1961-03-09

THE ROYAL ASSENT

Mr. Speaker:: I have the honour to inform the house that I have received the following communication:



GOVERNMENT HOUSE

[Stage Direction]
Ottawa, 9th March, 1961
Sir:
I have the honour to inform you that the Honourable Patrick Kerwin, Chief Justice of Canada, acting as Deputy to His Excellency the Governor General, will proceed to the Senate chamber today, 9th March, at 5.45 p.m., for the purpose of giving royal assent to certain bills.
I have the honour to be, sir,
Your obedient servant,
E. Joly de Lotbiniere
Assistant Secretary to the Governor General

[Stage Direction]
Sixth report of standing committee on standing orders-Miss Aitken.

Hon. Howard C. Green (Acting Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to make an announcement respecting the sixth annual meeting of the joint Canada-United States committee on trade and economic affairs. This meeting will be held in Washington on March 13 and 14, as was indicated in a joint statement by the Prime Minister and President Kennedy during the former's visit to Washington on February 20.
Canada will be represented by the Minister of Finance, the Minister of Trade and Commerce, the Minister of National Revenue and the Minister of Agriculture. The United States will be represented by Hon. Dean Rusk, Secretary of State; Hon. George W. Ball, undersecretary of state for economic affairs; Hon. C. Douglas Dillon, Secretary of the Treasury; Hon. Stewart Udall, Secretary of the Interior; Hon. Orville L. Freeman, Secretary of Agriculture; and Hon. Luther H. Hodges, Secretary of Commerce.
This will be a regular meeting of this committee for the purpose of discussing economic and trade matters of mutual interest to our two countries. These meetings have proved 90205-6-178i
valuable over the years in furthering understanding between the two governments on questions affecting their economic relations.
The last meeting was held in Washington on February 16 and 17 last year. The venue for these meetings has alternated between Ottawa and Washington. However, the committee is meeting again in Washington this year in order to expedite consultation and as a matter of convenience to the new United States administration.


Hon. L. B. Pearson (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker, as the Acting Prime Minister has said, over the years this committee has proved its usefulness, and no doubt when it meets next week it will have an opportunity to add to that usefulness because there are a great many immediately urgent questions in the economic relations between the two countries to which consideration needs to be given. I would hope that the Acting Prime Minister and the other members of the Canadian delegation to the conference will see fit to bring up such questions as tourist purchase exemptions, which are now before the United States congress and, indeed, the impact on United States-Canadian trade and economic relations of some of the new economic policies of the new United States administration.


Mr. Hazen Argue (Assiniboia):: Mr. Speaker, I think this meeting is very much needed at this time to discuss some of the important economic problems facing our two countries. Particularly in the field of agricultural surpluses it is necessary in my opinion to have an understanding with the United States so that Canada, as well as the United States, will have the opportunity to increase its exports of agricultural products. I am also certain that on the agenda should be the question of oil exports from Canada, with the hope that we can increase our exports of oil to the United States. There are many other outstanding economic problems on which I do not need to elaborate at this time. I am hopeful that this meeting may bear fruit.

On the orders of the day:


Mr. W. M. Benidickson (Kenora-Rainy River):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Secretary of State for External Affairs. I would direct the minister's

Canada-U.S. Committee on Trade attention to the statement he made respecting the forthcoming annual meeting at the ministerial level with respect to trade matters between Canada and the United States.
I refer the minister to the general report after a similar meeting in 1959, when it was indicated that with respect to the sale of wheat abroad these two governments had reached an understanding that what might be known as sales under concession would not be made by the United States to Japan or western Europe. Is the minister aware that there is strong evidence that in recent times sales to Italy by the United States have been on a concession and not a commercial basis? Is the minister considering including this item among the items to be discussed when our delegation goes to Washington?


Howard Charles Green: Mr. Speaker, as the hon. member knows, it has not been customary to disclose the agenda for these meetings before they actually take place. There is wide scope to discuss all questions having to do with economic and trading matters during these conferences. A report will be made to the house as soon as the Canadian ministers return to Ottawa. I think the hon. member can rest assured that all such questions which are of interest to Canada will be discussed.


Mr. H. W. Herridge (Kootenay West):: I have a supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. I wish to address my supplementary question to the Minister of Finance, who is also responsible for the administration of the Bankruptcy Act. In view of the fact-


Hon. Donald M. Fleming (Minister of Finance):: No, Mr. Speaker, the administration of the Bankruptcy Act falls under the responsibility of the Department of Justice.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: Then I address my question to the Minister of Finance on account of the minister being a delegate to this coming trade conference. In view of the fact that a number of United States lumber companies in southeastern British Columbia have in recent years gone bankrupt under very suspicious circumstances, and in view of the fact that the Hilco Lumber Company at Fruitvale, recently went bankrupt leaving Canadian employees with wages in arrears for months-


Some hon. Members:: Question.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: I am laying the ground for it. In view of these facts, will the minister discuss this problem-it is a serious one to many Canadians-at the coming conference on trade and economic affairs?


Donald Methuen Fleming: Mr. Speaker, I would think a question of that kind should


first be taken up with the appropriate Canadian authorities. If there is some question in regard to the law the matter should be brought to the attention of the appropriate department. It is not the sort of matter that would be appropriately introduced into a discussion until there has first been that kind of groundwork laid and investigation held.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask a supplementary question of the Minister of Finance. In view of the fact that the commercial attache to the United States embassy has expressed concern in regard to these bankruptcies and has offered his cooperation in an effort to correct this situation, would the minister place this on the agenda in the interests of Canadian citizens?


Donald Methuen Fleming: Mr. Speaker, the question could be examined, but I might point out to the hon. member that even if the subject may not be ripe for inclusion as a specific subject on the agenda of the forthcoming conference that does not preclude representations being made through the ordinary channels if the facts warrant it.



