1947-05-29

[Stage Direction]
Second and third reports of the special committee appointed to consider Bill No. 18, to readjust the representation in the House of Commons.-Mr. Power.


Mr. DANIEL McIVOR (Fort William):: Mr. Speaker, on a question of privilege, there appears on the front page of the Ottawa Citizen, and also of the Ottawa Journal, this headline: "Mentions McGeer To Succeed King". My correction, sir, is that while we thank the hon. member for Peel (Mr. Graydon) for his brain wave, we of the Liberal party will be satisfied for the next ten years with our present leadership.

3564	COMMONS
Privilege


Mr. GORDON GRAYDON (Peel):: Mr. Speaker, I hope that my hon. friend took note that I did not choose the next leader of the Liberal party. All I suggested was that there was an additional man mentioned. I do hope that we shall not reach the stage very soon when it will be libellous to mention a man in connection with the leadership of a great party such as that.



MR. COCKERAM-REFERENCE TO ARTICLE IN TORONTO &quot;DAILY STAR&quot;

Mr. ALAN COCKERAM (York South):: Mr. Speaker, on a question of privilege, I refer to an article in last night's Daily Star headed "Gold Industry Using Powerful Lobby in Ottawa". The article contains two paragraphs, as follows:
A powerful pressure campaign by gold mining and associated industries is under way in Canada to force the federal government to help them, informed sources said today.
Veteran observers here say nothing like it has been known since the days of the great railway lobbies in the pioneering era, when governments were made or unmade by these powerful interests.
As one who is actively engaged in the gold mining industry, and who has had much to say in the house on behalf of that industry, I deny absolutely that there is any such thing as a lobby. This article is, in my opinion, a figment of the imagination of the writer, and does much harm to an industry which at present is going through very difficult times.



MR. FLEMING-ERROR IN VOTES AND PROCEEDINGS OF MAY 28

[Stage Direction]
Mr. DONALD M. FLEMING (Eglinton): On a question of privilege may I draw your attention, sir, to what appears to be an error in the Votes and Proceedings of yesterday. At page 461 Votes and Proceedings records that resolution No. 5, Special War Revenue Act, was reported favourably by the committee of ways and means yesterday. As will be seen at page 3592 of Hansard, this particular resolution was withdrawn in the committee by the Minister of Finance (Mr. Abbott). I think clearly there is an error on page 461 of Votes and Proceedings.
Mr. SPEAKER:: I have taken note of the remarks made by the hon. member and shall direct that the correction be made.


Mr. MAYHEW:: I thank the hon. gentleman for bringing this matter to the attention of the house. This resolution was dropped, and it appears in Votes and Proceedings in error; I would ask that it be changed.



REPORTS AND PAPERS

Robert Wellington Mayhew: I desire to lay on the table copy of order in council P.C. 2109, dated May 27, 1947, passed under the provisions of the Unemployment and Agricultural Assistance Act, 1942, renewing loan of 12,448,000 to the province of Alberta for one year from June 1, 1947, and accepting as security therefor treasury bill of the said province bearing interest at the rate of three per cent per annum.



QUESTIONS

[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk).

Mr. CASTLEDEN:: 1.	What machine tools and equipment, if any, were sold by war assets corporation to (a) Montreal Locomotive Works; (b) Canadian Vickers Limited, Montreal; (c) Associated Machinery Corporation Limited, Montreal; (d) Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company, Toronto; (e) Massej'-Harris Company, Toronto?
2.	What price was received from these companies for this equipment?
3.	What was the original cost of this equipment to the Canadian government?


Mr. McILRAITH:: 1.	In order to obtain the information required to answer this part of the question, thousands of availability sheets would have to be copied and checked by War Assets Corporation personnel and would involve some three to four months work. Some indication of the large number of items involved is to be found in the answer to Part 2 which shows the dollar value of machine tools and equipment disposed of.
2.	The following amounts: (a) Montreal Locomotive Works, $407,147.74; (b) Canadian Vickers Limited, Montreal, $511,169.92; (c) Associated Machinery Corporation Limited, Montreal, $1,998,319.11; (d) Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company, Toronto, $262,615.55; (e) Massey-Harris Company, Toronto, $172,194.91.
3.	War Assets Corporation does not maintain a record of original costs of equipment which it receives for disposal.


WAR ASSETS-PURCHASES BY SUMAC COMPANY
Mr. CASE:: 1.	Have varied types of goods been purchased from war assets corporation by Sumac Company Limited of Ottawa? If so, what goods?
2.	When were they purchased and what were the prices paid at the time of purchase?


Mr. McILRAITH:: 1.	Yes. Shaving brushes, tooth brushes, whisk brushes and incomplete army trucks.

Questions
2.
Item Quantity Unit Price Total
Shaving Brushes .	2,064	$ .25 ea. $ 516.00108	.35	ea.	37.80Tooth Brushes .. .47,291	.05	ea. 2,364.55Whisk Brushes ...	3,222	1.73	doz. 464.50
Incomplete Army
Trucks	 624 400.00 ea. 249,600.00



MUNITIONS AND SUPPLY-CONTRACTS WITH OTTAWA CAR AND AIRCRAFT

['Our rules are like the\ndomesday book.']
Mrs. STRUM:: From 1935 to 4945 what was the annual expenditure through the national research council directed at finding the cause and cure of cancer?
83166-228J


Mr. McILRAITH:: 1935 to	1938	
Nil1939	
$1277	161940	
Nil1941	
672	841942	
342	001943	and	1944	
Nil1945	
2,072	50
Note.-The National Research Council has not established medical research laboratories under its own auspices but since 1938, through an advisory committee on medical research, has stimulated and correlated research by medical scientists in the laboratories of the various medical schools throughout Canada, where the necessary facilities for such work already exist.
Any person qualified to direct medical research and having the required fundamental laboratory facilities at his disposal, may apply to the council for a grant in aid of a specific research project on which he desires to work, and if the proposed project is approved by the advisory committee, a grant in aid of the research may be awarded by the National Research Council.



Mr. DIEFENBAKER:: 1.	How many volumes of the official history of world war I have been published? What periods are covered thereby?
2.	When will further volumes covering the rest of the war be forthcoming?
3.	Is a history of world war II being prepared. and if so, when is it anticipated that the first volume will be available?


Mr. LAPOINTE:: 1.	Two volumes. One deals with medical services; the other volume comprises volume I-general series, Official History of World War I, covering period from the commencement of the war in August, 1914, to September, 1915, with another volume of appendices and maps relative to the same period.
2.	No further volumes will be published but the material collected will be made available for qualified historians and others.
3.	Yes. Histories of world war II are planned as follows:
Present plans are that the naval history will have three volumes, of which two should be published during the current fiscal year and the third next year.
The army has already published three popular accounts under the heading "The Canadian Army at War" of which No. 1 covered "The Canadians in Britain 1939-44", No. 2
Questions

from Pachino to Ortona "The Canadian Campaign in Sicily and Italy, 1943" and No. 3 "Canada's Battle in Normandy." A total of 33,000 copies of these three numbers have been published and distributed and they are now out of print. A reprint is now in the hands of the printer. The Canadian army historical section has in course of preparation a one-volume history of the Canadian Army during the war which will be published during the current fiscal year. It has also in course of preparation, a four-volume history to be published over the next four years. The final volume will contain a general account of the work of all three services and of Canada's war effort as a whole.
Two volumes of a popular narrative of the R.C.A.F. overseas have already been published. The first, "The R.C.A.F. Overseas: The First Four Years" was published in 1944. 13,000 were printed, 11,500 were sold. The second, "The R.C.A.F. Overseas: The Fifth Year" was published in 1945 and 3,500 copies were sold. These were published by the Oxford1 University Press with private backing and the proceeds went to the R.C.A.F. benevolent fund. The third volume completing this story is in course of preparation and should be printed this year.


Gladys Grace Mae Strum: What was the total annual number of cancer deaths in Canada during the period 1925 to 1945?


Mr. MacKINNON:: Number of deaths from cancer, Canada, 1925-45:
1925 			 7,153
1926 			 7.614
1927 			 7,919
1928 			 8,514
1929 			 8.792
1930 			 9.273
1931 			 9,578
1932 			 10.024
1933 			 10,653
1934 			 10,581
1935 			 11,156
1936 			 11,694
1937 			 11.963
1938 			 12,038
1939 			 12,399
1940 			 13,322
1941 			 13,417
1942 			 13,654
1943 			 14,135
1944 			 14.271
1945 			 14,439


MOTOR VEHICLES-SUBSIDIES OR GRANTS ON CARS SHIPPED FROM CANADA
Mr. CAOUETTE:: 1.	Does the government pay any subsidies or grants for touring cars shipped from Canada?
2.	If so, what amount per unit?
3.	What is the total amount paid to the Ford Motor Company of Canada; General Motors of Canada and the Chrysler Corporation of Canada?


Mr. MAYHEW:: 1. No.
2 and 3. Answered by No. 1.


QUESTION PASSED AS ORDER FOR RETURN
Mr. PROBE:: What federal grants have been expended for each province of Canada in each fiscal year since April 1, 1936, under each of the following heads:
(a)	capital grants for educational buildings;
(b)	bursaries or scholarships; (c) apprentice training grants; (d) special grants for equipment or machinery used in vocational, apprentice or non-military or non-veteran youth training; (e) grants for equipment or machinery to retraining of veterans; (f) grants toward instructors' salaries for veteran training in (i) vocational subjects; (ii) pre-university academic instruction; (iii) university instruction?


IMMIGRATION
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Gordon Graydon: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Labour. Press reports this morning indicate that group movements of thousands of displaced persons at the request of employers in two Canadian industries are under consideration by the government and will probably take place in the near future. The reports go on to say as well that the government is considering an early movement of girls from the displaced persons camps in Europe to enter domestic service in Canada. Will the minister be good enough to give the house full information with respect to these press reports?


Hon. HUMPHREY MITCHELL (Minister of Labour):: In the first place there is under way a movement of fourteen hundred men for the lumber industry in Ontario under the terms of a recent order in council-not a special order in council, but an enlargement of the basis of entry under the law. There is nothing new about that, of course. Other matters in connection with what my hon.

Reading of Speeches
friend spoke about are under consideration at the moment, and when a final decision is arrived at a statement will be made to the house.


Mr. KNOWLES:: From where are the fourteen hundred to come?


Humphrey Mitchell: From the displaced
persons camps.


LABOUR CONDITIONS
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. ALISTAIR STEWART (Winnipeg North):: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Justice. In view of a report in last night's Ottawa Citizen will the minister assure the house that the R.C.M.P. will not be used in the Ottawa Car and Aircraft strike?


Right Hon. J. L. ILSLEY (Minister of Justice):: Police are not used in a strike; they are used in the maintenance of law and order. I regret to say that no such assurance as that asked by the hon. member can be given, and I think my hon. friend is well aware why no such assurance can be given. If a request is made through the regular channels the request will be considered and dealt with in the usual way in accordance with well established practice.


REPORT AS TO UNITED STATES EMBARGO ON CANADIAN MINK PELTS
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
John Oliver Probe: This morning I addressed to the Secretary of State for External Affairs a question which may be a problem for him or for the Minister of Trade and Commerce. If the matter comes under the jurisdiction of the Minister of Trade and Commerce probably the question will be considered as a notice. Has the Secretary of State for External Affairs been informed by the United States government that they propose to place an embargo on Canadian mink pelts? What action has the minister taken in this matter?
Right Hon. L. S. ST. LAURENT (Secretary of State for External Affairs): The short answer to the question is no. This rumour apparently arose out of testimony given before the subcommittee of the agriculture committee of the house of representatives, which is now investigating the fur industry in the United States. The hon. member will recall
that there was a similar rumour current last December, and that it was denied by the state department.


STATEMENT OF MR. SPEAKER WITH RESPECT TO READING OF SPEECHES
James Horace King: The debate on the budget has now been concluded. The house has taken steps by appropriate resolutions to facilitate its consideration of the business of the session still to be dealt with.
I thought, therefore, it would be opportune and meet with the approval of the hon. members if I drew attention to one of the rules of the house that has been frequently disregarded in previous debates, and perhaps particularly in the debate that has just finished.
Suggestions are frequently made with regard to amendments to the rules governing the business of the house, and I have no doubt these could be improved. However, I would point out to hon. members that rules are of little value unless they are observed, and that this can be achieved only by the cooperation of hon. members themselves.
The rule to which I have referred is that a member when speaking should not read from a written, previously prepared speech. As early as the year 1886, the House of Commons of that day .adopted the following resolution:
That the growing practice in the Canadian House of Commons of delivering speeches of great length, having the character of carefully and elaborately prepared written essays, and indulging in voluminous and often irrelevant extracts, is destructive of legitimate and pertinent debate upon public questions, is a waste of valuable time, unreasonably lengthens the sessions of parliament, threatens by increased bulk and cost to lead to the abolition of the official report of the debates, encourages a discursive and diffuse, rather than an incisive and concise style of public speaking, is a marked contrast to the practice in regard to debate that prevails in the British House of Commons, and tends to repel the public from a careful and intelligent consideration of the proceedings of parliament.
Long usage both in Canada and the United Kingdom has sanctioned the rule that a member while speaking must not read from a written, previously prepared speech-Bourinot, page 335. Bcauchesne's third edition, page 102, May, fourteenth edition, page 417. I am sure hon. members will agree that the best tradition of House of Commons debates is served by a member using his own language and delivering his remarks in the form of an unwritten composition. If the rule were otherwise members might read speeches written by other people and the time of the house
National Housing Act

be taken up in considering the arguments of persons who are not the properly elected representatives of the people.
I have noticed that quite understandably non-observance of the rule by one or more hon. members encourages others to do likewise.
I urge therefore that hon. members give practical recognition to this rule, and in future, refrain from reading their speeches. I am sure that this will be in the best interest of the house and the proper conduct of its business.


Gordon Graydon: May I ask Your Honour whether that applies to Your Honour as well?


James Horace King: A few days after I had been selected by this house as its Speaker I noticed a similar question in a newspaper, but I do not believe that the hon. gentleman who has just made that remark had anything to do with it. However his remark is not a contribution to the dignity and decorum of this house.


Mr. CHURCH:: Our rules are like the
domesday book.



NATIONAL HOUSING ACT


[Stage Direction]
Right Hon. C. D. HOWE (Minister of Reconstruction and Supply) moved the second reading of Bill No. 176. to amend the National Housing Act, 1944.
Mr. C. C. I. MERRITT (Vancouver-Burrard):: Mr. Speaker, I propose to make a few remarks on this bill to amend the National Housing Act. As I understand it, the bill is an attempt to bring down the costs and carrying charges of housing in Canada. The minister is of course approaching the problem by attempting to increase the amortization periods and lower interest charges, which is something for which we should give him credit. Certainly it is a step in the right direction and one might say, so far so good. But I wish to say to him, and I hope to say it in such a way that it *will stick, that he will never get anywhere this way, and we shall never have the lower income groups in this country properly housed by picking at the problem as he is doing.
We have seen in recent weeks the failure of the Housing Enterprises scheme. We know that the wartime housing programme, although very valuable as a temporary measure in these difficult times of housing, offers no long-term solution to the problem of low rent housing. The minister himself has said it is a temporary

measure and that he will withdraw from the field. The fact remains with us, as has been oaid so many times from the opposition benches since I have been in the house, that the housing of the low income groups requires houses for rental at $25 a month or less.
We have rightly been concerned in the past two years with the immediate problem of veterans housing, and that need goes on. I am not discussing that subject at this moment. I have discussed it many times before. But the fact that that need is with us is perhaps hiding from our gaze another important fact, that there is a long-term low-rent housing problem and a slum problem in Canada.
I have here a housing survey made by the Vancouver Housing Association in my own city in 1939 and brought up to date in 1946. It is a most excellent examination of housing conditions in Vancouver, prepared by experts who did years of work on it. It not only sets out arguments for slum clearance and low rent housing but does something else that is very valuable indeed. It gives some facts and figures on the bad housing conditions in a Canadian city. Too often we have to go to United States cities to get these figures.
I wish to give a few excerpts from this report, which will not be all inclusive but yet will give us some idea of housing in one Canadian city today. I will not refer to the particular areas I am talking about. Although they are set out in the report, I do not want to single out any area in Vancouver for unfavourable mention.
The first extract. I want to read is this:
No less than 59 per cent of the houses surveyed in this area were found to he in multiple occupancy, and over 40 per cent of the "rooming" population was living at a density of two or more persons per room. Compare this figure with the commonly accepted minimum standard of room occupation of one person per room . . . The majority of the rooms are rented as housekeeping units, but few of them have adequate facilities for washing, cooking or food storage. Under 10 per cent of the rented rooms had sinks or washbasins and only 5 per cent of the houses in multiple occupancy had more than one bath. Cases of twenty, forty or even fifty persons sharing one bathroom were found. East of Granville street over half the houses were heated by stoves only and a large proportion of the rooms in these houses were inadequately heated.
Referring to another area I read this:
Fifteen per cent of the houses surveyed in this district required major structural repairs; probably at least half of these houses are beyond repair and should be demolished. .Seventeen per cent of the houses lacked baths. Four per cent had outside toilets. Only twenty-five per cent had central heating.
Then referring to another area:
The housing throughout this area is of very poor quality. In the . . . section, where conditions are worst, 18 per cent of the houses sur-

National Housing Act
veyed were in very bad repair, 19 per cent had no baths, and 7 per cent were badly crowded. Interspersed with industrial buildings and bisected by the interurban tracks, this area bears all the hallmarks of a slum.
The report goes on to describe the existence of numerous cabins, waterfront shacks and house boats, and there is reference to many houses the rooms of which have no access at all to outside air. Although I will not burden the house with this, there are listed also numerous cases, which the people making the survey found, of families living in the greatest hardship and under dreadful conditions.
I want to put my view on record as strongly as I can. I am certain that we shall never solve the housing problem in the low income groups without a subsidy on housing and without the dominion government bearing part of that subsidy and taking the lead in making the arrangements necessary to get this kind of scheme in operation.


John Oliver Probe: Mr. Speaker, may I ask the
hon. member if this is his view or if it is the view of his party, when he speaks about subsidies on a federal scale?


Mr. TUSTIN:: You speak for your party.


John Oliver Probe: It is a fair question, because he was putting forward his view and I am simply asking for amplification of it. Is it the view of the Conservative party or is it the view of the hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard that subsidies on a federal scale should be granted?


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: I want to say to the hon. member who puts this fair question, that if he were as much interested in getting low rental housing for the lower income groups as he is in trying to make political capital, it would be more to his credit.


John Oliver Probe: Mr. Speaker, I rise to a
question of privilege. I asked the hon. member a question. I was not making a political speech at all.


Mr. GREEN:: You got what you deserved.


Mr. MACKENZIE:: It was a fair comment.


John Oliver Probe: Let the hon. member answer the question. That is what I want.


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: I have answered the question, and I may say that is all the attention I am going to pay to the hon. gentleman.


John Oliver Probe: It is a typical Tory answer.


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: And it was a typical C.C.F. question.


Gordon Graydon: The hon. member is trying to build houses with talk.


John Oliver Probe: That is all right. We can build them otherwise, too.


