1960-12-08

SEMI-MONTHLY INDEX OF DEBATES IN FRENCH

Mr. Speaker:: In case some hon. members have not seen it, may I bring to the attention of the house a new publication supplementing our parliamentary reports which appears today for the first time. It is the semi-monthly index of the debates in the French language and it is now available to hon. members. Both the English and French editions of the index are now available to the public by subscription.



THE LATE HAYDEN STANTON


Right Hon. J. G. Diefenbaker (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, it is always a matter of sadness to hon. members when one of their fellow members passes away. In the passing of Hayden Stanton, the late member for Leeds, the house has sustained a heavy loss. Through the years he won the confidence of the people of his area and constituency and occupied positions of public importance and service throughout his life. He became a member of parliament seven years ago, and latterly had been chairman of the standing committee on agriculture.
Hayden Stanton was one of those whom to know was to love. Unobtrusive in demeanour, generous in his sympathies, of high integrity and sound in judgment, he had made a place for himself in the hearts of his fellow members. As a farmer he naturally took a particular interest in agricultural pursuits. His own farm would be an example of an outstanding dairy farm, his specialty being Jersey cattle.
He was a devoted public servant. He had the respect and affection of the house. To his widow and son and daughter, to his grandchildren, I am sure I carry with me the unanimity of the house in extending sympathy at the passing of one who in his day and generation gave of his best to his area, to his county, to his province and to his country.


Hon. Lionel Chevrier (Laurier):: Mr. Speaker, on behalf of the official opposition I should like to associate myself with the Prime Minister in the words of mourning
which he has expressed concerning the death of another of our members. The hon. member for Leeds had been in this house for a period of seven years. He had been actively and continually interested in matters affecting eastern Ontario and generally, as the Prime Minister has already stated, in matters affecting the country as a whole. Like many of us, he had taken an active interest in municipal politics. He was interested in the board of education in the constituency from which he came and he was devoted, in a special manner, to that industry of eastern Ontario concerned with cheese production.
He was quiet and unassuming, and while he did not take part in the deliberations of this house too often when he did join in them he showed without doubt that he was possessed of a deep knowledge of the matters which interested eastern Ontario in a special manner. I have reference now particularly to power development for industrial purposes, the St. Lawrence seaway and matters affecting the cheese producing industry. He had a fine record of public service.
I should like to extend to his widow, to his son Ralph, to his daughter Mrs. Lattimer and to the members of the family the deep condolences of those of us who sit on this side of the house.


Mr. Hazen Argue (Assiniboia):: Mr. Speaker, we join with the Prime Minister and the hon. member for Laurier in their expressions of sympathy and condolences to Mrs. Stanton and to the Stanton family. We were indeed sorrowed to learn of the passing of a fellow member, Mr. Hayden Stanton. In his years in the house I came to know him well. I always found him co-operative, kindly and prepared to meet all members on a fair and equal basis.
Mr. Stanton held almost all the local offices within the gift of his neighbours and the people in his own municipality and district. He served in the House of Commons since 1953, and in recent times was chairman of the committee on agriculture. Mr. Stanton was extremely active in community and service organizations. Always in parliament he was a champion of the cause of agriculture, the industry in which he took such a well known and active part. We extend with others to Mrs. Stanton and to the family our deepest sympathy at this time.

Columbia River Development Financing


Mr. G. W. Montgomery (Victoria-Carleton):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to add just a word or two to what has been said by the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition. The late Hayden Stanton was my seatmate for the last three years. We had' been very closely associated ever since he came to parliament. We had a great many things in common in our preparation, you might say, for the work here in parliament. He was a man to whom you could always go for good, sound advice.
One thing I should like to add is this, and it is something that no one else has said. In all the seven years during which I have been closely associated with him, I never heard Hayden Stanton say anything but good about anyone. I think that is possibly one of the greatest compliments that can be paid to anyone.



COLUMBIA RIVER


Hon. Donald M. Fleming (Minister of Finance):: In view of inquiries that have been made in the house from time to time, Mr. Speaker, I think hon. members might perhaps be interested in the text of a letter which I wrote on December 6 to Premier Bennett of British Columbia and which contained the proposals of the federal government respecting the financing of the Columbia river development. The letter is not short, but if it is the wish of the house I would be prepared to read it.


An hon. Member:: Go ahead.


Donald Methuen Fleming: The letter reads as follows:
My dear Premier:
I duly received your letter dated October 27 concerning the financing of the Columbia river power development. Your writing of the letter followed our personal discussion of the same subject on October 26.
You will undoubtedly have been advised by now that at the meeting of the Canada-British Columbia policy liaison committee on November 23 and 24, the federal ministers amplified the nature and effect of the federal government's offer as first put forward on February 9, 1960, and confirmed in my letter of April 21. Since the questions in your letter under reply were based on the situation previous to the elaboration made at that meeting, I believe it would be appropriate if I were to repeat the outline of the federal offer here, in order that my answers to your questions may appear in their proper context. Subject to satisfactory agreement on the character and functions of a joint federal-provincial co-ordinating agency, along the lines indicated by federal representatives at the recent Canada-British Columbia policy liaison committee, the federal government would give financial assistance in the following manner:
1.	The government of Canada is prepared, subject to the approval of parliament, to advance one half

of the capital cost of creating the storages necessary to implement the proposed treaty between Canada and the United States for the co-operative development of the Columbia river.
2.	The government of Canada will advance these moneys as an investment in a joint project of Canada and British Columbia which will be self-liquidating.
3.	The government of Canada proposes the creation of a joint entity for the purpose (amongst others) of receiving and advancing the federal government's financial contribution. It is understood that you propose to designate the British Columbia Power Commission as the agency to have physical responsibility on behalf of British Columbia for construction and operation of these projects. Subject to satisfactory agreement between our two governments as to the role and position of the joint entity in safeguarding the obligations of the federal government under the treaty and the interests of the federal government (including such matters as the giving of necessary clearances called for by the treaty, adherence to completion dates as may be agreed in the treaty, Canadian content and employment in construction, etc., and such other matters as are appropriate to be entrusted to the entity), and subject to the approval and authorization of parliament, the joint entity could be authorized to advance the federal moneys for capital costs, to British Columbia Power Commission in accordance with the schedule of construction as contracts are approved.
4.	The financing thus provided by the federal government (or guaranteed, if a guarantee arrangement is agreed to be more suitable) would be looked upon as a joint investment with British Columbia, and be repayable by the operating entity to the joint entity on behalf of the federal government, out of revenues earned from the project after operating costs are met. Since it would be a joint investment, capital repayment out of revenues to the federal government would be in the same proportion to total earnings as the capital contribution by the federal government bears to the total capital contributed to bring the project into operation and would be subject to the same maturity dates and other repayment conditions as were applicable to the capital contributed by the provincial government, or by private investors.
5.	Under this arrangement, it would also be possible for the joint entity to receive and disburse the proportion of the capital to be contributed by British Columbia, if the province wishes to handle it that way. Alternative^, it would be possible for the entity to raise the finances directly from the public, with each government agreeing to guarantee the issue proportionately and to purchase proportionately any part thereof from time to time not taken up by public subscription.
Subject to the foregoing, I would answer your request for information on five precise points as follows:
(1)	and (5). You now inquire as to "the maximum amount which the federal government would be prepared to lend to the B.C. power commission". In our oral discussion on October 26, your question was put in rather different form. You then asked if there would be any strings attached to any loan that the federal government might make and, if the loan were to the B.C. power commission, whether the federal government would wish to have a guarantee by the government of the province and, if so, whether on principal, interest or both. As indicated above and as stated in my letter of April 21, I wish to confirm that the government of Canada is prepared, subject to the approval of parliament, to provide one half of the capital cost of the approved storage required to implement the proposed treaty between Canada

and the United States for the co-operative developments of the Columbia river, as an investment in a joint project of Canada and British Columbia that would be self-liquidating.
(2)	The financing provided or guaranteed by the government of Canada would be recoverable with interest from the revenues earned from the project.
(3)	The precise interest rate to be fixed would depend on the form of financing agreed to, but it would obviously have to bear a direct relation to the rate at which the entity could borrow in the market. With guarantees as suggested above, and in view of the advantageous nature of the project which has been arranged, it should be possible to secure a favourable interest rate. The point to be emphasized is that, on the basis of this concept of a joint investment, there would be no question of an interest charge to the British Columbia government for any investment by the government of Canada. Interest will be paid at the same dates as interest is paid on the capital provided by the provincial government, or to private investors on the bonds guaranteed by the provincial government.
(4)	Until its investment has been recovered by it, the federal government would be entitled to receive a share of the net revenue earned from the project in proportion to its contribution to the total capital contributed by the two governments.
You will appreciate that, apart from answering your specific questions in the context of the elaboration of the federal offer referred to, I have confined myself to a very general outline of the nature of the offer and of the ways in which it could be implemented. We are ready and shall be pleased to discuss the details of these and all other questions pertaining to the financing of the Columbia river project, in which the government of Canada has such an important interest, and express the hope that you may see fit to authorize your government's representatives to discuss these questions at the meeting on December 8 and 9.
Yours sincerely,
Donald M. Fleming.
That completes the letter to the premier of British Columbia. I believe the house is aware that a meeting between the two governments is taking place at the present time in Victoria. At that meeting the federal government is represented by my colleagues the Minister of Justice (Mr. Fulton) and the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Hamilton).


Mr. H. W. Herridge (Kootenay West):: Mr. Speaker, may I ask the minister a question. Is this the first occasion on which this offer has been made public?


Donald Methuen Fleming: This is the first time that the letter I have just read, containing this advance on previous discussions in relation to the financial basis on which the project might be undertaken with the joint participation of the federal and provincial governments, has been made public by the federal government.
90205-6-39J
Inquiries of the Ministry PRIVILEGE



MR. DIEFENBAKER    REFERENCE TO ARTICLE IN &quot;GLOBE AND MAIL&quot;

John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a question of privilege. I am told that most people, and I belong to that group, often take the substance of an article when they read the headline. This headline reads "Inflow of U.S. Capital Must be Cut, P.M. Says". Then the article reads:
The heavy inflow of U.S. capital investment into Canada must be cut back to reduce the drain of interest and dividend payments across the border, Prime Minister John Diefenbaker suggested tonight.
Then the article goes on to quote what I said. The quotation is entirely correct:
"Canada must expand its exports to the United States, reduce the demand on national earnings from non-resident investment and resolve the conflict between non-resident corporate interests and the national interest."
I emphasize these words in the statement as quoted:
"We must reduce the demand on national earnings."
I went on to point out that it was most desirable that Canadians, to a greater degree than ever before, should invest in the future of their country. I made no statement at any time in the course of my remarks which would in any way have supported the heading or the first paragraph of the article, and on this occasion I have a transcript of what I said.


Mr. Regier:: I wonder if I might ask the Prime Minister to identify the document to which he has referred.


John George Diefenbaker: I thought I had mentioned that. If I did not, it is the Globe and Mail of today's date.



FINANCE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Lionel Chevrier: May I
direct a question to the Minister of Finance, and ask whether in view of the statement made by several economists of Canadian universities concerning the governor of the Bank of Canada, as headlined in this morning's press, the minister proposes to make a statement expressing confidence in the management of the bank.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Mr. Speaker, I receive numerous letters from various people who discuss, sometimes in vigorous terms, their views in

Inquiries of the Ministry relation to monetary policy in general. Though the hon. gentleman has not been too specific, I take it that the subject to which he refers is a letter or letters which occupied a prominent place in this morning's newspapers. I may say that evidently the press received those letters just about 24 hours before I did.
I received one package of letters in this particular envelope which is before me. It is postmarked Ottawa, December 8, and registered. I received it this morning by special delivery. There are, in all, 14 letters, all in the same form and apparently all from the same stencilled impression. Thirteen of the letters were signed by one person each and one letter was signed by four persons, so that this letter, or these letters, have been signed in all by 17 persons. On inquiry I am informed that four of the signatories are associated with Carleton University, one with St. Francis Xavier University and 12 with the University of Toronto.
Mr. Speaker, this is a free country and I presume that professors of economics have the same right as anyone else to express their views on matters of current interest.
I receive many letters on this subject, and the points of view reflected in such letters are varied; they are not by any means identical. I presume these letters, like others on the subject, will receive the consideration that is due to them. In this present case I must say that while the indictment is rather sweeping, the letter is somewhat lacking in any statement of the grounds of the indictment. I am therefore left in some doubt as to the particular grounds upon which this indictment is based.
There have been oral intimations that further letters may be received on the subject; indeed, this package of letters is accompanied by a note which reads as follows:
The enclosed letter was not to be mailed until as many signatures had been contributed as possible, though in time to reach Ottawa on Saturday, December 10.
Unfortunately the press has somehow obtained knowledge of the letter. Therefore, the letter is sent now and the signatures of those who have not had time to mail them will be sent later.
As this enclosure is not signed or dated, Mr. Speaker, I am not in a position to identify the meaning of "now" but obviously it must have been within the last few days; certainly it was not today.
I think that is about all the information I can give to the house on this interesting communication, Mr. Speaker.


Hazen Robert Argue: Since the whole question of central bank policy has been raised by those economists, would it be the intention of the government to refer the annual report of the Bank of Canada to the

banking and commerce committee so that we could hear witnesses on this whole question, including the governor?


Donald Methuen Fleming: Mr. Speaker, if and when suitable committees of the house are appointed for the purpose and after the receipt of the annual report of the governor,
I presume then it would be a matter for decision on the part of the house. The annual report of the governor normally reaches the Minister of Finance in late March.


Hon. Paul Heilyer (Trinity):: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. In view of the great public interest in this matter, would the minister care to table copies of the letters referred to?


Donald Methuen Fleming: Mr. Speaker, in view of the wide circulation that this communication received long before it ever reached me, I should hardly have thought that necessary; but, having regard to the fact that I have 14 copies now and there are intimations that others are coming, perhaps I can find it possible to part with one of them.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: In
view of the great interest in this question, can hon. members expect the minister to "coyne" further phrases on this issue during the discussion of the baby budget?


Donald Methuen Fleming: I am sure it will not be necessary for the minister to resort to such stratagems as long as the witty member for Kootenay West is available.



XREBIOZEN


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hazen Robert Argue: Mr. Speaker, I should like to address a question to the Prime Minister, arising out of representations I have received pointing out that a new drug, krebiozen, used in the treatment of cancer, is subject to a tax and duty of some 31 per cent.
In view of the Prime Minister's well-known interest in health care, will he give consideration to the possible removal of this heavy cost to persons being treated for cancer?


Mr. Speaker:: Order. While the hon. member has addressed his question to the Prime Minister, it is a question on fiscal policy which normally is dealt with by the Minister of Finance in the budget. I think it has not been the practice of the house to accept questions before the orders of the day which endeavour to settle budgetary policies before the event.


Hazen Robert Argue: I wonder if I may ask whether the Prime Minister has received any representations in this field, and whether consideration is being given to them.


John George Diefenbaker: In so far as the first portion of the question is concerned, I think it is a proper question. I have received no representations. So far as the second part of the question is concerned, I would not want to contravene the ruling of the Speaker in this regard.



AIRPORTS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. John Drysdale (Burnaby-Richmond):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to address a question to the Minister of Transport. Will the minister investigate the situation at the Vancouver international airport concerning the circulation of a petition protesting the volume and intensity of noise from the engine testing facilities at the airport? The petition has already been signed by over 100 residents of River dale subdivision which adjoins the Fraser river directly across from the engine testing facilities.
Hen. Leon Balcer (Minisier of Transpori):
I shall be very glad to bring this matter to the attention of the officials of my department.



SAULT STE. MARIE, ONT.-ERECTION OF PORTABLE TERMINAL BUILDING

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. G. E. Nixon (Algoma Wesi):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Transport. I understand a contract has been let to supply a portable terminal building for the Sault Ste. Marie airport. Can the minister say when work will start on the erection of this buliding?


Hon. Leon Balcer (Minisier of Transpori):: Mr. Speaker, I am sure it will be started as soon as it is possible.



CANADIAN ATTITUDE TOWARD INCREASED


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. P. Deschaieleis (Maisonneuve-Rose-moni):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Trade and Commerce. Is it the minister's view that Canadian exports to Cuba should be increased?
Inquiries of the Ministry


Hon. George H. Hees (Minisier of Trade and Commerce):: Mr. Speaker, as I have said in this house on a number of occasions, this government is anxious to increase its exports to all countries of the world.
(Translation):



ROYAL CANADIAN MOUNTED POLICE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Gerard Loiselle (Si. Ann):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Justice or, in his absence, to his parliamentary secretary. Could he tell us whether the Royal Canadian Mounted Police has investigated the case of the "metropolitan apartments" in Montreal. If so, can he tell us the results of that investigation?
(Text):


Mr. Thomas M. Bell (Parliamentary Secretary io ihe Minisier of Justice):: Mr. Speaker, I will have to take notice of this question and see that a reply is given as soon as possible.



DOMINION-PROVINCIAL CONFERENCE INQUIRY AS TO EXCHANGE OF VIEWS SINCE OCTOBER MEETING

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Lionel Chevrier: Mr. Speaker, may I address a question to the Prime Minister. Following the dominion-provincial conference held in October, have there been communications between the federal government and the provinces or, in the alternative, have there been oral conversations since then?


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, I would not want to answer that directly at this time. I will review the file and see what the situation is.



ONTARIO


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hazen Robert Argue: Mr. Speaker, in answer to a question of mine on December 6 the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys informed the house that the Ontario hydro commission would use Nova Scotia coal in its third thermal plant. Since there has been a denial of the minister's statement in the Globe and Mail, I wonder whether the minister would care to clarify for the house exactly what the situation is.

Inquiries of the Ministry Hon. Paul Comfois (Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys): Mr. Speaker, there is evidently some misunderstanding about the statement I made last Tuesday in connection with the use of Canadian coal. I refer to what I said in Hansard at page 531:
It is my understanding that they intend to use Canadian coal.
I should have said "some" Canadian coal. That is the word I had in mind, if I did not use it. It has never been envisaged that Ontario hydro would use Canadian coal exclusively, and the Canadian producers are fully aware that their prices to Ontario hydro must meet United States competition.



TRANSPORT


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Léon Balcer: Mr. Speaker, yesterday the hon. member for Burin-Burgeo inquired as to whether a letter had been received from the president and local chairman of the brotherhood of railway and steamship clerks at Argentia regarding a proposed ferry service between the mainland and Argentia, and asked if I would indicate the nature of the reply.
The brotherhood wrote to my predecessor, and I replied on October 14 to the effect that a committee comprising departmental and C.N.R. officials has been studying the economic and operating aspects of existing and proposed services, including that of a service to Argentia, and that it was expected the committee would be reporting within the next few months. I added that there are many aspects which must be taken into account in considering a project of this nature, but gave the assurance that if it is favourably considered the government will make every effort to expedite its fulfilment.



THE MINISTRY


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Azellus Denis (St. Denis):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Prime Minister. Since the Postmaster General is often busy outside his department working on strikes, exhibitions, fairs, etc., is it the intention of the Prime Minister to appoint a parliamentary secretary to the Postmaster General to help him in his numerous capacities?


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the solicitude of the hon. gentleman, and I know it 
results from a desire to be of assistance. But I would point out that there are no vacancies inasmuch as parliament has only provided for 16 parliamentary secretaries. Therefore the hon. member will have to allow his desire to remain in abeyance pending a change should parliament so desire.



PENITENTIARY ACT


[Stage Direction]
On the order:
Second reading of Bill G-2, an act to amend the Penitentiary Act-Mr. Howard.
An hon. Member:: Stand.


Mr. Speaker:: I take it that when a bill stands it is at the request of the government unless something to the contrary is said, because it has some significance under standing orders. If the house leader will permit me to go that far it might save some time.



