1955-06-24

Mr. Speaker:: Anticipating the wishes of several hon. members, I want to point out that we celebrate today the feast of that great peace teacher, St. John the Baptist. It is St. John's day in French Canada, and it is St. John's day in Newfoundland. We extend greetings to all our French-speaking colleagues and to our Newfoundland members, particularly the hon. member for St. John's East and the hon. member for St. John's West.
(Translation) :
We shall sing of the greatness of this feast in the words of the poet Octave Cremazie:
Saint John the Baptist's day, oh glorious feast!
Thou carries within thee the shining trace
Of our ancient French memories,
Recalling to our hearts the virtues of our fathers
Thou showest, radiant with fire and light.
The glories which are theirs, and noble blessings too.
Right	Hon.	L.	S.	St.	Laurent	(Prime
Minister): Mr. Speaker, you have just referred to an anniversary of particular interest to a large part of the population of our united nation.
(Text) :



UNITED NATIONS


[Stage Direction]
Right	Hon.	L.	S.	St.	Laurent	(Prime
Minister): Mr. Speaker, you have just referred to an anniversary of special interest to a large part of the population of our united nations, but it so happens that this coming Sunday, June 26, will mark the tenth anniversary of the signing of the United Nations charter. As we all know, October 24, the day of the coming into effect of the charter, is regularly observed by the United Nations and interested non-governmental organizations as United Nations day. It is however appropriate that after ten years June 26 should have been set aside this year as a day of commemoration and that it should be given special notice in this house.
A decade is perhaps too short a span on which to base a final judgment of an international organization. One thing is clear,
however: from its birth in wartime, throughout its efforts to rebuild and keep the peace and its struggle against hunger, disease and ignorance, the United Nations has already played a unique and an indispensable role. It has been criticized for its shortcomings. But such criticism must be kept in perspective and should not be permitted to throw any doubt upon the vital need for the organization.
We are, of course, well aware that, at its present stage of development, the organization has not provided security. It has not, as we hoped it might, ensured that "succeeding generations" will be saved "from the scourge of war". It has become necessary for some of its members to seek additional protection in such regional groupings for collective defence as NATO. But we do not regard these as a substitute for the universal collective security that could be afforded by our world organization and we have not given up- and will not give up-our aspiration towards that objective; our greatest, and it may be, ultimately, our only hope in this nuclear age.
Our support of the United Nations has also been extended to the other purposes of the organization and in particular to its efforts to "promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom". From the outset this is a field which has been of special concern to Canada. Our strong interest in the work of the United Nations and its specialized agencies designed to improve conditions in economically less favoured countries has found tangible expression in various programs for technical co-operation. It is a field in which Canada is well qualified to contribute knowledge and assistance. The results are still dwarfed by the gigantic task that is still before us: but a beginning has been made and when the world can be relieved of some of the heavy burden of armaments it will be possible to increase efforts in this field.
But to maintain peace and to promote better conditions of life for peoples in all parts of the world, the organization requires mutual understanding and confidence between nations. The response of the members of the United Nations to the meeting being held through this week in San Francisco is encouraging. The foreign ministers or plenipotentiaries of all 60 member states have come together there to commemorate the anniversary in what we hope is a spirit of
[Stage Direction]
United Nations
harmony and dedication. This may be an augury of good will for the future, following as it does other signs of a more co-operative atmosphere in which the organization can become more effective.
Today as in 1945 we can permit ourselves to hope that through the United Nations we shall see the day when hunger, disease and ignorance will no longer be the fatalistic lot of so many millions in the world; when peace will no longer be merely an absence of fighting; and when the nations of the world will And it possible, in the words of the charter, "to practice tolerance and live together-as good neighbours".
Hon. George A. Drew (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker, this is fortunately one of those occasions, not too infrequent, when members on both sides of the house can agree on the expression of common aspirations and hopes that are shared by everyone here. There will be agreement in the minds of every one of us with the statement made by the Prime Minister as to the hopes in the hearts of all of us respecting the accomplishments of the United Nations. The ceremonies now taking place at San Francisco carry our minds back to those days ten years ago when representatives of 60 nations came together there to frame a new charter for the preservation of peace and for the improvement of the living conditions of mankind, with all the recollections of the reasons for the failure of the league of nations still fresh in the minds of many of those who were there.
As the Prime Minister has just said, a decade is too short a time within the long range of history for any one of us to be able to assess the ultimate value to humanity of this great organization. Nevertheless, much has been accomplished. The very fact that nations of so many different tongues and so many different social structures have been able to meet year by year and find common ground in some respects is in itself a great achievement.
I do not intend to review in any way the ground covered by the Prime Minister in regard to the very real accomplishments there have been in the field of the improvement of conditions in various parts of the world by common action. Nor do I intend to expand on one aspect of that, the better understanding of the hopes and aspirations of other nations that has been brought about by the daily informal contacts between the delegates who meet at the United Nations building in New York, at Geneva, in Paris, and at other places where gatherings of the United Nations Organization take place.

I think it would be a betrayal, Mr. Speaker, of all the sacrifice there has been if we did not also remember at this time the high purposes and the high hopes of those who met at San Francisco ten years ago. They recalled, and stated their recollection in clear words, that the failure of the league of nations had resulted from the abandonment of principles in the charter of that league and the failure to act collectively to carry into positive results the high purposes which had been declared. All who attended that meeting ten years ago subscribed to the principle that aggression must be checked and that every nation must be free to determine its own course by its own free decision. As has already been said, much has been accomplished. The actual overrunning of Greece by communism was prevented by the United Nations.
Since Israel became a nation in the family of nations after all these years, the outbreak of open war in recent times has been prevented along the Israeli-Egyptian frontier by the action of the United Nations. We Canadians have reason to be proud of a very gallant Canadian, General Burns, who played his part in that great result. Nor should we forget that in Kashmir it was the United Nations that prevented that lovely part of what had been a province of India from becoming the focal point of trouble between India and Pakistan. Although that situation has not yet resolved itself, the United Nations can claim much credit for keeping it in a state of suspense.
Then we come to Korea. There we saw united action against aggression. But, Mr. Speaker, every member of this house should recall that this was the result of a fortunate accident. The only reason there was united action against communist aggression in Korea was because Russia, for some unexplainable reason, absented herself from the meeting of the security council which made that decision. It is not likely that Russia will repeat that mistake in the future. Therefore, with the veto powers which exist, it seems extremely unlikely that similar action can be taken within the framework of the United Nations against similar aggression elsewhere. At a time like this, I think we should recall just exactly what the purpose of the United Nations is. I should like to read only the first two short paragraphs because I think they should be in the minds of every one of us at this time.
The purposes of the United Nations are:
1. To maintain international peace and security, and to that end:	to take effective collective
measures tor the prevention and removal of threats to the peace and for the suppression of acts of aggression or other breaches of the peace, and

to bring about by peaceful means, and in conformity with the principles of justice and international law, adjustment or settlement of international disputes or situations which might lead to a breach of the peace;
I emphasize this paragraph:
2. To develop friendly relations among nations based on respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples, and to take other appropriate measures to strengthen universal peace.
Surely, there is the whole foundation of the high aspirations of the United Nations. The hopes that were contained in these expressions have not been fulfilled. The principle that there must not be interference with the free right of every nation to choose its own course is the very foundation of the collective organization which is now commemorating its birth ten years ago. For that reason I submit, Mr. Speaker, that this is the appropriate time to say here in this house that, so far as we are concerned, we believe there should be no talk of the entry of communist China into the United Nations.


Mr. Coldwell:: Why raise that today?


George Alexander Drew: I hear an hon. member say, "Why raise that?" This is the time to raise it, while these people are gathered there. It is not because communist China is under a communist government. It is because communist China has been declared an aggressor by the United Nations. It is still declared an aggressor. There is only an armistice in Korea, and until there is peace it remains an aggressor. And the United Nations would lose any moral sanctity for its high purposes if on the ground of expediency it admitted a nation which was actually engaged not long ago in real and terrible war against our own young men, and the young men of the other nations which are trying to stop their aggression.
Now, why recall this now? Let every member, whose memory goes back to the high hopes of the league of nations in 1919, recall the dreadful course which led to its failure. Step by step expediency guided the course, instead of an acceptance of the principles which had been expressed at the time that great charter was signed in 1919. If the lessons of history mean anything to us, then let us not repeat the mistakes. Let us make sure that this great organization has the legal sanction of the acceptance of the principles upon which it was founded ten years ago.
During the last few days statements have been made which recall history. Russia has asked at San Francisco for disarmament on their terms-which means disarmament of everyone else, and no opportunity for any other nation to inspect what they are doing.
United Nations
They made exactly the same type of proposal before the league of nations at the very time they were building up huge armaments, under a communist government with the assistance of the private armaments industry of Germany at that time. Krupps, Loewe and other German armament companies, with the assistance of the communist government of Russia, were building up the arms of Russia for purposes of aggression.
This is simply a matter of history repeating itself. And now, after all the menacing statements that were made, Molotov asks for an expression of good faith. He asks for deeds, not words. Surely, indeed, here is the devil citing scripture.
If there is one act of good faith that is needed at San Francisco, it is a declaration by Mr. Molotov on behalf of Russia that at this time they will undertake, as a demonstration of good faith during these commemoration services, to permit the nations that they have overrun to decide their own course by a free vote such as was promised in the charter of the United Nations ten years ago.
Why should that be considered as asking too much? When the nations met to sign this charter they believed that Poland, the Ukraine, the Baltic states, Rumania, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria and the other nations overrun by communism would have an opportunity to declare their choice of the kind of government they wanted. That was nothing new. Votes of that kind had been taken under the league of nations after the first world war, under a combined committee supervising the votes. Why could it not be done? Why should it not be done?
Mr. Speaker, I submit that, if there is to be any moral sanction for the declaration contained in the charter of the United Nations, it is based upon respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of all peoples, then at San Francisco, now, Russia should be asked to declare that they will afford this opportunity to Poland, the Ukraine, the Baltic states, Rumania, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria and other areas they have occupied since the war. Yes, Mr. Speaker, we might even hope that China itself would be afforded a chance to express its opinion. Russia has been free in talking about colonialism elsewhere. Let them show their good faith by permitting China under collective action to have a vote. Russia exercises a good deal of authority there. I submit that the one real hope of lasting peace is to remove these sources of future danger by recognizing that fundamental principle of the charter. In that way we would really strengthen the United Nations, and the

United Nations
gathering at San Francisco would not merely be a meeting of commemoration; it would be a meeting declaring that the purpose of the United Nations is still sound and intact. I say that because the meetings are still going on, and Canada, as well as any other nation, is free to express its opinion or urge others to do so.
In that spirit, Mr. Speaker, I hope we shall not only recognize that this is the commemoration of a great event at the end of the other war but that we shall all rededicate ourselves to the great purposes set forth in the charter of the United Nations.


Major James William Coldwell: intend to follow the example of the Prime Minister and the advice of Mr. van Kleffens, the president of the assembly, and avoid making a foreign policy speech or referring to controversial foreign affairs.
Today we are celebrating the tenth anniversary of the signing of the United Nations charter. To those of us who were there many vivid pictures return. I remember very well, when Mr. Stettinius rose in the chair to open the conference, the applause with which he was greeted. I remember, too, that when Mr., now Sir, Anthony Eden went to the rostrum he was greeted with similar applause. I also remember that when Mr. Molotov went to the platform he received an ovation. At that time Russia had a reservoir of good will which we all regret she has lost over the last number of years.
I also remember those who represented Canada; I remember Mr. Mackenzie Rung who led the delegation of five there. I remember Mr. Gordon Graydon, who was a friendly soul and was such a help to our own delegation, both of whom have passed to the great beyond. Then there was Mrs. Casselman, the then member for Edmonton East, who today lives in retirement in the city of Edmonton, and then the Prime Minister and I, the only two remaining members of this house who were delegates on that occasion. The Secretary of State for External Affairs (Mr. Pearson) was there acting in his capacity as an adviser to our delegation and as ambassador to the United States. We met on that occasion, as has already been said, with high hope of achieving permanent peace and disarmament, which we have not achieved. But let me inject this thought: while progressively the league of nations fell in the estimation of humanity, the United Nations, I believe, has risen in that respect as the years have passed by.
Ten years is a short space of time in human history. The achievements of the organization are many, as the Prime Minister said this morning. The security council has failed

in what we hoped it might do, but on the other hand the economic and social council has to its credit many noteworthy achievements. I think indeed that as the days pass the establishment of the economic and social council might be regarded as the principal achievement up to this time of the United Nations Organization. Subsidiary organizations of the economic and social council have done much to assist those in the backward countries who have suffered from hunger, want and disease. The children's fund, the world health organization, the food and agriculture organization, and so on, might be mentioned. Since we met a short decade has passed. In that time new nations have emerged. India, Pakistan, Burma, Indonesia have progressed from colonialism to independence and places of power in the councils of the nations. Libya for example, under the guidance of the United Nations trusteeship organization, has become a nation, and the new state of Israel has been born, or perhaps it might be better to say that the old state of Israel has been reborn. Privileged nations, too, have seen their responsibilities to less favoured peoples, though they may not have wholly assumed them yet.
All these are significant achievements in ten years. In the history of mankind ten years is but as the twinkling of an eye. So, joining this morning with the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition and others in remembering the signing of the charter on June 26, 1945, I wish to say that, just as we sing "God Save the Queen" in our own country, so should we today join in the fervent prayer and say "God save the people" -everywhere.


Mr. A. B. Patterson (Fraser Valley):: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of our leader, I have been asked by my colleagues to speak on their behalf on this occasion. We in the Social Credit group wish to associate ourselves with those who, on this occasion, pay tribute to the aims and objectives of the United Nations Organization and to the effort put forth through its agencies for the attainment of those objectives.
We are aware of the fact that the fond hopes of the builders of this great organization have not been realized to the fullest extent. Wars of limited scope have been followed by periods of uneasy peace. Today international tensions continue to frustrate the efforts of sincere men of good will to resolve differences and establish an order based on brotherhood and mutual understanding. However, we are glad that some successes have been achieved. Some causes of friction have been removed and to some degree the voice of the United Nations has

challenged the world to a greater and more insistent search for an adequate foundation upon which peace can be established.
I am in agreement with the views of Mr. Trygve Lie, the first secretary general of the United Nations, when he referred to the United Nations as man's best attempt to resolve international problems and ensure peace and security. The work of the United Nations in the field of social and economic endeavour deserves recognition on the part of all those interested in the welfare of their fellow men. This program, directed toward the raising of living standards around the world and the alleviation of hunger, poverty and disease, is in itself an indication of the value of the co-operation of the "have" nations, so that the "have not" nations may become the recipients of many of those things which we so greatly enjoy.
So this morning we acknowledge the worth of the work that has been done by the United Nations since its inception ten years ago in these two areas of endeavour, and we trust that under God the succeeding years may see a fuller realization of those objectives toward which the United Nations Organization is steadily progressing.



MISCELLANEOUS PRIVATE BILLS

[Stage Direction]
Eighth report of standing committee on miscellaneous private bills.-Mr. Hosking.

Hon. George C. Marler (Minister of Transport) moved: for leave to introduce Bill No. 508, to amend the St. Lawrence Seaway Authority Act.


Mr. Green:: Mr. Speaker, may we have an explanation of this bill?


George Carlyle Marler: Mr. Speaker, this is a very short bill, the purpose of which is to declare that the St. Lawrence seaway authority is a corporation empowered to take or to use lands or any interest therein without the consent of the owner, within the meaning of section 35 of the Indian Act.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.



FERRY SERVICE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. T. A. M. Kirk (Shelburne-Yarmouth-Clare):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question
Inquiries of the Ministry to the Minister of Transport? Is the minister in a position to give a progress report as to the final stages of the construction of the motor vessel Bluenose and to indicate when it is expected that the inauguration of the service between Yarmouth and Bar Harbor will take place?


George Carlyle Marler: Mr. Speaker, my understanding is that the trials are expected to be completed by July 15, and I have no reason to believe that the ship will not enter into service between that date and the end of July of this year.



HOUSING


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Charles Henry (Rosedale):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Minister of Public Works. Has the federal government been requested to participate in a housing redevelopment project in Toronto known as Regent Park South? If so, what stage have negotiations reached and what is involved?


Hon. Robert H. Winters (Minister of Public Works):: 

PICTOU, N.S., PIER-SALES TO BRITAIN

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
George Alexander Drew: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys. In doing so, I might explain that I have not mentioned this to him, but it is based on a wire I have just received, to which I believe an early reply is perhaps desirable. If the minister is not in a position to answer these questions now he could take this as notice.
1.	Has the government any plans to replace the shipping pier at Pictou landing in Nova Scotia?
2. Is this port being put out of use by raising rails to the landing, and, if so, will

Supply-Fisheries
the government take steps to restore this pier for the purpose of shipping?
3.	Has the government received any representations with respect to the sale of Pictou county coal to Britain?
4.	Whether it has received representations or not, is it considering taking any steps in this direction?


Hon. George Prudham (Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys):: Mr. Speaker, I think that should be an order for return. If the Leader of the Opposition would put it on the order paper, I shall endeavour to get the answer.


George Alexander Drew: Mr. Speaker, I would point out that, as the minister knows, there are certain things now taking place which would make an early answer desirable. If the minister would take this as notice I feel sure he could answer the questions in the form in which they now are.


George Prudham: Several parts of that question will have to be answered by other departments. That is why I suggest an order for return.



NOVA SCOTIA


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. A. J. MacEachen (Inverness-Rich-mond):: I wish to direct a question to the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys. Is the minister in a position to report any improvement in the sales prospects for Nova Scotia coal in the overseas market?


George Prudham: I understand that the Dominion Coal Company has been endeavouring to expand the market for Nova Scotia coal in Germany. My information this morning is that negotiations are still continuing but that there has been no confirmation as yet of sales.

The house in committee of supply, Mr. Robinson (Simcoe East) in the chair.
DEPARTMENT OF FISHERIES General services-
129.	Information and educational service, including grant of $3,000 to Nova Scotia fisheries exhibition, $186,000.


The Chairman:: Shall this resolution carry?


Mr. MacLean:: Mr. Chairman, I have just two brief suggestions I should like to make to the minister with a view to facilitating easy study of his estimates on future occasions. One would be that it would be easier

for the members of the committee to follow more closely the details if the details in the back of the book had opposite them the estimate number that is given in the front. While I know that the minister's department does not publish the book of estimates, that is a suggestion I put forward for consideration. Then I should like to ask the minister if he would give consideration to having the annual report of the department laid out in the same sequence as that in which the estimates appear in the book so that one could follow more readily the explanations of the activities which have been carried on under each item of expenditure.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
130.	Markets and economics service, $263,710.
John Angus MacLean: I have noticed that certain fish products are being imported into this country from other countries. That is something that is normal enough, but I wonder what control over the quality, the labelling and so on, if any, is carried on by the department. For instance, one thing that has come to my notice is this. I believe there is being imported from South Africa a canned fish product which is labelled as rock lobster. I think this product actually is something else. I think it is crayfish or something of that sort. However, I am not an expert in that field. I wonder whether the minister can comment on that matter.


Mr. Sinclair:: This matter had been drawn to our attention previously. The South African product is not a lobster as we understand it but rather a crayfish which is more of the shrimp family since it has not the large claws. There is considerable export of that product especially to the United States and it sells a little bit cheaper than does our canned lobster. As far as labelling is concerned this type of thing comes more under the food and drug administration, than under our department. However, our department has been asked to look into the matter and we are now doing it.


Mr. Nowlan:: I suppose this matter could come under the item on industrial development of markets as the subjects are interrelated. I wonder whether the minister would make a statement with respect to reports that have been circulated? I think proposals have been made by firms in Europe-I believe they are German firms-about operating on the Atlantic coast. Some reference has been made to the possibility of development of the herring industry there. I wonder whether the minister would comment on that matter?


James Sinclair: That matter was raised a little bit earlier in the session by the hon. member for Cape Breton South and the hon. member for Inverness-Richmond. Two Germans in Toronto made some inquiries of our department about bringing out a large number of German trawlers and German crews and establishing a herring plant and fish meal plant in the Cape Breton area. We were unable to find that these promoters had any semblance of financial stability or of experience in the industry but we referred the matter to our trade and commerce department and also to the provincial government. Up to now they have still not shown any evidence of financial backing to enter such an enterprise. We have, of course-as the hon. member knows very well because of his remarks yesterday on the conflict between inshore fishing and deep-sea fishing-very close control over the number of big trawlers we licence. I cannot think of anything which would dismay the fishermen of his riding and most of the other ridings in Nova Scotia more than the thought of 20 or 30 used German trawlers coming in here to exploit our fisheries. We are not very happy about seeing used trawlers of any description brought into the country because we want a modern fleet. This is another reason why we are rather careful with regard to the issuance of licences for trawlers. We insist that trawlers be attached to a plant and that the plant have the capacity to use the catch of the trawler.


George Clyde Nowlan: Speaking of modern boats, I wonder whether the minister has given any thought to furnishing for these inshore fishermen some collection service. I have sometimes thought about this when members were urging that more money be spent on the construction of wharves or something of the kind which always are necessary in every community because it is the only wharf where the fishing is done, and the next village will tell you that is the only wharf where any fishing is done and altogether you could spend $10 million in constructing wharves. I have felt that it might help if a fish collecting service was given with modern fast boats operating for small villages and collecting fish for the fishermen. I know we have a bait service and for some time that has been done in places. I wonder whether the minister has given any thought to giving such a service, for instance, along the bay of Fundy?


James Sinclair: I have given a considerable amount of thought to this matter because of the development on the west coast. On the west coast our fishermen stay at sea and fish.
50433-331i
Supply-Fisheries
Fast packers buy the fish from the fishermen at sea and run it into the plants. That is all done by private enterprise. It has meant that the fisherman becomes much more productive because he spends his time at sea fishing rather than wasting time running in and out with his fish in a boat which is not designed for packing fish but rather is designed for catching fish. That development is a fairly recent one in British Columbia, having taken place in the last 15 or 20 years. We are beginning to see some signs of that development in the maritime provinces but I would hesitate to have the government get into that business because we do not buy and sell fish. It is a development which we should like the fishing companies to encourage in the maritimes because it would give the small fisherman more time to spend at sea in fishing and it would assure his catch getting to market more quickly and in better condition.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
131.	Industria] development service, $750,000.
Mr. Ashbourne:: I notice there is a decrease in this vote of $250,000 this year. As I intimated when I spoke in the house yesterday afternoon, I should like the minister to make a review with regard to this industrial development vote as far as Newfoundland is concerned.


James Sinclair: This industrial development vote contains most of the programs we have for modernizing our fisheries. Most of the money, of course, is spent in the areas where the need for modernization is greatest, and that is in Newfoundland. I say that without any reflection on Newfoundland. In this vote is included the provision for Nova Scotia long-liners with which we do the exploratory fishing along the Newfoundland coast, and to teach Newfoundland fishermen the modern long-lining methods so successfully used off the Nova Scotia shore.
This vote also covers our experiments on savings gear, that is the size of the mesh of the trawls used to catch haddock and cod on the banks. The Bonavista fish plant was provided for by this vote. That was an experiment by our department to try to devise a mechanical drying plant for light salted cod in Newfoundland operated in conjunction with a plant specializing in fresh and frozen products, so that the salted cod plant would be a stand-by plant to take the great extra volume of production which occurs especially in the trap fishing season when the fish come in in such tremendous quantities. We have an agreement with the operator of the fresh and frozen plant to take over the experimental plant at the end

Supply-Fisheries
of three years for its total cost less depreciation if the experiment is successful. This experiment is working out very well, and when it is successful we hope that the industry in other parts of Newfoundland will duplicate that project.
Up at Quirpon in the hon. member's riding, away up at the very tip of Newfoundland, we have another type of fish plant construction, a community plant. These isolated communities have to rely almost entirely on their own resources and we are encouraging the establishment of a model community plant with as much mechanization of the actual drying operation outside as possible. Some distance away, at a place with the enchanting name of Seldom Come By, we have a similar community project. At Valleyfield we are now constructing what I think is perhaps the most significant new plant in Newfoundland. The salted cod industry has not changed very much in Newfoundland in 400 years. They catch the finest cod in the world, salt it by hand, and dry it in the sun. The sun in Newfoundland is rather irregular in its appearance, so uniform quality is not always assured. They pack the fish in great hogsheads, press it down and sell it in the low income fish markets of the world, the Caribbean and the Mediterranean.
In every other food product great advances have been made in the quality, standards and packaging of the product. Therefore we are building this pilot plant at Valleyfield in the very heart of the salted cod industry to try to introduce modern techniques of handling and packaging the product, thus making it an attractive product that can be sold elsewhere than in the Caribbean and Mediterranean markets. We hope that plant will be finished this year. The tenders have been let and we hope it will be in operation next year.
We have finished the economic survey of all the outports of Newfoundland, and there are almost 1,200 of them. That covers pretty well the principal activities in Newfoundland. We have other activities in the maritime provinces and one activity in British Columbia.


George Clyde Nowlan: Do I understand the minister to say that the costs of the plant at Bonavista are in this vote or were in a similar vote last year?


James Sinclair: Yes.


George Clyde Nowlan: In other words, it is charged up against current account and is not a capital item. I thought the amount we voted for the construction of the Bonavista plant last year was a capital item.


James Sinclair: It is a capital item, yes. It is included in here.


George Clyde Nowlan: Do the details the minister gave just now cover the $750,000 or do they also include the $225,000 included in the supplementary estimates which we have not got before us yet?


James Sinclair: The supplementary is extra. We try to gauge the size of the vote by the amount of work our engineering and scientific staffs can actually do during the course of the year. Last year we underspent the vote. We trimmed the vote down but found that because the construction companies were able to proceed with the work we were able to spend more than the vote in the main estimates.


George Clyde Nowlan: Can the minister give us a breakdown of what was spent out of this vote outside the province of Newfoundland?


James Sinclair: I will in a moment.


Mr. Stick:: The minister has referred to experimental plants. An experimental plant was established at Winterton a few years ago. What has happened to it?


James Sinclair: I am sorry, but I missed the question.


Leonard T. Stick: You established an experimental plant at Winterton a few years ago. What has happened to it? The minister neglected to mention that a salt fish drier was set up on an experimental basis at Winterton two or three years ago. I want to know what happened to it.


James Sinclair: I am sorry I did not mention that. That was a smaller plant on a much smaller scale which we constructed under the same agreement. It has worked out fairly successfully and arrangements are now being made to sell it to the operator of the adjacent plant on the same basis, the cost to us less depreciation over the years of operation.


Leonard T. Stick: It has not been sold yet?


James Sinclair: No, it has not been sold yet.


William Alfred Robinson: Shall the item carry?


George Clyde Nowlan: The minister was going to give me a breakdown of some figures.


James Sinclair: While my officials are adding up the figures perhaps I might indicate the type of work in Nova Scotia planned for the year. More work will be done on cod liver residue. Our experimental station is doing a lot of work to see whether the residue after the oil has been extracted cannot be used for animal or poultry feed.


George Clyde Nowlan: Where is that station?


James Sinclair: The experimental station at Halifax, the biggest experimental station we have in the country. Then there will be additional work on fish filleting experiments. As you know, we devised a machine that skins the cod fillets automatically, and work will be done on similar fish and on the keeping qualities of fillets after they have been skinned. Then there is the herring exploration work to which I referred earlier and which involves the whole gulf area. We are experimenting with a mechanical clam digger. We have a great market for clams, a bigger market than we can supply with maritime clams. Digging them is very laborious work, and with the cost of labour the price of clams can be very high. The engineering staff and the experimental station are trying to invent a mechanical digger which will bring legal size clams to the surface and leave the smaller clams in the mud in the same way as a trawl of a certain mesh catches the adult fish and lets the small ones escape.
One of the main things we are working on down there is metal lobster traps. We have had a rather disastrous experience financially with our program of insurance of lobster traps. I will mention that when we come to the item. One of the great costs to the fisherman is the fact that the wooden traps have so short a life. In the crab fishery on the west coast, which is a similar fishery, steel traps are used entirely. They cost more but they have a much longer life. A cheap metal trap is not too easy to devise. We have constructed quite a number and are having them tested by special fishermen around the coast.
The last matter is one I mentioned yesterday, motorized dories for the banking fleet. All these add up to $100,085. In British Columbia we are spending $29,000 to extend our exploration for new shrimp beds.


Mr. Barnett:: I was going to ask the minister what projects, if any, were being undertaken on the west coast. Is the one he has just mentioned the only project?


James Sinclair: There is the mid-water trawl I mentioned yesterday, to try to catch herring at any level, perhaps an even more important project. That has been under way for two or three years. In the last season it worked very satisfactorily. Probably the most important of all as far as quality of fish is concerned is the matter of the use of refrigerated sea water in the holds of our packers instead of ice to keep the fish in better condition and to avoid bruising them in transport from the fish boat to the plant. These three items are being done under the vote.
Supply-Fisheries


Mr. Pearkes:: Would the mechanical clam digger to which the minister referred be suitable for west coast clams?


James Sinclair: Yes it could be. The clams on both coasts are pretty much the same in size. As usual, however, we have much bigger clams on the west coast that they have on the east coast. The clam shells grow larger in this favoured climate. The clam industry is a little more extensive on the east coast and, because there is a great need for help down there, we have conducted experimental work there rather than in British Columbia.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
132.	Field services administration, $754,200.
George Clyde Nowlan: Under the administration item here we have a director of Newfoundland fisheries. What is his responsibility and what is the setup within the organization of the fisheries department of that position?


