1947-04-28

ORGANIZATION AND ESTABLISHMENT OF PERMANENT POSITIONS ON STAFF

Mr. SPEAKER:: I wish to lay before the house a list showing the organization and establishment of the permanent positions on the staff of the House of Commons.



THE PRIME MINISTER


Mr. JOHN BRACKEN (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker, with your permission I rise to speak on behalf of my associates; indeed, on this occasion I trust I speak for the whole house when I express to the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) a warm welcome upon his return. I am sure we are all pleased to see him looking so well, and we trust that he is as well as he looks. If either now or in the future he should require any further rest, I am sure also that it will be readily given by every section of the house. Judging from his appearance, I gather he does not need one. His ruddy complexion would indicate that the sunshine of Virginia has done him more good than the storms in the House of Commons have done the rest of us.
I am happy to be able to assure him that in his absence the house was most competently led by the Secretary of State for External Affairs (Mr. St. Laurent). Sometimes he and his associates were right in their attitude toward the public questions which came before us; always, when they were right they had the support of those of us on this side of the house. But sometimes both he and his associates were wrong, and on those occasions we did our best to get them back on the right trail.
I am sure I speak for all hon. members when I say we are glad to see the Prime Minister back, and we trust his condition is such that he may carry on his duties here without any danger of further impairment of his health.


Mr. ANGUS MacINNIS (Vancouver East):: Mr. Speaker, I rise not because the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bracken) is not speaking in this matter for this group as well as for his own, but to add my expression of personal pleasure at seeing the Prime Minister back in his place, and to express the hope

The Prime Minister
that he may long be spared to fill that position, or, if not, some other position in the house.
I would also associate myself with tire leader of the opposition in his reference to the acting leader of the house during the Prime Minister's absence. I think I am not speaking too strongly when I say that during that time he has endeared himself to hon. members in all parts of the house.
Mr. SOLON E. LOW (Peace River): Mr. Speaker, I am sure we share the sentiments expressed by the leader of the opposition and the hon. member for Vancouver East (Mr. Maclnnis). We are happy to see the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) back in his place.
During his absence I believe we did a pretty good job; the amount of business transacted was, I should think, quite satisfactory. Of course we are not hoping that the Prime Minister may have to go again soon, so that.we can do more; but I am suggesting that we took his advice and carried on quite well in his absence. We hope his health will continue to be good, so that he may not be forced to go away again.


Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, may I thank most warmly my hon. friend the leader of the opposition and the hon. gentlemen who have spoken for other parties on the opposite side of the house and the members of their parties, for the kind welcome they have extended to me; and may I also extend to all my fellow members on this side of the house my warmest thanks also for the manner in which they received the words of hon. members opposite.
I need not say how delighted I am to be back in the House of Commons. My little trip to the south has done me a lot of good. I felt considerably in need of a rest before going away; but I have come back feeling greatly benefited by it, and I hope from now on in the proceedings of the house I shall be able to pull my full weight in the boat.
While the weather in the south was a bit inclement, I gather it was not quite as bad as it was here. However that is all more than compensated for by what hon. gentlemen opposite have been saying about the progress that has been made in the business of the house in the last few weeks.
May I join with those who have spoken of my colleague, the Secretary of State for External Affairs, in expressing to him my warmest thanks for the manner in which he
has led the house during my absence and for the example which he has set to all its members, including myself.
I should like also to express a word of warm appreciation to the members of the press gallery and other friends who greeted me so cordially on my arrival back in the city on Saturday afternoon, and a word of very sincere appreciation of the many courtesies extended to me while I was in the United States, particularly by the government of the United States.
I am happy to be able to inform the house that the President, Mr. Truman, has definitely accepted the invitation of the Governor General and the government to visit our capital, probably in June, and that Mrs. Truman will also accompany him. The President expressed to me the hope and expectation that he and Mrs. Truman would be accompanied by their daughter. I gave to the President the assurance, which was unnecessary, that he and the members of his family would receive a very warm welcome from the citizens of Canada.



RECORD OF HASTINGS COUNTY, ONTARIO, IN 1946

Mr. G. H. STOKES (Hastings South):: On a question of privilege, Mr. Speaker, I desire to call your attention and that of hon. members of this house to a report recently issued by the Ontario department of agriculture to the effect that in 1946 the county of Hastings produced 8,148,S21 pounds of cheese, which surpasses the record of any other county in the province of Ontario.



REPORTS OF COMMITTEES


[Stage Direction]
Mr. GORDON B. ISNOR (Halifax) presented the first report of the standing committee on public accounts, and moved that-the report be concurred in.
Motion agreed to.
Mr. GORDON B. ISNOR (Halifax) presented the second report of the standing committee on public accounts.
Mr. S. M. CLARK (Essex South) presented the first report of the sessional committee on railways and shipping owned, operated and controlled by the government, and moved that the report be concurred in.
Motion agreed to.
Reports Tabled

Right Hon. C. D. HOWE (Minister of Reconstruction and Supply):: I desire to table the annual report of Trans-Canada Air Lines for the year ended December 31, 1946, in English and French. The report is being distributed this afternoon.
By leave of the house I move:
That the annual report of Trans-Canada Air Lines for the year ended December 31, 1946, tabled this day, be referred to the sessional committee on railways and shipping owned, operated and controlled by the government.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I desire to lay on the table the report of the air transport board, being a review of licences respecting commercial air services pursuant to section 13 of the Aeronautics Act,
I desire also to table a copy of P.C. 1337, being an implementation in part of the recommendations of the air transport board.



CIVIL AVIATION


Clarence Decatur Howe: I wish to call the attention of the house to the fact that the first assembly of the international civil aviation authority will be held in Montreal commencing next week. The delegates from Canada will be myself, as chairman; Mr. A. C. McKirn, Canadian representative on the ICAO council; Mr. R, A. C. Henry, chairman of the air transport board; Mr. J. P. R. Vachon, member, air transport board; Air Vice Marshal
A.	Ferrier, member, air transport board and
S.	Graham, superintendent of air regulations, Department of Transport.
The alternates will be Mr. J. R. Baldwin, assistant secretary to the cabinet; Mr. G. P. Kidd, Department of External Affairs; Mr. C. S. Booth, secretary, air transport board, and Mr. W. M. Sharp, Department of Finance.
(Translation):
.	REPORT TABLED



CANADIAN NATIONAL RAILWAYS-AUDITORS' REPORT

[Stage Direction]
French version of the report submitted by George A. Touche and Company, auditors for 
the Canadian National Railways, for the year ended December 31, 1946.-Hon. Mr. Chevrier.
(Text):

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

Mr. BRYCE:: 1.	What were the total premium receipts under the Civil Service Insurance Act for the 25 years ending December 31, 1946?
2.	What were the total losses in the same period?
3.	What amount of insurance was in force under this act on December 31, 1946?


Mr. MAYHEW:: 1.	The total premium receipts under the Civil Service Insurance Act for the 25 years ending March 31. 1946, were $10,687,110.74.
2.	The total losses (death claims paid) in the 25 years ending March 31. 1946. were $4,785,024.41.
3.	The total amount of insurance in force
under this act on March 31,	1946, was
$30,691,755.32.	,
The above figures are given with respect to March 31, 1946, as all of the records regarding the operation of the act have been kept by fiscal years. No figures are available with respect to calendar years.


MARINE INSURANCE BROKERAGE-COMMOMTY PRICES STABILIZATION CORPORATION
Mr. FLEMING:: 1.	What broker holds the marine insurance on Commodity Prices Stabilization Corporation Limited?
2.	When was this insurance placed through him?
3.	What brokers previously held this insurance, and on what terms?
4.	Why was it placed through the present broker, and on what terms?
5.	What other insurance, if any, does such broker hold for other crown companies and government departments and government boards, and what premiums have been paid for such insurance?


Mr. MAYHEW:: 1.	Messrs. Dale and Co. Ltd.. Montreal, P.Q.
2.	March, 1942.
3.	None.
4.	Because they were a reputable firm in the business with excellent connections in the United Kingdom, United States and Canada, and could give the essential security required. By its very nature bulk purchasing requires

Questions	.
that marine insurance should be concentrated under one open cover policy. The corporation's risk on any one steamer was very considerable at times and to assure insurance "lost or not lost" an open cover was essential. Furthermore, the single open cover policy assured that the corporation received the lowest rates with the broadest terms and the maximum security.
5.	No information.


SUGAR STABILIZATION CORPORATION
Mr. BLACKMORE:: 1.	On what date was the Sugar Stabilization Corporation Limited formed by the government?
2.	For what purpose was this corporation' formed ?
3.	Who are the directors and officers of this
corporation?
4.	Which of these was appointed by or through the civil service commission?
5.	Which of these was not appointed by or through the civil service commission?
6.	In each of these latter cases, why not?
7.	What background and experience in the case of each director or officer justified his appointment?
8.	At how much is the yearly cost of administration of this corporation estimated for (a) salaries, fees; (b) rent; (c) travelling expenses; (d) postage, telegraph and telephone; (e) office supplies; (f) publicity and advertising; (g) all other expenses not elsewhere provided for?


Mr. MAYHEW:: 1.	By supplementary letters patent dated March 14, 1947, the name of Wartime Food Corporation Limited was changed to Canadian Sugar Stabilization Corporation Limited and its corporate powers were changed to purchase or otherwise acquire, export, import, exchange, charge, sell or otherwise dispose of, distribute, store, transport, process and generally deal in sugar, sugar syrups, liquid sugar, molasses and other sugar products.
2.	To perform certain of the functions of the sugar administrator under the regulations respecting sugar established by P.C. 3223 of October 21. 1939.
3.	(a) Directors: T. A. Climo, D. Crowley,
S.	R. Noble, K. W. Taylor, W. T. Wilson.
(b)	Officers: S. R. Noble, President; T. A. Climo, Vice-President; D. Crowley, Secretary-Treasurer.
4.	None (see answer to question 6.)
5.	All five (see answer to question 6.)
6.	These men were already officials of the wartime prices and trade board and were designated by the Minister of Finance, under authority P.C. 32S of January 28, 1947, to act in this additional capacity.
7.	S. R. Noble.-Mr. Noble was appointed sugar administrator of the wartime prices and
trade board in October, 1939, and has remained in that capacity since that date. He therefore has acquired an extensive knowledge of the industry in all its phases throughout the whole dominion. He was previously assistant general manager of the Royal Bank of Canada. Mr. Noble serves both the wartime prices and trade board and the Canadian Sugar Stabilization Corporation Limited without remuneration.
T. A. Climo.-Mr. Climo has been with the sugar administration since February, 1942, first as director of sugar distribution and latterly as deputy administrator, which position he still holds. Before joining the wartime prices and trade board Mr. Climo was vice-president of Robinson and Climo, grain and freight brokers, Montreal.
D. Crowley.-Mr. Crowley was released to the wartime prices and trade board by H. E. Hodgson & Company, sugar brokers, with whom he had acquired a detailed knowledge of and experience in the sugar business. Since February, 1946. Mr. Crowley has served as executive assistant to the sugar administrator and latterly as director of raw sugar.
K. W. Taylor.-Mr. Taylor, previously professor of economics at McMaster university, is chairman of the wartime prices and trade board, with which he has been associated since September 1939 as secretary, foods coordinator and deputy chairman prior to his present appointment as chairman of the wartime prices and trade board. Mr. Taylor serves the Canadian Sugar Stabilization Corporation Limited without additional remuneration.
W. T. Wilson.-Mr. Wilson is deputy chairman and comptroller of the wartime prices and trade board and a vice-president and director of Commodity Prices Stabilization Corporation Ltd. He has had extensive experience in government accounting, administration and finance. Mr. Wilson serves the Canadian Sugar Stabilization Corporation Limited without additional remuneration.
8.	Estimated administrative expenses: (a) salaries, $209,000;	(b) rent. $16,500;	(c)
travelling expenses, $9,000; (d) postage, telegraph and telephone, $13,000; (e) office supplies, $4,000; (f) publicity and advertising, nil; (g) other expenses, $10,000; total, $261,500.


JAPANESE CANADIANS
Mr. THATCHER:: 1.	Do Japanese Canadians still require permits to travel in Canada?
2.	If so, do such regulations apply to Japanese Canadian war veterans?
3.	W7hat purpose is served by the continuance of such regulations?
Questions


Mr. MITCHELL:: 1.	Permits are still required by persons of Japanese origin for movement or change of residence within British Columbia, or for movement into that province.
2.	Japanese who served in the Canadian armed forces in world war I or II, and their dependents, do not require such permits except to enter or reside in the British Columbia coastal area.
3.	These travel and residence restrictions are retained to facilitate the government's dispersal and reestablishment programme for persons of Japanese origin who were evacuated from the Pacific coastal area in 1942.


HOUSING-INSPECTION OF PREMISES
Mr. CHURCH:: Has any action been taken to turn over to the provinces or municipalities under the housing orders in council as amended the authority to inspect the premises dealt with under the orders in council and to investigate complaints as to undesirable tenants, or for a national system of inspection on these matters through municipal authorities?


Mr. MAYHEW:: No. in so far as the wartime prices and trade board is concerned.


VOCATIONAL SCHOOLS ASSISTANCE AGREEMENTS
Mr. PROBE:: 1.	What total sums of money have been allotted by the federal government by provinces for capital expenditures under the vocational schools assistance agreements, authorized by the terms of P.C. 1648 of March 8. 1945?
2.	What sums were spent by provinces as federal grants under the terms of these agreements in each of the fiscal years 1945-46 and 1946-47?
3.	Have representations been made that expenditures during the final year of the agreements be deferred until the building emergency for family housing has been met or become less acute? If so, from what provinces?
4.	What action has the Minister of Labour taken or alternatively what action does he propose to take to meet the requests for deferment of capital expenditures under this agreement without loss of federal assistance?


Mr. MITCHELL:: 1.	Under the provisions of order in council P.C. 1648 of March 8, 1945, agreements were entered into by the dominion with all provinces for financial assistance by the dominion for vocational training at secondary school level, including provisions for a grant towards capital expenditures made by the provinces between April 1, 1945, and March 31, 1948, for buildings and equipment, equal in amount to that subscribed by the provinces, up to a maximum of $19,000,000.
2.	Total amounts contributed by the dominion to the provinces pursuant to the

agreements entered into under P.C. 1648 by years covering operational costs and capital expenditures are as follows:
Prince Edward	1945-46	1946-47Island 	. ..$ 50,300 00	$ 45,000 06Nova Scotia 	... 32.324 71	28,024 37New Brunswick ...	... 81.598 35	71,035 99Quebec 	461,498 47Ontario 	589,000 00Manitoba 	Saskatchewan ....	. -. 64,460 00	31,513 71Alberta 	... 100,003 21	132,974 76British Columbia .	... 80,356 85	10,000 003.	Representations have been made that the period for dominion contribution towards special capital expenditures should be extended beyond the present date of March 31, 1948, by British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Quebec and New Brunswick.4.	No action has been taken on such requests. The matters involved in the requests are matters of future government policy on which no decision has yet been made.


INTEREST ON OVERDUE TAXES
Mr. DIEFENBAKER:: 1.	What rate of interest is being charged on overdue (a) excess profit tax; (b) personal income tax, for each of the years 1940 to 1945?
2.	Is interest compounded? If so, at what intervals?


Mr. McCANN:: 1.	The following interest rates apply both (o excess profits tax and personal income tax for the years 1940 to 1945.
1940 to 1943
Five per cent interest on (a) balance of tax estimated by the taxpayer from the due dates to the date of payment; (b) additional tax assessed from date of filing the return to date of payment.
Three per cent additional interest on (a) instalments in default from due dates to date of payment; (d) additional tax assessed remaining unpaid one month after issuance of the notice of assessment to date of payment.
Note: The 3 per cent additional interest on instalments in default does not apply to personal income tax or personal excess profits tax in 1942 and 1943, and to corporations in 1943.
1944 and 1945
Four per cent interest on (a) balance of tax estimated by the taxpayer from the due dates to the date of payment; (b) additional tax assessed from date of filing the return to date of payment.

Questions
Three per cent additional interest on tax unpaid one month after issuance of notice of assessment to date of payment.
Note: No interest is payable upon unpaid taxes for a period beginning twenty months after the date of filing a return and ending one month from the date of issuing the notice of assessment with respect to taxes of the year 1945.
2.	Interest is not compounded.


WARTIME PRICES AND TRADE BOARD-PERSONNEL
Mr. DORION:: 1.	What are the names and the addresses of the following personnel of the wartime prices and trade board (a) chairman; (b) deputy chairman; (c) members of the board; (d) administrators of the board; (e) deputy administrators of the board; (fj coordinators of the board; (g) deputy coordinators of the board; (h) persons to whom the board has delegated some powers?
2.	In what capacity are they acting?


Mr. DORION:: 1.	How many persons are employed in the wartime prices and trade board?
2.	How many of such employees are of (a) Canadian; (b) British; (e) German; (d) French; (e) Russian; (f) American, origin?


Robert Wellington Mayhew: Mr. Speaker, I have discussed these questions with the hon. member for Charlevoix-Saguenay (Mr. Dorion) and in view of the difficulty and cost and time involved in answering these questions he has agreed to drop them on the understanding that he will place a further question on the order paper which will give him the information required.
Questions dropped.


FLOODS AND STORMS IN GREAT BRITAIN- FOOD PARCELS
Mr. CHURCH:: 1.	What aid, if any, has been given towards alleviating the food shortage and famine in Great Britain caused by recent floods and storms, and to the economic strain brought about by the recent -war?
2.	As large numbers of municipalities and private community organizations are sending parcels of food as well as provincial and municipal governments, could not these parcels be forwarded by the government free of charge for delivery there, and the sum total charged up to lend lease?
3.	What is the rate charged per ton delivery for food parcels if based on average cost of pound parcel charges?
Mr. ST. LAURENT:
1.	The need for special help from overseas to alleviate shortages caused by the recent floods and storms in the British isles, is a matter which the Lbiited Kingdom government
will wish to consider itself. Up to the present time the Canadian government has no information which would indicate that the United Kingdom is contemplating any request for such help. For the purpose of alleviating economic strain brought about by the recent war, the Canadian government in 1946 extended a credit of one and one-quarter billion dollars to the United Kingdom. In addition, the long term contracts entered into by the United Kingdom and Canadian governments will do much to facilitate the import of foodstuffs into the United Kingdom.
2.	The advisability of charging the cost of privately dispatched relief parcels against the Canadian dollar credit is a matter for the United Kingdom government itself to decide.
3.	The postage charges on parcels to the United Kingdom are made up of three separate arrangements: (a) Charges for conveyance in Canada which are paid at so much per pound ; (b) Charges of the shipping companies for conveyance at sea, which are paid on the basis of cubic space occupied; (c) Charges of the general post office in the United Kingdom, which are paid at so much per pound.
Parcel post shipments are not calculated on a bulk basis, and no comparison is possible.


JOHN GRIERSON
Mr. FULTON:: 1.	Has Mr. John Grierson asked the government or any member or department thereof, for help in obtaining a visa to enter the United States?	.
2.	Has any decision been made with regard to such request? If so, what was the decision?
3 Was Mr. Grierson's appointment as adviser to the director-general of UNESCO recommended by or on behalf of the Canadian government, or by or on behalf of any member, department or official thereof?
4.	Was his appointment subsequently approved
by or on behalf of the Canadian government, or by or on behalf of any member, department or official thereof?	.
5.	Did the United States delegation m UNESCO make any representations against this appointment either before or after it was cm-cially approved by UNESCO?
Mr. ST. LAURENT:
1.	No.
2.	Answered by No. 1.
3.	No.
4.	No.
5.	No information is available.


IMMIGRATION-POLISH SOLDIERS
Mr. CHURCH:: 1.	Does the British government provide shipping space as well as fares for another hatch of Polish soldiers for whom a team has already gone over?
Questions

2.	Did any of these soldiers fight against Britain in the last war and where?
3.	What branch of the Polish army did they belong to, and did any of them fight with Germany in the last war on the western or Italian front?
4.	Wliat check is there by Canada of these soldiers and what is the nature of the agreement with Britain to accept them, and to what number, and on what terms, and to what provinces will this contingent be assigned and for what work?
Mr. ST. LAURENT:
1.	Yes.
2.	Some of them were conscripted into the German army and fought on the Italian front and in north west Europe.
3.	They belonged to those formations of the Polish army serving under British command. The question whether any of them fought with Germany on the western or Italian front is answered by Nos. 2 and 4.
4.	Selection is made by a team of Canadian government officials composed of representatives of the Departments of Agriculture and Labour and the R.C.M.P.
The Canadian overseas medical immigration service provides the necessary doctors to carry out the medical examinations. Only those are accepted who are medically fit, took part in active hostilities against the axis powers and also qualify under the terms of the agreement with the United Kingdom. Those who participated voluntarily in hostilities on the side of the axis, or who have criminal records, are rejected.
The agreement with the United Kingdom provides that Canada will permit entry into this country of 4,000 Polish veterans who served with the allied forces engaged in hostilities against the axis powers, who are single and who are qualified for and willing to undertake agricultural employment in Canada. The United Kingdom has agreed that the Canadian government will make the selection of those who have applied and an undertaking will be signed by the successful applicant by which he agrees to accept farm labour at current wage rates and in accordance with living and working conditions prevailing in the locality of his employment, and will continue in agricultural employment for a period of two years. There is provision in the agreements for the return to the United Kingdom within two years of any individual who might be found to be unsuitable.
Further details are contained in the statement made to the house on this topic by the Secretary of State for External Affairs on July 25, 1946, and reported in Hansard pages 3836 and 3838 and in order in council P.C. 3112 of July 23, 1946, which was tabled at the same time.
fMr. Church.]
The second contingent of approximately 1,124 Polish veterans has tentatively been assigned as follows: Maritime provinces, 50; Quebec, 100; Ontario, 374; Manitoba, 200; Saskatchewan, 100; Alberta, 300.


IMMIGRATION-DISABLED PERSONS
Mr. WINKLER:: Is consideration being given by the government to cases where entire families are desirous of migrating to Canada, and where due to war injury one member of the family is not physically fit to qualify for admission to Canada and to make provisions that when guarantees or bonds are furnished in Canada that such disabled person will never become a public charge, then such disabled person may proceed to Canada with other members of his family?


Mr. GLEN:: Cases as described are dealt with in accordance with provisions of the Immigration Act. Section 3 thereof provides as follows:
3. No immigrant, passenger, or other person, unless he is a Canadian citizen, or has Canadian domicile, shall be permitted to enter or land in Canada, or in case of having landed in or entered Canada shall be permitted to remain therein who belongs to any of the following classes, hereinafter called "prohibited classes":-
(a)		
(b)		
(c)	Immigrants who are dumb, blind, or otherwise physically defective, unless in the opinion of a Board of Inquiry or officer acting as such they have sufficient money, or have such profession, occupation, trade, employment or other legitimate mode of earning a living that they are not liable to become a public charge or unless they belong to a family accompanying them or already in Canada and which gives security satisfactory to the minister against such immigrants becoming a public charge.


NATIONAL HOUSING ACT-ASSISTANCE TO LOW-RENTAL HOUSING PROJECTS
Mr. MacINNIS:: 1.	Since the National Housing Act was passed in 1944 have any requests been made by municipalities for assistance with low-rental housing projects by (a) legislation to provide loans directly to municipal housing authorities; (b) legislation to provide rent-reduction subsidies to such authorities; (c) legislation or regulation to provide loans to local, non-profit housing corporations; (d) legislation or regulation to provide rent-reduction funds to local, non-profit housing corporations?
2.	If so, by what municipalities?
3.	What arrangements, if any, arising out of such requests, have been made to enable the carrying on of low-rental housing projects within such municipalities?

Questions
Mr. McILRAlTH: The answer to this question in its present form would disclose no information, but there is some information relating generally to the subject and I have arranged for this to be made available to the hon. member, who may be agreeable to dropping the question on that understanding.
Question dropped.


EXPORT OF SOAP
Mr. HATFIELD:: 1.	Did Canada export any soap during each of the years 1944, 1945 and 1946?
2.	If so, what quantities were exported and to what countries?


