1958-01-17

[Stage Direction]
Hon. Donald M. Fleming (Minister of
Finance): Mr. Speaker, I should like to table the text of a note delivered to the department of state at Washington on January 15 by the Canadian ambassador concerning the restrictions imposed by the United States government on imports of Canadian oil.
An hon. Member:: Read it.


Mr. Fleming:: Some hon. member says "Read it". I can read it if it is the wish of hon. members.


Some hon. Members:: Dispense.



LEAD, ZINC AND COPPER    INQUIRY AS TO STEPS TO PROTECT CANADIAN INTERESTS

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. A. Byrne (Kootenay East):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask a question of the Minister of Finance. Would the minister care to table the protests which the government has made to the United States authorities respecting the proposed tariff on lead and zinc?


Donald Methuen Fleming: There have been no notes or written submissions to the United States government on that score, certainly since the present government came into office; but, as I have indicated in reply to questions earlier this session, it has been a matter on which there has been frequent oral exchange of views. I pointed out that we made strong representations on this subject at the meeting of the Canadian-United States continuing committee on trade and economic matters in Washington in October. It has been mentioned frequently since then. The United States administration is very well aware of the position of the Canadian government with regard to this threatened action.


Mr. H. W. Herridge (Kootenay Wesi):: I
wish to ask a supplementary question of the Minister of Finance. In view of the great seriousness of this situation and the threat it offers to the mining industry of Canada, does
he think their present representations, methods and procedures are sufficient and adequate?


Donald Methuen Fleming: Yes, Mr. Speaker. Our views have been put before the United States authorities through the proper channels, and we have every reason to know that those views are fully understood in Washington. They have been put forward with very great vigour. There are two possible courses of action that might be taken at Washington with regard to this matter. One might be through congress and the other might be through the executive. Naturally, with our deep concern over this situation and the action which has been threatening now for some time, the house may be assured that we shall continue to watch the situation vigilantly.


Mr. H. R. Argue (Assiniboia):: I wish to ask a supplementary question. I wonder whether the minister has had brought to his attention the threatened increase in the duty on Canadian copper going into the United States. If so, have representations been made with regard to copper and other commodities?


Donald Methuen Fleming: I am not aware of any recent threat.


Mr. Coldwell:: The threat was made
yesterday.


Donald Methuen Fleming: I have not had any communication on that subject. We shall certainly look into it.


Hazen Robert Argue: Mr. Speaker, I might inform the minister that the press reports that legislation has been introduced in congress to bring this about.



INQUIRY AS TO ACCEPTANCE OF STERLING FOR SURPLUS AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Irvin Sluder (Swift Current-Maple Creek):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to submit a question to the Minister of Trade and Commerce pursuant to my question of January 13, with reference to the increased competition for the disposal of farm surpluses by other exporting countries and their acceptance of sterling. I would therefore ask if the present government is also prepared to accept sterling in payment for Canadian agricultural surpluses, as it advocated when it was the opposition on this side of the House of Commons.

Inquiries of the Ministry


Hazen Robert Argue: And you opposed on the other side.


Irvin William Studer: We never advocated it; and I would suggest that if noise sold wheat the hon. member for Assiniboia would have sold our entire surplus a long time ago.


Hon. Gordon Churchill (Minister of Trade and Commerce):: Mr. Speaker, I do not know how serious the hon. member's question is, and I take it he is not advocating the acceptance of sterling himself.


An hon. Member:: Let us hear the answer.


Irvin William Studer: Your party advocated the acceptance of sterling when you sat on this side of the House of Commons, and I want to know if you are accepting it.


Mr. Pickersgill:: It was just the leader who advocated it; the party voted against it.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Why not stick to the facts for once?


Gordon Minto Churchill: Perhaps we are engaging in a debate as to what was said by one party or another in days gone by. My hon. friends will have plenty of time on that side of the house to consider all these problems relating to the sale of wheat. I have discussed this question many times. The wheat board has accepted convertible sterling when wheat has been sold.


Mr. Sinclair:: Convertible sterling, yes. That is an entirely different thing.



INQUIRY AS TO REDUCTION OP PURCHASES FROM UNITED STATES

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. R. Garland (Nipissing):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the Minister of Trade and Commerce. In view of the apparent success of the government's plan to reduce purchases from the United States, is it proposed to pursue this course beyond the 15 per cent objective as announced by the Prime Minister shortly after he assumed office?


Gordon Minto Churchill: I am very glad, Mr. Speaker, that the hon. member recognizes that our trade with the United Kingdom is being increased-


Some hon. Members:: No, no!


Gordon Minto Churchill: -and that our general trade is increasing. Whether or not the increase in trade with the United Kingdom exceeds the 15 per cent which my hon. friend has mentioned will be shown in due course, but the general trade position of Canada is excellent and we are trading with all countries of the world.


John Richard Garland: Mr. Speaker, perhaps I should speak a little louder. The minister apparently misunderstood my question. If I may I will repeat it. In view of the apparent success of the government's plan to reduce purchases from the United States, is it proposed to pursue this course beyond the 15 per cent objective announced by the Prime Minister shortly after he assumed office?


James Sinclair: Why not 30 per cent? If 15 per cent is good, 30 per cent should be twice as good.


Gordon Minto Churchill: Mr. Speaker, I presume we could have questions repeated endlessly. The hon. member is interested-


John Whitney Pickersgill: In an answer to his question.


Gordon Minto Churchill: -in the increase in trade which is taking place between Canada and the United Kingdom.


Some hon. Members:: No, no.


Mr. Lesage:: The question is about the United States.


Gordon Minto Churchill: I hope he is also interested in achieving a better balance of trade between Canada and the United States.


John Richard Garland: Mr. Speaker-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. It seems to me this matter could very readily become a debate rather than a series of questions and answers as provided for at this stage of the proceedings. The hon. member for Yorkton.


John Richard Garland: Mr. Speaker, am I not entitled to an answer?


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I think the hon. member for Nipissing made a remark just as the hon. member for Yorkton was rising. Perhaps I should say to him that he did ask his question twice and received an answer twice, and as I cannot assure him the answer that he wants I felt, therefore, that the matter had gone far enough.



REQUEST FOR STATEMENT ON NEGOTIA- TIONS WITH SPAIN AND POLAND

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Peter Slefura (Vegreville):: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Trade and Commerce. I believe it is about six weeks since we had delegations arrive from Spain and Poland to buy some Canadian wheat. Can he give us any information now as to whether negotiations are still going on or whether we can assume we will not be selling any wheat to either Spain or Poland?

Hon. Gordon Churchill (Minister of Trade
and Commerce): Mr. Speaker, in the first place I do not know of any delegation coming from Spain and Poland. Second, these negotiations for the sale of wheat are carried on by private brokers. They may be going on at the present time.



AIR TRANSPORT


[Stage Direction]
Hon. George H. Hees (Minister of Transport:) Mr. Speaker, I wish to make an announcement regarding the extension of international scheduled air services of Canadian carriers.
Trans-Canada Air lines recently applied to the air transport board for permission to operate a scheduled service between Montreal and Brussels, Belgium, and a service between the co-terminal points Montreal and Toronto and Zurich, Switzerland. There are now in force bilateral air transport agreements between Canada and Belgium and Canada and Switzerland providing for the operation of these routes by a Canadian carrier. Trans-Canada Air Lines has been authorized to operate the routes between Montreal and Brussels, and between Montreal and Toronto and Zurich. I expect that T.C.A. will commence service to these countries this year.
Canadian Pacific Airlines Limited has applied to the air transport board for the addition of Edmonton in lieu of Yellowknife on its international route between Vancouver and Amsterdam. This application has also been approved, so travellers from western Canada who wish to go to Europe via C.P.A.'s polar route will now be able to board the plane at Edmonton. C.P.A. will also have the right to pick up and put down at Edmonton traffic destined to or proceeding from other points on its international routes via Vancouver.
Hon. Lionel Chevrier (Laurier):: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Transport arising out of the statement he has just made. Has the department or the government given consideration to the application for fifth freedom rights by Air France at Montreal?


Mr. Hees:: I am not aware of any application by Air France for such rights, but I will check on the matter.

On the orders of the day:


Mr. Stanley Knowles (Winnipeg North Centre):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Minister of Transport arising out
Air Transport
of his statement this morning concerning the extension of certain scheduled air services. Is the minister aware of the fact that even with respect to its overseas routes, Trans-Canada Air Lines is obligated to have its major overhaul and repair work done in Canada? Will the government consider making it a condition of the licences for the overseas routes granted to Canadian Pacific Airlines that this company meet the same conditions as are imposed on Trans-Canada Air Lines with respect to this matter?


George Harris Hees: I do not think we have a right to make such a requirement, but I will look into the matter.


Mr. Ambrose Holowach (Edmonton East):: Mr. Speaker, with respect to the earlier announcement made by the Minister of Transport, I was wondering if the minister could tell us when it is intended to inaugurate the services he referred to, particularly with respect to the Edmonton service?


George Harris Hees: Mr. Speaker, could I ask the hon. member if he is referring to the stop at Edmonton by C.P.A.?


Ambrose A. Holowach: Yes, Mr. Speaker.


George Harris Hees: That is up to C.P.A. They have the right to stop there and inaugurate the service immediately. It is up to them when they start it.


Stanley Howard Knowles: May
I ask a supplementary question of the Minister of Transport. Is the minister aware that there are Canadian Pacific Airlines advertisements in today's newspapers announcing a reduction in the company's fares to Europe, subject to government approval? My question relates to that condition. If the government has the say as to the granting of licences and as to the fares to be charged, can the government not make it a condition of such licences or the charging of such fares that all major overhaul and maintenance work be done in Canada by Canadian Pacific Airlines, as is done by Trans-Canada Air Lines?


George Harris Hees: I am not aware of the particular announcement by Canadian Pacific Airlines. If they wished to reduce their fares I think it would be a matter to be decided by the management of the company. I have already advised-


Stanley Howard Knowles: But
the advertisement says it is subject to government approval.

Inquiries of the Ministry


George Harris Hees: I do not think the air transport board will refuse their application to reduce fares. What I was referring to was the decision of the company to apply for the right to reduce their fares. I have previously replied to the hon. member's question, stating that I do not believe it is within the government's right to require them to have their repairs done in any particular place. However, I told him I would look into the matter and report to the house.


Major James William Coldwell: May
I ask this question. Does the minister not think, in the interests of fair competitive conditions, that conditions of the sort suggested by my hon. friend should be laid down, because Canadian Pacific Airlines could have servicing performed in Hong Kong or some other place in which there is low paid labour, thus creating unfair competition for Canadian labour as well as Trans-Canada Air Lines?


George Harris Hees: Once again I should like to remind the hon. member that I told him I would look into the question of whether or not the government has the right to require any private air line to have repairs performed in any particular place. After I have done that, as I have assured the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre, I will report further to the house. I do not think I can do any more than that at this time.



DOMINION-PROVINCIAL CONFERENCE REQUEST FOR TABLING OF LETTER FROM PREMIER OF NOVA SCOTIA

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the Acting Prime Minister whether all the correspondence with the provincial governments for which I asked on January 7, respecting matters arising out of the federal-provincial conference, was tabled by the Prime Minister last Saturday. The hon. gentleman will recall that these letters were printed in Hansard. Was there a letter from the premier of Nova Scotia which was not tabled at that time?


Hon. Howard C. Green (Acting Prime Minister):: I shall be glad to look into that situation.


John Whitney Pickersgill: May I ask a supplementary question. Does the Acting Prime Minister not know whether there was a letter from the premier of Nova Scotia? Does that mean that these letters, like those from the premier of Newfoundland, are not circulated in the cabinet?


Howard Charles Green: I do suggest that the remarks just made by the hon. member are quite out of place.


John Whitney Pickersgill: It was a question, and a perfectly proper one.


Mr. Brooks:: Just trying to show off.



LABOUR CONDITIONS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. F. G. J. Hahn (New Westminster):: In
the absence of the Minister of National Defence I should like to address a question to his parliamentary assistant or to the acting minister. In view of the critical unemployment condition on the Pacific coast, has a recent newspaper article in the Vancouver Sun of January 13 been drawn to the attention of the minister, respecting a charge that civilian employees of H.M.C. Dockyard, Victoria, are accepting employment during their off hours? Would the minister indicate whether these charges have been investigated, and what action his department intends taking in the matter?


Mr. M. J. A. Lambert (Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of National Defence):: Mr. Speaker, I shall have to take the question as notice, and the minister will make an announcement in due course.



WINDSOR


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. D. F. Brown (Essex West):: May I
address a question to the Minister of Northern Affairs and National Resources. Has the minister now received a reply from the province of Ontario with respect to the establishment of a metropolitan park and camp site in the county of Essex in aid of the present unemployment situation, as was anticipated in the minister's statement of January 13 last?


Hon. Alvin Hamilton (Minister of Northern Affairs and National Resources):: Mr. Speaker, I think perhaps there is a slight misunderstanding on the part of the hon. member for Essex West with respect to this program which I mentioned in relation to the campground-picnic proposition and also the forest access roads. The main characteristics of this program are that the provinces will take on certain projects in their areas, submit them to us, and we will pay 50 per cent of the cost. We have been in conversation by letter and by telegram with the province of Ontario and the minister told me last night

they would be sending to my department a list of the projects they have in mind. As yet I have not seen any such detailed list, and of course I cannot in any case speak for the province of Ontario. They are the ones who decide the projects they want.


Donald Ferguson Brown: Mr. Speaker, I am not under any misunderstanding. I am only interested in the employment situation. I am only interested in providing work.


Some hon. Members:: Order.


Donald Ferguson Brown: Mr. Speaker, may I direct another question to the Minister of Northern Affairs and National Resources. Has the province of Ontario given approval to the recommendation of the minister, and if not would he communicate with the province of Ontario again in regard to assistance in improving access to Point Pelee national park and the building of a bridge over Sturgeon creek leading to Point Pelee park as an aid to the hundreds of unemployed in the Windsor area?


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: Mr. Speaker, I have already told the hon. member for Essex West that I have no power and I have no intention of even suggesting any proposition to any province in this respect. The provinces run their own show, and we do not intend to direct them from this government.



FERNIE, B.C.-REPORTED IMPENDING CLOSURE OF COLLIERY

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
James Allen (Jim) Byrne: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys, or in his absence to his parliamentary assistant. Has the department been informed that the Elk river colliery at Fernie will be closed permanently at the end of this month, throwing some 300 men out of work? If so, would the department see whether or not something could be done by the dominion coal board to prevent closure of the colliery at this time?


Mr. Raymond O'Hurley (Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys):: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys I will take notice of this question, and the minister will give an answer tomorrow.



TRANSPORT


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. E. G. McCullough (Moose Mountain):: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Transport. In view of the application
Inquiries of the Ministry of the railways to the board of transport commissioners for an increase in demurrage charges on box cars loaded with grain at terminal points, can the minister give the house the assurance that such application will not be granted?


Mr. Speaker:: Order. It seems to me the
question relates to a matter pending before the transport board which has not been decided and is not yet the responsibility of the government. It is therefore a hypothetical question.



REQUEST FOR STATEMENT ON DELIVERY QUOTA SITUATION

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. W. A. Tucker (Rosihern):: I wish to
direct a question to the Minister of Trade and Commerce. Is he yet prepared to make a statement to the house with regard to the grain quota delivery situation in western Canada?


Gordon Minto Churchill: A statement on what?


Walter Adam Tucker: The grain delivery quota
situation in western Canada.


Gordon Minto Churchill: I will take the question
as notice and have a statement for the hon. member shortly.



REPORTED INEQUITABLE DISTRIBUTION OF SHIPPING ORDERS

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. G. H. Castleden (Yorkton):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Agriculture. Has he received any complaints from the western wheat pool organizations protesting the inequitable distribution of shipping orders as between the grain companies and the wheat pools? If this is not a matter for the Minister of Agriculture, then I direct my question to the Minister of Trade and Commerce.


Hon. D. S. Harkness (Minister of Agriculture):: Mr. Speaker, the matter of the allocation of box cars does not come under my department.


George Hugh Castleden: Then I will direct my
question to the Minister of Trade and Commerce. Has the minister received any complaints from the western wheat pool organizations protesting the inequitable distribution of shipping orders as between the grain companies and the wheat pools?


An hon. Member:: Diversion of box cars.

Inquiries of the Ministry


Gordon Minto Churchill: Mr. Speaker, I think this question has also been raised before. The answer is yes; representations have been made to me by the wheat pools with regard to box car allocation.


George Hugh Castleden: The minister misunderstood my question. It had to do with the inequitable distribution of shipping orders as between the wheat pools and the grain elevator companies.


Gordon Minto Churchill: The representations dealt largely with the allocation of box cars. The question of the hon. member, alleging inequitable distribution of shipping orders, was not part of their representations to me.



FINANCE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. A. M. Nicholson (Mackenzie):: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Finance. I wonder whether the minister is able to make any statement with regard to the Auditor General's report and the comment in yesterday's Gazette with regard to irregularities running into several millions of dollars. Has the minister made any dismissals, or is he able to make any statement?


Donald Methuen Fleming: Mr. Speaker, I have not seen the article to which the hon. member refers. The report of the Auditor General was tabled. All departments of government have taken under scrutiny the portions of that report which affect them, and whatever is required to be done to remove irregularities, if any, that existed under the former government will certainly be done.



PUBLIC SERVICE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Claude Ellis (Regina City):: May I direct a question, of which I am sorry I have not given him notice, to the Minister of Finance. He may like to take this as notice and answer tomorrow. When will caretakers grade II and those working part time, six hours or less, in the Department of National Defence receive a salary increase? I understand these two classifications were overlooked last May, and they have had no wage increase for more than a year and a half.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Mr. Speaker, on that subject may I say that all the classifications of caretakers in the
(Mr. Castleden.]	3 i
Department of National Defence were under review by the civil service commission at the time of the wage increase. I understand a new classification has now been worked out and submissions have been made to the appropriate authorities for consideration, and that a decision will be forthcoming shortly.


Alfred Claude Ellis: May I ask a supplementary question. When the new classifications come into force will recognition be given to the fact that these employees did not enjoy the wage increase received by other civil servants last May?


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: I can only say, Mr. Speaker, that undoubtedly when they were under review that matter I am sure would have been taken into account; but to give a definite answer yes or no would be to prejudge the issue.


EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Major James William Coldwell: Mr. Speaker, I would like to address a question to the Secretary of State for External Affairs. On Monday last, January 13, I addressed a question to either the Prime Minister or the Secretary of State for External Affairs inquiring if a communication had been received from our ambassador with regard to a statement issued by the supreme council of the Soviet union, made I believe on December 21.
May I ask if that report has now been received and, if so, what disposition has been made of it?


Hon. Sidney E. Smith (Secretary of State for External Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for having given me notice of this question. On Monday last I believe the Prime Minister reported on two letters from Mr. Bulganin, and he also informed the house of our receipt in December of a communication representing the findings of a meeting of the council of the supreme soviet.
I am now able to inform the house that on Thursday morning we received another communication from the Soviet union.
That communication was handed to our ambassador in Moscow, Mr. Johnson, and came to us by bag; that is why we received it only on Thursday last. That communication bears the date of December 21, and I know now, and explained to the hon. member who asked the question, that this is the document to which he was referring last night.

That communication has been sent to Your Honour and it has also been sent to the Speaker in the other place. The request was addressed to our ambassador in Moscow in these terms: "Will you bring this to the attention of your government and your parliament?"


Major James William Coldwell: Do I understand it will be available if any member of the house wishes to read it?


Sidney Earle Smith: Yes.


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Erhart Regier (Burnaby-Coquillam):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Secretary of State for External Affairs, further to his welcome announcement the other day that 2 million bushels of wheat had been offered as a gift to the people and government of Ceylon. In the light of the unemployment in the lumber industry in British Columbia, has the government made a similar offer to the people of Ceylon with regard to a supply of lumber to enable them to rebuild their homes?


Sidney Earle Smith: Mr. Speaker, in informing the house of the prospect that we would make an additional gift to Ceylon after we had sent forward certain medical supplies by plane, I informed the house that we would discuss with the representative of Ceylon in Canada, and our acting high commissioner in Ceylon would discuss with the Ceylonese government, their needs. That was done, and they asked for flour.


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. T. S. Barnett (Comox-Alberni):: I
should like to direct a question to the Minister of Transport. In doing so may I say that I hope he enjoyed his visit to the province of British Columbia. In view of the auspices under which the minister spent part of his time in that province-and I am not referring to those in which the hon. member for Coast-Capilano may have some particular interest-


James Sinclair: It would not do him any
good.


Thomas Speakman Barnett: -can the minister tell the house whether he would now be prepared to recommend to his colleagues recognition of the government of China with a view to opening up an expanded market for various products in that country?
Inquiries of the Ministry


George Harris Hees: Mr. Speaker, that matter did not come up while I was in Vancouver. It had nothing to do with my visit, and I have no comment to make.



NEW YORK


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
John Richard Garland: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Public Works in his capacity as house leader. Can the minister say if any rental agreements for office space in New York have been entered into by his department on behalf of any government agency since November 1, 1957?


Howard Charles Green: It is my understanding, Mr. Speaker, that the renting of space abroad does not come under the Department of Public Works in the ordinary course.


John Richard Garland: I wonder if I could with your permission, Mr. Speaker, direct my question to the Secretary of State for External Affairs rather than the Minister of Public Works.


Mr. Speaker:: Would the hon. member repeat his question?


John Richard Garland: Can the minister say if any rental agreements for office space in New York have been entered into by his department on behalf of any Canadian government agency since November 1, 1957?


Sidney Earle Smith: I shall take that question as notice, Mr. Speaker.



SHIPPING


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
George Harris Hees: Mr. Speaker, on Monday and Tuesday last the hon. member for Laurier asked questions regarding pilotage in the international section of the St. Lawrence river and on the great lakes. This matter is still under study by both Canadian and United States authorities, and it is expected that some reciprocal arrangement will emerge, but we are not yet in a position to make a final statement thereon or to indicate whether, in fact, any special legislation would be involved. It would not appear, however, at this stage that any legislation relating particularly to the international section of the river would be necessary.
Views on the matter of compulsory pilotage on the great lakes have been received

Inquiries of the Ministry	*
from the great lakes pilots' association and from shipping groups, and this matter has been under discussion for some time between Canadian and United States authorities. No decision has been taken regarding compulsory pilotage by the Canadian authorities, although the necessity of maintaining adequate standards of competence is recognized. Whatever decision may be taken in future in regard to this matter is not likely to affect the existing pilotage districts within Canadian waters on the St. Lawrence so far as can now be seen.



SEARCH AND RESCUE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. A. W. Stuart (Charlotte):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Transport. Since the minister has recently visited the west coast as well as the east coast, is he now in a position to inform the house when the modern coast guard service he has promoted for many years may become a reality?


George Harris Hees: Mr. Speaker, I will be very glad to outline to the house and to the hon. member what is being done at the present time in the way of providing coast guard service.



REQUEST FOR TABLING OF LETTER TO PREMIER OF NEWFOUNDLAND

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the Minister of Northern Affairs and National Resources if he would be willing to table the letter to the premier of Newfoundland, which he mentioned on Tuesday, refusing a request for an amendment to the power bill to assist the Atlantic provinces.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: I should imagine, Mr. Speaker, that in due course, subject to the appropriate reservations, this letter could be tabled.


John Whitney Pickersgill: A supplementary question. What does the hon. gentleman mean by "the usual reservations"?


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: I think possibly, Mr. Speaker, you should explain to the hon. member for Bonavista-Twillingate that it is usually customary to ask permission from the other party concerned.



AGRICULTURE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. B. R. Leboe (Cariboo):: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Agriculture. He may want to take it as notice. Could the minister give an up to date report on the action taken by his department under the Prairie Farm Assistance Act with respect to the Peace river district, particularly in British Columbia?


Douglas Scott Harkness: Mr. Speaker, as I have indicated several times before, we have put a large number of inspectors into the Peace river area both in Alberta and in British Columbia. They are carrying out these inspections as rapidly as they possibly can. As the hon. member knows, I think, weather conditions there have been very bad. In some cases inspectors have even had to go to inspect farms on horseback. The bad weather conditions have, of course, imposed some delay as far as getting the inspections completed and the payments made, but the work is being carried on just as rapidly as it can be done.


Mr. Low:: Are payments under the Prairie Farm Assistance Act being made in those areas where it has been possible to complete the inspections?


Douglas Scott Harkness: So far as the Peace river area is concerned, no payments are being made yet. The general policy which has been followed in that regard is to complete the inspections and adjustments as far as any particular area is concerned before starting to make payments. Otherwise there would be a great deal of dissatisfaction on the part of the farmers, because one farmer would say, "Mr. Brown got paid and I have not got paid, and I am only two or three miles away." In order to avoid that it has always been the policy in the past to complete a particular area so the cheques can all go out at the same time.



POLICY RESPECTING PAYMENT OF FLOOR

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Jacob Schulz (Springfield):: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Agriculture relating to support prices on eggs. Do dealers have to pay floor prices in effect at any time on all eggs purchased from the producers, or do they have to pay floor prices only on those eggs which they intend to turn over to the government as surplus?



195S

Mr. Speaker:: Order. We spent five or ten minutes the other day on the question of eggs and support prices. I wonder whether it would not be better for the hon. member to put his question on the order paper as a specific question rather than try to unravel this problem-


John Whitney Pickersgill: Unscramble?


Mr. Speaker:: -on the floor of the house, which may take too long. I should say "unscramble".



POST OFFICE DEPARTMENT


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Postmaster General. In view of the suggestion made by the Auditor General in the report tabled on Wednesday that parliament should take a new look at post office mailing rates on newspapers and periodicals, may I ask whether the government is considering the introduction of any legislation along this line? I wonder whether the Postmaster General is able to answer the question as to who benefits from the $18 million annual deficit, the publisher, the advertiser or the subscriber?


Hon. W. M. Hamilton (Postmaster General):: Mr. Speaker, the Auditor General's report having been tabled only a day or so ago and the reference to the Post Office Department containing such interesting phrases as "news having ephemeral characteristics", I feel that I would want to examine this particular part of the report at somewhat greater length before commenting upon it or attempting to answer the question which has just been asked me.
I should like to say, however, since the question has been asked, that I was most interested in the closing observation of the Auditor General, that these comments were made in the interests of good administration. This, of course, refers to the previous government's administration of the Post Office Department, and as I recall bears out almost exactly statements which were made in this house over a period of time.



NATIONAL DEFENCE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Mr. Speaker, on Wednesday last the hon. member for Kingston asked if a statement
Inquiries of the Ministry could be made on the new role of the Canadian infantry, since he understood that the role of the infantryman was being reassessed. I have made inquiries as to the source of his information, and I am informed that there is no consideration being given to changing the role of the infantryman with the advent of thermonuclear weapons. However, the fighting technique of the infantryman will of necessity have to be adapted to new conditions found to exist under the circumstances.
The term "reassessment" is not to be construed as meaning that a radical change will occur in the role of the infantry soldier, but that the method of employment of the infantry, its fighting techniques, will be reexamined in the light of modern warfare conditions. I might add, Mr. Speaker, that the role and use of the armed services is under periodic review, and the review that is being undertaken this coming week is not out of the ordinary.


Mr. W. J. Henderson (Kingston):: May I ask
a supplementary question. Has the department received a report from the infantry corps conference, which I understand is taking place?


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: The conference referred to is to start on January 24, so we could hardly expect a report as yet.



DOMINION-PROVINCIAL RELATIONS INQUIRY AS TO CONTEMPLATED CHANGES IN FISCAL ARRANGEMENTS

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Louis Deniset (St. Boniface):: I should
like to direct a question to the Minister of Finance. In view of the fact that the government of Manitoba is preparing its budget, can the minister state whether or not any changes are contemplated in the fiscal arrangements for the current fiscal year?


Donald Methuen Fleming: Mr. Speaker, this would involve government policy, and this is not the time to make any announcement.


Jean Lesage: You have no policy.



CANADIAN NATIONAL STEAMSHIPS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
James Allen (Jim) Byrne: May I
direct a question to the Minister of Transport. In view of the serious unemployment situation, can the minister inform the house how many cargo-bearing trips Canadian National

Inquiries of the Ministry (West Indies) steamships have made since the registry was transferred to Trinidad some two and a half months ago?


George Harris Hees: Mr. Speaker, I think that question was silly, and it answers itself.