James Sinclair: We have just abandoned that position. When we took over the Newfoundland fisheries administration under the terms of union, we established a position in Ottawa called the director of Newfoundland fisheries. We have now changed the position to director of industrial development service, and the present head of the Newfoundland service in Newfoundland has the title and rank of chief supervisor, the same as Mr. Baker in Halifax and Mr. Whitmore in Vancouver.
Now, perhaps I should answer the questions asked by the hon. member for New Westminster which come under this item. Last night he was good enough to allow them to stand on the understanding I would answer them today. I appreciate very much that he did not repeat the argument he made last year as to why he thought this closure of the fall fishing for pink salmon and chum salmon above the Pattullo bridge on the Fraser river was wrong, so I will not repeat the argument advanced by our departmental officers and by our scientists as to why this was done. The hon. member knows these arguments because I made them in a speech to the fishermen's union two years ago and repeated them in the house last year. He did ask three specific questions.
Perhaps I should, for the sake of the other hon. members who are interested, just remind them of the problem. Our west coast salmon, when they return from the sea to spawn, die after spawning. They are nffiikp the Atlantic salmon, which spawn and then return to the sea. Once these salmon, all five species, hit the fresh water they stop feeding

Supply-Fisheries
and they live entirely on the resources of their bodies until they come to the spawning grounds, when they perform their last function and die. The salmon which go farthest in these rivers naturally must have the most energy stored up in their bodies, so are in the best shape when they hit the rivers. Our sockeye salmon, which are the most valuable salmon, are the salmon in which that is most evident. Some of our sockeye salmon go 700 or 800 miles up the Fraser to find the little creeks in which they were spawned, so when they enter the river they are in good shape because they still have a long journey ahead of them.
At the other end of the scale are the pink salmon and the chum salmon. Both of these spawn quite close to the sea. They, too, stop feeding the moment they enter the river. But since they have a very short distance to go before they spawn and die, the process of wastage in the body happens much more rapidly, the fish deteriorate much more quickly. In the Fraser river in British Columbia we can see the spawning salmon going up. They are no longer silver bright but are splotched with colour here and there on their bodies. They get ugly and naturally the quality of the flesh goes down because they are no longer feeding. They are living on the stored resources of their bodies.
That is one point. The other point about the fish is that when they are in the river above the bridge the river is just a single channel. They are in their most vulnerable position so far as attack by the fishermen is concerned. Out in the open sea they have some chance of evading the gill nets, the seines and the three fish traps left on the west coast. In the river too, where there are several outlets and many bars, they still have some opportunity to evade the nets. But above the New Westminster bridge where the river is one narrow channel, they have very little opportunity to evade the nets as they are heading for the spawning grounds. Of all the periods of fish life, this is the most valuable so far as perpetuating that resource is concerned.
Then too, in British Columbia we have a very great increase in the fishing effort; far more fishermen, far better boats and far more effective gear. It is because of that that the fishermen have asked in recent years, as the hon. member for Esquimalt-Saanich has pointed out, for a limitation on licences, a request which is unheard of on the east coast. It was for these reasons that fishing for both pink and chum salmon was stopped in this upper area of the Fraser. There were the two grounds, first that the quality is down as compared with the same fish if caught at

sea, and secondly in the interests of conservation, because this is the area where they are most vulnerable. These same grounds were covered last year.
The hon. member asked three questions. First, how have the upper Fraser river fishermen failed to conserve fish? Well, of course, they have not failed to conserve fish because they do not conserve fish. The people who conserve fish are the Department of Fisheries. Our scientists advise us of the regulations to be passed and enforced so far as fishing areas, length of season, openings and closings, size of gear and so on are concerned. We have a very effective police force in our protective service to make sure these laws are obeyed. In the early days there was great difficulty getting the fishermen to obey these regulations designed to restore the run on the Fraser. They thought the department was being unduly severe. They were sure the scientists were a bunch of longhairs away over in a biological station who did not know the practical problems of fishing. These fishermen in British Columbia do not think that today. The amazing rehabilitation of the Fraser river run, probably the most outstanding fishery job done on salmon anywhere in the world, has convinced a lot of fishermen that these men are right and that they know their job. The proof is in the pudding. The increase in the catch in the last four years in the Fraser has been worth $42 million to the fishermen, and that is a real boon to them. That is why in the last season when we had a closing at the very height of the greatest run, at which time a million fish passed through this river on the way to the spawning grounds in one 48-hour period, we need not have had one patrol ship out in the river because the fishermen were convinced our regulations were right. The fishermen had received these greatly increased returns.
The second point the hon. member raised was that matter of the quality of the fish. The same point was raised, of course, by the delegation of the fishermen from that area who met me to protest against the closing of this fall run. These fishermen still have, of course, the early run of spring salmon, the great sockeye run and the early pink salmon. They can go down the river just 20 miles and fish in the lower river or they can go out to sea and fish as the other fishermen do who are even quite close to them. Getting back to the quality, I have explained the biological reason for the decline in the quality of the fish caught in the upper river. The head of the fishermen's delegation, Pete Janewein told me, and it is quite true, if I were to go down to one of our canneries

and watch one of these big seine boats come in there with their fish, I would find some of the fish caught at sea were not first-class quality. That is true, of course.
We have these packers that carry the fish, but when a fish boat is coming in for its home run it will choose to pack a load. Then, the weight of the other fish on the fish on the bottom does change the quality of those fish. However, that may be corrected by the use of this refrigerated seawater system with which we are experimenting, or it may be corrected by shelving so that the fish on top do not rest on the bottom fish. In this way they can be maintained as grade A salmon. These pinks and chums in the upper river cannot be maintained because they are not grade A when caught. I am going to make a suggestion to the hon. member. He is new to the fishing industry but he has displayed a very keen interest in the fishing activities of his constituents. Many of his constituents, mind you, I believe, are below the bridge, and many of those fishermen fish the whole coast and go up to Alaska or down the coast to Washington. On October 15, at which time there will be a reopening of the whole river, I will have one of our fisheries officers take the hon. member on a little trip. First of all he will take him down to one of the canneries at the mouth of the river, perhaps the Imperial or the Celtic, and he can see the fish packers coming in with the pinks and chums caught at sea, and unloading at the cannery dock.
They are beautiful fish. The pinks are small, perhaps four or five pounds, lovely looking, firm and hard and of a silver colour. The chums are even more handsome-big fish, four or five years old-magnificent. They get the name of Silverbright, and a premium is paid for them on the fresh fish market. He will see the quality of these fish when they are caught at sea. And my inspector will then drive him up to the Mission bridge and he will hook out of the river a pink salmon and a chum salmon. But they are no longer called pinks and chums up there: they are called humpbacks and dog salmon. I am sure that the hon. member would have difficulty recognizing them as the same fish. And, by the way, the names I have given are the names the fishermen use.
The little pink salmon has begun to turn. Its body is splashed with ugly colour. A great hump has grown on the back of the male salmon. The mouth has got an ugly hook. The dog salmon-the chum-is even in poorer shape. There are great splotches of colour over its body because of the deterioration of the fish. The nose has become badly hooked, and great teeth have appeared, which give it its name of dog salmon.
Supply-Fisheries
When the hon. member compares these two fish he will agree that perhaps our scientists, who have done so much work in this field, may have a point in saying that the quality of these fish is better if caught at sea than if caught up river.
Then, one last question he asked me was this: what compensation are we going to pay to these fishermen who have now been closed off fishing in this particular area of the river? That is another point about these fishermen. They feel they have some vested privilege, some vested right. Nobody in Canada has any vested privilege with regard to fishing in the sea or in the rivers.


Mr. Hahn:: I was not speaking of just anyone; I was speaking only about war veterans.


James Sinclair: Well, whether you dress it up and talk about war veterans-and I am a war veteran-I would say that a war veteran fisherman is no better or worse than any other fisherman. War veteran fishermen received their re-establishment credits and gratuities as assistance to establish themselves as fishermen; and from then on they should be treated just the same as any other fishermen.
Take the war veteran fisherman, if you like-but I cannot see any distinction so far as our department is concerned. There is no vested right to fish in the river. Let me remind the hon. member of what other fishermen do. The fishermen in my riding, for example, find that the whole south coast is today closed-closed by our orders. They are away up in the Skeena river, in the areas which are open. When we closed those areas they move 500 miles to fish areas which are open.
The whole process of fishing on the west coast is a movement from closed to open areas, and an orderly fishing plan should have that facility. The fishermen in the maritime provinces, who go far greater distances seeking fish, would be rather amused to think that fishermen would claim some special compensation because, in the interests of conservation, the fishery right at their front doorstep is closed to them for part of the year.
Does that answer the hon. member's question?


Frederick George Hahn: I have listened to what the minister had to say, more particularly to the offer he has made me to go to sea on October 15. I must say I would enjoy another trip at sea. I might tell the minister that I have done gill net fishing and seining. However, I can go out again and I shall accept his offer.

Supply-Fisheries
However, in respect of the particular quality of fish about which he has spoken I must say that I cannot reconcile his words with a letter, a copy of which I have here, which was addressed to the Johnston Fishing and Packing Company, rural route No. 1, New Westminster, British Columbia. This letter says:
The directors of the gillnet section of our union are desirous of obtaining information as to the procedure used in handling salmon caught above New Westminster bridge. As you probably know, there have been a lot of loose statements as to the quality of salmon caught in this area and in order to arrive at the facts of the case we would be very much obliged if your company could answer the questions listed below.
1.	In deliveries of salmon from your collectors to your plant are the salmon caught and collected above New Westminster bridge kept entirely separate at all times from salmon caught and collected in other parts of district No. 1?
The other part is below the river, and in the inlet. The answer to that is no, and appears in a later letter which I shall place before the minister shortly. Then the second question is this:
2.	In the process of canning salmon at your plant is a separate code mark used to differentiate between salmon caught above New Westminster bridge and salmon caught in other parts of district No. 1?
The answer to that will also appear as no in a later letter. Then it continues:
3.	Does the government laboratory require certification from your company as to the place of origin of any parcel of canned salmon submitted by your company for inspection?
There again the answer is no. It continues:
4.	What percentage of this year's total pack was of grade "b" quality which was canned at your plant?
The answer to that will be None. The minister has indicated that salmon caught above the New Westminster bridge are grade "b" salmon. Yet the answer to this question will appear as None. The letter continues:
Thanking you in advance for this and other information which may occur to you as pertinent to the quality of salmon caught above New Westminster bridge, I am
Yours sincerely,
F. Rolley,
Secretary.
Now, just to keep the record straight, as I hear said so often in arguments between my Liberal and C.C.F. friends-and I shall use the same expression-I shall place on record now the reply received from Johnston Fishing and Packing Company under date of October 14, 1954. This letter is addressed to the Pacific fishermen and allied trades union at 298 Main street, Vancouver, for the attention of Mr. Fred Rolley, and states:
Replying to yours of the 4th inst. in which you ask four questions dealing with the Fraser river

fishing operations, our answer to the first three is "no" and to the fourth "none".
This letter is signed by D. M. Bartlett, president.
It would appear from this letter that there is no differentiation made by the packers between what the minister called grade "b" salmon above the Pattullo bridge and grade "a" salmon below the Pattullo bridge. In this connection I would refer the minister to the report and evidence of the Sloan commission of 1939-40-I believe this is all on record-and would ask him to look particularly at some of the questions and answers.
In that case the report was found to indicate that there was no difference. The fact is that the report went so far as to stress that certain of the salmon that was caught at Hell's Gate on the way up to the spawning ground was of better quality than those being caught at sea.
I can agree completely with the theory, certainly, that the minister has propounded, and I am not going to argue with the scientists in respect to the quality of any particular fish. But, so far as I can gather, no actual test has been made to prove that any individual can distinguish between the quality of fish caught above the Pattullo bridge and those which are caught below. I would even defy the minister to show anyone in the house, or fishermen, or anybody else any differentiation between the quality of canned salmon that one can get above the Pattullo bridge and that caught below. Having eaten canned salmon from above the bridge and similarly salmon that was caught below the bridge and out at sea, not as a fresh product because, as the minister indicated, it takes some time for these boats to come in, I am satisfied that it is most difficult to differentiate between them, and I would be at a loss to express a point of view as to which is better in quality and taste. From the scientific point of oil concentration and other matters of that kind, I too feel quite sure from the report of the Sloan commission-and that is the only one that has been made up to this time that I can refer to; the minister may have more recent reports that have not been made public-that the fishermen have not been made aware of any particular tests that have been made to prove conclusively that the fish caught above the bridge are not of as good quality as those caught below.
In so far as conservation is concerned, there is no point in my repeating any of the former arguments. I would merely ask the minister once again: If the quality is comparable, what difference should it make to the department if fishermen above the bridge were to catch their million fish in that area

or go below the bridge and catch the same fish? If it can be shown conclusively that there is a difference in the quality, I am satisfied that the fishermen would be quite agreeable, and I would certainly feel that they would not have the same arguments to make as they are making at this time in respect to permission to fish above the bridge.
As the minister indicated just a short while ago in answer to my first question, these fishermen did conserve the fish. It is only through their efforts and their co-operation-


James Sinclair: They were forced to.


Frederick George Hahn: -and through an application of the regulations set down by the fisheries department officials, and the respect that they had for those officials, in addition to the need for conservation, that made it possible to build up the fisheries business to what it is today on the Pacific coast. I see no difficulty in so far as the conservation end of it is concerned. The only difference in opinion must be therefore in the quality of the fish that is offered to the public.
If the minister knows of a test that has been made in recent years to prove what he has said, then I think we should all be made aware of it.


James Sinclair: I do not want to prolong this debate. I think we can close it right now by referring to the very thing that the hon. member has spoken of. First of all with respect to the evidence he produced from this one canning company, I should like to point out to him that this small canning company operates right in the centre of this area, so it can scarcely be called as unprejudiced a witness as are our scientists and officers.
The second point is one which is obviously causing some confusion. The great bulk of the pack of that plant is not pink and chum salmon; it is sockeye, spring and cohoe salmon, and, as I have said, these are the fish that go a long way and are still in pretty good shape when they pass that area, and can still be caught by the fishermen in the up-river area.
I offer him the simplest of all tests in quality, and that is his own eyes and his own hands. Our canned salmon laboratory does make sample checks of production of every cannery after the fish are canned without regard to where the fish come from. It just tests the salmon as it goes through. Our experimental station, which works on the various methods of preserving and processing fish, does test fish, and their tests show what our own eyes and nose and sense of feel show, that salmon, pink and chum salmon, the salmon that spawn close to the river
Supply-Fisheries
mouth, are in better shape at the entrance to the river than they are 50 miles up the river.
The hon. gentleman and I have buttressed our arguments by referring to things that please us most. He said he did not think there would be very much difference between fish caught above the Pattullo bridge and below the Pattullo bridge. I agree on a yard or two above and a yard or two below. I went to the other extreme of the river, points 50 miles apart. To show the difference, once again I can use the Sloan commission. It is quite true that the Sloan commission did produce evidence from our scientists, the same people who gave me this evidence, that a lot of the fish at Hell's Gate were in good condition in 1939; but there were no dog salmon at Hell's Gate in 1939, no chum salmon there today. There were no pink salmon there in 1939. There are pinks now getting up to the Thompson river because of the Hell's Gate fishway, but in 1939 there were no dog salmon nor pink salmon. It was sockeye salmon, which we still allow the fishermen to catch, which were in good shape up that far. That is why we are going further than that. Naturally, the best boats can easily operate in the whole stretch of the river.
One last point. The hon. member said: As far as conservation is concerned, if quality is not a factor-and I think it is a most important factor-then what harm is done to conservation by allowing the one million fish to be caught in this area? We could have the whole salmon run of the Fraser river caught in that area if we wished, but for two reasons. The first reason is quality. The second reason is that the fish is so vulnerable to attack in that area, that one straight stretch of the river, that he has not the opportunity that he has at sea, to avoid or escape the nets, that he has in the lower stretches of the river. All along the Pacific coast in recent years we have had a shift. Our fishing boundaries are farther and farther away from the river mouth out to sea. So, for this very reason, because of the greatly increased fishing pressure, the number of boats, the size of boats, the more and more effective gear that is introduced, it is harder and harder for fish to get up the river to spawn. In the Skeena, the Ness and Rivers inlet and in rivers down the coast we have had a shift of boundaries out to sea. The fishermen in the area do not like it very much. They knew we had to do it in the interests of conservation. We are now starting to do that which was recommended and which we should have done 50 years ago in the greatest of all salmon streams, the last great one in the world, the Fraser.

Supply-Fisheries


Frederick George Hahn: I have another suggestion. In view of the minister's recent statement to the effect that there were no pink salmon in Hell's Gate and no proper test was made of the quality at that point, would he consider having his department run a comparative quality test of pink salmon, let us say at Mission or at some other points as they enter the entrance to the Fraser river, to indicate to the fishermen that there is a difference in quality?


James Sinclair: I shall be very happy to do that.


Mr. Fulton:: I should like to raise a matter that I raised last year regarding the opportunity of sports fishermen to catch the fish higher up the river. Last year on the discussion of the minister's estimates I brought it up when the parliamentary assistant to the minister was here, who said that the matter was still under consideration. I expressed the hope that some decision would be reached on it before this year, but I find from a reference to the British Columbia sport fishing regulations, 1955, that the regulations prohibiting fishing by anyone other than an Indian for sockeye, pink or chum salmon by any means in the non-tidal waters of the province are still in existence.
In answer to the hon. member for New Westminster, the minister just told us that the pink and chum salmon are pretty well unfit for human consumption shortly after they enter the river. He himself informed us that the sockeye stays in that firm condition much further up the river. I know that last year, when I was having correspondence with the department about the matter, they indicated to me that in their opinion none of these varieties, that is, sockeye, pink or chum salmon, could be classed as sport fish. I wrote back to the fishermen's association that had taken the matter up, and I had this reply from them. This was in the vicinity of Lillooet in the Fraser river. It is as follows:
In our opinion here, the sockeye is a sport fish. It takes a lure. It treats the fisherman the same as other fish do in that if he has not got the proper lure on his line, then no fish .... We can produce concrete evidence that at least 60 per cent of the fish are caught by the mouth.
He goes on to say:
You can rest assured that at least 99 per cent of all the fish we have caught by angling are in a prime condition. It has been found that those that are not in a prime condition will not take the lure.
I personally have had present persons who are in the fish canning business when a fish has been landed. The expression used by them was: "These fish are in prime condition, as good as we get on the coast."

That refers, I think, specifically to the sockeye. I believe that no differentiation was made between the three species in their objection. As I pointed out last year, the number of fish that would be caught by angling-and I am not referring to netting or other forms of mass catching, but the number of fish that would be caught by sport fishermen-would be infinitesimal as compared with the number of fish going up the river, and it does deny to these people a legitimate form of sport, one which I am told they were able to enjoy for many years previously. I have no knowledge of this myself because I have never fished for salmon in the Fraser or Thompson rivers, although I have fished for trout, but I am going on the basis of what I am told by those who have. If there is this difference between sockeye on the one hand and pink and chum on the other, would the department consider changing the regulation with respect to sockeye, of which the run has been substantially rehabilitated?


James Sinclair: Mr. Chairman, I am sorry that the hon. member for Esquimalt-Saanich is not here, but the hon. member for Comox-Alberni and the hon. member for Nanaimo are. It is a very well known fact that sockeye salmon do not even take the lure in the sea. Off the west coast trollers do get sockeye some distance out to sea that take the lure, but the salmon which have taken the lure in the sea are spring salmon, one of the best of our sport fish. We have the steelhead, a kind of salmon which goes into the stream and returns. It takes a lure in the stream and in the sea. The sockeye salmon is the only one of any importance you would see at Lillooet, because few pink salmon are now getting up past Hell's Gate. The spring salmon all spawn below Lillooet as do the cohoe and the chum salmon. It is true that the sockeye have the farthest to go. At Lillooet the fish still have about 400 miles to go to Stewart lake and places like that, and they are still in a bright, silvery condition. That is a good test, I would suggest to the hon. member for New Westminster.
But the way these people got these fish is well known. They got them with hooks. You have the spawning fish coming up the river, fighting their way up. If you have a few good hooks you will catch them in the mouth too, because the fish are helpless. We permit the Indians to catch their fish, because that has been their right from time immemorial. They do not catch them for sale, but they catch them for themselves and their families. I would be very happy if you would let my chief supervisor in Vancouver have the name

of the gentleman in Lillooet who is able to catch sockeye salmon with lures at Lillooet.
One of the things the salmon run does in the Vancouver area is to provide some of the finest trout fishing in the world. The trout actually feed on the spawn of the great numbers of salmon there. But I have two distinguished fishermen from British Columbia in front of me, one of whom is the head of the research board, and I am sure that they and other members from British Columbia will confirm that the sockeye does not take a lure in the strait of Juan de Fuca. The sockeye salmon also refuses to take lures in fresh water. Will you corroborate me on that?


Edmund Davie Fulton: I am sorry the minister has not had the correspondence brought to his attention. I carried on the correspondence with the department last year for some considerable time and I was assured the matter was under consideration. Apparently it was not. From the reference to that correspondence-and I put some of it on the record in the discussion of the minister's estimates last year-the minister will see the name of the organization, and I think the name of the actual writer appears. I have not fished for salmon myself in those rivers, although I know something about trout fishing there. I am assured by a representative of one of the rod and gun clubs that this sockeye takes the lure. He was not referring to jigging-catching them with a hook dangling in the water-he was referring to angling with a lure. I am not going to pit my word against a scientist's, but this was the correspondence, and I was not aware that the department took the position that these fish could not be taken by lure. I met that ground by saying that the number caught by genuine angling would be infinitesimal. If the minister is correct and says these fish cannot be caught by lures, why not relax the regulation and permit the lures but prohibit the jigging for these fish?


James Sinclair: Knowing they cannot be taken by lure, we know the fish that are caught have been jigged. I am sorry that this has never been drawn to my attention. He goes on to say that 99 per cent of the fish are in good condition. That is not so. I would point out that even at Hell's Gate, where there are-


Edmund Davie Fulton: I think he is referring to 99 per cent of those caught by lures.


James Sinclair: I shall make sure the hon. member gets a full report of this, because it would be of great interest to all the fishing fraternities in British Columbia if they learned that sockeye can be caught by lures
Supply-Fisheries
at Lillooet. If they could be caught by lures, it would be of very great significance, because that salmon is the one that has survived. It has gone down the river, and has fought through the nets, and gone up to the riding of my hon. friend, as his fishermen know, and is getting pretty close to where it is going to perpetuate the species. It would be unfortunate, I think, to allow those fish to be taken by lures.


Edmund Davie Fulton: You could put a limit on it.


James Sinclair: However, my hon. friend will get a full report in a few weeks on that aspect.


Mr. Hamilton (York West):: Mr. Chairman, after those sportsmen's lengthy reports, my question dealing with items of money probably will be a very flat one. Under this item 132, looking over the details of field services on page 208, I find that by far the largest item, and almost the largest of any in the complete estimates, is one for charter of aircraft, $200,000. This item apparently appeared for the first time last year with an amount of $210,000. It is under the heading of field services administration. I have noticed in previous years, under field services protection, the utilization of aircraft. Apparently they followed a close line on expenditure in that connection, because it was $52,000 in 1951 and it is about $58,000 this year. I wonder if the minister might explain to us this item of $200,000, and since I was not here last year, perhaps he might explain the $210,000 for last year.


James Sinclair: We have two sorts of aircraft services in the country. During the height of the fishing season, especially on the west coast where fishing is of such importance, we hired aircraft because they can make such extensive patrols and spot from the air any boats falling within the boundary. When Newfoundland came into the confederation, we began ourselves to build up their service to the standard we had in the rest of Canada, both the services in protection and the inspection of fish and in administration of the fisheries. We did not get very much of a system of patrol vessels which is very important and we contemplated a building program to build the protective staff in Newfoundland up to the standards in the maritime provinces. We found that while there was not much of a fleet of vessels, if we built vessels big enough to withstand the storms on the open Atlantic, they would be too big to go into the small harbours in the outports, and on the other hand if we built vessels small enough to go into these small outports they could not withstand the storms. It was therefore suggested that we should use either airplanes or helicopters.

Supply-Fisheries
With airplanes there is some difficulty. There are only one or two landing fields in Newfoundland and I believe only one of them is close to a fishing town. Landing seaplanes on these great Atlantic swells is a difficult thing. A year ago, as an experiment, we were persuaded to try helicopters. The company we hired was the Okanagan Helicopter Com-pr.ny of British Columbia which is the biggest private helicopter company in the world and which has done such a remarkable job in the northern part of British Columbia, especially at Kitimat. They provided the helicopters for us. We found them extraordinarily satisfactory. They can land anywhere. They can land in the smallest little fishing village. They can land on a wharf. They can land on a big trawler or on the local school grounds. They provide access to fishing areas. They have done an excellent job on salmon counting. We have to count the spawning salmon each year in our great salmon streams in order to have a forecast of the catch which will return about four or five years hence, depending on the type of salmon. That is an expensive operation because they are difficult to count. The headwaters of these streams are generally inaccessible. These helicopters can hover over streams for as long as you want them to do so and take a spot count. We even used them to build a small fishway on the Terra Nova river. We had intended to build a fishway there and to pack the cement and materials in by packhorse. A helicopter lifted the stuff off the dock in St. John's and dropped a small concrete mixer and men right on the spot. The thing was built in about a quarter of the time and at about a quarter of the expense. We have found it to be an extremely useful operation down there.
On the west coast we have more fields for airplanes. We have a good patrol fleet. Operations are not in nearly as exposed waters. We do not think there is much occasion for using helicopters there. The actual rate for the charter of these helicopters is set by the air transport board. The total cost last year was $195,228 and they madie a total of 227 flights. As well as using them for patrol service we move our inspectors, such as inspectors of processed fish, our plant inspectors, our administrative officers, the men who handle the fishermen's insurance, by this means. All these men are moved there from the outports by these helicopters. That is why the item is not under the patrol service, which is the item which covers the planes needed for protective service.


John Borden Hamilton: Then I understand that the $210,000 or $200,000 item this year is for a specific job in Newfoundland. Is that right?


James Sinclair: Yes.


John Borden Hamilton: And to the same
company?


James Sinclair: Yes.


John Borden Hamilton: Was this contract put out to tender among any other companies?


James Sinclair: I should like to speak on that matter because one or two of the companies, including one from Toronto, came to see me about it. The matter of flying in a helicopter is still not as safe as flying in an aircraft and I felt that if we were going to require the fisheries officials, the inspectors on our staff -and fishermen too, for that matter, and plant managers whom we were taking to plants to be inspected-to fly in helicopters, we should assure the people flying in them that we have hired the best helicopter company in Canada. I am sure that we did hire the best helicopter company in Canada; it is a company which has as yet to kill a passenger. They have had just one crash in all the operations they have carried out. They have done more flying, I believe, than have all the other helicopter companies combined. I believe that recently they bought out most of the other helicopter companies in Canada.
In any case, quite aside from that, no government work by helicopter is put out on a tender basis. I would not want to entrust the men in my department to a service which had obtained a contract by underbidding. That was the reason why the air transport board set what they regard as a fair and equitable rate and these contracts are with companies which are doing the work at that rate.


John Borden Hamilton: Do I understand the minister to say that no contracts for air services are let out by tender?


James Sinclair: For helicopter service by
the government.


John Borden Hamilton: Is that true
of the Department of Mines and Technical Surveys? Is the minister actually sure that is so?


James Sinclair: I went through this at some time and I found that the reason for this policy is that one. We want our men to fly in planes which are safe, which are well equipped, and which are manned by the best pilots in the field. We have done that and I am proud of the fact that we have done it.
While I am on my feet I should like to speak about the representations made by this Toronto company after this British Columbia company had been hired. The manager

was most irate to think that a British Columbia company could come down here and get a contract. Of course, I said, it is all right for a Toronto company to go out to British Columbia and get a British Columbia contract. He suddenly realized that I was a British Columbian. The company we hired is the best helicopter company in Canada. That is why I hired them.


William Alfred Robinson: Shall the item carry?


John Borden Hamilton: I am not yet
through with this questioning, Mr. Chairman.. Is this item this year a continuation of the contract let last year or is it an entirely separate and new contract for this year?


James Sinclair: It is a renewed contract at
exactly the same flying rate.


John Borden Hamilton: Were the
renewal terms in the original contract limited to this company?


James Sinclair: No.


John Borden Hamilton: In view of what the minister has said perhaps he can tell us this. Is this expected to be a continuing type of operation? Is it filling a need which will continue in the future?


James Sinclair: Yes.


John Borden Hamilton: From what the minister says, do I gather that it is not the intention at any time to put this work out to tender?


James Sinclair: I am afraid the hon. gentleman does not know the regulations of the air transport board. The air transport board will not allow you to tender for competitive bids in the ordinary sense on this type of service. They file tariff rates which are approved by the transport board. Those rates were accepted by us for this service. They have actually saved us a great deal of money. Instead of having to build these boats which would be largely unusable because of storms, these helicopters have done an extraordinary service down there. As a matter of fact, they have done a good service for Newfoundland. Earlier last month, the great mine on Bell island was completely isolated for over two weeks from the neighbouring city of St. John's because of pack ice. Our two helicopters were the only means of transportation available for the sick and mail between St. John's and Bell island. It was a community service but one which the public should expect from public equipment if it is available. I repeat what I said. If we are dissatisfied with the Okanagan Helicopter Company,- if they should start suddenly dropping their
Supply-Fisheries
helicopters around as these other companies have been dropping helicopters around this country-then of course we will invite other companies to safeguard the lives of our people. But I am very happy with the flying record of that company under very difficult flying conditions.
I might point out that two or three years previously the Post Office Department hired a company which I will not name-I will just say it is an eastern helicopter company from the province of Ontario-in order to try to inaugurate a post office service down there. The scheme collapsed within two months because they found they could not fly under the conditions prevailing down there. These helicopters have maintained a service under very difficult flying conditions.