DIVORCE


Mr. Arnold Peters (Timiskaming) moved: the second reading of Bill No. C-7, to provide in Canada for the dissolution and the annulment of marriage.
He said: Mr. Speaker, in rising to speak to this bill I have to thank chance for the opportunity to discuss it at the present time. It will be recalled that in the last year we have been very interested in the granting of divorces by parliament, particularly with respect to the problems that have arisen in the investigation and study that we have been able to make in this field.
One problem arises from the fact that some of the provinces of Canada have not availed themselves of the opportunity given to them in 1930 by the passing of the Canada divorce act to set up their own divorce courts. This has resulted in parliament granting divorces upon petition for people residing in the provinces of Quebec and Newfoundland. We have objected to the granting of divorces in this way. The other place has a committee which rules on divorce petitions.


Mr. Speaker:: I wonder whether the hon. member would permit me to interrupt for a moment. There seems to be more than the usual conversation which I am not sure is directed to the bill before us. I hope hon. members will reserve it until they get the floor so that we can hear the hon. member for Timiskaming now.


William Arnold Peters: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think some of it is probably directed toward

the introduction of this bill, and I hope to hear from those on the other side during the debate.
We have felt that the House of Commons cannot rule efficiently on divorce petitions, and are concerned about cases of this type and their effect on the work of the house and the other place as well. It seems to me that members of parliament and members of the other place, many of whom were formerly members of parliament or are public spirited citizens, do not have the ability to judge these cases and in most cases they do not have the inclination to act as a judicial body. There is a lack of staff in the house and in the other place to deal properly with the divorce petitions we are asked to pass through the parliament of Canada.
One thing that is surprising and about which we are very concerned, as I think all Canadians are, is that with respect to divorce actions brought before parliament there is no Queen's proctor. When investigations were made in some provinces they were brought about at the instigation and through the efforts of the Queen's proctor. We also find in the House of Commons, as I am sure they do in the other place, that political influence is exerted by members of parliament and members of the other place on individual members to allow a certain dispensation to come about when the person involved in the case is a friend, relation, constituent or other interested party. This would not be tolerated by a court. It happens here because of personal relationships and because there seems to be nothing wrong about doing this so far as these petitions are concerned.
We are also concerned about something that is probably more important than anything else with relation to the granting of divorces by parliament, and that is the question of children and their protection. If we were a duly constituted court we could give full consideration to the custody and maintenance of children. In the House of Commons we are not even allowed to discuss what will happen to the children as the result of a divorce action. We are also not able to afford any protection to the wife particularly so far as property rights and their disposition are concerned.
There is another very important issue, and that is the matter of appeals. In the eyes of the general public and legally speaking, we constitute the highest court of the land, and from this court there can be no appeal. If such conditions exist as have been pointed out many times in the newspapers, then it is not right that there should be no appeal. We might find that a case had been proved to our satisfaction, but if there were a court of appeal our decision might very well be reversed.
Proposed Divorce Measures
Since I first became interested in the question of divorce and the procedure followed in these cases many Canadians have also taken an interest in the matter. The result is the introduction of the bill now before us, which in my opinion will solve many of the problems that now exist with relation to the granting of divorce in Canada.
I	should like to read one or two short articles. The first is a letter that appeared in Liberty magazine last year which in my opinion is nothing but a confession of perjury and collusion. The name of the writer of the letter was withheld, but he lives in Montreal. The letter reads as follows:
I wish to congratulate you on this outspoken article. Eight at the moment, my wife and I are going through this mill, and I do hope that, because of your article, something concrete will be done to clean up this mess.
From the very moment that I paid the $1,200 for the divorce until now, everything about it has been in very poor taste. My wife and I mutually agreed on a divorce, even to the point of paying for it. Later I discovered that I should never have discussed with friends that I paid for the action, because this Is considered collusion.
Later I agreed to meet the detective (in order to avoid having papers served on me at the office) for him to get the ''evidence" on me. The "evidence" consisted of sitting in his office, and discussing, among other things, the "divorce laws" of Quebec, and having a beer, which was served by a female employee. He asked me if I would like to go and meet the girl. I said, "Do I have to?" He said, "No, but you may have to swear that you had relations with her."
Right now, I'm ready to swear that not only did I not have relations with any woman that night, nor have I ever (to my knowledge) talked with or even seen the girl mentioned in the action. If this isn't "collusion", I'd like to know what is.
We are only using this as an example, Mr. Speaker. This court did not even investigate this particular charge, although I am quite sure it was within the power of the Minister of Justice to ask this magazine to divulge the name if he wished to go into the matter to the full extent.
In an article in the Globe and Mail dated July 23, 1960, there is a reference to the same girl being in three divorce cases. The investigation in this particular case resulted in one lawyer in Ontario being disbarred. Then we have this:
Few Divorces Rigged: Roberts
Attorney General Roberts says he is confident only a minority of Ontario divorce cases are rigged.
He told a McMaster University Progressive Conservative club meeting Monday night judges should not "let the wool be pulled over their eyes." Courts should be capable of deciding whether a divorce is rigged.
The question of whether divorce proceedings should be changed was a matter for federal, not provincial governments to decide.
Well, Mr. Speaker, we have sunk fairly low, I would think, when the attorney general would suggest to judges that they give more

Proposed Divorce Measures careful scrutiny to these cases; that some of them are faked, it is true, but the federal government is responsible for this and therefore we have not anything to do with it.
Divorce is not a nice thing. In my opinion divorce should be resorted to only as a last resort when married couples cannot get along. With all the opportunities that are afforded to married couples in our modern society, with marriage counsellors, with courts that are set up to give aid to those who are in trouble matrimonially, then divorce should only be a last resort. When divorce is resorted to I do not think it means we have to make our people lie and commit perjury, involve themselves in collusion and do all the other things we now ask them to do when they become involved with our federal divorce laws.
Divorces are going to be a part of our life whether we like it or not. We had a national rate of 35.7 per 100,000 in 1959, and it went as high as 65.6 per 100,000 of our population in 1947. Some of our provinces, British Columbia for instance, had a rate of 90.4 divorces per 100,000 of population, and Alberta had 67.3 per 100,000 of population. There was a total of 6,222 divorces in Canada in 1959. While we may not like divorce, Mr. Speaker, while we may see many things wrong with divorce, it is a fact that we have divorces. There is no longer any reason for people to hide their heads in the sand. I have dozens of letters indicating that there are people who are still hopeful the divorce laws will be changed in Canada so they can get married and legalize the unions to which they have had to resort because, in many cases, they did not have the money to go through the divorce procedures in the provinces in which they lived.
We have received hundreds of letters, and very few of them have been opposed to broadening the grounds upon which divorce is granted. While I would not go so far as to suggest that, in a political sense, this would be dishonest, I do suggest that it might not be politically sound. Surely a member of parliament does not have to listen to every crackpot in his particular riding. If we are going to be honest, then I think we will have to look facts in the face and give consideration to some of those facts.
I	am not hopeful that this bill will pass today. However, I am hopeful that a bill of this nature will pass in the very near future, because I have a great deal of confidence in the people. I would ask the members who sit in this house to be honest with themselves and with the country and do what they consider to be right in the light of all the facts. The election in Eastview renewed my faith

in the general public. I believe that in East-view the people learned the facts and made a decision, so democracy is still functioning.
Many hon. members believe that because they have certain religious organizations in their area, they should support these organizations. Members may find that these organizations do not express the opinion of the majority of the people in their ridings in this particular field. I have a letter here from Fillmore, Mullins, Gilhooly & Beairsto, barristers and solicitors in Kelowna, British Columbia. This is representative of many of the letters, many of the phone calls and many of the visits I have had from lawyers all across the country. The letter reads:
This is just a brief note to say that I think that the average person in this part of the country whether politically allied with you or (as in the case with me) not, approves of the blockade which you and other members of your party are conducting in the House of Commons against divorce bills. This may force some change in the impossible situation that has previously existed and it seems clear that nothing else could do so.
He sent a copy of this letter to his own federal member. In this regard I should like to tell the house that this year I have informed all those who have written to me that they could assist in this matter by writing to their member of parliament, and that they could also write to the Prime Minister recommending that now he have the courage and honesty to bring about a much better situation in connection with divorce in this country.
Now, many of the churches have written to me, Mr. Speaker, and I am quite sure most of them do not support my political party.
Mr. Pallet!: I wonder if the hon. member will explain what he meant by the expression that the Prime Minister should have honesty. That was a rather peculiar statement he made, and if there are any allusions to the Prime Minister's character I would ask the hon. member to withdraw immediately.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member, I take it, is rising on a point of order. If there is any doubt about the application of the word, perhaps the hon. member would explain.


William Arnold Peters: 
Mr. Speaker:: Order. The hon. member is reading a comment on an action of an hon. member in the house, a procedure which is contrary to the rules. If the hon. member reads letters, as he has done, in order to support his policy or view, that is one matter. But even if it is against himself, I do not think he should be permitted to read a letter of that kind.


An hon. Member:: We would be here all day.


William Arnold Peters: I should condense the contents, perhaps. What they are saying in this letter is not necessarily opposition to the procedure but to the fact that we may have been preventing divorce rather than granting it. There are many letters that I should like to read, but as time is limited I shall refer to only a couple more.


Mr. Speaker:: I think the hon. member, if he attempted to read more, would be abusing the opportunity for debate. After all, he has the floor in order to express his views and not to call in the written views of numerous people outside the house.


William Arnold Peters: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. What we were doing or what we intended to do was to show the transition between an action we took last year and what public opinion has requested in the introduction of this bill. While we intend to continue to fight as we did against the injustices that we considered were involved in the presentations in the house, the general public across Canada has indicated, as have lawyers, clergy and various others, that the solution not only rested in disposing of parliamentary divorce but that there was a great need in Canada for bringing up to date and modernizing the divorce law itself.
It may be unfortunate that under the British North America Act the matter of divorce was put under the jurisdiction of the federal government. It is a fact that in Canada there are many differences of opinion because of the geographical locations from which a Canadian may come. The conditions

Proposed Divorce Measures in the province of Newfoundland, on the one hand, may be much different from those in the province of British Columbia. Between those two extremes there are probably shades of opinion, one way or the other, concerning this matter across Canada. But the British North America Act gave to Canada the right to pass laws relating to the matter of marriage and divorce, and we have that responsibility. The provinces themselves can only accept the laws that we pass. Many of them at the present time, in my opinion, are aware of the failings and limitations of the act we now have, and are looking for something that is more in keeping with modern times.
This bill goes a little further than the bill that was introduced a short time ago in the United Kingdom. But as was said in the house here the other day, we are no longer a colony. We are not necessarily obliged to follow the British act as we did in the beginning. We have the right to do as we like in order to meet the needs of the Canadian people. This realization has resulted in the introduction of this bill.
In this bill we have tried to do two or three things that will provide remedies for all the people of Canada, no matter where they reside. One of the major problems was the fact that this law is still going to be administered, as probably should be the case, by the provinces themselves. We have left it with the provinces, so they can take up this bill and enact their own provincial laws to provide the divorce courts to administer this bill. This provision will mean that those provinces that want a liberal divorce law will be able to have one, and those that feel they cannot have any divorce law and do not want any divorce law can still exercise that right.
In the section that refers to domicile we have made a change that will allow relief even in those provinces that do not want divorce courts. We have made it so that those people coming from such a province will no longer be obliged to petition parliament but will be able to present their petition in a province other than the one in which they are normally resident. In order to do this we have changed, for divorce purposes only, the domicile clause that now applies.
As you know, Mr. Speaker, the domicile clause was broadened in the divorce act of 1930, in the case of divorce, much more than is normally allowed by Canadian law. If passed, this bill would give the court jurisdiction to hear a divorce action if the parties were domiciled in any one of the ten provinces. For example, a wife in Quebec might 

petition in Ontario although her husband had changed his domicile to British Columbia. Normally if the husband had changed his domicile to British Columbia, in order to obtain a divorce the wife would have to follow his domicile and go to the province of British Columbia to seek a divorce. Now, because of the change in the divorce act of 1930, she can petition the parliament of Canada and retain the domicile of the province where she is normally domiciled.
This provision will broaden the act so that a wife having Canadian domicile will be able to apply for a divorce in any province of Canada, providing there is a divorce court set up in that province. It will also provide for cases where the husband has obtained domicile outside Canada since the marriage and the wife wishes to remain in Canada. Under this bill she may acquire a domicile of her own and the court may grant a divorce. This provision is wider than the legislation under the present Divorce Jurisdiction Act.
One of the major features of this bill that I think will be acceptable to all those who have examined it is the broadening of the grounds for divorce. We could refer to many, many newspaper articles, statements that have been made in the provincial courts, statements that have been made before the Senate and in the House of Commons before the miscellaneous private bills committee. It has been generally admitted that the ground upon which a divorce was being sought was adultery only because adultery was the only requisite, whereas really the divorce was being granted because of common law alliance, because of desertion or because the partner was in an institution for drug addiction, alcoholism or incurable insanity.
These various grounds have been provided in this bill. In each case, it should be brought to the attention of the house, the court will have power, under this bill, to exercise a great deal of jurisdiction in deciding whether or not these grounds are in the public interest. Therefore, though the grounds may be stated here, they are not recognized as grounds for divorce if the court can see some reason why the public interest would not be satisfied or met with these particular grounds.
As grounds for divorce we have provided adultery, desertion and cruelty. They are defined so as to repudiate or declare nonexistent the marriage relationship. We have provided for desertion in one form or another. For example, we have provided for voluntary desertion. We have provided for the granting of divorce on the ground of cruelty, either habitual or dangerous to the life of one of the parties. Clause 6 of the bill sets out a variety of grounds upon which the marriage

relationship could be dissolved; for example, perversion, habitual cruelty, and so on.
In each case where desertion is a ground for divorce we have put in a minimum of five years, so that desertion does not mean when somebody leaves for a week or two, as sometimes happens in the United States, where people leave for a very short period of time and come back and find they have been divorced on the ground of desertion. In each case the court is given the right under this bill to exercise its jurisdiction in relation to whether or not these things are for the good of Canada.
I suggest, Mr. Speaker, that in each of these grounds-and they are very extensive-we have taken into consideration both the public good and the requirements of the parties. I think we have made it possible for people to terminate their marriage through divorce without lying, without cheating, without involving themselves and their lawyers in collusion, without having to hire dishonest detectives, without having to incur undue, unnecessary expense.
We have tried to equalize opportunity in Canada as between the rich and the poor, so that it is no longer always possible for the rich to obtain a divorce while at the same time impossible for the poor to obtain one. We have, where possible, made it as easy for poor people to obtain justice as we have for rich people to obtain justice, bearing in mind at all times that it does not serve the country any good to have the lawyers, the judge, the court itself and all those connected with the divorce proceedings indulge in collusion and the other unpleasant things that we all know happen in divorce actions at the present time.
Mr. Speaker, in this bill we have not given consideration to a matter that we consider to be very important; that is the matter of the disposition of property and the custody of children. We are told-and the hon. senator who is chairman of the Senate divorce committee has made this statement on many occasions-that we already have the power, if we grant a divorce, to award custody of the children to either parent; we already have power to provide for the maintenance of those children. But in this bill, as soon as an action is taken, the province in which the divorce action is being heard will be able to grant the divorce; it will be able to grant custody of the children; it will be able to supervise maintenance and the operation of custody in the best manner, and serve the needs of the children in the best way. Therefore through this bill we have allowed the courts of the provinces to make this disposition of both property rights in alimony and the maintenance of children.
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Proposed Divorce Measures
In this bill there is something I have recommended, as I know other members of this house have recommended it for a long time; that is, that we should not hear a divorce action until we have ascertained whether or not the parties can come together again. In this bill we have provided for the matter of reconciliation at the discretion of the court. The bill states:
9. It is the duty of the court in which a matrimonial cause has been instituted to give consideration, from time to time, to the possibility of a reconciliation of the parties to the marriage (unless the proceedings are of such a nature that it would not be appropriate to do so), and if at any time it appears to the judge constituting the court, either from the nature of the case, the evidence in the proceedings, or the attitude of those parties, or of either of them, or of counsel, that there is a reasonable possibility of such a reconciliation, the judge may do all or any of the following:
(a) adjourn the proceedings to afford those parties an opportunity of becoming reconciled or to enable anything to be done in accordance with either of the next two succeeding paragraphs;
This clause allows the judge himself, if he so wishes, to act as a judicial counsel to bring the parties together and hear the evidence. It also means that this judge will not again be able to hear that case, but that someone disinterested will hear the case if it is brought again before the court. It also means that any evidence given by the two parties in the matter of reconciliation, or any disclosure they may make, will be treated in secrecy and will never be allowed to appear in evidence.
Mr. Speaker, this is quite a broad change in our divorce act. I think all the clergy in Canada, irrespective of the denomination to which they belong, will be interested in studying these proposals. I have met many who have said they have not given any consideration to the changes which they would like to see brought about, and now they will have the opportunity of examining what can be done. They will, of course, give consideration to trying to keep married people together. It is our first and fundamental wish that those who are married should remain faithful to their marriage vows and live under them. Should this not be possible, however, we sincerely believe that in honour, and with the least inconvenience to the children of the marriage and to the nation, they should be able to obtain a divorce at a reasonable cost, in a reasonable manner and in a court which is capable of hearing all sides of the problem and reaching a decision, a decision from which there will be an opportunity to appeal.
I feel sure that if the government has any intention whatsoever of getting rid of the problem which we faced last session, and which we shall have to face in a much more

Proposed Divorce Measures severe form next year, it will be found to give consideration to changes such as are now being proposed, whether in this bill or in a similar bill. If the government wishes to put forward a bill of its own I shall be happy to withdraw the present bill in order to make it easier to do so.
I take no credit for introducing this measure. I did not get into this divorce business for my own satisfaction. I did so because I believe we have to do something about this question in Canada. I dislike the dishonesty which is now attached to our divorce proceedings, and in this I am sure I have the agreement of everyone in Canada who has given any consideration to this media of public opinion have been more than co-operative. Television and the other media of public opinion have been more than co-operative in this regard because they too believe we should not have a legal or jurisdictional settlement in this country which is based on hypocrisy, dishonesty and all the things which we hold should not figure in our judicial system.
Thus I would strongly urge the government to view this question as a whole and not to attack the individual parts of this bill. I will agree that the bill is not perfect. Indeed, one of my colleagues will move, when the bill reaches the committee stage, that we amend one of the clauses. No bill is perfect. Sometimes a minister of the crown, with all the assistance at his disposal, has to rise and ask that an amendment be made. We realize that amendments may have to be made to this bill, and the suggestions which hon. members may have to make may certainly be acceptable to me.
The important thing is that we should, this year and this session, get down to the business of enacting a more liberal minded divorce law in Canada.