James Allen (Jim) Byrne: I rise on a question of privilege, Mr. Speaker. This question was asked in all seriousness, in order to determine whether the minister is going to do anything about getting Canadian National steamships back on the water.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: It is still silly.


George Harris Hees: Mr. Speaker, in my first answer I was referring to the fact that the hon. member knows quite well that Canadian National (West Indies) steamships have not sailed from the port of Halifax. He knows that as well as every other member of the house does. The question of returning the ships to service is a matter to be decided by the management of Canadian National Steamships, not the government.


James Allen (Jim) Byrne: On a question of privilege-


Some hon. Members:: Sit down.


James Allen (Jim) Byrne: -the minister has made no statement to the house to let us know what Canadian National Steamships are going to do.


Some hon. Members:: Order. Sit down.



PUBLIC WORKS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Howard Charles Green: Mr. Speaker, on January 15 the hon. member for Drummond-Arthabaska asked me this question:
Has the minister received a request from the city of Victoriaville for a grant for the construction of a protection wall? If so, is the minister favourable to such grant, and when might it be expected?
The answer is that no such request had been received when the hon. member asked his question, but one came in the next day. We will be very glad to investigate the situation, but we cannot meet these requests quite that quickly.



REQUEST FOR REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON SIMULTANEOUS TRANSLATION

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Maurice Breton (Jolieile-L'Assompiion-Montcalm):: I should like to direct a question to the Secretary of State. At the beginning

of the session we were informed that a committee of the house was studying the problem of simultaneous translation in this house. Can a report be given on this study?


Hon. Ellen L. Fairdough (Secretary of State):: May I inform the hon. member that, as I said on a previous occasion, the matter is one that is under study by His Honour the Speaker. When he has a report to make to the house, I am sure it will be made.



AGRICULTURE


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed, from Tuesday, January 14, consideration of the motion of Mr. Hark-ness for the second reading of Bill No. 237, to provide for the stabilization of the prices of agricultural commodities, and the amendment thereto of Mr. McCullough.
Mr. Louis Lewry (Moose Jaw-Lake Centre):: Mr. Speaker, when I opened my talk on this bill on Tuesday, I was attempting to convey the feelings of western farmers in particular toward Bill No. 237. The Moose Jaw city council has passed resolutions supporting the farmers in their fight for a better deal for agriculture. The Minister of Agriculture was quick to protest that the resolution I had submitted did not deal directly with this bill. I suggest that the farmers are trying to find a way out of their dilemma, brought on not by their own acts but by the lackadaisical attitude of the federal government in the past, and that this bill does not indicate any hope to lead them from the wilderness.
I hope the minister will allow me to present a second resolution which was passed unanimously by the city council of my home town. It deals with the matter under debate, in that the resolution urges immediate action by the federal government to implement policies along the lines indicated by the Saskatchewan royal commission on agriculture and rural life with particular reference to price supports for all agricultural products, based upon parity and utilizing deficiency payments. The resolution also urges a comprehensive system of forward pricing and an integrated national credit program designed to meet the needs of agriculture, as well as a program of crop insurance and an improvement in productive resources in agriculture.
From many parts of the Moose Jaw-Lake Centre constituency I have reports that farmers are still able to deliver only the unit of 300 bushels and a 1-bushel quota. Other places have the unit and a 3-bushel quota. I have written to the Minister of Trade and

Commerce on this continuing inequality. In addition, the box car situation is being brought to the attention of the government daily. All these things should point up to this government the fact that the farmers are desperate.
While I was home for the Christmas recess five resolutions were passed at a meeting of farmers and business men in the city of Moose Jaw. The meeting asked that the price support formula be applied to more than just the top grades of agricultural products. One resolution asked for deficiency payments for wheat, oats and barley; another asked for the two-price system for wheat marketing and a long-term credit plan for young farmers similar to the Veterans' Land Act assistance. Another resolution opposed the recent increase in freight rates.
I submit, Mr. Speaker, that all these things are part of the continuing pressure that needs to be brought to the attention of the government because of the prevailing feeling of the inadequacy of this farm prices support bill. They do not feel that the presentation of this bill is carrying out the mandate that was given the government last June 10. The farmers of western Canada ran Right Hon. C. D. Howe out of meetings in the west, and they will run this government out in the same manner if this bill is the kind of fulfilment they give of their election promises. This is not a progressive step to aid the Canadian farmer. To me it appears to come from befuddled minds that have no hope of solving the problems of Canadian agriculture.
I am told that many farmers are having to take the course of bartering wheat for their everyday necessities, and having to accept sacrifice prices for that wheat in order to live. If this proposal is the answer to the promises made to the farmers of western Canada I would suggest that both the Minister of Northern Affairs and National Resources and the Minister of Agriculture should immediately admit that they have no hope of fulfilling their election promises and should resign their posts. They are ignoring the trust given them when they were elected, that they would carry out the wishes of their constituents.
We have heard for years now that the answers to the problems of the farmers is parity of prices. To my mind this proposal suggests that the farmers accept 60 per cent of parity. In other words our farmers are expected to work year in and year out at a 40 per cent loss, while profits to the favoured few continue at their record heights.
The last bureau of statistics report indicates that food prices have declined, showing that the living costs are held down by low farm
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization prices. The Minister of Finance suggested that inflation has been checked. We suggest if it has been checked it is because the return the farmer is getting for his produce is still declining. It is hard to understand how the Minister of Agriculture can defend his statement that farm prices are not declining when we have his own government figures to show that such is not the case.
The Minister of Northern Affairs and National Resources was recently in western Canada on a political tour. He called the opposition in this house capricious and vicious. I say this bill is capricious, vicious and frivolous. It attempts to do nothing; in fact it promises to make the farmers worse off than they were even under the former Liberal regime. The Liberals attempted to tell the farmers that they never had it so good. This proposed legislation adds insult to injury and tells them they can expect absolutely less than nothing from the Tories. No wonder the government were reticent in bringing this bill before the house. No wonder they obstructed attempts of the C.C.F. to discuss the precarious position of the farmers. This is their answer; they will do nothing.
I suggest that the hon. member for Qu'Ap-pelle, the minister who went to Saskatchewan a few weeks ago on his tour, was misleading his audiences into a belief that this government was going to do something long promised, long expected, to assist our constituents. I wish to quote from a newspaper story published on December 6 in the Regina Leader-Post, in which the Minister of Northern Affairs and National Resources was reported to have said the following:
"The fundamental aim of your government is an attempt to provide a fair share of the national income for agriculture," he said.
He admitted he knew what was in the bill but said he was not free to reveal anything it dealt with. He did say, however, the program of the government has a series of basic agricultural reforms it believes are necessary.
"Not only does the farmer need support prices that enable him to meet in some measure his costs of production, but at the same time provides a rock-bottom guarantee that the price will not fall below a level that will put him in a position that he faced in the '30's" . . .
The government is determined to work with farm producers to arrive at its farm policies as it had in providing for cash advances, Mr. Hamilton said.
In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, may I say that there appears to be a new order in control in Ottawa, all right, and it appears that the atmosphere is permeating all through these buildings. Recently when ordering in the parliamentary restaurant I was asked by the waitress if I would like soup. I inquired as to what kind of soup it was. Her reply was, "It's bean soup, without the beans". Today we have before us, a farm prices support

Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization bill without any price support. We take it that this bill is Tory soup, without any substance and, in fact, no soup.


Peter Stefura: Mr. Speaker, the bill before us which provides for the stabilization of agricultural commodities has received more publicity than any other measure since the June 10 election. At least that has been the case in all the agricultural communities. It was supposed to have been the trump card or the ace in the hole of the entire Conservative platform. It was claimed that when the bill was enacted it would become the bill of rights for the farm people of Canada.
I, as a farmer, and realizing only too well the problems faced by the farm people, was hoping that at least some of these claims would be true. I was hoping that the resolutions on the price support policy passed at the F.U.A. convention in Edmonton on December 9-13, 1957, would be incorporated in this bill. The minister himself, when introducing this piece of legislation, at the resolution stage had this to say, as found at page 2186 of Hansard:
This is a far-reaching and important piece of legislation, perhaps the most important, in its implications, in its expected results for agriculture and its effect on the general economy, that has been considered by the Canadian parliament for many years. I believe this legislation will give to our farmers a much greater degree of security than they have ever enjoyed in our history-
And so on.
The bill began with great expectations of giving the farmer a fair deal. However, this did not last for very long. The longer the minister spoke the more he took away, so that by the time he had finished one realized that we were getting something which would be a lot less than we actually had even under the old Agricultural Prices Support Act. It was severely criticized by the members of our group, by the C.C.F. members and others. It was opposed by the farm unions, the Canadian Federation of Agriculture, the interprovincial farm union council. I think someone called it a great disappointment. Some hon. members referred to it as a monstrosity, and I believe somebody else said it was so much garbage on the farmers' doorstep.
I did hope that all this talk of how much this bill was going to do for the farmers was not just so much eyewash but that it would have some real meat in it, that it would give some really solid help to the agricultural industry, that it would be something for the farmer to fall back on and to depend upon.
The efforts of this opposition did bring about changes. The Minister of Agriculture, in introducing second reading of the bill, did

let it be known that when this bill came before the committee of the whole he would propose five amendments to it. With the unanimous consent of the house, and in order to speed up passage of the bill and to get down to the true meaning of it, these amendments were permitted to be discussed and incorporated in the bill before reaching the committee stage. The result of all this is that we now have a reprint of the original bill with the amendments added, but it is still known as Bill No. 237.
These five amendments alone, even though the general principle has not been changed, serve to prove that the original bill was no more than the minister merely trying to palm off on the agricultural industry what I would say is nothing more than an old windblown horse. By merely adding amendments to the original bill with no change in the principle it is no more than brushing the old horse's coat and adding a few ribbons to its tail. We nevertheless still have the old windblown horse. What we actually need is a bill which is good and sound, something the farmer can go to work on, something that will stand pressure when it does come through.
We have had a preamble added; we also have had the base period changed from three to ten years. If I may take the privilege for a moment, as has been done by the minister himself and by some other members, I would like to refer to at least one or two of these little amendments, first making brief reference to section 7, subsection (1), which I feel constitutes the key to the whole bill and brings up the question of base prices, floor prices and guaranteed prescribed prices as proposed in this legislation.
Although the amendment clarifies the original concept of the bill, it serves at the same time to indicate how ridiculous are some of the clauses, and it also shows how far removed this legislation is from the actual requests of the farm people made through the farm organizations, and how far it is removed from the campaign promises. The latter part of this clause, about half way down, says that it-referring of course to the duties of the board-shall take such actions and make such recommendations as are necessary to ensure that the prescribed price for an agricultural commodity in effect from time to time shall bear a fair relationship to the base price for such commodities. I have never in my life been able to figure out how one is able to take a percentage of something and say this will bear a fair relationship to the same thing out of which you have taken the percentage.

If we have a look at the base price, it has been previously described as the average of the preceding three years in any given period for any given product. The product might be butter, pork, eggs or beef. Let us say the area is Edmonton, where a variety of products have been sold at a variety of prices in the last three years. We would then have the average and that would be the base price, but since the amendments were permitted the 3-year moving period has been changed to a 10-year moving period.
This gives the farmers an edge at the present time, by taking advantage of the higher prices of 1948, 1949, 1950 and 1951. The basic principles, however, have not been changed. In view of the present trend of prices for agricultural commodities, which are continually declining, it very simply means that the base would be lowered, through the years, merely slower than the base price would have been lowered in a 3-year period.
Furthermore, this would mean that in the event of more prosperous times for our economy, if some unforeseen circumstances may develop whereby our agricultural industry is unable to keep pace with other industries, then the delays under this system would make things so slow that there literally would be no support or help for the farm industry in keeping pace with other industries.
This bill perhaps was not meant to be related to the economy of other industries. It does not directly tie in the agricultural industry with parity or cost of production. Although cost of production is mentioned in the	preamble,	it	is in	no	way	definitely incorporated in the bill itself. The	minister	has told	us	that	the
agricultural stabilization board shall keep the cost of production in mind in arriving at the prescribed price, but he has also let it be known that the board shall keep at least 10 other factors in mind when arriving at the prescribed price for any commodity.
I cannot help but wonder just how literally we can take his statements, even with respect to the cost of production. On December 14 as found at page 2397 of Hansard, he had this to say about the factors which would be involved.
(a)	estimated cost of production on the average efficient farm;
The question immediately arises as to what he considers to be the average efficient farm, its size, type and all the other factors which make up such a farm. Is the minister going to take the top efficient farm in any given area and then use that figure in establishing the prescribed price?
We all know there is a great difference between the sizes, types, conditions, etc. of
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization the farms in this country. We have almost as many varieties as farms. If only the most efficient units are used then we begin to deal with an ideal situation. We then develop a hypothetical case rather than one which actually exists in Canada. Unless the minister and the stabilization board are prepared to take all the farms into consideration in all the different regions, then we will start out on the wrong foot from the very beginning. We will deal with the situation we would like to see throughout this country rather than the one we actually have.
Through his scientific and technical knowledge and through automation I am of the opinion that the farmer of Canada is capable of being the most efficient farmer in the world today. I believe that man for man he could produce more units of farm produce than any other farmer in the world, yet financially the entire industry is in jeopardy. The relation between the costs of commodities and services used by the farmers and the prices for farm produce has been more unfair only in the period from 1931 to 1935. If we are going to solve the agricultural problem we will have to look at it as it actually exists and take it from there rather than taking it from the standpoint of what we would like to see.
The minister went on that day to discuss other factors, as follows:
(b)	supply of commodity;
(c)	prospective domestic and export outlets for it;
This in itself boils down to nothing more than a straight supply and demand proposition. If a fear of surpluses should develop with respect to any commodity in any given period, then the prices will be cut to a lower level. If the supply and demand factors are given a considerable amount of prominence the whole bill becomes nothing more than a policy of dog eat dog and the devil take the hindmost.
We hear a lot today about there being too many farmers, and that the less efficient farmer should be forced off the land. We hear that from people who I believe should know better; and if they do not know any better I believe they should keep their mouths shut. That is as negative an approach as one could possibly take toward solving the farm problem.
It was with a great deal of concern that I listened to the Minister of Labour announce a few days ago that we had over 750,000 people registered with the national employment service. He stated that he may be in a position some time after January 15 to give us the figures of those who have drawn all their insurance and who today
3402	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization have no income, a number which I believe is considerable. To force more people off the farms would do nothing but serve to increase the ranks of the employed.
Then what are you going to do? Are you going to open up soup kitchens, as you did in the thirties? Are you going to have the police beat some of these fellows over the head with clubs when four or five walk down the street together looking for jobs, as was claimed? Or are you going to give the men $5 a month to go to work for a farmer, and give the farmer $5 a month to keep the man, as was done somewhere around 1935?


An hon. Member:: Who did it?


Peter Stefura: It was done-


Mr. Speaker:: It seems to me that the hon. member is discussing the unemployment issue, which is really not the subject of this bill.


Peter Stefura: I am only calling attention to some of these points, Mr. Speaker; I am not going to develop the matter any further.
Some of the people who make such irrational statements should think twice before they make them. We also hear talk about cutting back some of this production-this production that the minister fears. We know that in the United States, even though they inaugurated the soil bahk and forced acreage reduction, production did not decrease as was hoped. With the advent of more scientific knowledge, more use of fertilizer, better hybrids, crop rotation plans, use of more modern machinery and better stock, all of which are available to the Canadian farmer and are being utilized by the Canadian farmer, such measures will not cut back production.
Depressing prices only forces farmers to produce more in order to keep their heads above water. The more they produce the more prices become depressed. It becomes a vicious circle. What we need is an entirely new concept in trying to solve the whole agricultural problem. A surplus of agricultural commodities should not be looked upon as a detriment to our economy, but rather as a blessing. It could be one of the most potent means of securing the peace that we so much desire, and also of maintaining our democratic way of life.
The Minister of Agriculture is very much worried about writing a definite formula into the act, as is asked by the farm people, for fear of running into difficulties such as they have experienced in the United States. But the formula proposed by the farm people is not the formula that has created difficulties in the United States, nor is it anywhere near


that formula. It is at least three years ahead of what is being proposed in the United States today; and incidentally, Mr. Ezra Benson is now defending that plan as one which will solve the agricultural problems of that country.
The United States program is based on the 1910-1914 period. Different indexes had been applied to bring it to the period when price supports first came into effect, and this support price was then pegged at a rigid 90 per cent of parity. It was on this basis that the United States ran into difficulties, and this is not the plan that is being proposed by the farm organizations.
The United States has since amended its act a number of times, introducing a degree of flexibility and a reduction in some of the supports to bring about a better relationship between support prices on the different commodities. But even so this is still behind what is proposed here by the farm organizations. The minister did not mention the fact that the only surpluses which are giving the United States a real headache are surpluses of wheat, corn, cotton and tobacco, products which are not affected by this bill. We do not grow corn or cotton, and western wheat has never been supported even under the old Agricultural Prices Support Act. The United States is not bothered too much with any other surpluses.
Social Credit members have spoken during the resolution stage of a two-price system, which the minister has stated to be something different again. Perhaps it is, but if you were to use it you would not have worries about surpluses. Products could be sold on the domestic market at parity and surplus commodities could be sold on the export market at world prices. There would then be a fair price to the farm people for their products but no incentive to produce excessive amounts unless world markets demanded extra production. Neither, with limits on maximum benefits to individual farmers, would this encourage corporation farms as did the original United States act, in consequence of which corporations were formed and tens of thousands of acres of grass were ploughed up and put into wheat.
The way this bill stands now, even with its amendments, it still fails to give the farmer any security or anything definite to fall back on except the whim of the minister. We do not like the base price being a moving base. It will continue to drop as the better years for farm prices, from 1948 to 1951, are dropped each year. We believe that any fair price for a commodity must be computed from a fixed base period.
Unless the prescribed prices are over 100 per cent of the base price, using a 10-year

moving base period instead of a fixed base period, prices for farm products will continue to decline. I certainly see no chance of the minister convincing the rest of the people in this country that he is doing right by everyone if he has to have prescribed prices of over 100 per cent; and they must be over 100 per cent if the farmers are going to receive anything near a fair price relationship ratio.
The prescribed price, which shall be set by the board with the minister's approval, is not written into the act in any formula, except that it is provided that the board shall keep it in mind. Prices that farmers receive will bear no direct relationship to the cost of commodities farmers must buy.
I will not quote figures at this time, because some of them have been quoted before. We all know that it was not too many years ago- about six years ago-that we were able to buy a tractor similar in size to those bought today for between $600 and $800 less than must be paid now. Combines could be bought for between $1,200 and $1,500 less. The cost of smaller machinery-ploughs, drills or what have you-has also increased in proportion. The cost of repairing farm machinery has also increased entirely out of proportion to farm income; in some cases it would stagger even the most vivid imagination.
Unless there is a more direct relationship between income and costs, including depreciation and repairs, whether in machinery or buildings, farm people will not be able to replace what they have today. Unless there is a direct relationship placed in this bill between all production costs and income, you will have done nothing more in this act than was done in the old act, other than rearrange the clauses.
It is most odd that although in our Canadian economy all other businesses have set records in profits and dividend payments, the agricultural industry has been declining. It is interesting to compare the figures for the agricultural industry, as previously put on record, with those for other industries. I have here an article taken out of the Edmonton Journal which is headlined, "Dividends Set Record Fourth Consecutive Year." This article reads, Mr. Speaker:
Toronto-Dividend payments by Canadian companies for 1957 are at an all time high for the fourth consecutive year.
Total of $722,959,865, as reported by J. R. Timmins Company is an increase of 8 per cent over the previous peak of $668,680,599, 21 per cent above $396,804,129 for 1955; and 131 per cent ahead of the pre-war record of $313,108,335 in 1938.
Since 1943, industrials have increased their dividends every year, from $111 million to $388 million. In 1957, they tripled the dividend alone more than three times over that
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization in 1943. I believe we can presume quite correctly that these figures do not include the reserves that have been built up by some of these industrials, nor the tremendous increases in the capital assets of some.
The mines of Canada more than doubled their dividends from 1946 to 1957, even though they paid out $16 million less in 1957 than in 1956, due mainly to lower base metal prices. In 1957 it was $148 million as compared to $67 million in 1946. The picture in utilities and financial institutions is even more striking. The utilities in 1939 paid out $30 million. That has increased every year, until in 1957 they were able to pay out $111 million, an increase of almost four times or close to 400 per cent. Financial institutions have paid out over four times as much in a lesser period of time. In 1945 they paid out $17 million, and that has increased every year until in 1957 it was very close to $74 million. Compare these industries with the agricultural industry, and you can readily see that there have been some things which have been drastically wrong in our whole economy.
This bill as it stands, even though amended, still falls far short of what the promises were, far short of what the farm people have been asking, and far short of solving the agricultural problems which a respectable bill on agriculture could solve. I believe the motion to send this bill to the agriculture committee is a good one; not that we wish to refer it to the committee with the idea of killing the bill, but with a view to incorporating amendments or policies that will be of benefit to our whole economy. Call in your experts, call in your farm representatives, let the people who are opposed to the bill present their case, and I am confident that a bill of some real value can be developed.
This practice has been followed previously with regard to other matters. I do not believe we should have legislation that could very easily become a political football. A big part of the success of this legislation depends on the whim of the minister. By placing a little more emphasis on some of its many features, even though it may be just establishing the cost of production, a tremendous difference can be brought about in the prices farmers will receive. It could very easily become a fair price before an election and then be forgotten about later.
The farm people should not become pawns in a game of political chess, and this legislation should not be used as a political football. The farmers have been kicked around entirely too much already. The minister in effect asks us to place our trust in him, and says that he and his bill will do right
3404	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization by the farmers. I have sat in this house and listened to some of the answers given by the minister to various farm questions. I could not help but wonder just how far the farmer could depend on the minister or on this bill. If the government were to win a four-year term of office in the next election, just how flexible would the minister's so-called flexible farm bill become? It occurred to me to ask whether it would become so flexible that it would not be of any value.
In reply to a question I asked on November 14 concerning the drastic drop in livestock prices last fall and the urgency of corrective legislation, the minister said he thought my preface to the question was not in accordance with the facts, even though the price of hogs in Edmonton dropped from $34 in August or September to $22.50 in November. He went on to quote figures for similar dates in 1955 and indicated that what we had was actually an increase in hog prices.
I would point out to the minister that for the entire year, according to the farm cost studies of the Alberta department of agriculture and dairy branch, where a five-year study of 51 average farmers in the Wetaski-win-Leduc area was made, the profit left for risk and management was only 92 cents per hog. Farmers selling hogs at the figures quoted by the minister were selling at a loss.
In view of these things one begins to wonder just how much trust can be placed in those who will administer this bill. Personally I am wondering just how much farther I can trust the minister in the administration of farm legislation than I can throw a bull by the tail, and that is not very far; especially when I realize that under the previous act, the Agricultural Prices Support Act, the Toronto price could have been $28.87 in 1956. I use the 1956 figure because that is the latest figure I have from the agricultural prices support board as of January 10, 1957.
I do not doubt that the figure for 1957 would be higher. It can be done, because it was done in the case of sugar beets on December 16, when the minister announced a support price of $13 a ton. The support price for cheese could have been 35.8 cents a pound, for creamery butter 71.6, for good steers up to 1,000 pounds 19.37 cents, for hogs 28.87 cents and for eggs, grade A large, 71.4 cents. However, I would not argue that the support price with regard to eggs should be 71.4 cents a dozen.
The only good thing about the bill is that it intends to bring about a more equitable relationship between the price supports on the different commodities. Nevertheless the

fact remains that the minister had the power, and still has, to bring support prices to those levels if he so desired.
If you take the farm cost studies in Alberta, they indicate that the average cost of producing a dozen eggs is 28.3 cents; yet under the act the farmer himself receives 29 cents or 30 cents for grade A large. The average price he receives for all eggs is less than 25 cents a dozen. He is selling them at a loss; yet this government, after six months in office, has done nothing to remedy the situation other than to introduce this bill, which falls drastically short of what is needed. I will agree with the minister and others that a new farm bill could be the most important piece of legislation for agriculture, but again I must say I cannot help wondering just how far we can trust the administration of farm policy when nothing definite is written into the act.
In this bill we have a "have regard to" clause. A similar clause not too many years ago cost the wheat producers of western Canada $512 million; yet we have a "have regard to" clause introduced in this bill. This clause leaves a bad taste in the mouth of every wheat producer in Canada today. Western wheat, oats and barley are not included in this bill. According to all reports we understand that production of animals and animal products will be on the increase in 1958. The farm people will continue to grow their coarse grains, and if they are not being supported will put them into animals or animal products. Then we shall have a surplus of commodities that will perhaps be much more difficult to store than wheat, oats or barley, for which we have storage facilities today.
At the risk of being redundant and repetitive let me say again that I will agree with the minister and others that a new farm bill could be the most important piece of legislation for agriculture to have come into being in the last 20 years, but I urge that the government send this bill to the agriculture committee, or at least introduce sufficient amendments to make it workable and of value in giving the farmer his fair and just share of the national income.


