1952-07-03

Mr. Coyle:: 1.	On what occasions since January 1, 1951, has the C-5 aircraft bearing registration A.O.P.-IO.OOO been dispatched on flights outside of Canada?
2.	What was the mileage, destination and route flown on each such flight?
3.	Were passengers other than members of the Royal Canadian Air Force personnel carried on any such flight?
4.	If so, what are the names of such passengers, and in each case, what was the status and reason for travel?
5.	Were such passengers carried throughout the flight, and if not, between what points was each passenger carried?
6.	Having regard to the number of passengers carried and the over-all cost per mile of operating the aircraft, what was the estimated cost of such trips for each passenger named?
7.	What was paid by each of the passengers named for such flights?


Mr. Drew:: Mr. Speaker, this question was under discussion yesterday. At that time the Minister of Public Works explained that if he were to give consent to its becoming an order for return it would be necessary to indicate a limitation imposed by the fact that, according to information he had received, records which would give the information requested in the latter part of the question-that is, numbers 3 to 7 inclusive-would have been destroyed, under the practice of the R.C.A.F. in relation to information of that kind.
Without in any way debating the answer given, I wonder if the minister is aware that there are circumstances which make it rather difficult to understand why that information would not be available in this particular case, because a question in the same form was on the order paper at the last session, and remained on the order paper at the time the last session closed on December 29, 1951. It had been on the order paper for a very considerable time.
I have asked the hon. member in whose name the question stood at that time, and he has explained to me that he understood- incorrectly, as it happens-that the question would be answered afterwards, although there had been no formal request that it
become an order for return. For that reason the question was allowed to lapse at that time.
I am inclined to think that if, instead of accepting the general explanation in regard to practice, the Minister of Public Works would find out if there was not some information obtained at that time and now on file, he would probably find that all this information covering the period between January 1, 1951, the date mentioned in the question, and a period a year ago, or at such time as the records were destroyed, was available. I leave it in that position. If the minister says that it is subject to the limitation in relation to the practice of the R.C.A.F. I naturally, on behalf of the member who discussed the matter with him, would be called upon to accept that limitation, subject to any discussion of the practice as something independent of this question itself.
Subject to what I have said I accept the proposal on behalf of the hon. member in whose name the question stands that it stand as an order for return. I would ask the minister to refer to this subject again in view of the information I have given him about this same question having been on the order paper in the last session. I would hope probably that information might be available.


Mr. Claxlon:: Perhaps I should say to the leader of the opposition that we shall be glad indeed to look further into the matter. I think it only fair to say that the R.C.A.F. does destroy passenger lists at the end of six months. I am told that the practice of the commercial airlines is to destroy passenger manifests every month so that the R.C.A.F. keep them for a much longer period. I shall be glad to see if any other information is available in accordance with the suggestion of the leader of the opposition.


George Alexander Drew: I do not want to enlarge this unduly, but there is an important point involved here. In the first place I understood the Minister of Public Works (Mr. Fournier) to state yesterday that it was a year, but now the Minister of National Defence says it is six months.


Brooke Claxton: It is in respect of the period of six months, I beg your pardon.

Inquiries of the Ministry


George Alexander Drew: The Minister of Public Works indicated that it was a year; his words were:
The information asked for can only be provided back to the 1st of July, 1951.
That is what he said after having explained the procedure.


Brooke Claxton: That is quite right.


George Alexander Drew: That simply leaves it in the way I have indicated. In view of the question having been asked earlier and the fact that it must have called for some action by the department at that time, with the probability that a file exists in relation to this particular matter, I would ask that it be reviewed on that basis.



PRIME MINISTER


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Gordon Graydon (Peel):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask a question of the Prime Minister. I called the Prime Minister a few minutes before the house convened to give him notice. Around the end of May, Elmore Philpott of the Vancouver Sun reported an interview with the Prime Minister which indicated that he was making plans to visit India, Pakistan and Ceylon this coming fall. Would the Prime Minister care to indicate to the house whether he intends to make such a trip?


Right Hon. L. S. St. Laurent (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, I did see Mr. Philpott some weeks ago and I told him that if it were possible for me to accept invitations I had received to visit the capitals of commonwealth sister nations in Asia I would be very glad to do so. He had recently returned from the east and during the course of our conversation it was indicated that autumn would be the most comfortable time to visit those capitals. That is as far as it went. I am sorry that I have no plans at the present time for accepting that invitation at any early date.


George Alexander Drew: Mr. Speaker, I feel sure that should the possibility of such a trip present itself the members of this house and the Canadian people would be most happy that the Prime Minister of Canada was able in that way to express the good will of Canada to the sister nations of the commonwealth whose close association with us is so important at this time.


Louis Stephen St-Laurent: I can assure hon. members that such a trip would be most interesting personally and I feel it would be the kind


of gesture that most Canadians would like to see made whenever the time was convenient to make it.



PEACE RIVER COUNTRY


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Solon E. Low (Peace River):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to draw the attention of the parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Trade and Commerce to a rather serious situation which exists in the Peace river country. I should like to ask him a question, but in order to do so I shall have to give some information. I hope Your Honour will be indulgent with me this morning because this may be the last opportunity I shall have to draw this matter to the attention of the minister.
There is in the Peace river country
10.500.000	bushels of wheat still in storage:
8.500.000	bushels in the elevators and 2 million bushels still in storage on the farm. They have only shipped 23,500,000 bushels from the Peace river country this year, which means that in the next two months, if they are to be ready for the next crop, over 5,000 carloads will have to be shipped out of that country if the farmers are to have any storage space available. Will the parliamentary assistant draw this matter to the attention of the wheat board and the transport controller to see if cars cannot be provided for that area?


Mr. G. J. Mcllrailh (Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Trade and Commerce):: Mr. Speaker, I shall be glad to have the whole situation looked into and if anything should be done I will see that the necessary action is taken.



FINANCE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. M. Macdonnell (Greenwood):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the Minister of Finance a question of which I have given rather brief notice. Could the Minister of Finance before the house adjourns give us any further indication of the course of government receipts and expenditures to date in the current fiscal year?


Hon. Douglas Abbott (Minister of Finance):: I thank my hon. friend for having given me notice of his question. I have made inquiries and I find that the statement of the comptroller of the treasury covering April and May will be published in this week's Canada

Gazette, which I understand will appear on Friday or Saturday. I would hope that the house might be adjourned before that time, but speaking generally I may say that the position of revenues and expenditures continues to be satisfactory.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: Would the minister state whether the figures are made up on the same basis as they were a year ago, or whether any different principle is used? It might be useful to the public to have that information in calculating the size of the surplus.


Douglas Charles Abbott: I think I indicated when my hon. friend asked me a question some time ago that we are endeavouring to pro-rate in the figures this year some charges such as annual debt charges, contributions to the superannuation fund and so on, which are paid intermittently through the year. However, similar adjustments will be made with respect to last year's figures so that a comparison of this year's figures with last year's figures will be a comparison of like with like.



IRRIGATION


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. G. Diefenbaker (Lake Centre):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Prime Minister and I will preface my question in the same way as did the leader of the Social Credit group. Some discussion took place the other night with regard to the South Saskatchewan river dam and irrigation project. Since that time I have received three or four communications from municipal authorities in central Saskatchewan asking whether the government would direct the commission to hold public meetings before a decision is arrived at so that full representations might be made as to the necessity and the feasibility of that project.
These municipal authorities have had no opportunity to make representations and they feel they should be entitled to do so. Would the Prime Minister, on behalf of the government, direct that public hearings be held so that a full presentation of the situation from their point of view may be made to the commission?
Right Hon. L. S. St. Laurent (Prime
Minister): I would not like to undertake to give any directions to the commission in view of what I understand to be the facts. I will bring to their attention the remarks the hon. gentleman has made this morning, but I think these municipalities would be well advised to channel their requests through the
Inquiries of the Ministry provincial government of Saskatchewan to which I understand the commission has given an undertaking that if they wanted public hearings, public hearings would be arranged.
I will bring the hon. gentleman's remarks to the attention of the commission together with the reply that I am making, and I think it might be in the interests of the municipal authorities who wish to have a public hearing to make that fact known to the government of Saskatchewan which I am sure will be disposed to do whatever would appear to be in the general interest of those making the representations.



CANADIAN PEACE CONGRESS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. George A. Drew (Leader of ihe
Opposition): I wish to refer to one subject which has been before the house at different times, and which it seems to me appropriate should be raised again in view of the fact that all members probably have seen the further distribution of material from the so-called Canadian peace congress. On June 25 the Minister of Justice, in response to questions that had been asked by the hon. member for Lake Centre on different occasions earlier in the session, gave an explanation as to the position of the government in connection with the possibility of prosecuting a man named Endicott. The question that had been asked on a number of occasions was whether the Department of Justice had reached a decision with respect to whether Endicott's actions constituted a breach under the Criminal Code either in its original form or in the form as amended last session.
I am prompted to direct the attention of the government to the explanation that was given in view of the further activities of this organization. In explaining the reason why the government had decided not to prosecute Endicott the Minister of Justice said that it might give publicity and might give Endicott and others the appearance of martyrs. He said it probably would not embarrass the communists if Endicott were prosecuted. Then he went on to explain that the freedom of speech which we all cherish and are all seeking to preserve, and which is being abused by Endicott and others associated with him, should be protected and held inviolate. That sounds like a very desirable course to follow but, Mr. Speaker, I suggest there is one aspect of this problem that has not been touched upon in any explanation given by the Minister of Justice. The Minister of Justice, neither on the 25th nor again on the 27th of June when he referred to this matter,
[Stage Direction]
Inquiries of the Ministry stated whether or not the Department of Justice had come to a conclusion whether there was or was not the appropriate basis for a prosecution to be launched under the terms of the Criminal Code.
I need not emphasize in this house that the hon. member for Lake Centre has been a most consistent exponent of the liberty of the individual and most certainly never implied that there should at any time be action taken which was not under the clearly stated criminal law of this country. However, the question has not been answered whether in the opinion of the government the conduct of Endicott and his associates does lay a foundation for a charge under the Criminal Code as amended or under its original provisions. The reason I mention the matter now is because within some measurable time we doubtless will be leaving this place until November, and I think the question should not be left in abeyance.
The explanation given by the Minister of Justice implies that an opinion may be held that a charge should be laid but that it would not be wise to lay it. It seems to me that the Department of Justice must decide whether, under the laws passed by this house, there is or is not ground for prosecution. If the laws are too severe they should be amended and ameliorated. If they are not severe enough they should be amended so that they will deal with offences in an appropriate manner. But if laws have been passed by the parliament of Canada then it is the duty of the Department of Justice to carry out its responsibility to see that the laws are observed. It is not in keeping with our judicial system that the Department of Justice shall adopt a course in applied psychology and try to determine what the effect will be of prosecution or otherwise.
The Minister of Justice has said that Endicott's abuses of our freedom have already brought him into sufficient contempt. The same thing may be said about a murderer. It brings him into contempt when it is known he has committed an offence that justifies prosecution. I come back to this matter for the reason that this morning I have received, as I feel sure all other hon. members have also received, a pledge for peace circulated by these traitors. I use the word "traitors" in the sense that they have been trying to destroy the spirit of our people for the defence of our own freedom. It is for the courts to say whether there has been an act of treachery justifying a penalty under our laws, and only the courts should decide that question. This is a pledge which people are asked to sign and doubtless they will collect
[Stage Direction]

these cards and announce at some future time that they have been signed by thousands. It will not make any difference how many sign them because they will use a figure that will be suitable to them in any event. This card with the dove of peace, issued by these people who are serving the Kremlin in an attempt to undermine the spirit of defence of our people, can only be regarded with contempt, but the question still remains whether that is enough and whether there is or is not ground for prosecution in the courts as a result of the course they are following. It seems to me that it is still for the Department of Justice to make a decision on that basis and not on what they anticipate the psychological reaction might be.
Louis Stephen St-Laurent: I think the hon. gentleman forgets that the administration of justice and the enforcement of laws passed by parliament are in the first instance the responsibility of the attorneys general of the Canadian provinces. It is quite true that any citizen can lay a complaint. It is quite true that the officers of the Department of Justice could initiate a complaint, but the proceedings would thereafter be under the control of the provincial administrations. It is my submission that it is quite proper for the Department of Justice, before deciding whether it will do something that might be done by the attorneys general and which would regularly be done by the attorneys general of the provinces in the case of ordinary crimes, to consider whether or not the result of their laying a charge would be apt to produce benefits for the public generally. The hon. gentleman believes, as I do, in the accuracy of everything he has said about these people serving the interests of the Kremlin, but between believing that that is so and being able to produce legal evidence before the courts that it is so, to the extent which would bring about a conviction, there is quite a wide gap. I think the Department of Justice is wise in considering the probable results of the initiation, in quite an unexceptional manner, by the federal Department of Justice of prosecution for a crime against the peace, order and good government of the country which normally would be within the jurisdiction of the provincial authorities. The Minister of Justice (Mr. Garson) was very careful to say that nothing in their attitude or their statements at the present time can be construed as absolving Mr. Endicott or the others who print these appeals for peace. Each action is a separate incident and if and when it became advisable to prosecute them each one of those incidents would be taken into account.

Now, I do not think I can add anything to the statement that was made at that time beyond pointing out that if any attorney general is of a different opinion as to the desirability of prosecutions being instituted he has it within his jurisdiction to take action; and if any Canadian citizen felt that he should make a charge it is within his right under our system of laws to make that charge. The Department of Justice has in certain cases taken the initiative because it felt that not only had there been a violation of a statute but that it was an instance where it was in the public interest that the department should step in and start prosecution.
Here the department has not come to the conclusion that, under the whole of the circumstances, it was desirable that it should do so, but it has done nothing to prevent anyone else from so doing if anyone else is otherwise advised.


George Alexander Drew: Mr. Speaker-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. Before the leader of the opposition replies may I say there is nothing before the house at the present time. I did not interrupt the leader of the opposition before as I gathered it was the wish of the house that he should continue. If he would like to ask some questions I think I should allow him to do so but, unless there is unanimous consent of the house, I cannot allow debate on this subject at this time.


George Alexander Drew: It was not with the thought of debate, it was simply to point out to the Prime Minister that I had not overlooked the responsibility of provincial attorneys general. After all, I have had occasion to consider their responsibilities from time to time.
I point out that at the time Gouzenko's evidence laid the foundation for charges against men who were serving the same master and for the same purpose the dominion government did not hesitate to take action. There is nothing to prevent the Department of Justice from acting in a matter of national concern, and I do believe this is a matter of national concern whether the decision is to proceed or not.


John George Diefenbaker: I asked the Prime Minister a question which has never been answered. It was not a question whether or not it is desirable to prosecute, but did the law officers of the crown give the opinion that, having regard to what Endicott has done, an offence could conceivably have been committed under any section of the treason and sedition laws as they are today? That was the question. It was not a question of policy or desirability, but is the law sufficient as it now exists to cover activities-I was going to say treasoninquiries of the Ministry able activities but it is not for me to judge- such as Endicott and those associated with him are today perpetrating in this country?
That was the question I asked the attorney general and that is the question I would like to ask the Prime Minister. What was the opinion of the law officers if all these facts were established? Would there or would there not be an offence?


Louis Stephen St-Laurent: Mr. Speaker, I do not know what opinions the law officers may have given the Minister of Justice. I remember, as my hon. friend does, how the late beloved member of this house, Mr. Tommy Church, used to object to any legal opinion being given in the house by the Department of Justice.
Now, I can give my own opinion. I think, personally, that if what I believe to be true and what the hon. leader of the opposition believes to be true could be legally proved before the courts there is ample provision in the Criminal Code to warrant conviction.



FISHERIES


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Albany M. Robichaud (Gloucester):: May
I be permitted to ask a question of the hon. Minister of Fisheries. I think I should say that not being accustomed to parliamentary procedure I have not given him the usual notice. My question is a general one, so perhaps he will entertain it.
I have read in several newspapers-


Some hon. Members:: Question.


Albany M. Robichaud: My question is: Are there
any plans under consideration by the minister's department to come to the assistance of the fishermen of the province of New Brunswick who have suffered losses?


Hon. R. W. Mayhew (Minister of Fisheries):: Mr. Speaker, the province of New Brunswick has not made any claim for assistance. I suppose the hon. member is referring to storm damage, and we have had no submission from the province of New Brunswick asking for assistance.



REDISTRIBUTION


Hon. W. E. Harris (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration) moved: the third reading of Bill No. 393, to readjust the representation in the House of Commons.


George Alexander Drew: Mr. Speaker, unless the government at this stage decides to reconsider its

Redistribution
decision 'to proceed in any event with the pattern that has been adopted for redistribution of the representation of the people of Canada, then this represents the last stage in a gerrymandering procedure which has become a subject of criticism over many years. I need not enlarge upon the statements that have been made by myself and by other members of the opposition that no one party can be charged alone with the responsibility for following a course in regard to redistribution in past years which has done a great deal to bring this method into contempt. Nevertheless, there does come some time when it is desirable that we recognize the change of events and that we do progress with the experience of other jurisdictions before us to improve the methods by which our own democratic processes will work out to the best advantage of our people and in a manner that will give them the highest possible measure of confidence in the system which is intended to serve their best interests.
We have made proposals in regard to another method and I submit, Mr. Speaker, that it is appropriate for me to refer briefly to this again because I intend to introduce a motion which would have the effect of delaying the coming into force of this act for a period of six months. If that motion were accepted, instead of this being merely regarded as a device to dispose of the measure itself, it could become the procedure by which the other course still could be adopted and public confidence established in our system of representation of the people in the House of Commons.
Already, Mr. Speaker, there have been comments in the press right across Canada which indicate, in spite of what was said by the Minister of Finance yesterday, that people are not uninterested in this subject. When the hon. Minister of Finance (Mr. Abbott) said that people are not interested in it he was reflecting a course which has been quite apparent, particularly on the part of the Minister of Finance. That of course has applied to other subjects as well. People are interested in it. I think it can be said that editorial comment generally reflects the degree of interest that there is in a subject, although we rarely have a uniform pattern of comment in the editorials of the newspapers of this country. That is the very natural expression of freedom of opinion and freedom of speech that we wish to preserve. But there has been considerable comment on this subject.
I should like to refer to an editorial which appeared yesterday in the Montreal Star. I refer to that editorial because that highly respected publication is not ordinarily regarded as being unduly critical of the

present government, although it does show a commendable impartiality in its approach to public questions. In yesterday's edition of the Montreal Star there is an editorial which I quote for the reason that it supports the contention that I intend to place before the house this morning. The heading on the editorial is, "There is still time to redistribute fairly." I have no intention of reading the whole editorial, but I should like to read the beginning of it.
Conservatives at Ottawa are staging a minor filibuster over the government's redistribution bill. Mr. Drew has asked again for the appointment of an independent commission to redraw constituency boundaries. From the government side comes no sign of agreement. Instead there is an evident determination to push through a bill already suspect.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I think I have ruled on previous occasions that it is not in order to read editorials in this house which reflect upon the proceedings of the house at the present time. Beauchesne's third edition, paragraph 266, reads:
The rule is quite clear, that the quoting of a newspaper, an author or a book which reflects upon debate before the house, either directly or indirectly, is entirely out of order, because members are here to give their own opinion and not to quote the opinion of others . . .
Members may quote an article or a book stating facts, but a commentary on any proceeding or any discussion in the house, with the object of swinging an opinion to one side or the other, is out of order.
I made the same ruling last year, and I think I should ask members of the house to observe it.


George Alexander Drew: I recognize that there is a borderline in regard to quotations from the press in cases of this kind, and I do not intend to delay the discussion by entering into an argument on that point. I say that there is a borderline because the difference between press comment or an editorial or a report that states what may be regarded as facts, and one which may be regarded as reflecting, to use the word in the rule, on the proceedings of the house is sometimes a vague and uncertain area. I recognize that it may be difficult to determine that area. I do not want to delay the discussion of this subject by entering into an argument on this particular point today, because perhaps having indicated that there are editorial comments I could paraphrase the general effect of them without quoting anyone else's opinion for the purpose of supporting the arguments we have put forward.
It is sufficient to say that there has been a substantial expression of opinion outside of this house as well as in the house, and in conversation in the corridors, shall we say, that it would be desirable to get away from a method that has been subject to criticism by members on both sides of the house.

Yesterday the suggestion was left that if the members of the opposition had really read the debates in other legislative chambers we would not have been saying that this alternative system had proven satisfactory elsewhere. I quoted from the United Kingdom Hansard of 1948 to show that, far from there being criticism of the commission method, there was uniform approval of that method, and that it was the extent to which the government of the day in the United Kingdom had departed from the recommendations of the commission that criticism was directed to what the house was being called upon to approve. It has worked satisfactorily in Australia, in the opinion of those who are associated with the results of that course. It has worked satisfactorily in New Zealand, according to the statement of responsible men there. It has worked satisfactorily elsewhere.
The reason I refer to this again this morning is that I would hope, even at this late date, that the government might see fit to reconsider its position to avoid the suggestion that there has been what has been so properly described as a racket taking place in the form of legislative procedure. I have seen questions asked as to how this would work out. It is rather difficult to tell whether supporters of the government believe in another method. At times when legislation is not before the house, there always seems to be a uniform expression of opinion that another method would be desirable. During the present debate there have been those who have indicated an alternative method would be desirable, but that the time is not ripe. There have been those who have returned to the argument that the members of this house, as representatives of the people of Canada, can best determine what should be done.
In response to that argument, may I point out that there never has been any suggestion that the members of this house or that the parliament of Canada should abdicate its responsibility on anything that is entrusted to it. The British North America Act imposes responsibility upon parliament to carry out a redistribution of the representation of the people in the House of Commons every ten years after the decennial census. It would be improper, and highly improper, if we abdicated our responsibility, and placed that in the hands of some other body that has not been suggested. The question has been asked, what is suggested? What is suggested is this. Appoint an independent commission-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I believe the house voted on that question during the present
Redistribution
session. It would not be in order to revive that debate at this time on third reading. The rules with respect to third reading are much more strictly interpreted than on second reading. On third reading, the debate must be confined to the bill itself and not outside matters.


George Alexander Drew: Perhaps it will simplify matters, Mr. Speaker, if I indicate that before I sit down I propose to move the usual motion that this bill be not now read a third time, but that it be read this day six months hence. I explain that I propose to move that motion so that I might still discuss the subject without it being suggested that I am still debating after the motion has been made.
When I refer to the alternative method, I am explaining why I suggest that this motion should not be regarded as merely a delaying process, but should be regarded as a procedure by which the government will be given an opportunity to consider the desirability of employing a method which has met with such satisfaction elsewhere. If Your Honour so rules, in the face of that resolution which, it seems to me, brings directly into issue the possibility of some alternative proceeding in the meantime, then of course I would leave the matter where it stands.
I had not intended to extend my argument on this point which relates to the reasons why I emphasize the desirability of delaying this bill's coming into force; I simply wanted to say that, under the proposals	that have been made,
the responsibility of parliament would remain, because any commission appointed by this parliament would report back to parliament itself, and parliament would then have the responsibility for accepting, in whole or in part, the recommendations that had been made and of acting or not acting upon those recommendations just as parliament does in connection with the report of any other commission which it may appoint.
I leave the matter there, Mr. Speaker, because that puts forward the point I wish to make, except that I confess that I would have liked to go into more detail in view of the suggestion I have seen that we have not clearly put forward exactly what it is that we are suggesting. I have been suggesting that, with the best judgment we can exercise and with the experience of other jurisdictions before us, we should devise a similar procedure best adapted to our own federal system and to our own particular requirements. I shall leave the matter there

Redistribution
from that point of view but I wish to say something with regard to the effect of what has been done.
No matter who has been to blame in the past, we are again confronted with the criticism which has been raised on every occasion in the past when redistribution has taken place. From what was quoted both by the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration (Mr. Harris) and by myself during the debate yesterday, it is obvious that it is not only here in this House of Commons in Canada that strong and forceful terms are used to apply to the result of methods which do not seem to produce a result that is in the interests of the people generally. Nevertheless it is at all times the duty of members to direct the attention of this house to the possibility of improvement. If we were simply to say that we are following the course that has been followed on earlier occasions-that although it is true there has been criticism, the criticism has been directed to both sides and consequently nothing need be done-there would not be any necessity for debate and we would not have much improvement in this or any other case. In view of the statement made by the Prime Minister (Mr. St. Laurent) at the time that this measure was introduced, many of us had hoped that a different approach was going to be made to this subject on this occasion. Again yesterday afternoon the Prime Minister made a statement that would have produced a result different from the one we have before us; that is, if the principles he enunciated in that statement had in fact guided the majority of the redistribution committee or the provincial subcommittees.
By the result of majority decisions there has been barefaced gerrymandering under the act now before us. There has been gerrymandering in the very way that has been described on earlier occasions. In order to deny to sitting members the opportunity in the future to represent the people whom they have served in the past constituencies have been joined when that joining was not necessary. Under the definition given by the predecessor of the present Prime Minister, namely the late William Lyon Mackenzie King, the most obvious type of gerrymandering is the combining of two constituencies represented by members of the opposing party for the purpose of denying to one of them the right to return to the House of Commons after the next election.
Another form of gerrymandering described by the same gentleman was that which detaches from an existing riding areas which have been inclined to give constant support
fMr. Drew.]
to the party in power, for the purpose of bolstering another riding with votes which may be counted upon or which the government may expect will follow the same course in the future.
Another form of gerrymandering is the taking of a constituency represented by a member of the opposing parties-and usually it is done in the case of the most prominent members of the opposing parties-and so distorting the boundaries of it that the organization of that constituency in a way that gives an interpretation of the wishes of the people becomes extremely difficult.
We have had the three types of gerrymandering in this case. We have had the first type of gerrymandering, that of the joining of seats, in a number of cases in order to deny to members now sitting in this house the opportunity of returning after the next election, because one of two members must give way to the other under the necessities of the result of this redistribution.
Then we have seen the detachment of townships and areas that appear to have followed a course that would suggest the likelihood that they would support the government and in that way bolster adjoining constituencies. Then we have seen the most abominable type of gerrymandering in the case of the constituency of Lake Centre for an obvious purpose. These acts of gerrymandering are there before us; and no protestations of high purpose will deny the result that is before our eyes.
This matter has been referred to in varying terms but one quotation that was read into the record yesterday from a speech of one of the greatest parliamentarians of our generation-I refer to Right Hon. Winston Churchill-emphasized the necessity at this particular time, no matter what may have occurred at any time in the past, of establishing public confidence in our system of representation of the people in the House of Commons. As he pointed out, this is a time to make sure that we do not in any way imitate the methods that we are criticizing so severely in those areas now behind the iron curtain. Abuse of government power is bad at any time, but it is particularly bad at a time when one of the great issues before us is to restrain the power of government. Freedom from excessive government power is really the fundamental issue between us and the dictatorships on the other side of the iron curtain. For that very reason, by every gesture we can make, by every practical demonstration that we can give of our own desire to see that the representation of the people is carried out in the most impartial manner possible, we

should do what we can to inspire in the minds of our people confidence that representation by population is a reality as far as it can be carried forward under some accepted principles which recognize the difference between urban constituencies and rural constituencies in the concentration of population. But here, embedded in this act we are now asked to pass in its final stage, is every abuse that has ever been criticized in the past, and in some cases in the most iniquitous form. You cannot have an arbitrary equality of representation throughout the whole of Canada. There are geographical reasons; there are reasons of concentration of population, or otherwise. But there can be some clearly stated principles which would guide a redistribution committee of this House of Commons in reaching its decision.
How can it be said that there has been any principle guiding redistribution when you see urban constituencies in one case of around
40,000,	and urban constituencies in another case of more than 90,000? How can one say that here is any principle applied when in one case we see a mixed rural and urban constituency with a little more than 30,000 and another mixed rural and urban constituency with approximately 90,000?
There has been no principle; there has been no guiding purpose apparent in the decisions reached as a result of the actions of the majority of the redistribution committee- except the old purpose of gerrymandering, to the advantage of the government.
Since this represents something that is not the privilege and prerogative of the members of parliament so much as it is the rights of the people themselves to proper representation in the House of Commons, I am about to move now an amendment for the purpose of providing an opportunity for further consideration of a method that would be more desirable. No harm will be done if there is delay in dealing with this measure, because we are going to meet again in November. Between now and that time steps can be taken to produce plans for redistribution which would be more satisfactory to the people of Canada, and effect some understandable principle which would at least give a pretence of representation by population in this country.
I therefore move, seconded by the hon. member for Eglinton (Mr. Fleming):
That the motion be amended by deleting the word "now" and adding the words "this day six months" at the end of the question.


Mr. M. J. Coldwell (Roseiown-Biggar):: Mr. Speaker, I am going to be very brief because I think practically everything that could possibly be said in this connection has already
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been said. The house in committee last night by an overwhelming voice decided that the schedule and the bill should remain substantially as it was when introduced.
I think however that the amendment of the leader of the opposition (Mr. Drew) is one that those of us who are critical of the schedule and the bill should support. I propose to vote for it when the vote is taken. I have held for a good many years that the method followed in carrying out redistribution by parliament is wrong, that unfortunately it means that members of the house are quite often called upon to think of their own prospects in subsequent elections rather than the representation of the people of Canada on a sound and proper basis.
When I look at the map of my own province of Saskatchewan I can only conclude that there has been something of a gerrymander. That is the word that has been used, and I find it a most convenient word to use at the moment. I feel particularly that the city of Regina, which was my home for a good many years, has been treated unfairly. It is true that the parts of the city that are now in Lake Centre were in Lake Centre or in Moose Jaw or in Qu'Appelle years ago.
But times have changed and the city has grown. About a year ago, if my memory serves me correctly, the boundaries of the city were enlarged, when a provincial act took into the city those heavily populated suburban areas that had been built up. It is a city which in thirty years has grown from
26,000	to about 72,000, I believe it is. Today, by this redistribution, some 5,000 or 6,000 Regina citizens, now included in the urban area of Regina as well as those in the newer suburbs, are being placed outside that city, in a constituency which will be dominated by another city, that of Moose Jaw.
To my mind that is indefensible. I do not believe the people of Moose Jaw will endeavour to gain any advantage over Regina, or to persuade their member, when elected, that he should fight for any advantage over the city of Regina; but I think it is most unwise to place a large number of citizens of Regina in a constituency that is either dominated by another city, or is substantially rural.
Last night I could not vote for the amendment offered by the hon. member for Eglinton (Mr. Fleming) to transfer that portion of the city of Regina and its suburbs, now included in Lake Centre, into the rural constituency of Qu'Appelle. I think that would have been equally wrong. My contention is that the limits of the city of Regina should be the limits of the constituency. There are 66,500 people now in that seat. By enlarging

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that number to 72,000, you still have a constituency much smaller than 17 city constituencies in Ontario, and substantially smaller than the constituencies in the city of Winnipeg.
I wish to make it clear that this is a mistake from every point of view. It is a mistake from the point of view of the satisfaction due to the people who reside in the city area taken away from the city of Regina, because while the area has not been heretofore in the constituency of Regina, it is now legally a part of the city of Regina. I think that is the worst mistake that has been made in Saskatchewan.
Then, the boundaries of my own constituency are greatly enlarged, so that when I return to that constituency I shall have an area to cover almost twice the extent of the original constituency which sent me to this House of Commons in 1935. I shall be happy to have the opportunity to run again for that constituency, if its electors desire that I should do so. I am happy that the name has been retained. In that respect I am glad that no change in name at least has been made, although the boundaries of the constituency have been greatly enlarged.
When I hear some of my maritime friends talking about coast line, I look at the map and see that my constituency is cut diagonally in two pieces by the Saskatchewan river, which is impassable in several instances for more than a hundred miles. How I am going to get across it, except by journeying down from Saskatoon to Regina or to Moose Jaw, I really do not know. But it will be done. I shall endeavour to serve the new part of the constituency as I have tried to serve the old part. I am told by the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner) that all this is because it was decided to leave Rosetown-Biggar in the map of the province.


Mr. Gardiner:: Not all of it.


Major James William Coldwell: That was a consideration which apparently I shared with the leaders of the other parties in this house.


Mr. Laing:: What would have happened if Saskatchewan had lost five seats?


Major James William Coldwell: Then my constituency probably would have been still larger and in all probability the method of approach in the province of Saskatchewan would have had to be substantially different. Apart from the feeling that I have of disagreement with the manner in which this redistribution has been done, I think the people of Saskatchewan appreciate that we have lost only three constituencies instead of the five we might have lost. All of us from Saskatchewan are ready

to express to members of the house from other parts of Canada the appreciation we feel of what was done in that regard.
But I think reconsideration should be given to this matter. I have held the view and have expressed it over and over again, both inside and outside the house, that redistribution should have been done by an impartial commission. I listened to Mr. Churchill's criticism of the bill in that house which was read into the record yesterday, but I remember that in that same debate the members of the government, of the Labour party, contended that the report of the commission was favourable to the Conservative opposition. As a matter of fact, an analysis of the results indicates that the contention of the government party was substantially correct because while the present Conservative government of Great Britain won a majority of the seats they succeeded in getting only a minority of the votes.
As the Prime Minister (Mr. St. Laurent) said yesterday, I presume that no matter what commission was set up, no matter what report was made, no matter what bill was introduced, opposition members probably would feel that they should criticize what had been done. In this case I think the opposition.-I include all opposition groups-can be relieved of any suggestion that we have been doing this. I think with the redistribution that has been made so far as Saskatchewan is concerned as well as other provinces and other constituencies-I am thinking of Annapolis-Kings for one-there is legitimate criticism of what has happened. Be that as it may, I think we should support the motion made by the leader of the opposition (Mr. Drew) and give this matter further consideration. In the meantime the government should be asked again to set up a commission which this house and the country can regard as impartial.