Mr. R. D. C. Stewart (Charlotte):: In rising to take part in the debate on the bill now before the house, Bill No. C-2, I do not intend to go into the political implications or to discuss the morality or lack of morality of the divorce law, as did the hon. member who is sponsoring this measure. Nor do I intend to discuss the sufficiency or insufficiency of the evidence in the proceedings before parliament.
However, as the bill introduces an entirely new concept in divorce jurisdiction I want to confine myself entirely to the question of domicile as the basis for jurisdiction as far as Canadian divorce courts are concerned. The explanatory notes set out in the bill do not, in my opinion, set forth the whole purport of the bill. The bill provides that any court with the exception of courts in Newfoundland and Quebec shall have

jurisdiction to entertain a suit dealing with the marital relationship if the parties are domiciled in any one of the ten provinces.
This is an exceedingly wide departure from the present rule. We have no such thing as a national domicile or a Canadian domicile. A person has a domicile within the province in which the cause is being heard except under the special conditions prescribed by the Divorce Jurisdiction Act of 1930. As I indicated, I intend to discuss this bill primarily from the aspect of domicile rather than dealing with the enlargement of the grounds for divorce.
In order to understand the law of divorce in Canada and, certainly, the practice that exists in Canada, we must look back to the historical concept and the growth of divorce law and divorce procedure. We inherited most of our divorce law from the mother country and, to a large extent, our divorce practice also. The English courts, in turn, obtained most of their law from the Roman law and the canons of the Christian church. We find that through the years those canons of the Christian church and the Roman law have been modified to a considerable extent.
I have no quarrel with the basic fundamental concepts of the Roman law. I feel they have been a very stabilizing influence over the years; and although the Roman Catholic church does not, even today, grant an absolute divorce they have a judicial separation or, to use the judicial Latin phrase, a mensa et thoro, which is divorce from bed and board. But during the years and up to the time of Henry VIII-and this may be enlightenment to the sponsor of this bill- we find changes taking place, and a commission appointed by Henry VIII recommended that complete divorce should be granted on the grounds of adultery, desertion and cruelty.
It is also significant from a historical point of view that acts of divorce by parliament were of rare occurrence until the eighteenth century, when there were still only 134 divorces. In the first half of the nineteenth century there were 50. Apparently the procedure was so involved and so expensive that it was only available to the very rich. However, the average Englishmen felt there should be a relaxation of the divorce laws, and in 1845 Mr. Justice Maule, in sentencing a man for bigamy, used these words:
Prisoner at the bar: you have been convicted of the offence of bigamy, that is to say, of marrying a woman while you had a wife still alive, though it is true she hias deserted you and is living in adultery with another man. You have, therefore, committed a crime against the laws of your country, and you have also acted under a very serious misapprehension of the course which you ought to have pursued. You should have gone to the ecclesiastical court and there obtained against your wife a decree a mensa et thoro. You should then

have brought an action in the court of common law and recovered, as no doubt you would have recovered, damages against your wife's paramour. Armed with these decrees, you should have approached the legislature and obtained an act of parliament, which would have rendered you free and legally competent to marry the person whom you have taken on yourself to marry with no such sanction. It is quite true that these proceedings would have cost you many hundreds of pounds, whereas you probably have not as many pence. But the law knows no distinction between rich and poor. The sentence of the court upon you, therefore, is that you be imprisoned for one day, which period has already been exceeded, as you have been in custody since the commencement of the assizes.
I point that out to show that even in those days it was exceedingly difficult to obtain a divorce.
After the ecclesiastical courts gave up trying divorce actions the next development in England was the matrimonial causes act of 1857. This statute came into force on January 1, 1858, and created a court of record entitled "The Court for Divorce and Matrimonial Causes'', and it is from this statute of 1857 that the Canadian courts derive their jurisdiction.
When we examine the proposed bill we find that the jurisdiction is changed entirely. Under the English law, and under the law as administered by the courts of Canada, divorce can only be granted by the court of the person's domicile. A person at birth has what is known as a domicile of origin. That domicile of origin remains with him or her, in the case of a single person, until he or she acquires a domicile of choice. A domicile of choice can only be obtained by setting up or obtaining residence in a new country or in a new jurisdiction, with the intention of making your permanent home there. The English authorities and the Canadian authorities have not defined domicile with clarity. It has been defined by one judge as the centre of gravity, but it is usually interpreted as the place where a man or a person resides permanently and with the intention of remaining there permanently. If the domicile of choice is lost or abandoned, then the domicile of origin is retained.
The married woman, on the other hand, outside of the limited category in the Divorce Jurisdiction Act of 1930, has no separate domicile apart from her husband. Unless it is a case where she has been deserted for upwards of two years, she must bring the action where her husband is domiciled; but in the case of desertion for upwards of two years she may bring the action where her husband was domiciled at the time of the desertion.
The present bill not only provides for a Canadian domicile-that is, a person domiciled in the province of New Brunswick is
Proposed Divorce Measures domiciled in every other province of Canada for the purpose-but enables a married woman to acquire a domicile separate and apart from her husband; and if I read section 4 subsection 2 correctly, it provides that a married woman may petition the court where she is residing, providing her husband was domiciled in any province of Canada at the time of the marriage, and so obtain a divorce provided, of course, the other requirements for divorce are present. At least she sets up that the court has jurisdiction.
Hon. members will realize, I think, that this is a very wide extension of the present law and of the jurisdiction of the court. Canadian divorces, as they are now granted on the basis of domicile, are recognized throughout the world, and I think this is as it should be. Any divorce-and I am talking now of absolute divorce, not judicial separation-makes a change in the status of the individuals concerned. It is more than an action in persona; it is an action in rem. It affects the status of the people; it affects property rights; in nullity actions it affects the legitimacy or illegitimacy of the children, and I submit that we should not so widen the basis of jurisdiction as to allow any weakening of the position of the Canadian courts, or allow decrees to be granted on any basis except the basis of domicile.
In recent years in some of our courts there has been a tendency in nullity actions, especially actions that are void, to be satisfied on the basis of residence, or at least it would appear that the evidence establishes residence more than domicile. But I submit that the weakness of the present bill is twofold. One, it is trying to set up a national domicile. Now, an individual can have only one domicile at one time. Domicile is peculiar, particular to a certain geographical and legal entity. That should remain as it is. The second weakness is that a married woman who is separated from her husband can acquire a national or a provincial domicile regardless of the present whereabouts of her husband, or whether he has acquired a new domicile beyond the domicile he had at the time of the marriage.
I point these things out to indicate that the English and the Canadian basis of jurisdiction, namely that of domicile, is much more satisfactory and provides an adequate assurance that any petitioner coming before the courts, if he establishes domicile and has the necessary evidence, will obtain a divorce, or a divorce can be obtained.
I intimated that I was not going to discuss the grounds as set out in the proposed bill. I think most of us are agreed that there should be an extension of some of the grounds.
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Proposed Divorce Measures but I cannot support *wholeheartedly the grounds set out in the bill. I think they would have a tendency to make divorces too easy to obtain; that, coupled with the question of domicile, they would leave the way open for abuses, for collusion and connivance, and would defeat one of the purposes of the sponsors of this bill. It is submitted that domicile should be the basis of divorce actions and should also be the basis of nullity actions, and if those actions were brought in the various provincial courts I think many of the objections to the present proceedings in parliament would be abolished.
We cannot force on any provincial government an act compelling them to set up a divorce court. That is a matter entirely within the provincial realm. It is true that under the British North America Act divorce is assigned to the federal government, but I submit to the house that at the present time all the provincial courts, I think without exception, are operating under preconfederation statutes. We obtain our divorce jurisdiction based on domicile from the imperial parliament.
(Translation):


Jean-Paul Deschatelets: Mr. Speaker, the house is now considering a bill which might have some very serious effects, as it involves first the whole matrimonial institution, then the constitution, at least as far as the province of Quebec is concerned, and also in a general way, the entire social order which, by tradition, has rested on the family.
I wish I could have had a little more time to study all the aspects of the divorce problem, but even at the risk of missing certain points, I think in the face of this measure, I should immediately state my position on the principles involved.
First, let me comment briefly on the bill itself. It is a bill on divorce in Canada, and its obvious purpose is to facilitate and generalize divorce in this country. For any person domiciled in Canada, this bill in effect proposes that the administration of the act be a responsibility of the courts; clause 4 of the bill is quite definite on that point. It gives the courts the power to hear divorce cases between spouses domiciled in any one of the ten provinces of Canada. Indeed, the explanatory notes on this clause read as follows:
Thus, for example, a wife in Quebec may petition in Ontario although her husband has changed his domicile to British Columbia.
[Mr. Stewart.}

Now if we look at the grounds for divorce listed in clause 6 or at the grounds for annulment of marriage in clause 8, we find with some astonishment that thousands of marriages could be broken up under such grounds.
While respecting the views of the mover of this bill, and of those hon. members who feel they should agree with him, I honestly believe that, if such legislation were passed, we would have in our statutes an act that would shake up our whole social order, one that would strike at the very roots of marriage and of family life, which we have always considered to be the cornerstone of our society.
American experience in this field proves that divorce courts invariably apply the divorce laws liberally, not restrictively, as in the case of civil law or criminal law, with the practical result that such legislation indirectly leads to free cohabitation. I think that, in the face of such consequences, we should not hesitate a single moment, and not only vote against this bill, but condemn the state of mind which inspired it.
Having said that, I want to go a little further and delve more deeply into the problem of divorce from our point of view as members of parliament. Let us not delude ourselves, for we are facing serious difficulty, and no matter how we look at it, the solution is not easy.
What happened in this house during the last session, when divorce bills were under scrutiny, certainly did not heighten prestige of parliament in the eyes of the public. Members will recall that, last year, several hundred divorce bills were deliberately blocked during most of the session and were then all passed at once in the last days of the session. The government did not dare to take a definite position at that time, but I feel that time for a solution is running short.
Last year-I am speaking from memory- probably more than 600 divorce bills were brought before us from Quebec and Newfoundland. There may be even more this year, and in two years from now we may get them by the thousand. When that number is reached, will the upper house be compelled to make consideration of divorce bills a full time job for all hon. senators?
As we can all realize, those bills are a nuisance to the Senate, to the government and to the members of this house. The divorce

problem simultaneously involves constitutional, parliamentary and religious aspects. However, that is not a reason for dealing with it in a timorous way. I believe that, in discussing the bill, we should assume our responsibilities and I shall briefly outline the background of the matter from that angle-at least with regard to the province of Quebec- before making a suggestion which, I believe, might serve as a basis for the settlement of this problem.
Before Canada was ceded in 1760, the customary law of Paris where legislation was based on French and Catholic principles, proclaimed that marriage could not be dissolved, and did not tolerate divorce in the territory which was to become Lower Canada, and later still, the province of Quebec. That legislation which remains the basis of civil law in the province of Quebec, only accepted separation.
Our civil law remained fully the same following the cession of 1760, and later on our practices and customs in civil law, that is French law, of which indissolubility of wedlock was a part, were confirmed by the Quebec Act of 1774.
In 1865, the joint parliament of the two Canadas adopted for Lower Canada the same, though newly codified civil code which, under section 185, provided the indissolubility of marriage in exactly the same terms that are to be found today in our code, that is the following:
-marriage can only be dissolved by the natural demise of one of the partners. As long as they both live, it is indissoluble.
Then came the British North America Act in 1867. It was at that time, I think, that, according to the various authors I read, the problem came up which seems so complicated to us today.
Before they joined confederation, the provinces of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, as well as British Columbia had their own divorce laws. In fact, a provision in the British North America Act- under section 129, I think-stipulated that provinces which had their own divorce laws before joining confederation would keep them as they were.
Following a decision by the privy council in 1919-in the case of Board v. Board, as reported in volume A.C., page 956-the prairie provinces obtained that right with regard to divorce. Since then, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta have their own divorce courts.
Proposed Divorce Measures
It was during the session of 1930 that, under the Woodsworth's bill, it was decided that a divorce court would be established in Ontario. Incidentally, we may note-and this is quite interesting-that the main argument advanced by Mr. Woodsworth, then leader of the C.C.F. party, was that the number of divorce cases was constantly on the rise and that they were becoming an embarrassment for parliament; now, according to him, an Ontario divorce court would have the effect of reducing that number. Events have proved him wrong.
On the other hand, subsection 13 of section 92 of the B.N.A. Act confers to provinces the exclusive right of legislating on civil rights, and it can be said-as various distinguished lawyers actually did say-that with regard to Quebec, the constitution of 1867 confirmed the provisions of our civil code, including section 185 which proclaims the indissolubility of marriage.
I shall now come back to the B.N.A. Act. Section 91 of that act endows the federal government with jurisdiction in respect of anything affecting marriage and divorce, except the actual celebration of marriage.
From that viewpoint, one must come to the conclusion, as far as Quebec is concerned, that the constitution provides for double jurisdiction. This, to my mind, is the crux of the problem.
To back this up, I should like to quote what a former prime minister of Canada, the Right Hon. Mr. St. Laurent had to say in that connection on March 24, 1944, as reported in a book entitled Le probleme du divorce, by Rev. Father de Lery.
Not only has Quebec no jurisdiction in divorce matters, but there is a statute dating back to before the confederation, maintained in force through the B.N.A. Act and which will remain in force as long as parliament does not decide to legislate in the matter, as authorized under section 91 of the constitution. That statute, which was in force at the time of confederation, provides that marriage shall be dissolved only by death of the husband or the wife. No matter what authority is set up, so long as that legislation is in force in the province, no divorce may be granted by any court.
The solution to the problem therefore appears a little more clearly now. Eight provinces now have divorce courts and, therefore, for the moment, there is no problem there as far as the federal government is concerned. The matter is entirely different in the provinces of Quebec and Newfoundland where no divorce courts are in existence and divorce was never recognized.
Before joining confederation, Newfoundland had not granted a single divorce. The province of Quebec has always opposed

Proposed Divorce Measures divorce. In short, neither province wants a divorce court. Therefore, I should like to ask the following question: Why not respect the wishes of those two provinces? Has it occurred to us that by granting to the people of those two provinces, Quebec and Newfoundland, the right to divorce, we would be imposing upon them rights and privileges which they are not seeking? Now, how can we reconcile the federal government's constitutional right to grant divorce with the civil law of both those provinces, which do not recognize divorce and have no wish to do so?
It has been contended by certain people that divorce cases might be referred to the Exchequer Court of Canada. It would be interesting, I think, to read what the author quoted previously, Rev. de Lery has to say about this in his book Le problems du divorce, page 104:
In the face of obvious opposition to the suggestion of giving Quebec and Newfoundland courts jurisdiction in divorce matters, it has been suggested that authority in the matter be devolved upon the exchequer court or some other federal court.
If divorce cases are referred to any court, provincial or federal, on either shore of the Ottawa river, any person in Newfoundland and Quebec would obtain an undeniable right to petition that court, for when a court is in existence, any citizen has a right to apply to it for redress of any damage sustained. And that court would have to grant or refuse the divorce on the sole basis of the law and the evidence. The granting of a divorce was formerly an act of grace, a favour; it would now become a matter of strict right. To set up a court is to recognize divorce. This is more than a matter of convenience of procedure. There is a principle involved.
I think we should put an end to this paradoxical, indeed slightly ridiculous situation, by leaving to the provinces full and exclusive jurisdiction in the field of marriage.
Let the provinces themselves decide whether they want divorce courts, and in the affirmative, let them determine when and how they may from time to time, if they so wish, extend the grounds for divorce.
If the government amended section 71-* this is a suggestion-to remove from the federal parliament jurisdiction over marriage and divorce, the provinces would then exercise full and exclusive jurisdiction in this field. Such a course would not only eliminate a source of considerable annoyance for parliament, which can only increase over the years, but it would also return to the provinces a jurisdiction which is intimately tied' up with the exercise of their civil rights. I have always felt, and those who have had to deal with constitutional problems have always felt, that there is nothing more local and more provincial than marriage ties.


So the sooner we can hand over this field to the provinces, the better it will be for everyone.
(Text):


Mr. Eldon M. Woolliams (Bow River):: Mr. Speaker, I am happy to follow the hon. member for Timiskaming (Mr. Peters) the hon. member for Charlotte (Mr. Stewart) and the hon. member for Maisonneuve-Rosemont (Mr. Deschatelets) and to have had the opportunity to listen to the ideas they put forward in reference to this bill with regard to divorce. In listening to their arguments I was almost convinced that many times, on many problems in Canada, we are divided not so much by political parties as by regions, environment and experiences.
On this occasion I should like to congratulate the mover of the bill. I think I can say that I am with him in spirit. There are some things about the bill with which, as I develop my argument this afternoon, I will take issue. However, I know that in presenting the bill he felt there were certain changes that should be made with reference to the divorce law of Canada. I could not go along with him in the idea that because some people in Canada had written to him and expressed views different from his own, whether they look at the matter from the ecclesiastical point of view or otherwise, they are crackpots. The reason I am a Conservative is because I am happy that we have a leader like the Prime Minister (Mr. Diefen-baker) who spelled out the rights that we have as Canadians. One of those rights is the right to worship as we see fit. In dealing with this particular matter we cannot isolate that consideration entirely.
I am also happy to take part in the debate today because, coming as I do from the city of Calgary and speaking as a westerner, I should like to make reference to a gentleman who is a great scholar, namely Mr. W. Kent Power, Q.C., a distinguished constitutional lawyer and a great gentleman who for many years has expressed his viewpoint on this subject. I know you will not mind my digressing for a moment, Mr. Speaker, in order to make reference to this gentleman who has shown in many ways the needs in reference to this matter and who has also written many textbooks with reference to the divorce law of Canada. He is also, as I said, a distinguished constitutional lawyer. For a number of years I have been indirectly associated with him and I know that in this field he is a real reformer and that he conscientiously believes that certain changes should be made. He has so expressed himself

in various organizations, particularly the Canadian Bar Association, from time to time.
In the beginning I might say that it is not easy for any member of parliament to rise in his place and speak on this matter of divorce. Every member of parliament must appreciate the fact that in the area from which he comes there are people who have different views on the subject. It is therefore not an easy subject to discuss. I do not know just how one should look at the matter but I am convinced the law must be changed. If there is any law of Canada that allows the dissolution of marriage, that law should ensure to the individual certain rights, dignity, compassion and justice. From listening to the various hon. members express their views today I feel that the law as it stands today in Canada is inadequate and archaic. It is my opinion-and I am going to repeat it-that if we are to have a divorce law at all in Canada it should serve the individual with dignity, compassion and justice.
This is not a new subject here, Mr. Speaker. This is not a new subject for civilization. It is not a new subject for Canada. It is not a new subject for any country. We can go back into some of the oldest records. In fact, we can go back-and I say this with the greatest of respect-to the Bible itself. I am now quoting from chapter 24 of Deuteronomy wherein is found expressed at that time the very problem we are now debating in our civilization today. In quoting from chapter 24 I am just going to read two or three verses. I make this reference only in order to show that it is not a new problem in society. From the beginning of society some men and women who have lived together for the purpose of producing a family have had problems. The foundation of every civilization is the family. I read from chapter 24 of Deuteronomy as follows:
When a man hath taken a wife, and married her, and it come to pass that she find no favour in his eyes, because he hath found some uncleanness in her: then let him write her a bill of divorcement, and give it in her hand, and send her out of his house.
2.	And when she is departed out of his house, she may go and be another man's wife.
3.	And if the latter husband hate her, and write her a bill of divorcement, and giveth it in her hand, and sendeth her out of his house; or if the latter husband die, which took her to be his wife;
4.	Her former husband, which sent her away, may not take her again to be his wife, after that she is defiled; for that is abomination before the Lord: and thou shalt not cause the land to sin, which the Lord thy God giveth thee for an inheritance.
5.	When a man hath taken a new wife, he shall not go out to war, neither shall he be charged with any business: but he shall be free at home one year, and shall cheer up his wife which he hath taken.
Proposed Divorce Measures
I refer to that quotation with the greatest respect in order to show that this is not a new problem.
Today we have had various references to the question of jurisdiction, particularly by the hon. member for Charlotte. I am going to refer for a few moments to this distinguished author who lives in Calgary and who today is retired from the active practice of law, and to what he has to say about jurisdiction. In doing so I may say that I am now speaking from a western viewpoint; I am speaking as a westerner from western Canada. I would be loath to speak on the subject, as far as the law is concerned, in reference to any of the other provinces than the prairie provinces because in various provinces the laws are different. When one makes a statement as to what appears to be the law in other regions on this subject or any other subject he must be careful.
The book from which I intend to quote is entitled "The Law of Divorce in Canada" by W. Kent Power, 1948. Of course, he has brought it up to date from time to time. In the paragraph of the said book at page 1 he states as follows:
Only the dominion parliament can legislate in relation to the substantive law of divorce. Exclusive jurisdiction over the subject was assigned to parliament by the British North America Act, 1867, sec. 91 (26)-"Marriage and divorce." Therefore, no provincial legislature or delegate thereof can enact a divorce law where, as in Quebec, none exists, or interfere with the substantive provisions of the law now in force, whether by a superseding act or by altering, adding to, suspending or repealing it. The word "divorce" in sec. 91 has not been judicially defined. Since, however, the B.N.A. Act of 1867 was passed by the imperial parliament after its enactment of the Divorce and Matrimonial Causes Act of 1857 in which "divorce" means the dissolution of a marriage-
I might pause there, Mr. Speaker, to say this. We in Alberta and Saskatchewan, of which I think I have some knowledge, have the same identical law as that which existed in Great Britain in 1857. That is the law that prevailed because of the British North America Act; I refer to the substantive law. Of course provincial statutes can make the law in reference to procedure and as to how we can proceed with a divorce action when it comes before the courts in question. Therefore, from my point of view, with regard to the area from which I come I think it can be safely said that this particular parliament has the jurisdiction with which to change the divorce law of this country.
In reference to jurisdiction, of course, we have the question of domicile, and the hon. member for Charlotte mentioned this matter. The definition of domicile is defined as follows: "The place where a person does reside and intends to make his permanent residence, or where he was born, which is that
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Proposed Divorce Measures person's domicile of origin." Unfortunately, it has always been the domicile of the husband that has governed the jurisdiction of the court. In that regard, in implementing the law as it stands, it has worked-as one hon. member said-some hardship on the people seeking remedy in that regard.
Then, of course, we have the Divorce Jurisdiction Act which has somewhat remedied the situation. That act gives the right to bring an action in that province where a person is residing, providing two years have lapsed since the desertion in that province where the husband was domiciled at the time the desertion took place.
That seems to cover the question of domicile fairly thoroughly as far as the Alberta and Saskatchewan courts are concerned. However, when you look at the grounds for divorce I suppose it depends, when you are discussing it, whether one looks at the marriage relationship from a spiritual or a contractual point of view. I was rather interested, Mr. Speaker, at the reference today to the book written in a rather satirical manner by A. P. Herbert, a former member of parliament in Great Britain. At the time he was working for the reform of British divorce laws, which were eventually changed in 1937 and have been changed somewhat since then. He deals with this matter strictly on a contract basis. As I said, it depends on the way you look at it. I will quote from his book "Holy Deadlock". Those who have not read the book would find it most interesting, even if they do not agree with it, because it is written in a very humorous fashion and illustrates how divorces were obtained in England before the time of the reform of their divorce laws. On page 16 of the Penguin series book he has this to say:
A man might jeopardize the lives of soldiers by his orders, the safety of the state by his vote, the property of his employers by his arithmetic, his own welfare by his choice of a partner or profession; but all such errors were forgotten, or could, at least, be corrected, by a man of character. Only in the most difficult choice of all- the choice of a partner, not for business, but for life-was a young man expected to be infallible, considered caddish if he confessed to error, and treated as a criminal if he attempted to correct it.
Very odd. And yet the wise and pious state took no trouble at all to prevent the young man from making the mistake, to impose delay between the decision and the fatal step. A decree of divorce was not made absolute until six months after the wise judge had decided that there ought to be a divorce-for fear the wise judge might have made a mistake. But there was no decree nisi for marriage: the foolish young man could tie himself up for life seven days after he had made his decision by walking into a register office and filling up a form or two. Very odd. All those laws and regulations to prevent a man from eating the wrong things, drinking the wrong things, seeing
[Mr. Woolliams.j

