbred and ingrained, on the part of the worker, as to the good faith of the government and of employers. In other words, the worker feels he will not get justice. Last night the hon. member for Cape Breton South (Mr. Gillis) referred to certain alleged violations of the law which had taken place in Hamilton. He pointed out that those now working are being paid for twenty-four hours a day, that there is a landing strip for aircraft in the plant, that employees are staying and living in the plant. And again-and this was not refuted-he said that rationed goods are going into that plant in great quantities. I am not saying that in every case the law is being broken by Stelco, but I say in certain cases it is being broken by the company, and the government is taking no action against it.
The workers see other things. They see a union member punch a scab-and the minister, as an old union man, knows what a scab is-on the nose. The worker was sent down for sixty days. Then some other person comes along and fires a gun at members of the picket line and he is fined $10. There is no justice in that.
By and large, I think the minister has made good selections in his appointment of conciliation officers, but he did not make a good choice in the case of Mr. Justice Roach. To my mind, he was not impartial, and he said that the union was run by a dictatorship because the union would not accept some of his ideas. I should like to quote from the record
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where Mr. Justice Roach is being questioned by the hon. member for Vancouver East as follows:
Q. On whose authority then did you, as commissioner, make this offer of ten cents across the board and the other matters associated with it?
A. I made it on my own responsibility.
Q. And if then you had no authority for this proposal, and if the men had accepted your suggestion, your proposal that this ten cents per hour wage increase should be put before the employees to be voted on by secret ballot and that secret ballot carried, what assurance did you have that the company would come through with the ten cents?
A. Oh, I had no assurance.
He expected the union to accept this hypothetical offer and then have another vote, and he was surprised because the union did not do so. Then he incorporated in his report the absolutely stupid statement that the union was working under a dictatorship.
There are one or two other points I should like to comment upon. Two or three days ago everybody was full of praise for the work of this committee, but now we are not so sure about it. I have no doubt that the members of the committee worked earnestly, assiduously and honestly, but to the great disappointment of the people of this country; they started out like a 16-inch howitzer and finished up like a pea-shooter.
There are two parts of the report with which I disagree. I do not like recommendation No. 5, which concerns itself solely with the law of picketing. If we are to concern ourselves with the law of picketing, there should also be a law on the statute books of this country about strike-breaking. Then in connection with recommendation No. 6 I find myself in substantial agreement with the hon. member for Spadina (Mr. Croll). As I interpret that recommendation, it means that after a strike vote has been properly taken at Stelco the minister is given permission to go and take another vote. If that is correct, then it is a violation of the rights of trade unions in this country.


Humphrey Mitchell: My hon. friend knows that is not correct.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: I do not know it is not correct, because I have been waiting three days for the minister to make a statement.


Humphrey Mitchell: If my hon. friend will sit down and let me speak-


Alistair McLeod Stewart: I am not going to sit down until I have had my say, because I do not want to listen to you just now.


Humphrey Mitchell: I have been waiting for three days.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: I assure the minister that there is no member in this house wlio would not have sat down to give him a chance to speak, but he has made no attempt to rise in his place. He has interrupted other speakers frequently enough, but I am speaking now and I am going to finish. I shall be very happy to hear the Minister of Labour afterwards, but I am giving my interpretation at the moment and it stands until he refutes it.
So far as I am concerned, if No. 6 is accepted as the policy of this country it will mean the end of trade unionism. It is just as dangerous and just as fatal as that. I should like to say something to the Minister of Labour and I am . going to speak in a kindly way. I am going to be frank and I am going to speak with a conception of British fair play. I am not going to get down to the gutter. I am going to tell the minister one or two facts which I think he ought to know. The first is that he no longer has the confidence of organized labour in this country. For one reason or another he has completely forfeited their confidence. I appreciate that the Minister of Labour wishes to serve this parliament and Canada, but the best way he could serve this country would be to tender his resignation as Minister of Labour without any mental reservation whatsoever.


An hon. MEMBER:: Says who?


Alistair McLeod Stewart: However, from the group which I see around him I doubt if we would get a better one.


James Horace King: I would ask the hon. member to address the Chair.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: I shall be glad to address myself to you, sir. Through you, Mr. Speaker, I say that the Minister of Labour would be performing a signal service were he to resign. Unfortunately, when we consider the ranks over there we find there are not many trade unionists from which we could choose some one to put in his place.


An hon. MEMBER:: Are you one?


Alistair McLeod Stewart: I am a trade unionist and I have my card here. The Minister of Labour has a card also, I am told.


Douglas Charles Abbott: I thought you were a chartered accountant?


Alistair McLeod Stewart: If one of you will speak without all trying to speak together I could listen and answer. I cannot understand a rabble. The only thing I can say is that we know the devil we have and

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we would be uncertain of the devil we do not have. But this is certain. Until the Minister of Labour acquires the confidence of the workers of this country he is going to be faced with even greater labour troubles than those that confront him to-day.


Ernest George Hansell: Mr. Speaker, I had not intended taking part in this debate, but everybody else seems to be taking a little crack at something or other. Ever since this industrial relations committee was first set up, a number of thoughts have been going through my mind. I must confess that I was a little disappointed this afternoon that neither of the amendments proposed earlier in the day were permitted to go through. The committee started out with a fairly big job to do and I wanted to see it done right. I am not saying that no ground was covered by the committee, but I do say that during the past weeks they do not appear to have solved the problem. It seems to me that the mountain has laboured and brought forth a mouse.
I must confess that I never did hold out very much hope that a parliamentary committee would solve the problem. I am quite certain that no information was brought out during the sittings of that committee that the government did not have already, or that they could not easily have obtained if they wanted it. The hon. member for Calgary West (Mr. Smith) seems to be the gentleman who conceived the idea that a parliamentary committee would be able to solve the problem and he rose in his place and made the suggestion to the government. Immediately the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) rose and said, "I am quite happy to accept the suggestion of my hon. friend." The hon. member for Calgary West has not been sitting in this house quite as long as some of us, and I want to say to him that I always am a little suspicious when the Prime Minister accepts a suggestion made by the opposition. Let me tell the hon. member for Calgary West this one-thing, that the Prime Minister has all the answers. Don't ever underrate his political acumen.


Mr. GIBSON (Comox-Alberni):: Clever,
Isn't he?


Ernest George Hansell: He is certainly clever
along that line. What actually happened was this. The hon. member for Calgary West wanted the parliamentary committee on industrial relations set up. The Prime Minister immediately rose in his place and took him at his wor'd. The result was that the responsibility of the government was then placed in the lap of the entire parliament of Canada.


An hon. MEMBER:: Where it should be.


Ernest George Hansell: I do not agree with that, and I will answer that remark in a moment.
The position now is this. The parliament of Canada has not solved the problem, and if the government cannot solve it they will always have the answer: Now do not talk to us because we gave you an opportunity to solve the problem and you could not do so. Under our parliamentary system of government, until it is changed, the matter rests just here, that when a political party bids for power to run the country and the people vest in it the right and the power to run the country, the government must accept the responsibility of running it, and must not pass the buck. That is the reason I desired the amendment to go through, because part of the amendment was to recognize that this was a government responsibility, and it is a government responsibility.
Are we to assume that the government did not know the labour situation before the parliamentary committee was set up? They certainly did. If they did not they were not measuring up to their responsibilities. I would ask the Minister of Labour (Mr. Mitchell) a question and he can answer it now or later when he replies. Does he know a single thing more now about the labour situation in Canada than he did before the parliamentary committee was set up?


Humphrey Mitchell: I will answer my hon.
friend right away. None of us is too old to learn. My answer is yes.


Ernest George Hansell: I am very glad to hear
that terse answer from the minister, and if that is his general attitude, perhaps the Social Credit party can even teach him something. I do not agree with the hon. member who preceded me, rushing in where angels fear to tread, even though devils do not, and demanding the resignation of the minister, because, if the minister resigns, who is to take his place? Somebody else in the government will have to take his place.


John Horne Blackmore: He would be a
Liberal, just as bad.


Ernest George Hansell: Yes; he would be a
member of the same administration, and you cannot divorce the minister's policy from government policy. So who is to take his place? Tim Buck? I have received telegrams demanding the minister's resignation and I pay not the slightest attention to them.


John Lambert Gibson: Why don't you fire him?
Industrial Relations


Ernest George Hansell: I do not want to fire
him; I am not in the firing business. I would just as soon see him there as anyone else from the same administration. It is the government who are running the country; they have this problem on their hands, and they have not measured up to the responsibility of meeting it. That is all. You have said it all when you have said that.


John Horne Blackmore: They do not know
what to do about it.


Ernest George Hansell: No, they do not. Even
in this debate, what are we talking about?


An hon. MEMBER:: Oh, oh!


Ernest George Hansell: I can enjoy the implications of that joke as well as my hon. friends can. We have been diagnosing the trouble. We have been attacking the government. We have been snipping all around the problem, but we have not yet made any concrete suggestions as to how the strike can be settled, and labour problems solved.


John Horne Blackmore: You mean the Conservatives and the Liberals have not?


Ernest George Hansell: I do not know that any of us have. Is the thing beyond solution? Surely it cannot be beyond settlement. No problem is beyond settlement. The fact of the matter is that it is the duty of responsible government not merely to solve a problem when it arises, but so to legislate for the entire economy of Canada that problems will not arise. That is an extremely hard thing to do; I recognize that.
What is this particular problem? The labour men want more wages. Their employers, on the other hand, the steel industry, say: We are sorry but we cannot give it to you. Perhaps both of them are right; I do not know. We do know that labour wants more. Whether the steel industry can pay it or not, I am personally still undecided. But I would say this, that if both are right, are we just going to let the thing rest there, or is there an alternative? Has the committee suggested any other possible solution to the problem?


John Horne Blackmore: It never even thought of it.


Ernest George Hansell: I am glad the hon. member for Lethbridge (Mr. Blackmore) interjected that remark.


John Lambert Gibson: He was a member of the committee.


Ernest George Hansell: I know that.


John Horne Blackmore: We tried to get them to think of something else and they would not listen.


Ernest George Hansell: Exactly. We in this group believe that we have a solution for these problems, a solution that would not merely heal the present sore spot on the body politic but make the body healthy so that no more sores would break out. That is the point.
I have heard a good deal against private enterprise and that the government should do this and do that and the other thing. It appears to me that my C.C.F. friends to my right-and I like these hon, gentlemen, I talk to them, you know; they call me Ernie and I call them Bill and so forth and so on-rise in their places as though they were the only champions of labour.


John Lambert Gibson: They think so.


Ernest George Hansell: In spite of the criticisms which have been levelled at the Minister of Labour, I do not believe that they are any more the champions of the rights of labour than is the Minister of Labour himself. That is my personal opinion.


John Lambert Gibson: They just talk labour; that is all.


Ernest George Hansell: I am not speaking for my group here; I make my own conclusions. The minister has a problem on his hands. I do not think he knows how to solve it. He will not come to us to ask us how. But that does not make any difference. I say here and now that our socialist friends are no more the champions of the rights of working men than-is anybody else in this house or any other party in Canada. That is my honest opinion. They have a great deal to say in blaming private enterprise for our troubles, as though, in championing the cause of labour, it is to be assumed that labour itself does not believe in private enterprise. I wonder whether that is so. The hon. member for Wetaskiwin (Mr. Jaques) a little while ago brought out the point-I do not know how accurate he was- that in the last election-and the vote is what tells the story-in all the industrial centres in Canada east of Winnipeg the C.C.F. candidates not only did not win a seat, but lost their deposits.


Mr. ZAPLITNY:: That is completely
wrong.


Ernest George Hansell: You tell us how many C.C.F. candidates ran and how many lost their deposits, and that will straighten it out. Anyway, we do know that they did not get the labour vote in those industrial constitu-

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eneies. All I am saying is that these people who claim the right to be the champions of labour, and who are or claim they are socialists, did not receive the full support of labour, and the only conclusion I can reach is that in the main the labouring people of Canada do not.want socialism.