Mr. Speaker:: I have permitted the leader of the opposition (Mr. Drew) and the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell) to refer to the commission, but I think there has been sufficient reference to that subject on the motion for third reading. May I ask hon. members who are to speak to discuss only the matters contained in the bill.


Mr. Donald M. Fleming (Eglinton):: Mr. Speaker, there are a few remarks I should like to make as the seconder of the motion now under debate. In what I have to say I propose to confine myself entirely to what happened yesterday and to make a general summation of the situation.
The redistribution bill which has now reached the stage of third reading cannot by

any stretch of the imagination be said to provide a satisfactory redistribution. Even after three days of deliberation in the house we are still left with extraordinary extremes. The least populous constituency in Canada under this scheme will have a population of 9,999, while the most populous has a population of some 91,000. Even in Ontario there are extremes of a low population of 28,000, on the one hand, and a high population of
91,000,	on the other.
There is ample evidence that the government has felt quite uneasy about what they are doing. In many respects that uneasiness has been reflected in the remarks by and actions of the government members. I do not believe that the government has any serious confidence in the redistribution that they are now on the point of finally perpetrating. The disorders that have occurred in the house, all this continual raucous shouting on the part of government supporters, have not successfully hidden from open view the fact that the government is conscious that it is doing a job of gerrymandering and perpetrating some serious injustices.
First I should like to deal briefly with a remark made yesterday by the chairman of the redistribution committee, the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, which I quote from page 4089 of Hansard:
Nevertheless I wish to assure hon. members that the question of a redistribution commission will be given the most serious consideration.
While that statement unhappily is belated, let us welcome it even at this time. But in welcoming it let us ask why that serious consideration that is now promised should not be given to this question right now. If the subject merits serious consideration, as is now apparently admitted, why does it not merit that serious consideration right now? There is no excuse in the face of what has happened, in the face of what was said yesterday, for deliberately pushing ahead and rushing this measure through. If the subject of an impartial redistribution commission is deserving of consideration following the census of 1961, then there is not a single answer that has been given that justifies its not being applied here and now in the light of the census of 1951.
My second observation relates to the extent of government responsibility in this matter. The Prime Minister (Mr. St. Laurent) was at great pains yesterday morning to try to shift responsibility for this gerrymandering from the shoulders of the government to the shoulders of the house. One can understand the alacrity shown by the Prime
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Minister to disavow any governmental responsibility for this botching of the job of redistribution to the advantage of the government. But when some of us said yesterday, "That kind of talk is not impressive in the face of the realities of the situation", no reply was made. We pointed out that this is a government bill standing in the name of the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration. It is a bill that has been supported in debate by all the ministers of the government who have spoken.
If there were any so naive as to think that any great degree of independence would be shown by supporters of the house in the face of what the Prime Minister said yesterday, then of course the proof of the pudding will be in the eating. We shall judge them by their fruits. What were their fruits yesterday? There were nine divisions in the committee of the whole yesterday. Before any of those divisions occurred the Prime Minister said that he was going to ask all his members to vote, but not to do so with an eye to political advantage or disadvantage. As reported on page 4094 of Hansard he said:
It is the responsibility of every one of us to attempt to get a fair redistribution under this system.
Then further on he said:
I would ask all the hon. members who belong to the Liberal party not to examine these different boundaries in the light of what they may do for Liberal prospects, for Conservative prospects, for C.C.F. prospects or Social Credit prospects but in the light of what they feel is the proper thing in virtue of their responsibilities to the public generally as well as to their own constituents.
Then, further on he said:
I said at the outset and I say now that I hope each member of the house, to whatever party he belongs, will endeavour in considering each one of these matters to render his verdict and his conception of what is fair and what is in the public interest.
Then he concluded on this rather personal note. He said, as found on page 4095:
I think that when we reach each one of these individual cases-
Here he was speaking about those that had been singled out for special mention during the course of the debate as being flagrant cases of gerrymandering.
-they should be looked at with great sincerity by every member of the house and the right conclusion reached.
At the conclusion of the same paragraph he said:
I am going to take my stand on each one of these questions as it arises, not as the Prime Minister but as the member representing the constituency of Quebec East.
By their fruits ye shall know them, Mr. Speaker. What was the response of Liberal members of this house to this appeal of the

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Prime Minister phrased in such brave words? There was an opportunity given with respect to each of these situations, each of the individual cases that had been mentioned by the Prime Minister, and what was the result? In each one of those cases the government majority voted down the amendment introduced by the opposition. There were nine such amendments and in the nine votes a total of 555 votes were cast by government supporters. How many of them saw fit to show a measure of independence? One government supporter on one vote, the hon. member for Lincoln, decided to be consistent. The hon. member for Lincoln having firmly supported the ground that county boundaries should not be interfered with in the case of his own county felt obliged to maintain consistency by voting in favour of the amendment of the hon. member for Huron North not to interfere with the boundaries of Huron county but to make Huron county the riding of Huron.
The proportion of independence shown by government supporters in the house, in view of the brave words of the Prime Minister, is one out of 555. Perhaps that proportion is a little higher than usual but I think it is a fair indication of how empty are words that profess to show independence, even independence from the government if you please, in the light of the hard realities of government discipline in the house.


George James McIlraith: I wonder if you could give us the figures for your party.


Donald Methuen Fleming: The fact of the matter is every member of our party voted in favour of each of these amendments, but we were not included in the scope of these brave words of the Prime Minister's appeal. The Prime Minister was indicating to his followers that they were free to vote according to their views, and that is the way they exercised their freedom. That is a fine showing of independence on the part of government supporters. Therefore I will not need to spend very much time on this talk about Liberal members in the house being free to vote.
What about the Prime Minister himself in discharging what he referred to as his responsibility in connection with these individual cases? They are the individual cases concerning which votes were taken on amendments introduced by the opposition. The Prime Minister was present for the first five of these votes taken yesterday afternoon and he was not present for the four votes last evening, but in every one of the five votes when he was present he lined up eagerly with all the Liberal members in the house and all the government ministers to vote solidly against the opposition amendments.

So we see very clearly just how much independence the Prime Minister was prepared to show, whether as Prime Minister or as the member for Quebec East, in departing from the recommendations of the Liberal majority on the redistribution committee. We saw the Prime Minister voting to perpetrate these gerrymanders, these flagrant abuses of the redistribution process, and to perpetrate inequalities in representation in such cases as were discussed yesterday, the extermination of Haldimand and in the process the representation thereof by the present member. The Prime Minister was not in the house when the vote was taken with respect to Lake Centre but I suppose we may assume, in view of his unbroken record yesterday afternoon in voting five time against five opposition amendments to cure and eradicate these gerrymanders, that if he had been in the house last night when the other four votes were taken he would have voted in the same way. Every government minister who voted on every one of these nine amendments voted precisely in the same way. They voted against the opposition amendments to cure the injustices that were about to be perpetrated by the government majority.
Questions put to the Prime Minister before the taking of some of these votes remained unanswered. I might remind the house that before the vote was taken in connection with the changes in the riding of Frontenac-Addington and the riding of Hastings-Peterborough to create an empire in the new riding of Hastings-Frontenac-


George James McIlraith: It is the tenth in size in the province.


Donald Methuen Fleming: -I put a question to the Prime Minister. I asked him whether it was the Prime Minister's conception of fairness that this riding of Hastings-Frontenac should be created in the way proposed by the government majority on the redistribution committee, having in it a population of over
43,000,	while right next door is the riding of Renfrew South represented by the Minister of National Revenue with less than half the area and with a population of only 31,000. That question was not answered. The Prime Minister had several opportunities to answer it but he judiciously refrained from doing so. The Prime Minister then voted against our amendment.
We have had an opportunity to test the brave words uttered yesterday morning by the Prime Minister for the benefit of himself and his followers by what happened in the house yesterday afternoon. We shall judge those words in the light of the votes taken,

in the light of such situations as the one I have just referred to where in effect favouritism has been shown to the Minister of National Revenue by throwing 49 townships into the huge riding of Hastings-Frontenac with a population about 35 per cent in excess of the much smaller riding of Renfrew South next door to it.
Some government supporters spoke to me at noon yesterday and said: "Now, you remember what the Prime Minister said this morning. We do not think you paid enough attention to it. You remember that he said that when we reached each of these individual cases that have been particularly mentioned they will be looked at with great sincerity and every member of the house will have the opportunity to reach the right conclusion and take the right vote on them." The suggestion was made to me that what we people in the opposition should do was to call off the fight then because the Prime Minister had said in effect that if we just waited until we reached the particular cases in the schedule everything was going to be all right and certain things were going to be done that would leave everybody happy. They said to me, "Why are you carrying on the fight"?


Mr. Rooney:: Did you believe it?


Donald Methuen Fleming: No, I did not. I have been dealing with the Liberals in this house too long to believe that. However, there was an opportunity to test the validity of that kind of cajolery, and we saw yesterday afternoon in the house when we came to each of these individual cases-


Mr. Martin:: Don't break that desk.


Donald Methuen Fleming: It is too bad the Minister of National Health and Welfare is not right here at my desk now.


Gordon Graydon: Better to break the desk than to break a promise.


Donald Methuen Fleming: We had an opportunity yesterday to see just how much weight should be attached to the brave words of the Prime Minister-just wait until these individual cases are reached; everybody is going to be so independent; everybody is going to do the right thing; you can count on our members; they are all great fellows with independent minds and they are going to do the right thing in these cases. Well, you know how that went-one out of 555 government votes was independent-and the Prime Minister's was not that one.
Yes, the government yesterday gave not one inch in a single one of these most flagrant and disgraceful cases of gerrymandering.
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Not one inch did they give after all those beautiful words yesterday morning. Mr. Speaker, in the light of what has happened, in the light of the wish of hon. members that statements made in this house should be serious, would it not then have been very much better if the Prime Minister had not said anything at all yesterday morning?
Then, Mr. Speaker, we witnessed in the course of debate that exposure of that most cynical attitude on the part of the government which goes a long way to explain what they are doing in this callous manner. You will remember that I was venturing to put forward the argument that the public should have an ample opportunity of reviewing what is proposed with respect to constituency boundaries-because after all it is the public that is going to be affected by them in the vote-and that the matter should not be proceeded with hastily and should be allowed to stand for the present time, as there will be an opportunity later in this present session when the house reconvenes on the 20th November. Hansard records my remarks and certain interjections at page 4101 yesterday morning as follows. I am reported as saying:
What could be fairer under those circumstances than that the public should have ample opportunity to review this matter and to make the views of the public known to members who are going to have to take the responsibility eventually of voting on the schedule and the bill.


Douglas Charles Abbott: The public do not care; it is only
the members who care.


Mr. Mutch:: The hon. gentleman is overestimating public interest in what goes on here.


Donald Methuen Fleming: That is a most significant statement. The Minister of Finance says that the public does not care and the parliamentary assistant-


Some hon. Members:: No.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Yes, he did; he certainly did.


George James McIlraith: No, he did not.


George James McIlraith: Finish it.


Donald Methuen Fleming: The gentleman last referred to said that the Minister of Finance-


Mr. Bradley:: Read the rest of it.


Donald Methuen Fleming: I think the Minister of Finance will probably regret making this most lamentable interjection to the end of his political days.


An hon. Member:: You hope!


Donald Methuen Fleming: Nevertheless the statement was that the Minister of Finance did not say what he did say. We who were just a short distance removed from the Minister of Finance and directly facing him heard what he said and correctly repeated in the house what he did say, but we were told by the hon. member for Ottawa West who was sitting behind the minister and obviously did not hear what the minister said: "No, he did not". However, we become accustomed to those things.	-

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So the discussion went merrily on.


George James McIlraith: Read the rest of it. It is of interest to the house.


Donald Methuen Fleming: I am very happy to continue because it is the worst example of squirming and shilly-shallying that has been seen in this house for some time. How quickly the Minister of Finance repented him of his words! How quickly he showed his concern that he should have made such a blunder! How quickly he showed his regret that he should have joined the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Howe) in exposing the cynical mind of the government, because this remark, "the public do not care", as applied to redistribution, will deserve to rank in history with that equally cynical and blundering remark made a little over a year ago by the Minister of Trade and Commerce when he said in this house: "If we wanted to get away with it who would stop us?"


An hon. Member:: The Tories.


Donald Methuen Fleming: These two remarks, Mr. Speaker, are of the same nature precisely. They are made of the same cloth; they are outpourings of the same mentality.
Here is a government which has convinced itself that it is absolute; that power belongs to it. It has long shown its contempt for the House of Commons and now it feels perfectly at liberty to show its contempt for the people. The people do not care, they say; and therefore in effect they say to themselves: Well, if we want to get away with it who is going to stop us? The people don't care; the opposition can't out-vote us; so we will go ahead and jolly well do what we like with this redistribution. We will put over such a gerrymander as will cut out of public life, if we can do so, some of the best men in the official opposition; and we will succeed in doing it and we will congratulate ourselves on having exercised our power.


Walter Edward Harris: I rise on a question of privilege. The Minister of Finance never said anything about a gerrymander as my hon. friend has stated.


Donald Methuen Fleming: I did not say the Minister of Finance used the word "gerrymander". What I said was-


Paul Joseph James Martin: You do not know what you are saying.


Gordon Graydon: Yes, he does.


Mr. Lennard:: A lot better than you do.


Donald Methuen Fleming: The Minister of National Health and Welfare, Mr. Speaker, has not had anything to do so far in this debate, and

it is just so hard for him to let a few pages of Hansard go by without the name of Mr. Martin on the record.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


Leslie Alexander Mutch: You can understand his difficulty better than any of us. If it is true, you should know.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I believe that the house should now revert to the matter under discussion.


Donald Methuen Fleming: I hope the Minister of National Health and Welfare will profitably take to himself that well-merited rebuke.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. So that there will be no misunderstanding, the remark I made was directed to all hon. members. There is a rule that on third reading the only matters that can be discussed are those that are contained in the bill.


Gordon Graydon: We knew whom you meant.


Paul Joseph James Martin: Mr. Speaker, I ask you if your remarks were not directed, as I am sure they were, to my hon. friend the loquacious member for Eglinton?


Mr. Speaker:: My remarks were directed to no particular member.


Gordon Graydon: The minister is on the record at least.


Mr. Speaker:: Order.


Donald Methuen Fleming: I will proceed to read what the Minister of Finance said in his later interjections when he tried strenuously to repair the damage done by his first and frank remark.


Douglas Charles Abbott: My hon. friend takes himself too seriously-far too seriously.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Well, Mr. Speaker, here we have another interjection in the face of what you have said, and I shall say this in view of the further interjection from the Minister of Finance.
The minister has said: Don't take yourself so seriously.


Douglas Charles Abbott: Too seriously.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Well, now we have it straight and we are this time in agreement as to what the minister has said.
I hope that I do not take myself unduly seriously-


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


Donald Methuen Fleming: -but I do take seriously my responsibilities as a member of the house and I may say to my hon. and very good friend, the Minister of Finance, that in estimating

the seriousness with which I should apply myself to my duties in the house I am not going to take him as my pattern.


Gordon Graydon: His estimates are always out.


Mr. Dickey:: You could do a lot worse.


Donald Methuen Fleming: I think this is a matter on which all members of parliament will need at some stage to take their responsibilities seriously; and when I say the Minister of Finance in his later interjections yesterday tried so desperately to repair the political damage done by his first and very frank statement, "The public do not care", I think you have an estimate of the extent and the nature of the blunder made by the Minister of Finance and his appreciation of it. It is like those budget blunders with which we are so familiar.
I then continue to quote from the record. .After the hon. member for Ottawa West said, "No, he did not", the Hansard record shows that he did. I continue to quote:


Donald Methuen Fleming: The Minister of Finance said that the public does not care and members on this side of the house besides myself heard him say it right now.


Douglas Charles Abbott: The public does not care about this discussion; it is only interested in the result.


Donald Methuen Fleming: The Minister of Finance is trying
to change it. The fact is that the minister said the public does not care and the parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Veterans Affairs said that the public takes-words to this effect-very little interest in what goes on in the house.


Leslie Alexander Mutch: On a question of privilege, I said
nothing of the sort. What I said was that the hon. member overestimated the attention the public paid to what he said.


An hon. Member:: Hear, hear.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Just compare that statement of the hon. member for Winnipeg South with what he actually said as reported in Hansard. This is his actual statement:
The hon. gentleman is overestimating public interest in what goes on here.


Leslie Alexander Mutch: And you were going on.


Donald Methuen Fleming: It had nothing to do with me. We were discussing the whole question of redistribution, so the hon. member for Winnipeg South is in the company of the Minister of Finance in trying to retrieve his blunder. Then, the record proceeds:


Donald Methuen Fleming: No, no.


Leslie Alexander Mutch: Oh, yes.


Donald Methuen Fleming: That is not what the hon. member said. He said we overestimated the attention paid to what goes on in this house. He did not tie it down to me at all.


Leslie Alexander Mutch: You were doing the talking.


Donald Methuen Fleming: He said we overestimated the
interest of the public.


Leslie Alexander Mutch: Leave it to Hansard.
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We shall leave it to Hansard, because Hansard records the remark as follows:
The hon. gentleman is overestimating public interest in what goes on here.


Leslie Alexander Mutch: And at the moment you were going on.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Then, I continue to quote from the record:


The Chairman:: Order.


Donald Methuen Fleming: In these two significant comments,
you have what it seems to me is a very complete exposure of the attitude of the government in this matter. What could be more plain?
The Minister of Finance takes the attitude that the public does not care.


Douglas Charles Abbott: No, Mr. Chairman. What I said
was that members are more interested in their self-preservation than the public.
You will search Hansard through, and you will find no statement on the part of the Minister of Finance that members are more interested in their self-preservation than the public.


Douglas Charles Abbott: You just read it.


Donald Methuen Fleming: He attempts here to say that is what he said, but Hansard does not contain any such words. Hansard does record, however, these words of the Minister of Finance, "The public do not care".
Now, Mr. Speaker, I come to the final subject that I want-


James Garfield Gardiner: May I ask a question, Mr. Speaker? Who is this man Mr. Fleming who is referred to so often in the record?


Donald Methuen Fleming: Mr. Speaker, he is a native of the same county as the Minister of Agriculture, who voted yesterday here to approve of the political carpentry perpetrated on that county of Huron.
Now, Mr. Speaker, what we have-


Douglas Charles Abbott: One went to Toronto and the other to Saskatchewan.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Yes, and they both ended up here.
The final subject to which I wish to refer in these few brief remarks is the question of the time element. In what I had to say yesterday I urged that the public should be given an opportunity of understanding what is involved in the changes in the constituency boundaries proposed in the schedule to this bill. I said that could be accomplished in various ways. A conference had been proposed, but of course that constructive suggestion came to nought; it fell on deaf ears.
Then, there was another suggestion that this matter should be allowed to stand until a later stage. Bear in mind, Mr. Speaker, we are in the last hurried days of the session. This may be the last day of this session, and there is always a tendency at this stage of

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the session, natural perhaps, that matters should be rushed through. This is much too important a matter, not only for the present but for the future, to receive precipitate treatment.


Douglas Charles Abbott: Hear, hear.


Donald Methuen Fleming: I venture to urge upon the house that nothing will be lost if the sovereign public is permitted to understand fully what is involved in this bill. That desirable purpose can be achieved if the government will permit the bill to stand. It would be very much better, of course, if in the meantime the government would refer this bill, indeed the whole question of redistribution generally, to a redistribution commission.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I have intimated before that I intend to allow no discussion as to whether or not redistribution should be referred to a commission.


Donald Methuen Fleming: I was not proposing to discuss the question of a commission. All I intended to say was that there is time to allow-I say no more than that-there is time between now and the reconvening of this house on November 20 to permit this matter to be reviewed by a commission. There is no argument on the basis of time against that being done. Even if the government does not see fit to use the services of such a body for that purpose-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The hon. member is continuing his argument, and I would ask him not to do so.


Donald Methuen Fleming: -then, at least the government ought to allow this measure to stand until the house reassembles. What is going to be lost by doing that, by giving the public in all parts of the country an opportunity to know what will be the boundaries of the constituencies in which every member of the public will be casting his vote at the next general election? What harm can there be in it? The only reason that there could possibly be for denying that simple and obvious request for justice and fair play would be that the government realizes that this bill contains iniquitous provisions which will have the effect of gerrymandering, as we have said. They want to get this deed done as quickly as possible. You remember, Mr. Speaker, the words from Macbeth:
If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well It were done quickly;
That, I think, is probably the mind of the government at the moment in trying to push this through. I asked my genial friend the Minister of Public Works last night just before adjournment, when he spoke of third reading of this bill:

You are not going to let it stand until November 20?
The minister said, "I do not think we could do that."


Mr. Fournier (Hull):: After listening to you, we have to go ahead now.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Mr. Speaker, that is simply the measure of perversity of the government mind.


Alphonse Fournier: On a question of privilege, Mr. Speaker, if the hon. member thinks I am perverse, he is quite wrong.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Perhaps I should withdraw the imputation that the government has a mind, Mr. Speaker.


Mr. Sinclair:: Just say we are completely bored.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Back of the haste in this matter is undoubtedly the hope of the government that the nefarious deed that they are proposing to perpetrate now will be forgotten between now and the next general election. If the view of the Minister of Finance is correct that the public does not care, it is easy enough for the government to conclude the public will forget. The longer you give the public to forget, so apparently runs government thinking, the less likely they are to recall such a nefarious and iniquitous thing as is being perpetrated in this bill. Mr. Speaker, there can be no argument whatever for pressing through right now in the last days of the session, when the house is under great pressure,-


James Sinclair: Hear, hear; air pressure.


Donald Methuen Fleming: -a measure of this kind which, of all kinds of measure,, ought to have deliberate consideration in this house and throughout the country. The schedule to this bill reached this house in printed form only on Monday of this week, June 30, after indeed many members had gone home thinking that the session was practically ended. Surely this is no way for the House of Commons to discharge its supreme responsibility to the public. If the government will not accede to a simple and reasonable request that this bill be allowed to stand until the house reconvenes on November 20, then in the interests of justice and in deference to our duty to the public who are supreme, there is nothing that can be done now except to support the motion that this bill be given the six months' hoist.


Some hon. Members:: Question.


George James McIlraith: Mr. Speaker, believing that the public are supreme, and lest they may be misled by some of the things they may read in Hansard

of this morning, I thought I should put one or two facts on record. I can do so quickly.


An hon. Member:: Hurry up!


George James McIlraith: The request is now being made by the official opposition to have me hurry up, their own members having taken none of the time this morning.


Mr. Marlin:: The old steamroller tactics.


George James McIlraith: I should like to explain
the question that has concerned the hon. member for Eglinton (Mr. Fleming), namely as to why government members voted against his stupid amendment of yesterday; and may I say that he is authority for the correct usage of the word "stupid". Otherwise, I would not have used it.


Donald Methuen Fleming: On the contrary. The Minister of Citizenship and Immigration (Mr. Harris) is the source of the observation that it is quite parliamentary to refer to remarks as being stupid.


Walter Edward Harris: Oh, no.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Mr. Speaker, I think you will find that it was the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration who offered that observation in the house.


Some hon. Members:: Sit down.


Donald Methuen Fleming: In deference to the high opinion I have of him and his views, I adopted his suggestion.


George James McIlraith: Mr. Speaker, I do not need to quote it to the hon. member, but a ruling on this question was given the other day and it was made clear that it was a proper adjective to use in reference to subject matter but not to persons. I was careful to use it in that way.


Mr. Speaker:: May I suggest that the word should be used as seldom as possible. Might I also express the hope that I will not hear it again.


George James McIlraith: Since the hon. member for Eglinton is a little bit sensitive on the subject I will ask permission to withdraw the word "stupid" as applied to his amendment.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, no.


George James McIlraith: I will use no adjectives
at all.


An hon. Member:: You said it.


George James McIlraith: I shall merely let the facts speak for themselves. If I may, I should like to draw to the attention of the house the adjectives used by the hon. member for Eglinton. He spoke about the constituency of Hastings-Frontenac as a veritable empire, as a huge constituency, and he used many other adjectives.
Redistribution


Mr. Hodgson:: Tell us about Renfrew South.


Mr. Speaker:: Order.


George James McIlraith: The hon. member for
Victoria is a little bit agitated. May I say that it was interesting to note his agitation or lack of it when his own members were taking up so much time to say so little. The point I want to make is quite simple. As to the constituency of Hastings-Frontenac which was referred to as a veritable empire, I ought to tell the house that it is the tenth in size of all the constituencies in Ontario.


Donald Methuen Fleming: We were talking about southern Ontario.


George James McIlraith: There are nine larger constituencies in Ontario; and those nine larger constituencies, with one exception, all have more population than has Hastings-Frontenac, and they are all represented in this House of Commons by Liberal members of parliament.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Will the hon. member permit a question?


George James McIlraith: Certainly.


Donald Methuen Fleming: How does the proposed riding of Hastings-Frontenac rank in size with all the ridings in what we broadly call southern Ontario as the bill stands?


George James McIlraith: I will develop that point if the hon. member wants me to do so. I had hoped not to develop many of the members' questions or arguments. There are two constituencies about the same size, namely, Renfrew North, and Victoria represented by the hon. member who was interjecting earlier. Parry Sound is larger.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Hastings-Frontenac is the largest.


George James McIlraith: I have statistics showing the precise number of square miles in all these cases if the hon. member wants that information.


Some hon. Members:: Dispense.


George James McIlraith: I take it that it is the wish of the house that I should not go into those particulars. Hastings-Frontenac is the tenth in size. Eight of the nine constituencies that are larger in size have more population. All of the nine that are larger in size are represented by Liberal members.


Donald Methuen Fleming: What about South Renfrew?


George James McIlraith: We proposed to put part of the constituency of Hastings in South Renfrew, and the opposition members opposed that proposal in committee.


Donald Methuen Fleming: May I ask the hon. gentleman if he will give the population of South Renfrew after the change has been made and

Redistribution
compare it with the population in the riding of Hastings-Frontenac?


Alphonse Fournier: Mr. Speaker, we are not in committee.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Will he give comparisons with respect to the areas?


Some hon. Members:: Question.


Mr. Speaker:: Is the house ready for the question?


Some hon. Members:: Question.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Is my question not going to be answered?


Mr. Speaker:: Those in favour of the amendment will say "yea".


Some hon. Members:: Yea.


Mr. Speaker:: Those opposed will say "nay".


Some hon. Members:: Nay.


Mr. Speaker:: In my opinion the nays have it.
And more than five members having risen:


Mr. Speaker:: Call in the members.


Mr. Caiherwood:: Mr. Speaker, I was paired with the hon. member for Kent, Ont. (Mr. Huffman). Had I voted I would have voted for the amendment.


Mr. Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the house to adopt the motion for third reading of the bill?
Argue
Bryce
Cardiff
Casselman
Charlton
Churchill
Coldwell
Courtemanche
Diefenbaker
Drew
Fairclough, Mrs. Fraser Fleming Fulton
Graydon
Green
Hees
Hodgson
Lennard
Macdonnell (Greenwood)
MacLean (Queens)
McGregor
McLure
Nowlan
Robichaud
Spence
White (Middlesex East) -27.


George Alexander Drew: On division.
Motion agreed to on division and bill read the third time.


Mr. Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the house that this bill be passed and that the title be as on the order paper?


Donald Methuen Fleming: On division.
Bill passed on division.
++NAYS
Messrs:
Abbott
Anderson
Applewhaite
Ashbourne
Balcom
Bater
Beaudoin
Black (Chateauguay-Huntingdon-Laprairie) Blackmore Blanchette Blue Boivin Boucher Bradley Brisson
Brown (Essex West) Cameron Campney Cavers w Claxton
Cleaver
Cloutier
Corry
Cote (St. Jean-Iberville-Napierville)
Cote (Verdun-La Salle)
Darroch
Denis
Deslieres
Dewar
Dickey
Dumas
Eyre
Fair
Fontaine Fournier (Hull)
Fournier (Maisonneuve-Rosemont)
Fulford
Gardiner
Gillis



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Mr.   Si. Laureni@: Mr. Speaker, may I suggest that when you leave the chair hon. members might wish to consider coming back at half past two instead of three o'clock.


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.

The house in committee of supply, Mr. Beaudoin in the chair.


Louis-René Beaudoin: I would remind hon. members that the committee will resume its business at 2.30 p.m.
At one o'clock the committee took recess.

The committee resumed at 2.30 p.m.
DEPARTMENT OF RESOURCES AND DEVELOPMENT General-
420. Emergency shelter administration, $100,000.


Louis-René Beaudoin: We will first take up items 420 and 421, which are to be found at page 56 of the book of estimates, and also item 557 which is to be found at page 74. Hon. members will recall that these three items were referred earlier to the standing committee on banking and commerce and are now brought back before the committee of supply.


