1947-02-04

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


Mr. THOMAS REID (New Westminster):: I rise to a question of privilege affecting the members of the House of Commons. I refer you, Mr. Speaker, to page 13 of the routine proceedings and orders of the day, where you will find a resolution standing in my name under No. 10. It was my understanding before the house prorogued at the last session that resolutions for the new session could not be received or placed on the order paper while the house was then in session, and so the resolution standing in my name was sent in after the house prorogued; and it was dated September 3. Now I understand the resolutions which reached the office earlier than mine, and while the house was still in session, are on the order paper ahead of mine. I submit that if there is no rule regarding resolutions there should certainly be a definite rule as to the time resolutions can be put on. A resolution sent in while the house is sitting should be for that session, and a resolution sent in immediately after the house prorogues is intended for the forthcoming session. I am asking you, sir, to have the matter investigated, because I believe I have been gypped.


Mr. SPEAKER:: I have noted the remarks of the hon. member and I shall be pleased to take the necessary steps to obtain the information for him.

Atomic Energy



ATOMIC ENERGY


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. JOHN BRACKEN (Leader of the Opposition):: I wish to direct a question to the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply. Press reports from Washington suggest that- Mr. Bernard Baruch, in evidence before a United States senate committee, indicated that a leak of secret information in connection with atomic energy had occurred in Canada. Is the minister in a position to give the house positive assurance that this has not occurred, and if not, will he cause an immediate investigation to be launched?


Right Hon. C. D. HOWE (Minister of Reconstruction and Supply):: Mr. Speaker, I read the press reports with surprise. It had been our view that all possible security measures had been taken in connection with our Canadian operations, and we had heard nothing to suggest that our friends in the United States had any other view. The question then arose as to whether Mr. Baruch was being quoted accurately, and I am happy to say it now becomes evident that he was not quoted accurately. I have just received a personal wire from Mr. Bernard Baruch. I may say that I had not communicated with him, but he took the trouble to communicate with me. His wire has been telephoned to me-I have not the original at this moment- and it reads as follows:
In view of the confused reports I feel impelled to tell you that there was nothing in my statement before closed session of the senate committee on atomic energy that in any way reflected on Canada or the present operations there. I did refer to the past spy activities of the Soviets in Canada which were as regrettable to you as they were to us.
Then follows a personal message to myself. I believe the Secretary of State for External Affairs can also throw some light on the wording of the statement as actually made by Mr. Baruch.
Right Hon. L. S. ST. LAURENT (Secretary of State for External Affairs): Mr. Speaker, when my colleague (Mr. Howe) and I were shown this newspaper report yesterday we both expressed concern as to the accuracy of the report, and I immediately endeavoured to ascertain just what the situation was. Just a few minutes ago I got from our ambassador in Washington the following report:
Concerning Mr. Baruch's reference to leaks in Canada, I have just succeeded in securing this morning the language actually used by Mr. Baruch, taken from the transcript. The only reference made by him to Canada during the public session of the committee was in the following sentence:
"As you can see by the newspapers this morning, Canada, one of the countries associated with us, has made some discoveries in plutonium and, which concerns me deeply, it was from Canada that the much publicized reporte of an information leak have come."
That was all that was said in the public session. It is a reference not to leaks coming from Canada but to the publicized reports that leaks had come from Canada. Then the report also points out that Mr. Baruch spoke in a very low voice and those in the committee room had great difficulty in following him. That may have been the cause of the distorted version of his remarks sent out yesterday. The chairman of the joint committee, Senator Hickenlooper, has told a Canadian correspondent that Mr. Baruch said nothing derogatory to Canada, Mr. Baruch's reference came in the middle of a fairly long discussion on the risks of information leakage, and later the committee went into closed session for a further discussion of means to maintain security. Now we have this assertion of Mr. Baruch that in the closed session nothing derogatory to Canada was said; and of course there was no occasion for anything derogatory to Canada being said.



INQUIRY AS TO SETTING UP OF PARLIAMENTARY COMMITTEE

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. H. C. GREEN (Vancouver South):: May I direct a supplementary question to the Minister of Reconstruction? Is there any possibility of a parliamentary committee on atomic energy being set up in Canada similar to the committee which was set up by congress in the United States? As the minister will remember, that suggestion was made by all of the opposition parties during the last session, and I should like to. know whether there is any possibility of having such a committee set up at the present session.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Without having given the matter consideration I would doubt the advisability of a committee at this time. The world is very sensitive to atomic energy matters, and any publicity that would come from the committee would be disturbing perhaps in a good many quarters. However, I shall be glad to discuss the matter with the government and give my hon. friend an answer later.
Emergency Powers



EMERGENCY POWERS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. M. J. COLDWELL (Rosetown-Biggar):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Prime Minister, of which I sent him notice this morning? I understood it was the intention of the government to place on the Votes and Proceedings and on the order paper this week measures necessary to continue the policy of price and commodity control after the expiry of the National Emergency Transitional Powers Act, as well as such measures as may be required for a considerable period to give statutory form to the orders in council enacted under wartime powers. I note that nothing has so far appeared in the Votes and Proceedings, and I suggest to the government that if these measures are to be presented next week, hon. members should be given the earliest opportunity of preparing to discuss them.


Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, my hon. friend is quite right in saying that the government had undertaken to place on the Votes and Proceedings the names of measures that were to be introduced for the purpose, as he said, of continuing the policy of price and commodity control under the National Emergency Transitional Powers Act, as well as such measures as may be required for a considerable period to give statutory form to orders in council enacted under wartime powers. I had myself expected to see these measures enumerated in the Votes and Proceedings today, but I understand there was a delay in the forwarding of the measures. The Clerk of the House has just advised me that he has now received the list which will appear in the Votes and Proceedings of today and on the order paper the day following. But I might give the house immediately the information that I think hon. members will be most anxious to have.
The legislation which will be submitted to parliament in respect of emergency powers will be divided into two categories:
1. The government will introduce about fifteen bills which, if adopted, will replace by legislation a number of orders in council which it is considered should in the national interest be placed on a more permanent footing. All of these relate to subjects which are within the normal competence of the parliament of Canada.
This legislation will include bills to amend the Fertilizers Act, the Inspection and Sales Act, the Feeding Stuffs Act, the Customs Act,

the Militia Pension Act, the Militia Act, the Patents Act, the Department of National Defence Act, the Canadian Grain Act, the Wheat Board Act and the Immigration Act (as regards return to Canada of Canadian Chinese), and bills respecting mail contract supplements, trading with the enemy, export and import controls and agricultural products.
2. The government will introduce a bill to provide for the continuation for a limited period of certain transitional measures to the number of about fifty.
The regulations covered by this bill will constitute all of the emergency powers of the government at this stage of transition from war to peace. It will provide for the extension of a group of orders, including those respecting control of prices, supplies and rentals, together with regulations for the return to Canada of remaining dependents of service personnel, settlement of claims against the crown arising out of the war, administration of Japanese property in Canada, relocation of persons of Japanese race, old age pensions and certain compensations to merchant seamen. All of these will be specified in a schedule to the bill. I have a tentative list here, but I think they can be given later.
A certain number of the orders which will be specified in the schedule will be the subject of additional specific bills later in the session. This would apply, for example, in the case of labour relations, which will be covered in a bill to amend the Industrial Disputes Investigation Act, orders regarding old age pensions which will be covered in a later bill to amend the Old Age Pensions Act and orders regarding veterans' preference in the civil service, which will remain in the schedule pending examination of this subject by a parliamentary committee with a view to later introduction of legislation.
Apart from the measures which will be covered by the legislation I have referred to, all other orders in council under the emergency powers will either have been revoked, expired or become spent or will be permitted to expire with the expiry of the National Emergency Transitional Powers Act, 1945.


Mr. A. L. SMITH (Calgary West):: Arising out of the statement made by the Prime Minister I wish to direct a question to the Minister of Labour. He is not here, and he has no assistant, though I know of no one who needs an assistant more than he does. My question is this. The Prime Minister mentioned an industrial relations amendment. That bill already has been distributed to manufacturers' organizations and labour or. ganizations in Canada. That being so, would

Inquiries of the Ministry
it not be possible for members of parliament to be shown the same courtesy and be given copies of the bill? Someone might convey this suggestion to the minister in his absence.


Mr. STANLEY KNOWLES (Winnipeg North Centre):: In this connection may I address a question to the Prime Minister in reference to the business of the house. In his summary of what was before us he referred twice to old age pensions. Are we to understand that there is to be a temporary measure continuing the present arrangement and later on a definite amendment to the act?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: As my hon. friend is aware, under the National Emergency Transitional Powers Act there was an amendment to the Old Age Pensions Act which increased the amount of pension, but under that legislation that amendment continues only to March 31 of this year. The government will seek to have that period extended beyond March 31, to continue until such time as a bill respecting old age pensions is brought into the house. That bill will include all that is in the order in council and something in addition. What will be included in addition I cannot say just now.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Can the Prime Minister say when that bill will be introduced?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: That will
depend upon the progress we make during the session. It must be during the session.



CANADIAN INFORMATION SERVICE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. GORDON GRAYDON (Peel):: I
should like to direct a question to the Secretary of State for External Affairs. Does the government contemplate making any official statement relating to a newspaper dispatch of some weeks ago which seemed to indicate that the Canadian information service was being placed under the jurisdiction of the Department of External Affairs? I have tried to find out if an order in council was passed, but there does not seem to have been one. Can the minister give me some information on that? In view of the fact that there was a shifting of the department, perhaps the Prime Minister is the one to whom I should have directed my question, but in any event I should like the government's answer, if I may have it.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I thought that in the list I gave to the house the other day I had
included mention of the transfer of the Canadian information service to the Department of External Affairs. If I did not, I will make a formal announcement on that a little later.



WAR INDUSTRIES


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. A. M. NICHOLSON (Mackenzie):: I wish to direct a question to the Minister of Reconstruction. Has the attention of the minister been drawn to an article appearing in the last issue of Time in connection with the sale of Canadair to the Electric Boat Company of Manhattan? Has the minister any comment to make with regard to the implication that the sale was made because of the lack of "know-how" of Canadian Vickers and the Canadian government?


Clarence Decatur Howe: Mr. Speaker, I read the article in Time. It has been the policy of the Department of Reconstruction to establish war industries as permanent peacetime industries whenever possible, and the sale of Canadair to the new owners was a move that it is believed would bring about that result. The matter of "know-how" is a matter of opinion, I suppose, but that had no influence on the transaction.



VETERANS AFFAIRS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. H. G. ARCHIBALD (Skeena):: I
should like to direct a question to the Minister of Veterans Affairs, of which I gave him notice. Groups of veterans are still being required to cram the work of five years into six months, and are in fear of losing all their educational gratuities. Would the minister care to make a further statement on the matter?
Right Hon. IAN A. MACKENZIE (Minister of Veterans Affairs): I may say at once that there has been a misconception in regard to this whole question. Many of these matriculation students up to now have finished their courses in a lesser period than six months; of course some have gone through the usual period of eight months and some have gone twelve months. This scheme is carried out with the cooperation of the Minister of Labour and with the active cooperation-and it has been very good-of the department of education of the province of Ontario. From both
Inquiries of the Ministry

these sources we have the assurance that the necessary facilities will be provided for training as long as they are required for those who are making reasonable progress. There is no change whatsoever in the policy; those who within six months have shown marked promise will be encouraged to take their examinations, for the reason that the universities have changed their policy in reference to having a special session to which the veterans have been invited early in the year, because if they missed the present October term they might have to wait for several months, which is not so good for their education, before again having an opportunity to enter university. In regard to facilities, in regard to encouragement, in regard to providing every amenity for the continuation of their studies, there is no change whatsoever in policy; and we have the splendid cooperation of the Department of Labour and, as I said, of the department of education of the province of Ontario.



NEWFOUNDLAND


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Gordon Graydon: May I ask the Secretary of State for External Affairs if there have been any developments in the field of closer relationships between Canada and Newfoundland since the parliament of Canada last met?
Right Hon. L. S. ST. LAURENT (Secretary of State for External Affairs): Mr. Speaker, the question is in very general terms: have there been any developments in that field? I may say that shortly after the house rose in August the Newfoundland national convention met in St. John's. Members of this house I am sure have followed with interest the reports of the deliberations of that convention which have appeared in the press. So far the sessions of the convention seem to have been chiefly devoted to an examination of the financial and economic position of Newfoundland. There has been some discussion also of alternative forms of government, and a debate has indicated interest on the part of some members in investigating the possibilities of confederation with Canada. However, we have received no communication in this connection from the Newfoundland authorities; and of course it is a matter for the Newfoundland national convention and the appropriate authorities in Newfoundland to decide whether an approach will be made to Canada regarding possible confederation.



ESQUIMALT DOCKYARD


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. G. R. PEARKES (Nanaimo):: I should like to ask the Minister of National Defence whether the security guards at His Majesty's dockyard at Esquimalt are now required to join the corps of commissionaires. If so, will they receive the same relative pay as previously?


Hon. BROOKE CLAXTON (Minister of National Defence):: There has been some discussion with the local corps of commissionaires with regard to the possible transfer of veterans and the administration of civilian security guards to the corps, but the matter is still receiving consideration. Rates of pay of course would receive the most serious consideration in the event of any transfer.



FOOD AND FUEL


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. E. B. McKAY (Weybum):: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Transport, a copy of which has been forwarded to him. Will the minister indicate what is being done by his department to relieve the crisis involving the lives of people, now existing in many parts of Saskatchewan due to the recurrence of blizzards and low temperatures, which have stopped the normal flow of foodstuffs and fuel supplies to many prairie areas?


James Horace King: Order. The hon. member knows very well that on the orders of the day questions should' be brief and to the point.


Eric Bowness McKay: It is brief. Here is the question. Will the minister state what special steps have been taken to provide extra railway snow removal, power and other equipment to ensure the movement of these supplies to the areas most seriously affected.


Hon. LIONEL CHEVRIER (Minister of Transport):: The hon. gentleman did send me notice of the question, and I thank him for doing so. I should tell him immediately, however, that in reference to the weather and blizzards the Department of Transport has no [DOT] power and no jurisdiction over an act of God. However, I did communicate with the officials of the Canadian National Railways-I was unable to contact those of the C.P.R.-and found out from them that in the area surrounding Moose Jaw, Regina and Gravelbourg

Inquiries oj the Ministry
south to the international boundary there has been a continuous series of blizzards for the last three weeks, with which the railways have had a great deal of difficulty in coping.
I am informed that the situation has cleared up substantially this morning; the temperature has risen to 30 below zero, and the railways have moved into the area their heavy mountain snow ploughs. Hence the position generally is that the railways are meeting the the last three weeks, with which the railways circumstances.



TRANS-CANADA AIR LINES COST OF AIRCRAFT &quot;NORTH STAR&quot;

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. G. Iv. FRASER (Peterborough West): On August 1 of last year I asked the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply the total cost to the T.C.A. of the North Star, and at that time he said he could not answer the question owing to the fact that he would have to get an average over twenty planes. Now that Canadair has been sold, can the minister answer that question? I am referring to page 4152 of Hansard for last year.
Clarence Decatur Howe: The price of the plane has not been established. Trans-Canada Air Lines has not paid for any plane as yet. It is expected that a price will be established shortly, and when that is done I shall be glad to advise my hon. friend as to the price of the plane.


Mr. FRASER:: Could the minister say
about when that price will be established, now that the plant has been sold?


Clarence Decatur Howe: I should think about the
middle of February.



SERVICE BETWEEN WINNIPEG AND EDMONTON

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. R. R. KNIGHT (Saskatoon):: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply in regard to the approximate date of commencement of the air line service between Winnipeg and Edmonton via Saskatoon, and to ask whether the minister can assure us that this service will be carried on exclusively by Trans-Canada Air Lines.


Clarence Decatur Howe: It had been
hoped that the sendee in question could have been in operation last autumn.
I told the house that the date of commencement depended upon the completion of
the airport at Saskatoon. I am sorry to say that bad weather in the late autumn prevented the completion of the airport. One runway was completed, and we had hoped that Trans-Canada Air Lines would agree to operate with the facilities it provided. However, after examination, Trans-Canada Air Lines advised the department that its operators would require full completion of the airport before operation could be commenced.
About two months more work is required at the airport, and it is hoped that before June 1 the service will be in operation. Service from Winnipeg to Edmonton will be conducted exclusively by Trans-Canada Air Lines.



ELDORADO MINING COMPANY


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. W. CHESTER S. McLURE (Queens): Does the government contemplate any change in the compensation payable to shareholders of the Eldorado Mining Company, in view of the success the government claims for its operations since expropriation took place?
Clarence Decatur Howe: The answer is
no.



RENT CONTROL


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. ROBERT FAIR (Battle River):: I
should like to ask a question of the Minister of Finance. Have the officials of the wartime prices and trade board relaxed rent control regulations to the extent that landlords may notify yearly tenants that after a certain specified date they become monthly tenants, and by this method deny the yearly tenants of the security of yearly leases?


Hon. DOUGLAS ABBOTT (Minister of Finance):: There has been no change in
rental control regulations with respect to evictions, or otherwise.



GOVERNOR GENERAL'S SPEECH


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Monday, February 3, consideration of the motion of Mr. J. W. MacNaught for an address to His Excellency the Governor General in reply to his speech at the opening of the session, and
The Address-Mr. Brunelle
[Stage Direction]
the amendment thereto of Mr. Bracken, and the amendment to the amendment of Mr. Coldwell.
Mr. H. E. BRUNELLE (Champlain):: Mr. Speaker, I was not in the house when the hon. member for Prince (Mr. MacNaught) and the hon. member for Richelieu-Vercheres (Mr. Cournoyer) moved and seconded the adoption of an address in reply to the speech from the throne. However from what I read and from what I have heard it would seem that they did honour to their task; and upon that I congratulate them. Both are promising young men. I congratulate them even more because it is my intention to ask today for shorter speeches m house debates. Those two hon. members set a good example by delivering brief but most effective speeches when they moved and seconded the adoption of the address in reply.
At this stage of the session I believe it is in order to suggest some amendments to the rules of the house. However, such suggestions have been made so often, without results, that I entertain but little hope of success. In the words of Mark Twain, everyone talks about the rules of the house, but no one does anything about them. Governments come and go, but the house rules, some of which are obsolete and meet with neither the wishes nor the approval of hon. members, remain.
I suppose therefore that conditions will continue as before: during the first part of the session there will be very little done, and during the latter part of it we shall be in a great hurry, with the result that things will be half done.
In the first place it would seem that all parties should agree to limit to twenty minutes instead of forty the time permitted for speeches. In the second place it would seem that the debates on the address in reply and the budget, and speeches offering amendments, should be limited to the speeches of the leaders of the parties in the house or their substitutes. It would make very little difference whether the debate on the address in reply lasted one week or two, or one month or two months, because the final vote is taken on the address submitted in the first instance, with no change.
It is true that those votes amount to votes of confidence in the government. I submit however they cannot be classified even as proper occasions for votes of confidence, because there are points in the speech from the throne and in the budget which all hon. memb*-s approve, and there are others of 
which some hon. members disapprove. Yet we have to vote either for or against the whole thing.
I believe further that at the opening of each day's sitting hon. members in opposition groups should be somewhat less inquisitive and ask fewer questions. It will be recalled that only this afternoon we lost more than half an hour from the asking of such questions. If hon. members wishing information were to write the different departments from which they require that information, they would receive replies in writing. Further, the political platforms of the respective parties in the house are now well known to all. Debates would be improved if they were shortened, if we heard a little less about purchasing power, directive economy and negative criticism, and more of really constructive suggestions.
After all, I believe all hon. members wish to preserve the well-being of our citizens. If we look back twenty-five years we must conclude that today we are doing very well. Conditions in general are as good as they could be. Living conditions in European countries do not compare with those in Canada; our only point of comparison is the United States, and anyone who has been in that country since the end of the war has found out that life and business in Canada are greatly to be preferred. Over here there is work for everyone, with the exception of a few unfortunate cases. Wages are good, and the epidemic of strikes which followed the conclusion of the war has almost disappeared. This is due to the good work of the department, and not to accident. In justice at this point I would pay a compliment to our Minister of Labour (Mr. Mitchell). During the war his task was no less delicate than it was difficult, and he fulfilled it masterfully. No one has worked harder, and for his ability, for his competence, for his judgment, yes. for his endurance, he deserves the thanks and felicia-tions of every Canadian. The Minister of Labour is a labour man. He is an honest unionist; he did a great deal for his fellow *men before he came to this house, and in this house he has done honour to the high post of Minister of Labour. It has been a pity to hear the bitter criticisms and the unfair attacks which have been made against him by some of the labour leaders and by some hon. members in this house who pretend to be specially concerned with labour. But in spite of ail this, the name of our Minister of Labour will go down in history as being that of one of the best we have ever had.
We hear a great deal of talk about the adoption of a labour code. Of course this will provoke opposition and indignation on the