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: If I may go on, Mr. Speaker, I was saying that I am as certain as I stand here that this problem will never be solved until the dominion government takes the lead in bringing about a scheme of subsidies for low rental housing for those in the low income groups. I know that this session as well as in previous sessions, the minister has given his view against that. But I want to appeal to him again to change his mind and get after this problem. Faced as we are with the other problem of getting roofs over people's heads, there is some excuse perhaps at this moment for our not having such a scheme. But hon. members will recall that it was not until after a year of criticism and suggestions from this side of the house that the government got after the production of building materials so that we might deal with the present problem. They were a year late in realizing that necessity and getting after it. I do not want to see them a year late in promoting a scheme of low rental housing.
A programme like this cannot be developed in a minute. It requires cooperation at every level of government; it requires cooperation from citizens' committees, and it will require all sorts of work for whoever considers the setting up of a building company and getting going with the actual construction. When you think of the record of the government in bringing about any kind of agreement between the dominion and the provinces, you can visualize how they would be on the dominion, provincial and municipal level. That is why I am so anxious that they reverse their policy and make a decision to go after this now. I urge them not to be a year late again.
I am not advocating a sort of general wide-open building of houses by the dominion government for every person in Canada; far from it. All I am advocating is that cases of real need be taken care of. If we restrict any such scheme to cases of real need, the government will not have to worry about the cost which would be involved. It is not a question of making a hand-out to everyone in Canada; it is only a matter of dealing with the cases in which actual physical living conditions are now so greatly below standard as to imperil the health and the social security of the people. Any study I have made and any figures I have been given by responsible people indicate that if you tie your subsidized low rental housing scheme to slum clearance and see to it that the people you move into the houses are moved out of quarters which are unfit for human habitation, then you can keep your scheme under control and you do
National Housing Act

not let it get out of hand financially. Moreover, you have basic social security, a much better kind of social security, in my submission, than that provided by paying out cheques every month-even although measures of that kind may be necessary too. But I suggest that by this kind of scheme you are making a fundamental approach to the improvement of the health of the nation, and you are making a real contribution to the removal of juvenile delinquency. We have had one debate on that very important point, and we shall have another when we come to consider the Penitentiary Act again.
I want to give one more excerpt from this report on the contribution that would be made by a housing scheme to the solution of juvenile delinquency. Again I have actual figures obtained in this survey of a Canadian city, which will indicate what connection there is between housing conditions and juvenile crime. Again I shall not refer to the particular area. "In this area between such and such streets the average delinquency over the five years 1930-34 was fifteen delinquents per hundred of school population of comparable age as compared with under three per hundred in the outer areas of the city." I think that is a most striking example. The same report gives the costs of administration of police, social and other services in area* of the city, and it is shown that these figures are about the same in areas where housing is good, but that the costs are comparably higher in areas where housing is bad.
This matter has been discussed many times in this house, and my only reason for bringing it once more to the attention of the minister is that I feel that this is perhaps the latest time a scheme like this could be prepared and put into operation without again being late in meeting a real housing emergency. No doubt the agreement would be difficult to negotiate because three levels of government are concerned and each government would have to make some financial contribution. The proportions would have to be arrived at and of course the actual building would have to be done by a municipal or some other nonprofit housing corporation. No city or province could go into it without the dominion giving a lead, because they would not dare embark upon that kind of expenditure alone. The matter is entirely in the hands of this government to do or not to do.
I conclude by saying that it would be more than inexcusable if the government were again late in embarking upon a programme which any government in Canada is bound to carry out in the next few years.


Mr. R. N. JUTRAS (Provencher):: Mr. Speaker, I assure you that I shall take only a few minutes of the time of the house this afternoon, but I should like to make a few general observations as well as offer some earnest suggestions on this subject to the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply (Mr. Howe). My purpose in speaking is to draw the attention of the minister to the aspects of our housing problem which particularly affect the rural parts of the country. I feel that the government has been so busy and preoccupied with providing housing in the urban centres that it has done very little to assist in providing housing in rural parts. I know that there are difficulties to be faced, but the present legislation does provide for assistance in providing housing on farms and in rural areas.
Owing to conditions beyond our control the provisions of the act have not been applied to any extent to rural areas. They have been applied mainly to the larger towns and cities; I think I am quite right in saying that it has been found impossible to take advantage of them to build houses in the small villages and rural communities. I have analysed the act and the amendments provided by this bill and I feel sure that once he has been given these new powers the minister could carry out all the suggestions I am going to make.
The various government housing schemes which have been carried out in the last few years have been of great assistance to the cities. One needs only to go to Winnipeg or St. Boniface, to mention two cities in the central part of Manitoba, and he will see street after street of new houses which have been built in the last two or three years. That is a very happy condition and everyone who comes back to Winnipeg after having been away for a year or two notices it. It is all very well, and I rejoice with everyone else because these new houses have been built, but unfortunately this condition has had a counter-effect upon the rural parts of Manitoba.
There has been a siphoning off of people from the rural parts to the cities to a far greater extent than many realize. I suppose this is a natural consequence of the many new houses which have been built in the cities. As no houses have been built in our small villages or on the farms there is a tendency for people to move to points where houses are available. Contrary to common belief the people migrating to the cities have not been the younger people; it has been mostly older people. I know of many people who have retired from farms and instead of

National Housing Act
settling down in the village or town as they used to do in years gone by they have gone up to the city and bought a house. It is mostly these older retired people who have migrated to the city.
The provisions of this act have been taken advantage of in the larger towns and cities because the lending companies have felt that their investment was a little safer in those places and they were willing to make loans for houses. The small villages have been completely left out. In many of these villages there are no industries and the lending companies have felt that it would not be a good investment to lend money on houses. I hope that under the new amendments to the bill more assistance will be given to housing in the smaller villages. If this were done I believe that housing conditions in the cities would be alleviated. My suggestion to the minister is that more attention should be given to the small villages and unincorporated towns, as well as to the building of houses on faSrns.
Unfortunately very little has been done to promote better housing on our farms. So far the government has not even offered any suggestions to our farmers as to how they can get economical, decent and pleasant homes. I have here a booklet, containing a series of plans and designs, which was issued by the national housing administration. These plans are exclusively for homes for urban areas, although some of them could be adapted for use in larger towns. None of them could possibly fit the needs of any farmer, nor would they be suitable for homes on farms.
My further suggestion is that in order to fill that tremendous gap. to meet that pressing need, the minister at once conduct a competition in all the nine provinces to secure plans, designs and specifications for rural and, more particularly, farm housing. The minister has the power to do it. It is definitely stated in the act; all he has to do is to say the word and the thing will be done. If he does that, a great many people throughout Canada will be grateful and it will mean a service worth millions of dollars to that section of our country.
After all, in this country which is predominantly agricultural, a good third of the population are living in rural homes. There is a definite need for help, or for the giving of suggestions to the farmers, particularly when it can be done without great cost to the government, and would render such great service to all concerned.
Water is the one item which hampers housing operations in rural sections. This applies more particularly to my district,
although it has some application generally throughout western Canada. I will refer to one instance in particular. In the Red River valley water is available, but unfortunately it is so alkaline that it cannot be used for household purposes. Under the heading of research, and at little cost to the government, the minister could give a helping hand if he were to send one or two scientists out there to make a complete analysis of the water supply in that area, which serves a large number of people. I would suggest that the water be analysed to see what can be done to improve it. Many companies have claimed that they could make first-class water out of it; but my understanding is that so far the cost has been prohibitive. I am sure that with a little research means could be found of purifying the water. This would mean a good supply of pure water for, I would say, half of the province of Manitoba. And I know this problem exists in many other parts of Canada.
If more attention were directed to housing in rural areas, the housing problem in the cities would be partly solved. As I said before, migration of people from the rural parts of Manitoba to the cities has been our greatest problem. I have made it a point to discuss the matter with individuals who have migrated to the cities, and the answer I received was that in most instances they had reached the age of retirement and had turned their farms over to their sons. They pointed out that they did not feel like entering into construction operations under conditions such as exist today. So much bother and cost was involved that they simply went to the cities and bought old houses.
Hon. members know that despite the housing shortage in various cities, anyone with cash can go to a city and buy a house. In the newspapers one always sees two or three columns listing houses for sale. That is exactly what these farmers have done. Young people who would have put up houses in towns have not the resources and cannot get the necessary assistance because, as I pointed out, the act is not applicable to smaller towns. Consequently younger people are in no position to put up houses. On the other hand the older people do not feel the urge and have reached an age where they do not wish to take the responsibility of building.
The result is that the younger people take the place of the older folk, and those older folk in turn migrate to the cities. Our rural population is decreasing, while that in the cities is increasing, and this adds to the headache of both federal and provincial governments.
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I feel sure that if the minister will look into this matter he could render tremendous help to the people in rural areas, while at the same time give assistance to those in urban areas.


Mr. A. M. NICHOLSON (Mackenzie) :: Mr. Speaker, I should like to congratulate the hon. member for Provencher (Mr. Jutras) upon the helpful contribution he has made to the debate. I share the opinions he has expressed so well with regard to rural housing in Canada. I have the doubtful honour of representing a constituency where, according to the 1941 statistics, based on such well known standards as availability of electricity, fireproof chimneys, electric lights and running water, we have the worst record in all Canada.
I have not been unmindful of the problems of the people I represent. In the past when discussing housing I have approached the problem from a broad point of view, realizing that there is not much likelihood of our solving the housing problem in Saskatchewan, and in Mackenzie constituency in particular, until we can get some machinery which will make possible modern low-cost housing all across Canada.
I am afraid I am not as optimistic as the hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard (Mr. Merritt) with regard to the usefulness of this particular bill. In the final analysis, of course, I shall support it, because it does offer some improvement. It does make it possible for direct loans to be made where at the present time it is impossible for people in many parts of Canada to take advantage of the machinery.
I should like however to devote the time at my disposal this afternoon to focusing attention on the critical situation still existing in Canada, which will not be improved by these minor changes in the National Housing Act. Indeed, if it were not for the outstanding contribution the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply (Mr. Howe) made during the war, I would be pressing for his resignation, on account of the housing conditions in Canada.
I want to say however that the people of Canada, and indeed those of the united nations, will always be grateful to the minister for the imaginative way he discharged his duties during the war. I hold in my hand one of the Canadian information service publications. These are publications which are sent to other countries and which reported on Canadian achievements during the war. All hon. members can be proud of this accurate record of performance. At page 27 we find a table giving the estimated value of war productionmerchant vessels, naval vessels, aircraft, mechanical transport, armoured fighting vehicles, guns and small ammunition, small arms, chemicals, instruments, defence construction and government financed expansion. These costs are set down at a grand total of $11,501 million. Then at page 47 we find a summary of Canada's mutual aid expenditure. Again in this connection the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply must receive a good deal of credit for making available to our allies-to Australia, the British West Indies, China, France, India, New Zealand, U.S.S.R., and the United Kingdom-goods to the value of $2,575 million. This means that the minister was responsible for expenditures during the war years running over $14 billion.
All I am suggesting is that the responsible minister who was able to organize Canadian man-power and materials to such an extent, and to achieve such performance during the years of war, must be able to do better than the present development in housing would indicate.
I have another of the Canadian information service publications available in other countries which tell in a graphic way of what has been done. The minister of reconstruction is personally interested in many of these achievements. We find on page 9 pictures of the Shipshaw power development; on another page pictures of ships being 'launched; on another page pictures of shells that were manufactured, and pictures of elevators which were built by the minister before he entered public life.
I have here the white paper presented to parliament by the minister in April, 1945, and at page 14 under "Public Investment" I find this:
The post-war employment problem is not to be solved by huge expenditures on "public works." Efforts to increase and stabilize employment and income must pervade all economic policies. On the other hand, it is the firm intention of the government to institute a system of managing its capital expenditures so that they may contribute to the maximum to the improvement and stabilization of employment and income.
The white paper makes it very clear that the Liberal government of Canada in no way is to be handicapped by financial difficulties in government financing, for at page 21 it says:
In these circumstances, the government considers the post-war debt problem to be quite manageable.
There was no worrying about Canada's debt, and very few members from any part of the

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country took time in the budget debate to complain of Canada's national debt. The white paper goes on:
Fiscal policy during the war has necessarily been based on economic as much as purely financial consideration. It is proposed to extend that practice into the post-war years and apply war experience to the problems of peace.
If this white paper means anything, now is the time for the administration to demonstrate that its observations had application to the problem of housing. Members of the house will recall that in the debate on the address on February 7 of this year the minister gave us quite a rosy picture of the housing situation, although there were a few discordant notes in his speech. He said:
I also realize that the accomplishment of a target is dependent upon the ability of the Canadian people to absorb new housing at the present level of building costs. Further, the need for housing is so great that any target should be set at the very limit of possible accomplishment. In 1947 we will be making a vigorous effort to meet a target of 80.000 residential units.
Further on he said:
As in 1946, we will continue to rely for the major portion of our new housing upon private endeavour. It is our policy to ensure that as much new housing as possible be built by private initiative. Towards this end we will lend every facility. If, however, for any reason the supply of housing by private initiative is insufficient, then and then only will the dominion government take a direct position in the housing field. I have already dealt with a number of operations in which the dominion is already participating for this reason. We would be very happy to withdraw from these activities, but, at the present time, this much needed type of housing would not be produced by other means.
That speech was delivered in the house on February- 7. On May 15 the Ottawa Journal, under the heading "Government concurs with dropping of Ottawa housing, says Howe" carries this story:
The 1946 programme now- is well advanced, and it is apparent that practically every project will exceed the "target" price, and that correspondingly high rentals will result.
It had been originally anticipated that rentals might be of the order of $35 to $40 for four-room units. Because of increased building costs, rentals calculated upon the formula are considerably higher.
Even in the 1946 programme it would be extremely difficult to meet the rental level originally anticipated.
These comments were made at the time the announcement was made that Housing Enterprises Limited was abandoning plans for a S3,000,000 apartment project along Mann avenue in Ottawa and a similar undertaking
amounting to $1,500,000 in Toronto. The Ottawa project was to house 408 families and the Toronto project another 200.
Recently I have received a report on the number of building permits issued in January, February and March of 1946 as compared with 1947. It is significant that there is a marked falling off in the first three months of 1947 as compared with 1946. In 1947, 4,807 building permits were issued for dwelling units, as compared with 5,512 in 1946. The reports from all parts of Canada indicate that there are not going to be buyers for a much longer period for houses selling at present prices.
I would draw the attention of the house to the fact that only a very small percentage of Canadian families are in a position to pay a monthly rental of S50 or more or to buy houses at prevailing costs. An analysis of taxation statistics published by the Department of National Revenue shows that there are only 183,318 taxpayers in Canada with an income of $3,000 or more. A rent of $50 a month is what might reasonably be expected from this group. Another 126,900 taxpayers receive from $2,500 to $3,000. They could afford to pay $45 a month, or if they were prepared to increase their rent payments and get along with older clothing and pass up the medical and educational expenses they would normally make they might be able to pay $50 a month. Those two groups total 310,218. They include single taxpayers with no dependents.	[DOT]
There are 293,500 making from $2,000 to $2,500. They could afford to pay $36.50 per month, on the assumption that one-fifth of one's income should go for housing. There are 903,930 taxpayers and non-taxpayers making between $1,000 and $2,000 a year. They cannot afford to pay more than $25 a month. There are 345,400 married men earning under $1,000 a year, and they cannot afford to pay more than $12 a month rent. So you see, Mr. Speaker, we have more than a million families who must find housing at $25 a month or less, and 345,000 who are getting so little income that $12 is the maximum they should plan for shelter.
In view of these statistics it cannot be denied that we have almost reached the saturation point in disposing of housing built at present prices in Canada. The situation throughout Canada is the same. I have received a copy of a letter which went to the Prime Minister from the Citizens' Housing and Planning Association of Toronto. I assume that all members received a copy of this letter. The chairman of the committee is
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Mr. Clark, the vice-chairman Mrs. Luffman, and the secretary, Mrs. Donald Fraser. I am not acquainted with any of these people, but the committee comprises quite an impressive list of persons. In the committee's letter to the Prime Minister some caustic comments are made regarding Canada's housing situation. They say:
The housing policy of your government may be summed up in three points:
(1)	Belief that private enterprise can and will build a sufficient supply of rental housing for Canadians. This conviction has been repeatedly asserted by Mr. Ilsley and Mr. Howe in parliament. It is contrary to the findings of your own experts in the Curtis report; it is contrary to the experience of every other country, and hence has been consistently opposed by this organization.
(2)	Opposition to public housing authorities, as expressed in the interpretation of the National Housing Act by Mr. Ilsley and Mr. Howe, and only recently modified for Toronto.
(3)	Denial of federal responsibility for a public housing programme, alleging this to be primarily a provincial responsibility.
It is pertinent to look at the Canadian situation in the light of this policy, and the recent decision of housing enterprises.
(1)	The failure of housing enterprises to achieve rental housing plainly disproves the claim that private enterprise will build rental housing for the middle income group. Private enterprise was not interested in building such housing and considerable pressure has to be exerted by your government on the insurance companies to bring them into this field. Now they give up and say it cannot be done. Valuable time and effort have been spent to prove what was clear at the outset-that housing for a large section of our population has to be public housing.
(2)	If we are to have public housing, we need municipal (or regional) housing authorities, as in England and in the United States. These must be allowed for and encouraged by the federal policy.
(3)	The government of Canada can no longer evade responsibility for a positive policy of housing for Canadians. The need is national and urgent; many of the factors in creating it and meeting it are a national responsibility. Leadership and planning on a national scale are essential and urgent; the provinces are neither equipped nor prepared to operate in this field. Denial of federal responsibility only postpones action still further; some provinces could not act at all, and the cross-country picture would be one of gaps, unequal standards, delay, and confusion; of this we have had too much already. A clear national policy is required to meet this national domestic emergency.
Thousands of good Canadian families are trying to live under desperate housing conditions-in tents, in trailers, in factory buildings, stores and shacks of all kinds. Local health authorities have virtually ceased to try to enforce sanitary conditions in thousands of dwellings, clearly unfit for human occupancy, but crowded with hard-pressed Canadian families. Welfare authorities are at their wits' end to house the families daily being evicted.
The security of family life in Canada is gravely affected. Our divorce rate is rising, and 
authorities, lay and church alike, are alarmed at the causes. Housing is a common one. A young family today faces great difficulties and the lack of housing contributes to them. It is a hazard we can reduce by resolute policy and effective action. Further drift in the matter is a direct contribution by government to the further undermining of Canadian family life.
I submit, to hon. members that this is a fair description of the situation in Canada. I must remind the house that the committee is not describing a new situation, not one that has been created by the war. I hold in my hand the report of the lieutenant governor's committee on housing conditions in Toronto, 1934. It is interesting to note that such well known persons as the hon. member for Muskoka-Ontario (Mr. Macdonnell), who was then the general manager of the National Trust Company, president of the Board of Trade of Toronto and chairman of the board of trustees of Queen's university, -was a member of that committee. The report, which I am sure is well known to most hon. members who have made a study of housing, contains a disgraceful picture of what is commonly known as Toronto the good, a description of the ward; pictures of the back yards there. There is a description of the housing shortage and a section on slums, a section on sanitation, a section on food storage, tuberculosis, infant mortality, juvenile delinquency, crime and family life. I submit that it is a very serious reflection on a great country, a great province and a proud city such as Toronto to have a report of this sort submitted in the year 1934, and now so many years later conditions are virtually unchanged. The same sort of report could be presented today in spite of the fact that Toronto is the second city in the dominion. Huge sums were subscribed for our war effort. Surely the people of this country can evolve a programme that will clear away the slums, that will build modern bouses and improve the living conditions of the people of that area.
I hold in my hand a picture from Vancouver which has a heading, "Low rental homes or swimming pools. Vancouver has double-crossed its homeless war veterans". Here is a picture of Vancouver's disgraceful housing conditions on the one side and on the'other a picture of a privately owned swimming pool which is being installed in one of the residential areas of that city. The failure of the federal government to retain some of their controls, to decide what is essential and what is not essential material makes it possible for people who live in one part of the city to use tight material and short labour to provide a swimming pool when they have the great ocean available for swimming at least for many months of the year, while other people