Donald Methuen Fleming: I think it is a regret that many members of the house will share that the first debate in this present session on the subject of housing should be reached only on what may be the last day of the session. When the minister's estimates were called some weeks ago, in view of the fact that the banking and commerce committee was sitting under an order of the house reviewing the annual report of Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation it was agreed that these three items from the estimates should be added to the reference to the committee on banking and commerce. While that committee submitted its report to the house several weeks ago, this is the first time that the estimates of the minister have been called again.
I submit that a subject as important as housing is for all sections of this country is entitled to more time and attention in the house than has been given to it at the present session. At the same time I wish to commend the reference this year of the annual report of Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation to the banking and commerce committee. I believe this is the first time since Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation was established that any report from that important organization has been referred to a committee of the house for study and review. Indeed, I believe this is the first occasion in the lifetime of the last two parliaments when any committee of the house has studied housing in any of its aspects.
In my view the banking and commerce committee conducted a very thorough review of the matters referred to it within the scope of the reference to the committee. The committee held many meetings, had extended discussions and an abundance of evidence from Mr. David Mansur, the very able president of Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation. I am satisfied that within its terms of reference the committee has done a very thorough piece of work. I had occasion more than once to urge that the
Supply-Resources and Development committee should have broader terms of reference. The reference under the order of the house confined the committee to the annual report of the corporation, and it was the ruling of the chairman, and I believe the view of the majority of the members of the committee, that the committee was precluded from hearing other organizations interested in the subject of housing. The result was that we had no other witnesses before the committee than Mr. Mansur and on one occasion the minister himself.
The only other submissions that reached the committee were letters received from three organizations which have a very important stake in housing, namely, the National Housebuilders Association Incorporated, which wrote a letter dated June 4 to the chairman of the committee, the Canadian Construction Association, which wrote a short letter dated June 4 to the chairman of the committee, and the Dominion Mortgage and Investment Association which wrote a letter dated June 11 to the chairman of the committee. There were some interesting matters mentioned in those letters but I am afraid no one can say that any extended consideration could be given to them under the circumstances, particularly when representatives from those important organizations were not called before the committee.
I do not say that these three organizations are the only ones which could have had interesting and valuable views to submit to the committee. Indeed, there are many organizations which, both from the point of view of the practical problems of construction and also from the point of view of the place of housing in any public policy, would have had much to contribute in assisting the committee. However, so far as the report of Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation is concerned it undoubtedly had a thorough review at the hands of the committee.
Opinions are divided, as we found in taking the evidence of Mr. Mansur, as to the extent of the housing problem in Canada today. The dominion bureau of statistics in its daily bulletin of June 4, in summarizing some interesting findings with reference to housing data from the 1951 census, opens its summary with this sentence:
In June last year Canada's ten provinces had a total of 3,587,364 dwellings, of which 3,423,010 were occupied and the balance either under construction or unoccupied for various reasons . . .
Then follows in summarized form a review of the statistics province by province garnered in the course of the census. I think it is not unfair to say that there was some reluctance on the part of Mr. Mansur to put any exact figure on the shortage of housing in Canada today. He did take issue quite firmly
4176	HOUSE OF
Supply-Resources and Development with the estimate put on that shortage in 1944 in the report of the Curtis royal commission on housing. We were left at the conclusion of the hearings without any very definite estimate. Indeed, there are factors in the situation as portrayed by Mr. Mansur which from his point of view make it very difficult to put an estimate on the shortage of housing in Canada today.
However, Mr. Mansur did submit to the committee some interesting figures in regard to the development of housing needs in the years commencing with 1946, and the construction of houses to meet that need. In the year 1946 he estimated the net family formations at 107,500 and the number of new housing units at 67,194. In other words, he estimated in the year 1946 that we fell behind to the extent of 40,306 units. He estimated that in the year 1947 the net family formations in Canada were 75,400 and new housing units completed were 79,231. In other words, he estimated in the year 1947 that we did construct 3,831 houses in excess of the net family formations in that year. He estimated that in the year 1948 net family formations were at 83,000 and new housing units completed were 81,243, or a deficit of 1,757. For the year 1949 he estimated net family formations at 77,100 and new housing units completed were 91,655, or a surplus in that year over net family formations of 14,555 units. For the year 1950 he estimated net family formations at 73,500 and new housing units completed were 91,754 or a surplus of 18,254. In 1951 net family formations were 96,500, a very substantial increase, the largest in the country's history, I believe, with the exception of 1946. New housing units completed in 1951 were 84,810 or a deficit in the year 1951 of 11,690 units.
For the six-year period the totals estimated by Mr. Mansur are these: Net family formations, 513,000; new housing units completed 495,887 or a deficit in the six-year period of 17,113 units.
I pause to observe there, Mr. Chairman, that in this six-year period when unquestionably housing construction rose to the highest rate in the country's history we still fell behind the net family formations in Canada to the extent of 17,113 units according to this estimate. I stress, Mr. Chairman, that this is only an estimate but it can be taken I think as probably the closest estimate that is available in Canada for this period.
Now, sir, this means that over this six-year period we have not quite met the needs arising out of current family formations in Canada. From that one may deduce the fact


that our housing position or the housing deficit in Canada at December 31, 1951, was slightly more than it was at December 31, 1945. We have not been given any firm figure, as I have indicated, of the housing deficit in Canada at December 31, 1945. When I raised the matter in committee and asked about the report on housing in Canada by the Curtis royal commission in 1944, Mr. Mansur disagreed with it and said that he was not prepared to accept the estimate put on the deficit by the Curtis royal commission. However, there is nothing in these figures and other available figures, Mr. Chairman, to indicate that housing is not still a very serious problem in Canada and the deficit in housing is substantial.
In saying that, I am taking account of the points raised by Mr. Mansur when he said that in his view, owing to certain conditions about which I shall say more shortly, other factors have entered into the effective demand for housing. To other economic factors he attributes the slackening of effective demand in certain quarters for housing-that is to say on the part of people who need and want housing but who under present conditions by reason of factors of cost and municipal taxes are not able to pay what is required to provide themselves with housing.
The next point I wish to dwell on for a moment is the extent of the financial stake which the country has already acquired in housing. Bear in mind, Mr. Chairman, that our housing legislation goes back to the year 1935 when the first Dominion Housing Act was enacted. You will remember that in the year 1936 that act, brought in by the Bennett government, was repealed and was replaced by a substitute act, and in 1944 parliament enacted the present act, the National Housing Act. Under the National Housing Act financial provision has been made by parliament in various respects to assist construction of housing in Canada. I am not going to weary the committee unduly with certain of these figures, but it seems to me, Mr. Chairman, that some reference should be made to them because they are impressive in relation to the financial stake which the country already has in housing. When I say "the country" I mean the federal government.
Just to choose a few figures on the five types of financial assistance provided by the National Housing Act I will give the following. Under section 7, on account of homeowner loans, the total appropriation by parliament to date aggregates $300 million against which commitments exceed $232 million. Under section 12, slum clearance,

parliament has appropriated $20 million against which only $1,150,000 has yet been committed. Under section 13 on account of loans for rental housing, parliament has appropriated $150 million against which approximately $99 million has been committed. Under section 16, parliament has appropriated for experimental plumbing and heating equipment, $5 million against which nothing has been committed. Under section 27A parliament has appropriated $5 million for housing research and community planning, against which $1,700,000 in round figures has to date been committed. In total, Mr. Chairman, against an aggregate parliamentary appropriation of $480 million, the commitments to date total in round figures $333 million.
There has been within the past year and a half a startling decline in construction. It is evidenced not only in the completions but it is very strongly evidenced in starts. We of the official opposition levelled strong criticism against the government for the abandonment without any authority from parliament early in February 1951 of the provision made by parliament at the fall session of 1949 for the equivalent of second mortgage loans in addition to the loans provided under part I of the National Housing Act-what was commonly called the additional one-sixth loans. We have said that it is no mere coincidence that the evidence of decline in housing starts which occurred then coincided with this declaration of a new policy on the part of the government.
Now, there are many figures available, Mr. Chairman, exceedingly valuable in the information they contain, but I must pass on as swiftly as I can. I mention in passing that that situation continued into the spring of 1951 when housing starts compared with the year 1950 particularly showed a decline; and I will give you just the total percentage figures, Mr. Chairman, without worrying about the decimal figures: April 4 per cent; May 19 per cent; June 26 per cent; July 41 per cent; August 37 per cent; September 51 per cent; October 51 per cent; November 46 per cent; December 54 per cent. You see how startling are those figures of the reduction in the number of housing starts in the last months of 1951 as compared with the corresponding months of 1950.
Now, that decline continued into the year 1952. I am going to give you a comparison with 1951, but a comparison with the figures for 1950 would show a very much greater decline percentagewise. January 1952 showed a decline of 42 per cent in housing starts as compared with January 1951. February
Supply-Resources and Development declined 29 per cent. Then, in March what might appear at first blush to be a reversal of the trend appeared and housing starts increased 4-6 per cent as compared with March, 1951. April, 1952, increased 2 per cent as compared with April, 1951. However, Mr. Mansur cautioned us against attaching too much importance as yet to what appeared to be a slight reversal of the trend in March and April, because he said there were certain additional factors which would account for at least a substantial portion of the increase.
Since the committee has risen, one learns with regret, from the daily bulletin of the dominion bureau of statistics of June 27, that the May figures for starts show a sharp decline as compared with the month of May, 1951. The first paragraph of the report in the bulletin reads:
Starts on the construction of new dwelling units showed a further sharp reduction in May as compared with the corresponding month last year, while completions were down only slightly. Starts totalled 7,121 units as compared with 11,699 a year earlier, and the completions numbered 5,325 units, compared with 5,688.
Then it proceeds:
During the first five months of this year starts fell in number to 14,395 from 17,252 in the corresponding period of 1951, and completions declined to 18,391 units from 25,209. The number in various stages of construction at the end of May was down to 38,814 units from 51,090 a year earlier.
There were declines in starts in all regions in May as compared with the corresponding month last year.
In my submission, Mr. Chairman, that is a report that may well cause concern, if not indeed alarm; that is a very startling rate of decline. I remind you, sir, that this decline is compared with the corresponding period in 1951 when a heavy decline had already set in as compared with the year 1950. If we compared these 1952 figures with the year 1950, we would see a most startling reduction, not only in starts but in the completion of houses in Canada. While we have no final figures today of the estimated shortage of housing, nevertheless it seems to me there is sufficient in these figures showing the decline in housing construction to emphasize beyond question that housing is still a very serious problem in Canada.
There is no longer a shortage of building materials. It is agreeable indeed, Mr. Chairman, to be assured by Mr. Mansur that there is today a plentiful supply of building materials of all kinds.
Housing costs are still a very difficult factor to contend with. It is estimated by Mr. Mansur that housing costs in 1952 are, and will continue to be, 5 per cent higher than in 1951.
4178	HOUSE OF
Supply-Resources and Development
In reference to something I just mentioned in passing a little earlier, I wish to say that we of the official opposition still contend, and the figures to which I have just referred abundantly corroborate and support our position, that the government acted unwisely and certainly without any parliamentary authority in February of 1951 in abandoning the provision made by parliament by way of the one-sixth additional loan. You can see the results, Mr. Chairman, in the figures I have given. In fairness, I wish to make it clear that I do not say that one factor alone accounted for the decline in construction that has occurred since. I do not do that at all. Nevertheless, it is a substantial factor. Mr. Mansur himself was prepared to agree it was a factor, although not prepared to commit himself as to the extent to which it, as a factor, is reflected in the figures to which I have made reference.
There are many builders in this country who would tell you, and they are people who are close to this problem, that the elimination without warning of that one-sixth additional loan provided under section 4 of the housing act did deal a very serious blow to all housing construction in the spring of 1951. The minister says we were faced, as the government thought, with a shortage of materials, and they were taking this step with a view to conserving materials as well as to holding back house construction at a time when the government thought it might have inflationary effects. The best that can be said for the government's calculation on that occasion is that it was a miscalculation. Houses that would have been built in 1951 were not built because the government, without any authority from parliament, chose to make a dead letter of the section of this act which parliament enacted seriously and hopefully in the fall session of 1949. It is admitted, indeed it could not be denied, that houses that are being built in 1952 which might have been built in 1951 are costing more today because of that postponement for a year.
The government did come along some time later, after they had realized the error they had made in February 1951, and they did make provision for increasing the percentage of loans under part I of the housing act to 80 per cent. They went a little further than that in the case of housing units for defence construction workers. There were conditions attached to the provisions for defence construction workers which, I think it is fair to say, substantially neutralized or at least subtracted from the help that might have been expected from the changes that were made late in 1951.


I must pass quickly to a subject which is becoming of increasing importance and increasing difficulty in connection with housing. It is the problem of municipal taxation. The areas of the most acute housing shortage today are in the larger municipalities where serviced land is becoming increasingly scarce, and in the suburbs of great metropolitan areas like Toronto the shortage of serviced land is exceedingly acute. It has become so acute that municipal governments in suburban municipalities have become so alarmed at the rising cost of municipal government-particularly the cost of servicing land for housing-that, in many cases, they are requiring the builder himself to provide the servicing of the land, at his own cost and entire present outlay before they will even grant him a building permit. That fact has created a serious situation.
Educational facilities become increasingly costly. Mr. Mansur has given what he regards as a conservative average estimate that it costs $25,000 to provide each new room in new schools in these areas where housing is being rapidly expanded and where the demand for housing is most acute today. The results are being felt more and more keenly every day as more municipalities, instead of welcoming and assisting housing, are in selfpreservation putting these difficulties in the way of builders by insisting that the builders provide the services for the land; and those services, Mr. Chairman, as you well know, are becoming more costly every day. Therefore the housing problem in Canada cannot be grappled with effectively apart from some realistic approach to the problem of an inadequate municipal tax base. More provision must be made for municipal revenue if municipalities are to be expected to carry the responsibility and the load of providing municipal services, social services and educational services which the law requires them to provide today. If we want to help the housing problem in Canada, we cannot have a better slogan than this: Help the municipal governments!
Just in conclusion may I mention the subject of development schemes under section 35. This is a matter of great concern particularly in the larger urban areas where we have a great shortage of housing today and where there are many people who are unable to pay an economic rent. I should say that while section 35 had general support in the house, and was welcomed in all parts of the house, when enacted in the fall of 1949, perhaps the inherent difficulty in connection with the section is that it requires joint action at three levels of government, namely, federal, provincial and municipal. On that

account, Mr. Chairman, almost inevitably the use of section 35 has been slow.
There are now evidences that different provinces are interesting themselves and that they are prepared, in partnership with the federal government, to put section 35 actively to work. In my own province of Ontario the government has shown a lively interest in this subject and has recently made an announcement of government policy. Whereas previously the standard proportion of distribution of costs among the federal, provincial and municipal governments was 75 per cent federal, 17J per cent provincial and 7J per cent municipal, it has been announced that the municipal government will assume the municipal share and bear the full 25 per cent where housing provided under these development schemes is used to accommodate persons who cannot pay an economic rent. Where that accommodation is made available to persons who are well able to pay an economic rent the provincial government has said-and I think rightly so-that the municipality should be expected to bear its 7J per cent share. Mr. Chairman, one may look hopefully to the future for more active use being made of the provisions of section 35.
When this section 35 was introduced in the house in the fall session of 1949, some of us had some difficulty because, in the light of a statement then made by the Minister of Resources and Development, we felt that it was apparently not the intention of the government to put it to use in connection with redevelopment schemes; that is to say, not schemes where virgin land is taken for construction and housing schemes but cases where an existing built-up area-presumably one where slum conditions prevail or where substandard housing exists-should be acquired, cleared and then made available for the construction of new housing.
In its inquiry the committee encountered that problem and has made recommendations which the minister assured us have his support; they are to be found in the report. I do not delay now to read them. However, I express the hope that at the earliest opportunity in the next session the government will introduce to the National Housing Act amendments to give effect to those useful recommendations.
One must express regret that the situation was miscalculated by the government a year ago last February when the one-sixth additional loan was withdrawn, and that it was further miscalculated at about the same time when some important and much-needed government housing projects were stopped. I am thinking particularly of the veterans housing project at the Fraserview site
3. 1952	4179
Supply-Resources and Development in Vancouver. On that site it had been planned that 1,100 houses for veterans should be constructed but construction was stopped early in 1951. Six hundred houses were then completed and the other 500 were not proceeded with. At the end of the year, after ten valuable months had been lost, construction was resumed. The result has been not only the loss of ten valuable months but an increase in the cost of the same 500 houses which would have been carried to completion if the government had not intervened and stopped the work. The additional cost is $400,000. It seems to me that that is a heavy price to pay for a government error and miscalculation.
This problem is still one of serious proportions. While we have had a useful and comprehensive review in the committee, I think we can all again express our concern that there is today a serious shortage of housing in Canada and that there are evident conditions today which make it apparent that the need is not likely to be met unless help is given to the municipalities and a new drive is put behind our housing effort in Canada.


Major James William Coldwell: Mr. Chairman, I shall say only a few words because the hon. member for Eglinton has covered the matter thoroughly, it seems to me, and has brought to the attention of the committee some weaknesses that have come to light in connection with our housing plans. He put on the record figures which indicated that we had fallen behind in providing homes for family units already formed or in the process of being formed. There is also, of course, the other matter which makes this an important consideration, namely that houses become obsolete as time passes, and housing becomes poor in various areas of our cities and, indeed, in our rural communities. In the figures which he presented to us, and which were given officially before the committee, no consideration was given to obsolescence and to the necessity for slum clearance and the replacement of homes both in the cities and, may I add, in many of our rural areas. I say that because while we find bad housing conditions in our towns and cities, we often find very deplorable housing conditions in the rural areas of this country. I agree with the hon. member when he says it is becoming difficult for municipalities to provide the services that are necessary. 1 have in mind schools, as well as sanitary arrangements including the sewers, water supply and the like.
I know that even in some of the newer subdivisions in this city of Ottawa, while the city is providing water, no provision has been made for sewage disposal, with the
4180	HOUSE OF
Supply-Resources and Development result that the costs of individual home builders are greatly enhanced because septic tanks have to be installed-equipment which I would hope in a few years would no longer be necessary. There will be therefore a dead loss both to the persons who instal the septic tanks and to the economy in general.
Having said that, I wish to add this, that one of the deficiencies in connection with Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation, and its operations, is the lack of adequate inspection of houses under construction. I know that that is the obligation of the lending institutions, but the lending institutions are providing very inadequate inspection.
Last year I had the opportunity of watching a home in this city in process of construction. Had the young couple who were to inhabit that home not watched the house every day, the results would have been disastrous. Some of the young people in that neighbourhood did not watch the building of their houses, with the result that there was a good deal of scamping and poor workmanship, and specified materials were not included in those homes for which they were paying, I think, excessive prices.
When young people have to pay $17,000 or $18,000 for a home that could have been built 25 years ago for $8,000, or $9,000-


Mr. Fraser:: No, $6,000.


Major James William Coldwell: -they are entitled to expect at least that the specifications will be carried out. Let me say from personal observation that specifications are not always carried out. In one case I have in mind the people who entered into a .contract to buy the house, and who had made the down payment, found it difficult even to find on the job the plans from which the contractor was working. It was only after insisting, day after day, that the plans be produced, and that certain things specified in the plans be done, that they had any success. As a matter of fact things were done that were not in the plans and, as a result, had to be undone, upon the insistence of those who were paying for the home. Drainage was bad and grading of the lots delayed unduly and so on.
I say when parliament is providing a plan of this description every effort should be ' made to see that proper inspections are made.
Young people cannot go to the additional expense of hiring architects to look after the building of these expensive homes. I use the term "expensive" in the relative sense, of course. They cannot do that; and the result is that in some instances contractors are getting away with nothing short of murder. I know that in the neighbourhood I have in mind at the moment those young


people who did not watch the building of their homes had all sorts of trouble with the construction and the workmanship and failure to fulfil the contracts as they were intended to be fulfilled. I say all these contractors should be carefully supervised. I would even go to the extent of saying that some of them should not be permitted to take contracts at all for the building of homes, because certainly they have been victimizing large numbers of young couples who have found it necessary to secure homes under very difficult conditions.
That situation exists right in this city, and in other cities as well, as I happen to know. I say the time has come when the department should take a hand in the matter of inspection and supervision. Where a coh-tractor has a poor record, as some of them have, the lending institutions should be told that Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation will not stand behind contracts made by contractors of that kind.
Passing across Canada I have been told that this sort of thing has been happening in other places as well. I have been speaking from personal knowledge and personal observations of about a year ago when I have referred to what has taken place in Ottawa. I do not want to name any contractor, or put any name on the record of Hansard; but on more than one occasion last autumn I was tempted to do so while I watched the building of these homes, and saw what was being done.
I rise simply to emphasize that fact. I know hon. members do not wish to listen to a long speech at this time, nor do I wish to repeat everything that has been said by the hon. member for Eglinton. He said it well, and made a good summary of the evidence placed before the committee. I am not going to indulge in reiteration. But I did wish to drive home that one point, that we must have better supervision and inspection.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: I should like to support the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar in what he has said about inspection, because I have had more than a dozen complaints in this connection brought to my attention. I believe that in respect of all these loans Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation should have an inspector on the job, and he should be there not just once a month or once every two weeks, but often enough to check on all the details and to see that all the specifications are carried out. Because, as the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar has said, in many cases these young people have not the opportunity or the knowledge to check on the specifications and blueprints.

I know of cases where grading called for in the specifications was not done. These young persons, after they move into their homes, try to have this done. Perhaps after two or three years they have to let it drop because the lending companies and the trades will not do it. Then, in many cases the plumbing in these homes is not done according to municipal specifications. These are things inspectors from Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation could check.


Mr. Blackmore:: Mr. Chairman, while the committee was considering the excellent report of Central Housing and Mortgage Corporation I gained the impression that altogether too much stress is being placed upon making the loans safe for the lending companies, and altogether too little on the importance of providing homes for people at prices they can afford.
The farther we go in this era of high living costs, the more I become alarmed when I contemplate what is going to happen to this country if something is not done to remedy the housing situation. People who have to rent houses in ordinary communities are faced with costs utterly beyond their ability to pay out of the incomes they are able to obtain. People who attempt to build are confronted with costs which mean in the last analysis, for I would imagine 75 or 80 per cent of them, that after struggling for a number of years to try to pay for their homes they finally have to give them up. This means that in the result the lending institution, which in the last analysis is the state, appropriates the home.
That condition is quite unsound. I do not propose to multiply words at this time, but I would remind the minister and the government that it is physically possible in Canada to render available to every Canadian a home at a price he can afford to pay. If it is not financially possible then it is high time that something was done about the financial setup of this country. It is not financially possible today for the vast majority of Canadians to acquire a home. I think I shall leave it there.


Mrs. Fairclough:: Mr. Chairman, I do not think I can let these items pass without a few comments upon the subject of housing in which the minister knows I am keenly interested. The hon. member for Eglinton has placed on the record statistics which show a deficit of 17,113 units in a specified time. I should like to make some comments with regard to the conditions which undoubtedly were not considered at the time those statistics were compiled. I refer to the units which are razed for various purposes, some because 55704-264J
3. 1952	4181
Supply-Resources and Development they are obsolete and others because they must be removed in order to provide for industrial growth. This is a problem which confronts industrial cities like Hamilton.
Of course, industry must grow, and in the main it must grow in the district where it is established. If in order to promote the growth of industry and to provide jobs for more workmen it is necessary to remove residential structures, then of course one cannot stand in the way of progress. But these only add to the figures which have been placed on the record by the hon. member for Eglinton.
I do not think there is any argument that one of the most stabilizing factors in our national economy is home ownership by the individual. That is a statement which has been made time and time again by responsible authorities, and I am sure we are all in complete agreement with it. If under our economy we prevent the ordinary workman from purchasing a home, then we work against not only the economy of our nation but the morale of our workers upon whom we must depend for our growth.
In that regard I think the statement made by the hon. member for Eglinton, but which was not elaborated, bears some examination. The hon. member made reference to municipal taxation. A great part of the heavy cost of new homes is due to the cost of servicing land which is carved out of areas formerly suburban or rural in character. When either by annexation or by agreement with adjoining municipalities a particular municipality seeks to make serviced land out of what has been unserviced land it immediately runs into extremely heavy costs. In this connection I can think of no better example than a project under way on the mountain in Hamilton where a trunk sewer costing several million dollars is being installed, a large proportion of the cost being borne by the taxpayers of Hamilton in order to provide services for land which within the past few years has been annexed to the city, some of it this year. This particular land could not be serviced in any form until the trunk sewer was put through.
In addition to the servicing cost which finds its way into the taxes paid by the home owner who benefits, a proportion of this cost must also be borne by the whole municipality. The result is that there is placed upon the real estate of the city the burden of paying part of the cost of providing services to new areas which are annexed to rapidly growing municipalities.
Until that situation can be rectified there is little hope of solving the housing situation in Canada. To me this constitutes the greatest deterrent to home ownership in this country
4182	HOUSE OF
Supply-Resources and Development This problem can be solved only by following the suggestions which have been made repeatedly in this house by various members of the opposition that a dominion-provincial conference be called to discuss the general reallocation of tax revenues and to provide for returning to the municipalities at least some of the tax revenues which are charged directly against them.
In my opinion it is not equitable that a municipality should have to pay a tax upon the gasoline used in its vehicles operating within its own boundaries or that it should have to pay a sales tax on equipment and other things which it purchases for its own use and then in return receive nothing whatever from the federal government in the way of taxes on the premises or real estate within that municipality occupied by the government. It just does not add up.
A conference of the type I have mentioned could go into all these matters. I understand that some of these were discussed this week by Mr. D. C. Corbett at the meeting of the Canadian federation of municipalities which is being held in the west. All these factors contribute to the situation which prevents the ordinary workingman or wage earner from providing his family with a home.
In cities like Hamilton and many other places in which there has been a great influx of population within the last ten years you find families living in one or two rooms, in shared accommodation, under conditions which are a disgrace to people who want to raise their children to observe the religious and moral laws which have been handed down in this country from generation to generation. The conditions under which many of these people live practically prohibit the bringing up of children who will be healthy in mind as well as in body.
I strongly urge the minister to lend his support in convincing the cabinet to call a dominion-provincial conference which will deal with these aspects of this important problem so that people in our municipalities may be able once more to build their own homes and provide roofs over the heads of their children.


Mr. Gillis:: Mr. Chairman, I know the minister wants to catch a plane at four o'clock and I am not going to start a debate at this time on the question of housing. I think the hon. member for Eglinton did a good job this afternoon in putting on the record the information on this subject which he had gathered in the banking and commerce committee. I think that information will provide a good basis for a real discussion


of this matter at the next session. I never had any illusions about the National Housing Act providing homes for the average salary and wage earner in this country because the economic unit fixed by the act when it was enacted ruled out anyone earning less than $8,000 or $9,000 a year. I never had any illusions about that, and I am very glad it is beginning to get through to others in the house that the Sun Life Assurance Company and other institutions of that kind are not going to provide housing for the average income recipient in this country.
I want to say to the minister that there is one problem about which I wrote to him and spoke to him, and I am wondering if any thought has been given to it in the interim. I refer to the problem of those who built homes between 1947 and 1950. They applied for loans covering their homes based on the prevailing prices of lumber and materials at the time, but between the time of securing the loan and completing the building the inflation in the price of building materials shoved up the price of the housing unit by some $2,000 to $2,500. I am thinking of the type of case I brought to the attention of the minister, that of people with an income of about $50 a week who figured out their budget and could make their mortgage payments on the basis of the amount of the original loan. However, in completing their home they found that because of inflated prices they were in debt for a couple of thousand dollars to a lumber dealer. In the cases of which I have knowledge the lumber dealers are pressing for the payment of the additional money.
The people affected thought they could secure a supplementary loan to make up the difference through Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation and the insurance companies, but as indicated by the hon. member for Eglinton that policy has been changed. These people are told to go to some other financial institution and take a second mortgage but that is impossible to that income group because it means adding about $50 a month to their mortgage cost and they are not able to handle it. There is a problem there. There may not be so many involved, but there are extenuating circumstances in the case of people in the lower income groups who tried to build homes. I should like to know whether the minister has got in touch with the insurance companies. These people are not averse to having an additional $2,000 added to the mortgage they already have with an insurance company but they do not want to have to go elsewhere and have to

finance under new rates and all that kind of tiling. Has the minister given that matter sympathetic consideration, and can that type of case expect some relief within a reasonable time?


Mr. Hosking:: The problem of housing is one which I am sure gives the minister a great deal of concern. I do not believe there is any greater handicap so far as the development of the country is concerned than the situation which has arisen in municipalities on account of high taxes and the shortage of housing. It is a well known fact that the most efficient form of government we have is that of the local municipality. I feel the minister should give every consideration to the municipalities in order to see that they do not lose their autonomy. Great care should be taken to see that any form of help which may be devised by a dominion-provincial conference should not be in the form of grants donated to the municipalities. It is a very bad thing for municipalities to lose control of their sources of revenue. If we are going to have efficient government at the lower levels the municipalities must be responsible for their sources of revenue and should not be assisted by way of grants. They should be assisted by giving them a direct source of taxation. That must be given to them at some time in the near future as the result of a conference between the provinces and the dominion.
When the question of housing is being discussed between the provinces and the dominion I ask the minister to use his influence to see that this topic is thoroughly discussed and that some satisfactory arrangement is made whereby municipalities will not be under the thumb of the municipal boards of the provincial governments. If the city and county councils are under the thumb of the government which makes the grant, they have to spend the money granted and the money raised by their own taxes as they are directed by that government. I think all members will agree that this is not a form of taxation that was envisaged when the British North America Act was first devised. This practice is a derivation of one malpractice after another as a result of which the municipalities, on which this country is absolutely dependent, are under the thumb of the municipal board which is not responsible to the city or county. When the minister is dealing with the problem of housing, in which the municipalities and the provincial governments are so much involved, I would ask him to point out this matter to the provincial governments so that with the help of the dominion government there may be some readjustment made
3, 1352	4183
Supply-Resources and Development so far as remedying this abuse which has developed over the years.


Mr. Fulford:: There is one matter I
should like to bring to the attention of the minister. I refer to the almost insurmountable obstacle facing the smaller municipalities with respect to new housing development. I have special reference to my own town of Brockville. Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation contemplated a development there for which they have the property. If they had proceeded with their plans it would have meant that about $700,000 would have been spent. Unfortunately the section of land involved is in the township and will have to be included within the town limits. That means the installation of public services such as sewers, water mains and hydro lines. The town authorities secured an engineer's report on the cost of installing these facilities, and it was found that they would cost more than the development contemplated by Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation. I appeal to the minister to devise some method whereby municipalities can be assisted when they find it necessary to expand beyond their own boundaries in order to proceed with housing development. In the particular case about which I am speaking I know that the Brockville town council had no other alternative than to turn down the offer of Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation. We are so desperately in need of houses there that I just do not know what the immediate future holds for the town. We have to have the houses, services must be supplied, and at the present time the municipality just cannot afford it.


Mr. Hees:: Mr. Chairman, when the government abolished the one-sixth mortgage loan on February 5 of last year, the Minister of Resources and Development advised the house that the government was taking this step in order to conserve building materials which were needed for the defence program.
The situation today was described by Mr. Mansur, president of Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation, when he spoke before the banking and commerce committee on May 6 last, and I should like to quote his words as recorded at page 29 of the proceedings of the committee. He said:
Early in 1951 there were some limitations upon new residential starts because of shortages of certain types of building materials. This difficulty no longer exists, and I do not believe that, except in very isolated instances, will the lack of building materials play any part in limiting the amount of new residential construction in 1952.
In other words, Mr. Chairman, the reasons which the minister cited to justify the removal of the one-sixth mortgage loans have now disappeared. And yet the government
4184	HOUSE OF
Supply-Resources and Development refuses to restore this measure, which so greatly assists those who wish to buy a new house.
Now, because of the abolition of the one-sixth mortgage loan, it is generally agreed today that a man must earn at least $5,000 a year, for at least four years, in order to set aside the $2,000 or more which is now required as a down payment on a new house. That means that people with incomes of less than $5,000 a year are virtually excluded from buying a new house. This, I believe, defeats the purpose of any good housing legislation, which is to encourage people with low incomes to own their own homes.
I believe that good housing is an essential to sound and happy family life. In this regard, I would like to refer to the opinion expressed by the secretary of the Canadian Welfare Council's family welfare division, when speaking at a meeting of the Canadian Welfare Council in Ottawa on May 14 last. On that occasion she said:
A lack of housing has become Canada's most acute social problem affecting family life. More cases of family quarrelling, desertions and juvenile delinquency have been traced to the housing scarcity than to any other cause. My estimate is based on Held reports by Canadian welfare agencies. The housing problem already has been brought to the attention of the federal government, but so far, little has been done about it.
Mr. Chairman, I believe that we must do everything possible to encourage people to buy their own homes, because it is one of the best investments that we can possibly make in good citizenship. Unfortunately, however, the government's present housing regulations make it virtually impossible for a man with an income of less than $5,000 a year to buy a new house.
The maximum down payment which a workingman can lay aside, over a reasonable period, is about $1,000. I believe, Mr. Chairman, that the government must take steps to see that a good minimum house can be obtained by making a down payment of $1,000. This investment in better housing for working people will, I believe, pay off many times over in the years ahead in healthier, happier and better citizens.
Now, another kind of housing which I believe is of prime importance to a great many people is good rental housing at a reasonable rent. The answer to that problem,
I believe, is the low-rental housing project, in which the three levels of government participate.
My own city of Toronto has an excellent example of that kind of housing, in the Regent Park project. I believe that Toronto needs at least four more of these projects, and I hope, now that the province of Ontario has


Louis-René Beaudoin: Shall the items carry?


Hon. Robert H. Winters (Minister of Resources and Development):: Before they do carry, Mr. Chairman, I just wish to say a word of appreciation to those who have taken part in the debate which I think has been of a high order and very constructive.
I agree with the hon. member for Eglinton in particular as to the value of the committee, and rather than reply in detail here today I would refer hon. members, and anyone else who wants to read a full and comprehensive report of the various aspects of the housing problem, to the proceedings of the committee wherein matters of detail and certain aspects of policy are dealt with. Answers were given to various questions which arose.
It is all very well to say that the level of loans should be increased and that the amount of the down payments should be decreased. However, the majority of houses are not built under the terms of the National Housing Act, and I can only speak for those that are built under its provisions.
I can say that we have had difficulty in persuading the lending institutions to go along as far as they have in making loans available and in reducing down payments. They feel that there is a limit beyond which the intrinsic value is just not there. I say in that same connection, having in mind the abolition of the one-sixth loan, this action was taken for reasons which were mentioned -that is shortage of materials and the fear that a great many houses would be started and not completed; and also we had in mind the great defence effort which was the first claim against materials and other resources. Subsequently a step was taken which had the effect of restoring the one-sixth, and that was to make available loans in the amount of 80 per cent of the agreed sale price.

Perhaps it might be appropriate if I were to quote an example.
Prior to February 6, 1951, under the additional loan technique a one and a half storey five-room house, selling for $10,000, would receive a loan of $8,166, calling for an equity or cash payment of $1,834. The same house financed under the present provisions would sell for $10,500. The loan would amount to $8,400 and the cash equity would be $2,100. Upon this comparison and similar ones that might be made I base the statement that we have substantially restored the provisions. You will note that while the agreed sale price has increased by $500 by reason of an overall increase in construction costs, the down payment required has gone up by an amount of $266 only, and the amount of the loan has increased by $234.
I do admit, of course, that under the statute as it reads today it is possible to make the one-sixth loan in addition to the higher 80 per cent loan. The clause is entirely permissive. There would, however, be reluctance on the part of the lending institutions to participate in higher loans if they had added to them an additional one-sixth. Moreover, loans of 80 per cent at present levels of costs are a sufficient burden for the ordinary home owner to carry without adding to that burden by an increase in the loan. This is particularly true in view of the very high level of municipal taxation prevailing today.
In specific reply to the hon. member for Cape Breton South, I may say that we have given that matter most sympathetic consideration. We have talked to the lending institutions but, for the reasons I have mentioned, and owing to their views about intrinsic mortgage values, we have not yet been able to reach an agreement with them that a higher level of loans should have been made in the particular instance which the hon. member has in mind.


Major James William Coldwell: What about the inspections?


Robert Henry Winters: The hon. member for Rose-town-Biggar asks about the inspections. Responsibility for adequate inspection, under the terms of the National Housing Act, rests with the lending institution. The basic arrangement is between the builder as vendor on the one hand and the ultimate owner as purchaser on the other. The lending institution makes the inspections necessary to ensure that the mortgage money is being used to advantage.


