1959-04-21

Right Hon. J. G. Diefenbaker (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, the Leader of the Opposition requested a few days ago and again yesterday that I should outline the main items which the government intends to introduce during the present session. I would say that in addition to the items which are already on the order paper the following will be introduced: the bill of rights, a bill to amend the Unemployment Insurance Act, a bill to establish a national energy board, a bill to amend the Export Credits Insurance Act, a bill to provide additional grants to the province of Newfoundland, an amendment to the Bretton Woods Agreements Act; bills respecting the superannuation of members of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and members of the Canadian forces; a bill to amend the Combines Investigation Act, and a bill to bring in certain amendments to the Criminal Code.
In the field of agriculture, amendments will be introduced to assist the provinces in implementing crop insurance, as well as a bill to extend and improve farm credit facilities, and a bill to allow veteran farmers to take greater advantage of modern agricultural practices will be introduced by way of amendment to the Veterans Land Act.
In addition there will be, of course, the budget legislation and the usual measure respecting the financing of the Canadian National Railways. Consideration is also being given to certain other measures of lesser importance. It is probable that some of these may be introduced before the end of this session. However, if any change is made in this regard ample notice will be given to members of the house.


Hon. L. B. Pearson (Leader of the Opposition):: In thanking the Prime Minister for the information he has just given, I take it that the order in which he has mentioned these bills is no indication of the order in which they are to be introduced into the House of Commons?


John George Diefenbaker: No, we are not following that order. I am glad the Leader of the Opposition asked that question.


Lester Bowles Pearson: In that case I merely express the hope that the Prime Minister and the house leader will put these bills on the order paper in ample time to give us on the opposition side time to study them, because they include some very important pieces of legislation.


Mr. Hazen Argue (Assiniboia):: This is a very heavy and exhaustive program which the Prime Minister has outlined, and I hope the legislation can be placed on the order paper as quickly as possible, since it seems, clear that the major part of the business of this session has yet to be done. If the session is not to be of very great duration it will certainly be necessary for hon. members to have this legislation before them as quickly as possible.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, in that connection I am sure all of us are very desirous of assuring that the business of the house will be placed on the order paper and then brought before the house at the earliest possible date.



COMMONWEALTH RELATIONS


John George Diefenbaker: There is another announcement I should like to make, Mr. Speaker. A corresponding statement was made at 4 p.m. Greenwich mean time in London today. It has to do with the composition of the commonwealth economic consultative council. It will be recalled that by decision reached at the commonwealth trade and economic conference in Montreal last September regarding commonwealth consultation on trade and economic matters there was a statement in the conference report which read in part, as follows:
Commonwealth consultation and co-operation in economic matters are of primary importance in achieving our objectives in the economic field. We are agreed that the present machinery for consultation is working well; it is flexible and informal and well fitted to the family character of the commonwealth relationship. We decided that the existing arrangements should be co-ordinated under the name of a commonwealth economic consultative council.
2878	HOUSE OF
Commonwealth Relations
The conference also agreed that, at the highest level, the council would consist of the finance and economic ministers of the commonwealth countries meeting together whenever the circumstances demanded and that-in the words of the report-it would-[DOT]
[DOT]-incorporate various channels and bodies through which economic consultation at present takes place and any further bodies which may be set up from time to time on a temporary or permanent basis. Meetings at high official level will also be held as necessary to prepare for the meetings of ministers.
Since the Montreal conference there has been an exchange of views regarding the particular commonwealth bodies of officials that should be incorporated within the framework of the council. All commonwealth governments have now agreed that the council should be regarded as also incorporating meetings of senior commonwealth economic officials held to prepare for meetings of ministers, the commonwealth liaison committee, the commonwealth economic committee and meetings of commonwealth statisticians to consider the balance of payments of the sterling area. The inclusion of other commonwealth bodies through which economic consultation takes place will be considered from time to time as seems desirable.
I should emphasize in conclusion that what is being done is to incorporate existing bodies within a new framework rather than to create new bodies. To quote once again from the report of the Montreal conference:
Arrangements which are already extensive have served us well: there is no need to expand them, nor would we wish to change in any way their consultative character.
A meeting of senior economic officials representing commonwealth governments will be held in London starting on May 5, to exchange views on general trade and economic subjects. It is expected to last three or four days. While the composition of the Canadian delegation is not complete, I should advise the house that it will be led by the deputy minister of finance, Mr. K. W. Taylor.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Mr. Speaker, as the house knows, for a great many years now commonwealth ministers in charge of financial and economic matters have been meeting periodically, as have other commonwealth officials in these fields. Various commonwealth economic and other committees were established years ago and have been functioning for many years.
I think of the imperial economic committee, which has been more lately called the commonwealth economic committee, the imperial shipping committees, and others. I gather


from the Prime Minister that no new machinery is being created, but that an effort is being made to co-ordinate and consolidate existing committees.
In so far as this proposal will serve to accomplish that purpose I think it is to be welcomed, but I do not think we should attach too great importance to the fact that this decision has been taken and has been implemented, because commonwealth economic consultation and co-ordination is going on effectively now and has been for a good many years.


Hazen Robert Argue: Any move to streamline any consultation is probably a good thing and certainly welcome as far as we are concerned. I would think that cooperation and consultation amongst commonwealth countries are much more essential now than they have been in the past. Particularly in the field of trade, the commonwealth, Canada included, faces the challenge of the European common market as well as the challenge of the Soviet union. With those great economic challenges facing us at this time, anything that can be done to streamline our methods of consultation and bring about new policies is more than welcome.



ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Frank Howard (Skeena):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Justice. I took occasion to send him notice, and I hope he has received it. Can the minister give the house any detailed information regarding a news item in this morning's Globe and Mail which reports that a guard at Kingston penitentiary has been arrested for possession of narcotics? Can the minister indicate whether there is any evidence that would point to a so-called drug ring operating among the staff of that institution?


Hon. E. D. Fulion (Minister of Justice):: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the fact that the hon. member gave me notice of his intention to ask this question. One of the guards at Kingston penitentiary had been under suspicion of trafficking, and an investigation was carried out by members of the R.C.M.P. in collaboration with the warden. On the night of April 19-20 he was searched upon his arrival at the penitentiary, and was found to be in possession of capsules which have been subsequently analysed as containing heroin. He was placed under arrest and charged under the Opium and Narcotic Drug

Act. He appeared before the local magistrate in Kingston on April 20 and was remanded until April 28.
From information so far available this appears to be an isolated case of trafficking, but the matter is still under investigation by the R.C.M. Police and the penitentiary authorities.


Frank Howard: May I ask a supplementary question. Would any of the inmates to whom those narcotics may have been directed also be subject to prosecution if they are in fact found in possession of the drug?


Edmund Davie Fulton: Mr. Speaker, that question is a bit hypothetical. All I can say is that the investigation is continuing, and if there is illegal possession established I would assume that further charges would be laid.



ATOMIC ENERGY


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Lester Bowles Pearson: Mr. Speaker, the other day a question was asked of the Minister of National Defence which he said would be more properly one for external affairs. May I ask the Prime Minister as Acting Secretary of State for External Affairs whether Canada was invited to participate in the Anglo-American talks which are now going on in London on co-operation in the use of atomic energy for mutual defence purposes?


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, in answer to the Leader of the Opposition I may say that the meeting in London is one between officials of the United States and the United Kingdom governments within the terms of the bilateral agreement for co-operation on the uses of atomic energy for mutual defence purposes signed between those two countries on July 3 of last year. Therefore the question of Canadian participation in that meeting, involving as it does the relations between the two countries named, does not arise.


Lester Bowles Pearson: May I ask a supplementary question. Is it the intention of the government to seek the same kind of bilateral agreement with the United States which the United Kingdom now has?


John George Diefenbaker: As the Leader of the Opposition knows, there already is an agreement with the United States for co-operation regarding atomic energy information for mutual defence purposes, which was signed on June 15, 1955. The question of negotiating a further 66968-9-183
Inquiries of the Ministry agreement modifying the 1955 agreement to take advantage of the amendments passed by the United States congress last July is now under consideration. As the hon. member knows, in the agreement between the United Kingdom and the United States there is, among others, the following provision:
Each party will communicate to or exchange with the other party such classified information as is jointly determined to be necessary to:
1.	the development of defence plans;
2.	the training of personnel in the employment of and defence against atomic weapons and other military applications of atomic energy;
3.	the evaluation of the capabilities of potential enemies in the employment of atomic weapons and other military applications of atomic energy;
4.	the development of delivery systems compatible with the atomic weapons which they carry; and
5.	research, development and design of military reactors to the extent and by such means as may be agreed.
I have quoted from the agreement between the United Kingdom and the United States, and I think the observations I made with respect to the Canadian position in this regard will be very clear to the hon. gentleman.



HOUSING


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Hubert Badanai (Fort William):: I have a question for the Minister of Public Works. Has any meeting been held or has any meeting been called of Canadian trust companies by the minister or by Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation for the purpose of inducing participation in mortgage lending? If so, will the minister give a report?


Hon. Howard C. Green (Minister of Public Works):: No, Mr. Speaker, there has been no such meeting held or called. We have had very good co-operation from the various lending institutions.



CANADIAN NATIONAL RAILWAYS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. D. M. Fisher (Port Arthur):: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Labour. In view of the approaching strike deadline of May 1, has he any information on what role his department is playing or will be called upon to play in the negotiations between the Canadian National Railways and the firemen's union?


Hon. Michael Starr (Minister of Labour):: Mr. Speaker, the facilities of the Department of Labour will be available when an opportunity arises for intervention.

Inquiries of the Ministry


Douglas Mason Fisher: I have a supplementary question for the Minister of Transport. In view of the deadline of May 1, and the arrangement for the president of the C.N.R. to appear before a house committee on April 28, is any consideration being given to changing the date of that committee meeting to after May 1?


Hon. George H. Hees (Minister of Transport):: No, Mr. Speaker.



IMMIGRATION


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. G. J. Mcllraith (Ottawa West):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration whether she has any comment on the insinuation in the Toronto Telegram of April 16 that she and her colleagues did not understand the meaning of the recent change in the immigration regulations made by the order in council of March 19, 1959?


Hon. Ellen L. Fairclough (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration):: No, Mr. Speaker; no comment.
(Translation):



TELEVISION


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Azellus Denis (St. Denis):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Finance. Is there any truth in the many spot television announcements that the Minister of Finance will attempt to defend his budget tonight? If so, who will be paying for those advertisements?


Hon. Donald M. Fleming (Minister of Finance):: Mr. Speaker, I was asked by the C.B.C. to appear on television tonight at 10.30, and I hope I shall have the pleasure of counting my hon. friend among my listeners. He would do well to tune in on that program.


Azellus Denis: May I ask another question? Does the Minister of Finance intend to blame the Liberal party for his maladministration?


Donald Methuen Fleming: The administration is good. My hon. friend might well envy the present administration.

(Text):



NATIONAL DEFENCE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hubert Badanai: I have a question I should like to direct to the Minister of Defence Production. Is it a fact that photographers are prevented, on the grounds of military security, from taking pictures of welders destroying six partly finished Arrow interceptors?


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The same question was asked yesterday, I think of the Minister of National Defence. I am not sure whether or not it was answered.


Lester Bowles Pearson: No, it was not.


Hon. Raymond O'Hurley (Minister of Defence Production):: In reply to the question yesterday the Minister of National Defence answered that he had no knowledge of the subject. I wish to state that, as all hon. members will recall, the CF-105 program was cancelled and my department has been proceeding with the termination of this program. At the moment no aircraft are being dismantled. We have four complete CF-105's, and they are not being touched for the time being. A fifth aircraft was damaged and was being repaired at the time of the cancellation. Five others were in different stages of production. No work has been done in connection with dismantling these aircraft.
However, all aircraft that were in production had the Hughes MA-1 fire control system installed, and this is classified as a secret component of the aircraft. These systems are being taken out of the aircrafts, and for this reason my department has judged that no photographs should be taken while this work is in progress.



INDUSTRY


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hazen Robert Argue: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Labour arising out of a statement reported in this morning's Montreal Gazette to the effect that there would be serious damage to the Canadian car industry if small cars were to be made in the United States and not in Canada. Can the minister say what study the government is giving to the submissions made to them yesterday by the united automobile workers, and particularly can the minister say whether a conference of government, management and labour will be held to discuss this very important question?
[Mr. Starr.)


Michael Starr: Very serious study is being given to all aspects of this situation.


Hazen Robert Argue: As a supplementary question, can the minister inform the house whether the government has already discussed or intends to discuss with the management of these automobile companies the possibility of their going into the small car manufacturing business in this country?


Michael Starr: That is one of the things that is being given serious consideration.


Hazen Robert Argue: Can the minister say whether any discussion has taken place between the government and the companies?


Michael Starr: No, Mr. Speaker.
(Translation) :



NATIONAL ANTHEM


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Azellus Denis: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Solicitor General? Has the minister inquired by now into the statements made by the Ministers of National Revenue (Mr. Nowlan) and of Citizenship and Immigration (Mrs. Fairclough), regarding the national anthem of Canada? If so, does he share their opinion; if not, does he intend to resign as minister?
(Text):


Mr. Speaker:: I am sure the hon. gentleman did not put that question with the expectation of receiving an answer. He is asking one minister about opinions expressed by a couple of other ministers, not necessarily within the scope of their administrative responsibilities.



LABOUR CONDITIONS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. J. W. Pickersgill (Bonavisla-Twil-lingate):: I should like to ask the Minister of Labour a question arising out of the very disappointing press release on the employment situation which was issued today. Could the minister give any explanation to the house as to why the labour force has shrunk, according to this statement, by 7,000 between February and March, whereas in the last five years there has been an increase in that month of about 22,000? I refer to the total labour force. At the same time, could the minister give any explanation for the rise of over 4,000 in the number of registrations at the national employment offices?
66968-9-183J
Inquiries of the Ministry


Michael Starr: Mr. Speaker, in answer to the hon. member for Bonavista-Twillingate I can well imagine why he is disappointed because there is a drop in unemployment. At the same time, his question as to the decrease in the labour force puzzled me, so I have made inquiries and have been informed that this sort of thing happens once in a while. In September the same situation occurred. As far as can be ascertained, in the province of Quebec in March approximately 7,000 women withdrew from the labour force. We can only assume that their husbands were able to get jobs and they went back to their homes. In the same province 3,000 men withdrew from the labour force, particularly from the woods industry, and in the main they were farmers who wanted to go back to their farms and work them, feeling that they had made enough money during the winter months.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Perhaps, Mr. Speaker, the minister did not hear the second part of my question, which asked for an explanation of the additional 4,000 registrations in the employment offices, which seems to suggest, as these are actual figures, that unemployment has increased.


Michael Starr: Mr. Speaker, in the months of February and March there was a week or two where there was a slight increase, but in the main there has been a continual drop in the registrations. At the moment the registrations are 78,000 fewer than they were at the same time last year.



PUBLIC SERVICE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Frank Howard: I would like to ask a question of the Secretary of State. On March 13 last I asked the minister whether his attention had been drawn to a newspaper article to the effect that strife and intrigue are being created in the selection of federal government employees through the actions of officials in various departments, and whether he could make any comment about that report. His answer at that time was that he had not seen the report but would check and answer later. I wonder if the minister now, a month later, is in position to answer.


Hon. Henri Courlemanche (Secretary of Stale):: Mr. Speaker, I am not in a position today to make any comment.
2882	HOUSE OF
Inquiries of the Ministry BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE



INQUIRY AS TO SETTING UP OP RADIO COMMITTEE

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Lester Bowles Pearson: Mr. Speaker, I would like to direct a question to the Minister of National Revenue. In view of the undertaking given by the minister to the house last session that a committee on broadcasting would be set up shortly after the beginning of this session, which was in January, would the minister now make the necessary arrangements so this committee can begin sitting at the earliest possible moment?


Hon. George C. Nowlan (Minisier of National Revenue):: Mr. Speaker, arrangements will be made for the convening of this committee at the earliest possible moment.


John Whitney Pickersgill: A supplementary question, sir. Does the minister regard this as a promise made to parliament?


George Clyde Nowlan: Yes, I regard this as a promise made to parliament; therefore I am considering it in that way and not as a distinguished Liberal minister once said of Liberal platforms, that like railway car platforms, they were things with which to get in on.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Would the minister indicate what he considers to be shortly after the beginning of the session in January?


George Clyde Nowlan: The reason this committee has not been convened earlier is that hon. members on all sides of the house, including those hon. members beside and behind the Leader of the Opposition, asked that we should not convene this committee until some of the pressure was taken off committee work.


John Whitney Pickersgill: In the absence of the hon. member for Laurier (Mr. Chevrier) I rise on a question of privilege to recall to the mind of the minister that the hon. member for Laurier repeatedly asked to have this committee convened early in the session.



FINANCE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. G. R. Pearkes (Minisier of Naiional Defence):: Mr. Speaker, yesterday the hon. member for Kootenay West asked if a loan had been made by the crown for a curling rink at H.M.C.S. Carleton. The answer is that no such loan has been made. However, the building is on national defence property and is leased to the curling club.



POLYMER CORPORATION


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hazen Robert Argue: I would
like to direct a question to the Minister of Labour in connection with the appointment of a mediator in the Polymer dispute. My question arises out of concern expressed by employees of the corporation as to whether a person from within the Department of Labour may be subject to political pressure when endeavouring to mediate in a dispute involving a crown corporation. I would like to ask whether any consideration was given to the appointment of a mediator from outside the government service, and can the minister give the employees any assurance that the mediator will act in an impartial manner?


Michael Starr: Mr. Speaker, we endeavoured to get an outside mediator. The person we had in mind unfortunately was unable to accept this nomination. We then took the best man we had, who is stationed in Toronto and has had a great deal of experience, with a good many years spent in this type of work; and I can assure the hon. member that in my department there have been no political pressures in connection with this dispute.



THE BUDGET


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed, from Monday, April 20, consideration of the motion of Hon. Donald M. Fleming (Minister of Finance) that Mr. Speaker do now leave the chair for the house to go into committee of ways and means, and the amendment thereto of Mr. Benidickson.
Mr. Lucien Cardin (Richelieu-Vercheres):: Mr. Speaker, before I go on with my speech which I started last evening I would like to offer my apologies to the hon. member for Halifax (Mr. Morris). I had no opportunity of correcting the proofs of my speech last night, and this morning, to my dismay, I found that Hansard had quoted me as referring to the hon. gentleman as "the shorter member for Halifax". May I assure the hon. member that I certainly had no intention of referring to him in that way. I thought I had referred to him, and I am morally certain I did, as "the hon. member for Halifax".


Mr. Morris:: Mr. Speaker, may I rise on a point of order. I thank the hon. member for his apology, but that is precisely the definition I would prefer. We have no junior or senior member.