Mr. A. R. MacDonald (Aniigonish-Guys-borough):: Mr. Speaker, in rising to take part in the debate on the motion of the Minister of Agriculture for second reading of the bill to provide for stabilization of the prices of agricultural commodities, and to speak for the first time at any length in the house, may I extend to you, sir, my belated though sincere felicitations upon your elevation to the honourable post of chief commoner of Canada. Throughout the years the

position of Speaker has always beer, associated with the very warp and woof of parliamentary practice. I feel that you will continue to discharge the onerous responsibilities connected with this exalted office with competency and impartiality.
May I also offer congratulations to the mover and the seconder of the address in reply to the speech from the throne. Both these gentlemen acquitted themselves with notable grace and distinction.
I am a new member of the Canadian parliament. The constituency I have the honour to represent has played a very important part in moulding the economic and cultural life of eastern Canada. It is the seat and centre of that distinguished school of higher studies, St. Francis Xavier University, whose co-operative plan and extension movement have evoked the plaudits of a continent. In the political field my constituency gave to public life a man who graced and adorned the Canadian parliament and who became one of the distinguished prime ministers of our country. I refer to Sir John S. D. Thompson.
As a new member I neither possess nor profess great knowledge of parliamentary practice and procedure, but I do believe that in the matter of parliamentary representation the functions of a member of parliament are two fold, one proximate, the other remote. The proximate concern of a federal member is to safeguard and foster the general welfare of his constituency, to improve where possible the economic, social and cultural life of his constituents. This in itself is a laudable ambition. But although it is commendable to seek the welfare of one's own constituency, we should never be swayed or blinded by petty or parochial considerations. Canada, with its notable heritage, is too big for parish politics.
Thus I believe that the problems of my province or any constituency should, in a general sense, be the sincere concern of all. All provinces, western, central and eastern, have their own particular problems and difficulties, but in this vast and wealthy country there should be no provincial problems incapable of solution if we are motivated by a spirit of co-operation, tolerance and good will.
For this reason I am particularly happy that the Minister of Agriculture has introduced legislation to establish a system of guaranteed prices for certain agricultural commodities. The various clauses of the bill will, I am sure, receive close attention by hon. members who are to follow. It is well known that a prosperous agriculture is a guarantee of urban prosperity. We also
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization know that agriculture is the basis of our Canadian economy. The introduction of the farm prices support bill is a source of gratification to all residents of rural as well as urban communities across Canada. The farm prices suport legislation will have a far reaching effect on the well-being of farmers in my constituency of Antigonish-Guysborough, as in Canada generally.
Guided by the extension department of St. Francis Xavier University of Antigonish, Nova Scotia, where an improved rural economy has been the objective for many years, Eastern Co-operative Services Limited has embarked upon a bold plan of expansion that is perhaps the greatest challenge that has ever been placed before the rural people of the six eastern counties of Nova Scotia, Antigonish, Guysborough, Inverness, Richmond, Victoria and Cape Breton. The implementation of the farm prices support bill will surely bring new hope to the farmers of eastern Nova Scotia, and to all farmers in Canada.
The estimated cost of bringing into being the expansion plan to which I have already referred is $500,000, of which amount one-third has already been subscribed. In order that the success of this great program may be assured, financial assistance from both federal and provincial levels will be anticipated. When in operation this plan will provide the opportunity for approximately 7,000 farmers and fishermen to join hands in one large group, to speak and negotiate with one voice, to purchase supplies and to market products of the farm and of the sea in a modern, scientific manner through one central organization.
Today, Mr. Speaker, we live in a fast-moving world that is highly competitive and highly organized. Apart from farmers, practically every occupational group is unionized or organized to protect its welfare. Lacking organization, farmers today are receiving only 46 cents of the consumer dollar.
The project being undertaken by Eastern Co-operative Services Limited of Nova Scotia is a modern trend that is developing in agriculture throughout North America, and it is the only kind of program that will solve the problems existing among the small farmers of eastern Nova Scotia. In these six eastern counties there are 6,500 farms in operation at the present time. There are over 800,000 acres of land in these farms, but only 128,000 acres are cultivated. The total gross income from all these farms is $4.9 million.
Speaking of markets, may I say that the people of eastern Nova Scotia and Newfoundland consumed $93 million worth of food in 1956. Here is a market at our very doors,
3406	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization yet we produced but a small portion of the food necessary to supply that potential market. Why have the farmers of eastern Nova Scotia not taken advantage of this vast and expanding market? There are, no doubt, numerous answers to this question, but I believe the number one answer to an insufficiency of production has been the lack of price stability for the primary producers. I am confident that the farm prices support bill will provide an incentive to farmers to produce in much larger quantities, because they will be assured of a fair return for their efforts.
I am convinced, Mr. Speaker, that agriculture has declined in eastern Nova Scotia and elsewhere in Canada because of the lack of stable prices to the producer. With price support an incentive to greater production, a new approach to the agricultural problem will come into being. In eastern Nova Scotia production will increase and processing of farm products will be carried on in a modern, scientific manner in sufficient volume to supply the enormous eastern Nova Scotia and Newfoundland markets indefinitely.
May I extend to you, Mr. Speaker, and through you to all my colleagues in the house my sincere thanks for their kind attention.
(Translation):


Mr. M. W. Martin (Timmins):: Mr. Speaker, in rising today, may I express my comments on this bill in the French language? I am sure all hon. members will give me their approval, being aware, as I am, of the large number of French-speaking Canadians who are engaged in agriculture. I can even state that the majority of eastern farmers in Canada are of French origin. You have probably noticed that instead of saying "French" or "English" Canadians, I stress the phrases "French-speaking" and "English-speaking" Canadians, as people who speak either of the two official languages of this country.
Is it not a curious fact, Mr. Speaker, that so few French-speaking members of this house, several of whom represent farming areas, have taken part in this discussion? One might gather the impression that western farmers are better represented in this house than their eastern counterparts.
It is well to remember that the forebears of our French-speaking farmers of eastern Canada were, after all, the first farmers in this country. Ever since they settled on the shores of the St. Lawrence, they have shown their attachment to the land which they had been cultivating for years before the discovery of the golden western prairies which


were soon to become the bread-basket of Canada. That fact is often overlooked whenever we are dealing with the agricultural problems of this country. We are far too prone to think only of the west in this regard.
There are two reasons for this. The first, as I explained just now, is that western farmers are better represented in this house than their eastern counterparts, probably because they prefer sending as their elected representatives career farmers who really know something of their problems, whereas in the east the farmer is inclined to stay at home and elect lawyers or industrialists who, in spite of their good intentions, cannot fully understand his problems, because they do not actually share them.
The other reason is that the western farmer depends solely on his crops, so that the agricultural economy of the west is very sensitive to crop failures. On the other hand, his eastern colleague has a more varied crop system so that if wheat does not sell, he can still market his cattle, or cordwood, or maple syrup in the spring, or find some way of getting by until things look up again.
The farmer has so consistently been the victim of unscrupulous speculators that he has come to believe himself hounded by some kind of ill-luck against which he can do nothing.
Luckily, nowadays, this situation is beginning to improve. In desperation, the western farmer has realized that he had to do as the industrial workers and organize a union of all farmers to protect himself against an exploitation which has lasted too long already.
Out of this movement came the request for parity prices. This movement forced the Conservative party, long opposed to the principle of parity prices, to guarantee, in their electoral promises of last June, that farmers would get their fair share of the national income.
But, of course, the movement is not yet very strong and there is no doubt that the government is not yet worried enough to make good on its electoral promises. Instead of this, the government is offering us a pale copy of a bill about parity prices, a copy so pale that only its title can be made out. Oh, the title looks good, but the rest of the page is illegible. The hon. Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Harkness) is asking us to trust him, and assures us that this undecipherable fine print will be just as beneficial as we have a right to assume from the title.

Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization
In my opinion, that is not good enough. Parity prices should be based on production costs rather than on the average return tor farm products over the last ten years. That average price has no connection with the cost of production; it represents only the minimum selling price which farmers had to take, as a last resort.
If there are so few young men on the farm today, if so many farms are deserted, it is because in the past few years the sale prices of farm products have been as low as during a depression. Why should a farm labourer have to work 12 to 16 hours a day barely to make a living when factory workers earn more by working only 40 hours a week?
Not only has this government set prices based on the average of the last ten years, a period when some of the prices fell to depression levels, but intends to set this ceiling at 80 per cent of this average. In my opinion, if eastern farmers were as well organized as western farmers, the government would never dare resort to such camouflage and describe it as "an act to guarantee farmers their fair share of the national income".
The government is perhaps thinking that by keeping farmers busy from sunrise to sunset, they will not have time to organize. The government is perhaps thinking that farmers can still be lured by fine words about their individualism, but let me tell you this: farmers may withstand hardship and work for a long time. They may be deeply attached to the land, but they are not blind. They cannot help noticing, every fall, that they are at the mercy of speculators and that farm prices are way down while retail prices are not at all affected. This steady reduction in farm income while the cost of living continues to rise surely requires some explanation.
Last June this government got many farm votes because farmers hoped that the government would set things right. I now ask the government to keep its campaign promises by improving the lot of the farmer, who has been long forsaken, and by granting him his fair share of the prosperity of this country. (Text):


Mr. H. F. Jones (Saskatoon):: Mr. Speaker, to a new member, to wait almost three months to make his first speech of any length in the House of Commons seems like a very long time. Many new Conservative members of this house are in this position. We thought that by our efforts to contain ourselves we would expedite the passage of emergency legislation which we consider vital to the
nation. From the earliest days of this session we have heard demands from opposition members that this or that item of legislation be brought forward immediately before the house. Of course it was not possible to comply with all these requests simultaneously.
Many Conservative members therefore took the position that in view of the fact that the house seemed disposed to pass the legislation that was brought forward, we would suppress our natural desire to be heard, as a contribution toward allowing these necessary items, on which agreement had been indicated by the other parties, to get on the statute books. It may seem to some that our efforts in that regard have merely resulted in giving the talking time to the opposition groups, but on balance I think the result has been that legislation has been passed which otherwise would not have been passed if we had insisted on being heard.
The legislation before us today is legislation which I should like to see reach the statute books as rapidly as possible in order that the benefits that will accrue from it may accrue in the shortest possible time to our agricultural population and to those not in agriculture but whose livelihood depends on agricultural stability. If the urgency of the legislation were not so pressing it might have been possible to refer this bill to the agriculture committee. To do that, however, would result in delay which might prevent the benefits of the bill from being made available to many agricultural producers in time for this year's operations. It is my view, therefore, Mr. Speaker, that delay resultant from referring this bill to the agriculture committee would not be justified.
I welcome, however, the suggestion of the Minister of Agriculture that provision be made for the whole matter of price supports to be discussed in the agriculture committee at the next session of parliament. It would then be possible for the committee to study not only the price support system and the price stabilization system here introduced but also the legislation in other countries, and to discuss the operation of the system of price stabilization which is envisaged in this bill in the light of its operations up to that time.
I hope the agriculture committee of the house will study not only price supports but also the whole range of income supports which are necessary to provide a realistic agricultural program. It is true that a measure of income support may be contained in
3408	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization a price support system, but prices are not the only problem which affects agriculture. I think it would be-indeed I think it is -an error for those who oppose this bill to suggest that all the problems of agriculture can be solved by means of price support. The over-all objective of an agricultural policy should be to ensure that farmers will receive a fair share of the national income. In 1956, for example, farmers represented 13.3 per cent of the total labour force in Canada but received only 7 per cent of the national income. That agriculture does not now receive its fair share is an indication not only of the seriousness of the problem but also of the diversity of the problems which affect agriculture.
There is, for example, the wheat surplus problem, which is at present receiving very vigorous attention from the Minister of Trade and Commerce. Furthermore, I am sure all western members of the house were delighted when the Minister of Trade and Commerce announced on Wednesday last that the government will ask parliament to approve a $35 million loan to the Colombo plan countries for the purchase of Canadian wheat and flour, as well as an additional $15 million as an outright grant for the same purpose. This was in addition to the decision made a few months ago to supply a quantity of wheat to both India and Pakistan and to send flour to Ceylon out of the available Colombo plan funds to the extent of a total of $10 million. That is one aspect of the problem to which the government is at present giving its diligent attention.
Another problem is that of price spreads. It is quite evident in this regard that the farmer is getting a smaller and smaller share of the consumer's dollar, although I think until recently at least the consumers were paying more and more for what they bought. The decrease in the share of the consumer's dollar received by farmers can be illustrated dramatically, as it has been by the Canadian Federation of Agriculture. According to their brief in 1951 the total consumer expenditure for food in Canada amounted to $2,649 million, of which the farmers received $1,617 million or 61 per cent. But in 1954 the consumers paid $3,066 million for food-that is to say, $417 million more than in 1951- and the farmers received $1,533 million- that is to say $84 million less-the farmers' share having been reduced from 61 per cent to 50 per cent. More recent figures indicate that the farmers' share is now in the neighbourhood of 49 per cent.
At one o'clock the house took recess.



COMMONS AFTER RECESS

[Stage Direction]
The house resumed at 2.30 p.m.
Henry Frank Jones: Mr. Speaker, before the
luncheon adjournment I was pointing out that in my opinion it is a mistake for those who oppose the bill to suggest that all the problems of agriculture can be solved by means of price support. I was pointing out there were many other problems in agriculture which really have to be considered if the situation is to be rectified.
I mentioned, for example, the wheat surplus problem, upon which the government is taking aggressive action; and the price spreads problem, where the government has appointed a price spreads commission to assist in collecting the relevant information on this matter to be brought to the attention of hon. members.
I refer also to a brief dated March 5, 1956, which was presented to the royal commission on Canada's economic prospects by the Canadian Federation of Agriculture, in which they referred on page 15 to the farm prices problem. There is mentioned, for example, the fact that, using 1948 as the base year, farm prices declined from 100 to 97.8 in 1955 while in the same period retail prices for those products raised from a base price of 100 to 111.72. Also by 1955 costs of distribution rose from 100 to 148, and it is also indicated that the farmers' share of the consumers' dollar in that same period dropped from 59.3 per cent to 53 per cent.
Another aspect of this problem, of course, involves freight rates, which are a factor not only in the cost price farm problem but also in the percentage of the consumer dollar which the farmer gets. In this connection the recent announcement by the Prime Minister of the suspension of the increase of 3.6 per cent authorized by the board of transport commissioners will be welcomed by the farmers and by all those persons who would be particularly affected by the suggested change, especially in the west and in the maritimes.
There is, furthermore, the over-all problem of increasing costs in the agricultural industry. According to the mechanization and farm costs report of the royal commission on agriculture and rural life in Saskatchewan, the operating costs per farm rose from $1,467 in 1946 to $3,022 in 1953, and that is a trend which is continuing. This trend bears particularly heavily on small farmers. In an editorial in the Western Producer of January 9, 1958, there is a suggestion that production costs have been slashed by mechanization and by the establishment of larger and more economical farm units. That editorial, in my

opinion, really means and is intended to mean that production costs have been reduced in so far as it is possible to reduce them at this time having regard to those circumstances over which the farmer has control. Other action is also indicated. The cost-price problem, which is chiefly aggravated by the cost problem, still remains, as does the problem of the uneconomical unit to which I shall refer in a moment.
There is also the problem of water and soil conservation, in which is inherent the necessity for construction of water conservation projects such as the one which is very near to my heart and the hearts of my constituents in Saskatoon and the surrounding area, namely the South Saskatchewan river dam project. I do not at this time wish to comment further on that project, because I understand negotiations are taking place between the federal and provincial governments in regard to this matter. There is also the larger problem of conserving not only the resources themselves but also our human resources which are a vital factor in this whole problem of farm and agriculture stability.
Furthermore there is the very serious and continuing problem of farm credits. At the present time in Saskatchewan, for example, approximately 25 per cent of the farms are too small to be operated economically. For these farmers price supports are not the answer. Large long-term loans must be made available to the farmers who are working farms too small to be operated economically. These farmers must have the credit to buy additional land in order that their total acreage may be sufficient, in an economic sense, to permit advantageous or profitable production having regard to the particular area concerned, the quality of the soil and the produce which may be grown on that soil. Young farmers who have the ability to operate such farms should also have loans made available to them in order that they may be able to commence operations.
Such a farm credit policy would among other things, enable those farmers who wished to retire to dispose of their farm land without their current fears of not collecting the purchase price. These two groups of farmers-the young farmers and the farmers now on farms too small to be operated economically-do not represent the only groups of farmers who require credit for capital expansion. With the advent of mechanization large amounts of capital are required, just as industry requires capital for similar purposes. But these are the two groups which are in most desperate need of credit, and they cannot get it in sufficient quantities from any existing source.
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization
This is a problem which is receiving the active consideration of Conservative members and of the government. Its solution will not result in increased production but in increased efficiency in farm operation. In the long run supervised farm credit need not be a cost to the federal treasury, but it is a means of helping farmers to help themselves.
There is also the problem of crop insurance which needs, and is receiving, careful investigation today. A comprehensive study is required. The list I have mentioned does not by any means exhaust the number of problems which beset agriculture. Many of these problems are chronic, but that does not mean they cannot be solved given good will and determination. In view of the factors I have mentioned I think it is quite wrong to suggest that price supports alone can be a solution. I should like to quote from report No. 8 of the royal commission on agriculture and rural life of Saskatchewan, at page 204:
Our price and marketing system has not provided producers of agricultural products with stable incomes nor has it provided them with timely or adequate information on the kind and extent of production changes v/hich should be made. As a result of income fluctuations, the use of credit is restricted to a greater degree than would normally be justified by expected returns on new investment. The main reasons for the failure of the marketing and price system to contribute to stable incomes and to guide the use of resources into those channels which produce the greatest returns are:
(a)	Resources in agriculture are not easily
transferred to alternative uses when product prices change;	*
(b)	Monopolies, in varying degrees, are present in other sectors of the economy; and
(c)	Barriers to trade exist.
The report goes on to draw a second conclusion:
Public policy can play a part in stabilizing incomes in agriculture by contributing to the achievement
of:
(a)	A more equitable distribution of income; and
(b)	A shift of productive resources in agriculture to uses most beneficial to the general welfare.
These goals cannot be achieved exclusively through markets, marketing, and price programs. Such programs must be part of a comprehensive, integrated program designed to correct deficiencies in the economy as a whole.
Let us, Mr. Speaker, look at the legislation before us in its proper perspective. Let us see what it can accomplish not only for agriculture but also for people in all parts of Canada including those in the cities, such as those in my own province of Saskatchewan, whose prosperity depends directly or indirectly on the prosperity of agriculture.
The first objective is to set up a comprehensive system of price supports covering all agricultural products except wheat, oats and barley grown in the wheat board area. Wheat,

Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization oats and barley grown in that area are expected because the government and the farmers' organizations generally do not want it to be covered, for the very sound reason that they do not want the operations of the wheat board interfered with.
With the exceptions I have mentioned, any agricultural product may be supported by any price recommended by the farm leaders on the advisory committee and accepted by the agricultural stabilization board and the Minister of Agriculture, providing that the price may not be less than 80 per cent of the base price, that is, the average prices of named commodities as outlined in the bill during the preceding 10 years. The named commodities are cattle, hogs and sheep; butter, cheese and eggs; wheat, oats and barley, produced outside the wheat board area. The important feature of the legislation is that the price of any agricultural product may be supported at any level, but that in any event the named commodities cannot be set lower than the statutory limit.


Alfred Claude Ellis: I wonder if the hon. member would permit a question.


Henry Frank Jones: I would ordinarily permit a question, but I hope the hon. member who has made that request will understand that this is the first time I have had an opportunity to make a speech of any length in this house, and I believe the hon. member and those around him have taken many opportunities since this session commenced to make speeches and to ask questions. For those reasons I would ask that questions be deferred. I have a lot of ground to cover.
Those hon. members who are trying, for one reason or another, to scare the farmers by suggesting that because the statutory floor, as they describe it, is 80 per cent of the base price, and that therefore the farmers will get only 80 per cent of parity, are misrepresenting the intentions of the legislation and of the government. One of the main reasons this bill is being presented is that farmers are not getting anywhere near the share of the national income which they should have been getting in the past 10 years with regard to many of these agricultural products.


Alfred Claude Ellis: What does this bill do about that?


Henry Frank Jones: I said the first objective of this legislation is to set up a comprehensive system of price supports. The real solution to the problem of price supports will be found in the way the advisory committee and the board operate the system. Certain guarantees have been built right into the act in the case of named commodities; but it is not wise, I believe, to adopt a price support

system which is as rigid or mechanical in its operation as would be necessary if the actual support prices were named in the legislation, or if a mechanical formula were fixed under the legislation.
I do not believe I need at this stage to draw the attention of hon. members to the difficulties which are caused by rigid or mechanical price support legislation, other than by referring to some views which have been expressed on this matter. The general criteria governing agricultural support prices are referred to in the report to the food and agriculture organization of the United Nations by the expert working party on agricultural support prices. On pages 66 and 67 some indication is given of the problems which should be taken into consideration. It says, for example, and I am quoting from the report:
An agricultural support policy should combine a satisfactory level and stability of income in agriculture to the maximum degree possible with:
(i)	the greatest practicable flexibility of agricultural production in its adjustment to consumer demand;
(ii)	a balanced and expanding consumption of agricultural products;
(iii)	the most rational use of the agricultural and other resources of the country;
(iv)	the greatest simplicity of operation with the minimum of cost to the community as a whole in relation to the results achieved.
Those four criteria which were discussed in the lengthy report of the expert working party on agricultural support measures of the food and agriculture organization of the United Nations should, I think, be borne in mind by those who criticize the lack of rigidity in this legislation. I would also refer to the Gordon commission report on Canada's economic prospects at page 372. In regard to this problem the report had this to say:
It is also clear that built-in formulas for determining the level of support, for example, parity formulas, have certain aspects in principle which are likely to create serious difficulties in practice. The difficulties arise from the complexity of the elements which enter into the determination of costs, prices and profits. These elements, even if measurable, are not constant. Consequently, formulas devised on a historic base may be a poor guide to appropriate action at some later time.
Since it may be expected that, from time to time, the market prices of particular farm products will tend to fall far enough to create seriously depressed incomes, and since other appropriate means of supporting incomes will probably not be available, it can be argued that the government should stand ready, under the necessary legislation, to sustain incomes by means of price supports. However, the level at which support prices should be set and the particular techniques to be used should be determined in the light of all the conditions obtaining at the time. The decisions involved should be based upon the fullest knowledge of the circumstances. The emergency conditions may develop at any time, and prompt action may be required. These considerations suggest the need for

machinery to keep conditions affecting the prices of particular commodities under constant and careful study.
Of course constant and careful review is provided for by the setting up of the advisory committee and by the provision for annual reviews of prices. I would also refer, Mr. Speaker, to report No. 8 of the royal commission on agriculture and rural life of the province of Saskatchewan, entitled "Agricultural markets and prices". The following appears at page 184 of the report:
If a comprehensive agricultural program were implemented, support prices would rarely be needed, and then only for unforeseen marketing situations. Until such a program is a substantial reality, support prices are necessary.
A program of support prices should be: (1) based on parity; (2) apply to all farm products; (3) protect the incomes of producers only up to a reasonable maximum; (4) be based on a recent period of full employment and normal trade; (5) provide that the difference between market and support prices come from the national treasury and not directly from the consumer; and (6) come into operation near the beginning of a price recession.
There are some objections to supporting agricultural prices at 100 per cent of parity. If supports are applied in conjunction with a forward pricing scheme, a high level of support would permit the farmer to receive high prices in prosperous years and would protect him against below average prices in recession period. Few groups in the economy enjoy such protection. The level of support should depend upon the impact which farm price declines have on the rest of the economy; if a sizeable part of the economy suffers when farm prices fall, the support level should be high.
No support price program can solve the problem of the lower income group in agriculture. With or without price supports, low income farmers require programs which will assist them in acquiring additional resources.
That is the opinion expressed in the report of the royal commission on agriculture and rural life of the province of Saskatchewan. I should also like to refer to an editorial which appeared in the Saskatchewan Star-Phoenix of January 2. The editorial makes reference to the hon. member for Springfield (Mr. Schulz), the agricultural expert for the C.C.F. group, and has this to say.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. It is not in order for an hon. member to read editorial comment on what has been said in this house during this session.


Henry Frank Jones: Mr. Speaker, in this regard I would be very pleased to receive your opinion as to whether I might read this editorial which deals with what the hon. member said outside of this house. If that would be in order I will proceed. The editorial reads:
Mr. Jake Schulz, C.C.F. member for the Manitoba constituency of Springfield and former president of the Manitoba farmers' union, seems to have spent a good deal of the Christmas parliamentary recess trying to whip up farm resentment against the Conservative government's proposed farm stabilization bill. He has called the bill, now awaiting 96698-216
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization second reading, "dangerous" and "worthless" and "a joker" and has been urging farmers to "march on Ottawa" to protest against the legislation.
We would say that it is Mr. Schulz's advice, and not the stabilization bill, which is "dangerous". The bill, which will be debated anew when parliament reconvenes, is far from worthless. In fact, it goes about as far as seems practicable in guaranteeing to farmers a minimum income on a variety of agricultural products. Once passed and implemented-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I think the hon. member has gone as far as he can within reason. He is now reading editorial comment on actions within this parliament.


Henry Frank Jones: Mr. Speaker, I draw attention once again to the comments of the agricultural expert of the C.C.F. group, whose advice is considered as dangerous by a newspaper which does not profess to call itself a supporter of this government. I recall that when the cash advance legislation was before the house the hon. member for Springfield had some very distressing comments to make as to the value of that legislation. If I recall his expression correctly, the legislation in his opinion was stupid.
I would like now to draw attention to some comments made by the treasurer of the province of Saskatchewan, Mr. C. M. Fines, as reported in the Saskatchewan Star-Phoenix of January 8, 1958. The article reads:
-unless there was a serious crop failure, an improved agricultural situation would stimulate the Saskatchewan economy, with farm-stored grain providing a backstop.
Reasons Mr. Fines gave for the Improved agricultural situation included cash advances, an improved livestock situation, higher protein content and greater sales of wheat, and a lower premium on the Canadian dollar.
Mr. Speaker, the formula which the Minister of Agriculture is suggesting to stabilize prices is not a rigid formula. It is not a mechanical formula in the sense that x plus y equals z. It is a formula in which all factors are introduced which are necessary in order to arrive at a proper stabilization measure. These factors were set out in detail by the minister on December 14, as reported at page 2397 of Hansard.
It may be that these factors could have been enunciated in the bill. I suggest, however, that in the light of the experience gained by the board and the advisory committee with the factors which have to be considered this matter may be reviewed at some time in the future. When this experience has been gained and general acceptance of the factors for consideration is obtained, then consideration can be given to incorporating them in the bill. I am sure that on consideration it will be agreed that rigid or mechanical means of calculating price supports should be avoided.
3412	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization In this connection I should like to refer briefly to a statement issued by the Canadian Federation of Agriculture on December 15, 1957. That statement, despite all that has been said by certain members of the house, dispels for all time the suggestions that were made in the house the other day that this legislation is the same as the legislation now on the statute books. For example, the statement of the Canadian Federation of Agriculture contains the following:
The bill establishes the desirable principle that on certain key commodities there will be price guarantees in effect at all times, and it names those key commodities.
The statement goes on to say:
The procedure provided in the bill of regularly reviewing the level of price supports and establishing them on key commodities 12 months in advance is a desirable one. Provision in the bill for a minimum guaranteed floor on each of the named key commodities, the levels of which are set by law, is also, in principle, a desirable feature. The new bill provides for a larger revolving fund, which may imply an intention by the government to make more generous use of price guarantees.
This statement by the Canadian Federation of Agriculture indicates, I suggest, that in the opinion of that organization this is a very different and much more worth-while measure than has hitherto been on the statute books. The objection to the bill raised by the federation is that it provides no guide as to the level at which price supports should be established. I think that objection has been met by the Minister of Agriculture not only in his enumeration of the factors to be considered, to which I referred as having been made on December 14 as found at page 2397 of Hansard, but also by the changes made in the bill itself.
As a matter of fact the bulletin answers its own objection, when it says:
Whether or not the farmers' present economic position would be raised by the use of price guarantees under this new legislation would have to depend on what decisions are made by the government in its administration.
Of course it is true that the actual cash benefit of this legislation will not become apparent until the actual support prices are set. How could it be otherwise unless you used a mechanical or rigid price support system?
In that regard, Mr. Speaker, I should like to say just a word about the advisory committee. To my mind the advisory committee is a most important body. It will have a most important function to perform, a function which has not been performed by any other committee on agriculture in the past. It is my thought that the committee will require the farm organizations to study the various problems necessary to be studied in connection with this price support legislation in 

order to reach sound conclusions as to what agricultural products are to be supported and the level of price at which they are to be supported. This committee will give to the farmers a continuing organization which will be a means for them to express their views directly on the prices at which agricultural products should be supported.
In closing I should like to say a word on one of the other principles of the bill, the forward pricing principle. I recognize that the value of the annual forward pricing provision is great, and I know it is possible for forward prices to be set for a period nated commodities. I hope this particular provision will receive the special and continuing consideration of the advisory committee, the board and the minister, because it seems to me that in this area particularly experience may prove to be the determining factor in deciding whether the forward pricing period should be further extended in order that the desired stability of agriculture may be achieved in relation to particular products. I suggest that the answer to that problem can only be found in relation to the experience which the advisory committee, the minister and the board acquire over the years as the operation of the legislation becomes better understood.
(Translation):


Mr. Samuel Boulanger (Drummond-Ariha-baska):: Mr. Speaker, after reading the bill entitled Agricultural Stabilization Act, which is supposed to replace the Support Prices Act, which is now in force I wondered whether my agricultural training had not become suddenly out of date, since I cannot understand what good could come out of this new bill which the department has already amended twice since it was first brought in.
As an agronomist with some experience of agricultural problems, both from an economic and technical viewpoint, as one who has acquired some practical experience on farms in western Canada, having worked as an agronomist for both the federal and provincial departments of agriculture, I claim I am somewhat justified to state, I think, that the agricultural questions are not entirely alien to me.
I have examined this new bill and compared it with the existing legislation which was adopted in 1944 and which has operated satisfactorily ever since.

Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization
I must say this new legislation does not provide any improvement important enough to justify any change that would merely involve administrative difficulties and confuse the minds of the farmers. The change in this legislation seems to have but one objective, one strangely similar to the objective which has prompted the introduction of some other pieces of legislation by the present government, i.e., a purely political one.
For the moment, let us consider the effects of this piece of legislation which the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Harkness) has twice amended since its introduction, on account of its utter lack of responsibility and popularity among the leaders of the agricultural class, the farmers and the members of parliament, because it does not meet the needs of our farmers. The formula for establishing the basic price of some farm products at 80 per cent of the average price in the last ten years is a discrimination against our farmers because it takes no account of production costs. It is a price which would necessarily be much lower than the cost of production.
I have figured out what the floor price for a dozen eggs would be under the new act. The average price I have been able to establish for the past ten years, would be 38 cents, with perhaps a few decimal points more or less. At 80 per cent, as the minister of agriculture wants to establish it, the price would be 30.4 cents a dozen. Can anybody imagine that such price would protect our farmers when it is known that the production costs vary from 32 to 34 cents a dozen? I am aware that this is a minimum price and not necessarily the one obtained by the farmer for his produce if demand is good; but in the case of overproduction, the price will obviously fall to the floor limit which, in this case, will remain below cost. Then who will pay? It will still be the farmer. He will curtail his production, thus giving rise to a greater demand for that product and to a disproportionate price increase. Production will then be out of line. In my opinion, the act of 1944 which is now in force proved sound enough to prevent that fluctuation. Its formula is flexible since the advisory committee can accomplish price changes according to need and as occasion arises, quite apart from the twelvemonth period provided by the proposed legislation.
It is understandable that the floor price is not as high as the producer would like it to be, but it can be said it is not low enough for the farmer to produce at a loss, as would be the case under the new legislation.
96698-216i
Moreover, the statement made by the minister of agriculture contains this mention "the price fixed at the beginning of the year will remain in force during the twelve months". That is another provision which inconveniences the farmer who is often compelled to plan his agricultural program many years in advance. He cannot tell a year and a half or two years in advance what the price of a certain commodity will be. Another inconvenience, a psychological one, results from the procedure of setting prices at 80 per cent of the average of the last ten years. In point of fact, those who are a little familiar with the trade practices in the country know there are unscrupulous dealers-


Mr. Arsenault:: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask a question of the hon. member.