Mr. MacKINNON:: 1 and 2. See statement attached.
Statement showing Canadian exports by countries, of soap during the calendar years
1944, 1945 Toilet soap
Country	1944 Lb.	1945 Lb.United Kingdom ....	266,300	143,981Eire 	
Br. East Africa	3,600	Br. South Africa ....	12,584	Southern Rhodesia . .	10,407Gambia 	456	Gold Coast 	949Sierra Leone 	462	Bermuda 	16,332	68,645British India 	26,475	535Ceylon 	52,968	23,965Sts. Settlements 	Br. Guiana 	73,075	190.358Br. Honduras 	55,558	104,878Br. Sudan 	Barbados 	149,845	103,543Jamaica 	237,104	487.890Trinidad 	490,806	346.924Br. W. Indies, other.	312,874	254.461Hong Kong 	Malta 	i20	Newfoundland 	475.072	435.168Australia 	18.200Palestine 	15.666	1,300Austria 	Argentina	96Belgian Congo 	31.620	85,302Chile 	
Costa Rica 	
Cuba 	36	i 95Czechoslovakia 	759.960Egypt 	174,885	3.286France 	25.068	13,064French Africa 	30,895	French Oceania 	92	St. Pierre & Miq. . . .	0.658	6.355Germany 	1,700Greece 	338.555Hayti 	13,059	18,568Iceland 	95Iraq 	9.180	Italy 	48.588	17.485Italian Africa 	Mexico 	Neth. Guiana 	23.603	13,754Neth. West Indies . .	22.000Panama	26,625	20,813Poland 	636.240Soviet Union 	Alaska 	
Venezuela 	Yugoslavia 	315,055United States 	403	78Totals 	2,579,343	4,443,805
ind 1946
Soap,	other than	toilet1946	1944	1945	1946Lb.	Lb.	Lb.	Lb.226,748	2.10060	7,200	112,i20	3,079	4,081	3,888	1,800	-	::::18.557	134,i39	132,648, 39,319	31,500	20,000	630	276,369	254.457	113,150	147,285156,404	6,055	26.428	31,675979	49,198	163,300	16.539	23.503271,325	20.144	34,138	27,842411.639	278.738	240.561	185.427234.149	498,620	623.356	506,163390	529,788	255,455	2,458.752	3,065.146	2,215.i60'396	14.062	1,971,80053,923	131	410	100,020	5,546.674	2.017.63441,289	9,000	13.725	102.424	744.793	213,167	380,444	8,018	42.377	21.865	52.88031.335	40S	[DOT] 8162.794,168	514,80038.559	3,055.575	3.033,553	1.944.35012.625	5	36,000	4,230	231,720	417,868	3,243.819	1,256,0803,700	100	5,73015,454	87,342	93,344	71.63645,324	57,413	543.458	304,97011.251	18.562	2.500	80,700	8.162.218	1.699.20015.440	108.13050	3360	1008.767.323	4.283,3513,163	6.080	2,942	4712,398,995	7,880,148	37,899,069	17,503,826
Questions


WHEAT BOARD-SATES OF CLASS 2 WHEAT
Mr. DIEFENBAKER:: 1.	What is the highest and lowest price at which the wheat hoard has sold class 2 wheat since November 1. 1946, and what were the dates of such sales?
2.	How many bushels of said wheat were sold during the said period? To which countries were such sales made and the amounts sold to each respectively?


Mr. MacKINNON:: 1.	Highest price at which wheat board sold class 2 wheat since November 1, 1946 (to April 23, 1947) ;
March 27, 1947-No. 3 Amber Durum $3.01 per bushel, basis in store Fort William/Port Arthur;
Lowest price at which wheat board sold class 2 wheat since November 1, 1946 (to April 23, 1947);
December 2, 1946-No. 4 Northern $2.11 per bushel, basis in store Fort William/Port Arthur.	.
2.	Sales of class 2 wheat November 1, 1946 to April 23, 1947 8.310,233 bushels; Countries to which sold as follows;
Bushels
Antigua	 44
Barbados	 633
Belgium	 1,975,191
Brazil	 345,100
Br. S. Africa	 539,257
Colombia	 [DOT] 7,466
Ecuador	 166
Eire	 204,361
France	 698,459
Jamaica	 11,728
Netherlands	 2,352,435
Newfoundland	 798
Norway	 1,157,521
Peru	 11,200
Portugal	 655,180
St. Pierre	 641
St. Vincent	   25
Switzerland	 335,462
Trinidad	 2,704
United States	 4,661
Total	 8,303,032
2. If so, has consideration been given to such representations, and what is the present status of the matter?


Mr. MACKENZIE:: 1.	No such representations have been received on behalf of veterans who served in the forces of His Majesty's allies in world war I and in the Canadian forces in world war II.
2.	Answered by No. 1.


IMMIGRATION-EUROPEAN WOMEN
Mrs. STRUM:: 1.	Are women now being recruited in Europe by the Labour Department of the Canadian government? If so, for what purpose?
2.	On what basis are they being selected?
3.	What agencies are being used to make the selections?
4.	What standards are being established for the employment of these women in regard to (a) wages; (b) hours; (c) working conditions; (d) training in Canada?


Mr. MITCHELL:: 1.	No.
2,	3 and 4. Answered by No. 1.


LUMBER-JOHN B. SMITH COMPANY
Mr. MENARY:: 1.	Is any lumber being held by the government in the yards of the John B. Smith Company, Toronto?
2.	If so, for what purpose is it being held?
3.	When will any of this lumber be released for sale?


Mr McILRAITH:: 1.	No.
2,	3 and 4. Answered by No. 1.


PICTOU COUNTY, N.S., INDIAN RESERVE
Mr. BLACK (Cumberland):: 1.	Has the Indian reserve or land held for Indians in Pietou county, Nova Scotia, been taken over recently by the government or sold to private parties?
2.	If so, what acreage, what price was received and who were the purchasers?


Mr. GLEN:: 1.	No.
2.	Answered by No. 1.


WAR VETERANS ALLOWANCES
Mr. KNOWLES:: 1. Have any representations been received by the government calling for an amendment to the War Veterans' Allowance Act so as to include within its provisions, as a matter of right, all veterans who served in any of the allied forces in the first great war, and who served in the Canadian forces during the second great war, and are now permanent residents of Canada?


PASSPORTS-CANADIAN-BORN CHILDREN
Mr. SMITH (Calgary West):: How many passports have been issued to Canadian-born children on the application of Mr. C. B. Hill, Superintendent of Child Welfare of the province of Alberta (a) in 1946; (b) in 1947 to date?
Mr. ST. LAURENT:
1. (a) 64; (b) 11.

Questions


INTERDEPARTMENTAL PANEL ON SECURITY
Mr. IRVINE:: 1.	When was the committee on the loyalty of civil servants set up and what is its correct title?
2.	Under what authority was it set up and what are its terms of reference?
3.	To whom does it report?
4.	Has any report or recommendation been made ?
5.	Has any report or recommendation been made in regard to any individual case and if so has this recommendation been acted upon?
6.	What departments or agencies of government are represented on this committee?
7.	Who are the representatives on the committee of each such department or agency?
8.	What are their special qualifications for this work?
9.	Will the work of the committee involve the expenditure of money and has any budget for the work of the committee been drafted or approved ?
10.	Can the government give an assurance that applicants for jobs in civil service will not be examined on their political affiliations?


Mr. MACKENZIE KING:: 1.	There is no committee on the loyalty of civil servants.
On April 14th, in reply to a similar question by the hon. member for Winnipeg North, the Acting Prime Minister stated, Hansard, page 1993. that among interdepartmental committees established by the government was a standing interdepartmental panel on security.
2.	The panel on security was established by cabinet authority in May, 1946, and, as indicated in the answer referred to in paragraph one. its terms of reference are to advise on the coordination of the planning, organization and execution of the security measures which affect government departments.
3.	To the cabinet.
4.	From time to time, reports and recommendations have been made with respect to appropriate security practices in government departments.
5.	As indicated in the answer referred to in paragraph one, the panel does not deal with individual cases.
6.	Any department or agency of government, as and when concerned with the matters under consideration.
7.	As designated from time to time under authority of the ministers responsible.
8.	Experience in the government service.
9.	No.
10.	Yes.


P.E.I. CAR FERRY
Mr. MacNAUGHT:: 1. Have contracts been awarded for the erection of the new car ferry terminal at Borden, Prince Edward Island?
2. If so, what are the names of the firms to whom the contracts were awarded and the amount of each contract?


Mr. CTIEVRIER:: 1.	Yes.
2.	The Canadian Dredge and Dock Company-Tender $747,512 (for the construction of the outside jetty extension and the fill for the comfort station);
The Foundation Maritime Limited-Tender $1,409,571 (for the rehabilitation of the existing main jetty).


BRANDON MILITARY HOSPITAL-CARE OF TUBERCULAR INDIANS
Hon. PAUL MARTIN (Minister of National Health and Welfare):: I wish to supplement
a reply that I made to the hon. member for Brandon (Mr. Matthews) in reply to a question which he asked me on Friday last and which I did not fully answer. He asked as to the transfer of the Brandon military hospital to the Department of National Health and Welfare. Since last Wednesday one of our investigators has been sent out to Brandon to investigate the cause and the nature of the damage resulting from the fire in that hospital a short time ago. A special investigator is now in western Canada and has been instructed to look into this matter and submit a report on what repairs or alterations are necessary. It is understood that the fire was confined to the administration wing. It is presumed that the administration work can be carried out in another wing of the building without rebuilding and with only a relatively small reduction in the future bed capacity of the hospital.



QUESTIONS PASSED AS ORDERS FOR RETURNS


Mr. MURPHY:: 1.	What is the cost of repairs since January I. 1947, to each home constructed under the Veterans' Land Act in (a) Sarnia township, Lambton county; (b) Roseland and Oliver farm areas, Essex county?
2.	Are repairs made prior to January 1. 1947, included in the cost of above homes? If not, what is the amount of such repairs?
3.	What capital or other costs in addition to repairs to above homes, since January 1, 1947, have been paid, or are payable or will be payable for work now being done in (a) Sarnia township, Lambton county; (b) Roseland and Oliver farm areas, Essex county?
Orders jor Returns


VETERANS LAND ACT-HODSING-LAMBTON AND ESSEX COUNTIES
Mr. MURPHY:: 1.	What is the cost for each home constructed under the Veterans' Land Act in (a) Sarnia township. Lambton county; (b) Roseland and Oliver farm areas, Essex count}', for (1) land; (2) roads; (3) sewers or drainage; (4) water mains (5) hydro and any and all other capital charges?
2.	Is there a cost per unit of project overhead for each said home which includes (a) inspectors' supervision; (b) regional or district office expense?
3.	If so, what is same per unit?
4.	What amount has the government expended to date in (a) the Sarnia township area project; (b) the Roseland and Oliver farm areas?
5.	Vilat amount, if any, remains unpaid?
6.	Are any claims by or against the government in dispute? If so, what are the particulars?
7.	Have veterans in any part of Canada obtained contracts for purchase of homes under V.L.A. at a lesser price than the cost to the government? If so, what are details in full?


HOUSING-VETERANS-MONCTON AND SACKVILLE
Mr. EMMERSON:: 1.	What is the total estimated cost of repairs to (a) the 20 veterans' houses at Moncton, New Brunswick; (b) the 8 veterans' houses in Sack-ville, New Brunswick?
2.	Are the costs to be borne in each case by the government or by the contractor?


HOUSING-VETERANS-FIRM OF BENNETT AND WHITE
Mr. FULTON:: 1.	What is the total amount paid to the firm of Bennett & White for the construction of V.L.A. houses (a) in British Columbia; (b) in Alberta?
2.	Is there any amount owing but still unpaid for construction completed (excluding any sums owing for repairs or alterations) ? If so, how much ?
3.	Give breakdown of figures under 1 and 2 for each project, by name.
4.	Of these sums, how much was paid or is owing to cover actual cost of construction, materials, etc., and how much was paid or is owing by way of management fees, cost-plus percentages, etc., in each case?
5.	Of these various projects which ones have been accepted as satisfactory?
6.	If any have not been accepted as entirely completed satisfactorily, how many houses in such projects have been accepted as satisfactory?


JACQUES GREBER-OFFICE SPACE
Mr. COCKERAM:: 1.	What is the square footage of the office 6pace occupied by Jacques Greber and his staff?
2.	Where is it located?
3.	What does it cost the government per year for this space?


FEDERAL DISTRICT AND PLANNING COMMITTEES
Mr. COCKERAM:: 1.	What are the functions of the following committees or boards: (a) federal district commission; (b) national planning committee; (c) federal area planning committee; (d) transportation committee?
2.	What moneys have been paid by the federal government to each of these committees in each of the past five years?
3.	What has been paid during 1947 to date?
4.	What is the personnel of each committee or board?


JACQUES GREBER-FEDERAL DISTRICT AGENCIES
Mr. COCKERAM:: 1.	What is the relationship of Jacques Greber to the dominion government on behalf of the federal district commission, national capita] or federal area?
2.	What compensation has been paid to Mr. Greber by the dominion government or through any of its agencies in each of the last five years?
3.	What expenses has he received?
4.	What are the terms of his employment?
5.	What other persons not permanent civil servants are engaged in a technical or consultative way by the government or any of its agencies for work on any federal area scheme?
6.	What compensation and expenses have been paid to each during the past five years?



FEDERAL DISTRICT

Mr. COCKERAM:: What moneys have been spent by the dominion government within the last five years for the purchase of real estate for purposes of the federal district or area?



HOUSING-VETERANS-NOVA SCOTIA

Mr. WINTERS:: 1.	How many houses were built or are being built under the Veterans' Land Act in Nova Scotia?
2.	Were repairs necessary on any of these
houses before taking them over from the contractor ?	,
3.	What is the estimated cost per house of effecting repairs?
4.	Is the repair cost borne by the federal government or the contractor?



YUKON TERRITORY


Mr. BLACK (Yukon):: 1.	From what sources was the territorial income of Yukon territory during each of the years of 1944-45, 1945-46 and 1946-47 so greatly increased that it was unnecessary for the federal government to make any payment to the territorial council?
2.	How much was it increased in each of said years?
3.	How much was it increased from each of said sources in each of said years?

Motions for Papers



MOTIONS FOR PAPERS


Mr. COLDWELL:: For a copy of agreements between United States and Canada relating to the establishment of far northern weather stations in Canadian territory.
Mr. ST. LAURENT: Mr. Speaker, I communicated with the hon. member this morning and informed him that following a cabinet decision to establish a number of weather stations in the Arctic, which was communicated to the United States authorities on February 13, a joint meeting of officials of the two countries was held in Ottawa at the end of February to work out detailed arrangements for the weather station programme. It is expected that these detailed arrangements will shortly be embodied in an exchange of notes between the two governments. As soon as the exchange of notes has been completed, copies will be tabled in the house in the usual way. The Arctic weather station programme was the subject of a statement in the house by the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply (Mr. Howe) on March 4. Pending the time when I can table the exchange of notes it is my understanding with the hon. member that this motion might be dropped.
Motion dropped.



IMMIGRATION-ARTHUR MOEN

Mrs. STRUM:: For a copy of all correspondence in the possession of the government, dated since January 1, 1944. with reference to the case of Mr. Arthur Moeu and his application to emigrate to this country.



UNITED FARMERS OF CANADA, SASKATCHEWAN SECTION-NON-DELIVERY STRIKE

Mr. ARGUE:: For a copy of all correspondence, letters, telegrams, reports and other documents exchanged between the government of Canada or any department or officer thereof and the United Farmers of Canada. Saskatchewan section, from August 15, 1946. to March 31. 1947, regarding those demands of the United Farmers of Canada, Saskatchewan section, as set forth at the time of the non-delivery strike and negotiations resulting therefrom.



OLD AGE PENSIONS


[Stage Direction]
Hon. PAUL MARTIN (Minister of National Health and Welfare) moved that the house go into committee at the next sitting to consider the following resolution:
That it is expedient to introduce a measure to amend the Old Age Pensions Act which will enlarge the scope of the act by providing increases in the pension payable and the income allowable to pensioners and by modifying certain of the eligibility requirements for pension.
He said: His Excellency the Governor General. having been made acquainted with the subject matter of this resolution, recommends it to the consideration of the house.
Motion agreed to.


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
John Bracken: Mr. Speaker. I wish to direct
a question to the Minister of National Revenue based on a report appearing in various sections of Saturday's press to the effect that the deputy revenue minister and income tax commissioner, Mr. Frank II. Brown, has tendered his resignation. I have spoken to the minister with respect to this question and he intimated to me that it was a matter on which he did not have undivided jurisdiction. However, I think the question is so worded that he can answer it. Is this report true, and if so. is there any basis for the further report that the department is many years behind in its work?


Hon. J. J. McCANN (Minister of National Revenue):: Mr. Speaker, the matter of the resignation of Mr. Brown is one which would come before the Prime Minister. Mr. Brown has intimated that for reasons of health he might not be able to continue in his present position. As a matter of fact when he accepted the position on the first of December he intimated then that he would have to consult his physicians to see whether or not he should continue.
With reference to the second part of the question, the further report that the department is many years behind in its work, that is not so. There have been great inroads made within the last few months in catching up with back assessments. The work of the department has very greatly increased. In one office alone, the office at Toronto, in the fiscal year 1946-47 there were 100,000 more returns than in the fiscal year 1945-46. During the past four months there have been more than 850.000 individual assessments made. Therefore inroads are being made on the backlog of work which accumulated. During the war years there was an enormous increase in the amount of work which had to be done in the department. We were short staffed. A
Inquiries of the Ministry

lot of our actuaries, assessors and the like went into private business. That condition is being remedied and throughout the country efforts are being made successfully to catch up with the backlog of work.


Mr. LOCKHART:: They are behind, then.


James Joseph McCann: Certainly they are.



AGRICULTURE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. W. BURTON (Humboldt):: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Agriculture, notice of which was sent to him this morning. Has the government given consideration to the joint request made by the LTnited Farmers of Canada, Saskatchewan section, and the Alberta Farmers Union, dated April 10, in which they urge the extension of the Agricultural Prices Support Act? If so, what action is contemplated?


Right Hon. J. G. GARDINER (Minister of Agriculture):: The two organizations referred to asked the government to bring the act in for amendment this session. It has been stated to them that it was not the intention of the government to bring the act before the house , this session.



VETERANS AFFAIRS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. G. A. CRUICKSHANK (Fraser Valley):: I should like to direct to the Minister of Veterans Affairs a question which is prompted by my great personal admiration and friendship for the leader of the opposition, together with the fact that I have his picture on a matchbox. Is the minister aware that the young women's Progressive Conservative association, in the course of visiting patients at the veterans pavilion, Ottawa, has been distributing campaign literature in the form of match boxes bearing the portrait of the leader of the opposition?
Right Hon. IAN A. MACKENZIE (Minister of Veterans Affairs): I had not heard of this matter until a few minutes ago. It seemed to me to be a harmless and ingenious method of public propaganda and campaigning. I think it is a matter of good taste. Veterans in the hospitals themselves will be the best judges of that. As usual we shall out-match them and out-box them.
COUNT ALFRED de MARIGNY



QUESTION AS TO DEPORTATION

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. G. DIEFENBAKER (Lake Centre):: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Mines and Resources. It has to do with Count Alfred de Marigny, formerly of the Bahama islands, who has been resident in Canada for some time. Is he about to be deported? If so, what are the reasons for that decision?


James Allison Glen: The hon. member spoke to me before I came into the house regarding this matter. This man came to Canada's shores some time ago-I have not the date, and I had no opportunity of looking at the file. He came as a seaman or second officer on board ship, landed in Canada, and said that he was here for the purpose of reshipping, which he did not do. After some time he made application for permanent landing in Canada. His case was heard and refused. He appealed to me and I again refused, because he is not admissible under the regulations. He has been in Canada for some time. The reason he has not been deported is simply that we have not been able to get transportation which would take him to the country of his origin.



INCOME TAX-SUGGESTED INCREASE OF EXEMPTIONS

[Stage Direction]
Hon. DOUGLAS ABBOTT (Minister of Finance) moved that the house go into supply.
Mr. J. H. BLACKMORE (Lethbridge):: I have a few words to say before the house resolves itself into committee of supply. The government is asking the house to vote supply of funds. In accordance with established British custom, I rise to voice a grievance, to make a request for redress, and later perhaps to offer an alternative. My grievance is that the income tax in my riding of Lethbridge and throughout the other 243 ridings of Canada is an irksome and injurious burden. A tax on all income between $660 and $3,000 is destroying the incentive of Canadian youth to acquire additional education, to marry and make homes and to have babies urgently needed in Canada. It is destroying incentive to be loyal and stable citizens devoted to Canadian democracy, and confident in Canada's future.
Income taxes are destroying the incentive of all Canadian producers to produce both goods and services. Income taxes are impairing both incentive and ability of Canadian consumers to consume both goods and services. Furthermore income taxes, by decreas-

Income Tax-Exemptions
mg pm-chasing power just exactly where purchasing power should be increased, are greasing the skids and preparing for a headlong plunge of the Canadian economy down the ways into the gloomy seas of depression.
The redress I request is that in his forthcoming budget the Minister of Finance exempt from income tax for single people all incomes of $1,500 and under; for married people all incomes of $3,000 a year and under.
The last speech I delivered in the house was on old age pensions. In that speech I requested that $50 a month be given to people sixty-five years of age and over with no means test, with free hospitalization, medical and dental services. I can conceive that the Minister of Finance may say: Where is the money coming from? How, he will say, can the hon. member claim to be consistent when he makes speeches of this kind so close together?
May I repeat what the people of Canada and this house must learn, that our ability to produce goods and to provide services determines our ability to pay old age pensions or to do anything else we choose to do. Our ability to have money ought to depend on our productive capacity as to goods and services. During the war it was commonly said and generally accepted in government circles that Canada's performance in the war would depend entirely upon her resources, human and material. The same thing should be true in time of peace. Our ability to perform should depend on our ability to produce goods and services.
I suggest to the minister that he should begin to consider an alternative to the financial methods which he is using which are doing so much damage to the Canadian people. I suggest that the minister so change the financial system of Canada as to enable that financial system to render financially possible for Canadians, that level of living standards which Canada's resources, human and material, make physically possible. Such a change can be discovered, Mr. Speaker. It can be made by the government of the day. Such a change ought to be made forthwith before serious deterioration, threatening us at the present time in Canada, sets in in real earnest. Such a change must be made if Canadians are to avoid disasters in the near future.
I have no need to draw hon. members' attention to the rapid development of communism in this country. I have no need to point out how restless labouring people are becoming, considering the dangerous rise in prices. I have no need to hint at disruptive
disorders which might follow. We might have far worse than all of these unless something is done, and done soon.
The change, if efficacious, must go far deeper than any possible expansion of Canada's foreign trade policy. It must go far deeper than any modification or combination of modifications of heretofore accepted principles of trade, either external or internal, or both together.
How it has come about that the peoples of the Anglo-Saxon world have become so much obsessed with the idea that the only thing they can do to increase their prosperity is to trade more is something which it is beyond my ability to understand. Take the United States for example, consisting of forty-eight states. In effect they are forty-eight nations. Now, if trade could solve their problems they could trade among themselves and solve those problems. But they do not find themselves able to do so. That fact ought to be sufficient to warn all hon. members that the mere expansion of trade will not provide the remedy we must have for the economic ills that beset us.
The change which is necessary in our system must be widely different from any kind or degree of governmental or social ownership of the means of production such as our soeialis-tically inclined friends seem to be enamoured of. The change must comprise a fundamental change in technique in our financial system.
I suggest to the minister that he earnestly study "Economic Tribulation" by Vincent C. Vickers, published in 1941, and printed by Stephen Austin and Sons Limited in Hertford, England. So that all those who are interested may realize that there are men not such crackpots as social creditors are supposed to be-that there are really men of affairs who have achieved a standing who are confident that something can be done with the financial system, may I quote from this book. Vickers, in his foreword, at page 1, has this to say:
Ever since that day in 1926 when, not in arrogance but with humility, I felt it my duty to explain to the governor of the Bank of England, Mr. Montagu Norman, that "henceforth I was going to fight him and the gold standard and the Bank of England policy until I die"- (and well I remember the words of his reply!) -I have been an ardent money reformer. Some few years afterwards I resigned my long directorship of Vickers Limited; since when I have spent much time and money in advocating the necessity for a reform of the monetary system.
Further on in the foreword he says:
I bear no ill-feeling towards my own class or any other class. I seek neither notoriety nor kudos. If someone can change my convictions I shall be only too ready to alter them. But in
Income Tax-Exemptions

fifteen years nothing whatever has occurred to make me alter my views. I still believe that the existing system is actively harmful to the state, creates poverty and unemployment, and is the root cause of war. This personal confession is merely to demonstrate that I have seen both sides of the picture. My opinions are based upon my own experience and knowledge. I am today in the unique position of being absolutely and entirely devoid of animosity and wholly disinterested. I feel myself no longer under any restrictions whatsoever, except to guard against doing harm to my country or giving offence to anyone.
May I say a word or two regarding this man. Here is a man who had been a director of the Bank of England, who had been high in the directorate of Vickers, a great industrial organization. Here is a man who certainly ought not to be disregarded when he speaks so learnedly and so earnestly concerning a matter of such vital importance.
I will not detain the house longer except to read two or three statements which Vincent Vickers makes in the concluding chapter of his book, at page 74, in the chapter headed "The Direction of Future Policy". In recommendation No. 1 he advocates:
State control and state issue of currency and credit through a central organization managed and controlled by the state.
I see the Minister of Justice (Mr. Ilsley), the former minister of finance, in his place. I think the present Minister of Finance (Mr. Abbott) would be well advised to read that book and to avoid thinking all the things that the present Minister of Justice has said about inflation resulting from debt-free money created by the state. Here in Mr. Vickers is a man of high orthodox authority who solemnly advocates debt free money. I will not read all his recommendations because I wish to save the time of the house. Recommendation No. 4, however, reads:
Any additional supply of money should be issued as a clear asset to the state; so that money will be spent into existence, and not lent into existence.
Whereby, of course, anyone can see that this man advocates what social erediters have advocated these many years, namely, debt-free money:
5.	The fluctuating quantity of gold lying in the vaults of the banking system should never be permitted to govern the volume of credit and currency needed by the country.
6.	The elimination of slumps and booms; and more direct procedure for eliminating unnecessary poverty.
7.	The abolition of the debt system where all credit is created by banks and hired out at interest to the country.
May I now revert for a time to the question of income tax? To show how widespread is
[Mr. Blackmore.l
the anxiety about income tax, and the demand for the reduction of it, may I refer to certain evidences which have appeared in Canada during the last two or three months? I turn to an article appearing in Saturday Night, the issue of March 8, 1947, under the title "Taxing the Wrong Thing". I quote:
It is beginning to be realized that the heavy taxation of income has the effect of destroying a great deal of the incentive to produce goods and services, and that, in the world's present situation, .that incentive needs to be left as effective as possible, because we certainly need all the goods and services which are currently being turned out, and a lot more.
Further down, under the heading "Killing Incentive", this passage appears:
It is production rather than consumptive demand that needs stimulating; and production is certainly not stimulated by a tax system which begins whittling away at the incentive to produce as soon as the annual income has reached $660. and reduces it practically to zero long before that income lias become really substantial. For the incentive to produce is simply the income which actually comes into the control of *the producer as a reward of his efforts. Money taken from the producer by the government has no incentive value; even if it is paid back to him by that government in welfare expenditures it is still no incentive, for he gets the benefit of those welfare expenditures, whether he produces or not.
I think I am safe in assuming that this organ speaks more or less for business, for what we might call capitalism.
Now may I turn to a periodical representing labour. I refer to the Canadian Unionist of April, 1947. Everyone in the house will recognize this paper as having a moderate, scientific and realistic approach to all matters of public concern. On page 76, column 2, I find an article entitled "Income Tax is Too High". I will not read the whole article; I merely' direct the attention of those interested to the beginning of paragraph 2 in which these words appear:
In its recent memorandum to the government, the congress called for a reduction of income taxes in order to provide exemptions for single persons earning $1,500 per year or less, and married persons earning $2,000 per year or less. Such an amendment is highly desirable because the income tax bears with a special severity upon workers with comparatively low incomes.
I think that is sufficient to represent labour. Much more could be referred to but I have no desire to use an undue amount of time.
And now I wish to refer to periodicals representing agriculture in Canada. Having done so I shall have cited expressions of opinion of the three main divisions of Canada's economy. In a periodical entitled "U.F.C. Information," of January 1947, I find an account of resolutions passed by the forty-

Prairie Farm Assistance Act
sixth central convention of the United Farmers of Canada. On page 5 we read the following resolution:
Whereas the present income tax exemption on single and married persons respectively is inadequate for a decent standard of living,
Therefore be it resolved that this convention demand that the income tax exemption be raised to $1,500 and $3,000 for single and married persons respectively, and
Furthermore be it resolved that the first $800 the farmer derives from the production of livestock and poultry be also exempt and the taxable income be spread over a five year period.
There is little doubt about the attitude of the people who passed that resolution. I turn now to page 11, where we have the minutes of district 4 convention, another group of farmers. At the bottom of the page I read as follows:
That this convention go on record as favouring an amendment to the Income Tax Act to allow for exemption of $1,500 for single status and $3,000 for married status.
I turn now to page 12 of the February 1947 issue and read the following statement at the close of an article called "Excerpts from a Farm Survey":
Another feature that was brought to our attention in answer to our question as to why they had changed to grain farming from mixed farming, was, ''Why should I work my head off raising cattle and feeding hogs and pay the greater part of the earnings in income tax?"
I think those are enough quotations and references to show clearly that my remarks about income tax are, in a broad way, representative of the people of Canada.
In closing I urge upon the minister that he forthwith bring in such modifications of the income tax regulations as will exempt all incomes of single persons of $1,500 and under and all incomes of married people of $3,000 and under.