John Horne Blackmore: They want results. That is the important thing.


An hon. MEMBER:: And do they get them?


John Horne Blackmore: The government does not seem to know what to give them.


Ernest George Hansell: I want to read from an article which appeared in 1943 in the Wholesale Grocers' News. It contains a statement made by Mr. William Green, president of the American Federation of Labor. This is what he said:
As the spokesman for a labour organization with six and a half million members, I want to make it emphatically clear here and now that the American Federation of Labor stands four-square in support of free and private enterprise. We recognize the right to own and manage property for public and private profit . . . We . . . will oppose any attempt to abridge, restrict or interfere with the functions of free enterprise . . .
Individual liberty and security are inseparably associated with the vital principle of free enterprise and the private ownership of property. These priceless blessings will remain with us only so long as we maintain the source from which they flow. They will go with the wind, pass beyond our reach and it will be difficult, if not impossible, to regain them if ever there is substituted for them any form of communism or governmental regimentation.
Because labour understands fully that it will suffer most if ever the foundation and superstructure of free government is destroyed or impaired, it stands firm in its determination to protect and preserve free enterprise and the private ownership of property at any cost.
Regardless of how capital and labour, employer and employee, management and workers, may disagree upon other economic, social and political questions, they stand united in defense of the maintenance of free enterprise and the preservation of the joint benefits which flow therefrom.
These are the words of William Green, president of the American Federation of Labor. I see that it is nearly six o'clock. I have something else to put on the record, but I realize that time is going, and I will conclude my remarks by repeating once again that ini the final analysis it must be the government's responsibility to solve the problems of the country. They should so legislate that those problems will not arise; but if they arise, they will be easy of solution. Any party which bids for power must be willing to accept that responsibility.
At six o'clock the house took recess.
After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock.


Karl Kenneth Homuth: In rising to continue the debate on the report of the industrial relations committee, I wish first to pay a tribute to the hon. member for Macleod (Mr. Hansell) who spoke just before the recess. He always brings freshness, humour and a lot of common sense to our deliberations and we appreciate hearing him at any time.
I wish to endorse the statements which have been made by my colleagues who are members of the committee and other hon. members of the committee with regard to the way the committee worked. I should also like to pay tribute to the splendid work of the chairman and the general feeling of trying to do something to cure the industrial unrest in the country. We went to the committee meetings with a certain amount of suspicion, thinking that, possibly, the members of the various political parties would try to jockey for position. In the first few days that was perhaps a little apparent, but it soon died out because we got to know each other much better.
There were members on the committee who were new members of the house; and when the committee finally reached the in-camera stage to bring in its report there was a feeling amongst all the members-even though three of them did oppose one section of the report- that they had tried to do a good job and had worked long and arduous hours in doing so.
Now that the report has come into the house for endorsation, we find that many members who were not on the committee are condemning it because it did not settle the strikes which are prevalent throughout Canada. Throughout the proceedings of the committee I contended-and I was supported generally by most members of the committee-that our job was not to settle the prevailing strikes but to try to evolve some machinery as an improvement on the present machinery so that we could avoid strikes in the future.
I do not think any member of the committee went to its meetings, and I do not think the members of the house thought that they would go there with the idea that they were going to set the standard of wages, the hours of labour or other conditions for which unions and industry are struggling. I do not think it was our job to do that, but out of the committee has come a report which, if implemented by the government, will, in my opinion, do a great deal to cure the ills from which industry is suffering.
In fighting political battles I have never been one who has pulled my punches. When
Industrial Relations

I go out to fight a political battle I put everything I have into it, but I have never yet used personalities in any election campaign in which I have participated. I resent hon. members rising in their places and asking for the head of the Minister of Labour (Mr. Mitchell). When election time comes round I shall go out and try to defeat the Minister of Labour, not because he is Minister of Labour, but because he is following the philosophy of a party with which I disagree. I suppose I have known the Minister of Labour longer than any other member of the House of Commons. In fact, back in the old days he and I belonged to the same party. In those days we were fairly successful in that party. I have known him for many years and I have had a high regard for him as a man who knew labour, but he was a conservative, careful labour leader.
I remember one Saturday morning going home from Ottawa. I usually drop into a little hotel in Toronto for my breakfast because I have to stay over there. I met my friend Humphrey. Humphrey was on his way to fight a by-election in Welland after having been named Minister of Labour. I shook hands with him and congratulated him on having been named Minister of Labour. I said to him then: "Humphrey, if you are permitted to handle the Department of Labour without any political interference"- and I do not mean narrow political interference; I mean the general policy of the government-"if you are allowed to do that, I have no fear whatever 'but that you are going to make a real success of a very difficult job." But he is in this position. The Minister of Finance (Mr. Ilsley) says, "I want more money." He provides for it in his budget and we pay or else. The Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Claxton) says, "These are the regulations under which you will take this or that medicine; these are the regulations under which you must work." The Minister of Labour is dealing with human beings. He is dealing with men who are not always easy to deal with. I say this quite frankly and - sincerely, that many of the things which he could do and would do, many of "the things which he has tried to do-and I am not giving any special praise to him-have been nullified because of the very thing which my colleague, the hon. member for Calgary West (Mr. Smith) referred to, namely, the lack of liaison, the lack of cooperation between the various departments of government. What better example have we than what is happening to-day?
A few weeks ago the government announced that they were going to remove the subsidy on

milk. What did that mean? It meant a two-cent increase in the price of a quart of milk to the consumers of the country. The government said that this will save $20 or $22 million a year. If it were a saving and it were shown in the budget, or in the expenditures for the coming year as a saving, then we could readily say that we were going back to the normal peace-time type of business. They removed the subsidy, and the burden which used to be put on the treasury of Canada is now placed on the shoulders of the people, particularly the fathers of large families who have to buy the milk. At the same time we pick up the supplementary estimates and find millions of dollars for public buildings. Surely, when we need houses for our people, when we are trying to hold the line on inflation, when we wish to see to it that we shall not have the conditions which followed after the last war-and I went through them-at least we ought to see to it that we protect the line in every department of government. What has happened? We hear now that the producer subsidy on milk is to be taken off. In Ottawa this will mean that milk which, under the previous subsidies, cost the consumer ten cents a quart will now cost fifteen cents a quart, or an increase of fifty per cent. Then the industrial worker will come to the Minister of Labour and say, "I must have more wages. I cannot feed my family, because with the increased cost of all these things my children must have I am not getting enough money." ' Those are the problems with which the minister is faced. So that I say I am not one of those who will go out and demand the head of the Minister of Labour. I am quite prepared, when an election comes around, to go out and ask for the heads of everybody sitting over there, but I do say that we should at least be fair about these things.
To-night I wish to deal with this problem in perhaps a little different way from that in which other speakers have dealt with it. As I say, I do not think our committee was set up for the purpose of establishing wages, hours and so on. We were set up to try to evolve some better machinery, and if this report is implemented by the government it will at least be something. But let us go back over the years since the beginning of the war. When war broke out, a great many industrialists in this country realized that the cost of living had increased, and. they raised wages. Others did not. Then came the law providing for the cost of living bonus. This was all based on 1939 figures. Were they the right ones? I do not know; I would say not. I would say that the wage rate of 1939

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was not a fair rate, because of conditions that existed at that time; and certainly the cost of living, taken in those terms, was not comparable. However, that was what the government did. Then, after a time during which industry was supposed to pay this cost of living bonus, wages were frozen. What had happened? A great many industries in this country had not been paying the cost of living bonus, with the result that, when, wages were frozen, under the law they could not pay the bonus which previously they had denied to their employees. So that we had in the cities and towns across Canada a checker-board system of wages which certainly was unfair to the industrial workers. Later, we had tremendous taxation imposed upon the wages of those workers, taxation which year after year caused loss of production and absenteeism. Why? Our people have become educated in the last few years. They have had to make out income tax returns, and now they know how to use figures. If you asked a man to work on Saturday afternoon he would figure that if he worked four hours his earnings for that week would be so increased that he would have to work those four hours for seventeen or eighteen or nineteen cents; and the higher his rate of pay, the less he actually received for working overtime.
The whole scheme was such that the financial policy of the government was nullifying the very thing the price control board and the Minister of Labour were trying to do. Time after time in budget debates we asked this government to grant greater exemptions to industrial workers. They refused. They were taxing the people of this country, so they said, not only to get revenue but to stop inflation. One budget came down and provided for compulsory savings. This was to give the workers of this country a backlog of savings with the government for the time when the W'ar wrould be over and we would be going through the reconstruction period. The following year, after protests from all across the country because of the money that was being taken from the pay envelopes of the workers, in his budget the Minister of Finance said they were going to relieve the people of these compulsory savings. They were not giving the industrial workers of the country anything. They were just letting them keep the money which was rightfully theirs. At that time we urged, "If you want to stop inflation, increase the exemptions of the industrial workers. Put them under a compulsory savings plan if you wish, but at least they will know that when the war is over and they go through a period which may mean unem-63260-329
ployment for a time they will have this money as a backlog to look after themselves and their families." Another budget came down. Again we urged increased exemptions in the lower income brackets. Again it was refused. I say this, and it is not being said in a critical sense but because I want to point out to the members of this house that much of our labour discord, many of the problems with which the Minister of Labour is faced to-day, are not due to the way in which the Department of Labour has tried to administer the law but to the general policy of the government, which I think was unfair to the industrial workers of Canada. If this government had brought down a 1946 budget in 1946, instead of bringing down a 1947 budget in 1946, at least the industrial workers would have been given some slight relief.
There is the whole question with which we are faced. Coming as I do from an industrial riding, I have some knowledge of industrial workers. Some of my hon. friends to my left, as I said this afternoon, would condemn every manufacturer in Canada by saying they are not honest; they cannot be trusted; they have not the interests of their employees at heart. That is the sort of stuff that starts communism in any country. Those are the kind of speeches that stir up unrest. I went to work; I punched the clock at twenty minutes after six o'clock in the morning -when I first started, and I was given pretty small pay; even the employer thought he was paying me too little. But these hon. gentlemen, as the hon. member for Macleod said this afternoon, think they are the only ones who represent labour. All I could see in their whole scheme was the politics behind it all. How well do I remember that in various elections certain union leaders went out and told their followers. "This is how you vote. You vote for the C.C.F." These people talk about their love of labour and what they will do for labour, but they are ready and willing to have union leaders regiment the most sacred thing a man has; that is, his ballot. They are prepared to let those leaders turn those ballots their way, in order to "put a socialist flag on capital hill", as they decided at their annual meeting in Saskatchewan the other day they would like to do.


John Oliver Probe: Tell some of that to Mr. Hilton.


Karl Kenneth Homuth: Mr. Hilton handled himself very well before the committee. And I did not see any of your men doing anything to subscribe to what your leader, and other members who were not on the committee, suggested should be done.

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Let me say this, that I am surprised at what the leader of the C.C.F. said yesterday, that he is willing to tie wages to profits. Let him ask any union leader in this country if he is prepared to have the wages of his union members tied to the profits of a company. Furthermore, he said he was also prepared to advocate that personal productivity should be the extent of wages a man should earn-personal productivity. If you do not believe it, look up the records of Hansard, because I asked him the question.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: It should be a factor.