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have to live in the sort of housing conditions so well described in the report read by the hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard (Mr. Merritt).
The last report of the chief inspector of the sanitation and housing division of the city of Winnipeg repeats the information that has been given by the health department of Winnipeg year after year. On page 5 I find a table showing the unlawful emergency occupa-lion of certain premises as dwellings. From that, table I find that there are twenty-three families living in stores; thirteen families in garages, one in tourist cabins, nine in unfinished dwellings and attics; twelve in cellars; one in a stable and one in a church. There are seventy-eight children in the group who were found to be living in emergency occupation. unlawful occupation. The health authorities of the city point out that it is intolerable that people should be living under these conditions, but it is a question of living there or living out under the sky, which is not so desirable in Winnipeg, certainly in the winter months. We find that there are 16.000 families who made application for accommodation in Winnipeg in 1946. Only eight per cent were able to be accommodated. Some very useful recommendations are made by the chief inspector, but the conclusion is significant:
House hungry squatters have not so far appeared in this city, but let us not be complacent about this. All that is needed is the spark, a leader, and we are likely then to have some rude experiences. The labour, money and material bottlenecks were broken during the war. The same bottlenecks have come to life again in this, the post-war period. The force or power that broke the bottleneck of war supplies was the federal government, acting presumably by the will of the people of this country. This power, so effective for war purposes, is now apparently atrophied and useless, indicating unmistakably the indifference or apathy of the general public and certain of the politicians, to a situation that should cause them serious concern.
So much for Winnipeg. I have here a picture from the Montreal Gazette of May 8, which has the heading:	"Family of eight,
with sick baby and money to pay rent, evicted." Underneath the photograph the following appears:	"Family evicted from
north-end home." Here is a picture of the law officers and the family with two little children in arms who have no rooms to which to go. That took place in the great and wealthy city of Montreal.
In the Ottawa Journal of Tuesday of this week appears a story:	"Low rental housing
project proposed by Ottawa committee." In the article it says:
Hr. Goodfellow told of fifty-nine families that had to be broken up because there was no room for the children.
"The problem is growing daily," Mr. Good-fellow said. "Unless we get some homes I don't know what might happen this fall." Mr. Pickering raised the question whether it was the responsibility of the committee to continue working on housing. "I think it is the responsibility of this committee to shove the responsibility exactly where it belongs-on the shoulders of the city of Ottawa, central mortgage, private enterprise and labour," he asserted.
In the meantime men who fought for their country and who were assured that when the war was over nothing would be too good for them are finding it next to impossible to find shelter. Just the other day I was talking to a man who was still in the army and who bought a new house in Ottawa. He was desperate. The only place that he was able to find for his wife and baby was this house. I understand the price paid was $9,800. What chance has a man on army pay to meet monthly payments on a $9,800 house. Yet this house is not any better than a house in which a veteran should live, and I am sure in normal times it could be built for $5,000 or less. We cannot ask these young men who were able to use a $100,000 tank or a $250,000 plane to live in the hovels that are available, the only places that are available in many of these cities. I understand that just this week the mayor of Hull came out urging that something be done by the dominion government to provide low-cost public housing. I am sure that those of us who spend the taxpayers' money must take notice of the conditions which exist in the country.
The bureau of statistics, in analysing the statistics compiled in the 1941 census, compares housing conditions in Ottawa and Hull just across the river. We find that in Hull 34 per cent of the houses are crowded as compared with 17 per cent in Ottawa. The value of home ownership in Hull is $2,300 as compared with $4,600 in Ottawa. Monthly rentals are much higher of course in Ottawa, and the households with exclusive use of bathing facilities represent 43 per cent in Hull and 84 per cent in Ottawa. Households with four conveniences-radio, telephone, vacuum cleaner and running water-are 4.7 in Hull as compared with 27 in Ottawa.
I submit that while we have people, in this day and age, who live in cities where there is central heating, where there are modern conveniences, it is a matter of real concern to the nation and to parliament to find these conditions. This brings me to the point mentioned by the hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard, which should be developed. I think the only solution is for this government to . recognize that at least one third of the people in Canada simply have no chance of getting
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housing under the legislation at present on our statute books; and further, that if the federal government does not give a lead, if it does not evolve policies which have not yet been evolved, we are going into a depression and we are not going to have a housing programme to provide a guarantee that there will be useful employment and a market for many materials.
In the United States they made a study which indicates that in 1939 19-9 per cent of the gross national product was used in housing. They came to the conclusion that in the two years before the 1929 depression, if they had faced the facts and realized that the falling off of housing construction was one signal indicating that they were headed for depression, and if something had been done with a view to working out a housing programme such as was worked out in Great Britain or Sweden, they could have prevented the depression having the impact it did.
I find in one of the "Housing Abroad" series published by the minister, volume 1, No. 1, a chart showing what happened to housing and the national income in Canada, Great Britain and the United States. In Great Britain, where they decided to carry out slum clearing and a low-rental housing programme, there was a rather slight drop in the national income, and they actually increased the number of houses built during that period. But in Canada there was a falling off in the number of houses being built before there was any indication that we were headed for a slump. By the time we got down to the bottom, however, in 1934 we were down to 16 points as compared with 100 in 1929, in house building. The same thing happened to a lesser degree in the United States; and now, as the falling off in building permits and the folding up of the programme under housing enterprises would indicate, we have reached the saturation point in Canada in disposing of houses under present terms. Now therefore is the time when the government should face the question of a subsidized low-cost housing programme as part of our post-war undertakings. If we could undertake that kind of programme immediately and enlist the cooperation of the provinces and the municipalities, I am sure it would be a major factor in preventing the depression from reducing our standard of living, as happened during the last depression.
In another publication with regard to manpower and material requirements for a housing programme, I find that to carry out a programme of 80,000 houses in a year it would require 403 million man hours; and on a rough calculation, using the basis of SI per hour, 
there is an expenditure of over $400 million. There is also the list of materials used in the
80.000	houses unit, such as cement, bricks, tiles, lumber products, lath and plaster, roofing, paint, plumbing facilities, electrical equipment, glass, and so on, totalling $280 million. In other words, for less than one billion dollars, 80,000 houses could be built. In view of the fact that the minister during the war was able to spend over thirteen billions, representing man-power and material, surely this modest programme that has been outlined of
80.000	houses a year can be realized.
We propose therefore to move certain amendments as we discuss the clauses and we would like to introduce a preamble which would set out our Canadian objective, just as has been done in Australia and the United States. We suggest it be the objective of this parliament to provide a programme of housing for the Canadian people which would ensure a separate home in a good neighbourhood for every family that desires one. We must accept the principle that society has reached the stage where a house of good quality properly equipped is not only the need but the right of every citizen. Where a family cannot own such a house, it is the duty of the state to bridge the gap by a rental subsidy.
We also think it should be the objective, in realizing this principle, to provide for the replacement of slums and other substandard housing in rural areas, to obviate overcrowding and facilitate progress in an orderly manner towards a proper standard of housing for the entire Canadian people. Another objective is the systematic planning of cities and neighbourhoods so as to develop and redevelop communities, which will provide good surroundings for home life and adequate facilities for advancing the industrial and cultural welfare of the nation.
Consideration in undertaking the large scale housing programme envisaged by the act should be given to the undeniable fact that a stable level of construction throughout the years immediately ahead is one of the most necessary factors in ensuring a steady level of employment, which in turn would provide buying power essential to prosperity at home and abroad. '
I submit that if the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply is not now prepared to take steps different from those that he has followed in the past he is going to be responsible for one of the most serious conditions we have witnessed in Canada, because we cannot expect Canadian citizens indefinitely, in view of our remarkable performance during the war, to be told that we have not now the ways and

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means of solving a little problem such as diverting a billion dollars' worth of man-power and material into the housing business each year.
I am not suggesting that all this should be spent under public housing. I think our expenditures could be divided roughly into three groups. One-third of our people will be able to build dwellings without assistance from anyone; one-third will be in the middle group who will need to take advantage of the facilities afforded by Central Mortgage and Housing, people in the middle income groups; and one-third of the people must be provided for by public low-cost housing, which will be built only if the federal government is prepared to guarantee that the necessary subsidy will be paid to bridge the gap between what the individual can pay and what is the economic rent to provide these services.


Mr. WILLIAM IRVINE (Cariboo):: Mr. Speaker, I desire to make a few remarks on this bill as it. is proposed to be amended. It is unlikely that anything new can be said in regard to the summary of conditions which such legislation should endeavour to meet. The previous speaker has placed on record a wealth of data which cannot help but impress those who have been listening. Everyone in this house will agree without question that the housing situation is desperate, and I am going to be critical of the government's policy in that regard. In doing so, of course I want to say that I have not the slightest doubt that the right hon. gentleman who administers this legislation has great capacity. He is a competent administrator, and if the results are not as we desire them, or as I believe it is quite possible to make them, I do not think the minister individually is to blame. He has been limited by the system under which he is working. His hands have been tied by practices and methods which cannot meet the situation. I hope that, after the discussion which is now going on with respect to this matter, the minister will take the bit in his teeth and do for peace what he did for war.
As I have said, the results are unsatisfactory, and that is putting it mildly. The bill which is now before us amends the previous legislation in the first place, by reducing the amount of the initial payment required to be made by the borrower who intends to build a house. In the second place, it extends the period of amortization to thirty years. In the third place, it brings duplex houses within the benefits of the act. Of course these are all minor improvements. Personally, I welcome them. So far as they go, and they do
not go very far, I am for them; I am going to vote for that legislation. But I suggest, sir, that no possible amendment to this act could make it accomplish what the necessity of the moment demands that it should accomplish. I question whether anything short of an entirely new objective, an entirely new purpose, an entirely new piece of legislation, can possibly do the job. The chief purpose of this act appears as set forth in section 1 of the bill:
... to protect the mortgage security the said lending institution and the corporation may join in making supplementary joint loans to the borrower and in taking such other measures and steps as may be required in accordance with normal mortgage practice to safeguard the interests of His Majesty and the said lending institution.
I have no doubt that this legislation will protect His Majesty. I have no doubt that it will protect the lending institution. But it should protect the homeless people of Canada. That is the essential purpose which is lacking in this legislation, and that is the burden of the criticism which I want to make with respect to it.
There are three criticisms of the housing policy of the government which I should like to emphasize. In the first place, there are not nearly enough houses being built.


John Oliver Probe: That is the big one.


William Irvine: Yes, that is probably the big objection; there are not nearly enough houses being built. In the second place, those which are being built are often inferior in quality. This condition is brought about partly, no doubt, by the lack of materials and probably to some extent by the fact that, owing to the great need of men, skilled men are scarce. Very often contractors and builders have to hire at full wages men who may not be expert craftsmen.


Mr. JOHNSTON:: Would you say that is true of national housing?


William Irvine: Probably it is true under all circumstances at the moment. No matter who is doing the building, those factors do enter into the picture and would tend to reduce the quality of the job.


Charles Edward Johnston: There is a big difference between national housing and wartime housing.


William Irvine: I am now discussing the legislation which is before us and do not wish to complicate the matter by taking up other schemes.
In the next place, the cost of houses now being built is so high as to be out of the
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reach of more than two-thirds of the entire population of Canada. I happen to be living in a six-room house which was bought last week from the contractor at $9,500.


John Oliver Probe: Your house?


William Irvine: No, it is not my house; I am renting a room in it. It has been estimated-if I mistake not, by the previous minister of finance-that building a house will cost at least $1,000 a room. I think that is a conservative estimate. I say next, sir, that the average family of five needs a house of eight rooms; so that even if we accept the estimate of 81,000 a room, an eight-room house, which the average family of five needs, would cost $8,000 to build. Let me make an estimate of what such a house, under the present set-up, will cost the purchaser. I am taking into account the repayment of the principal and the interest, and the amortization scheme. I am taking into account also annual taxes and am estimating them at only $100 a year; and I think that is low. I am taking into account that annual insurance will cost about $13, at the rate of fifty cents per 100 for three years. There should be a depreciation of $200 a year for forty years of the life of the dwelling. That would mean a monthly payment of $66.42, which in thirty years would amount to $23,911.20. That is a figure far beyond the limitations of the financial ability of the average working man in this country. It means that he would have to put into the building of his home a proportion of his income so great as to impair the living of his family and himself in many essential requirements. The bill provides that a certain amount may be borrowed under certain conditions; on an $8,000 dwelling, 95 per cent of the first $3,000, 85 per cent of the next $3,000, and 70 per cent of the remainder may be borrowed.
The Minister of Finance (Mr. Abbott) pointed out in his budget speech, and this has been emphasized a number of times during the budget debate, that over half of the working people of Canada do not receive a sufficient income to be taxable under the income tax scheme. The exemption figure for a married man with a family of two is $1,700. I think it is clear that no man with a family receiving less than $2,500 could ever think of building a home under the present scheme with any hope of ever paying for that home. All you have to do is to think about the possibility of a week or two of sickness, a month or two or six months of unemployment, or some other calamity and you realize that the interest begins to pile up, the principal is

unpaid and you begin to go behind. That may be repeated until the payments cannot be made in thirty years; your children's children will have to finish paying and nothing but the ashes of the home will be left when the payments are completed. I suggest that those who accept the present arrangement will feel that they are compelled to take it. It will be a case of necessity, and not their wills consenting.
I agree with the hon. member who preceded me that the greatest need is for a scheme of low-rental houses. Possibly these could be built by public bodies and rented to individuals at a rate which would cover the replacement cost of the building in, say forty years. Whatever was the estimated life of the building, the rental cost should be spread over that number of years, so that when the building is no longer useful it will have been paid for and the money available to build the next one, Such a scheme is perfectly sound because there is no danger of loss.
There is no reason why a better method of financing than the one now suggested could not be devised. I want to register my opposition to the method of financing which has been adopted by the government and which appears in the present legislation. It may be presumed that eventually we shall catch up with the shortages in building material, but there is no man who will live long enough to catch up with four and a half per cent. That just cannot be done, and there is no use in thinking it can be done. If he is not in the low-income class he will not borrow; he will build his house and save the four and a half per cent, which would be the wiser thing for him to do,
I am going to suggest that the government devise a new scheme to provide homes at low rentals for the people of Canada. These homes could be built in a manner similar to that adopted for the great undertakings in the war period which were supervised by the right hon. gentleman who will be administering this legislation. We plunged into tremendous expenditures for war. All the materials that were created by our finance and our efforts were blown to hell and we were left with nothing but a debt. Here we are suggesting that for peace purposes the government undertake a constructive scheme for the building of homes which will leave the nation with an asset equal to every dollar that is put into it. Why there should be any hesitancy in proceeding to build the houses required is utterly beyond me.
I am going to suggest that we use the national credit to finance this housing scheme. Not only do I suggest that we use it for

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housing, but if I had the time I should like to suggest and do more than suggest that we use it for the establishment of new industries and for the provision of additional capital equipment for older industries which need to be brought up to date.


Mr. DEPUTY SPEAKER:: I would ask the hon. member to confine his remarks to housing.


William Irvine: If I had been checked up every time I have departed from the paths of righteousness as quickly as Your Honour has now checked me up I would have been a much better man. I shall not go beyond merely suggesting that I am not confining my proposal of national financing to the one project. However I am going to confine it to the one project as you have just suggested. The mechanism for doing this would be quite stereotyped. There is no need for any mythical scheme to be conjured up. It is easily understood how these things are done and how easily they can be set up. I suggest that it is the responsibility of the Minister of Finance, under the guidance of the government, to provide such mechanism. It can be operated through the Bank of Canada, and perhaps it might be found necessary to set up a crown company to carry out the building of the houses required. But the main thing is that we can well afford to finance any real asset we are competent to create. In fact we cannot afford not to finance any enterprise in which necessity urges us to engage. And, as I have already said, every home built under such a scheme would represent a national asset equal to the amount of money expended in its building. So that there is no risk whatsoever. There is none to be incurred.
But that is not so now. Under the present scheme the government takes all the risk and the financial corporations take all the interest. It seems to be a sort of priorities field of investment for insurance companies, at a rate of interest which would be very difficult to get at the present time anywhere else, and with safety guarantees unequalled anywhere, any time.
The government might begin to launch such a scheme in a more or less orthodox way. If it is true that we are now experiencing an inflationary condition in Canada, there is no reason why the government should not sell bonds to build houses, and take up the surplus cash floating around so that it might be used to take care of the greatest need of the nation at the present time. That would be a perfectly orthodox procedure. If there are interest moneys paid, it would go to the people who bought the bonds, namely the people of Canada in general. If it were financed in any other way, and if interest were charged,
the money would go into the public treasury and would not pass into the hands of private individuals. While money is plentiful, the financing could be done by issuing bonds.
I do not think that is the best way to do it; but since we cannot be expected to break away from orthodoxy overnight, that would be one way to do it; and it would be better than not doing it. I suggest that it be done in that way, since that is the only way of doing it that the government would be likely to consider, and that we should lend to home builders the money required, at the cost of administration. It would not be long until monthly rentals from such houses would begin to come in. After a while, all new houses would be built from moneys collected as rentals from those already built and in operation.
But when money is scarce, as it is likely to be after the inflation is over, these houses would be available. We must remember that there is always the drop backwards. We have never had a boom without its corresponding slump, and I doubt whether we shall have any different experience this time because I have heard no scheme advanced for preventing the usual thing from happening. I expect, therefore, that the usual will happen; and it will happen because the profits which have been siphoned off by the profit-takers of the nation have not been reinvested quickly enough to be paid out in wages, and thus to keep the flow of purchasing power running in balance.
When this happens it would be a good thing for the government to do what our hon. friends here are asking.


Mr. BLACKMORE:: The social crediters.


William Irvine: It would be a good thing if the government were to create the money to build the houses. That is what the banks would do, if we borrowed from them; and there is no reason why we should not do it in: a direct way ourselves, without interest. It could be done by the payment of only administration costs. That would check the deflationary tendency following a boom, although it would not be a cure. It would help the economic system as a whole.
I conclude by saying that, although the minister is a gentleman of much greater experience than I am in matters of administration and of government, he might do well if at least he were to take some notice of the ideas which hon. members have tried to present in respect of this great problem of housing. He knows as well as we do that the situation is serious; perhaps he knows much better than we do. No doubt he receives more
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letters about it, because he is face to face with the problem. He knows that not enough houses are being built, and knows perfectly well that the average working man cannot buy the houses being built under the present scheme. I am asking him to consider the possibility of devising a housing scheme which would make available low-rental houses, that such a scheme be financed upon the credit of the state, and at cost, and that we proceed to do it and continue in our endeavour until every Canadian family has a home.


Mr. L. W. SKEY (Trinity):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to speak briefly concerning the expression used by the preceding speaker- "the necessity of the moment", and I wish to address myself to those words.
Before doing so, however, I should like to refer to the observations of the hon. member for Mackenzie (Mr. Nicholson), who spoke about Toronto and outlined some of the unfortunate housing conditions in that city. I am sure the hon. member will be glad to know that the city council, welfare institutions and all other agencies in the city have made every effort to meet the housing shortage. Last winter, although they passed through several critical periods, they did manage to keep a roof over everyone's head. Among other things, they reconverted Trinity Barracks and spent hundreds of thousands of dollars outside the city limits in the development of water and road services in the county of York in connection with housing developments in that area.
My one brief suggestion to the minister would be that, in company with the rentals administration of the government, he consider lifting the freezing orders on new accommodation opened after a certain date. I do not mean that the rentals administration order as it now stands should be changed, if the government insists upon retaining it. Bui I do suggest that if the government will consider lifting the freezing order and evictions order on new accommodation opened after, let us say, July 1, there will be a tremendous improvement in respect of the housing shortage in urban centres of Canada.
The minister has had the problem fully and ably presented to him. I am sure that has been done in his department, as it has been again in the house today, particularly in the speech of the hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard (Mr. Merritt). Mine is an urban constituency, with very small space available for further building. It is overcrowded, almost as bad in that respect as the constituency of Spadina, which is represented in this house by a Liberal member. This situation is found not only in Toronto, but in almost every

other city in Canada. It is our "immediate necessity", and I think the freezing order should be lifted on new accommodation by the first of July. By lifting it early this summer, any difficulties which may arise, administrative or personal, could be ironed out before the extremely critical period of next winter, and I am sure the minister will agree with me that next winter the housing accommodation in Canada will be extremely critical. So. Mr. Speaker, with this brief suggestion and mindful of the tremendous amount of work that lies before the house I take my seat after urging the minister to consult with the rentals administration on the suggestion I have made to him this afternoon.


Mr. HOWE:: It would be interesting if my hon. friend would elaborate on the benefits that would flow from his suggestion if adopted. 1 do not just understand them at the moment.