Louis-Joseph-Lucien Cardin: In those circumstances, Mr. Speaker, I shall withdraw the apology.
Mr. Speaker, one of the points I was attempting to make last evening was that in its defence of the budget the government is begging the question when it claims that under the circumstances it had no alternative but to have a large deficit. What the Liberal opposition has been saying is that the government has created, and indeed is responsible for, the circumstances in which the government now finds itself. If Canada is burdened with a record deficit and increased taxation it is because the government, in order to save face, has attempted to implement a fraction of the exaggerated promises and commitments which it made during the election campaign, and which the Canadian economy simply could not afford at this time. So I think it is quite clear that the deficit is attributable to the political expediency, to the opportunism, to the lack of wisdom and to the lack of administrative responsibility shown by this government.
When the house rose last evening I was saying that as we look at the deficit, and as we prepare to pay additional taxes, we might well ask ourselves what the government has returned to the people which might explain or justify this huge deficit, and what the government has to show in return for this record peacetime expenditure. Immediately, of course, the members of the government point to the increase in the old age pension, as did the Minister of National Revenue the other evening. In his remarks the minister referred to the increase in the old age pension from $40 to $46 made by the Liberal government as representing two cups of coffee, a slogan which was very widely used during the electoral campaign of 1957. What the minister did not say was that Canada could afford the two cups of coffee at that time, whereas the three cups of coffee which this government has offered in this $9 increase in old age pensions have created a deficit of $184 million in the pension fund which must be paid out of consolidated revenue, and which has necessitated a permanent increase in the special sales tax and income tax earmarked for that purpose.
That is not increasing social legislation, reducing taxes and balancing the budget. Desirable though it may have been to increase old age pensions, this government stands condemned not only for having misled the Canadian people with regard to the economic possibility of an increase in pensions at that time but for having, by its extravagance and ill-timed spending, added to the inflationary tendencies of our economy and detracted from the purchasing power of that very same $9 which was given to help out our senior
The Budget-Mr. Cardin citizens. As a matter of fact the three cups of coffee represented by the $9 increase have now been reduced to only two cups because of the increase in the cost of living.
Can we say that the money involved in the government's deficit has been used in order to stabilize our economy? Where, in fact, is the special billion dollar public works program which the Conservatives claimed would solve the unemployment problem? There is not one indication either in the estimates or in the budget speech that the government has embarked on what is designed to be, or what has turned out to be, a truly visionary program. On the other hand there are indications that unemployment is still rampant in the country and running at an uncomfortably high level for this time of year. We know, of course, that the moneys in the unemployment insurance fund are still below the critical point, yet there is not indication whatsoever of any legislation with regard to unemployment such as was promised in the speech from the throne at the beginning of this session. Can anyone say that our economy is in any way more stable now than it was in 1957?
Similarly, it cannot be claimed that government expenditure has been directed at solving the federal-provincial fiscal problem in such a way that both the provinces and the municipalities would have adequate tax revenues to enable them to meet their constitutional responsibilities. This, again, was promised by the Conservative government.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. If the hon. member would permit me to interrupt him, I would ask for a little more co-operation from the house. I think the hon. member is having difficulty in making himself heard in the face of so much competition.


Louis-Joseph-Lucien Cardin: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think it would be very interesting to take a good look at page 2410 of Hansard, where hon. members will find a table headed "federal contributions to the provinces". This is the table to which the Minister of National Revenue referred at page 2628 of Hansard, where he said:
My time is running out but we find that in the 1956-57 fiscal year-just two years ago-the total contribution made two years ago by the treasury of this country, by the minister of finance, by my hon. friend's predecessor, was $689 million. That was the last payment made by the immediate predecessor of my hon. friend. According to the budget which the present Minister of Finance has brought down, for which he is criticized for imposing higher taxes, for which he is criticized because it still has a deficit, which is the situation? According to those figures, for the fiscal year which will end next March 31 the total contributions to the province will be $1,212,500,000, virtually twice the $689 million which was paid three years ago.

The Budget-Mr. Cardin
Evidently in saying this the minister was trying to create the impression that the Conservatives had doubled the federal contributions to the provinces. But he forgot to mention that in arriving at that conclusion he had to include the increases which were made by the Liberal government in the budget of 1957-58 brought down by Mr. Walter Harris. It is not true that the last contribution made to the provinces by the Liberal government was of the order of $689 million, because in the budget of 1957-58 the federal contribution to the provinces was considerably increased.
May I remind hon. members that when the Minister of National Revenue was making this statement he was making it in the House of Commons; he was not making it on a political platform during a political campaign. It would be interesting to hear what Conservative members of the house have to say about the fact that the tax rental agreements and the tax abatements made to the provinces are considered by this government as federal contributions to the provinces, though we, as Liberals, have always acknowledged and recognized that the moneys obtained by the provinces either through the rental of their direct taxing powers or through the abatements applied to the provinces were not a federal contribution but were a direct constitutional right and prerogative of the provinces.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Hear, hear.


Louis-Joseph-Lucien Cardin: If the Conservative members in this house, particularly those from the province of Quebec, who have waxed so eloquent in the past about the necessity for preserving provincial rights and autonomy, do not get up in their places and accuse this government of a most insidious attack on provincial rights, it will be another conclusive proof that provincial rights and provincial autonomy have been used in the province of Quebec as a political warhorse and for political purposes only, and that in spite of the indignant speeches we have heard from these hon. members during election campaigns in the past they have lacked either the courage or the interest to get up and defend their province against a serious and really dangerous infringement of a fundamental constitutional right.
Perhaps, Mr. Speaker, the deficit could be explained on the grounds of a substantial increase in government expenditure in the field of national defence. Here again it should be noted that there is nothing in our national defence policy that warrants the expenditure of $617 million. The government, as we all know, has spent every last cent of the $211,800,000 in the special defence

equipment fund, which if it had not existed would have boosted our national deficit to well over $800 million.
It has been our national defence policy in the past for Canada to participate to the fullest extent it could in maintaining peace either through the medium of the United Nations or through NATO. We have in fact sent Canadian troops to Korea, and we have stationed troops in the Middle East and in Europe in order to prevent aggressive attacks from the U.S.S.R. At a time when it is well known that the dangerous, critical and strategic area is no longer Korea or Europe but indeed is the North American continent; when it is further realized that Canada has virtually become the forefield of United States defence and that in the event of war between the United States and the U.S.S.R. Canada would likely be the battleground of that war and at a time when the security of our very soil is being threatened as never before in the past, this government to all appearances does not seem willing to do as much for the defence of our own land as Canada did in the past for the defence of other lands which were in danger of aggression.
Under this government we have seen a cutback in our militia. Even though experts many times in the past have told us that the best protection against thermonuclear warfare is civil defence, it has not been possible for many months to obtain a report on civil defence so we might know what is or is not being done in this field. We have seen the last CF-100 come oft the assembly lines. We have witnessed the discontinuance of the production in Canada of the Astra control system. We are no longer producing the Canadian Sparrow. We stood by and watched the aerial defence of Canada turned over to the United States. We have discontinued the production of the Canadian Arrow and replaced it with the United States Bomarc because it was cheaper, though everyone knows that by the time our armed forces are equipped with the Bomarc it will be as obsolete as the Arrow would have been.
Just the other evening the hon. member for Quebec South, for whose judgment I have a great deal of respect, stated blandly on a television broadcast that the Sparrow was dropped in order that the government might economize. I have nothing against economizing, but the crippling of our national defence industry and the increasing of unemployment are not my idea of sensible economizing. It would appear that the government has not only placed our national defence policy on a bargain basis, but it does not seem to be willing to pull its own weight in the mutual

defence agreements we have with the United States for the defence of the North American continent. There is no other interpretation to be placed on the fact that the government has nothing to replace either the CF-100 or the CF-105, the discontinuance of which leaves a terrible gap in the strength of our armed forces.
The fact that the government is allowing thousands of scientists, engineers, technicians and skilled labourers to leave our national defence industry is an indication that the government is not planning to continue to any extent the production of Canadian armament for Canadian defence. While we feel that such an attitude is a tremendous blow to the pride we justifiably felt during the war when Canadians were sailing Canadian ships, firing Canadian guns and flying Canadian planes, the government's attitude has struck an even more painful and serious blow to Canadian industry as a whole which was born of the determination and sacrifice of the Canadian people to meet the challenge of that former day with Canadian armaments and equipment, and which indeed resulted in the unprecedented prosperity Canadians have been enjoying until very recent times.
Today it appears that the government has based its national defence policy on a production sharing basis with the United States. Of course the Prime Minister has given us the assurance that Canada will get its fair share of national defence production. I must admit that I am a little sceptical with regard to the Prime Minister's verbal assurances when I recall the assurances he gave to the Canadian people in the autumn of 1957 to the effect that there was no unemployment, and the assurance he gave a little later that while he was Prime Minister not one Canadian would suffer from unemployment.
Several months have passed since the Prime Minister gave the assurance that Canada would receive its fair share of defence production, and as yet there is not one indication that Canada will in fact get its fair share of defence production from the United States. The existence in the United States of the buy American act, the existence in that country of 4,500,000 unemployed, and the fact that a large number of defence industries there are working only part time are causes for anxiety which outweigh the Prime Minister's verbal assurances.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. member, but his time has expired.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Mr. Speaker, having had the pleasure of sitting through the entire seven days of this debate I believe I may say that the speeches were obviously of two classes. There
The Budget-Hon. D. M. Fleming were those which had something kind to say about the budget, and the other half comprising those which did not have something kind to say about the budget. Throughout I have been literally a captive audience.
Having been on the receiving end for seven days I may be pardoned today if I perhaps seek to reverse the role somewhat. I may comment, however, that I am deeply grateful to hon. members for the many kind things they have said in the course of this debate; I appreciate them very much indeed. If in my remarks today I do not dwell on speeches of that kind, I trust hon. members will realize that the time is limited for dealing with the other half of the speeches.
I may perhaps claim that in the course of the budget debate last year and this year I have learned to become somewhat philosophic and relaxed about that half of the speeches to which I should like now to address myself. A good many of these speeches, of course, have been read. I may be pardoned perhaps for suggesting that I think it would be a good thing if Professor Lamontagne would vary his style a little from speech to speech. A variation of that kind, rather than monotony, is a desirable thing in a ghost writer. There was one outstanding exception, of course, and that was the speech made by my good friend the hon. member for Essex East (Mr. Martin), who refreshed us all yesterday with his intervention in this debate, interspersed as it was with copious-or should I say "liberal"-statistics drawn from that unique source, the Martin bureau of statistics.
In summary, Mr. Speaker, after listening to the debate for these past seven days I may say, I hope not immodestly but out of conviction, that if I were bringing in a budget tonight it would be the same budget I had the honour to introduce in this house on the evening of April 9.
The house has before it, sir, an amendment introduced on behalf of the official opposition. It purports to ask the house to express regret that the government has shown bad faith. Mr. Speaker, it is interesting to examine this amendment and to search it from end to end for any statement of principle in regard to those matters that receive attention in it, namely taxes, expenditures, a balanced budget. What is the principle that the official opposition inserts in its amendment? What would it-


John Whitney Pickersgill: That politicians should carry out their promises.


Donald Methuen Fleming: -introduce by way of a budget, Mr. Speaker? What would be the guiding principle or policy of its budget if it were in a position to bring one in? Mr. Speaker, you can read this amendment a thousand times, and you will know just

as much at the end as to what was in the minds of hon. members opposite as when you began. There is no policy. They have not ventured to say where they stand on questions of taxes, or expenditures, or balancing of the budget. Therefore we are entitled to say to them at this time, when they have had the opportunity given to them under the rules of this house to state their policy, to state their position, to give the features of the budget they would have introduced: what would they have done had they been bringing in the budget? Rather the theme on the part of hon. members opposite has been that the people should not have elected the government. From member after member we have heard them deliver reproaches upon the electorate. Now, Mr. Speaker, it is well that we should have an understanding of some features of this democratic system of ours. Hon. members opposite had better learn soon that the people, the sovereign people, are supreme in this country, and it will reflect no credit upon the opposition to exert themselves to deliver reproaches upon the people of this country for their decision.
And so, Mr. Speaker, we have listened on the part of hon. members opposite to a series of what might be called hit and run speeches, because they have run right away from anything approaching a statement of their position on those important issues confronting the Canadian people. They have run away from reality; they have expressed no concern over such matters as inflation and other major problems.
I do not wish to overlook any hon. members opposite. In the course of this debate I think we have seen on the part of the C.C.F. group the same willingness to go blithely along proposing measures regardless of whether they would destroy initiative and enterprise, or whether they would harm the economy. It has been the old picture of pie in the sky, a sky full of pie, and pie that never has to be paid for.
Well, so much for them. As for the official opposition, Mr. Speaker, they have floundered in their own pretences; they have thought apparently they could somehow skate through eight days of debate without ever exposing their own views on those important questions. One of them said I had to walk a tight rope in this debate. Mr. Speaker, I may have had some difficulties to deal with in framing this budget, but believe me the tight rope walking in this debate has been done by hon. members opposite. Indeed, sir, in the way they have threaded their way around and away from those important issues they have, I suppose, earned for themselves the title of "the pick and choose company".

Now, evidently having no policy of their own to offer, I do not blame them for whatever they wish to say about us in the light of what we may have said on other occasions. But, Mr. Speaker, that is a far cry from what has been done by hon. members opposite with statements made in the past by members of the government and others who are sitting to your right. We have watched them in this debate wrench statements out of their context, twist them out of all resemblance, divorce them from the time and circumstances related to them, while they have not said anything about their own past statements. Perhaps, Mr. Speaker, I may be forgiven if today I seek to remind them of some of the things they have said in times past and undoubtedly would like to forget today.
There is one feature, Mr. Speaker, that stands out above all others in the attitude of the official opposition in this debate. It is this, Mr. Speaker, and it is a sad fact. The Liberal party, as represented by its speeches in this house, is today at odds with the Canadian people. The partisan interests of the Liberal party have been demonstrated to be at variance with the real interests of the Canadian people. They have spread gloom; they have breathed pessimism. They are happy only when they can revel in what is bad news for the Canadian people. When we have talked about expansion, prosperity, more jobs, their treatment has been cold water, cynicism and scorn. They do not want good news, so they go on talking about the difficulties.
There are difficulties but, Mr. Speaker, they do not need to be exaggerated, and it is no credit to hon. members opposite to have gone on in this way spreading gloom, magnifying, exaggerating, trumpeting abroad every difficulty they can conjure up. This presents real danger to the future of the Liberal party. May I say, Mr. Speaker, as a believer in the two party system, that I view this situation with very deep concern.
There have been certain criticisms in which hon. members opposite have indulged in the course of this debate, and while they are not serious I think, having introduced this budget, I should deal with them as far as time permits.
I am told first of all, Mr. Speaker, that my forecast is too optimistic. I forecast a 7 per cent increase in the gross national product over the 1958 record figure. Mr. Speaker, I put that figure forward having weighed it well; I put it forward on a solid basis, and anything that has happened in the 10 days since that figure was put before the house has gone to confirm that prognostication.
In the United States in this period respectable forecasters have come forward with

estimates that the gross national product in the United States will increase this year by between 10 and 12 per cent. We have seen in Canada in the same period a most extraordinary expansion of commercial loans. Mr. Speaker, the commercial loans in Canada amounted to $100 million last week, just about double the normal rate for this period of the year. I do not say that is going to continue at this extraordinary pace every week, but those factors are of a very great importance.


George James McIlraith: Will the minister permit a question?


Donald Methuen Fleming: I am sorry; I will not have time to answer questions in the limited time at my disposal, unless my hon. friend will wait to the end.


Lester Bowles Pearson: The minister can have all the time he needs.


Donald Methuen Fleming: I am satisfied that the forecast which I made of that 7 per cent increase is fully justified; and I am sure of this-and this I do not like to say, Mr. Speaker, or to find-that if this forecast is borne out in the event, the Liberals will be disappointed. They have shown that already. They will be happier, Mr. Speaker, if the recovery does not proceed as fast as I estimated in the budget speech. They do not even like to admit that there is any recovery in process. They do not want any good news. They do not want bright hopes for the Canadian economy. They prefer to dash cold water on Canadian hopes. This, Mr. Speaker, is the sorry state to which the once great Liberal party has fallen.
But when we are talking about forecasts let us go a little further in this review and test accuracy as reflected in previous figures. On June 17 last year I forecast a deficit of $648 million. As a result of further commitments undertaken later in the same session that figure was revised to $700 million. When the budget was presented to the house this year I was able to report a deficit of $616 million, and to draw the attention of the house to the fact that in our estimates of expenditures we were within two-thirds of one per cent of the amount they turned out to be. In connection with revenues, which are harder to estimate, we were in the event within 2J per cent of what the estimate had been. This combined estimate of revenues and expenditures, 1958-59, in the budget introduced on June 17, 1958, is throughout the whole post-war period, with the exception of one year, the budget which came closest to accuracy in the outcome.
Our hon. friends opposite were not very happy about this improvement in the deficit 66968-9-184
2L 1959
The Budget-Hon. D. M. Fleming position. They were deeply stirred by it, and they have done their best since to make it appear worse. Well, Mr. Speaker, on any test the result shows, first, accuracy in the estimating and, second, an improvement in conditions in Canada since last June even over and above the anticipated improvement on which we based our estimate in the budget of 1958.
Let us look now at the record of those who are complaining now that our estimates are too optimistic. I turn to what was said by hon. gentlemen opposite in the budget debate last year. I begin naturally with the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Pearson). Speaking on July 3 in the budget debate and dealing with my estimate of a deficit of $648 million he said, as found at page 1902 of Hansard, "the deficit will likely be over $1 billion." Again, as found on page 1903, he said, speaking of borrowings: "Approximately $1 billion is due to government deficit." Again two months later, speaking on September 4, he said, as found on page 4574 of Hansard:
Furthermore, the huge budgetary deficit announced by the minister, which may be greater than announced by him-
And further, as found on page 4583, the hon. member for Welland (Mr. McMillan) referred to a forecast by Mr. Harvey Perry, director of the Canadian tax foundation, and said that on the basis of that forecast that "our deficit would be close to $1 billion-we predicted it would go over $1 billion."
Well, Mr. Speaker, after the session the Leader of the Opposition heeded the ancient advice, "Go west, young man, go west," and west he went. He had some interesting things to say in the course of his western tour. The Winnipeg Free Press quotes him in its issue of October 6 as having said at Regina:
-"the deficit for the current year will be much greater" than the $700 million forecast by finance minister hon. Donald Fleming. . . . "My guess is that it will be close to $1 billion," Mr. Pearson said. "But that's just speculation."


Lester Bowles Pearson: So it was.


Donald Methuen Fleming: It certainly was just speculation, and pretty wild speculation at that. But he did not content himself with that. On he went, and we find that he spoke in Toronto and is reported in the Globe and Mail of November 12 as having said in the course of a speech to the Liberal businessmen's club of Toronto:
-we are now reaping the whirlwind of a billion dollar deficit.
The following day he participated in a byelection campaign in Trinity riding.


Lester Bowles Pearson: A very good one, too.


Donald Methuen Fleming: In an attempt to influence the result of that contest he is

The Budget-Hon. D. M. Fleming quoted in the Toronto Star of November 13 as having claimed "the Conservative government has a $1 billion deficit". At least in part on the strength of that misrepresentation, Mr. Speaker, his candidate won the election in that riding.