Karl Kenneth Homuth: I asked him the question. I say these are the men who presume to represent labour; and yet, as the hon. member for Macleod said, how many of them represent industrial ridings in the Dominion of Canada to-day? The point I was coming to was this, that one thing I could see in that committee, as a result of the briefs placed there by the union, a thing which I know is bothering a lot of people back home, a thing which I know is bothering industrial workers in this country, is the fear of the future. It is a real, live fear, because the last depression is so close to us. I do not blame them for that fear. Therefore I say that if we had the type of liaison and the type of cooperation between various departments of government that I think there ought to be, many of these difficulties would be solved, and much of the legislation which passes one department and is negatived by another would disappear.
What do we find? Hon. members in this house, and particularly those in the C.C.F., find fault that we have not come in with certain specific recommendations. Let me say that two members of the C.C.F. party who sat on that committee endorsed its policy, all the way through the picture. They endorsed the report; they endorsed clause 6. And what was clause 6? Clause 6 gives the right to the working man to declare what tie wants, by secret ballot. I am not going to deny him that right. If we are going to deny the working man that right, then we might as well have regimentation immediately. It is a right they have. If what many of the men who are out on strike to-day say is true, if many men, with whom I have been associated for years and who are active in labour circles had had the secret ballot; if there had been no intimidation, and if they had all had an opportunity to vote, those plants would be producing to-day, as they ought to be.
This afternoon the hon. member for Cariboo (Mr. Irvine) took my colleague the hon. member for Calgary West (Mr. Smith) to task because he referred to communism, and

because he referred to communists who were heading some of the unions in this country. Let there be no mistake; there never was a more perfect plan to communize Canada than there is at work .to-day. We have seen it in the last few years. Strangers come into town and stir up industrial friction, organize a few men into a union and call the factory on strike, without any hope of winning the strike. But they do it for one purpose: They do it because they want to cause unrest. They want to thwart authority. They do not want these strikes to be settled; they do not want peace in industry. They want to create unrest, and to sabotage the whole economy of Canada. Just as soon as these men see that there is no chance of winning the strike- and I have seen it time and again; I know the Minister of Labour has seen it-they get out from under, sneak away and leave these strikers, whom they have urged to go out, holding the bag.
What is behind this plan, this well-conceived plan, a plan which they must have never expected to bring into actuality? They do this because they can sneak away and leave 100, 150, 200 or 250 strikers that they have taken out of industry, and most of whom want to work-they leave those workers holding the bag, in the belief that they have left behind at least twenty-five or thirty, or perhaps a few more, communists.
They are men with hatred in their hearts, men who hate their employers, men who hate constituted authority, men who hate everything. And why? Because they are led by these men, led to go out on strike. If they can carry out that pattern in every industrial centre in Canada, as they are trying to do, Tim Buck will have his 40,000 communists in this country.
Mr. Speaker, this is a serious situation. I find fault with the government for having passed an order in council and then not enforcing it. Our committee report says that law is the basis of society. Undoubtedly, after the most careful consideration the government passed an order in council. That order in council provided that a controller would be put into the steel company plants. The order in council provided that those who violated it wTould be punished; there was a punishment clause inserted. It provided that, the steel controller having taken over the plants, having taken the plants from these companies, they were no longer the property of those companies, but rather the property of the government of Canada. The steel controller had power to make agreements as to wages or anything else.
Why did he not exercise those powers? Why is the government going to allow lawlessness

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in this country? If we allow that, then goodness knows what will happen in the very near future. If we are to overlook the breaking of law, as it has been done in Hamilton-and I do not care whether it is industry or the employee who breaks it-and as it was done in Windsor, then surely we cannot blink at things like that. But we have done it.
Some members will say to me that under an order in council you could take these men into court and fine them for a breach of the order in council. They would say, "If you were Minister of Labour or Minister of Justice would you be prepared to drag 2,400 or 2,500 people into court and fine them for breach of the law?" My answer would be this, that if I were not prepared to carry out the order in council I would not have passed it.
I have said that when the committee met we got to know each other better. I feel that the members of the committee sat dowrn with the honest intention of accomplishing something. We now come into the house and we find that there is certain opposition to the report.
I am not surprised at the attitude of the hon. member for Vancouver East (Mr. Mac-Innis) toward matters pertaining to labour, toward matters pertaining to the general economy of the country, and toward industry in this country. I have never heard him say anything good about industry in this country and I do not expect he ever will. There are certain people w'ho can continue with that attitude and that type of feeling in their ridings and perhaps the people will continue to return them to the House of Commons. As I say, I was not surprised at the attitude of the hon. member for Vancouver East, because to him anyone who employs anyone is just taboo. He wants to have no association with such a man. When the hon. member was speaking in the house on November 6, 1945, the hon. member for London (Mr. Manross) asked a couple of questions. I quote from page 1894 of Hansard as follows:
Mr. Manross:	How many men did you ever
hire?
Mr. Maclnnis:	I never hired anybody.
Mr. Manross:	And never will.
Mr. Maclnnis:	Quite right, and I do not
want to because I do not want to make a living by exploiting somebody else.
That is the policy of one of the chief lieutenants of the leader of the C.C.F. Supposing every one who started any type of industry in this country had had the same idea? There would not have been any industry in Canada; there would not have been anything in this country. Some of those hon. members condemned communism in the committee, and I believe they were sincere; but speeches such 63260-3291
as we have heard during this debate will certainly do nothing to bring industrial peace to this country. Rather they will do everything to stir up industrial unrest.
I do not happen1 to be one of those who can look back to centuries of British blood behind him; I happen to be a descendant of people who came from Europe, a long time ago it is true. They came here, and all they asked was the right to set their feet on the shores of Canada and be permitted to work out their destiny. They could not speak English when they came here, but that is 140 years ago. They saw what was happening in their own fatherland and they left, not because they hated their fatherland but because they loved freedom more. They came to Canada, and over the years like hundreds of thousands of others they struggled to make this country what it is to-day. They asked for no favours; all they asked was the right to work, to live their own lives and to raise their children with a certain amount of freedom to them.
They never thought the day would come when this land of their adoption would be faced with the very thing that they had hated over there, with the very thing that was the curse of Europe, the thing that will be the curse of Canada unless we take steps now to see that it is wiped and blotted out. I blame the government for not enforcing the law as they ought to. I blame the Minister of Justice (Mr. St. Laurent) for having written to the city council of Hamilton saying, "While this committee is sitting, I am not prepared to say what I would do with regard to enforcing the law." I do not know that you should have the right to suspend a law simply because the House of Commons is sitting. Supposing we had been discussing capital punishment or thievery or something else, would you have suspended the laws because some committee was discussing those matters?
This thing is so serious that it will take a strong hand to handle it. We have a wonderful future, a future for which thousands and thousands of men died in this war and thousands and thousands died in the first great war. It is up to us to see to it that the future they fought to preserve for us is preserved. The only way we can do this is by seeing to it that the law in Canada is lived up to and that communism, with all the viciousness that it represents, is wiped out.


Humphrey Mitchell: Mr. Speaker, first of all I
should like to compliment the hon. member for Waterloo South (Mr. Homiuth) upon his remarks, because they take me back to the old days. His views on government and the rights of labour, notwithstanding the fact
Industrial Relations

that he sits there and I stand here, have not differed since those days. I agree with him on the broad question of freedom; I believe in what is sometimes called free enterprise.
I often wonder what would have happened to the freedom of some of my hon. friends during the recent war had it not been for this vicious system of free enterprise they speak of. Over fifty per cent of the industrial production of the world is to be found in North America. Had it not been for that tremendous industrial machine and the will to die if necessary to save a way of life on the part of the young men in our fighting forces, freedom as we understand it would have perished from the earth.
Let me say to my hon. friends who believe in the philosophy of communism, if you can call it a philosophy, that had it not been for the driving forces of our free institutions, communism as they understand it might have perished from the face of the earth and fascism might have reigned supreme upon the continent of Europe. Let us be frank and honest about this and give credit where credit is due.
The driving force of free enterprise, of the people who at one time stood alone to save free institutions as we understand them, was what saved our civilization. In my judgment, some of the so-called leaders in this country have deliberately set in motion policies designed to destroy the reconversion efforts of the Canadian people. Where were those so-called leaders prior to the entry of Russia into the war? Let us look at the record.


William Irvine: What has this to do with
strikes?


Humphrey Mitchell: The hon. member need not worry, I will come to the strikes. I tell my socialist friend not to worry about that. Where were they?


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Where were they in
the Grey North by-election?


Humphrey Mitchell: Where were they-


James Horace King: I would ask hon. members not to interrupt the minister who has the floor, without his permission.


Humphrey Mitchell: I have no objection to interruptions because I have lived in that atmosphere all my life. I come from a town where we glory in it. What I wanted to bring to the attention of the house is this: You cannot play politics at this particular time with the destiny of a nation. I am sure that my hon. friend the member for Calgary West (Mr. Smith) after being here for a couple of sessions must sometimes like myself wish

he had stayed at home to enjoy the balmy breezes of the foothills of the Rockies. I know I sometimes regret being in my present position, but like my hon. friend I felt it my duty, during the difficult period we have been passing through in the last six years, to stay on. Let me compliment him upon making the motion he did and upon the statesmanlike attitude he took on the broad question of industrial relations when he made his speech in the House of Commons. I do not say this to flatter him but he showed deep insight into the processes that have made our democratic institutions what they are, and a deep insight also into the aims and aspirations of the working people of this country. I want to point out that the motion to establish the committee was supported by every member of this House of Commons without exception. The report of the committee was a unanimous one, with the exception that two members of the committee disagreed with one section of the report.


Mr. BENTLEY:: Three.


Humphrey Mitchell: Who was the third one?


Thomas John Bentley: I was.


Humphrey Mitchell: Well, then, history has been made. I did not see much of my hon. friend in the committee but he must have come along later. I believe that the committee rendered a distinct service. The hon. member for Macleod (Mr. Hansell), in the course of his address, asked me if I had learned anything from the committee. I am certain that the people of Canada learned something from the discussions in the committee for, after all, the processes of democratic government breathe and live on difficulties such as were presented to us. We had officers of labour organizations and of industry appear before the committee and give their opinions on labour conditions as they are at this moment. I do not think any member of the committee felt that a conciliation board of thirty-five members could settle any industrial dispute. The committee was not set up for that purpose, and the record will bear me out in that statement. I think it was the hon. member for Calgary West who suggested that we endeavour to settle the dispute in the steel industry, and Mr. L. W. Brockington, K.C., was asked to assume that onerous duty. I want to pay this tribute to Mr. Brockington: I think he served the committee well.
May I add that Mr. Justice W. D. Roach also served the committee well. At the very basis of our institutions is the right to differ in opinion, and it may be that some differed with the opinions of Mr. Justice Roach, but

Industrial Relations
undoubtedly he has rendered a distinct service both to labour and to employers by acting as chairman of fourteen or fifteen conciliation boards, and he assumed the difficult position of commissioner in this dispute in the light of his previous experience.
The speeches that have been made in this house since the committee's report has been before us have given some indication of the difficulties in industrial disputes. I have had some experience in these matters, and I do not believe that you can settle an industrial dispute by making statements to the newspapers. Industrial disputes are not settled in that way. Nor can you, in my judgment, settle them by taking sides in this house. At this very moment conferences are going on in the largest industry in this country in connection with a dispute over wages. You see nothing about it in the newspapers; yet these conferences are going on in a constructive effort to effect a settlement.
I do not think you can be a trade union leader and a politician at the same time. I say that from practical experience. My Conservative friends, particularly my hon. friend the member for Haldiimand (Mr. Senn), will remember that it was a regular thing some years ago for the Conservatives to win Hamilton East. In fact we had to pick out the sacrificial goat to take a beating by our Conservative friends. But, thank heaven, those days are past.
Mr. SENN; There is another day coming.


Humphrey Mitchell: We shall see. I remember that in 1931 I was secretary of the Hamilton district trades and labour council, and the boys said to me, "Humphrey, it is your turn next." At that convention there were thirty official delegates and I was nominated as the candidate. After the election, I woke up the next morning and found I was member of parliament for that constituency. I have found this out from experience, that I could not combine the two offices-


William Earl Rowe: You did well for a while.


Humphrey Mitchell: That is true, and I have done well since. But I found that in practice I could not be a good secretary of the trades and labour council and at the same time make the contribution I should make in this House of Commons. The two things do not work together. I am not going into the history of it. We used to run a non-political council in those days.


William Earl Rowe: "Some" non-political council. I remember it quite well.


Humphrey Mitchell: My hon. friend says he remembers it?