Samuel Boulanger: By all means.


Nérée Arsenault: Can the hon. member tell us where his figures come from, when he suggests the average price for eggs has been 38 cents a dozen over the last ten years? In the second place, can he give us the figures for A large, medium and small eggs?


Samuel Boulanger: The price I have used to arrive at my average is based on information which was provided to me by an agricultural co-operative whose annual turnover is over two million dollars. That is the sales price on the Montreal market for ungraded eggs.


Nérée Arsenault: Do you have any figures for classified eggs?


Samuel Boulanger: For classified eggs, say 3 cents more per dozen and you will arrive at the price.


Nérée Arsenault: No, I mean grade A, large, medium and small.


Samuel Boulanger: I will refer you to the federated co-operative, Victoriaville branch. They will give you the figures I have given today.


Nérée Arsenault: Not necessarily.


Samuel Boulanger: I was saying, Mr. Speaker, that we have in our rural areas unscrupulous merchants who victimize our farmers, not only in so far as the buying of their products is concerned but also in so far as the sale of consumer products is concerned ...


Mr. Ricard:: Mr. Speaker, I would like to put a question to my friend from Drummond-Arthabaska. He says that unscrupulous merchants victimize our farmers. Can you give us their names?


Mr. Marler:: That question need not be answered.

Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization


Samuel Boulanger: Mr. Speaker, I do not think I can answer the hon. member for St. Hyacinthe-Bagot.


J.-H.-Théogène Ricard: Mr. Speaker, anyone who says that unscrupulous merchants are victimizing our farmers should be in a position to give their names. I think that it matters a great deal for our people to know where to strike if we want to remedy this state of affairs.


Mr. Gauthier (Portneuf):: It is not necessary to give any names.


Mr. Gour:: They are partly Conservative merchants.


J.-H.-Théogène Ricard: Yes, we should really have to give the names.


George Carlyle Marler: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order. The hon. member for St. Hyacinthe-Bagot knows full well that he has every right to put a question, but he knows equally well that he has no right to interrupt anyone who has the floor and that he has no right either to express his opinion at that point.


J.-H.-Théogène Ricard: Mr. Speaker, 1 would like to point out to the hon. member for St. Antoine-Westmount (Mr. Marler) that when I asked the hon. member for Drummond-Artha-baska (Mr. Boulanger) if I could put a question, he gave me permission. I am therefore perfectly in order.


Samuel Boulanger: You asked no permission to make a speech, though.


Pierre Gauthier: You have permission to sit down.


J.-H.-Théogène Ricard: You too.


Samuel Boulanger: Those with the slightest knowledge of how trade is practised in the rural areas know that some unscrupulous merchants are exploiting our farmers-


J.-H.-Théogène Ricard: Answer my question.


Samuel Boulanger: -not only when they buy their products but also when they sell them consumer and other goods used on the farm.


Nérée Arsenault: I ask for an answer.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order! I would point out to the hon. members who have interrupted the hon. member for Drummond-Arthabaska that he does not have to answer their questions.


George Carlyle Marler: You are not at the city council.


Samuel Boulanger: I did not think that by speaking I would offend my hon. colleagues opposite to such an extent.


Douglas Scott Harkness: That will do for Montreal!


Samuel Boulanger: I was saying that some unscrupulous merchants exploit our farmers themselves when it comes to selling consumer goods and trade products such as fertilizers, farm implements, feeds, etc.
Under this new bill, merchants will be held as dictators in some parishes because they control credit, they will go around the concessions and tell credulous farmers that the government set the price of some commodities at such a level and that they cannot pay more than that price. Some may say that this is no concern of the government. I should think that the government has no right to put weapons in the hands of those unscrupulous merchants, weapons with which they will be able to exploit the agricultural class.
I say that the act in its present form-


Mr. O'Hurley:: Would the hon. member for Drummond-Arthabaska (Mr. Boulanger) permit a question?
The hon. member for Drummond-Arthabaska, who is an agronomist has lived among the agricultural people. Could he suggest some way to prevent merchants of the parishes from purchasing products from the farmers?
I also have another question to ask. Who passed the price support act in its present form with which we are faced today, and how are you going to prevent merchants from purchasing farm products?


Samuel Boulanger: If the hon. member for Lotbiniere (Mr. O'Hurley) will let me finish my speech, he can then ask questions.


Raymond Joseph Michael O'Hurley: Thank you.


Samuel Boulanger: It is my belief that the old act prevents such abuse and sets a reasonable price whereas * the contrary will be the case under the new act. That is the answer to the question put by the hon. member for Lotbiniere.
Mr. Speaker, the power vested in the Minister of Agriculture to appoint members of the advisory committee is another disadvantage and not the least of this new act proposed by the minister. This committee will consist of a chairman and of six to nine other members representing farmers and farm organizations. The bill provides moreover that members of this committee

may be paid for their services such remunerations and expenses as are fixed by the governor in council.
Here is revealed the spirit inspiring the one who proposes this bill. It is meant to be used as a political instrument. Do you believe that the minister is more qualified than farm organizations to appoint those representatives? Those are means to be used to deprive of their autonomy our farm organizations which up to now have been free from politics, a freedom which made their strength. The fact of being appointed by the minister is already quite serious but the section providing that those members may be paid a remuneration by the government makes it doubly so. I hope the farm associations will sense the danger awaiting them if they do not object to the minister's enthusiasm.
The existing legislation adopted in 1944, provides that representatives are to be named and paid by the farm associations. This is more democratic and logical.
Allow me to quote an example as a warning to the farmers against the appointment by the government of the members of this advisory committee. In July last, on the 16th more exactly, the government decreed that a permit had to be secured to import chicken meat from the United States. A large Canadian firm, informed of the government's intention, imported 60 carloads of turkeys at a dumping price to resell them at a regular price, thus making a considerable profit at the expense of our consumers and producers.


Nérée Arsenault: Under the Liberal administration?


Samuel Boulanger: On July 16; I have made it clear to the hon. member for Bonaventure that it was on July 16, 1957.


J.-H.-Théogène Ricard: The deal had been closed before that.


Nérée Arsenault: Before June 10.


Samuel Boulanger: Mr. Speaker, ever since this bill has been announced to the house in the speech from the throne, members of parliament, agricultural organizations and all farmers have been anxiously awaiting from the minister a statement which was supposed to contain sensational announcements. What a disappointment for everyone!
The government will be the only one to benefit from this measure. As I said a moment ago, it is an electoral tactic to make the electors believe that the promises made before June 10 have been fulfilled. The minister gave us the proof of it the other
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization day, before Christmas, when he took from his pocket the list of his party's promises and read about its commitments concerning the stabilization of agricultural prices.
May I be allowed to read another promise made by the Prime Minister (Mr. Diefen-baker) himself, at Newcastle, on April 26, 1957 and reported the day after, on April 27, in the Ottawa Journal. The Prime Minister said at that time:
(Text):
His party's agriculture program, he said, would include a system of flexible price suports, aggressive salesmanship around the world for Canadian farm products and an early commonwealth trade conference.
The opposition leader promised an immediate investigation into the difference between prices paid by consumers and those received by farmers. Between 1951 and 1955, he said, the farmer's share of the consumer price dollar dropped from 59 to 51 cents.
(Translation):
After these so-called conferences, have our markets with England been restored? Did we send an army of salesmen all over the world to sell our agricultural products? No, fifty manufacturers have been sent to England to make purchases there.
When the minister introduced his bill, he concluded with the following sentence: "The success of a program depends to a large extent on the will and determination of those responsible for its implementation."
I agree that there must be determination for the implementation of an agricultural program but knowledge and sincerity are also necessary. It is not with words-


Nérée Arsenault: And with the Liberals!


Samuel Boulanger: -and too apparent political ambitions that the needs of our farmers will be understood.	It is only through a
sympathetic and sincere study of their problems that a truly efficient solution can be found.
It is deplorable that the Agricultural Prices Support Act enacted in 1954 by the Liberal government and applied with such good results ever since should now be discarded to be replaced by another legislation which can bring but complication and dissatisfaction.
In conclusion, I wish to make three suggestions.


Mr. English:: May I ask the hon. member a question? Has the hon. member-


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order! If the hon.
member does not sit down, it means that he does not wish to be questioned. Therefore no one should insist that he do so.
3416	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization


Samuel Boulanger: I shall therefore suggest to the minister: (1) to reconsider the dangerous effects the bill might have if adopted; (2) to give consideration to the suggestions of the Canadian Federation of Agriculture and the Interprovincial Farm Union Council, who speak for the more serious farmers of this country, before rewriting his bill for the third time; and (3) to postpone discussion of this bill to the next session. This would be the best chance for the farmers to benefit from the present act while waiting for a change of government which would bring them what they really want.
(Text):


Mr. Blackmore:: Mr. Speaker-


Joseph-Omer Gour: Mr. Speaker, I regret-


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order! I have recognized-


John Horne Blackmore: Mr. Speaker, the remarks of the hon. member for Vegreville, who spoke for Social Crediters earlier today, showed rather definitely that the bill under consideration in its present form is unacceptable to Social Crediters. We are now debating a motion to refer this bill to the parliamentary committee on agriculture and colonization. I support that motion.
The case for Canadian farmers has been fully and emphatically put by those who have spoken preceding me in several different sections of the house. The gravity of the predicament in which farmers find themselves has been made known. In so far as time and opportunity permit I should like to make a slightly different approach. May I attempt in some measure an analysis of the situation, an analysis that might help to guide us in determining what might be a remedy for the problem, first at the present time, and second over a more or less long-range period.
The minister's remarks have indicated in him a deep anxiety over the development of embarrassing surpluses of Canadian agricultural products. The minister's anxiety in this respect is widely shared among Canadian farmers. In spite of this fact most Canadians will, I believe, agree upon several basic assumptions, some of which are as follows:
1.	We should save our farmers and get them up to a condition of financial ability to produce.
2.	We should rescue the top six inches of our soil from further deterioration and begin at once to rebuild that soil in the interests of future generations, if for no other reason.


As an example of what can be done to rehabilitate that soil may I point to Germany where, over the period 1870 to September 1, 1903, she increased her average yield of cereals from 14 bushels per acre to 34.9 bushels per acre, paying in the meantime $340 million in subsidies for the growing of sugar beets. I do not believe the Germans will ever regret that action.
3.	In co-operation with our provincial departments of agriculture, in turn working with their several district agricultural agents, we should study the wisest use to be made of our lands having in mind the circumstances at present surrounding us-and I think they are more complex than most people begin to realize.
4.	We should provide that the burdens of whatever adjustments it may be necessary and deemed advisable to make will be borne equitably by Canadians as far as it is possible, it being recognized that Canadian farmers during recent years have been the victims of increasing costs of production for which government policies at Ottawa have been mainly responsible, having permitted in 1946 at $5 a ton increase in the price of steel; it being further recognized that the government at Ottawa has been likewise largely responsible for Canadian financial policies and for Canadian trade policies; and, lastly, it being recognized that farmers more than any other class of producers are unable to cut back production in accordance with available markets.
But what to do? That is the question. How to attain each of these objectives is not at present fully or even reasonably well known. Suitable witnesses before the agricultural committee could help to enlighten not only the members of this parliament but the country generally. May I suggest that Canadian thinking is much confused because of inaccurate concepts. Among such inaccurate concepts we ought to mention:
1.	An utterly unsound knowledge as to the validity or the invalidity of the belief in free trade. I may say my general impression is that the people of Canada as a whole are completely at sea in respect of whether or not free trade is desirable in this country.
A fairly thorough, dispassionate and objective study of this matter is necessary to an appropriate appraisal of Canadian agriculture in its various aspects.
2.	The possibilities of modifications in Canadian financial policy in solving the problems of agriculture also deserve dispassionate and objective study and this they are absolutely not getting in Canada, owing to very foolish and selfish attitudes on the part

of political parties, particularly as they apply to markets at home and abroad, as well as to the storage of agricultural products.
3.	The possibility and feasibility of storage of agricultural surpluses on farms, such surpluses having been bought and paid for by the government.
4.	The extreme danger of disastrous destruction of foods by war as well as the destruction of soil productivity. Generally speaking, I get the impression that very few people seem to be able to project themselves into the possible state of affairs which might prevail in the prairie provinces should one hydrogen bomb be dropped there. No one ever seems to stop to think how long it would be before they would be able to use probably anything grown in those provinces. This consideration bears very heavily upon the advisability of the storage of grain on the farm and the paying of the farmer for it.
5.	The much talked of food and agriculture organization merits full investigation. Ordinarily we hear people mention the food and agriculture organization and wish that such an organization were set up, but they go no further than that. They do not probe into the question as to who ought to finance such an organization and where the financial means should come from. It is time we gave the whole matter exacting study. An agricultural committee would be a good place in which to do it.
Especially is this important, as are these other matters which I have mentioned, when we consider the fact that the population of the world is increasing by 1.7 per cent annually and that it could reach 6 billion people by the year 2000. This is not as a result of, as most people seem to think, a rise in the birth rate but because of a spectacular drop in the death rate resulting from increased knowledge in respect of curing people and also preventing them from contracting disease. These figures are to be found in a work of the population reference bureau in the United States referred to by the Alberta Wheat Pool Budget on January 3, 1958.
6.	A detailed examination of the facts pertaining to the domestic economy of the United States. This study ought to be made in order that the government and Canadians generally can be adequately informed concerning the economy of that country as it affects the economy of Canada. My general impression has been that the government itself has been inadequately informed concerning this matter and has consequently been led into making remarks which, under the circumstances, might not have been really wise.
7.	The matter of subsidization of essential products by other nations should also be
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization gone into with great thoroughness. Here is a list of the subsidization which certain nations are giving to products we would like to sell. The governments of many other countries have taken unusual measures to maintain the income of their agricultural producers and the following table shows the approximate support prices offered by a few governments to their wheat producers during 1955 to 1956.
Price per
Country	Bushel
Ireland	 $ 2.06
United Kingdom	 2.31
Belgium	 2.56
Japan	 2.59
Austria	 2.63
Germany	 2.73
Brazil	 2.85
Italy	 3.05
Norway	 3.43
Switzerland	 4.03
Canada	 1.69
These Canadian figures are related to No. 1 northern based Fort William.
Now any person disposed to be realistic will ask himself the question: how in the name of commonsense can it be that nations such as Switzerland can afford to support their wheat price to the extent of $4.03 while Canada is unable to support the price of her own wheat to any greater extent than she now supports it? The source of the information I have supplied is the international federation of agricultural producers news of June, 1956, as listed in the submission by Saskatchewan wheat pool and Manitoba and Alberta wheat pools to the cabinet on March 9, 1957. I think nearly everyone will agree that we ought to go into these matters with much diligence, because they indicate the kind of difficulties which the Canadian farmer faces abroad.
Another subject which also should be given an examination of the utmost thoroughness is the foreign policy of the United States. I have mentioned her domestic policy; now I turn to her foreign policy. It will be interesting to find out why it is that the United States follows the policy she now pursues, why she is so careful to protect her producers with tariffs and other restrictions which almost shut out competition from other countries. It is interesting to know, for example, that in the course of the last century the United States became the home of Friedrich List, a native of Wurttemburg in Germany, who became a professor of economics, and whose teachings had enabled Bismark to build Germany up to the tremendous strength which enabled him to impose his will upon France. This Friedrich List was invited to the United States in order that he might teach those in authority there the principles upon which
3418	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization he had made it possible for Bismark to develop his program, and the United States apparently had the wisdom in those days to listen to this great authority. Partly as a result she has since had a determination to sell her surplus goods abroad, no matter what the difficulties might appear to be. With generations of tradition in favour of such a policy, what chance, I ask you, would even a dozen Canadian ministers of finance have of moving the United States authorities from this traditional policy to any serious degree.
The United States has used her economic power to compel other nations to buy her goods. How does she do it? This is a most rewarding study. It certainly does not leave one with the admiration for the United States which one had before engaging in that study. Her present policy began with Woodrow Wilson's 14 points particularly No. 3; it was followed up by the most favoured nation clause, reinforced in time by the unconditional most favoured nation clause adopted in 1922. The policy has been developed since then, and has resulted in such monstrosities as GATT which too many Canadians seem to think is a kind of instrument of our salvation. In fact, GATT was contrived by the United States and forced upon the rest of the nations by the United States in order to enable her to drive her goods into the economy of almost any nation under the sun.
That may seem extreme. It would be good to see an agricultural committee sinking its teeth into such a problem with genuine authorities to guide it. Hon. members sitting on that committee would then find that what I have said is true. The United States is determined to maintain employment, that is, to export her unemployment, regardless of the cost to other nations. In the course of a speech made in October, 1944, President Roosevelt declared: "I intend to find jobs for 60 million Americans by trebling our exports abroad". That was the thinking which was prevailing in the United States during the second world war, and it is prevailing there still.
We should probe into the possibilities of commonwealth co-operation enabling the nations of the commonwealth to help to protect the economies of the various members of this great family; and if the commonwealth is unable to do this we must find out why. All these matters would have a tremendous bearing on the policies we would undertake to adopt in respect of Canadian agriculture.
Another problem which needs to be studied with great care is to what extent are our surpluses the result of low prices rather than
[Mr. Blaekmore.l

of high prices. This matter has been mentioned once or twice by speakers who have preceded me today. If low prices do bring about surpluses, then the minister, with all his good intentions, could probably be defeating his own ends. That would be too bad. I am convinced it would help him very much if he could have the benefit of advice from an agricultural committee which could go into the whole question appertaining to this matter.
Another problem is to what extent would it seem advisable to encourage the large farm rather than the family size of farm. Naturally, all of us favour the family sized farm. I do. But before we adapt our policy to the protection of the family size of farm we really ought to go into the matter of whether we are endeavouring through our agricultural economy to produce wheat and other products as cheaply as possible or to produce farm people, and the decision would have to be made after careful consideration and after discussions in which the farm people of Canada as well as the urban people should participate. As far as I can judge, the only place where we could have a dispassionate consideration and study of all these various problems is the committee on agriculture and colonization.
The minister will feel that he is in duty bound to take measures in fulfilment of the promises which his party has made. I recognize that, but I think the minister will also realize that he is just as much in duty bound to do the right thing when he does take action and not adopt policies which might, without it being his intention and without it being his fault, actually make matters worse.
So far as I and the members of my party can judge, after giving this whole question careful consideration, it would appear that the Agricultural Prices Support Act which the Liberal administration adopted in 1944 is capable of being used to benefit the farmers quite as much as is the bill which the minister now proposes, even if he puts into it all the amendments which may be required in order to try to meet the demands of those who are talking to him and besetting him to the point where I marvel he has not already gone distracted. Having all this in mind, I should say it does not really make very much difference whether this bill is put on the statute books today or tomorrow or some little time hence, because if it is not put on the statute books the Agricultural Prices Support Act will still be there. The minister, by using vision, courage and originality, will be able to use that act to bring into effect all the good things which he has in his heart and mind.

I repeat again that I propose to support the motion to refer this present bill to the committee on agriculture and colonization, and I also point out once more that the bill as it stands at the present time is completely unacceptable to Social Crediters.


Mr. A. D. Hales (Wellington South):: Mr. Speaker, in rising to speak on Bill No. 237, the agricultural stabilization bill, I am speaking for the first time in this renowned and time-honoured chamber. I should like immediately to join with those speakers who have preceded me in congratulating the Speaker and the Deputy Speaker on their elevation to the Speaker's chair. As this session of parliament has progressed it has become extremely evident that those appointments were well and justly made.
Like the hon. member for Lanark (Mr. Doucett), the hon. Secretary of State for External Affairs (Mr. Smith) and our newest member from the Yukon-although he is not in his seat as yet, many of us have had the pleasure of meeting him and are looking forward to the great contribution he will undoubtedly make to this house-I am one of the youngest members of this house with respect to the number of months of service to his constituency since June 10. By that I mean the election in my riding of Wellington South was a deferred election held on July 15 due to the untimely death of the late Henry Hosking the Liberal candidate and former member of this house.
At this time, Mr. Speaker, I would like to pay my respects to Mr. Hosking and I am sure hon. gentlemen on the other side of the house who knew him well will join me in this tribute. Mr. Hosking and I met on common ground on many occasions and, although we shared opposing political views, I respected him for his very arduous and diligent attention to the interests of the constituents of the riding I now represent. He devoted his talents, his time and his efforts to his riding in the same way as many of us are doing now.
I am particularly happy to take part in the debate on this agricultural bill because the riding I represent has long been known for its many contributions to the field of agriculture and, I might add, to the field of politics as well. In proof of this statement I need only to mention the late hon. Hugh Guthrie, leader of the opposition and for many years minister of justice in this house, the late R. W. Gladstone, a distinguished senator, and the Right Hon. George Drew, former premier of Ontario, leader of the opposition in this house and now Canadian high commissioner to the United Kingdom.
Returning to the subject of agriculture, Mr. Speaker, I take pride in pointing out that it 96698-217
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization was to my riding that the first Hereford animal was imported to Canada by the late F. W. Stone in 1860, almost 100 years ago. The first Angus cow to be imported to Canada was brought to Guelph by the late James Bowman. The first Shorthorn cattle, although landed at St. Catharines, were very soon driven to Guelph and the breed was propagated there.
The Ontario Agricultural College and the Ontario Veterinary College, the largest universities of their kind in the British Empire, are situated in the centre of Wellington South at Guelph, Ontario. Therefore, Mr. Speaker, these facts coupled with the fact that the Ontario Agricultural College is my alma mater and I am a retail meat merchant and farmer explain my particular interest in this agricultural bill.
The introduction of this bill, I feel, is the result of several things. First, and I think most important, it is the result of the depressed condition in which the farmers of Canada found themselves when our party went to the country. What were the agricultural conditions which existed across this great country of ours? I cannot speak for all parts of Canada but I do know what conditions existed in my own riding. Many farms were run down in appearance and condition, the soil was being robbed, the farmers were living off their depreciation. Many farmers were carrying on a part-time operation, working part time in factories. Farmers' wives and children were required to work in order to help make ends meet. Implement dealers were unable to make sales. I could continue enumerating these conditions but all hon. members know the story.
Between 1946 and 1956 prices of commodities and services used by Canadian farmers rose by 58.2 per cent, between 1951 and 1956 prices of farm produce declined by 21.8 per cent. In 1956 the net income per Canadian family was $4,900 while the net income per farm family was $3,037. In other words, the farm family was being asked to live on $1,863 a year less than the average Canadian family, to accept a standard of living reduced by that amount. Turkeys were pouring into my riding from the United States. Cheese came in from New Zealand. Boat loads of lambs came in from New Zealand and Australia. Canned peaches came in from the United States. And while all this was going on, Liberal cabinet ministers were travelling around the country telling the farmers that they were never better off. The hon. member for Melville (Mr. Gardiner) told the turkey producers that they would have to accept less in order to meet United States competition. Mr. Speaker, did we
3420	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization ever hear any members of the former government telling manufacturers of automobiles, furniture, appliances, boots, shoes and clothing that they should take less in order to meet United States' competition? No, they raise prices as they choose.
The then minister of finance, Walter Harris, in his speeches conveyed the idea that his government should allow agricultural products to come into Canada from the United States in order to keep our prices down. Hon. Milton F. Gregg once said in my riding, "Canada had the best year in her history; of course, farm income was down." The question of farm income was casually dismissed as though it were completely incidental.
I have outlined, Mr. Speaker, some of the conditions that the former Liberal government knew about and allowed to exist. The election came and after it was over the Conservative party formed the government. It was decided that something should be done- yes, something should be done immediately -to correct this unfair situation. We promised we would and we have. It is well known to all how quickly our government acted with respect to the importation of turkeys. Our present Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Harkness) had not yet been appointed and was then only acting minister of agriculture when he put turkeys under price support and import control. Just speak to any turkey producer and ask him what he thinks of our party. Ask the dairy man, too; he knows about the import control on butter oil and powdered milk, etc.
We now have before us a bill that fulfils another promise we made to relieve the distressed condition of agriculture. This bill represents another proof to those people of the rural areas who gave us such wonderful support that our promises were sincere. I think the minister is to be commended on this bill, for his willingness to hear representations from farm organizations, and for his eagerness to get the viewpoints of his party backbenchers. In other words I am sure he feels that in order to be successful such a bill must have embodied in it the thinking and the suggestions of the man from the back concession. The fact that he has introduced amendments proves, without fear of contradiction, that he is willing to co-operate, assist and give sympathetic consideration to anything that will help agriculture. I have been amazed at the number of times I have heard farm delegates say when they have come to Ottawa to present their views, "There sure is a different attitude around here now".
This bill, for the first time, is going to give the farmer something to go by. It is going


to give him a chance to plan his program, to plan in advance. Some hon. members can debate and argue as they like but I feel that the old bill never did just that. Too much was left to the minister of agriculture. Support prices just seemed to be pulled out of the air. Nothing was said as to how long they would be in force. But now we have a formula, a flexible formula, a formula any farmer can use and go about his business with a sense of security and stability.
I support the bill because it is flexible, because it takes into consideration the law of supply and demand, something that is most important. The United States system of agricultural support has found that to be the case. They have had great difficulties, involving great surpluses and great cost to the treasury because they have more or less ignored the law of supply and demand.
The advisory committee that the bill calls for, composed of farmers and members of agricultural organizations, will, while setting the prescribed prices each year, likely in January, base their decisions chiefly on the supply and demand picture and they shall have regard to the estimated average cost of production as outlined in the legislation. I should like to repeat that because I think there are many who feel this aspect has not been taken into account. The bill distinctly says that they shall have regard to the estimated average cost of production as outlined in the act.
I should like to take a concrete example of how the bill will work. Suppose I want to feed a number of steers this year on a feed lot. From dominion bureau of statistics figures I can ascertain the average selling price for steers for the last 10 years. I add these prices, divide by 10 and arrive at the basic price which in this particular case is $21.80 a hundredweight. According to the legislation 1 know that the support price for the next 12 months could not be less than 80 per cent of the base price or $17.44 a hundredweight. However, on studying the supply and demand situation I could very likely estimate the prescribed price that would be set by the advisory board. Unless the supply was extremely heavy I would expect the price to settle somewhere around the 10-year average, namely $21.80. I would at least have some idea what I should pay for my stocker cattle, as close to $17.14 a hundred as possible.
In the case of hogs you could arrive at a similar price. You would take the average prices for the last 10 years, obtainable from the dominion bureau of statistics, add them and divide by 10 and you would find that the base price would be $29.08 and the support or drastic level price for 1958 should not be

under $23.26. As I said before, the advisory board should meet preferably in January and again in the fall, and after a close study of the supply and demand situation they would set the prescribed price close to today's level, namely 27 cents.
The agricultural prices stabilization bill is sound, comprehensive and courageous legislation. I do not believe the bill will correct all the ills of agriculture. It will no doubt need further amending from time to time. The government has acted-I repeat, the government has acted-as we promised we would. The success of the bill will depend upon sound judgment, a sense of fairness in the administration of the legislation and the utmost co-operation from the farm organizations to make it succeed.
The farmer on the back concession needs help. Give him a sound agricultural policy. Let the law of supply and demand work. Give him some protection from the dumping of agricultural products and he will work hard and produce the food we need. But let us give him at least an even break so he can have the standard of living which he justly deserves. I appreciate, Mr. Speaker, the privilege of speaking at this time in support of the bill. I sincerely hope it will be passed immediately so that its many benefits may reach the farmer whom we all know needs immediate help.
(Translation):


Joseph-Omer Gour: Mr. Speaker, I regret having to tell you and all the other hon. members that I am disappointed by the bill that the hon. Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Harkness) has just introduced to help the farmers, although it has been amended three times.