Major James William Coldwell: May I say they do not make the inspections.


Robert Henry Winters: We have had the criticism that they do not make the inspections and I
3, 1952	4185
Supply-Resources and Development am inclined to agree that the criticism is valid in many instances. We have been speaking to the lending institutions and endeavouring to persuade them to improve their inspections. We have done what the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar suggested we should do, that is, under certain circumstances, we refuse to make loans to particular builders who are known to have bad records in building houses. We have that problem under consideration, and we are trying to work it out.


Ellen Louks Fairclough: In regard to the minister's statement that loans become inactive, let us say where there is a difference of more than 5 per cent between the builder's estimate and that of Central Mortgage and Housing or more than 3 per cent between that of the lending institution and Central Mortgage, I want to say there are a great many cases where the prospective home owner is faced with the necessity, if he is going to own a home, of taking on the difference himself in order to come within that provision.


Robert Henry Winters: Yes, there has to be an
agreed sales price.


Ellen Louks Fairclough: There is a great deal of that.


[Stage Direction]
Items agreed to.
Louis-René Beaudoin: We shall now take up items 255 and 256, the national film board. I might say that these items have been thoroughly studied by a committee.
National film board-
255.	Administration, production and distribution of films and other visual materials, $2,804,131.
256.	Acquisition of new equipment, $115,820.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: I should like to say a word in regard to this subject. I said before, and I say again, that I think it was a step in the right direction to set up a committee of the house to study the national film board's estimates. The report of that committee has been tabled, and I believe it is fair. It has been cut down considerably from what it was in the first place, but I believe it could have been cut a little more.


Robert Henry Winters: I think it is a very good report.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: I think it is a fair report. There have been comments in the press concerning a report that the committee sanctioned the moving of the national film board to Montreal. I do not think the committee did that. The committee only said that the premises now used by the national film board were inadequate for its purpose, and that the film board should be housed under one roof. Personally, I believe it would have been better for the film board to move to Peterborough
4186	HOUSE OF
Supply-Resources and Development instead of Montreal. We have a lot of culture there. We have the little theatre and a very noted playwright, Mr. Robertson Davies. We have scenery, and we have a music festival. I do not see why the Minister of Public Works did not suggest that move.


Alphonse Fournier: I could not even bring it to Hull.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: The committee investigating the national film board could not have made in 1949 the report it made this year, because the new director has tried to put a little management into that board which we certainly did not have before. It looks also as if the director, Mr. Irwin, has tried to carry out the Woods-Gordon management program. The recommendations of the Gordon firm have been carried out, and there is a statement to that effect on pages 35 and 36 of the committee's report. It might be a good idea to put that on the record, so that the members could see just what has been done.
There is one thing I regret, and that is that the committee did not call witnesses from the Canadian Commercial and Press Photographers Association or the Commercial Motion Picture Association. I believe that is something that should be done at our next meeting, if the committee is set up again next year. I hope that the minister will see to it that it is set up again next year. I think it is fair to the national film board to have such a committee. It gives the employees in the board a little build-up of morale, because they can see that nothing is hidden from the members. On May 8 I asked that the Commercial and Press Photographers Association as well as the Commercial Motion Picture Association be called before the committee. I was told that the steering committee would look into that, but the steering committee did not meet until the deliberations of the committee were completed, on June 20, at which time they studied the report.
The committee was also assured by the director that at the present time the board has not been out hunting up business at it was before. I feel this step creates better feeling amongst the commercial photographers. It was stated also that since 1950 the board has fewer employees engaged in distributing films, but with the excellent help of local film councils throughout Canada distribution has increased greatly. Even in foreign countries, where the national film board had offices which have been discontinued, distribution has gone up 15-9 per cent. We were told that revenues were gradually increasing since 1950 from the different


activities of the board such as commercial 35 millimetre film, 16 millimetre film and also television. In 1950, when the present director took over, there were about twenty treasury officers in the board, whereas now there are only eight. The film board is looking after its own account, and evidently these treasury officers are doing a good job.
The board also has a better system of planning its work. Films are taken at the proper time, and arrangements are made ahead of time instead of running out on a job and finding it was the wrong time to take the film. The cost of showing film has been cut in half since 1947, from 7-4 per cent to about 4 per cent. The Matthew report said that the film board should continue to have films produced by private commercial companies. I hope the film board will continue to do that. The minority report attached to the Matthew report said that at least 50 per cent of the work should be done by private companies. This recommendation has not been followed out. Private companies should at least have an opportunity of competing with the national film board. Tenders should be called so that private industry would have a chance to compete. I think you would get cheaper films and better films, not just because they would be made by private companies but because these companies would be competing with each other. Every motion picture company has different methods. This would give the national film board a chance to see how these people do the work. It would also help the commercial corporations.
I was sorry that a letter covering the policy declaration adopted at the annual meeting of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce which was held in Quebec city on October 30, 1951, was not placed before the committee, as this matter was not before the committee until our last meeting. But in that letter it is stated:
The Canadian chamber of commerce generally endorses the minority report of the national film board of the royal commission on national development in the arts, letters and sciences, in which it is recommended that two or three members should be appointed to the board of the national film board as moderators, with the duty of examining objectively all plans of the board. The national film board should not extend its operations. The film act should be amended so that It is no longer necessary for departments of the federal government to secure their films through the national film board.
I am sorry there was no chance for this matter to be discussed in the committee.
There are just a couple of questions I should like to ask. One is this. What are the arrangements with regard to the showing of 16 mm. films in tourist hotels throughout the country? These films are shown for the entertainment of guests. I should like to

know whether the hotel pays the lull cost of travel and time of the operator and rent of the films, as some of the films have to be rented.


Major James William Coldwell: I do not know whether the minister is going to answer questions now or whether he prefers to have the general discussion and then answer the questions.


Robert Henry Winters: Let us have the general discussion.


Major James William Coldwell: I presume he wants general discussion first. I shall be brief. As a matter of fact I regret that I was unable to attend but a few of the meetings of the committee. I was one of those who were greatly interested in the setting up of this committee; and it is with regret that I am compelled to say that I was unable to be present at many of the meetings. From what I saw and learned, however, I think the national film board is continuing to render fine service to our country. I hope those services will be continued to the fullest possible extent.
I have been particularly interested in what one might call the creative work of employees of the national film board. We have seen some remarkable creative work in the animated pictures that are being shown, and in some of the interpretations of the social and economic progress that has been made in our country. I should like to see more of that kind of thing done. I should like to see not only documentary films but others; I should like to see the film board pay increasing attention to the interpretation of these social and economic developments in our country that are particularly Canadian. For example, a few years ago a fine film was done on the fishermen's co-operatives, the fisheries, and so on of the maritime coast. I think that is the kind of thing that, to some extent, the film board can do better than any other organization. My observation has been that the board employs a number of young people who are more or less devoting themselves to the work of the national film board, not altogether because of attractive conditions because in some instances, as we learned when we were on the committee, there are young men and women there who are doing remarkable jobs at some sacrifice financially. I am thinking of one young man who came across from Britain and who synchronizes words, music and pictures at a considerable financial sacrifice. I think these people should be encouraged to do the kind of job that was done in connection with the films on the coastal fisheries and the cooperatives.


Robert Henry Winters: "The Rising Tide".
Supply-Resources and Development


Major James William Coldwell: Yes. In this country we have wonderful material. I was greatly interested in a film for restricted distribution, dealing with the treatment of mental disease in one of our hospitals. According to Dr. Menninger, for example, the well-known psychiatrist in the United States, in some respects Canada leads in the treatment of mental disease; and particularly, he says, the province of Saskatchewan. The minister smiles, but I am saying this quite seriously. I am not trying to take a rise out of any other province when I say that. That is fact, however. Where we have penal reform -and again I am referring to my own province-or an outstanding treatment of disease, whether it be tuberculosis, cancer or anything else, these things are worth recording, in my opinion. I am not taking any credit for the present government of Saskatchewan for the treatment of tuberculosis, that was started years ago by another administration of a different type, namely a former Liberal administration in the province. But where these things are done I think they are worth recording, not from the point of view of a province but from the point of view of interpreting to other parts of the world what Canada is doing and can do.
I should like to say this. I am glad the report contains a recommendation that suitable quarters should be provided. I do not know how the employees of the national film board work as efficiently as they do-and they work efficiently-under the conditions that exist on Sussex street. In order to safeguard our valuable films I think we should have places where they can be stored with safety, free from any danger of explosion or fire.
I do not want to prolong the discussion. I am glad indeed that the committee was set up. I think it was beneficial to the national film board to have the opportunity of telling before a parliamentary committee what is a good story, and of getting that story across to the country to some extent at least. I hope the work of the film board will be continued and expanded. I hope that nothing will be placed in the way of encouraging the national film board to do for our country the best possible job in this field.


Robert Henry Winters: In reply to the hon. member for Peterborough West, may I say that the motion pictures shown in summer camps and tourist hotels are on a loan basis from the national film board, and normally they are shown through projectors that are owned by the people who show the pictures. Resort owners also provide the projectionists in almost all cases. I also might say that in 1951 the tourist film audience in Canada
4188	HOUSE OF
Supply-Resources and Development totalled 769,000, which was up 20 per cent from the previous year.
I thank the hon. member for Peterborough West and the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar for what they have said about the film board and in particular about the proceedings of the committee, which I had the privilege of attending and which I thought was an especially good one.


Mr. Fulton:: May I ask the minister whether he can give us any information on a subject which I am sure is of interest to all the people of Canada-and which was referred to in the press about a monlh ago, I think,- concerning a documentary film depicting the part played by Canadian forces in the 1914-18 war? I confess immediately that I am not familiar with the details, only having read them in the press. My recollection of the statement made there was that this was a film compiled by the old government film bureau, as I believe it was called, made up of extracts from the best of the documentary films of many countries during that war, and that it was made available to branches of the Legion or any others who might be interested. We have been given to understand by press stories that practically every existing copy of the film had been worn out, that there was only one left, and that it was in bad shape. It was indicated that it had been found in the archives or the library of the film board. As I recall it, the question was asked whether an effort was to be made to rescreen that

film and to preserve it in order to indicate to this and other countries the tremendous and valuable role played by Canadian forces in the first war. It appears that no other complete record exists.


Robert Henry Winters: I believe the picture in question is called "Lest We Forget". It is a stirring picture. I have seen it. The film board has done a considerable amount of work in rehabilitating the sound track, and it is going to be retained as an archival picture and can be reproduced by the film board.


Edmund Davie Fulton: Will it be?


Robert Henry Winters: Yes, it will be.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: In 16-millimetre size?


Robert Henry Winters: It can be reproduced in 16-millimetre size. There is no immediate request for it at the moment, but it can be produced in that size.


[Stage Direction]
Items agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
47.	Land protection, reclamation and development in British Columbia under such terms and conditions as may be approved by the governor in council, $184,996.
James Garfield Gardiner: Mr. Chairman, before the discussion continues, may I say I was asked the other evening to put on the record the facts with regard to prairie farm assistance, namely the amount contributed annually in each of the three provinces and the amount subscribed. That information is as follows:



PAYMENTS UNDER P.F.A. FROM 1939 TO MAY 23, 1952

[Stage Direction]
Program	Manitoba	Saskatchewan	Alberta	British Columbia	Totals$ cts.	$ cts.	$ cts.	$ cts.	$ cts.1939	905,416 54	7,574,890 68	1,429,708 31	9,910,015 531940	615,109 23	5,603,266 80	504,179 29	6,722,555 321941	36,513 28	12,010,772 42	3,466,120 05	15,513,405 751943	16,685 25	5,037,472 87	2,425,057 59	7,479,215 711944	163,501 97	2,980,282 68	2,833,762 91	5,977,547 561945	30,148 50	12,541,768 16	4,395,734 38	16,967,651 041946	6,163 50	9,204,820 72	1,620,922 17	10,831,906 391947	490,410 75	13,368,005 75	3,375,088 60	17,233,505 101948	63,439 00	11,531,228 00	2,542,440 00	14,137,107 001949	332,454 00	15,373,262 00	6,336,359 00	22,042,075 001950	346,745 00	5,607,138 00	4,210,835 00	203,409 00	10,368,127 001951 (May 23/52)...	170,513 25	1,194,445 25	621,764 50	1,400 00	1,988,123 003,177,100 27	102,027,353 33	33,761,971 80	204,809 00	139,171,234 40
[Stage Direction]
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SUMMARY 1% LEVY COLLECTED 1939 TO JULY 31, 1951
Crop Year	Manitoba	Saskatchewan	Alberta	Unallocated	Total$ cts.	$ cts.	$ cts.	S cts.	$ cts.1939-40	333,453 13	1,344,208 23	743,121 61	724 40	2,421,507 371940-41	354,813 76	1,360,540 00	866,831 79	502 32	2,582,687 871941-42	339,969 87	711,869 33	407,642 45	272 05	1,459,753 701942-43	481,974 50	1,536,146 00	710,632 53	322 51	2,729,075 541943-44	779,490 76	2,743,544 09	1,191,300 92	371 01	4,714,706 781944-45	754,366 36	3,218,572 23	1,412,417 31	230 71	5,385,586 611945-46	575,408 69	1,977,735 42	873,082 60	131 69	3,426,358 401946-47	845,631 86	2,703,357 17	1,644,706 41	112 20	5,193,807 641947-48	764,744 37	2,727,187 90	1,624,237 42	148 51	5,116,318 201948-49	1,120,741 27	3,417,480 86	2,084,088 52	6,185 87	6,628,496 521949-50	1,355,660 07	4,525,628 79	2,515,568 28	197 64	8,397,054 781950-51	1,442,138 08	3,890,444 68	2,001,322 58	153 72	7,334,059 069,148,392 72	30,156,714 70	16,074,952 42	9,352 63	55,389,412 47To December 31, 1951	$58,455,485 95.
Edmund Davie Fulton: I should like to ask a question concerning a project in British Columbia. The prairie farm rehabilitation administration has been asked to make a survey and recommendation regarding what is known as the fruitlands area adjacent to North Kamloops in British Columbia, which is in my own constituency. This area was developed previously by a private company, and that part of it which is not incorporated as a village has been taken over by the irrigation jurisdiction within the last three or four years.
They are faced with a difficult problem. The irrigation system requires a good deal of expenditure for purposes of rehabilitation, to put the area into shape in which the land could be serviced. These are extremely valuable agricultural lands, but at the moment the revenues available from them, particularly after the disastrous winter we had in 1948-49, which killed so many of the fruit trees, are not sufficient in any degree to meet either capital costs or the interest which would be required to meet payments on borrowed sums.
The prairie farm rehabilitation administration has been asked to conduct a survey and make a recommendation as to the best way of going about bringing the system up to date to serve the land as required. What is the present position of that survey?


James Garfield Gardiner: There has been a preliminary engineering survey, and a report has been made to the British Columbia government. An economic survey of the area has been started, and when it is completed the report will be made in due course.


Edmund Davie Fulton: Is the minister in a position to say whether any recommendations have been made, and if so what they are?


James Garfield Gardiner: No, it has not yet reached the stage of recommendations. The economic survey is being carried on now.


Edmund Davie Fulton: Is the minister awaiting a reply from the British Columbia government? Is action by some other party necessary, or is it just a matter of continuing the survey by this department?


James Garfield Gardiner: I presume the hon. member has in mind the trees killed by frost. I think the final report made on that was that if payment were to be made it was considered to be a provincial responsibility. But there is no other report ready on the economic side of the matter.


Edmund Davie Fulton: I appreciate the minister's answer, but I do not think it meets the point I had in mind. He said an initial report had been made to the British Columbia government, and that at this time an economic survey was going forward. Is it necessary to

Supply-Agriculture
receive some proposal from the British Columbia government before anything further is done? In other words is the minister awaiting some further approach, or is it just a matter of waiting until the economic survey has been made?


James Garfield Gardiner: Just a matter of waiting until the economic survey is completed. There is no understanding or misunderstanding as yet between the provincial government and this government.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
48.	Land protection and reclamation; clearing and settlement of new lands under such terms and conditions as may be approved by the governor in council, $250,000.
Mr. Quelch:: To what area does this refer?


James Garfield Gardiner: To all Canada, really; but most of the work has been done in New Brunswick and Manitoba.


Major James William Coldwell: Does that include the Carrot river valley?


James Garfield Gardiner: Nothing is being spent out of this vote in the Carrot river valley. But it is under a vote of this kind that something might be done, if it were done.


Major James William Coldwell: Is something being done there in the way of P.F.R.A. survey?


James Garfield Gardiner: There were P.F.R.A. surveys made, but they were made under the P.F.R.A. vote.


Major James William Coldwell: Not under this vote?


James Garfield Gardiner: No.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
49.	Maritime Marshland Rehabilitation Act, $1,655,520.
Clarence Gillis: I notice an increase of $446,720. What progress is being made in the rehabilitation of the marshlands of the maritimes, and how extensive are they? When does the minister think the project might be completed?


James Garfield Gardiner: First class progress is being made. The reason for the increased vote is that the engineering is done, and we can get the work completed now. It is possible to have it completed, and therefore we have asked for more money.


Mr. Weir:: I have had the opportunity of seeing some of the development under way in the maritime provinces, and I think it is a very commendable piece of work. The crops that are growing on the area, with a little drainage protection, were splendid crops, of both oats and hay. I commend this type of work, and commend the efforts of the minister.


Mr. Nowlan:: The minister said the increase was for engineering services-


James Garfield Gardiner: No, the increase is for construction. The engineering was done last year.


George Clyde Nowlan: Would the minister give a break-down of what works will be constructed this year? Would he also comment on the suggestion made on the work being done up and down the Annapolis river? As he knows, repairs have been going on for a distance of about 25 or 30 miles on both sides of the river. A suggestion has been made that a dam should be built across the river at Annapolis, or at some other point, to cut out the necessity for these long dikelands. Has any survey been made?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes. I understand the project and have been over it personally. As a matter of fact I think it deserves considerable attention because the possibilities of building a dam could be beyond anything one could anticipate without seeing it completed. We have been hopeful that in due course we can get around to doing it that way. I must say that the engineering is not completed to the point where I can give any further report. This is something we are interested in and we hope it can be brought through to completion. I have a list of the other projects which are under way and perhaps it could be placed on Hansard.


The Deputy Chairman:: Is the committee agreeable?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


James Garfield Gardiner: The statement follows:
Primary 11	  $1,000,000.00
Special Surveys and Investigations
Annapolis river survey	 12,969.96
Unalloted under special surveys and
investigations	 17,030.04
N.S. 2, Windsor Forks marsh	 66,000.00
N.S. 3, Falmouth great dike marsh ....	20,000.00
N.S. 4, Queen Anne marsh	 16,000.00
N.S. 11, Truro dikeland park marsh__________	18,000.00
N.S. 16,	Castle Frederick marsh	
14,000.00N.S.	18,	Fox creek marsh	
26,000.00N.S.	20,	Advocate marsh	
90,000.00N.S. 21, Upper Nappan marsh	
20.000.00N.S. 23, Masstown marsh	
30,000.00N.S. 27, Newport town marsh	
5,000.00N.S. 38, St. Croix marsh	
11,500.00N.S. 40, Fort Belcher marsh	
16,500.00N.S. 43, Annapolis Royal town marsh ..	17,000.00N.S. 44, Converse marsh	
50,000.00N.S. 46, River Hebert marsh	
45,000.00N.S. 47, Selmah marsh	
13,000.00N.S.	49,	Scotch village marsh	
13,000.00N.S.	65,	Bishop Beckwith	marsh	
15,000.00N.B. 5, Westcock marsh	
13,000.00N.B. 7, Hopewell Hill marsh	
45,000.00N.B. 13,	Dorchester marsh	
100,000.00N.B. 18,	Fox creek marsh	
26,000.00N.B. 21,	Memramcook west	marsh ....	25,000.00N.B. 24,	Aulac marsh	
60,000.00
Special Surveys and Investigations-Con.
N.B. 27, College bridge marsh	 48,000.00
N.B. 28,	Upper Coverdale marsh ....	9,000.00N.B. 30,	Calkins marsh	
16,000.00N.B. 33,	West Coverdale marsh	
42,000.00N.B. 37,	Sackville marsh	
25,000.00N.B. 41,	Turtle creek marsh	
5,000.00N.B. 42,	Jones marsh	
14,000.00N.B. 43,	Creek's marsh	
11,000.00N.B. 45,	Chartersville marsh	
43,000.00N.B. 46,	Wilson marsh	
24,000.00


George Clyde Nowlan: There is definite engineering work in progress with respect to the dam, is there not?


James Garfield Gardiner: There is definite work being done.


George Clyde Nowlan: Has the minister any idea when that will be completed so he will be able to arrive at a decision?


James Garfield Gardiner: It cannot be completed this year; it will run into next year.


Mr. McLure:: What work is being done in Prince Edward Island in connection with this vote?


James Garfield Gardiner: The work on the Johnston river was completed at a total expenditure of $19,325.66.


Winfield Chester Scott McLure: Anything further this year?


James Garfield Gardiner: The province still has the drainage to do and will be making any further expenditures that are made. Our expenditures are completed.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
50.	Assiniboine river-diking and cut-off, $50,000.
William Gilbert Weir: This work is being done in an effort to control the flooding of the Assiniboine river. Incidentally this is linked with the observations made by the hon. member for Greenwood in connection with flood protection work in the city of Winnipeg. The Assiniboine river drains a very large area. I am not going to try to put all the details on record at the present time, but such rivers as the White Sand river, the Shell river, the Qu'Appelle river rising away in Saskatchewan, the Birdtail river, the Minnedosa river and the Souris river all flow into the Assiniboine. Those waters are all concentrated at Winnipeg where they join the Red river.
Heretofore this river has been considered a navigable stream and for that reason under the jurisdiction of the federal government. What is being attempted here is to prevent it getting out of bounds and flooding the country. I am keeping in mind what the hon. member for Greenwood said a couple of weeks ago. If this river should break out of its south bank with extensive flooding and
Supply-Agriculture
meet the La Salle, and then go down through the Brunkild country to meet the Red above Winnipeg; if it got out of control .it would aggravate extensively the flood condition that might apply to the city of Winnipeg. That is why we are so anxious and interested in having some measure of control on this river.
We are waiting at the present time for the survey that was instituted by the international joint commission having in mind the possibility of diverting this river across to the lake. I do not know whether that is feasible, but I would like to ask the minister whether any surveys have been made on the other rivers, some of which I have mentioned, which are further upstream from the Assiniboine. Have some control works or dams been built there which would relieve to some extent the flood hazards in the narrow channel where this river flows through the flat country toward Winnipeg?
This particular vote is earmarked for diking and cut-off. This cut-off is an innovation and some people have a question mark in their minds about it. This river is quite crooked and in order to overcome some of the hazards of flooding, particularly to stop the jamming of ice, attempts have been made to cut off the bends and thereby enable the water to run away a little more freely. It has worked quite well in most cases.
The project which was undertaken last year in co-operation with the municipality of Portage la Prairie proved most useful and has worked exceptionally well. I might go even farther and say that the acquiring of the necessary land was undertaken by the municipality, and I think the whole thing will work out quite well. Unfortunately the proposals for this year so far have not been so encouraging. The $50,000 in this vote has been considered by the municipalities concerned, and I think they are going to use most of it for diking purposes. They still have other worthy projects in mind that would help to alleviate this situation; and I hope when the minister gets his program more under way he will see his way clear to give further assistance in this regard.


Mr. Bryce:: I am glad to join with the hon. member for Portage-Neepawa in what he has said about this river because after it leaves his constituency it runs into mine. I think the hon. member is to be congratulated upon the work he has done in this connection. He was able to get the engineers and the different municipalities together, along with myself. Now that the minister has been good enough to provide for this

Supply-Agriculture
advance I think they are all of one mind as to what they are going to do. Previous to that I do not think anyone really knew where he was going. Now with the P.F.R.A. the whole thing is under the one engineer and things are going much better.
But I think we should proceed cautiously because the first thing we know we will have Winnipeg on our necks for allowing the water to move down too quickly. I do not think the hon. member has sufficiently stressed the seriousness of the situation. If this river should break its banks and run into the La Salle we will have one of the worst conditions we have ever had.
I have represented this constituency for only three or four years and cannot speak with the experience of a man raised in the district. But I know how serious the situation could be, and I thank the minister for setting aside $50,000 for this work, whether it is spent on diking or cut-offs according to what the engineers decide is proper. When money gets a little more plentiful in the future I hope the government will be able to provide a bigger vote.


William Gilbert Weir: We will wait for the report.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
51.	To provide for administrative expenses, Agricultural Prices Support Act, 1944, $92,700.
Mr. Charlton:: I am not going to take much time, but I should like to ask the minister what products are now being held by the floor prices administration board, the quantities of each, and the total amount of money that has been spent by the board to date.


James Garfield Gardiner: We have about 15 million pounds of 1952 butter, the value of the 1952 butter paid for being $5,774,391.79. We have paid for canned pork amounting to $21,238,277.58, Wiltshire sides amounting to $5,192,386.22, and beef amounting to $9,526,750.83. That is a total of $41,731,806.42.


John Alpheus Charlton: That is the total amount of money spent on the products the minister has mentioned?


James Garfield Gardiner: That is the investment in the stocks now.


John Alpheus Charlton: To date?


James Garfield Gardiner: At this time. [DOT]


John Alpheus Charlton: What is the total amount of money that has been spent up to now?


James Garfield Gardiner: I think I reported this to the house on a previous occasion this session. The net cost of the operations of the board from the beginning has been a little over $10 million. That does not involve any net cost in

connection with these products about which I have just been speaking. They may involve something more.


John Alpheus Charlton: The minister gave us the number of pounds of butter but not the number of pounds of pork, Wiltshire sides or beef. He just gave us the value.


James Garfield Gardiner: There are 37 million pounds of canned pork, 15 million pounds of Wiltshire sides, and 33,900,000 pounds of beef that have been bought, but some of it has been shipped. About 20 million pounds have been shipped.


John Alpheus Charlton: I believe the minister mentioned on his estimates the other night that the price of the canned pork was 63 cents and that it has now come down to 62-8. I wonder how the minister arrived at that figure?


James Garfield Gardiner: It was 63-8 at first and now it is down to 61-8.


John Alpheus Charlton: It started at 63 [DOT] 8, came down to 62'8 and now it is 61'8. How does the minister arrive at these figures, with pork being purchased at $25 a hundred dressed weight?


James Garfield Gardiner: The original figure was 63 [DOT] 8 but the cost at which it is going in now is 61-8, or 2 cents lower.


John Alpheus Charlton: The minister has not answered the question yet. With pork selling at $25 a hundred dressed weight how is the figure of 61-8 a pound in the can arrived at?


James Garfield Gardiner: I understand that the lower cost is due to the fact that there is a larger volume passing through. It is the increased volume which makes possible a decrease of 2 cents in the cost when it goes into the can. There is no difference in the price of the pork. Twenty-six cents has been the floor price all the way through, and it has actually been coming in at 26 cents. I do not think there is any other market in which you can get more than that price, and we are getting it at that price.


John Alpheus Charlton: The minister has not answered the question yet. What I asked the minister was how the price of 61-8 cents was arrived at in view of the fact that pork is being purchased at 26 cents a pound dressed weight.


James Garfield Gardiner: I have already put that on the record three times this session, but I will put it on again. The pork is 26 cents a pound to start with. When you trim off the fat and take out the bone it doubles the price, or did at the beginning, to 52 cents. Half the pork you buy at 26 cents is bone and fat, and by the time you trim that off and get it down to what you are going to put in the can you are only putting in half of the weight of the hog.

Therefore if you pay 26 cents for the hog it costs you 52 cents for the pork you put in the can. At the beginning it cost approximately 12 cents a pound to put it into tins and that made it 64 cents, or 63-8 cents.


John Alpheus Charlton: I do not think there are very many butchers who will believe-


James Garfield Gardiner: Believe it or not, it is true.


John Alpheus Charlton: -that half a dressed hog is bone and fat unless they are heavy hogs. Select hogs will not dress out that way. I can say that advisedly.


James Garfield Gardiner: That is the fact, anyway.


John Alpheus Charlton: Not on grade A or B-l hogs.


James Garfield Gardiner: My friend seems to be an expert on everything. When did he start butchering? As a matter of fact that is what the packing plants tell us. Those are the facts and that is all I can give him. I am not going to change their figures even to satisfy him.


Mr. Darroch:: I want to say I am very pleased that this item provides for the continuation of operations under the Agricultural Prices Support Act. So far as agriculture is concerned, I think it has probably been the most beneficial legislation that has ever been passed by the parliament of Canada. The application of the act on different occasions and to different branches of agriculture has done two things. First, it has cushioned the loss. We know perfectly well that at no time were support prices established under which there would be a profit to the producer, but I think probably the majority of producers realized why it was so done. As I say, it did cushion the loss. In other words the producer of the commodity was assured that he was not going to lose his shirt.
In my riding we produce mostly cream, hogs and beef. The farmers are not particularly producers of specialized crops. I think we have what are the best farmers in the country, the fellows who go along and produce a little of everything. They have received a great deal of benefit from the application of the act. For instance, let me start with cream, or butter, which is almost the same thing because cream becomes butter. Last year when the cream producers asked for a support price of 63 cents a pound for butter under this act the minister in his wisdom suggested that perhaps it would be better if they would take 58 cents a pound for two years. The wisdom of this counsel has been quite evident, and I am quite sure that had the price not been established last year the price of cream would be down at least ten cents. It has done something else as far as the butter industry is
Supply-A griculture
concerned. It has meant that there was a market for some of the surplus milk that we had on hand as a result of the embargo caused by foot-and-mouth disease. As I say, this branch of the industry has been benefited.
Then we go on to the hog branch of the industry. I was rather interested a moment ago to hear the exchange between the minister and the hon. member for Brant-Wentworth. I think the hon. member is forgetting that when you can pork you do not can the bones, just the meat. A dressed hog contains the head and bones and the rest of the carcass but only the meat goes into the cans, not the bones. I think that would explain the suggestion of the right hon. minister that 50 per cent of the weight of the carcass goes into canned meat with the result that not 26 cents but 52 cents is the cost of the meat for canning.
This support price for hogs came at a time when we had an unusually large hog population in the country. Whether that was again caused by the difficulties incurred through foot-and-mouth disease I do not know; but I am quite sure that the 26-eent price offered or established by the department prior to the embargo was not set up to show a profit to the feeder, but it meant that he would be at least getting his costs back. With the advent or whatever you like to call it of the foot-and-mouth disease this 26-cent price was very welcome to the hog producer, I am sure. It maintained the confidence of the trade. I noticed in my own community that young pigs which were then going begging for-$4 or $5 are now selling for $10 and $11, thereby establishing the fact that farmers feel they can go ahead and stay in the hog business with reasonable assurance that they will have a market.
Then we come to the beef situation. I know that cattle feeders lost money this winter. The fact of the matter is that the prices at which they bought their feeder cattle last fall were perhaps a little over-optimistic. Even at that time I could not see anything in the foreseeable future to indicate that they were going to make money on cattle that they had put in the stable at 33 to 35 cents a pound. Before the difficulties with foot-and-mouth disease the cattle market was beginning to decline; and I guess something happened last January which perhaps has not happened within the lifetime of most of us here. For a week or two, probably not over a week, prices for cattle in Canada were higher than in the United States and, as a result, for the first time in a long while cattle were shipped from the Chicago market to Canada. In fact I


Solon Earl Low: What would the butchers dress up to?