THE CANADIAN ECONOMY


[Stage Direction]
Hon. George H. Hees (Minister of Trade
and Commerce): Mr. Speaker, I am tabling today the report "Private and Public Investment in Canada-Outlook 1961", which summarizes the results of a recent survey of capital spending intentions. The survey, conducted annually, is designed to cover the anticipated outlays for new plant and equipment, institutional and government facilities and housing.
Capital expenditure plans for all sectors of the economy, as outlined in this report, involve total outlays in 1961 of $8,336 million. This anticipated expenditure exceeds actual outlays of last year by more than $100 million and represents a continuation of the high and relatively stable level of capital spending realized in recent years.
Within the total program, the principal increases are anticipated in institutional building and government projects. New hospital building in particular will be sharply expanded. There is also the expectation of a somewhat higher level of house building activity. On the other hand, capital outlays by business establishments on the basis of stated intentions will be a little lower than in the preceding year. This reduction reflects mainly a smaller program in the transportation industry, with requirements for both permanent facilities and equipment being

down. Outlays by commodity producing industries in total are approximately unchanged; larger expenditures related to natural gas developments are offset by reductions in certain other industries, notably iron and steel. Commercial construction for stores and office buildings is likely to continue at the high rate of 1960.
I should like to indicate also that it has been possible to include in this report a breakdown of the capital expenditure figures for provinces and major cities. In preceding years this regional material was not available until some time after the release of the national figures. The regional statistics indicate increased capital programs for 1961 in most of the provinces. In those provinces for which somewhat lower outlays are indicated, notably Manitoba and New Brunswick, unusually large expansion programs were completed last year.
The anticipated level of capital spending, if realized, will result in some net increase in demands upon the economy. An increase of 4 per cent in outlays for new construction is indicated. This will involve greater activity in the construction trades and related industries. On the other hand, the 2 per cent reduction in total outlays for machinery and equipment will affect mainly import items. Demands on domestic equipment producers should remain at about the 1960 level.
The results of the survey indicate that planned capital outlays, considered in relation to national output, will remain at a high level and will involve the continuing build-up in the capital stock of the economy.
Lester Bowles Pearson: It is, of course, difficult to comment on an important statement of this kind which has just been made to the house and which we have had no opportunity to study, especially since it has been made in considerable statistical detail.
The planned capital expenditures, Mr. Speaker, are an important indication each year of the prospects for the economy for the current and forthcoming year. While there has been no opportunity to study the figures given by the minister, it is quite clear from what the minister has said that the plans for capital expenditures in this country this year are not such as to take care of the increased need for employment which will undoubtedly result from the increase in the labour force of this country.


Hazen Robert Argue: It is most difficult at this time to comment on the statement made by the minister without having been given any previous notice of it. I would say that I feel the statement is being made at the right time, since the labour estimates
Inquiries of the Ministry will be under discussion soon and we shall have a chance to relate the figures in this statement to the unemployment situation. As I heard the minister's statement I would say that while a small increase in capital outlay is forecast, it seems conclusive from the statement he has made that there will be no major upturn in the economy, certainly not sufficient to provide employment for those now unemployed.
We welcome the minister's statement at this time in relation to the debate about to take place, and will have further comments to make later.



CIVIL SERVICE ACT


[Stage Direction]
On the order:	Government notices of
motion:
March 7-The Minister of Finance-The following proposed motion:-
That a special committee be appointed to consider Bill C-71, an act respecting the civil service of Canada, with power to send for persons, papers and records and to report from time to time;
That the committee have power to print such papers and evidence from day to day as may be deemed advisable or necessary;
That the committee consist of fifteen members to be designated by the house;
That the committee be empowered to sit during the sittings of the house; and
That standing order 66 be suspended in relation thereto.
Mr. Speaker:: Pursuant to section 2 of
standing order 21 this government notice of motion stands transferred to and ordered for consideration under government orders at the next sitting of the house.



UNITED NATIONS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. Paul Martin (Essex East):: I should like to direct a question to the Acting Prime Minister. Much as we appreciate the hon. gentleman's presence in this house, Mr. Speaker, I wonder if I could inquire whether it is his intention to participate in this portion of the general assembly of the United Nations. Is he in a position to say what the attitude of the government is regarding the statement made yesterday my Mr. Adlai Stevenson as to the desirability of postponing any disarmament discussion in the general assembly at this time?


Howard Charles Green: I hope to be going to New York in a few days' time. This week has been taken up largely with various discussions among the delegates and also in attempts to iron out

Inquiries of the Ministry the agenda for this resumed part of the assembly session. It is too soon yet to state just what plan will be reached. There has been an attempt to bring about the dropping of such controversial items as those relating to Hungary, Tibet, the U-2 incident and so on. Whether or not there will be any success in that endeavour, I cannot say. The general committee is meeting on Monday, and after that meeting we shall be in a better position to know just what the plans will be for this resumed session. I think there is no doubt that disarmament will be discussed during the session, but at what stage is not yet sure.



AGRICULTURE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hazen Robert Argue: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Agriculture, notice of which I was able to give him just a few moments age. Would the minister comment on a press report that federal government surplus canned pork being distributed in the Windsor area is unfit to eat? Has the government provided any check to test the quality of its canned pork still in storage so that its quality is assured before distribution?


Hon. Alvin Hamilton (Minister of Agriculture):: I should like to thank the hon. member for his interest in this matter. I am informed that the canned pork in question was part of a lot of 23,370 cases released at Toronto by the stabilization board to the Ontario department of welfare on April 1, 1960. Early in January, 1961 some 3,000 cases were sent to the social service authorities in Windsor. That agency has been distributing the product to needy people.
Reports that the product was faulty have been checked by officials of my department. They were informed by the office of the Windsor medical officer of health that samples were examined by the provincial health laboratory in Windsor and that the laboratory found no evidence of anything being wrong with the product. However, in view of the incidents of yesterday I have asked my department to check more thoroughly into the procedure followed with regard to this type of distribution.
There were also reports that some of the cans were bulging. Examination of several cans indicated that any evidence of bulging was due to overfilling, but I would have the department look into this further.


Paul Joseph James Martin: Is the Minister of Agriculture not aware that the ever alert member for Essex East inquired about this matter from the stabilization board this

morning and was told that the question was one entirely within provincial responsibility? Is the minister not aware also that the member for Essex East asked the department to inquire whether or not the 30 million cans of pork which are now within the controlled storage of the Department of Agriculture, although they are already contracted for, might be made available in part to serve the needs of the city of Windsor?


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: Supplies of pork now in storage are, as the hon. member said, committed, not in part but in toto. To follow the hon. member's suggestion would mean that we would have to buy pork back or at least cancel the contract for it and I feel we should let our sales commitments go forward and sell the pork rather than make inroads on these stocks. If we are going to enter upon a distribution policy I think that should be done on a planned basis rather than on an ad hoc basis.



COMBINES


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Frank Howard (Skeena):: I wish to address a question to the parliamentary secretary to the Minister of Justice and ask him whether any further investigations are being made by the combines investigation branch into the operations of Pacific Press Limited of Vancouver, or whether any court actions have been undertaken or are contemplated as a result of the report of the restrictive trade practices commission concerning the production and supply of newspapers in Vancouver and elsewhere in British Columbia.


Mr. Thomas M. Bell (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice):: I shall have to take the question as notice and see that a reply is given as soon as possible.


EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Herbert Wilfred Herridge: wish to direct a question to the Acting Prime Minister. In view of the fact that the dynamic and forward looking British Columbia federation of labour has considered proposals for sending a fact finding delegation to Cuba, will the minister inform the house whether the government has any objection whatever to a fact finding group going on such a mission?