John Borden Hamilton: Mr. Chairman, the minister protests so strongly that I am beginning to wonder whether he is a director of or has something to do with the Okanagan Helicopter Company.


James Sinclair: I think a comment like that should be withdrawn. I am not a director of the Okanagan Helicopter Company. I hired them because they are the best in the country and that is acknowledged by the aircraft industry. Actually the firm which made the representations about which my hon. friend is talking has, I think, the worst record of helicopter crashes in the country.


The Deputy Chairman:: Order. If the hon. member for York West was implying that the minister was a director of a company with which his department was doing direct business I must request him to withdraw the implication; if he was not so implying, the committee would welcome his denial.


John Borden Hamilton: I am quite sure that the way my statement was worded there should be no implication of that kind at all. I did say and I still say that the minister protests very strongly, and I am very surprised that a man in his position should be on his feet in the house telling the members what is or is not the best helicopter company in Canada. I find that a very unusual situation, and if I have made note of it I do not think any inference should be drawn other than the fact that I have made note of it. I might suggest to the minister that he might take up the question of which helicopter companies are involved in crashes since he apparently is stating facts, and I am suggesting that there were at least six companies in Canada that might have bid on the job. I am suggesting that last year when this contract was entered into there was no such restriction as he states in connection with tendering. Although it may be

Supply-Fisheries
the procedure of the air transport board now to accept arrangements of this kind on a straight tariff basis, that was not in existence at the time this contract was entered into. I would respectfully suggest that he might go back and look into that particular phase of this operation.
Certainly I think his remarks are entirely unwarranted in connection with any representations about companies operating in one part of the country or another. I do not think there is any feeling in that respect whatsoever. But notwithstanding his observations about the condition that may exist today, I do believe that, in all fairness, any company in this business, whether located in Edmonton, Toronto or Ottawa, and there are helicopter companies at all these locations, should have been allowed the opportunity to go into this contract situation with the minister. I do not refer specifically to one from Toronto because I doubt very much whether there is one equipped at the present time to carry out this work, although there was at the time the contract was entered into. I might also add that I think all these companies, not just the one from Toronto, will be as surprised as I am that the minister is in a position to stand up in the house and tell us which is the best helicopter company in Canada.


William Alfred Robinson: Shall the resolution carry?


George Clyde Nowlan: To come down to the ground again, there is one matter 1 had planned to deal with on the next item but I think it can properly come under this one. It is rather parallel to the discussion which went on between the minister and the hon. member for New Westminster with respect to the salmon regulations there. I think the department has had correspondence with respect to salmon fishing in some of the Nova Scotia streams, and I should like the minister to comment on that. As far as the matter I am going to raise is concerned, may I say in the first place that naturally I would not want to see anything done which would limit or restrict conservation in any way, but if the information I have received is correct-and I cannot vouch for it at all except that it comes from reliable parties- it would appear to me that conservation was not an issue.
As I understand the situation, some time ago the department changed the regulations with respect to fishing on the streams in northern Nova Scotia and advanced the date on which fishing can start from the 16th of April until some time in June. There is one flat date for everybody now running all the way from northern New Brunswick

through the bay of Chaleur right down across Nova Scotia and out to the strait of Canso. I think the minister will know, because he has travelled over that area, and maritime members know, that there is a substantial difference in the season between Nova Scotia and northern New Brunswick. For instance, the season at Matapedia on the famous salmon streams there would be two or three weeks later than down in Nova Scotia.
I am thinking particularly of those rivers running through northern Nova Scotia into the Northumberland strait. I am told by people whom I believe to be reliable, and I simply pass on the information, that there is a fall run of salmon coming in there. They come in, spawn and stay there during the winter. With the break-up of the ice in the spring they immediately drift back towards the sea. But they go back and forth in the rivers for two, three or four weeks, and during that period of time they gather great strength again, put on weight and are really ocean salmon. But before the 5th of June they have departed for the ocean and are gone. The net result of the regulation advancing the opening date of the fishing season from the 16th of April to the 5th of June is, I am told, that there is no salmon fishing in these streams whatsoever, the salmon having gone to sea.
There is no industry involved, but what used to be remarkably good sport fishing from the 1st of May to the 15th no longer exists because of the regulation. In due course the minister may receive documented proof of what I have said, but I do know that representations have been made and if the facts are as I am told they are I do not see that any question of conservation is involved whatsoever. The fish spawn in the fall when they first go up the rivers, and on the way out in the spring the number that would be caught would not be substantial at all. The matter concerns the people of the area and from all over Nova Scotia who have gone there in the past to fish. At one time there was excellent fishing in half a dozen small rivers. People used to go to Tidnish and to the rivers in Cumberland and Colchester counties. I think the matter should be reviewed and I should like to have the minister comment on it.


James Sinclair: We have an Atlantic salmon program which we started a year and a half ago because of the alarming decline in Atlantic salmon as far as sports fishing was concerned. We have the co-operation of the four provinces. One of the difficulties was the different seasons and the different catch regulations in the different provinces. One of the first steps was to bring about uniform

opening and closing of seasons in the areas of salmon movement, and it was quite a concession for some of the provinces to give up earlier opening dates. But you cannot rebuild the fishing unless you close in on the existing fishing. More fish have got to get up the rivers to spawn. We had to go through the same process on the west coast in rebuilding the runs there.
The problem the hon. member mentions is of course a little different from any problem on the west coast. It concerns the return to the rivers of the black or slink salmon which spawns in the rivers, spends the winter there and then goes down to the sea. This great sporting fish is a mean, nasty, angry fish. I do not believe anybody eats them because all the meat is gone from their bodies.


George Clyde Nowlan: That may be right when they first go down, but the point I was trying to make was that over a period of three or four weeks they go down black and lean, as you say, but when they get back to salt water they come back in with the tide, and in three or four weeks' time they have picked up again. They are in the same condition as they were when they came up the rivers the fall before. In other words, they cease to be slinks and become Atlantic salmon.


James Sinclair: The strongest salmon are the fish which actually spawn and get back to the sea. Those are the salmon we want to encourage to return and spawn again. That is why some of our scientists would like to see a complete end to fishing for salmon which have spawned and are on the way back to the sea. In the next five or six years we are going to have to apply more and more restrictions to the length of the fishing season and the size of the catch in the Atlantic provinces in order that more fish can get up to spawn, return to the sea and thus build up the fishery as it used to be. We hope to do that job.


George Clyde Nowlan: In view of the great disparity in the area of Canso from Bathurst to Camp-bellton, in view of the disparity in the season, and in view of the fact the salmon in some New Brunswick rivers are spring run and Nova Scotia runs are fall runs, would the minister have these regulations reviewed again to see if adjustments can be made in them?


James Sinclair: We will continue to review that. It is quite a problem because no matter what area you mark out, there is going to be a boundary within area one as against area two. These regulations we have made have met with the general approval of the
Supply-Fisheries
provincial authorities who are as concerned as we are about the restoration of these Atlantic salmon.


Thomas Speakman Barnett: I have one question which I am sure the minister can answer briefly. Would he tell us how the position of chief supervisor of fisheries is shown in the details in the estimates?


James Sinclair: What does the hon. member want to know, his salary, or what does he want to know?


Mr. Knowles:: Where is he in the details?


James Sinclair: On page 208, three fishery
officers grade 10. This covers our chief supervisors in British Columbia, in the maritime provinces and in Newfoundland.


George Clyde Nowlan: There are some other questions, so I think perhaps it would be better if we called it one o'clock.
At one o'clock the committee took recess.
The committee resumed at 2.30 p.m.


George Clyde Nowlan: Mr. Chairman, I have two questions to ask the minister. There is one matter I should like to amplify for just a moment-and this is the subject we had to leave, under pressure, at one o'clock. As I recall, the minister said that at some time he would review generally the matter I raised about the change of the open season, or the opening of the season on June 5 along the area stretching from the strait of Canso to the bay of Chaleur.
I would stress again to the minister that we have a coast line there extending several hundred miles. I am not sure as to the exact length, but I should think it would be from two hundred to three hundred miles. There is a very wide variation in the season. I think the minister will admit that it is a rather rough and ready, rule-of-thumb and mechanical device when he substitutes for the various dates which were in effect before the one flat date covering the entire area. In fact, Mr. Chairman, this covers almost the whole of the coast line of two provinces. It covers the northern and western part of the Nova Scotia coast, and the whole area of the New Brunswick coast line along the Northumberland gulf.
I think the minister will realize that, instead of making what I thought, with respect, was a somewhat perfunctory promise to look into the matter, he really should review it so that adjustments can be made, particularly in view of the difference not only in seasons but also in the run of the

Supply-Fisheries
salmon-the New Brunswick running in the spring and the others in the fall.
There is one further matter. I noticed something in the item for departmental administration which brings this to my mind. When I referred to the Newfoundland supervisor this morning he said that the position was being done away with. I see in the departmental details reference to an assistant supervisor of fisheries in Newfoundland. Therefore do I take it that the office is not being done away with? What is the purpose of that office?


James Sinclair: The position of assistant supervisor was there when the office of director of the Newfoundland fisheries service was held by Mr. Bradbury. When Mr. Bradbury was moved here to Ottawa the assistant moved up and is now chief supervisor in Newfoundland.


George Clyde Nowlan: Is it intended to continue that office?


James Sinclair: There will be no assistant. From now on there will be only the chief supervisor.


Mr. Bell:: Last session I placed a question on the order paper respecting the Department of Fisheries, and its operations in Saint John. I asked if any changes were contemplated in staff or facilities at Saint John, by transfer of facilities or staff from Saint John to Halifax or elsewhere. I was told that no changes were contemplated. I have reason to think however that there has been some sort of transfer of personnel that is out of the ordinary. In other words it is not a routine transfer.
Phrasing my question in another way, may I ask the minister for the number of personnel in the department who are working in the field services administration and the protection branch as a whole. Will that number remain constant, or is there going to be any other change? It has been drawn to my attention that a gentleman is being transferred from Saint John, and that it is not a replacement transfer. In other words, I do not think someone else is coming back to take his place. It would seem that his job, whatever it may be, is going to be moved elsewhere.


James Sinclair: The problem at Saint John is that it is not the chief office in the maritime provinces. That office is at Halifax. Saint John is the regional office for New Brunswick. The hon. member is probably referring to the fish culture branch, is he?


Thomas Miller Bell: Yes.


James Sinclair: A study has been made to see whether or not that should be centred in Halifax. No decision has been made, and it is not contemplated that any permanent move will be made in the coming year.


John Borden Hamilton: I should like to refer again to the contract I mentioned before lunch. Were any of the other helicopter companies in existence in Canada last year called in by the minister's department to discuss the contract which was let? If so, which one?


James Sinclair: I am told that, when we told the air transport board that we were proposing to hire helicopters and ask for rates, they told us to also make this knowledge available to the Sparton Airways company, and Photographic Surveys (helicopter section) which I believe has since been purchased by the Okanagan Helicopter Company. But for the reasons I have already given I chose to hire the Okanagan Helicopter Company.


John Borden Hamilton: I do not wish to overemphasize the point, but I would ask the minister to check the more recent records with the various companies, in the hope that they might be called in, in future, on this type of transaction.


Thomas Gordon William Ashbourne: With regard to the use of helicopters in the Atlantic provinces, and particularly in Newfoundland, I was wondering if the minister could tell us to what extent they have operated in the Labrador area.


James Sinclair: Quirpon is as far north as they have gone on flights. They have not actually crossed the strait of Belle Isle. They service the outports on the coast of Newfoundland principally.


Thomas Gordon William Ashbourne: I would like to point out the great value of the salmon rivers in Labrador, and I think the use of these helicopters in the Labrador area would be a move which would merit the minister's consideration.


James Sinclair: It would probably be the easiest way to patrol the Labrador salmon streams, which are under very great fishing pressure because of the iron ore developments and the military posts up there. We will study the whole matter during the coming year.


Mr. Blackmore:: Mr. Chairman, I should like to take only two or three minutes in this debate. What I shall say will be as much in order on this item as on any other. First I should like to let the people who represent the fishing areas of Canada know that we, who come from the prairies, where

the king is wheat, are solidly behind them. We do not get up and say much, because we want them to speak for themselves and to tell their own story. We endeavour to tell ours; and we are happy to see that they tell their story very well. In saying this I am putting one of the best wheat growing constituencies in the Dominion of Canada squarely behind the fishing areas.
The next thing is to tell the minister that I rejoice very much in the general attitude he has shown in respect of his department. When we have young men taking hold of departments and dreaming of a greater and greater Canada, dreaming of building the resources of this nation into a still more magnificent asset for the children to come, I rejoice. The minister has qualified as being in that class, in my judgment, and I congratulate him.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Protection branch-
133.	Operation and maintenance, $3,228,319.
Mr. McWilliam:: Will the minister advise the committee if the department intends to continue its educational program on the conservation of lobsters.


James Sinclair: Yes. Members of the fisheries committee saw our last venture in that field, a film prepared by the national film board, with our conservation officers, which will be circulated around the lobster fishing communities of the maritime provinces to tell the story very simply of the lobster's life and how our conservation measures are specifically designed to ensure the fishermen a continuing catch and indeed a better catch. I think the members of the committee who saw that film realized what a useful vehicle it will be to get the story across. We intend to expand that type of work for the fisherman.


Thomas Speakman Barnett: I notice that this item provides for the employment of quite a number of seasonal or part-time workers. Can the minister give us some understanding as to the policy of the government in making available to the seasonal employees, patrolmen, and so on, opportunity for permanent employment with the department? Is it the policy of the department to bring on to the permanent strength of the department the men who have served the department in these various seasonal occupations?


James Sinclair: Our employees are of three classes, the permanent employee on all the year round work, the seasonal employee who is hired for the fishing season, generally for protective work, and the part-time employee,
Supply-Fisheries
who is generally a scientist from a university whom we hire for specific projects during university recess.
The permanent employees are all hired through civil service competitive examinations with the usual veterans' preference. We try to hire seasonal employees in the same way, but we have quite a bit of difficulty in some fishing areas getting seasonal employees, especially on the west coast because they can make more money fishing. We have not quite that same difficulty in some areas on the east coast. But these men have no special preference when it comes to securing permanent employment because they still have to pass the civil service examinations, but they have a very great advantage. If they have worked one or two seasons with the department they know most of the answers to the questions that are going to be asked in the civil service examinations. We have a fair number of seasonal employees who try examinations and become permanent employees.


Thomas Speakman Barnett: The reason I asked the question is this. One of the few criticisms of a personal nature that have been brought to my attention was that some of the seasonal employees had not a proper opportunity to get on to the permanent staff. It would be useful if the minister could give us some indication of the opportunities open to them.


George Clyde Nowlan: Can the minister give us a breakdown of the employment of the seagoing personnel? I am sure it is not like the Swiss navy where everyone is an admiral, or the Kentucky army where everyone is a colonel. In going through the details I notice that 47 captains are listed, and apparently there are 44 of a crew altogether. I am omitting the first and second officers. There does not seem to be any suggestion of temporary help such as crew members. I was wondering whether we had 47 captains employed for a total crew of 44. There must be some discrepancy there that the minister could explain.


James Sinclair: We have 75 ships all told ranging in size from big ones with crews of over 30 for deep-sea work, down to small boats with a crew of one or two for local patrols.


George Clyde Nowlan: Where are the crews listed?


James Sinclair: On page 209. The hon. member will find them all through that page.


George Clyde Nowlan: Forty-four of a crew and 47 captains?

Supply-Fisheries


James Sinclair: Well, we have 40 captains, 18 captains seasonal, 10 captain-engineers shown on that page.


George Clyde Nowlan: I am forgetting them.


James Sinclair: On the smaller boats we have captain-engineers. We have some captains classed as fishery officers as well; they are both captains and fishery officers.


George Clyde Nowlan: Is there another place where the crew is shown separate from this?


James Sinclair: No; the crew is found all the way through these details. We find cooks, cook-deckhands and so forth in the details.


George Clyde Nowlan: There are 44 crew members, leaving out the officers. That is all I am saying. It seems to me there must be a discrepancy there somewhere.


James Sinclair: We finish up with a total crew of 1,075 for our 75 ships.


George Clyde Nowlan: I was wondering where they are listed.


James Sinclair: They are listed all the way through the details and on the other page as well. You will find cook-deckhands, cook-stewards, messboys, waiters, engineers in charge of marine stations, and so on.


George Clyde Nowlan: It does not add up to anything like that.


James Sinclair: We can supply a list if the hon. member wants it, but not for the record, of all our ships and the number of crew on every ship. I think the hon. member will find it in. the annual statement of the Department of Fisheries. A list of the ships, the size and the number of crew on each ship is given in the annual report of the department.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Inspection branch-
135. Operation and maintenance. $1,090,086.
John Angus MacLean: I presume this is the item which provides funds for the inspection of canned fish. Can the minister give a brief explanation of the system under which fish are inspected? I presume they are inspected at the cannery where they are actually produced. What further inspection are they given at some other distant point after they are shipped? If they are inspected at that point, can the minister give us some indication of the percentage of the product that is rejected at the inspection point away from the place of production, in other words, after the product is shipped to some market? Under circumstances of that kind, what action is taken? Has the producer any opportunity to be made aware of the exact reasons why the product is turned down?

Are samples of the condemned fish returned to him? What exactly is the procedure that is carried out?


James Sinclair: We have different inspection procedures for each fish. What fish does the hon. member have in mind, lobsters?


John Angus MacLean: No, a type of fish such as kippers, canned fish but not canned lobsters. Gaspereau is an example I have in mind.


James Sinclair: We do not inspect all forms of canned fish. We are gradually expanding our inspection services. On the west coast we inspect all canned salmon, for example; we inspect all chilled and frozen lobsters on the east coast. Canned gaspereau are almost entirely exported. Inspections depend on the exporter. If he is exporting to a country that wants a certificate of inspection, which is very common, especially in the South American markets, then he asks us to inspect. We have our standards for each canned fish product, and if the fish is not found of quality fit for human consumption it is destroyed. Inspection of gaspereau is done at the request of the exporter who wants to have a certificate of government inspection so that he can qualify for entry into the port to which he is shipping.


John Angus MacLean: I take it when the minister uses the term "exporter" he may not be referring to the canner of the fish; he may be the middleman who may or may not require this certificate of inspection. If a certificate of inspection is applied for and the product is inspected and condemned, and destroyed, I presume, who takes the loss, the original producer or the original canner?


James Sinclair: The man who asks for the inspection, because he is going to make a profit if the product is passed and has the seal of government approval on it.


John Angus MacLean: I am speaking from memory, but it was brought to my attention that a small plant in my riding had some canned gaspereau condemned in Montreal, I believe. The management of this plant felt very indignant about the manner in which the inspection was carried out. They felt they were not given sufficient explanation as to the precise way in which the product did not measure up to specifications and requirements. They complained that the product was condemned and destroyed out of hand without any information being given to the company that produced it before it was actually condemned, and that it was no longer available for re-examination.


James Sinclair: I remember that case very well because the producer in question, who is a small operator, wrote to me and asked

for a reinspection, which we granted. We put our top inspectors on it, and their report giving the reason why the fish was unfit for human consumption was given to the producer.


John Angus MacLean: Was a sample of the actual condemned product returned to the producer so that he could see for himself?


James Sinclair: He was present at the inspection. He has the right to be present himself or have a chemist of his own present at the inspection.


Mr. Cameron (Nanaimo):: Mr. Chairman, I wonder if the minister could tell us if there has been some change in departmental policy or some change in the operations of this branch, because I notice that last year you had five bacteriologists and seven chemists and this year you have only one chemist. Has there been some change in the set-up?


James Sinclair: Perhaps the trouble is the fact that we find it difficult to get trained chemists for fish inspection. That is one of the reasons I said we were beginning this system of graduate scholarships at our universities, hoping to encourage more graduate chemists to go into the chemistry of fish.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Fish culture and development branch-
137.	Operation and maintenance, $769,415.
Mr. Robichaud:: In view of the seriousness of the oyster situation in New Brunswick, could the minister tell the committee if it is the intention of the department to increase the activities at the Shippigan oyster station?


James Sinclair: The oysters in the maritime areas periodically suffer from disease, as do most living organisms, and it is a very difficult thing for fishery scientists to check diseases in animals of the sea because of the extent of the sea and the impossibility of eradication. With oyster beds, it is a matter of freeing the beds of all infected oysters. We have the station at Shippigan which specializes in oysters. We have as many men as we can get who are skilled in the science of oysters working on that project. Once again, our principal difficulty is to get qualified scientists to expand the program. If we get them, we shall expand the program.


Mr. Balcom:: Mr. Chairman, I should like to ask the minister a question with regard to lobsters. For some years there have been groups of people interested in extending the lobster season to all the year round. They seem to think that there would be no injury
Supply-Fisheries
to the lobster catches or the lobster industry if this were done. Would your department be considering that?


James Sinclair: Our Dr. Wilder, who is our expert on lobsters and an extremely competent scientist who has the confidence of our lobster fishermen, recently made a report in which he showed that as far as conservation is concerned there is really no reason to have these seasons. But these fishermen themselves in the interests of their own economy and the fact that they fish other species, and market supply, have asked for these varying lobster seasons. In the state of Maine they have no lobster seasons at all; they have a continuous open season. It is a matter again of the education of fishermen, the sort of program I mentioned a little while ago when speaking to the hon. members for Northumberland-Miramichi and Gloucester, but at the moment we have no intention of changing the present pattern of seasons.


Mr. Quelch:: I take it that the fishing in Banff national park comes under the minister's department.


James Sinclair: The national parks handle sport fishing in the parks themselves. We do the research in our department.


Victor Quelch: This is a matter of research. The minister seems to be doing such a wonderful job that I wonder if he could not divert a little of his energy toward finding out why fishing is not better in the Banff national park. I have heard different reasons given. I wonder if the minister could explain the main difficulties in the way of improving fishing there?


James Sinclair: One of the characteristics of most of our mountain lakes on the British Columbia and Alberta side of the rockies is the fact that the water has very little food for fish. It comes right off the snow or glaciers, is very pure with little organic life, and it is difficult to support a large fish population, no matter how much you may stock the lakes, because of the lack of food actually in the lakes. People in the area say that 20 years ago the fishing was much better. That is because 20 years ago most of the people going to Banff went by train, whereas today they go in tens of thousands by road. The fishing pressure on those lakes is many times greater than it was in those days. The Department of Northern Affairs and National Resources, which manages the parks, manages the fishing as part of the tourist attractions of the parks. The management is really in their hands.

Supply-Fisheries


John Angus MacLean: Mr. Chairman, yesterday evening I asked the minister a question regarding the fish conservation program in Prince Edward Island. I referred him briefly to a statement in the Canada Year Book for 1952-53 referring to Prince Edward Island. It says:
The province provides the sites for these investigations and the conservation and development branch of the federal Department of Fisheries builds the necessary dams and supplies the fish required for experimental purposes.
What I want to know is this. Has the department actually built dams for fish ponds on Prince Edward Island, and to what extent; and what success is being met with in this program, if it exists?


James Sinclair: I did answer that. I was in quite a rush at ten o'clock last night. We have the responsibility for the management of fisheries, but the actual construction or acquisition of the public ponds and the building of dams is a matter for the province. I think it was three ponds that they did construct, which we stocked. They were available for public fishing. But the program has not been very active since, because they have not provided any more ponds for us. We have no control over property rights there, and almost all the streams go through private property. There are no similar streams in the west or north because there they flow through crown land. We are willing to stock the streams if we have the ponds to hold these fish.


John Angus MacLean: I was under the impression that that was the case. I take it from what the minister has said that this statement in the Canada Year Book is not correct and that his department does not actually build the dams.


Colin Cameron: Mr. Chairman, I have a question with regard to item 137. I should like to come back again to the question of scientists in the department. Can the minister tell us how the salaries paid to biologists and chemists in his department compare with the salaries paid in comparable jobs outside the government service in private industry?


James Sinclair: The salaries for this type of scientist within the government, in the defence research board, the national research board and the fisheries research board, have been pretty well equalized. I do not think there is any doubt, however, that these salaries are below the salaries those men could get if they were out in industrial employment. There are other advantages, of course, in working in the civil service, such as security of tenure, and for a scientist

perhaps more opportunity for research, which is very important to a scientist. Our trouble is partly the salary question, but it is more the fact that if the man who graduates in biology or zoology decides to do his postgraduate work in marine biology, the only real chance he is ever going to have for employment will be in the Department of Fisheries or one of our international fisheries commissions, working for the government. Whereas the same lad, if he wanted to specialize in one of the industrial fields which uses these sciences, would have the opportunity of working either for the government or working for industry. That is one reason we have a disappointing number of students so far going in for marine science. That is why we want to encourage this work, with the co-operation of the universities, by helping them out with student projects and by providing these graduate scholarships.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Fish culture and development branch-
138.	Construction or acquisition of buildings, works, land and new equipment, $220,800.
Thomas Speakman Barnett: I notice that this item in this year's estimates is approximately the same size as the one last year, something over $220,000. I was wondering whether the minister could indicate to us the main direction in which this expenditure is to be made in the coming year. The details do not give us any information in that regard.


James Sinclair: I take it that the hon. member wants the expenditures in the Pacific area.


Thomas Speakman Barnett: Yes, as to the main undertakings.


James Sinclair: This vote is for the improvement of streams and other areas inhabited by fish on the Pacific coast. That means mainly stream clearance, removing log jams, the building of fishways either around power dams or around natural falls to provide better access. In this field, last year we built a fishway at Stamp falls in the hon. member's riding costing $115,000, and we expect to get that entire cost back in the increase in just one year's production of sockeye on that stream.
This year we propose to build a fishway at Skutz falls, costing $65,000; a fishway around Naden river falls, costing $45,000; to instal screens in irrigation ditches in the Nicola river valley, represented by the hon. member for Kamloops, costing $6,000; migration reseach at Capilano dam, the big water dam in my riding, to see whether we cannot divert the little fingerlings to get them down over the dam. We are able to get the fish up over this big dam but we are having

trouble in getting the small migrants down. Migration research on Puntledge river power dam-fingerlings are going through the power turbines-$4,000; a total of $124,000.


George Clyde Nowlan: Will you give us the same breakdown for the east?


James Sinclair: In the maritime areas we are going to construct six more circular ponds in the Antigonish hatchery, two concrete ponds at Grand falls, six concrete ponds at Cardigan, and two concrete ponds at Haley brook. We are going to renovate our garage and cold storage space at Cold-brook; bore a well at Grand lake; improve the water supply at Yarmouth; construct a fishway at Bartholomew river and Flume falls, New Brunswick; a steel deck on the fishway at Indian falls, La Have river; construction of five counting traps, and $4,000 for emergency dams and fishways.


George Clyde Nowlan: The minister speaks about fishways and fish ladders. As I understand it, the policy of the department is-or is it the law-that, for instance, as to a hydroelectric installation, the hydroelectric company or the power company itself is obliged to put in a fish ladder around the dam it has constructed?


James Sinclair: That is right.


George Clyde Nowlan: Whereas as to a natural obstruction such as a waterfall the department bears the cost.


James Sinclair: That is right.


George Clyde Nowlan: And the cost of power installations is borne by the power company itself.


James Sinclair: That is right.


John Angus MacLean: I should like to ask the minister if his department has been called into consultation with regard to building causeways in connection with the trans-Canada highway in the province of Prince Edward Island, and what effect they may have on fisheries and the migration of fish.


James Sinclair: We were consulted about that matter, and the culvert through the causeway has been designed by our engineers to allow the passage of migrant fish.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
139.	Consumer branch, $62,030.
George Clyde Nowlan: I wonder whether the
minister would comment on this item for a moment. Although it is a relatively small item, in the opinion of many of us it is one of great importance. It deals with the consumer branch of the Department of Fisheries. This is the branch about which the minister made a more or less sarcastic remark last
Supply-Fisheries
night, when he said if he reduced some items he should not be criticized for it.
In my opinion this is one item which I think the whole house believes should be increased rather than reduced because as the minister stated yesterday in his opening statement, the problem of increasing the demand for fish in this country is one of the paramount problems confronting his department. I think all of us have felt that this consumer branch, with the household economic kitchen, the advertising and the booklets, has been a really token constructive step in that direction. Since the problem is still with us, and since we are reducing this item, I am wondering what the minister has in mind.


James Sinclair: The reason this item appears to be reduced is that last year, to help our home economists in the other cities of Canada get around to the schools and the women's clubs in outlying districts, we bought four station wagons and mobile kitchen outfits. We actually would like very much to increase this work. We have a test kitchen in Ottawa with a staff, and a home economist in Vancouver, Winnipeg, Toronto and Montreal. Toward the end of the year I hope to be able to put one in the experimental station at Halifax, in Nova Scotia. The reason we have not pressed that matter so far is that the Nova Scotians today are the best fish eaters in Canada-


George Clyde Nowlan: And the best fish cooks.


James Sinclair: Perhaps they do not need instruction. Perhaps we should put this new economist somewhere else. In any event, we think Halifax is the next place to increase this service.


George Clyde Nowlan: That will be welcomed.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
140.	Fishermen's indemnity plan-administrative expenses, $215,000.
George Clyde Nowlan: Will the minister give us a breakdown on the fishermen's indemnity plan? As I said last year, the cost of administration looks to be extremely high.


James Sinclair: There is no question that the administration cost of this item is high. Not long after I became Minister of Fisheries I brought in the plan for two reasons. One was the continual complaints by small fishermen that they were unable to get any sort of insurance at all for their boats. The fishermen on the east coast had a greater complaint in this respect than the west coast fishermen, because the west coast fishermen as a rule have bigger boats, and they fish out of central towns where the boats can be inspected.