Lester Bowles Pearson: The people are sovereign.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Later my hon. friend went on indulging in the same forecasts. He is reported in the Ottawa Citizen of November 19 as saying the same old thing:
Prime Minister Diefenbaker sowed the wind of election promises and reaps the whirlwind in a billion dollar deficit.
And again:
There is a billion dollar deficit in a time of recession-
Well, Mr. Speaker, I made a speech in Toronto which hon. members opposite have chosen to quote very frequently since, and there I stated that in the light of the figures that were available at that time, the beginning of January, I did not think my estimate of the deficit would be very far out. But here we find the Leader of the Opposition, as late as March 16, saying in an address to the eastern Ontario young Liberals, as reported in the Ottawa Journal:
Opposition leader Pearson, in a blistering attack on the government, forecast a billion dollar deficit budget "within two or three weeks".
Now, Mr. Speaker, we do not know whether he was talking about the 1958-59 deficit there or 1959-60. The report must remain ambiguous on the point, but whichever way he takes it the Leader of the Opposition was hopelessly wrong in his attempts at estimating or even at speculating. I think hon. members of the house will be able to place their own estimate on the value of any of his prophecies or estimates with regard to the economy. Rather, I commend to hon. members opposite what was said by the Ottawa Citizen by way of editorial comment on April 9:
Those who, a few months ago, had forebodings that the federal government's 1958-59 deficit would approach the billion dollar mark should be glad that events have proved them unduly pessimistic. The figure as presented to the commons yesterday by Mr. Fleming, the Minister of Finance, is $617 million, which is even less than the minister himself had forecast ($648 million) when presenting his first full budget on June 17 last.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Explain your bookkeeping.


Donald Methuen Fleming: I commend to members of the opposition the views expressed in this editorial in the Ottawa Citizen, and I ask at the same time why they chose to exaggerate and misrepresent the deficit budgeted for in 1958-59. They know and they knew when they uttered those remarks that a billion dollar deficit would have done damage


to the Canadian economy, that it would have made our fiscal position much weaker and would have exaggerated our borrowing needs. For those who would listen to them, Mr. Speaker, the Liberals have brought on the Canadian economy by their talk all the harm that a billion dollar deficit would have brought upon it if they could have had their way.


Lester Bowles Pearson: That is a new excuse for failure.


Donald Methuen Fleming: They have adopted an irresponsible course, and they have convicted themselves.
They have also had something to say to us, if you please, about promises. I wish to deal with what has been said by them about promises. With respect to the subject of tax reduction in 1957, the Prime Minister and others associated with him in the campaign said that if the people would give the Prime Minister a mandate we would bring about a reduction in taxes. The people elected us and we carried out our promise. In December, 1957 the government introduced substantial reductions in taxation aggregating at that time $178 million, reductions that took various forms; increases in the exemptions for dependent children, reductions in the rates of taxation on those in the lowest income brackets, an increase in the portion of corporate income that is exempt in order to benefit small corporations. Hon. members opposite had a much better opportunity than we did to bring about reductions of this kind because times were better in 1955, 1956 and 1957.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


Donald Methuen Fleming: But even in the face of their opportunities they chose not to reduce taxes and we, grappling as we were with the difficult conditions they left us heir to, brought about reductions in taxation.
We had another election campaign in 1958. Already we were spending very heavily to combat a recession. In the campaign we did not make promises of general tax reductions under these circumstances. We pointed to several individual reductions which, if the people would re-elect us, we would bring about; and we did. This parliament was elected on March 31, 1958 and the promises on which the Conservatives were elected in the majority in this house have been carried out and will continue to be carried out.
In June of last year we proceeded to carry out those promises we had made that we would bring about certain individual reductions in taxation. We brought in a new estates tax act which reduced the tax on smaller estates. We reduced the sales taxes on purchases by municipalities and brought about a number of other individual reductions

which aggregated $26 million. Mr. Speaker, the aggregate of the reductions made in 1957 and 1958 totalled $202 million, under the circumstances then existing. But under the circumstances of today, in the light of conditions of today, the numbers of taxpayers, incomes and so on, these reductions have been estimated by my department to be worth not $202 million but $230 million per year.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Inflation.


Donald Methuen Fleming: I have said that that promise of ours was fulfilled. That promise was fulfilled to the letter.
I draw attention to the fact that again in this budget, Mr. Speaker, we have demonstrated, as we did in 1957 and 1958, the same concern for the man of small means, the small taxpayer and small businessman. The present budget removes from them much of the burden of the increases. Today we are showing that same concern for the person of small means. This has been accompanied, Mr. Speaker, by the largest program of aid to provinces, municipalities, hospital insurance, house construction, hospital construction, social security and aid to employment in the history of Canada. This is the answer to the double talk we have heard for years from hon. members opposite about the big interests. Our proven concern has been for the people of small means in this country.
Now, Mr. Speaker, they talk about reduced expenditures. Certainly before we came into office we inveighed against waste and extravagance and the expenses of government under the Liberal administration. We had reason for doing so. If we had been elected earlier unquestionably we could have saved this country money by eliminating waste and extravagance. In the 1957 campaign we asked the people for a mandate to increase social security expenditures and aid to the provinces and municipalities. We were given that mandate and we have carried out our promises. We never promised or pretended that these increases in social security could be carried out without somebody paying for them. In 1957-58 we had to work with the budget that had already been brought in by the Liberals, on the strength of which the spending programs of that year were already launched and commitments made before we came into office in late June, 1957.
In the 1958 campaign we promised the people that while continuing our social security program and proceeding with and hastening the introduction of hospital insurance programs and spending heavily and constructively to combat unemployment, we would continue to wage war against waste and extravagance. We have done so, and we shall continue to do so wherever we find 66968-9-184J
21. 1959
The Budget-Hon. D. M. Fleming them. The treasury board this year has been tighter and closer in its scrutiny of estimates than ever before. A lot of these things are not talked about in detail everywhere, but let there be no doubt about it; the treasury board today is doing an effective piece of work. There are not going to be any more printing bureau scandals; there are not going to be any more of these spring-filled dance floors. There is a tightening of the rein on expenditures.
When we are told about the expansion of the civil service, may I remind you that in bringing in the estimates for the present year, on February 5, I drew attention at page 706 of Hansard to these facts. I said:
Notwithstanding the increases of $42 million in salaries and wages and pay and allowances, there has been no appreciable expansion in the strength of the civil service of Canada or of the defence forces. While additional responsibilities have been assumed, the over-all increase in the size of the government establishment for 1959-60 will be only .4 per cent over 1958-59. This is the smallest annual growth shown since 1951. It demonstrates the government's continuing effort to increase efficiency and at the same time to economize on the use of staff.
It is appropriate that at this point I should ask hon. members opposite if they will be frank with the house and the Canadian people. Do you want to reduce old age pensions? Do you want to eliminate hospital insurance? Do you want to reduce or eliminate the expenditures we are making on housing, on public works, on our winter works program and other measures to combat unemployment? Would you deny the aid we are giving to the provinces and municipalities? I put on Hansard on the evening of April 9 table No. 1 which shows the rapidly increasing assistance we are giving to the provinces of this country. This table did not escape the attention of one Liberal journal in this country, and I should like to quote a sentence or two from an editorial appearing in the Saskatoon Star-Phoenix of April 17. I find this:
But the tax-sharing agreements aside, the provincial administrations have received from the federal treasury a good deal more financial assistance since the Conservatives took office. This fact is usually overlooked but Finance Minister Fleming brought it into prominence during his recent budget speech. He made public a most interesting table which, if nothing else, seems to prove the federal government has been quite generous with the 10 provincial governments, generally speaking.
There are further statements in that interesting editorial to the same effect. I commend it to the attention of hon. members opposite. So, Mr. Speaker, I ask hon. members opposite where they would reduce expenditures, if they say expenditures should be reduced? We are paying the provinces

The Budget-Hon. D. M. Fleming this year, as table 1 shows, as compared with last year, $148 million more in these various ways. Our responsibilities for social security and pensions of all kinds are increased in this budget over last year by another $148 million. Here is where the increases in 1959-60 estimated expenditures lie as compared with 1958-59.
You do not hear frank statements of that kind from hon. members opposite. So I say, Mr. Speaker, we have had from hon. members opposite, while they have been mouthing these phrases about reduced expenditures, not one word, not a single proposal, for taking one cent off the expenditures in this year's estimates. On the contrary, one of them has come forward with a proposal that would probably increase expenditures this year by substantially over $100 million.
They say something now about a balanced budget. I have something to say to them about that too, Mr. Speaker. We did not promise, when we went to the people, that we would balance the budget this year. We did not promise that we would balance the budget last year. A balanced budget, as such, was not even mentioned in the course of the 1958 election campaign. We were not elected on any promise or any platform that for last year or this year or any other particular year we would balance the budget. Nowhere in the 1958 campaign can any such assurance or promise on our part be found. I give that denial, to put it mildly, directly to the kind of nonsense and rot to which we have been listening from hon. members opposite in recent days.
Sir, we did hear something from the Liberals previously on this subject. Perhaps it is time, now, to turn to something interesting they have said. They talk to us in this amendment about deficit financing. Mr. Speaker, here are the words of the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Pearson) spoken in the house in the last budget debate as reported on page 1898 of Hansard for July 3:
Therefore it is not the deficit as such that we are criticizing, because deficits are required in the kind of situation we have in this country at the present time.
Mr. Speaker, that expression has never been withdrawn. Who are those who talk today about deficit financing? We had some other interesting comments which fell from the lips of the Leader of the Opposition in the course of the election campaign, and not once but several times. I recall to mind one in particular on February 10, 1958, when he said that the Liberals would bring about a tax reduction immediately of $400 million. That was followed up on March 21 in Toronto with a promise of a $100 million tax holiday. That is an aggregate of $500 million. This tax holiday
[Mr. Fleming (Eglinton) .1
is an interesting thing because the people were going to be given a tax holiday, if the Liberals were elected, right after the election, and when this brief tax holiday was over up would bound the same old rates of taxation again, like a bouncing rubber ball or my hon. friend the hon. member for Bonavista-Twil-lingate (Mr. Pickersgill).
Mr. Speaker, for hon. members opposite to charge us with bad faith when we made no such statement to the Canadian people in the election campaign is to indulge in the sort of thing they like to accuse others of, namely making false and misleading statements. I just point out in passing on this subject of deficits that if the Liberals, with their tax holiday and policy of deficit financing, had been in office and carried out their election promises, their deficit today for the fiscal year 1958-59 would be twice as much as ours was. Certainly it would have been well over a billion dollars and probably closer to one and a quarter billion dollars.
I see my time is running short, and I have not as much time as I would have wished to answer all the new attacks we have heard in this house with regard to certain forms of accounting. As regards the defence replacement account I have time only to say that this account has been in existence now for some years, actually nine years, and for eight of those years the Liberals did the budgeting. In seven of those eight years they provided drawdowns from the defence replacement account and they were used to improve their budget position. But there is a difference between the Liberal methods and ours. They did not tell the House of Commons what they were doing. We did. We told the House of Commons beforehand, expressly and frankly, that what we were doing was in the interest of better accounting to parliament. So we did what was right and proper and what we said we would do and what parliament last year approved. We have wiped out that defence replacement account.
They also complain about the old age security fund. How they have forgotten, Mr. Speaker, that the old age security fund was to be on a pay as you go basis. That was what the committee recommended in 1951. That was what Mr. Abbott brought before the house and is the system which came into effect on January 1, 1952. That is what the act calls for. It lays on the Minister of Finance the responsibility for making recommendations in this respect. Mr. Speaker, it has escaped the recollection of hon. members opposite, but what has happened in all these years? In 1951-52 the act was in force only three months and the deficit of $50 million was charged to general budgetary expenditure. In 1952-53 the deficit of $100 million was covered by

a temporary loan; it was not charged up against the budget of that year. That loan was written off as charged against the reserve for losses on realization of assets in 1953-54, and was not charged as a budgetary expenditure, and I will tell you why, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Abbott did not want that shown in his budget.
But hon. members opposite, having forgotten that they were party to that act in 1953-54, now say, when we put this fund on a sound basis and propose that the deficit for this year should be borne in succeeding years, that that is all wrong. How do they account for the fact that in 1953-54 they charged the deficit for 1952-53 up against, not the budget -it did not appear in the budget-but one of those convenient reserves which they had tucked away in the consolidated revenue fund where things were not intended to show. So in a variety of ways since then they have gone on.
They do not have to take my word as to our solution. I would like to read from the Toronto Star, the issue of April 10, 1959, and let hon. members know what is said about this budget:
It is time to put the old age pension fund on a self-sustaining basis-contributions fell $184 million short of disbursements last year. And Mr. Fleming proposes to do it in an even-handed way, raising the levy on personal income, corporation income and the sales tax from 2 to 3 per cent each.
He has also dealt fairly in raising personal and corporation income taxes by 2 per cent. The increases apply only to the top income fifth of individuals and companies; obviously the ones best able to pay more. Nor do we think there can be any serious quarrel with his modest tax increases on liquor and cigarettes.
That is the Liberal Toronto Star speaking.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Read the Globe and Mail.


Donald Methuen Fleming: The hon. member will have plenty of time to quote it to his heart's content, only I hope he reads them all, not only the selected articles.


John Whitney Pickersgill: As you are doing.


Donald Methuen Fleming: I might mention the matter of sales tax. It was dealt with by my hon. friend the Minister of National Revenue (Mr. Nowlan) in his clear speech a week ago last Monday, when he drew attention to the fact that it was the Liberals who proposed to use the sales tax as one of the elements contributing to the old age security fund, and Mr. Abbott brought it into effect because he said it was fair for the purpose and that the sales tax was not a regressive tax but a progressive tax within the limits effective for the old age security fund contributions.
I had hoped to say something further, Mr, Speaker, but my time is up.
The Budget-Hon. D. M. Fleming


Mr. Speaker:: If my interpretation of the rule is correct, the hon. minister is not limited in time.


Donald Methuen Fleming: The Budget-Hon. D. M. Fleming
I draw attention, however, to what is either an accidental or a calculated confusion in the minds and speeches of hon. gentlemen opposite. They talk about this rise in interest rates which reflects the extent to which the Canadian bond market is affected by conditions in the United States, and they confuse what is happening now, or what has been happening in relation to interest rates, with what happened under the Liberal government under what has come to be known as the tight money policy of the Liberals. Mr. Speaker, here is the essence of the difference: on our part, we have done what we could, in the light of the difficulties of the situation, to resist the pressures which have caused an increase in interest rates on this continent; but in the case of the Liberal government, the rise in interest rates and the other things they did were brought about in pursuance of deliberate government policy. There is the difference. Their policy was designed deliberately to check business expansion and interest rates were pushed up as part of that policy.
But that was not the only form which that policy took; part of that policy was intended to bring about, deliberately, a severe contraction in commercial credit and to force the banks to cut back on credit, and we well know the way in which the application of that policy harmed business, particularly small business, farmers and others. We opposed and we denounced that tight money policy, and we were right, and the Canadian people at the polls vindicated our stand in regard to the excesses of the Liberal government in deliberately pursuing that policy as they did. And, to the limit of our powers as a government, when we took office we reversed that policy and set about undoing the mischief that that policy had done in retarding the Canadian economy. Therefore, at this time, we are not in the position that tight money conditions have been brought about by the government of the day, as was the case when the Leader of the Opposition was a member of the government.


Lester Bowles Pearson: It just happened to you.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Yes, and it has happened all over this continent and we, the government of Canada, a responsible government, do not exercise supreme power over the economy of the whole of the North American continent. Our policy has been, as hon. members know, to resist as far as lies within our power the payment of high interest rates on federal borrowings and that, I emphasize once again, is a very different policy from that to which the Leader of the Opposition himself was a willing party-the
[Mr. Fleming (Eglinton) .1
Liberal policy of pushing up interest rates, contracting credit and nipping the buds of Canadian prosperity.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Was that a time of boom or
recession?


Donald Methuen Fleming: Hon. members of this house will see clearly that there is a world of difference between the policies of this government and the policies pursued by that discredited Liberal government which was dismissed from office and upon which the Canadian people passed a second verdict, on March 31, 1958, a verdict which has left them in the unhappy position in which they find themselves today.
So, Mr. Speaker, I have dealt with the terms of this extraordinary amendment, an amendment which has the temerity to accuse this government of having made promises which it did not make; of having been elected on the basis of promises which it did not give during the election campaign, and of having broken promises which it did not make.
We were not elected on any such platform as hon. members opposite have talked about. I have gone over the record of the 1958 campaign, and I have shown how wildly inaccurate have been the statements of hon. members opposite about our platform and our program as laid before the Canadian people at that time. The bad faith which is to be found in relation to this debate is not in the budget; it is not in the proposals to which the budget speech led. The bad faith lies in the unfounded charges that are contained in the opposition amendment. I suppose we might leave it at that. The opposition has nothing to offer. They did not have anything of which they thought sufficiently highly to be worth according even an honourable mention in their amendment. Such be their verdict upon themselves.
I do not propose to review now what I said in the budget speech which was, I realize, of quite excessive length. But this may be said for the budget which is now under consideration, that it is based upon a view of the present situation which frankly takes account of the difficulties as well as of the bright spots, and faces those difficulties and prescribes clear courses of action, if the house will approve, for meeting those difficulties. It states the tax policy of the government, and states it clearly. It is a constructive effort. It contains a group of constructive proposals based upon a realistic approach to the problems. I think it may be fair to say that it is an approach which will, if approved by the house, contribute substantially to recovery. If it be optimistic, it is optimistic with good reason to be optimistic. It applies what I believe to be a sound principle in dealing

with economic conditions that are changing as rapidly as economic conditions have changed in the period of the last year. It uses the fiscal methods open to the government as a flexible means of meeting the problems which confront us at this time.
It may well be that this budget does mark a very important point in the developing economy of this period. I feel complimented indeed by the article written by Mr. Bruce Hutchison, who by all accounts is an eminent Liberal, in what he has had to say about the budget. I have here his article which is headed, "Budget Shows Double Courage", and which concludes with this statement which I should like to leave with the house:
If so, the budget may be judged later as one of the most important in our history.
Mr. Speaker, I do not know whether that statement will be borne out in the light of events. I am not going to make claims of that kind but I am going to say that this is a realistic budget and one based upon a policy and not, like the amendment, which is based on a lack of policy. We have kept our promises. We shall continue to keep our promises. Because this amendment falsely accuses the government in this respect we ask the house to reject the amendment and reject it decisively.


Mr. Harold E. Winch (Vancouver East):: Mr. Speaker, I am convinced that many hon. members in this house must feel almost drowned by the verbiage that has flowed from the Minister of Finance (Mr. Fleming) during the last 53 minutes. My regret is that so much verbosity should have come from a cabinet minister and particularly the Minister of Finance containing no logic or reasoning.
The minister opened his remarks by informing the house that he has become philosophic and relaxed. Philosophy and relaxation are good in their place, if correct, but I personally have no hesitation in saying that the philosophy which I fear the minister has now adopted is not in the best interests of this country. In his budget speech and again this afternoon he made it evident that his philosophy is to close his eyes to the realities of conditions in Canada and he chooses to be relaxed at a time when there are major problems requiring attention and solution.
It was delightful from an oratorical point of view to listen for 53 minutes to Don Fleming Quixote charging against mirages to the loud huzzas of his colleagues.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Not so very loud.