The Address-Mr. Brunelle
part of certain knights errant who are always in quest of fights against windmills in the name of the autonomy of the provinces. As usual we shall have to adopt a course which will help the labouring class. If a labour code is desired by the labour unions, and if it will help to bring the level of wages paid to the workers in the province of Quebec up to the level of the wages paid to workers in other provinces, I will be in favour of it. We must satisfy the labouring class by just and practical means. We must give it happiness and contentment in order to save its members from falling into the ranks of the extremists. Industrial activity should be encouraged in every way in order to create jobs and accentuate production in general.
Having that in mind I wish officially to ask the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply (Mr. Howe) to do his utmost to sell or to rent or to give away the building or the war plant known as Electric Steels at Cap de la Madeleine. That plant should not be allowed to deteriorate to the extent that the building will become useless. Later on I shall privately give the minister my reasons for making this request in such an urgent manner. The Minister of Public Works (Mr. Fournier) visited the plant recently with me, and was greatly impressed by its size and value. I intend to use him as a witness when I plead my case before the Minister of Reconstruction.
I should like to refer to another class of worker who deserves the particular solicitude of the government-the agricultural worker. Industrial workers have their unions to protect their members, but the farmers have no union. I doubt if they will ever have a really efficacious union. I speak for the farmers of all Canada. I am opposed to special privileges and special financial favours being granted to one portion of agriculture. The eastern farmer as a rule does not spend much time asking for favours. In fact he has never been spoiled by government favours. The same thing cannot be said of the farmers in other parts of Canada. If there is any difference between the eastern and western farmer I would say that the eastern farmer works harder and longer hours and is a more deserving citizen. He is honest and he pays his debts. He administers his affairs more wisely and more economically than others. He takes good care of his property. You will not see near the buildings of an eastern farmer pieces of expensive machinery like threshing machines, combines, binders and mowers lying around exposed the year round to rust and dust and rain and snow. Fortunately the eastern provincial government have not passed any moratoriums
or shielding laws, if I may call them that; they have not passed any protecting laws that actually invite the farmer to be dishonest.
Be that as it may, the tillers of the soil are entitled to the special attention of any government. Even if a farmers' national union could be formed, it would not be as effective as the unions of other workers. The reason for that is self-evident. The farmer must work twelve hours and more a day; he must work on Sundays; he must work on legal holidays. He cannot charge or be properly remunerated for overtime work. The cattle, horses, sheep and hogs on his farm will not allow the farmer to take a holiday during the summer. In general the farmer receives no more than seventy-five per cent of the remuneration received by other workers. His task is far from being easy or light; it is far from being pleasant. Yet how essential is the production of the farmer!
I should like to give some statistics. I submit that the present prices of butter and eggs are not sufficiently high, and I shall limit myself to discussing those two items. In reality $2.50 per hundred pounds for liquid milk, or raw milk as they call it, is no more than a fair minimum price. It may be that such a price is paid in certain places, but it certainly is not general. On that basis, a net return to the farmer of 60 cents per pound for butter should be made possible either by new or additional subsidies or by the application of the provisions of the Agricultural Prices Support Act which was passed in 1944. In proportion a price of 60 cents per pound for butter would be less than what we pay for other consumer goods like shoes, clothing or canned goods.
In justice I must say that the present government and the present able Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner) have been good to the farmers. But the actual conditions call for more protection for the farmer. I profess to be fairly well acquainted with farming conditions in the east as well as in the west. I have many friends on farms in my constituency of Champlain, and I have farms in the province of Saskatchewan from which I draw a great deal more worry' than money. In general the income from the farm does not compare with the income received by other manual workers, either in terms of dollars or in terms of energy spent. In brief, subsidies or bonuses ought to be provided to raise the price at least of dairy products to the farmer. In some places, Mr. Speaker, farm labour is asking far more in daily wages than the farmers are making themselves. The
The Address-Mr. Brunelle

serfs are getting more than, the kings of the earth. The great writer, Lamartine was right when he wrote:
The plough in making the first furrow laid the foundation of society. It is not only wheat that grows out of ploughed land; it is civilization itself.
I intended to speak of rationing and controls, but I shall have to refrain in order to practice that brevity of speech which I preached at the outset of my remarks. I shall only say that the sooner we recover our full liberty, the better it will be for all concerned. Perish that bureaucracy which now afflicts Canada. If the sacrifice of something which is dear to us must be made, well and good; but we must remember that all of us in every sphere of activity are always jealous of our liberty, and I think that the country mouse in the fable expressed the current feeling:
Give me again my hollow tree,
My crust of bread and liberty.
According to an investigation made recently by the Department of Reconstruction, building materials will be available in almost sufficient quantities in 1947. In order to prepare the way, I suggest that a time limit be now set for the expiration of controls and that the greatest possible publicity be given to that time limit. In the meantime all interested parties would prepare to face the situation which sooner or later must be faced. I do not think there will be much of a shortage problem at the expity of that time limit, except in some special cases, like Ottawa, for instance, where shortages prevail more than anywhere else-except a shortage in speech-making-and where possibly the municipality could assume the responsibility with the generous aid of the government or perhaps with the aid of some provincial premiers such as the premier of Ontario and the premier of Quebec, who with their autonomy complex might be willing to take over. They actually did take over the milk question a short time ago, and the price of milk thereafter went up by' three to four cents a quart. But just the same, long live autonomy-!
There are certain small grievances of which vre are all anxious to rid the country, but in justice it must be said that Canada is still the best place in the world in which to live. And for that fact the present government deserves some credit. The members of this house are all no doubt determined not only to maintain our present advantageous condition but to improve it. Canada is stoutly heading towards her great destiny. The obstacles, if any, will not come from bey-ond our borders but from ourselves. If there is discord among our Deople, if there is suspicion

and distrust among us, or in a larger field if there is no cooperation between the governments of the provinces and the central government, our advance will be slower, and our progress might be brought to a standstill.
Yesterday I listened with interest to the long lecture given by the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bracken) and to his remarks on the progress of the federal-provincial negotiations. I notice that he made many suggestions. I think, Mr. Speaker, he could help a great deal if he would only speak to his provincial Tory friends in Ontario and Quebec and ask them to cooperate more in fact than in words. It is a known fact that the premiers of Ontario and Quebec are playing politics with this question. Every Tory in the countiy knows it and enjoys it, and every Liberal and every good Canadian knows it and deplores it. If the leader of the opposition does not know it, I would not like to pass judgment on the merits or demerits of his innocence. However that may be, already we have achieved much. Canada has attained the status of a prosperous free nation, ranking third in international trade, making her own treaties, signing her own commercial pacts, exporting huge quantities of goods, having ambassadors in every nation. In brief, Canada in the eyes of the world is a land of unlimited promise. We are all without exception proud of these achievements, because we all want a greater, a happier and a freer Canada-freer in practice, freer in fact, and even freer in appearance.
As a last word I would say this. In the face of the refusal of the big four, Britain included, to make Canada a party to the peace treaties, in the face of that painful disillusionment, it seems more than ever expedient for every Canadian, for every member of this house to stand united and to proclaim his self-reliance, his independence, yes, his self-respect, and to agree to adopt as a first move a neat and tangible sign, a distinctive flag which will symbolize to all the world, our Canada, our home, our native land.
Mr. DONALD M. FLEMING (Eglinton) (Translation): Mr. Speaker, before commencing my speech in English I should like to refer to the loss which this country and this chamber have sustained since the last session in the death of Hon. P. J. A. Cardin. Warm tribute was paid last Friday by the leaders of all parties in this house to his memory and to his services to this nation. Need I say, Mr. Speaker, that I associate myself with this well deserved tribute.
I had not known Mr. Cardin before I became a member of parliament one and a half years ago. I am happy to say that, not-

The Address-Mr. Fleming
withstanding the difference in our ages, the acquaintance which we then formed grew into a warm friendship, and I was indebted to him on many occasions for assistance, encouragement, counsel and his generous confidence. In his passing, which has so greatly impoverished this house, I personally mourn the loss of one of the greatest Canadians of his generation, an esteemed friend, a man of honour and principle.
(Text): It is to me a special pleasure, Mr. Speaker, to have this opportunity of saying a word of welcome to this chamber to two new members, the member for Portage la Prairie (Mr. Miller) and the member for Parkdale (Mr. Timmins), both of whom happen to be my personal friends. I should like to say to you, sir, that I am confident they will contribute much to the dignity and the decorum of the chamber, as well as to its deliberations. The member for Portage la Prairie has done the nation a great service in bringing before the people the verdict of western Canada on those deplorable aspects of the wheat agreement entered into by the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner) with Great Britain. As regards the member for Parkdale, having sat with him in former years in the city council of Toronto I predict that he will add greatly to the knowledge of this chamber on the pressing problem of housing as well as on a number of other leading national problems.
1 cannot forbear a word of reference to certain events which have taken place since this parliament prorogued on August 31, 1946. I cannot fail to deplore and at the same time to condemn the attempt on the part of certain members of the government opposite in the Pontiac by-election to stir up racial and sometimes religious feeling. I was in that riding in that campaign and I know of my own knowledge some of the things that were done by hon. members opposite, some on the treasury benches, in stirring up racial and religious feeling. It is deplorable.
Many of us approach this session with special interest because we have long wished to know more and wished the country to know more about the exact relationship between the Liberal party and the C.C.F. party; and it is to be hoped that at this session we shall learn something concerning that relationship. Perhaps the amendment which has been introduced by my leader, the leader of the opposition (Mr. Blacken) will provide an opportunity for the clarification of these relationships.
I am not going to remind the house of those occasions in the two previous sessions on which the leader of the C.C.F. came to the rescue of the government when it was in difficulties. I am not going to delay the house by reminding it of a statement made by the leader of the C.C.F. last year concerning the approaches made to him on behalf of the Liberal party, asking him to lead the Liberal party, or a Liberal-C.C.F. coalition. Incidentally, we have never been told just who it was who made those approaches on behalf of the Liberal party; but we had some assurances last session from the Minister of Agriculture-I am glad to congratulate him as the Right Honourable the Minister of Agriculture -that it was not he who made them. The next step was what he no doubt considered the honourable proposals of marriage which were made by the Prime Minister in his Quebec speech of November 29. A-wooing he went, and he invited the C.C.F. to align themselves under his banner.
The first reaction to these matrimonial proposals apparently did not come from the leader of the C.C.F. in this house. The first record I have been able to find of any notice taken of these proposals of marriage by a responsible figure in the C.C.F. party shows that it was taken by provincial reconstruction minister J. H. Sturdy of the Saskatchewan government. Mr. Sturdy is quoted in a Canadian press dispatch of December 6 as follows:
It was generally known at Ottawa that Prime Minister Mackenzie King's choice as a successor to leadership of the Liberal party was C.C.F. national leader M. J. Coldwell.
Mr. King's "strategy for heading off a Tory government is some kind of union of the C.C.F. and the Liberals," Mr. Sturdy said.
"I would rather see the C.C.F. sink, if necessary, in a blaze of glory than sell out to any party with its roots in the dead past."
The member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell) in due course got around to giving the official answer on behalf of the C.C.F. group, and it seems that the Prime Minister is to receive a negative answer to these proposals. That seems to be, as nearly as one can tell, the gist or substance of the speech made in this house last night by the member for Rosetown-Biggar, notwithstanding the cordial way in which he was received by the government benches when lie rose to speak.
I suggest that the amendment which my leader has introduced will afford the C.C.F. party an opportunity of saying to this house and, if they wish, to the people of Canada, whether they are or are not in fact an opposition party. We have seen many evidences
The Address-Mr. Fleming

of a working alliance between the government and the C.C.F. forces in this house. Here is an opportunity for the C.C.F. really to come out in the open and say what the relationship is between them. The amendment will give them their opportunity to say whether they have confidence in this government in the light of its record.
I am sure, Mr. Speaker, it was a matter of great regret on the part of members of this house, regardless of their political affiliations, that the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) in his speech yesterday did not take advantage of the opportunity to supplement what was lacking in the speech from the throne-a lack which is perhaps its most conspicuous feature. He had the opportunity to give the house some information about the programme of the government, because in the speech from the throne there was certainly no information but rather a mass of vague and meaningless platitudes. If the government has a policy or a programme to bring before the house at this session, we know just as much about it now as we did when the Prime Minister rose to speak. If there is such a programme, we are still waiting to hear it.
I am sorry, sir, that the Prime Minister is not in the house at the moment, because I wish to make reference to some of the things he said last night, and also to the way he said them. I am sorry the Prime Minister saw fit to make some of the remarks he did last night, and I should like to refer particularly to one of them. He began his remarks, as hon. members will recall, by making some reference to the facial expressions of members in this part of the house. I should like to have said to him, had he been here, that his own facial expression presented an interesting study, especially when the amendment was introduced by the leader of the opposition. I should like to tell the Prime Minister that when he undertakes to refer to the position which my leader holds with reference to this party and the affections of us who stand behind him, the Prime Minister or any other leader in this house might very well envy the loyalty and the affection which the members of the Progressive Conservative party accord to the leader of the opposition. The Prime Minister need not waste any time or any tears in making comments about the position of the leader of the opposition with reference to this party. His position is secure and we look forward to his assumption at an early date of the reins of office on the treasury benches.
No member of the house coming to this 1947 session, Mr. Speaker, dare close his eyes to the condition of this country. Some reference has been made to the fact that employ-

ment is at a high level. Yes, as we all know, it is at a reasonably high level, in a general sense, although in many local areas unemployment is rife. But that condition of employment has been induced by loans abroad. Let us just take stock of the country at the present time. Agriculture and primary producers have been penalized by government policy. They have been footing the bill for government policy, as regards both price control and assistance to nations abroad. That load which should have been spread equitably over the whole population has been borne by the primary .producers, and in particular by the farmers. Labour in Canada today is restless and suspicious. It has lost all confidence in this government. It has not forgotten that the chairman of the wartime prices and trade board told the industrial relations committee of this house last summer that he just had to hold the increase in wages in the steel industry to only ten cents per hour, otherwise we would have inflation down on our shoulders. What happened? Within three months wage ceilings were removed entirely, and labour has lost all confidence in this government. Mr. Speaker, the white collar class is in a more difficult plight than I think the government has ever begun to realize. They have been squeezed between the upper and nether millstones: on the one hand, inflexible salary ceilings, with no escape clause at all; on the other hand, tremendous increases in taxation and rising costs of living. The provinces have been set at sixes and sevens by the policies of this government. Unhappily there are many evidences that the youth of the country are losing the confidence that all of us would wish youth to have in this land and its future. Thousands of the best-trained of our youth are seeking employment in the United States. As a parliament we cannot, we dare not stand still in the face of that situation. Our first duty as a parliament is to the youth of Canada, because with them lies the future of the country.
Moreover, Mr. Speaker, there is that great northland, that land of treasure in which development work within the past year has received tremendous set-backs as a result of the blindness of this government. It is all very well for the government to make a gesture, to throw out sops to the mining industry in the form of slight decreases in taxation, but that does not get to the heart of the problem. The big producers are not the ones who need help. The ones who need help are those who are engaged in exploration and development work, those on whom the future hopes of this country for pros-

The Address-Mr. Fleming
perity depend to a greater extent than I think many in this chamber even yet realize. Over all is the picture of a country overburdened with an oppressive load of taxation, a load of which the people must be relieved in a measure before this session of parliament prorogues.
We had some interesting remarks from the Prime Minister last night on the subject of controls. It seems that once again the Prime Minister has donned the armour of the defender of the supremacy of parliament. Some of us would have liked to see him during these recent years carry the banner of the knight defender of the supremacy of parliament, but he chose to cast himself in a different role. Now he invites the plaudits of the house and the country because now in 1947 the government is proposing to put these controls on a statutory basis instead of an order in council basis. Well, if ever a man condemned himself and his administration it was the Prime Minister when he spoke on that theme in the house last night. If it is the policy of the defender of the supremacy of parliament that in 1947, if controls are to continue, they should be put on- a statutory basis, why did not the Prime Minister advocate that policy in 1946? Why did he not advocate it in 1945. instead of building up by means of order in council administration this gigantic bureaucracy which has assumed powers which should be exercised only by parliament?
Yes, I think the Prime Minister has forgotten much, and when he challenged the house last night to bring forward examples of how the government had done violence to the principle of the supremacy of parliament, I am afraid that while he was berating others about their short-sightedness, he himself was guilty of short memory. It is not so very long ago, Mr. Speaker,-you will remember the occasion very well, in September 1945-that an announcement was made in this house by the then minister of national health and welfare to the effect that two days before the government had set up the Canadian information service, and without so much as coming to parliament and without so much as saying by your leave, had transferred to the account of the Canadian information service appropriations voted by parliament in the previous session for the wartime information board. We tried to get some information about it, but were prevented from doing so; the government stood in our way and denied us the information. Yes; there is a good example of what order in council administration has meant under this government.
Not only that, Mr. Speaker. Has the Prime Minister forgotten the events of August last,
when for fear of a defeat in the house the government freed its own members in the debate on the subject of the milk subsidy, and the house voted by a substantial majority against any interference with the subsidy? But the government, headed by the same Prime Minister, went blithely forward and in a matter of a few days did away with the milk subsidy, in the face of the plain expression of opinion by parliament. Is that his conception of the supremacy of parliament?
And has the house forgotten that it is not more than two months since the chairman of the wartime prices and trade board went on the radio in a series of five broadcasts and laid down policy as far-reaching in its scope and effect as any declaration that has been made by any member of the government, including the Prime Minister himself, since the general election of May, 1945? Think of it! Great pronouncements of policy coming from a man who has no direct responsibility to this chamber! If our surprise was great on that occasion, how much greater was it when we were told by the same very able gentleman a few days later, that he had not consulted the minister to whom he is responsible, the Minister of Finance, and had not consulted the government before making that series of broadcasts. Could you want any better or more complete example of bureaucracy running wild? Could you want any better example of the flouting of the supremacy of parliament, any better proof of the fact that talk coming from the government today, doing lip service to the supremacy of parliament, is a pretty hollow exhibition.
Before I leave this theme, Mr. Speaker, may I say this by way of statement of the position of those of us who sit in this part of the house. We do not like bureaucracy. We do not like officials to enjoy vast powers without direct responsibility to this house. In our approach to this whole problem of controls, when we see this legislation I think it fair to say we will have two principles before us; first, the necessity of giving adequate protection to the consumer, and second, the necessity for stimulating production in this country, for without a great stimulation of production in Canada we will still be assailed with fears of inflation. The only way we have to cope adequately with the problem of inflation in this country is by increasing production tremendously, so that scarcity may be replaced by plenty.
The C.C.F. party is still on the same
course. They are still saying to us, in their amendment, that they want controls; they want controls made permanent in this country; they want to go on shackling the enterprise of
The Address-Mr. Fleming

the people of Canada. They want regimentation, because they believe in it, because they know very well that you cannot have a socialistic state without the regimentation of the people in that state. They may talk as they like about not believing in totalitarianism, but they are preaching a system which contains the inevitable seeds of totalitarianism.
Then may I say this word on the subject of taxation. If the government does not bring before this house at this session proposals for a reduction in taxation, before they have finished with this session they will know that they have had a fight on their hands with the Progressive Conservative party. We are here, Mr. Speaker, to fight for reductions in personal taxes in this country, and make no mistake about it. While the government have been silent on this question hitherto, we hope we may know soon what their plans are. They were not so careful before the 1946 session. You will remember that one minister of the crown, the Minister of National Revenue (Mr. McCann), undertook before the session opened to promise great reductions in taxation. Perhaps the government has grown wiser since then, but in any event there has been no intimation from the government as to whether or not they propose to bring about a reduction in taxation at this session. We of the Progressive Conservative party intend to fight for reductions in taxation at this session. We believe that high taxation is contributing very greatly at the. present time to the threats of inflation, because high taxation is increasing labour costs and the cost of materials, and is contributing very greatly to increases in prices.
I turn now, Mr. Speaker, for a moment to the housing scandal in this country. I am sure I do not need to recall to this house two events of importance in connection with this matter which occurred during the 1046 session. The first occurred on March 20 and March 22 of last year, when the Prime Minister and the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply in their speeches in the debate on the address in reply to the speech from the throne painted such a glowing, bright picture of housing conditions in Canada. It was the same thing the Prime Minister said last night, about how much better conditions are here than anywhere else in the wide world, without any reference at all to the opportunities we have in this country for coping with housing conditions. On that occasion the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply painted a very bright picture of the outlook for improved housing. He went on to say in an expansive way, "Why, lumber probably the least of

our worries in Canada in the field of housing materials." Well, it was rather a chastened Minister of Reconstruction who came before this chamber on July 22 of last year and made the abject confession that not only was the housing situation in Canada worse than it had ever been admitted to be by the government in times past, but that by March 31, 1047, the situation would be twenty per cent worse than it was on March 31, 1046. Even that admission was made on the assumption that this country would build 60,000 housing units in the year 1946.
Well, we shall be waiting with interest for some final statement on the housing units completed in Canada in 1946, but the fact remains that at least one prophecy which the government made on that occasion has been abundantly fulfilled; that is, that housing conditions in Canada today are worse than they were last year. It is a deplorable fact; and the responsibility for that deplorable condition rests on the doorstep of this government. After all the lavish promises with which they sought the confidence of the people of this country during the election campaign in 1945, what a fulfilment is this! And when the people of this country have the opportunity they will bring home to those responsible for thus deluding them the responsibility for this housing scandal in Canada today.
Did it not amuse this chamber last evening to hear the Prime Minister praise the government for the number of building permits being issued in Canada this year? He took great satisfaction from the issuance of building permits, and pointed to the fact that if these building permits this year were all translated into houses the programme would be expanded to vast proportions. I cannot take time to refer to all he said last evening, but he stated that the building permits ran to $382,000,000 in 1946 and these are just preliminary returns to the Dominion Bureau of Statistics from 204 municipalities. That is one of the things inherently wrong at the present time, one of the things which have bulked large in the government's mismanagement of this housing problem. The fact of the matter is that they have not taken the plain course any government with its eyes open ought to have taken, to put curbs on building construction that was not contributing directly to the production of houses. You would think the Prime Minister considered it a virtue to issue building permits in this country for a lot of structures that could very well wait until the housing needs of the country have been met.