PRAIRIE FARM ASSISTANCE ACT-RECOMMENDATIONS FOR AMENDMENT

John George Diefenbaker: There is a matter which I should like to bring to the attention of the house and through you, Mr. Speaker, to the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner) in connection with the Prairie Farm Assistance Act. While this act has brought great benefits to the western provinces, I feel that it should now be submitted to a committee of the house with a view to having brought to the attention of the house certain recommendations for amendment of it. Members receive more correspondence on the Prairie Farm Assistance Act than on any other subject; and that can be understood when a short resume of the statistics is placed before the house.
The Prairie Farm Assistance Act has been in effect since 1939. Considerable areas in Saskatchewan and Alberta have been in receipt of payments under this act in seven out of the eight years during which it has been in effect. Recently a return was brought down in the house, sessional paper No. 7B of March 14, 1947, in answer to certain questions which I placed on the order paper. The questions asked were:
1.	What is the number of full townships in each of the prairie provinces which have received prairie farm assistance payments the following number of times: (a) 7: (b) 6: (e) 5; (d) 4; (e) 3; (f) 2; (g) 1?
2.	What was the total sum of payments received by each individual township and what was the total number of individual farmer payments in 1 (a)?
3.	What was the total acreage of cultivated land in 1946 on the farm which received prairie farm assistance in 1 (a) ?
The answers to these questions, which show the extent to which drought has affected crop conditions in the prairier provinces, are as follows:
.	Number of Townships
Sas-
Years	Manitoba katchewan Alberta
(a)	7	
Nil	34	48(b)	6	
Nil	173	223(c)	5	
3	478	368(d)	4	
4	910	469(e)	3	
17	1,469	619(f)	2	
87	2,028	838(g)	1	
283	2,618	1,239
For the townships which have received payments of prairie farm assistance for seven years, the number of farmers paid during that period in Saskatchewan was 4,260, and the total amount paid to them was $1,031,170.24. Those statistics indicate the extent to which drought has affected large areas, not for one year but over a period of years, and the extent to which this act has been beneficial.
The act originally was passed in 1939 and there were amendments in 1940, chapter 38; in 1941, chapter 24; and in 1942, chapter 5. It was to be expected that in the operation of the act difficulties and anomalies would arise. In any event they are revealed only as a result of experience. The general objections which are raised to the act as it is at present constituted are as follows-and I suggest that these objections be placed before a committee representative of the western farmers, to the end that the act may be amended in accordance with the results of its operation.
First, it is contended that payment should be on the basis of the individual farmer. Whether or not that be so, I think there should be some change so that at least a por-

Prairie Farm. Assistance Act

t-ion of a township, even though not contiguous to another township, might come within the terms of the act.
Second, the act should be broadened so as to include some payment for hail damage, on an individual basis. The minister in his reply may say that insurance can be had against that risk.


James Garfield Gardiner: They pay on hail now.


John George Diefenbaker: I appreciate that it operates, in part, under the act as it is being administered.


James Garfield Gardiner: It operates on all townships once the act is declared.


John George Diefenbaker: Yes. The point I make is that so far as hail is concerned it should be applicable on an individual basis. The objection ordinarily raised to placing the whole act on an individual basis certainly does not apply to hail damage. If all payments were placed upon an individual basis, the argument might be advanced that a premium was being placed upon indifferent farming, or farming on submarginal lands. That argument is not applicable so far as hail damage is concerned.
The third point is that present payments are insufficient. They are beneficial so far as they go. They could not be expected to go as far as a system of crop insurance. But the general feeling expressed by farmers in western Canada is that, if the act were revamped and certain changes made, they would have no objection to an increase in the amount now deducted from their production.
The next objection is that the act discriminates against larger farmers. While I realize that a certain unit must be established, nevertheless I feel that the maximum amount payable should be increased, and that that maximum should be fixed at least at the sum of $1,000.
There is considerable criticism of the regulation which provides that an applicant, to be entitled under the act, is required to live on his land, or at least to devote himself solely to agriculture. Numbers of farmers over the years have paid the one per cent deduction compulsorily, yet from year to year they have been denied any return, irrespective of whether or not they have suffered drought damage. Some change should be made in the act whereby a man who operates his business in conjunction with another business should not be denied payment under the act.
I shall now refer specifically to two cases, although the four or five points to which I

have directed attention are discussed generally by farmers throughout the west. I wish to bring to the attention of the house two examples in support of my argument that a change in the act is necessary.
One has to do with the rural municipality of Dufferin, in Saskatchewan. Year by year a portion of that municipality, by reason of a valley which runs alongside of it, must suffer continuing drought; yet because it is not contiguous to a municipality declared eligible under the act, the farmers there resident are denied any consideration. From year to year contributions are made; from year to year the contributors are denied any return. While I am familiar with the difficulty of changing the act in order to meet individual cases, only a small amendment will be necessary to bring this and a number of similar cases within the provisions. After all, the purpose of the act is to ensure that a farmer shall not be denied some return from a crop which he had expected but which was destroyed by drought or some other climatic condition.
I should like to refer to another case in support of my argument that the act should be amended so as to provide for the inclusion of a portion of a township, if the individual basis already suggested be not accepted. This has to do with the rural municipality of Craik, but one of many. Here certain farmers in an area not contiguous to a township eligible under the act, find themselves denied any payment. The suggestion comes from the council of the municipality, and states that the farmers generally would favour the necessity of providing for the placing of townships, if necessary, within the system. It states:
At present the provisions are too rigid to do other than make for great unfairness in practically all partial township considerations.
And then the secretary treasurer of this municipality says:
It is an absolute miscarriage of the basic underlying principle of the Prairie Farm Assistance Act if they in great need, do not get the bonus when their neighbours immediately south do get same because their area extends two miles further east to the boundary of the township.
The general attitude of rural municipal-officials throughout western Canada is summed up in this letter, a copy of which I understand was sent to the minister, and which states:
In whole the act needs a spring-cleaning and the human equation, which is the equation aimed to be aided, given consideration instead of the present equation of townships and blocks being the factor in main consideration to the detriment of many human beings-
-who should be qualified.

Immigration
I am suggesting the minister should give consideration to changing the act. Hon. members representing constituencies from the three western provinces have all had experience with its operation, and would all be in a position to make suggestions to the government. In order to cover situations such as I have mentioned, which cause an injustice and certainly develop a feeling of resentment on the part of those who are disqualified because of the rigidity of the act as it now stands, the act should be amended. I am asking the minister if he will give hon. members an opportunity to place before the committee on agriculture the changes which they believe to be necessary. I understand of course that the adoption of those recommendations would remain a matter of government policy, but I think an opportunity should be given hon. members to express their views and to place before the government the picture of conditions prevailing under the act. I believe their recommendations would be beneficial not only to the government but to the country as a whole.



IMMIGRATION-DISPLACED PERSONS AND REFUGEES-DOMESTIC AND OTHER WORKERS

Mr. F. S. ZAPLITNY (Dauphin):: Mr. Speaker, I wish first of all to associate myself with the remarks of the hon. member for Lake Centre (Mr. Diefenbaker) in connection with the Prairie Farm Assistance Act. What he has advocated today is substantially the same as my colleagues from Saskatchewan and I urged last year in the discussion on the estimates of the Department of Agriculture.
Perhaps I will be pardoned if I now leave that subject in order to bring to the attention of the house and the country a matter which seems to me to be one of urgency and of considerable public interest and concern. I refer to the question of immigration. From time to time we have had debates in this house referring in part to immigration. We have had several statements from the government side on various phases of immigration, but I do not think it would be overdrawing it to say that there is a great deal of confusion and bewilderment in the minds of the people as to the exact policy of the government on immigration.
The particular phase of immigration which I want to emphasize today is not the general or long-term policy, which I understand is still in the making, but the immediate and urgent question of what is to be done so far as we in Canada are concerned about the displaced persons and refugees now in Europe. This question is not new in the house, and 83166-1584
unfortunately it is not new in Europe. The matter is becoming more urgent every hour.
The action we have had in the past has been, to say the least, disappointing to the public mind. On August 13, 1946, a committee of the senate which was dealing with immigration and labour presented its report, and I should like to quote from page 311, as follows:
Immigrants who come to Canada on the responsibility of relatives or friends already here enjoy a real advantage over those who arrive as complete strangers. The right to bring relatives and friends here is a privilege which our government may well extend to Canadian citizens.
Then further down reference is made to order in council 2071 passed on May 28, 1946, as follows:
The order in council has meant nothing to date, for practically no immigrants are being admitted, whether relatives or otherwise, nor are any steps being taken with a view to future admission.
That was August 13, 1946, and we are now well into 1947. That last statement seems to be substantially true today. The Minister of Mines and Resources- (Mr. Glen) has stated in this house on several occasions that the regulations dealing with the admissible classes of prospective immigrants are being widened and relaxed.


James Horace King: I would call the attention of the hon. member to item 5 on the order paper which reads:
Resuming the adjourned debate on the motion of the Minister of Mines and Resources for the second reading of Bill No. 10, an act .to amend the Immigration Act and to repeal the Chinese Immigration Act.
I do not think the hon. member should take advantage of this opportunity to debate a matter which will come before the house when item No. 5 is called.


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: Mr. Speaker, if I may
refer to what you have just said, I have Bill 10 before me, and it deals only with two phases of immigration, the repeal of the Chinese Immigration Act and the entry of service men's dependents into Canada, neither of which matters am I referring to today. Your Honour may recall that when Bill 10 was being discussed in a previous debate and some hon. members attempted to deal with the matter with which I am now dealing, they were prevented from doing so. The ruling was that the bill did not deal with the matter I am now discussing. I think the Minister of Mines and Resources was one of those who advised that under the bill to which I have referred the matter I am now discussing could not be discussed.
Immigration


James Horace King: The hon member knows that on the motion to go into supply hon. members have an opportunity to discuss matters which could not be discussed otherwise because they are not before the house. As I have just stated, we have on the order paper an item dealing with Bill 10, and when that bill is being discussed the hon. member will have an opportunity to make submissions to the minister or to the government on the immigration policy. I do not think he should take this opportunity to discuss what he will be able to discuss when that item is called.


Angus MacInnis: May I draw to your
attention, sir, the fact that earlier today the hon. member for Lethbridge (Mr. Blackmore) discussed the matter of income tax. This is a matter which will come definitely before the house tomorrow night when the budget is introduced, and it will be before the house for a considerable time thereafter.


Mr. MACKENZIE:: It is not there yet.


Angus MacInnis: In my opinion if there
was any question which should have been ruled out of order it was that one. Then the hon. member for Lake Centre (Mr. Diefenbaker) introduced a matter which I think will come definitely before the house when the estimates are being dealt with. Those questions were no more closely associated with anything now before the house than is the matter referred to by the hon. member for Dauphin. I submit to you that the matter he is referring to would not come before the house under Bill 10, or under any other measure that is now before parliament or that we know is to be before parliament.


James Allison Glen: I think the argument advanced by the hon. member for Dauphin is sound. The bill now before the house deals only with two items, that of dependents and wives who are still overseas and the Chinese Immigration Act. So far as I have heard' the hon. member's remarks, he is dealing now with displaced persons in Europe, which would not be a subject to be discussed under that bill. I submit that the hon. gentleman is entitled to speak on the matter to which he refers.


Frederick Samuel Zaplitny: I was about to say that the action taken so far in connection with bringing into Canada relatives and friends of those already resident in Canada has been disappointing, and that the lack of action which was indicated in August, 1946, seems to continue. A delegation interviewed the government on February 7 of this year, and in order to indicate that there was a lack of 
action in connection with this particular phase of immigration I should like to quote from a pamphlet entitled "The Refugee" which reports the visit of this delegation. One of the things mentioned in their brief was this:
The plight of at least 800,000 refugees, displaced persons and orphans is so desperate that quick action is necessary if any considerable numbers are to obtain a haven of refuge in Canada. So we respectfully plead for immediate action on our request.
I am not attempting to go into all the ramifications of the government policy; I simply am trying to urge upon the government that the time has come when something substantial will have to be done about this question of refugees and displaced persons. I should like to point out that the delegation to which I have just referred represented a large number of people. For example, the following organizations were represented:
Ukrainian Canadian committee.
Ukrainian Canadian veterans association.
Canadians citizens of Polish origin.
Mennonite board of colonization.
Lutheran world relief.
Committee for the relief of democratic refugees.
Monsignor Basil Markle, representing Most Reverend P. J. Monahan in the name of the Catholic bishops of the prairie provinces, and Catholic immigration aid society.
Those organizations represent hundreds of thousands of people in Canada. All they were asking the government to do was to take action as quickly as possible in permitting persons for whom applications had already been made, or were being made, to enter this country at the earliest opportunity.
We were disturbed to find that recently the government has been following a new sort of immigration line in allowing certain industries to bring in workers under contract as cheap labour. I hope that is not the type of policy that is to be followed as an alternative to bringing into Canada the relatives and friends of persons resident here. The senate committee definitely recommended in favour of the policy of giving priority to persons who w'ould be received here by friends and relatives and be given a start in the Canadian way of life in preference to the bringing in of cheap labour.
When I speak of displaced persons or refugees I want to make myself clear so that there will be no misunderstanding of what I mean. I shall quote from the constitution of the International Refugee Organization the definition of a displaced person and the conditions under which such persons should be given refuge in other countries. In this same booklet from which I have been quoting

Immigration
refugees are described as persons who objected to returning to their former countries of residence because of-
,(i) persecution, or fear, based on reasonable grounds or persecution because of race, religion, nationality or political opinions, provided these opinions are not in conflict with the principles of the united nations, as laid down in the preamble of the charter of the united nations
In other words, persons who find themselves in displaced persons camps in Europe for one reason or another and who have no criminal record or anything which would disqualify them from becoming good and respectable citizens. I believe that the majority of the members of this house would agree that such people would make desirable citizens for Canada.
What is to be the policy of the government? We have heard on several occasions from the Minister of Labour (Mr. Mitchell) of one type of immigration policy. For example on April 25, on Friday last, he was referring to the bringing into Canada of labour for the sugar beet farms and for a textile mill in Quebec. I quote from Hansard:
Mr. Mitchell: If I can say this to my hon. friend-
He was interrupted and then he went on:
Mr. Mitchell: -just a minute now; we have had speeches on both sides of the house advocating immigration, and as soon as we set the policy in motion, you understand, there is a slight reservation on the part of some hon. gentlemen.
What intrigued me was his remark "as soon as we set the policy in motion." To what policy was he referring? If the government has already decided on a policy it is something the members of the house do not know about, because the house has not yet been taken into the confidence of the government and told what its immigration policy is.
We also had the experience of reading in the press that the hon. member for Cartier (Mr. Hartt) who was then a candidate in the by-election, had announced the government's immigration policy in the course of that by-election. That announcement was later denied by the minister responsible for immigration. All these different announcements and denials and different steps being taken have created a feeling of confusion and bewilderment in the minds of the people, who are hoping for quick action in connection with their applications for the admission of relatives and friends.
May I add this for the benefit of the minister of immigration, that even if there is not transportation available for those persons on whose behalf application has already been made for their admission to Canada, I feel
that the government should take steps to issue visas to those who are within the admissible classes and who would make desirable citizens, so that they will have something tangible to show that they are to be given an opportunity eventually to come to this country. The worst feature of the whole situation in Europe is that these persons who have been in displaced persons camps some for two years, and some for much longer, are deteriorating in morale-I do not think that is too strong a statement-because they do not know what is going to happen to them. They cannot say for certain that they will be allowed to come to Canada or to one of the other western democracies, and they do not know that they will not be forced to return to their country of origin or what will happen to them. Every day that we procrastinate and delay, their morale and their usefulness further decreases, and they will make that much less desirable citizens for Canada. The government might well consider the issuing of visas in advance to persons in these displaced persons camps who are found to be in the admissible classes, so that they will have something to live for, some ray of hope that at some future day when transportation is available they can come to Canada.
I want to refer to a recommendation made by the delegation which interviewed the government on February 7 in connection with the regulations governing "relatives". Under the regulations the term "relatives" is very restricted in its meaning. The delegation recommended that a change be made in P.C. 2071 and P.C. 371/47, to include all the immediate relatives of any persons legally admitted and resident in Canada who are in a position to receive and care for such relatives. By immediate relatives they mean "up to and including first cousins and their children".
I would also refer to a meeting held in Toronto earlier this year at which the hon. member for Trinity (Mr. Skey) and I were present at which fifteen hundred people passed a resolution dealing with this same question, advocating the widening of the regulations to include all immediate relatives rather than just some restricted classes. There is a good reason for that, because often it is found that if the present regulations were to be followed strictly there would have to be a division of families. In some cases the father might be allowed in to the country but other members of his family might be barred. This works a hardship and an injustice on people who have already suffered more than their share of hardship and injustice.
I hope that the minister will find it possible to announce to the house today the specific
Immigration

things which the government has in mind in connection with admitting displaced persons and refugees say within the next six months. We have been told again and again that transportation is not available and other things are not as they should be. That is possibly quite true. But if we look at it from the point of view of humanity and realize that we are not dealing with a cargo of dry goods which can stand waiting on the European shore for the next three or four years, we shall realize that our immigration policy is a question of real urgency. Surely transportation and shipping can be made available if this country desires that it should be made available at this time.


Thomas Langton Church: Before the house resolves itself into committee of supply, I wish to complain about the great scarcity of ships for bringing people out from the old country. I have been in touch with some of the shipping companies and have been told that shipping is practically sold out for the next year, with the result, as the hon. member said a moment ago, very little can be done about securing shipping.
I object to the government bringing out Polish soldiers'. As was said in the British House of Commons, they were not all conscripted'; most of them were volunteers. They were told that if they enlisted on the side of Germany they would have food and clothing and might not have to fight. They obtained better conditions than if they had stayed at home and done their duty as good citizens of a great Polish country. I object inasmuch as the British government is paying the fares of these people to bring them out. As was announced in the house last week, a team from this country has gone over there to prepare the way for these people to come to Canada. We were not told what parts of this country they were to come to. At the same time we find that it is difficult for citizens of the old country to get to Canada because there is no shipping space.
I object to the government bringing out these people because in Italy they were fighting against the British forces and against our own forces. That was shown in the British House of Commons. Shipping space can be found for these people, but for the British, who bore the heat and burden of the day during the war, no shipping space can be found.
I have had a lot of correspondence with one shipping company which has ships on the seven seas, and they tell me that shipping space has been sold out for almost a year. There will not be anything available until the

fall and there may not be anything then. Charity should begin at home. We should think of these people, our own kith and kin, who protected our shores against invasion during the difficult days of the war.
I was surprised at the reply which has been given us here by the government regarding these Polish soldiers and others, because the real facts are set out in a return which has been tabled in parliament in the old country. Objection has been taken to that policy here. A large number of these men fought against us in Italy and in other parts of Europe. They were not all conscripted; a large majority of them were volunteers. They gave up their Polish citizenship, and when the Germans came through their country they welcomed the Germans with open arms and tried to get into the German army.
Perhaps we should not do everything that the British government asks. They pay the fares of these men. God help this country if we have to depend on everything that the present Labour government is doing at the present time in the old country. They are stifling private initiative and private enterprise. They have made a mess of their internal situation with regard to coal, floods, food and electric power, and their foreign affairs. They are giving away and scattering parts of the empire for a song. We hope that there will not be such a state of affairs in Canada.
I object to the policy of the government regarding shipping and its immigration policy. It is well known that hardly anybody from the old country can come to this country; they cannot get shipping, or comply with the immigration regulations. Conditions are not what they should be. The result is that most of these British people are going to New Zealand and Australia, particularly the soldiers who fought for the country. They did something for the dominions and for the old country. Instead of sending a large delegation to Lake Success-it should be called Lake Failure or Lake Farce-to look into the Palestine problem which will be nothing but tower of babel; we should give some consideration to immigration from the old country. The same thing applies to the united nations. It is nothing but a tower of babel. What useful purpose will be served by inquiring into conditions in Palestine when we know as has been charged in the British House of Commons, that wealthy Jews of New York city and other parts of the United States are the people who are supplying the money to bring these bandit, illegal, underground gangsters into Palestine. This charge has been made by the opposition in

Immigration
the old country. Wealthy people of the United States belonging to one race are financing what is going on in Palestine. These terrorists are murdering in cold blood officers of the Eighth army and others. In the face of that we are sending delegates to Lake Success to inquire into the Palestine situation, with which we have no connection whatever. We should release shipping to bring immigrants from Great Britain. A large number of ships were leased to us by the United States government during the war. I hope the head of the government, who has charge of this, will take up these matters to see if some shipping cannot be provided during the next two or three months for our kith and kin in the old country, and not leave it until it is too late.
From the information I have received from shipping companies, it is clear that shipping space has been all sold for the next year. The practical result is that people who want to come out here with their families or brothers or sisters, fathers and mothers are not able to do so. Some want to go to the prairies, and some want to go to other parts of the country to be with their kith and kin. I do hope that the government will take the matter up and that we shall have some reply, because I do not want to see all the people in the mother country who served in our forces have to go to New Zealand and Australia. That is where they are going. The minister did some good work. He opened some shipping immigration agencies in Belfast and Liverpool. We had one in London and in Glasgow one was opened. Tens of thousands of people want to come to this country but they cannot get the shipping space. Surely the government must have some ships. Then there are the private companies, the merchant marine and other ships which could be utilized by lease or charter parties to give us space for the next six months, so that people of the mother country could migrate here instead of having to go to New Zealand and Australia.