Lawrence Wilton Skey: I shall be glad to. Recently
I attended a public meeting in Toronto at which all the difficulties, shortages of building materials, rising costs, labour difficulties and every other kind of difficulty facing builders were put before the meeting, and I was impressed with the facts given. When the minister announced to the house the other day that Housing Enterprises Limited had had to abandon some very large projects I knew he was faced with the same building difficulties. At that meeting a lot of prominent citizens advised me- and I believe they spoke with certain knowledge-that if the minister would lift the freezing order on new accommodation rented after a certain date, literally hundreds of people in every urban centre would be able to obtain accommodation. These would include veterans with families, single persons seeking rooms and perhaps board, and perhaps even large civilian families would find accommodation if the owners could be sure that their tenants, if objectionable, could be evicted. Eviction might be necessary in only five per cent or less of the new accommodation provided, and what I am asking is that the other ninety-five per cent who could be accommodated in this way should be given the chance to secure this accommodation. The real reason why people will not open their homes today is that they are afraid of having undesirable tenants come into their homes and be unable to get rid of them.
Mr. HAROLD W. TIMMINS (Parkdale): Mr. Speaker, the minister in bringing down the amendments in Bill No. 176 reminded the house that extensive amendments had been made to the National Housing Act in 1946, but that by reason of changed conditions

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further amendments were necessary in 1947. For the most part there seems to be a good deal of merit in the amendments. The minister proposes, for instance, in respect of national housing mortgages, that the lending value shall be increased, that there may be larger loans. In the second place, the amendments will bring about lower down-payments by purchasers which the minister said was necessary because there is less money in the hands of purchasers at this time. Further, in order that the monthly payments may be kept down to the ability of people to pay, he proposes that the loans be amortized over a period of thirty instead of twenty-five years. All these amendments are good in a sense. They do make it easier for builders to finance. But as a matter of fact, as the minister himself stated, the problems in respect to building in 1947 are not so much financial as they are physical. I do not know of a single builder or a single person who wants a house who has been unable to get a house built by reason of not being able to finance a loan. The loan does not have to be under the National Housing Act, because there are many other kinds of mortgages that one can get. So I do not believe that difficulty in financing is stopping any house building today.
We know there are four groups of house building which are in a sense government controlled and Which are looked after under the system of priority of building materials.
In presenting this bill to the house, the minister had this to say, at page 2660 of Hansard:
We propose that where there is some control on the end sale price of the house to the home owner, the ratio of loan on a $3,000 lending value shall be 95 per cent, grading down to 90 per cent on a $6,000 lending value.
I take it from that-and the minister will correct me if I am wrong-that he is referring there to integrated housing, because that is the only kind of housing in Canada that I know of in which the government takes any part in controlling the sale price of the house. I am pointing out to the minister, without disparaging the amendments he proposes, or minimizing the results he hopes to attain, that as a matter of fact, according to a recent return which I received from his department, only 1.691 integrated housing units were started in 1946-47. So, while the amendment which the minister proposes is to some extent proper and will bring some relief, I do not believe that the relief we shall obtain will put us very much ahead in the matter of housing accommodation. I would be prepared to gamble that housing accommodation will not be increased by more than one or two per
cent by the changes which are proposed with respect to these mortgages. Of course, when you lend up to ninety-five per cent of the value of the property you are looking for trouble. We have had experience in days gone by when mortgages were made up to fifty and sixty and seventy per cent of the value of the property, but when you get up to ninety and ninety-five per cent you are putting the purchaser in a precarious position with respect to stability and the future holding of his property. However, it may be necessary that something along this line should be done. I am only pointing out that a dangerous practice is growing up.
The minister said that conditions have changed since the last amendments to the act were made. Even since this bill was brought down on the first of May-and now it is the 29th of May-many more serious changes in conditions have taken place. In the first place, so far as integrated housing is concerned there has been some hesitation by veterans in some parts of the country to buy houses under that scheme. We also know that, so far as Housing Enterprises Limited are concerned. they have dropped their projects in at least three cities. From a return which I received on March 31. I find that at the present, time Housing Enterprises Limited are carrying on projects in some twenty-three cities. I suggest to the minister that economic conditions in respect of building are probably no different in the other parts of Canada from what they are in Ottawa, Montreal and Toronto where these projects have been stopped.
Press reports tell us that because these projects are not to be continued in Toronto, some twenty thousand units which would otherwise have been provided will not be provided. I have read with a great deal of interest the comments which have been made by Brigadier Storms with respect to the obstacles which he found in housing. If there is any man who could get through a difficulty in housing or in any other matter it is Brigadier Storms. He is not easily stopped. He was my commanding officer in France during a considerable period of the first great war. I do not know of any man who commands more ability to get things done than Brigadier Storms.
One other feature of the amendment which I should like to touch on briefly is the amendment which appears on page 2661 of Hansard, about which the minister said:
We will he seeking authority for the Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation to convey property which it is administering for the crown. We have in mind particularly Wartime Housing units which are being sold to tenants.
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Wartime housing was essentially and primarily provided for veterans. The houses that I have seen and inspected in various parts of the country have no cellars under them. I do not believe it is good business for this government or for any government to sell to veterans houses without any cellars under them, because it means that in the future these people will have to live in housing units which are heated by stoves or by gas or by whatever [DOT]the local amenities may be. I do not believe that is proper housing for soldiers to have except as an expedient for the moment and temporary. I am not criticizing the government for what they have done in providing Wartime Housing. I am simply saying that some other form of ensuring the veteran his property might more properly be developed, because I do not believe that any of us should be a party to turning over to the veteran something which we know in the long run will be very much of an impediment or a detriment to him.
Turning for a moment to the next part of the act which has to do with the advent of the lending companies and the insurance companies into the field of providing scope for the development of land for building purposes, may I say that that particular venture has a good deal of merit to it. After all, we know, and the minister probably knows better than any of us, that in the larger cities practically all the land for building purposes is used up, and as you get into the townships and the municipalities you run into the difficulty of the lack of public utilities. For instance, it would be useless for a scheme to be developed miles away from schools, or miles away from water or without proper sewage facilities; and it will take a good deal of money to promote these land ventures.
Having regard to the projects which may be entered into, I should like to suggest to the minister that perhaps the department could give some leadership in seeing that in a sense these projects take the form of decentralizing communities. If I may use an illustration, surrounding Toronto on the north are three or four municipalities, Thornhill, Richmond Hill, Aurora and Newmarket. In planning these projects, one should bear in mind that perhaps suburban life is superior to urban life in so far as bringing up children and families are concerned. I am of the opinion that these projects should be developed around communities which already exist.
In the past, experience has shown that companies subdividing and promoting * land ventures have come to a disastrous end. I

know of few throughout the Dominion of Canada that have really made a success of land ventures and come through with much of their money at the end of the time when they have their land sold. The work of developing these ventures includes surveying the land. They have to have the plan passed by the municipal authorities and by the provincial planning board. They have to plan recreation and park land and also arrange for the laying in of water, sewers, pavement and sidewalks.
The minister has told us-and I think the act provides for it-that the remuneration which will pass to those who are planning these projects will be in the neighbourhood of two per cent. If I understood the minister correctly, I think he said that if there were anything over the two per cent it would have to be returned to the crown. That strikes me as a very low amount for a venture of this kind, and for that reason I have been looking for a nigger in the woodpile in respect of how the costs are going to mount and where those who will venture the funds in the particular projects will receive their remuneration. I presume the minister will not allow large sums of money to be used in these projects for administration purposes. I can see that it will be quite easy for a huge administration to be set up in the way of an office, with secretaries, draftsmen, surveyors and a great number of other people who would in a sense run the administration high, which would, of course, all be added to the costs which, in the long run, the government might have to take over and pay.
There is this other thing to be looked at, and it has happened before. Before the lending company or the insurance company gets into the project, somebody has intervened and has become the owner of the property, and that has happened in a month or two or in a week or two before the project goes through.
I suggest to the minister that some safeguards should be put in these projects so that they will not end up with this sort of thing going on. The remuneration to those who will be carrying on these projects will be small for the amount of work they will have to do.
I understand that in the United States some of the large lending companies have already gone into this field, but I am told that the remuneration they receive is in the neighbourhood of 4-5 per cent and 4-7 per cent in respect of the money venture in the project.
It seems to me that these amendments will not go nearly far enough; in fact they will not go any distance at all in solving the housing problems of Canada. They are all expedi-

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'ents. blit they all miss the mark, and the mark is that we have not a housing programme in Canada. All the projects which the department has worked out have been predicated for the most part on the priority system; in other words, the channeling of building material into a few hands who can in a sense control the kind of building that the government considers we should have. I think the government has missed the boat in that respect, because the statistics show-and we have used them before-that less than 12,000 homes were helped by the priority system in 1946, and according to the figures which we now have before us, we are going to be in a much worse position this year.
For instance, a release from the labour department of May 27 shows that construction contracts, mainly for home building, were down $23 million in April, 1947, compared with the corresponding period last year. No improvement was expected. According to the report, commercial construction showed little variation over last year, with the bulk of the decline showing in respect of certain industrial classes.
The minister and his department must take the responsibility in these matters. After all, some of us who have had some experience in housing think the measures which have been taken to date are not going far enough and we are really in a sense standing still. We point out to the minister, who has heard it many times before, that he must do something about the channeling of building material, in the sense that he has to call a halt to the business of so much material going into nonessential building, having regard to the fact that our primary problem today is housing for our people.
If, as a matter of fact, building costs have gone as high as they have, so high that the ordinary builder is stifled-and he built 48,000 homes last year in spite of priorities and everything else-and if, as a matter of fact, the minister is not prepared to say that home building shall get its share of material, then he and the department must assume the responsibility. One of the responsibilities he has to take is the fact that in the large cities, with the money received from the federal government, and the help of municipalities, for which I give them full credit, our people are living in conditions which are degrading and which will do a great deal in creating a demoralizing effect on the future of the nation.
We know that people are living in converted military barracks, in a converted air station barracks; they are living in buildings which formerly were munitions factories; the last
project represents one that was formerly an engineering plant. These people have to use communal accommodations; in other words, washrooms together, public rooms together; and their children are mixed up in various compartments of the same housing unit. The people there are beginning to feel that in a sense they are wards of the countiy, that provision has been made for them now and that provision will be made for them again. That is contrary to the concept which Canadians have of our people. We feel that we should be able to stand on our own feet and make our own way, but we are demoralizing the people by permitting these conditions to continue.
Part II of the National Housing Act is a useful section. It has not been used to any great extent up to this time. In Toronto, when I was on the council, we started the Regent Park project for the purpose of clearing out a slum area and providing adequate and proper accommodation for the people there.
I	have visited the district myself and I must say I was ashamed of the conditions under which the people were living there. I know that the project was a necessary one, and within the last year the minister has seen fit to place the stamp of approval on the undertaking in the Regent Park district in Toronto. That is only a beginning. I believe that part
II	of the National Housing Act must be used and used quickly for those people who, in our own country, are displaced people. Something must be done for them.
The city of Toronto cannot carry the cost alone-I am dealing with the Regent Park project at the moment-but must have help from the province because, as a matter of fact, the provinces all have their planning boards, and these matters require some provincial assistance. In addition to that, they require a great deal of federal assistance, because, if people live in a group that cannot pay the economic lent, then we the people, as my hon. friend the member for Vancouver-Burrard put it, through the governments of various levels must all take our part in providing the necessary housing.
I predict that the minister will find, with building conditions continuing as they are at the moment, that something will have to be done along these lines, within the next couple of months, I would say, because I do not believe that the various municipalities will be able to cope very much longer with this emergency situation.
Much as I commend the amendments the minister has brought forward with respect to the National Housing Act. I do not think he
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has gone nearly far enough. The bright boys of the department are still thinking in terms of building priorities and we are away past that stage. I am suggesting to the minister therefore, as strongly as I can, that he give some attention to part II of the act, to see that low-cost public housing is started in this country, so that we may get back substantially to the recommendations of the Curtis report of 1943, which made provision for housing which, I think, is most necessary and imperative at this time.


John Oliver Probe: This house has threshed a terrific lot of old straw, it seems to me, in connection with matters relating to housing, and I think a great deal of credit is due to hon. members on all sides of the house for taking the responsibilities of their office sufficiently seriously that, after these arguments have been presented in brilliant form in many cases and so many times in this house since I have been a member here, they are not content to let the government rest until a better approach than our present feeble effort in housing is put forth by the one man in this country who is able to do the job if he would get on with it; I refer to the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply (Mr. Howe).
The National Housing Act has been analysed in so many ways in this house that I simply want to indicate once more that under part I of the act the loans last year were 6,927. In housing emergency that is really a terrific national effort, is it not? Under part II of the act, which provides for rental housing loans, we were able to lay out money for 4,836 houses.
Part III of the act, which provides for federal funds for farm housing, is not even yet proclaimed by the government of Canada. Part IV of the act deals with the home improvement feature. Actually fifty-three units in Canada were repaired under the terms of that part. There was a certain amount of research carried on under part V, largely in the statistical field and none in the scientific field. There was spent $160,000 under this section, of which $85,000 was for economic research; $3,000 for architectural investigation; $70,000 for community planning; $3,000 for educational work and nil under technical research. All these figures come from the government's own factual summary "Housing in Canada", presented in January, 1947.
With respect to the whole matter of housing, I think the minister acts as though he intends that the government will just get out of the housing business entirely and leave it to free enterprise, because, while we have certain statutes on the books, the physical pro-

cess of house building is not being accomplished. The amount of money which we have spent and the amount we are providing for next year indicates that the government is gradually getting out of the picture. I want to present two tables to the house. One is with respect to the estimates of the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply for the coming year, dealing with housing.
571. To provide for payments of amounts ow'ing under guarantees pursuant to item 60 of schedule A to the Appropriation Act, No. 6, 1946 (and pursuant to corresponding items in previous appropriation acts) to approved lending institutions in respect of loans made for the purpose of financing the conversion of existing houses into multiple family houses, such payments to be made out of unappropriated moneys in the consolidated revenue fund, $1.
There is a nominal item of $1, owing to the fact, I presume, that the government has not anticipated any losses. Under home conversion plan, item 572, the government proposes this year to reduce the estimate of last year by $250,000, making an expenditure of $250,000 for the ensuring year. Under emergency shelter, administration, the estimate is $2,000,000, a reduction of $297,000 from last year. On Wartime Housing Limited in the ensuing year they propose to spend $27,500,000 by contrast with an estimate of $42,000,000 last year, a drop of $14,500,000. That is the financial picture under the plan of the department of reconstruction. They make provision for a potential expenditure of some $30,000,000 at a time when we have an admittedly serious crisis in housing.
By contrast I want to present a housing budget for another country which I was prevented from putting on the records here a month or so ago, because at that time it was not in order. I want to present from the department's own records, "Housing Progress Abroad", the Swedish housing budget for the fiscal year 1946-47, to indicate how other progressive countries are allotting their budgets in terms of housing. The figures are given in both kronor and dollars, and I presume they have been worked out on a proper par of exchange.
Operating Budget
Government housing loan office, salaries, appropriations	
$	314,479Government housing loan office, expenses,	appropriations	
62,617Reductions in rent for poor families with many children, appropriations	
2,365,550Contributions to promotion of housing in rural areas, reserve appropriation	
5,566,000Contribution to housing for retired people,	reserve	appropriation ...	2,226,400Total	
$10,535,046
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That in the Swedish housing budget is termed an operating budget. Under their capital budget, they have the following:
Capital Budget Government loan funds:
Loan for housing for poor families with many children (investment)
appropriation	 $13,915,000
Loan fund for promotion of housing in rural districts (investment) appropriation	 3,339,600
Fund for assistance loans:
Tertiary loans for certain housing
schemes, appropriation	 41,745,000
Additional loans for certain housing schemes, appropriation ....	5,844,300
Loans for erecting and improving dwellings for farm workers (investment) appropriation	 1,113,200
Loans for improvements to dwellings, appropriation	 2,226,400
Total	 $68,183,500
That is roughly double what the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply is proposing to ask this house for with respect to the ensuing year. It is interesting, of course, to note the way in which that budget is broken up with respect to provision for rental housing facilities for large families, for workmen's families and for rural families. The Swedish budget provides for the expenditure of money in manners that the Canadian government is not yet prepared to accept as an obligation of the Dominion of Canada.
I think we should examine as well the particular Bill No. 176 which the minister has before the house at the present time. I am willing to concede that there are one or two good features in the bill. But as has been said by everyone who has spoken this afternoon, there is a piecemeal goodness about it. There is, for example, the increased ratio of lending value to the cost of construction. However, that is not an unmixed blessing, because with the terrific rise in building costs -which the government has permitted by its decontrol policy-it simply means that the individual who is lucky enough to be able to make a down payment on a house is putting down approximately the same amount now, with rising costs, which he might have put down, a year or two ago under lower costs; and at the same time, because of the high cost, he has increased his liability for years to come. Therefore I say that, while the fact is that a man is able to buy a house with a smaller percentage of equity under this new proposal, it will not in fact give him as great an equity in his house as could have been arranged by assuring that building costs remained down. The amortization period is extended from twenty years or, under certain conditions, twenty-five years, as it was before,
to thirty years. That is a feature which should be commended. In my opinion, a third good feature is the provision for direct loans by the Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation where lending institutions may, for certain reasons, not want to lend money to a prospective home owner.
I consider it my duty to draw the attention of the minister to some of the bad features in this bill. The improvement of land is one of the main things provided for. Under that provision housing groups or mortgage companies or land companies may develop housing areas in suburban districts and the cost is guaranteed to those companies by the people of Canada. Such companies are permitted to make two per cent on their investment. In my opinion that, in effect, is a future subsidy to those companies and to the families to which they hope the properties will be sold. I can guarantee to the minister that, with present costs, those houses will not be houses that can be purchased by low-income families. I think he will have to agree with that statement. In my opinion that is a bad form of subsidy. I believe in the subsidy principle with respect to housing, but it should be applicable at the low-income and wage levels.
There is another feature which the minister and his officials have overlooked entirely and I should like to draw his attention to it at this time, because we propose to submit an amendment in committee to remedy the defect. As I see it, there is a danger that the maintenance costs for the suburban developments provided by this bill are likely to be loaded on the municipalities. The experience in connection with former housing developments in suburban areas has been referred to by previous speakers this afternoon. By this legislation, the development companies are protected from going bankrupt; we as the people of Canada are preventing those companies from going bankrupt, but many of the facilities which will be needed to make these areas habitable, such as streets, roads, water facilities, schools, utilities of various kinds, will have to be provided by the municipality. As far as I can see, there is no provision in the act to permit the municipality or the provincial planning board to take any part in the planning of this work.
I have here figures from the official United States records indicating that in 1935, when there was not a great deal of suburban development, the city of Boston found that its revenues per resident from the suburban area was $47 a year, whereas the expenditures
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on facilities for those suburbanites was $63 per resident. If this bill is permitted to be carried through and this work is carried on without consultation with the provincial or municipal government concerned we can envisage, not the bankruptcy of the speculators in suburban development, because they are protected by the government, but the bankruptcy of the municipality itself. Pressure will be exerted upon the municipality to extend public facilities, to build roads and all the rest of it, while the people who will exert this pressure upon the municipality will be protected against personal loss by the federal government under the terms of Bill No. 176.
Ancillary to this is the fact that there is no provision for the expression of opinion by local planning bodies with respect to the type of community to be built as a result of the enterprise which is being sponsored under this bill by the minister of reconstruction. As far as I can see, there is no provision for participation in any form by planning bodies which have been set up by municipalities or which are envisaged under the terms of different provincial statutes.
The final criticism-and this is an old one from the point of view of hon. members in this corner-is that there is no provision for participation in this fund by provincial or municipal housing authorities that have been set up or that may be set up in the future. As the hon. member for Mackenzie (Mr. Nicholson) said in the brilliant speech he made a few minutes ago, we are going to vote for this measure, but we are disappointed that it goes only such a short way to meet the problem facing us. We feel certain that this bill will not take us many further steps along the road to providing houses for the Canadian people.


Charles Edward Johnston: Mr. Speaker, I wish to say a word or two with regard to this subject. I do not think it is necessary for me to remind the house or the people of Canada of the urgent need there is for more housing. We are all aware of that fact, and the attention of the government has been directed to it on more than one occasion, not only at this session by hon. members who have spoken already but in previous sessions.
The hon. member for Cariboo (Mr. Irvine) referred to the fact that the government should continue the same type of housing programme in peace time as they used during the war. I hope I am not misquoting the hon. member, but that was what I understood him to say. I do not agree with that. I think the
houses which the government built under the national housing scheme are much superior to those built under any other housing programme the government has instituted.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: I did not understand the hon. member for Cariboo to say that.
* Mr. JOHNSTON: I think you will find that in his speech. Possibly what he had in-mind was that the government should carry on that type of mass production which it carried on during war time. That was my understanding of it, anyway. The hon. member for Mackenzie (Mr. Nicholson), who spoke a few minutes ago, suggested a continuation of the government's plan for mass production under government ownership. I should like to point out to the hon. members for Mackenzie and Cariboo that I have watched very carefully the different types of houses that have been built. It is my opinion that, except in one or two particular instances, the majority of the houses built under Wartime Housing or the veterans housing scheme do not begin to compare with the houses built under the national housing scheme. I have made the statement before and I do not hesitate to repeat it, that I believe it is better business; I believe it will result in more satisfaction to the men who receive these houses if we build one house properly rather than build two houses which inevitably will fall down in a few years. It is my view that in respect of a large number of the houses now being built by the government, such as those under Wartime Housing or under the Veterans' Land Act, the municipalities, both rural and urban, will be faced with a bad situation in years to come. I hesitate to refer to them as slum areas, lest some may take the wrong impression from my words. But I do not think one could use any other expression if he wished to convey a proper picture, and particularly when one thinks of the houses which were built in Hull, just across the river, during war time.
For the moment I should like to speak about the financing of these houses, and in that connection I would commend the hon. member for Cariboo upon the suggestion he made. That very thing has been in my mind. I do not think it is possible for the government to finance a large housing programme under the present financial arrangements set out in the contracts. I would assume that in respect of national housing the government is using exactly the same type of contract agreement as it is using in other types of housing. If I am wrong in that, the minister will correct me. I say that, however, because I believe it is a standard form of contract.
[Mr. Probe. 1

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Lnder it, as I pointed out before, those who are purchasing or building these houses are required to pay i>, per cent compounded half yearly. As the hon. member for Cariboo pointed out, on the incomes these people are receiving, including both civilians and veterans, it is absolutely impossible for them to pay those large sums of money at that high rate of interest over the period of time allotted in the contract, or the extended period allotted in the bill before us. I suggest that the minister should give careful consideration to devising some scheme whereby the national credit of the country could be used to give these people decent homes, and at an interest rate sufficient only to cover service charges.
I should like to refer to another aspect of the matter, and in this connection I again refer to the contract. The reference I am about to make would apply to veterans who are affected by different types of government housing programmes, as well as to those who are building houses under the National Housing Act programme. I believe every consideration should be given to the man who is purchasing one of these houses. It is a lifetime investment for him, and a tremendous amount of money that he is required to invest.
I suggest that every time a man makes a payment it should be recognized that to that extent he has a definite equity in the home. I do not believe the contract should be worded as it is today, so that the lending agency is in a position whereby, should the builder, civilian or veteran be unable to pay his required instalment, it can evict the individual affected. I know it might be said that the mortgage companies or lending companies would not do that. But I know of actual cases where mortgage and lending companies have done that very thing, although not under this legislation.
There should be some protection for individuals who are building these homes. When a man has made payments amounting to six or seven thousand dollars and then suffers some misfortune and finds that he must miss two or three payments, it seems most unfair that a lending company should be in a position to dispossess him of his entire property, and the equity therein.