The Address-Mr. Fleming
In that connection it is not necessary to take any words of mine; I would quote the words of Brigadier Storms, who is the general manager of Housing Enterprises of Canada Limited, a company, as you know, made up ninety per cent of public capital and ten per cent of private capital contributed by lending institutions in this country. This is what Brigadier Storms had to say on October 9, 1946, both on the subject of the need in Canada today and the way in which building materials and labour are being permitted by the government to be diverted to construction other than the construction of houses. I quote from the Toronto Globe and Mail of October 10:
Bricks, cement, plumbing, electrical fixtures and other materials which should be going into housing are being used for millions of dollars' worth of non-essential building, Douglas H. Storms, general manager of Housing Enterprises of Canada Limited, asserted yesterday in an interview.
"This country has gone berserk on building of the wrong kind," he said. "Everywhere you see plant extensions, theatres, garages, stores, summer cottages, dance halls and hot-dog stands under construction. You can't tell me those buildings don't take material away from housing because they do. What is more, they are absorbing thousands of workingmen who should be building houses.
"At the same time, people are living in the worst distress for lack of houses. On one street of small houses in New Toronto, we found that each house was occupied on the average by 19 people. All this non-essential building goes on and we cannot get houses built for homeless people."
And he continued further:
"The public should be made to realize how awful this situation is," he said. "Thousands of people, many of them veterans back from overseas, are doubling up with their in-laws and in some cases living four and five in a room."
Then he goes on to speak about the dangers, and he says:
I am telling you that if those people cannot get warm places to live in this winter, there will be riots.
That is strong language, Mr. Speaker, but you know what the danger is. Then he continued:
"If you can show me a municipality in Ontario which is exercising the slightest selective control over building I'll buy you a new hat," Mr. Storms exclaimed.
During the war and the ensuing control period building was restricted, he said. Once the restrictions came off business corporations and individuals, all with money to spend, had rushed in to build. Firms were now building big plant extensions which, he said, would stand empty a few years hence "when the honeymoon is over."
It is regrettable that the government has taken no steps to put an end to this honeymoon in the construction of non-essential buildings.
I now turn to another subject, that vexed one of dominion-provincial relations. I represent a constituency in Ontario, but in approaching the problem of dominion-provincial relations I wish to make it abundantly clear that I do so not merely as a. resi-. dent of that province but as a Canadian. It is a problem national in scope, one which holds the interest of Canadians in all parts of Canada, or should.
We of the Progressive Conservative party say, first, that a way must be provided for the dominion and the provinces to reach agreement. Secondly, if an agreement is to be effective, it must be nationwide. We would not take away from any of the provinces which have signed an agreement any benefits they may have obtained. But we do say that this matter of reaching agreements cannot be fully effective in the solution of national problems unless such agreements are extended from coast to coast. We say further that that necessary nationwide agreement cannot be achieved without a general dominion-provincial conference.
The provinces-all of them-are ready to sit down together in conference. They have asked for a resumption of the conference, and the responsibility for failure to resume rests with this government. It is their refusal that prevents the reconvening of the conference today.
As did my leader last night, on this subject I speak more in sorrow than in anger. The method the government has pursued is wrong. In the first place, the idea of starting out with certain inducements and trying to gather in all the provinces on the basis of those inducements; then, when it is found such inducements are not enough, raising the ante so as to gather in more, and when it is found that that is not successful, raising the ante even more, cannot be acceptable; that method of horse-trading is inherently wrong. It is wrong in principle.
We recall the very proper terms of condemnation of such methods expressed by the premier of New Brunswick on January 6 of this year when he described as an affront the method pursued by the dominion, namely that of raising the ante after signing the agreement with him. He said it was creating gross discrimination, and of course he was entirely right. It is very easy for the dominion to raise the ante because the taxpayers have to pay it. But that is not a proper method.
The Address-Mr. Fleming

In the second place, the method of secret negotiation is not a proper one. This procedure of making terms or negotiating agreements with one province without disclosing to that province the terms of agreements negotiated with other provinces is likewise wrong in principle. These negotiations should be brought out into the open where the people of Canada can see them. Otherwise we shall have created an .intolerable situation which inevitably will lead to jealousy and distrust.
In the third place, nothing could be more un-Canadian or inimical to the spirit of confederation; yes, to the very fabric of confederation itself, than this tactic of playing off one province against another, or trying to create fissures in our national unity. Had that been the spirit prevailing in 1864 and subsequently we know there would have been no confederation. The fathers of confederation met together for a common purpose in an attitude of give and take. It was not a situation wherein one party was resolved to lay down in a high-handed fashion certain proposals and to refuse to meet in conference with the other parties unless he had his own way on his own terms. There would have been no confederation on that basis. Today the provinces are willing to confer. Why does not the dominion government, in the name of reason and in the name of Canada, call them together?
It is regrettable also that the government has pursued the policy of writing agreements on only one particular aspect of a problem which it admits has three aspects. It is not enough to confine these agreements to the field of taxation. They must be extended to include the other two matters embraced in the original proposals of the dominion, namely public investment, which will have so great a bearing on employment in this country in years to come, and social security, for which the people of Canada are looking today.
The speech from the throne does intimate that the provinces are to be called together in general conference. We find this at page 3 of Hansard, where it is stated that they will be called for the purpose of seeking agreement in the two other fields. Just think of it I They are going to be called together to discuss the two fields of public investment and social security. Yet this dominion government persists in its refusal to call them together to discuss the three proposals, namely those two and the field of taxation as well.
So far as the government of Ontario is concerned, I am glad it has made clear that it does not begrudge the other provinces anything they may get, because the government of

Ontario has admitted the necessity for a readjustment of taxation powers in order to bring about fiscal equality as between provinces. I am glad Ontario has taken that attitude. The government of my province has been realistic, and properly so, in its insistence upon a proper definition of responsibility in the crucial days which lie ahead, as between the dominion and the provinces, and an understanding of what sources of revenue the provinces will have to meet their responsibilities.
The provinces must have the assurance that, having given up the principal fields of taxation which Ontario and Quebec have indicated they are prepared to rent to the dominion, the lesser fields of direct taxation will be left to the provinces so that they may retain their autonomy in days to come.
I urge on this house that because of the state of frustration in which so many people find themselves today as they survey the plight of housing, the plight of the taxpayer, the plight of labour and the white-collar worker and the plight of the primary producer, and as they look at the government suffering from a state of coma, surely the time has come when this house should measure up to its responsibilities and interpret the will of the people of Canada in this chamber. I submit that the proper interpretation of that will is to be found in the want of confidence amendment introduced by my leader, the leader of the opposition.


Mr. CLARENCE GILLIS (Cape Breton South):: Mr. Speaker, in the interests of
brevity I am not going to waste time in complimenting the mover (Mr. MacNaught) and the seconder (Mr. Cournoyer) of the address in reply to the speech from the throne. The hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell) did that last night for this group. They did exactly what was required of them. They eulogized the government and said that everything the government had done during its tenure of office was absolutely correct. They did not disappoint anyone on that side of the house, nor did they disappoint anyone on this side. The chances are that I, too, will not disappoint anyone this afternoon.
When I listened last evening to the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) answering the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bracken) I sat here and wondered if I were living in the Canada the Prime Minister was talking about. The rosy picture of peace and prosperity which he painted is certainly not applicable to the part of Canada from which I come. This debate provides an opportunity for every hon. member to place himself on record as to

The Address-Mr. Gillis
whether the prosperity painted last evening by the Prime Minister is applicable to the people who sent him here. If he does not do that, he is remiss in his duty. As I say, it is certainly not applicable to the part of the country from which I come.
As was pointed out by the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar the speech from the throne leaves much to be desired. It does mention that certain matters will be discussed, and in one section it states that labour relations will be discussed. That is not anything new in this house; what will be new is to have something done about the matter. I trust we shall be able to persuade the government to give more than lip-service at this session to this very important question.
During the last session of the house I rose in my place here and attempted to avoid a strike in the steel works in my part of the country which would affect some 4,500 members of my constituency. Because of faulty labour legislation, because the government had taken the attitude of sitting back and hoping for some miracle to happen, that strike developed and it affected a very important section of that community. It lasted for months and it has left scars there which it will take years to remove. A great disservice was done to that particular part of the country. I place the responsibility for that squarely upon the shoulders of the government because this situation was developing for months and in my opinion it could have been headed off.
I again find myself facing a condition where
13,000	coal miners in Nova Scotia are placed in a similar position. For months they have been endeavouring to come to some kind of reasonable understanding with the operator. At the time when the matter of a new contract arose this government had full responsibility in the field of fuel. But nothing was done. The controls were removed and the problem was handed back to the provincial government. A stoppage of work developed which lasted for forty-eight hours. The miners are now back for two weeks with a federal commissioner attempting to resolve the dispute.
I should like to ask why that federal commissioner was not injected into the picture earlier? It is much easier to iron out that kind of problem before a work stoppage occurs. What authority has that federal commissioner to make any award except to report to the Minister of Labour (Mr. Mitchell) ? He has none. His function is merely to try to get both parties to come to an agreement. In my opinion there is no possibility of the operator in Nova Scotia and the mine workers
coming to an understanding without government assistance. If there was, it would have been done long ago because they have had months of negotiation.
With a federal commissioner in there at this time, where does it leave the Minister of Labour in connection with the statement he made a few days -ago in answering a question I had asked? I asked the minister if his department was making any progress in resolving this dispute and the minister brushed off my. question very lightly with the answer that it was merely a local problem. A problem that affects the basic industry of the province, around which the economy of the province is built, means more to me than just a local the federal government poured millions of dollars into it by way of subsidies and subventions? Why. have they done that if they problem. If it is a local problem why has accept no responsibility for some regulation of the industry? I think the minister will have to revise his thinking on that particular matter because brushing it off with an answer of that kind is not going to solve the problem.
The issues in this particular dispute are quite simple and in my opinion the miners are very reasonable in their demands. There are only two main points at issue. First, the workers were asking for an increase of $2.50 a day. If that increase is granted it will merely put them in line with the wage rates now paid in western Canada. It costs just as much to live and a man must work just as hard in the mines of Nova Scotia as does a man in the mines of western Canada. But the miners got nowhere with the coal company with that demand. The second main point at issue- there are others, but they are not so contentious-was the establishment of a welfare plan, something that is in vogue in most of the coal mining districts of the world.
Having got nowhere with the company in connection with these demands, the executive board of the union visited Ottawa a couple of weeks ago when they spent almost two weeks with the Minister of Labour and his deputies They, were not adamant about their first demand of an increase of $2.50 a day because they dropped that down to an increase of $1.40 a day. That showed that they were willing to cooperate by modifying their demands. That revised demand meant that they were still approximately $1 a day behind the miners in western Canada. There was nothing done in Ottawa. The minister proposed setting up a conciliation board.
The machinery that existed in 1907 and the machinery that we have today by way of conciliation is not adequate to handle the
The Address-Mr. Gillis

problems of the industrial worker in this country today. We need new machinery. The company in connection with the proposal they made attempted to lead the people to believe that they were offering an increase of SI a day in the wages paid the mine workers of Nova Scotia, but in reality they were offering nothing. The offer they made was that for every point of increase in the production of coal in Nova Scotia they would increase the wage rates ten cents. What are the possibilities of increasing production in the coal mines of Nova Scotia? To my mind they are verv poor, and for many reasons. First of all, the company proposes more mechanization. To a limited degree that may be possible. There may be in one or two collieries a section which might be more highly mechanized. But the company took the attitude when negotiating with the executive board of the union that any coal derived from the mechanized end of the collieries would not be pooled with the general output and would not be included as increased production. That was completely dishonest. It was something the miners could not accept as an honest gesture on the part of the company to increase wages..
Second, while there are as many men on the payroll in the mines in Nova Scotia today as there were in 1939, there are 500 fewer men actually loading the coal. That means that the man who is actually loading the coal today is producing just as much coal as he produced in 1939 and it is physically impossible for him to increase that output to a greatei extent than at present. He is carrying an additional load of 500 datal men at the end of that shovel.
Third, there were 5,000 enlistments from the coal mining area, approximately 3,000 of whom came back on the payroll of the mines after three to five years of war, suffering physical handicaps. They are not in a condition to go down into the mine and mine coal. Many of them are obliged to go back into hospital periodically for medical check-ups, and so forth. But all that is counted as absenteeism, and that is why the rate of absenteeism appears to be so high in these collieries. That is another factor which militates against increased production in these collieries.
Coupled with these factors is the fact that mining machinery to-day in the coal mines of Nova Scotia is badly run down, because during the war it was impossible to get the mining machinery required, the picks and drills and shovels and things of that kind, and it would take considerable time to re-equip the mines with the machinery that is required.

So in reality in tying up the increase in wages with the proposed increase in production the company in my opinion was completely dishonest. It was trying to fool the men because by reason of the factors I have mentioned there is no possibility of increased production in these particular collieries.


Arthur Leroy Smith: Will the hon. member permit a simple question, which I am asking so that I may understand the position?


Clarence Gillis: Certainly.


Arthur Leroy Smith: The hon. member said that the increase was tied to ten cents. Ten cents per what?


Clarence Gillis: Ten cents for each point by which production is increased. There are ten points to a ton. If you raise it ten points, you raise it a ton.
With respect to the welfare plan, that is a question which in my opinion was settled twenty-two years ago, when the Duncan commission, under Sir Andrew Rae Duncan, investigated the coal mining industry of Nova Scotia and made a thorough analysis of all the factors involved. Might I point out that every recommendation in the Duncan report that was in the interests of the company has been implemented, every last one of them. The only recommendation that would benefit the mine workers and their families, the establishment of a welfare plan, was ignored, and it has been ignored for over twenty-two years. The company at that time absolutely refused to have anything to do with a welfare plan for the benefit of the mine workers. The Duncan commission recommended in clear and plain language the establishment of a welfare fund and set out not only the way in which the fund should be established but the mechanics for administering it. The Duncan commission recommended:
This fund should be constituted by contributions from all the operators of coal mines, to the extent of one cent per ton of coal raised, and by contributions from the province from the royalties which they receive in respect of the ownership. of the mines, to the extent also of one cent per ton of coal raised. If these contributions wrere continued for a period of five years, a fund would be constituted which would go a long way to improve very materially the surroundings in which the miners live, and to afford the miners and their families reasonable opportunities for social, physical and intellectual development.
The report goes on to recommend how the fund should be administered. That recommendation has lain in the archives of the provincial government for twenty-two years, after a great deal of money had been spent in the preparation of the report. But as I

The Address-Mr. Gillis
said before, every last recommendation in the interests of the company has been implemented. The only recommendation that benefited the men has lain buried in the archives of the provincial government for twenty-two years.
There are perhaps no coal mines in the world that are more hazardous to work in than the coal -mines of Nova Scotia. The general public, who have no intimate knowledge of the life that a coal miner leads, think of him as a person who is immune to danger, a person without human feelings. My conception of the life of a coal miner is this. Every time he leaves his home to go down into the coal mine, he is in exactly the same position as a soldier going into the front line because that may be the last time he will ever see his home. His wife and family are human too, and if he does not come back they feel just as badly as the banker's wife and family would do under such circumstances. But the general conception of the public is: Oh, well, they are just miners; they are used to these things; they are immune to the ordinary human feelings in regard to danger and death.
I say, Mr. Speaker, that you cannot compute the wages of a coal miner on the basis of dollars and cents and I am safe in saying that any member of this house who ever had the experience of having to earn his living and support his family from his labours in a coal mine would take the same attitude, if he suffered the kinks in his spine and felt all the fears that necessarily attach to a coal miner's life.
I have a few statistics here of casualties in a coal mining industry, and they read more like war casualties. They are United States figures but they are applicable to Canada in proportion to population; indeed perhaps the rate of casualties in Canada would be higher.
I have the figures for every year from 1941 to 1945, but I shall not take time to put them all on the record. I will simply give the totals. In that five-year period, in the bituminous industry in the United States there were killed, 5.598; injured, 251,547. In the anthracite industry, during the same period, 1941 to 1945, there were killed, 963; injured, 71,326. The total for the two branches of the industry was 6,561 killed and 322,873 injured. The average number injured annually between 1930 and 1944 was 66,968. The number of permanently totally disabled and permanently oartly disabled from 1930 to 1944 was 1,004,524. If one examines the operation of the coal mining industry since it began he 83166-7
will see that its casualties approximate the casualties of war. Its casualties are a continuing thing, taking place year after year.
The men who go down into the bowels of the earth into a coal mine are in my opinion producing the most essential commodity in this country. They work harder and cripple themselves sooner than anybody else and you cannot haggle and quibble on the basis of dollars and cents when it comes to compensating such men. They shorten their lives by fifteen or twenty years doing their job and taking the risks they do, with only a small share of the recreation and the things that the average man enjoys. You cannot compute the compensation for that sort of occupation on the basis of dollars and cents. The house should know these things and, what is more, the men who are examining into the industry and making recommendations with respect to it should know something about the conditions.
That brings me to the royal commission's report. To me, the report was one of the most disappointing documents I ever read.


An hon. MEMBER:: This year's?


Clarence Gillis: This year's report. Hon. members will recall that year after year since coming into this house I have emphasized and urged the necessity for a thorough examination of the coal mining industry of Canada with particular reference to the provinces of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. Finally the government got around to making that examination, and when the minister of munitions of that day spoke in the house in tabling the order in council which was to set up the commission, as indicated by Hansard of March 27, 1944, at page 1850, he said:
Therefore, the government will appoint a royal commission, charged with the duty of studying all aspects of the production and distribution of coal in Canada, to report to the government with recommendations for such alterations of the pre-war coal policy as its lindings may indicate as necessary or desirable.
That language would lead me to believe that the minister not only wanted to examine the industry for the purpose of finding out its disabilities, as to whether it was uneconomic and so forth, but intended the commission to recommend to the government the adoption of a national fuel policy whereby the mines of Canada could be expanded and markets made available and, I should think, the country zoned. The commission fell far short of that. In short, the royal commission on coal recommended absolutely nothing. They amassed a lot of evidence; but having gone over the problem year by year for the last thirty years,
I can tell the members of this house that there is nothing in that report in the way of evidence

The Address-Mr. Gillis

which is new to me or which should be new to the government, because if they will dig back in their archives they will find brief after brief, both from the east and from the west, setting out the problem exactly as it was stated to the royal commission.
But the disappointing part ofi the commission^ report is that they recommend absolutely nothing. As regards any recommendations that were made to the government either by the unions in their briefs or by others, cold water has been poured upon them and nothing done, and all that the commission recommends is a continuation of the pre-war subventions, the elimination of subsidies as quickly as possible, the abolition of production subsidies, the industry being made to stand upon its own feet.
What, does all that add up to? It simply means that the industry must go back to the thirties, with no more assistance than that. What was the situation in the coal mining industry of Nova Scotia in the thirties? It was this. Thousands upon thousands of boys who subsequently went to fight the war were walking the streets without an. opportunity to get a job, and; in the second place those who were employed in the industry were working, on the average, two and a half days a week, having to eke out an existence on a relief basis.
That is what the commission recommends the mining industry of Canada to go back to. In the development and mechanization of the industry they recommend that the overdue mechanization of the Nova Scotia mines should be effected by the operators without capital assistance from government funds.
I was a member of the reconstruction committee that sat in 1942. The members of the committee will remember that we had the heads of the operating company in Nova Scotia here, and on the question of developing the industry and mechanizing it they said it would take a large capital outlay which they were not prepared to make. They did not have the finances. Only recently one of the mines in Nova Scotia, No. 18 colliery, which is petering out, has come into prominence. There is a good seam that overlies No. 18 colliery, having millions of tons of coal. It employs 450 men at present but it will have to be closed down in six months' time. At a cost of $1,000,000 a tunnel could be drifted from the present site of operations, the facilities that are there being made use of, and we could have a mine that would last for years, a mine around which millions are invested in churches, schools, homes and so forth.


An hon. MEMBER :: How thick is it?


Clarence Gillis: About six feet. While the federal government had control of the industry they made a start at drifting the tunnel. They were prepared to go ahead with it but as soon as the war ended and the controls came off they dropped it. For the last three or four months, as the Minister of Reconstruction (Mr. Howe) will remember, representations have been made to him to do something about the matter, but the old alibi comes up-it is now a matter of provincial jurisdiction. And the provincial governments sit back and say, "We have no money", while the coal companies say, "We cannot make the expenditure". So another asset goes by the board because there is a shortage of money.
The royal commission says that is the correct attitude to take. Our own industry is not important. We are getting plenty of toal from the United States and it may be more profitable for some people in this country to import United States coal than to develop the coal mining industry of Canada a3 an asset for the Canadian people.
One thing the royal commission did not probe is the question, to what extent are the Dominion Steel and Coal in Nova Scotia importers of United States coal? I came up on the train with one of the top heads of that corporation in 1943, and I made the observation, "You have backed out of the Quebec market and the Ontario market as in the last war. What will you do to regain it when the war is over?" He said, "We are not worried about that. We have not lost a customer in Ontario and Quebec. We are importing sufficient coal from the United States to keep all our customers in Ontario and Quebec." Have they discovered they can get more money out of a scheme of that kind than they can in developing and expanding their own industry in Nova Scotia? Some time I should like some minister of the government, when he has a chance, to tell the house to what extent the operators of that industry are importing United States coal and retaining the customers they had in prewar days.
It looks to me as if the determined plan of the Nova Scotia mining industry is to shrink it to care for maritime needs only, get clear of paying subventions, get clear of paying subsidies, and leave it there as another forgotten factor in Nova Scotia. Then those who have exploited the industry as long as it was profitable and as long as they could milk the public treasury of Canada, will go into the importation of coal from the United States, because

The Address-Mr. Gillis
that is a lucrative business when one examines the drawbacks and so forth that they get on the coal which is imported into Canada.
Another thought that I should like to leave with the government is this. I am absolutely opposed to the judiciary being used on royal commissions that are probing industry and I am absolutely opposed to their heading up boards that are dealing with labour relations. I have all the respect in the world for them in their own field, in the field for which they were trained. What is the situation in Nova Scotia with regard to the judiciary? They are being used for every other purpose than the one for which they were appointed. This is the situation in Nova Scotia at the present time. We have seven judges of the supreme court and they have to look after circuit duties and from time to time constitute the court of appeal in the province. There is a good deal of work in that. One of the seven men, Judge Carroll, has been away for over two years. He was on the royal commission. During that time he may have attended to some of his duties, but I do not know that. Anyway, he was away for over two years. Judge Smiley has been dead for the past eighteen months and no successor to him has been appointed.


An hon. MEMBER:: They may not know about his death.


Clarence Gillis: Judge Archibald was on the national war labour board for a couple of years, so that he was out of circulation. The chief justice is a man eighty-three years of age, and I think he should bow his way out. Judge Graham is seventy-five years of age and he has disabilities that should cause him to retire.


Major James William Coldwell: Put him in the senate.


Clarence Gillis: So you see. in that field also, Nova Scotia is forgotten. We have no judges. If you are arrested down there now you will stay in gaol for the rest of your life, with no judge to try you, or until the government make up their mind as to the real duties of a judge.
In the field of industry, particularly the coal mining and the steel industry which are largely engineering or geological projects, while I do not care who assembles the evidence I think the man best qualified to make a decision and write a report with respect to any changes in the set-up should be a man who is trained to make those decisions and should do so rather than have the kind of thing we have in this royal commission's report. The report is merely a waste of time and of the money of the Canadian people. If the evidence assembled were new, I would say it is worth something, but it is not new. So far as recommendations
83166-7J
go, they made absolutely none. So far as one member of the commission, Morrison of Calgary, was concerned, the only thing he was absolutely sure to recommend against was the nationalization of these mines. But he failed to make any recommendation other than to continue the situation that has prevailed for the past fifty years in the mining industry in Nova Scotia, which failed us both in time of peace and in time of war. But he was very careful to say that nationalization might not work.


Arthur Leroy Smith: He is a coal miner, not a judge.


Clarence Gillis: There.are not many kinks in his spine from loading coal.