Howard Charles Green: There is no objection of which I am aware.


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. George Hees (Minister of Trade and Commerce):: Yesterday the honourable and alert member for Essex West directed a question to me concerning a report that a group of bakers in the United States was seeking to impose a tariff against the importation of Canadian made bread.
Canadian bread enters the United States free of customs duty. Its duty free status is bound under our trade agreement with the United States. Therefore a tariff could not be imposed on Canadian bread without our knowledge. We are aware of the bill in congress seeking a tariff on bread, to which the hon. gentleman referred. We are watching the progress of the bill, and if and when the time comes to make representations the house may accept our assurance that the views of the Canadian government will be made known to the United States government.


Hon. J. W. Picliersgill (Bonavisia-Twillingale):: I have a supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Could I ask the minister whether bread is a custom made article or shelf goods?


George Harris Hees: Mr. Speaker, it just depends on the particular baker.



UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. C. MacRae (York-Sunbury):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Labour, of which I have given him notice. In view of the present widespread abuse of the unemployment insurance fund in this country, whereby many thousands of men and women are drawing unemployment insurance when there is work for them in the industries which they follow, will the minister advise the house what steps the government is taking to correct this situation?


Hon. Michael Starr (Minister of Labour):: Mr. Speaker, there has been a general tightening up in the administration of the unemployment insurance fund. Regulations regarding casual employment and contract of service provisions are being strictly enforced. The addition of more than 40 enforcement officers to the staff has made it possible to extend spot checking operations.
As a result of these measures the incidence of fraud has been reduced. I might say that fraud or misrepresentation, when discovered,
Inquiries of the Ministry is speedily dealt with and punishment is meted out in accordance with the terms of the act.


Paul Joseph James Martin: I have a supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Since the Minister of Labour is now indicating what the government is going to do about abuses under the Unemployment Insurance Act, can he give the house some indication as to when we may expect the government to bring forward its proposals to replenish the fund?


Michael Starr: Mr. Speaker, whatever policy is adopted with respect to the fund or the Unemployment Insurance Act will be announced at the appropriate time in the House of Commons.


Frank Howard: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. I should like to ask the minister if he does not think it would be more beneficial to the unemployed if he were to direct his efforts toward providing employment?


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The hon. member's question is, of course, just an attempt to make an argumentative assertion, which is quite out of order.



COPYRIGHTS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Miss Judy V. LaMarsh (Niagara Falls):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Acting Secretary of State in the absence of the Secretary of State, arising out of a report appearing in yesterday morning's Globe and Mail in regard to a letter from the Secretary of State to Mr. D. W. Thomson, president of the Canadian authors association, which stated that it might be possible to introduce a new copyright act in the next session. My question is, in view of the urgency of this matter-and admittedly there was a legitimate case made by the Canadian authors association in a brief presented last week-will the minister give serious consideration to introducing a bill to revise the Copyright Act at this session of parliament?


Hon. Ellen L. Fairclough (Acting Secretary of State):: Mr. Speaker, this matter of course has been under consideration for some time and arises out of the work of a royal commission which examined the whole situation over an extended period of several years. Although this does not come within my own department I do know that the Department of the Secretary of State is vitally concerned, and every consideration is being given to expediting the introduction of a bill.
2810	HOUSE OF
Inquiries of the Ministry NATIONAL DEFENCE



D.E.W. LINE-FORWARDING OF SUPPLIES THROUGH WINNIPEG AND CHURCHILL

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. Lionel Chevrier (Laurier:) Mr. Speaker, I would like to direct a question to the Minister of National Defence. I would ask him if he has taken cognizance of a statement appearing in the Winnipeg Free Press of March 6 to the effect that the United States air force will abandon its plan to supply the distant early warning line through Winnipeg and Fort Churchill if award of a contract is delayed much longer.
Hon. D. S. Harkness (Minister of National Defence):: Mr. Speaker, I think the hon. member will realize that I have no jurisdiction over the air transport board, and that this is not a matter which comes within the confines of my department at all.


Mr. Chevrier:: I realize that, Mr. Speaker, but I was going to ask a supplementary question of the Minister of Transport. I asked the Minister of National Defence to comment as to whether this statement appearing in the Winnipeg Free Press is correct, and that the United States is likely to abandon its plan to supply the distant early warning line through Winnipeg and Fort Churchill.


Douglas Scott Harkness: All I can say, Mr. Speaker, is I have no knowledge in connection with this report.


Lionel Chevrier: May I ask a supplementary question of the Minister of Transport. The chairman of the air transport board, Mr. Davoud, has stated that before he can make any commitment he must wait for his minister to arrive back in Ottawa. The statement simply said that the word from the east was that the United States air force is becoming increasingly impatient for the federal air transport board to nominate an air line to do the job. I wonder if the minister would care to make a comment in regard to this statement.


Hon. Leon Balcer (Minister of Transport):: Mr. Speaker, I have not read the article in question, but I can assure the house that the air transport board has been in contact with the Federal Electric Corporation and the United States air force in regard to this matter. Discussions have been taking place for some time. I think I will be in a position later today or perhaps tomorrow morning to announce the new contract. I can assure this house that there is absolutely no risk or danger, that this contract would not be carried on.



FINANCE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. D. M. Fisher (Port Arthur):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Minister of Finance whether he can give us any information regarding the first month's operations respecting small business loans because of the usefulness this information will be in the debate we are to undertake in relation to unemployment.


Donald Methuen Fleming: There is no report available as yet on this matter, Mr. Speaker.



LABOUR CONDITIONS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. W. H. McMillan (Welland):: I would like to direct a question to the Minister of Labour, Mr. Speaker. Is it possible for the Minister of Labour to procure information regarding the employment record of a person registered with the national employment service if he is requested to do so by a member of parliament?


Michael Starr: I think it is evident that the hon. member for Welland refers to the reference I made yesterday in respect to Mr. Exelby. If that is so, Mr. Speaker, then I feel that if Mr. Exelby undertook of his own volition to disclose his personal affairs in great detail on a national television broadcast and in so doing created a completely false impression, it is quite proper for me to present certain facts of the same nature.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I would like to ask the minister whether he has ever read section 98 of the Unemployment Insurance Act, and if he is aware that he broke the law yesterday.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I would suggest that if there are further questions regarding the administration of the Department of Labour they should be asked on the estimates, which are to be called as soon as the last question is asked on orders of the day.