Harold Edward Winch: At this time Canada needs as minister of finance something more than a Don Quixote charging at mirages. We need
The Budget-Mr. Winch a minister who will face economic realities and problems that cannot be solved by excessive verbiage or emotional eloquence or by charges levied against other individuals or parties. We need someone who will face the realities of increasing interest rates and continuing unemployment and who will find solutions for problems relating to the export markets required by this country. These matters require a true philosopher and realist, not a Quixote.
The Minister of Finance referred to prophecies respecting increased gross national products in both Canada and the United States. This is something to which we look forward. It was very noticeable, however, that in the budget speech and in his remarks this afternoon when the minister spoke of increases in the gross national product he did not relate the increases to the value of the dollar. Therein lies one of the fallacies in the approach and prognostications of the minister.
It was also noticeable that when approximately twenty minutes ago the minister nearly burst his buttons telling us that in 1957 he had reduced taxation by $178 million we did not hear him say a confounded word about the fact that in 1958 he increased it by $325 million. Apparently from the minister's point of view there are some things to be emphasized and others to be ignored or given not too much emphasis.
The minister made some comment about a stringent economy but I think it should be noted that although we have no legislation concerning social welfare on the order paper this session the minister this year is asking for an expenditure of $350 million more than was requested in the budget last year.
During the 53 minutes the minister consumed this afternoon he continued the sham battle between the government and official opposition. I believe we have had enough of sham battles and charges and countercharges between the government and official opposition concerning what they said they would do and what they actually did.


Mr. Godin:: Are you sorry he mentioned only two parties?


Harold Edward Winch: We do not utilize the time of this house engaging in idle chatter of that kind. I could spend my entire time making similar statements, charges and accusations but I shall not do so because I do not believe in talking simply for the sake of talking nor do I countenance unnecessary repetition. Enough has been said concerning campaign promises and the fulfilment or lack of fulfilment of those promises.
I wish to tell the minister that I think he fell down in the policy decisions he made

The Budget-Mr. Winch relative to taxation. I know that hon. members of the government attempt to advance the argument that it is not taxation that is going to hit the average citizen in Canada. We say that such an assertion definitely is not correct. When an increase of 1 per cent in sales tax is introduced by the government the government is delving into the pocket of every individual in Canada.
I say to that that I find it difficult to understand why the Minister of Finance, when he is getting his greatest revenue mainly from the average citizen of Canada, feels he has to hit them more. I have reference, of course, to the increase on cigarettes. Before the last increase in taxation appeared cigarettes paid a federal tax of 17.7 cents on a package of 20, which I understand is 54 per cent of the retail price. Because the great majority of the average citizens enjoy their smoke and when the government is receiving 17.7 cents on a package of 20, 54 per cent of the retail price, I say it is a darned shame that the minister finds it necessary or decides to add an additional two cents per package of 20. What I say about it being a darned shame I also apply to the increase in spirituous liquors.
Prior to the federal tax increase approximately 80 cents out of every dollar spent on the retail price of spirituous liquors went to the federal and provincial governments. If my understanding and analysis are correct, the federal government receives 43 cents out of every dollar spent. Now, of course, it is going to be more. I personally want to tell the Minister of Finance that when he is already getting 43 cents out of every dollar spent on spirituous liquor I think he is just putting on a little bit too much pressure when he wants still more money. It would not be so bad if he would bring in a law to take some of the water out of it; but since he is still going to levy his tax on the amount of water in the spirituous liquor, then I say 43 cents out of every dollar is enough without an additional 12 cents a bottle. I have to say that I am grateful for one thing, namely that he has left the workingman's beer alone. The 1 per cent is going to have some effect, but I pay my compliments to the brewers who have already announced that they will absorb the sales tax increase.
In view of the fact that the Minister of Finance has found it necessary to increase taxation so as to raise approximately an additional $325 million, I feel the increases he has announced would have been more acceptable, more reasonable and more logical if he first of all, or at the same time, had gone after those who make millions and pay no taxes at all. I refer to corporation and company promoters and stock manipulators

who, of course on the evidence, in Ontario alone invest a few hundred dollars and make millions.
Every endeavour that we have made in the estimates committee to find out whether or not the government collects any taxes has been turned down. Therefore, there are only two men who know whether or not those who make money out of stock promotions- since they are in the know-pay anything in income tax. I refer to the Minister of National Revenue (Mr. Nowlan) who refused to give information in the estimates committee, and the Minister of Finance. I say to the Minister of Finance, if you are going to hit the people of this country for more than 17.7 cents per package of 20 cigarettes and more than 43 cents out of every dollar spent on spirituous liquors, then why have you not the common decency to collect something from those who make millions and pay no taxes whatsoever? Any demand by the Minister of Finance for increased taxation on the common people will be better understood if he will interest himself in going to those who in the past and now pay no taxes on certain financial manipulations in Canada.
I was most interested yesterday when the hon. member for Queens (Mr. Macquarrie) addressed this house in this debate. The hon. member had this to say, as reported at page 2841 of Hansard. He was speaking of the Minister of Finance:
I believe that already his performance in this most onerous office in these most difficult times rates him with the great finance ministers of our nation's history, men like Fielding, Sir Thomas White and E. M. Rhodes.
The hon. member for Queens is most certainly entitled to his opinion; so are we all; so am I. The Minister of Finance, in introducing his budget and informing this house and the country of the taxation increases did not deal with many of the realities and problems we are facing; did not make any statement whatsoever of policy or legislation to collect millions from those who pay no taxes now. I think the hon. member for Queens was wrong. The Minister of Finance will not go down in history as a great finance minister, as was intimated by the hon. member for Queens. In my opinion he will go down as "the great betrayer" because in his budget this year he has done three things. He divorced financial policy this year from his own government's and party's campaign promises. He divorced himself and his government from a realistic taxation policy; and he divorced financial policy from the needs of the common citizens. It is for these three reasons that I say he should be, and I think will be, eventually known as "the great betrayer".

I have mentioned the word "divorce" three times. From now on in the 20 minutes I still have at my disposal I am not going to discuss the budget because I have no intention of repeating the statements and the arguments which have already been put forward in the past by previous speakers. I should like to discuss the question of divorce because this debate gives me the opportunity to discuss not only the budget itself but anything else I feel to be of importance and should be discussed in the House of Commons. I recognize that in so doing I am raising a most controversial subject but I do feel it is necessary to speak upon it from two points of view; one, the handling of divorce for the provinces of Newfoundland and Quebec through the medium of the Senate and the House of Commons; and, two the matter of the law as it relates to divorce itself.
Before I enter into these two subjects I want to make it very clear that I am not expressing C.C.F. national policy nor am I giving voice to any policy of the C.C.F. members in this house. I am speaking strictly from a personal point of view on two matters which I feel should be brought to the attention of the house and be given consideration by the government and the house in the not too distant future.
Section 91 of the British North America Act of 1867 gives to the parliament of Canada exclusive legislative jurisdiction in relation to marriage and divorce. All provinces in our country except two have courts that deal with divorces. The provinces of Newfoundland and Quebec do not have such courts. As a result, the Senate and the House of Commons find themselves in the position of having to deal with matters which actually should not come before members of parliament for investigation and decision.
A great deal has been said in the house in the past about the extraordinary situation that faces members of the House of Commons in having to sit in judgment on divorce cases. Over the years suggestions have been made that separate courts should be established for these two provinces or that the Exchequer Court of Canada should handle divorce cases from Quebec and Newfoundland. It is quite evident, however, that no move is contemplated to establish outside courts in order to remove from the Senate and the House of Commons the responsibility of dealing with matters of divorce. Because there is no indication that such a step will be taken, I am taking it on myself to throw out a suggestion different from the establishment of courts but one which I think is worthy of consideration and
The Budget-Mr. Winch will remove from the House of Commons the unhealthy task which up till now it has had to accept.
In conversation with constitutional authorities I have found that parliament has the right to delegate power and as a result I want to make a suggestion which I ask members to think about calmly and reasonably. I suggest that we establish a precedent and that the House of Commons and the Senate should pass an act under which the Senate shall have the power to deal with divorce cases, royal assent then being given by resolution, so that the Senate alone will exercise the power preceding royal assent now required of both houses of parliament.
I say that if the United Kingdom can say that certain bills passed by the house of commons need not be passed by the house of lords and shall become acts on receiving royal assent then the opposite is true if the procedure is authorized by both houses.
In putting this proposal forward it is my personal opinion that it would be beneficial because divorce bills would no longer need to be considered on the floor of the House of Commons. I believe that the prestige of the Senate would be enhanced if sole jurisdiction were conferred upon it in this regard. I say that our present system is clumsy and outmoded and that the procedure I recommend would greatly simplify the situation. I say further that the Senate has the time and has developed the necessary machinery.
I recognize that there are three possible arguments against my suggestion. First, it might be said that it would saddle the Senate with the whole problem of divorce. I admit that but the Senate is already saddled with the problem so there is nothing new there. Second, it is also arguable that the participation of the commons in divorce bills is a useful check on Senate. In my opinion this argument is not sustainable. I should like to give the house statistics to substantiate that contention. I am certain that the members of the house who are present will be interested in this information.
From 1945 through 1958 the Senate committee heard 4,126 divorce petitions. Of these the Senate committee rejected 54. That meant that the House of Commons received 4,072 divorce bills from 1945 through 1958. The House of Commons rejected 18. There may be some members who would prefer to have information for the last two or three years. From 1956 through 1958 the Senate committee heard 1,219 divorce petitions and rejected 20. Therefore during the same period the House of Commons received 1,199 divorce bills. The House of Commons rejected four.
It is quite obvious that the House of Commons does not sit as a court on divorce bills.
2896	HOUSE OF
The Budget-Mr. Winch In the light of the fact that out of 4,072 divorce bills received by the house from 1945 through 1958 only 18 were rejected and in the period from 1956 through 1958 only four were rejected, we are making a farce of the procedure.
I come now to the main argument that can be used against my proposal. It can be reasonably argued that such an idea would involve an abdication or abandonment of the powers of parliament. I recognize that. I recognize what kind of a precedent it would be. But I feel that this objection can be met by pointing out that the act would be passed by both houses of parliament and if found unworkable or too shackling it could be repealed or amended by a subsequent act in any future parliament.
I should like to spend more time on the matter of our procedure but I am not going to do so. I hope I have given enough information to justify honest consideration by the government and by all members of the house with regard to the procedure of handling divorces from Newfoundland and Quebec by the two houses of parliament. I say that if the government is not prepared to do as I think it should, if it is not prepared to take the necessary steps to remove this work now required of both houses by referring it to an outside or already established court, then the government should have the guts at least to give consideration to the type of proposal I have made this afternoon.
It is not sufficient, at least in my opinion, to speak about the procedure of divorce in two provinces, without also saying a few words about the law of divorce in Canada. This, too, is a highly controversial subject. I get into trouble sometimes because I insist on raising highly controversial issues. I feel that if something should be said, then it is going to be said; that is, if I think it is right.
I do say on behalf of the minority-I am happily married myself, so I am not concerned-that Canada has the most antedated and antiquated divorce laws. Canada's divorce laws are more backward than those of most countries in this world.
Time and time again in my capacity as a representative of my constituency in this house, and previously in the provincial legislature, I have met persons who had real problems. They have been deserted for years, and where the husband or wife is they do not know; nobody knows. If a woman is deserted for a period of years, why should that woman be denied the normal happiness of life, the normal expressions of life? Should we insist that she become immoral by living as a common law wife? I do not believe so. When we have a person subjected to


physical cruelty and sexual cruelty, why does the law say that that person must remain tied to such an individual? Why is it that when a person is committed to an insane asylum and found incurably insane the spouse must be denied the right to a normal life? Why is it that when a man is committed to jail as a sexual psychopath-I understand that term is going to be changed-or as a habitual criminal or is found guilty of murder and the sentence commuted to life imprisonment, the spouse should be denied a normal life?
I ask that the members of this house and the government just think these things over. I am not alone in this opinion. I was most interested in reading in a local newspaper the other day a report from Vancouver which said that the British Columbia churches now advocate easier divorce. It says that five of seven British Columbia presbyteries of the United Church of Canada have advocated broader grounds for divorce, and then outline what they think should be the broader grounds. I know you realize, Mr. Speaker, as we all do, that marriage is a sacred and wonderful thing, and everything possible should be done to maintain a marriage, especially when there are children. But under the circumstances I have outlined, why should we in Canada be so far behind the rest of the world, be so unchristian and heathenish, as to deny happiness and a full life to those who are caught in certain circumstances.
As a result of my own personal reading, my consultations with many members of the church, social welfare organizations and as a result of my talks with individuals caught in the web of circumstances, I should like to recommend certain changes. I have no hesitation when I speak on this matter in giving my own views. Let me make this clear; the spouse would have to ask for the divorce because if there was a desire to wait and hope that the person would come out of the insane asylum or out of jail, then that would be the responsibility of the spouse. I should like to recommend that the divorce law be changed; and in addition to the existing grounds for divorce, the following be added: Desertion for three years; after repeated physical and sexual cruelty; after insanity for three years if the spouse is still retained in an institution; and, if one is incarcerated in a penal institution with a sentence over five years or an indefinite sentence after serving a definite sentence of three years.
In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, I would say that I first had a few words to say about what the Minister of Finance said on the budget and then on two matters which I did not think anyone else would raise, and which I felt should be raised. Having done so, I

would ask the government and every member of the House of Commons to search their own minds, their own consciences, and not only answer the questions which I am about to ask but also decide whether or not they feel they have a part to play in solving the problems of the minority, who have the same right to happiness as the majority. The question I should like to ask is this: Under what code of human behaviour, religious ethic, or civilized law should the innocent suffer for the sins of the guilty? That is what our law imposes upon people today. I leave the answer to that question to the thinking and the decency of the government and the members of this house.


Mr. Speaker:: It being five o'clock, the house will proceed to the consideration of private and public bills, pursuant to section 3 of standing order 15.



CANADA ELECTIONS ACT


Mr. Arnold Peters (Timiskaming) moved: the second reading of Bill No. C-ll, to amend the Canada Elections Act (publication of straw poll results).
He said: In introducing this amendment to the Canada Elections Act we are asking for the prohibition of the publication of opinion polls or what is commonly called straw polls prior to an election. These polls have been given pseudo-recognition by the people of Canada as being fair, being honest, though the integrity of opinion polls was questioned as recently as 1948 in a very large example.
The Canadian electors are in no way assured that the polls are representative or that the questions which are asked are representative questions. A question asked sometimes of an unrepresentative group leads to an answer which is occasionally used by political parties during the elections. Opinion polls are being conducted in the major portion of our schools. There are many advantages to conducting these polls. For one thing, it keeps a large number of people employed who are operating private polls of one type or another. Second, I think it is a good thing to discuss at election time who the pupil would vote for and probably the reason why that pupil would so vote. But on a number of occasions it has been very easy to tell prior to an election exactly what people in a certain area will do, because their children, attending school and reporting through their polls, make this information available to the teacher.
For some odd reason, possibly a quirk, of the Canadian mind, quite often our people
Canada Elections Act
have a tendency to accept these polls and decide that they have to vote in an election for the party that is going to win. So it sometimes gives an unfair impetus to the recipient of a very favourable poll. There would be nothing wrong with this if polls were conducted in a manner which would assure the people reading the answers that the polls were an honest sampling of opinion and that the questions had been designed to give true answers and were reported in that manner. But I do not think this is always true.
In the last few months we have seen where polls have been conducted and have not been accepted by the federal government. This is probably more evident in the Department of Labour than in any other federal department. The dominion bureau of statistics operates on the principle of the sample poll. I do not think any member in this house could tell who did the sampling for the department. I never came in contact with anybody who was ever asked any of the questions, but it was found that the system being used was not necessarily the most efficient one which could be developed, and within the last few months the Minister of Labour (Mr. Starr) has been using a number of other methods to find out the number of people seeking employment in Canada. This being one of our official polls it would indicate that it does not even operate in the manner in which we wish it to operate.
If the polls were supervised and the questions standardized, and use of these questions by correspondents and newspapers was made to give a fair sampling of opinion, then there would be less objection to them. But this is not the case. In the United States election of 1948 it was a well-known fact that a number of the polls in that country were so conducted that the questions were asked in such a manner as to receive a particular answer.
This information has been very difficult to come by, because after a poll is conducted and the results published nobody ever looks back on it again. So we tend to forget where the polls made mistakes in the past and are much more interested in what the poll is going to report on the new problem which has arisen. British Columbia faced this matter in 1939 when they passed section 168 of the British Columbia elections act, which reads:
No person, corporation or organization shall after the issue of the writ for any election take any straw vote, which will prior to the election distinguish the political opinions of the voters in any electoral district.
In moving this amendment we are not suggesting that these polls do not be taken, because they do serve some purpose. We

Canada Elections Act
are only suggesting that the results of the polls be not published during the period of election, or from the time the writ has been issued until the time the election itself is conducted.
In 1948 the matter of how honest and trustworthy polls were was shown in an election when Mr. Truman and Mr. Dewey were fighting for the presidency of the United States. Mr. Truman was fighting an election for the third time, but there were many reasons why his popularity should have decreased. He, through congress, had suggested that several things be done which were not too popular, and a number of the pollsters in that country were pledged to support, and to elect if possible, Mr. Dewey, and they worked toward that end. Very little information has ever been available as to what polls have accomplished or with regard to their operation, but a little book was written by Morris L. Ernst and David Loth called "The People Know Best. The Ballots vs. the Polls". It contains some observations which I think are interesting enough to examine. It points out at page 11:
The presidential election of 1948 has given us the most dramatic, the most significant example of the hazards which our basic concept is facing. With a unanimity which has seldom been equalled in our political history, the men and women upon whom we relied for facts, for comment and for opinion were hypnotized (or hynotized themselves) into the conviction that President Harry S. Truman's campaign was hopeless.
The great damage to our way of life was not that they were wrong. Far more serious is the attitude of all of us toward that error. We laughed at the recollection of their pontifical certainties. We sneered at their motives, at their intelligence, at the validity of their information, at their methods and at the media through which they spoke to us. We were gleeful or sad over their discomfiture, depending upon how the results of the election pleased us. But there is also an opportunity for us to gain a more substantial benefit. We can use our experience of this great illusion to improve our media of information and our understanding of them.
Then it goes on to say that this is one of the things that we must be on guard against today, because if we are not we are going to allow the pollsters to form an opinion and thus develop our need for voting in one direction because we want to be on the winning side, rather than being able to decide for ourselves which is right and which is wrong. This book points out that in many cases it does take away from the voter the right to make up his own mind and establish for himself his own opinion. Some of the polls in that election in 1948 gave Dewey 96 per cent of the vote, while others gave only as high as 56.