the wrong pictures, reading the wrong books, working in the wrong way-but nothing at all to prevent a man from marrying the wrong wife. But what a fuss if he admitted his mistake and wanted to marry the right one!
It depends how you look at it. If you look at it from a contractual point of view, that expressed the situation well. But as I said at the outset-and I repeat it now-it just depends how you look at it. If you look at it from the spiritual point of view, I come back to the bill of rights, that every Canadian has the right to make the decision according to his conscience. Some are for changes in the divorce law; some are against any change; but all people in Canada who express themselves in whatever manner they wish do it certainly with the proper conscience.
Let us look at what the law is today in the provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan, which have similar divorce laws. A divorce action is brought in the superior court of Saskatchewan, in the Queen's bench division; in Alberta it is brought in the supreme court trial division. What must be proved? First of all the party applying for the divorce issues a statement of claim in the court having jurisdiction. In some provinces this is done by a petition. They must prove domicile. I have already given the definition of domicile and I will not repeat it.
Then the marriage itself must be proved, and this is generally done by a marriage certificate. Then the parties must prove they have cohabited; in other words they have lived together as man and wife. Then-and I will have something to say about this later-the adultery must be proved. Then they must negative the questions of collusion and connivance. All of the facts are set out in a statement of claim, and when there is no statement of defence filed under the rules of court with jurisdiction after a certain period the action is set down for trial before a court with jurisdiction as an undefended action. There is a difference between the procedure in various provinces. The substantive law I maintain can be changed by this parliament and the power to do so rests with the federal government.
However, the rules governing the procedure are controlled by the provinces. In the province of Alberta-I do not say this in any critical way-it is much easier to obtain a divorce than it is in the province of Saskatchewan. This is because in the province of Saskatchewan they adopted a procedure which is very cumbersome. You have to file an affidavit of bona fides. The affidavit has to prove all the five points I have mentioned and of course has to negative collusion and connivance. After you have filed the affidavit,

a statement of claim is filed. Even if the action is undefended, you have to serve the statement of claim on all parties, the corespondent and the defendant. In the Saskatchewan courts I have seen cases where one mistake in procedure would cause the action to be dismissed and one would have to start all over again.
But this is not true in the province of Alberta, because over the years in Alberta the governments, or those who have power to prepare the rules of court, have streamlined the procedure. You merely file a statement of claim, and if after 15 days-and you reside in that province-no defence has been filed in the court the action is noted in default for a statement of defence and it can be preciped down for trial.
If someone is defending the action on the question of custody of the children, or some other defence, he files a demand of notice and the action can be heard within ten or 15 days. They have streamlined the procedure. In one province it is difficult; in the other province it is not so difficult.
So there is some onus on provincial governments to change the procedure if they feel it is cumbersome and should be speeded up. Of course, that rests entirely on the governments of the provinces of Saskatchewan and Alberta. I need not say any more in that regard.
I want to say something now about proof of adultery. It has not been suggested since I have been a member of parliament, nor have I read anywhere, that divorce laws should be repealed. If we accept that there should be divorce laws, let us make these laws such that they will serve the individual with dignity, compassion and justice.
In proving adultery, on many occasions we have to-as it has been called-put our dirty linen on the line. In many cases this is very embarrassing. More than that, I am convinced, with the experience I have had in reference to these matters in my profession, that on many, many occasions the marriage has failed long before there is any proof or suggestion of adultery. I will come to that matter in reference to proof of adultery.
As one great jurist said, "It is very seldom adultery is committed in threes". Therefore the judge must presume certain facts, certain situations and circumstances. As one great writer pointed out-and I must say that we have never had this problem in Alberta-if the evidence is that there is only one occasion on which adultery was committed the judge may presume it was so seldom that it likely did not happen. But if there were too many occasions, he might think they had stretched the truth and presumed against the parties. The action would be dismissed in each case.
Proposed Divorce Measures
This matter is generally proved on the question of presumption. I say now, standing in my place, that my experience in the two provinces of Saskatchewan and Alberta is that we have the highest calibre of men on the bench in these provinces. I want to answer some criticism that has been made from time to time from a certain part of this house in connection with collusion and perjury in divorce actions and cases. Perjury itself does not only occur in divorce cases. Witnesses have been found guilty of committing perjury when dealing with a question of land dispute or erecting fences.
Let me say that I am convinced that in the majority of cases that come before the courts of Alberta and Saskatchewan there is no collusion. We read about collusion in newspapers and they tend to exaggerate those exceptional cases where there has been perjury or something cooked up.
A great many people have the idea-and I listened to the letter read by the hon. member today-that if the parties do see each other that might be collusion. I do not think that is the law. I want to read from Mr. Kent Power's book "The Law of Divorce in Canada" page 65, and this is what the court of appeal of Manitoba has said, and I believe it has been accepted by the courts of appeal of Alberta and other provinces:
In order to constitute collusion there must be a corrupt agreement or conspiracy-
Let us deal with that for a moment. It must be that the parties sit down together, and George says: I am going out today to do the very thing necessary for you to get a divorce. That would be to conspire to do a wrongful act. But the fact that husband says: "Good morning, Helen" or the wife says "Hello, George" or they discuss the question of the custody of the children, or how much maintenance should be paid is certainly not collusion. That is where many writers and newspapers have been led down the wrong path and led astray. Now let us go on with the definition:
-to which the petitioner is a party, to obtain a divorce by manufactured evidence-
Manufactured evidence is evidence which has been cooked up or planned, or somebody goes on the stand to commit perjury or practices deceit on the court. When we talk about collusion, in 90 per cent of the cases that, to me, is a falsehood. To state that in the percentage of cases there is collusion is a slight on the judiciary of Canada. I am confident, and I repeat, the judges of Alberta and the judges I have been before in Saskatchewan were able to determine in a judicious matter what people were telling the truth and what people were not. That does not mean they would not make an
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Proposed Divorce Measures error, but it suggests to me that 90 per cent or more of the cases that go before the courts are justifiable cases, and the six facts I have mentioned are properly proved, for example, domicile, the marriage and cohabitation; that there was no collusion, no connivance. That has been my experience and, I am going to repeat, those newspaper articles which say all these cases are collusive are overstating the case for the purpose of getting a change in the law, and that is not good enough. There must be other substantial arguments.
It is interesting to see what Herbert had to say in reference to one other fact before I leave the question of proof. One strange fact, and I think this is one argument in favour of extending the law to other grounds than adultery, is that if the plaintiff spouse is guilty of adultery there is an onus on the solicitor for the plaintiff to lay those facts before the court. I say I am confident that in 99.9 per cent of the cases the lawyers, who are officers of the court, do lay those offences before the courts. If both parties are guilty of adultery the case could be dismissed because the judge can exercise his discretion against the plaintiff, which does seem rather strange, where both are guilty. If both parties are guilty of adultery, then it may be against public policy to grant the divorce. It is a matter of discretion based on the old Roman law and ecclesiastical law. That again is proof that over the years our courts have been able to exercise equity with a great deal of dignity. This is what Herbert has to say about this subject on page 81:
This was always a difficult matter, the framing of the safety question. A solicitor is an officer of the court. It is his duty to disclose to the court the fact that a petitioner for divorce has herself been guilty of adultery, if he is aware of it. It is his duty to his client to warn her that if she has committed adultery she must disclose it; for otherwise she may wander innocently into trouble with the King's proctor.
Now I am just going to pause there. In every province they have a Queen's proctor, or the job is done by the attorney general, and between the time of the order nisi and the final order the case can be reviewed if there is a complaint and then they can file notice of intervention and have a trial on that subject, and I have seen it happen in many cases. I continue:
The conscientious solicitor, therefore, satisfies himself before he begins. That is to say, he puts to his clients questions the answers to which may 'tend to show that she has been guilty of adultery.' Such questions may not be put to her in court by counsel or judge, and need not be answered, unless she has already given evidence to the contrary effect.
I must say, from my experience of the Alberta and Saskatchewan law societies that where a lawyer has had brought to his


attention by his client that there is adultery on both sides he immediately lays those facts before the trial judge. He puts his faith in those men who have been elevated to that high position to grant justice if it is a deserving case and, in my experience in that regard, justice is always done.
Now, with reference to what changes should be made, let us have a look at that for a few moments. This bill, I feel, goes a little further than it should, and I have not time to go into it, but it does seem to me that where there is incurable insanity that should be a ground; where there has been desertion for a period of three or five years, whatever a committee might consider best, that should be a ground; and also where someone has been confined to life imprisonment. I know a case where a person got 20 years within a few days of his marriage. That should be a ground.
But however far the grounds are extended, as they were extended in 1937 in Great Britain, one thing I believe, because I believe that the home is the foundation of society, is that there should be retained in that act certain safeguards. Maybe no one should have the right to make any application until he or she has been married for three or five years or longer. That would put the necessary caution into the minds of people before they enter into the marriage in question, and I believe that in some respects this has been spelled out by the British act in 1937. But, and I repeat, desertion should, of course, be a question of whether a person has been deserted for three years.
When I say those changes should be made, I base my argument not on the fact that I get letters pro and con but on what I see in society about me. Truly we do not know how many thousands of people are living in Canada today who, one spouse or the other, went across to the United States and got a form of divorce which is not legal in this country because the husband was not properly domiciled in this country. Those people then returned to their own land and they are subject to the Criminal Code to be charged with bigamy. It was my experience to defend one of these people in that regard.
There are, as Mr. Kent Power has said, thousands of people living in Canada in bigamous circumstances, and that is not all- what about the children, where do they stand? Are they legitimate or illegitimate? What about the marital status of the parties. What about property reports? Many times there is the question whether it is the first wife or the after-taken wife, inherits the property when a husband dies? This is quite a mess as far as the administration of these estates are concerned and the security of the

family is concerned. So I say on those facts, and because the facts to prove adultery in many cases occur after the marriage has fallen apart, there should be an enlargement of the grounds for divorce, and I base that on the premise that if we are to have any divorce law in Canada at all we should make it a law which is reasonable and which can be applied with dignity and justice. I think I have made my point clear in that regard.
The bill has gone somewhat farther but, to be fair, I must say that it is a step in the right direction, because it brings to the attention of the people of Canada a very important matter which has been under consideration for many years. It is a problem that will not be solved easily. We must have patience. It is a matter that we must always consider with great tact because in this country of many races and religions people have different ideas. All of those ideas in this great country of ours must be respected, because never should we allow the minority to be coerced by the majority or vice versa. Therefore, I feel this is a matter which should be considered and debated carefully. This is why I listened with great interest to one of the members from French Quebec who expressed his views based on provincial rights and provincial jurisdiction. That is why I say once again this matter must be considered carefully. Every member of parliament represents people of various races and religions. We are the spokesmen of those people, the hired men, as it were, who were sent here to express their point of view.
In a sincere way I have tried, Mr. Speaker, to bring this problem forcibly before the House of Commons as I see it, but with the greatest respect for all those who share other ideas, knowing full well that the problem will not be solved overnight.
(Translation):


Mr. Alexis Caron (Hull):: Mr. Speaker, we are now considering an extremely delicate problem, one that should be handled carefully. At the outset of my remarks, may I say that throughout my speech, I intend to respect the views of those who disagree with me. Indeed, as was mentioned by the previous speaker, there are so many different views in relation to the provinces and to the religious aspects, that we should respect the religious feelings of all members of the house. That is what I propose to do in the course of my remarks.
When the Senate was asked to broaden the divorce act to make divorces easier to get, I decided to study the matter more thoroughly
Proposed Divorce Measures in case it might come up before the house. I wanted to explain my opposition to such a move, not only as a Catholic, but as a believer in God, the Creator and ultimate end of man.
For those who believe in and accept the Bible-both the Old and the New Testament-as inspired books expressing the will of the Creator, that is where the answer to the problem can be found. The first reference to marriage, even though that term is not used, is in Genesis, where God says:
It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him an helpmeet lor him.
This is in Genesis, 2-18.
Then God proceeded to create woman, and it is said that the first words spoken by Adam were divinely inspired and were willed by the Creator. I quote:
This is now hone of my bones, and flesh ol my flesh.
He called her woman because she was taken out of man. This may be found in the Book of Genesis 2-23.
As we can see, according to the divine plan, marriage was intended to be and was the very close union between two human beings, male and female, of equal dignity, such union being inseparable.
In view of that statement, some people will be inclined to wonder why then, so soon after the creation, men started to take many wives, make them their slaves, and even sell them as if they were so many chattels? The answer is that the plan of God was soon put aside by people, and let no one make the disastrous mistake of confusing the laws of God and the actions of mankind. Nowhere will you find a shadow of divine approbation for those human actions, even in the case of those who seemed to enjoy a greater intimacy with God, like Abraham.
It is also true that in Mosaic law, there is a divorce provision; however, it was not introduced with the divine approval, but as a hypothetical case. We find the explanation in the New Testament, which is a clarification of the Old Testament, when Our Lord answered to the Pharisees who, to tempt Him, had asked:
Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife?
And Jesus replied:
Have you not read that from the beginning the Creator made them man and wife and that He said: "For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife; And they twain shall be one flesh: so then they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder." And they (the Pharisees) said:	"Moses suffered to
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Proposed Divorce Measures write a bill of divorcement, and to put her away. And Jesus answered and said unto them, For the hardness of your heart he wrote you this precept." But at the beginning it was not so.
Is this not a condemnation of divorce? But to properly understand Moses, we must recognize that the Jews were a nomadic people, whose intellectual development was very limited, and whom the Egyptians had kept in bondage for hundreds of years. We must therefore understand that Yahweh tolerated things which he never approved. Besides you will find in the prophets many a condemnation of the practice of divorce. In Matthew, Luke or Paul, we always find the absolute, never exceptions.
Here is an example of what St. Luke says (16-18):
Whosoever putteth away his wife, and marrieth another, committeth adultery: and whosoever marrieth her that is put away from her husband committeth adultery.
Now St. Paul in his Epistle to the Romans (7;2-3) said:
For the woman which hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth; but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband. So then, if, while her husband liveth, she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress',-
That quotation might lead people to think that divorce is only forbidden to women; but, if we go back to Genesis (2;24) where it is said:
"And they shall be one flesh,"
We realize that it clearly applies to both- man and woman. However, St. Paul was much more precise when writing to the Corinthians (1-7; 10-11):
And unto the married I command, yet not I, but the Lord:	Let not the wife depart from her
husband. But, and if, she depart, let her remain unmarried, or be reconciled to her husband; and let not the husband put away his wife.
As you may see, this is absolute, and I believe that on a matter of such importance, if there had been a possible exception, either St. Paul or St. Luke, or St. Matthew, would have mentioned it, because they were the spokesmen of Christ, and we cannot accuse them of misrepresentation. Therefore, the prohibition of divorce with the right to remarry, is absolute.
Some of those who are in favour of divorce think they have found a contradiction in St. Matthew (19:9) where it is reported that Christ told the Pharisees:
And I say unto you, whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for lewdness-
-or fornication according to some translators-
-and shall marry another, committeth adultery. 