Arnold Darroch: They were lighter. They would dress at less than 700 pounds. The original stipulation was that they were just to take carcasses 700 pounds and over. The butcher cattle would probably dress up to

52 or 53 per cent. They were decent cattle, just underweight-what they call heavy cattle; cattle around 900 to 950 pounds live weight.
That is something, sir, that has always puzzled me with respect to the price of livestock. Every time there is a suggestion that prices are going to be lowered they drop very quickly. Of course I know people are prone to become just a little bit panicky, and probably they think things are going to go down so they shoot out a few more than they ordinarily would. That is another feature that is not good for this type of market. It does seem to me peculiar, however, that once the government or the department steps in and establishes a floor price or offers to buy at a support price, then invariably the price starts to go up and they hardly ever have to buy. I have some ideas why that happens but I do not think I should state them here; and I think men who have been in the livestock business have an idea too.
As a result of all this, from the 12 th of May good cattle have never sold for less than 25 cents a pound. In fact the price has been as high as 29 cents per pound. This week they are back up a little; but I say the introduction of support provided for under this item has been of untold benefit to the agricultural industry, at least in the province of Ontario; and I would think if it is good for Ontario it is good for the rest of the country.
I believe, sir, the minister and his department have not always been free from criticism, on the one hand by the producers who feel they have not been getting enough, and on the other by the consumers who feel that the prices are too high and that by establishing the support price the government is arbitrarily setting a price whereby the cost of living is going to be sustained.
I was interested in picking up a paper in Toronto on the day I referred to, May 12. It was the Toronto Globe and Mail, which to all outward appearances at least is the official organ of the Conservative party in our province. Under the heading "Selling beef at a loss"-and I am not going to take time to read it all-there are one or two paragraphs which are rather pertinent, I think. Under this heading, and after taking a few biffs and bangs telling how much this is costing the country, it goes on to say this:
But the sole reason for the subsidy is that Canada's official floor price of twenty-five cents a pound makes our price the highest in the world.
They take in a lot of territory.
The subsidy enables agriculture minister Gardiner to maintain this high-price plateau in the domestic

market and at the same time get off the hook tor having caused unused surpluses of beef to accumulate here. From his point of view it seems to be quite beside the point that the so-called surplus is an artificial one. It was caused by the arbitrary high price level which he has imposed on Canadian consumers.
Canadian producers thus continue to get a price slightly higher than that in the United States, and avoid the rational course of permitting beef to find an economic level in terms of both world and domestic markets. In these circumstances there is neither economic sense nor justice to Canadians in this new excuse for a subsidy to be paid out of taxation.
It is rather interesting to read this article, just to see how far from the facts it really is. To prove it is wrong, I read the first statement:
But the sole reason for the subsidy is that Canada's official floor price of twenty-five cents a pound makes our price the highest in the world.
There are two editions of the Globe and Mail each day, so on Monday night I bought another copy of the Globe and Mail and on the market page of that publication dated May 13 I find this market report, "Steers go higher as floor prices adjusted here." It reads:
Steer prices jumped ?1 to $2 here yesterday following the Ontario stockyards cattle price adjustment to the Department of Agriculture's floor price program. The market was strong to $1 higher on cows and bulls. The estimated holdover is 2,000 cattle.
Choice steers sold from $26-$27.50, with good steers at $25-320 and medium steers at $23-$24.50.
In the morning this paper had said our prices were the highest in the world, and that was the price at which steers were being sold on the market on May 12. On the same page but lower down the newspaper quoted the Chicago livestock market report. On the Chicago market on May 12 the price of prime steers was $35-$37.50 and choice steers $34-$34.75. Those who are engaged in the cattle business would agree that choice steers here would be sold as good steers on the Chicago market, which would mean that they would be sold at $34-$34.75 as compared with $26-$27.50 on the Toronto market.
I am suggesting that the minister and his department have done a good job. I think the wisdom of the application of this price support program is self-evident. The best proof of that, I suggest, would be an article I read not long ago in one of the farm journals which compared prices in the United States and Canada. In the United States with its high support prices and large surpluses as a result of those high prices, their costs were immeasurably higher than ours. In spite of all this, in 1951 the Canadian farmer received a little better than 12 per cent of our national income, while
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our cousins in the United States were receiving a little over 6 per cent.


William Scottie Bryce: Can the minister tell us which item provides for any loss that may take place as a result of the exchange of meat between the United States, New Zealand, Great Britain and Canada. Is that under the support act, or is it under some other act?


James Garfield Gardiner: It is not in any of these estimates yet. It will come in next year's supplementaries.


William Scottie Bryce: Does it come under this support act?


James Garfield Gardiner: It will come under the prices support act.


Mr. MacKenzie:: Before the item passes, I should like to make inquiries about eggs. Has the department purchased any eggs, and if so has there been any loss?


James Garfield Gardiner: We have not been required to buy any eggs in the two and a half or almost two and three-quarter years past. This year we did find it necessary to buy some eggs in the' Saskatchewan area, the reason being that there was no cold storage for the eggs in that area. Eggs had to be sent from there to either Winnipeg or Calgary. The government did purchase some eggs in Saskatchewan at 30 cents, starting in May and continuing down to the present time.


Hugh Alexander MacKenzie: There has been no loss?


James Garfield Gardiner: There is no loss. A few of them have been sold, but not at a loss. We are not in a position to say there will not be any loss, but there has been none to date.


Henry Alfred Hosking: I realize the minister himself deserves a great deal of credit for the arrangement he made for disposing of our beef. I am certain that many members of our agricultural communities pay him the tribute he deserves. I would imagine, however, that some of the staff who were closely connected with these negotiations1 had an important part to play in the exchange which sent our beef to Britain when it was shut out of the United States market. This eliminated a glut on our own market. I think this is the proper time to pay tribute to the members of the staff who took part in the negotiating of that agreement.
Having said that, I should like to suggest to the minister that he keep an eye on the facts that the debate in this house must have called to his attention in the past few days, showing that rural areas in this country are rapidly becoming depopulated. This could have far-reaching effects on the economy of this country. My riding is made up of two

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sections, rural and urban. I should like to call to the minister's attention the fact that the good work he has done in applying support prices to agricultural commodities has enabled farmers and those who are interested in producing food for people to buy to feel that they have made a good investment and that they should continue to make an investment in agriculture. This policy assures the farmers that a temporary situation which may arise, such as the foot-and-mouth disease or anything else, which disturbs the economy of agriculture, will not break them.
By doing this you not only give stability to the agricultural industry; you give stability to the market. I am referring to the market in which urban people buy. If we have no floor price under an agricultural product, then because of that lack of floor price the return to the farmer drops so low that it is no longer profitable for a farmer to produce that commodity, then it is obvious that as time progresses there will be a shortage of that commodity. When that shortage occurs we have these very high prices to which the urban people object.
Referring back to the situation which has been brought to the minister's attention so clearly by the debates in this house within the last week, I would say it is most important that he not allow the rural areas to become depopulated, thus causing our agricultural production to drop off. If that happened the people who live in the cities would have to pay exorbitant prices for food in the years to come. I think the members of the department who have done so well in disposing of the surplus beef should look with pleasure on their performance, but should keep in mind the fact that they must give stability to the members of the agricultural community in this country if the urban people are going to have goods to buy at reasonable prices. I would commend the minister for his efforts in the past.


James Garfield Gardiner: I should like to correct the statement I made a moment ago that there were no losses on eggs. There was a loss of $1,866.24 a year ago.


Mr. White (Middlesex East):: I wanted to ask the minister what other farm products, if any, are being supported by the Agricultural Prices Support Act at the moment?


James Garfield Gardiner: Butter, eggs, pork and beef. I gave the figures a little while ago. I put them on Hansard.


Harry Oliver White: Yes.


William Alfred Robinson: Shall the item
carry?


John Alpheus Charlton: No. It is rather unfortunate that the minister is getting a little bit touchy these days. The statement I made a few moments ago was that I doubted whether a dressed grade A or grade B-l hog having the bone and fat removed would take 50 per cent of that carcass. I still say that. I am glad to hear that both the members for Wellington are so well satisfied with conditions as they exist today. After hearing the hon. member for Wellington North, I make the suggestion that with the head, hocks and fat cut off and the bone taken out, it probably would be 50 per cent. What do you do? Do you give that head and the hocks to the packer? I mean, do they get that for nothing? It is understandable, of course, if they do not count the weight of the head and do not count the weight of the hocks. But the head and the hocks are valuable products.


James Garfield Gardiner: They are sold, and that is all figured in: the dressing percentage, the cost of preparation and all credits. The credits, of course, take in the payment we get for the head that goes into head cheese and for the feet that go into feet, hocks and so on. But the actual position is that the canned pork amounts to from 78 to 82 pounds. There is a little bit of variation, but it is about half. The average hog will dress out at 155 pounds. Some will dress a little bit more than that and some a little bit less in the top grade. But the canned pork coming out of that average of 155 pounds runs from 78 to 82 pounds. The amount that goes into Wiltshires is 120 pounds and the amonut that goes into cuts would be 90. But the canned pork is what we are talking about and that is 78 to 82 pounds out of 155 pounds, which is not very far from half of it. It will depend somewhat on the amount that is trimmed off with the head, with the feet, the amount trimmed off with the fat and the amount taken out in bone.


John Alpheus Charlton: That is the amount that goes into the can?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes, the amount that goes into the can.


John Alpheus Charlton: What happens to the money that is collected for the feet and hocks?


James Garfield Gardiner: In figuring the cost of the canned pork, the other is credited to the cost.


John Alpheus Charlton: When the minister made his statement, or when he answered the question I asked him with regard to the value at 26 cents a pound he said you could double that figure to get the price.


James Garfield Gardiner: That is approximately
correct.


John Alpheus Charlton: The minister said you could double it?


James Garfield Gardiner: Approximately, yes.


John Alpheus Charlton: Well, according to my mathematics twice 26 is 52.


James Garfield Gardiner: Certainly.


John Alpheus Charlton: All right. The minister said 52 cents could be added right away to that canned pork.


James Garfield Gardiner: I still say that.


John Alpheus Charlton: Then I say what happens to the head cheese made from the head, the jowl, or the piece of bacon-or what they call bacon-off the jowl, the fat that is rendered out of the head and neck, the hocks that are quite valuable-they are hard enough to get, goodness knows-and the pickled pigs' feet? Where does the price of these products come in?


James Garfield Gardiner: If we go into the whole detail of it, the costs of preparation, including the cost of the tin, run up to about 15 cents. If you went into the whole thing it would take a lot more accounting than I have given. I simply say this. The amount you get out of a hog that you put into the can is approximately half the weight of the hog; and if the hog costs you 26 cents, then that which goes in costs 52. But the whole accounting is done by taking all you get back by way of credit and charging it up against the cost of preparation and the other costs in connection with the canning of the hogs. That works out at a net difference of 12 cents, roughly speaking. It has got down; when we got greater volume, it got down to 10 cents. It was approximately 12 cents to start with and it has worked down to 10 cents, through the volume, of a difference in the net between the actual return and the actual cost of putting the pork in cans.


John Alpheus Charlton: I suggest that had the minister made that statement at the beginning, we might have avoided all this argument we have had because he has now admitted that it is not 50 per cent at all.


James Garfield Gardiner: I did not make that
statement.


George Clyde Nowlan: Before the item carries I should like to make one passing comment on the remarks of the hon. member for Wellington North. I am not prepared to discuss with him the intricacies of the packing business but I should like to suggest to him that I hope he is more accurate in his information on that subject than he was upon the political and journalistic set-up in this
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province. When he stated that the Globe and Mail was the official publication of the Conservative party in this province, I presume that if someone suggested that, we will say, the Winnipeg Free Press was the official publication of the Liberal party in Manitoba, that statement might sometimes be repudiated by his party and might sometimes be repudiated by that paper. Certainly there is no official publication for the Conservative party in this province. I merely want to keep the record straight.


Arnold Darroch: I stand corrected, Mr. Chairman; but I still maintain that it tries to be.


Harry Oliver White: Have any commodity groups asked for support for their products in the past year, other than those mentioned?


James Garfield Gardiner: Assistance was asked for cranberries and for lambs. Those who produce lambs in Alberta asked for some assistance during the time the foot-and-mouth disease difficulties were being experienced. The cheese people also asked for assistance and later changed over to the plan that is now operating as between the Ontario producers and 'the provincial government. We have guaranteed their accounts under the Agricultural Products Marketing Act of 1949. But there is no floor price there. That is a guarantee against loss in handling the product the way they are handling it. I understand that poultry producers have asked for it within the last week.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
52. To provide for a contribution to the federated women's institutes of Canada to help defray the costs of the international conference of the associated country women of the world to be held in Canada in 1953, $10,000.
Major James William Coldwell: This is a small item, but will the minister explain what it is for?


James Garfield Gardiner: It is for the federated
women's organization. They are having a world convention here next year, and we are putting up this amount to help them in defraying expenses.


A. Earl Catherwood: This is one item to which I think all hon. members can give their unqualified approval. If there is any organization, particularly in rural Canada, that is doing fine work it is the federated women's institutes of Canada. I think this item to help defray the costs of their convention is a recognition of the splendid services they have rendered, and I am pleased to see it in the estimates.

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John Alpheus Charlton: I should like to go along with what has been said by the hon. member tor Haldimand and to say a word with regard to the founder of the women's institutes namely, Mrs. Adelaide Hoodless. It is quite commonly known across the country that Mrs. Hoodless founded the women's institute at Stoney Creek. One thing that is not quite so commonly known is the fact that she attended the same public school that I attended, namely S.S. No. 6, South Dumfries, but not at the same time. The cairn erected to her memory is within one and one-half miles of my home and also her birthplace. I think the credit should go where it rightly belongs, namely to the county of Brant.


Arnold Darroch: I should like to express my support of this item which provides money for the federated women's institutes. I should be afraid to go home without supporting it, because my better half happens to be a member of the federated board in Ontario.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: I am very glad the hon. member for Brant-Wentworth mentioned Adelaide Hoodless. I happen to know her owing to the fact that she is my better half's aunt.


Douglas Charles Abbott: Carried unanimously.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: As the hon. member for Brant-1 Wentworth said, she founded the first institute at Stoney Creek. That first institute was founded behind a blacksmith shop there, and has spread not only throughout Canada but throughout the British empire and other countries.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Central experimental farm, including research and co-ordinating divisions for the experimental farms service-
664. Construction or acquisition of buildings, works, land and new equipment-further amount required, $4,000.
Frank Exton Lennard: What is being done in connection with experimentation with hogs out there? As I pointed out last year, they have had those lop-eared Landrace hogs for about fifteen years. No two of them look alike. They are the greatest conglomeration of hogs I ever saw in my life. I should like to know what progress is being made in the experiments that have been going on out there.


James Garfield Gardiner: We dropped the experiments on the Landrace hogs after it had been demonstrated to our satisfaction at least that nothing was to be gained by changing over from the Yorkshire to the other type.


Frank Exton Lennard: During the last few years have they acquired any large English whites, and are any experiments being conducted?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes, they are being brought in for breeding purposes. They are a larger, heavier type, and are being brought in from time to time.


Frank Exton Lennard: Has there been any report that in any respect they are superior to the Yorkshire?


James Garfield Gardiner: They are really a type of Yorkshire. I had personal experience with the shipment donated to Manitoba in connection with the Winnipeg floods. A number of the large whites were sold at a sale at Brandon. Those who bought the hogs have had good results from crossing them with ours. The idea was to add greater strength to the hog and to remove some of the weaknesses of our hogs that were probably becoming a little inbred, in a sense. This new stock brought in was helpful.


Frank Exton Lennard: My experience has been that crossing a large English white boar with our ordinary Yorkshire sow brings about a quicker maturity, by several weeks. We have found a great improvement through using the large English white boar.


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes, they are stronger and heavier.


Winfield Chester Scott McLure: It would be better if the minister were to recommend Prince Edward Island bacon hogs as the best in the world, as he said at one time.


James Garfield Gardiner: They are very good.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Production service-
Health of animals-
666. Administration of Animal Contagious Diseases Act, and Meat and Canned Foods Act-further amount required, $130,000.
Frank Exton Lennard: What if any advance has been made in protecting hogs from rhinitis?


James Garfield Gardiner: It is under study in our laboratory here, and also at Lethbridge. No definite result has been obtained to the present time.


Frank Exton Lennard: There is an article in the Farmers Magazine of June which deals with rhinitis. I shall not take the time to read it, but I recommend it. That article sets out what the state of Kansas is doing, and the Canadian authorities might give some study to it, if they have not already done so. As we know, rhinitis is prevalent in Canada, and is something that should be given closer attention than we are giving it. Too many farmers are careless about it. I have seen it in Ontario, and I should like to know what is being done to isolate this disease.


James Garfield Gardiner: There is an exchange of information as between what is being done in Kansas and what we are doing. We have the benefit of the experiments they are carrying on, and they have the benefit of ours. My information is that we have not yet accomplished anything in trying to discover ways and means of preventing the development of the disease, at least nothing that is considered satisfactory. We will have to continue with the customary work.


Mr. White (Haslings-Pelerborough):: What formula was used in the settlement for the loss of animals in Oxford county from trypanosomiasis.


James Garfield Gardiner: The market value was the basis of settlement.


George Stanley White: At the
time of slaughter?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes, at the time they were destroyed.


George Stanley White: Was
the same formula used in the west?


James Garfield Gardiner: In this instance there were not the same quarantine restrictions as in connection with the foot-and-mouth disease, but the basic settlement was the same. We started out with the market value and then added to that because, even up to the present time, these people have not been allowed to bring in more stock. We think we gave reasonable consideration to those facts.


George Stanley White: Were
the owners satisfied with the settlement?


James Garfield Gardiner: We understand that is so. An answer was filed yesterday to a question which set out the objections which were raised by two or three.


Frank Exton Lennard: What advance has been made in connection with the study of vaccines or preventive measures in the case of an outbreak of swine fever?


James Garfield Gardiner: Is the hon. member referring to hog cholera?


Frank Exton Lennard: Yes.


James Garfield Gardiner: We do not know of any in Canada at the moment.


Frank Exton Lennard: I know that.


James Garfield Gardiner: The plan that is followed is to stamp it out whenever it does come across the line. We have restrictions at the border all the time which do not permit the shipment of live hogs into Canada. That is because they have hog cholera on the other side of the line. Whenever it comes across we quarantine it and go to work to wipe out the hogs that have the disease.
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Frank Exton Lennard: How is that done?


James Garfield Gardiner: We destroy the animal, as we did with foot-and-mouth disease. We kill the hogs and compensate the owners.


Frank Exton Lennard: Has any experimentation been carried on with a British preparation called crystal violet hog vaccine?


James Garfield Gardiner: We do not do much experimenting with hog cholera, as the United States are dealing with it all the time and we get all the information from them with regard to ways and means of handling it. When it does cross the line we handle it in that way.


Frank Exton Lennard: What way is that?


James Garfield Gardiner: We get rid of the animals. In so far as preventive measures are concerned, little of that is done in this country. We get all the information from the other side. If we had an epidemic, if it were more widespread, then perhaps we could adopt better measures.


Frank Exton Lennard: You do not like them to use vaccine?


James Garfield Gardiner: No.


Frank Exton Lennard: I understand that crystal violet is supposed not to convey the disease to other animals.


James Garfield Gardiner: We have avoided using vaccines for the reason just suggested by the hon. member.


Frank Exton Lennard: I was wondering if any tests had been made of this crystal violet vaccine, which is recommended in a pamphlet issued by the British ministry of agriculture and fisheries.


James Garfield Gardiner: In order to test it you would have to have cases of the disease. I can assure my hon. friend that I shall have the officials check this matter to see if anything can be gained.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
667. To provide for payment of compensation to owners of animals and poultry affected with diseases coming under the operation of the Animal Contagious Diseases Act, which have died or have been slaughtered under circumstances unprovided for under the above act and regulations thereunder, in the amounts detailed in the estimates, and to authorize payment from vote 25 of the main estimates, 1952-53, of compensation in conformity with the terms of the act for the control and extirpation of foot-and-mouth disease, $75,398.
George Clyde Nowlan: I notice that a substantial part of this vote is in connection with compensation for poultry flocks destroyed in Nova

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Scotia as a result of having contracted Newcastle disease. The hon. member for Cumberland and I both have referred to this before. On what basis is compensation paid? Is it a statutory amount, or by agreement?


James Garfield Gardiner: In so far as Nova Scotia is concerned, it was on the basis of individual losses. I think I put everything on the record the other night when we were discussing the item in the main estimates, with the exception of the total amount paid. A special arrangement was made in each case in Nova Scotia.


George Clyde Nowlan: Are there any outstanding claims in the province?


James Garfield Gardiner: The officials tell me they do not know of any case at the present time.


Mr. Murphy:: The first outbreak of Newcastle disease occurred in Lambton, and I am just wondering if those who suffered this calamity in other places in Canada received better treatment than did the person involved in this first outbreak. On what basis is settlement made?


James Garfield Gardiner: Prior to 1947 Newcastle disease was not reportable under our contagious diseases act and therefore we were not liable for payment. In 1947 it was brought under the act, and since that time payments have been made on the same basis as for other contagious diseases, namely the value of the stock which is slaughtered as agreed upon at the time.	*


Joseph Warner Murphy: That does not answer my question. In this case the man was required to have his henhouses or brooder houses torn down and destroyed. I do not think it is fair for anyone to have to suffer a loss like that. As I say, I believe this was the first case and the department had to strain a point in order to cover it. Is compensation paid for equipment in the way of brooder and henhouses?


James Garfield Gardiner: We compensate for the eggs and birds but we require a man to clean up his own property.


Joseph Warner Murphy: There would be no compensation for brooder and henhouses that were destroyed?


James Garfield Gardiner: We do not require a man to destroy them; we require that they be disinfected.


Joseph Warner Murphy: They were destroyed in that instance.


Hugh Alexander MacKenzie: Mr. Chairman-


James Garfield Gardiner: That must have been before 1947.


Hugh Alexander MacKenzie: Mr. Chairman-


Joseph Warner Murphy: If the hon. member for
Lambton-Kent will keep his seat for a moment it will be better. I know we are both involved in this matter.


Hugh Alexander MacKenzie: I was trying to help the hon. member, that is all.


Joseph Warner Murphy: I know you would like to do what some Grits did in the committee I have just finished sitting on.


James Garfield Gardiner: There were no chickens there.


Joseph Warner Murphy: No, but there were a lot of eggs laid ahead of time. People in the hatchery business buy expensive chickens. I think the hon. member for Lambton-Kent will bear me out when I say that in this particular case the compensation allowed was far short of the cost of the birds.


Hugh Alexander MacKenzie: The hon. member for
Lambton West has tried to interject a little politics into this matter, and that is just as far from my mind as it possibly could be. This happened in 1948 and it concerned the Hay hatcheries. It was the first outbreak of Newcastle disease in Canada. I am sure the officials will recall that.


Joseph Warner Murphy: I want to ask the minister if fairer consideration is being given those who suffer losses from this disease?


James Garfield Gardiner: We do not appear to have any record of that case. I think I can say that as a result of the experience gained in British Columbia and Nova Scotia more effective assistance is being given than was given previously. I do not think we would be in a position to go back and start to deal with the other cases over again because it might be rather difficult to even establish that it is any better now compared with the conditions that existed then.


Joseph Warner Murphy: Will the minister tell the committee whether shippers of chickens to the other side will still be obliged to have these crates disinfected before they come back into this country? I think the hon. member for Lambton-Kent will agree with me that it is from that point that the disease came into Canada.


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes, the returned crates all have to be disinfected when coming back.


Mr. Argue:: There is one matter I should like to draw to the attention of the minister on this item. I have a communication from Mr. Selmar Locken, secretary of the local lodge of the farmers' union at Ratcliffe, Saskatchewan. As the minister knows, Ratcliffe is south of Weyburn, within a few miles of

the United States boundary. I am told that the United States border patrolmen informed farmers living alongside the United States boundary a few days that if any of their cattle happened to stray across the boundary the border patrolmen had orders from the United States department of agriculture to shoot them on sight. I was asked to bring the matter to the attention of the minister in order to find out whether the Canadian government has had any consultation with the United States department of agriculture with respect to this instruction issued to the United States border patrolmen; and if Canadian cattle happen to stay across the boundary and are shot, will any compensation be paid to the owners of these cattle?
It was pointed out in this letter that even though farmers may use the greatest possible care in keeping their cattle within their fences, nevertheless the fences may become broken because of a severe storm or for some other reason and cattle may happen to wander across the line. I am asking the minister now whether this matter has been brought to his attention, and if a number of cattle along that boundary should be shot whether any compensation will be paid to the farmers. As the minister well knows, this is the buffer zone. It is not the quarantine zone, and these cattle are perfectly healthy. I think Americans are unduly concerned about a few head of cattle that may stray out of their pasture into the United States for an hour or two, but in any event if United States patrolmen slaughter Canadian cattle owned by farmers along the boundary will those farmers have some claim for compensation?


James Garfield Gardiner: We have had no knowledge of any such thing. No report of that kind has been made to us. All I can say is that we will check at once to find whether that is the case and have the whole matter looked into. If that were the case I think we would probably have to put on a patrol rather than give any undertaking to compensate at the present time. I am afraid if we were to give an undertaking to compensate, particularly on the same basis as we have compensated others, there might be a lot of them go across the boundary. I should like to check into the whole matter before saying anything more about it.


Hazen Robert Argue: I thank the minister for his assurance that he will have the matter checked. If Canadian patrolmen are stationed along the boundary to see that cattle do not get into the United States I am sure that will be a perfectly satisfactory arrangement. I should also like to ask the minister whether the department has give any consideration to
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building a proper game fence along the boundary to prevent livestock straying across now and in the months to come.


James Garfield Gardiner: No. Up to the present time I do not think we have given any consideration to building a fence along the boundary line.


Hazen Robert Argue: A game fence.


James Garfield Gardiner: A game fence to keep animals from going across.


Hazen Robert Argue: To keep ours at home.


James Garfield Gardiner: We have not undertaken that.


Arthur Laing: I should like to say a word on the whole matter of compensation, because I am surprised to see the basis of compensation and the rates paid in Canada subjected to any criticism at all. I think they are the most generous of any country in the world concerning which I have been able to obtain information.


Hazen Robert Argue: I did not criticize them.


Arthur Laing: I am dealing more with the remarks of the hon. member for Lambton West. I have here the amounts payable for Newcastle disease in British Columbia, and I think they are definitely generous. They went up as high as $8.90 in the case of a pedigreed turkey. Of course those are breeding turkeys. They went up as high as $3 for a capon. They were all of that nature. Payments were made of the nature of 17 cents for day-old unsexed chicks, 32 cents for sexed pullets, and so on. Payments were made on a pretty generous basis, and I should like to remind the committee that a number of the people whose flocks were wiped out in British Columbia received amounts in excess of $25,000. I think that is a pretty fair indication of the way these people were treated in Canada.
Federally in the United States not a five-cent piece is paid by way of compensation for Newcastle disease. Some of the states may have certain arrangements, but federally there is no compensation at all. They tell me that they are living down there with the disease at a cost to the industry of 20 per cent. It costs 20 per cent more in the production of both meat and eggs in order to live with the disease and treat it the way it has been treated there. I believe we have been paying on tuberculosis in cattle since 1911, and the whole history of compensation under this provision for disease in Canada has been quite generous. I think it has been well administered and I should like to hear the odd word of approbation instead of constant criticism.


John Alpheus Charlton: I know the hon. member would want to be fair to the hon. member

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for Lambton West. I am sure the minister admitted that the compensation paid at the present time is much better than the compensation paid in 1948. I do not think the hon. member tor Lambton West was criticizing the amount paid now, but was criticizing the tact that the amount paid now is so much greater-


Arthur Laing: Was he praising it?


John Alpheus Charlton: -than that paid in 1948.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Terminable services-
670. Freight assistance on western feed grains- further amount required, $11,250,000.
George Clyde Nowlan: I am glad to see this item included in the estimates again. The minister has heard me make this comment before, and I am not going to take more than thirty seconds of the committee's time to say it again now. I think, and I am sure many others think, the time has arrived for this to be a matter of permanent government policy rather than to be included in the supplementary estimates on a hand to mouth basis. When I raised the matter last year the minister was away from the house, but he probably looked in his Hansard and saw that the distinguished gentleman sitting alongside him, his parliamentary assistant, was reported at page 4878 of Hansard of last year as
agreeing with that view and saying he would refer it to the minister or the government. I am not sure whether he did, but I think this to be a very opportune time for the minister, in exchange for this way of providing for the matter in a vote, to undertake to see that in future it is dealt with on a permanent basis.


James Garfield Gardiner: The matter has been placed before the government every year by me as minister, and has been accepted annually. It has not been thought advisable to put it in any other form than it is now, but as I said the other day when we were discussing the matter the fact that it has gone on year by year and has not been changed is fair inducement for us to think that probably it is pretty well established. However, none of these things are necessarily absolutely permanent. If I might be permitted to do so, I should like to put on the record a table showing the total tonnage for each province, the total amount of money involved, and what that amounts to per ton by way of freight.


William Alfred Robinson: Is it agreed that the minister shall have leave to put the table
on Hansard?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


James Garfield Gardiner: The table is as follows:
TOTAL TONNAGE ON WHICH FREIGHT ASSISTANCE HAS BEEN PAID AND THE AMOUNT OF MONEY PAID IN CLAIMS FROM OCTOBER 1941 TO MAY 31st, 1952
-	Total Tons	Total amount of money	Average rate per ton over this period
		$ cts.	$ cts.
Ontario	12,288,280	59,366,552 00	4 83Quebec	11,104,913	66,628,569 38	6 00New Brunswick	1,286,769	10,626,980 25	8 27Nova Scotia	1,548,375	14,026,644 80	9 06Prince Edward Island	430,508	3,899,545 45	9 06British Columbia	2,580 906	16,687,616 15	6 47Newfoundland	44,069	895,992 67	20 33Gband Totals fob the Pebiod	29,283,820	172,131,900 70	5 88


George Clyde Nowlan: May I say that the opinion in' Special- the east is that no amount voted by parliament 673 Land protection and reclamation; clearing or spent by this department is better spent and settlement of new lands under such terms and
than this item.	conditions as may be approved by the governor in


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.	council-further amount required, $100,000.
John Alpheus Charlton: Item Mo. 48 in the old estimates was the same, and I see that $100,000 was chopped off this year in the regular estimates but it is added here.


James Garfield Gardiner: It will be noted that in the general estimates the item was cut from $350,000 to $250,000, but when it came to the supplementaries we thought there should be an equal amount this year and this was put into the estimates. Whether or not it will all be used has not been determined.


John Alpheus Charlton: Is this assistance to land clearing in the west?


James Garfield Gardiner: Not necessarily in the west; it is anywhere in Canada.


John Alpheus Charlton: But most of it is spent in the west?


James Garfield Gardiner: Well, we spent $100,000 in Ontario down around lake Erie a couple of years ago.


John Alpheus Charlton: This is interesting. On lake Erie?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes, Erieau, I think it is called. It is south of Chatham, anyway, and there is an area there, as I recall it, where they have about 1,500 acres very intensively operated for the production of vegetables.
There is a dike alongside which protects the area from the lake. As a matter of fact, I think the land is below lake level a little and there has been a dike there for years. People had actually built their summer homes on the dike and the waves coming in from lake Erie were washing away the dike. Some of the houses had even been undermined.
The provincial government and the farmers had been carrying on, and the farmers had been taxed so much an acre. The provincial government was putting up a certain amount for a number of years, but they found the process pretty slow and they applied to us for some help. We put up dollar for dollar with the province for one year and completed it. I understand that if it had not been completed the washing away that has taken place in some other areas along the lake is small compared to what would have happened in that district. It was just a speed-up, and we used $100,000 on that occasion.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
675. To provide for price adjustment on overweight hogs, $100,000.
Hazen Robert Argue: I would like to have an explanation from the minister of the formula that is being used for price adjustment, and to ask how producers can obtain price adjustments.
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James Garfield Gardiner: That has to do with the request we made to farmers at the time the foot-and-mouth disease hit first, to hold their hogs off the market until they were further instructed. Three weeks prior to the 19th April we said that the 19th April would be the last date on which the adjustment would be paid. This $100,000 was to take care of extra payments on account thereof.


Hazen Robert Argue: To whom is the money paid?


James Garfield Gardiner: The money went to the hog producers through the packing houses that bought the hogs.


Hazen Robert Argue: Has this anything to do with a man who sold his hogs for 14 cents a pound and feels that he has a price adjustment coming to him? Or is this something else?


James Garfield Gardiner: The only hogs upon which payment was made were hogs that did go overweight which otherwise would have been A or B. It did not apply to the so-called extra heavyweight hogs because they were probably overweight before.


Hazen Robert Argue: Have the farmers been issued their cheques?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes. The other man you have just spoken of has been taken care of by the packing houses in many cases. Where farmers were paid only 14 cents and should have been paid 18 or 19, under the arrangement we made for canning the pork the packing houses in many cases should have made adjustments and in many cases they have done so. I do not think every farmer who was entitled to it made application, but many of them who did received the adjustment.


Hazen Robert Argue: This is not for hogs that are graded extra heavy with the price quoted at 14 cents a pound.


James Garfield Gardiner: No.


Hazen Robert Argue: Those farmers cannot hope to receive anything more.


James Garfield Gardiner: I would not say that. I have a letter on my desk today from a farmers' union which says a certain farmer did get an adjustment but another did not, and they want to know how the one farmer did get it. The only reply I could give was to write whatever packing house he delivered the hogs to, and probably there will be some adjustment. If there is not he should write to us, and we will take it up.


Hazen Robert Argue: What adjustment is given?


James Garfield Gardiner: The case mentioned here was 4 cents a pound. Apparently the farmer received 15 cents or 14 cents and they later put it up 4 cents.
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William Scottie Bryce: Was that discontinued after the 19th April?


James Garfield Gardiner: The provision referred to in the estimates was, but the other matter has nothing to do with this. It is between the farmer and the packing plant.


William Scottie Bryce: The farmer can claim yet?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
311. Departmental administration, $1,118,455.
Gordon Knapman Fraser: Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask the minister a question. Has the postal department considered denying the royal Canadian postal facilities to communist Endi-cott and his communist peace friends?


Mr. Cote (St. Jean-Iberville-Napierville):: Would you repeat your question?


Gordon Knapman Fraser: I wonder whether the Post Office Department has considered denying the royal Canadian postal facilities to communist Endicott-the one they call "doctor", though I do not know why-and his communist peace friends who are continually sending through the mails peace literature. I wonder if the minister wants to answer now, or whether he would like me to ask a couple more questions.