Arthur Leroy Smith: Just as many as there are in yours from loading coal.


Clarence Gillis: I am doubtful if he ever loaded a pound of coal in his life.


Arthur Leroy Smith: You are so wrong.


Clarence Gillis: He has been a check weigh-man, and he has been a union official as long as I can remember.


Arthur Leroy Smith: He belonged to the union.


Clarence Gillis: I was twenty-six years on the end of a pan shovel. If I were summing up the evidence that was before that royal commission. I would tell the Canadian people truthfully that there was only one agency in this country that was capable of rehabilitating the coal mining industry of Nova Scotia, and that was the federal government. The provincial government admit that they are not able to handle it. I am reasonably sure they would be willing to hand over the control of that industry. The capital expenditure necessary to rehabilitate it can be made by only one agency in. this country and that is the federal government. I want to say this: in my experience with that industry, the only time that there was any satisfaction whatsoever, when we got our wages adjusted in any kind of reasonable manner, had them stepped up and avoided strikes, was during the period when the federal government controlled the industry during this war. There were then the best relations that ever existed in the industry. As far as I am concerned, as long as I am in this house, and can honestly do it, I am going to fight for the mining industry of Canada to be taken over by the federal government, because it is the only agency in this country which will develop it. If we want to sit back
The Address-Mr. Gillis

and take the attitude that we are going to lean on the arm of the United States for our fuel requirements, if we are not going to develop these resources, then we have no right to lay claim to this North American continent. Do not make any mistake about it; if you are watching the press, you will come to the conclusion that if the federal government or some other agency in this country is not going to do something about the eastern end of Canada, the United States is likely to. The stocks of this very corporation that I am talking about have gone away up on the market. They are being bought in the United States. British capital invested in this industry, according to press reports, has passed to interests in the United States; and you are very likely to find in the very near future an industry', in both steel and coal, in that end of the country developed to take care of the overseas market, a situation which is likely to make some of my friends in Ontario and Quebec squirm. I am reasonably sure that if they can set themselves up and go into that overseas market, they will cut the central Canadian product out completely. I am not objecting. However, I am a Canadian and I want to see Canadians develop Canadian resources. Mind you, I am not arguing against someone going in there and doing something about something that we are not touching. But I do want to see us develop our own resources rather than have people from the outside come in and take over.
I should just like to say a few words with regard to one of the new members of the house. I do not want to be unkind to any new member, because I remember when I came here myself, and I was very grateful for the way in which I was received and the patience that most of the members had with me. There is a strike on at the present time in Noranda, Quebec. It has been on for some time. One of the major issues in that strike is recognition of the union and the revocable check-off, where a man signs a card signifying his willingness to have his union dues checked off. That strike has been going on for some months. It is likely to interrupt the whole mining industry of northern Ontario. I have seen a report that they are likely to lay their tools down. I noticed an article in the Ottawa Journal of January 30, 1947, and I mention this because it deals with the issue in that strike. I am going to read this clipping. The new member to whom I have reference is the Social Credit Union des Electeurs member for Pontiac (Mr. Caouette); I am afraid my French is not very good:

Real Caouette, social credit union des electeurs member for Pontiac, told the Journal on his arrival in Ottawa for the session to-day that his party is flatly against the check-off for labour union or for any other purpose.
"To us the check-off is abhorrent as an infringement of personal liberty. We are against the check-off for labour unions, for taxation, for any cause however worthy it may seem."
Mr. Caouette said he had a lengthy conference with Solon Low and found himself in agreement with the social credit leader on major points of policy.
As the representative of that constituency, if the hon. member is correctly reported in that article I think he did the men on the picket line in his riding, many of whom perhaps voted for him, a disservice in making a public statement to a newspaper at this time on the very point at issue in the strike at Noranda. I mention this now in order to give him an opportunity, when he speaks, to clarify that point, because I think it should be clarified.
In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, if I have time I should like to say that I listened this afternoon to the hon. member for Eglinton (Mr. Fleming), who as usual took a few side swipes at the C.C.F. He said that we were totalitarians; that our main function was to keep the government in power, and all that kind of stuff; that we were just an adjunct of the Liberal party. I should like to remind him that his party went to the Liberal party to get their present leader, and if anyone is likely to take them down the garden path it is the man who is leading them now.


Gordon Graydon: Of course that is not
true, is it?


Clarence Gillis: Certainly it is true. The
hon. member said that we in this party believe in controls and regimentation. I should like to ask whether in this matter he agrees with Right Hon. Arthur Meighen, who in 1943 made this statement in Vancouver:
The theorist talks as if control were something new, but the truth is the state in a democratic country has always been the master. Control is the very essence of its being.
That is a pretty strong statement. Meighen believes in controls; he is older and more experienced than my hon. friend.


Gordon Graydon: Could we have the reference, please?


Clarence Gillis: This is a pamphlet containing an address by Right Hon. Arthur Meighen to the Iviwanis Club in Vancouver on October 21, 1943.


Mr. ROWE:: I hope you have read it all.


Clarence Gillis: Very likely it is put out by the official Conservative organization.

The Address-Mr. Lapalme


Gordon Graydon: By whom is it put out? That is what I want to know.


Clarence Gillis: You had better look it up;
my time is nearly up. I will show it to you when I am through.
In conclusion, may I say, Mr. Speaker, that the disabilities I enumerated with respect to my own end of the country are fairly general throughout Canada. The reason is very clear. We are trying to hang on to the old machine that dragged us through two wars. We are still blundering along without any philosophy in life; and as long as the dominant factor in this country is the making of money we shall have what we have today. What Canada must do and what every member of this house must do is place human values above the dollar sign and work for the alleviation of misery among mankind. Until we do that we shall have these marathon debates, doing very little about the problem except paying lip-service to it.
Mr. GEORGES E. LAPALME (Joliette-L'Assomption-Montcalm): Mr. Speaker, if it is customary to wish newcomers to this house the most sincere welcome and the greatest success, it is quite natural for a member on this side to insist all the more on the great victory of the new member for Richelieu-Vercheres (Mr. Cournoyer), my neighbour to the south and my confrere at the bar. May he find in this house the ties of friendship which bestow upon political life the only attractions it can offer.
I do not intend to deal at once with the proposals put forward in the speech from the throne. However, may I point out the new trend in the legislative measures concerning the future, and I also feel at ease in approving ihe proposals of the government with respect to amendments to the Old Age Pensions Act, the establishment of a committee to consider and report upon the question of human rights, and the measures to be taken to provide an increase in the membership of the house.
For the time being I am withholding my praise and my criticism, and I wish to dweil upon a subject which I believe affects parliamentary operations to a greater extent than the proposed legislation itself. I am referring to the mechanism of legislation, or rather to the mechanism of parliamentary operations or procedure. I was very much surprised a few moments ago to hear the hon. member for Champlain (Mr. Brunelle) express exactly the same ideas as I had in mind in relation to parliamentary discussions and the length of our debates. However, I was glad to see him change his direction and leave it to me to discuss this matter at length.
At the beginning of this month, February, who could answer the following questions: How long will we stay here and, when we leave next summer, how much work will have been done? Most hon. members can make a guess at the length of the session and put it at six or seven months. No one, however, could predict within ten per cent the total of our achievements. The reason is that the time lost in this house cannot be figured out. Fifty per cent of the speeches, even if they are very well prepared, are useless and never change a single vote; and owing to the obsolete rules and regulations of this house a discussion can be unduly prolonged and stretched out. In the meantime, days and weeks go by, and the only results are speeches lost in Hansard which no one reads except members, a few newspaper men who have to read them, and a few constituents to whom copies of their member's speech may be sent.
During the last two sessions, while sitting in this house and listening to speech after speech, I have often wondered if the population of this country would not have gained more from parliamentary operations if we had fewer speeches and more positive votes. I am not referring to votes on technical points, with which I shall deal later on. I am referring to a vote which immediately puts into effect in the life of a nation an important measure which otherwise may be implemented only weeks later. It is the nation which loses these weeks, while speeches gain thereby. After the last session a few newspapers raised the following problem with which I wish to deal: Would it not be appropriate to redraft the rules and regulations of the house in order to speed up the passage of our legislation? I think only last week the same question was brought up again in a national magazine.
I have good authorities to support this suggestion. Last fall in New York, before the United Nations the head of the Canadian delegation, the Right Hon. Secretary of State for External Affairs (Mr. St. Laurent), who was then Minister of Justice, denounced with good reason the length of the discussions, and requested that speeches be limited to a veiy short period of time. He spoke for only ten minutes. I wish I could be as brief, but since the legislator is above his own laws probably I shall take forty minutes to request twenty or thirty minute speeches. Should not a measure which was considered appropriate for the United Nations, the organization of the world, also be excellent for the administration of our country? If it can be held that certain delegates of the great powers speak for local consumption, cannot the same thing be held against members of the Canadian parliament?
The Address-Mr. Lapalme

Here is a resume of what has been written, in various newspapers and national magazines:
How many members would ever speak at all were it not for the radio, newspapers and Hansard, in other words for the spot-light which shows them off before a permanent audience? It is an open secret that publicity^ granted by newspapers and specially by columnists prompts many members to rise to their feet at every occasion. After three or four speeches, one is proud to read in newspapers that he is on the list of future cabinet ministers. Those who remain mum because they think too many talk -too much, stay in the background and are considered by their constituents as inert and incompetent back-benchers.
During two sessions, which is approximately nine months, I spoke only once. It is useless to add that since I do not run after publicity I was not overwhelmed by it. Many other lion, members did the same. A few have not even yet made their maiden speeches. What would have happened if all of us had decided to speak in every debate? We would still be here completing the work of the fall session of 1945.
It is very easy to see the ridiculous side of this situation, and it is easy to understand to what extent the positive operations of the house may be delayed, and are delayed, by the laxity of the rule. How can this situation be remedied? By carrying out the recommendation the Secretary of State for External Affairs suggested at a meeting of the United Nations, to the effect that they limit the length of speeches. This time limit should be set at twenty or thirty minutes, with the exception of party leaders; and one should be authorized to read his speech.
I am told that this suggestion has already been made in the house. I come with it again. Reading one's speech means that it has been prepared most carefully and that it will be on a higher level. It also means greater speed in delivering it, thus avoiding hesitation and repetition on the part of those who think they can improvise. Those who overstep their limit of forty minutes are usually those who do not read their speeches.
Furthermore, although all French-speaking members speak English, they would rather have a prepared text when they address themselves in that language. This is easy to understand. since some of their English-speaking colleagues, who have a natural command of the English language, never speak without staring continuously at their texts.
Therefore, what about those like myself who speak a tongue which is not their own. However, the imposing of time limits on speeches will not be sufficient to prevent what, to use a common expression, might be described as a parliamentary bottleneck. As a

matter of fact the present rules allow 244 members-not including yourself, Mr. Speaker -to speak for forty minutes on the debate in reply to the speech from the throne, and to say anything at all. When this marathon is over, we shall then vote. And we shall vote upon what? Upon legislative measures? Not at all. The speech from the throne is nothing more than the statement of a programme, and it is always carried by a subsequent vote. Then, why all these speeches-including my own' We should ration speeches. There should be no debate on the speech from the throne. Last year I believe the debate lasted for three weeks. Why should not participation in these debates be restricted to the official leaders of our political parties, or their representatives?
All this noise over the speech from the throne is nothing in comparison with the time lost oyer the voting of the estimates and the meetings of the committee set up for the purpose of studying bills in all their details. We listen to all these unnecessary debates leading to dull votes on technicalities, and speeches from eight to ten members, all approving the same measure, when it is not even opposed; and members' resolutions which are killed by speeches. I am omitting many more.
Sometimes the debate on the estimates looks like a marathon of endurance and boredom. Each member should be entitled to ask only one question on each item. This question could be subdivided into a few more. Once the answer has been given by the minister the member could discuss or accept the answer in a speech which should not last for more than ten minutes.
The detailed study of bills in committee usually lingers over an unjustified period of time, owing to the great number of speeches delivered which often wander away from the subject matter, taking us into every nook and corner of every constituency. It is almost a repetition of the procedure in respect of estimates. Is there a more embarrassing regulation than the one which allows an hon. member to speak for thirty-nine minutes and, after an interruption which gives him an opportunity to take his seat, to rise again and keep on talking for another thirty-nine minutes, and so on? There should be a ten-minute limit; and hon. members should not have the right to speak twice on the same section of a bill. Since we are handed bills beforehand, this procedure would compel hon. members to examine them in advance, thus giving them an opportunity to prepare their questions, instead of waiting until they have taken their

The Address-Mr. Lapalme
seats in the house and proceed to ask irrelevant questions, as so often happens, on account of lack of preparation.
Since I have been referring to the house sitting as a committee of the whole, perhaps I might deal with the permanent or standing committees, and their reports which are subsequently brought before the house. We all know why those committees were created. They are supposed to speed up parliamentary procedure and somehow to clear the ground, thereby performing a task which otherwise would have to be done by the house itself.
Why should we have the right to begin anew in the house a discussion which already has lasted for days or even weeks in a committee. We all recall in 1945 the debate over certain international agreements, which threatened to start afresh in the house, despite the weeks of argument which had taken place in the committee set up to study those agreements. Had it not been for the lightning move of Little Chicago that debate would have gone on and on, although each member in the committee had been granted an opportunity of exhausting his views. I believe that after the usual steps have been taken the report of a committee should be either carried or rejected by the house, without debate. At the most, hon. members might be entitled to explain in a few words their approval or disapproval.
However, the greatest waste of time occurs when technical questions are poured upon the house. This is all the more complicated for hon. members, because these questions are brought down unexpectedly, usually when the attendance is small. Furthermore, on most of those occasions the debate develops into private conversations. Mr. Speaker hands down his ruling, and an appeal is made to the house. The bells ring; hon. members hurry back to their seats and ask what is going on. Often those who are on the battlefield are unable to explain what has happened. A vote is taken-and we all know how much time is taken in the procedure of recording a vote. Three or four votes result in wasting a whole afternoon of the time of parliament. I recall arriving in Ottawa at about six o'clock in the evening and inquiring from a colleague what progress had been accomplished during the day. "Today", he said, "we voted." I learned that three or four votes had been taken on technicalities. Did the country gain any-tning that day from the work of its representatives?
Respecting these purely technical controversies do you not believe that the ruling of the Speaker should not be debatable or questioned? When housing, wheat, social
security and the reconstruction of the country are at stake, can we not pass constructive laws with celerity instead of taking pleasure, if it can be called a pleasure, in voting upon questions which are completely irrelevant to the welfare of the country? I am not mincing words when I say that for my part such performances are unworthy of parliament.
I will agree that the foregoing suggestions may seem drastic. Some of these I did not discover myself and I admit that others could be improved, but on the whole I think they are worth considering if we really wish to serve with deeds and not only with words. Words! Shakespeare must have had us in mind when he put these words in the mouth of his hero, "Words, words, words."
This brings me back to the present debate and to similar debates such as that on the budget. In these true parliamentary discussions the oldest tradition entitles a member to speak at large about everything and nothing. There are no restrictions concerning the subject matter. I have suggested already that the time limit on speeches should be reduced from forty to twenty or thirty minutes. I will suggest another restriction, an important cue:	the house should limit the duration of
a debate. After the party leaders have had an opportunity of speaking as long as they wish the house should then decide that members as a whole will be entitled to a limited number of hours of debate. For instance, the budget debate could be limited to twenty or thirty hours, after which the Speaker on his own would put the question to the house. The total duration of other debates should not exceed ten or twenty hours. With a twenty-minute limit on speeches, a debate of thirty hours would mean a total of ninety speeches, which surely is sufficient to clarify any situation.
(Translation):
Mr. Speaker, I know those suggestions may not meet with an easy approval but I dare count on their general acceptance by certain hon. members and especially by the government. I say "especially by the government" because, as I stated at the outset, my remarks of today w-ere inspired to me by a member of the cabinet. Some may think that I am now the unofficial spokesman of a government too closely pressed by the opposition, ivho would like to muzzle those of opposite views. Let there be no qualms about this. I have neither directly nor indirectly received instructions to speak as I did and, moreover, my suggestions would apply with equal force to the members of my own party. But this is what I mean by saying that my remarks were
The Address-Mr. Lapalme

inspired by a member of the cabinet. When complaining in New York about the time taken for the drafting of the principles which are to guide the world of tomorrow, the Right Hon. the Minister for External Affairs (Mr. St. Laurent) said certain things which brought to my mind my present observations. It surely never dawned on him that one of us would one day repeat his argument in this house. Nevertheless, it is his appeal to the united nations that prompted me to express here certain ideas which I had in mind ever since my first coming to Ottawa. Today I express them in all sincerity.
Having remained silent during two sessions, except on one occasion, I feel that I have a right to criticize the rules of the house regarding the number and length of speeches and debates. Like other hon. members, I could have made several speeches during each session, although I might not have spoken as well as they did. A glance at the roster of speakers prompted me to back up each time I intended making a speech, because I found the list too long and felt that among so many others, the effect of my speech would be lost. I may have thus contributed in hastening the business of the house, but I certainly did not do myself any good with my electors. However, if the rules remain as they are and we are compelled to work under the same conditions, I cannot promise to remain silent.
With regard to imposing a time-limit on speeches and debates, I must add that the list I have just given is in no way exhaustive. Many other matters would require attention. For instance, would it not be possible to put directly on record the speeches of sympathy or congratulations which take up the time of the house every now and then? Would it not be possible to refer the estimates to several committees simultaneously, thus shortening the time required for their consideration? I omit several other things which it would take too long to mention, because I would go on indefinitely when I am asking that speeches be shortened.
(Text):
It is interesting to watch the evolution of certain institutions which finally outdistance others that remain dead set in their conservatism. For instance, as a lawyer I have noticed that law is evolving more rapidly than procedure. For that reason Quebec is contemplating a revision of its civil procedure. The vehicle of law or legislation is procedure. In the physical world transport vehicles are endeavouring to outspeed each other. Speed

will never be great enough for travellers as well as for goods. Automobiles, aeroplanes, railways and liners have become the ultrafast vehicles of our civilization, and these will soon be transformed by the fission of the atom. Meanwhile parliament with the present vehicle of its legislation remains bogged down in the horse and buggy era.
I do not want to underrate the role played by this federal parliament. I am wTell aware that we are a deliberative assembly and the Canadian parliament is no worse than any other. Were I to compare federal and provincial debates I would not hesitate to say that the former are on a higher level. I do not underrate the role of this deliberative assembly, but I consider that deeds are more important than deliberations and that we should not attempt by means of deliberations to increase our prestige with the people.
If we wish to carry out the suggestions I have just put forward we have all the necessary means at our disposal. One of the permanent committees of this house which very seldom meets could be entrusted with the task of revising our rules, or a special committee could be formed for this purpose. I do not think I am mistaken when I say that the country would be pleased if its representatives would speed up parliamentary procedure and thus pass more quickly from words to deeds. At the present time parliamentarians do not enjoy such a good reputation. Is that not due to a great extent to their verbiage? It is high time that we lost this reputation.
If some consider that my remarks are a criticism of our parliamentary system they are mistaken. I am not criticizing our parliamentary system; I am criticizing only one of its methods. On the other hand, I want this to be a constructive piece of criticism. Those who have listened to me with great patience will realize that whenever I found fault with anything I offered a practical suggestion in its stead.
The house has the right to keep on with the same routine which is interfering with its work, but it also has the power to improve its methods. At each session improvements are effected in this building, but nothing is done toward changing the methods which should prevail within its precincts. I hope that the welfare of the Canadian people will be stronger than the old traditions and that some day parliament will be in a position to respond almost immediately to the request of the people.
At six o'clock the house took recess.

The Address-Mr. Murphy
After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock.