Mr. HARRIS (Grey-Bruce):: Do they?


Charles Edward Johnston: According to the contract they can.


Walter Edward Harris: But they do not.


Charles Edward Johnston: It is nonsense, if I may be excused for using that word, to suggest that 83166-229
we should leave a clause in the agreement under which such procedure would be permitted. If it is not done as the Iron, member suggests, then why leave the clause in the contract? Why tempt those companies with a clause of that kind? I suggest that it should be removed.
I am not saying for one moment that a lending company should not have fair and reasonable protection, but I say that under this legislation the government is giving those companies that reasonable protection, and the financial interests of those companies in these undertakings would not be affected if that clause in the contract were removed.
I am not an expert on the wording of contracts, but it seems to me it would be a simple matter to prepare a clause whereby, if a man through misfortune finds that he has reached a point where all parties concerned are agreed that he cannot continue his payments, a clause could be inserted stating that the property could be disposed of to some other individual on the understanding that a man who had paid six or seven thousand dollars would have his equity in the property returned to him. The property should be resold, not just to anyone the company might select, or at any price it might set, but to the highest bidder and at a reasonable price. Then, after the actual expenses of the sale wore deducted from the proceeds, the remainder should be returned to the man who originally entered into the contract with the company.
This would be unjust neither to the company nor to the man who bought the house. It would not deal unfairly with the government. If any of the three is financially able to take the loss, surely it would be either the company or the government, but certainly not the individual.
I have only a word more to say in the matter, and I have no desire to detain the house beyond six o'clock, particularly if it is the wish to have this measure passed today.
I would however suggest to the minister that he review the contract. I draw it to his attention particularly as it applies to veterans under Wartime Housing, but not so much in respect of National Housing, which concerns a different class of people. I suggest that the minister might give this matter his consideration with a view to making some change in the contract so as to give a purchaser of one of these homes a fair and equitable share in the property he is acquiring.
At six o'clock the house took recess.

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After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock.


Mr. W. A. McMASTER (High Park):: 
Mr. F. S. ZAPLITNY (Dauphin):: Before the debate is closed, I wish to discuss briefly a matter which affects my own constituency, which is, I believe, of general interest to the country. Some time ago the minister announced in the house that the corporation known as Housing Enterprises had for the most part decided to drop its building project for this year. I hold in my hand a clipping from a newspaper that appeared the day after the minister's announcement. This article gives certain information on that. Here are some of the reasons that were given after the minister made his announcement. I am not sure which paper this is, but I think it is a reliable one. It says:
Because of the continued high cost of material and labour and subsequent failure to provide low rentals, Housing Enterprises Limited, operated by the life insurance companies under the National Housing Act, has decided to drop its 1947 building programme, Reconstruction Minister C. I). Howe told the house this afternoon.
Then a little further on, the following appears:
The situation was brought to a head when a firm bid was received for 400 units in Hamilton and which bid would result in rentals of from $55 to $75 for three, four and five-room units respectively.
Further on, in reply to a question by the hon. member for Mackenzie (Mr. Nicholson), the minister said:
The rents being charged in the Toronto area were so high that they were not in the class of low-rental housing. They ran between $45 and $55 a month.
I put that on the record because it has a bearing on what I want to say about Housing Enterprises. I believe that the experi-
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ment which was perhaps entered into in good faith by the government with this corporation, which is a holding company for the life insurance companies of Canada, has not produced good results. I also wish to say that it is strange that the results produced were as meagre as they were when one realizes what concessions this company received from the government.
I have had a little personal experience with this corporation because it so happened that one of the concessions it received was the privilege of buying one of the airports at Dauphin, No. 10, and the terms of the sale, as well as the way in which it came about, created a great deal of interest and not a little indignation in the town of Dauphin and in the district. It appeared that before any of the locally interested bodies had received any notification or any warning that this airport was to be sold to Housing Enterprises, men were already on the job ready to tear down the buildings. However I am not going to labour that part of it because there may have been some misunderstanding there. But the part that is important is that this corporation has received from Central Housing Mortgage Corporation a concession which should have made it possible to construct many more houses than have been built and at a lower price, and houses which could have been let at lower rentals.
For example, in the case of the airport at Dauphin to which I have referred this company was given the privilege of buying thirty-two of the forty buildings that were sold. According to a return which I received, the original cost of these buildings was 8799,450. Housing Enterprises paid for all these buildings a total of $64,120, or eight per cent of the original cost. In addition to this, the original cost of putting up these buildings-some of them were constructed in 1940 and some in 1941-was much lower than it would be^ at the present time because costs of materials were considerably lower. As a matter of fact, I happen to know that the contractors who took contracts to put up buildings in this airport went out to the farmers and, in some cases, under false pretences bought lumber from the farmers at as low as 820. After the company had received a concession of that kind, I was surprised to find, in the course of a conversation with one of its officials, that they had not contracted to build one building in Manitoba. They also bought an airport in the town of Virden. Another return I have here informs us that in the town of Virden they bought buildings that originally cost
[Mr. Zaplitny.l
$463,730 at a price which worked out to a little 'less than six per cent of the original cost.
We find also that, while Housing Enterprises had not contracted to build any houses in Manitoba, they were given the privilege of coming in and buying up these airports and shipping the material out of Manitoba, some of it going as far west as Regina, Edmonton and Vancouver, and some of it going to Toronto. On top of that, we find that Housing Enterprises had the right to sell to the public on the spot any material which they did not require for their own purposes. Apparently the prices at which they sold were based practically on the prices of new material. We found that, in. connection with No. 10 airport in Dauphin, people who came to buy space heaters, which the company bought at the rate of eight per cent of the original cost, which works out at from $31 to $33, were charged, first, $100 and then $150; then, when the demand was great the price went up to $200, and in the end these space heaters were selling for $225 each.
It was the same story with washbasins, sinks, toilets, linoleum and so on. For example, washbasins which were incomplete because the trap was missing were $13 each; sinks, $12.50; toilets, $16; linoleum, $1.75 a yard, and so on down the 'line. Shiplap, for instance sold at $45 per thousand and dimension lumber, the bigger sizes, up to $50 per thousand. AVhen the citizens of Dauphin and district discovered that this company was tearing down the buildings at this airport and shipping materials out of Manitoba, at the same time making a huge profit on scrap material sold on the spot, they decided to make a protest.
I am not going to repeat the whole story here because the minister is familiar with it. Wires were sent in protest-I have copies of all of them-from the citizens of Dauphin and from such organizations as the branch of the legion, the board of trade of the town of Dauphin, the rural municipality, and so on, protesting that before the local authorities had had any opportunity to make provision for buying these buildings and supplying the material for local use, particularly to veterans who had begun building houses and had not the material with which to finish them, this company walked in and got a number one priority because they happened to be classified as a government agency under the Central Housing and Mortgage Corporation, having the privilege of making a huge profit on scrap material.
As a result of these protests, the officials in Winnipeg did make an arrangement with Housing Enterprises to release a certain

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amount of that material for the local use of veterans, and there again I have a protest to make, because we were given to understand that the prices to be charged by Housing Enterprises would be reasonable. No figures were stated at the time, but an estimate was given for lumber of from $25 to $30 a thousand. When the material was made available we found that the veterans were charged $45 or $50 for the same material. The same applied all down the line.
The objection I have is this. The government is going to spend millions. It is well known that Housing Enterprises have the privilege of borrowing up to $90 million on the dominion treasury, putting up $10 million of their own capital, being guaranteed the investment back again and a profit of at least two per cent. In other words, they do not take any risk whatever bu* are using the money of the policyholders of the life insurance company, investing it, and being guaranteed a profit. They are getting a return on their investment and are also given the privilege of buying up airports which could be made far more useful in local communities or in the provinces where they are. But in spite of all these concessions, we find that today the whole project has turned out to be one big fizzle.
I feel that if the government is going to be justified in spending $90 million or any amount of that size, the money would be far better spent if the government would do as was suggested this afternoon to my Tight-get in touch with the provincial authorities and the municipal authorities and offer them the same concessions as, or even better concessions than they offered Housing Enterprises. I believe that, because these authorities have some responsibility to the public, they would see to it that houses were built and rented at cost.
The more we study the agreement between Housing Enterprises Limited and Central Housing and Mortgage Corporation, the more we realize that the whole scheme does not look genuine. The whole scheme is worked out in such a way that Housing Enterprises cannot lose; and when we realize that, after having received a loan, after having been guaranteed a profit, the houses which they build belong to Housing Enterprises, and after payments have been made for a period of fifty years they still own the houses, we can understand the situation. It is true that some houses after fifty years will not be worth much, but some will be worth a considerable amount of money, and there is no reason why a private company should be given such a plum at a time when houses are badly needed.
If the government had spent the same amount of money, or had risked the same amount of money and given the same concessions to the municipal and provincial authorities, we -would have had houses at a lower rental price and it would have been more satisfactory all round.
I am particularly worried about the fact that in such communities as Dauphin and other towns of that size, where the local authorities were interested in doing something about houses, they found almost overnight that the airports -which should have been made available to them were suddenly sold to someone else. Somebody comes along and takes all the material and ships it out of the province, and nothing is left for the local people.
The minister is aware that in the town of Dauphin there was organized a veterans' company, consisting of returned men, who were willing to buy either of the two airports there, tear it down, and make the material available to the local people for building purposes. That company was not even consulted, or let in on the deal at all. The company knew nothing at all about the matter until Housing Enterprises walked in and took the airport over.
What was said this afternoon by the hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard (Mr. Merritt), although it sounds like a new line of policy from that side of the house-


Howard Charles Green: He has advocated it several times before. That is a little bit political.


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: If you want to get political I will start in the right place. During the last two years, we have been hearing nothing but private enterprise from members of the Progressive Conservative party in regard to housing, but today they admit that it takes the government and the provincial and municipal authorities cooperating to get houses built, I have not heard the words "private enterprise" mentioned once in the whole debate.
I believe that if the line of action I have outlined were taken the government could retrieve something out of this muddle that has resulted from the breaking down on the project of Housing Enterprises. The government realizes today, as hon. members do, that the reason why low-rental housing will never result from the operations of private firms building houses is that these firms are not in the business of building houses for the use of the people but for making a profit.
I am not going to argue now the question whether making a profit is wrong, but the objective is more houses and lower rental houses, and it is up to the government to invest every dollar possible in this project on
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a non-profit basis. The experiment with Housing Enterprises has been perhaps a lesson. It has been a costly one.
I find from another return that during the past year this firm was advanced loans totalling over $16 million, and the result of all that has been that only a limited number of houses-I have not the figures here-were built, and houses which originally were planned to be rented at $35 a month have now to be rented at $55 or $65 a month.
I also want to register a protest on behalf of Dauphin and other communities in Manitoba where airports were bought and wrecked without the local people having an opportunity of receiving the materials they required.
I am not going to take more of the time of the house, because some of the other material I have can be used perhaps on the various sections of the bill. I want to say emphatically that the results of the experiment in the last two years have proven that if we are to have low-rental housing it will have to be done through public enterprise, through local authorities cooperating with the dominion government, with the objective of providing houses and not making profits.


Mr. J. H. HARRIS (Danforth):: I presume, when the minister speaks, he will close the debate. If I might have an opportunity to say or word or two I promise you, Mr. Speaker, that I will not read my speech, which has not been my habit for two or three decades. I should like to make one or two general observations with regard to this question which seems to be gripping the imagination of the Canadian people. To my mind, broad enough consideration has not been given with regard to the real wants with regard to housing. It seems to me that our people-perhaps on account of the tragic war we have come through-having been brought to the large centres to ply their handicrafts in the art of making war material, are not desirous of going back to the place whence they came. If your department, sir, would give some thought to the reason for this shortage they would perhaps find that in yesteryear many of those now seeking housing accommodation in the large centres of population could find abundance of housing accommodation in the counties of Ontario, for example, or in the counties of Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island or New Brunswick. I cannot speak so well for what provision there is in western Canada to house our people. But no one in this chamber can gainsay the fact that there are scores of houses vacant in the back country, one might call it. or in the country portion of Ontario and the other provinces.

They are nice houses, but are a little old, and need a little repair and attention. They are surrounded by an abundance of the best farming country anywhere in the civilized world, off which people could get a good living.
In spite of all the discussions which have taken place in this chamber, I have yet to hear hon. members advocating that these houses vacant throughout the length and breadth of our land should be utilized. No encouragement. is being given to a movement to get our people back to those vacant properties. Why not, sir, within your department, have every county council within our province make an index of the number of vacant houses and vacant farms within their county and file that with the responsible party? Then instead of, as I sometimes feel disposed to say, wasting propaganda on our people in telling them what they should and should not do, let us have a little propaganda directed toward our people who are seeking housing, asking them to go back to mother nature, to go back to some of these good homes and lands which are lying vacant at the present time.
A quarter of a century ago, it was my high privilege to live on lot 30, concession D, Scarboro-if you will pardon a personal reference-on which there was a little four-roomed house where my family lived on some twenty-five acres of land. From there I took a seat in this honourable house. Looking back on those days, I say to the young men and the young women-part and parcel of the last war-who did so much for us, that after the first war I found myself in that position. Looking back, I say they were the happiest days of my short term of existence in this world. I enjoyed them immensely. Twenty-five acres and a four or five-roomed house built partly by my own hands helped me to understand how easy it was to make a living in this fair land of Canada.
I am saying this now, not for the edification of this honourable chamber but so that those many thousands who are looking for some place in which to live and eke out an existence in the urban sections of our community, may have their sights changed a little, may go back to the land and find how easy it is there, at their age, to make a living. Most of those about whom we are thinking tonight are perhaps between twenty-five and forty or forty-five. I want them to see how easy it would be for them to make a living and to find housing accommodation at very little expense. If they must follow a trade; if they must find their vocation in a city or a town, has there not been a tremendous development in the

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matter of transportation in the last quarter of a century? Is it not easy to get to town if the town is ten, fifteen or twenty miles away? If they cannot afford their own T-model Ford, as it were, they can still find, close to many of the large centres of population, all sorts of transportation services to take them to their jobs within the community.
With the least little bit of ambition, in these days when people are demanding an eight-hour day and perhaps working only about seven hours and getting eight hours' pay, much might be done. There are today sixteen more hours left in the day. Thirty years ago, while punching a time-clock at seven o'clock in the morning and again at six o'clock at night, six days in the week, more money was made by one individual in this chamber between the hours of six o'clock at night and seven o'clock the next morning on twenty-five acres of land than was made at the job he had at the factory where he punched a time-clock. Nowadays a job which pays good wages and this other little bit of endeavour after having put in eight hours a day-we need only eight hours' sleep-could give a bountiful living to those of our Canadian citizens who today find themselves looking for a house in which to live and looking, if they only knew it, for some little chore to help occupy those extra eight hours; not the eight hours that he works for someone else, not the eight hours which he requires for his sleep, but those eight hours of working recreation. My recommendation, sir, is that the eight hours of recreation should be spent in some of these thousands of vacant lands in the rural parts of Ontario and the other provinces, which are not too far away from where the individual can find a job. If that is done I think, in the final analysis, we shall have within Canada a stronger and better race of people.
I have trespassed on your time for no other reason than to bring to the attention of the Canadian people the fact that we are not doing right by our country when we allow thousands of farm homes to remain idle when thousands of our people are trekking to the industrial centres and are unable to find roofs to put over their heads. They are more and more becoming the type of people whom some of us in this chamber encourage to lean on the government instead of on themselves, instead of applying themselves in the grandest land that civilization has ever known, our country, Canada.


Mr. R. M. WARREN (Renfrew North):: Mr. Speaker, I had not any thought of entering into this discussion on housing, although I
did spend some time this afternoon listening to the hardship stories of some of the hon. members of the opposition until I found myself on the verge of tears. I have been rather quiet on this subject; as a matter of fact, I have been rather quiet on all subjects during this session. Perhaps one reason is that I formed the habit of talking to my people every two weeks for fifteen minutes through the local broadcasting station. That may have acted as a safety valve and I have not found it necessary to take up much of the time of the house.
When I came back tonight and found that the discussion on housing was still continuing I started to tell a story about housing to one of my friends outside. This incident came to my attention not long ago and I had used it in one of my broadcasts. I went up to my office to get a copy of that broadcast and I found that it was even more like a Ripley story than I had remembered. Then I came into the chamber and heard the hon. member for Danforth (Mr. Harris) talking my language and that encouraged me to go on to tell my story of housing.
This incident happened this spring. I was driving along with a fellow and he told me that he had built a bungalow in Pembroke, twenty-five feet by twenty-five, complete with basement, full wiring, painting, decorating and all that. He had built this home while working a ten-hour, rather than an eight-hour day. I do not know whether his wife helped him with digging the cellar, but in any event it was dug by hand. He and his wife ran the cement for the cellar and they built their home without any additional help. This was all done while he was working at a well paid job ten hours a day. He did what is advocated by the hon. member for Danforth. He is a young, healthy, strong chap who came from the farm and knows how to work. He happened to have in reserve a bush lot from which he cut his own lumber.
When he finished his story I asked him if he had any idea how much cash he had invested in the bungalow. Believe it or not, this is what he told me. He said he could not be sure because they had not kept accurate accounts, but their best guess was $600. He said it was $600, not $6,000. I just wanted to give hon. members the details of this instance where a bungalow was built in Renfrew county, in the town of Pembroke.
I can give the house another incident. My wife and I live in a little cottage in Westboro. A little more than a year ago an air force man bought the lot alongside where we live. He was not a carpenter, but he was young
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and strong and willing to work. Occasionally he would get in one of his pals who knew more about carpentry work than he did. He has not a basement, but they got in their foundation and a roof over part of the building. His wife and son moved in and they lived there all summer. They accomplished enough to permit the family to live there during the winter. They are still working away at their home, but it is almost complete and it will be a beautiful place in which to live. I do not know how much cash it has cost him, but he has something to show for the work he put forth on holidays and nights, sometimes well up to midnight. As the hon. member for Danforth has said, if you are young it does not hurt you to work until midnight even at such strenuous work. This offers much in the way of a solution for our housing problem, this sort of effort on the part of individuals.
A few blocks over, another air force man did the same thing. He built himself a home and he moved there with his wife and child. Then he was transferred to Toronto and he sold his home for $3,500. I do not know how much of that was profit, but I want to endorse what the hon. member for Danforth has said. I wanted to point these incidents out as being, in part, a solution for the housing problem in this Canada of ours.
Mr. DONALD M. FLEMING (Eglinton): Mr. Speaker, I think I can compress what I have to say on this matter into the space of four or five minutes.
As far as the bill itself is concerned, there is nothing of any great importance in it. It contains routine amendments to the act and takes some of the strictness out of certain provisions. However, the bill has provoked a debate on some of the wider aspects of the housing problem. I am not going to review everything that has been said about housing conditions in Canada during the course of this debate, because all of it sadly is true. I think conditions are worse now than they have been at any time.
The fault does not lie in the terms of the National Housing Act; it lies with the administration. I think the time has come when we should have from the minister a comprehensive report on the housing situation in Canada. The house will remember that the minister made a comprehensive report on July 22, 1946, the first report of its kind for some months. All we have had this session is mere fragmentary reports.
The latest development is that Housing Enterprises Limited has come to a standstill. 
I should like to read three or four sentences of what I said on this subject on March 22, 1946, as follows:
Housing Enterprises Limited has announced that its objective in 1946 is the construction of
6.000	housing units in various Canadian centres. That is rental housing. That is a drop in the bucket. Let us not delude ourselves that this will be low-rent housing. It cannot be. The cost of construction today is such that Housing Enterprises Limited cannot build low-rent housing as that term is properly understood. They will probably be medium-rental houses.
Now, in May, 1947, the minister has announced that, because Housing Enterprises Limited cannot build low-rental housing, it has brought its operations to a standstill.
Then, bearing on the matter of the need for a report, may I remind the house of what the minister had to say on this subject when he spoke on July 22, 1946, as reported at page 3672 of Hansard:
As at March, 1946, our minimum immediate housing needs were estimated at 150,000 housing units. This figure is equal to the number of houses which under normal conditions would have been built during the war years to keep up with the increase in the number of families.
And farther on, he had this to say:
I believe that these figures and estimates, although approximate, are valid and that we can anticipate by spring 1947, an immediate housing deficit of some 180,000 units, or a worsening of the situation by some 20 per cent.
I think the house is entitled at this stage to know what is the present estimated housing shortage, according to the officials of Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation, or of the department presided over by the minister. I would remind the house that the estimate of an immediate emergency housing shortage of
180.000	units as at March 31, 1947, was based on the assumption that there would be built in Canada the full 60,000 housing units set forth in the government's housing programme for 1946.
Then, may I say this word in conclusion. Some may complain about the amount of time occupied in discussions in the house with respect to housing conditions in Canada today. The debate today is an example. What has been said may not have been strictly on the bill, because the bill covers a very narrow front in so far as the general problem of housing is concerned. Only four or five amendments are contained in it, and they are not related one to another.
This emphasizes what some of us have been trying to say in the house in the past three sessions, namely, that there should be a committee of the house to deal with this subject. I suggested a standing committee of the house on health, welfare, housing and

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social security, before which reports could be had and where it would be possible to bring officials from the department and officials from Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation for the purpose of securing first-hand information. This would save a good deal of the time of the house.
We do not save time in this chamber by refusing to set up committees of the house to deal with matters requiring intimate and detailed investigation. The housing problem of Canada is far too serious a matter to be allowed to await the time when the government chooses to open up a discussion on housing questions in the house, and to hand out to hon. members, at altogether too rare intervals, prepared statements respecting conditions.
The house has a far greater responsibility with respect to this crucial housing situation than can be discharged by methods of that kind. What we need is a committee before which can be brought first-hand information from officials who can be questioned, so that hon. members may inquire into what they consider to be wrong with the way things are done, and so that they may prod where prodding is necessary to see that proper remedial measures are undertaken. We are not dealing with this problem in the house in what I consider to be a proper and enlightened manner.