Gladys Grace Mae Strum: I wish to raise the question of the treatment of women workers being admitted to Canada to work in the textile mills and in domestic employment. We are all alarmed at the trend that government policy has taken. AVe have been told for the last two or three years, and during the three sessions since I have been a member, that the government had a policy and that under that policy certain people could be admitted; but we found that it was a restricted policy. It applied only to the immediate relatives of persons who were
already in Canada. When we tried to get in cousins, uncles or inlaws, we were denied the right to bring them in. Now we find that the industrialists of this country are being given permission to set our immigration policy, because in effect that is how it is working out. If someone wants so many workers, by order in council he is given the right to go and bring in so many hundred people. I for one object to having any section of our economy set the immigration policy of this government. I think I voice the sentiments of every hon. member in that regard. If we are to bring people in by the hundreds and allow others to add to that number we should consider the field of immigration as a whole.
AVe should remember that the whole question of retaining population in Canada itself is an important one. In the thirty years preceding the war, between 1901 and 1931, our record was not very good in that respect. We find that in those thirty years the natural increase was three and a half million. In the same thirty years we brought in 5,100,000 people. So that our total population should have grown by eight and a half million people. But at the end of thirty years our population was not up to the extent of eight and a half million people. The real increase was only five million people. Therefore we had lost three and a half million people during the time we were bringing in 5,100,000 immigrants. When you break down that figure you find that, of the 3,500,000 people who left Canada,
1.000.000 were Canadian born and 2,500,000 went somewhere else, or asked to be sent back to their own country. This included many British people who applied for repatriation during the depression. This total meant that half of our immigrants moved on and a million of our own people who moved out.
I submit that this is a serious condition. We find that not only do our own people move out, but the people who are most expensive to train leave us. Our scientists, teachers and medical men move out. I have here the review of Canadian Health Needs and Health Insurance Proposals, which tells us that while no precise figures are available, a national health survey estimated that the loss in immigration is the equivalent of not less than ten per cent of our medical school output. In other words, ten per cent of our young doctors move out, so that we are losing the most highly trained and valuable people at the top, while we are recruiting people to come in on the lowest occupational level. [DOT]
Let me assure the house that I am not against bringing in either immigrants or

__________ Immigration
refugees, but we must separate the two, because we have a definite responsibility, which we have shirked, in regard to the need of displaced persons to find refuge in sanctuary. We have been very selfish, for many people must have died because we refused to take seriously our responsibility in this regard. The question of displaced persons and refugees must not, however, be confused with the problem of immigration, and our industrialists must not be permitted to determine our immigration policy through an operational move out the back door. That is what I object to.
In connection with refusals, I suggest that there are many worthy cases that are being denied all the time. I have here a letter with reference to a Norwegian who escaped from Norway and joined the merchant marine of the resistance forces. He was in the British command and shipped in and out of Canadian ports all through the war. He came to Little Norway and became engaged to a Canadian girl. This man is young and healthy, earning his own living, and is engaged to a Canadian, having been in the Canadian merchant marine, but he is now told that he cannot come to Canada. Just last week I saw a letter from the Immigration branch telling him that he could not come here, but an industrialist can get permission to bring in 100 or 500 textile workers from somewhere else.
That is what we must object to as members of parliament, the denial of our responsibility to persons who have already proved themselves worthy of admittance, while we grant a permit to someone to go and drag in so many hundred people to fill a textile mill.
In regard to this particular question, I wish to talk about the status of those women who will be brought to work in the province of Quebec. So far as the move to bring in workers is concerned, I think it is unfortunate that the order in council dealing with textile workers, which I have before me, and which permits their entry under the auspices of the Dionne Spinning Mill Company, is framed in the way in which it is. There is an application for admittance from Europe of 100 women for training and employment as .textile workers, and they are to be paid at wages as required by the law of Quebec regulating salaries and conditions of work in the textile industry of that province.
As members we must bear in mind that the textile industry is one of the most poorly paid in Canada. I have that on the authority of the year book for 1946 which gives the wages paid in every industry and the average wages for each province. I find that the maritimes and Quebec are the worst employers and 
have the worst wages; and of all the industries, the textile is one of the very worst in the matter of wages. It is therefore unfortunate that we should bring these women in and put them in the worst industry in the worst province. If we are to do that we should give them at least as much protection as we give the Polish veterans. The Polish veterans who are being brought in under the national employment office contract will have exactly the same treatment wherever they go in Canada- the same wages, the same contract. The Polish veteran will not be the victim of any one province or the victim of any low-paid industry. The government is to be complimented on working out a national agreement with the Polish veterans, but I would ask it to do the same for the women workers who come in to take employment in Canada. If we are to bring in men and women we must give them equal protection under the laws of the country.
I wish to discuss now the question of the domestic worker, which is of interest to everyone, because, according to the James report on reconstruction, the home is a valuable institution. I do not think any of us have any quarrel with that. We all agree that help for the mother in the home is necessary. Here is a paragraph that all hon. members should be interested in. I think it is relevant:
In any measure of social policy in which regard is had to fact, the great majority of married women must be regarded as occupied in work which is vital though unpaid, without which their husbands could not do the paid work and without which the nation could not continue.
If we are to bring in people to work in our homes we must have regard for the homes in which they will serve. I think it is regrettable, but it has been accepted that the stupid people who could not get work in anything else could always do housework and could look after children, and we have paid them accordingly. That stigma which we have put upon housework has made it almost impossible to get girls to work in homes now that there is work to be had in other industries.
I have here a table from the 1941 census which shows how poorly paid the domestic worker has been, although the domestic worker has had an important part to play in the question as to the number of women who work in domestic employment in comparison with the number of teachers, office workers and others. Office workers are only five per cent of the women workers, teachers only eleven per cent, whereas the women who did housework in 1941 constituted 24 per cent of all women workers. So that from the point of view of numbers they are important, because they are more than twice as numerous

Immigration
as the teachers and five times as numerous as the office workers. But here are the wages they were paid in cash, and many of them did not get board and lodging. Charwomen, cleaners and cooks did not get board and lodging in many cases. Cleaners and charwomen get an average of S358 a year; cooks get an average of $447 a year; housekeepers and matrons range from $235 to $364 a year; and in the domestic and allied trades the wages were from $285 to $366, according to the dominion bureau of statistics, 1941 census.


Mr. PARENT:: They are wrong. We pay more than that.


Gladys Grace Mae Strum: Maybe, but they are your own.
Mr. PARENT; You do not get a maid at $300 a year today. You pay $75 a month with board.


Gladys Grace Mae Strum: That was 1941.


Charles Eugène Parent: You pay $75 a month with board.


Gladys Grace Mae Strum: If we are to bring women in we should inquire whether or not there are openings in this field. Last Tuesday I attended, in the railway committee room in this building, a meeting which was called by the Department of Labour and attended by the mayor of this city and representatives of all the national women's organizations. We were told that there were 2,700 women looking for work and that there were between 400 and 500 positions open to them. So that does not indicate to me that in Ottawa at least there is any great shortage of domestic help. But the conditions of employment and the social status that goes with domestic employment have, I think, made women and girls reluctant to enter this field.
The government has a responsibility to the homes of this country, to the mothers and to the women who would do that kind of work if it were put on the basis of a profession and were paid decently. The recommendations of this commission are useful as a guide to the government in undertaking that sort of thing. This report recommends that training schools for domestic workers be set up. If the government is to admit girls from Europe, this is especially important, although it is also important from the point of view of our untrained workers here or the people who should be doing domestic work. This suggestion of a training programme is a sensible and useful one. The recommendation is that the training be part time and that, while the girl is training, she work part time. That is, the girl would go to school perhaps in the morning and would work in the afternoon.
She would also earn at the same time as she was training, and there would be less of a load as far as the expense of conducting these schools is concerned; she would gain selfrespect and she would immediately begin to realize that her work would be useful, necessary and worth while.
The government should consider carefully this suggestion made by women who are representative of women's organizations, and I think there are national women's organizations which would be only too happy to assist the Department of Labour in setting up these schools. I am sure that the Young Women's Christian Association and the National Council of Women would help. These women were at the meeting last week; they are to have a meeting tomorrow in the same place, and they are anxious that we raise the standards not only of the workers, but of the women who employ them, because the women who employ them have been guilty of a faulty attitude in regard to their employees. I see no reason why these girls should not have hostels. Many of them are not going to be able to live in. The modern house is small. The modern apartment is cramped and there is not room to house the worker. In addition to that, the worker herself -would much rather have living accommodation outside the home of her employer. As I mentioned last week at the meeting where we discussed this matter, I think the day is past when the maid should be relegated to the attic and be given the use of all the cast-off furniture. If this is to be a respectable and respected occupation, the girl has a right to a nice room in an attractive hostel and should be paid enough so that she could pay for her room on a reasonable basis. This was the approach which the people in New Zealand were using when I was there a few years ago. They were experiencing an industrial boom, and they found that their girls were very happy to flock out of the homes and into the factories, although many of them would have preferred to do housework. Therefore the people of that country were establishing minimum wages and hours legislation and were building hostels, so that the girls could have a social life of their own among people who were in a like occupation. That was a great improvement on the original status of the household employee.
I am going to ask the government that, if we are to bring in women, we do two things. I ask that the industrial worker coming from Europe be given the same protection as the Polish veteran, under a national labour code and contract; and that household workers, if we bring in household workers, be given the advan-

Immigration

tage of training and the advantage of protection by law. I urge that, because we still have many people in Canada who believe that to be different is to be inferior and who will treat these people as inferior persons because they speak a different language, have a different kind of dress, and are not accustomed to eat the same kind of food. It is a common fallacy1, one into which all of us easily drop, to look on people who are different as not being as good as we are, and to treat them accordingly. We must not permit that to happen. I am going to ask the government to see to it that we give this protection to our women immigrants.


Mr. DEPUTY SPEAKER:: It is not my desire to curtail discussion unduly or to say that there should not be wide latitude, in view of what has already been stated, afternoon. I feel, however, that I should bring to the attention of the house the rule under which we are proceeding, and I refer hon. members to Beaucbesne, third edition, reference 467, where it is stated that when a motion is made for the Speaker to leave the chair for the house to resolve itself into committee of the whole, then on the question-
... it shall be permissible to discuss any public matter within the powers of the federal parliament or to ask for the redress of any grievance . . .
-it goes on to say:
. . . provided that the discussion . . . shall not relate to any decision of the house during the current session, . . . nor to any matter placed on or whereof notice has been given in the order paper.
The discussion-for at least a portion of the afternoon has been with regard to immigration. I find on the order paper today, No. 5 is:
Resuming the adjourned debate on the motion of the Minister of Mines and Resources for the second reading of Bill No. 10, an act to amend the Immigration Act and to repeal the Chinese Immigration Act.
Therefore most of the discussion today could have taken place on that order. It also occurred to me that all the discussion today could take place in the debate on the budget which will be before the house very shortly. As I said when I opened my remarks, it is not my desire in any way to curtail discussion, but I did feel that I should bring the rule to the attention of the house and it occurs to me that future speakers should be guided by the rule unless the house from day to day decides otherwise.


Mr. STIRLING:: When Mr. Speaker was in the chair, the question of immigration was raised, and the Minister of Mines and Resources (Mr. Glen) drew' attention to the

fact that, although Bill No. 10 is on the order paper, it deals with three matters in connection with immigration, definitely stating them. In consequence of that, these matters of immigration which hon. members have been talking about this afternoon could not possibly have been discussed under Bill No. 10.
I suggest to Your Honour that no restriction was placed upon the number of matters which might be brought up. True, whoever might be occupying the chair would of necessity curb such discussion as dealt with matters already on the order paper. But when the hon. member who was leading the house suggested that on Mondays we should be permitted to discuss matters on the motion for supply, no restriction was offered as to the number of matters which could be raised.


Mr. KNOWLES :: Mr. Speaker, on the point of order: When Bill No. 10 was under discussion on February lil some hon. members were going a little outside the provisions of the bill. At that time the Minister of Mines and Resources (Mr. Glen) took the position that the discussion on that bill should be confined to its provisions. I find that Your Honour, as Deputy Speaker, was in the chair on that occasion, and that you said this, as reported at page 314 of Hansard:
The bill does allow considerable latitude, but I hope the house so far as possible will limit discussion to the provisions of the bill, and leave a general discussion of immigration to a later date.
I suggest that if these wider matters in respect of immigration could not be discussed under Bill 10, they should be in order now.


William Ross Macdonald: I recall the debate to which the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre has referred, and my recollection is that a number of hon. members did not see fit to accept my advice and limit their remarks. I have not that bill before me, but I believe one section in it deals with the arrival of immigrants in Canada, and their travel across the country. It is my recollection I expressed the opinion that under that section immigration from almost any country could be discussed. And when I say that, I do not want to encourage hon. members to discuss immigration too widely when that bill comes before the house again. If I said I hoped hon. members would reserve their remarks for some future occasion, I did not think it would be one such as this, when grievances were brought before the house, but rather at a time when the minister's estimates were under consideration.	_
I agree with what has been said by the hon. member for Yale (Mr. Stirling). The house

Immigration
is the master of its procedure; but, as he has said, I shall be bound by the rules unless the house decides otherwise.


Mr. H. W. HERRIDGE (Kootenay West):: Mr. Speaker, I feel I should say a word or two about immigration, seeing that you have permitted a few members to speak previously this afternoon on that matter. A number of my constituents have written to me about immigration and they are concerned about the government's policy. I want to say that I and those who support me are in favour of admitting to this country as many as possible of those people who fought for us or were on our side or who have our ideals. I think we have to do the best we can for refugees in Europe and other countries.
I want, in a few words, to express opposition to certain things. The first matter I should like to mention is the bringing into this country of former members of the second Polish corps. I think the Minister of Labour (Mr. Mitchell) has said that this was one of the finest immigration schemes that had ever been evolved in Canada, but when there are so many people in dire need wishing to come to this country I do not think there is any necessity of bringing in any more of these soldiers under the present terms. I have here a paper called The Commonwealth of April 25, 1947. This is a leading Catholic weekly, and I should like to quote as follows:
Cardinal Sapieha has recently appealed to Poles abroad to return to Poland, assuring them that all who have not lost their citizenship can return without fear. . . .
I am sure that, in view of a statement like that being made by such high authority, large numbers of these men will want to leave England and other points for Poland. I have no doubt that among the former Polish soldiers who were admitted there are many splendid men, many democrats, but in my opinion there are others who are not. I understand that we have brought in something in the neighbourhood of 150 who formerly served in the German army. I want to express my opposition to that. There are so many hundreds of thousands of people who are unquestionably suitable immigrants and, when that is so, I do not think we should bring to this country anyone who has rendered service in the German armed forces during the last war.
I wish to speak briefly with reference to the Ukrainians. I know there are thousands of democratic Ukrainians who wish to come to this country, and I would be one who would welcome all who are thoroughly democratic in their outlook. But we must not forget that there were four divisions of 83166-159J
Ukrainians who fought as volunteers in the German army, and we must be very careful that we do not let any of those birds into this country. When it comes to a question of selection I am sure that when our officers come to examine these people they will find that they all claim they are democrats.
In addition, I want to express my opposition, as did the hon. member for Qu'Appelle (Mrs. Strum), to the bringing in of contract labour under the circumstances under which they are apparently being brought in to work in the textile mills. I have had a number of letters in that connection and I am quite sure that will be a most unpopular procedure with Canadian labour throughout Canada.
I know it is very easy to talk on this subject. Immigration is a difficult question and I admit the difficulties. I am of opinion that if this government is to work out an immigration policy which will find general acceptance in this country it can do so only on the basis of having discussions with leaders of the veterans organizations, labour organizations and farm organizations. If the government is willing to do that and get their varying points of view I believe it will find that there is a measure of common agreement among them and that an immigration policy can be worked out which would be satisfactory to and supported by a large majority of the Canadian people, one which would at the same time assist great numbers of these refugees and other worthy people who wish to come to this country from Europe.


Mr. G. H. CASTLEDEN (Yorkton):: to this country. People in this country with relatives in Europe are urging that their relatives be admitted to Canada. Delegations have waited on the government urging the government to do something, and committees have been set up for the same purpose. I want to quote from the proceedings of the senate committee on immigration and labour which sat last year and presented some fine recommendations to the government. The people of Canada are asking what is wrong with our national economy when at a time like this we are not attempting to fulfil our obligations to the world and particularly to those persons in Europe displaced by the war, and why at the same time we have people in this country who cannot find employment. They believe that something must be radicallj' wrong. I quote from the senate committee on immigration and labour, at page 300 of their proceedings:
As to the possible increase in domestic demand through improved dietary standards, Dr. W. C. Hopper, of the economies division, Dominion Department of Agriculture, finds out that to raise the diet of every Canadian to the standard established by the Canadian Council on Nutrition would require an increase of about
2,000,000 acres to provide feed for dairy cattle and the necessary additional fruits and vegetables. This is about equivalent to the acreage that would be freed if our annual exports of pork and bacon to Great Britain were reduced by two hundred and seventy-five million pounds. It is equivalent in amount to approximately 8 per cent of our estimated available unused agricultural lands. Clearly, any major impetus to agricultural settlement in the dominion, if it is to come from improved nutritional standards, must come through increased export demand arising from improving dietary standards in other countries.
We have the fact that immigration is desirable and also available. Then where is the wisdom in Canada withholding from the crowded peoples of Europe access to her broad acres?


James Horace King: I am sorry to interrupt the hon. member, but I must again call attention of hon. members to order No. 5 on today's order paper:
Resuming the adjourned debate on the motion of the Minister of Mines and Resources for the second reading of Bill No. 10, an act to amend the Immigration Act and to repeal the Chinese Immigration Act.
It is the duty of the Speaker to call the attention of hon. members to the fact that they should not debate the subject matter of a bill which is not before the house.


George Hugh Castleden: Mr. Speaker, I would point out that twice already this afternoon this matter has been threshed out, and it was pointed out that the Immigration Act does not
[Mr. Castleden.l
permit of a discussion on the general policy of immigration because it is confined to Chinese immigration and to the admission of dependents of veterans.


James Horace King: The hon. member will admit that he is discussing immigration and that he will have an opportunity a few days from now to discuss that matter. I have no alternative to asking hon. members to abide by the rules.


Stanley Howard Knowles: On the point of order, Mr. Speaker, it was ruled when Bill No. 10 was before the house that we could discuss on the bill only such matters as were specifically covered by it, and attempts at that time to discuss general matters of immigration were ruled out. It was ruled that we must stick to Chinese immigration and to the admission of dependents of members of the armed forces.


James Horace King: The hon. member knows it is the practice and the rule on the second reading of the bill to discuss the principle of the bill and, in committee, to discuss the details. What is the title of Bill No. 10? It is:
An act to amend the Immigration Act and to repeal the Chinese Immigration Act.
That is the subject which is being covered by the hon. member who has the floor.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Are we to understand, Mr. Speaker, that when Bill No. 10 comes before the house for second reading we shall be permitted to discuss immigration generally?


James Horace King: When this bill comes before the house the rules will be applied to it the same as to any other bill.


Mr. SHAW:: Mr. Speaker, in view of the fact that the greater part of the past two hours has been devoted to discussing immigration and it is now approximately half-past five o'clock I would suggest that for the rest of the afternoon we be permitted to continue to discuss immigration.


George Hugh Castleden: I should like to refer to that portion of the proceedings of the senate committee on immigration and labour which deals with refugees and displaced persons in Europe. The Canadian national committee on refugees has made certain requests of the government:
1. That Canada should state her policy on displaced persons immediately without waiting for decisions of the united nations. Australia has already made known her intention to take 70,000 immigrants annually.


James Horace King: Order. I would ask the hon. member to abide by the rules, or I must ask him to resume his seat.

Immigration


George Hugh Castleden: Mr. Speaker, I am referring now to the displaced persons in Europe problem as it affects the Canadian people. Am I not permitted to discuss that? to come to this country.


Mr. J. A. ROSS (Souris):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to endorse what has been said this afternoon by the hon. member for Kootenay West (Mr. Herridge) and the hon. member for Broadview (Mr. Church) with respect to priorities for people seeking admission to this country. The hon. member for Broadview, in answer to a question today, was told that many Poles now being admitted to this country had served with Italy under German command against our own forces. I have had a great deal of correspondence lately with regard to passages for British people who want to come to this country,


James Horace King: The hon. member will realize that I cannot take one attitude toward him and a different one toward other hon. members. Therefore I would ask him to abide by the rules of the house. If he desires to discuss immigration he should wait until the immigration bill is before the house.


James Arthur Ross: May I refer to the matter of transportation for a moment or two? This afternoon several hon. members have discussed at length the matter of immigration and I should like to deal with transportation for a moment.


James Horace King: If several hon. members have spoken on that subject time should not be taken up on the question now. I would ask hon. members to abide by the rules and discuss their grievances, and not subject matters which are covered by other motions.


James Arthur Ross: On the matter of transportation, I have been informed that passages from certain parts of the old country are booked up solid for a year. Many people of good British stock in this country are much concerned about that matter. I was surprised to hear an order in council referred to today which certainly looked to me as if special privileges were being granted by the government when they passed an order in council making special arrangements for some one hundred people of a certain nationality to be transported to this country.


James Horace King: Order. I am sorry, but I would ask the hon. member to resume his seat. If it is the wish of the house to give unanimous consent to permit this matter to be discussed I would have to call on the hon. member for Yorkton (Mr. Castleden). Is the house ready for the question?


Mr. ALISTAIR STEWART (Winnipeg North):: There is a matter which I should like to bring to the attention of the minister. It has to do with what the hon. member for Dauphin (Mr. Zaplitny) mentioned this afternoon. In Europe there are some 800,000 displaced people, many of them wondering what the future has in store for them.


James Horace King: Order. I would ask the hon. member to be kind enough to abide by the rules. Hon. members know the rules perfectly well. They know I could not ask an hon. member for such and such a constituency not to talk about immigration or refugees coming into this country and have another hon. member who is clever enough to use certain words to continue to discuss the matter. It would be unfair to those who have tried to debate the question and were called to order by the Speaker. I would ask the hon. member not to discuss the question of immigration.


Alistair McLeod Stewart: I had no intention of discussing the subject of immigration. I do not know how you came to that conclusion on the basis of the few remarks which I made, sir. What I wanted to say was that a suggestion was offered by the hon. member for Dauphin to the minister and I think it is one which should be taken into consideration. All (hat these people have over there is hope. What will give them more hope than anything else is this government granting to those who are eligible to come to Canada, a visa, a document or a letter which will ultimately permit them to come.


James Horace King: Order. Is the house ready for the question?



MARINE INSURANCE BROKERAGE-REQUEST FOR REINSTATEMENT ON ORDER PAPER

[Stage Direction]
Mr. DONALD M. FLEMING (Eglinton): Mr. Speaker, the matter I should like to discuss for a moment is one which has many of the characteristics of a question of privilege. To the third question appearing on today's order paper I was furnished with some answers, but not all of them. These questions relate to marine insurance carried by the Commodity Prices Stabilization Corporation, and I believe the answers were tabled by the parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Finance (Mr. Mayhew).
The first four questions relate to the brokers who hold the present insurance, when it was placed, and the reasons it was placed through those brokers. Those questions are answered with more or less sufficiency.
Business oj the House
[Stage Direction]
To the fifth question, which asks-
What other insurance, if any, does such broker hold for other crown companies and government departments and government boards, and what premiums have been paid for such insurance?
-the answer given is, "No information."
I submit that is not an answer, and that the question has simply been ignored. The matter of where insurance is placed is one of government record, as is the information respecting the names of the brokers and the premiums paid for such insurance. It is within the knowledge of any government department as to what particular insurance is placed for it through a broker; in this instance ij; is Dale and Company of Montreal. I am entitled to be told what premiums have been paid for insurance through that brokerage firm.
The question has definitely not been answered, and no reason has been given for its not being answered. I would ask that the question be restored to the order paper with an order that it be answered.

Mr. E. G. HANSELL (Macleod):: Mr. Speaker, I sometimes marvel that your eyesight is so good as to see me rise away back here, especially when so many of my hon. friends in front of me are so much taller and broader than I am. When I rise I usually find myself hidden behind someone.
The matter I should like to bring before the house is one which could not very well appear on the order paper, nor could I ask a question concerning it when the orders of the day are called, because it involves some explanation. Then, I cannot put a question on the order paper in respect of it because it is a matter dealing with the house itself. I have been at a loss, therefore, to know when to bring it up, and I appreciate the opportunity afforded this afternoon.
The matter I have in mind' is in respect of a revision of parliamentary procedure, something which I suggest is long overdue. We have come to a stage in our governmental and parliamentary history when we have become something more than legislators, and when governments, through the very nature of our nation's business, find that parliamentary sessions are lasting longer and longer. It is in this connection I have one or two suggestions to make.
In the last two years special committees have been appointed to make some few recommendations in respect of house pro-

cedure. I was a member of the committee last year, and we sat just once. For some unknown reason-at least unknown to me-we did not meet again. There seems to be some sort of influence radiating from some place or another which defeats our progress in the matter of revising our rules of procedure. This year no committee has been set up.
I am not going to take up the time of the house this afternoon to go into all the ramifications and regulations as to what procedure could be revised, but I have a suggestion to make, one which has been made before, but about which nothing has been done. We make it again; and if we have to make it again we will keep on making it, until something is done. The suggestion is that much time could be saved in the house if, through common consent, hon. members would permit the estimates to go before the various parliamentary committees, there to be discussed and from there to be brought back to the house for final vote.


Stanley Howard Knowles: To be discussed all over again.


Ernest George Hansell: No; I think that would cut down our discussion in the house. We could try it, anyway; there is no reason why we should not. Some may say that it would not cut down the time of the session at all. Well, let us try it, and see; that is the way we shall find out. The very nature of the country, with its diversified industries, makes it such that members of parliament have to be here when certain things which may be of no particular interest to their respective constituencies are under discussion.
For instance, there is the Department of Fisheries. There are very few things in that department which might interest my constituents, but there is an afternoon's discussion on lobster traps. My goodness, I have not any lobsters in my constituency; I am not interested in that, and yet I have to be here. If those estimates could be given to a committee and perhaps notice of the vote numbers that are to be taken up published in Votes and Proceedings, then if there is a particular item in which I am interested I would know it would be brought up on a certain day and I could go before the committee and get off my chest what I have to say and not take up the time of parliament.
I figured out the other day how much it costs per minute to run parliament. My figures may be subject to a good deal of interpretation, but it costs just $100 a minute to listen to a man's speech. When a man

Allowances to Veterans' Widows
takes forty minutes to make a speech it costs this country $4,000. I do not think my speeches are worth quite $4,000.


Mr. JOHNSTON:: That is a matter of
opinion.