I think it is interesting to note some of the questions which are asked. In one of the Gallup poll ballots appears this statement:
The battle for control of Congress in the November election will be far more closely fought than the presidential battle-
As you feel today, would you be more likely to vote for the Democratic or for the Republican candidate for congress from your district?
The question which is asked does not relate, hon. members will notice, to the statement which precedes it. And then the result is reported as a Gallup poll report, as follows:
Democratic candidate	 41%
Republican candidate	 41
Other parties	 l
No opinion	 17
Another question was asked on August 12, and again a statement was made in connection with it, as follows:
Although congress brushed aside President Truman's request for limited price controls, there has been a sharp increase of public sentiment in favour of controls since the special Congressional session was called-
Do you think the government should or should not put back rationing and price controls on some products?
And the answer which was given, reads:
Should	 56%
Should not	 35
Price controls but	not rationing	 2
No opinion	 7
When these results are reported in the newspapers an impression is created that the issue has already been decided in the minds of the majority of the electorate. I suggest that this type of poll taking is not accurate, and that it is not necessarily honest. It is to the credit of the people of the United States that they saw fit in that election to vote on the basis of their own opinions rather than accept the opinion reached by most of the news commentators and all the public opinion polls.
All this, in my opinion, establishes a case for prohibiting the conducting of this type of poll and the reporting of these polls in the press during elections, because the use of these methods is eliminating one of the basic rights which the people possess-the right of choice. We depend a great deal on statistics, on publications and on facts and figures which are used as yardsticks, among them, for example, the figures which are published every month with regard to the cost of living. Publications of this kind are taken as facts and are accepted by the people as being facts. If we publish opinion polls as facts in the same way people will tend to use them and depend on them as crutches rather than to find out for themselves.
I would very much appreciate a vote on this matter. We have 31 public bills and orders

on the order paper; we have spent one day on each one of them, and have achieved no results. I am not sure whether hon. members are in favour of the proposal I am making or not, but 1 have noticed in the last few weeks that many people are in favour of it. Yet we still take the whole hour, and then defeat the measure by letting it go by the board. I strongly urge the government to allow a number of these 31 items to be voted on. They are all important to the people who put them on the order paper and there are a number which are a good deal more important than the one in which I am interested at the present time. I appeal to the government either to oppose this measure or to speak in its favour through one of its representatives, and thus allow us to continue with other matters. Otherwise I suggest we might as well discontinue the item of public bills altogether, because I think we would be wasting a great deal of time on these subjects.


Mr. McGee:: I was rising on a point of order to point out that on other occasions hon. members who have attempted to comment on this aspect of the matter have been ruled out of order, and to suggest that the hon. member for Timiskaming is himself out of order.


Mr. Speaker:: I was getting ready to interrupt just as the hon. member rose. While a passing comment on the fate of these bills is not objectionable, that certainly should not be made the subject of debate. We should confine ourselves to the matter in hand.


Miss Margaret Aitken (York-Humber):: think this bill is a foot-in-the-door infringement against freedom of expression, freedom of opinion and freedom of the press. Indeed, it is an insult to the Canadian people and I, for one, if there is a vote, will vote against it. What right have we to sit here in this House of Commons and legislate against expressions of opinion from the Canadian people, published or otherwise? What right have we to say that the Canadian people must not be allowed to read about the opinions of their fellow countrymen?
The hon. member for Timiskaming (Mr. Peters), in what I think was an attitude of arrogant superiority, is saying that the Canadian people cannot be trusted to think for themselves, and, furthermore, that we must protect them from the thoughts of others. This bill says to the Canadian people; you are so colourless, so opinionless, that we cannot trust you to read about the opinions of other people. I do think this is an insult to the Canadian people. One moment the socialists are viewing the situation with alarm
Canada Elections Act
because they say the polls are influencing voting, and the next moment, still viewing the situation with alarm, they are saying that the polls are not infallible and that- as the hon. member for Timiskaming himself pointed out-the polls were in fact wrong in 1948 and President Truman did win the election in the United States. Moreover, the polls did not seem to influence voting in the 1957 Canadian election.
I say that the socialists cannot have it both ways. They cannot say that the polls influence voting while maintaining at the same time that the polls can be wrong and, therefore, do not influence voting. I think that public opinion polls are part of our democracy, and not only of our democracy; in 15 countries around the world these polls are taken. I should just like to put the names of a few of these countries on record, because there is a certain significance attached to them. They include Canada, the United Kingdom, the United States, France, Denmark, Sweden, Italy, Holland and Norway. You will notice, Mr. Speaker, that none of these countries are communist countries. Communism will not allow the publication or expression of opinions. I do not suppose communist leaders even want to hear about public opinion as expressed in public opinion polls. Or perhaps, like the socialists, they are afraid of public opinion.
The passing of this bill would, I feel, place Canada in a ludicrous position. It would certainly indicate that Canadian politicians are afraid of public opinion, and I believe that to legislate against the publication of polls would be to legislate against freedom of opinion. I do not know how the hon. member for Timiskaming who professes to believe in a bill of rights can reconcile this bill to such a belief.
How far would such a censorship as this go? What about those who go across the country just before an election and who, normally, in the course of their work, comment on the state of public opinion? Practically every large newspaper sends reporters across the country to make surveys and take polls, and these reports are subsequently published in the newspapers. Is the hon. member suggesting that they should be censored, too, or that they should be made illegal? In my opinion he is, because the amendment begins with the words:
No person, company or corporation shall publish results of straw polls-
I think this is dangerous and evil legislation even to contemplate. Not only is it menacing freedom of opinion but freedom of the press.

Canada Elections Act
In his explanatory note the hon. member for Timiskaming sets down the purpose of his amendment to the Canada Elections Act in these words:
The purpose of this amendment is to prohibit, and to make punishable as an illegal practice, the publication in any manner before election day of the results of a straw vote or poll of the political opinions of the electors.
We are told that that is the purpose of this bill. What the hon. member has not told us is the real reason for the presentation of this bill. I suggest that the true reason is that the socialists are afraid of public opinion and perhaps with justification because public opinion and public favour certainly have not been very heartily on their side in the last few elections.
Last year when the hon. member for Timiskaming introduced this same bill in the house, as reported at page 2831 of Hansard of July 29, 1958 he had this to say:
We all know of cases where questions are asked of the general public which are very innocent in nature but by the time the results of such polls are used by certain advertising agencies and implications are drawn from them, the information presented to the public does not necessarily represent the opinions expressed by the participants in the poll.
I do not understand this strange generalization. The hon. member concluded that statement by saying:
There is actually no guarantee to the Canadian people that such polls are taken on a regular sample basis-
What does the hon. member mean when he suggests that all of us know of cases where innocent questions are asked and implications drawn which do not represent the opinions expressed by those polled? I for one know of no such cases. I can see no point in that kind of accusation. Polls are costly things to take and I cannot see why anyone would spend substantial sums of money on a poll and then falsify the results.
The Canadian institute of public opinion which is the Gallup poll in this country has some 500 people working continuously on a wide variety of subjects across the nation all the time. Their work embraces polls concerning the voting intentions of the electorate, not just at the time of an election but throughout the year every year. The hon. member says there is no guarantee that polls are taken on a regular sample basis. I do not know what he means by a guarantee but I do know that the Canadian institute of public opinion conducts a political poll every eight weeks. It describes its services as "a snapshot of voting intentions" taken not on election day or just before election day, but continuously thoughout the years. It is a political poll taken on a regular sample basis.

In conclusion may I say I condemn this bill not only as a manifestation of arrogant paternalism but also as a menace to fundamental freedoms. What right have we, the elected representatives of the people, to place any kind of restraint upon expressions of opinion? If the socialists would pay a little more attention to those expressions of opinion instead of trying to censor them they might learn something of what the people are thinking and be a little better off.
This bill is a veritable iron curtain behind which the socialists seek to hide their own inadequacies. It occurs to me the mere introduction of this bill is an indictment against the C.C.F. party and certainly a warning to the Canadian people. The socialists would impose their will upon the free expression of opinion of a free people. I hope, just as the hon. member for Timiskaming said, that we may have a vote on this amendment so that every responsible member of parliament may have the opportunity of standing up in this house and being counted on the side of freedom.


Mr. A. R. Webster (Si. Antoine-Wesfmount):: Mr. Speaker, if the bill which is before us for discussion this afternoon were to pass it would be in my opinion extremely difficult to enact it. What is to hinder the Prime Minister (Mr. Diefenbaker), the hon. member for Assiniboia (Mr. Argue) or any other hon. member appearing on a public platform or before a gathering of news people and predicting the result of a coming election by releasing the findings they have gathered from the reports sent in by their district organizers? Are we to make this a crime? Are we to make it unlawful to mention this from a platform? Any piece of legislation which having been put on the statute books is ignored or not enforced is to my mind serving only to clutter the administration of justice and to bring other worthwhile legislation into disrepute.
The newspaper people who travel across the country with the leaders of political parties during campaigns are entitled to and indeed are expected to express their opinions as to what people in the country are thinking and I do not believe we can bring in legislation to counter what the people of this country want and expect in the way of news.
A large number of people in this great country of ours are undecided as to how they should vote. Being human they naturally want to be on the winning side so that after an election they will be in a position to tell their friends that they were clever enough to have picked the winning candidate or the winning party. This is an unfortunate

situation because it indicates a lack of political education but, like the poor, this type is always with us.
I cannot see how any great harm could be caused by a straw vote which is only an indication of how the people are thinking at the particular time the poll is taken. Something could happen which would cause the voting population to veer completely around and vote in an entirely different fashion. Being so closely associated with our good neighbours to the south where the advance poll or Gallup poll has become almost a national institution I do not see how we in Canada could possibly prevent the publication of any advance prediction relating to a Canadian election.
The result of a poll among the general public concerning an election even when published does not mean that the outcome is guaranteed. Hon. members will recall during the election in which Mr. Harry Truman sought to become president of the United States all the newspapers and public polls were against him and yet by getting out and conducting an active election campaign he was able to win by a substantial majority. Apparently he was able to convince the people he was the better man. This illustrates the fact that although papers and magazines were full of how his opponent was taking the country by storm and that he might as well close up shop, nevertheless the polls were wrong and the man who had the backbone of public opinion behind him was he who won the election.
The hon. member who introduced this bill to amend the Canada Elections Act has said that he has no objection to the taking of public opinion polls in public schools and high schools by the pupils or in any other such places. Does he not realize that if the children who take these polls go home and report the results to their parents, in a number of cases they will have an effect on influencing the parents' votes. I know that during the last election in the constituency which I have the honour to represent my daughter was a school teacher and the children went back to their parents and practically told the parents that if they did not vote for my daughter's father they just would not have anything further to do with them, and that influenced quite a number in my favour. People want to be informed and I believe it is the duty of the newspapers to inform them. A poll does not constitute propaganda. The report of a public poll is only the announcement that in some measure a certain percentage of the population declares itself for or against a political party or a politician.
In my opinion these polls cannot prejudice our friends in any way because in this country
Canada Elections Act
people may often consider not so much the results of those polls but rather the party program and the candidates who are up for election. We saw that the results taken during the last election gave the facts, and the results were neither inaccurate nor dishonest, as the Canadian people sent to the house in the last election such a large Conservative majority.
I do not see any reason for the introduction of this bill, which seems to me to be only an excuse to use up the members' time when we could be gainfully employed in debating legislation that has merit to the country as a whole. I make these remarks as I am opposed to this bill and do not see any great merit in it. I believe this bill should not have been submitted to this house this afternoon.


Harold Edward Winch: Mr. Speaker, I should like to say just a few words in support of this bill.


An hon. Member:: To talk it out.


Harold Edward Winch: Not me. I just wish to say I am most surprised at the remarks of the hon. member for York-Humber (Miss Aitken) that this would mean an iron curtain. Because of her great experience she must know of petitions that are sent out and signed by anybody without their ever reading them. She also knows that the Gallup poll can, and does ask loaded questions. Because of her experience, she must know of petitions being signed without a knowledge of their contents. She must know how questions can be loaded. I cannot understand why she calls it an iron curtain. I rose particularly because a previous speaker said he could not understand how the legislation could be administered. This kind of legislation has been administered for 20 years in British Columbia without complaint. There is the proof, 20 years without any complaint in British Columbia.


Mr. J. E. Pascoe (Moose Jaw-Lake Centre):: Mr. Speaker, I think other hon. members on the government side have brought out most of the points that I think should be brought out in connection with this bill. In view of the lack of time I will not repeat their arguments but I would like to compliment them on their statements and on expressing my views so clearly. But as a former newspaperman who probably has had a great deal more experience in reporting and in editorial work, and knows more about the integrity of newspapers and their influence on the public than the proposer of Bill No. C-ll, I should like to bring out only two points which are involved in this proposed amendment.
In my opinion, they are two very vital points in our form of democracy which would

Canada Elections Act
be curtailed by this bill. These two points are freedom of the press and the right of each individual to all the information and expressions of opinion that he can possibly obtain, even during an election, or perhaps I should say particularly during an election. Any denial of those rights, I am sure, will not come from this government.
The sponsor of this amendment, the hon. member for Timiskaming (Mr. Peters), wants to have public opinion polls, what he calls straw votes, abolished by federal statute. The purpose of this amendment, as was pointed out by the hon. member for York-Humber (Miss Aitken), is to prohibit and make punishable as an illegal practice the publication in any manner before election day of the results of a straw vote or polls of the political opinions of the electors. All I can say to this is that the hon. member for Timiskaming must have a very small regard for the mentality of Canadian voters. Perhaps he has reason for this poor opinion. I have a much higher regard for those who mark their ballots in federal elections. By inference, Mr. Speaker, the sponsor of this bill is saying that Canadian voters have no minds of their own, and, like a flock of sheep, will cast their ballots after having themselves directed in one direction by newspaper quotations and headlines and by publication of what the mover calls straw votes. I suggest that this is a very poor picture of our electorate. It is a picture that is not borne out by recent elections.
The Canadian voters have minds of their own and exercise their franchise as they see fit, and are not told how to vote by any newspaper headlines. I see nothing wrong with publication of straw votes in an election campaign. As I have said, straw votes are part of public opinion polls, and public opinion polls are part of public education. Public education has brought the Canadian people to the high level of living and, I might say, the high level of government that we now enjoy.
I should like to conclude with strong support for freedom of the press. The Canadian people want to be informed and it is the duty of our newspapers to inform them. As you know, Mr. Speaker, on most days when orders of the day are called the press gallery is filled with reporters and their job is to inform the Canadian people. Again, Mr. Speaker, I do not think that public opinion polls have the influence on voters that the hon. member for Timiskaming (Mr. Peters) fears they have. I think that during an election campaign Canadian voters consider the programs of the various parties as they are presented to them on the platform and they also consider the ability of the candidates. In my opinion,

therefore, members of this house should show their confidence in the clear thinking of the Canadian electorate by voting against the motion.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The house resumed at 8. p.m.


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed consideration of the motion of Hon. Donald M. Fleming (Minister of Finance) that Mr. Speaker do now leave the chair for the house to go into committee of ways and means and the proposed amendment thereto of Mr. Benidickson.
Mr. D. V. Pugh (Okanagan Boundary):: The Budget-Mr. Pugh dominion. That organization is known as the Canadian Horticultural Council. This is the body which originally made representations to the tariff board during 1957, and they were the representations which led to the present tariff changes made in this budget.
Perhaps at this stage it might be as well to look at the council's membership. We have seven out of the ten provinces represented on the council, excluding only Alberta, Saskatchewan and Newfoundland. These three have no grower organizations, with the exception of Alberta which has one local. However, I am glad to report that all carry on extremely amicable relations in co-operation with the Canadian Horticultural Council. There are also seven ministers of agriculture who are with the Canadian Horticultural Council. Then there are associate members and also contributors. I have a list of the member organizations and it is rather a long one, and I would ask that leave be given for them to be printed so as to appear in the context.


Mr. Speaker:: What is the source of the information the hon. member wishes to have printed?


David Vaughan Pugh: The source of the information, Mr. Speaker, has been given me by the Canadian Horticultural Council. It is a list of the members.


Mr. Speaker:: Is it agreed that the hon. member has leave to have this list of the Canadian Horticultural Council members printed in Hansard at this point?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


David Vaughan Pugh: The table is as follows:
Organizations of the Canadian Horticultural Council
British Columbia:	B.C. Fruit Board, P. C.
McCallum; B.C. Fruit Growers Association; B.C. Interior Vegetable Marketing Board; B.C. Coast Vegetable Marketing Board; B.C. Tree Fruits Limited; Okanagan Federated Shippers' Association.
Manitoba:	Vegetable Growers Association of
Manitoba; The Gardeners Sales Ltd.
Ontario: Ontario Asparagus Growers Marketing Board; Ontario Berry Growers Marketing Board; Ontario Fruit & Vegetable Growers Association; Ontario Grape Growers Marketing Board; Ontario Peach Growers Marketing Board; Ontario Pear, Plum & Cherry Growers Marketing Board; Ontario Soil & Crop Improvement Association; Niagara Fruit Shippers' Association; Ontario Peach Growers Cooperative; Ontario Vegetable Growers Marketing Board; Ontario Potato Growers' Association.
Quebec: Quebec Pomological & Fruit Growing Society; Quebec Federation of Vegetable Growers; Cooperative Federee de Quebec.
New Brunswick: N.B. Potato Shippers Association; N.B. Fruit Growers Association; Hartland Agricultural Society.
Nova Scotia: N.S. Fruit Growers Association; Scotian Gold Cooperative Limited.
Prince Edward Island: P.E.I. Potato Promotion Committee; P.E.I. Potato Marketing Board; P.E.I. Producers Cooperative Association.