James Horace King: I would remind hon.
members that when the minister speaks he will close the debate.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Mr. Speaker, having made somewhat lengthy remarks when the resolution preceding the bill was being discussed, it is not my purpose to speak at length on the second reading of the bill. I shall have something to say about the various sections of the bill when we reach committee stage. However we have had a most interesting discussion, and perhaps I should comment on a few matters which were raised in that discussion.
The National Housing Act, which is being amended in the present bill, is the backbone of the financing of house building in Canada at the present time. The bill was amended last year; it is being amended this year, and I have every reason to believe that it will be amended next year, and perhaps at every session of parliament for several years.
The purpose of the amendments is to introduce such changes as may be warranted from year to year to make the National Housing Act an effective method for the financing of house building in this country. The hon.
member for Parkdale (Mr. Timmins), in his interesting remarks, suggested that he knew of no building held up for lack of financing. I understood him to say that he knew of no one who had been unable to build a house for lack of money, and that he knew of no builders who had been unable to build houses for lack of money.
That, I think, is an accurate appraisal of the situation. The fact that that is so is due, indirectly, to the National Housing Act. Obviously if borrowing on favourable terms is possible through the National Housing Act, private borrowing must be on a competitive level in order that such private borrowing may continue.
In any event, the result is that cheap and plentiful money has been made available for house building. We have heard the suggestion made tonight that the immediate answer to house building is subsidized state housing. I was surprised to hear that that suggestion came from all parts of the house, including the Progressive Conservative party. I am not closing the door to the possibility that subsidized state housing may be the ultimate solution of the problem; but I do say that if it is to be undertaken there must be quite a different chain of responsibility from the present one. Then, too, there must be a different supply situation, as to both materials and labour, from what exists at the present time.
I would remind hon. members that, under the British North America Act, housing is not a responsibility of the federal government. It comes in the field of property and civil rights, and is primarily the responsibility of the provinces. The federal government has recognized a responsibility for providing housing to take care of the dislocation in population arising through the war. It has been taking an active lead in providing housing for that purpose. But even though it is now taking the lead, it cannot proceed without the active cooperation of the municipalities.
There are great differences in various parts of Canada in the degree of success of housing programmes, and that difference is due wholly to the attitude of the various municipalities. Where a municipality has been cooperative, the number of houses has kept up fully to the requirements of the municipality. If a municipality is uncooperative the best efforts of the government can result only in a partial solution of the situation in that city or municipality. That is inevitable, and one of the handicaps of the department in attempting to provide adequate housing under present circumstances.

National Homing Act

I know of no case in any part of Canada where the government has refused to finance housing under conditions that conform to the requirements of the department. Therefore, if any city, or any municipality, in Canada has not its required housing, the fault is largely in the hands of the municipality. Through its active cooperation, that housing could have been made available.
If subsidized state housing ultimately proves to be the solution-and I have said myself that it may be unfortunate if that must be the solution-then the initiative must be taken by the local authorities, by the provinces and the cities, with the help of the federal government. I think no one will quarrel 'with that viewpoint. That is the only possible way of carrying out housing of that type. That is obviously the proper chain of responsibility.
Mention has been made of slum clearance. There is a great job to be undertaken in slum clearance. But that job must be undertaken through the leadership of the provinces and the- municipalities. Hon. members will appreciate that the federal government cannot go into a municipality and earmark certain blocks for demolition and reconstruction. That is a work for the municipality. I know of only one city which has undertaken any activity in slum clearance, and that is Toronto. As soon as the suggestion was made to the federal government that Toronto wished to undertake a project in slum clearance, part 2 of the National Housing Act was made effective, and assistance under that section was offered immediately to that city. At the present time Toronto, in undertaking that particular project, together with cities in Saskatchewan are the only cities in Canada empowered, under their charters, to enter into and to invest city funds in the housing field. I have seen no inclination on the part of the provinces to urge their cities to accept legislation that would entitle them to enter that field.
Slum clearance is a job that must be undertaken in Canada. It has been suggested that house building would be an effective method of relieving unemployment in time of depression. That is quite true, and it should be used for that purpose. In areas of spotty employment in Canada, the department urges that labour be absorbed in a housing programme. There is no more effective employer of several classes of labour than house building, and slum clearance is a splendid method of providing work where work is needed in low-employment areas. I hope that slum clearance will be used for that purpose. But obviously the time to undertake glum clearance is not at the period of highest employ-

ment in1 the history of this country, at the period when this country was never more prosperous.
Someone mentioned investment in housing in Sweden as compared with Canada. The difference is that housing in Sweden is state housing, and the figures given indicate the full cost of the housing, whereas the figures in Canada indicate only the government's share of housing investment, the bulk of the investment here is being carried by the lending institutions. The full expenditure in Canada on housing is vastly greater than the figures mentioned for Sweden. My department has studied house-building figures in all parts of the world, and we are unable to find any country which has built more houses per unit of population than has Canada during the post-war period.
We set a programme in 1915 for housebuilding in this country-I have mentioned it several times in the house-of 50,000 houses for the first full year after the war. We were able to improve on that. Slightly under
50,000	houses were built in 1945. The target for the second year was 60.000, and in 1946 we built 62,500. The objective is 80,000 for 1947. We have succeeded up to the present time in meeting our objectives. Whether we shall do so this year is in doubt at the moment. Progress of new construction must be much better in the next month or two if we are to meet that objective. The reason is that costs have risen to the point where a new orientation is required to provide houses within the reach of low-income families, and the purpose of this bill is to take steps in that direction. Means must also be found to overcome the shortage of serviced property in or near centres of population. That is another purpose of the bill.
A good deal has been said about Housing Enterprises Limited. I would point out that Housing Enterprises Limited was not a project of the federal government. It was a private corporation which borrowed money under the National Housing Act, just as any other corporation or private individual. It was formed to build low-cost housing. The government has never been happy about that phase of the project. Even in its early stages it seemed doubtful whether it was building a class of housing that this government should endorse as being in the low-rental area. However, the insurance companies had for years been bringing pressure on the government to end government construction. It was claimed that this was a field which should be left to private enterprise. The government has always countered with the answer: If that is your field, why not take some direct part in it? Housing Enteprises was started as a private

venture with the support of the federal government and by invitation of the federal government. The results have been becoming less and less satisfactory. Rentals that looked reasonably favourable in the early stages became higher than could be regarded as favourable in the later stages. When the decision was made by the insurance companies -not by the government-that activity in this field should be ended, the government had no objection.
The hon. member for Dauphin (Mr. Zaplitny) mentioned special concessions to Housing Enterprises Limited. He knows as well as I do that the same price for buildings to be dismantled in the prairie provinces has been made to all priority holders. Practically all the buildings in Saskatchewan were bought by the government of Saskatchewan on the basis that he has mentioned, eight per cent of the original cost. A large number of buildings in Alberta were bought by the provincial government of Alberta at eight per cent of the cost. A few buildings in Manitoba were bought by the government of Manitoba on the same basis. The first priorities go to the dominion, the second to the provinces and the municipalities. For its operations in the housing field Housing Enterprises Limited was considered to hold a first priority. The transaction was perfectly in order and perfectly parallel with the disposal of every building of that type in the prairie provinces. I could continue and go into more detail but I suggest, Mr. Speaker, that further discussion be in committee.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, bill read the second time, and the house went into committee, Mr. Macdonald (Brantford City) in the chair.
Section 1 agreed to.
On section 2-Corporation may execute documents.
Mr. FLEMING:: Will the minister say a
wmrd by way of further explanation of the scope of this section? Actually the section, as one reads it, confers on the corporation powers much beyond the purpose of the section as stated in the explanatory note. Has the minister a statement to make on this section? Can he indicate the concrete situation which has arisen, which in turn has given rise to the proposed amendment?


Clarence Decatur Howe: Section 2 of the bill proposes an amendment to give Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation power to convey property of His Majesty and deal with other matters with respect to title. The need for this amendment is that we are embarked 83166-230|	'
National Housing Act
upon a policy of selling Wartime Housing units to present tenants. The granting of the power is desirable so that the corporation may effect these sales arrangements and, in making title, avoid the cumbersome procedure of letters patent. Hon. members will remember that for the same reasons similar power is held by the Canadian farm loan board and the director of the Veterans' Land Act.
Section 3 (b) is further amended to give the corporation power to sell properties either for cash or on a deferred payment plan, and to take an agreement for sale or mortgage for the balance of purchase price owing.
The section is further amended by giving the corporation the right to sell mortgages or agreements for sale which they may hold as a result of selling Wartime Housing units. The amendment also gives the corporation power to dispose of loans made under the terms of the National Housing Act and in particular, loans made under the amendment proposed by section 8 of this bill. When the corporation takes a mortgage loan which fits the National Housing Act pattern, it is proposed that if participation in such a loan is sold to a lending institution, the loan may fall under the terms of an existing agreement or contract between the corporation and the lending institution.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Will the minister detail the method by which the houses built by Wartime Housing Limited can be vested in Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation before the situation contemplated by the new section will arise?


Clarence Decatur Howe: The title is vested in His Majesty. Ordinarily the title would pass by letters patent issued by His Majesty. This amendment will give Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation the right to act for His Majesty in making the conveyance in the ordinary way.


Donald Methuen Fleming: The section says:
Where title to real or other immoveable property is acquired by the corporation in the name of His Majesty . . .
Where the houses are built by Wartime Housing Limited, I wish the minister would indicate in detail how the title situation is worked out where the land is, in the first instance, conveyed by the municipality to Wartime Housing Limited. How do they get into the title position where the conveyance can be made to Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation?


Clarence Decatur Howe: Paragraph 3 reads:
Where title to real or other immoveable property is acquired by the corporation in the name of His Majesty or the corporation, either solely,
National Housing Act

or jointly with any other person, or where the corporation is authorized to sell or dispose of real or other immoveable property of His Majesty, the corporation may sell or otherwise dispose of such property . . .
That would be what my hon. friend refers to. The corporation is authorized to sell property of His Majesty.


Donald Methuen Fleming: That still is not clear. Where Wartime Housing Limited has entered into an agreement with the municipality to erect houses, the agreement is executed by Wartime Housing Limited. The reading of the section by the minister does not cover my inquiry. I am going back a step to ask the minister how the title at the present time gets into Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation to enable them to exercise the powers proposed to be conferred by this new section of the act.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Wartime Housing Limited
acquired title in the name of His Majesty. Title to houses was never held by Wartime Housing Limited; it was held by His Majesty, so that all Wartime Housing titles are in the name of His Majesty. So far as the agreements with municipalities go, of course the agreements must be negotiated before any sale is made. A sale can take place only when title to the property and to the house is absolute in the name of His Majesty. After that, the amendment now being made will permit Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation to sell the land of His Majesty by ordinary methods rather than by the method which is ordinarily used for conveying crown land, which is by letters patent.


Donald Methuen Fleming: I take it from the minister's answer, then, that in view of the terms of the agreements entered into by Wartime Housing Limited with the municipalities, it will be necessary in all cases to clear any individual sales to tenants with the municipalities.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Not individual sales.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Many of these agreements that I have seen have given the municipality the option to purchase these houses from Wartime Housing Limited. Is that a uniform provision in all the agreements? Will it therefore be necessary in every case to obtain a release of interest on the part of the municipality before Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation under this section would be in a position to convey title to the tenant?


Clarence Decatur Howe: That is correct.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Section 3 agreed to.

On section 4-Joint loan repayable for a period up to thirty years.
John Oliver Probe: This section indicates that a loan is available to the prospective owner by an agreement up to 95 per cent of the first
83.000	of the lending value of the house or any part thereof; 85 per cent of the amount by which the lending value of the house exceeds
83.000	and does not exceed 86,000, and 70 per cent of the amount over $6,000. On the surface this looks as though on the first $6,000 is would be possible to get a mortgage of $5,400. In other words, by putting $600 cash on the line a person would have an equity established in the house. But the lending value is altogether a different thing nowadays from the cost, I presume, of the construction of houses. What is the yardstick used by the department in setting the lending value of houses with reference to present building costs? Could we have a statement on that, because there is much disappointment? It is felt that prospective owners with $600 cannot buy a house that costs $6,000 to construct.


Clarence Decatur Howe: The lending value of the house is the cost of the house to an efficient builder. Under the integrated plan, there are builders who actually build houses under the lending value, and there are other builders who cannot build under but considerably over. It is the cost to an efficient builder.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Where are the efficient builders in Canada? Where are they to be found?


Clarence Decatur Howe: All across Canada.


John Oliver Probe: In practice, you would consider an official builder-


Clarence Decatur Howe: Not official, but efficient. We have different lending values for almost every town in Canada and they are fixed by the efficient builder in that area.


Mr. TIMMINS:: I have already pointed out to the minister what he said at page 2660 of Hansard:
We propose that where there is some control on the end sale price of the house to the home owner, the ratio of loan on a $3,000 lending value shall he 95 per cent, grading down to 90 per cent on a $6,000 lending value.
Do I take it that the amendment in respect of increasing the lending value applies only to loans on houses which are being built under the integrated housing plan?


Clarence Decatur Howe: The extra term is given only where the government can have some guarantee as to the selling price of the house. It applies to the integrated plan. It may apply

National Housing Act
in other cases if the government is satisfied that the selling price bears a reasonable relation to cost.


Harold Aberdeen Watson Timmins: It applies only where the government has some control over the question of what the sales price will be.


Clarence Decatur Howe: That is right,


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Would the minister explain subsection 6:
The governor in council may by regulation prescribe additional terms and conditions under which a joint loan may be made pursuant to subsection 5 of this section, and in addition may fix and determine a date on and after which or a period during which loans shall not be made under subsection 5 of this section.
This appears to me to be an unusual clause to have in the statute. Will the minister explain why it is so worded?


Clarence Decatur Howe: That refers to the point I have been discussing. The longer term is given only in cases where the government has some control over the sales price of the house, and the governor in council reserves the right to pass additional regulations as to the nature of the control required to obtain the benefit of that section.


John Oliver Probe: I am still anxious to get a further elaboration by the minister of what he means by an efficient builder with respect to lending value. Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation maintains a list of some sort of recognized builders in localities, or is it following an inspection of the building site that the corporation sets the lending value, or how is it that a prospective home owner can decide that he has enough money on hand to go ahead with a house-building project if he comes within the apparent percentages stated here? This is a more important point than so far it has appeared to be.


Clarence Decatur Howe: The departments with which I have been associated have been building low-cost housing since 1942 in every city in Canada. We believe we know what houses should cost, and the lending values are established accordingly. We find that efficient builders can often get below what we believe to be the fair cost of building houses in a locality. We call those efficient builders. Other builders have costs higher than we believe to be reasonable. We do not classify them as efficient builders. As costs vary, lending values are varied, and we believe we have sufficient experience to set the lending value at a fair cost for an efficient builder.


John Oliver Probe: Does the department set it on the plan of house which it receives-


Clarence Decatur Howe: Yes.


John Oliver Probe: - or does it set it on the estimate of the builder's efficiency?


Clarence Decatur Howe: We base it on plans and specifications.


Mr. FULTON:: With regard to future building under the W'artime Housing scheme, is it possible to build houses with basements? In my own city they want twenty-five more wartime houses, but they want them with basements and they have been told that they cannot have them if basements are required. Why is that not possible?


Clarence Decatur Howe: The purpose of Wartime Housing is to provide low-rental housing, and unless we can provide low-rental housing we prefer it to be furnished under some other government-sponsored plan. A basement costs from six to eight hundred thousand dollars-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Some basement.


John Oliver Probe: That is not efficient building.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Five to eight hundred dollars. I am so used to millions, hundreds of thousands are small amounts.


Mr. SMITH (Calgary West):: What's a million?


Clarence Decatur Howe: They cost from five to eight hundred dollars each and this adds several dollars a month to the rent. It often takes the house out of the low-rental area. Under Wartime Housing, we tried to have the rent from $22 a month to as high as $35. We have the integrated plan and there are several other plans. If a man wishes a basement we would like him to come under one of the other plans, which may not be more expensive than Wartime Housing, but we must keep Wartime Housing in its field, or we get out of our proper sphere.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Section 5 agreed to.
On section 6-Company may invest funds in purchase of land for housing development.
Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: The explanatory note on the opposite page says:
This new section JIB empowers life insurance, trust and loan companies to acquire land, improve it and sell it for residential purposes. The terms upon which any such land may be purchased, developed and sold under this section are set out in the section. The section also provides that Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation shall guarantee a company operating under this section a return of its investment,
National Housing Act

together with a rate of interest not to exceed two per centum per annum. The period of the guarantee shall not exceed fire years.
Will the minister tell the committee whether discussions have taken place with the municipalities which would be involved? I gather that this section has been added because of the difficulty in acquiring land, particularly in the metropolitan areas. If we are now proceeding by act of parliament to set up machinery that will allow development to take place adjacent to a city, then naturally the municipal authorities are vitally concerned and will want to know where they stand in the question of providing schools, sewers, parks and driveways. When developments of this type are completed they place an additional burden on the transportation facilities of the area. If, for example, a large development were to be completed outside Toronto, the city transportation facilities would have to be used to enable the people living in that area to come to work. That certainly places a burden on the people in the Toronto municipality. Will the minister indicate whether clearance has been given with the provincial and the municipal authorities, to make sure that this is not an invasion of provincial and municipal rights? Further, what guarantee will be given to the local authorities if a programme of this sort collapses? I gather that this act is being drafted with a view to accommodating Housing Enterprises; if, after they operated for a couple of years, they decided that their project was not feasible, who is to take the responsibility for guaranteeing the people in that particular municipality that they will not be saddled with a white elephant in maintaining these services in the area? Can the minister make a statement on that?


Clarence Decatur Howe: This act is not tailored to fit any existing situation. It certainly is not intended to fit Housing Enterprises. Their days of land assembly are finished1, as far as I know. This is to make provision for the assembly of land by a financial institution.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: What sort of financial institution?


Clarence Decatur Howe: Well, a mortgage company or ' an insurance company. Under the Insurance Act, an insurance company cannot purchase land. It is not legal under the act to do so. This would make it legal. It would make it possible for an insurance company or other lending institution to finance a properly organized agency to assemble land and develop it for sale to individual builders or to large

builders. The section provides that the approval of Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation must be obtained for all phases of the transaction, and the metropolitan planning boards are required also to give approval to the proposed development.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Where is that mentioned in section 6?


Clarence Decatur Howe: The metropolitan planning boards have jurisdiction in any event, and no land assembly could take place without the approval of the planning boards.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Should that not be provided for in the act?