Supply-Fisheries
The insurance department of the government and one or two of the directors of marine insurance companies told me it was going to be a virtually impossible task, because the administration costs were going to be too high. That is why they could not touch it, because they would have so many little claims, little policies on boats worth $1,000, $2,000 or $5,000, scattered over hundreds of miles of coast.
I felt at the time that we could cut that cost by the use of fishery officers which we have scattered fairly well around the coast. So we launched this scheme to give protection to boats under $7,500-that is where the real problem was-and at a 1 per cent premium, which would pay up to 60 per cent of the value on total loss, and 60 per cent on damage. We started that off with our own officers acting as insurance agents. We found that to give the sort of coverage the fishermen were expecting, we had to extend and bring in other people as agents who also serve as fisheries officers. Their principal task is to arrange these policies and inspect on loss, but we also use them as fishery officers and as protection officers when they are not so employed. There was another reason for introducing this scheme. Every time there was a storm on the east coast, where the waters are not as sheltered as on the west coast, fishermen who had lost their capital, their boats, would appeal to us for loans or grants to help them get started again, and it seemed to me better to give them some opportunity to protect themselves so that we would be free from these pleas for financial subsidies.
The third reason had to do with the matter of credit. As I have told you, I was very impressed with the Farm Improvement Loans Act when I was in the finance department and wanted a similar plan for fishermen but found that the banks simply would not think of lending money to fishermen unless they had some sort of insurance on their boats. These are the reasons why we brought in the plan. As far as boats are concerned, it is working out quite satisfactorily. We have given pretty good coverage on the coasts. We are not giving any coverage, unfortunately, on the great lakes or in the prairie provinces, where we have fishermen who also need protection, because we have no officers there.
To give a summary, we now have 2,563 boats insured under the scheme with an appraised value of roughly $5 million. Last year premiums paid were $72,000 and losses were $91,000, so we were down $19,000. There was quite a difference between the east coast and the west coast. "Hurricane Edna" and one or two other such disasters lifted the losses on the east coast with the result that in the

maritimes and Newfoundland premiums were $40,000, losses were $89,000 and we were actually down $49,000. On the Pacific coast the coverage was just the other way. Our fishermen do fish in more sheltered waters. Premiums were $32,000 and losses $2,000. Because of that we were able to improve the coverage on the west coast, and for the same 1 per cent premium we now give them 70 per cent coverage. I think the best effect on the west coast has been the reduction in private insurance costs. Our fishermen used to try to insure for fire alone because with gasoline boats fire is the greatest hazard. The commercial rate has come down from If per cent to lj per cent for total coverage against loss by fire.
When I started the vessel insurance scheme I had even greater pressure to start some form of insurance for gear. Every insurance person I talked to said that it just could not be done, that there was no way of covering fishing gear. Generally expert advice is right, but every now and again people say something cannot be done because they have not tried it. In recent years we have had very heavy losses of lobster traps. Therefore I decided that we would have a whirl at trying to insure just one form of gear, lobster traps.
This is a most important fishery in the maritime provinces. The traps are fairly durable. They last four or five years, are easily counted, and of course are made by the fishermen. We have had pretty disastrous results as far as lobster traps are concerned. One of the troubles, of course, is that the fishermen in sheltered areas do not insure their traps. We took the average losses over the entire Atlantic seaboard in making our calculations, but we did not get average coverage. The fishermen in the exposed areas, although not all of them, did insure their traps, and since the inception of this scheme our losses are running pretty heavily against us. On the entire Atlantic coast $26,000 was paid in premiums and losses amounted to $70,000. We cannot make money that way, and I am rather surprised that more fishermen have not taken advantage of this insurance.
This year what we have done is to increase the payments slightly and decrease the coverage to see whether or not we can still provide reasonable insurance under which the loss rate will not be quite so adverse. It may well be, if the metal traps now being tried experimentally by our stations on the east coast are successful, that we can offer a better rate, but unless there is substantial improvement and greater coverage of the lobster fishermen I am afraid we will have to

drop the scheme next year. I think the insurance experts were right. It is too difficult a problem to try to insure fishing gear in the water on exposed coasts.


Leonard T. Stick: How many Newfoundland fishermen have taken advantage of the insurance scheme, what amount of premiums have been paid and what is the amount of the loss that has been sustained? Have you got those figures?


James Sinclair: At the present time Newfoundland is taking most advantage of the vessel scheme. There are 1,066 insured with an appraised value of roughly $1 million. Premiums paid amount to $16,000 and losses to $30,000. So far as lobster traps in Newfoundland are concerned, the number of fishermen insured was 389, about 10 per cent of the fishermen engaged in lobster fishing. The number of traps insured was 42,000, about one-seventh of the traps used in Newfoundland. Premiums were $4,869 and losses were $13,826, about two to one.


Leonard T. Stick: What about the inshore cod fishermen using small fishing boats, not vessels? Do you have statistics for them?


James Sinclair: We do not separate types of vessels. We insure any fishing vessel up to $7,500 but we do not classify them with respect to whether they are catching lobsters, herring or something else.


George Randolph Pearkes: If metal traps are being used for crab fishing on the Pacific coast, would it not be possible to extend the lobster trap insurance to the crab fishermen on the west coast, particularly if they are metal traps?


James Sinclair: That was suggested to me by the crab fishermen on the west coast. I was out with their fleet last year off Vancouver island. Actually their losses are fairly low. The trap they use is quite expensive. It may cost $35 or $40 with the cable attached to it. They were not too interested, but I did say that if the lobster trap scheme was successful I would extend it to the crab fishermen on the west coast. However, I do not think the lobster trap scheme is very successful from the point of view of an insurance scheme, although it certainly is of benefit to the fishermen. I do not think we should contemplate expanding gear insurance at the moment until we have it on a little more workable basis.


George Randolph Pearkes: Is that because the lobster traps are not made of metal whereas the crab traps are metal traps?


James Sinclair: Most losses are storm losses where the actual buoy and rope tear away
Supply-Fisheries
from the trap or the trap sands over. These losses also occur on the west coast. In the fishing along Tofino beach the sanding up of traps is one of the features that brings about loss of traps.


Mr. Bryce:: I made an appeal to the minister last night for the inclusion of the prairie fishermen in this fishermen's indemnity scheme and he said that it was not possible to do it. However, I want to make the plea to him that he will do everything he can to try to get the Manitoba government to agree to some scheme so that something similar can be set up in Manitoba. I think it is a good scheme. No group in this country is more in the position of not knowing what they are going to get for their work than our farmers and fishermen. They have no security whatever, and if we can give them security by means of a cheap insurance scheme we will be doing something worth while. I do not know how much it costs to insure a boat of a value of $4,000 or $5,000. If the minister has that information I will be delighted to have it so that I can compare the rate with what the fishermen are paying at the present time. I am going to work on this as long as I am here, and try to get a better deal for the prairie fishermen.


James Sinclair: We will be very glad to make a study of this. I cannot tell you offhand the insurance rate which would be charged on the prairie lakes. On the coasts, the rate is around 4 per cent, but that is for total coverage. For 1 per cent we are only giving 60 per cent coverage and we absorb the cost of administration. The difficulty on both the prairie lakes and the great lakes is that it is the provincial departments which control the fisheries, have the protective services and have the officers in the field. We have none and it makes it difficult to administer federal services in an area where we have no fisheries officers.


William Scottie Bryce: I shall be delighted to receive that study at any time it is convenient for your department.


Thomas Speakman Barnett: On the point that has been raised by the hon. member for Selkirk and the reply the minister has given in connection with it, I am rather puzzled because from time to time I have noticed the gazetting of appointments of various officers of the provincial governments on the prairies as fisheries officers. My understanding of that situation was that while the provincial governments were paying the salaries of these men, technically speaking they were federal fisheries officers with the rights and powers of federal fisheries officers. I am wondering how that situation ties in with the explanation given

Supply-Fisheries
by the minister that a plan such as this cannot be administered on the prairies because the fisheries are under the provinces. I am wondering whether the provincial governments have objected to having their personnel used for the administration of such a plan or just what practical obstacle there is in the way of the extension of this service to the fishermen to whom the hon. member refers.


James Sinclair: The reason why all appointments as provincial game officers are gazetted is that they are made by order in council under the Fisheries Act because we have the overriding authority. But years ago these provinces asked to administer their own fisheries. It would be an intrusion into their administration if we told them they have to increase their staffs to make provision for this federal service. They administer their fisheries as we administer our fisheries. There is no reason why they should not set up a similar scheme or if they decided the commercial fisheries should be handled by the federal department-we handle about 95 per cent of commercial fisheries of Canada anyhow-then we would of course assume our obligation and provide every federal service to those fishermen. At the moment, this is not possible.


Thomas Speakman Barnett: If the provincial governments were willing to take on strength the necessary personnel to administer this scheme in their areas, then you would be willing to co-operate with them in providing the coverage of the fishermen's indemnity plan for the fishermen in that area, such as the lakes in Manitoba; is that it?


James Sinclair: We certainly would have no objection to such a course. We try to cooperate with them. We do as much research as we can for them, but none of the central provinces has yet indicated to us any desire to get into this field.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Fisheries research board of Canada-
142.	Headquarters administration, $130,545.
Mr. Stuart (Charlotte):: I want to say a very few words on item 142. In my remarks yesterday I suggested it might be well to give serious consideration to greater financial assistance to the biological board, which I believe is doing a very fine job across this country. There is in my own home town what I believe is the oldest branch of the biological board in Canada. Today that station is in great need of improved facilities. I will agree that it is a small station, but there are a number of people employed there who are

doing a very fine job. I do believe the department should give serious consideration to enlarging the facilities of the St. Andrews biological station.
I had a discussion with the minister concerning the property adjoining the station which is for sale. It is the only piece of property that could be obtained by the fisheries department. I believe it would be well to look into the matter and, if the price is reasonable, the property should be purchased because it could be of great assistance to his department. While we would still like to see our friends at Halifax get the improvements they would like to have there, I think that if the department has in mind the improvement or extension of facilities of these biological boards we would like to see the accommodation at St. Andrews improved.


Mr. Batten:: I should like to ask the minister if the fisheries research board of Canada has done or is doing any research on herring in the waters around Newfoundland. My question has particular reference to the Bay of Islands and Port au Port on the west coast of Newfoundland.


James Sinclair: Part of our whole program of exploration for gulf herring, to which I referred earlier, is a study in the area to which the hon. member has referred. At various times in recent years the area has supported very big herring catches, and yet in other years has had no herring at all. In this coming year I do not believe any of our program is for this specific area. We are trying to blanket the whole gulf area. It is part of our entire survey for herring in the gulf area.


Leonard T. Stick: I should like to follow up what the hon. member for Humber-St. George's has said. For many years the herring did come into the Bay of Islands year by year. Today the fishermen contend that these new methods of catching herring have driven them offshore. They now get them in the deep water. I asked last year for a survey to be made, and that should be done not at some future date but this year. A proper survey would mean millions of dollars to us. We are not getting as many herring as we should, and there is something wrong. A proper survey should be made, and the quicker you make it the better.


James Sinclair: This survey has been in progress for the last ten years. It is a very large area and we are not going to confine all our research to one part of that great area. So far as modern fishing gear is concerned, I do not think that has had much effect on the movement of herring because on the west coast we have perhaps the most

modern herring fleet in North America and the most successful. However, there has been no diminution of herring stocks out there.


Mr. McBain:: For some years the zoology department of the University of Western Ontario has been studying the movement of fish in inland waters, including the amount and kind of fish. This experimental work has been carried on up at Erieau on lake Erie by Dr. Scott, who is associate professor of zoology at the University of Western Ontario. I understand that type of work has had to be discontinued as a result of which Dr. Scott has had to store the equipment up there and sell the boat and truck he had. I find that Dr. Scott is now with the Department of Fisheries down at St. Andrews. I wonder if the discontinuance of this work is the result of the great lakes fisheries research committee.


James Sinclair: I am afraid I cannot answer that because that research was under the Ontario government, which administers the fisheries on the great lakes. As you know, the great lakes fisheries commission will put the federal government back into the great lakes to do a research job and for exterminating the sea lamprey. In the research program of that commission, we will have studies such as this, and will try to make full use of all the scientific facilities available at the University of Toronto, the University of Western Ontario, McMaster and the other Ontario universities. I think they can look forward to an increase in the research work on those great lakes fisheries in the years ahead.


Leonard T. Stick: I have listened to the minister's reply, and I am not quite satisfied in one sense, because I have seen the herring fisheries in British Columbia and I believe the reason you are successful out there is that you have conservation measures and have carried them out very well indeed. I saw it myself. However, the fact is that we had those tremendous herring fisheries over a period of years, and now we are not getting anything. We want to know the reason why. It may be that we will have to adopt the same methods in Newfoundland that have been adopted in British Columbia.
With all due respect, I would like to see our herring fisheries come back, and would like to see a real study made of that problem. If conservation methods are necessary they should be brought into force. We must redeem these herring fisheries on our east coast. They used to come there in tremendous numbers, but they do not come now. We want to find out why.
Supply-Fisheries


James Sinclair: It is not a matter of conservation. The herring are there in tremendous quantities in the gulf. It is a matter of charting their movements, as we can on the west coast and so knowing where to catch them. There has been a great change of climate in the gulf in recent years. The cod are moving farther north, and that may be also responsible for the movement of the herring. We have as big a program as we can man today on that herring hunt down there. But you do not pick up first-class trained biologists without some trouble. It is difficult to get trained scientists of the kind who could extend the program of research.


Leonard T. Stick: But the matter is being discussed.


James Sinclair: Yes.


James Alexander McBain: I note that scientific research work is being carried on in New Brunswick on Crecy lake. That I believe is a small lake. This work is being done more or less on an experimental basis for the benefit of the sport fishing industry. I note further that it has been going on for nine years, and the report points out that the catch last year was 30 times greater than it was nine years ago. Is more of this kind of work being carried on in Canada, or is that the only experiment?


James Sinclair: That is the one experiment we are doing in connection with sporting fish, other than salmon, from our research field station there. We have of course much more responsibility for the fisheries in New Brunswick than for those in Ontario. The trout family is very closely associated with the salmon family. That is one reason we do research on trout in the maritime provinces in conjunction with our work on the Atlantic salmon.


James Alexander McBain: In his remarks this morning the minister referred to the chum salmon. I note where half a million chum salmon eggs have been brought from the west coast, and that experimental work is being done in a river up in northern Ontario that feeds into Hudson bay. What has been the result?


James Sinclair: At various times we have tried to transplant some of the salmon types from the west coast to other areas. Some of our trout have been transplanted to New Brunswick. The difficulty with the movement of Pacific salmon is the fact that the fish have such a marked affinity for their home streams. It is even difficult to transplant salmon from one watershed to the next watershed in British Columbia.
It is the Ontario government which has taken from one of our stations out west these

Supply-Fisheries
chum salmon eggs in the hope that they can establish a fishery in the Hudson bay area, in the streams feeding into Hudson bay. The great value of the west coast salmon as compared with Atlantic salmon is that chum and pink salmon spend so little time in the streams, so they do not need a great stock of food in those streams. Most of the salmon's life is spent in the sea, where there is adequate food available. But the Atlantic salmon spends the first three years of its life in the streams, and of course the size of the run is conditioned very much by the capacity of the streams to support the fish <or three years.


John Angus MacLean: I should like to ask the minister one or two questions in connection with the fisheries research board. Last year or the year before I suggested to the minister when the estimates were being considered that perhaps one of the real difficulties in the matter of maintaining a suitable fish population along the east coast, and especially in the gulf of St. Lawrence, was the pollution of the water. I pointed out that perhaps it was not so much a matter of destruction by seals or of being overfished by human beings. This pollution can be found in minute particles and would affect the sea life.
I pointed out that even in historic times, two or three hundred years ago, it was noted that when there had been forest fires the fish avoided for a number of years the general burnt-over areas of the watershed. I think I am correct in assuming that fish have to depend upon the oxygen in solution in the water. Where there are industrial wastes and gases, much of these wastes and gases may be more soluble in water than is oxygen. Thus marine life may find itself swimming around in an atmosphere of sulphur dioxide, or something like that.
I note that the minister said the fisheries research board has been doing some investigation in connection with the effect on fish life in the area of spraying for the spruce budworm in New Brunswick. From the last report it would seem that it has been found that spraying for the spruce budworm has been having an effect on fish life in the area. Has the minister any further, up to date information he could give us with respect to this research?


James Sinclair: I spoke on this matter in my opening remarks. In very large areas of New Brunswick the logging companies have had to spray their forests to kill the spruce budworm. The spray of course also falls on the streams in the area of those forests. The D.D.T. is extremely deadly against any form of insect life in those streams upon

which the fish feed, and the result is that the fish just starve to death. It is for the same reason that the fish avoid streams flowing through burnt-out areas. It is not that the waters are toxic, but rather that there is no insect life in them, no larvae, no worms of any kind in those streams.
There is no easy answer to this problem of spraying, because if the trees are not sprayed the spruce budworm will kill them; whereas now they are going to at least maintain the trees, and we will have to restock those streams to bring back the fish life. In southwest Miramichi most of the small salmon have died of starvation in the first three years of their lives in areas which have been sprayed by aeroplanes to eliminate the spruce budworm.


Thomas Miller Bell: Would the minister comment further on the matter of the fisheries department at Ottawa restocking the lakes and helping the anglers in connection with trout and salmon? There has been reference to Crecy lake, and I can also think of the fact that Arctic char are being introduced to the lakes of New Brunswick. Would the minister take a minute to state what the policy is, and how it is that the federal government has some jurisdiction and the provincial game association seems to be doing some of the restocking? What are the plans? Many people are interested in this.


James Sinclair: We work closely together. What we are doing is research work from our St. Andrews station. In this particular lake we are doing experimental work in connection with fish management. What population of different types of trout can a lake support? What is the best size of trout to be caught to assure maximum yield? You do not want to keep the lake full of big, old trout, which grow slowly and take the food which could produce many more mediumsized trout. We give the results of that experiment to the game branch of the provincial department and they carry out the stocking of trout. As far as salmon are concerned, that is our responsibility because we have control over the fish that come in from the sea and go up into the streams.


John Angus MacLean: Is any research being done into the use of chemical fertilizers in small fish ponds for the rapid production of feed? These experiments have been done in the United States and with amazing success, we are told. I was wondering whether anything along that line has been done?


James Sinclair: Very little is being done with chemical fertilizers in either this country or the United States. There is a great deal done with natural organic fertilizers such as

chicken manure and pig manure in all the tropical countries where they grow fish in what they call tanks, in the same way as they grow rice in paddy fields. The fertilizer or manure is not for the fish; it increases the growth of plankton and algae in the pond on which the fish feed, the same as fertilizer makes grass grow and cows eat grass and we eat beef and drink milk.


Mr. Mclvor:: The best potatoes I have seen grown in this country were planted when the drills were half filled with suckers. Of course it was not fish and chips, but the Indians at lake Nipigon had several acres of these potatoes planted and they were great potatoes, almost as good as Ireland's.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Fisheries research board of Canada-
143.	Operation and maintenance, including an amount of $45,000 for contributions toward fisheries research and for scholarships in Canadian universities, $2,145,398.
George Clyde Nowlan: Would the minister deal a little more specifically with the amount of $45,000. This item amounts to over $2 million, and it is for the operation of a fisheries research board. It includes an expenditure of $45,000 which reads:
For contributions toward fisheries research and for scholarships in Canadian universities.
Is that $45,000 to be limited exclusively to scholarships, or is it to be some general research? I would hope it would be for scholarships. I notice that it is limited apparently to Canadian universities, which would be certainly desirable in most cases, but I can conceive of some types of research which might perhaps be carried out more effectively outside Canada than at some of our universities. Will the regulations provide that it will apply only to graduate students? Can the minister give us a little more detail?


James Sinclair: I mentioned in my opening speech that we already give $20,000 to various universities across Canada to do fisheries research projects for us.


George Clyde Nowlan: Will the minister permit an interruption? Does the $45,000 include the $20,000 which was paid previously?


James Sinclair: Yes.


George Clyde Nowlan: Will the university which has been getting it now lose it?


James Sinclair: That is the $20,000. The remaining $25,000 is new. That is for graduate scholarships to encourage young men and young women who are now graduating in biological and zoological and associated sciences to go on to graduate studies in marine biology and marine zoology with the intention in the end of being fisheries scientists.
50433-332J
Supply-Fisheries
The program will be handled through the national research council in the same way as they handle other graduate scholarships in research.


Samuel Rosborough Balcom: May I say a word as to the scholarships and this money for research. Is it the intention of the department to use the facilities provided by our universities in the maritimes such as Dalhousie and St. Mary's?


James Sinclair: Yes, it is open to all Canadian universities who have schools in this field.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Fisheries research board of Canada-
144.	Construction or acquisition of buildings, works, land and new equipment, $205,374.
George Randolph Pearkes: May I ask a question? In his opening remarks the minister referred to the importance of oceanography. Unfortunately the development of that service has been seriously hampered by the loss of H.M.C.S. Cedarwood last year. I notice the sum of $72,220 for the construction of new vessels. Is any of that money being spent: toward the development of a vessel for oceanography work?


James Sinclair: The navy is providing a new vessel to replace the Cedarwood. These oceanography studies are done jointly by the fisheries department, the navy and the hydrographic survey, although they are housed in our research stations. We have done a lot of that work along the British Columbia coast in waters fairly close to our own shores. This summer the navy is providing a vessel for us for oceanographic work right up to the 175th meridian, the Ste. Therese, a frigate, so we can discharge part of our research responsibility under the North Pacific treaty, but we are going ahead with this type of research on both coasts. Last year as well we had a ship up in the Beaufort sea north of the Yukon and Northwest Territories, doing work there which is helpful as far as fisheries studies there are concerned, and is important of course to the native population.


Thomas Speakman Barnett: Last year I had the opportunity of spending a very interesting hour or two at the research station in St. John's. I am not going into a discussion of what I saw there, but I was impressed by the fact that they appeared to be operating under very cramped conditions so far as their quarters were concerned. They seemed to be sharing a building with some departments of the provincial government. I was wondering whether plans are provided under this item or arrangements are being made to improve that

Supply-Fisheries
situation, which to me was not very satisfactory so far as our scientists in that area were concerned.


James Sinclair: I agree with the hon. member. It is a very difficult situation. We acquired that building from the government of Newfoundland who were using it for their health and welfare services. On the understanding they would leave shortly, we moved our staff in; but they are still there. They are like in-laws, they will not leave. I have done all I can to persuade Premier Smallwood to let us have our own building for research. The staff are working under very difficult circumstances. Some of their laboratories are no bigger than clothes cupboards. We have every hope to be able to build an adequate fisheries building on our site, which is a good site,,in that area to house all our fishery officers, inspection, protection and the research station in its own buildings if not under one roof; but at the moment we have not yet been able to dislodge our tenants- I should not really say "tenants", because they do not pay rent.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
145.	To provide for federal share of administrative expenses of the great lakes fisheries research committee established jointly with the province of Ontario; and to provide for a program designed to eliminate lampreys in the great lakes, $355,000.
Mr. Bennett:: I should like to say a word on this item. Since I come from the Georgian bay district I am particularly interested in the fact that this item is designed to help to eliminate lampreys from the great lakes. I do not think I need to remind the minister of the fame of the Georgian bay trout. The trout was a most important fish to our county, not only from the point of view of the commercial fishermen but also from the point of view of the tourist business. The commercial fishermen always received top prices for trout, and trolling for lake trout was a real drawing card to attract United States and other tourists to our area.
For instance, in our small town of Meaford we had a fleet of 45 launches which did nothing else but take out tourists to troll for lake trout. Actually today we have to talk in the past tense, because the trout have disappeared from Georgian bay, as hon. members have been told. The disappearance of this fish has been a severe loss to the commercial fishermen, and also to the tourist business there. In Meaford now, instead of having 45 launches we have exactly one boat which goes out to troll for lake trout, and the same can be said all along the shores of Georgian bay and lake Huron, in such

places as Wiarton, Owen Sound, Midland, Meaford, Walkerton, and Thornbury. There just are no lake trout.
The minister said three or four weeks ago that the moneys included in this item would be used to concentrate on an effort to keep the lamprey from entering lake Superior. No one can complain about that, but is it not possible to start a campaign today to fight the lamprey in Georgian bay and lake Huron because, as he said, the campaign will take a number of years and even if successful and the lamprey is wiped out, it will then take a number of years to restock Georgian bay and lake Huron. I have spoken to the minister two or three times privately about this, and I urge him again that if we cannot start the campaign in lake Huron and Georgian bay now, let us start it just as soon as we possibly can.


James Sinclair: Mr. Chairman, I have received quite a volume of mail from this area of Ontario on this matter, urging that, as well as doing the work in lake Superior, we start work immediately in lake Huron. Last year we had a vote of $165,000 for this work. We were able to spend $161,000. The limitation again is the number of engineers and scientists we can get to do this work. The limitation is not money. This year we think we can double the effort because of the people we trained last year.
We have an item for $330,000. That is the reasonable estimate our staff makes of the work which can be done. Last year on lake Superior we put in 22 of those electrical barriers and we hope to erect another 40 this year, which will pretty well handle the streams in lake Superior into which the lamprey has entered. Then we intend to extend the program to lake Huron.
If 1 may use a simile, the situation we have now is like a forest fire which has burnt over a great area and is now burning a new forest. I think the first thing to do is stamp out the fire in the new forest before we restock the area that it has gone over. The great lakes commission will take over this work next month, under the research and control program for all the great lakes.


Daniel (Dan) McIvor: Mr. Chairman, I was asked by fishermen at the lakehead to express appreciation for the work done by the Department of Fisheries and other dominion and provincial authorities in trying to eliminate the lamprey or small eel. Many people think the British Columbia salmon is fine eating, but once you have a meal of lake Superior fresh cod, then the salmon takes second

place. I just wish to express appreciation for the work they are doing to wipe out these lamprey.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
International commissions-
146.	To provide for Canadian share of expenses of the international fisheries commission appointed under treaty dated March 2, 1953, between Canada and the United States for the preservation of the north Pacific halibut fisheries, $93,500.
Howard Charles Green: Mr. Chairman, this item has to do with the international fisheries commission for the preservation of the north Pacific halibut fisheries. As the minister knows, in previous sessions I have asked him about the position in Hecate strait, which lies between the Queen Charlotte islands and the mainland of British Columbia. Many of us have believed that those waters should be considered as Canadian territorial waters, but the stand taken by the government has been that there was an interdepartmental committee appointed to look into the whole question of territorial waters, and until they reported no definite statement could be made as to what policy the government would adopt.
I notice that yesterday the minister told the committee that this interdepartmental committee had reported, but that the report had not yet been made public. I wonder if he could let us know today what the situation is at the present time with regard to Hecate strait. It is not so much a matter of the distance out from the shore line, but it is a case of the waters which lie between two parts of Canada, between the Queen Charlotte islands and the mainland of British Columbia. I believe that in the case of some types of fishing, that strait is considered as Canadian waters, but for general purposes it is not, and the Americans have been fishing there as though they were international waters. Perhaps the minister could tell us this afternoon what the situation is at the present time.


James Sinclair: Mr. Chairman, the Hecate
strait waters, of course, have been a source of controversy between our fishermen and United States fishermen for a long time. By an order in council in 1908 we asserted that those waters were our territorial waters. At that time, of course, Britain handled all our international matters for us. The Americans, of course, fished there long before that, and they are still fishing there. We have never asserted our rights to those waters to the extent of arresting them or driving them out, but it has been repeatedly said that if any other nation intruded there we would certainly assert that those were our waters.
The whole matter of territorial waters has come very much to the fore in recent years.
Supply-Fisheries
As I said yesterday, the United Nations set up a special commission to study it, and our country was represented at the great technical fisheries conference in Rome this spring. The interdepartmental committee has made its report to the Secretary of State for External Affairs. The government has not yet had a chance to study that report. The minister said, when he was before the external affairs committee, that the report would be made public once the government had studied it. It will be presented as our submission when the general assembly discusses this problem next year.
All our fishermen naturally want to see our territorial waters extended as far as possible. The Hecate strait has this valuable halibut fishery and other fisheries as well. However, we have not let those fisheries go by default. The commission which deals with those fisheries is the international halibut fisheries commission, probably the most successful one dealing with the high seas. Last year's catch was the greatest in all history, 71 million pounds. The commission last year split the season to make fresh halibut available oftener on the market. The price has dropped a little, mainly because of the very big catch last year, which is to be expected. But I think we have an extraordinarily valuable resource up there being conserved by this intelligent international action.


Howard Charles Green: Evidently it will be some years yet before any agreement can be reached among the various nations concerning the question of how far out from the shore line territorial waters extend. Is it not a fact that Hecate strait is an entirely different situation? In other words, the question is whether that water which lies between two parts of Canada is not Canadian territorial water. Would it not be possible for the government to announce a policy with regard to Hecate strait without waiting until some agreement is reached through the United Nations?


James Sinclair: The only way we could do that would be by taking the sort of action the South American nations have taken, putting battleships out there and picking up the boats of other nations, which have been operating there historically for a long time, and fining them or confiscating the boats or something like that.
We do not intend to do that, for two reasons. First of all, we have always had these harmonious relations and have developed that fishery jointly. Second, we believe the present method of approach toward solving the difficult problem of territorial waters is the best.

Supply

Fisheries
So much attention is focused on Hecate strait that people forget we have similar problems elsewhere in Canada, such as in the gulf of St. Lawrence and the Newfoundland shores.1 Those shores are tied up with very old treaties. The British have a similar problem in the Irish sea between two parts of the United Kingdom, between Northern Ireland and Great Britain. A number of countries have these problems of the waters between offshore islands and the mainland.
I think the only hopeful approach is by a declaration of the United Nations which will apply to all countries in the world, because now there is a great variety of rules, laws, and arbitrary laws about territorial waters.