Alcide Côté: Mr. Chairman, there is no possibility of the department uncovering the matter. If it is in a sealed envelope, I am sorry to answer that we cannot do anything. Where we can find obscenity and things like that we do act.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: Well, Mr. Chairman, I think some of these letters are going through unsealed. Members of parliament have received unsealed letters containing Endicott literature. I should not say it is literature, because it is not; it is just trash. Then there are letters from this peace union which are also unsealed. Members of parliament are receiving them, as do other people throughout the country. There should be some regulation, and I imagine there is, to prevent that stuff going through.


Alcide Côté: Mr. Chairman, we will be happy to do whatever can be done in such cases. If there is a contentious matter we refer it to the Department of Justice to decide; or in other cases we refer the items to the attorney general of the province for action.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: Mr. Chairman, I just want to finish out a couple more questions. Since the department put in the one mail a day system in residential districts across Canada

there has been great dissatisfaction among the postal carriers owing to the fact that it does not mean one postal delivery a day to them but two postal deliveries; and in some cases these men have to make between four and six hundred calls a day. There are one or two routes in Peterborough on which the postmen have to make 600 calls a day. There is a feeling amongst postal delivery men that their pay is not in line with the pay received by policemen or firemen in the various municipalities in which they are working. The postmen feel, too, that since the office workers in the post office receive overtime pay they should also get overtime pay. Is the department doing anything in regard to that?
In the United States postal workers receive what is called special service pay after ten years of service. Is the department considering any such recognition here.


Mr. Cole (Si. Jean-Iberville-Napierville):: I think it is only fair to say that all questions of salary come under the civil service commission. So far as the overtime question is concerned, it is actually under a national joint council survey.


Major James William Coldwell: I should like to ask a question of the minister.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: The minister never answered the question concerning the possibility of having two deliveries a day.


Charles Delmar Coyle: Perhaps I might make a statement on that question. I think it will be immediately apparent to almost anyone that it is impossible to give as good a delivery service on a one delivery per day basis as it was formerly on a minimum of two deliveries a day; therefore, from the standpoint of service to the public, the Post Office Department looks forward to the day when conditions will be such that it will be appropriate to reinstate the minimum two deliveries per day.
On the other hand, I think I should mention that there have been many expressions of opinion from patrons who are now receiving one delivery a day that this service is adequate. I must admit that these expressions of opinion are from private individuals, and are not from business concerns who happen to have located in residential sections and therefore are only receiving the one delivery a day. The department fully realizes the disabilities which these business concerns might conceivably suffer and we have therefore, whenever circumstances have permitted, made a special study of these cases with a view to making such rearrangements as the circumstances permit to improve the service. Today we receive very few complaints indeed, and this in itself I think is an

indication that the department has been able to overcome some of the disadvantages which were brought to our attention immediately the change was made from two deliveries to one delivery. We are not contemplating any change in the one delivery system at the present time but, as I indicated above, we have not ruled out the possibility of reinstating two deliveries when conditions are favourable.
At this point I might mention that to reestablish two deliveries under present circumstances would involve an additional expenditure of over $3 million yearly.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: Owing to the fact that there is only one delivery a day, the post office is losing money. I know of cases where mail is coming from Montreal to Peterborough via express. It was never carried that way before. Mail is passing between other towns and villages via express instead of postal delivery so the people to whom the mail is addressed will receive immediate delivery instead of having to wait until the next day.


Alcide Côté: It is possible, in some classes of mail, that we have had to meet some new competition. I believe that over all we really did economize only to a reasonable amount. Last year our revenues were $122,266,674, compared with $105,533,994 for the year before.


Major James William Coldwell: I have a point connected with economy. The department has been economizing, and the member for Peterborough West has raised one phase of that economy which has been irritating some people. I believe the department is entirely overlooking the inconveniences that are caused in many country places by the economies that have been put into effect in the rural areas. I know of cases where postmasters in the small places, who are putting in what happens to be almost a full day and providing the premises, are getting as little as $85 or less a month. That however, is not the point I intended to make.
I have before me a complaint from one of my constituents that a small office in the province of Saskatchewan-I might as well name it, the hamlet of Surbiton-has had a change of status. This is a farming area, a good community, but where unfortunately for me so far as the territorial extent of my constituency goes the farms have been largely consolidated and the population has become depleted in the past two or three decades. Last January the status of this office was changed from an accounting office to a nonaccounting office, and that curtails the service automatically.
In the non-accounting offices the postmaster cannot issue money orders for more than $15,
55704-265i
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and so far as postal notes are concerned he is restricted as to numbers and denomination, etc. Such an office is not allowed to issue radio licences. In those areas the greatest inconvenience is caused to patrons of the post office during the winter months of the year when it is difficult to go long distances by automobile. In that period, as in other periods, if a person wishes to send a mail order or remit money through the post office in an amount exceeding $15 he has to ask the postmaster at the local post office to send to an accounting office for the money order. It may be that there are only one, two or three trains a week, and consequently you can understand the tremendous inconvenience that is caused under the circumstances.
I believe the department does not really understand the extent of the inconvenience in the rural districts of provinces that are somewhat sparsely settled like the province of Saskatchewan where, as I say, you have consolidated farms and great distances between farms. Many of these people are quite well to do, particularly in the area I am discussing. At times they are unable to get to an accounting office, and so are unable to get a postal note or money order for more than $15 in order to get supplies they need from the cities of Saskatoon, Regina or some other place.
I am bringing this to the attention of the postmaster, because I believe this is a false economy. It is always false economy when lack of service of this description causes great inconvenience to post office patrons. After all, the post office is, to a large extent, a public service. We know it sometimes operates at a deficit, but those who live in the cities have all the conveniences and are asking, as the hon. member for Peterborough West did, for more conveniences. I say some consideration should be given to the people who live in the rural areas and are obliged to do their business at these non-accounting offices.


Alcide Côté: may say to my hon. friend that it all depends on circumstances and the demand in the locality. When we are asked to give authority to issue money orders in large amounts, we investigate each case and accordingly grant the authority to write money orders for greater amounts where the circumstances justify, and the postmaster is competent to undertake the accounting.


Major James William Coldwell: I am going to ask the minister to investigate this particular case at Surbiton.


Mr.   Coie@St. Jean-Iberville-Napierville: shall be pleased to do so.

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Major James William Coldwell: There are a number of other cases. I did not take a note of one that was given to me in the southern part of the province when I was there. I could not tell you the name of the village or hamlet. There are other cases, however. They may not be brought to the attention of the minister as I have brought this one to his attention at the present time. Perhaps by the very fact that he says something might be done if cases are brought to his attention, those who read Hansard or who read the newspapers will be enabled to bring other cases to his attention.


Mr.   Coie@St. Jean-Iberville-Napierville: shall be pleased to have those cases investigated.


Mr. Fair:: Mr. Chairman, I also have a case of false economy to bring to the attention of the minister, but I shall wait until eight o'clock.
At six o'clock the committee took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The committee resumed at eight o'clock.
Louis-René Beaudoin: We were considering
item 311.


Robert Fair: Mr. Chairman, when the committee rose at six o'clock I had given the Postmaster General notice that I had another economy measure to discuss with him after eight o'clock. This has to do with the service given by the Post Office Department at Furness post office, located on the Saskatchewan side of the fourth meridian. About 20 years ago two or three small country post offices were closed in order that the residents of this district might have rural mail service. A man by the name of W. A. McLeod was giving good service, though receiving only $500 a year. This service was given twice a week over a 24-mile route, serving 31 householders. He had a four-year contract which expired on March 31, 1951. On March 30 service was suspended because Mr. McLeod refused to renew his contract at the old rate of $500.
During the debate last session the Postmaster General told us that the average increase was 17 per cent. Mr. McLeod put in a tender at $600, just slightly more than the 17 per cent increase, and indicated that he would not do the work for any less. That, I might add, is not a very big wage anywhere. In the midst of its economy drive, headed by the former Postmaster General, the Post Office Department would not increase the amount from $500. After the residents were without mail service for nearly three months

they got in touch with me and asked me to see the officials here in Ottawa. I got busy, starting away down the line, and continuing until I reached the deputy postmaster general. I was not able to get any increase for some considerable time. Finally they said they would have to do something about it, and offered to raise the amount to $600. By that time the man who had been carrying on -and he is not a young man any more- had found other work to do. They were unable to get anyone else to tender. The postmaster at Furness offered to do the work for $600 per year until such time as he could not do it by motorcar. The department decided that was not satisfactory. The result has been that those people have been without mail service of any kind. They do their business in Lloydminster, a town more than 20 miles away from most. of those people.
I feel they are entitled to at least rural mail service, even though it costs a little more than $600 a year. I believe the amount would have to be increased before anyone could be secured to do the work. While people in other parts of the country are enjoying daily mail service-and even complaining about that, with their mail delivered to their doors-those people away out in the country, the pioneers, have been without mail service for more than a year. They received their last mail a year ago last March.
Possibly the former Postmaster General was sent to the bench so we might have someone else heading the administration of the department. We now have a new man there. He is a good-natured looking fellow, and always has a smile. I do not know that he will always be able to say that he can grant requests made, but I would ask him to take this matter under advisement.


Douglas Charles Abbott: I hope not; it would be hard on the treasury.


Robert Fair: Let me remind the Minister of Finance that when he and the Minister of National Revenue want to levy taxes against the farmers in that section of the country, they see to it that those taxes are paid, and that they pay interest on the amount of unpaid taxes. So perhaps the Minister of Finance should reconsider his objections.
I have had a number of letters in the last few months from rural mail couriers who are asking that something be done for them. I know they are operating under the tender system. As I have explained to many of them, if they tender too low it is their own fault. But here was an instance of a man who had tendered at a reasonable rate but who will not receive the contract. He becomes fed up with the department, and will not

work for it any longer because in the meantime he has obtained something else to do that is paying better wages.
I believe that on the whole, when we compare their pay to that received by other people in the post office as well as in other departments, the rural couriers are doing their job too cheaply. These men who go out in all kinds of weather, both winter and summer, are deserving of much better pay and better consideration than they are now receiving. The prices of the cars they have to buy to give the service have increased, as have also all other expenses. This should be taken into consideration when contracts are being let.
I hope the Postmaster General will give the people in the area to which I have referred the service to which they are entitled, because they are still Canadians, even though they are away out in Alberta.


Mr. McCubbin:: Mr. Chairman, I wish at the outset to congratulate the Prime Minister upon the very fine choice he made as Postmaster General. I know that once the minister becomes familiar with his department-and he will soon do that-he will do credit to that portfolio.
I do not wish to be critical at this late stage in the session, but I wish to say a word on behalf of the rural mail couriers. They are a group of men and women- because they are not all men; many of them in my own constituency are ladies-who go out in all kinds of weather to carry the queen's mail up and down the concessions and side roads, carrying letters and papers to the farmers living there. They give this service every day, winter and summer, good weather and bad, hot or cold. I do not know of any finer group of men and women anywhere giving service to the people of Canada. But I do not think the government is fair in the wages or salaries it pays these people. This is one group of government servants not being paid what they deserve. Someone may say, "Well, what about the tender system? It may have its imperfections, but these persons have taken the jobs on a tender basis. The -only way they could receive more money would be to throw up their contracts, and re-tender".
I do not think this is good enough. When a man is giving good service in other branches of government employment, I know an effort is made to raise his pay. This is done, too, in private business. We try to give them what they deserve. The same does not hold true in connection with rural mail couriers. They are allowed to continue
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year after year, four-year term after four-year term, without any change. I know some in my own riding who have been giving service for more than thirty years, and in all that time have received only one increase in pay.
I know it has been said that a committee will be set up at the next session to reconsider the whole system, but that is not good enough. We want these people to get a salary increase and we would like to see them get it now. There are certain ways of doing it. One would be to provide a supplementary payment as was done in 1948. I think the government and the Postmaster General should take this matter under consideration to see if something cannot be done to assist these noble government employees.


Ellen Louks Fairclough: Mr. Chairman, I am sure that in these last few hours of the session the Postmaster General will realize that some of the usual amenities fall by the wayside, but on behalf of the official opposition I have pleasure in congratulating him upon his appointment to the office he now holds and wishing him every success. There are a few things I should like to bring up this evening on these estimates, some of which have been mentioned already by my colleagues.
In particular I should like to refer to a matter which was mentioned briefly this afternoon by the hon. member for Peterborough West; that is, the reversion to two deliveries of mail a day in urban centres. This is a matter which claimed our attention last year and on which many of us spoke. The claim was made by the Post Office Department that economy was made possible by reducing this service, but I find on looking at the estimates that whereas the department budgeted last year for $97 million its actual expenditure was in excess of that figure. I hope the minister will have figures at hand to show the real results of this move.
I realize full well that the matter of one a day, two a day, three a day or four a day delivery is of concern only to urban municipalities and consequently has little relation to the over-all picture. I do know that in adopting this new delivery plan a great deal of overtime was necessary, as well as the employment of additional inside staff to do the extra sorting required. When the minister comes to answer questions I should like him to indicate what was paid out last year for overtime and for the employment of additional inside staff.
The hon. member for Peterborough West asked a question which was answered, but as I did not hear the answer I shall have to read it in Hansard tomorrow. I do hope that con-

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sideration is being given to the reinstatement of two a day delivery for residential walks in urban centres. This is a matter of concern to all people in business or in the professions in our growing municipalities. I do not think I can do better than describe a situation which exists in Hamilton in what is currently regarded by the Post Office Department as a residential walk.
Within that walk there is a club which possibly could do with one delivery a day. Next door to that club is the Bell Telephone Company. Next door to the Bell Telephone Company is a well-known restaurant above which are a number of professional offices. Next door again is a hotel which also contains many shops and professional offices. Around the corner and down the side street is the head office of one of the largest canneries in the Dominion of Canada. Down the back street is the Y.M.C.A. and a stockbroker's office, as well as several other business offices. I think I have given enough information to indicate the character of this so-called residential walk.
Within the past six months it was necessary for me to move my office from a location which was serviced with three a day delivery. I moved only three and a half blocks and have one a day delivery at 8.30 in the morning. This means that mail from Toronto, Montreal, Chicago or New York does not reach me until twenty-four hours later. I know a similar situation exists in the business and professional offices located in the block in which my office is located, and which is only three and a half blocks from the centre of the city of Hamilton.
During the past few years, with the shortage of building materials and so on, many people have moved out of their uptown offices into what was formerly residential accommodation which had been converted into office space because of its central location. I suppose the answer to this complaint will be that these persons could go to the central post office, which in this case is only six blocks away, rent a post office box and collect their mail. We would be glad to do that, but unfortunately the central post office has no boxes for sale. All of that type of accommodation is taken up. One is faced with the situation that unless his clients and customers and other correspondents use special delivery in each case, his mail will be delayed by twenty-four hours.
I have had numerous letters from people in Hamilton which I do not propose to read into the record at this stage, but they prove that mail for delivery within the city of

Hamilton has taken as much as three days when the distance involved was only half a mile.
I am sure the Postmaster General will be the first to say that a situation like this cannot be condoned in a department which pretty well pays its own way. Within a short time we have had an increase in rates. We all realize that costs have increased, and I am sure the businessmen of this country consider that postage is the least of their expenses. I am sure also that they would be willing to pay more for post office service if they could obtain it. But when one is stymied at every point, when one cannot receive mail which he knows is in transit either by applying at the central post office or by having it delivered at his premises, it is indeed a cause for some' concern. So I ask the Postmaster General to tell us what is contemplated, and I hope he will say it is not going to be very long until at least two a day delivery is reinstated on residential walks within municipalities.
With this in mind I think I should read into the record a rather amusing commentary which appeared in a local newspaper. It is headed, "Those were the days", and reads as follows:
Maddened businessmen impatiently awaiting letters which travel from city to city across Canada with all the speed of a pony express are wondering just how much progress there has been in the past sixty years. In April, 1892, the postmaster for Hamilton was pleased to announce an extra afternoon delivery of mail in the downtown area. This made not two, not three, but four deliveries of mail daily. Local mail received at the general post office by 2 p.m. was promised delivery the same day. Today it can easily take a letter two or three days to travel three blocks in the city. To secure any reasonable guarantee of early delivery a letter must have a 10-cent special delivery stamp attached. For householders there is only one delivery a day, sometimes late in the afternoon. Looking back at 1892, it looks as though at least in one department the clock has been turned back a very long way.
I realize that all departments of the government have great problems in these days of rising costs and demands for economy, but in a department which has consistently had considerable revenue flowing into it, as well as expenses out of it, it seems to me there is very little reason for curtailing a service which after all keeps the business, industrial, commercial and professional life in this country flowing. I hope the minister has taken all this into consideration and will give us a favourable answer. I hope he will reinstate if not three at least two deliveries a day on the residential walks many of which now service commercial and professional enterprises within municipalities.
There is one other matter of which I wish to speak, and it is one that has been brought

up in the house on many occasions. I refer to the problem of charges on food parcels to the United Kingdom. I do not think there is an hon. member in the house who is not aware of the explanations that have been given on former occasions. We have been told many times that one of the mail problems is the reluctance of the post office department of the United Kingdom to make any reasonable concessions in the matter of postal rates in their country. However, we live in a country of plenty and there are a great many people in Canada who have friends and relatives in the old land. They are worried about them. They would like to help them out if only to the extent of one food parcel a month, but when they take their parcels to a post office they find all too frequently that the cost of the postage on the parcel exceeds the cost of the food contained therein. They are quite willing to buy the food and send it to their friends and relatives in the old land, but they cannot see why the government of Canada should not go along with them at least part of the way in some sort of alleviation of the added expense of postal charges.
I have here a letter which has come to me within the current month. Again I shall not read it into the record because it is the old story. Why can we not have lower postal rates on food parcels to Great Britain? As my second main question I ask the Postmaster General whether his department cannot consider some concessions in postal rates on food parcels to the old country without regard to the fact that the United Kingdom cannot accede to any request that may be made by this government for collaboration in that respect.
In an effort to co-operate with the Postmaster General's department and with the house in general I shall only make these two requests. In the first instance I ask that two a day delivery at least be reinstated on residential walks throughout the country, and in the second place I ask that serious reconsideration be given the postal rates on food parcels to Great Britain.


Hugh Alexander MacKenzie: Mr. Chairman, I quite appreciate that at this time of the session any long drawn out remarks would be very unpopular. As a matter of fact I am very glad the Minister of Public Works has left, because he was giving me a rather frowning look a few minutes ago, and I do not want to be diverted from the few observations I should like to make. I quite agree with those who have spoken that across the board economy should be practised in all government departments; but do not forget that the Post Office Department goes hand in hand
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with the development and progress of our great dominion. I think it is one of the last departments where we should make any drastic cuts in service in order to practise economy, because to me that would be false economy.
I suppose this question has come up every time the estimates of the Post Office Department have come before the house. I want to speak for a moment about rural mail delivery and the rural set-up as we have it in this country. Rural mail delivery was established in Canada some 44 years ago. That is a long time ago. The riding of Lambton-Kent which I have the honour to represent has some 80 rural mail services. There are in Canada approximately 5,200 rural mail routes with about 7,500 side services, which means that we have all told around 12,700 rural mail routes and side services throughout Canada. These couriers travel approximately 120,000 miles a day and deliver mail to approximately
375,000	boxes throughout the dominion, so they render quite a service and the work they do is quite extensive.
As hon. members will recall, last year the Post Office Act was amended so the postal department could adjust salaries paid under rural mail contracts that were less than $1,000 per annum. To me that was not a forward step. To me that did not solve the problems of rural mail delivery at all. As a matter of fact I am inclined to think it rather complicated the situation because at the moment there is a certain amount of discrimination. The person who is receiving under $1,000 gets his salary adjusted but the person who is receiving over $1,000 must throw the route open to public tender; and under the Post Office Act it is emphasized so often by the officials that the lowest tender must be accepted provided the party is reliable and furnishes good bondsmen.
The service was started under a public tender system and the tender is for a contract for a full year. I do not know of any other branch of the post office service that operates under a public tender system. There is no other branch having to do with Her Majesty's mail that I know of that employs the contract system. Don't forget that the janitors and caretakers in the post offices do not tender for their positions. Their jobs are set up for them and the positions are awarded through the civil service commission. There is a mail courier in Watford, Ontario, who has delivered mail for some 42 years. I would think that is something of a record. During those 42 years of service he has never to my knowledge had a public tender called because he had established himself and could not afford to

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take the chance of throwing the route open to public tender. He did get a small adjustment when the Mail Contracts Supplemental Payments Act was inaugurated during 1947 and 1948. A small adjustment was made then, but since that time no adjustment has been made. I would say, too, that in the suburban areas where the contracts are made for four years initially, the number of boxes may have been comparatively small but boxes may since have been established all along the line and the carrier may have twice as many boxes to serve. There is no way around that.
Again X say the system of public tender is wrong. I quite appreciate that the post office officials, efficient as they may be, feel that it is a difficult job to set up a system where public tender is not necessary; but I wonder what the deputy postmaster general or some of the senior officials, who get a fair salary as the public accounts will show, would think if they were asked to put in a public tender to compete for their jobs. You would say, and they would say, that would not be fair at all. Of course it is not fair, but at the same time that is the system they have followed throughout the years with respect to these carriers. I would say that there are a lot of injustices in the present set-up.
Under the present Post Office Act there are no regulations which say that rural mail service can be extended on this spur or that spur. It is left entirely to the discretion of one or two men in the Post Office Department, and I do not think that is a fair way of doing it.
I am quite pleased that the Postmaster General has stated that he is willing to set up a committee to study this problem and report to the house, as a possible method of getting away from the public tender system. Well, that is all right I quite agree; but it is nothing new. That has been suggested for many years. The fact is that it has never been approved and although it is a good idea it would be so slow in operation that I do not think it worth while at the present time.
So I would say to the Post Office Department that they should re-establish the system in force in the postal service during 1947 and 1948. They then gave the rural mail carriers and those handling the mail some degree of equality of pay across the board. I think that could be done again; but this system you have now, the $1,000 plan, gets away from the idea entirely and you have the same inequalities of pay that you had before. I would entreat the Post Office Department to re-enact the Mail Contracts Supplemental Payments Act again to take care of the injustices that

do exist in the post office service, and specifically among rural mail carriers, until such time as you have a committee set up which can bring in something that will be fair, equitable and just to a body of men and women who do give good service in this country, and who are not used as fairly as other post office employees.


Henry Alfred Hosking: I take part in this debate because I think it would be advantageous to the minister, who is assuming a new portfolio, to hear and learn some of the problems that confront his department as they are known to members who live in various sections of the country which are serviced by his department.
I would like to congratulate him at the outset on his announcement that at the next session a committee will be set up to look into the service given and the operation of his department. I believe he will obtain much information from that committee which will make it easier for him to give the service that his department is capable of giving. I think we as members should appreciate the fact that he has made this announcement. However, I think it would be wise at this time to state a few of the principles upon which his department has grown.
The postal department has always been very proud of its record and of the tradition that "the mail must go through". As long as I can remember I have always understood that there was nothing more important than Her Majesty's or His Majesty's mail, and that the mail must go through. That feeling is built upon tradition, and is one which most of the employees of the department fulfil at all times.
I cannot help but feel that in the last year it has been greatly jeopardized. In fact I do not think I would be very far wrong in suggesting that the instigation of the one delivery a day gave all employees across the board a feeling that it did not matter if the mail did not go through. To me that is one of the serious objections to this one delivery a day. If that change has broken down the high spirit, the integrity, and the strong feeling of urgency all employees should have that the mail must be delivered, that they must get it out, that it is not theirs, that they are handling it for the Queen and it must go out; if the feeling that they need not bother delivering the mail today has permeated those delivering the mail, then I think we have done a great disservice to this country.
I live in a city that is affected by this one delivery a day in the residential areas, and I hope this minister will make every

effort to re-instil into his staff that wonderful spirit, the esprit de corps that they had, the thought that they have an important job which they must do and which they must not leave unfinished. If he can do that he will be worthy of the gratitude of the citizens of this country. I am quite confident that he is able to do that, but the job is not easy.
Speaking of the rural mail carriers I would suggest that efficiency is very important in the government, but I do not believe there is any more efficient way to operate our rural carriers than on the tender system. I would point this out to the minister, and to ask him for some action, if possible, during this year. I would have no complaint about the tender system if the cost of living were not rising; but just imagine a person who tendered for a mail route four years ago and today is operating at that same tender price, when we all know that the cost of his gasoline, of his automobile and of his own time has practically doubled. Now he is in a position where he is not adequately paid, and the only way he can have any adequate readjustment is by asking to have his route put up for tender.
Everyone knows there are many mail carriers, and I would point this out if I may. In my riding the best rural mail carriers are those who have been doing the job for some time. For some reason or other they are better regarded by the people they serve. Perhaps it is because they operated in a different era than those who are starting today. But I am quite confident that they give the best service, and they are the ones who have to put their jobs up for tender, not because they want more money for doing the job but in order to cover the increased costs of operation and of their living.
I would ask the minister, therefore, to give every consideration to these people, and to find some means of giving better treatment to the employee who is most conscientious, the one who has operated for years and years and about whom the members of parliament hear no complaints whatever. Some way should be found of adjusting the salaries of these employees in order to balance up the increased cost of living. If the minister could do that he would be doing a service to all the people who enjoy the benefits of our wonderful mail service in this country.
Before I sit down, Mr. Chairman, I would like to say that my deskmate, the hon. member for Kent, who is absent through illness, has asked me to say that he has 55704-266
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exactly the same feelings as those I have expressed tonight.


Winfield Chester Scott McLure: At the outset I might say, Mr. Chairman, that on Monday, June 9, when the Postmaster General introduced his estimates, I was anxious to congratulate him on being appointed to this high position in the cabinet. Let me say to him that we may be criticizing his department, but I want him to understand that my criticisms will be directed against the department and not against him because he is a new man on the job. A year from now, if we all come back, we might then direct our criticisms against the Postmaster General. I would say to the Postmaster General that the best slogan for him to adopt would be to be like the postage stamp; if it is to be of any use, it must stick to its job. The Postmaster General must do the same. Some postmasters general took too active a part in politics, especially in by-elections, but they are not with us now so we had better leave them alone.
With reference to the postal department, I do want to say that it serves more people and comes in contact with more people than possibly all the other departments put together. It is a great manufacturing department. It is the one department that manufactures a little article called a stamp; no one really knows the cost of it, but I am told that it is about l/100th of a cent. This department sells some stamps for 1 cent, some for 2 cents, some for 3 cents and a huge number of them at 4 cents. Then they sell some more costing 5 cents, 10 cents and as high as 20 cents. It is for that reason I call the department a great manufacturing department, and that is where the profits come from.
For years I have been interested in this department, because there was always a surplus of $10 million, $12 million and sometimes as high as $13 million. All of a sudden this huge profit disappeared and became a deficit of over $1 million. I do not think that should have happened. After having the benefit of increasing the rates by 50 per cent, the department shows a decline from a profit of $10 million or $13 million to a deficit. It is very difficult for me to understand how that could take place. I am not going to deal with many generalities, because I have too many problems nearer and dearer to me than the generalities of the postal department. I see the Minister of Public Works putting on his glasses to get another look at me.
I might say, Mr. Chairman, that I have nothing but the highest praise for the great

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postal system of this young Canada of ours. We have a post office in Charlottetown-I am not speaking of the building; that will come later-that is exceptionally well run. I doubt if any province has a post office of the same size with the same number of employees that is giving any greater service to the people. Right from the postmaster and the inspector down to the mail carriers and the stamp vendor-about whom I shall have a few words to say later on-all give good service.
I believe the department has not dealt properly with our province because it has not been made a postal zone the same as the provinces of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. Why should we as a province, with all the rights of any other province, be tied to the Saint John post office? Here we have a post office which is just as good in the way it is set up and the men who are employed as the Saint John or Halifax post offices. At the same time we do not enjoy the authority to conduct our own business.
Let us look at the set-up. First of all the department at Ottawa sets up a regional controller with a head office in Moncton. He takes charge of the maritime area including the Magdalen islands. Under him is Mr. W. R. Ingram, district director of postal services at Saint John, New Brunswick. He has control over New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and the Magdalen islands. There is a separate district director at Halifax for the province of Nova Scotia. Formerly Prince Edward Island was able to conduct its own business, but the department at Ottawa abolished our district. Now what happens? We have a very capable post office inspector at Charlottetown, Mr. Coyle. We also have a postmaster, Mr. Connolly. Both are good men. We shall suppose, and I have known of such cases, someone from a rural section comes in with some trouble, or perhaps to obtain some article he requires. He goes in to see the postmaster at Charlottetown who says, "You need that, and we will get it for you". He must then go through to the post office inspector, but that is right next door to him in Charlottetown. Then they must go through to Mr. Ingram in Saint John, New Brunswick. Well, it depends on the time of day when they get through to him by telephone or telegraph. He may be out. Then when they get through to him he cannot decide it. He has to go through to Mr. W. C. McEachern, the regional director at Moncton. It may perhaps be his day off and he may be out golfing. Then Mr. McEachern cannot act. He must go back to Ottawa. Instead of our doing our own business, by

the time it gets back to Ottawa it may be a week end; they do not work Saturdays or Sundays, and on Monday they are still playing golf.
It takes from seven to ten days for this little item to be settled, when it could be settled in ten minutes by our own inspector or our own post office man. I want to say again that the department here had no right to abolish the district director and take away from the province of Prince Edward Island, and from the city of Charlottetown in particular, the right to run its own business with regard to postal matters.
I put this matter up to the Postmaster General last year, but he is now gone; nothing was done about it. It was never mentioned, it probably never came up for consideration.
So much for the postal department. I now want to deal for a few minutes with another matter. When the Postmaster General was introducing his estimates the other night he made a statement that came close to the hearts of many on this side of the house- because we have been pleading for it ever since 1945-when he announced that it was his intention at the next session to set up a parliamentary committee to study the problems of the rural mail couriers. This announcement was received with rejoicing by most of us.
I am rather surprised at what has happened tonight. When I turn back to other occasions when a number of us were speaking on this particular subject, we find that there was complete silence on the other side of the house. But tonight we find two or three of them wanting to get on the bandwagon. We are glad to have their assistance; and when the time comes for the Postmaster General to set up this committee I am sure it will be able to lay down a plan that will do away with the discrimination that exists today and that will give these mail couriers the treatment they deserve. They are among the finest people we have employed in any way. They are faithful. Let us deal with them as they deserve to be dealt with. I am sure a committee will assist the Postmaster General.
For the benefit of the Postmaster General in view of the decision he has already made, namely that he is going to set up this committee, I just want to give an idea of some of the discrimination that exists in the mail routes. I am going to deal only with the district I know, namely my own constituency of Queens.
In this constituency the couriers have different routes to travel. As I said, I am going to deal only with those I know. I am going

to take them from the standpoint of the distances travelled and the services being rendered. I just want to show the Postmaster General what discrimination exists. For instance, I have before me contracts for six miles, and in those contracts I find a difference of $100 for doing the same work, travelling the same distance, over the same conditions of roads and giving the same service. All of them give good service; but even in a distance of six miles, here is $100 of a difference. Then we go to the distance of eight miles, and we find there a difference of $120, for the same class of work, giving the same service. Then when you move along to the distance of nine miles, and the figure is still going up-we find a $150 difference in the contracts. Then coming to the contracts for ten miles, I find there is a difference of $250 a year between contracts covering ten miles. Let us go a little bit further and go to the 13-mile limit. Here are contracts of men driving 13 miles, over practically the same kind of roads-most of them dirt roads, as we say-both of them having the same conditions in the winter and the same conditions in the summer. Here we find a difference of $310 in two or three contracts.
That is not so bad. We now come to the worst ones. We first come to the contracts with regard to 14 miles. Here we find a difference of $360. You can take these and follow the thing along, but let us go to the case of a man driving 15 miles. Here is a difference of $690 on a mail contract. One contractor drives 15-2 miles. He serves 48 boxes and gets $875 making six trips a week. Another contractor drives 15 miles; the distance is a little bit less. He serves 46 boxes, two boxes less, and receives $1,565. He was shrewder in getting his contract through. That man, at $1,565, is not getting one nickel too much; but the other poor fellow is being gypped by the department to the tune of $690 a year and probably does not know it. I am not mentioning any names here because the department can easily turn them up and find out exactly who they are.
The same thing goes on with respect to contractors driving 16 miles. I am not going to tire you with too many of these lut there is a $260 difference there. With respect to those driving 16 miles over a fair road, there is a difference in their contracts of $510. That is discrimination of the worst kind. Whether it is due to patronage, whether it is due to political influence or to the system of tendering I leave it to the department to judge.
Then we come to another case, that of a man driving 17 3/10 miles daily. He serves only 28 boxes and receives $930. His
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neighbour, on the next mail route, drives only 17 miles, serves 12 boxes more than the first man, and receives $1,440, or a difference of $510. These routes are within a few miles of each other.
For the benefit of the department, and so these facts will be on record, I should like to set out a few more cases. This refers to one man driving 18 miles. As a matter of fact there are four of these in Prince Edward Island, and there is a difference in their contracts of $600.
Let us take another case. One of these men drives 21 miles. As a matter of fact I think the actual distance is 21 2/10. I know the route very well because I have been over it lots of times. This man serves 42 boxes and receives $1,140. He makes six trips a week, and must travel over a bad road in the spring. The other courier drives 21 1/2 miles and serves 76 boxes, and for this receives $1,760, or nearly $600 more; and he does less work.
Then let us go on to another case. The first of these mail couriers drives 22 1/2 miles, serves 51 boxes and receives $1,200, while his neighbour who drives four miles less gets $360 a year more.
That is your tender system for you! The worst of it is that the tender system is not entirely to blame. I think the department here in Ottawa is to blame for a good deal of it.
Then we find a much greater discrepancy when we deal with longer routes. I have in mind one man who drives 27 miles and another who drives 28. There is a great difference here, both in the service given and the number of boxes served. The man serving the greater number of boxes-I believe he serves 73-receives $1,440, while the other man who serves a lesser number and drives a shorter distance receives $2,200. As I said a moment ago, the man who is receiving $2,200 is not getting a nickle too much. I could go on to give the facts respecting others who drive 30 or 35 miles, but I believe the information I have given is sufficient to indicate to the minister that there is great discrimination here.
I have a further criticism to make of the Post Office Department. Only a short time ago a contract was up for tender. This was in connection with a 15-mile route. The man who had held the job threw up the tender because he said he could not make it pay at that price, and he had no help on his farm. I believe the amount received was $1,550. This man went to his neighbour, who had plenty of help, and the neighbour said, "Yes, I will take it off your hands, if I can get it." The department said, "No,

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you cannot have it; we have to call for tenders." Tenders were called for and, in order to be sure he would get it, this man put in a tender for $1,525, and felt sure he would get it. He received no notice that his tender had not been accepted. However, a short time later he received notification to this effect: "No; we are going to get someone else to tender." They called for tenders over again; and in doing this I believe they were acting outside the law, because they went to another district and brought in a man from there. I have always thought that was against post office regulations. How this man who got the tender knew what the other man had tendered, I do not know. However the second man tendered at $1,200 and, naturally, he got the contract.
If the Post Office Department here in Ottawa would look into these cases and not try to save $10 or $15 a month on these poor mail couriers I believe it would be much better. They should ask themselves this question, "Has this man who is tendering given us good service?" If that were done I think we would get down to a basis under which these men would be properly paid, and when they meet one another one would not say to the other, "I am driving the same distance you are, but you are receiving $500 a year more than I." Yet in the face of this discouragement these men are as honest as the sun. Throughout the length and breadth of this country we hear of very few cases of mail couriers getting into serious trouble.
I have spoken on behalf of the mail couriers because I feel sure the new Postmaster General will give us an opportunity to take up this matter. I have confidence that hon. members will put a plan before the department that will be workable and fair, and do away with this discrimination.
I have one further point to discuss, and then X believe I shall have finished. Some time ago I discussed with the department the superannuation of personnel of the naval or air forces serving in the Korean theatre of war. The question has been asked whether their military service would count on their superannuation, and in this connection I have received several letters from the department. The deputy postmaster general wrote me on March 24, and still the question is not settled. I believe that with the assistance of his deputy minister the Postmaster General will soon have the matter disposed of. I understand treasury board is blocking the efforts being made. Those who enlisted in the Korean force should receive a square deal in respect of their superannuation, and a decision as to who should pay it.