William Earl Rowe: The biggest political council in Hamilton.


Humphrey Mitchell: I want to tell him that the Hamilton trades and labour council in my day made the greatest contribution to the life of the community of any organization in the city of Hamilton.


William Earl Rowe: They must have, when they elected you.


Humphrey Mitchell: I intend) to deal briefly, and I hope in a non-political way with what I think of the fundamental principles of this report and what I believe are the fundamental issues which confront the people of this dominion. Rightly or wrongly-and I believe, rightly-this nation and this committee have endorsed the principle of price control.


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: Massey-Harris.


Humphrey Mitchell: My prairie chicken says "Massey-Harris".


Stanley Howard Knowles: Let us not get into the zoo again.


Humphrey Mitchell: I repeat, rightly or
wrongly the great majority of the people of this country have endorsed the principle of price control. I am frank to admit that this is a matter of judgment, of opinion. My hon. friend the member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell) spoke a couple of days ago of bringing in the scientists. He also reminded us that economics is a dismal science, and we all know that no two economists in one room can agree with each other. You have to get plain, every-day people like the hon. member and myself to make the decisions. However, I admit there are two points of view. There are those who, like my hon. friend the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bracken), hold that the proper thing to do is-in the language of the street-to lift the lid, get the production, and let it shake itself down. That is the course they have plotted in the United States. We think that, at least in this period of transition, the soundest thing to do is to move gradually and in an evolutionary way out of the controls which were necessary during the war. I think my hon. friend will give us credit for as much sincerity as he himself holds, and he will concede that all of us, in the final analysis, are advocating our respective policies with the simple and fundamental object of protecting the living standards of the great mass of the people of this country. Only time will tell whether he is right and we are wrong, or whether we are right and he is wrong. Naturally, I believe that we are right, because-


Mr. McIVOR:: Because you know.
Industrial Relations


Humphrey Mitchell: No; I am not one of those clever fellows who bet on the horse after the race is run, like my hon. friend the member for Dufferin-Simcoe (Mr. Rowe). But the proof of the pudding is in the eating of it. Look around the world and you will see that in every country there is a fight to maintain the living standards of their people. And which nation has been most successful? The record and the figures show that Canada has been more successful than any other nation in the world.


John Oliver Probe: Ten families to a house.


Humphrey Mitchell: I have no patience with those people who always decry their own country and their own people. When all is said and done, these policies would not be possible but for the cooperation of the great mass of the Canadian people. Like the hon. member for Waterloo South I was not born in this country.


Mr. MacNICOL:: He was born here.


Karl Kenneth Homuth: Sometimes I wonder why I was born.


Humphrey Mitchell: When I listened to some of the hon. members who spoke this afternoon I wondered that about myself. I have been in most of the countries of the world, and I know of no country where I would rather live and raise my family than Canada.
I have suggested that we should look around. Let us look across the street. I sit for the constituency of Welland. I fought the last election on wage stabilization and price control, and all I had to say to my good friends there was this, "Do not ask me; just go across the border." My hon. friend the Secretary of State (Mr. Martin) could ask his voters the same thing, just to go across the bridge from Windsor into the city of Detroit. There is no need to go to New York or Philadelphia or Chicago to see the effects of an unrestricted price structure.
I think it was the hon. member for Cape Breton South (Mr. Gillis)-and I am not saying this "in a kindly way"-


Clarence Gillis: You can be as rough as you like.


Humphrey Mitchell: -who took our good friend Donald Gordon and took him to bits and put him together.


Clarence Gillis: That is right.


Humphrey Mitchell: I am convinced of this, that my hon. friend would admit in his quieter moments that he does not covet the job which Donald Gordon is trying to carry out.


Clarence Gillis: I was very kind to him.


Humphrey Mitchell: Let us look at the record. In the United States the whole road is strewn with men who tried to do what Donald Gordon and his organization have done so successfully in the Dominion of Canada. I know it is easy to rise in one's place in this house, with all the freedom we have, and criticize some individual who is not here and cannot speak for himself. That is the easiest thing to do. But if I have to choose between Gordon and some third-rate economist that I see walking around in the railway committee room, slipping notes to certain people, I will choose Donald Gordon.
Here is an extract from the Winnipeg Free Press, which I think is one of the best papers in Canada, although it criticizes me sometimes.


William Earl Rowe: Not very often.


Humphrey Mitchell: 
Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Before the C.C.F. was born.


Humphrey Mitchell: In those days in Hamilton we used to call them the "latter day saints." As I say, I have always been a believer in higher wages and progressive legislation irrespective of whom it was introduced by. I still maintain that position to-day.
As I have said before in the house, we have an obligation to the millions of defenceless people in the country who cannot protect themselves. We have an obligation to see to it that, as far as humanly possible, with all the trials, tribulations, difficulties and pressures, we protect the living standards of that., as I call them, great defenceless mass of people in Canada. So far as I am concerned, while I have breath in my body I am going to continue to do just that very thing, notwithstanding what may be said by those people who, if they had their way would destroy to-morrow morning freedom as we understand it.
That brings me to another point, but I might stay with price stabilization a little longer. With regard to the present disputes, I think it can be freely admitted by all of us that in 1944 we established a labour code in this country under the jurisdiction of the Department of Labour. I give credit to every party in the house for not criticizing that code at that time, which is an indication that they approved it. It was endorsed by every labour organization in the country. For the first time in the history of Canada labour organizations were protected by law and given the right to
bargain collectively. I am frank to admit that the organizations played some part in it, but, since the establishment of that code, labour organizations in Canada have grown faster than at any time in their history. Let us give credit where credit is due.
Then in the Department of Labour we built up the largest conciliation service in the history of the department, a conciliation service which, in my judgment, given a degree of common sense by both sides and the will to conciliate, can solve any industrial dispute. But I do not think there is any substitution for common sense and conciliation in the adjudication of labour disputes, and that goes for both sides.
It was said by an hon. member here this afternoon, who claimed that he was a trade unionist, that we were out to destroy trade unions. Any man who would say that in this day and age-well, it is amazing to me that he should be a member of the House of Commons.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: Study your own legislation.


Humphrey Mitchell: Take the director of industrial relations in the Department of Labour. He is a trade unionist of forty years standing. The director of industrial relations came from the Canadian Congress of Labour. The deputy minister of labour was an old trade unionist before he went into the labour department of the Manitoba government.
The hon. member for Calgary West will remember that one of the witnesses accused Gordon, myself and, I think, the employers, of a conspiracy to bring on a depression. Just imagine that 1


Thomas Reid: That is old stuff.


Humphrey Mitchell: That is the stuff which makes revolutions out of this pie-in-the-sky philosophy expounded by these fellows which the people sometimes do not understand. Let me say to the employers of this nation that there are no grounds for the so-called fears expressed by some of the hon. gentlemen who have spoken in the last three days. As I have said before, any employer who thinks he can destroy labour unions is just wasting his time. He might just as well try to push back the St. Lawrence river. As a son of a trade unionist and a trade unionist by conviction, I believe that there is no substitution for a well-organized, well-disciplined and well-run trade union as an instrument for the advancement of the working people of Canada.
May I stay with price controls for a moment longer. You cannot have it both ways. I shudder to think what would happen in this
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nation to-morrow if we wiped out price control. Supposing we wiped out rent control. Let us go into the matter with our eyes wide open. What would happen if we wiped out rent control; who would be the greatest sufferers? I think everyone will agree that the working people of this country would be the sufferers. There are many other aspects of price control I could enumerate along those lines.
I now come to section 6, which everybody is bothered about. We are going into uncharted seas here, I am frank to admit, but I have always argued that if you have a good case you need never be afraid to go before any tribunal you think is reasonably honest and decent. Neither should anyone who has a good case be afraid to put it into a secret ballot box. That is so crystal clear to me. The hon. member for Cape Breton South and the hon. member for Skeena (Mr. Archibald) have had a great deal of experience in these matters, I am sure, as I have; and they must have known cases where people were brought in from the street to vote in what did not in the least resemble a ballot as we understand it. The united mine workers of America, from their own practical experience, saw to it that such a condition should be part of the machinery of their organization. I have a vivid recollection-one of many-of a meeting of about sixty people who, by a show of hands, called a strike of 1,400 people. I do not think that is the proper way to run any kind of organization.
I could give the house many examples. I was chairman of a commission having to do with a dispute being run by one of the witnesses who appeared before the industrial relations committee, where they brought people in from the street to cast a strike ballot. And mind you, I think that cuts both ways. I have knowledge of employers doing the same thing, so that all the disciples are not on one side. I think, with a staff skilled in the application of this recommendation of the committee, any minister of labour can use the judgment which is necessary to see to it that it is carried out fairly. If he does not ne should not be minister of labour, and possibly would .not be after the next election. That is the great curative force in all these matters. I believe it is well worth giving a try. I am not going to suggest that it is a cure, you understand, Mr. Speaker, but let me remind hon. members that, with the exception of three members of the committee, this was a unanimous report, which is an indication of the drift of public opinion in regard to the irresponsible leadership of organizations. That is inevitable. The pendulum swings both ways. This is an indication of the feeling in 
the minds of the members of the committee, who represent a broad cross-section of the people of this dominion.
The question of picketing has been touched upon. I have not a great deal more to say about that than I said when I answered the hon. member for Vancouver East (Mr. Mae-Innis) the other day. I am going to repeat my statement at that time. I think an Englishman's home is his castle. I believe he has a right to move from his home to his place of work or business and back again without being molested by anybody, whether they are in the employ of an employer or of a trade union. Let us walk down the middle of the road. I have known the day of the picket line. I have knowrn the day of the goon squad, a day which in this dominion I am happy to say is fast passing. The suggestion has been made that we study the law of picketing. The law of Canada in regard to picketing is akin tc. the law of Great Britain. I was a party to making submissions to Hon. Mr. Guthrie, who was then minister of justice, which brought about the amendment in 1934 of the law concerning picketing. If hon. members are keen on studying that I can tell them it was the submission of the Trades and Labour Congress of Canada of April, 1934. I could read it, but it is quite a lengthy submission. I remember talking to Mr. Guthrie, who in those days sat where the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. MacKinnon) now sits.


James Horace King: Order. The hon. gentleman has spoken for forty minutes.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Continue.


Humphrey Mitchell: That is an encouragement. I think in five or ten minutes I can finish. Let me repeat; I do not think you can have price control without a measure of wage stabilization. We built up across this country a system of boards composed of representatives of labour and of industry, with an impartial chairman, and in some cases the Minister of Labour. Labour representation was put on those boards at the request of labour organizations. Here again, Mr. Speaker, even with the building up of that machinery and all the conciliation services, I do not know how one can settle any labour dispute unless both parties are prepared to use the machinery placed at their disposal. Let us go one step farther. The will of the majority should prevail. The vast majority of the trade unions of this country have availed themselves of the instrumentality of these respective boards. Here, however, you have men representing forty thousand people 'who deliberately set out to circumvent the boards established for that purpose.