Nérée Arsenault: Only once.


Joseph-Omer Gour: I would have liked the bill to be introduced immediately after the adoption of the one about assistance to the western grain producers, because at that time I voted in favour of that legislation, in the hope that corresponding benefits would be offered to genuine farmers.
Unfortunately, we have waited with impatience for more than three months, and now we are faced with an offer that I consider, I think, at its real value. So. I regret to admit that instead of helping the farmers it will be detrimental to them.


Nérée Arsenault: Well, vote against it.
96698-217i
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization


Joseph-Omer Gour: Mr. Speaker, I will not hold the Minister of Agriculture responsible for that. I know him very well and I think he is a good friend of mine. But I also feel that he has been subjected to the influence of his cabinet colleagues since there would seem to be no other way of explaining this disadvantageous project, which will contribute to a lowering of the support prices. He should have had something better to offer.
I understand that during the last campaign the Prime Minister (Mr. Diefenbaker) went around the country making a lot of irresponsible promises. They felt sure that they would not be called upon to take office. Hence their present predicament. The resolution brought forward by the minister suggests the establishment of some form of parity price, but the experience I have gained, I think, over the forty years and more during which I have been in close contact with the farmers and during which I have been a member of every association, as well as the experience I have gained through fourteen years of farming 1,000 acres of good land, raising cattle, pigs and poultry, leads me to believe that if the farmer is to get a parity price for his products, these should fetch from 30 to 40 per cent more than they do now. I have reference here to those things produced by mixed farmers. This is not going to be the case if we are to go by the minister's offer. This will, I feel, bring about a price which will be from 10 to 15 per cent lower than the present price received by the farmer.
The mixed farmer finds himself in a difficult position. A great many of them leave the land. There are two main explanations for this, but in neither case does the fault lie with the former government. Twenty years ago a farmer who had 100 acres of land, some head of cattle and agricultural machinery, had costs amounting to approximately $15,000.
In those days, they were using horses and inexpensive farm machinery. Labour costs were 25 per cent of what they are now and so on. Nowadays, in these modern times, a farmer needs at least 150 to 250 acres of land and modern plowing equipment which has a total value of at least $30,000 to $35,000. He has to maintain his farm, his ditches, his fences, and his buildings. You know how many buildings are needed for various types of livestock:	pig-pens, hen-houses, barn,
stable, implement shed, garage, normal storage and freezing facilities, as well as the farmer's own living quarters. All that is worth at least $20,000 to $25,000. Therefore how can a young farmer get a loan to buy a hundred
3422	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization acres of land? The provincial or federal government offers those young farmers a loan of $4,000 to $6,000 to buy a hundred acres; which is not enough. That is why our young men cannot stay on the farm.
Another reason why they leave the land are the attractive wages now paid to workers, and the short working hours, to which, in many cases, are added holidays and a pension plan. I am very happy that all our wage-earners should have them, but we must keep in mind that the farmer who has taken up mixed farming is a very useful citizen as he produces most of the commodities which we need for consumption; moreover, he is one of the main buyers of all sorts of manufactured products, iron fences, cement, fertilizers, machines of all kinds, equipment for stables, motors, shearing-machines, milking-machines, refrigerators, and so on, and he buys more clothing than anybody else since he works in the dirt, in bad weather, and must wear a different set of clothes at home in the evening and still others to go out. Like any other citizen, he needs a car and often a truck, perhaps even a car for his sons, since transportation is not as readily available to him as to city dwellers. He cannot find helpers since salaried people would not work 60 hours a week without unemployment insurance when they can work 40 hours a week with the benefit of unemployment insurance and, in many cases, with the benefit of a pension after a certain number of years. I do not blame these people; I would do the same thing in their place. Nevertheless, that is why people leave the farm.
The exodus of our farmers to the city cannot now continue at this rate for it could cause untold difficulties to industrial workers in the cities where many are now without work and shelter, thus decreasing the number of buyers for all the products mentioned-


J.-H.-Théogène Ricard: Mr. Speaker, does the hon. member allow me a question?


Mr. Habel:: You make your speech when your turn comes.


J.-H.-Théogène Ricard: Why did my hon. friend refrain from speaking about this for the last 22 years?


Mr. Gauthier (Porineuf):: He did better than that.


J.-H.-Théogène Ricard: It does not show.


Joseph-Omer Gour: Mr. Speaker, I have been a member of this house for the past twelve years and I have never known a member to be so unfair to others and to interject remarks so devoid of intelligence.


An hon. Member:: That is probably because he was a member of the Liberal party.


Joseph-Omer Gour: As I was saying, this situation would reduce the number of buyers of products I mentioned a moment ago, besides reducing the number of buyers of western grain because farmers of Ontario, Quebec and the maritimes are good customers for the grain producers of the prairie provinces.
Now then, to remedy this situation as I see it, for the farmers of the provinces which I just mentioned, it would be necessary to raise immediately by at least fifteen per cent the guarantee of the base price, commonly called the floor price, which would mean 65 cents for butter, 45 cents for eggs, 28 cents for hogs and so on for the other products. The Liberal party passed an act along these lines in 1944 and improved it afterwards.
It would be better for the government to raise the base price of the farmer's products by 15 to 20 per cent of the present base price.
The guaranteed price on cheese could then be 34 cents a pound while the premium on bacon could be raised to $4. I also believe that the freight subsidy on western grain should be raised to $3 a ton and that our grain producers in Ontario should have the same guarantee as the grain producers of western Canada.
The government should also offer our farmers loans of at least 80 per cent of the actual value of the lands. It should see to it, either through an agreement or tariff regulations, that the commodities for which we guarantee a floor price, such as powdered milk, butter, cheese, and other products likely to compete with our farm products, are not shipped to Canada.
The government should also set up an advisory committee made up of consumers and farmers, as well as men with a good experience in large scale mixed farming.
I feel that the committee should have the authority to investigate the spread between the price the farmer gets for his products and the price paid by the consumers; for instance, for a piece of cheese which the consumers pay, as I do, 43 cents for half a pound,

or 86 cents a pound, the farmer receives only for that cheese a little under 30 cents. It's about the same for most agricultural products.
According to a bulletin entitled Dairy Facts *-the Farmer's Share of the Consumer's Dollar, butter yields to the farmers 77 per cent of the consumer's dollar, beef, 57 per cent, pork, 51 per cent, potatoes, 41 per cent, preserves, 24 per cent; and cheese, as I just said, 34 per cent.
I do not wish to commend the sending of a delegation to Great Britain to allow these people to sell us more products that we most likely make here, which will harm our industries and increase unemployment; we have enough of it. Incidentally, I thought it was extraordinary for the Minister of Justice (Mr. Fulton) to say in the house, while boasting of his great success in British Columbia, to the effect that the federal government would pay $16,000 a month to a certain company so that it may keep 400 men on the job while 350 other workers of that company will get unemployment insurance benefits.
I think it might be preferable to have delegations, not of 50, but of 2 or 3 people who, with government representatives abroad, with our ambassadors, would go and sell our agricultural and industrial products to the various foreign countries. Industries might also send their representatives.
Here is a sample of flax fiber which in 1940 was selling for 32 cents in England, and in 1942 for 60 cents a pound in the United States. We made a sacrifice in order to sell this flax fiber to the United Kingdom for 32 cents a pound, and now they offer us 13 cents a pound, because they are buying it from Russia at 16J cents a pound, delivered in Scotland. This means that, if we were to sell it for 13 cents a pound, our farmers would earn 10 cents an hour for their labour, and our industrial workers would get from 15 to 20 cents an hour.
I have been chairman of the National Flax Board since it was founded in 1939, and it had to close down all its plants. Now we have 1,500 unemployed workers and Russia is laughing at us.


Nérée Arsenault: Will Mr. Speaker allow me to put a question to the hon. member?


Joseph-Omer Gour: The hon. member and his colleague who interrupted me a while ago, would make a fine pair together. I have been sitting in this house for twelve years and I have never met people who so little knew how to behave.
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization


Nérée Arsenault: Mr. Speaker, on a question of privilege.


Joseph-Omer Gour: In any event, I put this suggestion in good faith in the best interests of every real farmer, as well as of Canadians in general.
In conclusion, I would ask my good friend the hon. Minister of Agriculture-he is one of my good friends and a nice fellow-to change the offers he has made so that his bill may be referred to the committee on agriculture and colonization-


Nérée Arsenault: Give us the figures for the years 1956 and 1957.


Joseph-Omer Gour: -so that all the representations of the farmer groups may be heard and the bill improved. I will support the bill, do not worry, since your Conservative colleagues, by the look of them and by their attitude, as far as I have been able to see from the expression on their faces, seemed as sorry as we did, in the opposition, when you brought your proposals forward. I could see on their faces that they were saying to themselves: Not one of us here representing agricultural constituencies will be re-elected at the next election.
(Text):
May I say this to my good friends and neighbours, the hon. member for Glengarry-Prescott (Mr. Villeneuve) and the hon. member for Carleton (Mr. Bell) who is not here, who for many years were promising double prices for farmer's products, parity price, and so on, in my district and in their own districts: What are you doing now, my friends? Here is the place to fulfil your promises.


J.-H.-Théogène Ricard: Give us time.


Joseph-Omer Gour: This is the time to have your government do something for the farmers, and get a fair floor price as I have asked.


J.-H.-Théogène Ricard: Vote against it.


Joseph-Omer Gour: This is what the farmers want, so that they will know ahead at least what will be the lowest prices paid for their products.


J.-H.-Théogène Ricard: You will vote for it anyway.


Joseph-Omer Gour: I hope that my friend the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Harkness) will get more help from these hon. members who represent farmers in order to get something better than what he has. I admire him, and I know that he is an honest gentleman.
3424	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization


Jacob Schulz: Mr. Speaker, in the beginning I should like to point out that to my way ot thinking it is rather unfortunate that we are obliged to continue to discuss this amendment which is no more than a simple and fair request. Surely there is nothing wrong with asking the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Harkness) to refer this agricultural price stabilization bill to the standing committee on agriculture and colonization for study before this house is called on to make a final decision. I assume that most members of the committee are well aware of the farm price problem. By putting their heads together surely they can figure out some appropriate recommendations and perhaps improve this legislation to the point where it will solve this problem. I can assure the minister that this bill, in its present form, does not even come close to curing the deep seated farm price problem.
Unlike other groups in Canadian society, Canadian agriculturalists have been unable to build and retain a strong, permanent educational and protective organization and maintain a position of "parity" with other groups. While other groups banded together for self-preservation, farmers followed the maxim of "every man for himself". Consequently these hard working, hard sweating and often financially hard pressed individualists suffered much from unfair competition resulting in a merciless cost-price squeeze which has now reached the point where, by and large, the vast majority of them are operating in the red and are facing imminent insolvency.
In a brief submitted by the Manitoba government to the royal commission on economic prospects, it has been proved that the gross income of Manitoba farmers decreased from $280.5 million in 1948 to $197.7 million in 1954. Their net income fell from $182.2 million in 1948 to $71.9 million in 1954 and their return per dollar of capital investment dropped from 18 per cent in 1948 to one-tenth of one per cent in 1954. This is as far as the deterioration had progressed three years ago. Today it is much worse.
Those who have an intimate knowledge of the farm situation are well aware of the fact that today agriculture has become the soft spot in our economy and that constructive measures must be taken on the government level to raise and stabilize farm prices if complete economic stagnation on the farm front, that may turn into a country-wide recession or even an over-all economic depression, is to be prevented. But in spite of the urgency of the situation and the fact that the Liberals professed to believe in individualism, they refused to help these individualists.

When the Progressive Conservative party came out with their national platform, promising farmers adequate parity prices and printed the words "adequate parity" in capital letters so that farmers would not miss the point, I believed they meant what they said. Being the only party that could defeat the government, I was hoping that they would win the election. The night of election day I was happier over the Conservative victory than I was over my own. When the new government took over and the strongest supporter of parity prices became the Prime Minister (Mr. Diefenbaker), I was sure they would keep their word. When parliament opened on October 14 and it was stated in the speech from the throne that the government would introduce a measure to stabilize farm prices so that farmers would get a fair share of the national income, I believed it and so did the farmers. But when on October 31, the day the resolution was introduced in the house, I saw to my surprise that the word "fair" was missing from the resolution I began to wonder whether it was used in the throne speech only for the purpose of window dressing on Queen's day and then was to be forgotten.
My doubt increased to suspicion when discussion of that resolution was delayed, for no good reason, until December 11th, when on that grey December morning, the Minister of Agriculture explained the details of this proposed new farm price stabilization legislation. It struck me like a thunderbolt. I will never forget that moment when our new Minister of Agriculture revealed his detached, benevolent interest in the farmers' welfare in such an obviously disappointing form. That was the morning when I began to realize fully that the Conservative promise of parity prices was nothing more than a political smoke screen, and that the farmers once again, as so many times in the past, became the victims of cheap ambition and political chicanery.
It shocked me to the point where, when my time came to speak, I could not even take it seriously. I could not help but laugh at the minister's new invention to save the sinking farmers. In my ironical mood I went so far in my condemnation as to call it a joke. Today, Mr. Speaker, all I can say is that I am glad that after all the determined efforts of the minister to pooh-pooh our criticisms he finally did agree that it was a joke, withdrew his first bill and brought in a revised one.
After studying his amendments, however, I came to the conclusion that the best one is the nicely worded and high sounding preamble, and if the principle of maintaining

Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization
a fair relationship between prices and costs which is there referred to were implemented in the bill itself, then it would be of the highest standard. But that is not the case. Therefore I would suggest to the minister in all sincerity that the only difference between his first bill and the one we are now trying to refer to the committee is that the first one was a big joke and this one is a joke.
There is nothing in this reprinted bill which provides for establishment of support prices for farm products to bring about a fair relationship between the costs of goods and services which the farmer must buy in order to operate and	the prices	he	willreceive. It completely ignores the principle of parity, but that is what this government promised before and after election. I have here a report of a speech made by the Minister of Northern Affairs and National Resources (Mr. Hamilton) to the Saskatchewan farmers'	union	convention,	as	reported in the Winnipeg Free Press of December 6, 1957:
Hon. Alvin Hamilton, resources minister said Thursday night the federal government "has before it an agricultural stabilization bill to put agriculture on a relatively equal footing with other industries in Canada . . . The farmer needs support prices that enable him to meet his production costs . . .
That is what	he said	and I was	told	thatwhen he said it	he had	in his hand	the	first
bill. That is what I call cheap ambition.
Let us now analyse this improved bill which we are now asking should be submitted to the committee and see how far this is away from that promise. It consists of two parts. Firstly, guaranteed prices may be established as prescribed by the governor in council or the cabinet on agricultural commodities designated as such by the governor in council in terms of a percentage of the base price based on the average market price in the preceding 10 years. Secondly, there will be an annual adjusted mandatory minimum floor price of no less than 80 per cent of this base price for named commodities such as cattle, hogs, sheep, butter, cheese and eggs and wheat, oats and barley produced outside of the designated area as defined by the wheat board act.
For the operation of this scheme the bill provides for the establishment of a revolving fund of $250 million, the appointment of a board by the government to administer the act and an advisory committee appointed by the Minister of Agriculture to advise the minister and the board with respect to the stabilization of prices of agricultural commodities referred to it by the minister or the board. The governor in council may accept, alter or reject recommendations.
Outside of the additional $50 million which is added to the $200 million provided for under the old Agricultural Prices Support Act the first part of this new price support program is for all practical purposes identical to the one instituted by the Liberals.
The old as well as the new scheme does not provide for support prices to be set at a fair relationship to the cost in spite of the fact that this is what the government promised it would do if elected. As soon as it was elected this government forgot that it is only fair that we should look at the institution of farm support prices in the same way that we look at the existence of minimum wages. Minimum wages were established for the purpose of protecting labour from exploitation and guaranteeing them a minimum standard of living. Apparently the government does not know that farmers are simply asking for the same kind of minimum protection that other working people have enjoyed for years. How can the farmers sell their products for less than a parity price when parity, in reality, means no more than a price equal to cost of production.
Those who suggest that the Canadian primary producers should continue to sell for less than it cost them to produce-as they have been doing for years-are economic nitwits who have neither the ability to think nor the capacity to feel. Such kind of thinking borders on lunacy, because it cannot possibly be done without ruining the farmers and the country too.
Not only is this major principle omitted from this plan, but neither the board nor the committee have power to set prices; they can only advise the minister, and they can only do so on such matters and with regard to such problems as are referred to them by the minister. How many will be referred to them? The power of decision under this new plan as well as under the old as to what product shall be supported, and on what level will rest with the cabinet or, in the ultimate analysis, with the Minister of Agriculture in exactly the same way as under the existing Agricultural Prices Support Act. The parallel between the new bill and the old act can raise goose-flesh on anyone with a good memory. When farm prices went down, the former minister of agriculture was occupying himself with juggling figures, trying desperately to prove that the farmers were never better off and that they required no support under their prices. How worthless the old support program turned out to be under the direction of a political mind shrouded in confusion behind a skull which acted like an iron curtain can be seen by reading one paragraph
3426	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization from the last report issued by the prices support board of which I have a copy. I quote:
As indicated in the tabular summary below, the total net cost from the start of operations in 1946 to March 31, 1957, was $94,084,716.91. Of this total, about $70 million was attributable to the losses on the extensive buying and selling programs undertaken for hogs and cattle as an emergency measure following the embargo on the shipment of livestock and livestock products to the United States during the foot-and-mouth disease outbreak from February 25, 1952 to March 1953.
If you deduct the $70 million used as an emergency measure, as stated in the report- a sum which no doubt would have been available anyway without a prices support act-it becomes clear that only $24 million has been used in 11 years to support farm prices in spite of the fact that during the last six years prices have been falling more and more out of line with costs. Does the minister really think that after the unhappy experience farmers have had with this old price support scheme he can get away with blowing up another similar political bubble under which he has the power to appoint the personnel of the committee, the power to decide which products shall be referred to the committee for study and the power to make a final decision as to when and how supports shall be applied? How can he possibly believe that farmers will again accept anything in which the degree of application depends almost entirely on the caprice of one man?
It is not within the prerogative of the Minister of Labour (Mr. Starr) to decide on what level unemployment insurance is to be paid; it is set out in the Unemployment Insurance Act what the amount shall be, and not left to the political mood of a few men or even of one man. In other words, it is guaranteed by the law. Why then, does this bill not set out what prices shall be paid for agricultural products? Why must the setting of farm prices come more or less within the prerogative of one man to decide instead of under the jurisdiction of the fair and just law of this land. This is the kind of protection other people have.
Can it be, Mr. Speaker, that the Minister of Agriculture is of the opinion that he will be as fair and as just as the law of the land, that he will have regard to the cost of production in setting these guaranteed prices and that farmers should therefore trust him? We trusted the former minister of agriculture, and what happened?


Mr. Gardiner:: He did quite a good job
with you.


Jacob Schulz: He juggled us around and he juggled us down until we landed in hell.


Irvin William Studer: Tell us how you got your farms.


Jacob Schulz: And then he stood beside it, throwing snowballs to lower the temperature -about $2 million a year he threw to us for 11 years.


Irvin William Studer: Tell us about the socialist
system.


An hon. Member:: Try making a speech yourself.


Irvin William Studer: If I made one I would try to make a contribution.


An hon. Member:: You could not do a job like this.


Jacob Schulz: I am speaking frankly, perhaps more frankly than I ever did before.


Irvin William Studer: You usually don't speak
frankly.


Alfred Claude Ellis: How are you going to vote on this matter?


Irvin William Studer: Why are the socialists worrying about how anyone votes.


Jacob Schulz: I repeat, I am speaking frankly, perhaps more frankly than I have ever done before. I have no good reason to believe that the economic horizon of our new minister is wider than that of the old one. If it were, he would have already used the present prices support act. The act is there, the money is there, the board is there-but he is not there. Watching his performance in the house on the discussions of declining farm prices I have reached the conclusion that his thinking on this point is more restricted than that of the former minister. His desperate attempt to deny the fact that farm prices are still declining provides conclusive proof of this contention. Take, for example, November 14 when, as reported on page 1106 of Hansard, he was asked what he would do to stop the constant decline in cattle prices. Here is his answer:
Now I do not know of the drastic drop in livestock prices to which my hon. friend and various other people who have made this statement in prefacing questions are referring.
At the same time he tried to prove that cattle prices went down only $2 in two years and stated that this cannot be regarded as a drastic drop.


Douglas Scott Harkness: They are up higher now than they have been for two years.


Hazen Robert Argue: On what level are you going to support them?


James Garfield Gardiner: The member for Springfield is running a sports shop; he would not know those things.


Douglas Scott Harkness: He does not read the papers.


Jacob Schulz: The curious thing to me was this. He went back two years to prove that

the price o f good steers had not gone down but what he did not tell us was that between December 1956 and December 1957 the price of good steers declined from $20.97 to $17.86.


Douglas Scott Harkness: What is the price now for those good steers?


Jacob Schulz: I am talking about the situation at that time.


James Sinclair: Ask him the price of hockey sticks. He will know that.


James Garfield Gardiner: Footballs would be better, they are full of wind.


Jacob Schulz: On November 26, as recorded at page 1510 of Hansard the minister was again asked a question as to what he would do with regard to falling livestock prices to which he replied:
I would like to point out, however, as I have done before that this habit of prefacing a question with a statement about a drastic and continuing fall in prices is not one which is borne out by the latest statistics which I have received. As a matter of fact during the past week or ten days prices of both cattle and hogs have gone up from $1 to $1.50 per hundred. The price of lambs is up about $2 to $2.50 per hundred, and the general level of poultry prices and so forth is higher than it was at this time last year and higher than a few months ago.
The minister went back only one week or ten days to prove to us that prices were not going down. Just think of that. But he did not tell us that since he took office the price of good steers fell from $19.72 in July 1957 to $17.86 in September 1957. At the same time the price of hogs dropped from $37.75 in July 1957 to $30.50 in September 1957. The price of lambs fell from $24.57 in July 1957 to $22.33 in September 1957. And by the way, for the information of the house, I would point out that I took these figures from the very same pamphlet the minister used that morning to disprove that prices were going down. This is what I call real juggling. This is the reason I have lost confidence in the minister and in the bill and I can assure him I am not alone in this respect. The farmers have lost confidence too. In order to prove that point I will read a paragraph from a letter which I received from a farmer's wife in Ontario who writes:
The agricultural minister has no need to wonder why all questions pertaining to agriculture are prefaced with the observation about the drastic state of farmers, and the reduction in their income. You would think he had been living on a desert island for a long time, that he has to be told repeatedly of these things.
This is representative of what the farmers think of the minister. I do not think there has ever been a minister in history who lost the respect of the people he represents faster than did our present Minister of Agriculture with his bill.
Senate and House of Commons Act
This should make it clear that under the circumstances the first part, the enforcement of which depends on the minister cannot be depended upon and therefore is practically worthless. I would not dare ask farmers to accept it or to rely on it.
What about the second part of that bill? The second part is not only worthless but dangerous. Several key commodities which I have enumerated before would be supported by a permanent floor price at 80 per cent of the average market price of the preceding ten years. This low floor price-or should we call it basement price-would no doubt react unfavourably on the price structure and actually provide an incentive for the trade to push prices down to that low level. Why-should they pay more than the floor price if they do not have to? I have long suspected that low floor prices are more of a detriment than a benefit to farmers although I could not prove it. But now we have the admission of the former minister of agriculture which he made on December 20 as recorded at page 2673 of Hansard where he stated that by setting low support prices the government is giving an indication to the trade that this is the price the government thinks ought to be paid for the commodity and the tendency will be to gravitate towards that price.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. It being five o'clock the house will now proceed to the consideration of private and public bills, the former having precedence.



SENATE AND HOUSE OF COMMONS ACT


Mr. W. M. Johnson (Kindersley) moved: the second reading of Bill No. 22, to amend the Senate and House of Commons Act.
He said: Mr. Speaker, it gives me a great deal of pleasure to proceed with this bill at this time. In introducing Bill No. 22, an act to amend the Senate and House of Commons Act, I believe I am putting into effect the wishes that have been expressed by many Canadians. I know that view has been expressed on many occasions by members of this house and it has been expressed on more than one occasion by the Prime Minister (Mr. Diefenbaker); that is, to put into effect a means of taking the attendance in the House of Commons. The principle of taking attendance is one that is generally accepted in all walks of life and in all business endeavours and I see no reason why it should not be rightly accepted in the dispatch of government business.
The bill which I am moving is a simple one. It is Bill No. 22, entitled an act to amend the