The words: "except it be for lewdness" (or fornication, according to some translators) seem to allow for an exception. However, we should not forget that we are dealing with a translation from the Greek, and that is why some translate the word porneia by "lewdness" and others by "fornication". Which word should we choose? Most English versions translate porneia by "fornication" and, if we take the definitions of various dictionaries, I would opine that the word "fornication" was the one Our Lord wanted to use.
What does Larousse say with regard to lewdness?:
Unchaste character-The lewdness of prostitutes.
As it may well be that a married woman be a prostitute, there would be a contradiction if Christ had said that a prostitute may be repudiated.
Here is how the Larousse dictionary defines "fornication":
Fornication: A simple sin of the flesh, that is to say sexual intercourse between persons that are neither married nor bound by a vow.
And in "The New Catholic Dictionary", Vatican Edition 1929, the definition is as follows:
(Text):
Fornication: The free act of carnal intercourse between persons who are not married, but who are free to marry.
(Translation):
With those definitions in mind, the word fornication seems to me to translate the Greek word porneia.
Furthermore, the King James version has the following translation of St. Matthew's (19:9):
(Text):
Whoever shall put away his wife,-except it be for fornication (Porneia) and shall marry another committeth adultery (Moicheia).
(Translation) :
It is therefore obvious that Christ spoke exactly as related by St. Matthew (19:9), for in the same sentence of the Greek text the words porneia and moicheia are used to express two different thoughts.
But here is another objection: why is the word woman used to mean wife, even in the case of fornication?
The best explanation of this comes from England where, a few years ago, two orphans separated in infancy never met again. One of the orphans took the name of his family of adoption. Later on, the two met, fell in love and were married. They had children and it was later discovered that the couple were brother and sister. So for that reason no existing legislation permitted them to marry. Not having been authorized to marry

legally they had to separate. Having learned the truth, they separated, since any sexual intercourse then became a simple case of fornication, unwitting fornication but fornication nevertheless, due to the fact that they were not really married, since their marriage was void and non-existent. That is undoubtedly the type of marriage that Christ referred to when he said:
Except in the case of fornication.
The Church never recognized divorce, and you have the case of Henry VIII and Napoleon I before whom the world bowed, but not the Church.
The Church has always recognized the invalidity of certain marriages for reasons that made marriage non-existent, but only after an examination, a scrutiny of the facts. The main reason for annulment is refusal or incapacity of consummation, the purpose of marriage being procreation.
I do not recognize that parliament has the right to assume responsibility for dissolving marriage, but parliament does so nevertheless and these words of Our Lord to the Pharisees could very well apply here:
It is for the hardness of our heart (that parliament allows) that you put away your wife, though from the beginning it was not allowed.
The few words placed in brackets are changes needed to apply this to our times.
But the excuse that held good for a nomadic people no longer has any validity in the twentieth century, where we have such a high regard for our own knowledge.
The tragedy of our time is that we have lost sight of the reason for our existence, because of our ignorance of the teachings of the Bible and of the Gospel. We seem to be interested only in our physical welfare; nothing is left for the soul, the only part of our being which has an eternal destiny.
I do not dispute to parliament or to our courts the right to deal with the civil contract in marriage, but no man or group of men has the right to dissolve a legal marriage for any reason whatsoever. Even the Church cannot dissolve a legal marriage. However, on religious grounds, the Church can rule on the validity of a marriage, just as the state can rule on the validity of civil marriage contract.
Those are some of my reasons for objecting to this bill.
There is also a social reason. It must be recognized that the family is the basis of society, that marriage is the cell that safeguards the family, and that if the marriage is broken, the family is destroyed.
How can you expect, Mr. Speaker, that a child raised in an environment where there is no respect for a contract or a promise, how
Proposed Divorce Measures can you expect such a child to harbour the feelings of respect that are due to his parents and elders?
There are two categories of divorces cases:
(a)	between well-to-do people;
(b)	between low income people.
In a divorce between financially secure people, the child is often, if not most of the time, exposed to the little schemes of those idle people who are concerned only with their personal satisfaction, and whose divorce is usually prearranged; and if the father has tried to be strict to teach the child the value of thrift, the suitor, on the contrary, will be generous as a means of gaining the favours of the mother and winning over the child. Such an environment is utterly bad for a child's education, and tends to make him a loafer who will only be a drag on the community.
In the case of persons of limited means, the children, having learned that moral values are meaningless, are an easy prey to juvenile delinquency and early criminality. In both cases, society stands to lose.
The divorce disease-because it is a contagious disease, since the number of cases increases each year to an alarming degree- is common especially among neurotics. At the turn of the century, a study was made on suicide cases in various European countries and it was established that most of those who committed suicide were neurotics.
Suicides per 100,000 people:	In Baden,
from 1895 to 1899: single 28.1, married 25.7, widowed 51.3, divorced 64.1.
In Belgium, from 1896 to 1900: single, 17.4, married 18.2, widowed 32.2, divorced 135.6.
In Denmark, from 1891 to 1895: single
30.0,	married 36.6, widowed 77.2, divorced
259.2.
In Prussia, from 1895 to 1899: single 26.5, married 28.8, widowed 51.8, divorced 103.2.
In Saxony, from 1896 to 1900: single 39.5, married 39.1, widowed 80.6, divorced 131.9.
In Switzerland, from 1876 to 1885: single
29.0,	married 30.1, widowed 53.8, divorced
157.2.
In Wurtemberg, from 1894 to 1898: single 23.9, married 24.1, widowed 37.7, divorced
82.0,
The same correlations existed between the number of insane and criminals.
That proves that divorcees are unstable, insecure and restless; thus such a tendency towards insanity and suicide. For the child who is more sensitive, the same causes will bring moral disorder leading to delinquency.
Whatever is apt to destroy the family can only cause confusion and disorder, and thus handicap society.

Proposed Divorce Measures
Here is what Theodore Roosevelt said as reported by Rev. Father Forest, o.p.:
There is a tendency to exaggerate the secondary aspect of public problems, and politicians in particular are prone to busy themselves with questions somewhat important, but of passing importance, in comparison with basic problems. The question of tariff or exchange has literally no importance in comparison with the vital problem of preserving the basic unity of society, that is the family. If husband and wife fulfil their duties towards each other and towards their children according to Christian teaching, we may be sure that the other problems will be automatically solved. If, on the contrary, we have solved the other problems in the most judicious possible way, it will be to no avail if we have lost our national soul; and we are bound to lose it if we cannot place the question of family relations on its true basis.
It is evident that our democratic society is in jeopardy and if we do not acquire this awareness of moral values, we shall be irremediably lost.
Morals are lamentably deteriorating. Devotion to duty does not exist any more; more and more do we look forward to an easy and idle life: less work, more leisure. The god of money has taken precedence over God the Creator. People no longer seem to get bored by spending days, weeks or months of leisure on the southern beaches in wintertime or on ours in summertime. It is a sign of unhealthy idleness. Senses gradually take over the mind. Let us beware.
Let us not forget that several great civilizations have perished because these peoples had lost their sense of values. Each time moral values are deteriorating we are losing ground.
We complain about the communist threat but what are we doing to avoid it? Communist people have an ideal, but what have we got to offer? In the U.S.S.R., work is glorified, praised; studies come first, arts and science flourish. Here, our work is intented to satisfy our sensual desires mainly; work is only a means, not an end to enhance human value. In the arts, the superexistentialists are only trying to create confused sensations or dreams, and these people come in scores.
When Rome came to ask for bread and games and when sexuality had an unequalled influence, bodies and minds weakened and the barbarians had only to reach out to conquer them.
The same thing happened in Egypt, in Persia and in Greece. Despite the admonishments of Diogenes, Demosthenes, Sophocles or Aristotle, the senses took over the mind. Our turn is coming; we are perishing and with us is perishing our democratic civilization.

This sentimentality which leads the hon. member not only to seek the maintenance or the acceptation of the principle of divorce but to ask for broader grounds for it, even in good faith, is undermining our society and accelerating our downfall.
Unless there is a great awakening, our civilization is done for and it will be our own fault.
Reference has been made to divorce courts. The hon. member for Maisonneuve-Rosemont (Mr. Deschatelets) has expressed his point of view. Two members, I admit, have made a point of objecting to some divorce bills during the last session because of the frightening number of divorce cases or because of the constitution which makes it easy to get a divorce.
It so happens that the Senate has not enough time to make a thorough investigation of these cases. In some instances, there may be collusion and perjury.
I think it might be well to consider the opportunity of deferring these cases to a court which, at least, would see to it that the Canada Evidence Act is respected and even order the immediate arrest of those who come and commit perjury in order that a divorce be granted.
It is not only a matter of discussing this bill, but also the principle of broadening the grounds for divorce. On this point we, as Christians, and particularly those of us who come from the province of Quebec, must object. We believe there is conflict between civil and criminal jurisdiction, between the provincial authority and the federal authority on this matter.
For all those reasons I have stated, I will vote against this bill.


Mr. L. J. Pigeon (Jolieite-L'Assomption-Monlcalm):: Mr. Speaker, this bill is another challenge to the natural and divine law, and I think it is an insult to the people of Canada.
Mr. Speaker, before the year 1900, not even a score of divorces were granted in Canada. In 1957, on a national basis, Canada has put through 6,328 divorces and the number of divorced people in Canada, between the ages of 25 and 34 is estimated at 10,000.
We have no reason to believe that this number is going to grow less, on the contrary, it seems due to increase.
To these figures should be added the far larger number of separations, with or without legal sanction.
It is not without reason that divorce is considered as enemy number one of the

family. It can easily be shown as responsible for most of the current problems of juvenile delinquency and others.
Divorce is really a public calamity, and the province of Quebec has always recoiled from opening its doors to such a fearful plague. There are of course divorced people in our province but they had to go outside the province to get their divorce. This does not mean that we do not have our broken homes, and we should not deceive ourselves on that point. It is obvious, though, that the family is held in higher regard in our province.
Listen to this, Mr. Speaker, as regards divorce. One day, it is said, a report was being submitted to the trusteeship council at the United Nations stating that peoples practising polygamy could not have a free government or hope to attain political freedom. Hearing this, the Liberian delegate got up and said: "What difference is there really between polygamy, which permits a man to have more than one wife, and divorce, which permits a man to change his wife as he pleases, or vice versa?"
Even if divorce is quite the fashion across the border, the people of Quebec are justified in considering it as a social evil. Our stand in the matter was forcibly summed up by the former prime minister when he said: Quebec's stand on divorce is clear: we are firmly and irremediably against it.
The Church has always condemned divorce. In his encyclical letter "Casti con-nubii", Pope Pius IX showed all the calamities issuing from that practice, saying in particular:
Divorces cause as many evils as the indissolubility of marriage confers benefits. On the one hand, there is security for the partners in their unbroken vows, on the other hand, the prospect of a forthcoming separation, the possibility of a divorce, make the marriage bond a precarious one. To say the least, they induce suspicions and anxiety
On the one hand, the coming of children, their protection and their education are effectively safeguarded, on the other hand, they are exposed to the most serious prejudices.
Thus, we could not at any time change our attitude in the matter of divorce.
Courts for divorce exist in eight provinces. Two only, Newfoundland and Quebec, have none. Any resident of those two provinces wishing to obtain a divorce must turn to Ottawa for a divorce bill or exceptional legislation.
Proposed Divorce Measures
Since the two world wars, divorces have been mounting terribly, and strong pressures have already been exercised to take those bills out of parliament.
Quebec is right in opposing divorce courts within its territory since it would amount to a recognition and facilitation of divorce. So far, it represents only a concession. Attempts have been made in the past, which continue today, to ease the granting of divorce but, happily, those attempts have failed. I hope that this bill will be nipped in the bud.
The institutions and traditions which are part of our western culture and heritage were based on natural law. We must make our choice. We cannot depart from natural law and at the same time preserve our western and democratic traditions.
Science has advanced, but the multiplicity of divorces brings us back to this decadent period which preceded the fall of the Roman empire: a setback of 15 centuries.
In the eyes of all who look upon the family unit and the children as the basic unit of society, the general welfare of the family and society must be sacrificed to the so-called happiness of the few.
Quebec has never granted a single divorce. This stand is based on natural and divine law as well as on the civil law of French Canada.
In 1867, French Canadians, being irrevocably opposed to divorce, could have hindered the birth of Canada. They wanted the provinces to keep their jurisdiction over marriage.
A compromise was accepted allowing parliament to grant divorce to residents of Quebec by way of exceptional jurisdiction.
To allow the granting of divorce by special legislation enacted by parliament makes for an essential difference, since it leaves untouched the principle of the indissolubility of marriage, and is opposed to the dissolution of marriage by a court which recognizes the right to seek a divorce.
It has been suggested that divorce petitions coming from Quebec be accompanied by the superior court judgment declaring judicial separation on the grounds of adultery. It has even been stated that should parliament legislate to this end, the Senate would then be released from those fastidious inquiries which are causing complaints. After announcement or legislation to that effect, parliament would grant divorces in the province of Quebec on the basis only of a separation for adultery granted previously by a court of the province. Thus, the Senate would be released from hearing these cases but could act upon the judgment ordering separation and upon the preceding enquiry.

Proposed Divorce Measures
This proposal would have the following effect: Parliament would legally and actually entrust to the courts of our province consideration of the divorce cases.
The Quebec judges would act as examining magistrates and the senators and members would only have to give their sanction to measures they had not considered.
We may fear that parliament would very soon tire of passing legislation it would not have considered before and would be inclined to delegate all of its authority to these judges; we would then have those divorce courts which the province of Quebec does not want. Moreover, this proposal would not correct the alleged defect of the present system but merely aggravate it.
The members and senators who already complain they have to pass bills, the merits of which they have neither the time nor the taste to study, would have even more ground to protest if every petition were to be considered not by the Senate committee but by a judge outside parliament.
Under the present system, a Senate committee subdivided in several subcommittees considers the petitions; occasionally, the committee on miscellaneous private bills studies certain cases. The benefit of this procedure is this. While it is true that most members and senators have no time to consider each case according to its merits, the House of Commons and the Senate can at least rely on the integrity of their peers, the members of committees and subcommittees.
I believe that the Senate committee on divorce is by no means inferior to any divorce court in this country.
In 1867, the province of Quebec conceded jurisdiction on marriage to the federal government. This allows parliament to grant divorce bills, notwithstanding the civil code of that province. Now, Quebec objects to the establishment of divorce courts. I hope parliament will never impose the establishment of divorce courts in the province of Quebec.
"The province of Quebec is against divorce", Hon. Arthur Roebuck said a few years ago. He was then, as he is today, the chairman of the Senate committee.
This statement from the hon. senator is true in the case of the vast majority of the population, but still there are too many divorce bills.
It is most regrettable to find among the petitioners a few that are Roman Catholics. Apart from the case where a marriage is invalid according to divine and ecclesiastical laws but valid according to the civil law, I
[Mr. Pigeon.l

see no ground that could justify a petition for divorce.
I cannot accept that a divorce be requested instead of a legal separation-even if a remarriage is not contemplated-to sever, shall we say, all ties with the other party and avoid paying an alimony. In this case, the petitioner is setting a very bad example, for how can one know whether he or she intends to remarry or not.
Today the petitioner denies any such intention, but what about tomorrow. The door is thus opened to many temptations for the other party freed by the divorce, and most probably ill use will be made of the so-called freedom.
But the problem goes deeper still. To say that the bond is completely severed, is to deny and ignore the true nature of marriage, which is an everlasting and unbreakable union in which both "shall be one flesh" (Genesis 2, 24). There are occasions where a separation is allowed by ecclesiastical and civil laws, but the indestructible bond is not altered by such a separation. Therefore it rests with ecclesiastical and civil courts to determine the conditions of that separation.
But, one may say, "my spouse has been unfaithful to me and has committed adultery". Stopping the allowance of your spouse is no way to have the party come back to you and mend his or her ways. On the contrary, it is the way to have your spouse go to anyone. It is to be noted that divorce courts in the other provinces always make a decision as to alimony and property sharing. In Quebec, these questions are decided upon by the courts which grant separation.
There are other means to bring about a reduction in the number of divorces.
In my opinion, one way would be to have more severe rules for the proceedings in the Senate committee. As far as I am aware, but I am no expert and I may be mistaken, the existing regulations do not provide for notifying the third person in a divorce petition. A clause should specify that the third person is to be notified of the hearing of the case. In the present way, a petitioner may charge the other party with adultery with persons unknown, a thing which would be impossible in court.
A short relation of the facts which it would be possible to prove should also be required.
If the committee on divorce needs to take legal opinion on these various points, it should do so.
Moreover, as far as collusion and connivance are concerned, more should be required than a denial, even a sworn denial, on the part of the person petitioning for a divorce.



I960

[Stage Direction]
In most cases, the defendant does not put up a defence, does not even show up, and this is likely to cast serious doubts about collusion, at least by implication. When the defendant does show up, it is to confess to his turpitude. It is disgusting to see the guilty party, and even his corespondent, confess to their misbehaviour. From the legal point of view, it might not be collusion, but something even more disgusting.
That situation is not only peculiar to cases brought before parliament. The same also holds true in respect of divorce courts.
According to the statement made in the House of Commons by Mr. Fernand Girard on January 19, 1956, the divorce reform association of Toronto, in a manifesto urging that the legal grounds for divorce be extended, had this to say:
Did you know that there is divorce by consent in Canada? One judge has said that nine out of ten cases before him are collusive, that is, the parties have perjured themselves in order to get a divorce.
Mr. Girard also referred to an article entitled "Court of Broken Dreams" in the March 1955 issue of Liberty magazine:
A person sat in on a courtroom recently in an attempt to understand why 5,000 Canadian couples annually crack up their marriages in a divorce process of mud-slinging, name-calling and money-wrangling.
Collusion, perjury, make-believe adultery, disgusting details, and all the other evils and scandals deplored by members of parliament and magistrates of divorce courts are inherent in any divorce case, whether it be heard by parliament or by a court.
Complaints are being voiced about it all. It is only logical that the cause-the right to divorce-be removed. At least, we should seek to lessen the evil by insisting on stricter investigations before the Senate committee as well as before divorce courts.
Let us hope that the rules of the Senate committee will be revised and made more rigid. I strongly urge the Minister of Justice (Mr. Fulton) and the attorneys general of the provinces where there are divorce courts, to investigate the procedure followed in those courts.
I am convinced that the Canadian people as a whole will approve any earnest effort made with a view to reducing the number of divorces and to limiting one of the worst evils of society.
For all those reasons, Mr. Speaker, I am strongly against the passage of this bill.
Proposed Divorce Measures
(Text):
Mr. Harold E. Winch (Vancouver East):: Mr. Speaker, this bill in its implications and purport is of such importance that one could undoubtedly speak at great length upon it. However, I think I can express my convictions and views in a few minutes.
I must say that I have listened with interest and some sardonic amusement to some of the remarks that have been made thus far on this bill. We have heard quotations from the bible in support of divorce, drawing to our attention that the problem existed some 2,000 years ago; that under certain circumstances man and woman should part. Then almost immediately thereafter we heard quotations from the bible against divorce; that it should not be allowed and was not permissible. Therefore apparently, whether we are for or against this bill we can bolster our arguments by statements from the bible; we are safe, no matter where we stand.
I am most certainly in favour of the principles of this bill. A change in the divorce laws of Canada is long overdue. This may not be recognized by some people in some provinces, but I can remember that as far back as 18 years, I think it was, the legislature of British Columbia unanimously passed a resolution asking the federal government to modernize, to christianize the divorce laws of Canada; and if it would not, then to find ways and means of placing the jurisdiction within the legislature of the provinces, at least, as far as British Columbia was concerned.
An honest critique or analysis of the situation existing in Canada as a result of our present divorce law can only bring one to one conclusion; that is, that the effect of the divorce law as it now exists in Canada is such as to condone hypocrisy, collusion, connivance, unhappiness, immorality and perjury. There can be no question of that.
The hon. member for Charlotte (Mr. Stewart), I believe it was, when speaking on this bill mentioned a couple of clauses in particular and said that in his opinion these would lead to collusion and connivance. How naive can a person get, especially in a statement like that from a lawyer-


Mr. McCleave:: He should know.


Harold Edward Winch: -who must know that the majority of divorces in Canada today are based on collusion and connivance.


Mr. Aiken:: That is wrong; that is nonsense.


An hon. Member:: Nonsense.


Robert Jardine McCleave: Would the hon. member
permit a question?


Harold Edward Winch: My hon. friends say "nonsense". They did not say "nonsense" a few minutes

Proposed Divorce Measures ago when the hon. member who spoke before me quoted an honourable judge of Canada who said that nine out of ten divorces in Canada were based on perjury.


An hon. Member:: He was full of nonsense.


Harold Edward Winch: That is what a judge said, and I imagine any judge should know.


Gordon Harvey Aiken: Any judge who said that was talking nonsense.


Harold Edward Winch: Mr. Speaker, you will not get a number of members of this house admitting it here, but there are many people who have stated that most divorces are based on collusion, connivance and perjury because of the law of Canada.


An hon. Member:: Pure balderdash.


Mr. Speaker:: Order.


Harold Edward Winch: I am not bowing to his knowledge or authority, sir. It is too bad that there are so many members who will not face reality and facts.
Why, irrespective of the percentage involved, should a person or persons be condemned to a lifetime of unhappiness, to years of purgatory in their lifetimes in this world, because they made a human mistake and chose the wrong partners? Why, because of a marriage law, when a mistake has been discovered', should people be condemned to unhappiness and a denial of the means to lead a moral life when they do find the person who they think can give them happiness? The present law makes for immorality, it makes for perjury, collusion and connivance because of the very basis on which it works- the only grounds upon which one can get divorce.
I think we all know of case after case where people have got divorces and, afterward, been happy for years and years-cases in which no adultery was ever committed; they were arranged divorces. Why should people have to be put in that position if they are unhappy, if they have made a mistake, if their partners were not what they thought they would turn out to be? Why, we have a situation in Canada where a partner can be committed to a penitentiary for years, or for life as a habitual criminal, or as someone who is incurably insane. Then we say to the remaining spouse: you are tied for life, denied a home life, denied affection, denied love and denied marriage. Surely this does not make sense. Or take the case of a woman who has been deserted by her husband. He has cast off all responsibility and cannot be found. Why should the law say: you are tied, there is nothing you can do about it. Mr. Speaker, that is heathenish. It is unchristian. It is

immoral, and we say that the law of Canada is among the most backward, the most archaic in the democratic world.
As we advance in our thinking on other questions we should advance in this, too. I should imagine that over the years I have received scores of letters from women who have been condemned to loneliness or condemned to immorality because they have to make a choice between obeying the law and establishing a common law relationship since they could not break a marriage vow which had been disregarded. I say the law has taken too much into its hands when it says that this is a condition under which a minority of our people have to continue their lives.
Of course, everyone wants to see a marriage stand and be firm. Everyone wants to see children enjoying the company and protection of both their parents. But when, because of human circumstances, situations arise when separation is best, why should the law say no? One of the previous speakers has mentioned the children. Naturally we are all interested in the children. But speak to psychologists and ask them about the impact on children of an unhappy home, a home where the parents are forced to be together, with all their antagonisms and hatreds. The law says they must.
I think we should use a little understanding. I am not going to mention religion, but the position of the catholics has been referred to. Let me say that this bill in front of us has been based in the main on a statute passed in Australia where a vast number of the people are catholics. So I do not think religion should be brought into this. This question should be appraised on the basis of a feeling of Christianity, of understanding, of realism and of trying to see that the law in its written word does not bring unhappiness and insecurity to men, women and children because it is archaic, stupid, outworn and outdated. All this bill seeks to do is to modernize something which was outdated many years ago.