Ernest George Hansell: The hon. member for
Bow River says that is a matter of opinion. I think they come pretty close to being worth $4,000, but not quite that. I say with all sincerity that the time of our sessions could be cut tremendously, and at the same time each and every hon. member would have all the time he needs at the proper time to discuss, as adequately as he requires, any item coming before parliament.
There is one other matter I should like to deal with, a matter which I think is being considered favourably by a good many members. I refer to the hours of our sittings. I do not know whether hon. members find what I do; but, as the months go by, I find it rather a grind to get to my office at ten o'clock in the morning and stay here until eleven o'clock at night. That is a pretty good sized day. By the time I get to my sleeping quarters, which is not my home, and do the one or two things I have to do before retiring, such as brushing my teeth, I find that it is about one o'clock before I can turn in. I am quite confident that hon. members would find their work much more pleasant if the hours of sitting were rearranged.
I suppose a dozen different suggestions could be made respecting change in hours, but I am going to suggest that we do not sit on Monday nights, on Wednesday nights or on Friday nights and that the hours in the afternoon be from two o'clock until six o'clock. That works out to just one hour less per week than what we are putting in now. It would mean that the only nights we would sit would be on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I do not see how the cabinet ministers stand the grind of attending to their departmental work, being responsible for their own legislation and seeing to the administration of their departments. When their estimates are up they have to sit here until eleven o'clock at night and they have as much responsibility for being here as any other hon. member. I do not know how the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) stands the grind. Perhaps he goes home in the evening and I am quite willing that he should because he has a tremendous responsibility, but there are some others who would like to go home in the evening as well. I am suggesting that, for this session at least, the estimates be
referred to a. committee and that the hours of sitting be revised. Let us try it to see how it works, and I am sure we all would be much happier.



ALLOWANCES TO WIDOWS OF NON-PENSIONED VETERANS

Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, there is an entirely different matter that I should like to speak on for a few minutes. I address my remarks in particular to the Minister of Veterans Affairs (Mr. Mackenzie). On April 23 I directed a question to the minister as to whether consideration was being given by the government to amending the War Veterans Allowance Act to provide an increase in the amount of the allowance both for veterans and for the widows of non-pensioned veterans. The minister made a forthright reply, and I appreciate the fact that he gave a clear-cut answer to my question. He said, as reported at page 2332 of Hansard:
It is not the intention of the government to introduce at the present session of parliament any amendments to the War Veterans' Allowance Act.
The grievance that I raise is to protest against that decision and to make an appeal to the minister and to the government to reconsider the matter at an early date. I do so in particular on behalf of non-pensioned veterans' widows.
As hon. members know, the dominion council of the organization representing these widows was in Ottawa last week. Most members are familiar-the matter is fresh in our minds at the present time and that is why I raise it now-with the situation in which these women find themselves. It is true that in recent years the government has taken certain steps in favour of these widows by establishing a special allowance for them. But-particularly with rising prices, the effect of which is being recognized in that the old age pension is to be raised-these widows feel that the time has come for the government to give consideration to their request for an increase in the amount. They now receive a maximum of $30.41 a month. The amount they are asking for is the modest sum of $40 a month. There are a number of other requests but I shall name just two of them. The second request is the matter of providing for hospitalization for these wddows when they require it. The third matter is that of making this allowance available to widows of all non-pensioned veterans of the South African war and the first world war rather than to the restricted group which is now the case because of the definition of an actual
248S

Allouwances to Disabled Veterans
theatre of war. That is all one needs to say on the point at this moment, for surely it is not necessary to emphasize the plight of these women in view of the meagre amount that they now receive.
As I say, the minister has made a definite statement as to the intention of the government this year, but I do make a plea to him to reconsider the matter and see if the government cannot, before the session is over, either in the estimates or in some other way, improve the position of these deserving widows of Canada's non-pensioned veterans.


Mr. J. R. MacNICOL (Davenport):: Although the Minister of Veterans Affairs (Mr. Mackenzie) did say on April 23 that the government had no intention of increasing the allowance to non-pensioned widows, this year, I think he deserves credit for the legislation now on the statute book with regard to these widows.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: The hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre wants all the credit. You were the real author of it.


John Ritchie MacNicol: It is about ten years ago that the matter was first brought into the house, and I have had the pleasure on. many occasions of saying that the present Minister of Veterans Affairs deserves credit for what these people are getting. I have been hoping, however, since the statement he made on April 23 that there would be no increase, that perhaps before the end of the session, in his generosity of heart, he would be able to convince his colleagues in the cabinet of the desirability of increasing the allowance to non-pensioned widows. The cost of living to these widows has gone up, just as it has to everyone else. They are now advanced in years, compared with the time the allowance was first made, and they need all the money they can get now. I know a number of these ladies residing in my constituency and they often come to see me about the matter, just as a number of ladies came last week to call on different members.
I wish to thank the minister for what he has done. It would never have been done but for him and I wish to give him that credit. However I wdll ask him to reconsider the matter with a view to allowing these widows something more. At their time of life they are often in need of medicine, and $30.41 is not much to clothe them and enable them to live properly. On their behalf I appeal to the minister's generosity, and would ask him again to reconsider the status of non-pensioned widows.



ALLOWANCES TO DISABLED VETERANS ATTENDING UNIVERSITY

Mr. D. G. ROSS (St. Paul's):: There is one matter I wish to bring to the attention of the Minister of Veterans Affairs (Mr. Mackenzie). When a veteran goes to the university, if he is single he gets an allowance of $60 a month. If a veteran goes to Osgoode Hall he is allowed to make $40 as well, which brings his amount up to $100. If a veteran receives a pension of $50 a month, all that he receives in the form of an allowance is $10. I have in mind a veteran who is a disability case, and all that he is getting from the government in the way of an allowance is $10. Of course he has his pension, but he is not in as good a position as the other chap at Osgoode Hall who is able to make $40 in addition to his allowance of $60. The chap to whom I refer also goes to Osgoode Hall, but because he has lost a leg he is not able to make $40 a month. It seems to me a great pity that a man who has a disability should suffer the loss of part of his allowance. This allowance should be given to him as of right and he should have his pension free. It is much more difficult for the chap who is pensioned to get along and make a few dollars than for the other fellow. It does not seem right that the allowance which he gets for his education should be deducted if he receives a pension.
I have received several letters along the same lines from these chaps, and I think something should be done about the matter, because there is a grave injustice if this is the case. It is particularly hard on a lad who is going to university when he is suffering from a disability of any kind, because he cannot get around in the same way as the others. It is a pity that he should be penalized and his pension taken from him when that pension is for a definite purpose. If a man goes out and makes $60 or $100 a month you do not cut out his pension because he is earning money. Suppose he makes only $50; you do not deduct the pension from the amount of money he makes. Why should you deduct the amount of his pension from his allowance? I suggest that his pension is something that should be considered apart from any allowance he receives. I wish the minister would look into this matter.
I should like to endorse what the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre said in regard to the widows. Some of these women are older now and they need all the money they can get. It seems to me that $30 a month is a pretty small allowance for them.

Daylight Saving Time



DAYLIGHT SAVING AND RURAL COMMUNITIES

Mr. E. J. HENDEESON (Lambton-Kent):: I wish to register a mild protest against daylight saving, which came into effect this morning. I wondered what was wrong when the maid rapped at my door at the unusual hour she did. I had to alter the clock and get up an hour earlier. I make this complaint not for myself, because I have enjoyed daylight saving. When I was younger it was harder for me to get up an hour earlier; but I find, as age is creeping up on me, it is no bother for me to get up at any time in the morning. I am speaking for the rural people, the farmers particularly. They are definitely opposed to the adoption of daylight saving piecemeal as we have it at present. When the war was at its height and daylight saving was standardized throughout Canada we got used to it; we worked by it and it was all right. Now that the decision has been left to the individual municipality, the situation is different. In the town in which I live they have adopted daylight saving to the detriment of the rural people, upon whom they depend for their prosperity. I was at a municipal gathering not so long ago where the officials of every municipality in the county were gathered and they definitely passed a resolution opposing daylight saving.
I do not know whether this matter comes under dominion jurisdiction, but I suggest that if we are to have the new time it should be in effect throughout Canada. We ought to have some heart for the rural people. Here it is, almost the first of May. The weather is cold; the farmer has seeding to do; he will be working his head off-I had almost said his fool head, because that is pretty nearly what it will mean'-in order to raise crops to feed a hungry world, and we are making it harder for him by adopting daylight saving time.
The farmer has to get casual labour from the urban municipality and quitting time comes at five or six o'clock, so that his hired help leaves him at the very time when, as those of us who have been brought up on farms know, the farmer is most in need of assistance. When the afternoon sun is shining, and toward evening, then the farmer needs all the help he can get. Once more I protest on behalf of Lambton-Kent, where I live, against the adoption of daylight saving. I protest on behalf of the rural people.



EAST MALARTIC MINE DISASTER

Mr. EEAL CAOUETTE (Pontiac):: All Canada was shocked to learn of the tragedy that struck my constituency of Pontiac in the accident at the Malartic mine. We had all
hoped that the eleven men trapped in the mine would be rescued, but the latest news has dashed our hopes. It now appears that eleven families are bereaved. I wish at this time to express my sorrow at the accident and my sympathy with these stricken families. At the same time I would call the attention of the Canadian people to the necessity for greater vigilance and a more rigid enforcement of safety regulations in the mines of Canada, so that tragedies of the kind at Malartic may be of less frequent occurrence in the future.


George Alexander Cruickshank: Every hon. member will undoubtedly agree with the remarks of the hon. member for Pontiac and join him in the expression of sympathy to the bereaved.
I wish to associate myself, Mr. Speaker, with *what the hon. member for Davenport (Mr. MacNicol) has said and I hope the minister will give seridus consideration in the reasonable request that has been made by the women's delegation. I should like to say to the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) that I agree with his sentiments in behalf of the women.



TAXATION OF COOPERATIVE ASSOCIATIONS

Mr. T. J. BENTLEY (Swift Current):: The matter I wish to raise is really a grievance of some urgency at this time, because the prospect or the possibility of discussing it under a specific order will likely be some days or maybe weeks away; I do not know when the opportunity will come. It is in the matter of a ruling of the Department of National Eev-enue in its application to the taxation of cooperative associations. The recent ruling has been that cooperative associations, when making up their accounts and the allocation of dividends for the year, must differentiate between those which are paid for provident purposes and those which are paid for productive purposes.
The patron of a cooperative association who receives a dividend on consumer or household goods that he has bought, does not have that apply to his income for taxation. But a dividend on what he buys for productive purposes -that is in the field of gasoline or those things for power work and so on-becomes part of his income and is taxable. Whether there is much quarrel with that particular division is a matter of opinion, but I should like to draw to the attention of the minister concerned that it is practically impossible for the cooperative associations to carry out that ruling. For instance, suppose a farmer comes in to buy some lumber from a cooperative that handles lumber. He takes away his truckload of
2490	COMMONS
Taxation oj Cooperative Associations
lumber. Some of the lumber may be for building a granary or for repairs on the barn. Another part might be used for some little repairs or patchwork on the steps leading into the house, the porch, or something of that kind. The same thing applies with regard to gasoline. Much of the gasoline may go into the tractor, or it may go into the car when the car is being used for the operation of the farm. Then, in the same car, the gasoline may be used when the car is operating for domestic purposes, purely for pleasure, or for household use. The same thing applies in the field of groceries. It is difficult to separate that part which is used to feed the farmer's family from that part which is used to feed the hired men who are used for productive purposes.
I have given only a few instances here, but I think I have given enough to indicate to the minister that this kind of accounting is going to put the cooperative associatipns in a bad position. They will try to be honest; yet they will have to be the judges as to what particular purpose or use their patron has put the particular goods he has bought in that store or on that association's premises in. the past year. That is a difficult job for any cooperative manager to undertake.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Mr. Speaker, we have discussed a great variety of grievances this afternoon. I wonder if we could get into supply before six o'clock, and call just two items?


James Horace King: Is it the pleasure of the house to adopt the motion?
Motion (Mr. Abbott) agreed to, and the house went into committee of supply, Mr. Macdonald (Brantford City) in the chair.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: As announced by my colleague the other evening, two new departments will be called, not for discussion, but just to get them into supply. The first is the Department of Justice, vote 95, administration.



DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE

[Stage Direction]
95. Departmental administration, $224,092.
Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Stand.
Item stands.



DEPARTMENT OF LABOUR

[Stage Direction]
108. Departmental administration, $701,576.
Ian Alistair Mackenzie: May the item stand?
Item stands.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Mr. Chairman, I move that the committee rise, report the. resolutions and ask leave to sit again.
^


Stanley Howard Knowles: Report progress, you
mean?


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: No, report the resolutions, when discussing items in supply. My hon. friend might learn something more about procedure.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Did we pass these resolutions?


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Wre only called them.
Progress reported.
At six o'clock the house took recess.
After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock.



EMERGENCY POWERS


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Friday, April 25, consideration in committee of Bill No. 104, to provide for the continuation of certain orders and regulations of the governor in council for a limited period during the national emergency arising out of the war-Mr. Ilsley -Mr. Macdonald (Brantford City) in the chair.
William Ross Macdonald: When the committee rose on Friday night it had passed order in council P.C. 1609 as amended, and certain amendments had been carried with respect to other orders in council under the Department of Reconstruction and Supply. It is my recollection that the committee was considering orders numbers P.C. 9439 and P.C. 7502 as amended. Do the two last-mentioned orders in council carry?


Mr. GREEN:: Mr. Chairman, the hon.
member for Eglinton asked the following question as reported at page 2458 of Hansard:
Mr. Fleming:	I just want to give the minister
notice so that he might bring before the committee a statement of the areas declared to be congested areas and the dates on which they were so declared.
Mr. Howe:	Very well.
Is the parliamentary assistant able to give that information this evening?


Mr. G. J. McILRAITH (Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply):: I have those dates available. In the early stages this operation was done by municipal areas, which were declared to be congested areas as follows: Ottawa, by order 474 of January 13, 1945; Hull, by order 480 of

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Fehruary 19, 1945; Toronto, by order 481 of February 16, 1945; Hamilton, by order 482 of February 21, 1945; Vancouver-New Westminster, by order 484 of February 10, 1945; Victoria, by order 483 of February 10, 1945, and Winnipeg, by order 529 of July 5, 1945.
In September practically the whole of the dominion was included within the terms of the section as follows: On September 1, 1945, all of British Columbia, except the Peace River block; the province of Manitoba and the province of Ontario; on September 6, 1945, Saskatchewan, Alberta and the Peace River block; on September 13, 1945, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Quebec.


Howard Charles Green: The whole country is in now, then?


George James McIlraith: Yes.


Howard Charles Green: Within the last few days I have had a letter from the Vancouver zone council of the Canadian Legion. No doubt the same letter has reached the minister. In it they ask if something can be done to make available for emergency shelter some of the barracks buildings at Jericho, Kitsilano, Little Mountain and the Seaforth armouries in Vancouver. There are quite a few buildings there which are not in use. Evidently they were inspected by the Minister of National Defence when he was visiting the Pacific coast in April. The understanding was that upon his return here he would look into the question of making some of these buildings available for emergency shelter.
The letter suggests that the hutments which are not in use could be converted by Wartime Housing into emergency shelters for veterans and their families. As the parliamentary assistant knows, the situation in Vancouver with respect to housing for veterans is serious. Some 1,200 veterans and their families are in the old Vancouver hotel. I think altogether about 4,700 veterans are looking for homes. Can the parliamentary assistant tell us whether there is any possibility of having some action of the type suggested taken at this time?


Angus MacInnis: I suppose all hon. members from Vancouver received a letter similar to the one to which the hon. member for Vancouver South has referred. From the letter it would seem that a considerable number of emergency shelters could be provided through the reconversion of these hutments. The barracks of Jericho alone, as the letter states, would provide for approximately thirty families. Then there are the others the hon. member has mentioned. If at all
possible these hutments should be made available and work started on them at the earliest possible moment.


George James McIlraith: The practice is that the emergency shelter programme is worked out in connection with the municipal authorities. Perhaps I could deal with these different areas separately. At Jericho the medical and dental buildings are, I understand, owned by the province, not by the dominion government. The other buildings there are not declared surplus and I am of the opinion that it is the intention of the department to retain them. At Kitsilano there are no surplus buildings. There are surplus buildings at Little Mountain and a programme is being worked out to make them available. It is intended to use them for university students.


Howard Charles Green: How many will be accommodated?


George James McIlraith: There are six buildings at Seaforth, but they have been found to be unsuitable and I believe the city shares that view. Little Mountain should provide fifty family units.


Howard Charles Green: Jericho was the headquarters of the Pacific command for the navy, army and air force. As the Minister of Veterans Affairs knows, there are quite extensive barracks there, some of the buildings being three stories high. Under the present defence arrangements there is only an area command in British Columbia for the army and a small command for the air force, while the navy headquarters have been moved to Esquimalt. Surely the Department of National Defence will not require all these buildings. Would it not be possible for the department of reconstruction to take up with the Department of National Defence the possibility of getting at least some of these buildings for emergency shelter? Has the question been discussed with the Department of National Defence?


George James McIlraith: The question has been discussed at some length with the Department of National Defence and the last information I have is that they will not be declared surplus by those departments. The hon. member will realize that the declaration of surplus is not a matter exclusively within the jurisdiction of the department. I can have the matter looked into to see if there is any possibility of having any part of these buildings declared surplus.


Howard Charles Green: When all the barracks are
on land held by the dominion is it necessary to have any huts that could be used for
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emergency shelter declared surplus and sold? Is there no procedure by which the dominion government can use the huts for emergency shelter for a time and then, when the emergency is over, let them be used again by the Department of National Defence? I can quite understand why the army would not want to sell the huts because they are on army property; they are really permanent buildings but not required by the Department of National Defence under present conditions. Is there not some method by which buildings not required at the moment could be used for emergency shelter?


George James McIlraith: Perhaps I should have explained the use of the words "declared surplus." I was referring to buildings being declared surplus by the department now having them. That does not mean that the buildings are declared surplus or disposed of by the crown. I used the term merely to indicate that the department now having custody of the buildings would be the one to declare them surplus under the Surplus Crown Assets Act. Once they are declared surplus by the department now using them, the emergency shelter authorities or the crown may retain the ownership, and does.


Howard Charles Green: It so happens that my
home is right across the street from this Jericho property. It is an old golf course that was taken over and buildings were put up by the government. Many of the buildings are empty and there would seem to be no reason why they should not be made available for emergency shelter.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I do not speak with
immediate authority, but I notice that the Vancouver press state that Jericho will actually be used for the purpose my hon. friend has mentioned. I may say that, as far as any influence of mine is concerned, all available property there will be used for emergency housing. I know every inch of Jericho, and so does my hon. friend. The only building being held for defence purposes is the large air force building immediately after you cross the bridge. I understand that they will want that for three or four years. That is now part of the negotiations taking place in regard to the disposal of Kitsilano. There is, in my opinion, no reason in the world why the other barracks that are vacant should not be made available immediately for emergency housing purposes in greater Vancouver, and I shall lend all my support to that purpose.


Mr. ISNOR:: I should like to inquire
from the parliamentary assistant whether the same policy is being followed on the east 
coast as the hon. member for Vancouver South has suggested should be followed on the west coast? I ask that question because of negotiations which have been carried on by the city of Halifax through His Worship J. E. Ahearn. Apparently the mayor of Halifax is a little more aggressive than even that well known personage who represents the city of Vancouver at the present time.


George James McIlraith: Exactly the same policy is being followed on the east coast. I think it is fair to say that, as far as emergency shelter is concerned, the position is a little more happy in Halifax, because at the moment there is no demand on the part of the municipal authorities for additional emergency shelter. I believe they have what will reasonably meet their requirements at the moment.


Gordon Benjamin Isnor: Do I understand the parliamentary assistant to say that there was no need or no demand for emergency shelter in Halifax?


George James McIlraith: No; I did not put it quite in that way.


Howard Charles Green: That is what it sounded
like over here.


George James McIlraith: I pointed out that
emergency shelter had been provided to meet their immediate, urgent needs as indicated by the municipal authorities. A considerable amount has been made available in that area.


Mr. McMASTER:: The matter of emergency shelter is one to which I have given considerable attention for some years, and I have often wondered whether the government remembers that there is such an act in force. According to figures received from Toronto, the number of persons per unit in that city in January this year is only slightly greater than the number in 1940, and undoubtedly is considerably less than the number during the depression. Some people wonder why that is, but the fact is that in Toronto there are many large homes with only a limited number of people living in them.
I never could understand why a fairly well-to-do man with a family of only one or two could occupy a large house and the government neglect or fail to take possession of that house and do something with it, or at least with part of it, in order to provide accommodation. At the same time the government will keep a small home of six rooms away from an owner-generally speaking it is small homes that are involved-when that home is being rented for $20 or $25 a month. The next house is rented for perhaps $35 a month simply because it did not come under the provisions of the ceiling imposed on October 11, 1941.

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There is something wrong. I know of seven-roomed houses in which one person is living.
I know of some nine-roomed houses with two people living in them. A year or so ago a great furore was raised because a large house in a good part of the city was to be taken over by the city or the government and rerented. That was not done, but the owner of the house thought it was a terrible thing for the government to suggest putting a hand upon his property. The government is constantly putting its hand upon the homes of tire small people, houses with six rooms or less; and people cannot get possession of their own homes.
I should like the hon. gentleman to say what has been done in the city of Toronto in order to ascertain the amount of space available in the larger houses. While I am on my feet, I should like to say something I had not expected an opportunity to say. On the lake front just east of Yonge street there were many large buildings owned by the Royal Canadian Air Force. Some person has said they were not in condition to be used as living quarters, but I am told that was not so, that they had all the necessary plumbing and other fixtures; that they were well heated, and. in fact, provided everything people who were without homes might require. Yet those buildings were torn down and sold about a year ago. Now as I pass on the train I see a large excavation there, as though some commercial or industrial plant is to be erected. I do not see why these buildings could not have been made available to the people of Toronto, and I should like to know what attempt the government has made to ascertain the possibility of obtaining space in some of the larger homes in the city of Toronto.


George Alexander Cruickshank: Casa Loma. -


William Alexander McMaster: I was not speaking of Casa Loma.


George James McIlraith: Two main points were raised by the hon. member for High Park. In the first place, I understood him to urge that the government should start a policy of compulsorily billeting persons in homes.


William Alexander McMaster: Oh, no.


George James McIlraith: That has not been done so far, and I should! think hon. members on all sides would hesitate before embarking on a policy of that sort. It is drastic treatment to commence at this stage, to begin forcing additional persons into the premises of home owners or home occupiers. I am, quite frankly, a little amazed at this suggestion coming from
a member of a party which seems to favour the removal of controls as rapidly as may reasonably be possible.
The second point raised by the hon. member, as I understand it, has to do with the R.C.A.F. equipment depot in Toronto. That question was explored, and the city health authorities would not permit that property to be used for housing purposes. I understand that it didi not have the proper type of flooring or plumbing accommodation. Therefore it was not suitable, and was dismantled.


William Alexander McMaster: If the hon. member will give me the report from the civic health authorities to that effect I can take up the matter in the proper place. As far as forcing people into private homes is concerned, I do not see much difference between putting people in part of someone else's home, and refusing to let a man get possession of his own home. I do not speak about rehabilitating these houses; I suppose the parliamentary assistant has heard about shared apartments before this.


Mr. CAMPBELL:: I have been wondering to what extent the emergency shelter authorities have cooperated with the municipalities and provinces in providing shelter in the sort of buildings about which the hon. member for High Park had been speaking. In the city of North Battleford, Saskatchewan, the provincial government was able to purchase the airport buildings from War Assets Corporation, and they provided some eighty suites, which meant that every veteran in that city was given an opportunity to have a suite of rooms last winter. Perhaps North Battleford is the only city in Canada in that position. I believe a great deal more of that could be done if we had the right kind of cooperation between the housing administration and the provincial and municipal authorities. Those airport buildings were located just a mile outside North Battleford, and they were turned into nice, comfortable suites renting at a reasonable figure. They have provided playgrounds for the children, a recreation hall for the people living there, a store of their own, and all the rest of it; they have a bus line into the city, and they are really enjoying life. It seems to me that more of that sort of thing could be done with some of these airport buildings in other parts of Canada.


John Ritchie MacNicol: When I was home over the week-end I drove quite a few miles around the city of Toronto taking a look at buildings under construction. I know the appalling housing situation in Toronto, particularly in my own part of the city where so many thou-
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sands of the working people live. I know how they are crowded, with two or three or four families in a small six-roomed house. I asked myself if the government had a tabulation made of the millions of bricks being used in the construction of theatres, churches and all sorts of other buildings in Toronto. I am not finding any fault with the fact that these other buildings are being constructed, because permits must have been obtained for that construction. But I thought not only of the millions of bricks being used in those buildings but of the thousands of kegs of nails and the millions of feet of lumber; and as I drove around I asked myself which was the most pressing demand on the government: to permit the construction of theatres and churches, which of course are necessary, and many other buildings of that kind which require vast quantities of building materials and the services of many expert bricklayers, carpenters and so forth, or the demand for the construction of houses. I just asked myself whether the government could be conversant with the appalling housing situation in our large cities and, if so, why they permitted these other buildings to be constructed. I am not opposed to their construction, but surely housing comes first in the situation under which the people are struggling to live at the present time.


George James McIlraith: To deal, first, with the points raised by the hon. member for North Battleford. some nine different municipalities in Saskatchewan now have emergency shelter units. The number of projects is larger than that, but nine municipalities are involved. The whole programme is worked out in conjunction with the provincial and municipal authorities, and I should be very much surprised if any of those municipalities said they had received any other than excellent cooperation from the emergency shelter authorities. I believe they have.