Senate and House of Commons Act Senate and House of Commons Act and it involves an addition to subsection 1 of section 45 of the Senate and House of Commons Act in the following words:
Provided that the attendance shall be taken during each sitting day and a list of members present annexed to the Votes and Proceedings of the House of Commons of each day.
Section 45, as hon. members will realize, refers to the declaration which hon. members shall make at the conclusion of each month in order to collect their pay from the treasury office. In that case, as we know, it is required that members make a statutory declaration of the number of days' absence. But the bill goes one step further. The explanatory note reads as follows:
The purpose of this amendment is to acquaint the Canadian people with the attendance of their elected representatives in the parliament of Canada.
In the interests of democracy I believe the more information we can get across to the Canadian people the more efficient that democracy will be. The principle of taking attendance in legislative bodies is accepted in the other place, as hon. members will realize upon looking at the minutes of the proceedings of the Senate of Canada. They will find in each day's proceedings a list of the senators present during that day's activities. Therefore, I would hardly expect any members to complain about accepting this bill on the basis of reflecting on their reputation.
I want it understood at the start that the bill does not mean that members are required to remain in their seats in the House of Commons during all of the debates, and I am afraid that conception might be generally held. I think that would be rather unfair punishment to inflict on anyone. Hon. members should have the opportunity to go behind the curtain for a smoke or to attend to their other business. All the bill does is to provide that some means should be utilized to indicate when members are in attendance in the House of Commons and to provide an indication of which members are absent during the dispatch of government business.
I recall that when I was a university student I had no objection to the professor marking the vacant seats during the lecture each day. There was a purpose for that, to make certain that the hard-earned money of our parents was being spent to good advantage. Here we are being paid to attend to government business, to represent our constituents in the House of Commons, and I can see no reason why we should not have our attendance taken on the same basis.
In outlining a proposal which I think would be practicable I do not want to provoke an argument as to the various


techniques which could be used in taking the attendance. But all parties will agree with me that the most important part of the proceedings on any day is the opening period during orders of the day. It would seem to follow that that is the most important period of the day and it would not be asking too much of hon. members to be in their places for the first 15 minutes of orders of the day so that their presence could be noted by an official of the House of Commons. In the event that a member was occupied with other engagements and unable to be here he would simply need to state to the official that he was unable to be here at that time but was present in the building and he would be accepted as having been present. A list could then be placed in Votes and Proceedings for public perusal.
The business of running the country by means of a democratic parliament is of such importance that it means the constant attention of those who are selected by the people to present their views and ideas. I should point out that one of the accomplishments of the minority position of the government at the present time has been the maintenance of good attendance by members of parliament. In theory at any rate there is a constant threat of the government being defeated. At one time last evening I thought the threat was going to be even greater than it appears to be because a certain incident was going to be happening soon. However, we find that "soon" can mean several things. During the last parliament, however, the Liberal party had a great majority, a majority so large, in fact, that all the members west of the city of Ottawa could have stayed home and the government would have been sustained on a confidence vote, but this week, however, all the Liberals in Canada were in Ottawa which was the reverse of the other situation.
I think we can safely assume that members of the House of Commons will participate in voting if they are present in Ottawa. Let us look at the record of the previous parliament. The average attendance for votes called on a Monday in the years 1953, 1954 and 1955 is 143 members out of a total of 264 who could vote. On Tuesday there is some improvement, 174, with a further increase on Wednesday to 186. The peak voting attendance was on Thursday, with 189 members. On Friday during that same period the average declined to 132, which means that less than half the members of the House of Commons were expressing their views on the issues to be decided by means of the vote.
We find that on Mondays last year there was an average attendance of 144 for votes and on Tuesdays 149. On Wednesdays there

was an increase to 186. On Thursdays the attendance was 178, with the tragic figure of 102 members being represented in Friday votes. It is small wonder that many members of the House of Commons have been labelled "T to T boys", those who show up on Tuesday and leave on Thursday. As a member of the previous parliament I recall sitting beside my deskmate and our inquiring from each other who members across the way were because in the four years we had sat there we had not seen them often enough to place them. I presume they were some of the individuals who perhaps found their occupations calling them on Mondays and Fridays.
There is evidence that absenteeism still exists because on the very day that this bill was introduced, November 4, I made a personal count of the members of the Liberal party who were present and noted that only 43 out of a possible 106 were in their places during orders of the day. That, of course, was on a Monday. It is indeed to the credit of the government members that their attendance was so complete I was unable to count the number absent on that particular day.
This problem is not a new one. It is not one that has developed in recent years because Mr. J. Redlich, a professor at the University of Vienna, in his book, "The Procedure of the House of Commons", volume I, points out the following at page 43:
Repeated attempts were made to secure the attendance of members in the house by orders threatening fines for unauthorized absence.
He is referring to the British House of Commons. The footnote points out the following:
The expedient does not seem to have been very successful. At all events, the modern complaint that towards the end of the session the numbers in attendance diminished considerably goes back to Elizabethan times.
Further light is cast on the subject in volume II, page 105, of Mr. Redlich's book, where he says:
The party system has a very marked effect upon one prominent feature of parliamentary life-the attendance of members. The large number of the representatives of the people, and the considerations of space which have been described above, when taken together, make it almost a physical impossibility for all members to be present at the same time; as in other parliaments, there are great variations in the number who attend. The House of Commons being a politically sovereign assembly, this variation, unless guarded against, would involve great risks to a government which is absolutely dependent upon the constant support of a majority of those present.
The consequence is that there has never been a time when complaints of the absence of often quite a large proportion of the members have not been heard. The means adopted in earlier years for enforcing the duty of attendance, such as calls of the house (of which more in the historical note) have long been abandoned as futile. They have
Senate and House of Commons Act been replaced by other and more effective inducements. In the first place, there is a deepening of the feeling of responsibility of members to the electorate; this is itself a result of the gradual but decided increase in the dependence of representatives upon those who have sent them to parliament, which has followed the extension of the suffrage.
I think there is an indication, Mr. Speaker, of the history of absenteeism in the House of Commons. Mr. Redlich goes on to point out some of the techniques that were used to assure a full attendance in the house. The oldest method to ensure attendance was the roll call taken at a varying interval. The most ancient and the most severe penalty for a member not present when the roll was called was a direction to the sergeant-at-arms to arrest the deserter. The most ancient form of money penalty was the deprivation of salary.
Mr. Norman Ward in his book "The Canadian House of Commons" points out that the first and only serious attempt to tighten up the attendance regulations was made in 1920. At that time the maximum allowance for a member was raised to $4,000 for a session of more than 50 days, and a member was entitled to the full indemnity only if he attended three-quarters of the actual sittings of the house. Mr. Ward states:
The 1920 statute was revolutionary, and its effects most salutary.
A footnote quotes Mr. Fowler in the Senate debates of 1943 as saying:
Under the more stringent regulations now in force the attendance has been excellent.
Mr. Ward goes on to analyse the situation, and states:
So poor was the attendance among Conservative members during the long session of 1947-48, for instance, that several groups supporting the party outside of parliament proposed at a party convention to condemn absenteeism in the legislature.
The necessity of maintaining attendance in the house was not overlooked in drafting the standing orders of the House of Commons. Standing Order No. 5 states:
Every member is bound to attend the service of the house, unless leave of absence has been given him by the house.
The lax attendance which has been experienced has not gone unrecognized. In a news story in the Saskatoon Star-Phoenix of March 20, 1954, entitled "Howe Appeals for Higher Attendance", it is stated:
Acting Prime Minister C. D. Howe, at the Liberal M.P.'s caucus on Wednesday made a direct, earnest appeal to government supporters to improve their attendance while the House of Commons is in session.	[DOT]
Mr. Howe pointed out that the public will be watching members' attendance in the commons more closely in the future in the light of parliament's
3430	HOUSE OF
Senate and House of Commons Act action in increasing the $4,000 sessional indemnity to $8,000 per annum as from the commencement of the current session on November 12 last.
The commons has no attendance register and thus the vote on recorded divisions constitutes the only public indication of M.P.'s attendance.
We find also that in the Financial Times attention is being drawn to absenteeism. In an editorial dated March 23, 1956, we find this:
Perusal of Hansard during the last session, and to date in this session, indicates that absenteeism still is rife among M.P.'s. The week-enders are still at their old tricks; and it is even suggested that the weekends are stretching out.
The conclusion re-enforces the purpose of this bill and states that there are still remaining too many loopholes in the House of Commons' rules in the matter of attendance which can be taken advantage of by members who are slack in the exercise of their duties. They state that it behooves the elector to keep check on his representative and see that he does the job he is now being well paid for doing.
This session has not escaped the eyes of the press. The Ottawa Journal of November 12, 1957 states:
"Weekenditis" has returned to the House of Commons.
The article continues:
When the session began in the no-majority house almost every member was in his place every day.
Now the members from the west and the mari-times begin to growl that the long weekend means Monday absentees among their colleagues from the central provinces who can go home for the weekend conveniently.
It is obvious that consideration will have to be given to this important problem for the sake of the government. The privileges which we have gained as members of a democracy are historical and I think they should be safeguarded by whatever rules are necessary for their active enforcement. We know, as I have mentioned, that attendance is taken in the other place and is listed in the daily Votes and Proceedings, so the mechanics of doing so are far from impossible.
I do not think it is necessary to go into all the mechanics of fulfilling the spirit of this bill at this time. The mechanics could be worked out by a committee working in co-operation with the staff of the House of Commons. Any procedure that would be adopted would be offensive to those who, from time to time, are absent themselves. I do not expect any criticism will come from those who have been most diligent in their attendance. I am hoping for speedy passage of this measure because the Canadian people will benefit from it through more diligent and thus more complete representation.
[Mr. Johnson (Kindersley) .3


Gordon Minto Churchill: Mr. Speaker, we have before us now a rather interesting bill dealing with the subject of recording attendance at the sessions of the House of Commons. The hon. member who introduced the bill has given some historical account of the attendance in the House of Commons, and has pointed out that right from early days, back in Elizabethan times, there was some difficulty in having members attend as regularly as some people thought they should He traced the comments with regard to attendance right down to the present day. Obviously this is not a matter that has suddenly come to our attention or something which is new to this particular day and generation.
In the course of his remarks he pointed out that a record of a sort is maintained by the fact that members have to furnish the Clerk of the house with a statement indicating the number of days they have attended sessions during the month. In furnishing this statement a member may indicate the reason for his absence, whether it was due to illness or some unavoidable cause. It is quite obvious that if attendance is recorded, allowance has to be made, for instance, for illness or unavoidable absence. The hon. member who proposed the bill did not indicate just how that was going to be done. He is suggesting that every day, when Votes and Proceedings are printed, a list of the members who have been in attendance should be recorded therein. I presume that those who are unavoidably away or who are away by reason of illness, at some subsequent date would have to indicate that the fact they were not recorded was due to circumstances beyond their control. The subject becomes rather complicated when you begin to think of the various methods by which attendance might be recorded, and how you are going to make allowance for those who cannot be here.
The hon. member suggests that if the names; are recorded like this from day to day the public would then be fully informed. In political warfare I presume this would be extremely useful ammunition, enabling someone to recite that such and such a member had been absent on so many days during the course of the preceding session. To do that, of course, in the absence of the hon. member who had been away and not give him a chance to make his explanation would prove embarrassing. The difficulty sometimes with political life is that information of this nature might be used a little bit unfairly.
However, I was wondering what was in the mind of the hon. member in suggesting this procedure and what real purpose would

be served by this daily recording of attendance. He suggested that if this attendance record were taken in what he called the most important part of the daily proceedings which is before the orders of the day that would be a satisfactory time to make the record. I am no so sure that that is the most important part of the day's proceedings. It happens to be the period when members are here in the house in large numbers, when announcements are made from the government side and when questions are asked by hon. members. There may be a fair bit of interest in that particular part of the day which, during the course of this session, has stretched out to about an hour and a half. In other years it used to be limited to about 45 minutes. As I say, there may be a fair bit of interest in that particular part of the day but I am not so sure that that is the most important part of the day's proceedings. There is interest in seeing what type of question is asked and what type of answer is received, and frequently in my opinion not much is accomplished. I think that during the course of the actual debates in the house which come after the orders of the day are called much more important proceedings are carried out. However, the hon. member suggests that that is the time for the roll to be called and the members' attendance to be recorded.
Then he does not insist that the members should stay in the chamber. They may then go about their other duties. Of course there are other duties in the House of Commons. Frequently many committees are sitting here and members are obliged to leave and attend those committees. One committee is sitting this afternoon. I know that in other years we have counted the number of members engaged in committee work outside of the chamber, and that number has run to well over 100. Yet on those occasions someone has spied out the chamber and said, "'There are only 40 members present; what are they doing?", not giving them credit at all for the other work that is carried on by members of parliament.


Solon Earl Low: Take a look at the press gallery now.


Stanley Howard Knowles: At
least it is not empty.


Solon Earl Low: Almost.


Gordon Minto Churchill: Simply recording the attendance of members during the first hour of the day would not solve that particular problem at all. If the complaint is that members are not in the chamber and are not attending to their duties, this procedure will not keep them in the chamber. If the purpose is to ensure that they are in Ottawa each day of
Senate and House of Commons Act the week, it depends on where they live. They might record their attendance at, say, eleven o'clock in the morning, then disappear by car or by plane, return the following morning and again record their attendance. I see no purpose in that type of mechanical recording of attendance.
The hon. member who introduced this bill talked about democracy which to me has meant freedom of the individual. Yet he is suggesting certain restraints on individual freedom. Why should it be necessary to have a daily recording of the attendance of members during the first hour each day? Under our democratic system I think there is available to the people of this country a salutary check by means of which to deal with their members. We are obliged to face elections from time to time. At election period the people can decide whether or not their member is giving the service they expect to be given by a member of the House of Commons. They can take note of his activities during the session. They can hear reports from time to time. Prior to a general election there is always a nominating convention at which delinquent members can be dealt with; and if they are not dealt with on that occasion, they can be dealt with when the votes are cast on election day. I think there is available to the general public, with regard to the members they send to Ottawa, the opportunity to determine whether or not they are adequately represented, without having a daily check list showing whether or not members were in Ottawa at say eleven o'clock from Monday to Friday or, as we have it now, from Monday to Saturday.
This matter is tied up with attendance within the chamber. When matters of vital importance are under consideration the chamber, in my experience, has been very well filled. When matters of less importance are under consideration, the chamber has not been so well filled, not because the members who are absent from the chamber are not aware of what is going on but because, being aware of the subject that is under discussion and knowing that some of their colleagues will be present to look after things, but because they feel that their presence is not at that moment required.
If this bill were passed and this rigidity imposed upon members of parliament I think it would be an unnecessary imposition on them. We have had this subject brought forward previously under other circumstances. I have weighed the issue in my own mind over several years and I fail to see any value that would result from the proposition put before us. I think this is no way in which to measure the service of elected members of
3432	HOUSE OF
Senate and House of Commons Act parliament. The position that is accorded us here is given to us by the free votes of the people. They send their representatives to the House of Commons to represent them, put forward their case and conduct the business of the country. From time to time they change their representatives at Ottawa. Over the years this method has worked and has been found to be satisfactory. The people who complain about the non-attendance of members are seldom the ones who are in this chamber themselves or who are steady attendants of this chamber.
The people who complain are frequently those who have no particular responsibility in parliament but who are observers of the scene and are perhaps not aware of the duties performed by members of the House of Commons.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Is
the Winnipeg Tribune in that category?


Gordon Minto Churchill: I think the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre might comment on that himself later, but I did have an exchange of correspondence with the Winnipeg Tribune over the question of a quorum in the House of Commons. I recall my hon. friend wished to impose his form of rigidity on attendance by way of enlarging the quorum of the House of Commons.


Stanley Howard Knowles: suggested raising it from 20 to 30.


Gordon Minto Churchill: I suggested that it should stay at 20 and that is where it stayed. The Winnipeg Tribune got a bit confused and thought it had something to do with the general attendance of the House of Commons.
However, people get a wrong impression of the duties of members of the house when they deal simply with the question of how many members are, for instance, now present in this chamber or how many were here yesterday, without giving any consideration to the committees which may be carrying on their proceedings elsewhere or the bills which may be under discussion or the various other duties which members have to perform. The duties of a member of the House of Commons, irrespective of the side of the house on which he sits, are heavy. I have been here long enough to appreciate that and I know that representing a constituency takes many hours of a member's time in dealing with correspondence and in dealing with visitors or delegations of interested bodies who have suggestions to make with regard to legislation. I do not know of any member of the House of Commons who has not, during the course of his experience here, found that it is an onerous duty to deal with all the matters I have


mentioned and, at the same time, to keep himself informed on matters of public interest and all the things which are coming before the house from day to day requiring his attention either by way of debate or decision when he is called upon to vote, or in the work of the various committees which meet from time to time.
I have never found that there has been much spare time available for a member of the House of Commons if he is anxious to enlarge his knowledge of public affairs and I think this is the experience of many new members who are in this present parliament. These members are seeing things from the inside now and they are I am sure, discovering that there is an immense amount of material to be studied if they want to be informed on all the subjects which come before this house. About 20 departments are represented by the government and each department has subdivisions. Each department has an immense amount of literature published with regard to it or on its behalf and for a member of the House of Commons to inform himself adequately with regard to subjects considered by the house he has to put in a great deal of time on such work. That prevents him from always being in the chamber and, on occasion, even prevents him from being in Ottawa.
The hon. member who introduced this bill made no provision for the legitimate requests of constituents for their member to visit them and to speak at meetings in his home constituency or in other places. It is one of the duties of members of parliament to carry the message to the people of Canada by travelling to and fro across this country and by speaking at meetings.


Willis Merwyn (Merv) Johnson: Would the minister permit a question? Is the minister implying that time spent in a constituency for political purposes is to be considered as government business and therefore exempt from pay deduction?


James Sinclair: That is a silly question.


Gordon Minto Churchill: I think time spent in one's constituency, if it is agreeable to a member's constituents, is a very proper way in which to spend that time, provided it is not carried to the extreme.


James Sinclair: Hear, hear.


Gordon Minto Churchill: I remember a few years ago talking to a very experienced member of the House of Commons on this particular question of so-called absenteeism and he told me that in the area in which he lived the people expected their member to be present and to visit in their homes even while the

house was in session. I asked him if they did not find fault with the member being away from the House of Commons.


Willis Merwyn (Merv) Johnson: That is exactly the point of my bill.


Gordon Minto Churchill: He said no, they did not find fault with that at all and they thought he should be able to spend some time with them. I think members of parliament perform a good service in leaving Ottawa from time to time and in getting in touch with the people in other parts of the country, even when the house is in session. I am not, of course, suggesting that too much time should be spent in that way but we should make allowances for it. The hon. member with his suggested attendance record would not make any allowance whatsoever for that and how could it be explained?


Willis Merwyn (Merv) Johnson: There are 21 days allowed under the act.


Gordon Minto Churchill: Nevertheless the hon. member's attendance record is a daily attendance record despite the 21 days allowed under the act and, for these absences, what provision will he make with regard to explanation? How is that explanation to be made? It is much too complicated.
In my opinion, in suggesting rigid systems such as this, the hon. member is attempting to lower the position of a member of the House of Commons. There may be occupations in which rigid attendance records should be kept, but surely this is not one of them. He made reference to university days-


Willis Merwyn (Merv) Johnson: And the Senate.


Gordon Minto Churchill: -when records were kept of a person's attendance. In my days at university, I would inform the hon. member, no records were kept of our attendance. We were considered to be responsible people. Most of us were not spending our parents' hard-earned money, we were spending money which we had earned ourselves and no record was kept. We had to stand or fall on what we gained from our opportunities at university. Once you impose the rigidity of daily attendance you take something away from that person and you do not put him on his own. Looking back at my university days I would say ours was a better system than that in which records must be kept from day to day. It placed the responsibility exactly where it belonged and I think the same is true with respect to members of parliament. They stand or fall on their own record.
Hon. members make their own contribution here in the House of Commons and elsewhere throughout the country, and the people decide whether or not they are
Senate and House of Commons Act adequate representatives. There are members of the House of Commons who may come here about six times in the course of a session and who yet make a more effective contribution to the proceedings of this house than, perhaps, do others who may be here on many more occasions.


An hon. Member:: But they get full pay.


Gordon Minto Churchill: I do not think that pay is based on the question of whether members are actually here in this chamber for one hour a day while the house is in session. I think it has nothing to do with that whatsoever. It is an indemnity for the loss of business earnings which one might have earned if one were not a member of parliament. It is not pay for daily attendance here.
The hon. member has, I am sure, certain ideas of regimentation in his mind which, I think, are not applicable to the type of work which is performed by the House of Commons, and for these reasons and others which I could enumerate, but prefer not to discuss because I wish to allow other hon. members an opportunity to speak, I am inclined to vote against this bill.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Will the hon. gentleman permit a question? In view of his contention that this is a form of regimentation and contrary to the principles of democracy, would the minister consider recommending to the commissioners of internal economy that the time clocks which some of our employees have to punch and the book our stenographers have to sign be discontinued?


Gordon Minto Churchill: I think, Mr. Speaker, that that is carrying it a bit further than anything I have been speaking about.


Stanley Howard Knowles: That would be relying on their responsibility instead of on regimentation.


Gordon Minto Churchill: We have been elected by the votes of the people, and the situation is surely different. I have been submitted in my lifetime to as much regimentation as anyone in this chamber, and I resist this type of regimentation. I have worked in institutions where we were forced to sign a book when we came in, and I have refused to sign because I do not like that way of doing business, yet nobody fired me. I would never ask employees working under me to sign a book saying whether they came in at nine o'clock or 9.05 or even 9.25. I do not like that kind of regimentation. A man stands or falls on his ability and on his contribution to the job.

Senate and House of Commons Act


Mr. F. C. Christian (Okanagan Boundary):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to say at the outset that I personally am not in favour of Bill No. 22. I should like to endorse the argument which has been advanced by the hon. member who has just spoken. To put the matter very plainly, I do not think members of parliament should be treated like school children.
I should like to say further that I do not believe the employees who work in this building should be obliged to punch time clocks, because I think they have a demoralizing influence. To some extent at least they require a man to be here at a certain time, and I think it would be much better to respect our employees more and do away with time clocks. I think this bill is an example of regimentation, and in any event the particular proviso requiring that attendance should be taken during each sitting day is poorly constructed. While I do not agree with the proviso, I would point out that it does not make clear the time when the attendance should be taken. You might have a situation where a member arrives at 11 o'clock in the morning and leaves, say, after the question period, and does not return to the House of Commons that day. On the other hand, if there were a definite hour inserted as to the time of the roll call, a member could turn up at that time, sit for a short while and then leave.
The present system is an honour system and the responsibility is placed squarely on the shoulders of the member of parliament himself and if the people he represents feel he is not measuring up to what is expected of him in the House of Commons, then under our democratic system of government they have a remedy and they have a right to elect somebody else to represent them.
I do not think that attendance in the House of Commons is necessarily an indication of the work which a member does for his country. Members of parliament could be here from the opening of the parliamentary day at, say 11 in the morning to 10 o'clock at night, except for the usual intermissions, and yet those same members could be guilty of neglecting their constituents by not paying proper attention to their problems. I feel that the average member of parliament irrespective of party often spends long hours at his work. I know myself of members who leave this building sometimes at two or three o'clock in the morning and who work seven days a week. If attendance is taken and if a certain amount of regimentation is introduced it might influence such members to say "What's the use?" and render less service to their country than they are doing at the present time.

I do not see any real purpose in this bill. I favour the honour system which is now in existence, and I submit that the present system is producing the best results for the country.


Mr. W. G. Dinsdale (Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Veterans Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member who has put this resolution forward is a very close personal friend of mine, and I know that in advancing this proposal he has done so with the most sincere intent.
He is from western Canada, and because of the great expanse of geography in this country hon. members who come from more remote parts of the country are, perhaps, in attendance more frequently than are those whose constituencies lie closer at hand. I further know that the hon. member has a very laudable purpose in bringing this legislation forward; he is desirous that the best quality of service be given in the performance of public duties by all hon. members of this house. However, I am forced to agree with the two previous speakers that he is trying to do the right thing in the wrong way. I mean by that that he is trying to improve the quality of representation in the house by legislative compulsion.
I do not think I need to re-echo the sentiments of those who have spoken earlier in this debate. In a democracy where individual responsibility is of the essence, it would not be desirable to endeavour to improve the quality of representation by compulsory means. We are, of course, guided here according to the tradition established in the mother of parliament at Westminster, and in that chamber, as I recall, having visited it particularly during the war years, there is not even a separate seat for every member. The voluntary system, the system of placing the responsibility on the shoulders of the individual members of parliament, is carried out to the maximum extent there. It is understood, under the type of parliamentary system that operates both in the United Kingdom and in this country the areas of responsibility are so great that it is unreasonable to expect a member of parliament to spend all of his time in the legislative chamber.
I could spend some time this afternoon outlining the multiplicity of tasks that fall to the lots of members of parliament. Certainly quite basic is our responsibility to attend the debates of the House of Commons in the chamber itself but outside of that, as has been so eloquently pointed out by the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Churchill), we have responsibilities in the constituency, in committee work and revolving around our work in the office which

Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization
would make it utterly impossible for hon. members of the house to be in the chamber at one particular moment in order to respond to a roll call.
I would like to reinforce the sentiments of those who have spoken previously with reference to the comparison to roll calls in the academic sphere. I think that one of the prime characteristics of the transition from the lower levels of education to what is sometimes called higher education is that from regimentation and compulsion to academic freedom. My friend the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles)- we always seem to get on this subject during these pleasant hour-long interludes-has the same alma mater as myself and he will recall that in the liberal arts atmosphere of Brandon College compulsion and regimentation in this respect were at a minimum.
I do not want to be accused of talking this out but I just wish to make one more point this afternoon.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Sit
down then.


Walter Gilbert Dinsdale: The hon. member for Kin-dersley (Mr. Johnson) sat in recent previous parliaments and it might be that the problem of absenteeism was more acute on those occasions than it is at the present time; but I think he will agree with me that the public of Canada, once it awakens to this situation and is kept in touch through the press and by other means, takes the proper course. The new faces that have appeared in this chamber following the events of June 10 last are indicative of the fact that we have a mature and responsible public opinion in this country that will see to it that hon. members perform the functions they are sent to this house to perform or otherwise their constituents back home will take the action that is possible for them to take under our free and responsible parliamentary system.


Willis Merwyn (Merv) Johnson: It took them 22 years to find out, though.


Mr. P. B. Rynard (Simcoe East):: Mr. Speaker, I am opposed to Bill No. 22, the compulsory attendance bill. This is not a school of juveniles, this is a parliament based on the peoples' charter, the Magna Carta and the bill of rights. We are the peoples' elected representatives and it follows as the day the night that all of the members here must have in their hearts a burning desire to serve their constituents in the most unselfish way. Do we propose or hope to blackmail some of our fellow members just because they miss a day? Perhaps we might argue that because an hon. member occasionally spends a day
in his riding that he will do a much better job here in Ottawa in terms of representing the views of his people at home.


Willis Merwyn (Merv) Johnson: That is allowed for in this bill. I am not changing that in any way.


Philip Bernard Rynard: You just wait until I finish.


Willis Merwyn (Merv) Johnson: You have only a minute to go and then you are finished.


Philip Bernard Rynard: I appreciate that but I will let you know when the minute is up. As a matter of fact, the present leader of the Liberal party elected last night in open convention reminded some of his followers of the very great danger that exists in the brass getting away from the grass. Let us never get away from the little fellow back home who works and toils to make Canada what it is today and who pays our salaries in this House of Commons.
I have seen hon. members come into this chamber and spend only a few minutes here each day and I have also observed others sitting the whole day through listening and considering the views of their fellow members on legislation. Do you mean to fool the people by publishing a list of attendance of those who spend a sparse few minutes a day in this house with those who spend hours here? No, that would be downright dishonest.


Willis Merwyn (Merv) Johnson: That is what they do in the Senate.


Philip Bernard Rynard: That would give a false impression unless a record were also kept of the time spent each day by the hon. members in the chamber. I would also point out that there are a few hon. members in this house- I know of two at least and there may be more-who for reasons of health are not allowed to spend the allotted hours of sitting in this house, yet the two gentlemen to whom I refer are men of mature judgment and wisdom. Mr. Speaker, may I recall it six o'clock?
At six o'clock the house took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The house resumed at eight o'clock. AGRICULTURE

[Stage Direction]
The house resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Harkness for the second reading of Bill No. 237, to provide for the
3436	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization stabilization of the prices of agricultural commodities, and the amendment thereto of Mr. McCullough.
Jacob Schulz: Mr. Speaker, in continuing from where I left off this afternoon I want to say that choosing the last 10 years as the period for calculating the base price and then making it a moving period is another factor that will facilitate a downward price movement. In the first place, the price of farm products in that period was completely out of line with the cost and therefore it should never have been chosen. It does not make sense. As the period moves on, the spread between price and cost will widen from year to year. This downward price trend will affect the calculation of the base price to a greater degree year after year. As the high price years are progressively removed from the gradually falling 10-year moving average, the guaranteed minimum level will fall correspondingly. Within four years, when the high-price years of 1948, 1949, 1950 and 1951 are removed, the base price will be calculated on the average market price of 10 low-price years.
As a matter of fact, the present low market prices, which average about 80 per cent of parity, will actually become the base price and the mandatory floor price will be set at 80 per cent of that lower and lower sinking base price. It will bring the minimum floor price to the low level of about 64 per cent of parity or, in other words, 46 per cent below the cost of production.
Here is an example of what will happen. The price of butter on the Toronto market for 1957 was 60.6 cents per pound which should bring the 80 per cent permanent floor price for the year to 49.6 cents. If the market price for the next four years should average the same as in the last four years, the minimum guarantee for 1962 would decline to 48.4 cents, a drop of 12.2 cents a pound.
The price of cheese in 1957 was 34.1 cents per pound. The 80 per cent permanent floor price would be 27 cents and for 1962 it would fall to 25.9 cents, a drop of 8.2 cents. The egg price for 1957 was 51.6 cents. The minimum guarantee would be 45.4 cents and by 1962 it would go down to 44.6 cents, a drop of 7.2 cents a dozen.
When one analyses the text of the bill from every angle and figures out its meaning he can hardly believe that a government could bring forward such an absurd proposal. Only confused mortals with a worm's eye view, harbouring dark and unholy thoughts, could think of such an idea. When you think that farm prices in the last few years have proven
[Mr. Rynard.l

to be more out of line with costs than at any time in history but are used as a measuring stick to set floor prices, it is even too ridiculous for further comment.
In what court of justice could this bill stand up without being condemned as the greatest betrayal in our history when compared with the need and the promise? No wonder the minister is refusing to refer it to the committee. He knows that it would never stand the scrutiny of ordered minds. He should know that the whole thing has no principle, no heart and no soul. He must know that it is nothing more than a bundle of contradictory platitudes.
What other reason could he have for refusing to turn it over to a committee established by parliament for the purpose of studying such matters concerning agriculture? When he was asked to do so he claimed it would take too much time. But that was on the eleventh of December. Today is the seventeenth of January. So even this alibi does not stand up when put under the spotlight of existing facts.
(Translation):


Mr. Benoit Chabot (Kamouraska):: Mr. Speaker, as the representative of a mostly agricultural constituency, it is my duty, I think, to say a few words in this house about this bill.
The agricultural class of my constituency has been making, and is still making, almost heroic efforts to live modestly out of the land. I do not exaggerate when I say that 80 per cent of our farmers are not satisfied with their lot and I do say this, all the more convinced that I am by the fact that, due to my former duties, I have visited these good people three or four times a year in the last twenty years of my life.
It is illogical, Mr. Speaker, that our farmers, who are almost the sole factor of our survival as Canadians, should be abandoned to the whims and requirements of business, and be made the victims of the progress of modern industry.
The present agricultural crisis is the result, I think, of three main causes.
(1)	The industrial development of this country, which is fast changing the old economic and social pattern, has put the farmers at a disadvantage with regard to the other classes of our society, as they are unable to get together and protect themselves adequately against their well-organized enemies who exploit them at every turn.