Robert Jardine McCleave: Mr. Speaker, I think one of my tasks will have to be to set at rest some of the fictions which have been developed during the debate this afternoon and which, if indulged, would present a totally false picture to the Canadian people concerning just what this bill attempts to accomplish.
I think the chief fiction is that we could suddenly make our divorce laws honest by putting into effect this measure or a measure similar to it. That would be a very far cry from what the experience has been in other countries where laws similar to this have

been enacted. I suggest that all the grievances about collusion, connivance and so on would still remain. The broader grounds for divorce would open up new fields which do not exist today and which adultery or the pretext of adultery was never used as a key to unlock in the first place.
May I call it six o'clock.
At six o'clock the house took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The house resumed at 8 p.m.
Robert Jardine McCleave: Mr. Speaker, before the house rose at six o'clock, I was making the point that there were several fictions which surrounded the argument being advanced in support of this bill to broaden the grounds for divorce in Canada, and as I continue my remarks now I intend to deal with them. First, I should like to make it plain, that I do agree that this is an area where some reform is badly needed. While I disagree with what I would like to call the extravagance of the remarks of the hon. member for Vancouver East (Mr. Winch), I must still confess that, having studied some 1,200 to 1,400 divorce cases presented before parliament in the last four years, or since I have been here, one has to honestly concede that the elements he mentioned of collusion and connivance have entered into them. However, where I do disagree with him and with some of the other hon. members who have preceded me so far in this debate is in their saying that to adopt a measure such as we have now under consideration would put an end to the fictions which surround the only basic ground for divorce, namely that of adultery.
I do not think these fictions would disappear at all, Mr. Speaker; rather, I think we would be simply expanding the field of divorce and that, instead of having a national divorce rate of around 36 per 100,000 of population-and this has been the rate for the last two or three years-we would attain, if we approved such a bill, a divorce rate much higher, well over 40, perhaps into the 50's. I do not say that is necessarily bad, but I think that before we make up our minds on this measure, or on some equivalent measure, we should at least know where we are going.
May I briefly review, against the experience of the 1,200 or 1,400 cases that I have had to consider since coming to parliament the grounds that are suggested in clause 6 of the bill. Perhaps I can make my point even clearer. The ground of adultery is left
Proposed Divorce Measures intact in paragraph (a). Another paragraph deals with wilful desertion. In the 1,200 to 1,400 cases that I have mentioned there have been cases of wilful desertion, and it has occurred for a period of more than two years, so that the ground in paragraph (b) will support the argument of the proponents of the bill.
Another suggested ground is persistent and wilful refusal to consummate the marriage. That would, I think, open up new territory, but not very large. Perhaps it is covered now by the fact that we do also deal with annulments, and I would think that the number of cases would not be altered by the adoption of such a paragraph.
The next paragraph deals with a person guilty of cruelty. That, I think, would open up new grounds. Among the 1,400 cases we have considered in the last four years there have been many instances where a husband or, on occasion, the wife, has been guilty of throwing his or her weight around against the other spouse; but if the cruelty is given a rather exact definition, as is used, for example, in the province of Nova Scotia, the expansion would not be too large.
Another suggested ground is that the other party to the marriage has committed rape, sodomy or bestiality. This would add a few cases to the present number. I have spoken to detectives who have frequently followed the subject for some time, and when they closed in to make the kill or to make the case they have found rather indescribable scenes in hotels and motels. I do not intend to dwell on that except to point out that I think this is a most wholesome addition to any law dealing with divorce reform; perhaps it should be extended to include lesbianism as well.
Another suggested ground is that a party to the marriage has for a period of not less than two years been a habitual drunkard, or been habitually intoxicated by reason of taking or using to excess any sedative, narcotic or stimulating drug or preparation. This I think would open up the field to hundreds of new cases a year; for the experience of the last few years shows that while the petitioning wife-it is usually the petitioning wife who makes the allegations-has told the committee of the other place and the committee of this house about any such errant behaviour of her spouse, this is usually thrown in more or less to create sympathy for her case; but I think these grounds alone would open up the field immensely.
Then, there is a paragraph dealing with frequent convictions for crime. In my experience, at least, I can recall only two cases among the 1,400 where the husband had spent a large part of the married life in
636	HOUSE OF
Proposed Divorce Measures jail. I think this would not only enlarge the field but would also throw it open to certain abuses. In a companion section immediately following another ground is set forth, namely where the other party to the marriage has been imprisoned for a period of not less than three years after conviction for an offence punishable by death or imprisonment for life or for a period of five years or more. Looking at that clause very quickly it seems to me it is open to abuses, especially in the latter part where it refers to imprisonment for a period of five years or more in that somebody may, inadvertently or advertently, by criminal neglect some night run over somebody with a car under rather drastic circumstances. It might be a first offence and yet the person concerned might wind up with a very stiff penitentiary term. No matter how many people in Canada may desire divorce reform I do not believe they are going to think that a severe sentence for motor manslaughter justifies the breaking up of any marriage at the whim of the party who is left on the outside of the prison walls.
A further ground provided in the bill is having attempted to murder or unlawfully to kill the petitioner. That ground seems reasonable. Fortunately we have not had any cases of that sort before us but I suppose it is simply an extension of the ground of cruelty. Another portion of that clause provides as a ground the committing of grievous bodily harm on the petitioner or the intent to inflict same. That also would be an enlargement of the ground of cruelty, and I think it is a perfect example of the sort of thing one should get at when one enlarges the grounds for divorce to include cruelty.
As we know, in some other jurisdictions the feeding of the wrong type of bird seed to the pet parrot is apt to provoke a family quarrel which can lead to the dissolution of the marriage in the courts, and we certainly want none of that in Canada. By some rewording here I think we could cover the type of cruelty that the hon. member for Timis-kaming (Mr. Peters) has in mind. I would point out again, however, that in my opinion this would enlarge the grounds for divorce and result in many new cases being brought forward that are not covered under our present law. Recalling the experience of 1,200 to 1,400 cases, offhand I can think of very few where strong enough evidence was produced as to justify an allegation of cruelty, so to me this clause would be an expansion.
Then I come to a major and very important ground, wilful and habitual failure to provide maintenance to the other party. A number of cases have come before us where in effect this is what has happened and I


suspect an even larger number where the husband has deserted the wife, for that is the usual circumstance, and has failed to provide for her and the children. Again we get into a rather drastic enlargement, as some people might think, of the grounds for divorce.
A further ground set out in the bill is failure to comply with a decree of restitution of conjugal rights. The number involved there would probably be small. Being of unsound mind and unlikely to recover is set out as another ground, and in that case the person must have been confined for a period of, or for periods aggregating, not less than five years in an institution. I think this is a very wholesome suggestion but we have had no such cases come before us. Again this would enlarge the number of divorce cases.
Yet another clause provides as a ground that the parties to the marriage have lived separately and apart for a continuous period of not less than five years. I think this would also bring forward a large number of cases.
I have made this somewhat rapid survey of the new grounds for divorce set forth in the bill, not to say that the bill is bad, because I think most of it is good, but rather to point out, as I think we must fairly point out if we are to do our duty, that by enlarging the grounds for divorce we are not getting rid of the very many cases of fictitious adultery such as have bothered parliament in recent years.
In his opening remarks the hon. member for Timiskaming used some rather strong words about the present conduct of parliament and its ability to handle divorce cases. I think he made two points; first, that we did not possess the judicial abilities to carry out such chores and, second, that it opened the way to lobbying. If ever any member of parliament stood indicted by words out of his own mouth, Mr. Speaker, it is the hon. member for Timiskaming and his cohort who supports the bill because in the committee over which I have had the honour to preside in the past I have certainly found that members of parliament have been very fair and openminded when they have had to deal with these unfortunate cases. I have also found, however, that there are some members who will be approached by a party to a divorce and will follow that party right down the line until the final vote is taken.
Hon. members will recall that last year the hon. member for Skeena (Mr. Howard), who played a large part in these proceedings, informed the house that he was against all divorce cases. If that is so, then that is not a judicial attitude to bring to any committee which is to adjudicate on the rival claims of

two people who have had a falling out because if you come with your mind made up in advance you are certainly not bringing any judicial abilities to bear on these people's problems.
As to the point about lobbying, it is true there was lobbying with respect to divorce cases several years ago and we took the stand that if it continued we would throw out such cases. I think it had a salutary effect until last session when, because of the blockade of divorces, all sorts of people appeared within the gates of parliament to ask that something be done or to present their own particular cases. I think that parliament need not worry about lobbying with regard to divorce cases if we return to the older and sounder practice. However, most of the petitioners who come before us are very poor and they are desperate and when you drive them to the wall so that they do not know whether or not their age old rights are going to be granted you can expect that they will be asking parliament for help, not in the proper way but rather by badgering us with long distance calls, telegrams and letters. This was one of the most shameful heritages of that heroic crusade waged by the hon. member for Tim-iskaming and the hon. member for Skeena last year in that what was a fairly good judicial process was corrupted by then-actions.


William Arnold Peters: It is going to be worse this year.


Robert Jardine McCleave: I hope that Hansard caught that interjection. The hon. member said something about it being worse this year. I can assure the hon. member that this is Canada and it is 1960. We are a democratic country, and if people have no other means of obtaining relief, that is people from Quebec and Newfoundland, then they are entitled to come before us and there are people here who will see that justice is done. I use the word "justice" in its fullest sense. I say further, Mr. Speaker, that there will be members from the member's own party who, if the chips have to be put down again this year, will stand up with the two major parties in this house and be counted on the side of such justice.
May I advert to one other solution of this matter proposed by the hon. member for Timiskaming (Mr. Peters). I think this is one that should be considered. It is certainly a way out of the difficulty. I refer to the question of giving a sort of blanket Canadian domicile so that cases may be dealt with, for example, in the province of Ontario if it is not possible to take action in the province of Quebec. I feel that is a solution that certainly would work out but it has several
Proposed Divorce Measures objections. I believe when we are considering the problem and this solution we should also consider the objections.
In the first place, the supreme court of Ontario and the supreme court of New Brunswick, which would be the two courts that would handle the majority of the cases, would not take kindly to the idea of dealing with some 400 or 500 more divorce cases. It is a solution but I think common sense tells us it would be a very difficult solution to apply.
The hon. member for Maisonneauve-Rose-mont (Mr. Deschatelets), and I think he was supported by one or two other members from Quebec, made the point that divorce should be treated as a provincial problem. I hope that I have understood the point he made, and if not I am sure he will correct me. I will be very happy to be corrected. There are difficulties in that, too, Mr. Speaker. You would have a country in which the inhabitants of eight provinces could obtain divorces and perhaps the inhabitants of two other provinces could not obtain divorces.
I believe we should consider what underlies the fact that the federal parliament is seized with jurisdiction in divorce. When the fathers of confederation sat down to consider this problem they had to devise some workable solution to protect the minorities in the province of Quebec. It was known then and, of course, is known now, that the attitude of the dominant church in that province is that marriage is an indissoluble sacrament. I am not quarrelling with that position at all, Mr. Speaker, but I think it is a fact that has to be considered when we weigh this problem of divorce. Sir John A. Macdonald and the other fathers of confederation seized upon this federal jurisdiction in divorce as one workable solution that would not offend the majority in the province of Quebec and would still protect the rights of the minorities. It may be very easy to suggest that the provinces should be given this jurisdiction in divorce, but I think that if that course were adopted instead of making a forward step we would be going back beyond 1867 itself and the purposes of confederation.
What about the present system, Mr. Speaker? How does it work out? I think ordinarily, under the rules of this house, we should not refer to the people or practices of the other place. However, since there is such a definite connection between what the committee of the other place does and what we do here perhaps I will not be considered out of order if I make some comments. In the first place, I do not think there is any finer judicial mind in Canada than that of my friend in the other place who is in charge
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Proposed Divorce Measures of the committee. He has a judicial mind and is a very fair person. Anyone who suggests that these gentlemen in the other place are not capable of exercising a judicial function will certainly find me squawking to the last word in my throat because I think my friend and the others who sit with him on these committees have done a very fine job indeed.
It has been suggested that nine out of 10 of these cases are rigged or the majority of cases which come before parliament are rigged. I think I can make a very simple refutation of that. The national divorce rate, as has been pointed out before, is about 36 per 100,000 people. In the province of Quebec the rate is about 6 per 100,000 people. Perhaps this fact points out how well, under certain circumstances, the move of society to keep the family together can work because I think any province whose divorce rate is one sixth of the national average can point to itself with pride. In the province of Newfoundland the rate is even lower. It fluctuates. One year it may be zero per 100,000 of population and in another year it may be up to one and one half or two per 100,000 of population. By and large, their divorce rate is about 3 per cent or 2 per cent of the national average. Again, I think that is something to which Newfoundlanders might point with pride.
This year, approximately 500 applicants came before us asking for relief. All but about two or three of them were from the province of Quebec. I believe about 90 per cent of these petitioners were women. Of these women, I would estimate most of them were in the humble categories of society. They certainly did not have very much money. Some of them obviously had to save and save for years before they could come to parliament and ask for relief from an intolerable marriage.
I think if we cannot reach agreement here on either broadening the grounds for divorce or taking steps that would rid parliament of an unsavoury job, then at least we can pride ourselves on helping people who really need to be helped. I do not like the handling of divorce in parliament any more than anybody else, and I should like to see us get rid of it, but at the same time there are practical difficulties in the way of taking such a step.
I am not going to be ashamed for one moment of what I have had to do in order to achieve such help for people or of what my colleagues in the House of Commons and in the other place have had to do. This is the highest court in the land and I think any one of us can be proud any time he takes some steps that remove a bit of misery from a person's life.


Mr. A. D. McPhillips (Victoria, B.C.):: In
rising to take part in this debate, Mr. Speaker, I find some difficulty in view of the amazing nature of this piece of projected legislation. Ordinarily on second reading we are required to keep to the principle of the legislation and to avoid dealing with the clauses in detail. But in this instance so many principles are involved that, in the course of my short remarks perhaps Your Honour will be indulgent enough to allow me to refer to at least one clause in detail.
I can understand how my colleague the hon. member for Halifax (Mr. McCleave) felt when he was dealing with divorce suits that come before parliament. I think he had every right to give voice to the things he said but let us remember that this piece of legislation has nothing whatever to do with the divorce suits that come before parliament. This bill is designed to foist upon the provinces of Canada which have divorce jurisdiction certain things they have not asked for. It has nothing to do with those suits that are before parliament. At the outset I should like to make that point clear. This bill has nothing to do except with the provinces which have that jurisdiction.
As to some of the principles involved, there is the matter of jurisdiction which is of importance in the matter of divorce, as is known by all lawyers and by many other people. Then there is the matter of new grounds for divorce. Then the bill takes up the matter of nullity suits. I have always contended that nullity suits are not within the realm of the parliament of Canada because the parliament of Canada was given marriage and divorce. A nullity suit is brought because there was no marriage. If there is no marriage, what jurisdiction has the parliament of Canada to deal with the matter at all?
I do not need to remind the house, particularly the legal members of it, that in the operative clause of a decree of nullity these words always appear: and this court doth order and adjudge this marriage to be and to have been null and void to all intents and purposes whatsoever. Hence there was no marriage. I contend that the parliament of Canada has nothing to do with the matter of nullity of marriage.
Then the bill also takes up the matter of maintenance. I want to deal briefly with one clause of this bill which has to do with jurisdiction, namely clause 4	(1) which
reads as follows:
4. (1) For the purposes of this act, a party to a marriage who is domiciled in any province of Canada shall be deemed to be domiciled in every other province of Canada.

In my opinion, that provision is a draftsman's nightmare. It is like a provision that says, "for the purpose of this act black shall be deemed to be white". It impinges on extremely important questions and on important legal decisions that have been made throughout this country down through the years.
The province from which I come, namely the province of British Columbia, has had divorce jurisdiction of long-standing because the province of British Columbia or the crown colony, as it was then, took the law of England as it existed on November 19, 1958 and that included the divorce and matrimonial causes act of Great Britain. I should like to read the appropriate section from that act. My hon. friends up there in the corner of the chamber can then see that some of the new ground they thought they were plowing is not new ground at all. This is the divorce and matrimonial causes act of British Columbia. It is chapter 97 of the revised statutes of British Columbia, 1948, section 12, which reads as follows:
12. It shall be lawful for any husband to present a petition to the said court, praying that his marriage may be dissolved, on the ground that his wife has since the celebration thereof been guilty of adultery; and it shall be lawful for any wife to present a petition to the said court, praying that her marriage may be dissolved, on the ground that since the celebration thereof her husband had been guilty of incestuous adultery, or of bigamy with adultery, or of rape, or of sodomy or bestiality, or of adultery coupled with such cruelty as without adultery would have entitled her to a divorce a mensa et thoro, or of adultery coupled with desertion, without reasonable excuse, for two years or upwards;-
That was the law of British Columbia and it is still the law of the province of British Columbia, with the exception that because of an amendment made by the parliament of Canada, the wife now has what we call equality of right and can obtain a divorce on the ground of adultery simpliciter without proving adultery with desertion or with cruelty or incestuous adultery. But those added grounds of divorce which are inserted in the projected bill and having to do with rape, sodomy and bestiality are nothing new. They have been recognized for generations by British jurisdictions. That is not new ground at all.
As to the matter of jurisdiction may I say this. I know that in my province-and I am sure the situation is the same in many others-we have built up a great backlog of cases on this matter of jurisdiction in divorce and it deals with that matter not only in substance but in practice. As one great British lawyer once said, in the matter of practice, it is better that the practice be wrong and certain than that it be uncertain.
Proposed Divorce Measures
What result would flow from this bill? One thing I thought might come about is that we might establish in Canada a sort of second Reno. In other words, you can get your divorce wherever you want to go; you can shop around and find the cheapest spot. Possibly a quiet and pretty community like Summerside, Prince Edward Island would be indicated. I know that their court fees are less than ours. That might be a fine place to go and so it becomes Canada's Reno, or some other location. What is going to happen to the courts of that particular province? Are they to be inundated by every man or woman who says to himself or herself, "I can get my divorce more cheaply there and so I am going to go there". We might have two or three Renos over this vast country.
Sometimes it is said-and I have heard it -that the parliament of Canada has never done anything about this matter since confederation. That statement is untrue and it is unfair. The parliament of Canada gave the equal right to the wife shortly after it was brought down in Great Britain. In other words, the wife has the same right as the husband and is under no disability in that regard.
On the matter that was mentioned in this bill about maintenance, the aftermath of divorce which is an extremely serious matter and sometimes an extremely sad and distressing one, may I say this. As a practising lawyer, I have had this happen on many occasions.
The decree of divorce is just one step. Concurrent with that a wife may obtain an order for maintenance. What happens? The husband makes one payment, or two payments, and then he disappears. With us, very often, he disappears to the United States, and then the wife is out of luck. Sometimes he goes to another province of Canada, and if we have reciprocal arrangements with that province, after the expiration of a long time and at the cost of a very considerable amount of money, the husband may be brought to time. But most often this is not the case. Most often it is not the case because the wife has not the money.
I know other lawyer members of parliament must have had the same experience as myself. The procedure of divorce having been gone through this state of affairs arrives and one's client says, "What is the matter with the law of Canada? What is the matter with the courts? Why cannot I get justice?" When it comes to that stage, Mr. Speaker, I simply say this, "Madam, husband and wife are supposed to live together; if they will not live together, the mind of man has not been ingenious enough to find a remedy for