National: Canadian Association of Nurserymen; Canadian Food Processors Association; Allied Florists & Growers of Canada, Inc.; Canadian Mushroom Growers' Association; Canadian Wood Products Ltd.; Canadian Fruit Wholesalers' Association; Canadian Wine Institute.
Province: P.E.I. Department of Agriculture; N.S. Department of Agriculture; N.B. Department of Agriculture; Quebec Department of Agriculture; Ontario Department of Agriculture; Manitoba Department of Agriculture; B.C. Department of Agriculture.
Associate: Ontario Food Processors Association; Continental Can Company; H. J. Heinz Company of Canada Ltd.; Martin Paper Products Limited.; Niagara Peninsula Fruit Growers Association; Norfolk Fruit Growers Association; Thompson Wood Products Limited; Jordan-Danforth Wines Limited; T. G. Bright & Company Limited; Chateau-Gai Wines Limited; W. Clark Limited, Lome Clark; Gair Company of Canada Ltd; Bath-hurst Containers Limited; B.C. Federation of Agriculture.
Contributors: Alphonse Raymond Limitee; Atkin's Flowers; Kent Fruit Growers Cooperative; Northern Seed Potato Co. Limited; Oxford Fruit Cooperative Limited; Superior Bulb Company Limited.
On referring to the list, Mr. Speaker, it is noted that the province of Quebec has its various organizations, as does Ontario, Manitoba, British Columbia, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island. This list is a long one, comprising virtually all growers in Canada. My purpose in placing this list on the record is to show that requests coming from the council are in no wise sectional but rather the unanimous decision of a representative body. You will see that this can mean only one thing, and that is an ideal relationship between the council and the government, particularly with the Department of Agriculture. This has long been recognized by the department and I need only quote the words of a former minister of agriculture, Mr. Gardiner, to this effect, when he stated in Hansard of Friday, July 24, 1942, at page 4697 as follows:
I want to say . . . that the Department of Agriculture and I as minister greatly appreciate the associations that have existed between the horticultural council and the department . . . Since I have had the privilege of being Minister of Agriculture the one group of farm producers who have maintained ideal relationships between the department and their industry are those people who are associated with the horticultural council . . . They have not asked the department or the government to be represented in certain places. They set up an organization of their own; they have made known their needs and seen to it that the department at all times knew what their organization thought ought to be done. They have worked consistently at the task of taking care of the interests of their producers. They have not wasted any of their energies in other directions. While the thanks of the growers of fruit, and particularly the apple growers, have been extended to the department officials and to myself as minister, I must say that a great part of the credit is due to the fact that the industry has been so well organized under the council ... I think they found the officials of the different departments ready to sit down with

them to work out their problems. The problem could not be dealt with entirely by the Department of Agriculture. The Department of Finance plays a considerable part . . . and also the Department of Trade and Commerce when the problem is associated with trade outside of Canada. That organization at all times has been well informed not only with regard to their own industry here, but also with regard to the possibilities of marketing their products. They have stayed with the job until they, in co-operation with our officials, have worked out plans which would be helpful.
May I also quote Mr. Stirling, a former Conservative member of this house, who for many years ably represented his constituency. His remarks followed those made by Mr. Gardiner and are reported in the same edition of Hansard:
I should like to present my own thanks to the minister tor the way in which he has referred to the Canadian Horticultural Council. I feel sure that the recognition which he has given this evening will be greatly appreciated by the many associations which go to make up that council.
So long as I have been a member of this house, in my endeavours to represent the fruit and vegetable growers of the part of Canada that I represent, it has been of very great assistance to me to be able to turn to the information always available through the secretary of the horticultural council.
May I add my own appreciation of the services provided by the council? I may say in passing that they were kind enough to have me at their last three-day meeting in Ottawa. I have dealt with this council at length, because I wish hon. members to know more about it. This body-the Canadian Horticultural Council-is a sincere one. There is nothing sectional in its ambitions. The government knows, through its long association with the council, that the requests made by it have been thoroughly studied and debated, and it is for this reason that the government respects the council's decision.
You will understand now, Mr. Speaker, that I have no hesitation about raising my final point, which is this: that the government should give effect to the fair value for duty section which applies to fruits and vegetables. You will recall that it was passed last year under the amendment to the Customs Act, namely paragraph (b) subsection 7 of section 40A. However-and this should be underlined -this was only to take effect upon proclamation, and to date the section has yet to be proclaimed. The Canadian Horticultural Council has always recognized the principle of fair value for duty. They feel that it is an absolutely necessary safeguard against distress selling or, as we say otherwise, the importation of fruit and vegetables into this country at fire sale prices. I say that the council has always recognized the principle of fair value for duty, but perhaps it would be better to say that they have fought for it since the inception of the council in 1922.
The Budget-Mr. Pearson
Finally, I subscribe to this principle because I have seen the effects of distress selling in my own constituency, and I am sure many hon. members here have themselves seen the effect of distress selling in their own ridings. I myself have seen the gradual deterioration of a well established industry. It is a hard thing to consider that at best our growers can only realize a second rate price for the goods they produce. Fair value for duty is, I think it is fair to say, the answer to this problem, and I now ask the government to give early and earnest consideration to this establishment.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Mr. Speaker, I hope that my hon. friend who has preceded me will forgive me if I do not follow him into the fruit orchards and vegetables gardens of the lovely part of the world from which he comes. I propose to deal with some more general aspects of the budget, of the speech made by the Minister of Finance (Mr. Fleming) in introducing it and, indeed, of the speech which he made this afternoon in defending it.
I regret that the Minister of Finance is not in his place but I quite realize that he is filling an important public engagement at which I know those who sit on the opposite side of the table will have a greater opportunity of asking him questions with regard to some of his spectacular statements than we had in the house this afternoon. However, the absence of the minister does not deter me from complimenting him on his energy and his industry and on what I might call the massive performance of his budget speech which, according to some commentators and onlookers, may be his last. If this should be the case I think we can say quite sincerely that he has been the greatest minister of finance that Canada has had since Mr. Walter Harris.


John George Diefenbaker: That, of course, is not a new joke. That has been used several times.


Lester Bowles Pearson: In saying this I do not overlook the fact that the Prime Minister (Mr. Diefenbaker) was acting minister of finance, I think, though for a very short time.


John George Diefenbaker: No; that last statement was no more accurate than the other one.


Lester Bowles Pearson: I can congratulate the Minister of Finance on that score at least, and I do it very sincerely, for I have a real admiration for him though at times I find it difficult to understand how a man who can be so amiable in private conversation can, when he debates in the house or on the hustings, indulge in what I can only call such voluble irascibility. I cannot, however,

The Budget-Mr. Pearson compliment the minister on either the form or the content of his budget speech which I thought-and nothing he has said this afternoon has removed that thought-was less than candid and more than normally partisan in many places.
The Minister of National Revenue (Mr. Nowlan) in a report which he apparently makes periodically from parliament hill to the Kentville Advertiser described this budget very accurately indeed in the latest of these reports which I have seen as "bitter and disagreeable medicine". Well, that seems to be the verdict in the country. A paper which circulates widely in my own constituency-a very good newspaper, though a very Conservative paper-The Sault Star- called it a vexing disappointment. The Globe and Mail called it worse than that.
The budget does indeed show a startling contrast between past promises and present performance and nothing that the Minister of Finance said this afternoon has altered our view on this score. To hon. members on the government side that contrast must have been disheartening. To the country it is disillusioning.
There was an interesting contrast, too, between the approach of the Minister of Finance and the Minister of National Revenue to the budget in so far as the question of promises is concerned. The burden of the remarks of the Minister of Finance this afternoon on this aspect of the subject was, as it were, "We did not make the promises but we are keeping them." One part of the remarks made by the Minister of National Revenue the other night was to the effect that they made them but they are of two kinds. He went on to say as reported at page 2624 of Hansard of April 13, 1959:
-there is no doubt that promises of any kind, whether pre-election promises or otherwise, should be honoured and respected so far as circumstances will possibly permit-
Indeed, the Minister of National Revenue has now divided political promises into two kinds, those made outside the house and those made inside the house, first and second class promises. Surely there is sufficient justification in those words and their reflection in government policy for the charge which is implicit in our amendment on which we will be voting this evening, the charge that this administration has elevated expediency into a principle and practice of government. Surely that is the main reason why this government has lost standing in the country so soon after its electoral triumph of a year ago.
Perhaps, however, hon. gentlemen opposite are beginning to learn. I confess that this


budget shows some signs of it. They are perhaps beginning to learn that every promise conceived by an advertising director who now directs a political party and tossed emotionally and irresponsibly to the electorate-


Mr. Nesbitt:: What about the tax cuts?


Lester Bowles Pearson: I will come to that. Perhaps they are beginning to learn that such actions have fiscal and economic consequences.


An hon. Member:: You will come to grief if you continue.


Lester Bowles Pearson: At this time the Prime Minister has indeed called the political tune but it is the people who are paying the piper. That is perhaps why one prominent Canadian business man has called this budget the chicken roosting budget, and no crowing by the Minister of Finance or his faithful backbench followers can conceal that fact. Perhaps an even better designation for this budget would be the budget of the morning after two nights before.
Events are now catching up with the minister and his colleagues. Their pilgrims' progress from the fantasies of the hustings to the realities of the treasury benches has been slow, painful and very expensive for the country. If, however, this progress should result in planned and well thought out economic and fiscal policies in the future based on sound economic principles and not on the whims and emotions of party pressures and party advantage, something at least will have been salvaged from the partisan promissory activity of two elections.
The Minister of Finance this afternoon was guilty of a course of action of which he and some of his colleagues have been guilty before. When they are in trouble and when it is difficult for them to explain the problems that face them in the economic and financial fields-and the minister was having some difficulty in that regard this afternoon, especially when he got into the field of monetary policy-they blame it all on world conditions. They say the United States or some other international factor is to blame.


An hon. Member:: The Liberals.


Lester Bowles Pearson: 
John George Diefenbaker: You will have to watch the applause, though, and see that it is not credited to the wrong source.


Lester Bowles Pearson: When the Minister of Finance, without the kind of smile which he has on his face now, attacked our estimates of the deficit for last year and my own in particular -because I did undoubtedly make an estimate and so did the Canada tax foundation of almost $1 billion-we said the deficit would be $835 million based on the minister's own calculations of revenue. Taking into account the national defence expenditure fund that would have been $950 million as my hon. friend the hon. member for Essex East (Mr. Martin) pointed out yesterday. On the basis of the revenue forecast by the minister himself, the estimates we made earlier and which the minister said had done so much damage to the country-estimates of almost $1 billion, on those estimates based on the minister's own calculations of revenue and not ours- he had to change them later, the deficit would have been $950 million.
As it is, his revenue has exceeded his estimates. He had a few windfalls, one due in no small part to the increased interest rate which gave the Bank of Canada a slightly larger profit than they had calculated, I think $22 million larger. But whatever the
The Budget-Mr. Pearson figure may be, last year's deficit was the highest peacetime deficit in our history, a record.
The estimated budgetary deficit this year is not $393 million but $435 million, if we include, as we should, the current deficit on the old age security fund. That makes a two-year budgetary deficit of $1,270 million, which is a record however you look at it. It makes the budgetary and non-budgetary deficit for 1958-59, $1,200 million, well over the $1 billion which the minister tosses back to us. His estimated cash deficit, budgetary and non-budgetary, for the current year 1959-60 is $850 million. Therefore, we have a cash deficit for two years of over $2 billion, which is another record broken. We had a deficit last year in the old age pension fund of $184 million and a year's drop in the unemployment insurance fund of $242 million, two more records. We have an increase in one year in the national debt of $1,400 million, which is a peacetime record in our history and which almost wipes out the reductions made in 10 years to the national debt because of prudent and wise Liberal financial administration.
I will give a few more records. From December 31, 1957 to December 31, 1958 we had an increase in the money supply of $1,324 million, or more than 11 per cent, which is greater than the total cash deficit for that year, and that is a record. We also have an increase in taxes in one year-not the figure the Prime Minister used on television last night-of $352 million, and we have that while, according to the figures which were released today for March, more than half a million men are still out of work. That is another record; that is another first, Mr. Speaker. We have an increase in the number of government employees, also a new record.
Then we come to expenditures for 1958, 1959 and 1960, something about which the Minister of Finance had a good deal to say this afternoon in showing how hard the treasury board-he is the chairman of the treasury board-had worked to keep expenses down. Last year, as the house knows, the expenditures were $5,387 million, the highest in any year, peace or war, in our history, and $538 million above the figure for the last year of Liberal administration.
We on this side of the house remember how the hon. members on the other side, when they were over here and when they were on the hustings, were going to save $500 million out of government expenditures because of waste and extravagance. What have they done? They have added $538 million to government expenditures. That was another record until it was exceeded by

The Budget-Mr. Pearson the budgetary estimates tor 1959-60, which reached $5,660 million. These expenditures for 1959-60, which the minister gave the other night in the house, are $165 million more than the amount submitted in the main estimates previously. But it is not likely that that will be enough to deal with the extra expenditures of government, because out of this $165 million the minister has to find amounts under the Agricultural Stabilization Act; he has to find $51 million for the C.N.R. deficit; he has to find assistance, if any to western grain producers; he has to find increases, if any, in the salaries of civil servants; and he has to find enough for the usual and further supplementaries. But with all these increases in government expenditures, the capital expenditures, as I shall try to show in a	momentthese are the employment expenditures, Mr. Speaker, at a time when we need employment -are not higher this year, they are lower. Therefore, the level of expenditures generally will not likely make any material contribution to a lower level of unemployment but they are likely to make a contribution to a higher level of inflationary pressures.
I have a table here comparing the main estimates-and this is not the kind of comparison which is fair, not in comparing the main estimates of one year with the main and supplementary estimates of another, as the minister has done more than once in the house-of 1958-59 with the main estimates of 1959-60. I have taken the figures for one of those years from the summary of standard objects of expenditure and special categories which is attached to the estimate book which we received some time ago. If you look at the expenditures in this way you get a very interesting idea of where the increases and decreases are. Civil salaries and wages are up in the current year by $24 million, and the government was going to cut down civil service expenditures. Here is an interesting item. Perhaps this has a bearing on what the hon. member for Essex East said last night in his peroration. He expressed the hope that the minister might move up or, if it suited him, he might move down or, at least, he said the minister should move. The minister and his colleagues are moving all right, because under the item "travelling and removal expenses" we have an increase of $9 million in the current estimates over last year. I know this government had done a good deal of travelling, Mr. Speaker, but I did not know that it added up to a $9 million increase in our expenditures.
We remember also how the minister and his friends, when they were on this side of the house, inveighed against the government of the day for wastage on telephones, telegrams,

publication of departmental reports and all that kind of thing. Well, telephones and telegrams and all that sort of thing are up over $2 million in 1959-60 and the publication of departmental reports should be down because we have the greatest difficulty in getting departmental reports circulated. We assumed that naturally the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Churchill) especially was saving money. Well, the publication of departmental reports-


Mr. Churchill:: When are you going to steal another one?


Lester Bowles Pearson: -this year is up $1 million. On exhibits and advertising-I do not know how much of this goes to the McKim advertising company-we have a figure of $11,800,000 this year; but, Mr. Speaker, when we get to the summary of standard objects that deal with capital expenditures, the things that make jobs-and we have 525,000 people looking for jobs in this country-when we get to buildings and works, construction or acquisition, repairs and upkeep, we have a decrease of $68 million. So much for the great billion dollar works program which we heard so much about. These record increases, Mr. Speaker, come from a government elected on a solemn undertaking to reduce the cost of government and eliminate all waste and extravagance so as to increase services without raising taxes. At one stage indeed they were going to appoint a royal commission to look into the civil service and cut out all these unnecessary costs.
When the minister told us this afternoon that we have been misquoting and misrepresenting promises which were never made, may I say there is one promise dealing with this which has already been put on the record of Hansard. I would not put it on again tonight if it were not for the minister's vehement denial this afternoon that it was ever made. I refer to the promise made on Empire Day, May 24, 1957, over the C.B.C. to the people of Canada by the Prime Minister, and I will repeat once again these immortal words. He said:
The Liberals tell you it is not possible to lower taxes and raise pensions at the same time. Give us a chance-
And he got the chance.
-we'll show you.
But the Minister of Finance says that no such promise was ever made. Lest the minister of National Revenue might dismiss this kind of statement as the bubbling over of an election campaign, let me add some other words also spoken by the Prime Minister. I quote from another statement he made:
My idea of politics is that promises should only be made that can be effectuated.

In other words, promises that are made should be kept, which is a simpler Anglo-Saxon word than "effectuated". Well, let us look at some more records. There is another first in our financial history. We have had recently rising prices in a period of persistent recession or pause or whatever you want to call it. The average treasury bill rate for last week, and the Minister of Finance did not tell us about this this afternoon, was 4.61 per cent, an all-time high in this country, compared with a treasury bill rate on July 30, 1958 of .87, or an increase of 530 per cent during that period of time. The minister is inclined to blame this on the United States so perhaps he will listen to this. The present rate in Canada is 60 per cent higher than that in the United States where the treasury bill rate is 3 per cent, so let us not blame that development in this country on the Americans. So much for the Tory condemnation of dear money.
Where are the other vows of yesterday? Where is the 15 per cent trade diversion? That figured largely in a lot of talk not so very long ago but I can understand why members of the government are very silent about it now in the light of what has happened. In 1958 the United Kingdom's unfavourable balance with Canada widened, and the United Kingdom is the country that was going to be helped by this diversion. It rose from $221 million to $254 million. That is diversion the wrong way. In the first three months of 1959 imports from the United States into this country, which were to be diverted, are up 4 per cent and imports from the United Kingdom, which was to benefit by the diversion, are down 8 per cent compared with the same period in 1958. These are figures from the bureau of statistics survey and not from the Fleming or Martin statistical services.
No wonder, that the president of the board of trade, Sir David Eccles, complained in a speech in London on February 5 to the Canadian chamber of commerce, I believe, that Canada had done little to improve her purchases from Britain. He is reported as saying in what was referred to in the press as a rebuke to Canada:
No other country sold to us so much more than it bought.
Then, Mr. Speaker, where is the cure for unemployment through that billion dollar public works project which has also disappeared? Where is the new deal for the provinces and the municipalities? Where is parity, not charity, for the farmers? Where is that stand-up policy to the United States that was to prevent restrictions on our exports and unfair competition in surplus disposal programs? Where is this policy that was going
The Budget-Mr. Pearson to protect our sovereignty against United States economic and financial control?
On March 9, the Prime Minister on the program "The Nation's Business" had this among other interesting things to say, and I quote from the text of his broadcast as issued from his office:
It was because I knew Canadians felt so strongly about the necessity of preserving Canada's destiny that I have advocated and the government has launched its national development policy to push back our northern frontiers. The result of our action has been that in the last several weeks over 75 million acres in northern Canada have been taken up for oil and mineral development, and I want to underline this-
The Prime Minister is doing the underlining, not I.
-that this is a major means to preserve our sovereignty.
Then he went on to say, "Let us be realistic." Well, Mr. Speaker, I will try to be realistic and indicate the facts as we secured them from the minister concerned. Of all these millions of acres taken up for oil and mineral development to protect and preserve the sovereignty of Canada, 95 per cent of the leases went to United States firms or Canadian subsidiaries of United States firms. This is the way we are protecting our Canadian sovereignty.


Mr. Hamilton (Qu'Appelle):: On a question of privilege, I gave some figures in the house to the hon. member for Mackenzie River (Mr. Hardie) concerning one single sale of permits in an area just north of British Columbia, the total acreage amounting to 3J million and the area being 2,000 miles away from that mentioned by the Leader of the Opposition.


Lester Bowles Pearson: I wonder, Mr. Speaker,
whether the minister would state his question of privilege.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: The question of privilege is very clear. The Leader of the Opposition has misinformed the house by giving absolutely incorrect figures.


Mr. Speaker:: If the minister disagrees with what is being said he will have an opportunity at the end of the address to make a correction.


Lester Bowles Pearson: I would not wish to do the minister any injustice so I will read the questions and answers. Perhaps I do not need to read all the questions. I will read the pertinent ones but if he wants them all I will put them on the record. The first question was:
What are the names of the ten successful bidders for oil and gas permit rights in northern Canada?
2910	HOUSE OF
The Budget-Mr. Pearson
We got those names. The second question was:
Which of these are United States corporations, Canadian corporations, Canadian subsidiaries of United States companies, British corporations, others?
The third question was:
Of the total acreage under permit rights, how many acres have been assigned to each of these companies?
I gave the answer to that question tonight in terms which are strictly accurate. The successful bidders were United States corporations or Canadian subsidiaries of United States corporations in the case of 95 per cent of the area that was leased.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: Mr. Speaker-


Some hon. Members:: Order.


Mr. Speaker:: Unless the minister is rising on a point of order or a question of privilege he should not interrupt. If it is a matter of disagreement with the facts as presented or if he feels the house is being misled by what is being said he has an opportunity at the end of the address to make clear anything that is in question.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: I think the hon. member should read the whole answer.


Lester Bowles Pearson: I want to make it perfectly clear. The Prime Minister said, in respect of the taking up of leases for oil and mineral development, that this was a major means to preserve our sovereignty. When we asked for specific information in respect of certain specific bids we got the information that I put on the record, and it is strictly accurate.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: You are still wrong. Read the answers.


Michael Starr: Read the answers.


John Whitney Pickersgill: They are on Hansard.


Lester Bowles Pearson: All these promises, Mr. Speaker-


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: A very shameful performance.


Michael Starr: Put on the answers.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: A deliberate misstatement.


Mr. Speaker:: Order; let the hon. member make his own speech.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: I should like to rise to a question of privilege.


Some hon. Members:: Sit down.


Mr. Speaker:: Order.


Mr. Rouleau:: A vision again.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. minister was rising on a question of privilege?


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: I believe I am correct in saying it is a proper matter of privilege in this house when I, as a minister, stand up and say the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Pearson) is misstating a clearly stated answer I made in the house. Even though I have not got it here, he will find that I said: assuming that this means one sale, this is the answer. Any person who would do a thing like that has definitely committed a breach of privilege, and I want it corrected in this house.