Then I have one further point to raise, about which I have spoken before and received a partial promise. I refer to the stamp vendor in the post office at Charlottetown. This person has been there for 52 years, under agreement with the Post Office Department that a 2 per cent commission would be paid on all sales in the post office and on all stamps sold in the Charlottetown area. He was able to make a fair living on that 2 per cent, but then the department put in these meter machines which take away 50 per cent of his revenue. They are wonderful machines for business; I have no objection to them, but this man should be compensated when they are used.


Mr. Gibson:: Is there any other deal like that for vending postage stamps?


Winfield Chester Scott McLure: I could not tell my hon. friend.


John Lambert Gibson: Perhaps the Postmaster General will tell us later.


Winfield Chester Scott McLure: This man has had this contract with the department for 52 years, during which he has given wonderful service. He must work from eight o'clock in the morning until eight at night, though I understood recently they were going to cut off twenty-five or thirty minutes from the day, no rest period, no meal hour, as he had to employ somebody to sell while he was out.
If you figure this up on the basis of the eight-hour day worked by others you find that this man has given 76 years of service. He is now around 80 years of age and the department tells him that he must get out. But they cannot turn him out because he has given good service. Before I left home I said to him, "Don't let them push you out, whatever you do; if you can just make ends meet, go ahead and stay there".
If the law enters into this matter this man should be able to sue the department. He should be able to get a fiat, as the hon. member for Lake Centre would say. There is not a judge in the land who would not say he should be paid for the business the meter machines have taken away. I am sure the Postmaster General would agree with that. When he looks into the matter I hope he will say to himself, "If I were in that position I would not stand for it; I would try to get back at the government so I would get a rate under my contract which would give the return it gave before I had these machines as competition". He applied to the department and asked that he be given 3 per cent on his sales, which would just about equal what he was losing because of the meter machines.

There are many other things that could be taken up with the minister, but as the hour is late and we are all anxious to see the session close I conclude by asking the Postmaster General and his officials to take notice of what I have said in regard to our post office. They must not forget that we just want back the right we obtained under the agreement of 1873 when we joined the Dominion of Canada. We did not join as a bloc of land; we went into the dominion as a self-governing colony. We had a good government, too. The only mistake we made was to go into union without having a better contract. The contract we entered into has never been fully lived up to. Let us go back to first principles and treat Prince Edward Island as a postal unit as it was before this division occurred.


Mr. Anderson:: Mr. Chairman, I should like to say a few words on behalf of the rural mail carriers of Canada whom I believe are the most poorly paid of any people in the government service. These contracts are let by tender, usually for three years, and these people must travel every working day in the year with the exception of statutory holidays. They do not get three weeks holidays with pay as do others in the service. As the previous hon. member said, if they want to take a day off they must get someone else to take their place.
Quite often these men can do no other work. The nature of the rural carrier's work is not such that he starts at seven in the morning and finishes at noon; he generally starts in the forenoon and finishes some time in the afternoon. There is not enough time left in the day to permit him to engage in any other work and the result is that this is his only income. I would appreciate if the minister .would give this matter his full consideration.


Major James William Coldwell: Mr. Chairman, I want to join with others in the pleas that have been made on behalf of the rural mail carriers. Those of us who live on the prairies and have seen the rural mail carriers driving week in and week out along prairie roads, whether it be hot or whether it be sub-zero weather, realize that the inadequacy of their remuneration constitutes a scandal as far as parliament is concerned.
This is my 21st session of parliament; and back over the years, with the exception of special sessions, hon. members have joined together from all sides of the house to make a plea on behalf of the rural mail carriers. Yet so far nothing satisfactory has been done
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for them. As the hon. member for Queens said a few moments ago, the contract system sets one man against another. They underbid, particularly when times are bad. When times are good it is quite often difficult to get people to do this job at all.
There are two kinds of mail carriers. There are those who drive through the country to deliver mail at the boxes along the way, or who convey mail from depots to points not served by mail. Then there are those who take the mail from the depot to the post office. In my travels I have run across cases of postmasters who receive pitiful pay and commissions but who in turn provide premises for the post office. Sometimes they are quite unable to make ends meet. Then someone else would be given the contract to carry the mail from the post office to the station. They are also unable to exist on the amount of pay for that service, whereas if the postmaster in some of these places also carried the mail from the station to the post office and received the remuneration for that as well he would at least be getting a little more than he is receiving now. I am not suggesting that men who have been carrying the mail from the trains to the post offices should suddenly be removed from these positions, but I do say that as opportunities arise the Post Office Department should consider consolidating these two services, which might well be a single service performed by one individual, and paying more adequately therefor.
I want to join, as I have joined on numerous occasions in the past, with those on all sides of the house in expressing the hope that if a committee is established and the matter is gone into thoroughly it may be possible to devise a plan. I know it is a very difficult problem because distances, conditions and so on differ, but I think we can devise something better than cutthroat competition under the tender system which often means that the person who gets the contract performs the service for very inadequate remuneration.
I join with others in making a plea for better conditions for the rural mail carriers, and may I also say for those who carry the mail in the cities. I know that in the cities the hours are sometimes long. The men go on duty early in the morning to sort the mail for the various districts and their own areas, and sometimes it is well on toward evening before their work is done. I think we should try as far as possible to work out satisfactory conditions for those who are employed in carrying the mail, whether it is in rural or urban areas.

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Albany M. Robichaud: Mr. Chairman, if parliamentary procedure allows a new member of parliament to offer his congratulations to a new Postmaster General, I wish to do so with all my heart. Mr. Minister, the congratulations I extend to you this evening are not the result of a general formula. These are fraternal congratulations I bring to you, for they come from your Acadian cousins. Although they did not know you personally, they had heard a lot about you. It is therefore with pleasure, Mr. Minister, that I bring to you, on behalf of my compatriots, a fraternal message and that I extend to you the congratulations of my fellow citizens from New Brunswick.
Mr. Chairman, it is fortunate, at least in so far as the affairs of my county are concerned, that a new minister should head the important Post Office Department. As I anticipate friendly relations and sincere co-operation between the new Postmaster General and the new member for Gloucester, I believe I can also anticipate effective results.
Tonight, I want to submit to the Postmaster General three specific and concrete cases concerning Gloucester county.
First, Mr. Chairman, there is the case of the post office at Petit Rocher, in Gloucester county. May I draw the Postmaster General's attention to the fact that Petit Rocher is one of our large Acadian parishes on the shores of Chaleur bay, some twelve miles from Bathurst. On June 18 last, I placed a motion on the order paper, requesting a copy of all correspondence, telegrams, reports, and petitions sent to the department in connection with the opening of a central post office at Petit Rocher. I have not yet received that information.
As I know that district very well, I take the liberty of drawing to the minister's attention the fact that for the past several years the people of Petit Rocher, at the initiative of the parish priest, the chamber of commerce, industrialists and merchants, have been requesting that something be done to remedy the unfortunate situation prevailing in that village. The post office is located at one end of Petit Rocher, while the church, the rectory, the station and the wharf, near which stand a lobster-packing factory and a cold storage, stores, the co-operative, the office of the credit union, in one word the very centre of the village, located within a radius of approximately half a mile, is far away from the post office. The result is that the people are asking for, and rightly so, the establishment of a central post office in the centre of
tMr. Coldwell.]
the village of Petit Rocher. Therefore, as the representative of those people, I beg the new Postmaster General to receive their request with sympathy and I do hope that he will give his immediate attention to this matter which has been kept in abeyance for years in the department's files. I thank the minister in advance for his kind attention.
The second matter I want to bring to the attention of the minister is in connection with the post office at Shippegan. In January last, this post office was declared vacant and applicants were sought to fill the post.
I have here in my hand the civil service commission's requisition, dated January 25, 1952.


Mr. Langlois (Gaspe):: You mean a competition?


Albany M. Robichaud: Yes, a competition. On March 3, 1952, certain people interested in this competition were advised that it had been cancelled. Now-and I hope I am in order in doing this-I would like to ask the hon. minister whether he is in a position to give me all the details concerning the post office at Shippegan.
First of all, what were the reasons for advertising a competition for appointment of an employee in that post office? Second, why was this competition cancelled? Third, what is the present status of the present post office attendant at Shippegan?
In brief, I would like the hon. minister to tell me if the policy of his department consists in retaining the services of an assistant to the postmaster of a large rural community like Lameque on Shippegan island, whose people have been demanding that their postmaster be given an assistant.
Mr. Chairman, those are the three questions I wanted to put to the Postmaster General. I hope that he will provide me, before it is too late, with the information I require.
(Text):


Solon Earl Low: Mr. Chairman, I do want to take just a minute or two to add my voice to those who have spoken on behalf of the rural mail couriers. As I travel through the great north country I hear a great many complaints about the contract system of tenders, and I have received a good many suggestions. Many of the mail couriers feel that it would be wiser if in the office of the divisional inspector some committee might be set up to assist the inspector to consider each mail route on its merits and allot some definite charge per mile for the carrying of the mail on those specific routes. The charges would have

to be adjusted or reviewed from time to time; but it does seem possible that a committee might be used by the inspector in his central office to make some satisfactory arrangement without having to resort to the tender system which, as has already been shown, militates against the faithful people throughout the country who have done a good job for so long. I just ask the minister if he will not consider having some arrangement adopted whereby the tenders can be done away with and a better system set up to recompense the people who carry the mail.
I also just want to take this opportunity of telling the minister that I congratulate him on his succession to this very important position. I like the attitude with which he has started out on his career, and I am sure it will be a long and enjoyable one.


Arnold Darroch: With much that has been said about rural mail couriers I am entirely in agreement, but I do not know just how the department would get around the tender system. I suppose stated rates per mile could be worked out, but I imagine if they were changed and no tenders called we would hear charges of political interference and patronage. I certainly would not want to see the matter given to the civil service commission because it would not be very long before they would be demanding that a person have a couple of years in a recognized university before they could apply for the job.
The hon. member for Wellington South expresses what I think is a good idea as far as rural mail couriers are concerned and I think there is another matter that concerns people in rural communities with respect to mail delivery. It is that there should be a realignment of rural mail routes. Most of the present rural mail routes were laid out in the days of the horse and buggy and before the day of the plowed road. 1 think consideration will have to be given to rearranging a majority of the routes.
I want to say this for the department, that any time I have asked them to put an extension on a route I have been fairly successful-


An hon. Member:: You have been lucky.


John George Diefenbaker: You must be persuasive.


Arnold Darroch: It must be my approach.


Louis-René Beaudoin: Order.


Arnold Darroch: On one occasion recently I was asked:	Do you think we should give
rural delivery to every farmer? I said "yes", and I still think that. I certainly would not agree with the hon. member for Wellington South and the fair and hon. member for Hamilton West on their suggestions to
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the minister that he inaugurate twice a day deliveries in the cities. Before I could agree to that I would suggest that rural mail routes would have to be rearranged. I think people in towns and villages of 1,000 population and over have a right to one delivery a day before their city cousins go back to two a day. I use the figure of 1,000 and over because those of you who know the conditions in rural Ontario, and I suppose they are general throughout the country, know that in urban municipalities of 1,000 and over quite a number of people probably have to go a mile to the post office and a mile back for their mail. I think before people in the cities are granted delivery twice a day these people have a right to some consideration, and I would urge the minister to give this his consideration. Perhaps something can be done about it by the time another session rolls around.
If people want special delivery they should be willing to pay for it. I think these special delivery rates are quite reasonable for the service given.
There is another matter that is peculiar to the district from which I come and about which I would like to make a few suggestions to the minister. It is proposed to have a change in the rail service from Palmerston to Kincardine and from Palmerston to Southampton. This of course will mean a change in the method of mail delivery. I believe the proposal is to carry the mail on trucks. We know they did that for a period during the railway strike, and I think probably as a result of that experience the department are prone to believe that it would be more economic and satisfactory to deliver mail to that district that way than to use the trains. But I would point out to the department that there' is one very peculiar thing about our district. It is that we have a lot of bad weather and bad roads.
At the time mail was delivered on trucks- and I quite agree a fairly good service was given though only first-class mail was delivered-it took place in September under ideal weather conditions. Those conditions will only prevail for six or seven months of the year. I do not think I am wrong in saying there are at least five months of bad weather in our part of the country. I also believe they took a traffic and weather census this winter, and as a result of that census they found the roads were open for a great majority of the days. Again I would point out to the department that it was an exceptionally favourable winter for that type of census. From my own experience, and I have spent over fifty winters in that district,

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too many of which I have vivid recollections, I am sure we cannot expect to have weather like we had this winter every year.
I would suggest to the minister that perhaps his department should join with the municipalities in their protests to the transport board against the C.N.R. discontinuing this service. I am quite satisfied that mail delivery will not be as satisfactory as it is under the present set-up. As I think I properly pointed out on a previous occasion, we are putting the service on rubber and gas both of which might become scarce at any time and be needed for something perhaps more in the interests of the country than this particular job. We are still going to have the rails there; they are going to continue giving freight service; and I suggest to the department that perhaps they should give this further consideration before acquiescing to the suggestion of the railroads on this change in the mail service.


Mr. Green:: When the minister answers the various questions that have been raised I would be very grateful if he would let the committee know what progress has been made in arranging for postmen in the cities to work a forty-hour week and get extra pay for their overtime. I know that in Vancouver there has been a great deal of difficulty about this problem, and I believe the system adopted was to allow a man who works overtime to have time off on a later day. However, that did not work out very well either, because I know some of them had to wait many weeks in order to get this extra time off. It does seem to me a wiser way of handling the situation would be to provide for overtime pay where men are required to work extra hours. I hope the minister will deal with that point, and also the question of putting the postal staff on a forty-hour week.


Mr. Larson:: I know the minister has had the salaries paid to rural mail carriers brought to his attention from many quarters. They are not satisfactory. The whole problem is that costs are going up, and it seems difficult to get mail carriers to serve the routes that have been in operation for some time. I appreciate that it would be rather difficult to settle this matter, but I am pleased to hear that the minister has decided to set up a committee to look into the question.


George Taylor Fulford: I do want to congratulate the minister upon his appointment. At the outset I want to say how pleased I am that this year there has been no campaign to abolish the small village post office. I have had that worry in past years, but during

1952 there has been no such campaign and I trust the Postmaster General has been somewhat responsible for that.
I should like to say a word in commendation of Mr. George Herring, who was recently superannuated from the position of director of communications. I always found Mr. Herring most co-operative, most attentive and most reasonable. While 1 am on the subject I should like to say a word about Mr. L. J. Mills, who I believe is on loan from the treasury branch of the Post Office Department. I have found him almost equally attentive. I say "almost" because Mr. Herring had the job for so long and knew the ropes so well it is hard for anyone to take his place, especially on a temporary basis.	.
I should like also to join with those who have spoken about the predicament of the rural mail carriers. When I say "predicament" I mean it in its literal sense. It is a terrible system, and one that should be rectified as soon as possible. I have been hearing about it ever since I have been a member, and I hope I do not have to hear about this abominable system very much longer. We all hope some system will be devised which will be equitable to the rural mail carriers.
In conclusion I should like to say a word about a system which has been inaugurated by the civil service commission; that is the system of bringing outsiders to class I and II post offices. I think it is a bad thing for a man to have to move from one community to another as postmaster. When a man tries the civil service examinations and passes them, then goes into postal service in one post office, he should remain in that particular post office. His final reward for efficiency ought to be the postmastership there. I certainly do not agree that a man should be moved from one community to another and given that position.


Gordon Graydon: I should like to raise my voice with respect to postal facilities in my own area. I suggest the minister should inform the committee concerning the situation at Streetsville, Ontario. It is a rapidly growing community in the county of Peel and, as the minister and his predecessor know, representations have been made by myself and others locally for a new post office. I understand those representations have now been considered, and that some move is to be made with respect to improved postal facilities. First I should like the minister to indicate to the committee at the appropriate time the type of improvement in the postal

service that the patrons of that post office may expect in the near future.
May I also make representations to the minister in connection with the postal facilities in the county town of my constituency. The town of Brampton has had the same post office since about 1890, if my recollection of its history is correct, though I am afraid I cannot remember personally that far back. Since that time the town has grown, during the last few years particularly because of the rapid expansion in industrial developments and business generally in that part of Canada. The postal facilities there need improvement. The post office building in Brampton also houses the customs and excise branches of the Department of National Revenue. All these departments are finding the accommodation rather cramped. The need for a new public building in Brampton is very great.
I am going to ask the minister if he will take into consideration the representations that have been made, and which I am making again now, for a new public building, either for the post office itself or one to house the post office and the offices of national revenue. If the minister looks into the situation he will find this is not an improper request to make. The population of the town has almost doubled in the last fifteen years, and the post office facilities are not capable of great expansion. For that reason I believe he will find that a new public building would be in the interests of the departments involved as well as the interests of those whom a public building would serve. Will the minister, at the appropriate time, answer the question as to whether or not there is some possibility of a new building in the near future to give improved postal facilities to that town? I should be pleased indeed if he could give full particulars about what is proposed with respect to these facilities, and the moves that have been made up to date in that connection.


Harry Oliver White: I shall detain the committee for only a moment. Along with many others, I want to extend my congratulations to the Postmaster General. I am sure his appointment has met with the approval of all members of the house, and we all feel he is going to be very co-operative in the discharge of his duties.
There are just one or two things I want to mention. The tender system has been discussed, so I shall not say any more about it. I should like to say a word about the rural delivery of mail. Today I received a letter from the department concerning applications for the extension of two mail routes. I wonder how the member for Wellington North was so successful. I think I shall have to have
3. 1952	4219
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a little talk with him. In the one case the applicant lived two-tenths of a mile from the route, and he was too near. The other two people on another road lived seven-tenths of a mile away and they were too far. You might be able to tell that to some people but not to me.
I hope that situation will be reviewed. While the basis of delivery may be two to the mile, or whatever it is in Ontario, I understand that in some other provinces they do not need to have as many. In this day and age of fast transportation, let us try to profit by it. Someone said the rural mail routes were established during the horse and buggy days. With modern transportation let us now try to extend rural mail service to as many people as possible. Let us not be too rigid about the rules. In suburban areas and in those areas around the cities that are growing fast, there is probably some difficulty. In some areas sidewalks are not down and they are finding some difficulty in getting mail delivery. I hope action can be speeded up in some cases. I think that is all I need to say at this time. I hope that the minister will co-operate.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Chairman, I am not going to repeat anything that has been said with regard to rural mail couriers. Since coming to the House of Commons I have heard this story over and over again. Indeed, if you read the debates year by year on the post office estimates, you will find that they are almost prototypes and complete repetitions of those in previous years with regard to the demand that something be done toward providing a system that is fair to the mail couriers in place of the present obsolete system which in so many cases denies fairness and justice.
I rise not for the purpose of joining in the demand that something be done in this regard, because I have practically given up hope that anything will be done inasmuch as the mail couriers have not many votes. That fact apparently is one of the reasons why over the years nothing effective has been done to meet their demands. I rose for the purpose of bringing to the attention of the minister the situation in the city of Prince Albert, which is a city of some 17,000 and which I think has the worst air mail service of any city in Canada. It serves the northern part of Saskatchewan, including 'that new area being opened up in the uranium fields ana also tne other basic metal fields. Yet within the last few months the air mail service has been reduced to a minimum. Indeed at the present time the air mail service consists of only 14 mails for every 24 days.

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Since I came into the house I received a letter which was written by the Prince Albert board of trade and which requests reconsideration of a situation that is a denial of fairness to a city the size of Prince Albert. In this letter it is stated that during the period from May 25 to June 21 the total number of air mails into Prince Albert was only 14. Canadian Pacific Air Lines operate into Prince Albert and have a daily service, except for Sundays, in and out. This letter from the Prince Albert board of trade states in part as follows:
. . . we feel that postal officials themselves will now agree that for a city of this size serving a large territory in this province, the above calibre of service cannot be termed adequate.
Apparently the hon. member for Prince Albert had taken this matter up, for the letter .states:
. . . the board of trade would appreciate every effort being made to convince authorities that the previous service should be reinstated immediately in order that businessmen in this city and citizens generally may enjoy similar postal service prevailing in all Canadian cities and many centres of smaller population and less importance.
I know what the situation is in Prince Albert. That is my home. The mail service is totally inexcusable. The air mail service, which consists of 14 air mails delivered during the period of about a month, denies that communication without which business cannot be properly done today. The letter goes on to state:
. . . the expansion of this city during recent years and the expansion of the territory which it is .[DOT]serving, does not coincide with the reasoning of the post office department that mail service need not include full-fledged air mail service.
I make this appeal to the minister. I realize what the general answer is, namely that there is a saving in expenditure. That is true; but surely there should not be a saving effected at the expense of reasonable service for a city the size of Prince Albert which serves a vast area east, west and north; and the northern section in particular reaches about 400 miles north of Prince Albert. I ask the minister to reconsider the decision made some two or three months ago to reduce that air mail service, and to reinstate that ordinary mail service which all of us today, almost everywhere in Canada, have the right to expect, in particular those living in cities serving a large area such as Prince Albert.
There ig one other matter I want to mention also. Various members have extended their felicitations to the mmister. I did that personally and most sincerely. Since he has been minister it has been possible to approach him or his department and be assured of reasonable consideration of reasonable
[Mr. Diefenbaker.l
requests. That is something worthy of mention. When matters are brought to his attention, I have found that they are not shelved for future consideration, but that one receives a reply that the matter is being considered. One does not always expect the consideration to be favourable, but one does appreciate the situation when there is a minister who gives an immediate reply and who not only promises to look into the matter, but does so.
I point out to him this fact. Under the law, with respect to the appointment of postmasters there is a soldier preference or a service preference. I have received information-and I have offered the most strenuous objection on more than one occasion-that where appointments of postmasters have been made, in cases where those qualified were living in the neighbourhood, for some reason or another appointments were made outside of the preference. I impress upon the minister that if he is to receive from members of the house co-operation equal to that which we find we are going to receive from him, the soldier or service consideration that assures the appointment of servicemen must be maintained.
With those few remarks I am going to resume my seat. I join with the previous members in again repeating the request that something be done for the mail couriers, and also once again repeating what has been said on earlier occasions that, after all, the Post Office Department is one department where profit should not be the sole consideration. Profit is not the reason for the setting up of the Post Office Department; it is service. And it is in that spirit that I ask for consideration for the city of Prince Albert and the area served by it.


William Scottie Bryce: Mr. Chairman, I should like to bring to the attention of the Postmaster General the situation with respect to my home town of Dugald. I would point out that 25 years ago we had a better mail service than we have today. At this time we receive our letters Friday morning, and do not receive anything further until the following Monday. When the minister goes to the west I hope he will spend a couple of days in Winnipeg, and that he will get back for us the service we had 25 years ago. It would certainly be appreciated.


George Alexander Drew: I should like to refer to one subject raised by the hon. member for Peterborough West, who made reference to the use of the mails by the Canadian peace congress. In response to that statement the Postmaster General explained that it was

difficult to determine what was inside an envelope, or to take action in regard to anything that might be handled in a sealed envelope.
I wish to refer to this because the regulation which would govern a case of this kind has been discussed in the house at some length on earlier occasions. It arose earlier, not in connection with the use of the mails for communist propaganda; the discussions on the occasions to which I refer related to a denial of the use of the mails to certain organizations and individuals, either in connection with stock-selling activities, lotteries or things of that kind.
Because of the answer by the minister this evening I should like to refer back to what was said at that time. There are two regulations which have a direct bearing on this matter. Although they are now numbered 347 and 348, at the time this subject was under discussion they were numbered 204 and 205.
When this was being discussed and some question was raised as to the propriety of denying use of the mails to individuals in connection with lotteries and activities of that kind, and particularly the directions given affecting individuals who might be associated with such lotteries, the Minister of Justice, as reported at page 2335 of Hansard for May 9, 1950, said:
The statute calls on the Postmaster General to refuse the use of the mails to persons whom he reasonably suspects of using the post office facilities to defraud the public. The only question is whether the Postmaster General had reasonable grounds for his suspicion. From the facts when they are disclosed I think you will have to agree that the Postmaster General did have good grounds for his suspicion.
The regulation to which I refer covered fraud in connection with the handling of securities or lotteries, or other matters of the kind; the section 205, which is now 348, contains this provision-and I am omitting the words that relate to other subjects-
It is forbidden to post for delivery or transmission [DOT]by or through post any publication, matter or thing of a seditious, disloyal or scurrilous character.
The remarks of the Minister of Justice, therefore, will apply with equal force to anything that could be described as seditious, disloyal or scurrilous. Then the Minister of Justice, as reported at page 2337 of the same date, had this to say:
The point which the Postmaster General must decide is the simple one of whether or not there are good grounds for suspecting that postal privileges under the Postmaster General are being -abused.
The subject under discussion then was the *denial to a number of organizations of the
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use of the mails. I should like to quote from what I said on May 16, 1950, as reported at page 2528 of Hansard. At that time I was discussing the monthly supplements of the Canada official postal guide which contained the names of the organizations and individuals against whom orders had been made by the Postmaster General.
I see just on these two pages in front of me in this single supplement the names of branches of the Legion, of a religious order, of a teachers' organization, of an insurance company, of a labour organization, of a curling club and of an athletic committee-and the names of a number of individuals. Then under these orders are these words:
"Registered letters are not to be accepted addressed to the above, and all mail addressed to or coming from the above is to be intercepted and sent specially by first mail to the administration branch (for the dead letter office)."
I submit that if it is appropriate for the Postmaster General to issue orders against branches of the Legion, religious orders, teachers' organizations, insurance companies, labour organizations and groups of that kind, whose activities in the ordinary course of events are 'not only lawful but highly commendable, because they may infringe some of the provisions of these regulations, then it just is not within the bounds of common sense that orders should not be made restricting the use of the mails for seditious and disloyal material of the kind to which we have referred earlier today.
Here I have only a few of the things that have come in recently from this disloyal organization known as the Canadian peace congress. I do not wish to appear to be obsessed with the activities of this one organization. I have, however, indicated my own belief that under proper legal provisions and fully in accordance with our conception of impartial justice steps should be taken to deal with people whose one purpose is to undermine the spirit of our people in their efforts to resist communist aggression, whether from the military point of view or through propaganda within our own country.
No more disloyal, seditious and scurrilous publication has been circulated through the mails of Canada than this publication I hold in my hand under the title "I Accuse" which claims to have been prepared by this man Endicott. Nor is it confined to things of this kind alone. As is known generally to members of the house, this shameless man, this man who uses our very broad freedom to try to undermine the efforts that are being made by Canada, along with the other free nations, to take a stand against communist aggression, not long ago attempted to create the impression that certain nuns, some of whom were Canadians, had been responsible for

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the death of Chinese children. That vile slander, issued first by the Chinese communists and repeated by these jackals for the communists, is the kind of thing that is going unchecked and is being distributed.
The Minister of Justice made it clear that it is not the intention of the Department of Justice to take action under the provisions of the Criminal Code relating to treason and sedition, but the same Minister of Justice has made it abundantly clear that he believes it is not only competent for the Postmaster General to act under sections 347 and 348 of the postal regulations, it is the duty of the Postmaster General to act if he has reasonable grounds for believing that any organization or individual is using the postal services for the distribution of disloyal or seditious or scurrilous material.
What can young Canadians in uniform in Korea at this time think of a situation of this nature? What can they think of our tolerance of these carefully calculated efforts to undermine their confidence in what they are doing? Many of these young men in the battle line have died and others have been grievously wounded in the defence of this and all other free countries against this vile doctrine and the aggression which is carried on in its name. How can we tell them that it is appropriate for the postal regulations to deny to Legion branches the use of the mails where perhaps with complete sincerity but not in strict conformity with the law they may be conducting lotteries, and at the same time these people who are serving only one master, the master against whom these men are fighting on the field of battle, are permitted to use our mails at the general expense of the public of Canada to distribute their disloyal, seditious and scurrilous propaganda.
I know that the Postmaster General was not the Postmaster General at the time this subject came up earlier for discussion. I wish in all sincerity to join with those who have complimented him upon his elevation to this office. I agree with what has been said about the indication he has given of his desire to deal with the problems that are placed before him; but may I say that if in the light of the decisions already announced in this house by the Minister of Justice, to whose opinions he referred on an earlier occasion, it is correct-and I make that qualification-for the Postmaster General to act in accordance with the opinion of the Minister of Justice in relation to a relatively unimportant activity, then the time is long overdue for vigorous and positive action to prevent the use of our mails for these seditious purposes.