Mr. J. W. MURPHY (Lambton West):: Mr. Speaker, as a back-bencher I wish to add my congratulations to the mover and the seconder of the address. The opening of this session will be remembered in the years ahead, not because the speech from the throne was the first delivered by the present governor general nor because we did not receive the summons in the usual manner. What impressed me, as I believe it impressed most members present on that day, was the incident which we find recorded on page 2 of Hansard when the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) rose and begged leave to move, seconded by the Secretary of State for External Affairs (Mr. St. Laurent), a motion concerning a man whom we may now simply call Fred Rose. I will not read the motion, but after it was made by the Prime Minister, the Prime Minister added these words:
This resolution speaks for itself. I have nothing to add.
Then Hansard adds:


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
And then deadly silence. Never within my memory has silence registered such contempt. I have no hesitation in saying that there is no room in Canada for those who would destroy Canada. There is no room in our legislative halls for anyone who prefers the communistic system to our Canadian system. Those who do not believe in the way of life which has made us the nation we are today should not be permitted to occupy positions of trust or of power in any part of our government, dominion, provincial or municipal. They should, they must be removed, and one was. Liberty, freedom of speech, of assembly and of press does not and must not be permitted to mean that the enemies of this country conspiring to overthrow by violence our governmental economies and social system shall have licence so to conspire under the protection of our constituion. Let the echo of their doctrines be heard only by themselves within the confines of prison cells.
On behalf of the vegetable and seed growers of Lambton county I wish to take this opportunity to express their appreciation of the order issued last fall requiring an import permit to import Dutch sets and shallots into this country. I do not know the amount involved in dollars and cents, but it was estimated, at $100,000 or better. Whatever it is, however, these growers are now assured of a Canadian market for their product at a fair price, whereas in former years their industry 83166-8
was in peril because in some years the United States, having a large surplus, exported its surplus products into Canada at a price much lower than our cost of production. I would be very ungrateful indeed if I did not express my personal thanks to the other members on both sides of the house representing adjoining or nearby ridings for their cooperation and interest in. this matter. To me it indicates what the members of the two old parties can do when working together for a common purpose.
I should like to make a running comment for a moment or two on my impressions of the last two or three days in the house. It was the first occasion on which I, and no doubt many other members here, saw new members introduced. I sat back here not knowing what was going to happen and was startled when I s£*w the Prime Minister and his right-hand man, jump up and walk to the door. Richard was not there to open the door; nevertheless it was opened, and. I learned that these gentlemen were about to escort the new member up the aisle. I had heard rumours before, during and since the election, that the new man might be a Mackenzie King Liberal or just a Liberal or a Cardin Liberal. I was not sure, but at any rate they took him by the arm, one on either side, and as they came up the aisle he certainly could not get away if he tried, he was so rigidly held. He approached the table and the usual ceremony was performed. When I saw him approach your dais, Mr. Speaker, I wondered, after hearing the hon. member for Temiscouata (Mr. Pouliot) the other day, in speaking of and to you, if the new member might be taking on the duties of Speaker of the House of Commons.
After that, the leader of His Majesty's loyal opposition (Mr. Bracken), and two of his large supporters retired in the same manner and brought in one Conservative member after another. Of course we all know that after the weather clears in Halifax there may be another by-election there and our chief the leader of the opposition will have to give another command performance.
After our leader had introduced the new Conservative members, the Social Credit party brought forward their champion in the same way. To me it was quite impressive. The next day a number of hon. gentlemen came in wearing carnations. There is of course a day in the year when flowers are worn in honour of mothers but I did not think all these her., gentlemen had the same mother. I did think, however, these flowers represented something and as we had heard a great deal about a possible change in the leadership of the Liberal
[Stage Direction]
The Address-Mr. Murphy
[Stage Direction]
party I thought that perhaps hon. gentlemen were mourning the retirement of their political father.
Yesterday our leader made one of the finest speeches ever heard in this house. It contained so much meat that the Prime Minister could neither chew nor swallow it. In the course of his remarks, the Prime Minister of course championed the Liberal party, but somehow the speech delivered by my leader cut deep and the remarks of the Prime Minister were certainly directed at my leader. If the leader of the opposition had delivered a poor speech it would have received no attention from the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister did trip over the five-cent piece; a little later on when he was advising this audience that the leader of the opposition had been remiss in his responsibilities, that he had not a knowledge of the proceedings of the house, it appeared to everyone that the motion of want of confidence certainly irked somebody, and the Prime Minister proceeded to lecture this party on that motion. After a while our leader rose and informed the Prime Minister that he had a good precedent for the motion since it was exactly the same as one which the right hon. gentleman himself introduced a few years ago. That was quite a fall indeed.
What impressed me however was this. The Prime Minister eulogized his party, which he seemed to think enjoyed the confidence of the people, but apparently he forgot that in the last four by-elections the great Liberal party won only one, so that, instead of having the confidence of the majority of the Canadian people, it would appear to have only twenty-five per cent of that confidence.
After the Prime Minister got through, there was great applause during which the leader of the C.C.F. rose to speak. I do not know whether he did it purposely to share in the applause given the Prime Minister but he did not sit down. He stared at the galleries in appreciation of the applause which he thought apparently he was receiving, and after it was over, in view of the rumours we have heard about a change of leadership, it occurred to me that those who were applauding were not sure whether they were applauding the present Prime Minister and leader of the Liberal party or the future leader of that party.
Mr. Speaker, I intend for a few moments to deal with a matter in connection with housing. The hon. member for Eglinton (Mr. Fleming) this afternoon dealt with that in a general way more capably than I could ever do it. I am going to deal with the matter specifically,

having reference in particular to the county of Lambton and the city of Windsor, with particular reference to the homes built for veterans under the small holdings provision of the Veterans' Land Act. I may say that I did not get into this until just a few days ago, a little before the middle of January, when five of these young veterans came to my home and told me that they had had an ultimatum from Mr. G. H. Parkinson who represented the Department of Veterans Affairs at London. Some few days prior to that he had given these veterans an ultimatum that they had to buy the homes within a week, move out within a week, or they could stay in until the first of May and pay rent. Two of the veterans had signed up, and I am going to speak about that matter specifically in a few moments; but others had not and they just did not know what to do inasmuch as Mr. G. H. Parkinson

"H" for Hitler, I think-was to return in a few days; in fact, a day or so after they came to my home. I want it distinctly understood that these veterans were young lads who had spent several years in the service of their country-. They lacked business experience; they did not know values. They were desperate for homes, and homes were scarce. They were married, of course, some of them having families, and they did want homes of their own. After their predicament had been explained to me, I agreed that I would go the next day to see the homes and inspect them. The next day I did go with three capable home-builders, men of experience. I may say, too, that I had seen the plans of these homes, and they are splendid. They are ideal floor plans and the homes from their outside appearance are of a very fine type. To me they were classified as a y'oung soldier's dream; and there is no question at all about it, they appeared to be just that. Anyone driving by the homes would think they were well built. I hope this condition to which I am calling attention does not prevail in many parts of the country, and I understand that it does not.
An hon. MEMBER :: It does, though.


Joseph Warner Murphy: I am going to confine myself to things that I know something about.


An hon. MEMBER:: Louder.


Joseph Warner Murphy: I heard that hon. member. I think he represents some riding in Prince Edward Island. He prefers to cross to the mainland on the ice, I believe. I understand from another member from Prince Edward Island that they are going to get a ferry and lower the rates. Having in mind the address I heard from that corner about a year ago, I would not open my mouth, if I were he.

The Address-Air. Murphy
We made a thorough inspection of these particular homes. In the meantime there had been a great deal of publicity about the homes in Windsor and about these particular homes in Sarnia township. The grievances apparently were justified because the Windsor Daily Star, the London Free Press and the Sarnia Observer had been referring to the construction of these particular homes. Everyone in this chamber knows that these particular papers are certainly outstanding journals of the day. The Ottawa correspondent for the Windsor Star is not the only one on that staff or in that organization who has received or deserved empire recognition. As far as the London Free Press is concerned, the chief editor of that paper was just recently appointed chancellor of the university of Western Ontario. The Sarnia paper had sent out their own special observers to see these homes in Sarnia township and had printed articles about them. I say that before I go into the conditions of this construction, because it is evident to everyone that these newspapers were justified in carrying on a campaign on behalf of the veterans in Sarnia township and Windsor.
I might say, too, that these homes are not large homes. They are small homes. I should like to give the house the size of them first. I have the size of only three of them here. In Sarnia township there are only eight homes built, of four different types, two of each type. One was 18 feet, 9 inches by 32 feet, one and a half storey with basement; and the second was 24 feet by 30 feet, one storey; and the third one I have here was 25 feet by 31 feet, 8 inches, one storey. When we went with the veterans themselves to these homes we noticed that the septic tanks were not working. I have seen it reported in the paper that was because it is a one-tank system. I disagree with that. A one-tank system is perfectly all right as long as you have sufficient weeping tile. But these homes had been occupied for only a short time, and the only conclusion that I or anyone else could come to was that there was not sufficient weeping tile for these septic tanks.
We went into the homes, and I am going to describe quickly some of the faults, in view of the demand that I expect to make a little later on this evening. In the first place, in one home the water had come up to within three inches of the top of the basement floor. They had put a sump-pump in. That indicated that the water level of that property had not been taken before it was purchased for the veterans. When the water was that high at 83166-8J
that time of the year, it is needless for me to say what the condition will be during the spring or rainy season.
Then they showed us a floor joist. Everyone knows what that is; it supports the floor. Believe it or not, here was one joist with about a foot cut out of it. It was not headed, as would be done by an ordinary builder. The only thing that held up the joist was the floor above it. That was an unpardonable and inexcusable mistake for any building contractor to make. There was no occasion for such sloppy work. Mind you, this was not the only house where this occurred. These floor joists were not supported by anything except the floor above, which held up the joists. In more than one house the main beam supporting the joists was cut, in one instance about one-third and the other by more than that, which is also unpardonable and ridiculous from a building point of view. Chimneys were poorly built, with used brick, and not straight. They had very poor mortar joints; you could run a wire three or four inches between the bricks, and if you held a match up to the chimney the draft would draw the flame into the chimney. There were no water taps in the basement. I am not complaining about that, because I do not know whether the plans even called for them, but there should have been some. I do not know if the plans called for laundry tubs; in any event they were not there, and the wives of these veterans had to take the water upstairs and downstairs to do their washing. If the plans did not call for laundry tubs, well and good; but in any event there should have been taps down there. There were no water heaters in all these homes, and only one or two were insulated at all. The others were insulated in a small way by the veterans themselves. Then there was no sub-floor under the bathtub; and, believe it or not, the sub-floor under the kitchen and the rest of the bathroom was only one-third complete, one board and skip two.
We went into one house which was not sold, a one and a half storey house, and there the plaster board was off the ceiling; otherwise we would not have noticed what had taken place. There, believe it or not, we saw that the subfloor on that upstairs portion was the same as under the kitchen and bathroom; just about one-third sub-floored. I did not measure it; it was so ridiculous that anyone on looking at it would say it was a terrible job to palm off on a veteran. I wonder where the inspectors were. These homes were supposed to be built under government inspectors, but they must have been either blind or fit subjects for an insane asylum to pass work like that for a
The Address-Mr. Murphy

soldier or anybody else. It was terrible construction. A moment ago I was going to say that one of the housewives complained about the kitchen floor being springy. The inspector replied, "Yes, it is springy; it is easier to walk on that way."
Before I forget I must tell you, Mr. Speaker, about this Mr. Parkinson, who had two contracts signed. He went into the unemployment office, where one of these young lads worked, and practically forced him into taking over one of these homes. His language and conduct were such that some of the rest of the staff had to ask him to desist; and that is how this young lad came to purchase the property. Of course the homes did not call for plaster. It was plaster board, and the joints were terrible, with the corner joints an inch or an inch and half apart. Already they have had repair men come in, and they had to put quarter rounds in the comers. The kitchen sinks were well named; they sink. And get this. We examined the kitchen hardware. You know the hardware they have on the doors of henhouses, or the doors of the houses behind the houses. They use strap-hinges; and they had strap-hinges three and a half inches long on kitchen cabinets. Henhouse hardware, I call it. All they had was porcelain sockets, though they were supposed to have electric light fixtures in the ceilings. The trim was rough and soiled; it had not been sand-papered before it was painted. There were two and a half inch nails, such as they use for sub-floors, driven into hardwood floors; then they tried to countersink them and split the floors. Water was coming in the windows. The insulation was incomplete. In one house they had left two bags of insulation above the ceiling; they had not even bothered to open them, and the veteran himself had to put it on. I do not know what the plans called for, but they had only 500-watt water heaters, and that was not sufficient. Not even the bond timbers or plates for these houses were bedded into cement. The electric wiring was defective. There was no shut-off in the heat registers.
I could go on for an hour and a half describing the defects in these homes. They were disgraceful. I cannot understand how government inspectors could approve such work.


Mr. MACKENZIE:: May I ask who was
the contractor?


Joseph Warner Murphy: The Ryan Construction
Company, I believe.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: They have a very
high reputation in Canada, I understand.


Joseph Warner Murphy: I regret to say to this
house that my friends built these houses, and I feel very badly because I must stand up here and tell the house and the people of Canada of such home construction for veterans. But if I am to be entitled to be elected to represent my constituency, or any other hon. members are entitled to be elected, our duty to our country comes before our duty to our friends.
After inspecting the homes in Sarnia township. I sent a telegram to Mr. Murchison, director of the Veterans' Land Act. Mind you these homes in Windsor cannot be compared with homes in Sarnia township. The Windsor homes have a splendid location; there is not a finer spot for veterans in the Dominion of Canada. They have sixty of these homes built around a golf club, but I do tell hon. members that the prices are far too high.
To carry on with what I was about to say,
I explained to the boys in Windsor the situation we had in Sarnia township. It was disgraceful and revolting; and if the Minister of Veterans Affairs (Mr. Mackenzie) could have seen those houses for himself he would have settled the whole thing in five minutes.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: May I interrupt my hon. friend, not to interfere with his address at all but just to inform him that as soon as I was told about certain complaints in Windsor by my hon. friend the Minister of National Health and Welfare I immediately sent my deputy, the director of land settlement and a special technical adviser to Sarnia and Windsor.


Joseph Warner Murphy: I know you did, and it is unfortunate that they did not see the Sarnia houses. My complaints about those houses came after your men had been in Windsor. My wire to Mr. Murchison was as follows:
In view of ultimatum of 15th instant by Mr. G. H. Parkinson of your department at London, presumably reading the directive to you, I have to-day with competent home builders inspected eight VLA homes in Sarnia township. Your ultimatum gave these veterans three alternatives. 1, to sign contracts within a week; or 2, to vacate within a week; or, 3, to pay such rent as may be determined by your officials but to vacate May 1, 1947. Have advised veterans to request new purchase contracts at fair price.
Later I received a wire from the acting director of the Veterans' Land Act which suggested I was not familiar with the terms, but there was no misunderstanding by me. Again I wired Mr. Murchison to say that- I had inspected the Windsor homes and contended that the prices were too high. I could go on for a long time describing the way in which these homes were built, but my main complaint is in regard to the Sarnia townshiD

The Address-Mr. Murphy
homes. I repeat, the Windsor homes could be repaired without a great deal of labour, but I am sure the prices are far too high, and other builders have constructed similar homes for veterans in the same neighbourhood at much lower prices.
I notice that Mr. Parkinson was quoted on January 30 in the Sarnia Observer as follows:
A crew of men from the Ryan Construction Company arrived at Sarnia this week with a load of material and have already started the improvements.
Mr. Parkinson requested the veterans to complete purchase contracts for the houses at a meeting held two weeks ago. The veterans declined to sign until they had written assurance that certain repairs and refinements to the houses would be done. The director said he could not include this clause in the contract but assured them the work would be done well.
He said to-day he would personally supervise the work and would remain in Sarnia for the next few weeks. The Ryan firm will bear the entire cost and will work from a line of faults made up by an impartial contractor of Hamilton, Mr. Parkinson said. He commented on the price of the houses. He said, "I feel that the prices of these houses are not out of line at all. They were appraised by competent builders."
I challenge that statement immediately. There is no competent builder in the Dominion of Canada who would appraise those houses within twenty-five per cent to forty per cent of what the soldiers are being asked to pay for them. In that statement I am referring to Sarnia.
I notice that according to order in council P.C. 419/202 of January 17, 1947, veterans are now given permission to rent these homes, pending completion of the deals. Number 5 of the order states that the period for rental shall not be in excess of one year. I suggest to the government that under these conditions I do not believe one year is long enough. No matter how the houses are repaired, I do not think the Sarnia people will ever take them. They should be given an opportunity of renting these homes for at least two or three years, until they can build homes for themselves, to their own satisfaction.
I emphasized at the outset that the press had supported these veterans. And from the little I have said this evening I think it will be agreed that they were moderate and fair in the stand they took on behalf of these veterans. It is difficult for me to figure out why the job of building homes for veterans should be more of a problem than the making of weapons of destruction in the prosecuting of a war.
I am not the only one who is wondering if the taxpayers' money was well and wisely spent on these Veterans' Land Act projects.
Fair consideration must be given to the veteran. He is the producer of the future and will pay a large share of the tax bill.
The seconder of the address in reply to the speech from the throne stated that our prospects were bright. A cheery thought; but it is far from being a factual estimate of the national economy. If he is correct it is because the voters of Parkdale, Pontiac and Portage la Prairie indicated in a way the government understands that the practice of borrowing and spending money like water must come to an end.
Our wealth is in the youth of the nation, these veterans. They are the trustees of posterity. We know the veterans' place in history is secure. Surely we do not need a special bill of rights to assure them the right to economic security.	[DOT]
Through the golden fabric of our laws runs a golden thread preserving the rights of the individual. Therefore, in view of the excessive and outrageous prices asked by the government for these veterans' homes and in view of the manner of their construction, I respectfully ask that a royal commission be appointed to make a full inquiry.


Mr. ROSS (Souris):: Right across Canada.


Joseph Warner Murphy: Therefore on behalf of the taxpayer and the veterans who were fortunate enough to return and not have their blood crimson the bloody soil of Hitler's devastated Europe, I demand that a royal commission be appointed to inquire into all contracts for purchases of land acquired for small holdings under the Veterans' Land Act,- to inquire into all contracts for the building of homes for veterans under the Veterans' Land Act and contracts for the construction of roads, the installation of water mains and other costs involved in the purchase price of these homes.


Mr. ALISTAIR STEWART (Winnipeg North) :: Mr. Speaker, as is my practice, at the end of last session I returned to Winnipeg to report there to my constituents as to what had happened in parliament. In return they did me the honour of informing me as to what they thought should be brought up in parliament at this session. Therefore I am charged with the responsibility of presenting to this house, and more especially to the government, their desires in the matter.
One of the questions which is causing grievous alarm is the way in which the price ceiling has been punctured, if not exploded. Yesterday the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) during the course of his speech took some credit to himself for the main-
The Address-Mr. Stewart

tenance of the price ceiling. Obviously the right hon. gentleman is not a housewife. Obviously he does not go out to purchase the food he requires for himself. It is equallj' obvious he does not know many housewives in Canada. Otherwise he would have learned that the average housewife in the dominion does not believe the bureau of statistics when it states that the cost of living has risen only by some 27 per cent. Instead she believes that the cost of living, with wdiich she comes in contact every day, has risen by something closer to 40 per cent or even 50 per cent.
Of all the price increases the most notable and perhaps most scandalous is the increase in the cost of milk. The house will recall that last August a motion by the C. C. F. party was brought before the chamber asking the government to reconsider its decision to remove milk subsidies. The content of the speeches made in support of that motion was to the effect that the government should maintain these subsidies.
As the leader of our group, the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell) said, we have been told on many occasions by the Prime Minister that parliament would decide. Parliament decided in no mean way when it defeated the government in a vote on this issue, and virtually instructed the government to continue subsidies. As we have been told, despite his avowals the Prime Minister flouted the will of parliament. The result will be grave for many families.
We have been told by experts employed by the federal government that every child should have at least one quart of milk a day. For a family of five, let us say, in Winnipeg North, if each child were to receive its proper supply of milk the cost to the wage-earner would be at least ten per cent of his income, an amount which obviously is out of all reason when one considers the many other things which have to be bought. Therefore milk will not be purchased. Those who are going to suffer most by the government's policy are, once again, the children of Canada.
We have been told, and again by experts, that one of the finest all-round foods for children is milk. But because of the government's policy tho/e children are being denied the milk they need. I had hoped hon. members opposite had learned a lesson from the depression and the war which followed. Many of us must have read with amazement the statement of a cabinet minister informing us that almost half the young men of Canada who volunteered for active service were rejected from category A because they were physically unfit. I know of no more scathing

indictment of a government or of an economic system than to permit a condition to exist which allows almost half of our youth to grow up physically unfit. That is the situation. When we examine into the cause of this unfitness we find that most of it is due to malnutrition. When we pursue it further we find that most of that malnutrition is due to the lack of an adequate supply of milk.
I repeat that by carrying out this policy of refusing to subsidize milk the government is jeopardizing the health of the children of Canada. The workers in the cities do not ask that they be supplied with cheap milk at the expense of the farmer. They hope and expect to see the farmer get a fair and just price for what is produced on the farm. But they do say that this is a matter of health, something in which the dominion parliament should be vitally interested, and they are asking that these subsidies be reimposed.
There is another matter with which I should like to deal, a matter not affecting the youth of the nation but those at the other end of the age scale, those who are in receipt of old age pensions. The pension paid in Manitoba today is a miserable pittance averaging less than $25 a month. We know that that sum is not enough to live on. My own investigations have shown that many old age pensioners are paying in the neighbourhood of $12 to $18 a month in rent alone, leaving them an average of less than $10 a month on which to subsist. Not only that, our aged have to wait until they have reached the age of seventy years before any care is taken of them. It has been argued that they ought to have saved money during their lifetime to look after their old age, but when one considers the average wages paid in this country during the thirties and before that, one sees how impossible it was for any wage-earner to save at all. In the proposals of the Dominion of Canada made at the dominion-provincial conference, this statement appears:
A strong ease can be made for reducing the age limit to 65 in order to provide assistance at least for those in the age group of 65-69 who are actually in need.
That proposal was made by the government. If that was the government proposal, why has the government not implemented it? Why does the government not put that proposal into action? One other thing. There is an almost unanimous desire that the means test be abolished. I know the argument is made that if the means test were abolished many who were undeserving financially would receive pensions. I would sooner see the

The Address-Mr. Stewart
means test abolished and the undeserving get pensions than see the means test maintained and those who need a pension denied it.
Let me give two specific examples. A small delegation of superannuated employees of the Canadian National came to see me some weeks ago. They told me how they had been superannuated at the age of sixty-five years with pensions ranging from $20 to $25 a month. If they lived to the age of seventy years and were able to obtain an old age pension, that pension would be whittled down until they would be little better off. Considering it from the point of view of those pensioners of industry, it is essential that the means test be abolished.
There is another group for whom this house has some moral responsibility, the superannuated civil servants of Canada. They find themselves in the same predicament as the superannuated workers of the railroad. What is even worse, these superannuated civil servants have never received any increase in pension to counteract the obvious and undoubted increase in the cost of living during the years of war. I hope the government will realize its responsibility to the men and women who have faithfully and loyally served this country and give them the increase which they deserve. On all sides, then, there is agreement that the means test should be abolished.
As a result of a debate held last year on old age pensions initiated by the hon. member for Vancouver East (Mr. Maclnnis), the then Minister of National Health and Welfare placed a table upon Hansard and he said:
From sixty-five to sixty-nine, 69 per cent are employed. In other words, if you extended the non-means test plan down to the age of sixty you would be paying money to a large group of people who were gainfully employed.
What are the implications of that ministerial statement? Almost 70 per cent of our old people between the ages of sixty-five and sixty-nine years are working. Does he believe for one moment that a man of sixty-eight years willingly gets up at six or seven o'clock in the morning, goes to his daily toil and works through until six or seven o'clock at night for the sheer pleasure of working? Does he not know that by compelling people in that age range to work we are appreciably cutting down the number of days they will have to live? Does he think that those old people work for the sheer pleasure of working? They work for the reason given in the advertisements of the insurance companies. We have been told that 90 per cent of the people of this country who reach the age of sixty-five years are either destitute, living on charity or compelled to work in order that they may
live. Those old people are working because of necessity, and it is morally indefensible to compel old people to work like this. If we had recognized our obligations to them we would have pensioned them off long ago.
My constituents, and I imagine many of the people in other constituencies, are asking that the means test be abolished, that the age be lowered to sixty-five years and that the pension be increased appreciably at least to $50 a month.
There is one other matter of some concern to which I should like to refer. I find among the organized workers a general demand that there be a labour code all across Canada. The workers are asking for this because they realize that it will add appreciably to the unity of this nation about which we talk so much and do so little. I am not going to discuss this in detail now because I intend to wait until the proposed legislation of the government is before the house.
But this situation I must bring before this parliament even though it affects only a small handful of men. I do so because there is a vital principle at stake. The case of the employees of the Canadian Pacific who were on strike in Winnipeg in 1919 has been taken up by almost every union. In 1904 the Canadian Pacific Railway Company inaugurated a non-contributory pension plan. In wage negotiations after that time the railway unions were always reminded by the company that the contributions to the pension fund were in lieu of raises in wages. When the unions asked for raises they were told, "No; we are paying this extra money into the pension fund for you." Therefore the workers naturally felt that they had an equity in the fund.
What happened when the strike took place? The Canadian Pacific took the position that the strike constituted a break in service and no pension benefits earned prior to 1919 have been paid to C.P.R. employees who participated in the 1919 strike. Be it noted that the Canadian Pacific is the only organization which has discriminated so flagrantly against the workers involved in that strike. When the case of those who had been pensioned or who were still working and were not eligible for a pension was brought before the company, Mr. Coleman, the then vicepresident, stated in 1939:
We have kept in close touch with this matter over a considerable period of time, always encouraged by the hope that sufficient improvement might take place in the financial condition of the company as to enable us to realize a firm conviction which we have always held that, in such improved conditions at least, some relief might be forthcoming.
The Address-Mr. Stewart