Clarence Decatur Howe: It is in the provincial act. No authority can take that away. This is simply making financial provision to make it possible-


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Before you leave that point-


Clarence Decatur Howe: Just sit down now, please.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Thank you.


Clarence Decatur Howe: This simply makes it possible for the financing of land assembly by private agencies with the approval of Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation. The land assembly must be carried out under the laws of the province and the regulations of the municipality. That is necessary in any event. It is simply a private transaction. It is not the government using force majeure. It is simply the government lending money. We . believe it is necessary to provide that type of financing in order that land assembly and land services may be kept ahead of the housing requirements of this country, particularly adjacent to large cities.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: I understood the minister to say that Toronto was the only metropolitan area which had legislation that would enable the federal government to embark on this sort of thing.


Clarence Decatur Howe: No; I said nothing of the kind.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Then how many centres in Canada are there where there are metropolitan areas which have such legislation. The minister mentioned Saskatchewan. We have machinery there that would enable it.


Clarence Decatur Howe: If my hon. friend would1 listen instead of jumping up and down, he would appreciate what was said. I was not referring to the land assembly in any way when I made that statement. I was referring to the right of municipalities to invest municipal funds in building houses.

National Housing Act


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: The minister has still not answered my question. This section provides for moving into municipalities to develop new lands. As I pointed out, it will place a burden on the transportation, water and sewerage systems in adjoining municipalities. What provision is being made to ensure that the municipalities so affected will not be worse off as a result of this development than they would be without it?


Clarence Decatur Howe: If any municipality does not want it, it has a right to refuse its facilities. No municipality has to provide sewerage. No city has to provide sewerage for outside municipalities. This is not the government doing these things. The government is simply lending money, or guaranteeing the lending of money. These are private individuals assembling land under the laws of the province and under the regulations of the municipality.


Donald Methuen Fleming: As to this section, I think most of us in the house will be in agreement with the desirability of legislation of this type, having in mind what has been accomplished in the United States by some of the large financial institutions such as insurance companies and others in building housing. While this particular section does not go very far, perhaps it will help to bring about large-scale housing developments which have within them the possibility of good planned development in certain municipal areas. However, the thought that strikes me in reading this section is this. The power to be conferred by this section is hedged around with so many restrictions and conditions that I wonder if many of the financial institutions are likely to take advantage of it. When the legislation preceding this bill was under discussion, our socialist friends to the left made much of the fact that the guarantee of a two per cent return was to be given to these companies, together with the return of their capital investment, and the guarantee was to extend for a five-year period. In relation to the risks and other conditions which are attached, I do not think that can be said to be any great inducement to these lending institutions. The question was asked of the minister as to what conversations had been carried on with the lending institutions to see to what extent they would take advantage of legislation of this kind. I find that the minister said at page 2673 of Hansard of May 1:
I am sorry I cannot give the conversations with the lending institutions because I have not talked with any of them.
I assume that the conversations were carried on between officials of Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation and these financial
institutions. I think the committee would be glad to hear from the minister as to what indication has been given by such institutions as to the extent to which they are prepared to proceed1 with land assembly schemes of the type provided for in this section.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I am informed by officers of Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation that considerable interest has been shown by the lending institutions since the resolution preceding this bill was introduced. There is every indication that several important lending institutions will take advantage of this section. My hon. friend suggests that it is restrictive. It was intended to be restrictive. It was not to invite speculation in land on the "heads I win and tails you lose" basis. It is framed for developments which have, as their object, making land available for housing rather than for real estate speculation. I think my hon. friend will appreciate the necessity for avoiding the encouragement of speculation in land, under government guarantee.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Quite so. I think we are all in agreement with that idea, and we are all in agreement with the idea of avoiding the land butchery which has gone on in some of the outlying sections of the metropolitan areas. But unless these financial institutions at the present time have such a plethora of money on their hands that they do not know what to do with it, it seems to me that a two per cent maximum return presents very little attraction to them. It may be that these land assembly schemes will, in turn, lead to building schemes, and the institutions which have entered into them will derive some benefit through lending and mortgage business.


Clarence Decatur Howe: That is the answer.


Donald Methuen Fleming: It is only in a case of that kind that it would seem to me that two per cent would present any attraction to a lending institution.


John Oliver Probe: I should like to revert to the matter brought up by the hon. member for Mackenzie, and in this connection I should like to refer to page 4 of the bill. The new section 11B (2) (a) reads:
(a)	the land shall, in the opinion of the corporation, be suitable for a residential housing development.
Throughout the country are many urban and other municipalities which have planning boards of various sorts or master plans for their localities. In many provinces planning acts have been passed which give leads in the matter of planning. However, during the last few years and because of the great housing
National Housing Act

shortage federal agencies have been permitted to cut across the master plans of many municipalities. I think it is only fitting that I should refer at this time to my own city.
Regina is a well planned, pleasant, little city out on the prairie plains. As citizens of that city, we were proud of our accomplishments in the way of general planning. However, various emergency schemes of the federal government came into being and, by dint of necessity, we had to permit the placing of so-called temporary buildings in localities which were not at all suitable for housing. I think the minister and his department would be the last to say that they have furthered the over-all plan for the city.
The temporary nature of these structures does not take away from the fact that they create a situation which does not add to the attractiveness of the urban centre, and I am sure this situation applies in many other places, r should like to have the minister make an addition to the clause I have referred to and I move, seconded by the hon. member for Yorkton:
That section 6, subsection 11B (2) (a) be amended by adding after the words "housing development" the words "and approved as such by the government of the province, the planning body and the municipal council for the area in which the proposed residential housing development is situated."
If that amendment is incorporated it would take care of such matters as were mentioned by the hon. member for Mackenzie in the sense that the municipality would express final approbation of the facilities that are to be used, and the planning authority will sa.y whether or not they fit into the general plan for the area. We would not have the sort of thing that has occurred at Deschenes, near Aylmer, Quebec, where there is an enormous veterans development. Those houses were built in an actual swamp, and in many cases the basements have had to be serviced with pumps installed by the Department of Veterans Affairs.
That sort of thing could have been avoided if the local municipality had been drawn into the picture and consideration given to whatever provincial regulations existed in connection with the matter. If a particular municipality did not want to follow out a plan, that would be their tough luck, but it seems to me that there is a way through cooperation by which the true intent of a housing development can best be arrived at.


Mr. POULIOT:: The minister seems to be filled with good will. This discussion has involved a lot of technicalities in which I am not interested, any more than the man on the [Mr Probe.]
street. All I want to know from the minister is what anyone has to do to get a small home. That is a simple question and I do not ask it in an effort to be humorous. I simply want to know how the man on the street can secure a roof to place over his head and the heads of his family. These amendments will change very little the set-up which was organized some time ago. The purpose is excellent, but I ask the minister-and he knows I am sincere-if he can put in a nutshell what the man who wants a small home will have to do to get it.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I assume that my hon. friend is referring to the citizen who wishes to build a small home. All that he would need to do is, first, to obtain a good contractor and, then, through the contractor make application for a loan under the National Housing Act. If he could advance $600 he would be entitled to borrow sufficient money to build a home costing about $6,000. After he has built his home, he would have a mortgage which could be paid off in from twenty to thirty years, but he would have a roof over his head.


Jean-François Pouliot: I appreciate wh&t the minister has said and I hope that there will be the least possible amount of red tape in this matter. This is a tremendous problem. During the war, many country people were induced to give up their homes to move to the cities. That caused congestion and that is the reason why some families have to live in single rooms. The minister, every hon. member and every citizen in the country realize the importance of this problem. I sincerely hope that the minister will not be handicapped in his efforts by the red tape of other boards which perhaps would put obstacles in his way. I want the minister to have the most complete chance to execute his plan. He has done all he possibly could to improve housing conditions. This is, of course, completely outside politics, and is for the benefit of the people. Therefore I hope the procedure the minister has summarized will be just as simple for everyone as he has described it.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: The minister has
intimated that this is merely enabling legislation and that nothing can be done without the consent of the local authorities. The hon. member for Stanstead has also given me a little legal advice to the effect that this is enabling legislation.
But a reading of the section indicates that it is not merely enabling legislation. It commits us to guaranteeing a return on investment at a rate of interest not to exceed two per cent per annum for a period of years,

National Housing Act
and provides the conditions under which the investment will be made. It states that:
(a)	The land shall, in the opinion of the corporation, be suitable for a residential housing development;
(b)	the purchase price of the said land shall be satisfactory to the corporation;
(c)	the improvements to be effected and the cost thereof shall be satisfactory to the corporation;
(d)	the company shall submit to the corporation an application in a form satisfactory to the corporation containing such information and accompanied by such material as the corporation may prescribe;
(e)	the investment shall first be approved in writing by the corporation.
In view of the unanimous opinion of the house that we must have fuller cooperation on the part of the dominion, provincial and municipal authorities in solving our housing programme, I think we should not pass legislation such as is proposed by the minister without making it clear in black and white just what the municipalities will be committed to, if an act is passed. I think there must be some guarantee that the local authorities will not be saddled with the perpetual cost of maintaining services if some arrangement is entered into between the federal government and t'he life insurance companies to complete a development outside one of our cities. Unless there is some agreement among the people who will be affected, I believe we are heading for trouble. I hope the minister will accept the amendment moved by the hon. member for Regina City.


Clarence Decatur Howe: What the 'hon. member for
Regina City has moved, and which has been seconded by the hon. member for Mackenzie, is that we state in a dominion statute that a citizen of a province must obey the law of that province. It boils down to just that. It is a citizen of a province or a municipality that approaches Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation to obtain a loan to carry on a real estate development in a town in that province. If my hon. friend suggests that there must be a federal statute which says that a man must obey the laws of the province and municipality, I do not agree with him. I think he must do it in any case.


John Oliver Probe: I agree with the minister in that respect, and I am not particularly interested in the legal phraseology. But I do know this, and I believe the minister will agree, that a real estate company can acquire land without the leave of any local municipal body, and can call it a development scheme.
Mr. HACIvETT:	Acquire land that it
could not acquire without the statute.


Clarence Decatur Howe: My hon. friend suggests they
can acquire land. I suppose a man can buy it, but he certainly cannot build on it without the permission of the local authorities. The hon. member for Stanstead can give a ruling on that, too, if he wishes, if he sets himself up as an authority.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Not only does it apply to the people in the municipality involved, but the people in the adjoining municipality are also concerned. It is quite conceivable that a satisfactory arrangement may be made with the authorities of a township adjacent to a city, without consulting with the city authorities. I think it is important that we must clear with all the authorities concerned; and unless some amendment is inserted here, we are headed for trouble if we give the federal authority the right to enter into negotiations with private companies to develop in one municipality property which will place unfair burdens on those in adjacent municipalities.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Surely my hon. friend must appreciate that relations between municipalities is a matter for provincial regulation; it is not for a federal regulation. Again I say he is suggesting that we put in a federal statute a provision stating that the residents of a province must carry out the laws of the province. Surely that is not good legislation.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: All we suggest is that federal funds should not be spent on any development which will create in years to come a local grievance which will make it more difficult.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I agree that they should not.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: But we are guaranteeing against losses in connection with these developments. If you have developments such as Housing Enterprises have started it is quite conceivable that the people in a local municipality will be saddled with an unfinished development, and then the people in the adjoining municipality will have to provide services, bus transportation, light and power for people who have no other way of being serviced. It is not fair to commit the federal treasury to the losses which might result, without having this cleared before the development commences.


Donald Methuen Fleming: I entertain an even lower opinion of the amendment than that voiced by the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply, who placed his objections on constitutional grounds. As I understood him, he said there is no use in putting in a provision to the effect that the institution concerned
National Housing Act

must obey the provincial law. It must do that anyway. It would be just as foolish and just as futile to enact a provision that a provincial or municipal law should be dispensed with, because it would not have any effect.
I do not believe in parliament putting itself in a position of legislating nonsense or meaningless things. But this amendment is objectionable on other grounds as well. I think in all cases the provinces have enacted legislation which places control over land development in the hands of the municipalities. The province does not attempt to regulate or control the development of land itself.
This amendment proposes to say that, in addition to all the other requirements laid down in the section-and, goodness knows, there are so many of them that I fear it will be little used-parliament should say to every such institution that, having obtained the approval of Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation, the company must go to the provincial government, which probably has no machinery for dealing with the matter and is not the least bit concerned. Parliament would be saying this, "You have to get the approval of the provincial government, even though the provincial government will not interest itself in the matter." That is why they have conferred jurisdiction on the municipalities. Then, why tie this thing up in reams and reams of red tape-we have enough of it in the section now-and make the situation worse?


John Oliver Probe: I am prepared to admit there may be a certain amount of red tape. On the other hand, we have a duty to perform, and that is to prevent the purchase of land ostensibly for housing development, and then find that nothing is done about it for four or five years. Then, in the event that it looks to the corporation interested that the development may prove to be a white elephant, they will dispose of it just before the end of the five years, to make sure that they have their two per cent profit. Or, if it is successful, they may hold it at the end of fire years, at which time the government's interest in it expires, and they could make a fairly handsome profit out of it. I can foresee that situation developing.
I wonder if the Chairman would mind my asking the Minister of Veterans Affairs what municipality was consulted with respect to the Veterans Land Act development on Des-chenes road. I realize that may be slightly out of order because it does not deal with the matter directly in hand, but it does deal with community planning.


William Ross Macdonald: Of course the question is out of order, and if I allowed1 it similar questions might be asked.


William Irvine: There is no reason why it should not be answered for all that.


William Ross Macdonald: There is some doubt in my mind whether the amendment is in order, because it makes provincial consent an essential part of the jurisdiction we possess. However, I am not going to fule it out of order, although there is some doubt.
Amendment negatived.


John Oliver Probe: I move:
That section 6 be amended by adding, after subsection 11B, subsection 11C:
"(1) Where a municipality has under appropriate provincial legislation power to invest its funds in the purchase and improvement of land to be used for a residential housing development analogous to the power conferred upon a company under subsection (1) of section 11B, and such municipality satisfies the conditions and enters into an agreement similar to that required of a company under subsections (2),
(3)	and (4) of section dlB, the corporation shall guarantee to the municipality a return of investment and interest in the same manner as guaranteed to a company under subsection (3) (c) of section lilB, provided that any lands intended to be included in such housing development which are already owned by such municipality shall be deemed to have been acquired by the municipality as of the date of the agreement with the corporation.
(2)	Subsections (5), (6), (7), (II) and (12) of section 11B shall apply mutatis mutandis to an agreement with a municipality.
(3)	For the purpose of this section "investment" shall have the same meaning as in subsection (9) of section 11B, saving that the purchase price of any land to be included in the housing development which is already owned by the municipality at the date of tfie agreement shall not exceed the actual cost to the corporation, as may be defined by regulation or the fair market value, as may be determined by the minister, whichever is the lesser."
The intent of this amendment is to put municipal public housing authorities, where such exist or may be set up at a later day, at least on a par with private development companies in the application of this section of the act. As the minister indicated a few moments ago, the city of Toronto has the legal right to take advantage of this act, and urban municipalities in Saskatchewan would also be in a position to take advantage of the act if they were enabled to do so by a section such as this. Many municipalities still own a great deal of land of their own, and they would like to have it developed along lines which they have in mind and which are not related to private development business. For that reason I move this amendment, seconded by the hon. member for Saskatoon City.

National Housing Act


Clarence Decatur Howe: I would point out that this motion is entirely out of order because it would place a potential tax burden upon the people, and therefore can be moved only by a member of the government, preceded by a resolution approved by the governor in council. Obviously it provides for money legislation and therefore is beyond the competency of the hon. member to move.


William Ross Macdonald: For the reasons given by the right hon. minister I must rule the amendment out of order.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Section 7 agreed to.
On section 8-If loan not available under sections 4, 8 or 14 corporation may make loan.
Donald Methuen Fleming: This section purports to confer on the corporation power to extend loans in cases that are not covered by sections 4, 8 or 14. These three sections are taken from the first three parts of the act. Section 4 deals with the loan on the house owned by the occupant. Section 8 is taken from part 2 of the act, the rental housing section, and section 14 from part 3, dealing with rural housing. If there are any proper cases not already covered by those sections it seems to me at first blush that we should have appropriate legislation dealing with those cases specifically. It strikes me as anomalous that the government should propose a general provision of this kind saying: We have covered all the cases we can think of by sections 4, 8 and 14, but if we have left any out we are giving a general omnibus power to the corporation to make loans. The terms for a loan are not adequately defined, and the cases are not adequately defined. I question whether a provision of this sort is sound legislation for parliament to enact. I think the minister should have specific cases to lay before us.


Clarence Decatur Howe: The purpose is to make sure that the provisions of the housing act set up by these amendments can be implemented. Certain of the insurance companies have so far declined to agree to lend under the thirty-year amortization plan, and certain others object to the ninety-five per cent provision. Since the terms upon which the government guarantees funds are terms agreed to by parliament, the government is taking power to make direct loans on the terms indicated if the insurance companies decline to lend on the terms set out.
Mr. MoKAY: I think we are all pretty well agreed that everything should be done to encourage housing construction, particularly low-rental housing projects. I have been informed that some provincial governments
and cooperative organizations might enter the field if they had some encouragement from the federal government. If it is within the purview of the federal government I believe that it should give the same financial assistance to the provincial authorities which wish to enter the housing field as is given to life insurance companies and other organizations. I feel that this aid should be extended to municipalities, societies and associations such as cooperatives and on the same terms as are. being afforded to others under this act. I therefore move, Mr. Chairman, seconded by the hon. member for Dauphin:
That section 8 be further amended by adding subsection 31B, as follows:
"(1) The minister, with the approval of the governor in council may, on behalf of His Majesty, make a loan to a provincial housing corporation or to a local housing authority for the purpose of assisting in the construction of a low-rental housing project or in the purchase of existing buildings with the land upon which they are situated and their conversion into a low-rental housing project.
(2)	A loan under this authority of this section shall be on the same terms and conditions as those upon which a loan may be granted to a limited dividend housing corporation under section 9 of this act.
(3)	For the purpose of this section, local housing authority shall mean any municipality, society, association, corporation or commission having authority to construct, hold and manage houses built as a low-rental housing project.
(4)	The minister, with the approval of the governor in council, may, on behalf of His Majesty, guarantee to the provincial housing corporation or the local housing authority a net return in any year after completion of the project of three per centum per annum of the cost of_ the project for a period not exceeding the estimated useful life of the project and in any case not exceeding fifty years.
(5)	A loan or guarantee under this section shall, for the purposes of the Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation Act and section 13 of this act, be deemed to be a loan undier part II of this act.
(6)	The governor in council may by regulation make provision for any matters concerning which he deems regulations are necessary or desirable to carry out the purposes or provisions of this section."


Clarence Decatur Howe: I pointed out that the previous amendment was out of order. All I can say about this amendment is that it is outrageously out of order for the same reason.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: To put it in order, I wonder whether the minister would consider introducing it himself.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Not at all.
The, CHAIRMAN: It appears to me that it is the unanimous opinion of the committee that it is out of order.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: No.
National Housing Act


William Ross Macdonald: Then, for the reasons I have previously given, I must rule this amendment also out of order.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Before the title carries, may I say I think we should have a preamble, and I wish to say a word in connection with the preamble. In his remarks the minister mentioned that the Swedish performance was not as good as Canada's. I should like to remind him that in one of his publications, "Housing Progress Abroad," we find on page 1, "Purely on a population basis, Sweden would be about fifteen per cent ahead of Canada." I intimated this afternoon that I thought legislation of this sort should have a preamble that sets out in general terms the housing objectives of this parliament. I mentioned that in the United States and in Australia they have set out what would be considered a reasonable goal. Therefore I should like to move:
That the bill be further amended by inserting the following words before "His Majesty" in the preamble.
"Whereas, the purpose of this act is to provide a programme of housing for the Canadian people that will ensure a separate home in a good neighbourhood for every family who desires to have one.
And whereas, the principle must be accepted that society has reached the stage where a home of good quality and equipment is not only the need but the right of every citizen. Where the family's income does not permit the ownership or rental of such a home, it is the duty of the state to bridge the gap by a rental subsidy.
And whereas, an important objective in realizing this principle is the replacement of slums and other substandard housing, in urban and rural areas, to obviate overcrowding and to progress in an orderly and rapid manner toward a modern standard of housing for the whole Canadian people.	.
And whereas, another objective of great importance is the systematic planning of our cities and neighbourhoods so as to develop _ and redevelop communities which will provide good surroundings for home life and adequate facilities for advancing the industrial and cultural wealth of the nation.	.
And whereas, vital consideration in undertaking the large-scale housing programme envisaged by this act is the undeniable fact that a stable level of construction throughout the years immediately ahead is one of the most necessary factors in ensuring a steady level of employment which, in turn, will provide the buying power essential for prosperity at home and abroad.
Therefore,-"
I am sure it cannot be argued that the accepting of this general objective would, of necessity, commit the government to any definite expenditures until they saw fit to bring in a particular proposal. It is merely an outline of what I think should meet with the
whole-hearted support of the minister. The cost over the next ten years would be much less than the expenditures the minister undertook in connection with carrying out his responsibility while Canada was at war.