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We talk of industrial councils. I am all for them, but I do not believe in compulsory cooperation. I do not believe it is practical, logical or sensible. My advice to the steel workers, to the electrical workers, to the rubber workers and to all other trade unions, in their own selfish interest if you want to put it on that level, and my advice to the employers-and you can put that on the same level-in the interests of our way of life, is that they avail themselves of the machinery set up by the government for the adjudication of labour disputes in this country. Anyone who advises to the contrary is in my opinion, not rendering a service to the employers, the employees or the nation itself. That is why Mr. Brockington's task was so difficult. That is why Mr. Justice Roach's task was so difficult. That is why the task of anybody, in any dispute, is so difficult, when the two parties will not avail themselves of the machinery established by law in this country. My mind goes back to the last British general strike. I have a definite recollection of what led up to it, and what happened after it was finished. It was germinating for many months, and those of us who were there will remember it well. Mr. John Clynes, who was a minister in the war cabinet in the first great war, and secretary of one of the largest organizations in Great Britain had this to say:
I have no doubt that we shall be told that this new-found and ill-digested policy is worth a trial. Those who have thought this matter out know that in giving it a trial they would begin by paralysing our industries and our whole social system. That paralysis would affect first, and worst, the masses of the poorer population. You cannot do it without anticipating a condition of civil war.
I believe this sincerely, that our thoughts should not be influenced by sentiment. If these present disputes are to be considered as substitutes for legal processes, then it is a challenge to our form of government and to our way of life.
I shall not detain the house longer, except to say, as my hon. friends in the committee said, that there are people in this country who do not want us to succeed in our reconversion programme. They do not fit into the pattern of things. They are the people who call for the abolition of wage controls. They are the people who call for the resignation of myself and Donald Gordon, and everybody who attempts to express an opinion in this country. I was rather glad this afternoon to see my hon. friend the member for Winnipeg North (Mr. Stewart) in association with one of the leading communists in this country, in connection with a resolution which 83260-330
I received only within the last couple of days.
It says:
War labour boards and a return to free collective bargaining and the immediate resignation of labour representatives of these boards as a first step towards their dissolution and the immediate resignation of Donald Gordon, chairman of wartime prices and trade board and the Hon. Humphrey Mitchell, Federal Minister of Labour.
I am sure my hon. friend is complimented. He knows the game. He comes from Winnipeg. He is an old trade unionist. He says he is an old trade unionist, and he knows the way it goes. He knows the battle that his own party has had with those people. And let me say this-


Angus MacInnis: We never cooperated with them, as you did.


Humphrey Mitchell: Oh, now; that is all right. Let me say-


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Nonsense.


Angus MacInnis: It is not.


Mr. CHEVRIER:: You do not like what the minister is saying.


Humphrey Mitchell: Now, just a minute, do not be too hasty. The hon. member for Vancouver East (Mr. Maclnnis) had a communist party candidate against him in the last election. Of course he did-and so did I.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: And so did I.


Humphrey Mitchell: And he lost his deposit.


Angus MacInnis: In my case not only the communist lost it, but so did the Liberal and the Conservative.


Humphrey Mitchell: Then why trot out this old talk that we cooperated with the communists? That is all right for the soap-box, but it does not go here.


Angus MacInnis: Do not be so contemptuous of the soap box.


Humphrey Mitchell: I have spoken from one many times.


Angus MacInnis: You are a good man on the soap-box.


Humphrey Mitchell: And that may be true, too. I want to say this in conclusion

and perhaps I have overstayed my welcome-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: No.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: You are making a good speech.


Humphrey Mitchell: I say this, that what is needed at the present time is for all of us to endeavour to maintain the condition of stability we enjoyed during the war.

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When we look around the world; when we look to Calcutta, to Palestine, to Yugoslavia, to Italy, and to those other countries-and among our own family group-we see the emotional let down which is inevitable after six years of terrible war. I predicted that, given a stable economy, we would enjoy a boom for many years in the Dominion of Canada. If we have that individual selfdiscipline, without which no government can fashion a policy, I have no fear of the future well-being of the people of the Dominion of Canada, irrespective of what political party they belong to.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Question.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: No.


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: Mr. Speaker, I think the people of Canada and the labour movement generally will be disappointed in the performance of the Minister of Labour (Mr. Mitchell).


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Question.


Mr. COLD  WELL@: A free parliament; free speech!


William Ross Macdonald: I must ask hon. members to maintain order.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Delaying parliament.


William Ross Macdonald: The hon. member for Dauphin has the right to speak, and he has the floor.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Question.


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: I am sure the stalwart supporters of Liberalism and free speech on the other side of the house-


An hon. MEMBER:: Oh, never mind that; get on with your speech.


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: Mr. Speaker, if hon. members across the way are eager to get on with the work of the house they will help both themselves and the house by keeping quiet, because I do not intend to be shouted down. I will stay here as long as necessary.
I was about to say that the country generally and the labour movement in particular will be disappointed in the speech just made by the Minister of Labour. I am not saying that particularly to criticize the minister; I say it advisedly, because I feel the people of Canada at a critical time like this, when production is being held up by industrial unrest, and when the labour movement which to-day, I believe, is trying to cooperate with the government, is being pushed in the face, in return, would have expected that the Minister of Labour, after a long debate of this kind,

would rise in his place and place before the country .some plan, and seme solution for the present situation.
In spite of that, we heard nothing to-night that we have not heard in the last three days. And the Minister of Labour, instead of telling the house and country what he and his government intend to do to rectify the situation which exists in Hamilton-and it is a serious situation-spent his time in lecturing the house about communism, and things of that kind. Let me say at the outset that I hold no brief for communism, neither does the party with which I am associated. However, it is strange that in June of last year before the election we did not hear these inflammatory speeches against communism by our friends the Liberals because at that time it was more convenient to keep oS the subject.
What are the workers asking for to-day? They are not asking for much, only a living wage as was referred to by the speaker to my left. They are simply asking for something that will put them where they can keep their families and themselves in these post-war years. They are not even asking for more money than they were receiving; they are just asking for wages high enough to compensate for the higher cost of living. When they find it necessary to go out on strike to get this, what does the Minister of Labour do? He calls them communists.
I will admit that not all members of the Progressive Conservative party think in this way, but one member spent most of his time while he was speaking to-night, in tell us about the horrors of communism. I maintain that the time may come when it may be necessary to debate the virtues or otherwise of communism or any other ism, but this debate is not the time at which to do so. I believe that in this debate hon. members should have stuck to the question, and the question is: What are we going to do about the industrial unrest in Canada?
I think it is wrong to suggest to the people of this country that all our labour troubles are caused either by communists or by politicians. There must be a basic reason why people go out on strike. People do not go out on strike simply because they are well off; there must be a basic reason for this unrest and that reason has not been brought out. The hon. member for Waterloo South (Mr. Homuth) made a statement which I believe should be corrected. He referred to the speech of my leader who spoke earlier in this debate and he accused him of being in favour of tying wages to profits and a few other things. He was asked this question by

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the hon. member for Waterloo South, and he made this reply as reported on page 5172 of Hansard of August 21:
Mr. Homuth:	Would the hon. member pay a
man according to his personal productivity?
Mr. Coldwell:	I would say that, taking an
industry on the whole, the average productivity of the individual in that industry should bear some relationship to the amount he receives in wages; in addition to the productivity per man, the profits of the industry, the reserves which have been built up by the industry, the working capital and other financial factors, and the relation of the particular industry to the economy as a whole, the standard of living and wages of the workers concerned, and all the factors . . .
That makes it quite clear that he was looking at the picture in its broad form. The reason why this group has been carrying on this debate is not the reason we have been accused of. It is not to make political capital; it is simply because we feel-I have good reason for feeling this myself-that the work of the committee has not been completed. I do not intend to say anything disparagingly about the work of the committee because I have great respect and admiration for the members of it. I attended a few meetings because I was interested in the proceedings, although I was not a member. I always found the committee members to be hard1 working, industrious men who were putting in a great deal of their time. But the work of the committee is not completed.
To support my contention, I should like to bring to the attention of the house what the president, of the Canadian federation of agriculture, Mr. H. H. Hannam, had to say in a letter dated August 14, which he addressed to the chairman of the committee. The letter reads:
Dear Sir,-
The report of hearings which your committee has conducted into industrial relations prompts us to suggest that there has been no assembling nor appraisal of facts and information on which the decisions of such a committee ought to rest. No doubt you and members of your committee feel this very keenly.
That is the opinion of the man who represents the organized farmers of this country. In his opinion the committee had not yet acquired the data and information on which it could form a conclusion. Further on, he makes a recommendation or suggestion, as follows;
We believe that the first step in facing up to this situation would be the appointment of a royal commission which would survey the division of the national income as indicated by the levels of farm prices, industrial wages and corporation profits, and make recommendations for adjustment of balance where necessary, and submit a charter of economic rights which would commend itself to the people generally, and 63260-330J
thereafter serve as the basis for necessary action in the preservation of industrial peace and the maintenance of an equitable economic balance among all groups.
When a man such as the president of the Canadian federation of agriculture expresses the opinion that the work of the committee was not finished; when we have members on practically all sides of the house admitting that, although the committee tried to get all the information they could, there was a great deal they could not get, then there is good reason for this group moving the amendment which was moved this afternoon to the effect that the whole question should be sent back to the committee to give them an opportunity to finish the job they started.
The work of the committee was not finished because, regardless of the technical terms of its reference, I believe it was understood by the people of this country that it was appointed in a time of crisis to try to bring to parliament a formula for the solution of industrial disputes, and that formula has not been presented. The recommendations in the report are not particularly harmful because they do not mean a great deal. They are recommendations which probably could have been put in any report. But they do not do the job which the committee set out to do. The situation in Hamilton has not improved and the number of strikes have not decreased. The intensity of the antagonisms that existed has not been lessened, and we find that to-day the country is faced with the same situation that existed on July 16.
I should like to refer to something which was given as the chief reason for the difficulty the committee had. The committee was told that the chief difficulty was that the wartime prices and trade board had informed the committee and the government that ten cents was the ceiling, so to speak, over which wage increases could not go. I am not going to say anything of a critical nature about Donald Gordon, because I do not believe that a man should be attacked because he is trying to administer a policy laid down by the government. If any criticism is due, it should be levelled at those who lay down the policy.
However, I should like to point out that, as far as the wartime prices and trade board and price control generally are concerned, the same attitude has not been taken toward the workers as has been taken toward certain other interests. For example, I hold in my hand administrator's order A-1959 permitting an increase of 124 per cent in the prices of farm implements. If you go through the list contained in this order you, will find that it
Industrial Relations


An hon. MEMBER:: He did not say that at all.


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: The record will show. I believe that that is what he said, and when I recall what happened in the 1930's and the

Industrial Relations
Regina riot I am inclined to believe him. What does section 12 of the order in council say?
Any person who (a) interferes with the exercise by the controller or any deputy controller of any of the powers, authorities and rights conferred upon him or (b) interferes with any employee or other person seeking to comply with the terms of this order or (c) counsels or procures any person to violate this order, shall be guilty of an offence and liable upon summary conviction to a fine not exceeding in the case of (a) five thousand dollars or imprisonment for a term not exceeding five years or to both.
Pretty strong language; wide powers to hand over to a controller-and these are apparently the very things which the hon. member for Waterloo South would see to it were enforced.
One of the reasons why the members of this group are so anxious that some statement should have come from the Minister of Labour is this. In a few days this house, the greatest tribunal for the protection of the workers that we have in this country, will no longer be sitting, and then the government may decide to take the advice of the hon. member for Waterloo South and enforce the terms of this order in council. If they do so in the present crisis at Hamilton, something may happen there.


Mr. MERRITT:: You know that he gave
no such advice.


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: He said that had be
been in the position of passing the order in council, he would have seen to it that it was enforced.


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: If he had passed it at
all.


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: If he had passed it at
all, and apparently he was in favour of it because he did not criticize the order in council; he had no opposition to it.


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: Now we have the record straight.