Mr. Speaker:: As I understand the question of privilege which the minister is raising, he is saying that the Leader of the Opposition is not using the answer that was given, not that the Leader of the Opposition is giving an incorrect answer.


Lester Bowles Pearson: I have used the answer that the minister gave. I have not stated one incorrect figure. Once again, in order to be fair, I will read the questions. These questions and answers may be found at pages 2348 and 2349 of Hansard for April 8, 1959. The questions are as follows:
1.	What are the names of the 10 successful bidders for oil and gas permit rights in northern Canada?
2.	Which of these are United States corporations, Canadian corporations, Canadian subsidiaries of United States companies, British corporations, others?
3.	Of the total acreage under permit rights, how many acres have been assigned to each of these companies?
4.	Of the total acreage under permit rights, what percentage has been assigned to (a) Canadian corporations; (b) United States corporations and Canadian subsidiaries of United States companies; (c) British corporations; (d) others?
5.	In this connection, what is meant by "cash bonus bids"?
The answers appear on a subsequent page of Hansard and are as I indicated in my statement.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: Read them.


Michael Starr: He is not telling the truth.


Lester Bowles Pearson: As a result of the March 9 sale these 10 companies received permit rights as follows, and the 10 companies are itemized. Then, the next answer is:
4. The percentage acreage breakdown as between the Canadian, United States companies, etc., within the 10 companies listed in 3 above is as follows: (a) Canadian corporations, 4 per cent-"


Michael Starr: Be honest and read the answer.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: Mr. Speaker, on a question of privilege-


Mr. Speaker:: Is the hon. member rising on another question of privilege?


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: It is the same question of privilege, Mr. Speaker. The hon. member was asked to read my answer-


Mr. Carter:: The hon. member does not have to do what you tell him.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: -and I have Hansard here in front of me.


Chesley William Carter: Read it afterwards.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: I ask him to
turn to page 2348 of Hansard and read the first answer because the hon. member has not read it.


Mr. Speaker:: I am sorry, but the hon. member who has the floor has the right to make his own speech. I see no question of privilege in the point that has been raised by the minister.


John George Diefenbaker: I rise on a question of privilege.


Mr. Speaker:: Order.


An hon. Member:: Who is Speaker of the house?


John George Diefenbaker: If I understood the Leader of the Opposition aright, he mentioned the 75 million acres that had been taken up-


Some hon. Members:: Order, order.


John Whitney Pickersgill: The Prime Minister is now making a speech.


Mr. Speaker:: I ask hon. members to be quiet so I can hear the question of privilege which the Prime Minister is trying to make,


John George Diefenbaker: The hon. gentleman mentioned 75 million acres as having been taken up, and then went on to say that the answer in Hansard showed that only 4 per cent of the companies that took up that acreage-


Mr. Robichaud:: He said 5 per cent.


John George Diefenbaker: -were Canadian companies. This statement is not borne out by the answer given in this house which refers to a total of some 2,900,000 or about 3 million acres so that the minister has, in effect, a question of privilege in that the Leader of the Opposition is not quoting what he said as reported in Hansard.


George James McIlraith: That is. not a question of privilege, and you know it.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I hope hon. members will kindly allow the Prime Minister to make his point.


John George Diefenbaker: I realize that the truth hurts some of these babblers. The fact is, Mr. Speaker, that the Leader of the Opposition has either deliberately or unconsciously, 66968-9-185
The Budget-Mr. Pearson unknowingly or deliberately, misstated this answer. It refers to 3 million acres, not 75 million acres.


Mr. Speaker:: This is an unnecessary tempest because what the hon. Leader of the Opposition has been reading, I take it, is a matter of record, and what the Prime Minister refers to is a matter of record, so it does not seem to me there is room for misunderstanding.


Mr. Harkness:: There is misrepresentation.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: Mr. Speaker-


Mr. Speaker:: I suggest the minister of northern affairs allow the hon. member to proceed with his speech. Before the time for the vote arrives I will give him an opportunity to correct any wrong impression which he feels has been made in what has been said.


Lester Bowles Pearson: If I had intervened this afternoon when the Minister of Finance was speaking every time he made what we considered to be a misstatement or one that caused a wrong impression the Minister of Finance would not have had any time to speak at all. I would also draw to your attention that when we courteously asked the Minister of Finance for the opportunity to ask him a question, he would not accept our question.


Douglas Scott Harkness: You are just continuing the misrepresentation.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Now, these members of the government, who are so sensitive about statements on this side that they rise to questions of privilege which have nothing to do with privilege in any way and yet the Prime Minister take up 15 minutes of my time-


Some hon. Members:: Order, order.


Mr. Speaker:: I consider the matter closed, and I hope the Leader of Opposition will proceed.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Yes; I will return to this statement of the Prime Minister that 75 million acres in northern Canada had been taken up for oil and mineral development. This shows how this government, under this Prime Minister, is protecting our sovereign rights, and yet when we ask for information in respect of a specific matter, dealing with some million acres which were leased, and we get specific information covering about three million acres, we find that 95 per cent of these leases were granted to United States corporations or Canadian subsidiaries of United States corporations. This is how this government is protecting our sovereign rights. Is it any wonder, therefore-perhaps the

The Budget-Mr. Pearson Prime Minister will keep quiet for a few minutes now and compose himself-


John George Diefenbaker: I will not have to ask the C.B.C. to correct a report.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Is it any wonder that-


John Whitney Pickersgill: The Prime Minister had to send in a correction last night.


Lester Bowles Pearson: I seem now, Mr. Speaker, to be interrupted by both my friends and my foes. Is it any wonder, in these circumstances, that we accuse the government in this budget of both bad faith and bad management, as a result of which confidence in this government and therefore confidence in Canada has been weakened, both at home and abroad. There is lots of evidence of bad faith, although the Minister of Finance got very indignant this afternoon because we used these words in our amendment. I tell him and the government that the word of Canada does not mean as much now as it did.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Shame on you!


Lester Bowles Pearson: I can get lots of evidence to support that statement. I can give the evidence of the R.C.M.P. contracts. I can give the evidence of term 29 of the pact of union with Newfoundland, which was finally and irrevocably and unilaterally determined by the Prime Minister the other day. I can give the evidence of the commitment by the government to purchase pictures for the national gallery which was later rescinded. I can give the evidence of the promise to convene a federal-provincial conference on fiscal relations.
Then, Mr. Speaker, what about bad management? I had hoped to be able to talk tonight about the conversion loan which the Minister of Finance insists was such a colossal success. Yes, I think that was the word he used: It was a "colossal" success. But ask the man who owns a bond. Ask the municipalities. Ask the provinces or the corporations who have to borrow money at present interest rates. I tell the Minister of Finance that far from this operation being a colossal success, in its timing, in its scope and in its cost it was a failure. It has resulted in dear money, in lack of confidence in Canadian bonds, and I do not think the minister himself believes all the adjectival praises he heaps upon it at this time.
We will leave the conversion loan because the 15 minutes I was going to spend on that subject have been taken up by the Prime Minister and the minister for northern affairs.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Let us look at the prospects for 1959.


An hon. Member:: Let him speak as long as he likes.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I feel that if we are going to have these statistics on the record there will have to be 50 per cent more silence from 3 per cent of the membership.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Thank you again, Mr. Speaker. In former days, and by that I mean days before the present Minister of Finance, the prospects for the coming year were usually given in considerable detail in the budget speech. But the present Minister of Finance has practically eliminated this customary and important section from his budget speech for this year, massive a performance though it was. In 1958 five pages of Hansard were devoted to the prospects for the forthcoming year. This budget speech had one paragraph to forecast economic conditions in 1959-60. It had one paragraph on the forecast of the gross national product which is the basis for estimating a revenue and thereby establishing a deficit or a surplus. All the minister had to say this year, was that, assuming normal crops, stable prices and no untoward external events, there should be a gross national product of about $34.5 billion, or a 7 per cent increase. He made no attempt then to justify this optimistic forecast, and he made no attempt to justify it this afternoon. It is a forecast which has been dismissed by many experts, and I will name mine, although he did not name his this afternoon. They include the Canadian tax foundation, the financial editor of the Montreal Gazette, and indeed the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, which in its submission to the government forecast a gross physical output in 1959-60 of approximately 1 per cent, not 7 per cent.


John George Diefenbaker: What date is that?


Lester Bowles Pearson: That was two months ago when they made their submissions to the government.


Donald Methuen Fleming: They do not disagree with mine now.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Let us look at the figures. For the first quarter of 1959 the estimate is a 4 per cent increase. To achieve 7 per cent for the whole year, Mr. Speaker, that 4 per cent would have to increase to 6 per cent in the second quarter, 8 per cent in the third quarter and 10 per cent in the last quarter, without any increase in prices. Let us hope the minister's calculations in this regard are not as far out as they were last year.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Or yours.


Lester Bowles Pearson: My calculations on this point last year, as stated in my budget speech, were that the minister was too optimistic. The minister estimated a gross national product increase of 2 per cent, and with stable prices what did he get? He got 0.6 per cent, I think. How much further out could you be than that? The minister always forgets the qualification of stable prices when he is arguing about that. Let us hope for the good of the country that he is not as inaccurate this year as he was last year. He does not give us any basis for his optimism. He does not say it is due to an increased level of investment, because if he did say that he would be contradicted by his colleague, the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Churchill)-although that is no new experience for ministers of this government- who in his departmental report on private and public investment in Canada for 1959 said that the level of investment would likely be down 1.2 per cent in 1959-60. He could not surely have based his optimistic calculation on exports, because although the government has made a great deal of the export situation during the year which has just passed, the figures for the first three months of 1959 show a decrease of 3 per cent, whereas imports are up 5 per cent.
There are some very dangerous features in our export situation. In particular, one of the most important export products we have in this country is uranium. What have we learned about that recently? The other day in the house the minister said that for the first time in a year he had been able to go down to Washington to see the head of the atomic energy commission of the United States in regard to a product the importance of which is indicated by the fact that during this current year, if all goes well, we will be exporting to the United States about $325 million worth. That $325 million, or whatever the amount may be, depends on a contract made by the previous Canadian government with the United States.
That contract comes up for renewal in 1961, and in April, 1959 the minister at last goes down to Washington to discuss this matter with his opposite number in the United States government. He spent a whole day in Washington. I hope he had a profitable time, but I have some doubt about the profitability of his visit when I realize that within five days of his return a senior official of the atomic energy commission makes a public statement in Colorado, the centre of the United States uranium production industry, to the effect that after 1962, 80 per cent of the United States requirements for uranium will be met from United States sources.
66968-9-185J
The Budget-Mr. Pearson
To say the least, that is a discourteous way to treat a Canadian minister to make such a statement, only a few days after he had been down to Washington, I hope to impress upon the United States government, not only the importance of this export trade but also the fact that the United States government has a moral duty to take up those contracts. Because it was not many years ago when they got down on their knees and begged the Canadian government to spend all its energy and resources in order to develop this product for United States consumption. Now, having found uranium in their own country, are they going to do what they have done with other base metals, namely turn off the tap when they find a tap of their own?


Gordon Minto Churchill: Will the hon. member permit a question?


Lester Bowles Pearson: I will, but I was not permitted to ask any myself.


Gordon Minto Churchill: It is a short question. The hon. member has just said-and I hope I am correctly reporting him-that the statement in the United States was to the effect that 82 per cent of the United States requirements for uranium were supplied from United States sources. Does he stand by that statement, because it is incorrect?


Lester Bowles Pearson: Canadian supplies will be cut by 80 per cent, so from our point of view it will have the same result exactly; they will take only 20 per cent.


Gordon Minto Churchill: Who made that statement?


Lester Bowles Pearson: That statement was made by an official of the administration.


Gordon Minto Churchill: Then that is incorrect, again.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Thus our export trade will be in some difficulties which I hope the government will be able to surmount. I wonder if it is consumer expenditure on which the government intends to rely for its 7 per cent increase? It might be well to remember that the rise in consumer incomes will be partly offset by increased taxation and higher prices and that it cannot in any event be sufficient to provide a 7 per cent increase in real terms of gross national product. The minister also touched on the changing role of inventories. I suggest that his prediction of a 7 per cent increase may well be too optimistic, and that if the hon. gentleman is wrong in this calculation the effect on employment opportunities in 1959 and 1960 in this country will be very bad indeed.
Let us look at the effect on employment. When in the budget debate a year ago, we did our duty by calling attention to some of
2914	HOUSE OF
The Budget-Mr. Pearson the discouraging possibilities in the employment picture we were sneered at, as we were this afternoon, by the Minister of Finance as being prophets of doom and gloom. A year ago we told the government that the unemployment level throughout 1958 would remain high, and we were laughed at. This government optimism of that time is proving to be false, and our forecasts, which were dismissed then as expressions of doom and gloom, have shown themselves to have been correct.
The action taken by the government last year to meet the employment difficulties was both too late and too little, as the establishment of the winter work program showed. Employment in this country varies closely, though of course with an inevitable lag, in accordance with the physical volume of our gross national product. In 1958, on an average, 6.6 per cent of our labour force was unemployed during the year. The estimated increase in our labour force for 1959 is 2.5 per cent. Therefore, if our gross national product remains constant, 9 per cent of our people will likely to be out of work in the current year. If only a 4 to 5 per cent increase in the volume of the gross national product is achieved-and that is the estimate of the tax foundation-that would mean that during the current year we would have, on the average, more than 300,000 people unemployed in this country which would be the second highest level in the post war period. Thus, notwithstanding the hon. gentleman's facile optimism on this score, the problem of unemployment remains and is likely to remain throughout the year.
Along with this there is a second serious problem-though one would never know it from the minister's budget statement-and that is the problem of increasing prices along with persistant unemployment. Though inflation remains a problem parallel with that presented by unemployment, the minister, in a somewhat brief reference in his budget speech to inflation, said merely that he was against it, but that he did not see any evidence of overt inflation in the coming year. The danger, he said, was only that of potential inflationary pressures. Believe me, in the light of the fiscal and monetary situation of this country and the amount of money that the minister, according to his own calculations, has to raise this year, that danger of potential inflationary pressures is a very real one indeed.
The minister tried to make us feel a little happier about this by pointing out-and he was quite right-that the consumer price index had declined slightly since November. I think that is the case. But he did not point out that since November the wholesale price


index has been rising

1.7 per cent-and the wholesale price index has a better coverage and is a better reflection of the movement of prices and costs than the retail price index though it usually precedes the retail index in its changes. The minister has once again in this budget rejected the doctrine of the inevitability of creeping inflation and yet-and I know I will be told that I am a prophet of doom and gloom when I say this-even if we have a boom in 1959-and we are not going to have a boom in 1959-I believe that prices will rise in the current year. There is a great deal of evidence, unfortunately, to support that view.
The increased taxation imposed by this budget will mean-indeed, it has already meant-an opportunity for further increases in the prices of goods and services to producers; and any further increase in the money supply-and there is a real danger of that- will certainly expedite that process. Last year we had a tremendous increase in the money supply. I think it amounted to $1,400 million. The full inflationary effect of that increase was not realized because the recession had reduced what the economists call the velocity of its circulation. This year, however, any progress toward recovery-and we are making progress toward recovery- will serve to remove any such brake, and inflationary pressures will consequently be greater.
To sum up, last year we had mounting unemployment and some inflation in the midst of recession. This year there should be less, but still serious, unemployment and a greater danger of inflation. The paradox of this dual problem, this double dilemma, will persist and will remain a challenge to a government which has not yet shown that it has any effective plan to meet this challenge.
When we on this side talk in this way someone on the other side usually interjects to ask: what would you have done or what else could the government have done? I would remind the hon. gentleman that I went into this matter in considerable detail in the speech I made during the debate on the address, a speech which the minister conveniently forgot this afternoon when he twitted me for not having found alternative policies.
But I say to the minister and his colleagues that they could, a year and a half ago, have introduced into this house a budget making provision for a planned program of expenditure designed to extend possibilities of employment and which could later have been quickly and easily readjusted so as to meet conditions asJ they changed^ The ordinary expenditures of government could have been

kept down-but they were not kept down- and increases in the expenditure of government-and there would have had to be some increases, of course, one and a half years ago-could have been directed to areas where unemployment was greatest and to capital projects which would have had the maximum effect in terms of jobs.
One and a half years ago the government could have realized, as we on this side realized, that unemployment would be high all through 1958. They could have worked out a winter works program in the spring of last year, not in the fall of 1958, just as they should be working out such a program now for the current year.
What did they do? They charged along piling up promises and commitments, and increasing departmental commitments and expenditures, without developing, as the Toronto Globe and Mail pointed out to them, any overall fiscal policy whatever. All that the Minister of Finance could say to us in reply to that charge was: "What kind of policy would you adopt?"
Last year the fiscal proposals of this government were based on electoral necessity. This year they are based on inescapable financial necessity. As a result we have the worst of three worlds abnormal unemployment, rising prices and higher taxes. The minister, of course, has made a virtue of the fact that people seem resigned to the new Conservative policy. If that resignation exists I assure the minister, if he needs any assurance, that it will turn to bitter anger if in spite of these higher taxes both serious unemployment and higher prices persist throughout the current year.
The amount of the minister's new taxes is $352 million and this will have a serious impact. He has taken some credit for the fact that it is spread over the community in a way in which those who are most able to pay do pay. But of the $352 million the sum of $84 million will come from corporation income taxes which now in most cases can be transferred to the ultimate consumer and which is becoming more and more assimilated in our economy to a sales tax. The sum of $75 million of the $352 million comes from an additional old age security tax, 1 per cent of personal incomes. That will certainly fall most heavily on the lower income groups. Of the $352 million the sum of $93 million is sales tax, and how the minister when he was on this side of the house used to criticize sales taxes.


Donald Methuen Fleming: And how your government used to defend them.
The Budget-Mr. Pearson


Lester Bowles Pearson: Of course, that is quite right. The minister made that point this afternoon. But what has changed his mind about the sales tax?


Donald Methuen Fleming: What has changed yours?


Lester Bowles Pearson: We are not attacking this particular tax in the way the minister is defending it.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Oh, no?


Lester Bowles Pearson: Surely, when the minister became Minister of Finance we had the right to expect that he would bring to his new portfolio the economic and financial principles for which he argued so strongly on this side of the house. That is what he said. That is the position he took. That is why we have the right to be suspicious of the bona tides of this government when it introduces a budget of this kind. How can we dissociate the former views of these men from the views they hold at this time without accusing them of hyprocrisy or inconsistency?
Let me remind hon. gentlemen opposite of what the Minister of Finance said in 1950, and repeated every year since then. I refer to a statement of the minister reported at page 713 of Hansard of September 13, 1950:
I wish to put myself on record-
And I will put the minister on record again.
I wish to put myself on record, as I have on similar occasions in the past, with regard to taxes of this nature-
That is sales taxes.
-by saying that they are not the kind of taxes that ought to be encouraged by the House of Commons. They are discriminatory against people of small means.
Are they?
They are hidden taxes-
Are they?
-and in the third place the consumer pays for more than the tax. The consumer pays the original tax plus the wholesalers' mark-up on the tax, plus the retailer's mark-up on the mark-up on the tax. In that way you will find that in most cases what the consumer pays, by reason of the imposition of the tax, is just about twice as much as the government receives by way of tax levied at the manufacturer's level.
Those words were spoken by the Minister of Finance in 1950. If the minister still feels that way about sales tax why did he bring in the kind of budget he did? The minister is a very determined person and does not change his mind easily. Why did he not do away with increased sales taxes? What could have convinced him to change his mind?