Clarence Decatur Howe: My hon. friend is attempting to amend a preamble. May I point out to him that there is no preamble to this bill.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Yes. "His Majesty by and with the consent ..."


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: No; that is not a preamble.


Clarence Decatur Howe: In any event, my hon. friend knows, as does every other hon. member, that his suggested amendment is simply propaganda; it means nothing.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: It is in line-


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Order.


Clarence Decatur Howe: If it has any meaning at all it is out of order, because it adds a potential burden on the taxpayer, and if it does not add a potential burden on the taxpayer it is pure nonsense.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: I am sure that the minister's friends in the United States and Sweden will be interested in finding out that a preamble drafted along similar lines to the preamble to similar bills in the United States and in Sweden is pure nonsense.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: My hon. friend is
endeavouring, I admit with the finest intentions in the world, to amend something that does not exist.


Mr. MacNICOL:: Like many other hon. members, the hon. member knows nothing about housing.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: My understanding is that we have a preamble before section 1.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: No; there is no preamble to this bill.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: If not, we can make one. I find from Beauchesne that it is in order to have a preamble to every bill.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: May I tell my hon. friend that if he asked Doctor Beauchesne for his opinion he would find that he does not believe there should be a preamble to any bill.
Amendment negatived: yeas 18; nays 40.


[Stage Direction]
Title agreed to.
Bill reported, read the third time and passed.
[The Chairman.]

Railway Act Amendment


[Stage Direction]
Hon. LIONEL CHEVRIER (Minister of Transport) moved that the house go into committee to consider the following resolution:
That it is expedient to present a bill to amend the Railway Act to make provision, inter alia, for an increase in the salaries of the commissioners and for an annual grant of two hundred thousand dollars for a period of ten years towards the maintenance of the railway grade crossing fund.
Motion agreed to and the house went into committee, Mr. Macdonald (Brantford City) in the chair.
Stanley Howard Knowles: Will the minister make a statement.


Mr. CHEVRIER:: The bill which is based on this resolution will seek to increase the salaries of the members of the board of transport commissioners and at the same time, to pay into the grade crossing fund over a period of ten years the sum of $200,000 a year. I need not read the resolution; it is on the order paper. I think, however, the house will expect me to say something about the reasons which lie behind the decision to increase the salaries of the board of transport commisioners.
The board of transport commissioners was set up in 1903, and I think I can make this general statement, that with but one exception there has been no increase in the salaries of the commissioners for a period of forty years.


John Ritchie MacNicol: What is the salary today?


Lionel Chevrier: I will come.to that in a moment. I say this, notwithstanding the fact that the duties of the commissioners have increased considerably over the years, as I will indicate in a moment or two.
In 1903. when the board was set up, the salaries of the commissioners were as follows: chief commissioner, $10,000; deputy chief commissioner, $8,000; and the commissioner- because there was only one at that time- $8,000. In 1908, when the number of the board was increased from three to six, the salaries were: chief commissioner, $10,000; assistant chief commissioner, $9,000; deputy chief commissioner, $8,000; and each of the three commissioners, $8,000.
In 1913 the salary of the chief commissioner was increased from $10,000 to $12,500 per annum, and except for that increase having to do with the salary of the chief commissioner in 1913, the salary range stands today as it was forty years ago.
Over the years from 1903 to 1908 the
judicial salaries in the different courts, as well as salaries of officials in other phases of the government service, have been substantially increased to meet changing conditions. The same upward trend over the years has been evidenced, perhaps to an even more marked degree in the salaries paid in various lines of private business and endeavour.
The government in 1930 set up a commission to study the salaries and organization of the civil service throughout Canada. It was known as the Beatty commission, and it brought in a report which recommended substantial increases in the salaries of the board of transport commissioners. However, it was not deemed advisable to follow the recommendations of that commission. Then in 1946 the present government set up the Gordon commission, which made certain recommendations. The recommendations of that commission were that the salary of the chief commissioner be raised to $13,500, that of the assistant chief commissioner to $12,000. and that of each of the commissioners to $10,000. The report made certain other recommendations having to do with superannuation, which I need not go into at the moment. But the government has seen fit to adopt that part of the Gordon report only having to do with salary increases, and has implemented it in the present resolution.


Mr. HACKETT:: That would make the salary of the chief commissioner $13,500?


Lionel Chevrier: That is right.


John Thomas Hackett: The assistant, $12,500 and the others, $10,000?


Lionel Chevrier: The assistant, $12,000 and the others, $10,000 each. By the others, I mean the commissioners.


Donald Methuen Fleming: What about the deputy?


Lionel Chevrier: The same as the commissioners.


Mr. McKAY:: Would the minister please name the commissioners?


Lionel Chevrier: I have not their names before me at the moment, but I think I can give them from memory. The chairman is Colonel Cross, the deputy chief is Mr. Hugh Wardrope; the assistant deputy chief commissioner is Mr. Sylvester; the commissioners are Mr. Stoneman, Mr. Stone and Mr. MacPherson. I should have said that the board of transport commissioners, by virtue of the provisions of the Railway Act, is a court of record. The jurisdiction of the board of transport commissioners, when it was set
Railway Act Amendment

up in 1903, was quite limited. Its powers had to do with the regulation, construction and operation of railways other than government railways within the legislative jurisdiction of the parliament of Canada. That was general in its terms. But since then the jurisdiction has been extended tremendously. For instance, it now covers express tolls, telegraph companies, telephone companies, international bridges and tunnels, maritime freight rates, the abandonment of operation of lines, the Canadian National-Canadian Pacific Act, the Transport Act, certain agreements made pursuant to chapter 32, section 1 of the Statutes of Canada, the purchase of electrical energy from a person who has acquired water power under lease from the crown; the operation of the railway grade crossing fund, and so on. So that one can see that over that period of more than forty years the duties of the transport commissioners have been extended tremendously.


John Thomas Hackett: The volume of work has decreased.


Lionel Chevrier: No; the volume of work has not decreased.


Mr. MACDONNELL (Muskoka-Ontario):: Would the minister give some indication with regard to that?
, Mr. HAZEN: It has not obtained jurisdiction over air services?


Lionel Chevrier: No. Jurisdiction over air service is given to the air transport board, which is an adjunct of the Department of Reconstruction and Supply.


Stanley Howard Knowles: It comes under the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply.


Lionel Chevrier: Yes.


Howard Charles Green: "Adjunct" is the right word.


Lionel Chevrier: Perhaps I had better follow the suggestion of the hon. member for innipeg North Centre and simply say that it comes under the jurisdiction of the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply.


Stanley Howard Knowles: That is right.


Lionel Chevrier: I could go into greater detail. The hon. member for Muskoka-Ontario asked m what way the jurisdiction of the board had been extended.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: May I make this explanation, because I had somewhat the same idea as the hon. member for Stanstead, that while it is no doubt exactly correct, as the minister has stated, that in one sense the jurisdiction has been greatly

extended, in the early years of the century there was a tremendous amount of construction work going on, and the railway board, as I think it was called then, was an important part of our mechanism. I do not think one has, perhaps through ignorance, the same feeling about the board today.
Mr. CHE\ RIER: I have not yet completed my statement, and perhaps I should. I do not want to go into too great detail. If the committee wants to get further information about the board of transport commissioners, I am quite willing and at liberty to give it, but I think my remarks on the resolution should be of a general nature. I have given the basis for the decision to increase the salaries. I should like now to turn for a moment to the other part of the resolution which has to do with the grade crossing fund.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Before the minister does that, would he answer one other question with regard to the commissioners? What is the pension or superannuation basis in their case at the present time, or what will it be?


Lionel Chevrier: None whatever. They have no pension.


John Thomas Hackett: Just a ten-year tenure?


Lionel Chevrier: That is right.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Their salaries are quite high. They ought to be able to take care of themselves.


Lionel Chevrier: To deal now with the grade crossing fund, there has been no payment into the grade crossing fund since the beginning of the war. The grade crossing fund was set up in 1909, and it provided for a payment of 8200,000 a year into the fund for a period of ten years. Those payments were made to cover three ten-year periods, namely, thirty years, and that provided for a payment of $6,000,000 into the fund. In 1939 the last ten-year period expired and no further payment was made during the war. When there were exceptional cases, they were dealt with by separate vote. There has been paid into that fund up until now, including the thirty-year payment, roughly speaking $7,300,000.


John Thomas Hackett: Will the minister permit a question?


Lionel Chevrier: Yes.


John Thomas Hackett: 
Lionel Chevrier: I was going to deal with that later on, but perhaps I had better do so immediately. The government deals with this problem, not only by means of the grade crossing fund, but also by special vote. At the moment the board of transport commis-isioners have been asked to make a survey and investigation of those projects which, in their opinion, demand immediate action or priority action. Although the survey has now been in the course of preparation for some months, it is not yet completed. When it is completed, those projects will be approved or disapproved by the Department of Reconstruction and Supply. Some of them will be marked with a top priority, and for those that are marked with a top priority I presume funds will be voted either out of a vote in the estimates of the Department of Reconstruction and Supply or out of a special vote of parliament. So that in answer to my hon. friend's question, I say that, over and above the payment into the grade crossing fund, additional contributions are made by special vote.


Mr. COLDWELL:: Will the minister permit a question which he may answer later if it is inconvenient for him to do so now? On what basis are grants made? Do the railways contribute? Is there a stipulation, or does the country undertake it entirely?


Lionel Chevrier: Are you referring to the grant going into the grade crossing fund?


Major James William Coldwell: No. I am talking about the elimination of grade crossings. When a grade crossing is to be eliminated the money comes out of this fund or by a vote of this house. Do the railways in any way contribute to that?


Lionel Chevrier: Yes. This is the position. Let us assume that the board of transport commissioners approves a certain project where the grades should be separated. They may order a payment out of the grade crossing fund not to exceed $100,000. They may order the municipality to pay a portion of the cost, the province to pay a share, or the counties to pay a certain portion. It depends upon the amount of traffic.


Major James William Coldwell: But not the railway?


Lionel Chevrier: Oh, yes.


Major James William Coldwell: You did not mention that.


Lionel Chevrier: I should have mentioned the railway; yes, definitely.


Major James William Coldwell: That is the point I was getting at.


Lionel Chevrier: Yes. Unquestionably the railway has a portion to pay. I have not any particular project in mind at the moment, but a portion may be paid out of the grade crossing fund, a portion from the railway and a portion from the municipality or the province, as the case may be.


Mr. BENTLEY:: The percentage paid by the railway would vary with each project, would it?


Lionel Chevrier: Yes, and they vary in
accordance with the importance of the road or the railway.


Major James William Coldwell: Or whether the railway was there" first.


Lionel Chevrier: Yes. I should like
to go on with the reasons for these payments. A moment ago I referred to the $7,000,000 paid into the fund. Over and above that, there has been expended another S6,000,000 in connection with these projects. The proposal here is to continue payments into the fund as was done prior to the war. While the resolution deals with the two matters to which I have referred, the bill will provide for other amendments to the Railway Act which I need not go into at this time.


Thomas Langton Church: The resolution provides
for a change of policy. I think I have had as much experience with the board of transport commissioners as any other member of the House of Commons. In 1909 this board was given jurisdiction over telephone and express companies. The bill is to provide for an increase in the salaries of the commissioners. They are now getting the salary of a high court justice and, in addition, they have their travelling expenses, private car and many other things like that. The commission is not carrying out the functions for which it was appointed. When the late Hon. Mr. Justice Mabee was chairman of the old board, it did so and got results.
One section of the Railway Act provides that the board of transport commissioners may, of their own volition, check operations of railroads, express and telephone companies and do other things. Is there any regulation of the railroads in this country today? During the war, a thousand people were killed at level crossings, and it is now proposed to spend $200,000 a year. This is only pin-money. The board is not functioning the way the founders of the board by statute law intended that it should. When Mr. Justice Mabee was chairman he followed the act and summoned the Bell Telephone Company, the express companies and other companies to
Railway Act Amendment

show cause on complaints. The board should carry out the functions for which it was appointed.
It is now proposed to set up a commission to regulate water traffic which is now unregulated. The seamen want such a board. The city of Toronto was forced to spend a $12,000,000 contribution to build a viaduct and harbour and eliminate grade crossings across the whole water front. This $200,000 will largely be spent in one province and it is mere pin-money to help eliminate the level crossing peril. All that they will be able to do is to buy a few bells, wigwags, lights or other means of providing temporary protection. About a year ago the government said to wait until the war was finished and they would show what they were going to do about grade crossings, that they were going to work with the Ontario and other governments. They have provided for large expenditures of money, up to a million dollars, to link in some highways in some of the larger cities. But nothing is being done about grade crossings and these killings will go on just the same.
Another opportunity will be presented when the bill is before us, but I want to say that the railway commission should be doing something to protect the people travelling on our railways. When the late Doctor Manion was our leader, he referred to the government railway as the deadheads railway on account of the huge pass system. The railway commission should look into this whole system of granting passes to see whether there are any abuses. They are not doing it. It is only a minor thing, and I am not objecting to transportation for members of the House of Commons, officials and others, because that is allowed by the Railway Act. But there are many abuses, and I know of some myself from newspaper articles and complaints by letters. There will be other opportunities and I do not want to delay the passing of this resolution. This railway commission should carry out the functions for which it was appointed. We have already had a discussion on this matter of grade separation, during the debate on my bill to amend the criminal code, re deaths at level crossings, and the perils and injury there.


Donald Methuen Fleming: The minister indicated that there would be other amendments which are not referred to specifically in the resolution. ill any of those amendments relate to the railway grade crossing fund and the manner in which payments may be made from that fund to assist in the elimination of grade crossings?


Lionel Chevrier: The only amendment having to do with the grade crossing fund is the one providing for the payment of $200,000 a year for ten years.


Thomas John Bentley: There are one or two questions I should like to ask the minister.


Lionel Chevrier: I understand that the question period is on the bill itself and not on the resolution. I have no objection to answering questions, but if there is to be a series I would rather have them asked on the bill.


Thomas John Bentley: They are simple questions. First, I should like to ask if the grade crossing fund is administered entirely by the board of railway commissioners.


Lionel Chevrier: Yes.


Thomas John Bentley: Would that take care of these small diversions that sometimes are necessary in small villages when a highway is diverted, as well as overhead crossings and subways?


Lionel Chevrier: I do not know what particular project my hon. friend has in mind. If he is referring to a grade separation, the answer is yes. He refers to a diversion of a road, and I am not quite sure what he means.


Thomas John Bentley: Sometimes where a highway crosses a railroad going on one side of or through a village it can be diverted to run on the other side.


Lionel Chevrier: Yes, I would say that such a project could be covered by a payment out of the fund.


Thomas John Bentley: Is there any provision for changing something that has already taken place?


Lionel Chevrier: Yes, provided that one of the parties makes an application de novo before the board.


Mr. KIDD:: I do not want to oppose the resolution in any way. It is in two parts, one providing for an increase in the salaries of the commissioners and the other for the payment of $200,000 a year over a period of ten years. I should like to draw to the attention of the minister something which happened last Sunday evening which has to do with the railway station at Kingston, and I shall discuss this matter again when the estimates are before the committee. There is a level crossing there, and a definite promise has been made to build a new station at Kingston. What I saw last Sunday evening is a shame and a disgrace. I think the minister will see the same thing at the station at Cornwall.

Railway Act Amendment
Last Sunday evening marked the holiday week-end, and crowds of people were taking the train at 6.30 o'clock that evening. At that time there was a downpour of rain. We talk about railway crossings, but on the proper occasion I intend to draw this matter to the attention of the minister, and, if necessary, to the attention of the Prime Minister. Women and children must hurry to catch these fast trains. The train running between Toronto and Montreal operates in two sections, one of which leaves Ottawa and joins at Brockville. Sometimes the first section will come in first, and sometimes the second.
But at 6.30 p.m. in this downpour of rain, these people had to run for the train. Let me pay a compliment to the train officials who do the best they can under the circumstances. But these trains are undermanned, despite the fact that there are all kinds of men wanting positions today, and among those are returned soldiers. The train officials do not lack in courtesy.
When the train pulled in on Sunday night, what happened? Women and children had to run the length of four or five coaches, past the dining car. Then, when they reach the point where they are to enter the car they find that there may or there may not be a stool to step on. On that occasion I saw a mother running along with a baby in one arm and with luggage in the other. Meantime, if they want to get on the train they must stand in line while forty or fifty people get off, and the others get on. Then, when they get on they go into a full coach, and they must carry their luggage through probably two or three coaches. Surely something should be done about this. Money is being sought for railway crossings, but this is a simple matter.
I think the Canadian National Railways, so far as the Montreal-Toronto service is concerned, needs checking up by someone. I am not referring to the officials, but I say they should have extra help, and the rights of the public should be respected.
There are plenty of nails, and there is lumber available. All that would be necessary would be the erection of what is known as a wooden umbrella to run the length of eight or ten coaches. When the railway estimates are before the committee I intend to bring this matter to the attention of the minister, and, if necessary, to that of the Prime Minister. I have already put it in writing to the president of the railway company, and I am suggesting that something should be done.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: When a grade separation is ordered and the
various proportions of cost are fixed by the board, who carries out the work? Is it the railway concerned?


Lionel Chevrier: As a rule it is the railway concerned; but in certain cases it is by agreement between the parties.
I can think of two or three casgs where it will be done by the railways. When an application is made to the board, the board serves a copy of such application upon the railway and municipality concerned. The railway thereupon sends its engineers to ascertain whether the grade can be separated, and the cost thereof, whether it should be an under-pass or an over-pass, and what the cost will be in each case. Then, when the municipality or other party replies, either for or against the application, the board has all the facts and renders its decision.


Donald Methuen Fleming: After a hearing.


Lionel Chevrier: Yes. Then the railway builds the separation, generally by giving out the contract after advertising for tenders.


Mr. STEPHENSON:: With respect to automatic signals installed at various crossings, it is my understanding that the materials which go into these signals are not made in Canada. Am I right in that?


Lionel Chevrier: Some are and some are not.


Charles Elwood Stephenson: Is there a company manufacturing and installing them in Canada?


Lionel Chevrier: I cannot say.


Charles Elwood Stephenson: I understand there is not. I believe there is no company manufacturing them, and yet when they are brought in there is a duty of forty per cent on the materials coming into Canada. Can the minister tell me whether or not that is correct?


Lionel Chevrier: I cannot at the moment, but I shall try to give the information on the bill.


Charles Elwood Stephenson: If they are not manufactured here, why should we have to pay that duty?


Major James William Coldwell: That applies to a lot of other things, too.


Arthur Leroy Smith: I speak
because I am in favour of the principle of the resolution, and particularly the last portion of it, with respect to the $200,000. I think that is a moderate price to pay for the many lives we shall save by grade separation.
Railway Act Amendment

I should like to ask a question with respect to the first part of the resolution. When the time comes, would the minister give us some idea of the amount of work done by the board? I speak with some diffidence because the chairman of the board is married to a relative of mine. I think I should be honest enough to state that.


Stanley Howard Knowles: In other words he is an in-law.


Arthur Leroy Smith: Outlaw, did you say?


Stanley Howard Knowles: No, in-law.


Arthur Leroy Smith: I think there is a great deal in what my desk-mate, the hon. member for Muskoka-Ontario has said, namely, that in earlier years there were periods of construction, quarrels between the railways as to which should go here or there, expropriation proceedings, and movements by people in the various villages and towns to have stations established and agents placed. Then we went through another time when the railways took another view and wanted to close certain lines and certain stations, remove telegraphers, and so on. But my offhand view has been that in the last few years, and certainly up to the time of the undertaking in which they are now engaged, the work of the board has been more limited than it was in earlier days. I hope I am wrong about that, but perhaps the minister would give me a clear statement as to the amount of work going on. I know they do not go west anything like as much as they used to.


Lionel Chevrier: They are certainly working full time now.


Arthur Leroy Smith: That is quite true; but this is the only major operation in which they have been engaged for a long time. I can certainly agree that they are busy now, and I agree that proper salaries should be paid to them, or to anyone else, but when we reach the proper stage I hope the minister will be prepared to give us some idea of the amount of work they are doing.
Resolution reported, read the second time and concurred in. Mr. Chevrier thereupon moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 255, to amend the Railway Act.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.


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

Friday, May 30, 1947