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: An hon. member to my left asked me whether the controller had the right to settle a strike. Apparently that is one of the things the government overlooked in the order in council, giving the controller the authority to settle the strike, because section 10 says:
The commissioner, the Hon. Mr. Justice W. D. Roach will continue with his duties as an industrial disputes inquiry commission as aforesaid, and the bargaining representatives of the aforesaid employees and the companies-
Note, it says, "employees and the companies".
-shall continue their negotiations with a view to the settlement of the matters presently in
dispute between them and shall negotiate in good faith with one another and make every reasonable effort to conclude a settlement.
After giving the controller such wide powers over practically the opinions of the workers, I do not see why the government should not have given him power to negotiate with the workers. Then he might have been able to do what is provided in section 11 of the order in council, which says:
The controller is hereby authorized to apply on behalf of each of the said companies to the appropriate war labour boards for an immediate increase in the wage rates of employees employed at the aforesaid establishments of the said companies, and to give effect to any authorization or direction which may be made or issued by any such war labour board.
The hon. member for Macleod (Mr. Han-sell) stated this evening that, in spite of this long debate, no member of the house had presented a solution for the industrial unrest we now have in this country. I am not going to say that is altogether true, because there may have been suggestions here and there which the hon. member may have overlooked; but, generally speaking, his statement may be true. If the government wanted to solve the impasse which things seemed to have reached at Hamilton they might consider the taking over of the steel industry of Canada as a public-owned utility. Why do I say that? I know hon. members will say that it is because I am a socialist, but that is not altogether so. I am not one of those who would socialize for the sake of socialization. I am one of those who believe that where it is necessary to take over an industry or utility or service and run it under public ownership in order to make it serve the people, that should be done.
I think it is not accidental that the Polymer plant, which is a publicly-owned industry, has been singularly free from strikes. Research Enterprises, T.C.A., and a great many other publicly-owned organizations have been free from strikes for a number of years. There is something which we must face in the future; it is this. People talk about private enterprise for the sake of opposing it; but do not hon. members agree with me that in a highly industrialized and highly civilized country the point will come at which you cannot have national development and at the same time have economic empires within the nation, each trying to run their own show? There must come a point at which basic industries that have a great influence over the lives of the people will have to become public utilities. By that I do not mean that every industry has to become publicly-owned; but you cannot have economic empires, with men at the head
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of them who are not concerned about public welfare but are concerned only with their profits-and I am not saying that that is immoral, either; it seems to be a natural outcome of our economic system-concerned only with the expansion and accumulation of wealth in their own hands, coming into contact, sometimes suddenly, with public opinion, coming into conflict with other economic empires, and creating chaos in this countiy. That cannot be. Why do I say that?
I have here somewhere a quotation which I should like to read to the house. I happen to to be an adherent of the Catholic religion, but that is not the main reason why I read this. This is a quotation from His Holiness the late Pope Pius XI, in his Quadragesimo Anno, in which he points this out:
It is rightfully contended that certain forms of property must be reserved to the state since they carry with them the opportunity for domination too great to be left in. the hands of private individuals without injury to the community at large.
I would commend those words to all hon. members, whether they regard themselves as private enterprisers, socialists, Social Crediters or anything else, because I believe that it is sound advice. There is a point in the economic development of any country in this day and age at which certain forms of industry reach a size and an influence where they begin to affect the daily life of every person in the country; and surely the steel industry, being a basic industry, is becoming one of those industries in Canada.


An hon. MEMBER:: What about farming?


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: Somebody asks, "What about farming?" He ought to know better than that. He knows that no farmer has anything like a monopoly so far as his source of income is concerned. If the hon. member thinks otherwise he can go west and farm to his heart's content.


John Horne Blackmore: The hon. member quoted someone a moment ago as saying that up to the present time no solution had been offered in the house. I should like to point out that in my speech as recorded in Hansard, at pages 5120 and 5121, the solution is offered, and I commend it to the consideration of all members of the house and to labour throughout the country.


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: If I am guilty of having said what I did-


John Horne Blackmore: Not "guilty."


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: -it is only because the hon. member for Macleod was the one who

said it. I am sorry if he did not listen to the speech of the hon. member for Lethbridge (Mr. Blackmore).


John Horne Blackmore: I just wanted to get it straight. Perhaps the hon. member for Macleod was not in the house at the time.


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: I am sure that that is said with good intentions.
But to come back to what I was discussing, I was pointing out to the government-unfortunately the Minister of Labour is not in the house at the moment-that one of the solutions is for the steel industry to become a public utility for the use of the Canadian people. As I said before, I am not saying that merely because I want to go on a socializing spree, but for this reason. There seems to be a great deal of conflict in the minds of the hon. members who were on the committee itself, and a great deal more conflict in the minds of other hon. members, as to whether or not the steel companies could actually have paid the increase in wages demanded by the union and still go on making a profit and carrying on with their industry. I have not been able to find figures which could prove that either one way or the other. Neither, apparently, has anyone else, because if we turn to page 131 of the minutes of the committee we find that one hon. member attempted to find out something about the cost of producing steel from Mr. Hilton, and was not given the information. I refer to some questions by the hon. member for Spadina (Mr. Croll) on page 131. Mr. Hilton had been talking about the rise in the cost of producing steel and the falling off of profits, and so on, and the hon. member said:
Have you a copy of this submission to the wartime prices and trade board?
That was a submission of the steel company to the wartime prices and trade board to show that they required this $5 a ton increase in price. Mr. Hilton replied:
I haven't one here.
The hon. member asked:
Q. Is it available?
A. It is confidential information.
That is the kind of reply that the members of the committee got. It was confidential information, so that they were left in the dark as to whether the company could or could not pay increased wages. The union contends that the company can, and the company contends that it cannot. I am inclined to believe that the union know what they are talking about, because, after all, they are the men who are engaged in the industry; they are the ones who make the production of steel possible. I have as much

Industrial Relations
confidence in the knowledge of the steel industry by the leaders of the union as I have in the president of the company.
But let me refer to another attempt which was made, in this house, to get that information. On July 11, 1946, a return was brought down in the name of the hon. member for Vancouver East (Mr. Maclnnis), in which one of the questions in reference to the costs in the production of steel was this:
3. What is the actual cost of production of a ton of ingot steel in each of the three basic producers' plants?
We turn to the reply, which is this:
It is contrary to the board's policy that financial information of individual concerns, which is obtained in confidence, be released.
How is it going to be possible for the members of the committee or the members of this house to decide whether these companies can pay the increased wages, whether the profits which they say they are making are the correct figures-and Stelco admits making over $4,000,000 of profit last year? We do not know whether these figures are exact. We have no access to their books. We have no way of proving to our own mind and conscience what action we should take in this matter. Therefore I say, if this basic industry were made a public utility the government would be in full possession of all the facts and figures. They could, if they wanted to-and I have no reason to believe that they would not want to-call in the union leadership, show them the books, give the facts, and say, "Here is what we are producing; here is what this industry is earning; here are the wages which we feel we can pay without depriving it of the capital required for expansion; that is the most we can offer you." Then, if the amount the government can offer is still less than is required for a minimum standard of living, I believe the union should apply to the government of this country for a subsidy for that industry in order that it may be able to pay a wage which will give the workers a decent standard of living. The decision which will have to be made in the last analysis is this: do we want production of steel in this country? Is it an industry, a form of production which is basic and necessary to our economy? If it is, we shall have to see to it that steel is produced. If the private concerns who are in charge of it to-day cannot see eye-to-eye with the working man who makes the production possible, and will not under any circumstances let anybody know what the actual cost of production is, because it is confidential information, the only course left is for the government to see to it that that industry is operated in the interests of the people.
I wish to refer to one of the recommendations contained in the report, and one only, namely, the one which starts out by saying:
Law being the basis of our society-


Arthur Leroy Smith: Will the hon. member permit me one question?


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: Yes.


Arthur Leroy Smith: The hon. member suggests that the steel industry should be operated by the government and then we would be out of trouble. The government have a controller operating the industry now. Why are we still in trouble?


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: I do not wish to argue with the hon. member about that, but apparently the controller is not operating the industries. As I pointed out, the controller was not given the power to negotiate with the unions, which is one of the first things needed in order to settle the dispute.


Arthur Leroy Smith: Apparently the hon. member has not read the order.
. Mr. ZAPLITNY: I read it right here. If the hon. member were here he would have heard it. Perhaps he was not here.


Arthur Leroy Smith: The hon. member is quite right; I did hear it, but he and I do not understand it the same way.


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: As I say, I wish to refer to one of the recommendations of the report which starts out by saying:
Law being the basis of our society, your committee condemns:	(a) the policy adopted by
some unions. . .
And so on. It refers to certain unions and employers and to lawbreaking. I refer to this section, because I believe we must come to a time when we shall have to start out with this kind of recommendation and say that, justice being the basis of our society, therefore we shall have law in order to make it possible that justice shall prevail. If we start from the cold and technical angle that law is the basis of society, regardless of where justice lies, then we shall be in for trouble.
That brings me to the last thing I should like to say, namely, that a great deal has been said in this and other debates about the division of the income of industry, or the productivity of industry, between capital and labour. So far as I am concerned, I say emphatically that I am not satisfied to put labour in the same category as capital. I do not look upon these two things in the same light, because in my mind

and I can go back again to Adam Smith to prove my point if necessary-capital is only an incidental of labour. Labour is the original state
Industrial Relations

of things. There is only one form of wealth in this or in any country, and that is the wealth produced by applying labour to natural resources. Capital and all the rest of the things incidental to it were created by labour in the first place. But to-day capital has got itself into the position where it has become the golden calf of our economic system. To-day capital puts itself on the pedestal, on the same level as labour and sometimes a little higher, and it says to labour, We shall decide how much of the product of your labour you shall have. I object to that.
We must get back to fundamentals and 'realize that there is only one source of wealth, namely human labour applied1 to natural wealth. The sooner we realize that, the sooner we shall realize that when men go out on strike and ask for the product of their own labour, they are doing it, not because they are communists, but because they are human beings with a sense of righteousness and justice in their hearts for which they are willing to fight.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: On July 10, 1946, P.C. 2901 was passed, which reads in part as follows:
And whereas the Minister of Labour reports that he is advised that there is grave danger of a strike in the immediate future by employees of the companies named in the next preceding paragraph arising out of the failure of the said companies and the said union representing the employees of the said companies to settle matters presently in dispute between them;
That a stoppage of work in the said companies would seriously curtail the essential supply of steel and would dislocate production in other industries and would be contrary to the national interest thereby jeopardizing the orderly transition to a peace-time economy in Canada . . .
And so on; which indicates that nearly six weeks ago the government recognized that there was a serious national problem on our hands. A few days later, on July 16, the hon. member for Calgary West (Mr. Smith) introduced his motion, which called attention to the fact that we had one of the most serious peace-time problems that we had encountered. He said, as reported at page 3488 of Hansard:
The steel strike in Canada must focus the attention of thinking men and women on the broad question of industrial relations. We have had many troubles recently. Some have been settled and some have not.
Then he goes on to make a suggestion. He said:
My suggestion is this, that this house should immediately set up its industrial relations committee. To that committee should he invited- yea, brought, if necessary-those persons who might not like to come.
IWr. Zaplitny.l
All who listened to the hon. member for Calgary West felt that he was speaking sincerely in trying to focus the attention of parliament and of the country on this problem.
On August 22, we are dealing with the report of the committee. We have listened to two cabinet ministers who are vitally concerned, the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply (Mr. Howe) and the Minister of Labour (Mr.' Mitchell). I submit that the statements made by these two ministers are unsatisfactory to parliament and to the country. I consider that we would be failing to discharge our duties if we accepted the report of the committee and the statement of these two ministers and hurried away to our homes without facing up to this problem. If the problem were as serious as it was said to be on July 16-and it was-then parliament must face up to it and demand that the cabinet should give a statement other than the one we have listened to to-night from the Minister of Labour and the one given by the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply, some days ago.
Speaking in this debate on August 20, as reported at page 5128 of Hansard, the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply said:
Meantime, while the committee was sitting, strikes in a number of basic industries were in progress. Not only have they paralysed industries directly affected, but they are extending to industries not directly associated with any labour dispute. That situation is most acute at this moment. There is scarcely a section of the country which is not beginning to be affected by these strikes.
Then on the next page the minister concluded:
It gets so had that it is impossible to perpetuate itself. I believe that these strikes are nearing the point when they will either solve themselves or be capable of solution. I believe the work of the committee has contributed toward bringing about that situation, and I can assure the Minister of Labour that anything I can do as Minister of Reconstruction and Supply to assist in bringing these strikes to an early conclusion, will be done.
That is not a useful contribution to make to a debate of this kind, to suggest that possibly the strikers will be starved into surrender and somehow, sometime, the matter will solve itself. If we leave without some indication of what government policy is to be, there will certainly be other strikes. It has been announced that a strike in the meat-packing industry is pending. I think it is fairly obvious that, even although management and labour might be able to get together in the meatpacking industries, even though Canada Packers might agree that they could grant an increase of twelve cents an hour, it would be impossible for such a decision to be reached while government policy is as it is. Certainly no union would be able to convince its mem-