John Whitney Pickersgill: On a question of privilege, sir. Since I cannot put a question, I draw Your Honour's attention to the fact that a question of privilege-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. If the hon. member would state the question of privilege which arises perhaps I will hear what he has to say about it.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I am submitting, sir, on a question of privilege that a minister of the crown in an answer given in this house yesterday was in breach of a law made by this parliament. That is my question of privilege, and to substantiate it I should like to read a part of section 98 of the Unemployment Insurance Act of 1955. It reads as follows:
98. Information, written or verbal, obtained by the commission from any person pursuant to the provisions of this act or any regulation shall be made available only to the employees of the commission in the course of their employment and such other persons as the commission deems advisable-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I draw Your Honour's attention to the fact that we were told yesterday not what the commission deemed advisable but what the minister caused the Hamilton office to supply, which parliament said should be kept secret in the same way that details regarding income tax are kept secret, and for the minister to gain cheap political advantage-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member is correct in rising on a question of privilege but not in making the imputation he made. That is not a question of privilege.


Lionel Chevrier: Mr. Speaker, the member for Bonavista-Twillingate has directed a question to the minister, and I think should be entitled to a reply.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The hon. member for Bonavista-Twillingate has risen on a matter of privilege. The point he makes is that a minister of the crown in the house has not observed the conditions of a statute passed by the house. I think a matter of privilege properly arises under such circumstances, and the Minister of Labour should have the opportunity to discuss it.


Michael Starr: Mr. Speaker, I think I should also rise on the question of privilege at this time. The act clearly states that the information can be given if it is deemed advisable.


John Whitney Pickersgill: The information can be given if deemed advisable by the commission.


Michael Starr: The information can be given if deemed advisable by the unemployment insurance commission. The unemployment insurance commission in Hamilton is an office which operates under the provisions of this act. An employee of that commission at Hamilton is perfectly within his rights to use his judgment, and when a minister who reports to parliament requests certain information he is certainly doing his duty to supply
Supply-Labour
the minister with it. In any event, Mr. Speaker, when there is any misrepresentation of any kind to the detriment of our economy I feel that as a member of this government it is my duty to reveal the true facts.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Speaker-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. As I have indicated to the hon. member who raised the matter, it is my view that in certain circumstances a question of privilege could arise. He has indicated his views and the minister has done likewise. It seems to me that is as far as the matter can be carried, in the absence of a motion.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Speaker-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I see nothing to be gained in pursuing the matter unless the hon. member wishes to make an issue of it by bringing in a motion.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Well, sir, in my view, under the rules of the house, the minister misrepresented what I had said.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The hon. member read the statute and the house heard it. The minister commented on it and expressed his views. I think the hon. member can hardly say that a case of misrepresentation arises when he himself has read the section concerned.

The house in committee of supply, Mr. Flynn in the chair.
DEPARTMENT OF LABOUR General administration-
178. Departmental administration including a grant of $10,000 to Frontier College and the expenses of the international labour conferences, $1,373,104.


The Chairman:: This item will be found on page 37 of the blue book and the details on page 256.


Michael Starr: Mr. Chairman, in these main estimates the total amount requested is $136,497,933. The Department of Labour is asking for the sum of $33,879,953 and the unemployment insurance commission for $102,617,980. Of the $33,879,953 for the Department of Labour, $26,600,000 is required to carry out the purposes of the Technical and Vocational Training Assistance Act. This represents an increase of over $17 million in the amount provided for this program in 1960-61.
Honourable members will recall that when the new bill to expand technical and vocational training in Canada was introduced last November I spoke of the many compelling reasons for increased training in Canada. I should like to bring to the attention of the committee the fact that notwithstanding this

Supply-Labour
substantial increase in our vocational training program, page 39 of the blue book shows a decrease of slightly over $12 million in the department's estimates from that which was voted in 1960-61. I should also explain that in the 1960-61 estimates column there is an item of $30 million which was voted for the municipal winter works incentive program, and there is no comparable figure in the 1961-62 column.
I wish to assure the committee at this point that this municipal winter works incentive program will be continued during the winter of 1961-62 should the extent of seasonal unemployment warrant it and should the government decide to do so. Moneys required for this purpose will be included in a later supplementary departmental estimate.
The other increases in the operational votes are generally speaking in the salary allotments, and are largely due to the general salary increases which were given to civil servants and authorized by the government last summer.
I should now like to deal generally with the main activities of the Department of Labour. When presenting my departmental estimates it has been my usual practice to speak briefly on the various functions of the department. My remarks will concern the highlights of activities which give rise to the financial requirements over the coming fiscal year.
First, we give every assistance possible to labour and management in developing constructive relationships and in improving the skills of the work force. Second, we assist in bringing into employment and training those who are unemployed. I assure you, Mr. Chairman, that in the campaign against unemployment we are mobilizing and will continue to mobilize all the resources at the disposal of the federal government. The points I wish to make today in assisting hon. members in their consideration of my department's estimates concern the programs of the various branches of my department and the positive contribution they make every day to improving the welfare of Canadians.
Today's manpower problems have established the changing and expanding work of my department. We have expanded and greatly intensified our work in those activities most directly concerned with dealing with unemployment through creating job opportunities and developing the skills of the labour force. For example, the experience of the first two years of our municipal winter works incentive program demonstrated to us that this program could create winter jobs. On the basis of this experience we greatly expanded the scope of the program and its duration, and as a result, Mr. Chairman,

almost twice the number of direct jobs have been created through the program this year. We know that methods of construction and programming of work which were available before the start of our "do it now" program, but not used to any great extent, have become a well known and accepted part of Canadian life and this to me, Mr. Chairman, spells success.
We have found that a wide gap exists in the contribution of vocational training to the development of the skills and the requirements of Canadian industry. I have already mentioned the substantial increase in the amounts we are asking to be voted for this program during the coming year. The increase in our expenditures in support of vocational training programs from $9,197,600 a year ago to $26,600,000 for the fiscal year 1961-62 stems largely from the positive action taken by this government to provide facilities and programs to meet the requirements of industry and workers in such training.
I refer to the Technical and Vocational Training Assistance Act which received royal assent last December. Already the effect of this new legislation, with its realistic approach to the problems of training for trades and technical skills at all levels, are being felt. Financial impediments to the development of adequate training facilities have been removed. From the Atlantic provinces to the west coast important expansions are under way or about to begin. For example, at St. John's, Newfoundland, a new college of trade and technical training is being built at a cost initially estimated at more than $4 million. Nova Scotia has forecast the construction of a provincial trade school and a vocational high school. The province of New Brunswick is proceeding with the construction of a provincial technical institute and is planning three additional trade schools. Ontario's plans have not as yet been announced but very much expanded facilities are in prospect. Prince Edward Island is advancing plans for the construction of training facilities at a new centre, and we have received assurances that the province of Quebec will enter into an agreement with the federal government under the new act and will implement plans already made for construction of new facilities and expansions of many which are already in use. Manitoba is planning a combined institute of technology and a trade school at an estimated cost of $5 million. Alberta and British Columbia each have plans well under way for extensive capital projects.
This rapid development in, capital expenditure programs represents a response by the provinces to the federal government offer made in this new legislation to assume