Alexander Maxwell (Max) Campbell: I am willing to give them credit for that.


George James McIlraith: I thank the hon. member for that. Cooperation is a two-way proposition. It varies with one municipality and another. It is fair to say that, in general, cooperation with municipalities has been very good.
With respect to the points raised by the hon. member for Davenport, it is really a matter of building materials covered under the order in council which is already passed. I would point- out to him that in the production of colourless window glass it would appear that the supply in 1947 will be ade-

quate. I have the figures available with respect to brick but perhaps there is no point in giving them.
To go back to the question which was debated before, namely, construction permit control and the other controls, the matter of construction permits rests with the municipal authorities. I do not know that there is much need to elaborate on that at this time since the order is already passed. If permits were granted for these buildings they were granted by the municipal authorities. I assume the municipal authorities gave the matter complete and proper attention before they granted them.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I really cannot understand it, if the municipal authorities, particularly the city of Toronto, are harassed to death for accommodation, and they are. The eviction court in Toronto is a sad place to enter. I go there frequently and listen to the arguments put forward by those who want eviction and those who do not want eviction to take place. It seems to me strange that the municipal authorities would not try first to house their people. To provide homes for the multitudes who are now packed almost like sardines- that is all we can say about it-in unhealthy and dangerous conditions of every description, should be the important thing. I do not want to think the city council and the city authorities in Toronto would give preference to I do not know how many theatres-I passed by a number of them-which have men working on them and piles of lumber and building materials of every description around them. I am not finding fault with their being built, but I am trying to say that housing should have No. 1 priority over everything else to give the people a chance to live under decent conditions.


Angus MacInnis: Before we leave this order in council, there is a question I wish to ask the parliamentary assistant. When the members for Vancouver were in that city during the Easter holidays they met the city council and, among other things, discussed with them the project of buying certain houses in Bremerton in the state of AVashington. Some 1,600 houses were to be floated on barges to Vancouver. Has that deal gone through?


George James McIlraith: I have some information on that point. There are two or three things about it. First of all, the municipal authorities in the city of Vancouver will not make a contribution to that project. I understand that they are unwilling to do so. They want it done, if it is done, by the dominion government alone. I might add one other

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thing. There is no evidence whatever that the United States authorities would permit these houses to be taken out of the United States and into Canada. That is another difficulty.


Howard Charles Green: Have inquiries been made about the matter?


George James McIlraith: There is one other difficulty. The municipalities will not administer the project. These are the difficulties in the way at the moment. I think I am justified in saying it looks as if they will not be having Bremerton houses.


Angus MacInnis: Surely there must be something wrong here. I had a copy of a letter which was sent by the corporation council of Vancouver to the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply, I think. From that letter my understanding was that the city was asking for financial assistance from the government. I understand that to>
a certain amount that financial assistance was offered; whether it was sufficient or not I do not know. I am greatly surprised to hear that the city wanted the government to pay all of it. I am almost sure that is not the case.


George James McIlraith: I am sorry I have not the letter and the reply here. The letter was received and replied to in considerable detail by the minister. As I understand it, the city takes the position that it has no authority to expend money on that project. I understand further that the dominion government made the city an offer under which the dominion government would pay $500 per unit of these houses. I am sorry I have not the letter. If I had I would have more detail.


Howard Charles Green: Have inquiries been made of the United States authorities by the Department of Reconstruction and Supply since Easter?


George James McIlraith: No such inquiries have been made since Easter. The position is that there is no point in making such inquiry until someone assumes the responsibility by bringing these houses in and financing them.


Howard Charles Green: The parliamentary assistant said he believed the United States authorities would not release the houses.


George James McIlraith: No, I did not express it in that way.


Howard Charles Green: How did the parliamentary assistant express it? What did he mean to convey?


George James McIlraith: I said there was no evidence that the United States authorities would permit them to be exported, to Canada.


Howard Charles Green: Why does the department not find out whether or not they can be obtained from the United States?


George James McIlraith: The reason is-


Howard Charles Green: Are the city authorities and members of parliament just wasting their time trying to have this deal put through? The government should at least find out from the United States government whether or not these buildings can be made available.


George James McIlraith: The United States
government have a prohibition against the export of building material. The reason they .have not been approached since Easter to change that and to make a special exception or do whatever is required under their law to vary it is that no one here is in a position to take the houses. It is still a hypothetical question because no authority here will assume responsibility for taking the houses and putting them in the city of Vancouver and operating them. That question has to be settled first.


Howard Charles Green: Was an approach made to the L'nited States government before Easter? If so, what was the answer given?


George James McIlraith: Perhaps I can restate it with a little more detail. The'situation at the moment with respect to these Bremerton houses is simply this: the Canadian government or the department is not in a position to make such an approach to the government of another country until it has a bona fide application to import these houses. Such is not yet the case. There is no bona fide application to import these houses.


Howard Charles Green: I suggest that the lead should come from Ottawa. The people on the Pacific coast have found that these houses are available. They have inspected them and are satisfied with them. They cannot go farther until they know whether or not the houses can be obtained. If they cannot be obtained there is no use in wasting more time on the project.


George James McIlraith: Perhaps I could state it in another way. There is no use in determining a hypothetical question about an import permit from a foreign government until there is some evidence that someone will import houses. So far, in this talk about Bremerton houses, there is no evidence that they are available, and we have been unable to get any real cooperation in the vray of working out an arrangement with the municipal authorities to provide for paying for and operating the houses. That is the situation and the difficulty.
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Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I wish to speak as the member for Vancouver Centre and not as a minister. I happened to go into the matter thoroughly when I was at home during the Easter recess, though unfortunately I was detained from attendance at the meeting at which my hon. friend the member for Vancouver East and others were present, with the city council, to discuss the situation; but the evidence I received was definitely to the effect that the houses were available, provided that the government of Canada gave assurances to the government of the United States that the houses were required and that they would give their blessing to the enterprise., as these houses could be transported to Vancouver, British Columbia. I happen to know Canada fairly well and there is no place in Canada that requires housing to the extent that Vancouver, British Columbia, does. The conditions there are truly and definitely emergent, and I understand that the hon. member for Vancouver East and two of my colleagues, the hon. member for Vancouver North and the hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard, were at a conference the other day. My understanding from dispatches which I saw was that one of two officials of the Department of Reconstruction and Supply was to be sent immediately to Vancouver to confer with the Vancouver city council in regard to this condition.
I wish to impress upon the committee the fact that this condition is a truly serious one in Greater Vancouver and that the negotiations, as far as I know, were proceeding most satisfactorily. I am therefore nonplussed, I must say, by the evidence I have heard tonight, because the Vancouver press has continually carried dispatches, and one or other of these two officials is on his way to Vancouver now to discuss these negotiations with the city council of Greater Vancouver in regard to terms for transporting these houses from Bremerton to Vancouver.
As far as I am concerned, I want to have some further explanation, which I shall ask for in the usual constitutional manner, in regard to the lack of progress with reference to these negotiations, which I had hoped would be successful for the sake of people who today need housing, most of them being ex-servicemen, with their dependents, in Greater Vancouver. Our understanding was, after investigation that these houses could be obtained at prices which were from one-third to two-thirds of the prices for which one can build houses today in Canada, including cost of transportation.

I must agree with the hon. member for Vancouver South-I am afraid I am doing it too frequently nowadays-in his representations in regard to this matter, because after all we represent a great city, a great centre, and in this case a great cause, and anything I can do to assist in this way I shall be most happy to do.


Angus MacInnis: I do not want to pursue this matter further; but, as I have indicated, I am in the same position as the hon. member for Vancouver Centre. My understanding was that these houses were for sale by the government authorities. They are war surplus, I understand, or something of that kind, and no question of the authority for selling them was involved. There are sixteen hundred of them. According to the figures I saw, the price, set down on a serviced lot in Vancouver, was $2,160, which it was said would enable good accommodation to be provided for ten years. I am very much surprised at the information or lack of information which the parliamentary assistant has given us tonight.


George James McIlraith: Perhaps I should come back to one point in this discussion. First of all, as to the price, I am not in a position to argue that one way or the other. It is wholly unproven figure and is certainly very much below the cost of moving some houses from Dawson Creek to Edmonton. I am not, however, in a position to argue that in detail one way or the other. The whole crux of the matter is very simple. It comes to this, that the municipal authorities in the city of Vancouver took the position that they have no authority to expend municipal funds for the purpose of providing this type of emergency shelter. Whether they have or have not is a question of law, but certainly it is one that they themselves must assume the responsibility for deciding. We here cannot decide it. That is their position. They take the position that the dominion government should pay all the cost. The dominion government has not paid all the cost of these projects with other municipalities, and just what is the position if the dominion government now goes to British Columbia and pays all the cost in Vancouver, after having worked out satisfactory and reasonably workable arrangements with a great number of other municipalities across the dominion where the municipal and dominion authorities cooperated and contributed their portions of the cost and had the buildings made available, and so on?
That is the crux of the whole situation. As for the urgency in Vancouver, no one at all familiar with the situation will fail to agree at once that there is great need for emergency shelter in that city. That is not in issue at all

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and is not the point. I think the departmental officials are as well aware of that as anyone, and I can do nothing other than wholly agree with the remarks made by hon. members here about the need for shelter in Vancouver. But we must, I think, come to the real difficulty and deal with it. We must face up to it, and it turns simply on the inability to get cooperation from the municipal authorities either to pay for any part of these buildings made available for emergency shelter or to contribute to their cost.


Howard Charles Green: That is another case of passing the buck from the government to the municipality. The municipality will pass it back again, and in the meantime the veterans have no place to live in. The parliamentary assistant has said that the city will not underwrite the scheme-


George James McIlraith: I went farther than "underwrite"; I said, "will not contribute."


Howard Charles Green: Is the department prepared to make an agreement with a private firm or a private individual if they will underwrite the project?


George James McIlraith: The policy of the emergency shelter authorities has always been to deal with municipal authorities only. When you get to a matter of local administration, and so on, most people will agree that it is absolutely necessary to have the municipal authorities in it. That cooperation has been forthcoming from practically all the municipalities in the country. It has never been the policy to deal with a private individual in making emergency shelter available on the unit basis.


Howard Charles Green: The press report of the interview that was held here with the minister of reconstruction last week by three of the Vancouver members-unfortunately I was unable to return to Ottawa in time for the interview -was as follows, and I am quoting from the Vancouver Province of April 19:
Previously, the Ottawa government had offered to put up $500 per Bremerton house, if Vancouver would underwrite the proposition. Today, Vancouver M.P.'s drew from Mr. Howe the undertaking that the dominion would put up the same amount even if the project were not handled by the city but through a non-profit corporation, with the accent on non-profit.
Is that statement correct, or is it not, because this evening the parliamentary assistant has said that his department will deal only with the municipality?


George James McIlraith: All I can say about that is that the policy has been quite clear in the past. There has always been municipal management- of these emergency shelter projects.
This is the first I have ever heard of any suggestion that there would be other than municipal management of the project. That, if it were true, would, of course, involve a complete change of policy and would be something which the minister would have to deal with. I could not authoritatively bind the minister on a matter of policy like that. But [DOT] it certainly is the first suggestion I have ever heard that we have other than municipal administration of this emergency shelter.


Howard Charles Green: The university of British Columbia is administering some emergency shelter.


George James McIlraith: Yes, that is quite true for special university projects; the provincial university is doing that.


Mr. PEARKES:: Is not the Canadian Legion doing that?


George James McIlraith: In Victoria there is a project where the legion takes part in it. They do not administer it themselves. They take part in it with the municipal authorities. There is one other project of a similar nature.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I wish to ask my hon. friend a question. He has made a statement -and no doubt he has made it quite sincerely and honestly-that the municipal authorities of Vancouver rejected this cooperative enterprise. I should like to know how that communication was received and by whom it was signed. Was it signed by the mayor of Vancouver or by any of the civic aldermen of Vancouver? I am entitled to know, I think, as a representative from Vancouver.	.


Howard Charles Green: And is it since Easter or before?


George James McIlraith: I can perhaps help to clarify that. I believe there was an amendment proposed to the city charter which was brought up before the Vancouver city council, a suggested amendment that they were to put forward to the provincial authorities giving them the authority to spend money for purposes like this and the city council rejected it.
I think that would be a matter of record in the city council.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: May I ask who that communication came from? Was it the city clerk of Vancouver who made that communication to my hon. friend?


George James McIlraith: I cannot say who it was that communicated that to the department. I think it will be found that the amendment was beaten by a very close vote of thirteen to twelve, if my memory serves me correctly.
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Mr. NICHOLSON:: Have you the date?


George James McIlraith: I am not sure of the date, but I think it was about the middle of April.


Mr. SINCLAIR (Vancouver North):: As one of the three members who attended the meetings with the Vancouver city council and with the minister, I must confess that I am a little surprised at hearing the difference in the parliamentary assistant's version of this and what the minister told us. It is apparently in the press, so in speaking I am not breaking any confidence. This Bremerton deal is a most unusual one, because I am quite sure there is no other place on the North American continent where there is a surplus of 40,000 houses, which is the surplus of wartime houses that there is in the state of Washington and Oregon, which were put up for the shipbuilders. They are two and three-bedroom houses. The houses are available at Bremerton in the state of Washington for $400; that is, the house itself, in its present situation, complete with stove, refrigerator and heating equipment. The joker in it is that the houses are not pre-fabs. They cannot be knocked down except for salvage. There is little sale for them because it is not allowed to move such houses along the highways of either the slate of Washington or the state of Oregon. The only way whereby these houses can be moved is by sea on a scow'. Quite a number of United States communities on Puget sound have obtained those houses at $400, floated1 them to their new location, brought them ashore and established them there. Here is the situation in Vancouver. A group of veterans did go down to examine these houses, did get a commitment that 1,600 can be made available if an official approach were made to the United States housing authorities by the proper authorities. None of the prefabricated houses could be bought because obviously the Americans wanted them themselves, but 1,600 of these other houses could be bought for $400 each. The figures quoted by the hon. member for Vancouver East were to the effect that a total of $2,160 would remove these houses from their sites in these wartime industries at Bremerton, float them up the sound to the Fraser river to the city of Vancouver and put them on these lots provided by the city at $100 apiece. Far from these figures not being certified, the city engineer and the city building inspector of Vancouver have checked these figures and agreed that that is a fair estimate. It is all very w'ell to say that the government has not done this in the past. This is certainly an unusual situation, surplus houses available for the one place 
in Canada where the housing situation is more extreme than it is in any other. We met the Vancouver housing association, that excellent group of citizens who have so well managed the hotel Vancouver where 1,227 veterans' families are now finding shelter.


Mr. MERRITT:: That is the citizens' rehabilitation council.


James Sinclair: Yes,
which has done such fine work. It is quite true, that unlike Wartime Housing, these Bremerton houses when set up will not be the type of housing that could be sold to the tenants as can Wartime Housing. I have gone over these matters carefully with the alderman who is most concerned, Aider-man Cornett, and these young veterans, and I think this project should be publicly underwritten. If the city cannot do it, then it should be done by the federal government.
As far as the statement made by the parliamentary assistant is concerned, that the Vancouver city council rejected the scheme, that is not quite true. Six out of eight councillors were extremely anxious that the city should take advantage of this unusual offer. Two of the councillors, however, when this matter was brought up before the council, insisted on the regular two-weeks' notice before a charter amendment could be proposed. By that time the provincial legislature had prorogued, so that there was no opportunity. It is interesting to note that the mayor of Vancouver who is such an authority on spending other people's money did not raise bis voice to try to help the six aldermen get this housing authority through. In fairness to the Vancouver aider-men, six of these aldermen did try very hard to get the city to purchase these houses. I suggest, like the other Vancouver members, that this is a most unusual situation where these good houses are available at such a low price, and that certainly no buck-passing between the federal government and the city council or any other group should be allowed to stand in the way.
As far as the statement of the parliamentary assistant is concerned, I was present at the meeting when the minister of reconstruction did say that he had made an offer of a grant of $500 per unit if these Bremerton houses were brought in by the city so that there must have been some pretty definite plan submitted to him before he would make such an offer. On the question raised by my colleague, the hon. member for Vancouver East, the hon. member for Vancouver-Bur-rard and myself, as to whether that offer would be extended to a non-profit group, he

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did not quite commit himself. He said he was inclined to recommend it if it were a responsible non-profit organization, but that he would have to consult his colleagues before committing the government. I think at that time he suggested the Vancouver housing association or the rehabilitation league, who have done such excellent work. Far from saying no, I think it is a fair statement to say that he was inclined to approve if some responsible group would take over the importation of these houses.
This does not immediately concern me, because I am not a Vancouver member, although my constituency is called Vancouver North. It does, however, concern every member from British Columbia to see an offer like this of 1,600 houses, with stove, heater and refrigerator, available at $400, with an estimate of a total cost of importation and erection of between $2,000 and $2,500, slide by, because of some jurisdictional quarrel over who should pay for emergency shelter.


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: I have listened to this discussion in silence, but with a great deal of interest. Here we have a case where, as I understand it, the city council is afraid of getting into subsidized low-rental housing all alone, without any help from the province or the dominion. We have heard from the parliamentary assistant and from the other hon. members for about half an hour, that the dominion and the city council cannot find a basis for agreement. I believe that is what worries private members from Vancouver- the fact that agreement cannot be reached.
There is no question in the world that we must have a large number of houses built this year in Vancouver by Wartime Housing, and probably we should have the Bremerton houses, too. I do not care what agreement is come to, but I wish to say to the parliamentary assistant that very soon now these houses must be made available. This very same dispute between the dominion and the city had held up the opening of the old Vancouver hotel as a veterans hostel for some six months. The need was most acute. Many hon. members'-and I was one of them-were active in trying to get it open. Late in January it was opened, but because certain veterans took forcible possession of the hotel. When that was done all the difficulties were resolved, satisfactory arrangements were made and the hotel was opened. While I am not sure of my dates, I believe it was six or eight months later the Little Mountain camp was declared surplus and evacuated. It, like the old hotel Vancouver, remained vacant for a considerable
period of time, while this same dispute was going on. The inevitable happened there, too.
I could liken the inevitable to air rushing into a vacuum. There were empty houses on the one hand, and veterans' families in sore need on the other. The veterans simply moved in to Little Mountain. Had it not been for the university authorities, and had not the university branch of the legion come to the rescue very smartly and taken over that project on a management basis, at the same time straightening out the difficulties caused by the "squatting", if I may use a term which has been widely used, there would have been trouble at that point. The people of Vancouver have not liked the experience in these two instances.
I have risen at this time, at the end of this long and indeterminate discussion, to express my view that the government cannot let that happen again. I do not care what the arrangement is. I do not care even if the management is provided, without a detailed agreement with the city having been reached, such agreement being left to be decided after.
I should like to impress upon the government that this contract for the old hotel comes to an end early in 1948. There are at least 2,500 veterans' families urgently requiring housing at once. We cannot let any more emergency shelter become vacant without having management ready to take it over on the very day it becomes vacant. And we cannot let these 1,600 Bremerton houses go by, unless we are prepared next April to have a sufficient number of houses on the ground so that no one will miss the 1,600 we might have got from Bremerton.
I know Wartime Housing is working much faster now, as it acquires what is called the know-how of building. I am much concerned about the 2,000 houses mentioned in the newspaper report. The first contract was for 1,200 houses, and that was signed in the summer of 1945. I believe the last few houses are either just now coming into occupation, or have just come into occupation since the beginning of the year. I do not believe we have a period of even one or two months to play with before some actual work must be done to get wartime housing or Bremerton houses into Vancouver.
My suggestion to the parliamentary assistant is this: You have reached an impasse with the city council. They are on ground on which they consider they are entitled to stand. You are on ground on which you consider you are entitled to stand. We shall never get anywhere that way. You will both have to give way to some extent, in the interests of
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the people who need those houses^ no matter what it may do to your other arrangements, and no matter what it may do to the city's responsibility for housing in the future. Both sides will have to come together, prepared to give way, so as to get those houses started.


George James McIlraith: One or two things I think should be said about this point, although some of it may be repetitious. First of all, I think I made it clear in answer to the Minister of Veterans Affairs that there is no doubt at all about the need for emergency shelter in Vancouver. It was said tonight that the need in that city was the most extreme in Canada. That is not quite accurate. In any event it is extreme, and there is no doubt about the urgency.
The term buck-passing was used in reference to the negotiations in an effort to get emergency shelter in there. I think the kindest remark I can make about that term is that it is most unhelpful.


Howard Charles Green: It is most true, too.


George James McIlraith: It is most untrue, as well as being unhelpful, notwithstanding the hon. member for Vancouver South. When a dominion authority, which has a responsibility to all the people of Canada in all the municipalities, finds an arrangement that is satisfactory to all the municipalities in Canada, with possibly one exception in addition to Vancouver, an arrangement into which almost all municipalities have seen fit to enter, and about which they have been satisfied-and have so expressed themselves in many instances-surely it is not buck-passing to ask the municipality of Vancouver to enter into a similar type of arrangement, and to start off the suggestion by offering them a cash contribution, right off, in the first letter, for each housing unit. Surely it is not buckpassing to suggest that the municipality look after the local administration of an emergency housing project? If all other municipalities have seen fit to enter into this arrangement, how can we now be accused of non-cooperation when we are asking the city to enter into the same type of arrangement. It just is not logical or reasonable.
Something was said about the private feelings of the city councillors. I am sorry, but I am not in position to tell hon. members what are the feelings of the city councillors because I do not know their private feelings. I merely know the position they have taken publicly in the course of their duties; I merely know the position they have seen fit to maintain, rightly or wrongly, as city councillors. I have not even suggested that they were wrong; I have merely stated the position they
[Mr. Merritt. 1
took, and that is their affair. They have their responsibilities; they have their own jurisdiction, and I have not been critical of it at all. I have merely pointed out what it was.
It will be seen from the discussion tonight that, notwithstanding the speeches of hon. members, notwithstanding their intense interest in having emergency shelter provided for needy cases, we come back to the same point, that not one of them has dealt with the key problem, whether or not it is possible to do anything without the cooperation of the municipal authorities.


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: I most certainly have done so.


George James McIlraith: I do not want to enter into a detailed discussion. I should like to ask hon. members who controls such things as water connections, the distribution of water and the disposal of sewage in the corporation limits?


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: The city is not raising any trouble about servicing.


George James McIlraith: They will not give the services that all other municipalities give in connection with wartime housing. By the way, there are a great many of these units going into Vancouver. Their proposition at the moment is that the city be paid $400 for each lot upon which wartime houses have been built.


James Sinclair: That is w'hat Wartime Housing promised to do and now you are reneging on it.


George James McIlraith: No, I am not reneging on anything; I am merely stating the fact. That was in addition to requesting that full taxes be paid on all these lots.


James Sinclair: Why not?


George James McIlraith: That is the difficulty there. The emergency shelter authorities are fully aware of the difficulty in Vancouver and are most anxious and willing to cooperate. However the government has a duty to other persons residing outside the city of Vancouver, and it has to defend what it does in one municipality when it is different from what is done in other municipalities.


James Sinclair: As a member on this side of the house and also as a member who is not representing a Vancouver seat, perhaps I can be expected to make a little more impartial reply. One of the points raised by the parliamentary assistant explains

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why the Vancouver city council feels so dubious about going on. Wartime Housing made an agreement with Vancouver by which they got these lots very cheaply and for low taxes. The signed agreement was that if any house was sold to tenants within five years the city would get $400 as tax sale price of the lot. Now when the houses are beginning to be sold Wartime Housing is attempting to renegotiate the contract, which the city accepted in good faith, to give only $100.
When three of the Vancouver members met the minister we said that one [DOT] of the first things that should be done to establish the right atmosphere for negotiation between council and government was for Wartime Housing to live up to their present agreement and pay the S400 they had agreed to pay.
The second point in connection with these negotiations came out in the words of the parliamentary assistant when he said that there were a very great number of wartime houses in Vancouver. That is quite true. In my own riding of Vancouver North we have a. great number of them which were built on lots that were obtained for $1 a lot. Twenty-five dollars was paid in lieu of taxes, which means that the citizens of Vancouver North, who were paying $75 or $80 more taxes on a similar type of house on lots in the immediate vicinity, were making up the difference.
The three Vancouver members made it quite clear to the minister that they did not believe in going on giving special subsidies to veterans in wartime houses by continuing to pay $25 in lieu of taxes. We felt that the veteran who bought a house privately should receive some protection. Why should he pay full taxes on his house and then share the cost of the reduction in taxes to veterans in wartime houses? The three of us, despite our different political outlooks, agreed that the Vancouver city council was right. I would suggest to the parliamentary assistant, as we suggested, to the minister of reconstruction, that one of the first things Wartime Housing bad better do in Vancouver is to live up to the deal that they have made.
Mr. MelLRAITH: As far as the contract between Wartime Housing and Vancouver is concerned, Wartime Housing is perfectly willing and ready and anxious to live up to its contract in detail. If the hon member want to pursue the point any farther he will find that there has never been the slightest suggestion that they do other than live up to the contract.


James Sinclair: Apparently the parliamentary assistant is right and
the mayor and the council are wrong, or Wartime Housing is doing something of which the parliamentary assistant has no knowledge. The first point brought up by the Vancouver members-there were four of us at that meeting-was the fact that Wartime Housing were trying to renegotiate that stipulation, and I ask my colleagues to substantiate that statement.


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: That is true.
Mr. MelLRAITH: I think I can clear that up very quickly. If the city wants full taxes on these houses it must renegotiate the contract with Wartime Housing, because the contract provides, among other things, for a much smaller fixed payment in lieu of taxes. If the city wants its full taxes it must, of course, renegotiate the agreement. It cannot have both sides of the same coin face uppermost at the same time.