Alcide Côté: Mr. Chairman, I want personally to express my sincere appreciation for the kind expressions that have been uttered about the Postmaster General and the department. I can assure all hon. members that I shall do my best to give the information requested and to solve the problems which come before me. I will not have time to deal fully with all the questions that have been asked, and which I think can be divided into two parts.
Reference has been made to the rural mail couriers. I would refer hon. members to the declaration I made previously that a committee would be set up at the next session. I know there are problems created by having these contracts let by tender. In that way a contractor selects his price but once he has the contract it is possible that complications may arise. A departmental committee has already made many suggestions which I shall be glad to place before the committee so they may be studied by the members. I only-hope, as has been suggested already, that a proper scheme satisfactory to all will be worked out.
I shall try to answer some of these specific questions as briefly as possible. I do not know all the details of the case referred to by the hon. member for Battle River, but I shall look into the matter and advise him. The hon. member for Hamilton West asked a few questions and made a few suggestions. I would direct her attention to the fact that the economies that were effected were offset by the extra payments that had to be made in connection with railways and mail contracts. We have also had two increases in the salaries of postal employees, and additional services are being provided.
An hon. member wanted figures about overtime that had been paid. The payments in 1951-52 for this purpose amounted to $1,981,700 and the estimate for 1952-53 is $2,100,000.
Reference was made to the rates on gift parcels to Great Britain, and in this connection I would refer the hon. member to a statement which was given on April 3, 1952, which appears in Hansard of that date. I shall not repeat that statement tonight. I might say that Great Britain asked that the higher rates be made effective in October, 1951, but we were able to persuade them not to increase the rates until after the Christmas season. These rates are based on arrangements between both countries; we made concessions and they made concessions. When Great Britain decided to do away with these concessions we inevitably had to let them do what

they wanted to do, and that is why the only success we had was in delaying this change in rates for a few months.
So far as this point is concerned, I think I should probably give this further information. Parcel rates are based on the following three factors: first, cost of handling in Canada; second, cost of sea conveyance; third, terminal payment for delivery in Great Britain. Domestic parcel rates in Canada were increased in the summer of 1951. These basic increases are reflected in the rates on parcels to Great Britain and other countries. Payment for sea conveyance is determined by the steamship company. The terminal charges paid the British post office for handling and delivery of parcels after they have reached a British port are fixed by the British post office.
Effective April 1, 1949, arrangements were made with the steamship companies and the British postal administration for the acceptance of reduced charges for gift parcels. It was therefore possible to offer cheaper postage rates. In the fall of 1951 the British post office advised that the cost of handling and delivery had so increased that it was not only necessary to increase normal parcel post rates but also to abolish the preferential rates which hitherto applied to gift parcels. The special sea conveyance rates which had been charged for gift parcels were withdrawn on April 1, 1951, and when the reduced British terminal charges were also withdrawn it became necessary to increase the parcel post rates to Great Britain. This was made effective from January 1, 1952.
I think it is only fair to say that because of the circumstances the authorities in Great Britain found it necessary to cancel the arrangements they had with us at the time and that is why they as well as we had to make other arrangements.


Mr. Leonard:: Carried.


Alcide Côté: I am ready.


Frank Exton Lennard: I thought you were going to sit down.


Alcide Côté: I just wanted to give the information requested. The hon. member for Queens talked about a deficit.


An hon. Member:: He is not here.


Alcide Côté: I might say that although it may appear there was a deficit in 1950-51 we did not have a deficit because we had paid increased rates to the railway companies which applied not only for that year but for previous years.
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I think I can conclude by saying that I will take into consideration all the questions that have been put to me tonight. The hon. member for Peel raised one question, but I will send him the information he asked for. I know he will be satisfied. So far as the questions asked by the hon. member for Gloucester are concerned, I will write giving him the information he has requested. I may tell him, as well as all other hon. members, that I will do my best to satisfy them in answering their questions and will try to solve their problems as best I can.


Ellen Louks Fairclough: With respect to the matter of overseas parcels, I can well understand that the United Kingdom government could not make concessions in the matter of postage because of the very limited number of their own citizens who would benefit by the receipt of these parcels. However, I do not think that is an argument that applies here in Canada, where so many of our citizens have interests in the old land. Therefore I would urge the Postmaster General to take this matter into consideration and pursue it still further.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
313. Transportation-movement of mail by land, air and water, including administration, $40,542,048.
Mr. Applewhaite:: This item refers to the transportation of mail, and according to the particulars some $9,500,000 is for transportation by air. Under ordinary circumstances I would have liked to speak on this item at considerable length, but I shall show more mercy to the house than has been shown by several hon. members during the past couple of weeks. However, I am going to take time to say with respect to air mail services on the west coast that I and the people on the coast have great reason to express appreciation not only to the Postmaster General but to his deputy for the consideration, sympathy and understanding that have been shown. In brief my plea at this moment is that the Postmaster General give serious and, if I may say so, prompt consideration to the installation of airmail service to these points particularly, Ocean Falls, Kemano and Kiti-mat on the Pacific coast which are not now receiving that service though they are served by regular twice a week air service. The development in that area and the need for increased service would justify me even at this stage of the session in talking about it for ten or fifteen minutes, but I am not going to do so. I am merely going to leave that request with the Postmaster General because I feel sure if he will investigate, even in the most cursory manner, the increased needs that have arisen in those areas he will

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find that this plea is very well founded, and at the same time-


An hon. Member:: Carried.


Edward Turney Applewhaite: The hon. gentlemen
opposite who mutter "carried" might well have remembered over the past weeks that there were other matters to come before the house besides those in which they took such a long drawn out interest. I propose to finish my remarks, and if they suggest that I am taking longer than I am entitled to I shall say what I had originally intended to say. Before the interruption I was on the point of saying that I wished to add to my recommendation to the Postmaster General that at the same time and in connection therewith there might well be considered the provision of an airmail system east and west between Prince George and Prince Rupert, a distance of some 488 miles, where there are now four or five usable airfields.


Ellen Louks Fairclough: Before we leave this item I think it might be well if we asked the Postmaster General if he has the answer to the question asked by the leader of the opposition.


Alcide Côté: I will be glad to refer my hon. friend to the statement I made before dinner. I might also add that if it is possible to find out where the document he mentioned is printed it would be possible to refer the matter to the authorities of the province where it is printed and action might be taken by them with respect to it. When items are in sealed envelopes the department can do nothing. The postal department is against censorship. As much as I might like to open an envelope addressed to the hon. member for Hamilton West and learn all her secrets, the fact is that it just is not done. It is most unfortunate, but it may happen that questionable documents are in sealed envelopes and they cannot be opened just to satisfy the curiosity of the Postmaster General or anyone else.
However, if it is brought to the attention of the Postmaster General that something is obscene or against the law respecting fraud or lotteries, then under section 7 of the Post Office Act, which reads as follows, action might be taken:
7. (1) Whenever the Postmaster General believes on reasonable grounds that any person
(a) is, by means of the mails (i) committing or attempting to commit an offence, or (ii) aiding, counselling or procuring any person to commit an offence, or (b>
with intent to commit an offence, is using the mails for the purpose of accomplishing his object, the Postmaster General may make an interim order . . .

First it must be established that an offence has been committed or is about to be committed and as long as the proper legal authorities do not feel that an offence has been committed or is about to be committed the Postmaster General cannot act. Again I refer my hon. friend to what I said before dinner. We want to do our utmost to protect the public but at the same time we cannot violate the sanctity of the -mail. We must protect the secrecy of communication of individuals using the mails.


Ellen Louks Fairclough: Well, in the first place I would like to assure the Postmaster General that so far as it is within her power the secrets of the member for Hamilton West do not pass through the mails. In the second place I might say that action has been taken, as the Postmaster General well knows, on many occasions, some of which have been cited by the leader of the opposition. It must be that the department has taken steps to discover what was contained in the covers which passed through the Post Office Department.
At this stage I do not propose to carry this matter any further, but I would ask the Postmaster General to take it under serious advisement. After all, the matter has been drawn to his attention not only now but on former occasions. I would ask him to take it under advisement and act accordingly.


Alcide Côté: I may say to my hon. friend that the way we find out that mail has been used for these purposes is because some of the letters reach the dead letter office on account of insufficient or incorrect address and we then open them. That is the only way we find out. We do not open letters when they are in the ordinary channels of distribution.


John Lambert Gibson: I am sorry that I cannot spend a little more time in congratulating my very good friend the Postmaster General on his appointment, and also to express my appreciation to him and his officials for all they have done for me. I have always received very courteous and competent service from them.
The whole history of his department is one of development in transportation. It goes all the way from the smoke signal to the pony express, and then we reach the railway stage, trucks and finally aeroplanes. I think we are on the air service branch now. As the minister realizes Canada is very proud to have all-up mail service from St. John's, Newfoundland,

to Victoria, British Columbia. But it is unfortunate that when it reaches Victoria, British Columbia, it does something like the communist party does; it dives underground when it gets there.
We have settlements in my riding with 125 people employed, with planes landing there every day and planes passing over there every day, yet they have a mail service every eight days by steamer. I was looking up some figures from the dominion bureau of statistics the other day and, although I do not suppose the Postmaster General has had time to look up all these things during his short tenure of office, it seems to me the government has some chosen instruments for the carriage of air mail in Canada, and I know he will be interested in the figures. From the civil aviation statistics of the dominion bureau of statistics I found that 18 per cent of the revenue of the Canadian Pacific Air Lines comes from your department. Maritime Central Airways receive 11-2 per cent from your department. I then come to Trans-Canada Air Lines. Of course this really is a chosen instrument, and I appreciate why that should be so; but they get 15-4 per cent of their revenue from your department. Central Northern gets 8-1 per cent; Rimouski Air Lines-and I know your parliamentary assistant knows this line well-gets 5-6 per cent and they all appear to be chosen instruments.
However when we get out to the Queen Charlotte Airlines, the third largest air line in Canada, they are something like the plumber's monkey wrench and seem to be forgotten. Despite the fact that they are the third largest air line in Canada they only receive 1 per cent of their revenue from the Post Office Department. That is all you pay them for the carriage of air mail. I am particularly interested here, not in the company although it is a useful and worth-while company which serves my constituency; I am interested more particularly because they are the only people who can carry air mail in my riding.
I appreciate the consideration the minister has given this problem. I have presented it to him and I know he is giving it very careful consideration now. I think the mail service by air to the Comox airport is very well justified; but I would be particularly grateful if the minister would go into this matter and see if there are any further possibilities. We have planes landing there three times a day and everybody says: Where is the air mail? They look across the river at Powell River and see the smoke from the plant over there where they get two air mail services a day and they say: What is
Supply-National Revenue the matter with us? Is there something wrong with us? Do we smell bad, or have we the wrong member representing us?


Mr. Casselman:: That is the answer.


John Lambert Gibson: I am quite convinced that my good friend the Postmaster General would not let them have any misapprehension about that despite what the hon. member says, and I think I can count on him looking into this and giving it very serious consideration.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Customs and excise divisions-
302. General administration, $2,105,832.
Mr. McCann:: I think perhaps that if I made a brief explanatory statement with reference to the division of customs and excise it might make it unnecessary to ask a lot of questions which would otherwise be asked. This will only take two or three minutes.
The estimates now before the house are intended to cover operations of the customs and excise division of the Department of National Revenue, which consists of some 215 customs-excise ports, approximately 145 outports and other offices, as well as the central administration.
This division administers the customs tariff, the Customs Act, the Excise Tax Act, the Excise Act, and portions of some forty other acts. The ports and outports are responsible for the examination and appraisal of imported goods; the assessment and collection of duties and taxes payable thereon; the assessment and collection of excise duty, excise taxes and sales taxes on domestic goods; the supervision of customs bonded warehouses and of licensed excise establishments, and the administration of the laws mentioned above and regulations made thereunder.
Through headquarters and the ports special branches are staffed to carry out audits, inspections, investigations, drawbacks and refunds.
During the last year the department collected, by way of revenue, $1,476 million, an increase of $250 million over the previous year. The estimate of revenue for 1952-53, as projected by the Minister of Finance, will be in the neighbourhood of $1,495 million. The expected increase for this year has already been reflected in the revenue for April and May, and the indications are that the customs and excise division will again see an increase in the volume of business.

Supply-National Revenue
International traffic appears to be continuing on the upswing, especially in the fields of trucking and tourist travel. Foreign vehicles entering Canada on travellers' vehicle permits in the month of April totalled 56,400, an increase of 12 per cent over the previous year, and a new record for the month. Traffic has been heavier in all parts of the country, with the largest gains occurring in Ontario and Quebec. The four-month total from January to April is actually 9 per cent higher than it was for the corresponding period last year.
This year's estimates provide for an increase over last year of $1,999,153. The larger part, in fact 95 per cent of this increase, or in other words $1,914,126, is required to cover the adjustments in salary occasioned by the general increase applicable to all government employees, and for the addition of sufficient positions to bring us up to the same strength as last year.
Apart from the need for additional seasonal officers, provision is being made for an essential increase in the excise tax audit staff and the customs appraisers. Both these branches are now overworked. An increase of 25 auditors is essential, both for protection ' of the revenue and for better service to the taxpayers by more frequent audits. Excise tax auditors average an annual recovery of some $20,000 per auditor, and assist the taxpayers in a fuller understanding of the tax regulations. Seven new customs appraisers will be added to the department to cope with the problem of investigation of foreign values, about which I spoke to the house in the course of discussion of the customs tariff bill.
Other votes which show an increase over last year relate to overtime and office and bousing accommodation. Overtime, it will be noted, this year shows an apparent increase of $100,000 over last year. Actually the amount we are working for is $80,000 less than the amount we were required to expend last year. A substantial portion of overtime results from special services to the public and is recouped from persons so served. The moneys thus repaid to the government are placed in the consolidated revenue fund, and heretofore have not been credited against the departmental expenditures.
The department's estimate of amounts recovered is in the neighbourhood of $300,000 annually; therefore in the preparation of these estimates the amount of $300,000 has been deducted from the over-all vote for ports, outports and preventive stations so that, in effect, the department is seeking

$500,000 for overtime payments, expecting that the balance of its requirements will be obtained from those to whom special services are rendered. The vote covering construction and the acquisition of land this year shows an increase over last year of $243,450. In this connection I would like to say that the projects envisaged for the coming year are projects which have been regularly deferred until they are now of some urgency. There still remains a long list of other such projects which, although desirable, must be deferred still further. It should be remembered that all during the war and the period that followed a close check has been kept on construction, despite the fact that the volume of business and the local demands for service have greatly increased throughout these years.
I shall be pleased to answer any questions that may arise in connection with any of these estimates.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: I do not
propose to take the time of the committee in making any general remarks, and shall confine myself to plunging at once into questions. The minister has given us a broad picture of the situation, with figures that are relevant. I should like to ask him whether it will suit him, on this item or on item 306, to deal with one question which I think exercises the mind of the public a good deal, namely the question of smuggling and enforcement. I am anxious to get a certain amount of detailed information about that. Some time ago the question was taken up with the Department of Justice, and we had a sort of general assertion from the Minister of Justice that the situation was improving, which was not as convincing as it might have been. I should like the minister to give us a considerable amount of detail. We have only about fifteen minutes left this evening, and if he would prefer to deal with that first thing in the morning I would be prepared to leave it until then.
If that is his wish, I should like to turn now to one or two other questions. Perhaps the minister would indicate his preference now. Shall we proceed immediately with the question of smuggling, or would the minister prefer to leave that until the first thing in the morning?


James Joseph McCann: I think probably we might proceed in the regular way, Mr. Chairman. The practice that has been followed under the first item, general administration, is that almost any questions may be asked.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: I am now asking a question, but I am in doubt as to whether the minister wants to proceed-


James Joseph McCann: I am satisfied to have you go ahead with any questions you desire to ask.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: First of all I should like to know what the minister considers was the loss to the treasury last year from smuggling operations. He will recall what the Minister of Finance said in his speech on April 8, as recorded at page 1258 of Hansard:
In the case of cigarettes only I had forecast an increase of $21 million and I experienced a decline of $1 million. There are of course a number of reasons for this decline.
There is also a statement which I shall read from a publication with which I am not very familiar, but which evidently went into this matter. It is the March 8 edition of Weekend picture magazine. I shall read from it quite briefly. This purports to give a picture of the smuggling situation:
When the federal government raised the tax on a package of cigarettes to 25-2 cents last April (the U.S. federal tax is eight cents) and the cigarette manufacturers followed up with price increases to bring the cost of a package of cigarettes to 42 cents (46 cents with provincial tax in Quebec), the petty smuggler faded into the background along the border as the big operators gradually went into the business. The men who became rich in prohibition days and those who wished to emulate them saw their opportunity. They could buy a carton of cigarettes in Maryland, where there is no state tax, for as little as $1.59 from distributors. This same carton brought from $3 to $3.50 on the Canadian black market-as much as 120 per cent profit. Buyers were easy to find, for the same number of Canadian cigarettes cost $4.20 in most provinces and $4.60 in Quebec.
Some idea of the quantities being moved surreptitiously into Canada may be gained from the fact that an R.C.M.P. patrol seized a cache of 970,000 cigarettes in a new three-ton truck on a farm near Coaticook last December 15. On the Canadian black market such a load is worth $14,550.
There is a lot more here I could read, but I do not want to lengthen these proceedings an unnecessary moment. I do want, however, to get from the minister what he considers the most significant facts. First of all I want to know the number of prosecutions and seizures which were being made prior to the change in the tax on April 8 last, and whether the minister has reason to think the situation has improved very greatly. Some opinions I have heard, though I cannot profess to have verified them, seem to indicate that the change is not nearly as great as one might expect.
I should like the minister to begin by telling us what he considers the loss to have been, in so far as he is informed; and second, the course of the prosecutions and police activity up until the time the tax was changed and since.


James Joseph McCann: I shall admit, Mr. Chairman, that the matter of smuggling, particularly of
Supply-National Revenue cigarettes, has been a problem which has engaged the attention of the officials of the department, and given them considerable anxiety. If we go back a few years, I can give the total number of seizures. For the year 1951 there were 7,061. If we go back to 1945, we find that there were 2,697 seizures. It has gone up gradually, and in 1946 there were 4,482; in 1947, 4,835; 1948, 5,207; 1949, 5,655; 1950, 6,530; and in 1951, 7,061.
However, we find that the peak was reached in the month of September, when there were 731 seizures, and that declined until December of 1951, when it was reduced to 644. I think perhaps it might be interesting if I gave you something specific with reference to the seizure of cigarettes; that is, cigarettes seized by police and the ports in the years 1949, 1950 and 1951. Perhaps the last few months would interest you, or give you a comparison with a year ago. In June of 1951 there were 1,241,284 cigarettes seized. The peak, as I said, was reached at the first of this year, in January of 1952, when the number was 1,889,290; and it has been gradually going down since January. If you take the month of May, the seizures were then 1,139,160.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: That is the number of cigarettes. How many seizures were there?


James Joseph McCann: How many what?


James MacKerras Macdonnell: The minister has given the total seized, as I understand it.


James Joseph McCann: Yes. Then I was giving you specifically the figures for cigarettes. I think that is what you wanted. I believe this might help to clear up the situation.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: Can the
minister give the number of seizures in May of this year?


James Joseph McCann: May of last year?


James MacKerras Macdonnell: No; May of
this year.


James Joseph McCann: Yes. Of cigarettes, 1,139,160.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: That is the number of cigarettes seized?


James Joseph McCann: That is the number of
cigarettes.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: Yes; but what was the number of seizures?


James Joseph McCann: The number of seizures? In May, 1951, it was 600 and in May, 1952, it was 707.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: Then do I understand that actually the number of seizures in May of 1952 was worse than in 1951, although the tax had been reduced in April?
4228	HOUSE OF
Supply-National Revenue We would not expect that results would appear immediately perhaps; but it is certainly disconcerting to find the situation was worse this last May than it was a year ago.


James Joseph McCann: In May, 1952 the number was 707; but the peak in 1951 was in September of that year when there were 731 seizures.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: May I point out to the minister that that peak of September, 1951, if I have the figures down correctly, was 731 seizures whereas in May of 1952 we have 770. In other words the situation is worse.


James Joseph McCann: I hope the hon. gentleman will understand that is 731 seizures of everything.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: When did we shift over from cigarettes?


James Joseph McCann: I wanted to give you specifically the number of cigarettes, but I have not the information here as to the number of seizures of cigarettes.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: May I ask this question. After all, if we are going to have any real appreciation of what is going on we must have comparable figures. I think it is clear that what we need are comparable figures running right through in order to show whether this thing is getting better or worse. It is not merely a matter of the money lost; it is the whole unpleasant disregard of law. What I mean is this. Once people get into the habit of disobeying one law, they can easily extend the habit. May I now suggest that this item might stand until the morning.


James Joseph McCann: If the hon. member will give me an opportunity to answer the rest of his question, perhaps he would have the information. He asked a question with reference to the money.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: I always like the minister better when he is good tempered. Do not let him and me fall out with each other. What we are actually finding is that the minister was giving figures that were not comparable, and I do not think they were getting us anywhere. If he has other comparable figures that he wants to give us, I should be glad to have them. But I am suggesting that, at the moment, we are comparing things that are not comparable. If the minister wants to go on, I am perfectly willing to do so.


James Joseph McCann: I think perhaps if I were to give this statement it might help to clarify the situation. It has to do both with cigarettes and tobacco.
Although it is somewhat early as yet to assess the effect of the recent lowering of the


tax on cigarettes-and I think that is the information the hon. member wanted-it can be reported that there has been a falling off in the quantities of cigarettes seized since the budget. Cigarettes seized during the month of May amount to 1,139,000. This is some 360,000 less than the number seized in the previous month-that would be April- and almost 1 million less than the peak reached in November last.
A further indication that the situation has improved is perhaps evidenced by the increase in the production of Canadian cigarettes which, for the month of April, shows an increase of 100 million over April of last year-the figures are 1,523 million compared with 1,438 million-and the May figures which show an increase over the corresponding month of last year of 284 million.
The revenue figures for cigarettes present a similar comparative picture for the month of May, and show an increase this year of $927,000. The amount collected in May of this year also exceeds the revenue collected in May of 1950 by over half a million dollars.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: Is that both customs and excise?


James Joseph McCann: No. There is not much customs collected on cigarettes; it is excise tax and excise duty. I was giving the comparative figures. The amount collected in May of this year exceeds that collected in May of 1950 by half a million dollars, the figures being $15,359,000 as compared with $14,855,000 a year ago.
The production figures for cut tobacco are perhaps even more impressive, the months of April and May showing an increase over the same period last year of 1,162,000 pounds. That is the production of cut tobacco.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: Those production figures have their own interest, but you would need to know a great deal about them in order to know what their real bearing is on smuggling. The mere fact that we are producing a great deal more than we were producing before might mean that there was an arrears of production and that they were speeding up. I come back to this point. I want to know the number of seizures. To me it is not of great importance, if the number of seizures is going up, that the actual average amount seized is less. I do not regard that fact as of great importance. That perhaps means that they are not operating on quite as large a scale, but still they are operating. I see that it is now eleven o'clock. I would therefore suggest that in the morning the minister might give us a list of the seizures running back over a good many months, say over the last eighteen months.


James Joseph McCann: Does the hon. member mean seizures of everything, including cars, cigarettes and jewelry?


James MacKerras Macdonnell: Either of everything or of cigarettes. I started with cigarettes. If the minister will give us comparative figures, and if those relating to cigarettes are most convenient, I suggest he give us the figures for cigarettes. It will be quite satisfactory to me if we can get a figure carried through that is comparable so we can form, an estimate of what is going on.
Item stands.
Progress reported.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


Alphonse Fournier: Mr. Speaker, with the unanimous consent of the house I move:
That when the house adjourns this day it stand adjourned until tomorrow at ten o'clock, a.m.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

Alphonse Fournier: Tomorrow we will begin with national revenue, and then take up immigration, legislation, finance, and the balance of the supplementaries.


[Stage Direction]
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.
[The following items were passed in committee of supply]:

[Stage Direction]
General-
420.	Emergency shelter administration, $100,000.
421.	To provide for the expenses incurred by Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation in constructing and supervising construction of married quarters, schools and related services on behalf of the Department of National Defence, $900,000. Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation-
557. To provide for advances to Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation for the purposes of subsection one of section 34 of the National Housing Act, 1944, in respect of housing projects for veterans, housing projects at Deep River, Ontario, for sale to Atomic Energy of Canada, Limited, and housing projects at Gander, Newfoundland, for sale or rental, $8,300,000.
National film board-
255.	Administration, production and distribution of films and other visual materials, $2,804,131.
256.	Acquisition of new equipment, $115,820. National parks branch-
National parks and historic sites services-
768.	Construction or acquisition of buildings, works, land and new equipment-further amount required, $50,927.
Supply
Engineering and water resources branch-
Water resources division-
Water resources division, including the administration of the Dominion Water Power and Irrigation Acts-
769.	Construction or acquisition of buildings, works, land and new equipment-further amount required, $32,800.
Projects division-
770.	To provide for a contribution by Canada to the improvement and reconstruction of the road between Patricia Bay airport, Vancouver island, and the city limits of Victoria, B.C., in accordance with the terms of the agreement between Canada and the province of British Columbia-further amount required, $171,013.
771.	To provide for advances made in the fiscal year 1951-52 by the Minister of Finance to the Northwest Territories power commission for power development in accordance with section 17 (2) of the Northwest Territories Power Commission Act, chapter 64, 11-12 George VI, $1,000.
Northern administration and lands branch-
772.	Lands division-administration of territorial and public lands; seed grain collections-further amount required, $9,350.
Northern administration division-
Northwest Territories, including Wood Buffalo park and Eskimo affairs-
773.	Operation and maintenance-further amount required, $45,600.
774.	Construction or acquisition of buildings, works, land and new equipment-further amount required, $9,000.
775.	To authorize payments to be made from the consolidated revenue fund in respect of each of the five fiscal years commencing on the first day of April in the period from April 1, 1952, to March 31, 1957, to the territorial revenue account of the Northwest Territories in accordance with an agreement to be entered into by the Minister of Finance, with the approval of the governor in council on behalf of the government of Canada, and the commissioner of the Northwest Territories with the approval of the council of the Northwest Territories, on behalf of the government of the Northwest Territories, such agreement to provide, on such terms and conditions as may be agreed upon, for payment of the total of amounts calculated on the following basis: (a) annual subsidy hereafter called the "population subsidy" to the government of the Northwest Territories of eighty cents per head in respect of a population of sixteen thousand and four persons, being the population for the year 1951 as determined by the census taken in that year, $12,803.20, (b) compensation to the government of the Northwest Territories in consideration of its agreement to suspend and to refrain from levying, and to require the municipalities in the Northwest Territories to suspend and to refrain from levying, individual income taxes, corporation income taxes, corporation taxes and succession duties, as defined in the agreement, for the five year period specified in the agreement, the amount of compensation for each year to be the amount by which the greater of (i) the guaranteed minimum annual amount of $186,000, or (ii) the adjusted annual amount which is an amount that is, in respect of a fiscal year, the average of amounts determined in respect of each of the two calendar years immediately preceding the fiscal year, each of such amounts to be the greater of (A) the guaranteed minimum annual amount, or (B) the amount that is the product of the guaranteed minimum annual amount and the product of the
[Stage Direction]
Supply
ratio that the value of the gross national product per capita in the respective calendar year bears to the said value in the calendar year 1948 and the ratio that the population of the Northwest Territories for the respective calendar year bears to the said population in the calendar year 1948, the said ratios to be determined by the dominion statistician, exceeds the amount of the population subsidy, the estimated amount of compensation for the fiscal year 1952-53 being $226,473.02, the estimated total amount required for the fiscal year 1952-53 being $239,276.22, $239,277.
Forest conservation and wildlife management, including Wood Buffalo park-
776.	Operation and maintenance-further amount required, $8,150.
777.	Construction or acquisition of buildings, works, land and new equipment-further amount required, $49,650.
Yukon Territory, including forest conservation-
778.	Operation and maintenance-further amount required, $261,400.
779.	To authorize payments to be made from the consolidated revenue fund in respect of each of the five fiscal years commencing on the first day of April in the period from April 1, 1952, to March 31, 1957, to the Yukon consolidated revenue fund in accordance with an agreement to be entered into by the Minister of Finance, with the approval of the governor in council on behalf of the government of Canada, and the commissioner of the Yukon Territory with the approval of the council of the Yukon Territory, on behalf of the government of the Yukon Territory, such agreement to provide, on such terms and conditions as may be agreed upon, for payment of the total of amounts calculated on the following basis: (a) grant in lieu of grants to the government of the Yukon Territory for support of government and legislature and other special grants, $30,000; (b) annual subsidy hereafter called the "population subsidy" to the government of the Yukon Territory of eighty cents per head in respect of a population of nine thousand and ninety-six persons, being the population for the year 1951 as determined by the census taken in that year, $7,276.80, and (c) compensation to the government of the Yukon Territory in consideration of its agreement to suspend and to refrain from levying, and to require the municipalities in the Yukon Territory to suspend and to refrain from levying, individual income taxes, corporation taxes and succession duties as defined in the agreement for the five year period specified in the agreement, the amount of compensation for each year to be the amount by which the greater of (i) the guaranteed minimum annual amount of $170,487, or (ii) the adjusted annual amount which is an amount that is, in respect of a fiscal year, the average of amounts determined in respect of each of the two calendar years immediately preceding the fiscal year, each of such amounts to be the greater of (A) the guaranteed minimum annual amount, or (B) the amount that is the product of the guaranteed minimum annual amount and the product of the ratio that the value of the gross national product per capita in the respective calendar year bears to the said value in the calendar year 1948 and the ratio that the population of the Yukon Territory for the respective calendar year bears to the said population in the calendar year 1948, the said ratios to be determined by the dominion statistician, exceeds the amount of the population subsidy, the estimated amount of compensation for the fiscal year 1952-53 being $222,233.45, and to authorize payment of an amount not exceeding $182.92 to the government of the Yukon Territory in consideration of the release of its right to payment by the government of Canada

of interest and penalties in respect of overdue taxes under clause four of the agreement, as amended, entered into pursuant to chapter 21, Ordinances of the Yukon Territory, 1948; the estimated total amount required for the fiscal year 1952-53 being $259,693.17, $259,694.

[Stage Direction]
47.	Land protection, reclamation and development in British Columbia under such terms and conditions as may be approved by the governor in council, $184,996.
48.	Land protection and reclamation; clearing and settlement of new lands under such terms and conditions as may be approved by the governor in council, $250,000.
49.	Maritime Marshland Rehabilitation Act, $1,655,520.
50.	Assiniboine river-diking and cut-off, $50,000.
51.	To provide for administrative expenses, Agricultural Prices Support Act, 1944, $92,700.
52.	To provide for a contribution to the federated women's institutes of Canada to help defray the costs of the international conference of the associated country women of the world to be held in Canada in 1953, $10,000.
Loans, investments and advances-Agriculture-
556. To authorize and provide for the operation of a revolving fund in accordance with the provisions of section 58 of the Financial Administration Act, for the purposes of financing the production of improved and new varieties of seeds, including administrative expenses; and for the acquiring of livestock for experimental purposes; the amount to be charged to the revolving fund at any one time not to exceed, $250,000.
Science service-
Science service administration-
659.	Construction or acquisition of buildings, works, land and new equipment-further amount required, $410,800.
Animal pathology-
660.	Operation and maintenance-further amount required, $6,700.
661.	Construction	or	acquisition	of	buildings,
works, land and new equipment-further amount required, $2,100.
Botany and plant pathology-
662.	Construction	or	acquisition	of	buildings,
works, land and new equipment-further amount required, $62,000.
Forest biology-
663.	Construction	or	acquisition	of	buildings,
works, land and new equipment-further amount required, $101,000.
Experimental farms service-
Central experimental farms, including research and co-ordinating divisions for the experimental farms service-
664. Construction or acquisition of buildings, works, land and new equipment-further amount required, $4,000.
Branch experimental farms, substations and illustration stations-
665. Construction or acquisition of buildings, works, land and new equipment-further amount required, $108,300.

Production service-
Health of animals-
666.	Administration of Animal Contagious Diseases Act, and Meat and Canned Foods Act-further amount required, $130,000.
667.	To provide for payment of compensation to owners of animals and poultry affected with diseases coming under the operation of the Animal Contagious Diseases Act, which have died or have been slaughtered under circumstances unprovided for under the above act and regulations thereunder, in the amounts detailed in the estimates, and to authorize payment from vote 25 of the main estimates, 1952-53, of compensation in conformity with the terms of the Act for the Control and Extirpation of Foot and Mouth Disease, $75,398.
668.	Grants to fairs and exhibitions, under such terms and conditions as may be approved by the governor in council and subject to allocation by the treasury board-further amount required, $10,000. Marketing service-
669.	Subsidies for cold storage warehouses under the Cold Storage Act, and grants, in the amounts detailed in the estimates-further amount required, $832,354.
Terminable services-
670.	Freight assistance on western feed grains- further amount required, $11,250,000.
Special-
671.	Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act and water storage-further amount required, $500,000.
672.	Major irrigation and reclamation projects in the prairie provinces-further amount required, $500,000.
Supply
673.	Land protection and reclamation; clearing and settlement of new lands under such terms and conditions as may be approved by the governor in council-further amount required, $100,000.
674.	Amount required to recoup the agricultural prices support account to cover the net operating loss of the agricultural prices support board during the fiscal year 1951-52, $186,390.
675.	To provide for price adjustment on overweight hogs, $100,000.

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311.	Departmental administration, $1,118,455.
312.	Operations-including salaries and other expenses of staff post offices, district offices, railway mail service staffs, and supplies, equipment and other items for revenue post offices, also including administration, $61,196,517.
313.	Transportation-movement of mail by land, air and water, including administration, $40,542,048.
314.	Financial services, including audit of revenue, money order and savings bank business; and postage stamps, $2,525,240.
733.	Departmental administration-further amount required, $75,000.
734. Operations-including salaries and other expenses of staff post offices, district offices, railway mail service staffs, and supplies, equipment and other items for revenue post offices, also including administration-further amount required, $218,376.
735.	Transportation-movement of mail by land, air and water, including administration-further amount required, $460,900.
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Friday, July 4, 1952