75 per cent of the capital costs of new facilities incurred up to March 31, 1963. More and better training facilities are needed and it appears, Mr. Chairman, that we are going to have them.
The cost of federal sharing in these capital developments during the fiscal year 1961-62 is estimated at $14,175,000, exclusive of Quebec. If Quebec completes an agreement this amount will undoubtedly be higher. In some cases facilities to accommodate additional trainees will be ready for use within the new fiscal year. Other projects while taking longer to complete, will provide early relief to our urgent training needs.
Immediate increases in the, sharing of provincial expenditures for the operation of technical and vocational schools are promoting an immediate expansion of training enrolments to the limit of facilities currently available. In our estimates for the coming year we have provided $4 million for the training of unemployed workers compared with $1,310,000 for the fiscal year 1960-61. In 1960 the federal government offered to share with the provinces to the extent of 75 per cent of the cost of this training, once a minimum level of training had been reached. The program has gained momentum rapidly. In the fiscal year 1959-60 some 3,600 unemployed persons had been given training to January 31, 1960. By the same date in the fiscal year 1960-61 more than 7,000 had been given training. For the months of February and March marked increases in enrolments are expected as the provincial programs gain momentum. Training classes have been established in 385 centres in a total of 82 different occupations, and as additional facilities become available we expect to have a program extensive enough to cover all unemployed persons who can profit by training.
The program for training indentured apprentices is also continuing to grow. By the end of January in the fiscal year 1959-60 there had been just short of 10,000 new enrolments for apprenticeship. By January 31 this year there had been more than 11,100 new enrolments. The continued expansion of facilities for this training will provide for further increases in the coming year.
The foregoing are the largest items of expenditure for which we have budgeted in our estimates to cover the technical and vocational training program. The program of training of disabled persons, an effective means to restore handicapped workers to active careers of self-support, is continuing to grow, with a vote of $370,000 as the federal share of the program. Other programs for training in primary industries, as foremen and
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supervisors, for student aid and vocational correspondence courses will continue. An expanded program of assistance to students attending post-high school courses in science and technology below university level has been introduced. The need for technicians and other skilled workers at a level between that of the tradesman and the professional man has become acute in industry. It must be satisfied, Mr. Chairman, if our economy is to keep abreast of world competition.
A new program of assistance to persons training as technical and vocational teachers, supervisors and administrators is being developed. Too frequently our technical and vocational institutions have had extreme difficulty in recruiting competent staffs. Many Canadians wishing to prepare for careers in this field have had to seek their training in the United States or elsewhere. The expected growth in our vocational institutions will create additional and urgent staffing problems.
I had occasion recently to meet with representatives of the provinces at a conference called to discuss proposals for a new federal-provincial agreement to implement the provisions of the new Technical and Vocational Training Assistance Act, and their response to the possibilities opened by the new act was most gratifying to me. The provisions of the agreements to be made under it and the programs authorized were generally acceptable. There appeared to be an air of satisfaction and eagerness on the part of all provincial representatives to get ahead with the training program which the new look in our legislation has made possible.
We are constantly developing our understanding of employment and unemployment and the more effective utilization of our manpower resources through the work of the economics and research branch. One of the principal functions of the branch is the continuing analysis of labour market conditions and the examination of the meaning of trends and events in labour markets for the demand and supply of labour. The value of this information is self-evident. Publication of a good deal of this information has proved of value to parliament, labour and management, provincial governments and the public at large.
Continuing work on the character of our manpower resources and their participation within the Canadian economy has facilitated a deeper understanding of the character of our employment and unemployment problems. For example, the publication this year of studies of seasonal employment and unemployment has made available to us new insights into the nature of this problem. It has strengthened the government's view that

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much can be done through the winter works program to provide employment for those who find themselves unemployed during the winter months.
The branch has also participated in joint studies with the provinces of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick for the purpose of examining the problems of seasonal unemployment in those provinces. These studies will reinforce other work going on in the branch concerning the nature of workers who are not able to secure continuing employment.
The field of manpower training is one to which much research has been devoted over the past several years, and this work has helped to shape the character of our new legislation on training. This work has involved a detailed investigation of shifting occupational and industrial needs within the labour force and of the required technical qualifications. Studies have been carried out on the effects of automation on manpower in specific industries and on the evaluation of a wide range of technological changes on manpower requirements. In the field of professional personnel, further work has been undertaken to determine the nature of supply and demand trends, particularly for scientists and engineers. One important aspect, Mr. Chairman, of the employment of workers is covered by the continuing work of the economics and research branch in the labour management field. Similarly, in today's world, the branch is investigating the important problem of the costs of fringe benefits and the significance of labour costs on the whole Canadian economy.
The regular work of the branch in connection with wages, working conditions and collective bargaining has continued, and publications have been issued on a regular basis. In addition to the general work in the field of employment and unemployment, there is provision in the work of the department for continuing programs in a number of important areas. I shall refer here, Mr. Chairman, to only four of these fields. Our women's bureau works closely with the national employment service and other groups in developing an understanding of the problems of women in the labour force and for the promotion of good employment standards for women. Through the special services branch, programs are administered in the farm labour field and in connection with the organized movement of workers between Canada and the United States.
The civilian rehabilitation branch, in cooperation with the Department of National Health and Welfare, the unemployment insurance commission and the vocational training branch, continues to co-ordinate at the federal level all these services that contribute
to the vocational rehabilitation of disabled persons. It is assisting the provinces to organize programs or endeavours to bring together in an organized pattern all government and voluntary efforts that seek to remove the disadvantages experienced by so many of our handicapped citizens. The value of this program, Mr. Chairman, has been clearly established and, on the basis of provincial needs, we are asking for increased provincial support in this area of activity.
A division of older workers has been established within the civil rehabilitation branch. Through these efforts and the efforts of the unemployment insurance commission, we see evidence that many more of our employers are realizing the valuable contributions that the experience and maturity of the older worker can make. I have taken a very personal interest in the employment problems of older people in a variety of ways, and I am most encouraged by the response of employers to our efforts in this field.
The special services branch of the department co-ordinates our many significant activities in the field of winter employment. These include the winter employment program and the municipal winter works incentive program. Both these programs have grown out of a conviction on our part, through research in the seasonal unemployment problems of the Canadian economy, that a great deal can be done to develop employment during the winter months. The winter employment program, jointly administered by the Department of Labour and the unemployment insurance commission, has become the focus of national interest. It enlists the support of national and local organizations, of industry, of labour and of every available publicity medium in stimulating winter employment.
An example here, Mr. Chairman, has been set by federal government departments and agencies in carrying out maximum construction, maintenance, repairs and purchasing during the winter months. Public spirited citizens in the towns and cities from coast to coast deserve great credit for the time and effort they put in each fall and winter on behalf of the local "do it now" campaigns. Organizations, such as the Canadian Construction Association, the Canadian Manufacturers' Association and other nationally known organizations are taking an active interest in the stimulation of winter employment and are intensifying their efforts each year. National advertising is contributing hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of public service support on behalf of the winter employment campaign.
We have found, Mr. Chairman, that for every dollar spent by the government more

than $10 is spent by business and other groups on advertising and publicity to increase winter employment. This year's municipal winter works incentive program was enthusiastically promoted by provincial governments and municipalities across the country. Over 5,900 projects submitted by 1,820 municipalities and 44 Indian bands have been accepted. This program may be compared with the 2,600 projects previously undertaken by 861 municipalities during the winter of 1959-60.