Donald Methuen Fleming: Certainly not the Liberal party.

The Budget-Mr. Pearson


Lester Bowles Pearson: The minister told us in his budget speech and again this afternoon that decision of his government about expenditures, about the deficit and about taxes result from the systematic application of a sound and considered fiscal policy. I say that the evidence shows that that is nonsense, and that these decisions embodied in this budget result from fiscal necessities, brought about by electoral irresponsibilities.
The minister attempted to rationalize all of this in his budget speech. I quite admit he did try to make a kind of academic argument for the change which apparently someone brought about in his way of economic thinking. He tried to rationalize his thinking in a very odd intellectual exercise, considering his past views and past assertions. The minister has now become a follower of the man who used to be laughed at so often in this house by the minister and those who sit on that side of the house. I remember that the hon. member for Greenwood (Mr. Macdon-nell) as he then was, who is now Minister without Portfolio, used to laugh along with my friend the Minister of Finance. The minister has now become a follower of John Maynard Keynes and he now talks about flexibility.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Are you referring to me?


Lester Bowles Pearson: Yes, I am talking about the Minister of Finance, flexibility Fleming. While the minister talked a great deal in his budget speech about flexibility, he used to laugh at us when we talked about it. But in the course of his budget speech as reported at page 2415 of Hansard the minister also said:
Government expenditures are in large measure analogous to the overhead expenses of private business; they cannot be greatly changed on short notice.
That seems to represent a temporary reversion to his earlier thinking.


Donald Methuen Fleming: No, that is an answer to your nonsense about having two budgets in one year.


Lester Bowles Pearson: There was not much flexibility displayed in that particular observation. Again, at page 2415 of his budget speech, the minister made a statement that was remarkable for one with his rigid economic background, as opposed to his present flexibility, and remarkable in the light of what he used to say. This is what he said the other evening. It seems to me I have heard these words spoken by some of the Liberal predecessors of the minister in the office of the minister
[Mr. Fleming (Eglinton) .1

of finance. I do not know what the explanation would be; perhaps the same man wrote this paragraph.


Donald Methuen Fleming: It was not Professor Lamontagne, anyway.


Mr. Habel:: Do not worry so much about that gentleman.


Lester Bowles Pearson: The minister said:
There are times when a substantial deficit is clearly the right policy;-
We have had three of those. I continue:
-there are times when some provision should be made for the orderly retirement of debt;-
Those times have gone. They went out with the Liberal administration.


Donald Methuen Fleming: That is not part of the speech as recorded.


Lester Bowles Pearson: The minister then went on to say:
-and within these ranges there is always the question of degree. The problem of timing the adjustments in budgetary policy is not an easy one, and yet good timing is often of crucial importance.
I wonder what kind of timing the minister could have had in mind when he used that expression, economic timing or political timing? Perhaps by the time electoral timing becomes important the minister may have been elevated to a great, new sphere of international activity-which may have been in the minister's mind in this connection-where, I cannot forbear to add, I hope he will not employ the violent, vigorous, histrionic, verbal tactics he sometimes displays in this house and which, if he used them in that capacity, could convert a cold war into a less cold war.
In any event, Mr. Speaker, in 1959, a new disciple of Keynes is born, a convert who was once one of the most violent of unbelievers. But how can we possibly have faith in the minister until he publicly recants his former views? The Minister of Finance is now on record as being in favour of anti-cyclical budgets. He has caught what he used to call a disease. Paul Samuelson described the impact of "The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money", published by Keynes in 1936, as follows:
The general theory caught most economists under the age of 35 with the unexpected virulence of a disease first attacking and decimating an isolated tribe of south sea islanders. Economists beyond 50 turned out to be quite immune to the ailment. With time, most economists in between began to run the fever, often without knowing or admitting their condition.
The minister, Mr. Speaker, belongs to the last group.


Donald Methuen Fleming: That is what you say.


Lester Bowles Pearson: He did not know it but all during those years he has been running the Keynesian fever and he now at last admits it.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Nonsense.


Lester Bowles Pearson: However, I say to the minister that he probably is about the last convert because, if Keynes were still living, he would today, I am sure, reject most of the doctrine he put forward in "The General Theory" 23 years ago. The minister may be a shaky Keynesian but he is a true Conservative because the essence of Conservatism is to adjust years later to changes made by Liberals, to adjust years later to changes made by Liberals after the compulsion of new conditions make further reforms necessary and the old adjustments meaningless.
The government, however, and this is my concluding section of my remarks on the budget, Mr. Speaker, still makes excuses for all its trouble by the fable of its evil inheritance, that hoary old canard which really should be dropped by them. The minister says that the recession began in the spring of 1957 and we concealed it from the people. The Prime Minister repeats the fable at every possible opportunity, that a recession which in the fall of 1957 they claimed after four months in office did not exist began in the spring of 1957 and was concealed from the country and from them.
Mr. Speaker, let us dispose of this transparent fallacy once and for all by quoting from the government's own considered and expert analysis of the situation in the report "Economic Prospects for 1958" which the Minister of Trade and Commerce did his best to conceal from the house and from the country. If you want a good reason for that feeling about it let me quote this paragraph which disposes of this argument, surely, once and for all. This is from the minister's own report:
Overall physical activity reached a peak during late 1956 and early 1957 and the changes to the third quarter were quite minor, but have since become somewhat more pronounced. Total employment, on the other hand, continued to increase somewhat longer with employment in manufacturing reaching a peak by the middle of 1957 and total non-agricultural employment declining only in the fourth quarter of last year.
There it is, Mr. Speaker. Now let us deal with the position as we see it at this time. The economic position in this country is better than it was; otherwise we would be in a desperate situation indeed. I agree with the minister, and I have never denied it though he accuses us tonight of denying it,
The Budget-Mr. Pearson that there are some bright features in the economy which do presage recovery. The minister gave all the details. He selected his own figures but when we do that he accuses us of picking out figures for gloom and doom. The minister gave his evidence. I could give lots of evidence which would emphasize the dangerous features in the situation but it would not convince the minister. I think I have given him some evidence, however, that there is lots of trouble ahead. It is possible to exaggerate; it is possible to minimize both the extent of the recovery that has been achieved and the dangers that still lie ahead. But let us take the views of people from outside the country, which certainly should be unprejudiced. This is what the London Times had to say after the minister's budget was introduced in this house. Nobody can accuse the London Times of taking anything but an objective view of the Canadian economy.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Why not quote some Canadian views?


Lester Bowles Pearson: Yes, I could give some Canadian sources but the minister would say they are prejudiced. The London Times had this to say:
Canada is having more difficulty than other countries in shaking herself free from the bog of recession into which she plunged last year. Consequently, the austerity of the Canadian budget proposals contrasts bleakly with the stimulus of those introduced in Britain on Tuesday.
Then, from across the line the U. S. News and World Report of April 13, had this to say:
U.S. business activity has regained just about all the ground lost in the recession. But the same is not true in Canada.
We do not now at this time and we never have argued that there would not have been economic difficulties whatever government had been in power in this country. We do state, and this is the burden of our argument, that the government had no planned policy for dealing with those difficulties.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Certainly, you
have not.


Lester Bowles Pearson: It increased those difficulties by the narrow political approach established a year ago. Let any member of the government deny that they were not influenced by political considerations in their economic policy. The government increased those difficulties by approaching them in a hit and miss, piecemeal and confused fashion and in that sense they must bear the responsibility which is attached to the government, not perhaps for creating a situation in which we are but for making the situation worse than it would otherwise have been.

The Budget-Mr. Pearson
One of the editors of the Financial Post, John Macdonald, had this to say on March 28, and this is a very good description of what has happened to the government and to the country through the policy of the government. This man said:
The government is in the position of being obliged to throw water upon the inflationary fires of its own making.
Surely, no member of the government, no member on the other side, will deny that if action had been taken a year and a half ago, in the summer of 1958; if a budget had been introduced in the fall of that year; if there had been an accounting to the people of Canada; if there had been a statement of the economic difficulties, economic possibilities, economic dangers in this country; if action had been taken at that time to meet some of those problems we would not have been in the situation we have been in in the last year. It cannot be denied by any honest member of the government that at that time the government was more concerned with the forthcoming general election than with the economic and financial position of the country. Therefore, Mr. Speaker, some of the fires that the government are trying to put out now-and we will give them full credit for the efforts they are making-are, as the Financial Post man said, of their own making.
Perhaps, Mr. Speaker, I might complete my remarks by reading a paragraph from a Canadian paper because the Minister of Finance reproached me a few moments ago for taking my quotations from outside Canada. Here is a paragraph from the Peterborough Examiner. I apologize to the Minister of Finance for ending on what may be an unduly personal note. He knows that I do this in no unfriendly way.
The hon. member for Eglinton, the Minister of Finance, is a man who deserves our respect and admiration; he is as supple in his opinions and in his economics as a pitchman selling kickapoo- joy-juice,
I do not know what that is, Mr. Speaker, and I hope it is not alcoholic. Then the editorial goes on:
In flexibility he stands head and shoulders above his cabinet colleagues and for plugging a hole he is swiftly off the mark. It is being said in Toronto that his budget is aimed at the self-indulgent and rich; actually it calls all sections of the country to relieve the treasury from its financial plight.
That financial plight, is in large part at least the result of both bad management and bad faith on the part of the government. That is why we on this side have moved this amendment on which we will now proceed to vote and which we on this side will certainly strongly, sincerely and enthusiastically support.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The Minister of
Northern Affairs and National Resources took exception to the interpretation put on certain statements of his and I promised him an opportunity before the vote to make a correction.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: Mr. Speaker, I believe it is most important for the accuracy of the Hansard record that I make very clear precisely what my two points of privilege were. The first was that the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Pearson) was trying to mislead the house with regard to the facts as stated by the Prime Minister.


Some hon. Members:: Order.


Joseph-Alphonse-Anaclet Habel: You have got a lot to learn yet.


Mr. Speaker:: I would hope that no member would try to mislead the house.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: I would hope so too but unfortunately that does occur. I want to make it clear for the record-


Some hon. Members:: Withdraw.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: -that when the Leader of the Opposition referred to the answer I made in the house on April 8 the inference was very clear that he was taking the percentages in this answer which referred only to approximately 2 per cent of all the land under permit in the northern areas. He said that the percentages he quoted with respect to United States companies or Canadian subsidiaries of United States companies applied to the whole northern area. I have to say flatly that that was not only incorrect but can only be excused by abysmal ignorance or a complete attempt to mislead.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


An hon. Member:: Nine forty-five.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: My second point of privilege was this. When I asked through you, Mr. Speaker-


An hon. Member:: Nine forty-six.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: -if the Leader of the Opposition would read my answer he proceeded to read the questions quickly.


An Hon. Member:: Nine forty-seven,


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: I will speak very slowly at this point, Mr. Speaker, and Hansard will bear me out that he started to read my answer but he left out several words at the beginning of it. His voice was heard to come in on the words "sale on March 9" and he left out the words, "assuming that the information required is the one", which is followed by the words "sale on March 9", that sale being just under three million acres. I therefore submit-


Mr. Caron:: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, I submit that if the minister wants to go ahead he needs unanimous consent.


Some hon. Members:: Sit down.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I was not really hearing the minister on the question of privilege. I gave him the opportunity to make his correction. I take it he is now satisfied that he has corrected the error.


Guy Rouleau: He is never satisfied.


Mr. Speaker:: It being 9.45 o'clock it is my duty, pursuant to section 5 of standing order 58, to interrupt these proceedings and put forthwith the question on the amendment now before the house.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, may I rise at this time to make a rather unusual request. I do not believe the rules forbid anyone who has voted leaving the house thereafter, but naturally we do not follow that course because of the difficulties that would ensue if each and every one of us were to do so. In view of the fact the Minister of Finance (Mr. Fleming) has an appointment at 10.30, I suggest that the house will understand if he leaves.


Mr. Speaker:: The house can, by unanimous consent, endorse any irregularity. I take it that the house is in a mood to give the hon. Minister of Finance leave to leave.


Lester Bowles Pearson: I think the minister ought to be allowed to leave.


Mr. Speaker:: I would not want the house to be under any misapprehension about the rule because subsection (2) of standing order 12 says:
When Mr. Speaker is putting a question, no member shall enter, walk out of or across the house, or make any noise or disturbance.
Argue
Badanai
Batten
Benidickson
Boivin
Bourget
Bourque
Brassard (Lapointe)
Cardin
Caron
Carter
Crestohl
Denis
Dumas
Dupuis
Eudes
YEAS Messrs:
Fisher
Forgie
Garland
Godin
Granger
Habel
Herridge
Leduc
Macnaughton
Mellraith
McMillan
McWilliam
Martin (Timmins)
Meunier
Michaud
Mitchell
66968-9-186
The Budget-Division	
Nixon	Richard (St. Maurice-
Pearson	Lafleche)
Peters	Roberge
Pickersgill	Robichaud
Racine	Rouleau
Ratelle	Tucker
Richard (Ottawa East)	Winch-45.
NAYS	
Messrs:	
Aiken	Hodgson
Aitken, Miss.	Horner (Acadia)
Allard	Horner (Jasper-Edson)
Allmark	Horner (The Battlefords)
Anderson	Howe
Asselin	Johnson
Balcer	Jorgenson
Baldwin	Jung
Barrington	Keays
Baskin	Kennedy
Bell (Carleton)	Kindt
Bell (Saint John-Albert)	Knowles
Bigg	Korchinski
Bourbonnais	Kucherepa
Brassard (Chicoutimi)	Lahaye
Broome	Lambert
Browne (St. John's West)	LaRue
Browne (Vancouver-	Legere
Kingsway)	Lennard
Cadieu	Macdonald (Kings)
Campbell	Macdonnell
(Lambton-Kent)	Maclnnis
Campbell (Stormont)	MacLean (Queens)
Cardiff	MacLean (Winnipeg
Casselman, Mrs.	North Centre)
Cathers	MacLellan
Chambers	Macquarrie
Chown	MacRae
Churchill	McBain
Clancy	McCleave
Coates	McDonald
Comtois	(Hamilton South)
Cooper	McFarlane
Courtemanche	McGee
Creaghan	McGrath
Crouse	McGregor
Danforth	McIntosh
Diefenbaker	McPhillips
Dinsdale	McQuillan
Dorion	Maloney
Doucett	Martel
Drouin	Martineau
Drysdale	Martini
Dubois	Matthews
English	Milligan
Fairclough, Mrs.	Monteith (Perth)
Fairfield	Monteith (Verdun)
Fane	Montgomery
Fleming (Eglinton)	More
Fleming (Okanagan-	Morissette
Revelstoke)	Morris
Fortin	Morton
Fraser	Muir (Cape Breton
Frechette	North and Victoria)
Fulton	Muir (Lisgar)
Gillet	Nasserden
Green	Nesbitt
Grenier	Noble
Gundlock	Nowlan
Hales	Nugent
Halpenny	O'Hurley
Hamilton (Qu'Appelle)	O'Leary
Hamilton (York West)	Ormiston
Hanbidge	Pallett
Harkness	Parizeau
Henderson	Pascoe
Hicks	Paul

The Budget-Division
Payne
Pearkes
Phillips
Pigeon
Pugh
Rapp
Rea
Regnier
Ricard
Richard (Kamouraska)
Rogers
Rompre
Rynard
Simpson
Skoreyko Slogan Small Smallwood Smith (Lincoln)
Smith (Simcoe North)
Speakman
Spencer
Stanton
Starr
Stearns
Stefanson
Stewart
Tasse
Taylor
Thompson
Tremblay
Villeneuve
Walker
Webster
Weichel White Winkler Woolliams Wratten-167.
On motion of Mrs. Fairclough the debate was adjourned.


[Stage Direction]
It being eight minutes after ten o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.

[Stage Direction]
The following answers, deposited with the Clerk of the house, are printed in the official report of debates pursuant to standing order 39:

Mr. Robichaud: 1.	Was Martin F. Russell, of Shippegan Gully, Gloucester county, New Brunswick, recently dismissed as temporary guardian for the range lights at Shippegan Gully?
2.	If so, on what date did this dismissal take place and for what reasons?
3.	What is the name and address of the guardian presently in charge of the said range lights?
Answer by: Hon. George H. Hees (Minister of
Transport):
1 and 2. Following advice from the Caraquet chamber of commerce of a shift in the channel, it was necessary to make changes to the Shippegan Gully entrance range. A new structure for the front light was installed and the back light was relocated. At the same time, opportunity was taken to change both lights from oil to automatic battery operation. A Mr. Martin F. Roussel had been part time lightkeeper for these lights but with the change to automatic operation a lightkeeper was no longer necessary and his services as part time lightkeeper were
Questions
for this reason terminated effective October 1, 1958. A caretaker was considered to be adequate for the protection of the lights, and Mr. Roussel acted in that capacity on an entirely temporary basis from October 1, 1958, to January 15, 1959.
3.	As the shipping season has been closed, a permanent caretaker has not been selected up to now.


R.C.M.P. RESIGNATIONS
Mr. Howard: 
to
Questions

Questions


OCTAVE BUJOLD
Mr. Bourgei: 1.	Was one Octave Bujold of Chandler, Quebec, employed by the Department of Transport?
2.	If so, in what position and for what length of time?
3.	Was he dismissed from this employment?
4.	If so, on what grounds and on whose complaint?
5.	Was an investigation conducted into the circumstances surrounding the dismissal?
6.	Was the employee given an opportunity to be heard?
Answer by. Hon. George H. Hees (Minister of Transport):
1.	Yes.
2.	As wharfinger, Chandler wharf, Quebec, from August 13, 1937 to October 31, 1958.
3.	Yes.
4.	(a) Participation in politics; (b) the hon. member for Gaspe.
5.	Yes.
6.	Yes.


STABILIZATION BOARD PURCHASES, PRAIRIE PROVINCES
Mr. Argue: 1.	What products have been purchased by the agricultural stabilization board from the three prairie provinces from April 1, 1958 to December 31, 1958?
2.	What is the estimated total purchases of each of these products acquired from the three prairie
provinces by the board from April 1, 1958 to December 31, 1958?
3.	What is the estimated amount of money paid for each of these commodities acquired from the three prairie provinces by the board from April 1, 1958 to December 31, 1958?
Answer by: Hon. D. S. Harkness (Minisier of Agriculture):
1.	Butter, eggs, pork.
2.	Butter, 1,805,000 pounds; Eggs, 2,965,000 dozen; Pork, 10,067,000 pounds.
3.	Butter, $1,155,000.00; Eggs, $1,215,000.00; Pork, $3,492,000.00.


TRANSPORTATION ALLOWANCES, RENOUS NAVAL DEPOT
Mr. McWilliam: 1.	Is it proposed to make changes in transportation allowances for civilian personnel engaged at the Renous Naval Ammunition Depot, Renous, New Brunswick?
2.	If so, what changes will be made and when will they be effective?
Answer by: Hon. G. R. Pearkes (Minister of National Defence):
1 and 2. The transportation allowance regulations for civilian personnel employed at the naval ammunition depot at Renous, N.B. are under review. Until this review is completed the present regulations will remain in effect.

Wednesday, April 22, 1959