Proposed Divorce Measures that". That is what it boils down to. It just cannot be done. We do the best we can with the laws that we pass.
As I said before, so far as parliament is concerned we are debating something here that has nothing to do with parliament. We are debating a bill that seeks to foist something on the provinces of Canada that have this jurisdiction, for which they have not asked. As far as I know, they have not asked for it. They certainly have not asked for it en masse, that I do know.
For these reasons, Mr. Speaker, I find that on no account could I agree to vote for this bill on second reading.
(Translation):


Mr. Vincent Brassard (Chicoutimi):: Mr. Speaker, we have before us a legislation which is modestly entitled:
An act to provide in Canada for the dissolution and the annulment of marriage.
The bill might perhaps more aptly be entitled: "Package bill to increase the number of divorces and facilitate their obtention in all provinces of Canada".
For until now, it seems that federal statutes in respect of divorce only contain chapter 85 which provides that:
The law of England as to the dissolution of marriage and as to the annulment of marriage, as that law existed on the 15th day of July, 1870, in so far as it can be made to apply in the province of Ontario, and in so far as it has not been repealed, as to the province, by any act of the parliament of the United Kingdom or by any act of the parliament of Canada or by this act, and as altered, varied, modified or affected, as to the province, by any such act, is in force in the province of Ontario.
That is all I have been able to find in the federal statutes, Mr. Speaker. As far as the other provinces are concerned, with the exception of Quebec and Newfoundland, they already had their own divorce courts before confederation and a special clause of the British North America Act recognized provincial legislation in this matter which already applied before confederation.
The case of the province of Quebec is entirely different, because that province, instead of adopting British common law, was always jealously anxious to keep the French civil code, which does not recognize divorce in any form and, like the Catholic Church, very clearly states that marriage may not be dissolved.
May I be allowed, Mr. Speaker, to refer to clause 185 of the civil code of the province of Quebec which reads as follows:
Marriage may only be dissolved by the natural demise of one of the parties. Marriage may not be dissolved while man and wife are alive.
[Mr. McPhillips.l

There can be no plainer or irrefutable statement.
As a Catholic legislator, it is therefore absolutely impossible for me to concur in either the intention or the letter of this proposed legislation, which ignores both Catholic doctrine and the French civil code in force in the province of Quebec.
Catholics recognize only the authority of the Church in matters of marriage annulment. The Church maintains a tribunal which is called the Rota to ascertain the nullity of certain marriages under conditions which make them void in themselves.
While the creed and opinion of members who share neither our faith nor our preference for the French civil code should be respected, it should nevertheless be recognized that the province of Quebec has always refused to institute or to permit the institution by others of civil courts in matters which are not recognized by the civil code. That is why if Bill C-7, now before this house, is adopted, it would constitute an intrusion of a type never witnessed into provincial legislation and, therefore, a most serious breach of the 1867 constitutional act which maintains the French civil code, and recognizes its use in the province of Quebec.
Under section 4, Bill C-7 clearly states:
For the purposes of this act, a party to a marriage who is domiciled in any province of Canada shall be deemed to be domiciled in every other province of Canada.
In other words, this would mean that residents of the province of Quebec would be relieved from the application of the civil code in force in that province and placed under the jurisdiction of divorce courts in any of the eight other provinces of confederation, and without first securing the agreement of the Quebec legislature, which under our constitution is the sole guardian of the civil code. This, in fact, would mean legislating over the heads of the provincial authorities and placing the citizens of two Canadian provinces under the jurisdiction of courts located outside their provinces. What does the Quebec civil code say in regard to domicile? Section 79 specifies that:
The domicile of a person, for all civil purposes, is at the place where he has his principal establishment.
I am pleased to note that this rather unusual suggestion, which is no doubt inspired by a highly developed practical sense, is being put forward by a member of the C.C.F. party, a party which in more than 30 years had never succeeded in establishing a bridgehead in our province before it voluntarily withdrew in favour of the new party. I can understand the sponsor's wish to free the House of

Commons from the strenuous and at times loathsome task of legislating in divorce cases. However, while the intention is excellent, the methods suggested are unacceptable for a number of reasons.
Mr. Speaker, it may be true that divorce bills, whose numbers have been increasing from year to year, clutter up the dominion parliament's order paper, and are perhaps quite tiresome and occasionally give rise to disgraceful scenes. The fact remains, however, that the legislative machinery that has to be put in motion in order to get a divorce in Quebec and in Newfoundland is complicated and cumbersome enough to discourage many would-be divorcees.
There is no need to emphasize the extremely disastrous social and moral consequences for those hundreds of estranged couples who not only live as outcasts of society, leaving a trail of misery and failure, but often leave behind them abandoned and dismayed children who are the unconscious victims of their parents' misconduct. These children are a burden to the community; they are foredoomed to juvenile deliquency and are nearly always found later among the inmates of our reform institutions. Therefore, our laws on divorce will never be strict enough, and not only should we not facilitate divorce, but it is our duty to make it more and more difficult to obtain.
Another aspect of Bill C-7 with which I cannot agree is the list of 14 grounds for divorce instead of one which tradition seems to have recognized so far.
When we take the trouble to read through the evidence given to the Senate committee on divorce, we must admit that often the evidence leaves many questions unanswered and leaves the legislator under the very clear impression that he is faced with a scenario wonderfully played by investigators who are perhaps of good faith, but whom we almost invariably meet in every case.
Bill C-7 tends to establish 13 other grounds for divorce besides adultery. It would be, Mr. Speaker, if you allow me that expression, like supplying 13 other subjects for a scenario in order to vary the procedure and allow a greater number of divorces.
After what I said, it is easy to understand why I am opposed to all forms of divorce and why I feel that most of the divorces granted by parliament are rather sickening. I believe that the best way to settle the question would 90205-6-41$
Proposed Divorce Measures be to leave each province which already has a court of divorce settle that question according to its mentality, customs and traditions. As far as the provinces of Newfoundland and Quebec are concerned, which refuse the establishment of divorce courts, I submit that parliament should be extremely cautious in granting annulment of marriages for the residents of those two provinces. If the evidence in each case were examined with greater attention, I feel that many divorce petitions would be refused, which would deter a great many from putting on an act before the federal parliament. In my opinion, Mr. Speaker, when a husband and wife cannot live together, the Quebec civil code, in full accordance with the Catholic doctrine, provides for separation a mensa et thoro without the marriage being annulled. I feel that this is still the best solution to this acute problem, especially in large urban centres.
I am happy to note, however, that since I took my seat in this house, nobody from my riding or my district, which has a population totalling a quarter of a million people, has ever petitioned for a divorce in Ottawa. This is all to the credit of our people respectful of the social and moral values of Christian marriage and I shall certainly vote against the bill now under discussion.
(Text):


Gordon Harvey Aiken: In opening, I should like to say that I believe there is room for improvement in the divorce laws of Canada, but I do not believe the bill before us will do the job properly. I think we must put this whole situation in perspective, and the first thing we must ask ourselves is this: is there a public demand for divorce reform in Canada, or is there a demand for a reform in divorce procedure? I think this is one of the matters which has been completely clouded over. It is the difficulty about the procedure for getting a divorce which has occupied public attention during the past year rather than the grounds upon which divorce should be granted. To take examples, the hon. member for Timis-kaming (Mr. Peters) who sponsored this bill mentioned the question of parliamentary divorce in his opening remarks. Whether or not that has anything to do with this bill I am not prepared to say. I would not go as far as the hon. member for Victoria, (B.C.) (Mr. McPhillips) did when he said that it has not, because I think the jurisdictional angle does bring it to some extent within those limits.
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Proposed Divorce Measures
Nevertheless, the whole question as put forward by the hon. member who sponsors this bill, and by the hon. member for Skeena (Mr. Howard) who supported him earlier this year, was a procedural one-not that there should be a change in the divorce law but that there should be some procedure for granting divorces elsewhere. Even if the hon. member has received a large number of letters in support of his stand, I think that stand was taken on a procedural matter and not on a matter of substance.
The hon. member also mentioned the Toronto case and another case where a corespondent had found her name was used on three or four different occasions. I agree that this was most improper. The person responsible was properly dealt with by the courts and by the law society. But here again this was a procedural matter-it was a case of drawing evidence from the wrong source, false evidence and so on. I submit that the letters sent to the hon. member did not indicate a desire for complete divorce reform in Canada. Cases of perjury, conflicting evidence and so on are, again, procedural matters.
There was a case retried here publicly in the parliament buildings. A great deal of evidence was taken and a great many people appeared here. It ended as a good many other cases do; the committee found difficulty in deciding who was telling the truth and who was not. This is exactly the same situation as occurs when divorce cases are heard before the courts. The court has to decide. A judge sitting alone, or a committee, must decide who is telling the truth. If there is evidence indicating that there has been perjury it should be followed up and prosecution should be undertaken. Again, this is procedural matter.
We must not interpret this artificially engendered outcry as demanding the loosening of the bonds of matrimony to the point suggested in this bill. As I see it, if this bill is carried to a logical conclusion, mental cruelty such as eating crackers in bed or belching at breakfast could very easily develop into the type of divorce case about which we read, laughingly, in other jurisdictions. Cruelty is not defined in this bill as physical cruelty, and in many other jurisdictions the courts have extended the definition of cruelty to the point where they can consider anything which mentally disturbs one of the partners to the marriage as being cruelty. I think you can take almost any marriage in this country and find that kind of cruelty, and if such people wanted a divorce they could get it under the relevant clause in this particular


bill. I am sure that the Rev. Crossley Hunter, who wrote to the hon. member in support of his stand, never intended to support him in connection with a bill which would bring about such results as these.


William Arnold Peters: Is the hon. member not aware that in this clause of the bill there are safeguards? A court would have discretion in establishing protection in the public interest so that the things he has mentioned, such as belching, would never become a ground.


Gordon Harvey Aiken: This is more a statement than a question, Mr. Speaker, but I will be glad to answer it. Regardless of how you cut it, this is what the clause says. It is within the jurisdiction of the courts. I have firm faith in the courts of Canada and I would hope that they would never extend this meaning of the word "cruelty", but I do not know. It is very loose. In a few minutes I am going to mention a few other clauses which I think are no better and which, taken together, would open up the whole grounds of divorce to much worse types of collusion than exist today.
I should like to speak about some remarks made by the hon. member for Vancouver East (Mr. Winch), and some remarks that I have had to sit here and listen to during the last 11 months. The hon. member for Vancouver East said this afternoon that there is collusion in nine out of 10 cases. He purported to quote some judge who had stated this. I do not know who the judge was, but I know that any judge who made such a public statement could not have been acting in a judicial manner if he felt that a divorce was collusive, but nevertheless granted it. Judges have definite power to refuse divorces, and if any judge has granted divorces in nine out of 10 cases where he thought there was collusion, regardless of who he is, he was not doing his duty.
We can quote all kinds of suspicion. A lot of suspicion has been thrown around. I heard the hon. member for Timiskaming (Mr. Peters) and the hon. member for Skeena make comments about the legal profession. They have stated the legal profession knows that there is this collusion but they have done nothing about it, and when they were called to public account they did not tell the truth. I say that the whole matter of collusion has been blown out of all proportion, having regard to the facts. Those hon. members have refused to accept the words of persons who know and who should know.
Earlier this year I heard the hon. member who sponsors this bill say in this house that the treasurer of the law society did not know what he was talking about. I tried to find the exact quotation, Mr. Speaker, but in the

torrent of words we had during the last session I was absolutely unable to find it, but I sat here and heard that statement. The treasurer of the law society is one of the most respected counsel. His honesty and integrity are above question, and he would never make a statement when he did not know what he was talking about.
I say that the violen and frequent attacks of the hon. members on the legal profession have been most unfair. I say that publicly and now I am going to say one more thing.
I am not a person to stand and accuse, and I make no accusation such as has been made by the hon. member for Acadia (Mr. Horner), but I point out to hon. members it is a well known fact that when revolution takes place the first people to go are the lawyers. The lawyers are the most vulnerable because they are the people who stand up for the law as it is written, and who believe that the law as it is written must be followed until parliament sees fit to change it.
I am not saying, Mr. Speaker, that there is no collusion in divorce. This would be impractical. I am a practising lawyer; I have handled a good many divorce cases. I think a person can speak better from his own experience than he can from listening to others. I have had dozens of divorce cases and, as far as I recall, there was only one in which I was suspicious that there might have been collusion. The others were absolutely straightforward cases. In most cases the defendants were living together as man and wife in an adulterous state. They were such open and shut cases that one could have no question about collusion whatsoever. I think we have to accept those facts. I think the whole thing has been blown so far out of proportion that we are on the verge of being stampeded into accepting something that is not really there.
Having put the matter into perspective, as I see it, Mr. Speaker, I should like to mention just two principles of the bill. The first relates to domicile and the second to grounds for divorce. There are quite a number of clauses in this bill, but when you break them down these are the two principles. I can see very easily the intent of the hon. member in making domicile a national matter. In doing so, if it were possible-and I am not sure it is-to give a person in this country Canadian domicile, then we would immediately get rid of the problem that is bothering the hon. member and other hon. members relating to Newfoundland and Quebec divorces in this parliament. This would be the first effect because a Quebec resident could come to Ontario and get a divorce and that would be the easy way out.
Proposed Divorce Measures
But I am afraid that is not either legally or practically possible. It cannot achieve its purpose for this reason. Provincial superior courts have jurisdiction only within the province for which they are set up. Under the British North America Act, which is our constitution, section 92, item 14, gives to the provinces exclusively this jurisdiction. I will read it:
14. The administration of justice in the province, including the constitution, maintenance, and organization of provincial courts, both of civil and of criminal jurisdiction, and including procedure in civil matters in those courts.
Now, the judges of the provincial courts are appointed by the governor general, but the courts themselves are provincial. Their jurisdiction is limited within the bounds of the province for which they are set up. If this parliament would legislate that, as the hon. member for Victoria, (B.C.) (Mr. McPhil-lips) said, that black is white, if we would legislate that a resident of Quebec is a resident of Ontario, it would not permit the courts within their own jurisdiction to deal with somebody who is actually in fact a resident of another province. I have heard some hon. members say that the courts would not do it. I imagine that if the courts found they had that jurisdiction they would do it because that is the way the law would read, but I do feel the courts would find that under those circumstances they would not have jurisdiction to try residents of another province in the provincial courts of this province.
Furthermore, another question was mentioned earlier this afternoon, namely international recognition of our courts. It has always been on a high basis, and if we were to change the commonly accepted laws of domicile by an artificial means we would run the risk that some other jurisdiction would not recognize our judgments as being founded on accepted and recognized international principles. I would say that even in Nevada, where in Reno the divorce courts are supposed to have the easiest jurisdiction in the world, people have to go through the formality of going to Reno and residing there to establish residence in that state before any jurisdiction is given to the state. I submit that this could not be accomplished.
In his opening remarks the sponsor of the bill mentioned something else which is at variance with the explanation in the bill and with my understanding of the facts of the matter. He said, as I have it noted here, that matters involving custody of children and maintenance could also be settled by the court granting the divorce. If I understood him correctly this would mean that if a resident of Quebec came to Ontario, brought action for a divorce and was granted a
644	HOUSE OF
Proposed Divorce Measures divorce the Ontario courts would have jurisdiction with respect to the custody and maintenance of the children. I say that this is not the case at all. The courts are still provincial courts. The provinces of this country have been granted jurisdiction over property and civil rights, and custody and maintenance of children definitely fall within these categories. I think the hon. member was mistaken in thinking that a provincial court in Ontario would have anything to do with the custody or maintenance of children in any other province of Canada.
The second principle relates to the grounds for divorce. I do not want to go through them clause by clause for fear of bringing down your wrath, Mr. Speaker, by discussing the clauses of the bill on second reading, but I should like to make a cursory examination of the principles set forth in the bill with respect to jurisdiction and grounds for divorce. The one that bothers me more than any other,
I believe, is the cruelty clause which says that after the other party to the marriage has been cruel to his spouse for one year a divorce can be obtained. In my view that enlarges the grounds too much and I feel that the period of one year is much too short.
Two other grounds provided in the bill are desertion for a period of two years and failure to maintain for two years. I believe these clauses would open the way to worse collusion than has ever been brought to the attention of this house. If desertion for two years were a ground for divorce, how easy it would be for one party to go away for two years, or not even go away at all and for the other party to say in court that he did go away.
The same thing applies to failure to maintain for a period of two years. I think it would open the way to much greater collusion than we have now. In addition, regardless of collusion I think the provision is too easy in any case and opens the way for divorces when grounds are not present. It opens the way for divorces where reconciliation might have taken place. I grant that if after two years people find it impossible to live together another year or two may not help, but there are cases where a situation continues for some time and then something happens that brings the parties together. I found this to be the case a good many times when I was engaged in family court and welfare work. A case will sometimes seem hopeless but then some little thing will happen that will bring the parties together. To provide that cruelty for one year or desertion or failure to maintain for two years shall be grounds for divorce would in my view open up the matter too widely and bring about serious abuses of the divorce laws.


There is also the question of imprisonment. I do not want to go into that in detail. I simply say that imprisonment for a three-year period may be brought about by something for which the party at fault was properly imprisoned but it still may not be the type of crime which would justify the spouse in getting a divorce. It is true that certain types of criminal offences might lead to a divorce but I think that a straight prison sentence should not be a sufficient ground.
The last one I should like to mention is presumption that the other party to the divorce is dead and the granting of a divorce on that ground. This is a situation that has caused many people a great deal of heartbreak in the past. We know of many people who have come to this country and whose spouses, husband or wife, disappeared following the second world war. In many of the iron curtain countries and many of the countries that were overrun the spouse merely disappeared and there is no proof whether he or she is still living or is dead. The other party to the marriage comes to this country and wants to marry. Some jurisdictions in Canada have provided some leeway in this regard.
Under the marriage act of the province of Ontario such a person may apply to a county court for an order presuming the other party to be dead and permitting a marriage licence to be issued, but this does not dissolve the marriage. If by any chance the other party to the first marriage should appear the second marriage is automatically null and void. This provision merely creates a defence against a bigamy charge but does not relieve the parties of their marriage bonds. I do not think we in this country would want to go so far as to say that if a person has disappeared he should be presumed dead and a divorce granted because that person may have done no wrong.
In every divorce action, and I believe this has not been emphasized today, there is a plaintiff and a defendant. The plaintiff must complain that the defendant has done something contrary to the marriage contract. That is the basis for a divorce, a breach of contract, if you wish to put it as simply as that. How can we say that a person who may have been detained beyond his ability to escape, a person who becomes lost, a person who loses his memory or some other such person should be divorced? I think that is going too far. I think we should not extend our divorce laws to the point where a person, having done nothing wrong, may return and find himself divorced.
In fact, I wonder how the jurisdiction of the court would be established. Who would be the defendant in an action of this kind?

It is not spelled out in the bill. Certainly a person who is presumed dead could not be served with any documents and if he is presumed dead he could not even be served by the substituted method of advertising. I do not know what procedure could be adopted, but I think that this final ground for divorce is also wrong in principle.
For all these reasons, Mr. Speaker, I think the bill goes too far. I believe there is some room for divorce reform in this country. There are grounds that should be included in the divorce act, but I feel that this particular bill would not achieve the result the hon. member desires. It would not get rid of collusion. In my opinion it would bring the sacrament of marriage into complete disrepute because as well as being a civil contract it is in most cases a religious ceremony.