Paul Joseph James Martin: May I ask the
minister at this point if he has a table showing how these 900 projects are divided as among the various communities; how many work days and how many hours of work will be given to each individual, each project and so on? If he has, would he table it as he did last year?


Michael Starr: I would be glad to table this but I have not a copy with me at this moment. I will get it.
At the present time, that is up to March 3, which is the last compilation available to me, total expenditures on projects undertaken during the period of the program, namely October 15, 1960 to April 30, 1961 inclusive, are approximately $185 million. The estimate of the incentive payments to the municipalities through the provinces for the program is now over $31 million. The approved projects under this year's program will provide on-site employment for over 100,000 workers, and at least an equal number of workers will be employed in the production of materials used on winter works projects. It is estimated that the projects that have been accepted so far under the program will provide 4,487,000 man days of work during the winter months. Applications under this program are still coming in from the municipalities at the rate of over 100 per week.
A variety of other activities of the Department of Labour have continued. For example, the department has provided leadership in Canada's work within the international labour organization. During 1960 Canada was represented at seven international labour organization meetings by tripartite delegations. Similar meetings are scheduled for 1961 including, for the first time in five years, an international labour organization American regional conference to which we will be sending a delegation.
The department undertakes a number of diverse activities which, in one measure or another, support the department's work as a whole. In today's world, where pensions have become the rule rather than the exception, we are sometimes inclined to underrate the value of the annuities program which also comes under my department. Individuals, not
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able through their employment to secure pensions, are assumed of low cost annuity plans. The group contracts by our annuities branch have also provided an effective and secure means of investment for employees in various industries across the country.
The annuities branch sells individual annuities, both deferred and immediate, and group annuities. At the close of the last fiscal year there were in force 116,057 individual deferred annuity contracts and 231,424 certificates for employees in group pension plans. In addition, annuities were being paid under 818,228 matured contracts and certificates at the rate of $43,403,649 a year. The net premium income for the fiscal year 1959-60 was $56,041,417, and the annuities account in the consolidated revenue fund totalled over $1,100 million as at March 31, 1960.
The industrial relations branch of the department is responsible for the administration of the Industrial Relations and Disputes Investigation Act, the Fair Employment Practices Act, the Annual Vacations with Pay Act, the Fair Wages and Hours of Labour Act and the promotion of labour-management committees in industry.
The function of the Department of Labour which has the longest history lies, of course, in the field of industrial relations. The Canada Fair Employment Practices Act continues to be a most effective weapon in the struggle against discrimination in employment. My department believes that not one application for employment form coming within federal jurisdiction contains questions contrary to the provisions of the act, though at the time of the passage of the bill the great majority of employers' application forms contained questions asking the prospective employee his race, religion, national origin or colour.
The labour-management co-operation service has continued to stimulate the development of labour-management committees in Canadian industry. Today there are in excess of 1,600 committees in industry across the country. The complex nature of our industrial relations system in Canada, the importance of many industrial disputes both to the country as a whole and to the thousands of individual workers and employers affected, is obvious. The responsibilities of labour and management to work together in securing the greatest possible benefit for their joint endeavours is great, and rests squarely on the shoulders of labour and management.


Paul Joseph James Martin: Shifting all responsibility.

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Jacques Flynn: I regret to interrupt the minister, but his time has expired. Do I understand that the committee gives unanimous consent to his continuing?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Michael Starr: The hon. member for Essex East made a remark to the effect that I was shifting responsibility. I am sure that when he said that he misunderstood what I was saying. I will repeat what I said. The complex nature of our industrial relations system in Canada, the importance of many industrial disputes both to the country as a whole and to the thousands of individual workers and employers affected, is obvious. The responsibilities of labour and management to work together in securing the greatest possible benefits for their joint endeavours is great, and rests squarely on the shoulders of labour and management.
I am sure that when the hon. member for Essex East has considered that he will not wish to repeat his comment.


Paul Joseph James Martin: I said that with regard to unemployment. The minister is shifting his responsibility.


Michael Starr: I said nothing about unemployment.


Paul Joseph James Martin: I did.


Michael Starr: As usual, then, the hon. member was out of order. Sometimes the gulf which appears to divide labour and management in this country seems difficult to bridge. It must be bridged. I have asked labour and management groups to meet and address themselves to problems of higher productivity, of technological change, and the whole field of joint interests. In this direction, I say, lies the solution to many of our contentious problems. Since we felt that an effort on our part could bring them together, the Minister of Trade and Commerce and I have asked representatives of industry and labour to meet here in Ottawa on March 15. We are sending out that invitation in the hope that we can create an atmosphere in which both labour and management can resolve the difficulties which they have faced and are facing.
I should like to say something now about the operations of the unemployment insurance commission, which administers the national employment service and unemployment insurance. As hon. members are aware, these operations are receiving a good deal of attention from both the government and the public; rightly so, since they are vital to the well-being of so many of our citizens at this time as well as to the prosperity of our country as a whole. This prosperity will be secured only through long range positive

action, and it is in line with this conviction that the employment side of the commission's work has been consistently improved, especially of late. It is of the utmost importance that unemployed persons be placed in jobs with the least delay. It is equally important that such placements should be satisfactory not only to the workers concerned but also to their employers and to other workers.
In carrying out this program, officers of the service made more than a quarter of a million visits to employers last year in order to explain the facilities of the national employment service and to obtain orders for workers. In another direction, the employment service is constantly seeking out applicants with the skills required to meet employers' orders which cannot readily be filled from applications on file. As I advised the committee during the last debate on these estimates, steps were being taken at that time to strengthen the employment service staff, and these endeavours are already bearing fruit. We are thus engaged in an effort to improve the quality of the service and also to improve the use of the service by the public through a public relations program.
I am happy to say that this two-pronged approach, although of comparatively recent origin, has already produced results both tangible and intangible, particularly when measured against current economic factors. Thus, although placements for the calendar year 1960 were 2.8 per cent lower than they were for 1959, the last three months for which placement figures are available-* November, December and January-show an increase of 16.7 per cent compared with the corresponding period of 1959-60.
During 1960 the employment service placed 950,300 persons in jobs and it is noteworthy, I think, that of this number of placements 120,134 were workers aged 45 and over. This has been brought about in part as a result of the older workers program in which I am particularly interested, and it emphasizes again the value of public information to which reference was made earlier. During the past year 300 employers employing some 60,000 workers have either raised the age limit specified on their hiring applications or removed it entirely.
Another direction in which progress has been made is the placement service to youth, including career counselling for young people in school or just entering the labour market. I may say that a considerable number of school drop-outs returned to school as a result of national employment service counselling.
Among the special services given by the commission are those for the physically handicapped and veterans, placement service