(2)	The necessity to mechanize their farms at high cost while having to sell their produce at a ridiculous and disproportionate price.
(3)	The natural dislike of young people for farming, where they have to put in much effort and sacrifice to earn a living for their family; while, on the other hand industry seems to offer them a far greater security at a lesser effort, as well as comfort and leisure.
Because of these three reasons, I commend the government and I am pleased that a bill has been put before us which should considerably improve the farmer's lot.
The three parties forming the opposition are voicing bitter criticisms and seem to me very anxious about the possible results of this legislation. They have a perfect right to do so-for my part, I want to be more confident. I can't seem to convince myself that the hon. Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Harkness) is asking us to approve this bill in order to lower farm prices. I believe he really wants to improve conditions, and I hope he will succeed.
I would have liked to see parity prices, as the hon. members of the Liberal, C.C.F. and Social Credit parties are asking, but it seems that such an experiment, which has been made abroad is a very costly one, and that it would be a very onerous mistake for our country to pass such legislation.
I would not have objected to a mistake on the part of the government benefiting the farmers of this country, for governments have rarely made mistakes which were profitable to agriculture.
Since I have had the honour of sitting in this house, I find that hon. members opposite have many more chances than government members to make known, on the floor of this house, the needs of their ridings or of their provinces. It is probably for that reason that the farm difficulties in the province of Quebec have not always been pointed out here, I think, as they should have been. When I see my hon. friends from the western provinces urge so forcefully a subsidy on their grains, I realize the trend of events does not run a smooth course in their area. The province of Quebec, through its members, has sometimes given the impression that conditions were not so bad among our farmers.
Mr. Speaker, may I point out that 80 per cent of the farmers in my riding live from hand to mouth, and are finding it very hard to make ends meet.
By poorly I do not mean that they are ill-fed or ill-clad. I mean that in order to remain
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization on their farm the whole family must take a hand in the work of the farm. The mother, the sons and daughters help to do various jobs according to their ability. To earn a gross annual income of $5,000, as most workers in the various trades earn fairly readily nowadays, a farmer requires 125 acres of good land and 15 good milch cows; he must sell $1,500 worth of hogs, calves and eggs each year, and to do this, the whole family has to help out.
Therefore, Mr. Speaker, you can see that, from the point of view of personal income, the comparison is a sorry one between farmers and other classes of society. Oh, I know that the farmer enjoys some family and social advantages which cannot be expressed in terms of dollars. Those advantages are very important and the farmer himself tends to forget them, impressed as he is by the false and misleading appearances of the so-called comforts enjoyed by other classes of society. And it is precisely because of this natural tendency for our young farmers to look to those places where it seems to them life is easier that the government must spare no effort, no sacrifice, to make agriculture a paying proposition.
For any number of reasons which I have no time to set out here, the farmer has been left to himself without protection, whereas the other classes of society, from the representatives of government to lumber workers, have organized for the solution of those problems peculiar to their business or avocation.
Meanwhile, however, especially during the past ten years, the farmers as a class have been helplessly caught in the fluctuations of trade and industry. While industry grows rich at their expense, the consumers are paying through the nose for what the farmers, after working extremely hard, are selling at a ridiculously low price.
I will go a step further and say that the survival of our agricultural community and perhaps even the survival of Canada itself depends on the stabilization of the prices paid to our farmers at the same level or in proportion with other manufactured products.
You may believe that I exaggerate but I am convinced that we cannot go on forever asking the same people to make all the sacrifices while in so many other trades salaries are getting higher and higher for increasingly shorter hours of work.
Mr. Speaker, I have confidence in the agricultural bill introduced by the hon. Minister of Agriculture because the bill provides that a commission made up of representatives of the farmers shall set prices according to the cost of production.
3438	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization
One must have lived 25 years among farmers to know how often they have been threatened with insecurity and at the price of what efforts and sacrifices they have managed to survive. It is through their willingness to work and their sense of responsibility that they have managed to surmount so many difficulties.
Is it normal, Mr. Speaker, that a product like milk, when sold by farmers around cities, for daily consumption, should bring more than twice the price normally paid for milk going into the production of butter? It means that the farmer living close to a city sells his milk to the dairies at $4.65 to $4.75 a hundred pounds, while the farmer selling the same milk to butter factories gets only from $2.00 to $2.25 a hundred pounds. How many times have I seen farmers selling their eggs 30 cents to 35 cents a dozen when their cost of production was from 40 cents to 45 cents, or sell their hogs, their potatoes and other agricultural products below cost!
The rural community of my riding and it is also the case of most ridings in the province of Quebec, has not benefited as much as the other sections of the population from the necessary protection on the part of governments.
Mr. Speaker, this bill must by all means put an end to such disorder and social discrimination. The survival of the country depends on our farm population, and it is time and only fair that the country should sacrifice the millions required to keep the farmer attached to the land he still owns.
If the bill of the hon. Minister of Agriculture does, as I believe it will, reach its goal, farmers will sell their milk, butter, cheese, hogs, maple syrup, potatoes, beef, wheat, and poultry at prices from 15 to 20 per cent higher. For such a higher price, the consumer will ask for a better product, and the producer will be more interested in improving the quality of his produce.
I recognize that the technicians of the commission will be faced with difficulties, but the government managed to solve much more difficult problems than that. During my last campaign, I pledged myself to fight to my last breath on behalf of the farm people who so heroically fought for survival, and I am convinced that without their acceptance of continual privations and their typical spirit of sacrifice, the disaster would be much greater still.
As a proof that things are going wrong, the provincial agricultural credit has had to finance almost 60 per cent of the farms in my riding. I am taking the percentage of my riding, but I could use the same percentage for perhaps the whole province.
[Mr. Chabot.l

If the government has come to the conclusion that it was proper to help western farmers, it is all the more reason why they should help eastern farmers because, if my information is right, the standard of living is still much higher in the west than in the east.
At the present time, Mr. Speaker, our farmers should be selling their butter 65 cents a pound, their potatoes $1.15 a 75 pound bag, their pork, 28 cents a pound, their eggs, 55 cents per dozen A large and the rest in proportion. In spite of this improvement, the farmer will have to budget very closely and find elsewhere that extra cash he needs to give his children the education required by the times.
Mr. Speaker, I feel it is my duty to ask the minister to put on the list of those products whose price is to be supported, the pulpwood cut by the farmer, that is to say that wood which the farmer grows on his own lot.
In my constituency, as in about every constituency in the province of Quebec, 60 per cent of the farmers cut from 20 to 25 cords of wood every winter to gain a little of that extra revenue which they cannot find in agriculture.
If, for instance, the farmer's pulpwood could, after grading according to needs, be sold $16 a cord in the case of poplar, $18 a cord in the case of fir, $22 a cord in the case of spruce, I am told that the companies would not hesitate to pay such a price for the graded product.
This grading would protect our forests, which would then be worked intelligently, and the bill moved by the minister would achieve a double purpose, namely, safeguard one of our greatest national resources and provide greater security and comfort for our farmers.
In spite of the difficulties which may arise from this bill, I believe that the benefits which the agricultural class will derive from it will be worth much more than the funds which its implementation will require.
It is urgent that energetic and positive steps be taken to help out our farmers, for this country absolutely cannot do without them.
I do hope, Mr. Speaker, that bill 237 now before us, notwithstanding a few disturbing points, will considerably improve the economic and social standard of our deserving agricultural population.
(Text):


Mr.  A. B. Paiierson@Fraser Valley: Mr. Speaker, many of the debates on agricultural matters in this house have been concerned mainly with the plight of this industry in

the prairie provinces. The problem of marketing our large surplus of wheat at a price adequate to maintain the industry has been one of our major concerns. Measures which we believe would assist the farmer until such markets are found has given rise to extended discussion and debate in the house. Then we have had questions arising from the operations of the wheat board, the allocation of box cars, the duties of the transport controller or whether or not such an officer is necessary as well as a host of other problems in that connection which have been dealt with. But now we have before us an agricultural measure which is much different from any of those which I have mentioned. It is one which proposes to by-pass that tremendously important phase of the agricultural economy and to stabilize the agricultural industry without reference to one of its most important commodities, namely wheat except that grown outside the area designated by the Canadian Wheat Board Act.
I know it may be argued that this is but one of several or many measures which together will be designed to bring stability to the agricultural industry. But if so I think it has been clearly indicated in the debates thus far that it is one which will apparently contribute very little to the achievement of that objective. We listened to a debate several days ago in which one of the government supporters spoke against a measure that was introduced by an opposition member because it was not comprehensive enough. He pointed out the weaknesses in it and the failures. But certainly, as we look at this particular measure tonight, we do not see where it will contribute very much to the stabilization of the agricultural economy across the country.
It is an act to provide for the stabilization of the prices of agricultural commodities. Mr. Speaker, I do not think anyone would take the position that the need for such action is unnecessary. It has been pointed out time after time in the house that agriculture was and is at the present time in a very serious position and that those who are engaged in that industry are waging a losing battle against great odds, namely increasing costs on the one hand and reduced prices on the other.
I should like to refer to an editorial from my own home town paper, the Abbotsford, Sumas and Matsqui News. I am sure that we all recognize the fact that this is a worthwhile paper, and an extremely important one in British Columbia. Under the heading of "1958 Prospects" we read the following:
In the Fraser Valley, our principal Industry Is agriculture and it faces an uncertain year in consequence of the general economic slowdown. Costs
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization have risen, and in some cases are still rising, for both dairymen and poultrymen. Yet another round of increases is likely early in the year if present indications are a reliable guide. Such a cost squeeze is hard on the most efficient farmer, and may prove disastrous for marginal operators.
Whether there will be increases in the price of farm products sufficient to compensate for the inflationary pressures which farmers are feeling is highly speculative. As a general rule, increases for the farmer do not come with sufficient speed to protect him from such cost squeezes.
I would suggest that this is indicative of conditions not only in my own area but right across the country. A little further on in the editorial we find this:
Basic outlook of Fraser valley agriculture is bright, because of its access to a growing metropolitan market. High cost factors, however, create problems which are accentuated in the Fraser valley and which call for understanding and assistance.
Mr. Speaker, the fact has been stressed here on many occasions that the farming population of Canada are receiving much less than their share of the national income. I do not think it is necessary to put further figures on record because they have already been placed on record a number of times not only in this debate but in others. But it would seem to me that there is a general recognition of the fact that our farming population are not receiving their fair share of the national income. In the speech from the throne that was given recently we read the following words:
In order to assure to the farmers of Canada a fair share of the national income, you will be asked to enact a measure to provide greater stability in the prices of their products. Every possible effort is now being made, and will continue to be made to seek new markets for agricultural products as well as to regain those that have been lost.
I should like to suggest that this is recognition on the part of this government that farmers have not been in the position where they have received their fair share of the national income. We have a promise that at least something definite was contemplated to remedy that injustice.
We have had farmers and farm representatives speak here in this house with respect to the requests that have been made by the farmers and by their organizations. Not only have they made the requests, but they have outlined clearly and positively the steps they felt were necessary in order to bring about what they considered was a proper recognition of their needs and a proper position of agriculture in the Canadian economy. They want a fair share of the national income. In order to achieve that objective they have requested parity prices for their products. They are desirous of having a measure of security which is at least in some respects comparable to that which is enjoyed by other categories

Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization of workers across the country. We all remember, I believe-and we are in agreement with this fact-that the Conservative party during the last election made certain promises to the agricultural workers. I have in my hand a pamphlet entitled "A New National Policy, Highlights of Progressive Conservative Policy in Verbatim Quotations from Speeches by John Diefenbaker", the present Prime Minister.


An hon. Member:: They are good speeches.


Mr. Patterson:: Yes; they are good speeches. I hope the time will come when the promises included in this booklet will be fulfilled because at present we have not seen any fulfilment of some of the major promises which are made here. On the other hand, I might say there seems to be some backing away from them and the government is finding that the implementation of these proposals and promises is much harder to accomplish than the mere promising which was done back in those days.
I am sure everyone will see I am reading from an official document here and on page 8 it says: "A fair share for farmers". It reads as follows:
We will assure the farmer of his fair share of the national income by maintaining a flexible price-support program to ensure an adequate parity for agricultural producers based on a fair price-cost relationship.
A little further down it says:
My pledge to farmers In all parts of Canada Is: To assure that the farmer shall receive his fair share of the national income. My objectives will be: Equality for farmers in Canada's economy. My desire is to correct the social inequity and the inferior economic position into which agriculture has been allowed to fall.
Those, Mr. Speaker, are very fine words, very fine expressions of intention. When we compare them with what we have before us tonight I fail to see where there is very much relationship between the two.


An hon. Member:: Then vote against it.


Alexander Bell Patterson: I heard someone speak way over there somewhere. I do not think it would be necessary to put on record the motion made by the present Prime Minister (Mr. Diefenbaker), before the time he was leader of the official opposition. The date was March 12, 1956 and the amendment is to be found on page 2024 of Hansard. It was moved by the then hon. member for Prince Albert:
That all the words after "That" be struck out and the following be substituted therefor:
"in the opinion of this house consideration should be given by the government to the advisability of introducing during the present session legislation to create a parity of prices for agricultural products at levels to ensure producers a fair price-cost relationship."


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


Alexander Bell Patterson: I am glad I am getting
some support from the government supporters. Possibly a little later on I will not get that same support.


An hon. Member:: It is the only support you have had in a long while.


Alexander Bell Patterson: I understand under the rules of the house we are not allowed to read clauses of the bill at this stage but the definition of parity prices given by the present Prime Minister on that same occasion is as follows:
Parity prices are the dollars and cents prices that give to farm products the same buying or purchasing power they had in a selected base period when prices received by and prices paid by farmers were regarded as in good balance: It has been put this way: If you can sell a truckload of barley and buy with the money received so much food, clothing, building materials, fertilizer, farm machinery and other living and production items as you could in a chosen favourable period in the past then your barley is selling at a parity price.
I do not see how, as far as the present measure which is before us is concerned, it will bring into realization the objective pointed out in this definition of parity prices. We have before us Bill No. 237, a bill that was so completely objectionable that the minister hastened to announce amendments to it right at the time of its introduction. The bill is so unsatisfactory even at this time that it is being rejected by farmers and farm organizations generally. Disappointment, anger, disgust, mass meetings, lobbies and threatened marches have been the result of the introduction of this measure.


An hon. Member:: Who has been stirring them up?


Alexander Bell Patterson: The question is asked, "Who has been stirring them up?" I think common sense has been stirring them up. The opposition members in this parliament have pointed out the very obvious weaknesses, weaknesses which apparently the minister still fails to see in his own bill.
I would like to refer to another important newspaper in my own riding and I say it is important because I feel that local weekly papers in the ridings possibly represent the attitude and feelings of the people in the communities. This is an editorial from the Agassiz-Harrison Advance, a community newspaper the publisher of which is a Mr. John W. Green.


Howard Charles Green: He did not know any more about the bill than you do.


Alexander Bell Patterson: The Minister of Public Works has probably read the article.


An hon. Member:: Who is the editor of the paper?


Alexander Bell Patterson: I am sure the minister will recognize the name. The initials are not the same as his, but the first name is John W. Green. He is at least fairly well acquainted with the gentleman who wrote this article. It is entitled "No Help at All":
The agricultural price support act introduced by the Conservative government seems to be completely useless.
In the past support prices were set by a government board advised by a committee from farm organizations. Under the new act the system is the same.
The only real difference is that the new act gives a definite guarantee of a minimum price-but it is a worthless guarantee. It promises only that farm products covered under the act will not sell for less than 80 per cent of the average price for the preceding 10 years. Quite plainly that offers no hindrance to steadily falling prices.
Of course the government contends that it will actually set prices higher than the guaranteed price, keeping them in line with conditions in other sectors of the economy. That leaves the farmers subject to the whims of politicians and civil servants, just as they were before. They have tried that system and it isn't any good.
What they want, and what the Conservatives promised them, is parity.
The Minister of Agriculture now says no one is sure what parity is, but he thinks his new bill is pretty close to it. Conservatives seemed to know before the election, but in case they have forgotten, parity means a price that will return to the reasonably efficient farmer his cost of production plus a reasonable profit. It is a price that will go up when costs of machinery, feed, fertilizer, freight, wages, buildings, clothing and other things a farmer must pay for go up, and if they ever come down, it will come down too.
I will just go a little further down in the editorial.
The minister says parity was a failure in the United States because it caused surpluses. He doesn't want any system that will encourage farmers to grow more food.
There is some argument as to whether United States surpluses were actually the result of parity pricing, but there is no question that parity made United States farmers prosper along with the rest of the country. In Canada prosperity passes the farmers by. Farming is the biggest and most vital industry in the country, involving about a fifth of the population. Isn't it worth a few surpluses to make that many people ride the country's economic escalator instead of getting ground up in it?
Parity prices wouldn't be simple to administer. They would create a complicated problem for any government. But governments are elected to handle problems. Isn't it better to give them a few extra than to impoverish a fifth of the population?
I drop down toward the close of the editorial.
The problem of farm poverty amid general prosperity is undoubtedly a difficult one. A party that so obviously doesn't understand the farmers' position could not be blamed for believing that parity is not the answer.
But the Conservatives have not said that before. In opposition they have spoken and voted for a parity system. On the hustings they have promised
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization
to introduce parity. Now that they are the government they are trying to pass off a worthless counterfeit. They cannot be excused for that.
And the final sentence:
The new price support bill probably doesn't mean that the farmers are any worse off than they were before, but the Conservatives certainly are.


Mr. Nesbiii:: What do you suggest?


Mr.   Pafierson@: I could not have put it in better terms.


An hon. Member:: Who wrote the rest of your speech.


Mr.   Pafierson@: If you could read this you would not attribute it to anybody but myself.
Mr. Speaker, we have a list of the commodities named under the terms of this bill. Some of them are produced in my area, but there are many commodities produced in the Fraser valley which are not included in this bill. It does not say anything about vegetables at all, or soft fruit, or poultry or turkeys-


Douglas Scott Harkness: You do not understand the bill. They are all included.


Mr.   Pafierson@: I wonder if the minister could tell us where they are included.


Douglas Scott Harkness: They are included right in every section of the bill.


Alexander Bell Patterson: They may be, but there is no guarantee.


Mr. Montgomery:: Be honest enough to give the benefit of the doubt.


Alexander Bell Patterson: When we consider the
promises that have been made, and what happens I do not know that we can give the benefit of the doubt too often in these matters.


An hon. Member:: Read the bill.


Alexander Bell Patterson: I have read the bill. Have you? I realize, Mr. Speaker, that there are some commodities which are named in this bill and it is possible that others will be included, but there is no guarantee. As this editorial says, it is left to the whim of certain individuals as to whether or not other commodities will be included. And may I say this: if they are included they are not guaranteed 80 per cent parity, but whatever price may be set for them.
The farmers in my area are faced with many problems in trying to make a living in the agriculture industry. They are faced, as outlined in the article I read from the Abbotsford, Sumas and Matsqui News, with the problem of rising costs and so on. Some time ago there was a 50 per cent reduction in freight assistance on feed grains, for instance.
3442	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization That was done under the previous administration, and of course, we took exception to it and we pleaded that that subsidy should be left as it was before. But the government of the day was heedless of the needs of the farmers in my area and in British Columbia and went ahead with the proposition and reduced this subsidy on freight assistance on feed grains.
Now we are faced with continually increasing costs of freight. I do not know how many increases have been granted in the last several years, but we do know there has been a substantial increase just in the last two years. Recently a decision was handed down by the board of transport commissioners authorizing a further increase of 3.6 per cent. We appreciate the action that was taken to suspend that decision until appeals have been carried through, and we are sincerely hoping that in the present situation this further increase will not be granted.
We are faced also with the problem of trying to compete with subsidized foreign agricultural imports. In some cases there is no direct subsidy, but agricultural activities are carried on in areas where there have been substantial programs of irrigation and land improvement which have resulted in greatly increased production, and our farmers in the province of British Columbia are finding it very difficult, if not impossible, to compete with this type of competition. So it seems that from every viewpoint they are up against obstacles which are almost insurmountable.
I should like to refer in this connection to one commodity which is included under the act, and that is eggs. We appreciate the fact that there is a floor price with regard to the eggs, yet we consider that it has very little relationship to the cost of production. When I was home I found there was a great deal of dissatisfaction about the egg situation. Speaking in this debate today the hon. member for Vegreville (Mr. Stefura) stated that in Alberta the cost of production of grade A large eggs was 28.3 cents a dozen. I may say that in the province of British Columbia the cost of production is much higher. In Alberta they feed cheap wheat to the poultry. The wheat growers cannot sell it anywhere else, so they pass it around among the farmers for use as feed and the price is low, possibly $18 or $20 a ton.
But when the producers in my area, for instance, buy feed wheat they have to pay over three times that amount, and yet they only receive about the same for grade A large eggs as the producers receive in Alberta. I do not think there is any justice in a situation like that, and our producers cannot carry on their activities when they are placed


in that position. So I make a plea that if this bill goes through, consideration be given to making some substantial changes which will bring to the farmer, as has been promised, a fair share of the national income and ensure that he will receive a price which bears a certain relationship to the cost of production, and that he will not be forced to carry on in this uneconomic way.
An amendment has been moved to the effect that the subject matter of this bill be referred to the committee on agriculture and colonization. That is a very worth-while amendment in my opinion and I hope it will be agreed to. If this bill went before that committee the various organizations could be called in and the whole question dealt with in a thorough manner. If this were done it is possible that the bill might be rounded out into a measure that would make at least some contribution to the stability of the agricultural industry of this country.
Even though I have raised all these objections I have done so with the hope that the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Harkness) will agree to some fundamental changes that will bring to our people a fairer share of the national income.


James Garfield Gardiner: Mr. Speaker, the legislation which is under discussion this evening was introduced by way of resolution, I think almost two months ago, and we have been having considerable discussion on the question since that time. My friend the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Harkness) shakes his head to indicate that I am wrong but I happen to have the first bill that was handed to us before me and it is dated December 3, 1957.


Douglas Scott Harkness: That is quite different from two months; it is less than that.


James Garfield Gardiner: That is six weeks ago and all the discussion on the resolution occurred previous to that and the resolution was on the order paper for a considerable period of time before it was discussed so I think it will be found that it has been before the house for very close to two months.


Douglas Scott Harkness: You are as inaccurate as usual.


James Garfield Gardiner: But there is another fact in connection with it about which one has to be extremely careful. One must take pains to ensure that he has the right bill before him. I have three bills in my hand at the moment, each of which is a version of the measure before us. One is dated December 3, 1957, the second is dated December 14, 1957, and the third one, which is different from the others, is also dated December 14, 1957.

Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization
Therefore, one has to keep in rather close touch with what is going on from day to day and even from hour to hour in order to know whether or not he has before him the actual legislation that is under discussion at any given moment.
There have been some suggestions made as to why changes have been made in this legislation. If I understood him correctly the previous speaker, the hon. member for Fraser Valley (Mr. Patterson), suggested that representations had been made by farm organizations and some suggestions were made by members sitting on the government side of the house to the effect that somebody must have been stirring them up. One of the ministers of the government, the Minister of National Revenue (Mr. Nowlan), made a speech which has been reported very widely in the press in which he said that the government were really stirred up by the backbenchers on the government side and that even though they were stirred up and the bill has been redrafted there has been no change in its principle. I am more or less inclined to agree with that statement but there are some other important things which I think should be said in relation to the bill and one of them is that most of the hon. members who have participated in this debate in various parts of the house, particularly those in the two groups that are not supporters of the government and are not members of the Liberal party, have referred to the measure as not being quite as good as the one that now exists on the statute books.
It will be remembered that it is now almost a month, and I know I am fairly accurate in saying that, since I addressed the house on second reading of this bill and because I have addressed the house before on this subject I am not going to take much time in dealing with the measure itself other than to verify what hon. members have been saying in various corners of the house to the effect that there is not very much difference between the bill which is now being proposed and the one we had before. As a matter of fact, the only real difference is that you cannot do as much under this bill as you could under the earlier one. In other words, you are narrowed down and restricted because of the fact that certain things have been written into the measure as it presently stands.
Some hon. members in the C.C.F. and Social Credit groups have suggested that when you draft a measure in rather general terms and leave it to the government to administer the act in a manner which will be helpful you are, by so doing, leaving the measure to the consideration of some one individual or some very few individuals. You are, as a matter 96698-218
of fact, making the whole government responsible under both the terms of this bill and the terms of the existing act for what is being done with the taxpayers' money. That is generally thought to be a reasonable thing to do, that is not to simply place money in the hands of the government to be expended and place the responsibility for the expenditure of it with some one else but to hold the government itself responsible for the expenditure of that money. Both of these measures do that.
Each time you write into a bill a section which says, "You must do it this way or that way; you cannot do it this way or you cannot do it that way," then you simply tie the hands of those who are trying to do a job in the interests of the people being served and for this reason I do not follow along or agree with that argument. The measure is in general terms similar to the terms of the existing act and I still maintain the position I took a month ago to the effect that this bill is not as flexible as the act is. In other words, you are tied down, for example, to taking a ten-year period in order to arrive at certain results. Under the act presently on the statute books this government could take a ten-year period, a five-year period or a three-year period. It is not bound to take any particular period and I would like to submit that it is not reasonable to think that you can take the same period and apply it to every one of the products that might be under consideration from time to time, the reason being that those things which influence the prices of different commodities are not the same in all cases over a period of ten, five or even three years. Many things happen in connection with crops that alter and affect the situation and therefore to limit the measure in this way would bind the government to the consideration of only certain commodities. The amendments have had the effect of making this measure less flexible.
As has been said by hon. members of the government and others, there is a great difference between the bill as it was originally brought down and the one that is before us now. I have the one which is before all members of the house at this time and the only outstanding difference between it and the first bill is the number of years that are specified. It was three years in the previous bill and it is ten years in the present one.
In addition to that some one has said there is a preamble to this bill and he rather liked the preamble to this bill as compared with the other bill which had no preamble at all. In the preamble of the bill now before us the government has enunciated what was contained in subclause 2 of clause 9 of the
3444	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization original act. The idea expressed in the preamble is carried on throughout the measure in order to state the same thing over and over again but there is no great difference between the two.
Some comments have been made about the operation of the existing act over the years. A statement which is made often was repeated by the hon. member for Springfield (Mr. Schulz) this afternoon. He has been making it for a long time. He has been corrected many times but he still makes it. Of course, no one can stop him doing that and he goes right on saying it. His statement is to the effect that there was only $200 million provided under the old measure and there will be $250 million under this one, which he does not distinguish as being very different provided certain things happen. But he goes on from there to use figures to prove that only $26 million was utilized over the years under the old legislation.
Of course, that leaves out entirely the fact that the fund is a revolving fund under both measures. It is not an amount which is set up, which you are told you can spend and then when it is gone you get another $200 million and spend that. The fund is used in such a way as to set up a support price under a product and then the product is taken in at that particular price and it costs the government so much. Then it is disposed of and there may be no loss at all. As a matter of fact, in some cases there may be some profit.
But the revolving fund is there in order to make it possible to utilize the money for the purpose of supporting prices, although now it is called stabilizing prices. There is some argument whether there is any difference in the meaning of the terms. I think "support" is a better term to use than "stabilize". Nevertheless, the amount of money is there to be utilized for the one or the other purpose or for both purposes. When the board pays money out to buy and then sells the product it comes back in again and the better the administration of the act is and the better the handling of the whole proposition is the less will be the amount of money that will be spent and not be available to be used again by the board.
As a matter of fact, I would think if you had a board that got rid of $250 million every year with nothing coming back in you would be doing in an even more definite manner what we object to in connection with what has been done on the other side of the line. But under the measure we did have out over the whole period somewhere in the neighbourhood of $400 million, not $26 million, not $200 million. I can quite understand people saying that even that is not a great amount


when you consider that the legislation has been in existence over a considerable number of years. It has actually been in operation for about 11 years. It can be said that that is not a large amount of money to utilize and it would not be if you were handling grain and all the other commodities, but nevertheless there has been about $400 million used and I think at one particular time there was about $125 million out at one time.
It is suggested that $72 million of the amount was money that was put out in connection with the foot-and-mouth disease. It was intended when the legislation was drafted that any emergencies which arose that made it necessary to support prices to the farmer could be dealt with under the act. It was broad enough to do that and that situation was dealt with. It happened to be foot-and-mouth disease that came along but it could have been something else. We have handled certain cases that arose in connection with cholera and so on. Any disease in connection with animals could be dealt with.
But when you get a situation such as we had with the foot-and-mouth disease where we could not export any livestock products that were affected by the disease, that, of course, is a reasonable thing upon which to spend the money. There is more necessity for it then than there is for anything else. When the hon. member for Springfield keeps on repeating that statement with regard to the expenditure of money I am inclined to think he either does not understand the legislation or he is simply misrepresenting what the facts are to people who have not made a study of the legislation.