Mr. M. D. Morton (Davenport):: Mr. Speaker, if the debate here has proved anything it has proved the great divergence of viewpoints across this country on this most important matter. The views that have been expressed in this house from the various sections of the country are, in some ways, diametrically opposed to one another. I think this should cause us to pause and consider because it is not a matter that can be easily solved nor is it something about which we can reach a rapid conclusion.
The bill before us presents us with a matter of procedure as well as with the broadening of the grounds for divorce. We are discussing today a subject which is of concern to many people for many different reasons. It is of concern to those who are living under the hardships and in a continual state of unhappiness because of broken marriages. It is of concern to those who look after the moral and spiritual welfare of our people. It is of concern to those in the social welfare field who desire stability in family life which is the backbone of our society. There is, therefore, bound to be some conflict of opinion and we have seen this illustrated in the views expressed here today.
I think we should approach this great problem of broken marriages with an open mind, sincerely seeking a far-reaching policy which holds together the family unit, heals the sore spots, eliminates the threatening aspects and instils a sense of responsibility within families so that they will seek to overcome the real hardships. We should not merely find the easy way out for those who will not try to live up to their responsibilities. Reference has been made this afternoon to the biblical injunction, what God has joined together let no man put asunder. However, in this age can we assume that marriages have been joined by God because of an outward ceremony? Unless there is a real
Proposed Divorce Measures acceptance by both parties to the marriage of the will of God there cannot be a real marriage of the heart and soul.
Before we become too strict or rigid in our condemnation of the mistakes in any marriage, let us adopt the attitude of forgiveness that was advocated by Christ himself. Judge not lest you be judged. May I add that, in judging we do not assume we are passing God's judgment. Therefore, let us not ignore the problems which lead to broken marriages. Let us, without prejudice, seek a solution which will take in all points of view.
I think it is easy to understand the view that has been expressed by those who have come from the province of Quebec when we realize the historical origin of the canon law which has taken such a rigid view of marriage. We recall that the canon law developed to fill the gap in civilization after the fall of the Roman empire. The people of that time had seen what had happened to Roman civilization as a result of the lack of respect for marriage and easy divorce. The family law of the Romans, and family life itself, had fallen apart and this was one of the causes of the death of that civilization. We can understand why those who followed took such a strict attitude toward this aspect of life.
Some comments have been made today which tended to cast reflections upon the judiciary in their dealings with divorce actions, and I should like to join with those who have refuted these statements. It is true that allegations have been made that there has been a great deal of collusion in these cases and that perhaps some judges take an easier view than others toward divorce. I do not believe it is fair, merely because there have been some abuses to cast these aspersions upon the whole judiciary which I believe is seeking an honest solution to the problem. I think we will have to agree that as a result of certain disclosures in Ontario punishment has been meted out to those who deserved' it but these investigations did not disclose the widespread abuses that had been alleged.
The bill before us today, Mr. Speaker, deals with four principles: One is the principle oi domicile in Canada in respect to divorce, and it broadens that principle; two, it widens the ground for divorce; three, it widens the ground for nullity; and, four, it provides for a procedure for reconciliation. Although we may not agree in detail with all the aspects of this bill I think it has proved to be a good vehicle for an honest discussion and study of this problem. There are many things in it that are worth considering.
In so far as the first principle is concerned the matter of domicile, it has been dealt
646	HOUSE OF
Proposed Divorce Measures with fairly adequately today but I should like to make some comments in respect to one or two aspects of it which I do not believe the sponsor of the bill intended and for which perhaps safeguards should be put in the bill. I feel that the widening of the domicile would entail certain difficulties. This provision would assist those in the province of Quebec or the province of Newfoundland which do not have a court in which to apply for a divorce, and such people could go to the province of Ontario, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick or Prince Edward Island. This would place a very unfair burden on these other courts if they had to deal with a large volume of cases coming from these provinces. I suppose the sponsor of the bill feels this would be preferable to having these people come to the House of Commons. However, I would point out that in giving these courts jurisdiction to hear these cases he gives them no greater power than we could give to the exchequer court.
He cannot, by extending this domicile which can only be effective with respect to divorce, give to other provinces like Ontario the power to deal with property and civil rights within Quebec or Newfoundland; nor could they deal with the custody or the maintenance of children or the maintenance of the petitioner. This would be a matter that would have to be settled in the province of domicile, because there is no such thing as domicile in Canada which is recognized in law. This is only a vehicle to add jurisdiction to the courts for a particular purpose and may not be recognized by other courts outside Canada under the conflicts of law.
There is one abuse that could happen and I do not think it was indicated. A husband living in New Brunswick or in Prince Edward Island could, if he wished to do so, go to British Columbia and bring an action for divorce against his wife. The poor wife would be put to the expense of having to defend that action in a court in British Columbia and the cost to her would be almost prohibitive unless she was a person of means. That is something that would have to be safeguarded if that extension of domicile were to be carried out.
The other principle dealt with is the matter of broadening the grounds for divorce. I think it is fair to say that there are in Canada today many people who realize that the grounds for divorce are too restrictive. There are many who feel that there are grounds that could be permitted. However, in their thinking they are disturbed and perplexed as to what limit may be placed on these grounds so that there is not, on the part of the couple being married, an inclination to say, "If we cannot get along, we will go and have our 

marriage dissolved". The grounds, whatever they may be, must be strict enough to put each couple on their mettle to make an honest attempt to make a go of their marriage. Marriage is a partnership. The sooner the couples concerned realize that fact, the fewer difficulties we shall have in dealing with the matter of divorce.
I will not go into the particulars set out but if I wanted to be facetious I could find the opportunity. There is one clause which states that if one of the parties has been a habitual drunkard for a period of two years or has been otherwise intoxicated, there would be grounds for divorce. One could perhaps say that a nagging wife could drive her husband to drink and then, after a period of two years, could divorce him. However, I do not think the sponsor meant that. However, as I said, it is difficult to draw the line between the desire, on the one hand, to relieve the hardships of those who made a mistake and are suffering and, on the other hand, the desire to be strict enough to force people to live up to their responsibilties.
Within the last few years a royal commission in England has been dealing with this problem of having the divorce laws extended and the experience in dealing with those extended laws. The commission has been reporting since 1955. I should like to read one or two of the paragraphs from their findings. It might help with some of the principles involved here. At page 24 of the Reports from Commissioners, Inspectors and Others, volume 14, "Marriage and Divorce to Minor Offences", volume XXIII, paragraph 69 (i) we find the following under the heading "Views of those nine members who are opposed to the introduction of the principle of break-down of marriage"; that is, I presume, where a marriage is considered to be completely at an end, there should be a divorce perhaps by consent. I quote:
69. (i) We have rejected the introduction into the law of the principle that a marriage should be ended if it has irretrievably broken down, because, as we show later, in whatever form that principle might be introduced it would entail the recognition of divorce by consent. In its more fully developed forms it would also entail the recognition of divorce against the will of a spouse who had committed no recognised matrimonial offence. It is the introduction of either of these elements that we regard as fundamentally objectionable and as containing the seeds of grave damage to marriage as an institution.
(ii) We believe that the consequences of providing the "easy way out'' afforded by divorce by consent would be disastrous to stability in marriage. The inevitable result would be the granting of divorces in cases where no real necessity for the remedy had arisen. In other words, the divorce rate would be swollen by the failure of marriages which would otherwise have held together with advantage to both parties as well as to children. People would then come to look upon marriage less and less as a life-long union and more and

more as one to be ended if things begin to go wrong, and there would be a very real risk that in the end widespread divorce would come to be an accepted feature of our society. As those attitudes spread they would undermine, and ultimately destroy, the concept of life-long marriage.
(iii) The evils which would result if the community were to come to accept divorce as the obvious way out of all marriage difficulties need no elaboration, save in one respect-the consequences for children. We were enjoined to pay special attention to the "interests and well-being of children". We are deeply concerned about the effect on children of the present divorce rate: their suffering would be multiplied if divorce were to become more widespread. The best home for children is of course a happy home, but in our opinion (and most of our "expert" witnesses confirmed this) children can put up with a good deal of friction between their parents so long as the home remains intact. The relations between the parents must usually be very bad indeed before a divorce is in the interests of the children.
Then in paragraph (vii) they go on to state as follows:
(vii) For the reason given in paragraph 38 we refrain from any discussion of the religious aspect of marriage. Apart altogether from this aspect, we believe that it is fundamentally incompatible with the concept of marriage as a union for life for the parties to be free to put an end to it by agreement. It seems to us self-evident that a marriage cannot be the concern only of the partners to it. If there are children, their interests must be considered. But whether there are children or not, the state must be concerned in the maintenance of a marriage and in its dissolution, because the state has an overriding responsibility to ensure, in the interests of the community, that the institution of marriage is upheld. For marriage is not merely a civil contract between the parties to it. It is a status arising out of that contract and, as a status, it concerns the community as well as the parties. If husband and wife were free to terminate their marriage at pleasure, then marriage would become a purely contractual relationship and the interests of the community would receive no recognition.
The royal commission made certain suggestions after their study which they considered possible for increasing the grounds for divorce. One suggestion was as follows, and in connection with this suggestion 18 members were in favour and one member was against it:
(1)	The present law of divorce based on the doctrine of the matrimonial offence should be retained.
(2) (Nine members in favour). The principle that a marriage should be dissolved if it has irretrievably broken down-as exemplified by divorce by consent, divorce at the option of either spouse after a period of separation, or divorce on a comprehensive ground of break-down of marriage-should not be introduced into the law.
(3) (Nine members in favour). There should be provision for divorce in cases where, quite apart from the commission of a matrimonial offence, the marriage has broken down completely; accordingly, where husband and wife have lived separate and apart for a period of at least seven years immediately preceding the application, it should be possible for either spouse to obtain a decree dissolving the marriage, provided that the other spouse does not object.
(4)	(One member in favour) -
Proposed Divorce Measures
This was a minority suggestion:
A marriage should be indissoluble unless, the spouses having lived apart lor not less than three years, either spouse shows that the facts and circumstances affecting the lives of the parties adversely to one another are such that it is improbable that an ordinary husband and wife would ever resume cohabitation.
There were also other suggestions that are somewhat similar to the suggestions set out in this bill. Mr Speaker, I think that considering the results of a royal commission that has studied this problem in a country that has laws similar to ours-in fact, our laws originally evolved from that country- a country that has widened its divorce laws, we should take some cognizance of the findings it has made. We should give some consideration to the findings of the royal commission in our study of the problem. The royal commission has suggested areas in which grounds for divorce could be safely extended.
In passing, I think one could say that if a great deal more attention were paid in the preparation for marriage there would be less trouble after marriage. I think it is fair to say that certain churches, including the Roman Catholic church, the Jewish church, the United church and some others, are seriously studying this problem and are taking up programs of trying to inform young couples before marriage of their responsibilities. I trust and hope that all those who are interested in this problem will continue to make greater efforts in providing these preventive methods so that we will have less cause for divorce.
I wish to say one word, Mr. Speaker, in respect to the procedural aspect that is dealt with in this bill. I think that as far as the eases that come before this House of Commons are concerned, most of us are in agreement that we have not the proper procedure. But in the over-all procedure I think that, even as dealt with before our provincial courts, greater attention must be given to the aspect of reconciliation mentioned in this bill.
We have read and noted the success in some of the states of the United States, where if one party to a marriage voluntarily goes to the court and states his or her problem the court can then summon the other spouse and discuss the problem. They have reported that they have been able to save as many as 50 per cent of these marriages. After they bring the couples together they have them sign a marriage contract, acknowledging in writing their various responsibilities. This has done a great deal to impress upon these couples their responsibilities in marriage.
In our larger centres in Canada we have family courts which are doing a great job. Perhaps this work could be extended to

Proposed Divorce Measures other centres. I feel that the time has come when most of the married couples coming to courts for divorce should be required to go through a procedure to ensure that all efforts are made to see whether reconciliation can be obtained. Through the assistance of marriage counsellors, the assistance of clergymen and others, a great deal more could be done in the matter of rehabilitation and reconciliation of married couples. I think this is a matter which could very well be the subject of study before we come to final consideration of any grounds for extending divorce. I feel it would be one of the safeguards in preventing any further collusion on extended grounds for divorce. If one could feel that where a marriage has been in difficulty and in danger of breaking up it has gone through a set procedure to ensure that every effort has been made for reconciliation, then I think we could feel safe in dealing with the extension of the grounds for divorce. I think that should allay the fears of those who do not believe in the granting of divorce.
I would like to say on this matter of procedure and, yes, even on the matter of grounds for divorce, that divorce cannot be settled by blackmail or sit-down strike methods by any minority group, imposing its will upon others by threats or obstruction. Nor can it be solved by the inaction of others. There must be a realization of the problem. I think in all fairness-and I take the risk of saying this-there must be a realization by those who oppose divorce that a large number of people do believe there are grounds for divorce. Although these groups have the right to enforce their views on their own members-that is, members of churches -they should adopt a tolerance which would permit a reasonable extension of the divorce law and a proper procedure to deal with such cases, especially by those who do not belong to their group.
I plead that we face up to the problem; that we study it and come to a logical solution based upon the social and moral needs of our society.


Mr. R. L. Hanbidge (Kindersley):: Mr. Speaker, this is one of the most important pieces of legislation that will come before this house this session and I want to congratulate the hon. member who has introduced it. There are a great many items in the various clauses of the bill with which I am not in entire agreement, but in the general principle of broadening the grounds for divorce I am in entire agreement. I am sure that some of those items in various parts of the bill which do not meet with my approval or the approval of other members can be remedied if the
measure should go before a committee. I should just like to let the hon. member know that if we ever get to a vote on this bill this evening I intend to support it.
I have no intention of following the hon. member who introduced this measure with reference to his actions last session. He took a certain amount of credit to himself for blocking divorces, but I deplored his action at that time and I still do. I think he was wrong in the attitude he took. However, I am in favour of broadening the grounds for divorce.
This is not the first time a bill for enlarging the grounds for divorce has been introduced into this house. I think it was in the thirties that the present leader of the government in the other place introduced a bill with this object in mind. In 1937 a bill was introduced in the other place by the Hon. Senator Mc-Means from Manitoba, and the present leader of the government seconded that measure which received the approval of the majority of the members of the other place. Nevertheless, it was rejected by the House of Commons.
At the time the bill was introduced, an editorial appeared in the Winnipeg Free Press. I do not always agree with everything the Winnipeg Free Press has to say in its editorial column but this was one occasion on which I found myself in agreement with that newspaper. On March 10, 1938, referring to this bill which was introduced in the Senate by Senator McMeans, the editor said:
There are very sufficient reasons why the rigidity of the divorce law should be relaxed in Canada as it was last year in Great Britain, the situations in the two countries being largely similar. It is a subject on which there is, of course, great difference of opinion, and it is important that in the discussion of the bill introduced by Senator McMeans there should be calm consideration of the whole situation. At present, divorce can be granted only for adultery or the committing of unnatural offence. There are many Canadians who believe there are other valid grounds that should be recognized and that more harm than good results from not doing so.
The importance of the home as the basis of our national life and the consequent need of preserving the marriage bond as inviolate as possible may be fully conceded. There is no intention of loosening that tie beyond the requirements of sound and necessary consideration. To do so would be to seriously increase many of our social problems closely related to family life. But entirely unreasonable and unwholesome conditions are resulting from the refusal to grant divorce except for practically only one cause.
If a worthless husband deserts his wife and goes off to the United States and lives there permanently, she is condemned under the present law to a life of, loneliness for the rest of her days. The same thing results if either husband or wife becomes incurably insane. Because one life has been fatally blighted, should the other be sacrificed to an undue degree? If a sailor is missing and never returns, must his wife be denied a normal life? If a brutal

husband Is persistently cruel, must the wife endure it with no hope of release? If there is no natural affection, is there a home worth preserving?
So much for that. I do not think the sponsor of this bill has any intention of broadening the grounds for divorce to the extent which has been suggested by some hon. members; I certainly do not think they will be as wide as they are in certain states of the North American continent-I will not refer to any particular state for fear I may make things more difficult for the minister of external affairs. The fact remains that we are far behind the United Kingdom in this matter of the divorce laws. The United Kingdom widened the scope of its divorce laws in 1937. The sponsor of the bill on that occasion was, I believe, Mr. A. P. Herbert, the author of a famous book-I am not sure whether it is called "Holy Deadlock" or "Unholy Deadlock". I believe that is a takeoff on wedlock.
In the course of today's debate there have been some references to holy writ. I have no intention of putting on the record the various chapters and verses to which reference has been made, but for the benefit of some hon. members who are perhaps not as well acquainted with the holy scriptures as you and I, Mr. Speaker, I should like to give the references so that if any of them wish to look them up they may do so:
St. Matthew, 19th Chapter, verses 3 to 9 St. Mark, 10th Chapter, verses 2 to 12 St. Luke, 16th Chapter, verse 18 St. Paul, First Corinthians, 7th Chapter, verses 10 and 11.
I am not sure of the other. I think it is St. Paul's epistle to the Ephesians but, as I say, I am not so sure of that, and you may have to correct me, Mr. Speaker. I think it is Ephesians, Chapter 5, verses 31 and 32.
Mr. Speaker, this question came before the House of Lords in Britain. As I mentioned, the bill was passed in 1937. However, a royal commission had been appointed to deal with the matter as far back as 1907 and it was not until 30 years had passed that the views of that royal commission were expressed in the statute law. In 1930 the question was debated in the House of Lords. A bill was introduced, and one of the speakers in the debate was a gentleman with whom you are very well acquainted by name, if not personally, that is, Lord Birkenhead, who was formerly Sir Frederick E. Smith. Lord Birkenhead had adorned the English bar for a great many years and in speaking in that debate he said, referring to the history of the legislation:
In my view the history of the matter has very great importance. The act of 1S57, far too late in
Business of the House
my view, removed a jurisdiction from the ecclesiastical courts which-I say it with all respect- they were ill-fitted to discharge. Their view was that marriage was and ought to be indissoluble. The ecclesiastical courts themselves, who laid down this doctrine with every circumstance of canonical formality, prayed in aid a number of fictions under the head of nullity which were comparable to the chicanery which disfigures our lav/ today. I pass by the conjugal eccentricities of Henry VIII with the observation that they met with a good deal of indulgence from the ecclesiastics of that day, and I come to the latter part of the seventeenth century. Towards the end of the seventeenth century it was recognized that, by the procedure of a private Act of Parliament, divorce ought to be obtainable on the ground of adultery. It is hardly necessary to say, having regard to the age with which I am now dealing, that this was a method of relief which was open to the rich and open to the rich alone, and it is a great reproach to our institutions over so long a period of time that when once it was recognized that divorce ought to be conceded on the ground of adultery a dividing line should have been drawn between rich and poor.


An hon. Member:: Ten o'clock.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Lionel Chevrier: May I inquire what the business is to be tomorrow and Monday?


Mr. Churchill:: Tomorrow we shall continue with the second reading and, I hope, the committee stage of Bill No. C-49, respecting technical and vocational training assistance. In view of the importance of this bill it is likely to take most of the day, and there is a private members' hour from five to six. However, should there be any spare time, I suggest that we consider setting up three special committees, namely item No. 8 on the order paper, leading with the procedure of the house; item No. 11, dealing with Indian affairs; and item No. 9, which has reference to research.
On Monday, if Bill No. C-49 has been disposed of, we will go on with the resolution concerning the productivity council. If that is completed during the course of the day, we will take the resolution dealing with veterans pensions. Tuesday would be a continuation of those two measures in whatever stage we have reached; that is, second reading of the bills, and perhaps the same for Wednesday. Therefore, on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday we would be dealing with the productivity council and veterans pensions legislation. If the house makes rapid progress on Monday and Tuesday we might start with supplementary estimates on Wednesday.
It being three minutes past ten o'clock, the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.
90205-6-42i

Question



ANSWER TO QUESTION

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

Mi. Robichaud: 1.	Have plans and specifications for the Campbell-ton-Cross Point bridge been prepared by an outside firm of architects?
2.	If so:	(a) what is the name of the firm
engaged? (b) what was the fee charged for such work? (c) what amount has been paid to date?
3.	If the work has been prepared by department architects, has any account been submitted by outside architects for preliminary plans on this project?
4.	If so: (a) what was the amount of the account submitted? (b) what amount has been paid to date? (c) to whom was it paid?
Answer by: Hon. D. J. Walker (Minisier of
Public Works):
1.	No, but an engineering consultant firm was engaged on this work.
2.	(a) Langevin, Letendre, Monti and Associates, consulting engineers and Paul Pelletier, consulting engineer, Montreal, Quebec.
(b)	Approved amount $151,500, based on the tariff of minimum fees of the corporation of the professional engineers of the province of Quebec.
(c)	$144,144.43
3.	No.
4.	Answered by No. 3.

Friday, December 9, 1960