The revenues of the company have improved appreciably during the last seven years and yet what do we find? The company still refuses to pay these men the pensions which are morally if not legally theirs. As a result of pressure brought to bear by the unions and by my colleague, the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles), that a royal commission be appointed to investigate this matter, the government eventually appointed an investigator. Mark you, this investigator was appointed at the request of the unions, and yet when the report was presented to the minister, did he convey its contents to the unions? No. The first thing he did was to give it to the railway company, then for six or seven months the railway company held that document and it was tabled only in the dying days of last session. It was not the railway company which asked for the report; it was the unions; but they did not see it for several months after the railway company had seen it.
Mr. Johnstone, the investigator, in that report, asked that a royal commission be set up. Yesterday the Minister of Labour (Mr. Mitchell) stated that no royal commission would be set up. I shall be gentle with the minister because he is not in the house, but I disagree completely with the position he takes if for no other reason than that if a royal commission were appointed to investigate the legitimate claims of these men it would report in their favour. Perhaps we cannot compel this railway colossus to pay these men what is their due, but at least we could bring, as a result of that report, a certain amount of moral pressure to bear on the railway, and if it did not carry out the terms of the report it would be subjected, and rightly so, to the moral obloquy of this nation.
There is another matter I wish to discuss, the question of immigration and the question of refugees. In the first speech I made in this house I said certain things about our immigration policy, and I have seen no reason at all for changing them. I said that some of the rules and regulations passed by the department were iniquitous, and that still holds. One of the regulations we have is this, we divide our citizens into preferred groups and nonpreferred groups such as Ukrainians and Poles, and those even lower than the non-preferred, naturally, as we would expect, the Jewish people. I should like the house to bear that in mind while I diverge a little.
I have a bone to pick with the Minister of Mines and Resources (Mr. Glen), including Indian affairs, immigration and other matters. Recently, only last month, the minister was

in Winnipeg attending a Liberal convention and according to a report in the Winnipeg Free Press-I admit that these reports are not always correct-this is what he said:
Mr. Glen, who spoke at the Monday afternoon session, said changes in Canadian immigration policy are in the making-
I hope so.
-and he hoped to be able to announce changes in the regulations shortly.
I hope that is true. Then the report goes on, in direct quotation marks, to quote Mr. Glen:
"We have already done more than any other country so far in assuming the responsibility of getting refugees from Europe," the minister declared.
Quite a number of people came to see me about that statement and I said, "If the minister is correctly reported the statement is a colossal fabrication; there is no truth in it". To prove my point I read to them certain excerpts from Hansard in the first session of this house, where at page 3536 I asked:
How many refugees have been admitted to Canada since January 1, 1940?
The reply of the minister was:
There is no record of those who might be called refugees. I regret that I cannot give the information.
The minister could not give the information to the house then; he did not know. But in Winnipeg he suddenly found that the information was available, and if he was correctly reported he was either deceiving this house or deceiving the people who read that report in the newspaper.
To go further, on last year's estimates, at page 5495 of Hansard, in effect the minister said: No one will say that Canada's contribution in the matter of refugees is a very large one. That is right. It is a shamefully small and inadequate one and even yet we have no policy with respect to refugees. The United Kingdom, overburdened as she is, has taken in 200,000 refugees in the years of war; Australia is taking in 70,000 a year. The United States may not have played its full part but at least it has been much more generous, in ratio, than we have been in this country.
I think this house knows as well as I do that there is still unparalleled misery in Europe, a misery that is almost unbearable. This house must know as I do, if it has a Christian conscience, there are thousands of people in Europe who are only too willing to start life in a new country, but they have no place to go to in this world of ours. I do not ask that those who are brought to Canada be nazi collaborators because we want nothing to do with them. I do not want to see brought to

The Address-Mr. Stewart
this country those who aided nanism and fascism in any way whatsoever. But I point this out to the minister, and surely he must know it, that already these people in camps have been carefully screened and the collaborators and fascist sympathizers removed. He must know, too, if he is on the job that not only have these people been screened but they have been classified as to skills and aptitudes and we know exactly how many of them can do a particular job. We know that thousands of them are skilled in arts and crafts and trades of all sorts. This government, and rightly so, wants to take its place at the peace table as an equal with other nations. I agree with that. But if we are to take our place as an equal we must accept the responsibility that goes with equality and we must give succour and haven to many of these people in our own country. Here is a case where Canada can give great moral leadership to the world. Here is a case where Canada can give to the hopeless some hope which will encourage them to live. The information I got today from a man who has just returned from these camps is that in preparation for the expiry of UNRRA at the end of June, already there are groups of people who have signed suicide pacts. We are playing with the lives of people, and there is no time for that sort of
play-
What has been our policy? Let us examine it, and the best way I can do so is to give the house some examples from my own knowledge.
A year and a half ago a Winnipeg girl, Freda Yurman, came to see me. She had come to this country form Poland in 1939, and in her little Polish village her relatives and her fiance lived. War broke out. That girl's relatives were exterminated. Her fiance joined the Polish armed forces. His relatives were murdered too by the nazi hordes. The village was wiped out, Poles and Jews alike. This young man was captured by the Germans and taken to a camp where he was beaten and cruelly maltreated. Then he was put on a death train with others to be taken to another place where these people would be gassed and then cremated. He decided to fight for it, and with several others he made a break from the death train. He alone escaped. The rest were shot down like so many dogs. After God knows what vicissitudes and trials he made his way across Europe and eventually landed in Palestine, and to this girl's great joy she learned from him that he was safe. Remember, these two people mean everything in the world to each other; they have nobody left. I tried to have them reunited. I wrote the minister giving him the facts and asking
if he could not bring this man to Canada. What was his answer? In part he said: The first difficulty is that Rubin Thau is inadmissible to Canada under the regulations and it would require special action by order in council to waive existing requirements of the law.
What was this man's crime? He was a Jew% and therefore before he could be brought to this country we had to pass a special order in council to rescue him. Apparently it was beyond the power of the ministry; we had to pass an order in council, and the ministry was not prepared to do this. Yet, when the time comes, the ministry can move with great speed by order in council to filch from the people of Canada their freedom.
Not only was this man not admitted but, according to the documents tabled by the minister yesterday, a known criminal who was not born in this country was allowed to come to Canada by special permit issued by the minister. We will take criminals, apparently, but not those who need our help.
I pursued the matter farther. The minister told me, and rightly so, that obviously our troops had to have priority-our troops and their dependents. No one will cavil at that statement; we agree with it. The minister did not know what the state of this man's health was and I got in touch with Thau. He was medically examined by the health officer at Tel-Aviv and I gave the minister a copy of the certificate and assured him that I could obtain transportation for this Jewish boy by air.
What was the minister's answer? Let me read first what I wrote:
Surely the entry of this man into Canada will establish no precedent. On the other hand, it might do something to bring comfort and happiness to two people whose lives have been a history of persecution and whose future is in your hands.
What answer did I receive? It was indeed a brief answer:
There is really nothing I can add to what has already been said.
We could not pass an order in council to bring happiness to two people, but, as I say, this government can pass orders in council quickly enough to take our liberties from us and to steal our property from us, as was done in this country, and at times to abrogate the most cherished concepts of British justice. So much for that particular case.
If we are to take into this country refugees, on what basis are we to do it? On the only decent basis, that all people coming into this country shall have equal rights, not still on
The Address-Mr. Stewart

the wretched discriminatory basis which is contained in the regulations of the immigration branch, that basis which tells us, for instance, that Ukrainian people are inferior, according to the government's ideas; that Polish people are inferior. Many members of this house must know what a contribution these people have made to this country.
These early Ukrainian settlers came to this land not knowing the language, their only possessions strapped on their backs, and they were dumped unceremoniously by the railway companies on the most barren and infertile soil of western Canada, far from civilization and from medical aid, dumped on land where there were no buildings and none of the amenities of life. Yet it was there that they started to build, to erect and to create. They built mud cabins in which they had mud ovens which were used for heating the cabins as well as for cooking purposes. They were persevering. thrifty, diligent; they fenced and ploughed their land, and as a result we see today good farms, excellent homes, good barns, perhaps roads that are not so good. The children of these early settlers, whom this government regards as inferior people, are occupying positions of distinction in every walk of life in this country. I need only point to my colleague and deskmate, the hon. member for Dauphin (Mr. Zaplitny), whose contribution to the debates of the house has added to their lustre, and yet he is considered by this government, under its own regulations, to be a member of an inferior, non-preferred people.
In what way, Mr. Speaker, are those who come from the Ukraine inferior? Are they inferior in thrift? Are they inferior in loyalty? Are they inferior in honesty, courage or independence? Are they inferior in their devotion to democratic ideals? Are they in any way inferior in respect of the numbers who laid down their lives for Canada? Of course they are not. We accepted from them their sacrifices; we accepted from them their lives when it came to fighting the very doctrines that we persist in carrying on, and we insult them in death by perpetuating those doctrines.
Let me read a short statement by the Very Reverend Doctor W. Kushnir of the Ukrainian-Greek-Catholic church in Canada:
The last war taught us that there are no superior races and no inferior races, that the superior races might easily become the inferior races and vice versa, that we are all dependent upon each other for mutual protection, that the old shibboleths and signals are obsolete, that narrow nationalism must give way to a broader community of nations, in fact, a more genuine brotherhood of all the people of the world.
I would to heaven the government would heed that and act upon it.
[Mr. Stewart.}


Mr. GLEN:: May I ask the hon. gentleman what his authority is for the statement that the regulations of the Immigration Act discriminate against Ukrainians.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: My authority is the minutes of the committee on immigration in 1928, which I have, and the statement made in the last senate committee of inquiry, which has not been denied as far as I know.


James Allison Glen: The hon. gentleman's statement was that the regulations under the Immigration Act characterized Ukrainians as inferior people, and I should like to know the evidence for that.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: I say that they are regarded by this government as inferior when they are put in the non-preferred class.


James Allison Glen: That is not what the hon. gentleman stated. He said that the regulations under the Immigration Act considered and treated Ukrainians as inferior people, and I want his evidence.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: Obviously, when the government characterizes by regulation a group of people as non-preferred I can only accept the premise that these people are regarded by the same government as inferior.


James Allison Glen: Will the hon. gentleman tell
me the section of the act which says so.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: Good
gracious! You do not need the act for that. Do you not know your own regulations?


James Allison Glen: I know them, and I am aware of the fact that the hon. gentleman does not know what he is talking about.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: I have never said this was in the act. It is in the regulations of the department and that has never been denied.


James Allison Glen: Again I interrupt the hon.
gentleman to point out that what he did say was that the regulations under the Immigration Act characterized Ukrainians as inferior, and I want to know the evidence.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: Does
the minister deny that there are regulations of the government which characterize the Ukrainian and Polish people as non-preferred people.


James Allison Glen: That is not the statement you made; you are qualifying.

The Address-Mr. Stewart


Alistair McLeod Stewart: Let me refer to another group.


James Allison Glen: You have not answered the
question yet. I want your evidence.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: The house will remember that a few weeks ago there was held in this city a ceremony of citizenship at which the Prime Minister was present and spoke, and at his elbow there was a little elderly woman of Polish descent from Winnipeg, Mrs. Mynarski. I had been at a ceremony in Winnipeg some weeks earlier where she was giv&i a posthumous award granted her son. He had died in the noblest way a human being can die, by giving his life for his comrade, and this award was granted fof his gallantry, the highest decoration which the empire can bestow, the Victoria Cross. That family is worthy of honour in this country, and yet it belongs to a class of people who are discriminated against as one of the inferior people, under these very same regulations. Why talk about our virtues of citizenship, or our ideals of citizenship when we have these regulations still used by one of our government departments?
The Polish people came to this country many years ago. They, too, went to the west. They built their settlements and churches. They ploughed the fields and tilled the land and made a garden out of what was almost a desert. They have taken their part in industry and commerce. They fought alongside other Canadians and died with other Canadians in the struggle against the same sort of doctrine against which I am fighting. The memorial to all these immigrants in western Canada may not be engraved on tablets; their memorial is in the fields of grain which wave in the prairie breeze, in the railways which span this country, in the bridges which cross its gorges, and its rivers and in the factories which they have helped to build and in which they labour. Yet we still regard them in these regulations as being a nonpreferred group of people.
There is still another group who do not come under this stigma, but we find them in the camps in Europe in large number. They are those of German descent from countries adjacent to and adjoining Germany. Most of them have fought fascism and nazism throughout all these years. Now they, too, are homeless. Now they, too, are destitute. We know the contribution which people of German descent have made to Canada. Then let us realize that these potential immigrants can make a similar contribution, and let us welcome them to this country. For the last twenty-five years, so far as immigration goes,
apart from rescuing refugees which I have been talking about, we have had no policy at all unless one calls a policy the purely negative attitude of exclusion based on the fears and terrors of depression days. Every minister of immigration has found ample excuses to make. In the last two years our present minister has had good excuses and valid ones. I do not quarrel with him for that. But surely in two years he should have had time to think of a policy for this country. We do not yet have one. I suggest to him that we should survey our resources and, having done so, should then permit carefully balanced immigration, supervised and adjusted where necessary until our immigrants are integrated into Canadian life. I do not ask for the open door, nor do I ask for mass immigration. We certainly do not want in this country another flood of cheap labour designed to break the labour market. What I ask for as a policy, and what I would agree with to a considerable extent, are the submissions made by both labour congresses. But above all, let me remind the minister again that any policy which brands an immigrant from the Ukraine or Poland- as non-preferred and which discriminates against him, or any policy which excludes Jews because of their religion, should be immediately rescinded in the name of democracy and in the name of decency.


James Allison Glen: The hon. gentleman is making a charge which is a very serious one, that Canada is discriminating against Ukrainians and Poles because of the very fact that they are Ukrainians and Poles.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: Of course I make that charge.


James Allison Glen: I say to the hon. gentleman that there is no such regulation, that there is no such discrimination, and what he is saying is entirely contrary to the facts.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: Is the hon. gentleman saying now that there is no regulation at all in his department which regards Polish and Ukrainian people as nonpreferred immigrants?


James Allison Glen: There is no such provision made.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: When I made that charge


James Allison Glen: What I ask the hon. gentleman for now, and have asked for several times before is this: Give me the evidence upon which you base that statement. Give me the regulation upon Which it is based.
The Address-Mr. Stewart


Alistair McLeod Stewart: I have asked the hon. gentleman to read the minutes of committees on immigration. I made this' charge in September of 1945.


James Allison Glen: You are talking about the charge-


Alistair McLeod Stewart: I
should like to complete my sentence. I made this charge in September of 1945. The minister never refuted it. I made this charge during his estimates in 1945 and he never refuted it. Where now does he get his evidence to show that what I say is not true? I have the minutes of evidence of these committees on immigration and I will stay with them until I know different. What I want to say to the minister is this: Parliament and parliament alone should have the power to decide who shall or who shall not come into this country.


James Horace King: I am sorry to interrupt the hon. member but his time has expired.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: Mr. Speaker, if the house is willing to allow me to finish, I would appreciate its generosity. I shall not be very long. There is only one last point I should like to make.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Go on.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: There is a statement in the speech from the throne:
My ministers are also following with interest the activities of the United Nations with regard to the question of human rights and fundamental freedoms, and the manner in which those obligations accepted by all members of the United Nations may best be implemented. It is the intention of the government to recommend the appointment of a select committee of members of both houses to consider and report upon these matters.
Does the government think human rights and fundamental freedoms are jeopardized only outside the boundaries of Canada? They are in great danger in this country, as we know from experience. Therefore I am going to ask the government to extend the scope of this committee and to authorize it to consider also a bill of rights as an amendment to the constitution of Canada. In the first speech I made in this house, the speech in which I made these charges to which I referred tonight, I asked for a bill of rights for Canada. In the succeeding sessions members of other parties have followed my lead and I commend them for their sagacity. Whether or not the government will grant this desire of the people of Canada for a bill of rights, I do not know, but I promise them this: the C.C.F. is going to continue

to fight for such a bill. We started it and shall end it, and the only acceptable end is when there is a constitutional amendment which will guarantee to our people what we ask for, a bill of rights which should be incorporated in the constitution-


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Mr. Speaker, I rise to a point of order. This question is specifically referred to in two resolutions on the order paper.


Mr. MacINNIS:: He is discussing the
speech from the throne.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: -protecting minority rights, civil and religious liberties-


James Horace King: Order. Just a moment ago I told the hon. member that his time had expired. I understood that hon. members were ready to give him some more time for his conclusion, but I am not prepared to allow him to carry on with his speech unless he has the unanimous consent of the house.


John Bracken: He has the consent of this section of it, Mr. Speaker.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: I have only to finish this quotation.


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


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Yes.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: A bill of rights should be incorporated in the constitution protecting minority rights, civil and religious liberties, freedom of speech and freedom of assembly, establishing equal treatment before the law to all citizens irrespective of race, colour or creed and providing the necessary democratic powers to eliminate racial discrimination in all its forms.


Mr. D. S. HARKNESS (Calgary East):: Mr. Speaker, I am in complete agreement with the sentiment which has already been expressed by several members of the house, that speeches be as short as possible. As a result I will guarantee that I shall not have to be cut off. In view of that promise, I propose to forgo all compliments and make my remarks as brief as I possibly can.
To start with, I should just like to say that in conversation with the hon. member for Lambton West (Mr. Murphy) after he had completed his speech, I was most shocked and amazed to learn that the houses he described to us are being sold to our veterans at prices of between $7,000 and $8,000.

The Address-Mr. Harkness
The first thing I should like to say something about is the oil industry. I am glad the Minister of Finance (Mr. Abbott) is not in his seat tonight because I think he is a little tired of hearing me talk on this subject. However, an encouraging amount of development work went on during 1946. In Alberta 187 wells were drilled, including one particularly good well in Turner Valley, which served not only to extend the area of that field but also its life. In the Lloydminster field, which straddles the Saskatchewan-Alberta boundary, fifty-one wells were put down, of which some forty were oil producers, and a large drilling programme is in progress at that field from which we hope eventually quite a considerable amount of oil will be recovered. Had the government adopted the suggestions I made during the budget debate last year, the amount of drilling going on would have been considerably greater, and I should like to urge now that the tax deductions and depletion allowances advocated at that time be included in this year's budget proposals in order to encourage the discovery of oil which we need so badly in this country.
I should like to draw the attention of the Minister of Finance to two other matters whilst the budget is in course of preparation. A large amount of the low-grade crude oil produced in the plains area of Alberta comes from the wells mixed with water and sand. An apparatus known as a heater treater is used to remove these impurities from the oil before it is shipped to the refineries, and the use of this niece of equipment is essential to enable oil to be shipped in winter time, and to permit the companies to operate profitably at almost any time. The oil men have requested that this most essential equipment be allowed to enter the country free of duty and sales tax, and I trust the minister will bring forward a tariff amendment making this provision.
The other matter is the entry into Canada free of sales tax of iron or steel casing; in other words, pipe for oil and gas wells. This pipe is so admitted at the present time under the War Measures Act, but with the termination of the National Emergency Transitional Powers Act this concession will end, and it is strongly urged that its continuation be provided for by an amendment to the regular tariff schedules. The continuation of this concession is more necessary now than it was in years past because United States prices for pipe and the freight on that pipe have increased. All other drilling costs have also gone up, including wages; and, as a result, anything that can be done to lessen drilling costs will help materially to bring about increased production.
I should like to bring one other question to the attention of the budget makers. I refer to the eight per cent tax on all supplies to domestic consumers of utilities corporations. This eight per cent tax of course includes natural gas used for heating purposes, and the result has been that those of us who use natural gas to heat our homes have been discriminated against as compared with people who use wood, coal, oil and so on. This tax was a war measure, and it may be that the government does not intend to reenact it. If such is not the case, however; if the government are going to continue to impose this eight per cent tax I would ask that natural gas used for heating purposes be not included. I see no reason why users of natural gas should have an extra eight per cent slapped on them for the heating of their houses, as compared with anybody else.
The next matter on which I should like to touch is the application of the railways for a flat thirty per cent increase in freight rates. This, I believe, is opposed by everyone in western Canada, where the general feeling is that, no matter what may be the decision of the transport commission on the application, no increases should be permitted by the government until the whole freight rate structure has been reviewed and a system of rates introduced which would remove the unfair discriminations which exist at the present time. Particularly the situation should be ended under which goods of all kinds shipped from eastern Canada to the Pacific coast pay a smaller freight rate than the same goods shipped to points in Alberta.
As yet I have not had time to read the voluminous report of the royal commission on coal. I have read the recommendations of the commissioners, however, and I must say I am disappointed that the majority report essentially recommends that things be left as they were before the war. I was particularly disappointed to find that the commissioners could not see any possibility of a large-scale extension of the market for western coal in the provinces of Ontario and Quebec. I should like to make it clear that I am not taking issue with the commissioners; I am merely disappointed that this should have been their finding. The minority report of Mr. Angus Morrison did suggest that there was a potential market in northwestern Ontario for a certain amount of western coal which could be developed at slight extra expense, and I trust that his recommendations in that regard will be implemented.
I should like now to say something about defence matters. Apparently the defence pro-
The Address-Mr. Harkness