Howard Charles Green: What is the situation with regard to the crab fisheries in Hecate strait? In earlier years the Americans were taking more crabs out of those waters than the Canadians. I know the Canadian fishermen have been very much concerned about that situation. The last figures I have on hand were given on May 4, 1953. I am quoting from page 4737 of Hansard for that year. This shows that the figures were as follows:
1950, Canadians, 723,400 pounds; Americans. 880,292 pounds; 1951, Canadians, 838,100 pounds; Americans, 960,749 pounds; 1952, Canadians, 1,105,100 pounds; Americans, 1,169,062 pounds.
Can the minister bring these figures up to include 1953 and 1954? There was grave concern that the Americans were fishing crab to such an extent that they would fish out the waters. Of course that would be most unfortunate for Canada. Perhaps the minister has figures for 1953 and 1954.


James Sinclair: We have very greatly increased our crab fisheries up there. It is becoming very profitable fishing. In 1952 we caught 2 million pounds; in 1953 3'19 million pounds; last year, our biggest catch ever, we caught 4-2 million pounds. The market value was $1,169,000. The Americans now make a little greater catch than ours, but they used to take about three to our one. We are increasing our fishery and we will certainly continue to increase it, because there is a growing market for crab, especially in the United States. That is where most of our crab is shipped.


Howard Charles Green: The figures the minister has given must include the waters of Dixon entrance, do they not? In Hecate strait the figure the deputy minister gave for 1952 for Canadians was 1,105,100 pounds. The minister gave figures for that year of I think two or three million pounds. There is a great difference in the figures. They must be talking about different areas.


James Sinclair: I am talking about the whole area including Hecate strait, Dixon entrance and Queen Charlotte islands.


Howard Charles Green: These figures which were given me in 1953 apply only to Hecate strait.


James Sinclair: I am sorry. I have not those figures. The report we have now is for the entire area.	.


Howard Charles Green: Would it be possible to get those figures?


James Sinclair: We can try to get them, but with the crab fishery we do not have it broken down into specific administrative areas, as we do with the halibut and the salmon. It is only a matter of the report of the fisherman who says he caught it in Hecate strait, or in Masset or in Dixon entrance.


Howard Charles Green: Is there any fear of the crab fishery being depleted?


James Sinclair: We do not think so. We have our scientists making their usual studies. They did tagging last year. There is a large crab population all the way along the coast off Vancouver island. We are glad to see the market develop. We think we have a long way to go yet before we are using that crab catch as extensively as the maritime people are using their lobster catch.


Howard Charles Green: The assistant deputy minister -he is now the deputy minister-gave me figures in a letter of July 7 of last year, after the house had prorogued. They cover landings of crabs by Canadian fishermen, Dixon entrance and Hecate strait. He showed the figure for 1952 as a total of 1,105,100 pounds which is the figure I read to the minister a few moments ago. Where does he get the figure which is almost twice that?


James Sinclair: That is the whole area of the northern fisheries; Queen Charlotte islands, Hecate strait and Dixon entrance. That is the figure I am giving for the crab fishery.


Howard Charles Green: These figures I was given last July include Dixon entrance, 273,600 pounds and Hecate strait, 831,500 pounds in 1952.


James Sinclair: But they do not include the Queen Charlotte fisheries as such. There are also crab fisheries to the west of the Queen Charlotte islands. Those are the waters between Queen Charlotte islands and the mainland.


Howard Charles Green: To take Hecate strait alone, the figure for 1952 was 831,500 pounds. In 1953 it was 528,700 pounds. Has the minister those figures for 1954?


James Sinclair: Not here. I have only the figures for the total catch, for the entire crab fishing area.


Howard Charles Green: Perhaps I could get that information later on.


William Alfred Robinson: Shall the item carry?


George Clyde Nowlan: Before the item carries may I say this, in view of what the minister said to the hon. member for Vancouver-Quadra. I do not necessarily subscribe to the theory that we would have to put battleships out to sea today, in view of the fact that we have a report now from the international law commission. But without debating that matter, would the minister assure this committee that he will make it his responsibility, in so far as he can do so, to see that the report of that international law commission is on the agenda of the next United Nations assembly, and is dealt with at that time, and that the Canadian government supports the implementation of the report of that commission?


James Sinclair: That is going a long way. I was at the United Nations last year when the matter was discussed, and then it was the decision of the assembly that this matter would be brought forward in the 1956 general assembly. That is the only assurance I can give in that connection.


George Clyde Nowlan: The minister says it is going a long way, but the minister has gone a long way in the administration of this department. All we ask him to do is go as far as he can when the report of that commission comes up for consideration.


Howard Charles Green: Will the interdepartmental report on territorial waters be tabled before the house prorogues?


James Sinclair: That is a matter for my colleague the Secretary of State for External Affairs, who has not yet brought it before the government. His own officials are studying it at the moment.


Howard Charles Green: It will be publicized when it has been studied by the department?


James Sinclair: That was the assurance that the minister gave to the external affairs committee.


Thomas Speakman Barnett: I understand that apart from the vote for the salmon fisheries commission, this item is by far the most substantial of any of the votes for the various international fisheries commissions. As far as the salmon fisheries commission is concerned, I think most people in British Columbia are aware of the type of work which that commission is doing. We have such tangible things as the-
Supply-Fisheries


William Alfred Robinson: Order. Is the hon. member speaking on item 147?


Thomas Speakman Barnett: No. I am merely suggesting that I should like to have the minister give a little further information with respect to the type of work being done by the halibut commission. I was going to say that in British Columbia we are aware of the work being done by the salmon fisheries commission because a good deal of it is done on shore where we can see it. I am wondering whether all this vote is for administrative purposes, or whether part of it is for patrol work, and particularly whether any of it is for research work which is being undertaken under the auspices of the commission.


James Sinclair: It is almost all for research. The halibut commission has an extremely small secretariat. It has its scientists who do exploratory fishing, a large program of tagging of halibut and general research. The commission submits its budget to the two countries, and Canada has always without question paid our half of the budget as has, of course, the United States. They are not hampered for lack of funds. They have all the funds they need. I would repeat that the proof of the pudding is in the eating, and point to the fact that last year we had the greatest catch of halibut in all history.


Thomas Speakman Barnett: The bulk of the work is research work?


James Sinclair: Yes.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
149. To provide for Canadian share of expenses of the international commission for the northwest Atlantic fisheries appointed pursuant to international conventions for the investigation, protection and conservation of the fisheries of the northwest Atlantic ocean, dated at Washington, February 8. 1949, $12,500.
George Clyde Nowlan: I notice that this is the smallest vote of all for commissions other than the whaling commission, which is extremely small. Since this northwest Atlantic fisheries convention covers such a tremendous area, I was wondering whether the smallness of the vote indicates that not a great deal is being done, or whether it is just getting under way, or what the situation is.


James Sinclair: This commission is a little different from the other commissions to which the hon. member refers. Both the salmon commission and the halibut commission have their own research staff. They do the work in the entire area. Then the two contracting governments enforce the regulations with protective staffs. The ten nations in the northwest Atlantic fisheries commission have a different approach. Each of these nations is a great fishing nation with big research

Supply-Fisheries
staffs. They have divided the northwest Atlantic into a series of areas; each country has been allotted membership in a panel for the area, and each country has been allotted a definite segment of research work, not necessarily in the area in which they have the maximum fishing effort but rather in the work in which their scientists are particularly outstanding.
If one nation, for example, has most of the best oceanographers in the world, then they are the main suppliers of research there. This vote actually simply covers the cost of the small administration staff which is at Dal-housie University. The commission picked Dalhousie University as the permanent base of their operations. Then there is also the expense of sending our commissioners to the meetings. The meeting this year was held in Ottawa. Next year it will be held in Halifax, so our expenses there are very small.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Special-
151. To provide for operation and maintenance of Newfoundland bait service, $286,396.
Thomas Gordon William Ashbourne: I should like to speak for a few minutes on this item, particularly with regard to Labrador. No cold storage facilities are available on a stretch of coast extending for a thousand miles. In view of the fact that there is a decrease in the vote this year, I think that matter should receive the sympathetic and earnest consideration of the minister and that some facilities should be placed at the disposal of the Labrador fishermen. During the past week I received a letter with a petition from Father Tessier, who is in the mission of Our Lady of Labrador, and he points out the great need for facilities of this type for the fishermen there. He is greatly interested in the welfare of the people on the Labrador coast.
In view of the fact that there has been such a serious decline, particularly since confederation, in the Labrador fishery, I think this matter should receive special consideration. A survey should be made by the department, and provision should be made for the establishment of a freezer and bait depot for fishermen on the Labrador coast. In the spring of the year quite a few caplin come to the shore and, as the minister said, the herring has almost entirely left certain parts of the strait and the gulf. There was a time when no better herring were produced than Labrador herring, but they have deserted the shores for some unknown reason, and the squid have gone likewise. I do not know if it is because the gulf stream with its warmer water may be coming farther north.

However, the caplin come in there, and when they do, the fish come in after the caplin. You see an abundance of fish in the straits in the summertime. The caplin last for a while and then disappear. The people then have practically no bait whatsoever to use to catch the cod which they see there in large quantity. A freezer with a bait depot would be a practical help to those fishermen and would greatly increase the production of cod in that area.
As is pointed out in the petition, I think the best location for the bait depot would be at West St. Modeste. There is a lot of bait available there at Pinware river, and nearby there is a good natural harbour, well sheltered against all prevailing winds and accessible at all times. It is centrally located near two of the larger groups of population at Pinware bay and Lance au Loup. In the past bait depots were provided by the Newfoundland government, and under the terms of union the Department of Fisheries is responsible for the operation and maintenance of those depots. It may be argued that the revenue from the sale of bait is not great, though in the last year I believe it amounted to approximately $90,000.
I would urge that this matter be given the greatest consideration by the minister, and that some facilities be extended to that very important area. As I said before, a coast line of 1,000 miles is involved, and I do not think I am unreasonable in asking for at least one freezer and bait depot to be provided seeing that we have had one wharf from the Department of Public Works in six years in Labrador.


George Clyde Nowlan: Before the minister replies, has he given consideration to establishing bait depots in the maritime provinces, where the fishermen have a very difficult time getting bait at certain times of the year?


James Sinclair: The matter of bait depots is something which the Department of Fisheries went into for the first time when Newfoundland entered confederation. In the maritime provinces the provision of bait is a commercial operation of the fishing industry. Many companies sell bait to fishermen at less than cost to encourage the fishermen to deal with them and sell their catch to them. We have encouraged the establishment of such commercial bait depots by paying a subsidy of $10,000 to any man or company who would put up an adequate bait depot and serve the fishermen. We have done that throughout the maritime provinces, but the actual operation is then a commercial operation in the hands of private enterprise.
When we were joined in confederation by Newfoundland we agreed, as one of the terms

of confederation, to take over the Newfoundland bait service without fundamental change. At that time there were 16 freezer depots, three holding units and one refrigerator ship which carried the bait around the coast to the bait depots. The bait is sold at about half the commercial price. When I say "commercial price", the Newfoundland merchants make quite a business of selling bait to the foreign ships, the Spanish and the Portuguese, who come in to bait up.
I have always thought it a rather shortsighted policy to sell bait to these ships to enable them to outfish our fishermen and supply markets which we used to supply, and X think the Newfoundland fishermen are of the same view. But the merchants have that business, and they sell bait at just double the rate we charge.
The Newfoundland bait depot service has not proved to be a very profitable operation. We agreed to continue the service without fundamental change. The only change we have made in the six years since confederation is to add two bait depots. My predecessor agreed to add one at Port aux Choix, and shortly after I became Minister of Fisheries one of the Newfoundland members repeatedly urged that a bait depot was extremely necessary at a fishing port in his riding, that there was a great fleet of fishermen badly in need of this facility. I was very dubious, as were my officials, but I yielded to his blandishments and we built an $18,000 bait depot there. Last year we sold $145 of bait, and it cost us $2,400 to run the bait depot. Therefore I must confess it has not been very profitable. Actually all told last year we received from sales of bait about $80,000. Our net cost of operation was $134,000 and our total expenses were $220,000.
The hon. member for Grand Falls-White Bay-Labrador made a plea just now for the establishment of a bait depot on the Labrador coast. I notice we have one at Quirpon, the closest port on the mainland to Labrador.


Thomas Gordon William Ashbourne: At the tip of Newfoundland.


James Sinclair: It is in the same general area. Last year in order to supply it with bait, keep a man there and keep the plant in operation it cost us $4,503, and we sold $4.05 of bait. That is one reason why I must confess that I think we have to consult with the province and find some way of putting this operation on a little better basis.
There are two reasons for this decline in bait purchases. One is the change in the character of the fishing. We are now encouraging the building of draggers, which do not need bait, and the building of big 50433-333
Supply-Fisheries
trawlers. Of course trap fishing inshore does not require bait. The old hand-lining type of fishing with bait is going out of use. We see that in the revenue from the sale of bait, which has declined from $145,000 at the time of confederation down to $72,000 in the year 1954-55. I think it is desirable that we should have these facilities to provide bait at a reasonable cost. As the hon. member for Grand Falls-White Bay-Labrador has said, the bait is present in Newfoundland waters in tremendous quantities at certain times of the year. However, the fishermen have not the means of preserving that bait until the commercial fish are present, and that is the purpose of these bait depots.
I think quite a number of these depots could well be closed and the money which is now being spent on them might be more usefully employed in encouraging other aspects of the fisheries in Newfoundland. One of the things, perhaps, for which we could use these bait depots would be salt depots under the plan we announced of helping the Newfoundland fisherman get his salt at a lower price. Before I make any extension of this contract we made at confederation by building more bait depots, I should like to be very sure that they will come a little closer to meeting expenses than have the last two depots we have built.


Leonard T. Stick: The minister is probably not too familiar with this bait business. Many years ago it came about that the bait fishery failed. The bait does not always come to our shores, and for a number of years our fishermen had no bait. Then pressure was brought to bear on the government to provide facilities for bait to be put into cold storage plants so the fishermen would have bait in the fall to catch fish. This was the reason for the establishment of the bait depots. Whether or not it is a paying proposition does not enter the picture so far as I am concerned. We entered into an agreement with Canada, and Canada pledged her word to carry on this bait service. We rely on Canada to live up to her word.
It is true that if the bait fish are available at the time, the fishermen are not going to buy bait out of cold storage when they can get fresh bait. However, there have been times in the past when there has been no bait available and the fishermen lost a great deal. I look upon the bait service as insurance to the fishermen. The time will come when the caplin and squid will not come to our shores, and then there will be a great demand for these services.
I make no apology for the bait depot I have in my riding. It is necessary there, and it is insurance to the fishermen. It did not

Supply-Fisheries
cost Canada very much money, $16,000, and we lose about $2,400 a year. The minister is responsible for the operation of the bait depot, and he told us this afternoon he sells bait to merchants who sell to foreign vessels.


James Sinclair: No, we do not.


Leonard T. Stick: You supply the bait and they sell it for twice what they pay for it.


James Sinclair: We do not supply merchants. We supply only the fishermen. The merchants would like us to sell them bait at half price so they could sell it to the foreign fleet, but we will not permit that.


Leonard T. Stick: Where do they get the bait?


James Sinclair: From the fishermen themselves.


Leonard T. Stick: There is a history attached to these bait depots. It is true, as the minister has said, that we are adopting new methods of fishing and bait is not required when we use draggers. There is, however, an obligation on this government to maintain this service. Some of us must insist upon the government living up to that obligation.


James Sinclair: I want to make it very clear that we will maintain our obligation agreed to under the terms of union. All I was pointing out was that before going beyond our obligation to build more bait depots we will have to have a much stronger case established than was for the two depots we have built since confederation. I think it might be helpful if we had a discussion with the province to see if we could not close up some bait depots which are not even close to paying their way. Discussions might be held to see whether a similar amount of money could not be spent on some other aspect of the fishery, so we would still meet the same obligation but perhaps make better use of the money than is being made at the present time.


Thomas Gordon William Ashbourne: I am sorry to hear the minister say he contemplates closing some of these bait depots. I do not know if he has seen a fisherman after he has come back from a trip of 50 miles in the fall of the year in order to get bait to earn his livelihood. He is drenched to the skin. As I said before, I am not here to advocate the spending of more money than is necessary. But when I think anything is necessary I am going to be one of the last to sit down after stating my case before parliament. That is what I was sent here to do.
With regard to the bait depot at Fort aux Choix, which was established by the minister's predecessor, I believe, it was only

last year that the fishermen were praising the presence of that bait depot. They were telling me how much money it had meant to them because they were able to sell lobsters in the United States market. They would never have been able to catch these lobsters if they had not had the bait from the bait depot. That is one of the great benefits of having these bait depots.
I understood from the previous minister that there was to be a bait depot in my riding as well, but I did not get it. I feel there should be a survey made to see whether or not these people, who perhaps carry on their fishery in a more primitive way, have a good claim. They have not those draggers or trawlers such as are sent out from the European countries. They have not the money to put into those vessels. We see the beautiful vessels that come across from Portugal, Spain and France. We see the other ships come across from Norway and take fish and seals right at our doorstep. There should be some way of providing our fishermen with the wherewithal to catch fish.
I feel, Mr. Chairman, that the minister should visit Labrador after he comes back from Russia. Then he would see the need for a bait depot on the Labrador coast. I should like to say that since I received that petition from Father Tessier, I received a letter from Mr. C. M. Lane, the general secretary of the Newfoundland federation of fishermen, enclosing a similar petition. Of course he points out that no cold storage facilities exist from Port aux Choix to St. Anthony on the east coast. He suggests that a complete survey be made, and if it is not necessary-well, that is the thing that will have to be decided.
There are times when the fishermen can go out and get fresh bait. When I was a boy I was out jigging squids myself. Last year I jigged about 50 codfish in about half an hour. I did not have any bait, and did not need it. I just had a jigger at the time. There are times when fish are so plentiful you do not need bait. There are other times when the fish will not bite or you cannot jig them in that way, and they just have to have bait. But if there is no fresh bait available, even if they have to go 50 miles to get it I think ample provision should be made so it will be there in case the fishermen want bait.
I would ask the minister whether there was any free bait advanced to fishermen for which no proceeds were received at that bait depot, where he said there were sales amounting to only four or five dollars.


James Sinclair: I am afraid I cannot say that. But since we are paying the man to operate the depot, I hope he collects for all the bait.

One of the things that is difficult to understand is why they do not go to Quirpon bait depot to get this bait.


Leonard T. Stick: They cannot go down through the strait of Belle Isle.


James Sinclair: There are a number of bait depots which come close to balancing their expenses, but a number of those depots have earnings of less than $100. At Port aux Choix the sale of bait amounted to approximately $3,700, and other cold storage fees to $115, making a total revenue of slightly over $3,800. Expenses, including the purchase of bait, salaries and wages, and the operation of the plant, amounted to $6,050. So there was an operating deficit of $2,250, or about two-thirds of the amount of bait sold. And that is the fifth best operation from a financial point of view.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
153. To provide for administrative expenses of the Fisheries Prices Support Act, $71,300.
John Angus MacLean: I presume that the fisheries prices support board has franking privileges. The minister mentioned yesterday that in 1953 they spent only $6.45 on postage, while they spent $631 for telephone and telegraph services.


James Sinclair: I should have obtained the answer to that last night. When the fisheries prices support board meet they have to get market quotations immediately. Then there is the matter of calling in the members of the board from various sections of the country. Therefore I do not think the bill for telephone and telegraph services is unreasonable. But in the matter of postage I should think it would be either a good deal more or nothing at all.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Probably it covers special delivery or registrations.


James Sinclair: That may be so. However, I shall endeavour to get the details from the chairman of the board and let the hon. member know.


George Clyde Nowlan: The minister has said there is no foreseeable surplus. I note a reduction of $14,000 in the cost of administration. What will be the administration expenses of the board this year, in view of his statement that there will be no surplus?


James Sinclair: We have to maintain the core of administration whether or not we are actually administering prices support. The board is composed of skilled personnel drawn from the fishing industry and from fishermen's organizations. They are representatives from all parts of Canada, and when a meeting is 50433-333J
Supp ly-Fish eries
called they are all drawn in. There are no regular meeting dates. Meetings are called when a group of fishermen request a study of prices support for their commodity. If the markets are good and fish stocks are all moving, as they are today, we do not see as much expectation of meetings of the fisheries prices support board.


Thomas Speakman Barnett: It will be recalled that when I spoke on the first item I referred to operations of the fisheries prices support board. I have followed some of the discussions, which indicate that various special expenditures of one kind or another are being made in connection with plans the minister has outlined for the modernization of the fishing fleet and fishing methods on the Atlantic coast.
In my opening remarks I made reference to the contrast, as it appeared to me, between price returns to the fishermen in Newfoundland and those on the Pacific coast, and inferred that at least a partial explanation for the type of fishing fleet and gear we have on the Pacific coast-the pride in which I share with the minister-is explained by the better price return for our fisheries products.
I notice that under the act setting up the board a fund of $25 million is set aside. Yet it appears to me that the scale of operation which has been conducted has utilized only a very small percentage of that amount. Would the minister give some further explanation than he gave last night as to why the fisheries prices support board has not operated on a larger scale so it might have exercised some beneficial impact upon the price levels of those fisheries products which, I think the minister will agree, have been very low in price for a number of years, which now explains some of the basic difficulty in connection with the modernization of fishing methods in some areas of the country.


James Sinclair: I take the very opposite view from that outlined by the hon. member. I would not be very happy if I had to say that our revolving fund of $25 million for price support had been used in one year, because that would show that the fishing industry was in a bad way.
This is an emergency fund to tide a fisherman over sudden drops in income, when his receipts are so low as either to bankrupt him or give him a return far below the cost of production. Or it may be used to sell the catch he has on his hands for which he can find no market. It is not a means of bolstering up regular incomes which are based upon the current world market price of fish. It would be a very negative way of trying to do that.

Supply-Fisheries
What we are trying to do for the Newfoundland fisherman is increase his productivity. The trouble in Newfoundland is that the actual productivity of most of the fishermen is low. The average productivity of the fisherman in Newfoundland making his own salted cod is 53 quintals a year, or about
6,000	pounds of dried cod, which gives him a gross return of about $530 for that part of the fishing season. Our aim is to improve the quantity and quality of that product through dragger subsidies, long-liner subsidies and salt subsidies, to enable him to increase his productivity, to make a better product and receive a better return, so he can buy better gear and thus again increase his productivity.
But the Fisheries Prices Support Act operates very much like a fire station. It is there to be used if disaster strikes. But we hope disaster does not strike. The best years in the fishing industry are those years when we do not have to use prices support. We have no need to use it on the west coast, which is a good indication of the healthy state of that fishery.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
155. To provide for assistance in the construction of bait freezing and storage facilities, subject to the regulations established by the governor in council, $30,000.
Thomas Miller Bell: I have a matter I want to bring up concerning an aquarium. Shall I wait until the supplementary estimates?


James Sinclair: If you will, please; I shall discuss it then.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Protection branch-
659. Construction or acquisition of buildings, works, land and new equipment-further amount required, $145,066.
George Clyde Nowlan: Can the minister give a breakdown of the particular items entering into vote 659, and also votes 661 and 662 when he comes to them?


James Sinclair: Construction branch, construction or acquisition of buildings?


George Clyde Nowlan: Yes; a breakdown of the particular items.


James Sinclair: The acquisition of land and costs of clearing a site for a marine ways at Newcastle, New Brunswick, for our own boats, to house them out of the ice in the wintertime; completion of office-residences at Masset and Tofino, British Columbia, and construction of one additional office-residence at Sandspit, British Columbia. In these outlying stations on the British Columbian coast we have to provide an office and a house for our officers.

Preliminary survey of the foreshore at Bella Bella, British Columbia, for the construction of a wharf for the mooring of departmental vessels. Bella Bella is half way up the coast.
Installation of water pipe line at Sourdough bay, British Columbia, to supply our marine station there; replacement of a vehicle operated by the district protection officer at Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, the old vehicle having outlived its usefulness; completion of one new protection vessel for the mari-times area, $19,275; completion of one new protection vessel for the central area; that is, for our Northwest Territories, Great Slave lake, $26,238, and the completion of two new protection vessels for the Pacific area, $42,106.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Inspection branch-
661.	Construction or acquisition of buildings, works, land and new equipment-further amount required, $92,000.
George Clyde Nowlan: Can the minister give us a breakdown of items 661 and 662?


James Sinclair: This supplementary estimate is required to cover the construction of a 65-foot steel vessel completely fitted with laboratory equipment for use as a floating laboratory in the Newfoundland area, $90,000, and replacement of a government-owned automobile operated by the officer in charge of the Montreal subdistrict office, central area, $2,000.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Fish culture and development branch-
662.	Construction or acquisition of buildings, works, land and new equipment-further amount required, $41,200.
James Sinclair: This is the balance of the payment on the Stamp falls fishway which we completed a month ago. The work was done last year but it was not completed until the beginning of this fiscal year.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
664. To provide for a contribution towards the cost of a public aquarium at Vancouver, British Columbia, in accordance with an agreement to be entered into by the Minister of Fisheries, with the approval of the governor in council, whereby adequate facilities are to be made available to the fisheries research board, the total cost to be borne in equal shares by the government of Canada, the government of British Columbia and the city of Vancouver, the contribution of the government of Canada not to exceed, $100,000.
James Sinclair: I promised the hon. member for Saint John-Albert a statement on this item. This is a contribution to the building of a public aquarium at Vancouver. The Department of Fisheries has a large biological

station where a study of fish under all conditions is maintained. We were going to build more tanks there for the housing of more live fish, when the director of the station and the director of the institute of fisheries at the University of British Columbia suggested we should pool our resources and build the same tanks in a marine aquarium.
As a joint effort, the University of British Columbia, the fisheries research board and the city of Vancouver, parks branch, are putting up a marine aquarium in Stanley park for $300,000. We got the tanks we wanted, plus office space; the university research group and the fisheries institute got the tanks they wanted and research space; the Vancouver parks board got a very attractive aquarium for $100,000. Therefore it is a joint effort which will do a great deal to encourage interest in fisheries in Vancouver, and I think it is worthy of support.
We have not a first-class aquarium in Canada. Last year we gave assistance to the University of Toronto to construct a very fine gallery of Canadian fisheries in the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto. It is a very fine display. Again, it has great educational value. We have models of all Canadian fish broken down into their various species and categories, and also actual models of Canadian fishing vessels and their gear. Does that answer the hon. member?


Thomas Miller Bell: I suppose the minister can guess that I am going to say we should perhaps do something similar on the east coast. I would not ordinarily consider it in such a sectional way if I had not picked up an article in the paper the other day which said that rare fish specimens are invading waters along the Atlantic coast.
I would think some consideration should be given to having some sort of a permanent exhibit on the east coast as well. I understand there is some sort of a biological station at St. Andrews, but we do feel that the east coast is just as important as the west coast. There should be an aquarium at the other end of Canada, so it would be balanced out.
If some sort of a joint project could be arranged, would the department be interested in taking part in a similar agreement if the governments and other interested bodies on the east coast showed some tendency in that regard?


James Sinclair: We would be very happy to do so, both from the point of view of research and from the point of view of creating public interest in the fisheries of Canada, if we
Supply-Fisheries
get the proposal from the governments and the universities of the east.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
665. To provide for a grant of $10,000 towards a permanent fisheries exhibit at the Pacific national exhibition, Vancouver, British Columbia, $10,000.
Stanley Howard Knowles: I believe this is the last item of the minister's estimates. I should like to say just a brief word. Like many other members who come from constituencies where fishing is not a major industry, I have sat through the debates on these estimates not because I did not have other things to attend to but because the minister and those taking part in the debates have made the subject extremely interesting. I believe I would be expressing the views of the members generally if I congratulated the minister and those who represent fishing constituencies on the manner in which they have conducted these discussions, and if I congratulated the minister on the good work he appears to be doing.
It seems to me the debate might perhaps be made even more interesting next session if the minister will accept a suggestion I should like to make. I am sure that as one on the inside of his department he must be aware of its shortcomings. I am sure it is not 100 per cent perfect, as one might judge from the debate this session. Perhaps next session he might prepare a memorandum on the shortcomings of his department and furnish copies to some of the opposition members, and perhaps to some of the Newfoundland members as well, who, even though they sit on the government side, have spoken like opposition members today. This might make next year s debate even more interesting.
In the meantime I wish the minister, his department and his officials well in their efforts to improve the lot of the fishermen of this country, and in their efforts to persuade Canadians to eat more fish.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Edward Turney Applewhaite: It is my understanding that it has been arranged by unanimous consent that we should rise at this time and report progress on the resolutions and ask leave to sit again later this day, in order to take care of interim supply.
Is it agreed that I should rise, report the resolutions and ask leave to sit later again this day?
Progress reported.
Resolutions reported, read the second time and concurred in.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Applewhaite):: wonder if I may take it upon myself to make a suggestion to the house at this time. In

Interim Supply
five minutes' time it will be the hour for private and public bills. I have been given to understand that all private and public bills are going to stand in order that we may proceed with interim supply. If I have the unanimous consent of the house, I could call it five o'clock. It being five o'clock, the house will proceed to the consideration of private and public bills.



PRIVATE BILLS

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Applewhaite):: The
business under private and public bills having been disposed of, the house will proceed to the consideration of the orders of the day.


Hon. W. E. Harris (Minister of Finance) moved: that the house go into committee of supply.
Motion agreed to and the house went into committee, Mr. Applewhaite in the chair.



INTERIM SUPPLY

Walter Edward Harris: Resolved, that a sum not exceeding $257,705,895.34, being one-twelfth of the amount of each of the items to be voted, as set forth in the main estimates for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1956, laid before the House of Commons at the present session of parliament, be granted to Her Majesty on account of the fiscal year ending March 31, 1956.


Stanley Howard Knowles: I note that once again the minister is asking for interim supply to the extent of only one-twelfth. I take it he hopes that before the end of July the main estimates will have been passed.