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: All this discussion just goes to show that there is need for people to reach an understanding. I must say that I would rather not thresh over this old straw: I would much rather hear from the parliamentary assistant that he realizes that these houses must go into Vancouver this year and that he is prepared, through Wartime Housing, to see that they do go there and that an agreement is reached by such negotiation as is necessary. If the city proves intractable, as the parliamentary assistant seems to suggest, then the suggestion the Vancouver members have already made should be adopted, that is, that the rents be set slightly higher to take the difference into consideration. There is no good in trying to allot the blame, and it would not be necessary if we could be satisfied that the government was intent on getting these houses started. If that were the case we would not have to discuss this matter at all.


Howard Charles Green: Two subjects have become mixed up in the discussion. One is the ordinary wartime houses and the other is this Bremerton project. I have my notes covering Wartime Housing which I took at the meeting with the city council, and we were certainly told by the city council that the original arrangement was that if the houses were sold within five years the city would get $400 a house.
Mr. MelLRAITH: That is correct.


Howard Charles Green: We saw them during the Easter recess and they told us that the government was then taking the stand that, instead of paying $400, only $100 would be paid.
I also took some notes with regard to the Bremerton project. The parliamentary assist-
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ant has said1 the city would not give any help at all. The councillors toldi us the city would open up the district in which the Bremerton houses would be placed, at the expense of the city, which I presume meant roads and water, at least; and they also said they would either give or renit the lots to the Central Mortgage Corporation, whichever the corporation wished. So that there is no question about the council being willing to cooperate. It is just a matter of the two authorities getting together.
I would ask the parliamentary assistant whether his department will now find) out from the United States government whether these houses are available for sale to Canada. That has not been done as yet, and I suggest that it should be done just as quickly as possible. Perhaps it will have to be done through the Department of External Affairs. The minister of that department is here this evening, and he can tell us whether that step will be necessary. Is the government willing to find out at once whether or not these houses are available? And is the Department of Reconstruction willing to have the houses, when they are brought in, operated by an organization such as the citizens' rehabilitation council or some other non-profit organization? If those two points were cleared up, first, whether or not the houses can be obtained at all from the United States, and whether, if they are brought in, they could be operated by a body such as the rehabilitation council, we would be getting somewhere.


George James McIlraith: The hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard raised some questions about the speed with which these problems are handled. I believe the emergency shelter authorities and the department are fully equipped to deal very quickly with these matters; the difficulty does not lie in that direction at all.


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: May I ask the parliamentary assistant when you would have to commence in order to have 2,000 wartime houses completed by next April?


George James McIlraith: I cannot answer that question accurately; too many factors are involved, so that any answer I might give would not be worked out carefully enough.


Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt: That rather destroys the value of what the parliamentary assistant just said.


George James McIlraith: No, it does not destroy it at all; it just shows the need of cooperation on the part of all parties concerned. The

situation is still the same on this point as I previously stated it to be. The question has been raised of the application to the United States authorities. I will bring the matter before the minister, but for myself, with what little influence I have, I certainly would not suggest that an application be made to a foreign government to import houses on a hypothetical question like this, when no one is ready to import them and the authority is not clarified.


Howard Charles Green: You would not even ask whether the United States would consent?


George James McIlraith: Surely we must have some evidence of a bona fide application to import before a foreign government can be approached on a matter like this. However, as I said, I will bring forward the point in any event. The question was narrowed down by the hon. member for Vancouver South in his concluding remarks in regard to the management of these houses, assuming the other difficulties were worked out in conjunction with the city. He asked whether the citizens' rehabilitation council could administer them, or whether that might be done by some other authority. In the first place, "some other authority" is perhaps pretty vague, and I think we can just leave that aside for the moment. As far as the citizens' rehabilitation council is concerned, I should think possibly some satisfactory arrangement could be worked out for the management of this project by them, if all the other difficulties could be satisfactorily solved in cooperation with the city. I do not think there is any use in beating over the other point of where the city councillors stand or do not stand. The fact remains that they claim they have no authority to spend any money on getting these houses in, and the further fact remains that they have declined to apply for that authority. As I said1 before, I have been careful not to state whether they are right or wrong in that; I merely give it as the fact.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: The members from the Vancouver area have I think, done a very good job. I was in Vancouver at the time the discussions took place between the Vancouver members and the city council, and the statement by the parliamentary assistant tonight comes as quite a surprise to me. In reading the Vancouver newspapers, one got the impression that the city fathers were prepared to cooperate fully in carrying out a project of this kind. I believe Vancouver deserves special consideration. My information is that a larger percentage of ex-service personnel have settled in Vancouver than in any other

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city in the country. I think it is well established that building materials are going to be very short for the next couple of years, and with the situation described' by the hon. member for Vancouver North, where 1,600 houses can be placed on lots in Vancouver with very little trouble, I believe, while this government has this emergency power, it should go out of its way to see that something is done. I believe the hon. member for Vancouver South made a reasonable request when he suggested that the minister of reconstruction should1 consult with the United States authorities to find out whether or not these houses can be made available. If the Vancouver newspapers were reporting the conferences at all accurately I am sure public opinion in Vancouver will force the city fathers to go along with the federal authorities in reaching some agreement. The whole discussion thus far this evening emphasizes the point I made on Friday, that we do need to have consultation at all levels of government; and I think the parliamentary assistant should give some assurance that machinery will be set up to enable us to deal with this sort of problem.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I was in Quebec last September making a survey in regard to the question of a free port, and on the docks there I saw a number of prefabricated houses. On inquiry I was advised that they were being shipped to France, and I was very glad to learn that France was getting some assistance from us. I understood that we were sending a thousand or more prefabricated houses, each having about four rooms. They were neat little houses; as a Canadian I was very proud of them and was glad to think our allies were getting some assistance. At the same time I wondered if we had so many houses in Canada that we could afford to ship a thousand or so abroad in that way.


George James McIlraith: The hon. member for Mackenzie raised a point as to cooperation. Perhaps the best answer to that is that we have approximately 120 of these emergency shelter projects, and we get very good cooperation in connection with at least 117 of them. I think that emphasizes the degree of cooperation the authorities are prepared to give in this matter. There is no doubt at all that the utmost cooperation is required on the part of all the authorities, whether dominion or municipal.


Charles Edward Johnston: Can the parliamentary assistant say anything about prefabricated houses being shipped from Vancouver to England?


George James McIlraith: To deal with the second point raised by the hon. member for Davenport about prefabricated houses, it is quite true that prefabricated houses were being exported, but they were only shells with the lumber in them. They had none of the finishing materials in them.


John Ritchie MacNicol: No stoves; no plumbing.


George James McIlraith: No, nothing of that kind at all; no wiring or anything of that sort; just the lumber shells, and the lumber in them is actually taken out of the lumber export quota. It is part of the export quota of lumber.


Douglas Gooderham Ross: Something has been said about the question of houses in the city of Toronto. So far as emergency shelter and shared accommodation are concerned, many people in Toronto would be glad to take people in.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: They generally do.


Douglas Gooderham Ross: I know, but you are easy to take in. People in Toronto are willing to take persons in and give them shelter. A great deal of that is being done at the present time, especially in connection with university students. But you have to be careful who they are. They have to be compatible. That is to say, they have to be people who can get on together. There are two reasons why the people would like to do it. We realize the appalling situation we have in Toronto. If hon. members were there they would realize it too. It is easy enough to get these people into your houses. They will come; there is no doubt about that. All you have to do is to ask them to come and the}" will come in; but they will stay there, and it is quite a problem to get them out, particularly when you think of the regulations in connection with evictions and all the long processes which have to be gone through. The average person who has a house is going to be just a little bit careful before he takes anybody in. My suggestion is, make some change in the law in connection with eviction. Make it easier for a person to get rid of these people if they are not liked. Change it so that they can be evicted for cause. At the present time it is difficult to get rid of them for cause. I know of home owners who have been trying to get rid of these people for cause and they have not been able to get them out.
I suggest that if we have some sort of written agreement between a person who owns a house and the person who wishes to come in, which would be binding and which could not be overriden by the present order in council with regard to agreements, it will be
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found that a great many people in Toronto will be glad to give accommodation to those who need emergency shelter. That is an important factor. People will not take persons into their homes and give them shelter today because it is so difficult to get them out. Unless they are almost crooks you can hardly get them out of your house. That is the suggestion I have to make. I do not like the idea of blaming Toronto for lack of shelter or the citizens for not giving shelter to these people because it is not the fault of the citizens. It is the fault of the regulations governing evictions.


An hon. MEMBER:: It is the fault of the government.


Douglas Gooderham Ross: It is the fault of the government, yes. The hon. member did not think I was speaking on behalf of the government. Perhaps I have not expressed myself clearly but I think I have made my point. My suggestion to the parliamentary assistant is to do something about these regulations and he will find that a great many homes will be opened up.


Arthur Leroy Smith: In games it is often wise to get an out-of-town referee who is unprejudiced toward these aristocrats from British Columbia. They assume that position with the rest of Canada all the time. In the private quarrel which has been going on between them and the parliamentary assistant to the minister I am trying to analyse the facts. I accept it on all sides that in Bremerton, which is not far away, there are 1,600 houses available, which could be brought to Vancouver and set up-they contain a refrigerator and a stove-for approximately $2,000. That seems to be the basic fact. If that can be done it is the cheapest housing in the world for Canada, infinitely less than we are paying under any other government scheme. What is the reason for this debate and what is the position of the parliamentary assistant? Merely one of frustration, saying we cannot do it because of some people-I was going to use the word "stupid"-perhaps stubborn people on the Vancouver city council. Here we sit in this House of Commons which is assumed to be a responsible and deliberative body. That last word is certainly true. Here we sit w'ith a thing at our doorstep which should be done, and we find the parliamentary assistant-all the committee wants it done- saying we cannot do it because of a technical -and it is a technical-difficulty with the Vancouver city council. That being so, it is not good enough for the parliamentary assistant to tell us that our hands are tied for that

reason, without giving us some constructive suggestion as to how this difficulty can be solved.
Then I turn to the second question which was asked by all the Vancouver members as to the present status of these houses. By "status" I mean whether or not these houses can still be purchased. The parliamentary assistant takes the position-where he gets the authority or the precedent for it I do not know-that he will not ask the government of the United States-I assume from that remark that the houses are governmental owmed-whether they are available until he has bad the detail of purchase and movement worked out. If business were conducted in that way we would never get anywhere. Surely there is no object in fiddling with the city council of Vancouver. There is no object in blaming them for being stubborn if these houses are not available. All we have to do is ask a very simple question. I understand from the hon. member from Vancouver North that the only reason we can get them is that you have to float them. They are not prefabricated, and Vancouver is one of the places to which they can be floated. . With the greatest respect to the parliamentary assistant, his every answer, his whole speech tonight, was simply that of frustration, saying, "blame it on the other fellow," without a single constructive suggestion as to how we can get the 1.600 houses which are so badly needed by men returned from this war. In other words, the answer is not good enough.


George Randolph Pearkes: Most of the debate this evening has centred around houses to be built in the cities. I have on previous occasions pointed out the desirability of erecting houses where there is work for men to do- in the country. As far as British Columbia is concerned, we need to erect houses near the logging camps and sawmills. I understood last year that the regulations were made more elastic, so that logging, mining and fishing companies might be able to get assistance in the construction of houses in those areas away from the city. I was concerned with the remarks made by the parliamentary assistant this evening, as far as I could hear him, and his voice at that time did not carry very well to these back benches here. Did he say that only the municipalities could administer houses built under these schemes?


George James McIlraith: Under the emergency shelter.


George Randolph Pearkes: I was under the impression that, according to the regulations amended last year, logging, lumbering, fishing and min-

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ing companies would be able to erect and administer houses, assisted in the financing by this federal government.
Mr. McliLRAITH: I was speaking about emergency shelter.


George Randolph Pearkes: I should, like to ask the parliamentary assistant how many such projects have been started since these regulations were passed last session.


George James McIlraith: The hon. member for Nanaimo has been, I am afraid, inadvertently confusing what is before the committee at the moment. We are now dealing with the emergency shelter regulations and my remarks were confined to them. The point he now raises has to do with the National Housing Act and administration of Wartime Housing Limited. There is on the order paper a resolution concerning the National Housing Act and I hope we shall reach it soon, when the information he asks for can be given to him. The question he asks does not pertain to the emergency shelter regulations.


William Ross Macdonald: Will the two orders in council referring to emergency shelter carry?
P.C. 9439 and P.C. 7502 agreed to.


William Ross Macdonald: With regard to order in council No. 3, an amendment has been offered but not accepted. There have however been amendments offered and accepted to No. 245 and No. 1997. Will these two orders in council as amended carry?


Mr. FULTON:: This afternoon the parliamentary assistant was kind enough to promise me that he would make inquiries into a situation which has already considerably vexed the house and, I understand, the minister, and that is the matter of nails. Since the matter was last discussed in the house, I have had telegrams from farmers and ranchers in my own constituency saying that they require to do their spring work on their flumes for irrigation purposes. Unless they get nails to repair these flumes the water will not reach the land, and in that dry country it is essential that irrigation be started now. It is absolutely impossible to obtain nails. There is, we are advised, no priority for such purposes as repairing flumes; the only priority that exists is with respect to the building of houses, but I am told that, even after this priority is satisfied, there are nails left over. Although we are advised of all these factors, I had a second telegram today informing me that no nails are available except on the black market, and on calling this matter to the attention of the department I am given to understand that there exists an unexplainable .situation in British Columbia with regard to 83166-160
the disappearance of nails from legitimate markets. Has the parliamentary assistant had those inquiries made which he promised, and is he in a position to tell me how I can assist these farmers in getting nails which they require for the repair of their flumes?


George James McIlraith: The hon. member for Kamloops didi speak to me about this matter this afternoon. I gave what information I had and I was to speak to him further before six o'clock. I told him I would see him this evening but I have not had an opportunity of doing so, as hon. members will appreciate.


Edmund Davie Fulton: I appreciate that.


George James McIlraith: The situation is this. The priorities given for nails are limited to the low-cost houses under the Veterans' Land Act, Wartime Housing, integrated housing, and veterans housing of that sort, and it leaves between eighty and eighty-five per cent of the gross nail production in the country available for distribution through the normal channels of trade. Apparently there has been a severe difficulty in some parts of British Columbia in getting nails through the local hardware stores. I dto not think there is any doubt about that difficulty and the acuteness of it. There is no control of the distribution down through the retail outlets. There is simply control over all production and the nails required for priority projects. The steel controller is at present in western Canada. Perhaps all I can usefully say on the point is that the difficulty spoken of by the hon. member for Kamloops will be looked into.


Edmund Davie Fulton: I appreciate the position the department is in and also the spirit of the remarks made by the parliamentary assistant, but I think he on his part will appreciate my difficulty. These people want twenty-five kegs of nails in Ashcroft. They need them urgently for this work, because if they do not get the water in that country in the spring, and get it on the land, they will not have any crops at all. All the flumes are knocked to pieces every winter by the snow and ice; they are only wooden structures which have to be made watertight every year. The people on whose behalf I am speaking want twenty-five kegs of nails, and the sympathetic and courteous remarks of the parliamentary assistant, while I sincerely appreciate them, will not help me to tell them how to get nails. Surely the department can bring some pressure to bear upon those who are in charge of the wholesale distribution of nails in that province. I am not one to do any capitalist-baiting or business-baiting, because business as a whole is, I believe, respectable, and has been pushed

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around too much; but there are two firms-* McLennan, McFeely and Prior and Marshall-Wells-who largely control or influence the wholesale distribution of hardware in that province, and I am quite sure they would be anxious to adjust the situation which is portrayed by the parliamentary assistant, who says that only fifteen per cent of the nails are allocated on a priority basis, which means that eighty-five per cent are available for normal trade. If these firms had it brought home to them that nails are going astray I am sure they would make twenty-five kegs available to those in Ashcroft who need them. As a matter of fact, I have no doubt that if it were brought to their attention that people all through the interior of the province, the retail hardware stores, cannot get nails except on the black market, these: responsible firms would look into the matter and make sure that hardware stores in the interior of the province get their fair share of nails direct from their warehouse. Will the parliamentary assistant say whether the department can use their influence-I hate asking them to use it, but the nails are needed-and send a telegram to Marshall-Wells and McLennan, McFeely and Prior, asking them to make twenty-five kegs of nails of the specified size available to the Ashcroft Ranchers' Association?


George James McIlraith: I intended to do something more than express myself sympathetically to the hon. member for Kamloops. I do not feel myself in a position to send a telegram to the wholesaler. I did indicate that the steel controller, who is also the priorities officer, is in the west now, and we also have a regional officer in Vancouver. I meant to imply that we would certainly look further into the difficulty raised by my hon. friend. I refrained from saying that any priority order will be issued, because it will not be issued. What we can do is to make an inquiry to see where we are likely to get the nails, to find out where they have been trying to get the nails and get all the other relevant information. We simply have not all that available here at the moment. The best I can do for the hon. member is simply to indicate that the matter will be looked into further by the appropriate officer, with a view to helping him and indicating where the nails should be available.


Edmund Davie Fulton: Can the action be initiated by telegraph now, so that the investigation will start first thing tomorrow morning?


George James McIlraith: I may be overcautious, Mr. Chairman, but I do not care to tie myself down as to the method or the time. I do not know whether certain officials in the depart-

ment will be talking by telephone with the steel controller tomorrow or not, or how it will be done.


Edmund Davie Fulton: Have his secretary dictate a telegram.


George James McIlraith: I suggest to the hon. member that lie leave the matter just with the statement I made, that we would have it looked into. That means precisely what it said. If he would just leave it that way, perhaps he would get done by me what he is hoping to get done. I can only say that I can direct the inquiry to the proper officials who can get the facte, find out what the situation is and try to be as helpful as they can.


Edmund Davie Fulton: Mr. Chairman, this atmosphere of frustration is spreading.


Mr. REID:: I suggest to the parliamentary assistant that he go a little farther because, when I was back home at Easter time, it was drawn to my attention that farmers who were living close to the boundary and who were unable to get nails, were able to buy across the line all the Canadian nails they required at more than double the price. This is an aspect which has never before been brought to the attention of the committee, and I am doing it now. These farmers living within about ten or twelve miles from the border, who were unable to find nails in Canada, went across the border in their cars and, lo and behold, in the hardware stores in the cities and towns close to the border there were kegs of Canadian nails. It is well known that the United States authorities have withdrawn about thirty-four customs officers. I know the department cannot stop the taking of nails across the line, but this is what is worrying us: [DOT] How did these bootleggers get the nails in the first instance? How were they able to get kegs of nails which are now in the United States and being sold at two and a half times the price?


John Ritchie MacNicol: Are they Canadian nails?


Thomas Reid: Canadian nails. They went across the border under cover, but how were they obtained? What wholesaler supplied these black market men with Canadian nails so that they were able to do this nefarious business? It is galling now for Canadians, when they cannot get nails in their own country, to go across to the United States and find Canadian-made nails right in the shops in the United States.
I had another case of a young veteran who could not get nails, where a contractor said to him, "I can get you some;" and the

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contractor sent to the province of Saskatchewan and got him two kegs of nails. How have they a surplus in Saskatchewan? He told me that on good authority. He said, "It is true that I paid double the price for them, but I wanted those nails and I got them." When the parliamentary assistant is having the matter looked into I suggest that he find out, or have instructions given to find out, first, how these nails are slipping across the line and, second, who is responsible for handing out nails to these men who are carrying on this nefarious business.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Were the Saskatchewan
nails black market nails?


Thomas Reid: No. So far as I know, the
Saskatchewan nails were not; but the Canadian nails across the line were black market nails.


Mr. FERGUSON:: I have heard some hon. members say that they realize the government's difficulty. I can say that I understand the government's muffing. We hear about nails for veterans' homes, but we hear nothing very much about the shortage of steel for ships, of which this country is badly in need. When we cannot build ships we have unemployment, particularly in Collingwood, Kingston or any other city in Canada where ships are being constructed. This entire situation has been laid at the feet of the government and blamed on them. Possibly we should extend the numbers who are granted O.B.E.'s and a few other honours, to make this government wake up and do the job which they did during the war when shortages occurred. There seems to be a lack of incentive to get down to earth and get busy.


An hon. MEMBER:: More controls.


Julian Harcourt Ferguson: We do not need controls. I 'have had hundreds of men working for me, and I always found that if you talked to them as mem, on a commonsense basis, they would increase their working hours and produce the goods; and1 it was not C.C.F. controls that did that. There must be a solution. I have found this to be true of union officials, union men, labouring men and women all over this country: if appealed to properly and if the shortage was actually demonstrated to them conclusively, they would get down to work and produce the goods. I believe that is applicable to any. plant in Canada producing any commodity.
We continually harp from day to day on the shortage of nails-bootleg nails made in Canada, bought in the United States and used in Canada. You skip over the shortage of 83166-1601
steel for all purposes, and that is due to the government's negligence prior to the cessation of hostilities. Eighteen months before this war was over, when the Germans were retreating in France, the minister of reconstruction knew that the war would be over very shortly; and if he can point his finger to any preparation that he, his department or this government made to meet the exigencies which exist today in any commodities, I should like him to do so. The people of Canada are being hoodwinked about the shortage of nails. But in every single commodity there has been no preparation made to alleviate these shortages. We are spending days here trying to extend the powers, for what? Powers to procrastinate. That is what we are doing. Let us get down to earth. We have spent an hour tonight listening to members from Vancouver who could not get a concrete statement out of the parliamentary assistant about what he was actually going to do or what this government was going to do, so that there could be a concrete and definite comeback from the officials of Vancouver city. Talk about buckpassing! It is all buck-passing. Possibly we should offer more O.B.E.'s, and then we might get somewhere with the production of all the shortages which exist today.


Mr. WINTERS:: I should like to say a very few words about the position of Nova Scotia in respect of timber control. That will get us off steel for a few minutes.


Edmund Davie Fulton: Let the parliamentary
assistant go out and send my telegram first.


Howard Charles Green: On a point of order, may I ask what we are discussing.


William Ross Macdonald: I called the orders in council with regard to both the steel and timber regulations, because the amendment with respect to both regulations had been approved. However, if the committee would prefer to dispose of the steel regulation first, we can do so.


Howard Charles Green: You have not yet disposed of order in council P.C. 3.


William Ross Macdonald: That order in council stands until we dispose of 245 and 1997, because amendments in respect of those two orders in council have been passed. I thought the committee should come back to pass the amendment to P.C. 3.


Howard Charles Green: It was my understanding that we would pass these one after another, and P.C. 3 would follow the emergency shelter orders in council.


William Ross Macdonald: It is immaterial, so far as the chair is concerned. I shall read the
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amendment. It is moved by the parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Reconstruction :
That the following be inserted in the schedule to the act in the column entitled "Amendments" so as to pertain to order in council P.C. 3 of 4th January, 1944, as amended:
"Section 12(2) is deleted and the following substituted therefor:
12(2) Where a controller believes that any person has failed to 'produce books, records or documents, or to give full and complete information as required by such controller under tjie authority of any regulation, he may, with the approval of a judge-of the Exchequer Court of Canada or of a superior or a county court, which approval such judge is hereby empowered to give upon the ex parte application of the controller, authorize in writing under his hand a police officer, police constable or other person employed for the preservation and maintenance of the public peace, together with any other person named therein, to enter and search, if necessary by force, any building, receptacle or place, for books, records or documents which may contain information required by such controller, and to seize the same and carry them before such controller or such other person as such controller may direct, to be held at the discretion of such controller for such uses as he is authorized by any regulation to make."


[Stage Direction]
Amendment agreed to.
William Ross Macdonald: Shall P.C. 3 as amended carry?


Edmund Davie Fulton: I asked the Minister of Justice if he would accept an amendment to section 15 (6) of P.C. 3. The minister pointed out at that time that there were certain objections to the amendment, one being that the same provision occurred in an earlier order in council, and that the amendment had been omitted when that order was discussed.


George James McIlraith: Would the hon. member for Kamloops let us have the section of P.C. 3 to which he is referring?


Edmund Davie Fulton: It is 15 (6). The amendment which I should like to move is as follows:
That the schedule to the bill be amended by inserting in the column headed "Amendments" the following:
"Order in council P.C. 3 dated January 4, 1944, as amended, is further amended by deleting from section 15 (6 the words "or is found or apprehended or in custody" where they occur in the last line thereof."
The purpose, as I said the other night, was to provide that a person must be sued or proceeded against in the place where he carries on business or where he resides. That ensures that there will be no abuse of the power of prosecution in taking action which might result, as the section is at present worded, in a man's being apprehended in one part of the country, although he carries on
[The Chairman.]
business in another part, and being held and proceeded against at some point thousands of miles away from his place of business without his books and records available.
The Minister of Justice pointed out that a similar provision existed in the Foreign Exchange Control Board Act which passed the house last year. He said we had not taken specific objection to that section, and upon investigation I find that is true. However I do not think the fact it is in that act makes it necessarily good. The Secretary of State for External Affairs pointed out that it does not make it necessarily bad, but I think he will agree it does not make it necessarily good. It also exists in the Customs Act. But there it is clearly confined to cases where the penalty will not exceed S200. The penalty here may be as high as $5,000.
The government says it is making an effort to do away with controls as rapidly as possible. In many instances it has consented to restrictions on wide and possibly excessive powers within the framework of the main control measures. It is on this ground I would ask that the amendment be accepted.