Industrial Relations
bership that if a company can afford only six cents or seven cents, it should accept that sort of compromise. If we leave here and we have strikes in the transportation field, the meatpacking industry and a number of other most essential industries, this country will be faced with one of the most serious peace-time conditions that we have ever known.
I am very sorry the members of the house did not have an opportunity to refer this report back to the committee. I see no good reason why the house could not be adjourned instead of proroguing, as we did during the war on several occasions when it was felt that it might be necessary to call us together to deal with urgent national matters. I see no reason why the committee might not have continued its deliberations. Several of the members of the committee who have spoken have indicated that they worked under tremendous pressure, and that they were not satisfied with the amount of time at their disposal. Others who have taken part in the debate have drawn attention to serious items which were overlooked. The hon. member for Spadina (Mr. Croll), a supporter of the government, made a telling criticism of paragraph 6, which reads:
Your committee recommends that the Minister of Labour may. at the request of either party to an industrial dispute, and if he deems fit, either before or after a strike is in progress, direct that a strike vote be taken under government supervision, to determine the wishes of the men affected as to whether a strike will take place or otherwise.
Several hon. members who have participated in the debate suggested that, after parliament adjourns, action might be taken by the government at Stelco in Hamilton, that the decision might be taken by those within the plant that the previous vote had not been taken in a legal way, and the Minister of Labour indicated that he would make the position very clear. I understand that in the committee the minister made statements to the effect that he had no intention of introducing that sort of procedure, but hon. members observed that the minister spoke for an hour to-night and refused to give any commitment as to what would be the government's policy in this connection.


Humphrey Mitchell: If I may just say so, I agree with the hon. member for Cape Breton South (Mr. Gillis).


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Why did you not say so when you were on your feet?


Humphrey Mitchell: I have said so.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: No one heard it.


Frank Exton Lennard: Yes, they did.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: I am sorry; I did not hear it, and the record will indicate whether I am right or the minister is right. But let me call his attention to the fact that in the Ottawa Citizen of this evening there is an editorial in connection with the Card report, the last paragraph of which editorial reads:
A strike vote, as now suggested by the industrial relations committee of the Commons, would surely have prevented these printers' strikes. Notwithstanding Mr. Millard's objections, the Citizen believes that such a vote, with a secret ballot under government supervision, would end the steel strike with benefit to all Canada.
Apparently not only members of parliament but editorial writers are under the impression that this clause gives the minister power to deal with the Hamilton steel strike, as was suggested by the hon. member for Spadina and others who have taken part in the discussion.
I do not think anyone will question the good intentions of the hon. member for Calgary West, and I accept my responsibility as a member of parliament for supporting the proposal to set up this committee. I should however, like to draw the attention of the house, to the statement made by the leader of our group, the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell), at that time as reported at page 3491 of Hansard:
May I also comment on the suggestion made by the hon. member for Calgary West and concurred in by the Prime Minister. I too accept that suggestion, but in the present circumstances it comes too late to deal with the situation that has developed.
I think the editorial writers who have been criticizing the hon. member for Calgary West had some justification for their argument. On balance, I believe it was a mistake to have had this committee relieve the government of the responsibility of dealing with this situation.


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: They did not relieve the government.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: The matter has
dragged on for nearly six weeks, and the situation is practically unchanged. Apart from clause 6, I have no great criticism of the report brought in by the committee, but it is fairly obvious that it just does not deal with the problem of the steel industry or the problem of industrial unrest in Canada.


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: Does the hon. member
think the setting up of that committee relieved the government of any responsibility?


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: to say, "Well, we had a parliamentary committee that dealt with this matter and here is their report; this is all they had to say." If the committee had not been set up I believe the government would have been forced before now to produce some formula in addition to what is already before the people of Canada in connection with this situation.
The contribution made this evening by the Minister of Labour was not helpful. I can understand why some members of parliament want to raise this communist bogey and accuse those who do not agree with them of being communists, though they never make very clear just what they mean; but I did not expect the Minister of Labour to take time, in such an important public statement, to raise this question, certainly not in view of the associations his party has had with the communist party.


James Sinclair: Do
you know the situation in British Columbia?


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Oh, yes, I know that
in all parts of Canada-


James Sinclair: The
C.C.F. is supposed to be arm-in-arm with the C.I.O., which is solidly communist out there.


Major James William Coldwell: You know we have
expelled the communists in British Columbia, and you people criticized us for being undemocratic when we did so.


James Horace King: Order. I must remind
hon. members that when an hon. gentleman has the floor he must not be interrupted without his consent.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: I have a copy of the
Owen Sound Daily Sun-Times for Saturday, February 3, 1945, in which I see a full-page advertisement which is inserted "by the authority of the North Grey Liberal Association." It goes on to say:
Union leaders coast to coast support McNaugh-ton. The labour leaders pictured on this page represent tens of thousands of Canadian trade unionists. These men say: "Put patriotism before partyism-and back McNaughton!" As trade union leaders, men who have worked in the (best interests of the membership of their union, and in the interests of the people of Canada as a whole, they feel that the people of this country need General McXaughton in the House of Commons.
Then it has the pictures of these "union leaders from coast to coast"; everyone a known communist. They are Fred Collins, Malcolm MacLeod, Charles Murray, Alex Welsh, Pat Sullivan, and so on.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Read them all.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Jack Turner, Charles Murray, Jack Shaw, Nigel Morgan, George

Gare, William Edmiston, George Harris, Bruce Magnuson, Peter Dunlop, C. S. Jackson, Jack Taylor, Dewar Ferguson, Harry Hunter, Cyril Lenton, Harold Pritchett, James Davis, Malcolm Murdock, Michael Kennedy, C. R. Sullivan. They are all either known communists or fellow travellers.


Major James William Coldwell: And many of them were interned.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Yes; many of them were interned for part of the war. When it suited the Minister of Labour and his colleagues they paid for a full-page advertisement showing pictures of well-known communists who say, "Back McNaughton. Back the Liberal party. Put patriotism before partyism."


Humphrey Mitchell: Let me say to my hon. friend that I do not mind what he says about other people, but I have fought the communists all my life. You are talking about me now; you are not talking about somebody else.


Major James William Coldwell: But not during the Grey North by-election nor during the last federal election.


Humphrey Mitchell: I have fought them all my life. I do not believe in their philosophy or in their principles, if they have any.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: -It might interest the committee to learn that the Liberals were very generous. They not only paid for a full-page ad for the communists, but they had a full-page ad for the Progressive Conservatives. On page 9 of the same paper is this ad:
Send a North Grey man to Ottawa-not an Ottawa man to North Grey. Be sure to vote Case on Monday. Issued by authority of the North Grey Liberal Association.


Mr. CASE:: Almost unanimous.


Stanley Howard Knowles: The C.C.F. paid for their own.


Major James William Coldwell: We paid for our own.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: I am sure hon. members appreciate the fine spirit which prevailed in Grey North when the Liberals paid for a full-page ad to bring the present hon. member for Grey North (Mr. Case) to the House of Commons. I also have two pages-


Wilfrid Garfield Case: You took up a collection to pay for yours.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: We do not apologize for that. I also have a copy of the New World for August, 1944, which states:
Why I support Mackenzie King.
And it is by Tim Buck. Here we have the pictures of these two well-known Canadians,

Industrial Relations
side by side. One is the Right Hon. William Lyon Mackenzie King, P.C., CM.G., M.P.- and with all the rest of his titles. And then, right across the page is Tim Buck-


John Lambert Gibson: Period.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: -of the Labour Progressive party. So that I do not think it becomes the Minister of Labour-


Major James William Coldwell: Or any other Liberal.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: -or anyone else on the other side of the house to raise this communist bogey during this or any other debate.
Mr. Speaker, the material has been covered very fully, and I do not plan on repeating anything that has been said. The Minister of Labour mentioned that in some parts of Canada he i3 called ten-cent Mitchell. I think five-cent Mitchell would be more appropriate for him, because there is just five cents-


Humphrey Mitchell: My hon. friend is
thinking of the collection plate.


James Joseph McCann: He is used to the five
cents.


James Sinclair: And that is about all it is worth for the sermon- five cents.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: We make no apology for the fact that we do get money for our political party from people who do give nickels and1 dimes; and we do not despise them. I notice it came out in the evidence that the steel workers make some contributions to a political party, as per capita dues. They pay two cents per member per month in some cases, for political action.


Humphrey Mitchell: Which they have a
perfect right to do.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Yes. I think it also came out that the Steel Company of Canada contributed to campaign funds. I want to make it very clear that the Steel Company of Canada never gave a five-cent piece to the C.C.F. Buit the members apparently were a bit embarrassed to press Mr. Hilton too far-


James Sinclair: What about the brewers in Saskatchewan?


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: -to find out how
much they had given to each party.


James Sinclair: You organized the breweries.


Major James William Coldwell: We never have had a cent from the liquor industry in the whole of our existence.
Mr- SINCLAIR (Vancouver North): Why did you stop organizing the breweries in Saskatchewan? Because there is more money leading them.


Major James William Coldwell: That is untrue.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Now, to get back to the point I was making-


Arthur Leroy Smith: Why do that? This is fun.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: I want to point out that the minister and Donald Gordon have taken the stand that a ten-cent increase is all that the price ceiling will allow. It has not been made clear in this debate, nor . was it made clear to the committee, why the ten cents was pulled out of the air. Why was it not nine; why was it not two? Why did you reach ten cents?
The five-cent increase means an additional forty cents a day. I noticed in the evidence the management of Stelco would not come clean and put their cards on the table to demonstrate that they could not pay this increase, or that they could not have carried on if they had not had the $5 a ton increase.
I was in the United States last winter when their steel strike was in progress. The dispute there was not as to whether the steel companies could afford to pay more. They took the position that it was not the business of the unions to know whether or not the extra could be paid. My information was that the steel companies there could close for six months during the present year and be in a better financial position at the end of the year than they were in any ten, years prior to the outbreak of the war. Their plan was to close down and break the unions.
Fortunately the administration in the United States recognized that this course of action could not be followed. They gave the companies an increase of $5 a ton, but it was mandatory that those companies in the United States should pay an additional 18i cents an hour.
I am not surprised that hon. members in the committee were favourably impressed by the labour representatives who gave evidence before the committe,. Those men made it quite clear that they were not asking for anything that would put the steel companies out of business. I am sure all members of parliament were interested in the little booklet that was presented to them, to give us information regarding the situation. This was given weeks before the strike broke out, and it pointed out that unless something was done, a strike would take place.
Industrial Relations

A number of questions were asked and discussed frankly. Is 833.60 a week too much? The hon. member for Cariboo (Mr. Irvine) posed that question this morning. No member of parliament has risen in his place and said that $33.60 a week, or $1,750 a year, is too much in this day and age.
We have come to the end of the war which has enabled us to do many spectacular things in the field of production. We contributed generously to mutual aid. We managed to maintain a measure of price control, which, I agree, was more satisfactory than they had in the United States. It was very satisfactory, considering all the factors concerned.
But I admit that Donald Gordon is unreasonable when he takes the position that the Canadian economy will not permit $33.60 a week for these steel workers. Just this week we passed a bill giving increased salaries to judges. According to the public accounts, I find that 271 judges are to have an increase of $637,000 in the next year. I admit that brings a lot of pressure on the price ceiling. Yet Donald Gordon did not raise his voice in protest.
As the hon. member for Cape Breton South (Mr. Gillis) said:, it is all right to give $20,000 to a judge who is already getting $15,000, or to give $16,000 to one who is now getting $12,000, but it is not all right to give this increase to the steel workers! I understand that the increase the steel workers are seeking would cost Stelco an additional $2,500,000. "$2,500,000 more for the steel workers?-we cannot do it." But, "$670,000 for the judges? -why, that is no problem at all."
Hon. members last year participated in legislation to increase our "take-home pay." I supported it, and1 I take my share of responsibility for it. But I must not lose sight of the fact that what I have done for myself I should do for the other fellow. Two hundred and forty-five members and ninety-six senators voted themselves an additional $2,000 a year, or a total of $682,000 for 341 parliamentarians, and yet Donald Gordon said that we could not give the steel workers in the steel companies an additional $2,500,000 in order to bring their minimum wage up to $33 a week, or $1,750 a year.