Walter Edward Harris: There is no certainty at the moment, Mr. Chairman, that that will be so. If we are here on the 25th or 26th of July, I shall make another motion similar to this.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
Resolution reported, read the second time and concurred in.


Walter Edward Harris: that the house go into committee of ways and means.
Motion agreed to and the house went into committee, Mr. Applewhaite in the chair.


Walter Edward Harris: Resolved, that towards making good the supply granted to Her Majesty on account of certain expenses of the public service for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1956, the sum of $257,705,895.34, being one-twelfth of the amount of each of the items set forth in the main estimates for the fiscal
[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Applewhaite).]
year ending March 31, 1956, be granted out of the consolidated revenue fund of Canada.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
Resolution reported, read the second time and concurred in.
Mr. Harris thereupon moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 509, for granting to Her Majesty certain sums of money for the public service of the fiscal year ending March 31, 1956.
Motion agreed to, bill read the first and second times, by leave, considered in committee, read the third time and passed.
[Stage Direction]
The house in committee of supply, Mr. Applewhaite in the chair.
[Stage Direction]
159. Departmental administration, $472,451.
Edward Turney Applewhaite: This resolution will be found on page 29 of the main estimates, the details commencing at page 228.


Hon. Stuart S. Garson (Minister of Justice):: Mr. Chairman, if I seemed a little hasty this afternoon, you can understand that I have been waiting all day to get to these justice estimates. I do not think any useful purpose would be served in my making any speech introductory to these estimates. It would not pay any great compliment to the intelligence of the members for example if I attempted to abridge the annual reports of the commissioner of penitentiaries, the director of investigation and research under the combines investigation branch or the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
There are moreover a number of fairly large fields of discussion that are somewhat restricted at the present time by the fact that the joint committee of the Senate and the House of Commons on capital and corporal punishment and lotteries is not making its final report at the present session, that the royal commission on the law of insanity as a defence in criminal cases will not be reporting until the end of the present fiscal year, that the royal commission on criminal and sexual psychopaths is in the same position. Moreover the advisory committee under Mr. Justice Fauteux of the Supreme Court of Canada on the question of remission and probation policy will not be reporting until some time later, around next October or November. That leaves a somewhat restricted field of discussion, and it seems to me that we shall make better progress if we just go on with the estimates without any introductory remarks by myself.


Edmund Davie Fulton: I agree with the minister when he says there probably would not be any particular point in attempting any general review of the work of the department, and that it would be better to leave matters until the particular items are reached. There are, however, one or two questions which come within the general purview of the department and of the administration of justice which can be discussed only on this first item, and I should like to take a few minutes of the committee's time to mention one of them. It is a matter which has had considerable attention in the House of Commons. I refer to the matter of undesirable literature, particularly the types which are available in such large quantities to the younger children of this country.
The last time this matter was discussed was in connection with the revision of the Criminal Code, when the sections dealing with offences tending to corrupt morals were before the house. At that time the minister indicated that he was not prepared to accept certain amendments which I proposed and they were, in fact, not adopted by the house. I recall the minister stating on that occasion -as he has stated on other occasions-that in his view the law, while not perfect-[DOT] because probably no law ever is perfect- was reasonably adequate, and that the whole answer now lies in its vigorous enforcement by the various local authorities.
With that view I am not altogether in agreement. I believe in the legislation there are certain inadequacies which I shall mention in a moment. However, I agree with the minister to a considerable degree that a good part of the problem is that of local enforcement.
It is my opinion, based upon the decided cases which have come before the courts under this section, that the section is workable and that in general it covers the offence of publishing crime comics and other forms of undesirable literature. Just to complete that thought may I say this. It must be admitted, however, that on the newsstands of Canada there are still disturbingly large quantities of this undesirable material which is going into the hands of juveniles without sufficient check. This situation certainly suggests that a good part of this problem lies in securing adequate and vigorous enforcement of the law; and there, as the minister has said, the responsibility is on the local law enforcement officers. However, in the legislation there are certain weaknesses which I want to mention and lay before the minister with a view to suggesting amendments which might take care of those weaknesses.
Supply-Justice
The law now provides-and I am reading from section 150 of the Criminal Code-that anyone who makes, prints, publishes, distributes, circulates, or has in his possession for the purpose of publication, distribution or circulation a crime comic, is guilty of an offence punishable in accordance with the section. It will therefore be seen that both the printer and publisher as well as the local vendor are equally liable under the Criminal Code as it now stands. But it is my opinion that the only way to deal adequately with this problem of protecting our society against the dangers of this type of literature is to deal with it at its source.
In too many cases, in my view, prosecutions are brought against a local vendor who is generally convicted and has a fine imposed upon him, and there the matter rests. I do not believe anyone can be absolved of responsibility in the chain of distribution of this type of material. I believe the local vendor is responsible if he, in fact, sells these articles. Whether or not he attempts to defend himself by saying that he has so much stuff on his stand that he does not know the details of all of it, the fact is that he is selling material which constitutes an offence.
But it is not going to deal with the problem to go after the vendor alone and leave the printer and publisher or the initial distributor to go scot free. I suggest that in too many cases prosecutions are brought against local vendors-or in some cases, it is true, against local distributors-while the initial printers and publishers are not proceeded against at all.
I therefore suggest to the minister amendments to the section of the code along two lines. First, I suggest that the department might direct its attention to the question of whether or not it could be provided in the code that, wherever offending material is found and a prosecution is launched, and there follows a conviction which establishes that the material complained of is, in fact, an offence under the section, a prosecution should also be required against the printer and publisher if the printer and publisher are in Canada, or against the initial distributor if it be one of those publications which is brought into Canada having been printed in the United States and then distributed in Canada in its finished form. In other words I suggest some amendment which would make it impossible merely to proceed against the local vendor, so that in every case prosecution would be carried back as far as possible along the chain of distribution and the person most responsible for the

Supply-J ustice
offence-that is, the man who first put it into circulation-would be bound to be proceeded against.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: May I ask my hon. friend a question?


Edmund Davie Fulton: Yes.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Is he suggesting that it would be appropriate to put in the Criminal Code a provision directing the provincial attorney general or his law enforcement officers that, when they have prosecuted a vendor of obscene material and have secured a conviction, they should go further and prosecute the publisher, the source of that material? Was my hon. friend's thought that we should make it an offence under the code on the part of the attorney general and his officials if they did not so prosecute?


Edmund Davie Fulton: Of course not. How ridiculous can you get? I am not guilty of any such absurdity. I ask that the department direct itself to the question of whether there is any way in which it may be provided that where a prosecution is launched against a vendor, it should follow that a prosecution be brought against the initial vendor-


Stuart Sinclair Garson: It could only be brought by the provincial attorney general.


Edmund Davie Fulton: Yes.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Then should we have a provision in the code that they must do it, and that if they did not do it that would be an offence.


Edmund Davie Fulton: Whether it be a provision in the code or whatever method be worked out is a matter with which I am not concerned at the moment. I am purposely avoiding detail here, because I do not want to get into a discussion of detail. We would never come to a real agreement if I started to propose matters of detail. I am trying to place before the minister what I regard as a problem here, and I ask him and his department to direct their attention to it and to see whether in some way this problem can be met. I rather feel that the minister would agree with me on the general principle that it is not an answer to the problem merely to prosecute the local vendors.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: I agree entirely.


Edmund Davie Fulton: If anything I said suggested to the minister that we incorporate in the code a provision making it compulsory upon the attorneys general to do this or that in such a way that it would become an offence if they did not do so, I assure the minister that no such suggestion was in my mind. I shall look over carefully what I said as it appears

in Hansard, and if it does bear that suggestion I will have to ask permission to make it clear that was not what I intended.
Another line of attack on the problem, which has been suggested before and rejected but which I would ask the minister to consider again, is that it might be provided that the penalties against printers and publishers, or against those who first put this offensive material into circulation, should be made specific. It should be made clear that the penalties to be imposed upon them should be heavy, and very much heavier than the penalties to be imposed upon local vendors or local retailers.
There was a case in Toronto last year where the publisher was convicted, though I understand that the conviction was quashed on appeal because of an error in the charge. It might be of interest to the committee to know that this particular publisher, Superior Publishers Limited, was singled out for special mention before the subcommittee of the United States Senate judiciary committee at their hearings in the city of New York last year as being the publisher of a particularly undesirable and, I think it would be correct to use the word, depraved form of crime comics which were being imported into the United States. I pointed out to the members of that subcommittee that while this matter of crime comics was another field in which the balance of trade was against Canada, nevertheless it had to be admitted that this firm in Toronto published this type of thing, and I also understood a certain number of them found their way into the United States.
That firm was convicted although, as I say, the conviction was later quashed on appeal because of a technicality with respect to the drawing of the charge. Nevertheless on the initial conviction they were fined $1,000. I suggest that a fine of $1,000 to a firm doing a volume of business as large as that is really nothing more than a licence fee, and is out of all proportion to the nature of the offence and the profits which are to be made in this form of racket and undesirable publication. Inasmuch as most of these cases are probably going to come before magistrates' courts initially, I suggest that a fine of $1,000 would be a pretty heavy fine to a magistrate but such a fine to a company engaged in the business of publishing this type of material is, as I say, nothing more than a licence fee.
Therefore I suggest that the minister should consider very carefully whether it would not be desirable to provide in the code that in the case of printers, publishers or wholesale distributors convicted of an offence under this

section there should be a minimum penalty, and that the minimum should be very heavy. On the other hand, the penalty against local vendors might still be left properly, I think, to the discretion of the court.
The third respect in which I believe our law dealing with this subject might be usefully amended is in connection with the importation of the plates from which these things are printed or, indeed, of the printed product itself. There are no statistics in this field, for the very obvious reason that as the publication and distribution of this material is an offence under the Criminal Code, statistics are not published by those engaged in the trade. Therefore I have no reliable information as to the proportion of these things actually printed in Canada and the proportion imported from the United States in the form of the finished product or in the form of plates for printing in Canada.
In any event, the importation of the plates is not made an offence. I believe-and I should like the minister to correct me at once if I am wrong-that if, under the general concept of our criminal law, it is an offence to print, publish, distribute, circulate, etc., certain material in Canada, it would be an offence to import it into Canada for the purpose of doing any of these things. If that is correct, then it follows that the importation of the finished crime comic or finished magazine into Canada for the purpose of distribution is an offence.
But you will note, Mr. Chairman, that it is not an offence to import a plate from which one of these things would be printed, and I understand that a large number of them are in fact put into circulation in Canada by means of bringing in the plates from the United States, plates which would be exactly similar to those used there, and then printing and distributing them in Canada. I think our legislation might be completed by including in our code a specific provision making it an offence to import such a plate.
The minister may be aware of it already, but the committee generally might be interested to learn that the United Kingdom parliament passed an act this year similar in its effect to sections 150 and 151 of our code in so far as crime comics are concerned. There it was under the name of "Children and Young Persons (Harmful Publications) Bill". It was bill 67 of the United Kingdom parliament, and they made it an offence to print, publish or distribute, etc., any book, magazine or other like work which consists wholly or mainly of stories told in pictures, with or without the addition of written matter, being stories portraying (a) the commission of
Supply-J ustice
crimes or (b) acts of violence or cruelty; or (c) incidents of a repulsive or horrible nature.
It may be interesting to the committee to learn that this pattern is repeated in the United Kingdom, and I believe France is considering similar legislation. The problem is one of real concern to a large number of countries at the present time, including the United States, though there they have decided not to proceed by way of federal legislation. However, a number of states have adopted legislation dealing with this problem. In the United Kingdom, as I say, they proceeded with legislation very much along the lines of our legislation except that they went one step further. Section 4 of their bill provides as follows:
4. The importation of-
(a)	any work to which this act applies; and
(b)	any plate prepared for the purpose of printing copies of any such work and any photographic film prepared for that purpose;
is hereby prohibited.
They wrote a specific clause into their legislation prohibiting the importation of the plates from which these things are printed.
I recommend to the minister that he and the department should give very earnest consideration to whether it would not be desirable to incorporate a similar provision in our Criminal Code by way of a further amendment to section 150 or section 151.
Having dealt thus far with the question of legislation making it an offence to print and circulate this material, I would not want to conclude my remarks without saying what I have said before and what I know many others have said as well, namely that the problem is twofold. It is not only a problem of prevention and elimination of undesirable material, but also a problem of making available in larger quantities alternative and desirable material.
I realize that aspect of the problem is not one so much for the Department of Justice as it is for other departments and local governmental, welfare and similar agencies. But I do not think it would be well for the house to let the impression go abroad that we feel the problem is going to be dealt with simply by legislation of the type I have in mind. There is the other aspect of it. I am very glad to see that in Canada as well as in the United Kingdom a beginning has been made on that approach. I am happy to say there are now in Toronto, where unfortunately most of the undesirable things originate, one or two firms which are working on the publication of desirable substitutes. I hope these firms will find a demand for their products, and will receive the support of governmental, welfare and similar agencies at all levels.

Supply-Justice


Mr. Macdonnell:: I rise on a question of privilege. May I suggest that the hon. member for Kamloops restrict the generality of that statement he just made to the effect that nearly all undesirable things originate in Toronto. I have an idea that perhaps he did not intend it to sound quite as general as that.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Perhaps I might be permitted to reply briefly to the hon. member for Kamloops in case there is no other member who wishes to discuss this subject which he has raised. In this way we can finish it before we move on to another. I do not think there is a very great difference of opinion between the hon. member for Kamloops and myself. We agree as to the necessity for the existing provision in the Criminal Code. As a matter of fact, we should compliment him on being the hon. member who moved the obscene literature amendment in the first place. We in the Department of Justice attempted, and not without success, to improve it somewhat on its way through parliament. I think he will agree that it is now a quite enforceable section for any prosecutor who really wants to enforce it.
So far as his first suggestion is concerned I agree with him that if offending material is found in the possession of a retail vendor who is prosecuted and convicted, and the law enforcement authorities trace the source of this material as being a publisher or wholesaler of such material, they should prosecute the latter as being more substantially at fault than the retail vendor. But when the hon. gentleman suggests that we should have some provision in our Criminal Code casting upon the law enforcement authorities of the province some responsibility to do that in addition to their present responsibility to enforce the law, I must say that although I would be glad to consider his suggestion, I cannot see how the responsibility to enforce the law can be very much greater upon the provincial law enforcement authorities than it is now. The present responsibility of the provincial law enforcement authorities in this regard is quite unlimited; and it is a responsibility for which they are answerable. If they do not carry it out properly, then they have to defend their position in the legislative body to which they are answerable, namely the provincial legislature. Offhand I cannot see, under our Canadian constitution, that we in this parliament have the jurisdiction to impose any additional responsibility upon them to enforce the law over and above the responsibility they now have under the provisions of the British North America Act.

The hon. member for Kamloops says, second, that he thinks we should provide that penalties against printers and publishers should be more heavy and more specific than they are now. At the moment, section 150 of the new code, subsection 1 reads:
Everyone commits an offence who
(a) makes, prints, publishes, distributes, circulates or has in his possession for the purpose of publication, distribution or circulation any obscene written matter, picture, model, phonograph record or other thing whatsoever.
The provincial law enforcement authorities, on the basis of the facts which are submitted to them, have to reach a decision as to the manner in which they will prosecute the alleged offender. They can either lay a charge for an indictable offence or for an offence punishable under summary conviction. If they think, as perhaps the hon. member for Kamloops and I would think, that where a publisher of a large amount of this obscene material was the person to be charged the proper charge should be for an indictable offence, there is nothing in the code as it stands now to prevent them from laying it as an indictable offence. In that event, if the publisher is convicted, under section 154 of the Criminal Code he is liable to imprisonment for two years, which is quite a substantial punishment.


Edmund Davie Fulton: As the minister knows, you cannot put a corporation in jail. What about the case where it is an incorporated company?


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Under another section of the Criminal Code, in lieu of that punishment there is an unlimited fine in the case of a corporation. It is quite unlimited and could be a million dollars if the court were willing to impose such a fine. I do not know how we could increase such an unlimited fine


Edmund Davie Fulton: I know you cannot increase an unlimited fine, but I was suggesting a minimum fine or a minimum penalty for printers and publishers.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: On that score, I wonder whether it would be a proper act upon our part to proceed upon the assumption that the law enforcement officers of the provinces of Canada are so little to be trusted in the discharge of their duties that we have to spell out in the Criminal Code how they should exercise the discretion which the Criminal Code presently imposes upon them. My hon. friend and I have debated this point before. I think upon reflection he would agree with me that we should not do this.
Surely in a free country like Canada the real remedy for the present situation with regard to inadequate enforcement of these obscene literature sections, which inadequate

enforcement both he and I deprecate, is a heavier concentration of public opinion upon the provincial enforcement officers. Surely that is the real solution, and no doubt my hon. friend from Kamloops intended to bring that to bear in some degree by raising this matter in the house this afternoon.
With regard to his third suggestion about the importation of plates, I thank him for bringing to our attention the provision of the United Kingdom statutes. I am sure we in the Department of Justice have no objection at all to considering the wisdom of a provision of that sort, perhaps to be introduced at another session of this house. I would point out to him in that connection, however, that under the law as it is now it would seem to me that a person who imported plates of that sort might fall within the provisions of section 150, subsection 1, paragraph (a). All one needs to prove is possession of obscene written matter for the purpose of publication. Although this is not a considered opinion, I would suggest and perhaps he would agree with me that plates of this sort of which he wishes to prohibit the importation are obscene written matter.


Edmund Davie Fulton: The plate is written backward.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Well, it is written and it is obscene. That is one consideration which we would have to take into account in deciding whether or not my hon. friend's third suggestion was worthy of consideration.


Edmund Davie Fulton: I appreciate the minister's approach to my suggestions. Dealing with the second one only, I understood the minister to say that he would regard it, that is to say the provision of a heavy minimum penalty for printers and publishers, as unduly restricting the discretion to be left to the law enforcement officers.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: And the courts.


Edmund Davie Fulton: I suggest to the minister he is not quite correct in saying that it is restricted to enforcement officers. It would restrict the discretion of the court. I think there are good precedents for that in numerous sections which provide either substantial penalties for certain offences, or specific minimum penalties. But it would not be an unusual provision.
Many of these matters are still coming before magistrates. Although discretion is there to bring them by way of indictment, nevertheless many are coming before magistrates' courts. Therefore what would seem at first blush to be a heavy penalty in a magistrate's court might not be a particularly heavy penalty when measured in terms of the seriousness of the offence.
Supply-Justice


Mr. Winch:: Mr. Chairman, there are three matters upon which I wish to speak. I admit that what I am about to say could be discussed under other items, but because I shall deal with policy I believe it can be said appropriately under this vote.
However, before turning to those three matters of policy I would like to make one statement, because I feel it is my responsibility to do so. When the discussion took place on a similar vote last session I brought to the attention of the minister certain correspondence that had come to my hand to the effect that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police were not assisting individuals who had served terms in penitentiaries to rehabilitate themselves. I wish to state at this session that in the interval between sessions the minister made a complete investigation of the information I gave him on the floor of the house. When I arrived in Ottawa at the opening of this session the minister turned over to me all the reports, confidential and otherwise, that had developed from his investigation. It took me a number of weeks to study these reports.
As a result of my study of the reports resulting from the investigation undertaken by the minister following my statement in the House of Commons, I wrote to those who had got in touch with me, and I also wrote to the minister, stating that I understood the reasons the R.C.M.P. had made their investigations. I set out two criticisms, and I understand the minister has taken action in connection with the information I gave him.
Because I raised the point last session I feel it my duty at this session to tell the House of Commons that the minister carried forward his investigations and placed all the evidence in my hands. After studying that information I wrote to those who had got in touch with me. I understand the minister has taken action on my recommendation, and that he is in absolute agreement with all I have done in the matter. I believe I would be less than an honest member if I did not state at one session the result of something I had discussed at an earlier one.
As I said in the beginning, in the discussion under this vote I wish to raise three points involving policy. All these have to do with our penitentiaries system in Canada, which comes under the jurisdiction of the Minister of Justice. My understanding of the law is that any person found guilty of an offence can be sentenced to terms either in a provincial jail or other institution, or in a penitentiary. If the sentence is for one day less than two years, such person can be sentenced to a provincial jail, in which event he or she is the complete responsibility

Supply-Justice
of the province. If such person is sentenced to two years or more, then he or she is sentenced to a penitentiary and becomes the responsibility of the federal government.
At the outset let me make it very clear that there are two groups of citizens in Canada. There are, first, the majority of citizens who are law-abiding, and in the second place there is the very small minority who are not law-abiding and who, because they come in conflict with the law, are incarcerated, either provincially or federally, in a jail or penitentiary. 1 do not believe those who have proven themselves to be antisocial, and therefore have come in conflict with the law and have been sentenced, should be pampered or coddled in any way. Let me make that very clear. They have broken the law and must pay the penalty. But, sir, in paying the penalty I do believe and insist that they should be treated as human beings, not as animals.
It is my contention that the Minister of Justice, who I believe is a progressive minister, is being placed in an unfair position. It is my understanding of the law that if a person is antisocial and is found guilty, he or she shall then be incarcerated either in a provincial jail or a federal penitentiary. But if such person is insane, whether the term of imprisonment is for a period less than two years, in which event imprisonment would be in a provincial jail, or perhaps for life, when incarceration would be in a penitentiary, it becomes the responsibility of a provincial government to supply accommodation in an asylum for the criminally insane. I know this is correct in British Columbia, because if a sentence is anything up to two years the person would go to Oakalla, and if for two years or more such person would be sent to the penitentiary at New Westminster. But if you are insane, then you go to Vancouver island into the Colquitz institution for the criminally insane.
That is not the position as I have found it in Ontario. I say, sir, it is not fair to the Minister of Justice, to justice itself or to the warden of the penitentiary in Ontario when, in Kingston penitentiary, you have the criminally insane. In Kingston penitentiary, which I visited only some two months ago, there are in the neighbourhood of 1,000 men who are antisocial, serving sentences of from two years up to life. You have there in the charge of that warden very dangerous men. His responsibilities are great; they are very onerous. Yet, Mr. Chairman, in that institution you have not only those almost 1,000 inmates serving sentences of from two years to life, 
the most antisocial men in Canada, but you have those whom your own psychiatrist has declared insane.
I say, sir, something is definitely wrong when a warden who has to take charge of almost 1,000 antisocial men serving up to life sentences, also has to take charge of those who have been certified by their own psychiatrist in that penitentiary as being criminally insane, because of the fact that the newly elected and past government of Ontario will not accept its responsibilities and take care of those who are insane and have been sentenced to jail. Because of that fact the Minister of Justice has to pass on to the warden of Kingston penitentiary the care of the criminally insane among the 1,000 penitentiary inmates he has in his care.
One of two things has to be accepted. I put this to the Minister of Justice through you, Mr. Chairman. Either the law as I understand it has to be enforced on the provincial government, to make them discharge their responsibilities and accept those in the Kingston penitentiary, who are certifiably insane, or there has to be a change and the Minister of Justice has to ask for the necessary money to put up the required institution on a penitentiary basis to take care of those criminally insane.
Just stop and realize the situation, Mr. Chairman. In the past year or two there have been riots and escapes at Kingston penitentiary. I went to the penitentiary. I went into the segregation ward of those who have been declared insane. I appreciate the fact that the Minister of Justice conferred with General Gibson, and on his instructions I was permitted to see the records; I could check with him. I went into that segregation unit inside the penitentiary where the criminally insane are housed. In company with the warden I spent over 20 minutes with one man alone who is definitely insane. I did not speak; I was there and the warden spoke. The warden said, "You sent me a letter. What is wrong?" He said: "They are trying to kill me. They are trying to kill me." The warden said, "How?" He said, "They are putting poison and ground glass in my food. They are trying to blow me up, my stomach and my intestines. They are trying to blow me up." The warden said, "Have you still got that package of tobacco you received that was poisoned?" He said, "Yes." I was right there, Mr. Chairman. I tell the Minister of Justice that the package of tobacco was solid; he had had it for months. This man swore that inside the penitentiary a hypodermic needle was put under the cellophane and poison inserted to kill him. While 1 was there, Mr. Chairman, the warden just took the

paper and rolled a cigarette out of the dry-tobacco and smoked it, but still the man said, "Oh, no, it will not affect you; it is just me." That kind of person, Mr. Chairman, is not a responsibility of penitentiary authorities.
In the past 22 years I have had some dealings with people of that nature. That man is what is known as a schizophrenic paranoic, and dangerous. Yet in that penitentiary, because Ontario is not accepting and will not accept its responsibility, you have these people. That is only one man, sir. I say it is not fair to the warden, not fair to the inmates and not fair to the guards. The Minister of Justice should let us know that if he cannot and will not make the province accept its responsibility for the criminally insane, then capital moneys must be made available so the federal government will put up an institution to take care of those who are certifiably insane.
You wonder why you have trouble in your penitentiaries, why you have riots and fires. Surely it is understandable when you have certifiably insane inside them. I shall be glad to speak on this at greater length on another item if the minister wishes, but I want to go to something else which I think is of the utmost importance. I know the minister is having trouble. He has not the money and he has not the institutions.
A few moments ago the Minister of Justice told us what he is trying to do with his finances in regard to penology. The minister is responsible for our now having a committee of both houses on capital punishment and lotteries. The minister has arranged for a royal commission to deal with certain aspects of this problem. The minister has arranged for two committees, I believe, on the matters of remission and parole. But, sir, there is a certain amount of power in the hands of the minister and I cannot understand why he has not used it yet.
Up until two months ago if I had been told what I later saw I would not have believed it. As I said, Mr. Chairman, those who break the law have to pay the penalty. They cannot be pampered; they cannot be coddled. But, sir, even if they do break the law they should be treated as humans and not as animals.
I have some interest in and knowledge of penology. To my knowledge the evidence throughout the world is that you gain best results by trying to rehabilitate, and that the hole or solitary confinement is no answer. I know that in the progressive states of the United States men who are uncontrollable are put in solitary, but never for more than a few days at a time. In no case are they put in for more than 15 days at a time.
Supply-J ustice
In Canada we no longer have what is known as the hole, but we do have what is known as solitary. It is a part of segregation.
I have no objection to segregation. I am convinced that with a certain type of inmate, segregation is absolutely required. But I do not know of one country in the world that has solitary the way we have it in the Dominion of Canada. If I had not seen it myself I would not have believed it. Even now I cannot understand why we have the solitary system in Canada under the Minister of Justice.
Let me tell you what solitary is, straight from my visit to Kingston penitentiary, where I saw and spoke with the inmates and the warden. There is a small cell about 4| by 10 feet. There is a mattress, a concrete floor, a lavatory, a sink, earphones on the radio and steel bars. Yet this is not like any other cell in the penitentiary, because outside of the barred door there is a solid door with a four-inch peephole. If a man had to stay there for one day-perhaps he should, but you and I would not like it. If we had to stay there for several days it would result in claustrophobia.
For a man to be locked in a room without being able to hear or see anybody, and being let out for only half an hour a day, may be all very well for a few days, if a man is bad. If it is done as in California and Idaho, for up to 15 days, yes. If a man is an escapist or a riotist, yes. But I know this because I was there. In Kingston penitentiary I spoke to two inmates. One man was a leader of a riot, a bad boy, I admit. One man escaped, but he was caught within a few hours. How many days or weeks were they in what is called solitary, a plain room where one cannot see or speak to anybody? A week? No. A month? No. Six months? No. Nine months? Yes. When I was there, they had been there nine months, and they are still there, which makes it a year now.
Sir, I cannot understand it. I do not believe in coddling or pampering, but I do not believe in a man, irrespective of his guilt, being kept for nine months or a year in solitary confinement. I thank the hon. minister for giving me the authority to call two of the men out of solitary and speak to them. It took me ten minutes before I could even speak to them, because they just could not speak; they were shaking. They were on an indeterminate sentence; they did not know whether they would ever get out.
I cannot understand why the Minister of Justice, as I know him, will allow even criminals to be kept for nine months or a year in solitary confinement, locked in a cell

Supply-Justice
and allowed out for only half or three-quarters of an hour a day for exercise.
Yes, they are bad; but perhaps one of the great problems is that you do not have accommodation for segregation. I think it is not so much the minister's fault. He has not the accommodation to handle the various types of men he has to deal with in the penitentiary system. It is archaic, it is vicious, it is despicable. What I have been saying is from my own personal inspection of the solitary confinement system at Kingston, my own personal inspection of the records of the warden that were made available to me, my own personal talk with men who at that time had spent over nine months in solitary and did not know if or when they were going to get out.
Sir, I cannot understand it. I just cannot understand why that is allowable in Canada. I know-and I am certain the minister knows from what he has heard and from his studies -that you can control a man better by removing those things that count most, his writing, his receipt of letters, his smokes and his radio, than you can by putting him for nine months to a year in the claustrophobia of solitary confinement.
Mr. Chairman, may we call it six o'clock?
At six o'clock the committee took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The committee resumed at eight o'clock.
Harold Edward Winch: Mr. Chairman, at the time of adjournment over the dinner hour I understand I had left about 13 minutes of my time. In my opening presentation on this item I gave my thanks to the Minister of Justice for his investigation of something which I drew to his attention last session. I am sorry that at that time I did not also give him thanks for something else which came to me, so I shall do it now, even though it takes about a minute of my time to do so.
During my visit to Kingston penitentiary I also had the opportunity of visiting the women's section. I want to say in my 22 years of parliamentary experience I have never been in an institution about which I could offer higher congratulations than I offer to the minister now with regard to that institution as I saw it. It was one of the cleanest and best-run institutions I have ever seen, and I want the Minister of Justice to know that. As a matter of fact I cannot understand why he is building a new one, as I understand is his intention.
I have now 12 minutes left out of my 40 minutes. I have expressed to the Minister of

Justice my thanks for investigating the problem I raised last session. I have told him what I think of the women's jail. This afternoon I raised two matters which I think are of major importance. The best I can do now is not to reiterate what I said or even to enlarge on it. Although I have only 12 minutes left I assure you, Mr. Chairman, that I could speak for 120 minutes on the two problems.