George James McIlraith: I am afraid I am in
a position of not being able to accept the amendment offered by the hon. member for Kamloops. These words have been contained in the section for some years. We are now dealing with an extension for a limited period of time. So far there has been no complaint about this section. If the words are taken out we are faced with the possible administrative difficulty of having to go to the expense of transporting an accused person back to the place where the offence was committed, or where he carries on business, even though the accused might be prepared to plead guilty.
Mr. ST. LAURENT:	The same provision
is in the order which was passed with regard to the wartime prices and trade board. If the hon. member will look at page 26 of the office consolidation and refer particularly to section 11(2) of that order, which was passed by the committee the other day, he will find exactly the same language.


Edmund Davie Fulton: I admit that, but I pointed out that it was an oversight. Had we noticed it, we would have moved a similar amendment when that order in council was before the house. As to the matter of expense, if an accused is prepared to plead guilty, surely it would not cost any more to commence the action in the court where the accused resides or carries on business. If he is going to plead guilty, presumably he would not

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object to that being done. It would not cost any more, or present any administrative difficulty.


George James McIlraith: Earlier this evening
hon. members raised questions about breaches of these orders. By deleting these words the hon. member is making it more difficult administratively to determine where offences take place, and permitting the raising of jurisdictional defences to prosecutions in what is already a difficult administrative position. I can only reiterate that this is an inopportune time to make that administrative change.
We have precedents of this sort in the permanent legislation, and I do not see why we should be expected to make the exception in this temporary short-term order in council, when we have it in permanent legislation. There has never been any suggestion that it has been in any way abused, in the number of years when there were a great many control orders outstanding.


Mr. MILLER:: I do not think it can be said that the principle of British justice was ever based on the theory that the government or the crown would be fair to an accused person. I realize that in modern legislation, particularly in the regulations being made from time to time, the old theory of protecting the accused is being sacrificed to the principle of making it convenient for the crown, not necessarily to convict but to prosecute. It seems to me that, if the crown authorities desire, under the provisions of subsection 6 they could try a man, perhaps 600 or 700 miles from where he lives, from where his witnesses might be or from where his records might be. It may be said that that is fantastic, that no government would be so unfair, but I repeat that British criminal jurisdiction has not been built on the foundation of trusting the crown authorities; it has been based on the rights of an accused person, on the principle that his rights will never be infringed. Those battles for liberty of the person and the right to make a full and free defence were fought long ago, and the onus or a heavy part of the burden has always rested on the crown. It should not be made easy for the crown to proceed at the expense of an accused person. I suggest that we should get back to the theory of protecting the accused, and therefore the amendment moved by the hon. member for Kamloops should be accepted by the government or carried by this committee.
Amendment (Mr. Fulton) negatived.
P.C. 3 as amended agreed t.o.
On P.C. 245.


Mr. CASE:: I think it would be a mistake to let this opportunity pass without driving one more nail into the coffin.


Edmund Davie Fulton: Where will you get it from?


Wilfrid Garfield Case: I have been told where I can get one to finish the job if I can just hit the nail on the head. There are two schools of thought in connection with this scarcity of nails. One is that the fault lies with the manufacturers, and the other is that there is a bottleneck at the wholesale level. I agree with the hon. member for Kamloops that it is impossible for the retail trade to secure nails.
It should be emphasized that not only is it difficult to secure nails for construction purposes but, as has been indicated from my riding, it is difficult to obtain them for other purposes. A fish-box manufacturer at Penetang has had his factory closed down for six months because of a lack of nails, with the result that 150 to 175 men have been out of work. They have made a strong appeal for nails, and they say they are willing to use any kind if they can get them to put into motion an industry which affects our entire food supply. I have had communications from the retail hardware dealers' association complaining that they are unable to obtain nails. They contend that there is a bottleneck at the wholesale level, that nails are being passed out to large users.
I consider this matter of sufficient consequence and importance that the department or the steel controller should take notice of it. The excuse is made that if more nails are manufactured there will be no wire fencing, that it is a question of deciding which is the most important. It seems to me that there has been a lack of planning. When nails were first mentioned in this house we never thought for one moment our national economy would depend on this ordinary article.
The ratepayers of the town of Meaford voted to build a new public school to cost $160,000, but they were unable to obtain the nails required to start this public building. Building, particularly in the smaller communities, will be at a standstill, while people who are building huge skyscrapers and constructing places of amusement will be able to obtain all the nails they need. I do not think it is a matter of more controls. I am one of those who believe that the controls should have been removed long ago, particularly on industries of this kind. There would then have been a greater incentive to produce. It is all right to argue about price, but if you are unable to
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obtain an article at any price it creates a graver situation than if you can obtain it at some price.
It is interesting to note that those who are willing to patronize the black market are able to secure these items that should be sold through the regular trade channels. It must be accepted that it is the controls which drive legitimate dealers to carry on through the black market. This evidence was well supported by the minister of reconstruction when he stated, in effect, in this house that they had discovered there were more used cars being sold through the black market than through any other source and that for that reason controls were being removed.
I think wTe shall have to grapple with this problem in some realistic manner in order to meet the demands of those engaged in the construction industry and the production of goods and services so necessary to the general economic welfare of the country. I wanted to put these remarks on the record even though nails have been spoken of so often. However I think this is the first time I have mentioned them in the house. I do hope that the steel controller and those charged with responsibility will give immediate consideration to one of the greatest problems we have to contend with at the present time.


Mr. GILLIS:: I want to get a little information, and perhaps I might even get that causeway built across the strait of Canso before I am finished. I am sorry the minister of reconstruction is not in his place at the moment, but I shall leave a few thoughts with his parliamentary assistant. During the last war the federal government rehabilitated a plate mill at Sydney, Nova Scotia. That mill had been built by the Canadian government at the time of the first war at a cost of $11,000,000 to the taxpayers of Canada. It did not go into production because the war was finished before it was ready. My information is that the company sued the government for breach of contract because the mill did not produce and they secured some more money.
During the period between the two wars all the machinery from that mill was moved by the then existing corporation to Ojibway in Ontario. When the last war broke out, all that *was left was the shell of that mill which had been erected at a cost of $11,000,000 to the taxpayers of Canada. I raised the matter on several occasions in 1940, and finally the present minister of reconstruction made a statement to the house that the government intended to rehabilitate the mill. This meant that 
for the second time the taxpayers of Canada would equip the mill at Sydney and put it into production.
During a part of this war that mill employed some 600 men and produced steel plate for shipbuilding purposes. As soon as the wrar ended, the mill went out of production and it stands idle today in Sydney, Nova Scotia. The federal government has been requested by the city council and other bodies in Nova Scotia to do something about putting that mill back into production. I wrote the minister asking whether it could not be used for the production of steel plate; and only a few days ago, on April 11 to be exact, he informed me quite definitely by letter that the mill was not going back into production. The general manager of the Sydney steel plant, Mr. C. M. Anson, replied to the inquiry of the city council as to whether this mill might be put back into production, and this is what he said:
. . . in his reply to the council advised that the plate mill was obsolete and too costly to operate in comparison with the modernly equipped mills in Upper Canada.
I would draw to the attention of the committee the fact that in 1941 this mill was reequipped by the Canadian government, and I would ask the minister or his parliamentary assistant to inform the committee whether the work done at that time and the equipment put into the mill were supervised by representatives of the government, and what kind of equipment wras put in that became Obsolete and out of date within four years, as far as the production of steel plate is concerned. Or did the government merely provide the money and allow the Dominion Steel and Coal Corporation to put old, obsolete equipment in that mill, with the government paying first-class prices? My reason for asking the question is that the taxpayers of Canada have an investment of approximately 16,000,000 in that mill. At the present time we are importing most of our steel plate from the United States. There is a serious unemployment problem in that end of Canada. Is it the intention of the government to try to use that mill and put it back into production? If not, since the Canadian government and the taxpayers of Canada own that mill, will the government consider selling the mill to people I have in mind, who might put it into production?


George James McIlraith: I am sorry I am not in a position 'to give the hon. member full information on the subject. On one point, however, I can do so; that is, we will consider an offer to sell very quickly and thoroughly. As to the other part, I believe it worked out

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in this way; that it was the rehabilitation of an old plant which was not equipped. That was done by the company, but they obtained a loan for the purpose from the dominion government. Part of the loan was repaid; a settlement was then made, and the plant was turned over to the crown in settlement of certain balances outstanding. I believe that is the way in which the transaction was carried out. With my lack of information I do not think it would be useful for me to extend my remarks on the subject.


Mr. STEPHENSON:: I was perhaps the first in this house to inquire about nails something over a year ago. I am still inquiring about nails, and it seems to me that the answer given tonight was no better than the answer given a year ago in regard to the nail situation. I do not believe the answer which has been given is good enough, and I think the government should do something immediately to see that nails are made available to the people of Canada, not only for building purposes but for urgent repairs on the farm. If only fifteen per cent of the nails produced are being held on priority for housing purposes, where are the rest of the nails going? I believe the people of Canada should be given an answer to that question. Especially do I think something should be done for the farmers. Here is a quotation from a letter from a hardware dealer, showing what happens when farmers come in and ask for nails:
As a parting shot the farmer customer will venture the assertion that "had the farmers been as completely indifferent to the appeals of the government during wartime, as the government now is to the needs of the farmer, a totally different production picture would have resulted." He will further state that in his humble opinion the primary industry of the nation should at least have some consideration.
The farmer today is still being asked to produce the things we need so badly. During the war he had to let his buildings and his equipment go.. Now, when he may have a chance to repair them, he cannot get a nail in the hardware store. I believe it is time nails were made available, somehow or another, to hardware stores, so that the farmers and the people of Canada generally who need nails so badly may procure them.


Mr. SINNOTT:: This nail subject has been going on now ever since I hit the nail on the head in the Citizen on Friday, and I believe enough pressure has been brought to bear on the government. At least we have been told by the parliamentary assistant that the steel controller is looking over the situation in western Canada. I am as anxious as anyone else to pass the rest of the orders in council
so that we may hear the budget tomorrow night. It does not matter whether we talk on this subject for another two days; enough light has been thrown on it now, and I believe the minister is taking steps to remedy the situation at once.


Alexander Maxwell (Max) Campbell: We have heard about nails tonight, and we heard about nails last week. I remember that in answering some members on this side the minister made the statement that today nails are under the control of private enterprise. It has been suggested several times this evening that there is a black market in nails. I do not know whether or not that is true, but if it is there is only one source nails can come from; that is, from the people who make them. We have just passed P.C. 3, which gives the minister all kinds of power to examine books, sales and so on. I would suggest that the government examine the books of the firms making nails to find out whether or not there is a black market, and if there is, that it should take the necessary action to see that this practice ceases.


Mr. LENNARD:: I am not going to talk about nails, but I should like to ask the parliamentary assistant a question. What are the regulations in regard to the export of steel?
An lion. MEMBER: Including nails?


Frank Exton Lennard: No; leave the nails out of this. What are the regulations controlling the export of raw steel?


George James McIlraith: Dealing with the export of steel, there is no export of nails at all.


Frank Exton Lennard: I was not talking about nails.


George James McIlraith: I should like an opportunity to answer the hon. member's question. I reiterate what I said; there is no export of nails at all and has not been since February of last year. As to steel generally, manufactured products requiring steel are exported. That is controlled under export permit. Steel in any semi-finished form is not exported at all. None of it is exported at this moment.


Julian Harcourt Ferguson: I should like to ask the parliamentary assistant whether, speaking as a representative of the people of Canada, he will say that from the point of view of the government this steel mill in Nova Scotia can turn out steel for shipbuilding purposes on a basis that would be profitable or otherwise. Have the government determined that that mill should remain idle when steel for shipbuilding purposes is so essential? If they believe they can work that mill on a basis
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where they will not lose money have they the power to take it over and start it in operation?


George James McIlraith: The difficulty there is that you cannot go back of what can be supplied by your blast furnace. You have to keep your production balanced all the way through; you have to relate one to the other. At the moment I know of no way of increasing that over-all production. I have the figures of production of all the various types of steel products, which information was tabled a few days ago in the House of Commons, and perhaps there is no need to repeat them. I am sorry that I cannot give the hon. member fuller information on the subject he inquired about.
On the question he raised earlier this evening about production generally I should like to give him the figures for steel ingots in millions of ingot tons. For the year 1947 the projected production is 3-1 million. That is larger than any wartime production and more than twice as large as any production in the years 1938 and 1939.


Julian Harcourt Ferguson: May I remind the parliamentary assistant that I am not interested in what we are doing today or in 1939. I am interested only in the fact that what we are doing is not enough.


George James McIlraith: In his earlier remarks I understood the hon. member's whole criticism to be on what we were doing over 1939 and .that it was not enough.


Julian Harcourt Ferguson: What the government are doing today to meet the demand is still not enough.


George James McIlraith: The point is simply this. If you relate all the different types of steel products together we are making all we have capacity to make. You can get into an argument about the allocation of one type of steel product and another, and you can argue about it at great length. I am afraid I am not an expert on the different types of basic material which go into the various end products. You can argue about whether that productive capacity should be put into one type of product or into another. The plan has been to arrange production to get the maximum possible production for the over-all needs, and that is what has been done.


George Alexander Cruickshank: The other day I listened to the C.C.F. and the Conservatives congratulate the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply and say nothing but praise him. They told him he was a great industrialist and that he won the war single-handed. Tonight
	yrj
I want to do a little praising on my own. I wish to tell the parliamentary assistant that we won the battle of British Columbia tonight and also to tell him that he has done a magnificent job as parliamentary assistant, but when do we get some nails in Fraser Valley?
P.C. 245 agreed to.
On P.C. 1997.


Robert Henry Winters: I have forgotten, Mr. Chairman, whether I was at a comma or a semicolon when being ruled out of order a few minutes ago; therefore I had better start over. Under this order in council I wish to say a few words with respect to the situation regarding supplies of lumber in Nova Scotia. My point in this regard was raised as a result of the statement made on April 22, 1947, by the Minister of Reconstruction andi Supply. In that statement he said that the retail price of lumber in internal British Columbia and in the prairie provinces was to be raised to encourage the production of lumber. I believe that regulation does not apply east of Manitoba.
The Nova Scotian situation with respect to the supply of lumber is somewhat unique as is Nova Scotia's situation with respect to the supply and availability of a good many products. With regard to lumber we have what one might call a three-cornered situation. There is practically no demand in central or western Canada for Nova Scotian lumber. There is a great foreign demand, but in this direction the amount of export is limited by the amount of lumber put on the domestic market. In the local domestic field we are also limited in the amount of lumber we can put on the market, because of the retail prices. Our retail dealers, who form a substantial part of our economy in lumber, are forced, if they adhere to the ceiling, to put lumber on the local domestic market at a loss. With the export market limited and in some cases unavailable to retailers, there is a definite limit as to how far these retailers can or will go in serving the public at a loss.
From the discussion in the committee one would gather that there is a substantial market in Canada for lumber produced in Nova Scotia. In fact, when the hon. member for Davenport earlier this evening mentioned the manufacture of prefabricated houses in Quebec I could have said that in Nova Scotia also we have manufactured a substantial number of prefabricated houses of the same type. It is true they were for emergency shelter. They did not contain any of the normal conveniences except wiring. Wiring was supplied

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in the form of a kit. However they were quite good houses; they were made for the export market and I understand that they served the purpose well. In Nova Scotia we have tried our best to interest the Canadian government in purchasing these houses, particularly after seeing in papers all over Canada that there was an urgent demand for emergency shelter. But we have never been successful in having any of these prefabricated houses used elsewhere in Canada. Therefore, because there is no demand for our lumber products elsewhere in Canada, we look to the local domestic market and here we are restricted by the selling price. We are limited on the export market, where there is a great demand, by the quota system. We feel that we are squeezed from, all sides.
There is a further aspect with respect to British Columbia fir, which is almost totally unavailable for private enterprise. Recently, through the good offices of the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply and the timber controller, we have been able to get a fair allocation for all government projects, but for private projects Douglas fir is simply not available, and that in itself is quite a restraint on production and construction. It has happened, as it has happened elsewhere in Canada, that the ceiling price on lumber has not been too carefully adhered to ini many instances, with the result that lumber is not as easy to get as it might be because of black market dealings; but I believe that the availability is increasing. The Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island lumber dealers' association met last week, and in a press report (he following appeared:
A committee, appointed by the association, to study the supply and distribution of certain commodities, reported they were highly satisfied with the results achieved thus far and a very cooperative spirit had been displayed by the manufacturers.
On the other hand, in the same report of the association's proceedings it was stated:
Most members reported that lumber stocks *were down to a minimum and it continued difficult to build up an inventory, particularly in spruce. Doors and hardwood flooring were also in short supply as well as cedar shingles, wood lath and other building materials.
I have heard from lumber dealers that the situation is easing and that the distribution is good. My own limited experience is to the effect that the situation internally is easing. So that in the light of the minister's announcement with respect to western Canada and our own particular situation in Nova Scotia and, I believe, in Prince Edward Island-I think I am safe in saying that, having regard to the fact that the meeting I referred to 83166-161
was a joint meeting of the Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island lumber dealers' association-we are now at the point where one of three things should be done, probably jointly in some instances. First of all, if there is an over-all shortage in Canada there should be a greater opportunity for putting our lumber and lumber products at a profit on Canadian markets other than the maritimes. Second, the time, I believe, is arriving, if it has not already arrived, when the domestic ceiling price should be raised. Third, I believe the time is at hand when full consideration should be given to increasing export quotas, and I should be pleased to hear the parliamentary assistant make some statement in that regard.


Mr. BROOKS:: I want to second what has been said by the hon. member (Mr. Winters) with reference to maritime lumber. He spoke particularly about Nova Scotia, but what he said would apply, I believe, with even greater force to New Brunswick. The lumber dealers and people generally in New Brunswick are greatly interested in the lumber industry, because it supplies work for nearly one-third of our people. The people there were greatly concerned at the report of the minister a few days ago that the price of domestic lumber from British Columbia and in the prairie provinces was to be increased from fifteen to twenty per cent. Our people in my own province and, I am satisfied, in other maritime provinces, are at a loss to understand why there should be an increase in domestic lumber from fifteen to twenty per cent from British Columbia and the west and not from the maritime provinces as well. I sometimes wonder whether British Columbia has more pull with this government than we from the maritime provinces have. As I listened tonight and heard the minister from British Columbia, and all the members from that province, join forces in the matter of housing in the city of Vancouver, the thought occurred to me that where there is unity there is strength; and possibly it is in this unity which we find among the members from British Columbia that their strength lies. I would suggest to my colleagues from the maritimes-and I do so in all sincerity-that we from the maritimes should take a lesson from British Columbia members, and in matters of this kind, when they affect our provinces, we should all stand together, irrespective of whether we are opposition or government members and try to see that whatever government is in power, whether Liberal or Conservative, shall do justice to our section of

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the country. We have not done that in the past. I sometimes think we play too much politics in the maritimes. If we played politics less and united more, probably we would not be in the position in which we find ourselves today in many matters.


An hon. MEMBER:: They are mostly Liberals from the maritimes.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: There are mostly Liberals from the maritimes-


An hon. MEMBER:: Good.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: -and possibly that is the reason we are not getting the results.


Robert Henry Winters: Don't play politics.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: I am quite sincere. This is a serious matter to my own province and to show how serious it is, I have here a newspaper item in the Saint John Telegraph-Journal of Saturday of this week, the heading being "Timber controls threaten our lumber industry." In other words, the timber controls threaten the industry in the province of New Brunswick.
I am sorry the minister himself is not here tonight, because I should like him to tell me just why there is this discrimination, and it is rank and unfair discrimination, that we are getting in New Brunswick and' other maritime provinces today in respect of lumber. The minister is a very busy man and I -am not reflecting on his not being here, because he is here on all occasions when it is possible for him to attend, and if he is away tonight I am satisfied it is for a good reason. However I wish he were here tonight to answer that question why there is this discrimination.
The hon. member for Queens-Lunenburg pointed out just why the lumber industry and why the controls have a great effect on our maritime industry. He said we mostly export our lumber, and that is a fact. Some years ago, I believe it was under the empire trade agreements, we exported our lumber for the most part to Great Britain. We developed a splendid market there, and anyone who has been in the port of Halifax or Saint John or in any of the other ports in the maritime provinces and seen in the past ten -or twelve years ships loading for the British market will realize what a splendid industry it is. But what are these controls doing as far as our industry is concerned?
It was pointed out that we have a small quota, and today we see the hand, not of the British Columbia politician, but at least of the lumber industry of that province. The quota

for export lumber is controlled) mostly by British Columbia and we in the maritime provinces have a very small quota. We are allowed to ship lumber to the United States, but for every carload of lumber that is shipped across the border in to the United States we must sell two carloads in Canada. There is a price ceiling on our lumber, and I am told on good authority-other members from -the maritime provinces can correct me if I am wrong-that the price ceiling on lumber produced in the maritimes is $8 less than cost of production. When, therefore, a lumber exporter sends his one car of lumber to the United States or his quota to Great Britain he has to make enough on that exported lumber to pay his loss on lumber sold on the domestic market.
What is the effect of this? Well, the effect is this. We are asking high prices from countries to which we export and we are asking a high price in the British market. We are taking advantage today of the people in Great Britain in their great famine for lumber. We are taking advantage of them in making them pay for the loss we sustain in this country in selling lumber -below cost of production. There is no question about that, and we in New Brunswick and in the other maritime provinces feel that this will have a detrimental effect on future trade, this great business which has been worked up over a long period of years. What are the people of Great Britain going to say in years to come when they can get lumber in other parts of the world instead of from Canada and the maritime provinces? They will say, "In the time of our greatest need, when you should have sold us lumber cheaper than you did, you took advantage of our stress and sold it at prices much higher than you were selling in your own country". The result will be, I am sure, that when Russia gets back on her feet, when great exporting countries get back, when Finland is exporting to Great Britain and when Sweden is again shipping lumber, we shall lose that splendid market in Great Britain in consequence of what they regard as the unfair treatment which we gave them in the time of their greatest need.
You speak about black markets. I am satisfied that there is a black market in lumber in the maritime provinces. As I said, the price of lumber is $8 below the cost of production. The natural result of that is that the producer is going to hold the lumber and sell it at the highest price, if it is at all possible. It is being done, and it is being done in a widespread manner. You talk about a black market in nails. There is a black market in lumber, I think, not only in the maritime provinces but here in Ontario. The reason

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is that we are selling lumber in this country-today at below cost of production. In discussing this lumber situation, and particularly our loss of foreign markets and foreign customers, the Telegraph-Journal had this to say on April 26:
This is unfair to our foreign customers.
It is doubly unfair to our producers. On one hand, they are strong-armed into selling in Canada at a loss-a thing which is almost incomprehensible and is certainly not in accord with sound business practice or sound government administration. On the other hand, they see their foreign markets being shattered by a shortsighted and ruthless policy.
They know how stiff competition is under ordinary conditions. Here in New Brunswick, for instance, they have seen lack of markets knock the bottom out of prices, throw thousands of workers out of jobs, and drive wages in the woods and mills down to a shocking and pitiful level.
That statement, Mr. Chairman, is correct; and I am sure it is a well-considered statement. I should also like to quote from the Telegraph-Journal of February 15, and that is some months ago. This was not only the feeling a few days ago when this regulation was changed, but for many months the people in the maritime provinces have felt that these controls and regulations were most unfair to our lumber industry, which is the most, important one we have in our province. On February 15 of this year, the Telegraph-Journal had this to say:
Our timber trade with Great Britain is traditional. More than that, it is essential to our prosperity. Our position, if we lost it. would be utterly hopeless. Yet today men who are ignorant of the timber trade are in the driver's seat and . . . are -whipping this vital industry toward destruction. This we can't afford to tolerate.
The same article goes on to refer to other commodities that we are selling to Great Britain. Take wheat, for instance. We are not selling wheat to Great Britain at a much higher price than we are selling it in. this country. We realized that the people of Great Britain needed wheat and needed it badly. The policy we adopted was this, that we sell wheat to Great Britain as cheaply as we possibly can in order to help those people who so much need our help. Why dlo we have one policy for lumber, as to which there is also a famine in Great Britain, and another policy for wheat?
There were many other things that I had intended to say, Mr. Chairman, but I see that it is nearly eleven o'clock and I shall take only a few more minutes of the committee's time. I thought possibly the hon. member for Lunenburg might have mentioned the situation with regard to birch woods in the maritime provinces. We have in the maritime 83166-161i
provinces almost a billion feet of birch wood lumber which today we are not able to cut and export. Why? Because our quota will not allow us to do that. What is happening to this -birch wood lumber? There is a disease known as dieback disease, which is gradually wiping out all these birch wood forests. In five years' time, we are told, all this splendid birch wood will be ruined and will not be fit to export unless a special quota is given to the maritime provinces and we are allowed to cut and export this birch wood. Because of controls and the quota, what is happening? We are not allowed to cut it. It is going to waste. Yet it is worth millions of dollars to us. It gives employment to thousands of our men. In spite of the fact that Mr. MacQuarrie, minister of lands and mines of Nova Scotia, has made special representations to this government, no extra quota has been given, and this great loss has been inflicted on the people of Nova Scotia and the people of New Brunswick.
Mr. Chairman, I will take no more of the time of the committee, but I hope that the minister will reconsider the treatment which he has given to the maritime provinces and will endeavour to correct what we consider to be very great wrongs.
Progress reported.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Mr. Speaker, with the unanimous consent of the house, in order that the budget may be presented at eight o'clock tomorrow evening, I would move:
That the order of the house to resolve itself into committee of ways and means be proceeded with at eight o'clock on Tuesday, April 29, and that the provision of standing order 15 dealing with private and public bills be suspended in relation thereto.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Tuesday, April 29, 1947