James Sinclair: Where did Donald Gordon say that?


Major James William Coldwell: In the committee.


James Sinclair: You are putting words into his mouth.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: That nothing over ten cents-


James Sinclair: Where did Donald Gordon say that? You are a clergyman and you should stick to the truth.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: My understanding is that Donald Gordon threatened to resign if. anything over ten cents an hour was granted.


James Sinclair: That is not what you said that Donald. Gordon said. You should know about sticking to the text. You should not put words into Donald Gordon's mouth. You have enough words in your own mouth.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: During the war there was a normal work week of forty hours and the workers were quite prepared to work overtime, but the argument is that it is better to have everyone working a 40-hour week than to have one group working fifty, sixty or seventy hours a week and then have a large number of unemployed.


James Sinclair: Who are working fifty, sixty or seventy hours?


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: There are a lot of people in Canada.


James Sinclair: Tell us where.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: The men oh the great lakes were working a 12-hour day.


James Sinclair: Not in the steel companies.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Members of parliament-


James Sinclair: Get back to the steel companies.


Angus MacInnis: If an hon. member wants to interrupt another hon. member he should rise in his place and ask permission; he should not sit in his seat and carry on continual interruptions.


Gordon Graydon: Should not an hon. member sit in his own seat.


James Sinclair: The hon. member, like all hon. members, should stick to his text.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Another section reads:
Can the companies afford to pay?
At this point the "practical man" enters. He says: "All this is very fine. No one wants to see steel workers getting less than $33.60 a week. Forty hours is long enough for work in such a heavy industry. No one can deny men wanting two weeks vacation with pay. But can the industry afford these objectives? Are you trying to drive your employer into bankruptcy?"
The steel workers can be quite frank and reply:	"We don't know. We don't think so,
but we don't know."

Industrial Relations
You see, despite all the talk you hear about workers and employers being "partners'' or members of "one big, happy family," the working partners in the steel industry don't know for certain what the owning partners really earn. The owners don't give their employees that confidential information. It seems as if the best the steel workers can ever get is the flat assurance that, whatever their request might be, the company can't afford it. Peculiarly enough, after an increase is granted, the company does manage to keep on going.
However, on the basis of what can be found out from study of public financial reports, here is what seems to be the case.
Take the three big steel companies, for example.
They all functioned during the war and didn't lose any money. They show increases in profits and peculiar increases in reserves, capital value, depreciation reserves, etc. All of them received support, in cash, buildings and equipment from the government.
I was interested in noting that when Donald Gordon was before the committee he said as reported on page 285 of the proceedings-


Arthur Leroy Smith: Will my hon. friend permit an interruption? I am sure he wants the record correct. He said a moment ago that the evidence disclosed that they all received cash, buildings and equipment from the government. I do not think he is correct.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: I am just reading from the booklet prepared by the steel workers, and I think the hon. member will agree that their information, is quite trustworthy. If the hon. member will indicate that particular companies did not receive it, I shall be glad to take his word.


Arthur Leroy Smith: I am speaking only from memory, but my memory is that the only assistance received by any company was in the form of expedited depreciation. I think that is what was said. May I correct my hon. friend in another matter because, knowing him as I do, I am sure he will want the record to be accurate? Speaking of Donald Gordon's ten cents, he will remember that I said that I felt he had not proved his position. What he said was that he could not support a ceiling on the basis of anything substantially over ten cents, but in using the figures you did as to one company in your comparison with members of parliament and so on I think the hon. member should be fair to Mr. Gordon. Mr. Gordon said that the ten cents would be a pattern and that it would apply not only to the steel companies but to our whole economy. He said that if it were spread over our whole economy, knowing the spread it would take, he would not undertake to carry on. I think that is pretty accurate.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: I find I am in essential agreement with the hon. member for Calgary West. In connection with the ten-cent ceiling I want to say that I think it has been pretty well established by now that if the fifteen-cent increase had been granted the pressure on the price ceiling would not have been nearly as great as has been created by the prolonged strikes. I cannot prove this, but I have been advised that nails are selling in several parts of Canada at $25 per 100 pounds. I am sure that if this strike continues, the serious shortage of supplies will create a much greater pressure on the price ceiling and make it more difficult to maintain controls than if a reasonable increase had been granted.
To come back to these companies, when Donald Gordon was before the committee he pointed out the difficulty they had had in getting financial statements from the steel companies when pressure was being brought to bear to grant a $5 per ton increase. He said: We laid down the position that we would have to be shown that their over-all position was such that they would be in a poor financial condition. Mr. McMaster took violent objection to that.
And again:
I should say to the committee that we leaned heavily upon the company for the factual infqr-mation we required, and while we tested that information to the best of our ability, it is true that we depended largely upon the accuracy of the steel company's figures.
The hon. member for Cariboo made it quite clear that that sort of evidence was not satisfactory. Last night, when the leader of this party was speaking, the Minister of Labour interjected to say that their traditions were such that they did not run away from problems. While it is getting late in the season and many members have made commitments that are pressing, I feel we would be failing in our responsibility to the Canadian people if we left for home without having some formula from the administration that would indicate what will happen in the industries now on strike and in the other industries that are going on strike.


Humphrey Mitchell: I will give you the formula right away for both sides-obey the law.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: That brings me to an editorial which appeared in a paper which has been very kind to the Minister of Labour and the administration. On Tuesday, August 20, 1946, the Toronto Daily Star contained an editorial entitled, "An impracticable order in council."


James Joseph McCann: That is on the record three times already.
Industrial Relations


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: This part is not on yet. After referring to the fact that the government has passed an order in council taking over the operation of the three steel companies, the editorial continued:
At Montreal yesterday, Mr. Kilbourn said that use of his powers as controller to arrest striking employees "is not practical." Of course it is not. And it is not practical to fine every striking employee $20 per day for each day or part of day that he is on strike. Such a provision is impossible of enforcement; and even if it were, it is a negation of the principle of collective bargaining. It should never have been included in the order in council.
Does the minister suggest that he is going to enforce the law, that he is going to put these men in gaol or fine them $20 a day.


Humphrey Mitchell: That section has been in the industrial disputes act since 1906. Every time we have put in a controller we have got an agreement to the satisfaction of the employees and the employer, and I am convinced that if both sides had gone along with the controller in the steel industry there would have been no strike.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: I am sure that if the minister had not made his ten-cent speech, indicating an increase of ten cents as the ceiling, the problem would have been solved.


Humphrey Mitchell: I know my hon. friend does not want to be untruthful. Let me again say that the Minister of Labour never said that at all.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: It is on the record.


Humphrey Mitchell: I am not going to fool the workers or anybody. I said this, that if you have even a one-cent increase in wages it goes into the price structure. It cannot help but do that. I know what you are trying to do for political reasons.


Major James William Coldwell: Say what you did say, for the record.


Humphrey Mitchell: I said this, that whatever increase there might be, I questioned very much whether we could hold the price ceiling with even a ten-cent increase. I think it is far more honest to do that than to give the working people of this country pie-in-the-sky as they were given in the United States.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: That makes it clear that the minister considers that ten cents an hour increase is the ceiling.


Humphrey Mitchell: I did not say that at all.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: The minister interrupted me and still has not made his position clear.


Humphrey Mitchell: To explain it in simple language, a suit of clothes will not fit every

member of the house. I am sure that my hon. friend the member for Muskoka-Ontario (Mr. Macdonnell) could not wear my suit of clothes.


An hon. MEMBER:: Nor you his.


John Ritchie MacNicol: You would burst his.


Humphrey Mitchell: I could not wear his either. I think an increase of ten cents in some instances would destroy an industry. That can be very easily understood. Take some small town in Saskatchewan, from which province the hon. member for Mackenzie comes. What would apply there would not apply in the city of Toronto.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: What about steel?


Humphrey Mitchell: My hon. friend and his associates were critical of the increase in the price of farm implements. Yet steel is the basic thing that goes into farm implements.


Major James William Coldwell: And you allowed a $5 increase to the steel industry.


Humphrey Mitchell: I know that story. The workers in the agricultural implement industry accepted a ten-cent increase.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: It is obvious that the minister did not say enough.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Question.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: I am concluding my remarks with an appeal to the government to make a statement. I understand that the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) is returning to Canada shortly. This matter is so important that the people involved in the strike should have a statement from the government that would indicate that these problems are going to be solved before the members leave for their homes.


Humphrey Mitchell: My hon. friend wants a pattern. I think the best pattern is to go before a jury of your peers, and in this case that is the regional war labour boards in Ontario and Nova Scotia. Why should you be afraid of them?


Mr. RONALD MOORE (Churchill):: Mr. Speaker, the subject of industrial relations has been pretty well covered. I do not intend to bring up any new points this evening, but I want to go on record with respect to one thing. I agree with the members who have urged that this house should remain in session until this strike has been settled. I am not going to say any more on that.
I was a member of the industrial relations committee, but unfortunately I was called back home and had to resign from the committee. Every member of the committee did

Industrial Relations
his best to find a solution of this problem. The evidence given by one man stands out in the industrial relations committee. That was the evidence given by Mr. Donald Gordon of the wartime prices and trade board. Apparently the members of the committee were unable to break down the statement made by Mr. Gordon that a ten-cent increase in wages to the steel workers would break the price ceiling structure in this country. When that point was made I think the committee and the government should have got together to get all the facts with respect to the situation and either break down that argument or admit that it was sound. Personally I do not think it is sound.


Mr. CLEAVER:: I prefer to take Donald Gordon's opinion.


Ronald Stewart Moore: That may be your opinion, but there is something else you ought to consider.


Hughes Cleaver: Do you want to lose price control in this country?


Ronald Stewart Moore: No; I am in favour of price control.


Hughes Cleaver: You make me sick. 1


Ronald Stewart Moore: But who broke the price ceiling first? It was the government's policy to grant an increase in the price of steel and an increase in the price of farm machinery and increases in the prices of three hundred different commodities la9t January. That was the beginning of the break in the price ceiling structure.


Hughes Cleaver: No matter who is to blame, do you want it broken?


Ronald Stewart Moore: No, I do not. If we had had a proper investigation we could have arrived at the facts, and an increase in wages above ten cents could have been granted.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Question.


Arthur Leroy Smith: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Churchill (Mr. Moore) is entitled to be heard, and I think we should keep quiet and let him have his say.


Ronald Stewart Moore: I am just going to make one other point in connection with what the Minister of Labour (Mr. Mitchell) had to say a little while ago. He stated that during the war free enterprise on the American continent was responsible for some fifty per cent of the production of goods which took place throughout the entire world.


Humphrey Mitchell: I did not say that.


Ronald Stewart Moore: I copied it down-fifty per cent of the production of goods throughout
the world took place on the North American continent. We will look it up in Hansard to-morrow. The point is this, that that production took place largely in war plants, and, according to the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply (Mr. Howe) in the year 1943, almost eighty per cent of the goods produced in Canada were made in new plants built by the government or in plants assisted out of public funds.


William Irvine: Mr. Speaker, who won the election?


James Horace King: I said I declared the motion carried.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: I was paired with the hon. member for Springfield (Mr. Sinnott). Had I voted I would have voted against the motion.
On motion of Mr. St. Laurent the house adjourned at 11.13 p.m.
Friday, August 23, 1946