Daniel (Dan) McIvor: Keep on going.


Harold Edward Winch: I appreciate greatly the remark of the hon. member, but I am not allowed to do so. Mr. Chairman, I am going to conclude fairly rapidly in this way. I am not going to lay any charges against the minister. As I understand the problem and as a result of my investigations, I am doing my best to assist the minister.
The first point I raised was that to the best of my knowledge there is no provision in law whereby the Minister of Justice is obliged to take care of the criminally insane. It is a matter of fact and a matter of record that in the penitentiaries of Canada there are criminally insane. I say, Mr. Chairman, through you to the Minister of Justice: You have to arrive at a decision. By law you are not responsible for the care of the criminally insane in the penitentiaries of Canada. The provinces are responsible. At least one province is not accepting its responsibility, and because that province is not accepting its responsibility in the major penitentiary of Canada you are placing on the warden a responsibility which is not his.
That is a penitentiary where you have in the neighbourhood of 1,000 men who are antisocial, who are serving sentences of from two years up to life. Yet you now also place on that warden the responsibility of taking care of those who your own psychiatrists in that penitentiary say are criminally insane. Through you, Mr. Chairman, I should like to make a recommendation to the Minister of Justice and it is this. He has a responsibility to do one of two things. If he has the power he should use it. If he has not the power to make the provinces take care of the criminally insane who are now in the penitentiaries, or this penitentiary, he should get it. If he cannot use or cannot get that power, then I say it is his responsibility on his own behalf, on the warden's behalf and on behalf of the criminally insane to ask the Minister of Finance for the money necessary to build an institution in which he can put the criminally insane and not have them in a penitentiary where they are potential dynamite. Mr. Chairman, I say one or the other must be the

choice of the Minister of Justice. Which one he will adopt, I do not know.
Second is the matter of the hole or solitary. May I say that in Canada it is not known as the hole; it is called that but it is solitary. As far as I know, Canada is the only place where a man can be incarcerated in straight solitary for a matter of nine months or a year on an indeterminate sentence.
I ask the Minister of Justice to stop that procedure immediately. If a man does wrong, he must be under discipline-there is no question about that-but not for as much as a year in solitary. If he has to go back, yes; in segregation, yes. I am not blaming the minister, but if the minister has not the type of institution where he can put into segregation a man who cannot be disciplined, then I say it is his responsibility to request the Minister of Finance to ask the House of Commons for the money with which he can have constructed the type of institution that is required.
Certainly, sir, we in Canada, even though we do not believe in mollycoddling criminals, must realize that we have to treat them as humans and not as animals. Therefore my second recommendation to the minister is that he should stop this business of solitary confinement in the hole for months and months, and even up to a year. If he needs money to provide an institution for segregation, then let him get up and honestly ask for it. I can assure him that as far as we are concerned we will back him right down the line.
I have come to know the minister in the past two years. I know the investigations he is making, I know the work he is trying to do, but I cannot for the life of me understand some of the backward policies still in force in our penitentiaries which he could put an end to just by a word, just by an order.
There are a number of other problems which I shall have to raise at another time because I can see that my time is almost up, but may I conclude in this way. We in Canada pride ourselves that we are progressive, and I think the world knows that we are progressive. But there are phases in which we are very backward. I am convinced that the minister wants to be progressive, but there are phases under his control where he is very backward. So far as our penitentiaries are concerned, we are archaic and barbaric in some respects. In my opinion some of the things that go on in our penitentiaries are disgusting and disgraceful, but the minister could correct them in 24 hours.
Supply-Justice
If the minister cannot do so of his own volition, then let the minister have the courage of his own convictions-and I am convinced he has the convictions-and get his cabinet colleagues to agree. If he cannot get them to agree, then let him tell the members of the House of Commons and we will back him.
Those who are antisocial have to be treated as antisocial. They have to be jailed under discipline, but let us treat them as humans and not as animals.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Unless there is somebody else who would like to discuss this particular subject I think perhaps it might be better if I were to reply while it is fresh in the minds of members and complete our dealing with it before we move on to something else.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: Before the minister
speaks, may I ask him a question. I had proposed making some remarks about penitentiaries, though not about the same aspect that has been covered by the last speaker. Would it be convenient if I made my remarks now, and they will be reasonably brief, or would the minister prefer to speak now?


Stuart Sinclair Garson: If it would not inconvenience my hon. friend from Greenwood, I think it might be better for me to deal now with this particular aspect of the matter. That will not mean that we will not continue to deal with the subject of penitentiaries for as long as anyone wishes.
In rising to my feet the first thing I want to do, of course, is thank the hon. member for Vancouver East for the very friendly attitude he has always taken toward the Department of Justice and the penitentiaries administration, and in particular for the attitude he displayed on the occasion to which he referred in his opening remarks, concerning a matter which had to do with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. I must pay tribute to him and say that his own conduct in connection with that matter was, I thought, exemplary all through the piece. I also want to thank him for his compliments, which are properly due, to the officials in charge of the women's penitentiary at Kingston. I would agree with him that the compliments he paid to the officials are well deserved, and have no difficulty in accepting all the praise he showered upon that institution.
I am afraid from that point on some difference of opinion will develop between my hon. friend and myself on two or three counts. In the first place, the hon. member said he was discussing penitentiary policy. With great respect, I suggest that at best my

Supply-J ustice
hon. friend was not in any sense discussing penitentiary policy but, even upon his interpretation of the facts, was discussing the treatment it was necessary to apply in two quite exceptional cases which are in no way characteristic of penitentiary policy generally.
I may say that, while I am not questioning his statement of the facts as he saw them, his statement of the facts is quite incomplete, and the purpose of my remarks from this point on is to supplement the facts he has submitted to the house with others which I think the house should have in order that it may acquire a balanced picture of the two cases to which the hon. member referred.
First of all, let us take the case of the gentleman who is insane and whom we have not been able to get into a provincial mental institution in the province of Ontario. It is quite true that we have been unsuccessful in this respect, but it would be leaving quite a wrong impression if, listening to my hon. friend, one were to think that all cases of insane prisoners are similarly treated. In the whole of our penitentiary system I suppose we have somewhat less than 50 prisoners who are insane. When I say we have them, we do not know they are insane when we admit them into the penitentiary, but we later discover that they are and after we have discovered they are insane we avail ourselves of the arrangements we have with the provincial authorities under which we are able to have these insane prisoners turned over to the care of provincial mental institutions in a manner which was strongly recommended by the Archambault commission.


Harold Edward Winch: I am only speaking about Kingston.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: That is quite true, but we have these same cases in British Columbia, New Brunswick, Manitoba, and other provinces. So far there are only two provinces which have been unable to accept all of the insane prisoners we have turned over to them for treatment in the provincial mental institutions.
This sort of provision for the treatment of insane prisoners in provincial mental hospitals in the manner recommended by the Archambault report is not only a much better arrangement for the insane prisoner himself, because he is a sick man who requires treatment even though he is at the same time a prisoner. It is also a very much better arrangement from the standpoint of the taxpayers of Canada. Those who, like my hon. friend from Vancouver East, know something about the cost of operating institutions, whether they be penitentiaries or mental institutions, I am sure will realize at once

that if we were to set up a mental hospital for the criminally insane to take care of less than 50 patients, our per capita costs for the care of these patients would be astronomical. It is a very much more economical arrangement for us to turn them over to provincial mental institutions, and of course pay for their care upon the per capita cost of a large provincial institution.


Harold Edward Winch: I agree with you 100 per cent, but what are we to do about this man?


Stuart Sinclair Garson: I want to do what my hon. friend did not do, and that is to present his whole story in its proper setting. As I said, we have had difficulty in only two of the provinces of Canada in getting our prisoners accepted in this way. The total number of insane prisoners in respect of whom we have had this difficulty has never exceeded more than half a dozen, and most of the time it is less than that. At the moment the hon. member for Vancouver East is talking about one particular prisoner.


Harold Edward Winch: No, I only mentioned one but you had more than that in there.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: No, I think not.


Harold Edward Winch: You had nine in that one prison the day I was there.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Like some of the other instances my hon. friend mentioned, he got the part of the story he did get accurately enough, but he did not get the whole story. I want to finish the story so the whole picture will be before the house.
In Kingston we have a psychiatric ward under a trained psychiatrist and staffed with psychiatric nurses. That is not for the purpose of treating insane prisoners. It is for the purpose of taking care of prisoners who may be in a pre-psychotic state. If we can prevent them from going further they would stay with that penitentiary as prisoners. If they become insane we turn them over to the provincial mental institutions as patients. That is the point I want to emphasize, Mr. Chairman, because I would not want any member in the house, in listening to these two cases to which the hon. member referred, to think that insane prisoners were placed in solitary confinement in a cell. This man was in a psychiatric ward under the care of a trained psychiatrist, and psychiatric nurses.
It is quite true that we have had difficulty in connection with about half a dozen cases in two provinces in Canada. That difficulty is the source of considerable embarrassment to us. It is embarrassing to me to have my hon. friend get up and make these charges here today. However, I think that if we use

good judgment in this present awkward situation in which we are placed, in due course I think we will be able to persuade the province concerned to take over this prisoner as a patient. We made our last application in that connection, a repeated application, in this present month. I have a great deal of sympathy for the provincial administration concerned. Their officials too have their problems of space in these provincial institutions. In the meanwhile, while we are waiting for them to take this particular prisoner he is being cared for in our own psychiatric ward under a trained psychiatrist.
The other case to which my friend referred as having been in this solitary confinement for a long period, and which he says is worse than anything in any other country in the world, is one which, as in the first, my hon. friend only gave, perhaps because he only had, part of the facts. Perhaps if I present some supplementary material we will get a better balanced picture of this second case also. In this case the inmate has a long and serious record dating back to 1937. The offences for which he has been convicted include housebreaking, theft, receiving, armed robbery, a charge under the narcotics act, bribery and the possession of counterfeit money. He is now serving his third penitentiary sentence, which is one of 12 years.
In his previous two sentences at Kingston he built up a very serious record for agitating and trouble-making. Early during his present sentence, the authorities of the penitentiary, pursuant to their enlightened policy to which the hon. member for Vancouver East has referred, thought they might be able to redeem this prisoner from his ways by getting him to serve on an inmates' committee of the institution. He was appointed to that inmates' committee and in that connection was granted somewhat more freedom of movement than other prisoners have. Well, what did he do?


Edmund Davie Fulton: He escaped.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: That is right. He violated the privilege he had been given by escaping from the prison last June by concealing himself in an outside truck which had entered the prison to deliver supplies. Fortunately he was recaptured by the police within a short time after he got out. When he was brought back into the prison the authorities, being somewhat disillusioned with this experiment of theirs, placed him in segregation.


Harold Edward Winch: Not segregation.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Yes, segregation.


Harold Edward Winch: No, solitary.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Well, in solitary, if you like.


Harold Edward Winch: That is different.
Supply-J ustice


Stuart Sinclair Garson: What is this solitary? In connection with this solitary confinement, the cells used are amongst the largest in the Kingston institution. To give the dimensions, they are six feet wide, eleven feet long and ten feet high. They are in a building erected some five or six years ago and are well lighted, well ventilated and equipped with radio earphones for prisoners who are segregated-it is a verb this time-for administrative reasons and are undergoing punishment.
The inmate in question-and following the example of the hon. member for Vancouver East I shall not mention his name-had the privilege of using the radio in his cell, of borrowing books from the prison library, of normal visits from his relatives, of the normal tobacco issue, the daily exercise period during which he was able to speak to others who were being exercised with him.
Now, Mr. Chairman, the cases of those who are segregated for administrative reasons are reviewed monthly by the institutions classification board. On several occasions in the last few months the board, notwithstanding the unfavourable outcome of their first effort at rehabilitation when this man escaped, have considered releasing this inmate to association with the normal prison population. But it has been found that he has been implicated in breaches of discipline or intrigue that led the board to postpone his release from segregation. Only two weeks ago, when his case was being reconsidered, he was found to be in possession of hacksaw blades which had evidently been smuggled in to him, and had partially cut the bars of his cell with the obvious intention of escaping.
We feel that this is the case of a man with a pretty serious record. We try to pursue an enlightened policy, but we are not operating a Sunday school at Kingston, and when we encounter a man who shows repeatedly, by his conduct, that he is dangerous, then in the discharge of their responsibilities the penitentiary officers have to take those precautions which, if they were not taken, would leave them open to severe censure.
In a case of this kind, where a man is found in possession of hacksaw blades, with the bars of his window partly sawed through, the prison officers thought-and let me say at once, I agree with them-it was necessary to take strict measures to ensure the safe custody of the prisoner himself and the safety of the staff and other inmates.
This could best be done by segregating individuals of this sort from the rest of the prison population. And having regard to the fact that this prisoner escaped when he had privileges which, in an effort to rehabilitate

Supply-Justice
him, had been given to him by the classification board, I feel he was treated justly. During the last few months this man's case has been up repeatedly for favourable consideration, but in every instance some circumstance arose which indicated that he could not safely be granted that favourable consideration.
I do not think the prison officials are open to the serious criticism which the hon. member for Vancouver East made. I have no doubt the hon.- member spoke in good faith but with the knowledge of only one side of the story, which perhaps he got from the inmate himself. I would assume that was the source of his information, as it was presented to the committee today. So far as the inmate is concerned, the responsibility for his release rests largely with himself. In that connection the classification board is quite prepared to continue its policy of reexamining his case with a view to restoring him to the rest of the prison population, as soon as it is safe to do so.


William Alfred Robinson: The hon. member for New Westminster.


Harold Edward Winch: Mr. Chairman, I appreciate all that has been said by the Minister of Justice, but it does not change my mind one iota.


William Alfred Robinson: Order. I thought the hon, member was rising to ask a supplementary question following the statement by the minister. If not, I would remind hon. members that we are now discussing the first item in the estimates of the Department of Justice. It has been our usual custom to allow speeches by representatives of the four parties before we begin the question period. For that reason I had recognized the hon. member for New Westminster.


Frederick George Hahn: Mr. Chairman, before presenting the problem I have in mind I should like to thank the minister and the members of his staff for their co-operation in supplying the information for which I asked during the year. I would thank them more particularly in respect to a request I made for an investigation into certain charges of unfair business practices on the part of several of our larger business firms. The co-operation I received from the minister and his staff was the finest and I should like this fact to be known.
This year Warden Douglas of the penitentiary at New Westminster is due for retirement, and it is only right and fitting that some sort of recognition be given of the excellent service he has rendered in past years to the country. Everyone recognizes that Warden Douglas has always considered first the officers and men serving under him as well as the 
rehabilitation of the prisoners, and has made the greatest of efforts to keep his penitentiary clean and in good condition. We understand he is to be replaced, and express the hope that the minister will be able to find someone who is capable of stepping into this position and continuing the job Warden Douglas has done so well in the past.
I should like to make one or two observations on the subjects discussed by the hon. member for Kamloops and the hon. member for Vancouver East. I agree with the hon. member for Kamloops that the question of lurid crime magazines and magazines containing undesirable literature should be probed as closely as possible. I believe publications of this kind are not found as frequently as they were at one time; but there is always a chance for their rebirth or, if I may use the word, their reincarnation, unless some of the ideas set forth by the hon. member are followed through. I noted recently on a newsstand a certain magazine, the name of which I shall give the minister in private-I have no desire to see the public running to find that magazine-which I considered was of an undesirable nature.
The hon. member for Vancouver East, as is his custom, spoke realistically and vividly of his experiences at Kingston penitentiary. We in British Columbia have learned to appreciate the hon. member's efforts toward prison reform and to see that the prisoners themselves are not treated unfairly. His observations concerning the criminally insane and those in solitary confinement would cast a blot upon the penal history of our country and, if true, should be thoroughly investigated.
The minister has said that the picture outlined by the hon. member was not complete, but I think an investigation should be made.
I would be very much opposed to a continuation of the conditions the hon. member described. There are two opinions, apparently, as to the true story. Perhaps if our committee is set up at another session it may see fit to investigate some of these accusations with a view to discovering the truth and effecting any changes that may be considered necessary.
Other matters I have in mind are twofold. The first of these is local, having to do with a question I raised last year concerning the removal of the penitentiary from New Westminster. The minister and I have had frequent correspondence and discussions in the matter, and I am not going to ask him at this time to remove the penitentiary because he has indicated that at the moment such action would be impractical. However, this is something he might do in the future, or it may be

that some future minister of justice will see that the recommendation is carried out.
However, there is one question that is of great importance to the city of New Westminster, and it concerns the valuable land surrounding the penitentiary buildings. This consists of some 80 acres of the finest homesite locations in the whole area. My understanding is the property itself is not of such a nature that it will keep the penitentiary inmates and officials supplied with food. Therefore my suggestion is that the lots be given up, or that some offer to purchase be obtained from the city of New Westminster, and that the funds received be used to purchase another tract of land for prison farm purposes outside the city.
We have several regions within the area which are anxious to get the penitentiary. Certainly they would be just as anxious to have the department begin a farm program in that area. I am thinking more particularly of the municipalities of Surrey and Langley, which adjoin the penitentiary, or are practically directly across the river. If they were found unsatisfactory, then the neighbouring constituency of the hon. member for Fraser Valley could be considered. I understand that in the Agassiz area there are sites that would be quite suitable.
The fact that the department has seen fit to dispose of some of the land indicates a trend in the right direction. I would merely ask that since the city of New Westminster has no further lots available to its citizens on which they can build new houses, the department should as quickly as possible make this property available to them in the hope that the city at least will find a more practical use for it than just growing fruits and vegetables for the inmates of the penitentiary.
The other question I intend to discuss at this time has to do not with the criminals but others who must be considered in penitentiary work. It was dealt with in excellent fashion on May 10 by the hon. member for Kingston in his budget speech. I support in every respect his remarks at that time. He called for the 40-hour week for the penitentiary staff. The request has been made from time to time. My understanding is that possibly others'-


Stuart Sinclair Garson: I think my hon. friend will be glad of this interruption. I announce that we are going to introduce the five-day 40-hour week.


Frederick George Hahn: That was one of the most pleasant interruptions I have had in a long time. Can the minister indicate to the committee at this time when it will be introduced?
Supply-J ustice


Stuart Sinclair Garson: On the 1st of September.


Frederick George Hahn: Thank you, sir. As I said earlier, that was one of the most pleasant interruptions I have had in a long time. On behalf of the employees of the New Westminster penitentiary, and I am satisfied also on behalf of the employees of the penitentiaries all across Canada, I thank the minister.
There are one or two other matters involved in this question. The night and graveyard shift employees should be given consideration similar to that which the day shift enjoys. Possibly this question has been dealt with by other labour groups from time to time. However, in the case of the penitentiary workers we find that the day shift receive their meals in the penitentiary while the night and graveyard shifts do not. The rate of pay for each group is identical. What it means in effect is this. The penitentiary worker on the day shift is either getting what might be considered a bonus of a meal, or the man working on the graveyard shift or the night shift is being penalized by reason of the fact that he has to bring his meal, which is a costly item when spread over a month.
I would urge that the minister keep one consideration before him at all times when dealing with penitentiary workers, and that is this. Those same workers are, generally speaking, in an industrial area. An industrial area will make available to them positions of a relatively important nature. They will, when business requires it, receive from other employers the offer of jobs. That is very important to keep in mind in our desire to have at all times men of high morale, who know how to handle prisoners. It is highly important that we do not lose experienced staff. The only way one can gain experience in a penitentiary is to work with the prisoners. It is most important that if private industry gives certain rights to its employees, the same right should of necessity be passed on to the employees in the penitentiary.
The fact of the matter is that in the New Westminster area, the area in which I live, industry outside the penitentiary pays a night differential to its workers. It recognizes the differential in the form of remuneration, shorter hours or in some other way. I would strongly urge the minister at this time to consider giving these men something to compensate them for the extra expenditure they are put to because they have to work at night or on the graveyard shift, as the case may be.
This matter of working in a penitentiary is not one to be considered entirely on a dollar and cents basis. It is an educative

Supply-Justice
program. The minister has recognized that, as has the nation as a whole. We are using new methods of reformation and rehabilitation of those prisoners to bring them back into society, and thereby we hope to save many of them in the future. We must keep that trained staff at all times. Therefore I would strongly urge that further consideration be given to this particular matter.
Another factor that enters into it is this. Outside industry pays its employees time and a half for overtime employment. The penitentiaries do not. I realize that in outside industry it is quite a different matter. If the men do not wish to work overtime they do not have to. But in a penitentiary we have to keep on a full staff at all times, and therefore it becomes even more important to keep them happy and in a frame of mind that will induce them to remain on the job at all times. We should have regulations that would make it desirable for them to remain with us.
In concluding I wish once again to thank the minister for announcing that the 40-hour week will come into effect on the 1st of September. I wish he and his administration would seriously consider this local matter in the city of New Westminster, where property values are so high and land is needed so badly because no lots of any kind are available in the city proper. If at all possible, this land should be made available to the city.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: Mr. Chairman, it is a pleasant change to be debating a subject which by no stretch of the imagination could be considered a matter of party difference. There is no question that we in this house are animated by one desire, and that is to try to find the right course to follow. There can be precious little difference among us except that, I suppose, there is the fear in certain quarters that we may get too sentimental and, on the other hand, there is the fear in other quarters that we may not be sympathetic and understanding enough.
The first thing I should like to bring to the attention of the committee is a matter of fact which staggers me, which indeed seems almost inconceivable to me; that is the relative figures of crime in this country as compared, for example, with Great Britain. I read from a publication called Welfare of March, 1955, in which there are figures I had seen before but could hardly credit. I still hope there may be some explanation. Here are the figures:
In England and Wales, in 1952, with a population of 43 million, around 32,000 were sent to jail, whereas in Canada, with a population of around 15 million, about 90,000 were sent to jail.

In other words we are proportionately nine or ten times as bad, judged by that test. I hope later on in the course of this debate some explanation may be given for at least part of that discrepancy, though it is not conceivable that we could have a complete explanation for a disparity of ten times.
In that connection I believe I could reasonably spend a moment or two-and I shall be brief-comparing the conditions we have here with conditions as disclosed in Scandinavia. I read briefly again from this publication called Welfare, on page 47. This is by Dr. Samuel Laycock, who was chairman of the royal commission on penal reform in Saskatchewan in 1946. He is a man of experience and, I would judge by his writing, a man of sympathy and understanding. Describing a visit to Scandinavia, he says:
The first general impression I came away with was the general lack of tension and the relaxed atmosphere in Scandinavian prisons. In Denmark, the administration of justice is centralized so that the police, the courts, and penal institutions are all under the Minister of Justice.
Later on he says:
The attitude is not a sentimental one-
He is referring to the attitude of the staff toward the inmates.
-but neither is it hostile, punitive, defensive, or aggressive. The whole atmosphere emphasizes acceptance.
And still later:
I was impressed in every prison I visited in Europe by the lack of idleness and by the good attitudes to work on the part of the prise ners.
1 found a widespread practice of making articles for state use.
Again he says:
The staff ratio to inmates of prisons in Denmark is high. The ratio of inmates to staff is usually two to one or at most three to one. At Hersted-vester in the institution for criminal psychopaths there are 145 staff members for 178 inmates.
I do not wish to take the time of the committee to quote this at too great length. Now, when I turn to our situation here and when I read the excellent report of the commissioner of penitentiaries, I feel sure that the attitude of the department in approaching this task is one of kindness, sympathy and understanding. I raise the question- and my reading of the report is not so careful that I am sure it is not in here-whether this report deals adequately with the disparity between Canada and Great Britain. Unless those figures are completely misleading, it seems to me that ought to be on the masthead, that somehow or other we should be reminding ourselves constantly of that situation and asking ourselves in the most searching manner what it is that has caused it and what may lie in our power to change it.

Now, another thing for which I do not have the figures but which I believe should equally be reported from year to year and explained is the number of repeaters. I like that word much better than the word "recidivists", because for one thing I am never sure how to pronounce it, and it simply means "repeaters". I can well understand the difficulties of those facing this problem. I imagine they have physical difficulties to begin with which overwhelm them at every turn. I lived the early part of my life in Kingston, and I imagine it is hard to turn the Kingston penitentiary into a very homey place.
I should like finally to refer to the Arch-ambault report. I understand that although it had to remain in cold storage, so to speak, during the war years and for some time afterwards, it is still in a sense the bible for us. It is still the thing we may turn to. I have before me the report. I notice that the recommendations number 88, and they all strike me as sensible, serious recommendations. I should like the minister to indicate briefly to us just what has been done to follow these, which ones it is not considered wise to follow, if there are any such, and, third, what is the prospect for carrying out those that remain to be done.
I picked out one or two which struck me particularly. No. 8 is the recommendation that a training school be established for penitentiary officers on the lines of the courses at Wakefield, England. I read with interest- I think it was in the commissioner's report- that this school had been established and that it has proven a success, but it left just one question in my mind. I understood from the report that the people there received a six weeks' course. I could not help wondering whether six weeks would equip people to deal with the situation, which must be one of incredible difficulty.
My own first recollection of the administration of the Kingston penitentiary is almost a crude one in a way, yet there may be a certain humanity in it too. I remember when I was a boy the warden of the penitentiary, who certainly had not had much formal training but who was a most human human being, coming and describing to my father the way he was carrying on that work. I was fascinated by his talk, because it was of a most unusual and unexpected nature. One of the things I remember very vividly is that he described going to see one of the most hardened inmates in his cell, an individual with whom it was supposed to be very risky to be left alone. This warden, who was a most unexpected creature, told this desperado that what he needed was "a pint of the oil of gladness".
Supply-Justice
I mention that to indicate that this man, if he had no other qualification, had the qualification of being a most human creature, and I am sure that as far as mere humanity took him he went a long way with the inmates.
I hope the minister can say something to us about the way the staff is recruited and about the way they are trained, because after all that must be the key to the whole business. It is not going to be easy to persuade people that it is the most attractive life in the world; I imagine recruiting is difficult. I think it would be of great interest, and great importance, if the minister would spend some time when we come to the penitentiary item in telling us about that.
I do not need to take much more time of the committee. I should like to hear something said about the parole system. I notice, by the way, that one of the outstanding characteristics of the Scandinavian treatment was that they evidently allowed prisoners to leave the prison on periodic short leaves during the period prior to their discharge. That was done for two purposes. First of all it was done so that going back into the world would not be such a shock as it otherwise might be. Second, it was done for the obvious reason of trying to let prisoners take steps to prepare for their re-establishment when they left the prison.
I think that is all I wish to say. I thought it well to speak at this stage rather than to wait for the penitentiary item, because it indicates the line of questions I should like to put to the minister when we come to the penitentiary item. I thought perhaps it might be worth while to indicate at this stage the direction in which my mind is moving.


Daniel (Dan) McIvor: For about 50 years, Mr. Chairman, I have been interested in men, women and boys who make mistakes. I am like the hon. member who has just spoken and the hon. member for Vancouver East. We like to find out what is the cause of crime. Everybody knows that the reason a boy will get into trouble is that he has nothing to do. If you keep him busy with his hands and feet for six days in the week and then on Sunday give him something better to do and a higher ideal to live for, you will not have a bad boy.
The districts that I know that have been noted for sending men to the provincial jail and the penitentiary have been communities that, have not a church in them. They may have a beer parlour as a social club, but because that community has nothing to lift the people up out of lower thinking-thinking from the chin down instead of from the chin up-the men and the women too are likely

Supply-Justice
to go wrong. To me that is the crime. Where you find a community in which there is a church-and I do not care what is the denomination or sect-that is busy and alive and keeps men and women busy with good things, the devil cannot get his hand in.
I must say that I have had happy experiences with the various ministers of justice, beginning with the late Right Hon. Ernest Lapointe and right on down the line. I have found these ministers of justice to have good judgment. As the hon. member has just said, they have shown human understanding and sympathy. The present Solicitor General is just as good as any of them. He has two cases under consideration, and before the week is out I hope to get some results. Then when the people get out it is our duty to keep them busy with good things and give them an opportunity to make good.
I must say that I have greatly appreciated the services of the director of the remission branch during the past 20 years; he has been extremely co-operative. All I want to do tonight is express appreciation for the co-operation of this Minister of Justice and those under him.