gramme presented to us during the last two sessions of parliament has been materially altered. On January 16 it was announced that the over-all strength of the permanent defence force would be cut from 51.000 to 38,000 men. At that time the Minister of National Defence (Mr. Claxton) was reported in the press as stating that there would be no definite decision as to what kind of defence force the dominion would have. In other words, in 1947 we are to have a period of marking time as far as defence matters are concerned. Reserve forces will be left more or less in a state of suspended animation, with no real effort made to "recruit them to strength, and with their programme of training greatlj- emasculated. Apparently this is being done in the interests of economy, but it looks very much like a return to the situation which prevailed between the two wars, when defence was very badly starved and almost completely neglected; and I trust that it is not the first sign of a return to those conditions. During the past two sessions members of this party repeatedly asked the government to state its defence policy, but always without success. The recent statements confirm our fears as to the situation; that is, that there was no defence policy, and that, as a result, the government has had nothing to state. I think it is now clear from what has been said by the minister that all the plans so enthusiastically expounded by the ministers concerned during the past two sessions were not based on any sound foundation of general policy, and, as a result, amounted to nothing, and have now in effect been scrapped. Possibly even the money spent on them so far has been more or less wasted.
With the general concept of economy in national defence matters I am thoroughly in agreement. However, I question very much whether the government's efforts toward economy have been launched in the right direction. I wonder if the large and expensive collection of officers maintained last year in Washington has been materially reduced, or is it still functioning full blast there while at the same time the numbers in our cadet forces have been cut in two? Further, we find reserve units with an authorized strength of 700 or 800 men which are authorized at the present time to send only twenty men to a summer camp for training this year. That is a question I would ask the minister to answer at some time in this session.
There is one instance of waste, coupled with reduced efficiency, which I should like parliament to bring to the attention of the house. It is the amalgamation of military district No. 13 headquarters with headquarters western

command, and the projected movement of the personnel of the former military district headquarters from Calgary to Edmonton.
When the announcement was made that the eleven district headquarters in Canada were to be absorbed in five commands I was hopeful that the movement would result in the elimination of the duplication of staffs, and a considerable saving in man-power and money. Upon looking into the matter, however, I was astonished to be told that the only saving in all Canada brought about by the change would be the elimination of five staff officers. Surely that is not a great saving, in the light of all the ballyhoo which went on about the matter, and the high hopes held out.
Upon examination of the situation so far as military district No. 13 and western command are concerned, I was more than surprised to find it would result in greatly increased expenditures. This is an increase which I estimate will run to at least a half a million dollars in the next three to five years, and, if any building programme is undertaken, will run to very much more than that. All this, I believe further, is accompanied by a decrease in efficiency.
Ever since it was formed, Calgary has been the headquarters of military district No. 13. The department has at that point a physical set-up for such headquarters as western command has now become. The placing of headquarters at Edmonton, however, will entail the purchase or construction at that point of buildings running into very large sums of money, in order properly to house and to look after the headquarters. There is no possibility of erecting those buildings at the present time, in view of the present state of housing in Canada. I understand the plan is to use temporary huts and things of that sort. But that is not going to prevent the expenditure of this money in the future, if the present plan goes forward.
So far as the immediate extra cost is concerned, the number of personnel to be moved from Calgary to Edmonton consists of 200 officers and men who, with their families, make up about 600 persons. My information is that the cost to the government of moving these people will be a minimum of $140,000, and will probably run to $200,000. Because of the acute housing situation in Edmonton the majority of the families will not be able to move, and will have to remain in Calgary for many months, and probably years. During all that time the men concerned will be entitled to draw what is described in army pay offices as separated family allowances. I

The Address-Mr. Harkness
estimate that these separated family allowances will run to more than $5,000 a month. This is an added and unwarranted expense which, as I say, will probably continue for years.
On the other hand, if the command headquarters which, I may say, has been at Edmonton for the past year, were moved from there to Calgary, the personnel involved would be only fifteen or sixteen. Most of these men's families are not living in Edmonton because they could not secure housing accommodation. Therefore the cost of establishing the whole command headquarters at Calgary, from the point of view of moving the people concerned, would be negligible.
Furthermore, of the twenty-one permanent force units in Alberta eighteen of them, including I believe all the large ones, are located in Calgary. I understand it is not proposed to move these units, particularly services such as ordnance depots and shops, army service corps, and the like, because the cost to service the large permanent force units which would be left in Calgary and the reserve force units which are mostly in the south, would be particularly prohibitive if these installations were moved to Edmonton. Therefore Calgary will continue to be the chief permanent force centre in Alberta, with command headquarters 200 miles away from it. I believe two-thirds of all the reserve force units of Alberta are south of Red Deer, which is exactly halfway between Calgary and Edmonton. Thus, the result of placing headquarters at Edmonton rather than at Calgary will mean a great increase in the amount of travel on the part of the entire staff.
In addition to transportation costs, each officer when in Calgary and away from headquarters draws $7 a day command pay. The total increased cost of having headquarters at Edmonton will thus, from that point of view, taking into consideration transportation and command pay, amount to several thousand dollars each month more than has been the situation heretofore. In addition to this, delays of all sorts in dealing with problems of both active and reserve force units will be considerable. As a result, there will be a lack of or a loss in efficiency.
The mayor of Calgary and the board of trade, along with the hon. member for Calgary West (Mr. Smith) and myself, have protested against this move, and asked the reasons for it. All we have been able to get from the Minister of National Defence in reply is a letter which he addressed to me on January 7, in which he said, in part:
I wish to assure you that the decision to make the move in question was arrived at on practical, strategic and economic grounds.
That is a fine explanation!-much the same as my stating that Ottawa is a better place than Montreal in which to live, a statement which could provoke a considerable amount of argument from many hon. members. But the minister's reply is in the same class. It is not a reply; it is nothing.
In his reply to the board of trade the minister said this, in addition, and that is all we have been able to get out of him:
Last January command arrangements were organized under five senior commanders whose areas of responsibilities were widened to coincide with the strategic defence problems of Canada. It was now possible to take advantage of various economies apparent in the plan.
And later on he states:
Command headquarters was also in charge of administration of active and reserve force troops in Alberta.
It would be uneconomical to have the two headquarters operating separately. And the commander should not be separated from his staff, the letter went on.
And a little further on:
I hope that the citizens of Calgary generally will appreciate that this movement is dictated by reasons, firstly of sound military organization, secondly by the necessity of achieving full cooperation between the armed forces responsible for defence and lastly, from the standpoint of achieving every possible economy in the employment of men and money.
All those so-called reasons are in my opinion only statements. The minister has produced no proof to support them. As a matter of fact there has been no specific and valid reason for the move except the possible desirability of having the air force headquarters, which are situated at Edmonton, and the army head* quarters together. Apart from that, no valid reason has yet been put forward.
I think I have shown that the minister's statement in connection with economy is absolutely wrong. If my statements are not correct, the minister should produce proof. All that we in Calgary ask for is that the move be postponed until it is shown to be in the interests of economy and efficiency. The minister has stated that it is, but he has produced no proof. We submit that the exact opposite is the case.
I happen to know that an investigation into the cost of the move from Calgary to Edmonton as compared with having the command headquarters at Edmonton, as well as into the relative strategic advantages, was ordered after the move had been announced. I should like to know why that investigation was not undertaken before the move was ordered or
The Address-Mr. Harkness

before a decision was reached. But now that the investigation has been held, what are the findings? I am very much interested in knowing that, and I challenge the minister to lay them before the public and before parliament here. I am sure they will bear out in a large measure my contention that there will be greatly added costs without any corresponding advantages.
The only possible reason that can be advanced for this move is the desirability of having air and army headquarters together. It is a debatable point whether Edmonton possesses any strategic advantages. I believe it does not. In the event of invasion from the north by air or otherwise, the tactical headquarters command would immediately move north to the area of operations and the rear headquarters would move back to Calgary to be with the services with whom their chief job would lie. In the event of any fighting actually taking place, which is the only thing which would provide any strategic reasons, Edmonton would be deserted.
Until good reasons are produced to justify the move, there are only two conclusions to which I can come: first, that it was dictated by political reasons. It is a well known fact that Edmonton has strongly supported the Liberal cause for many years, while the reverse is true of Calgary. That may have had a determining effect upon this decision but I sincerely trust that has not been the case.
The second and only other conclusion I can come to is that the officials at national defence headquarters made a false appreciation of what the situation was without being fully informed of the facts. I think the fact that an investigation was held after the move was ordered is practically an admission of this. I am afraid that, once having made that false appreciation, they are stubbornly sticking to it; because of a fear of loss of prestige or something of that sort they will not admit their mistake.
In other words, I believe this thing was decided by a few officials here in Ottawa who brought out a map, looked at it and said, "Oh, yes, there is Edmonton right in the centre of the province." It may be in the centre of the province geographically, but it is certainly not the centre of population. The centre of population in the province is much farther south of Edmonton. These people do not realize that. They also do not realize that most of the permanent and reserve units are in the southern part of the province and that this move will cause a great increase in expense

without any added efficiency. In fact the reverse will be the case; there will be a decrease in efficiency.
In view of these facts, I call upon the Minister of National Defence either to justify fully the projected move or to cancel it in the interests of the economy which we on this side of the house certainly desire and which the government professes to desire.


Mr. BEAL CAOUETTE (Pontiac) (Translation) :: Mr. Speaker, you will realize what my feelings are when, for the first time, I have the privilege of addressing the Canadian parliament. However, at the thought that our country's population is anxious to have a government at their service, I feel somewhat more at ease and, at the same time, deeply deceived by the slight hopes given our people in the speech from the throne.
This afternoon, a member of the C.C.F. party took to task a statement I gave the Ottawa newspapers concerning a strike which broke out and still persists at the Noranda mines, in my constituency. The stand taken by the Union of Electors in the strike at the Noranda mines is very clear cut; they approve the demands of the Noranda miners who seek security for themselves and their families. When they ask for a wage increase, we are with them; we urge the government to insist that the Noranda mines guarantee security to these miners. Mr. Speaker, when the miners' union asks for a deduction of union dues from salaries, we cannot support this system commonly called "check-off" and I shall tell you why.
We look forward to a free Canada and free Canadians. We want our people to be free; we desire their protection; we do not want them to be subjected to rigid laws. That is why the check-off must not fetter the freedom of the Noranda miners, no more than that of other Canadians. By opposing the checkoff, that is the deduction of union dues from the salary, we simply wish to protect the freedom of the miners, the freedom of the workers. If a worker or a miner wishes to give his support to, and become a member of a union, he is free to do so; he is at liberty to join whatever union he prefers. But there will be some to object that the check-off or deduction of dues from the salary at the Noranda mine is entirely optional and that no one is forced to accept it. I admit it is so at the present time; but the heads of the Noranda union boldly tell us, for example, that next year they will ask for compulsory

The Address-Mr. Caouette
contributions, thus forcing the Noranda miners to join the CIO union at Noranda. It is precisely against this compulsion which may come into force next year, that we are fighting with all our might. That is a dictatorial method whereby the citizen is deprived of his freedom. Under the pretext that the union must have freedom and security we are told that the check-off is essential. Mr. Speaker, what is important to us in our Union of Electors or our Social Credit movement, and what is important to every hon. member of this house, is the freedom of the citizen; it is the security of the citizen. If a union enjoys security while, on the other hand, its members have none, and are continually faced with poor living conditions, suffer from depression, and get only low salaries, there is in such a situation nothing particularly advantageous to workers, miners, farmers or others, for that matter.
We want in the first place security for the citizen. When the miners from Noranda, from my constituency, or elsewhere, can obtain a fair salary, they will enjoy security and as a result they will be able to guarantee their union's security, provided they can freely join it. without being forced into it. It should be clearly understood that whoever is compelled to join a union never becomes necessarily an active member but rather a subversive member of that organization; and, instead of working in the union's interests, he will work against it, after having -been compelled to join it. Never will he tolerate being directed against his will to a place where his freedom, which he considers sacred, would be violated.
It is obvious that the C.C.F. party wants to establish a petty system under which Canadians will no longer be allowed to move freely but will be constantly controlled and will not be able to do anything without the government's consent. Well, Mr. Speaker, I am sure that the Canadian people want neither socialism nor communism in Canada. They want security, freedom, a system respectful of order and individual freedom.


Mr. LESAGE:: Then, they want a Liberal government.


Mr. COTE (Matapedia-Matane):: May I ask the hon. member-


James Horace King: Order!


Antoine-Philéas Côté: May I ask the hon. member a question?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Go ahead.


Mr. GAUTHIER (Portneuf):: Go ahead.


David Réal Caouette: Mr. Speaker, I was
chosen to represent the constituency of Pontiac
in this house and I am naturally indebted to my electors, but I believe I should also thank the ministers of the Liberal party who helped me during my campaign-


Pierre Gauthier: That's an
old one.


David Réal Caouette: -for without their
aid, I must admit, I would surely have been defeated.
As I have said, I have been elected to express in this house the explicit wishes of my constituents, to insist on the implementation of the people's programme rather than a political party's.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


David Réal Caouette: The activities of this
parliament, the economic and political activities of our country can have but one aim:	the
common interest of our people. That is a prerequisite of democracy. Democracy rests upon true respect of the human being, composed as it is of two elements, namely matter, the body, to which is due economic security, and mind, the soul, which calls for personal freedom. Security and freedom for each and every one shall be the object of this, my maiden speech.
If true democracy means every man's freedom and security, let us see what obstacles stand in the way of its achievement in this country. I shall quote, Mr. Speaker, from an address by the Right Hon. Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) in the general election of 1935:
Once a nation has given up control of its money and its credit, it does not matter who makes the laws of the country. As soon as usury takes control, it will bring ruin to any nation. Until the control of money and credit is restored to the government and recognized as its most obvious and sacred responsibility, there is no use talking about democracy and the sovereignty of parliament.
Nothing has been said in the speech from the throne about the government's reassumption of its sovereignty. Instead of enacting laws to bring men, women and children to task, let the government legislate to control finance and money. That would solve the problem of security and freedom. For the Canadian people, and for any one of us, having security and freedom means having buying power. When we have money, we also have security and freedom. Without money, we have neither. The same old Social Credit refrain. Money, always money. Yes, Mr. Speaker, always money. During the ten years of depression in Canada, the only thing that was lacking was money. During the war years, this country found the money to make guns, planes and shells, to make uniforms
The Address-Mr. Caouette

for our soldiers and to send them overseas. But when the war was over, no money could be found to make sure that the people of Canada would enjoy freedom and security.
Now as regards the programme of the Electors' Union, some are surprised that after his election the new member for Pontiac should be sitting next to Social Credit members.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: No, no.


David Réal Caouette: Mr. Speaker, the programme of the Social Credit party bailies with the programme of the Electors' Union. That is why I sit with the members of the Social Credit party. The Union of Electors comprises Liberals, Conservatives, and followers of every political shade and hue. We unite not around a party, nor around a group, nor even around a party leader but in order to secure the objectives and results which the electors wish from the government. The Union of Electors advocates progress and that is why it wants parliament to have representatives supported by the electorate and not by party funds. The Union of Electors sets forth a very plain and very definite programme; it supports a policy suitable to one and all. Why am I a follower of the Social Credit party? You do or will understand. I am quite at ease with the Social Credit group. I believe it is the only one which recognizes real freedom of the individual, which allows one of its members to hold opinions different from those of the leader and other members. I believe that the Union of Electors will show its mettle in the house and that in the near future we shall represent the entire Canadian electorate in parliament. The policy of the Union of Electors is clear and well-meaning towards everyone.
Before I go into the details of our programme, may I digress briefly. I was not elected to vrage an obstinate and stubborn struggle against so and so. I wish to assure all the hon. members of this house that we can honestly and sincerely cooperate with another party whenever the interests of the people of Canada as a whole, and not merely of a section of the country, are at stake.
The very first point which we advocate in our programme is that all annual incomes under $3,000 be tax free. That is a big claim and the electors support that part of our programme. No one in Canada opposes it. All over the country, electors favour income tax exemption for those who earn less than $3,000 a year. I am sure many electors have not forgotten that the members have voted themselves a tax-free increase of $2,000 per annum. Added to their previous indemnity,

it brings the tax-free total to $3,000. These people felt that if such doings were in order for our representatives, they were equally in order for the electors. I therefore submit that they were right. Such is (he first point on the Union of Electors' programme. If it applies to members of parliament, I believe it should also apply to our constituents who have elected us and pay our salary.
Secondly, we advocate an equitable old age pension plan; let such pensions be paid at a reasonable age, before death and not afterwards. An old age pension of $60 monthly payable at the age of sixty. We contend that every person should receive a $60 monthly pension upon reaching the age of 60, and without investigation. Such a pension would be more Christian and humanitarian. Instead of paying the investigators, let us give that money to the aged.
Thirdly, we advocate a $60 monthly pension payable to all cripples and invalids at the age of twenty-one. At present, no Canadian law provides for the security and freedom of cripples and invalids. They must rely on their parents. No law provides for them. Should the government enact a law granting a $60 monthly pension to cripples and invalids at the age of 21, it would comfort them and they could look forward with confidence to a happier life than at present, free from despair, fear and the thought that they must rely on the help of their parents, brothers, sisters and other relatives. They have enough of their infirmity without having to live in a hopeless condition for the rest of their lives. That is why we are asking a $60 monthly pension, payable to cripples at the age of twenty-one.
The last point, Mr. Speaker, is most important and most pleasant for the whole population; I mean the national dividend of $20 per month. This national dividend would be based on the difference between the total value of our production and the total amount of currency and credit in circulation in Canada. We would make up the difference, balance it with the corresponding purchasing power and distribute it to all citizens alike, even to the hon. members, as a dividend. It has been contended-some have even said so in Pontiac county-that a national dividend would be absurd. It is said that the people who have money are lazy, that they are all lazy. It is said that they will stop working, that they will refuse to work any longer and that idleness will forthwith become the greatest evil in Canada. During the election campaign in Pontiac, the constituency I now represent and which is

The Address-Mr. Caouette
fairly prosperous, there were people who wanted to win that constituency with all its wealth, but no one among them was afraid of becoming lazy with the money he would obtain. Money is all right for some, but not for the common people, who might become lazy if they had it. Must we say that we have become lazy because we get that money? No. Neither will the people become lazy. Money does not beget laziness. People who have money are tempted to put it to work. A lazy millionaire has never been seen in Canada, Mr. Speaker. No, never. We have never seen a man who had $50,000, for instance, or a million, who was not anxious to make another million. But when a man steadily does hard work without ever succeeding ia saving anything, he becomes discouraged and gives up his job.
Mr. Speaker, a strike is on at the present time at the Noranda mine, and the Minister of Labour (Mr. Mitchell) has a hard task in finding a solution. He receives telegrams and petitions to settle the Noranda strike as soon as possible.
I know that it is a problem, but it would be very easy to tell the mine to pay the 16 cents an hour increase that is asked for, because they admit themselves that they can pay that 16 cents.
There is something else, related to what I said a moment ago about exempting from income tax all income below $3,000 a year. At the Noranda mine as elsewhere, in each one of the constituencies of the hon. members of this house, there are workers, miners and farmers, and that is especially true of the working class, who will miss hours and days of work on account of that tax. They tell you openly: "If I work on such and such a day, I am going to lose it in taxes; I don't want to work just for the sake of paying taxes". So the worker refuses to work. He is not too much to blame. Such heavy taxes hamper production and work, and that is why I suggest that during this session the house should adopt by unanimous consent an exemption from income tax for all incomes below $3,000, so that miners and workers may keep their wages.
We are told that God gave this commandment to mankind:	"In the sweat of thy face
shalt thou eat bread". But let us not allow the government to interpret this as meaning that the miner and the worker must thus earn their bread 500 times before having the right to eat it once.
We have also heard of Alberta and of the Social Credit government. In 1935, the Alberta government promised $25 per month
to the voters, but they never got it. It has
never been said, however, that the dominion was responsible for that. No, such things are better left unsaid. It has never been said that the laws of Alberta had not been approved, but disapproved. No, let it rather be said that Mr. Aberhart, then premier of Alberta, met with complete failure in that province.
Mr. Speaker, if Social Credit is doomed to failure, why does the federal government not allow the provincial authorities of Alberta to experiment with the theory of Social Credit, to put it into practice, to place a rope around their neck and erase forever from the face of Canada the very name and the doctrine of Social Credit? But Social Credit measures are not. allowed to be passed by the provinces. They are constantly being stopped from doing so. Why? Because the government is well aware that if Social Credit were to be applied in Alberta, it would soon spread throughout the rest of Canada. Then there would be no divided political parties but a government responsible to the people and unafraid to give the people their freedom.


Mr. BEAUDOIN:: Such measures are outlawed not by the dominion government but by the supreme court.


David Réal Caouette: Only yesterday I heard the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) speak of the greatness and formidable strength of the fair and noble Liberal party. May I call to your attention, Mr. Speaker, his contention that none of the opposition parties is in a position to form an administration. This is all very well, but I wish to point out that without the province of Quebec, the Liberal party would never have come to power.
Mr. LE3AGE: It is true.


David Réal Caouette: If the Liberal party have always been able to form a Liberal government here in Canada, it is thanks to the province of Quebec.


Mr. GAGNON:: That is true.


David Réal Caouette: Is it not?


Joseph Arthur Lesage: Yes, it is true, go on.


David Réal Caouette: I note however that the dominion government shows very little gratitude to the province of Quebec. It is with pleasure that I acknowledge the presence in the cabinet of a few French-Canadian ministers from Quebec but I regret sincerely and deeply, Mr. Speaker, the absence of French-Canadian deputy ministers in the present government.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: So do we.
The Address-Mr. Caouette


David Réal Caouette: Such requests have been made for years. If it be acknowledged that the Liberals have been maintained that long in power by the province of Quebec, there should at least be in the cabinet one French-Canadian deputy minister to assist the ministers-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Not in the cabinet.


David Réal Caouette: Mr. Speaker, those of us who have toured our province in the last few years have noticed that our people are more united than ever before, not in support of a party or an election, but in support of the policy which I outlined a few moments ago.
No regrettable incidents or accidents occurred in the constituency of Pontiac-while a few months later regrettable accidents and acts of brutality were reported in Richelieu-Vercheres.


Mr. LOW:: Hear, hear!


David Réal Caouette: A Montreal group, hired by a Sorel organization, went to Sorel to create trouble; they locked up one of the organizers of the Union of Electors.


Joseph Arthur Lesage: Mr. Speaker, I rise to a point of order. I understand that the matter referred to by the hon. member is before the courts at present, and as it is sub judice, the hon. member cannot discuss it here.