to young Indians as part of their integration into urban life, to immigrant workers, and so forth. A sharp intensification of interest in vocational training has brought about many more directions of unemployed workers to courses of training by national employment service officers than ever before.
Taken separately, these things are of more immediate concern to some groups of citizens than to others. In their total effect, however, they are of fundamental importance for the Caandian economy as a whole. The commission believes, and I share this relief, that better placements will not only lead to better production but will also lead to the employment of more workers.
Hon. members will be interested to note that the commission's efforts to safeguard the fund against improper claims have been stepped up through a strengthening of the investigation division and an educational program. It is of course unavoidable that unlawful practices in the use of unemployment insurance stamps and in claims for benefit will crop up either as single incidents or as a rash of incidents. It is therefore necessary that the insurance provisions of the act, such as those relating to insurability, contract of service, availability for work and so on, be enforced and explained with both perseverance and understanding. As a result of the efforts on the part of the enlarged investigation division, the number of detected punishable infractions of the act rose from 17,279 in 1959 to 29,619 in 1960.
The commission's audit division, whose task is checking to ensure that employers comply with the act, completed 189,068 audits during 1960 and made 38,417 investigations, both figures being slightly higher than those for 1959. The number of registered employers in Canada subject to audit rose to 382,879, an increase of over 9,000 compared with the previous year.
The total amount required for the unemployment insurance commission is $102,617,980. This of course includes the government's contribution to the unemployment insurance fund of $57 million. The net increase in the commission's administrative costs is some $5,155,000. This increase is due primarily to salary increases and to an increase in personnel, notably in the investigation division.
Before concluding, Mr. Chairman, I wish to say something further about unemployment. This is, of course, one of the serious problems with which we have to deal at the present time. Hon. members are familiar with the fact that in a matter of months-as a matter of fact since November 17, 1960-this government has brought forward a wide range of positive and constructive measures to deal with the social
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blight of unemployment and to give an upward push to our economy. I have every confidence that the actions we have taken will produce the desired results and will have the desired effect. Unemployment is not something which can cure itself. It can only be cured and its consequences arrested by a massive attack across the whole field of the general economy-


Paul Joseph James Martin: Hear, hear.


Michael Starr: -and this is what we are doing.


Paul Joseph James Martin: No, sir.


Michael Starr: Results are becoming apparent in housing, municipal construction through sewage disposal aid, building of new trade and technical schools, strong impetus in export trade resulting from the new credit provisions and a restored confidence in the industrial and manufacturing sector of the economy.
The measures which have been brought forward relate to the work of every department of this government. They take in the fiscal and financial sphere of government responsibility. This is not, of course, the place for me to review in detail what has been done. I therefore confine my remarks to the work and responsibility of my own department, the Department of Labour. Meanwhile the concerted and sustained movement to bolster the economy will be kept up. On a number of occasions in this house and elsewhere there has been mention of what has been done in the United States. What has been done in the United States is good and will undoubtedly reflect favourably on our situation in Canada. But let me point out that we took action and have continued to take action, and that our action was both prior to and more comprehensive than action so far taken in the United States.


Paul Joseph James Martin: That, of course, is not so.


Lionel Chevrier: That is not so.


Paul Joseph James Martin: That is not the
case.


Lionel Chevrier: That is just balderdash, and the applause is not going to strengthen the statement.


Michael Starr: Mr. Chairman, now that the official opposition have run out of ideas as to what may be put forward, they want to copy whatever is being done in the United States, as they have always done in the past.


Paul Joseph James Martin: We want action.

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Michael Starr: As I have said, it would not be proper for me to dwell at this time on what has been accomplished under the jurisdiction of other ministers.


Lionel Chevrier: That is not much.


Mr. Jones:: A great deal has been done.


Michael Starr: I have dealt with the work of my department, and I trust that the picture I have attempted to present will commend itself to all hon. members of this committee.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Mr. Chairman, in opening my remarks on the work of the minister's department and the problems that face that department I should like to begin by paying a tribute to the efficient and selfless work of the members of the Department of Labour from the deputy minister down.
Perhaps I could say a special word about the deputy minister who retired this year, Mr. Arthur Brown. I confess that I am prejudiced very much in his favour. He and I entered university together at a very young age; we went to war together; we came back about the same time; we came to Ottawa about the same time, and I know something about the work he has done to serve his country over the years, and is still doing in another capacity after retirement from the public service of Canada. In wishing him well I should like to associate the members of this party with the good wishes that I am also extending to his successor, Mr. George Haythorne.
As I have a great deal to say that will be critical of the policy of the minister, perhaps I should say at the beginning that I, as do all hon. members on this side, respect his sincerity and his willingness to help us when we ask him questions. We also appreciate the important and complex problems with which he is faced as Minister of Labour.
Mr. Chairman, the discussion on item 1 of the estimates of the Department of Labour provides an opportunity to review the work of the department as well as to initiate a discussion of the problems that face it. The minister has given us the first, a review of the activities of his department, for which we are grateful, but he has dealt in an almost ludicrously inadequate way with the problems which face the department, and above all, with the problem of unemployment in this country to which he devoted two or three minutes at the end of his fairly long statement.
The minister explained in doing so that this was not a matter with which he felt it necessary to deal on item 1 of his estimates. The inadequacy of the minister's statement in this regard, especially in respect of unemployment, is discouraging and disheartening. You would have thought, that he