Mr. Casileden:: I have just one instance of what I think is a serious failure on the part of the department to maintain the standard of justice that Canada should be dealing out. I think it is a situation which is deteriorating, judging by what has happened recently. I believe the matter should be brought out into the light of day and adjusted.
I refer to some recent developments in the divorce procedure that is followed in, of all places, Canada's own parliament. There are many records of protests throughout the years about the iniquitous set-up, from members of this party, from senators, and from members who have been on the committee. The whole thing is obnoxious; it is inefficient; it denies justice; and it reflects on the good name of Canada and the esteem in which she is held.
The particular development to which I refer is something which happened last year. Out of this mess of what appeared to be trumped-up evidence produced by professional investigators, some of whom appear in 80 and 90 cases in a session, one very angry person felt that the courts of Ontario should hear the charge that had been laid against one of these investigators, so he took the case and charged these men with perjury before the courts of Ontario, since the offence occurred in Ontario.
In this case the Ontario court found the accused persons guilty and sentenced them to nine months' imprisonment, as I think was

only just. But the important development, which I think the minister should be looking into, is what occurred in the appeal court of Ontario on May 13 last. He probably knows about it. The Ontario appeal court heard the appeal in this case and ruled that the investigators-


Edward Turney Applewhaite: Order. I am going to stop the hon. member before he goes too far, in the hope that perhaps he will not go too far. I must point out to him that imputations upon judges or upon judicial proceedings are not permitted in the house. Some hon. members may think I have been a little quick in raising this point before the hon. member has transgressed, but I thought perhaps it was better to do so before the damage was done. I did not want any member to set a precedent that other members will feel they may follow. May I read the citation which is applicable:
253. All references to judges and courts of justice and to personages of high official station, of the nature of personal attack and censure, have always been considered unparliamentary, and the Speakers of the British and Canadian houses have always treated them as breaches of order. Members have even been interrupted in committees of the whole by the chairman when they have cast an imputation upon a judicial proceeding. The proper course for persons who feel called upon to attack the conduct of a judge is to proceed by way of petition in which all the allegations are specifically stated so that the person accused may have full opportunity to answer the charges presented against him.
That is citation 253, page 105 of Beau-chesne's third edition. I know we are discussing the Department of Justice and it is perhaps difficult to bring what we consider, shall we say, matters in connection with the administration of justice that need correction to the attention of the house without referring to specific cases. So I am going to ask the hon. member and those who follow him to direct their criticisms to the system under which we are operating and to the way in which that system may leave itself open to mishandling but, in the interests of decorum of the house, to be careful not to cast aspersions upon people in judicial capacities nor to cast, as the citation puts it, imputations upon actual judicial proceedings. With that warning in advance I think the hon. member will have no difficulty in making his case.


George Hugh Castleden: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I think perhaps you were a little quick on the trigger. I have no intention of casting any reflection on the courts of Ontario. The thing I wanted to point out was that in the appeal court the judges held that the men did not commit perjury because they maintained that, in their own words in the words

of the defence, there was no intention to mislead; that it was an intent to mislead the Senate committee or parliament and not a court of justice, and that the divorce committee in this house of parliament was not a court of justice.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Mr. Chairman, this matter has already been before the house in the form of a question. I made it clear then that the difficulty arose in that particular case because the charge was laid under a section of the old code, and that the difficulty then experienced in this case has been cleared up by the wording of the new code. Therefore this is all ancient history. It is too bad that a technicality arose in connection with the charge laid under that particular section of the old code, but no further difficulty of that sort will be experienced because it has been taken care of by our excellent House of Commons committee in dealing with the new code.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Have these investigators been so informed?


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Well, the investigation about which the hon. member for Yorkton is speaking took place and the charge was laid when the applicable section was the section of the old code which was still in force, but this particular section of the code was coopered up during the course of the consolidation of the old code. That is what the consolidation was for, and such a situation as that described will not arise under the new code.


George Hugh Castleden: Then I understand from the minister that no other case can arise in which such a decision can be made, and that under the new definition such people could be found guilty of perjury on the basis of the evidence that was presented.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Yes, that is right.


George Hugh Castleden: In this particular case I felt that the judge showed a great deal of wisdom. If a person goes through the evidence in these divorce cases, some 450 of them this session, he becomes pretty sick of the existing situation. The evidence presented in so many cases is so obviously trumped-up that I think the Senate, the House of Commons, the whole of Canada's parliament, suffers seriously thereby.
I suggest to the minister and to the Prime Minister that justice is not being administered by the divorce committee. It brings disrepute upon Canada, which is not right, and I believe if continued it will lead to a worse condition. Surely there must be some other way to deal with these cases so they can be taken out of the hands of parliament, whose members are not elected as a judicial
Supply-J ustice
body but to make laws. Surely it is possible to establish a court to handle these matters, or make provision through the exchequer court, where these cases can be heard before qualified judges learned in the law who can hear the evidence under oath in a proper manner and thus put an end to Canada's parliament being besmirched by this kind of thing any longer.
I am sure most Canadians would applaud the action of the Minister of Justice and the cabinet if they would clean up the matter and establish a court in Canada to do this work so parliament would not have to do it. That is not what parliament was intended for. Parliament has been given a job for which it is not suited or trained, a function for which it was not intended. With the recent increase of $200 a month for all judges in Canada possibly they might assume this extra job, or let the minister establish another court; but let us do away with this iniquitous farce which disgraces every Canadian today.


Harold Edward Winch: I am sorry I have to rise again, but I find it necessary. I thought I had made myself clear, but perhaps I had better make my position even clearer. I have no sympathy whatsoever with criminals. If a man or woman is antisocial and breaks a provincial or federal law, he or she has to pay the penalty of incarceration in a provincial or federal institution. In that institution they cannot be coddled. I have said that more than once and I repeat it. They have to pay the penalty for their crime. But in such institutions there is a responsibility on the authorities first of all to maintain discipline and, second, to try to rehabilitate the prisoner. In all I said this afternoon and this evening I tried to make that very clear, but I still cannot quite understand the attitude of the Minister of Justice.
I am certain the minister knows how I feel about this matter. He knows that I believe those who break the law must pay the penalty. He knows I believe they have to be disciplined and cannot be coddled, but they have to be treated as humans. Yet the Minister of Justice has ignored the two major points I raised. In the first place he states there are only two provinces in Canada which do not accept their responsibilities.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: I did not say that. What I said was there were only two provinces of Canada which, although they customarily accept insane patients from us, on some occasions were unable to do so.


Harold Edward Winch: I accept that, Mr. Chairman; but the Minister of Justice has a problem right now with one province, Ontario, which

Supply-J ustice
for a long time has not been accepting its responsibility. Because of that fact the warden of the largest penitentiary in Canada is facing a problem he should not have to face. It is quite all right for the minister to say there is a psychiatric ward at Kingston, but I should like to ask the minister when he last visited that psychiatric ward. How many members of the house have seen that psychiatric ward? How long is it since the minister or other members of the house went there to investigate the problem of the people in the psychiatric ward?
I mentioned one case, but it is not a matter of just one case. I mentioned that case because the warden and I spent 15 or 20 minutes with the man. What is involved is the fact that the warden of a penitentiary with up to a thousand of the worst men in Canada serving from two years to life, men who within the last 18 months rioted and burned buildings, has to be responsible for those whom the penitentiary's own psychiatrist has said are certifiably insane. It is not a case of one alone but a number. I say it is that principle which is wrong.
I am trying to help the minister. If he cannot get the government of Ontario to do anything about the matter, then he has to get the government of Canada to do something about it. It is not fair to the penitentiary system or to the Minister of Justice to have a situation where, in a group of a thousand men, the warden bears the responsibility for those who have been certified insane by your own psychiatrist in that penitentiary. It is the principle which I say is wrong.
However, I want to deal particularly with the second point. I was most interested in the remarks of the Minister of Justice on the matter of solitary confinement. I did not name any person whom I had seen in solitary at Kingston penitentiary, but of course the minister can find out very easily whom I did see. I saw two men, and he named one. He is quite correct.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: No, I did not name him. I identified him by his characteristics.


Harold Edward Winch: The minister is quite correct. When I first got up to speak, I mentioned that the man had a long criminal record, that he was a bad man and an escapist. The Minister of Justice gave information that I did not know until he spoke a few moments ago. If I heard the minister correctly, he said that within the past few weeks this man got a hacksaw and cut partly through the bars.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: That is right.


Harold Edward Winch: Now, Mr. Chairman, that really intrigues me. My hon. friend here says, "private enterprise".


Stanley Howard Knowles: That was a Tory friend.


Harold Edward Winch: I hope the Minister of Justice is making a real investigation into how he got that hacksaw, because I should like to know how he got it, and I will tell you why. 1 went through that segregation block. I went through not less than half a dozen of the solitary cells. I went through the recreation area. I spent all day with the warden and the various guards. I should like to know how a man in solitary can get hold of a hacksaw blade.
First of all you go into the segregation block. You have to go through a barred door to get into that block. Once you get into that segregation block you cannot get into the solitary cells except by a door which is opened by one guard. He is the only man who is ever allowed inside the solitary cells in the segregation block. The men in solitary do not even come out for meals. They are passed in through a slot in the iron bars on the door, and that is done by a guard. The inmates are only out of their cells for half an hour a day, and speaking from memory I would say they were in an area enclosed by an eight-foot fence. It is right off the segregation block. They are not in contact with any other prisoner. They can only meet three people a day, and they are the three guards. Now, just how he got hold of a hacksaw blade is really intriguing. I am speaking as a result of the experience of being there and seeing the situation. I say that is intriguing.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Just by way of being clear, is my hon. friend calling me a liar or disputing my word at all?


Harold Edward Winch: No, I am just intrigued. I would not call the minister a liar and he knows it. I said that it is intriguing. Do you not find it intriguing?


Stuart Sinclair Garson: I certainly do.


Harold Edward Winch: 
John Borden Hamilton: The subject I want to discuss tonight, Mr. Chairman, will certainly not compare in dramatic effect with the utterances of the last hon. member. I choose to talk about it in connection with the first item of the department because I do believe it involves chiefly a question of administration. I should like to read, if I may, a question asked by the Leader of the Opposition of the Prime Minister as recorded at page 4813 of Hansard for June 15, 1955:
In the absence of the Minister of Justice, Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Prime Minister. In view of the fact that the Conrad Hilton chain is now operating under a contract with the publicly owned hotel which is 50433-334
Supply-J ust ice
in process of construction in Montreal-in the absence of the minister the Prime Minister may prefer to take this as notice-has consideration been given to the effect under the Combines Investigation Act of the agreement made between the Canadian National Railways and the Conrad Hilton chain from the point of view of the restrictive practices outlined in that agreement?
The answer by the minister is found at page 4981 of Hansard. After repeating the question asked by the Leader of the Opposition the minister said:
May I say, Mr. Speaker, that the answer to the hon. gentleman's question is as follows. The combines branch has noted the reports about a management contract between the Canadian National Railways and the Hilton hotels group. Since the information before the branch does not indicate that the Hilton group has other hotel interests in Canada, any such contract would not appear to give rise to inquiry under the Combines Investigation Act. In other words, in so far as Canada is concerned this would seem to be a case of substituting one independent management for another, rather than a combination or merger between two groups already in the country.
There is also doubt that hotel accommodation could be considered an article or commodity, within the meaning of the anti-combines legislation, which refers to combinations and mergers in respect of articles and commodities.
Then I should like to read from the Combines Investigation Act, which appears as an appendix to the annual report of that branch for 1954, and is found in the Revised Statutes of Canada, 1952, as chapter 314. Section 2 of the act is as follows:
2. In this act,
(a) "combine" means a combination having relation to any commodity which may be the subject of trade or commerce, of two or more persons by way of actual or tacit contract, agreement or arrangement having or designed to have the effect of-
And turning to subparagraph (v)-
- (v) preventing or lessening competition in, or substantially controlling within any particular area or district or generally, production, manufacture, purchase, barter, sale, storage, transportation, insurance or supply,
The act provides further, under section 32 (1):
Every person who is a party or privy to or knowingly assists in the formation or operation of a combine is guilty of an indictable offence and liable on conviction to a fine in the discretion of the court or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years or to both.
These sections would appear to be the ones into which the agreement to which I am referring must be fitted if we are to show that there has been a contravention of the act. I must say it is most difficult for anyone to take the meagre information we have been able to obtain after days of questioning in connection with this agreement and put it together in a form which would convince the minister that an investigation should be launched into this type of agreement. However, I do say the minister has it within his

Supply-J ustice
power to obtain sufficient details about this contract to bring it four-square within the sections I have read.
In conjunction with his answer given in the house I might turn to the concise Oxford dictionary, which I have borrowed from the table of the house, in which a commodity is described as a useful thing, an article of trade, or a convenience. I believe this definition fits into the sections I have just quoted.
What evidence do we have about this transaction? In this connection I would refer to the minutes of proceedings and evidence of the sessional committee on railways and shipping, particularly to page 139 where Mr. Gordon was giving an outline of the situation in connection with the Hilton scheme. This is what he said:
One significant thing which I am sure will be of interest to the committee is that by reason of this agreement Hiltons have agreed and have undertaken not to compete with the Canadian National hotels either directly or indirectly wherever we are established in Canada. Having in mind their declaration of intention of entering the Canadian hotel field; they nevertheless agreed not to compete with the Canadian National Railways hotels wherever established in Canada.
I would also refer to page 150, where Mr. Gordon was answering questions asked by the hon. member for Notre Dame de Grace who, had he been here this evening, would have been delighted to carry out the function I am performing. At page 150 Mr. Gordon said:
There is one qualification which I should have made, and that is that at the time of the discussion of this agreement the Hilton interests had been in discussions about the possibility of opening a hotel in Vancouver. So we were not able to insist that that blanket agreement requiring no competition with C.N.R. hotels could be made applicable to Vancouver. But what we did get them to agree to was that if the Hilton interests decided to go ahead with a hotel operation in Vancouver, they would discuss the proposal with us and give us an opportunity to see whether a joint operation would be feasible. In other words, we would have the first refusal if they decided to go into Vancouver. Apart from that, the undertaking is a blanket one. Nowhere, where there is a C.N.R. hotel in operation, will Hiltons enter into competition.
Those two statements, at pages 139 and 150 of the committee proceedings, are pretty conclusive evidence of a blanket type agreement which will prevent competition between hotels, most certainly in several cities in this country. I am wondering if this type of agreement is not worth investigating.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Would the hon. member identify the cities in which he alleges this situation would occur?


John Borden Hamilton: Certainly, to begin with, it will occur in Montreal.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Which is the Hilton hotel in Montreal?


John Borden Hamilton: It will be the Hilton-Queen Elizabeth, I suppose, when it is built.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: How can the Hilton-Queen Elizabeth compete with itself?


John Borden Hamilton: As a matter of fact it will prevent any other type of building either by the Canadian National Railways or, I would say, by the Hilton interests in Montreal. It will ensure that only one hotel is built by either of those interests. We might refer as well to Winnipeg, unless in the meantime the Canadian National has disposed of its hotel interests there.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: What is the Hilton hotel in Winnipeg?


John Borden Hamilton: I am referring to the Canadian National hotel in Winnipeg. I am sure that under the terms of this agreement Hilton will not be building in Winnipeg.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: My hon. friend is not alleging there are Hilton hotels in Montreal, in Winnipeg, in Vancouver or in any of these other places now?


John Borden Hamilton: I am not implying that they are there now.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Are they there or are they not?


John Borden Hamilton: I assume there is no Hilton hotel in existence anywhere in Canada.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Fine.


John Borden Hamilton: And under the circumstances I am quite sure that under this agreement Hilton will not compete in any city where the C.N.R. has a hotel. In connection with this requested investigation, I do not think there is anything unusual about it. I do not think it is out of the way. I see that in the last year we have had investigations into any number of types of restrictive trade practices; soap products, hardware, electrical wire and cable, household supplies, Vancouver gasoline, china and earthenware, the match case, the rubber case, the fine papers case, the coarse papers case, cemetery memorials, food and beer parlours, food products, hosiery, household appliances, North Sydney bread, overalls, propane gas, radio and television sets, television, tenders of the city of Ottawa, Winnipeg bread. There are quite a number of them. I might refer as well to the report which was prepared, I assume, under the direction of the minister. On page 2 it says that the act also provides for general inquiries into restraints of trade

which, while not forbidden or punishable, may affect the public interest. Certainly this type of agreement comes within the category that may affect the public interest.
The minister in his reply to the Leader of the Opposition said as well that since the Hilton group apparently are not now in Canada they are coming in, in substitution, under a management contract only. That is the information that has been repeatedly given to us in various committees. I am wondering whether the minister would feel the same way if United States Steel entered into an agreement with Algoma Steel under which they would come in and operate the Algoma Steel blast furnaces, and in no case where Algoma Steel might have other facilities would they move in in competition. I am wondering whether in fact a geographic barrier is a true barrier to an investigation of this kind.
I suggest to the minister that there does appear to be ample doubt about the full effect of this agreement. There is little doubt in the minds of the people of Canada that this agreement is not for the benefit of Canadians; but there appears also to be little doubt that it should be investigated under the provisions of the legislation directed by the minister.


Edmund Davie Fulton: Mr. Chairman, I feel that the minister should answer the last point before the resolution carries. It seems to be a point of substance.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: The point referred to by the hon. member for York West? The question I was asked by the Leader of the Opposition was:
In view of the fact that the Conrad Hilton chain is now operating under a contract with the publicly owned hotel which is in process of construction in Montreal, has consideration been given to the effect under the Combines Investigation Act of the agreement made between the Canadian National Railways and the Conrad Hilton chain from the point of view of the restrictive practices outlined in that agreement?
As I indicated in my reply on June 20, 1955, the information we had before the combines investigation branch at that time did not indicate that the Hilton group had any other hotel interests in Canada, and any such contract would not appear therefore to give rise to inquiry under the Combines Investigation Act. If it is my hon. friend's meaning in the remarks he has made this evening that there is a group of Hilton hotels in Canada at the present time between which and the C.N.R. hotel in course of construction in Montreal there is an agreement to restrict competition or to fix prices or anything of that sort, then that is not information we have. If my hon. friend is alleging that, why of course, he being a responsible Canadian citizen, we 50433-334i
Supply-Justice
would be glad to take cognizance of that and act accordingly.


John Borden Hamilton: No.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: In the absence of information to that effect, the answer I gave to the Leader of the Opposition I think is quite correct.


John Borden Hamilton: Will the minister permit a question?


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Surely.


John Borden Hamilton: Does the minister mean it is not possible to contravene this legislation in anticipation? An agreement is in existence preventing competition which might have taken place.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: What I mean is this. The
information at that time available to the department was to the effect that the Conrad Hilton chain were entering into an arrangement with the Canadian National hotel system under which the Conrad Hilton organization would take over the management of that hotel in Montreal, which was the subject matter of the contract, and would manage it for the C.N.R. hotel system.
I do not think, and I am sure upon reflection my hon. friend would probably agree with me, there is in that arrangement anything that would be of a restrictive nature or would confine competition. What would the competition be that would be confined? There is only the one hotel that is the subject matter of the contract.
I will grant you that if the Hilton hotel organization had an existing hotel in Montreal, and if there were a contract between the Hilton organization and the C.N.R. organization to the effect that they would agree on prices or agree not to compete with one another, then there would be a contract in relation to the competition of actual hotels and that would be a situation that might require investigation if they were the only, or almost the only, hotels there. But on the' information which was before us at the time this question was answered there was one hotel in the course of construction not yet completed, and the suggestion was that there would be a management contract under which the Hilton organization would manage that hotel.
Now, that hotel, even when managed by the Hilton group, would still have to compete with the Windsor hotel, the Mount Royal hotel, the Ritz Carlton, the Laurentien, and all the other Montreal hotels. It would be quite a far-fetched argument to say there was an undue interference with competition in the business of providing hotel accommodation in the city of Montreal when such a management contract had been entered into.

Supp ly-J ustice


John Borden Hamilton: The act simply says "preventing or lessening".


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Yes, unduly preventing or lessening competition. I am very much interested in my hon. friend's views upon this. As I said earlier in my remarks, he is a responsible person and a member of parliament. If he gets up in his place here and says to me as the minister in charge of the Combines Investigation Act administration, "I, the member for York West, am asserting that there has been a breach of the Combines Investigation Act in this agreement", we shall of course be very glad to investigate his allegations. But on the basis of the sort of case he has made tonight it does not seem to me that the investigation would disclose an offence. It would have to be something more substantial than he has alleged.


John Borden Hamilton: Has the minister looked into the agreement that was referred to by Mr. Gordon?


Stuart Sinclair Garson: I have not personally looked into this agreement. I do not find time to personally do such things. We have a staff for that purpose, and I have no doubt that staff has probably done so, or will look into it, if warranted. I have not put the question point-blank to them as to whether they have or not. The point I am making is that if, in a city in which there is a large amount of hotel accommodation already in being, another hotel is in the course of construction and, while that hotel is in the course of construction, before it is doing business, before it is in a position to compete, you have an arrangement whereby it is to be managed by another organization, if therefore my hon. friend is alleging that as the basis upon which he contends as a member of this house that there has been a breach of the Combines Investigation Act, that is a rather unsubstantial assertion, if he will permit me to say so.


John Borden Hamilton: May I say to
the minister that I have not alleged that in any way, shape or form.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: What is my hon. friend's allegation?


John Borden Hamilton: My allegation and the reasons for the allegation are contained in the evidence before the special committee.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: I know my hon. friend's
reason, but what is his allegation?


Mr. Hamilion (York Wesi):: The allegation is that there is an agreement between two parties which will prevent competition in the hotel business, or can prevent competition in the hotel business, in several places.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Will my hon. friend answer this question? Between what hotels in Montreal will this agreement prevent competition?


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: I asked the minister-


Stuart Sinclair Garson: That is the city you are talking about. Between what hotels in Montreal will competition be prevented by this agreement?


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: First of all, I do not think that is a fair question. I have referred to the fact-


Edmund Davie Fulton: The question was, what is the minister's department doing about it?


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: The question, as far as I am concerned, covers the restriction in competition contained in the words of the president of the Canadian National Railways. I am not referring to the particular management contract for the hotel in question, but the all-inclusive words which the president has used dealing with competition throughout Canada in the hotel business. The hotels do not have to be in existence, as I see it. If in fact these people have agreed not to come into Canada at any place where the C.N.R. already has a hotel or anticipates putting a hotel, certainly that must be-


Stuart Sinclair Garson: May I point out to my hon. friend-and I am sure he must know this, but he may not have stopped to reflect-that it has no bearing on the argument he is making now that in every place in Canada, to my knowledge, in which the C.N.R. has a hotel, there are a large number of other hotels, and there is a large amount of competition in every one of those centres. Even if my hon. friend, with the familiarity with this contract which he is claiming-I wonder if my hon. friend has seen it-


John Borden Hamilton: I am asking if your officers have seen it.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: But my hon. friend must realize that in all these places there is a large amount of competition. If he is basing his assertion that there has been a breach of the Combines Investigation Act on the fact that the C.N.R. hotel there will continue to compete with all the hotels that are there at the present time, but may not have to compete with a purely hypothetical Hilton hotel; if that is the allegation he wants us to investigate, we shall be very glad to do that. But I can say to him, based upon our experience in proving cases of this kind in the courts, where we really have to prove our case, that even assuming that all these assertions my hon. friend has made were proven to be facts, I think we would have a difficult time proving there had been a contravention of the act.


John Borden Hamilton: I would be quite satisfied, Mr. Chairman, with the undertaking of the minister to investigate and find out if officials of his department have had an opportunity of perusing this agreement in full in connection with their investigation and his reply in the house.


Stuart Sinclair Garson: Mr. Chairman, to repeat what I have said two or three times already, whenever a member of the House of Commons rises in his place and makes representations of the character of those made by my hon. friend tonight, he can be absolutely certain we will investigate them.


Mr. Carrick:: May I ask the hon. member for York West if he has considered all the aspects of the legal problem? I know this is not the place to go into questions of a legal nature, but there is a portion of the Combines Investigation Act which makes it an offence to operate a combination, as described in the act, but it must be a combination that is alleged to operate to the detriment of or against the interests of the public who are consumers, or others. There has never been a conviction, I believe, for an offence under this part of the Combines Investigation Act, although there have been numerous convictions under section 498 of the Criminal Code. The Criminal Code makes it an offence to have an agreement to prevent or lessen competition "unduly". The term is synonymous with "to the detriment of the public". I wonder if the hon. member has considered that there has never been a conviction in any case where it has not been proven that the parties who combined controlled the trade.
The justice department would be confronted with the problem in this case of proving that the C.N.R. and the Hilton hotel people control the hotel accommodation in a particular area before it would be considered that the agreement was to the detriment of the public. It is not every agreement that is illegal; some agreements are perfectly legal. It is only agreements that operate or are likely to operate to the detriment of the public that are illegal.
Assuming that hotel accommodation is a commodity, which I do not believe it is within the meaning of the act, nevertheless I wonder if my hon. friend has considered that there could not be a conviction unless it was proved that the C.N.R. and the Hilton hotel people did control the hotel accommodation in a particular area.


Mr. Regier:: Mr. Chairman, may I call it ten o'clock?


Walter Edward Harris: Mr. Chairman, I quite appreciate that we have had a good week, but if I
Supply-J ustice
have been able to judge the discussion in the last few moments, it does seem that we have been discussing one of the items much further along than the present item. Perhaps we could carry the first item which, I take it, has been discussed, and proceed later with the others. Perhaps with a little more time we can make some real progress.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Edmund Davie Fulton: Ten o'clock.


Edward Turney Applewhaite: Does the hon. member for Kamloops say "ten o'clock"?


Edmund Davie Fulton: Yes, Mr. Chairman.
Progress reported.
Resolution reported, read the second time and concurred in.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Walter Edward Harris: On Monday we shall take the St. Lawrence seaway authority bill, the bill with respect to loans to fishermen, the bill with respect to salaries of certain officials of boards, and the bill to amend the Library of Parliament Act. Then we shall take a motion to go into supply. If we get into supply we will merely call items and have them stand. Then we shall take the bill to amend the Income Tax Act.


[Stage Direction]
It being three minutes after ten o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.
[The following items were passed in committee of supply]:

[Stage Direction]
129.	Information and educational service, including grant of $3,000 to Nova Scotia fisheries exhibition, $186,000.
130.	Markets and economics service, $263,710.
131.	Industrial development service, $750,000. Field services-
132.	Field services administration, $754,200. Protection branch-
133.	Operation and maintenance, $3,228,319.
134.	Construction	or	acquisition	of	buildings,
works, land and new equipment. $132,500.
Inspection branch-
135.	Operation and maintenance, $1,090,086.
136.	Construction	or	acquisition	of	buildings,
works, land and new equipment, $58,050.
Fish culture and development branch-
137.	Operation and maintenance. $769,415.
138.	Construction	or	acquisition	of	buildings,
works, land and new equipment. $220,800.
139.	Consumer branch. $62,030.
140.	Fishermen's indemnity plan-administrative expenses. $215,000.
141.	To provide for the destruction of harbour and gray seals, $35,000.
Fisheries research board of Canada-
142.	Headquarters administration. $130,545.
[Stage Direction]
Supply-Fisheries
143.	Operation and maintenance, including an amount of $45,000 for contributions toward fisheries research and for scholarships in Canadian universities. $2,145,398.
144.	Construction or acquisition of buildings, works, land and new equipment, $205,374.
145.	To provide for federal share of administrative expenses of the great lakes fisheries research committee established jointly with the province of Ontario; and to provide for a program designed to eliminate lampreys in the great lakes, $355,000.
International commissions-
146.	To provide for Canadian share of expenses of the international fisheries commission appointed under treaty dated March 2, 1953, between Canada and the United States for the preservation of the north Pacific halibut fisheries, $93,500.
147.	To provide for Canadian share of expenses of the international Pacific salmon fisheries commission appointed under treaty dated May 26, 1930, between Canada and the United States for the protection, preservation and extension of the sock-eye salmon fisheries of the Fraser river system, $152,500.
148.	To provide for Canadian share of expenses of the international whaling commission, appointed pursuant to the international convention for the regulation of whaling, dated at Washington, December 2, 1946, $2,500.
149.	To provide for Canadian share of expenses of the international commission for the northwest Atlantic fisheries appointed pursuant to international conventions for the investigation, protection and conservation of the fisheries of the northwest Atlantic ocean, dated at Washington, February 8, 1949, $12,500.
150.	To provide for Canadian share of expenses of the international north Pacific fisheries commission appointed pursuant to the international convention for the high seas fisheries of the north Pacific ocean, dated May 9, 1952, $30,000.
Special-
151.	To provide for operation and maintenance of Newfoundland bait service, $286,396.
152.	To provide for the extension of educational work in co-operative producing and selling among fishermen. $80,000.
153.	To provide for administrative expenses of the Fisheries Prices Support Act, $71,300.
154.	To provide for assistance in the construction of vessels of the dragger and/or long liner type, subject to such terms and conditions as may be approved by the governor in council, $200,000.
155.	To provide for assistance in the construction of bait freezing and storage facilities, subject to the regulations established by the governor in council, $30,000.
Loans, investments and advances-
540. To provide for the establishment of one or more special accounts in the consolidated revenue
fund, replacing those established by vote 536 of the Appropriation Act, No. 4, 1954, for the purposes of a plan to be known as the fishermen's indemnity plan, to be administered in accordance with regulations of the governor in council, for the purpose of assisting fishermen to meet abnormal capital losses; and to authorize payment from the accounts in the current and subsequent fiscal years, in accordance with the regulations, of indemnities; the accounts to be credited with all amounts received by way of premiums and recoveries and with advances to the said accounts in accordance with the regulations, such advances not at any time to exceed, $150,000.
General services-
657. Industrial development	service-further amount required, $225,000.
Field services-
Protection branch-
658.	Operation and maintenance-further amount required, $24,250.
659.	Construction or acquisition of buildings, works, land and new equipment-further amount required, $145,066.
Inspection branch-
660.	Operation and maintenance-further amount required, $16,060.
661.	Construction	or	acquisition	of	buildings,
works, land and new equipment-further amount required, $92,000.
Fish culture and development branch-
662.	Construction	or	acquisition	of	buildings,
works. land and new equipment-further amount required, $41,200.
Fisheries research board of Canada-
663.	Construction	or	acquisition	of	buildings,
works, land and new equipment-further amount required, $62,000.
Special-
664.	To provide for a contribution towards the cost cf a public aquarium at Vancouver, British Columbia, in accordance with an agreement to be entered into by the minister of fisheries, with the approval cf the governor in council, whereby ade-auate facilities are to be made available to the fisheries research board, the total cost to be borne in equal shares by the government of Canada, the Government of British Columbia and the city of Vancouver, the contribution of the government of Canada not to exceed, $100,000.
665.	To provide for a grant of $10,000 towards a permanent fisheries exhibit at the Pacific national exhibition, Vancouver, British Columbia, $10,000.

[Stage Direction]
A-Department-
159. Departmental administration, $472,451.
[Stage Direction]
Monday, June 27, 1955