Mr. Smith (Battle River-Camrose):: Would the hon. member permit a question? He states that emergencies were provided for under the legislation. What about the $100,050 in connection with the scrapie disease? Was that done under this legislation?


James Garfield Gardiner: I am only going to say at the moment that the scrapie disease was dealt with and dealt with satisfactorily, and a committee of this house decided unanimously that it was dealt with properly. To go back to the amount of money that was spent, a certain amount has gone out and more of course can be put out. At the moment though we are not considering these matters so much as we are the definite proposal made in the amendment to the effect that the bill be referred to the committee on agriculture. I have now indicated it has not been changed materially. I have already said that so far as we in this section of the house are concerned we were prepared to vote for the

Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization
bill on second reading. The undertaking we gave earlier will probably be carried out by most of us in this section of the house.
There is another matter that is before us now. The amendment asks us to refer this whole matter to the standing committee on agriculture and to call in people from all across the country to make representations so that the committee may consider ways and means of improving the bill. This suggestion was made, I think, on the 17th of December-


An hon. Member:: No, the 11th.


James Garfield Gardiner: -by the hon. member for Assiniboia (Mr. Argue). I think he asked a question of the government on the 17th of December, I believe, with respect to whether it would be possible to have that done and the minister on his responsibility as a member of the government stated to the house that was not their intention and they were not going to do it. So far as matters of this kind are concerned, when the government has taken the responsibility in that way and has made a definite statement we have not said a great deal more about it. We may come back and ask about it at different times, but we took that to be an indication at that time that the government was not prepared to send it to committee. I think there was far less justification for taking that position on the 17th of December than there is now.
The matter was brought up again the other day when the amendment was moved and the minister again assured us that the government had no intention to refer the matter to the committee, and we have accepted their taking that responsibility and saying that. We have this amendment before us now and we must give consideration as to how we are going to vote on it. It is an amendment to the motion for second reading of the bill. If the government said now that there was still time to send the measure to the committee and have these people called in from all over the country I do not think there would be any opposition from this group. I think we would say yes, but I am going to say this. We have been here now since the 14th of October and there has been a great deal of boasting-maybe I should not use that word -or in any case it has been claimed many times that this has been one of the speediest sessions we have ever had in this history of of the Dominion of Canada. Yet we can have a bill like this before us for almost two months and not arrive at a conclusion yet as to whether it is going to be passed.


Mr. McGrath:: You talk too much.


James Garfield Gardiner: There is one thing about it. I do not talk half as much as some other
96698-218J
people in this house and when I do talk I usually have a reason for doing so. If I did not talk sometimes you might not be sitting over there very long because it would not be very difficult to remove you, you know.
At the present time we are considering the question of whether we are going to call in people from all over the country. I have said every time I have spoken in the house this session that I think we came here for special reasons, one of them being that we had had an election, another being that we got a government that did not have a majority in the house and another being that they were given certain undertakings by different groups in the house that have managed to keep them here until now. We thought they had, and they did have, two or three things to do that were quite important. One of them was to carry out some of those promises they had made. We said, all right, in so far as it is merely a matter of spending more money under legislation we have on the statute books, and an undertaking to collect the money with which to pay, we would go along within reasonable limits.
Then, we had said, too, that there were estimates before the house that were placed there by this party when we were the government. Certainly, we are not going to vote against our own estimates. Go along and put them through. But we do not like the lack of speed with which they are being put through or with which the other matter is being dealt. I am going to say this. We are not going to be responsible for asking you to take another two or three months by referring this measure to a committee of the house and calling in people from all over the country to tell you what to do.
I quite understand that when they did not give you a majority they did not tell you what to do. No doubt they thought, after listening to all the speeches and the promises that were made, that you did know what you wanted to do. I am beginning to doubt that you ever knew what you wanted to do. You were simply making promises, simply making criticisms and finally, so far as this bill is concerned I am wondering if you ever knew what you wanted to do. I do not know whether or not you are sure yet. I think whatever you are wanting to do, if you are going to do it you do not need to call in anybody to confuse you any more than you are confused now.


Douglas Scott Harkness: We do not want to bring anybody in to confuse the C.C.F. any more.


James Garfield Gardiner: We are quite ready to go along with you if you do not want to submit this measure to a committee. We are quite
3446	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization willing to go along and see to it that the measure is put before us in its final form. Then, we are prepared to go along, unless you do something very unreasonable when you do get the measure in final form, with second reading. We are prepared to see this thing got rid of in the house and out to the people so that they can do something with it. As a matter of fact, we think it will be so much poorer than anything else we have had that it will be good for us on this side of the house to have it in operation.
There is one other thing that has been put before the house this afternoon and I have been hoping I would not have to deal with it but I am afraid 1 am going to have to deal with it. I have always been a great admirer of people who come to this country from another country, who settle here and make a success of things. Therefore, I do not want anything that I say this evening with regard to the type of criticism to which we have listened to be taken as a reflection upon any of the people who come to our shores and find conditions here such that they can get along very well. When I was listening to the discussion this afternoon to the effect that the present Minister of Agriculture and I were responsible for the terrible conditions claimed to have been created, I was a little inclined to let my memory go back to a statement I saw not very long ago.
You know, we are always very proud of being elected to this House of Commons. The more often we are elected, the prouder we are of the fact. When persons come into this house for the first time we are inclined to listen to statements they make once or twice, and perhaps let them repeat those statements more times than that without too much regard to them. However, there is a limit to the extent to which you can allow this to go on without saying anything about it. There are quite a number of members of the legal profession in this house and as they know, in any trial there are quite often exhibits to be produced from time to time, and they are numbered. The farmers union have an exhibit in this house. It is exhibit No. 1, and is pretty well known across the country. This exhibit spent a lot of time this afternoon stating what terrible conditions we had created among farmers in this country under the other government, and what terrible conditions were likely to be created under this one.
I should like to read to you from an article which appeared in the Ottawa Citizen which is headed "Russian-Born MP Once Romanian Army Officer". The article was written by a gentleman who is very well known in the press gallery of this house, and is signed.


As we all know, this is a story that the reporter would get from the individual as to that individual's life history. Now, listen to this:
Jake got out of Romania in 1930,-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I wonder if the hon. gentleman would tell me how he relates this article to the matter under discussion?


James Garfield Gardiner: I am relating it to the fact that this afternoon I was told that the farmers were having a very difficult time; that I was responsible for part of it and my friend who is here now as Minister of Agriculture was responsible for the other part. I just want to read this to give an indication how some farmers did get along.
Now, the story is this:
Jake got out of Romania in 1930, and his first years in Canada were enough to drive him back to Bessarabia. At Gilbert Plains he was too poor to pay the doctor for a check on his wife. Jake drove to town in a crazy wagon with wobbly wheels he picked up for two bucks.
I think we used to call those Bennett buggies.
His cows kept him from starving.
The C.C.F. member somehow toughed it out, raised a family, put up fine buildings, and by 1945 he was on the council of Grandview municipality.
This is a remarkable record indeed.
He raised a family of three. The eldest runs the farm, a second boy is in Winnipeg-
The article refers to another member of the family to whom I shall not refer in this connection. I recall the day when this matter which I mentioned this afternoon was brought to the attention of the government. We were told that one of these farms was valued at $28,000 and was traded in on a sport shop in Winnipeg because the boy did not want to farm. The point I am making is simply this. All these matters that were talked about in connection with the development of the farm and the placing of two boys in one family in a position to have a farm each if they wanted it or placing them in a position of turning a farm into something else if they did not want it, all these things were done while the last Liberal government was in office. All I am saying to you is this. If that is the best exhibit that they can bring into this house in order to prove that nothing was done for the farmers during that period of time, then it is a very poor exhibit and would not prove to any judge anywhere in the country that some of the things that are being said by a representative in this house can be borne out by the facts.
I am quite prepared to agree, if it becomes necessary to agree, that the gentleman in question is a much more capable farmer than others, that being trained in the Romanian army made him a better farmer than

many who were born here may be. However, there are farmers in this country who have succeeded, a great many of them. When that story is repeated, as it was told here this afternoon, in the manner in which it was told and when people on this side of the house and the other side of the house are accused of not doing things which are in the interest of the farm population of Canada, then I think we should call as an exhibit this man who so greatly improved his position over such a short period. All this is in addition to what those who are born and raised here can do under the conditions provided by government in this country.


Alfred Claude Ellis: How low can you get?


An hon. Member:: Very cheap.


James Garfield Gardiner: What is the question?


Alfred Claude Ellis: I say how low can you get, to make a personal attack on a member of this house?


James Garfield Gardiner: How low can I get? I can tell you how low some other people can get. This same gentleman came to the next town to mine and made the statement that he was down in Ontario recently and he could say what he liked down there about the minister of agriculture but he would have to be careful when he got back near his home.
These things can be said outside the house and we do not get much opportunity of replying to them. But when they are said here in the house they are something that can be replied to. I am simply suggesting that, when the hon. member makes speeches with regard to the organization that he led,- and which I think he led fairly successfully in the western part of Canada-he should base those statements upon the actual facts as they have occurred and not just put up an argument for the sake of gathering something in. I am quite satisfied that my hon. friend can rise in his place and say, "I did not make money in farming". I do not know whether or not he did so, but he lived on the farm. He got those farms and he lived in an area where farming was the main part of the industry. I therefore say he will have to go much further than he did this afternoon in order to prove to my satisfaction that farmers cannot do fairly well in this country under certain circumstances in some places.
Having said that, I want to say this. There are a great many problems confronting farmers from one end of this country to the other and measures as good as the one that is before us now, and even as good as the one which we had previously, which was better, are required in order to assist farmers to keep up their farms, to keep things moving along and such measures are necessary if they are to get their share of the
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization national income in this country. But when we are doing this I think we should keep ourselves entirely to the facts as they are and not twist the statistics beyond the point where they can be verified to prove everything that is placed before us.
So I suggest that so far as we on this side of the house are concerned, we are ready to put this measure through. We are even ready to agree that it should not be sent to the committee in order that we might get on with the business of the house and get the house wound up. We say that if the government call another session-as I understand they intend to do-within the next few weeks and we are back here, then we can consider again whether a measure like this should be sent to a committee. But to send it now, after we have been sitting here since the middle of October, and to place this bill before a committee will keep us here for weeks. If we are going to be able to do what this legislation suggests we should do, then it should be put through and not delay the house longer. I think we ought to get along with the matter and not submit it to a committee at the present time. I think we ought to get the bill passed and get it on the record.
(Translation):


Mr. O. F. Villeneuve (Glengarry-Prescott):: Mr. Speaker, this is the first time I have had the honour of speaking in this house and I am pleased to support Bill 237: an act to provide for the stabilization of the prices of agricultural commodities.
To my mind this bill is only part of an overall policy aimed at the improvement of agriculture in this country and, with the help of agricultural groups and organizations, to put it on the same level as the rest of our economy.
The success of this policy will naturally depend on the efforts of every interested group and on the way in which the law will be administered. It will not be an easy task and our best agricultural experts must take a hand in the process.
I have the honour of representing an eastern Ontario constituency where the rural population is larger than the urban population. I appreciate what the present government is doing in order to improve the lot of the farmer.
(Text):
Mr. Speaker, I first of all want to congratulate you on your elevation to the high office which you now hold. Certainly one cannot help being impressed by the dignity with which you preside over this chamber.
On this my first occasion to speak in this house, I am happy to support Bill No. 237, an act to provide for the stabilization of the
3448	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization prices of agricultural commodities. To my mind this is the beginning of a comprehensive scheme for agriculture with the co-operation of farm organizations and commodity groups, bringing agriculture into a more favourable position in our Canadian economy. The success of this measure must, of course, depend on the efforts of all groups interested in agriculture, and this legislation being intelligently applied to this objective. This is not an easy matter and it will require the best brains available, and a thorough knowledge of agriculture.
The constituency that I have the honour to represent is one of but four in southern Ontario where the rural population exceeds the urban population. I am grateful for what this government is trying to accomplish in the interests of agriculture because one of the specific promises I made was that I would do everything possible to get a better deal for agriculture. It is the privilege and the prerogative of my hon. friends across the way to criticize, but they do not take into consideration any realistic approach to this subject.
Dealing with the bill and taking beef as an example, may I say this. We must remember the two things which make for the success of this bill or the operation of it. I refer to domestic consumption in this country and our ability to export. We have increased domestic consumption of beef in the last seven years by 55 per cent. Having regard to our population of 17 million, that is a very pronounced fact. From 1948 to 1951 we had an export market in the United States. In fact, in 1950, the year of high prices, we exported one-third of the cattle produced in Canada. The reason why we export to the United States is that we have no other market in the world that will give us as high a return. It is therefore essential for us at all times to think in terms of export.
Conditions alter. The foot-and-mouth disease broke out here in the early months of 1952 and, as the former minister of agriculture has stated, we could not export beef or pork products. It was an extremely fortunate thing for this country that we had at that time the prices support act because otherwise there would have been a catastrophe. The government of the day stepped into the picture, bought this surplus beef and it did not demoralize our normal channels of trade within the coniines of our country.
But what happened in the United States? From 1953 to 1956 they have had a drought in the mid-west where one-third of their cattle population was seriously affected. When they market over 20 million cattle a year that fact has a considerable effect on the economy in this country, and our position has reversed to some extent. In 1954 we im-
TMr. Villeneuve (Glengarry-Prescott).]

ported as much beef as we exported. In 1955 and 1956 we imported into Canada more beef than we exported to the United States. This year the tide has changed. I am not saying it has changed because there is a change in government. However, the situation has changed. In the mid-west states they have had a great deal of rain this year and good growth, and they are coming to Canada to buy young cattle with which to restock and replenish those farms which had to get rid of those cattle. The result has been that this year we have exported over 10 per cent of our production of cattle which makes a very significant difference. Therefore the price and the future for the beef producer looks very bright.
I do not want the western farmer, particularly the wheat grower to think that this bill is designed merely to help the eastern farmer since it is not specifically dealing with benefits to him. However, 65 per cent of the cattle produced in Canada does come from the four prairie provinces where we have only 27 per cent of the population. That surplus has to be moved to the eastern section of the country or to the United States. Therefore I say the government's legislation is designed, having in mind the overall picture, to help production throughout all regions in this country.
Dealing with pork, there is of course disease among United States hogs and a bill has been passed through this parliament prohibiting the importation of hogs from the United States. We have been favoured with very substantial returns because of the prohibition of importation of United States hogs since 1952, with the exception of course of the year 1955. Those people raise an average of from 60 to 65 million hogs a year, while we in Canada raise somewhere between 5 and 6 million. Yet, as I have said, this prohibition has had a very pronounced bearing on the situation. My friends across the way do not realize that we have a reciprocal trade arrangement where items must flow both ways. A lot of these things must be faced in a realistic manner and we must appraise the situation as it affects the whole North American continent and not just take a slant such as "Here I am and I am entitled to more money." We all feel that, but I believe that looking back 10 years you do get some of the largest returns we have had, although in the last three years certain items have been somewhat depressed. For example, the cattle situation which has been affected by the United States not importing as many cattle as they normally would have done. Nevertheless you have a fair average.

We are confronted with another serious problem about which I truthfully state I do not know what we can do. In western Ontario I know of at least 10 men who feed as many as 1,000 cattle in a year and anyone knows that such a man does not need the same return required by the ordinary small farmer-that is to say on the basis of the percentage per head profit-in order to make a success of his business. In Brampton, as the hon. member for Peel (Mr. Pallett) knows, one man alone in 1956 raised 90,000 turkeys; this year it is up to 130,000. Farmer after farmer in my own area who used to produce 300 to 500 turkeys found he was getting such a small margin of profit and the danger of loss was so great that he eventually had to abolish that part of his business altogether.
I ask how are you going to arrive at parity prices? Are you going to take the successful big operator or are you going to take the deficient farmer? To get a fair return for any of these people it is not easy; it is quite all right to criticize but it is not easy. I think this bill is at least an approach to the problem. I do not say it is everything it should be-I would be the last one to say that-but at least it is a sound approach.
One thing I like about this Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Harkness) is that he does not go up and down the country like the former minister of agriculture, telling the farmers how well off they are. Eighty-five per cent of the population of Canada are consumers who perhaps do not understand the agricultural picture. I say that our minister is conscientious and he is doing the very best he can and does not go around saying that everything is rosy in agriculture when it is not.


James Garfield Gardiner: On a point of privilege, Mr. Speaker, I just want to say I never did say that. When you have been here as long as I have you will find out, however, that many things are reported which you did not say.


Osie F. Villeneuve: That may be so and I have a lot of respect for the right hon. member for Melville (Mr. Gardiner) as a public figure. I realize he has been here a long while and I would be the last to wish to attack him. That is quite true, but you also find out that the longer you are in politics the shorter it would appear you can cut corners.


Osie F. Villeneuve: That people's hair shorter but the hon. member does not have very much.


Osie F. Villeneuve: To
continue, Mr. Speaker, in the years since 1941 my constituency has produced more cheese
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization than any other constituency in Canada and naturally I am vitally interested in that commodity. In the period from 1941 to 1949 the government of the day, because of the effects of war and those of the postwar period, requisitioned all the cheese in Canada for shipment to Britain at a fixed price. I am not critical of that; it was a situation which any government would have had to meet and look after, but from 1948 on in the province of Ontario we have had what is known as the dairy herd improvement plan under which 1,186 herds of dairy cattle last year were put under test to establish the costs of production of milk in various areas under various conditions.
As you know, butter has been fixed at 58 cents and cheese, thanks to the province of Ontario, has taken a second mortgage and been placed at a guarantee and has at least given some considerable return although still not the cost of production. In 1950 as a result of inquiries made under this dairy herd improvement plan milk production was found to be $3 per hundred or thereabouts, that is to say in cheese producing areas. In fluid milk areas naturally the cost is more but that is a different problem.
There was a great clamour in the province for marketing boards and farmers wanted to set up their own selling agencies to look after the interests of the people they represented. Therefore 18 different types of marketing organizations for farmers and producers were set up in the province of Ontario; the cheese producers association was one. They sold their cheese at 28 cents in 1950. In 1951 the then minister of agriculture, under this prices support act, stated that 28 cents was the guaranteed price. Three of these gentlemen who went to Great Britain tried to get a better return for the producers they represented in this association. They may have made a mistake in that they did not go to the Department of Agriculture of the federal government to state the facts of their case because I am sure the then minister of agriculture would have been very happy to go along with their requests to better their conditions. They were, however, fortunate enough to be able to sell their cheese in Britain at 32 cents. In 1951 the province of Ontario established a fixed price for that board of 36 cents. It amounted altogether to something in the neighbourhood of $3 in net return to the producers, which of course was the object in the first place.
Now what happened? Eight times more New Zealand cheese was allowed to come into this country in the years 1950, 1951 and 1952 than had been imported for 40 years previously, and when asked about it in this

Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization house the government of that day said nothing could be done to stop it. The result was that we in the cheese industry have never got back the cost of production, much as we have tried. This year they have got the price up to 34 cents, but the province of Ontario has paid guarantees for the last ten cents a pound amounting to a million and a half to keep that industry up. The first 24 cents is guaranteed under the co-operative plan as designed by the government. I am not finding fault there, because they can only lend up to 80 per cent of the three year average, but the producers are still far from getting a fair deal.
I happen to have an extract here which relates to this question. The hon. member for Middlesex East (Mr. White) asked this question on Monday, January 10, 1955 about the import of cheese, as recorded in Hansard at page 20:
I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Agriculture. Does the minister plan to make any change in the regulations that now permit the importation of New Zealand cheese when there is a surplus of cheese and other dairy products in Canada?
In reply, the Eight Hon. C. D. Howe, minister of trade and commerce said:
Mr. Speaker, there is no prohibition on the importing of cheese. There is a duty on cheese, and technically anyone can ship cheese into Canada who can do so over the duty. A verbal arrangement was made with New Zealand at a time when we were having difficulty exporting to the British market. New Zealand was asked not to ship cheese to this market. The circumstances under which the request was made have changed. New Zealand was pressing to be relieved from that verbal agreement and there seemed no very good ground for insisting that it be continued. The shipment of cheese has been made in the ordinary course of business in the same way that anything else is exported to Canada. I suggest it is a mistake to say that we allowed the import. The normal laws of the land were allowed to function in this matter.
The former minister of agriculture, the right hon. member for Melville, later stated:
In order that there will be no misunderstanding I want it completely understood that I fully agree with what the Department of Trade and Commerce did.
And, later:
I was merely drawing attention to the fact that the hon. member who asked the question did not ask it of the right minister. I did not know exactly what might have been in his mind, so I thought it was necessary to say what I did.
Mr. Speaker, I say this does not sound exactly the same as the statement which the former minister of trade and commerce (Mr. Howe) made in May of last year when he said there would be no more importation of New Zealand cheese for the next 12 months, four weeks before the federal election.


James Garfield Gardiner: There had been a different agreement entered into a year before that.


Osie F. Villeneuve: One
must understand, Mr. Speaker, that this cheese comes in at one cent a pound and the only agreement I know of is one which the province of Ontario made with the minister of trade and commerce of that day stating Ontario's position that it was willing to make guarantees to the cheese marketing board on one condition, namely that no importation of New Zealand cheese would come into Canada while we had a surplus on hand.


James Garfield Gardiner: And the Department of Trade and Commerce made an agreement with New Zealand that they would not send cheese here without a permit from the government.


Osie F. Villeneuve: That is right. I am glad we agree on some things. Mr. Speaker, I do not want to take a selfish attitude because dairying affects every province across this land. But the unfortunate dairyman who has no fluid milk market in this country has been up against it, and to my mind I do not see why, because we have only approximately 2 per cent of surplus on dairy products in Canada, yet our farmers who have to produce milk to go into processing whether it is powdered milk, canned milk or butter, have had to produce at a loss ever since this price has been established. I do not think the dairy industry alone should sustain this loss, and I will say right now that the way to overcome it is not by means of a hit or miss policy such as has been adopted in the past with regard to cost of production, but by trying to give the producer a reasonable rate of return. If the producer had $3 a hundred-and that is not an exorbitant price when you consider that fluid milk sells at $4.80 or thereabouts-he would be reasonably happy.
The net return to farmers in the area from which I come was $2.73 a hundred, and on the basis of this dairy herd improvement plan which has been in operation for 10 years the cost of producing the milk was $3.06 a hundred. I do not believe any man, and particularly any man in the dairy industry, would consider that only 2 per cent of overall surplus production cannot be controlled in order to give the producers a fair return.
As far as sheep are concerned I do not want to be personal. There is only one man I know of who made money out of sheep in this country, and that was the gentleman from Alberta who had the good fortune to have disease in his flock and got $150 a head for them. I have sold quite a few at four cents to eleven cents a pound in the last five years

in the Montreal market, average weights 125 to 150 pounds; lambs from 17 cents to 22 cents. So this still gives me the idea that if you are a good friend of certain people you are certainly well compensated for your crop.


James Garfield Gardiner: I wonder if the hon. member remembers the statement he made the last time he and I were on the same platform?


Osie F. Villeneuve: Yes, at the end I said I made a little mistake in reading figures. But I will tell you more about cheese. In ten years you have given the cheese industry of Canada under the price support act $155,348.82. You gave one farmer $150 a head for losing his sheep, which was ten times more than the market value, at least.


James Garfield Gardiner: Nobody who knows anything about it agrees with you, but that does not matter. Go right along.


Osie F. Villeneuve: Just a minute, and I will tell you something. In 1952 when the foot-and-mouth disease broke out the province of Ontario came to the rescue of the producers and particularly the cheese industry. It provided $293,000 out of the treasury. This was money that had not been voted. It was given in the form of price supports such as we have here. This had to be taken from the provincial department of agriculture. That is the treatment the cheese producers received under you, as minister of agriculture.


James Garfield Gardiner: Tell them what we did the night we went down with you.


Osie F. Villeneuve: Yes, I know one thing you did. The floor price was around 25 cents on cheese and there was no sale for it. The next morning you and the then hon. member for Stormont (Mr. Chevrier) made an announcement. I think he persuaded you to do it because he knew the temperament of the producers and the feeling that prevailed that night. You gave us a 30-cent guarantee.


James Garfield Gardiner: We did no such thing. We bought 500,000 pounds of cheese at 30 cents.


Hazen Robert Argue: What about your present Minister of Agriculture?


Osie F. Villeneuve: It is
quite easy to criticize and that is our privilege in a democracy. On the other hand I am the first one to admit that this problem is not an easy one to solve and I will say this. Though I may have strong differences of opinion with the hon. member for Melville I readily recognize that he is a man with an iron-clad constitution because he has 96698-219
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization been able to hold the portfolio of minister of agriculture of this country for 22 years. I will admit that.
My hon. friends opposite have offered a lot of remedies for the present agricultural situation but they have not come out with any constructive criticism or suggestion with regard to the bill before us. As I stated previously, I have every confidence that the farmers and producers will receive a fair deal under this legislation because it has a ten-year basis even with respect to dairy products. Subclause 2 of clause 2 of the bill reads as follows:
(2) In prescribing a percentage of the base price of an agricultural commodity under subparagraph (i) or (ii) of paragraph (e) of subsection (1). the governor in council shall have regard to the estimated average cost of production of the commodity, and such other factors as the governor in council considers to be relevant.
The advisory committee will be composed of from six to nine members representing farm organizations and commodity groups across this land. These people will be in contact with producers at all times. I am firmly convinced that we have every reason to expect this bill, if intelligently applied, will be the most advanced piece of farm legislation to have been enacted by this house in the past 25 years.


Mr. H. A. Bryson (Humboldl-Melfort):: Mr. Speaker, I am very happy to have this opportunity of supporting the amendment moved by my colleague, the hon. member for Moose Mountain (Mr. McCullough) to the effect that this legislation should be referred to the committee of this house on agriculture and colonization. However, before dealing with the measure before us this evening I should like to comment briefly on one or two of the statements that were made in this house this evening by hon. members opposite. I should like to refer in the first instance to the speech made by the hon. member for Melville (Mr. Gardiner). I have always had a great deal of admiration for the debating ability of the hon. member for Melville when he hits above the belt but the personal attack that we heard him make this evening against the hon. member for Springfield (Mr. Schulz), employing tactics of smear and innuendo, represents the kind of intimidation for which the hon. member is so well known. That is the reason why we in the province of Saskatchewan grew so tired of the hon. member's personal vendettas and kicked him and his government out in 1944 and the Liberal party in that province has been as dead as Nebuchadnezzar's aunt ever since.


James Garfield Gardiner: Mr. Speaker, may I point out that the hon. gentleman has forgotten his
3452	HOUSE OF
Agricultural Products-Price Stabilization history. The last time I contested an election in Saskatchewan as leader of the Liberal party we defeated every candidate who ran in the coalition government party including every member of the government.


Alfred Claude Ellis: You control the machine out there along with everything else.


Hugh Alexander Bryson: Mr. Speaker, the blame for the defeat of the Liberal party in the last federal election can in large measure be laid on the doorstep of the hon. member for Melville in so far as the defeat of western Liberal candidates is concerned. It is all very well for him to stand here under the protection of this house and make the attack he did this evening on the hon. member for Springfield but I challenge him to go out and stand on a platform anywhere in western Canada before an audience of farmers and make the kind of attack we heard him launch this evening.


James Garfield Gardiner: I made no attack. I simply read what the hon. member said himself. That is all.
On motion of Mr. Bryson the debate was adjourned.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Lionel Chevrier: Mr. Speaker, may I ask the house leader what the business is for tomorrow?


Howard Charles Green: Mr. Speaker, we shall continue with this debate and then, if it should be concluded, we will go on with the estimates of the Department of Citizenship and Immigration and the Department of Trade and Commerce.


[Stage Direction]
At ten o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to the order of the house passed on December 2, 1957.