David Réal Caouette: There is Richelieu-
Vercheres-


Joseph Arthur Lesage: Mr. Speaker, I should be grateful if you would rule on my point of order.


James Horace King: Order. If the election of Richelieu-Vercheres is now before the courts, the matter is sub judice and the hon. member cannot discuss it in this house.


David Réal Caouette: Mr. Speaker, we will deal with that again when the trial is over.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: That's it!


David Réal Caouette: One thing is certain, however, and that is that after the 23rd of December the Electors' Union kept on organizing in the constituency of Richelieu-Vercheres. We are organizing not only in the province of Quebec but throughout Canada, and before long we shall have in this country a government which will command the respect of the electorate and will respect the expressed will of the voters. Our organization is tremendous; it is not financed by election funds, but by the people themselves. We have worked for years to establish that organization and we now take pride in stating in this parliament

our good will not towards any particular person but towards the whole of Canada and all its people.
A short time ago, Mr. Speaker, the chairmen for Ontario and Quebec of the Electors' Union addressed to all federal members from those provinces a letter underlining what the right hon. prime minister expounded during the 1935 campaign and which I have just quoted. It is an appeal to all members to approve and support the requests made by the electors of these two provinces. For my part, I approve them because we are striving to overthrow financial dictatorship in order that each and every one may enjoy freedom and security.
Mr. Speaker, federal-provincial agreements were also discussed yesterday. I shall be brief, and confine my remarks to a few words only. We believe in provincial autonomy, we favour agreement with the provinces. We claim that the federal government is nothing but the result of agreements between the provinces. The provinces have agreed to have a central government, but I do not believe the central government has agreed to have provinces. That would not make sense. The provinces must be independent. When federal-provincial agreements are considered, let us admit that the provinces should engage in conferences, write agreements, sign them and then submit them to the federal government. In the province of Quebec we do not readily admit that an agreement should be entered into with a particular province when the others are left out. The Canadian confederation comprises nine provinces who must have their say, because the federal government owes its existence to them. Such is the stand we take in connection with agreements between federal and provincial governments.
Now, Mr. Speaker, we are told that some controls will be maintained. There are controls which must not be maintained. There are controls which must disappear. I remember that when gasoline was rationed, those who had genuine coupons made purchases, as well as those who had spurious coupons and those who had no coupons at all. Why, then, ration gasoline? In the case of other goods, prices have not increased in Canada, because the prices board was apparently alive to its task. Prices have risen to a certain extent. One pound of sugar is purchased with one coupon, but on the other hand ten-pound bags of sugar are sold for $20 or $25. Sugar can be had with genuine coupons, it can be had with spurious coupons and in certain localities it can be obtained without any coupons.

The Address-Mr. Caouette
As regards butter, what is the situation, in Canada? One pound of butter can be purchased for 44 cents with one coupon, but it can also be obtained without any coupon for a price of 75 cents, in the city of Montreal.


Louis-René Beaudoin: Eliminate butter at 44
cents a pound.


Joseph Arthur Lesage: Can you prevent it?


David Réal Caouette: It seems to me that the government could. It is possible to prevent the operation of such black markets by lifting controls on production and distribution. Doing away with control of production will help wipe out the black market. If you favour all round control, you favour the black market. Mr. Speaker, the Prices Board, or controls or ration coupons must vanish. Canadians are asking that they be done away with.
They request the lifting of all controls; however, as the leader of the Social Credit party (Mr. Low) said yesterday, we would keep in force only the control or controls which we would recognize as essential. Abolish all controls on construction and the building of dwellings will advance more rapidly in Canada. The government find the required building materials for Wartime Housing, but not for the private contractor. Nothing is available for the private contractor, but they find such materials for Wartime Housing.
There are some for government undertakings but not for private enterprise. Mr. Speaker, this control must be done away with. When building materials are freed in this country, contractors will be able to get some, the construction of houses will go smoothly and those who, at present, have no homes will soon get one. It will take some time, however, before a great number of houses are built. We agree that it is still necessary to keep an eye on rentals but not to the point of compelling the landlords to live under the heel of the government for years to come.
Mr. Speaker, I conclude my remarks. I congratulate the mover of the address in reply to the speech from the throne but I cannot extend my congratulations to the seconder-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


David Réal Caouette: -as I consider-


An hon. MEMBER:: That is mean.


David Réal Caouette: I find that the seat of the hon. member for Riehelieu-Vercheres is stained with blood.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Joseph Arthur Lesage: Mr. Speaker, on a question of privilege and in order to safeguard the
honour of the members of this house, I think that the really unhappy words just pronounced by the hon. member for Pontiac, that is the last words of his speech, should be removed from the record.


James Horace King: I believe that the hon. member who has just raised a point of order is perfectly right. I would suggest to the hon. member who has resumed his seat to change the last sentence of his speech.


David Réal Caouette: Mr. Speaker, a moment ago I was prevented from speaking, or from going on speaking of Riehelieu-Vercheres-


Mr. LANGLOIS:: Speak up like a man.


David Réal Caouette: I am speaking of what happened in Riehelieu-Vercheres, but not of those who are facing trial.


James Horace King: Order!


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Withdraw or don't withdraw.


James Horace King: It is the first time the hon. gentleman speaks in this chamber. Instead of asking him to withdraw what he said, I shall ask him to modify his statement. If he refuses, I shall have no other option but to beg him to withdraw his remarks.


David Réal Caouette: Mr. Speaker, I shall modify my statement by saying that I cannot congratulate the seconder of the address-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: That is not what
we are asking, we want you to withdraw what you have said.


David Réal Caouette: -because I do not like the way his election took place not its result.


Joseph Arthur Lesage: We admit you do not like
the result of that election.
(Text):


Mr. BENOIT MICHAUD (Restigouche-Madawaska):: Mr. Speaker, along with the other hon. members who have preceded me in this debate I wish to offer my sincere congratulations to the mover and the seconder of the address, who have discharged the tasks imposed upon them with such ability and distinction. I only wish either of these gentlemen could lend me his rich voice for at least the time I shall address the house on this occasion.
Despite appeals made and hopes expressed by the different speakers that this debate on the speech from the throne might be made as short as possible, at this early stage of the session I must crave the indulgence of the house to bring to its attention a problem which in my opinion is of paramount import-
The Address-Mr. Michaud

ance to a number of people in New Brunswick and the maritimes generally, and which cannot wait until the estimates of the Department of Agriculture are brought before the committee of supply. I have in mind the serious plight which faces the potato growers of New Brunswick; and for fear that occasion may not arise soon for the discussion of this matter of urgent public importance I avail myself of the very first opportunity to deal with it as best I can.
At the outset I wish to point out that I am not speaking of my own personal problem as a grower, since my crop has been disposed of quite satisfactorily on local markets. I speak for the vast majority of the farmers of my constituency who have no alternative but to sell their produce at a loss. The potato is by far the most important of our vegetables. It is fifth in importance among our field crops, coming after wheat, oats, barley, hay and clover. Its all-Canada value for 1944 was estimated at $70,000,000, as compared with $460,000,000 for wheat, $263,000,000 for oats, $129,000,000 for barley and $183,000,000 for hay and clover. Of the principal crops it has by far the largest yield per acre. The all-Canada average for 1943 was 153 bushels to the acre. The average yield for New Brunswick in 1943 was 289 bushels to the acre, which is more than eight and a half tons. Our average for 1946 must be at least 300 bushels to the acre; for the successful farmer it is in the vicinity of 400 bushels, with some going over 500. The average for Prince Edward Island is not quite so high as that for New Brunswick, but it is considerably higher than that of any other province.
It is not only from the point of view of yield that Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick hold an important position in the production of tubers. From the point of view of total production the four leading provinces rank as follows, and these figures show the average for the years 1942, 1943 and 1944:
Bushels
Quebec	 20,000,000
New Brunswick	 15,000,000
Ontario	 12,800,000
Prince Edward Island	 7,000,000
The per capita production is as follows:
Bushels
Prince Edward Island	 45
New Brunswick	 20
Quebec	 3-7
Ontario	 2
From these figures it would appear that Prince Edward Island and some sections of New Brunswick have developed a highly efficient technique in producing potatoes economically and on a large scale. It must

be remembered that their soil and climate are particularly suited to the growing of this kind of crop.
To produce economically and on a large scale entails, however, considerable expenditure. A good system of rotation must be established; expensive machinery must be purchased, and large frostproof warehouses must be erected. Such expenditures for the average farmer run into many thousands of dollars. The potato grower who has gone to such expense knows his job, to a science; but many of them may not know so much about other types of farming. For all these reasons, once a farmer is organized to grow potatoes efficiently and on a large scale, it is not fair to ask him to change to some other type of farming.
Yes, Mr. Speaker, our potato farmer is highly efficient. He knows his job, and he does it well. He knows what yield may be expected when climatic conditions are favourable. Unfortunately, however, like the wheat grower in the west, he has no control over such climatic conditions. For that reason the yield per acre varies considerably from year to year. Thus in 1943 and 1944 the total yield for New Brunswick was approximately 17,000.000 bushels, whereas it was only about 11,000.000 bushels in 1945, and in 1946 it must be close to 20,000.000 bushels, with only a very slight increase in acreage.
Unlike wheat farmers, however, potato growers have no means of carrying over surplus crop in a bountiful year to a year of crop failure, unless the tubers are dehydrated; and dehydration is neither- economical nor practical. It is true that a certain quantity can be turned into starch, or put to some other industrial uses. But this also is mot economical for Canadian grade one potatoes. Industrial processing can hardly take care of all our inferior grade tubers.
So far as the export market is concerned, we have been fortunate within the past three or four years in being able to export large quantities to the United States. This year, however, there is a huge crop across the line, and there is no possibility of selling table stock potatoes to our friends to the south. We have been and are still exporting large quantities to Central and South America. Those quantities are mostly for seed, and that market cannot by any means take care of our surplus production. Generally speaking, the bulk of our crop must be marketed in Canada, and for table purposes.
What happens, then, when there is a bumper crop, like the one we now have on our hands? In the first place, a great many farmers have not sufficient storage facilities for the whole

The Address-Mr. Michaud
of their crop. They expect to sell a certain portion of it in the fall. Most of them have to do so in order to meet the very heavy financial obligations incurred in the producing and harvesting of their crop. When, as in 1946, there is a heavy crop, most of the surplus must also be marketed in the fall.
One does not have to be a professor of economics to visualize the effect of these large quantities of tubers offered for sale at the same time. Under such conditions the law of supply and demand goes into full swing and works havoc. Prices slump, sometimes to a point far below cost of production. Once the market takes this trend, there is no way to bring prices up, unless new outlets are found for the excess product offered for sale.
At present farmers in New Brunswick are selling table stock potatoes at a loss, and they have been doing so ever since late varieties came on the market at the end of September. When this situation developed last fall representatives of the potato growers came to Ottawa to interview Mr. Taggart of the agricultural prices support board. I accompanied the delegation which included the minister of agriculture of New Brunswick, two ministers from the provincial government of Prince Edward Island, the hon. member for Victoria-Carleton, a member of the New Brunswick legislature, and prominent gentlemen from Quebec and Ontario.
Shortly after this interview an order in council was passed, and the Department of Agriculture issued a statement outlining two methods of assisting potato growers, as provided in the said order in council. The first provision is for a subsidy of fifty cents a barrel to be paid by the board for potatoes used in making starch. Since this industry cannot afford to pay more than $1.15 a barrel for potatoes, the subsidy brings the total price, paid to the farmer to $1.65 a barrel, which is quite satisfactory, considering that potatoes used in making starch are not graded, and contain a percentage of tubers which cannot be sold for table stock.


An hon. MEMBER:: What about alcohol?


Benoît Michaud: That is not economical. Unfortunately at the present time there is only one starch factory of importance in New Brunswick, and that is the factory of F. W. Pirie Company, Limited, at Grand, Falls. This plant does remarkably well, and buys huge quantities of potatoes from farmers in the surrounding district. The fact remains, however, that it can bring relief only to a relatively small area in the vicinity of Grand Falls, and at the most to only one or two of the parishes in my constituency.
The second provision contained in the order in council to relieve the farmers is a guarantee to take over any surplus potatoes not disposed of through other channels, by May I, 1947, at the rate of $1 per 75-pound bag, inspected and loaded on cars at point of shipping. Whether this policy of the government has had any stabilizing effect upon the market is hard to tell. It is quite possible that, without it, prices would be much lower than those now prevailing. The government is to be commended for these two measures designed to relieve the potato growers of the maritime provinces, because otherwise I fear the situation would be nothing short of catastrophic.
In spite of these very helpful measures, the fact remains that at the present time potatoes shipped outside New Brunswick for table purposes do not net the farmers more than fifty to fifty-five cents a bag, which is quite a bit below cost of production. If the agricultural prices support board were to commence buying at once at the price of $1 a bag, as promised, and re-sell to retailers, it would automatically cause dealers to pay the same prices. The farmers in northern New Brunswick take the view that the marketing of table potatoes could be improved considerably by such action of the board.
A very reliable gentleman from one of the largest potato producing communities in my constituency has just brought certain facts to my attention:
First, that potatoes are in short supply in Montreal and a high price is being charged for them. This fact is corroborated by a medical man well known to me.
Second, a young man from my constituency states that the restaurant in Montreal where he usually eats serves potatoes only three times a week.
Another elector of mine has had to send potatoes to his sister who is living in Montreal because she has been unable to procure them at the store where she deals. My correspondent concludes his letter with the suggestion that the government take over immediately the distribution and sale of table stock potatoes at a fair price to the farmer.
Some hon. members may ask why the farmers are selling potatoes at fifty and fifty-five cents a bag when they have the promise of $1, less incidental expenses which would net them approximately ninety cents a bag on May 1. The answer is simple. In the first place, the farmers need money now to meet their expenses. In the second place, this government buying is something altogether new and the farmers do not know just how it will
The Address-Mr. Michaud

work out. Finally, if they waited until after May 1 it would not leave enough time before seeding time to market the huge quantities of potatoes which are likely to be left in the warehouses on that day.
To my mind, the only acceptable solution is for the agricultural prices support board to start buying at once instead of waiting until May 1. Assuming that the government, through its prices support board, were to buy all the excess potatoes in the maritime provinces, how much would it cost the treasury of the country, taking into consideration the subsidy at. present paid on potatoes being processed into starch? It is safe to assume that the assistance rendered by the government, to the potato growers will run into a huge sum of money.
The next question that naturally comes to our mind is whether the country can afford to carry out this policy from year to year. The United States has spent considerable sums of money to subsidize its potato industry. In that country there is a guaranteed price of something like $2.20 a barrel. In older to give the house some idea of what is being done by our neighbours to the south, I should like to read from a dispatch from Washington, dated December 31 last, which reads:
United States agriculture department officials predicted to-day that millions of bushels of frozen and rotten potatoes will be dumped under government instructions during the next several weeks.
They will be part of the 1946 crop surplus of nearly 100,000,000 bushels. Officials estimated the government's final loss on the surplus will amount to around $80,000,000.
I am not going to read it all, but the article concludes by stating:
The total cost of the 1946 potato support programme is expected to be $100,000,000. Of this amount, the agriculture department will recover about $20,000,000 from those sold to distillers, starch plants, live stock feeders and foreign buyers.
I think it is quite safe to say that we could not think of adopting such a policy for Canada. We simply could not afford such extravagance. In my humble opinion another solution must be found, a natural solution, a normal and sound solution, a solution which would not cost the government too much.
At the present time there is a de jacto minimum guaranteed price for practically all farm products except potatoes. In most cases this de facto minimum price is the maximum price as well. We have a maximum price on potatoes which came into operation early in 1942 and which affected the 1941 and subsequent crops. Because of this maximum price
[Mr. Michaud.1
which I consider fair and reasonable, the farmers have not been able to make the large profits which they could have made from 1941 to 1946, and which would have compensated them for heavy losses suffered in years of depressed prices.
Incidentally, I think I should at this stage point out how the potato market behaved on the same Saint John river prior to 1941. Prices varied anywhere from nothing or next to nothing up to $3.50 a bushel. In certain years prices were very good and farmers made good profits. In other years prices were considerably below the cost of production and producers suffered heavy losses. It was somewhat like a poker game in which the stakes were very high and the losses quite frequent. As might well be expected, many farmers went broke at that kind of game. Only the most robust financially were able to stay in the game and wait until they could pick up a winning hand.
The tragic part of this huge gamble is that it was in years of good crops that the farmers fared worst; they made their money in years of poor or average yield. Can anyone imagine anything more paradoxical, more tragic and at the same time more ridiculous? When a kind providence bestows upon our farmers a bountiful crop it might be expected that in a well organized economy benefits would accrue to the farmers. That seems to be the case with other agricultural products. Unfortunately it has not been the case with potatoes. On the contrary, our farmers are almost invariably penalized when a crop turns out to be above the average. Under the present set-up it is not the farmer who toiled and took the risk who benefits from a good crop. The law of the jungle prevails, with the result that the consumers and the middleman reap the benefits which rightly belong to the producers.
All this does not seem to make sense. There must be a solution. There is one which is being offered by the farmers and which is not materially different from that applying to other farm products. I have discussed the proposed solution with a great many farmers from my constituency, and outside it as well. Practically all of them favour some sort of government intervention in order to stabilize prices. I now propose to submit to the house, and more particularly to the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner), the suggestions indicated and urge the minister to give them his usual sympathetic consideration and see that appropriate legislation is submitted to the house during the course of the present session, if our suggestions are deemed to be sound

The Address-Mr. Michaud
and capable of being implemented. The farmers with whom I discussed this alarming question of depressed prices are of opinion that we cannot hope to stabilize prices unless we have:
1.	Controlled acreage.
2.	Orderly marketing.
They are prepared to accept necessary restrictions to that effect and, that being the case, I fail to see why anyone else should be unwilling to fall in line.
First, we must have controlled acreage. At this point may I remark that there does not seem to be much wrong with our present acreage. The best proof of this is the fact that the Minister of Agriculture has recommended only a very slight decrease in acreage for 1947, less than one per cent, if my memory serves me aright. No; it is not our acreage which is responsible for our present predicament. With an average crop in 1946, potatoes would be selling at ceiling prices all over eastern Canada.
With a fair guaranteed price, however, there is great danger of farmers increasing their acreage to a point where it would constitute a national problem of overproduction. There is something really fascinating about growing potatoes. Like other kinds of farming, it can be carried on more economically when conducted on a large scale. Naturally, every farmer who has possibilities wishes to expand and, unless some sort of check is placed on him, he will keep on expanding. For this reason it is suggested that the present acreage be not increased and that every substantial producer who markets otherwise than locally be given a quota based on his average production of, let us say, the past three years. To the extent of his quota he would be given priority to sell at a price which would ensure fair returns, a price approximating the present ceiling price, or possibly slightly lower. Any amount of potatoes grown by a farmer in excess of his quota would be at his own risk. In years of poor crops and good export markets he would probably be able to dispose at a fair price of any excess crop over his quota. On the other hand1, in a bumper crop year, like 1946, his excess over his quota would simply have to be dumped.
In a speech of this scope, it is not possible to go into the details of the solution suggested, and to meet all possible objections to it. For this reason I must confine myself to advocating the broad principle of controlled acreage. The details and the machinery to increase or decrease acreage could be embodied in a bill establishing a potato marketing board.
The second step toward this stabilizing policy could be termed orderly marketing and would work out somewhat as follows. Every carload of potatoes shipped by rail would be handled by the board, and sold at the price set by the government. This price should be sufficient to ensure a fair return even in years of poor crops. I can see no reason why the present ceiling price could not be made the fixed price. The consumers have paid this price until September last and, to my knowledge, have not suffered or complained to any extent.
Under a well organized potato marketing [DOT] board, prices would increase gradually as the crop year advanced, somewhat in the manner that the present ceiling price has operated during the past two or three years. Every farmer would be permitted to market the same proportion of his crop as his neighbour, during the same month or marketing period. Under the present order in council governing the price of potatoes, the lowest price paid is for the months of September and October. It increases five cents on November 1, five cents on December 1, five cents on January 1, and so on until June. This increase is designed to cover shrinkage and the cost of storage.
As a result of such orderly marketing, every farmer would have the privilege of selling his crop gradually over the crop year, and in such a manner that at the end of any month, if he so desired, he would have sold the same proportion of his crop as any other farmer.
Under this project the farmer would be assured of selling all liis quota, as human consumption would not vary much from year to year. But, if it should happen that the whole quota assigned to farmers could not be used up for table purposes, it could be disposed of at the processing price, and probably without any cost to the government.
This solution appears quite easy and simple to the farmers with whom I discussed it. Nobody would lose by it except perhaps a few consumers who would be called upon to pay a fair price for their tubers.
Before I resume my seat, I wish to make it abundantly dear that the plan which I have outlined briefly need not take into consideration areas where there is no necessity for this governmental intervention. It would have nothing to do with local dealings not involving the moving of carload lots over rail. It is felt that if the large quantities of potatoes moved by rail were marketed as suggested, prices would adjust themselves automatically to proper levels in other localities. It is the huge bulk of potatoes grown in New Brunswick and Prince Edward

The Address-Mr. Michaud

Island and moved in carload lots which glut the market and cause these wide fluctuations in prices which are so damaging to our potato growers.
Our farmers, by producing economically and on a large scale, are rendering a real service to eastern Canada in forcing the price of this commodity to its proper level. Without them, Ontario and Quebec would be paying a good deal more for this much sought vegetable. In so doing, our farmers are making a genuine contribution to the economic life of the nation, and for making this contribution I submit that they should be given the protection to which they are rightly entitled by way of stabilized fair prices.
They must not be abandoned any more to the caprices of climatic conditions and the harsh law of supply and demand. Something must be done to bring about a saner state of affairs. In their name I have offered a solution which I feel is workable. If another solution is more acceptable let us have it, and let us have it soon before our farmers get too deeply into debt. I must insist, however, that whatever floor price is arrived at, it should be such as to ensure adequate returns to this class of farmers who never went on strike even when they could not sell their product. They played the game during the war years by submitting to a ceiling price. They lost considerably on account of this ceiling price. Let us make sure that they do not lose any more through failure to give them a floor price, and a decent one.
On motion of Mr. Miller the debate was adj ourned.
On motion of Mr. Mackenzie the house adjourned at 10.58 p.m.
Wednesday, February 5, 1947