was making a routine report regarding the activities of the Department of Labour during a normal year of full employment in this country instead of during a year when, in January, 11 per cent of the working force was unemployed.
In the face of that situation the minister did say that unemployment was one of the serious problems with which we have to deal. He also said that the government had mobilized all the resources of the federal government to deal with this problem. The result of that mobilization is reflected by the figure for unemployment that we received in January and will be reflected by the figure for February which we will be receiving within a few days.
The minister has given no indication this afternoon of the seriousness of this problem. He has not attempted to analyse the problem of unemployment. He has not put forward any new ways or means to deal with it. He has given us no policy statement at all regarding this matter. I urge the minister to rectify this omission before this item passes.
So far as I am concerned this afternoon, Mr. Chairman, my intervention at this point of our discussion is to address certain questions to the Minister of Labour in an attempt to bring out certain problems, as we on this side see them, with which we feel the government should be dealing. I intend to present our own analysis of the situation based on information we have received regarding unemployment and to ask the minister whether this analysis is sound and whether the information we bring forward to support this analysis is accurate. If the minister tells us that we are wrong in this regard we will ask him where we are wrong. I will mention some of these questions now which I intend to ask and which I hope the minister will deal with later.
The first question has regard to the rapid depletion of the unemployment insurance fund, in the face of mounting unemployment. I will ask the minister whether he agrees that the investment policy of the unemployment insurance committee by which the fund, through conversion of its victory bonds, has already been depleted by $30 million, and perhaps will be depleted to the extent of $70 million. I will ask the minister how he is going to explain this depletion to the other contributors to the fund, industry and labour.
My next question arose earlier in today's sitting and has regard to the government's intention to bring forth legislation to replenish the fund. This intention was announced by the government last November. I will ask the minister why nothing has been done in

this regard since that time. I ask the minister when it is intended that action be taken in the face of this alarming situation. The government must have been aware for more than a year that legislation of this kind was necessary. So I ask the minister to give us a reason for the delay in taking action because the committee will soon have to unload more of its bonds and thereby incur further losses.
The next question I wanted to ask-and the minister has mentioned it in his statement-concerns the alleged irregularities connected with unemployment benefits and the alleged inadequacy of the national employment service. A great deal in this regard has been read into a memorandum submitted to the Senate committee on manpower and unemployment by Dr. James. In the discussion of this matter before this committee of the other place one of the senators-a long time supporter of the Conservative party- made certain statements. I will quote from the Senate committee reports of February 2 at page 461. This senator is reported as follows:
May I suggest to you that if we were to speak about abolishing unemployment insurance entirely the unemployed would disappear by half as a good many of them have no wish to continue working steadily as long as this unemployment insurance is available for working part time.
That is an astonishing statement to appear on the records of a committee of the parliament of Canada. Even this afternoon, Mr. Chairman, we heard supporters of the government refer to widespread abuse of the unemployment insurance fund. The inference that is being drawn, and the impression that is being created throughout this country, is that hundreds of thousands of workers are cheating in regard to unemployment insurance benefits. This is a very serious impression. to create and I am sure it has no foundation in fact. I ask the minister to say something about these reflections on the efficiency of the national employment commission and the honesty of the workers of Canada. If there is something seriously wrong, can the minister inform us what is going to be done to correct it, and to strengthen and add to the efficiency of the national employment service?
The third question to which I wish to refer deals with vocational training programs. The minister did have a good deal to say about this subject. He finally recognized last December that this program and its administrative operations needed to be improved. We on this side have been pressing for that improvement since 1958. We would like to know a little more about the program. The minister gave us some information this afternoon, but we would like to know if the
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minister is satisfied with the present administrative setup of the department in connection with the operation of this enlarged program. We on this side feel that a small branch in the department and an advisory council, however efficient, are not adequate to deal with this vitally important matter of vocational training.
There is another question on which the minister merely touched in his statement, namely the Industrial Relations and Disputes Investigation Act. As far back as 1958 the minister admitted that this act required amendment and change. On August 15, 1958, as reported at page 3593 of Hansard he had this to say:
Coming to the Industrial Relations and Disputes Investigation Act, may I say that I have given notice of my readiness to consider amendments to this act and that a number of suggestions have been received and are being considered at the moment.
I am still waiting for three major national organizations which have been requested to submit their recommendations, but to date I have not received them. However, on checking into the matter I find that they are in the process of completing their recommendations, and that they should be within my hands within the next few weeks.
That was August 15, 1958, but nothing has been done to carry out the intention of the minister. Since that time we have had merely postponement and delay. I ask the minister whether he still thinks this act should be improved and, if so, how does he explain the long delay in bringing forward amendments to it? Is he still waiting for the representations he expected in 1958, or has he merely shelved the whole matter? If he has not, when does he intend to introduce the amendments which he considered so desirable in 1958?
I now come to the most important of all domestic problems facing us at the present time, and one which is of particular interest and concern to the Minister of Labour who has a special responsibility for dealing with it. I refer, of course, to the question of unemployment. So far in this house, Mr. Chairman, we have been unable to get in this session or, indeed, in the previous session anything but superficial treatment by spokesmen of the government of the nature of the unemployment crisis that faces us; and of what can in fact be done about it. We on this side will keep pounding away at the seriousness of the problem even though this is subject to the cheap and tawdry response that we are prophets of doom and gloom, a reaction which we can characterize only as one of desperation on the part of the government spokesmen, a reaction on the part of hon. members in this house who in previous years on this side and in situations that

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were not nearly as dangerous as they are today, in terms of unemployment did not hesitate to use much stronger language in attacking the government of that day.
At this point may I quote from an editorial in the Montreal Gazette of February 28, a paper not notoriously friendly to the Liberal party, which reads:
Just to hope that all will be well, and to refuse to mention that anything has gone wrong, may help a little, by creating an atmosphere of optimism. But it will never correct the underlying causes of what has gone wrong.
It is not being neurotic to recognize that times have changed. No one is neurotic if he faces reality and seeks a constructive adjustment to it.
This is something which has not yet happened. A well known United States commentator, Mr. Walter Lippmann, put the same point in his column on March 4, which appeared in the Ottawa Journal, when he was dealing with the fact that people who try to uncover these difficulties and underline the seriousness of the situation are open to this kind of cheap criticism which I have mentioned, and he went on to say:
They-
That is, the criticisms.
-will be unwelcome to many. They will be unwelcome to those who take the view that with words of confidence and optimism a recession like this one can be talked away-
He is not afraid to use the word "recession". I continue:
-and that the sombre truths should be glossed over and suppressed. There is everything to be said for keeping up the confidence of a sick patient. But an essential ingredient of that confidence is that the doctor is not deceiving himself. If, as seems so probable, we face a long hard effort to revive the American economy, the confidence of the people will best be sustained by convincing them that the economic doctors are not treating nice words as a substitute for real action.
Nice words, whether in Ottawa or in London, by Canadian leaders, are no substitute, and have never been a substitute, for real action. What Mr. Lippmann said in this regard about the United States has even greater application to Canada because relatively our situation is worse than that of the United States. Indeed, Mr. Coyne, the governor of the Bank of Canada, speaking in New York either yesterday or the day before-and it was a very interesting speech indeed-had this to say to his United States audience:
Trends in the growth of national product, employment and unemployment, are rather less satisfactory in Canada than in the United States. Even disregarding the population factor, for the last four or five years gross national product has improved less in Canada than in the United States.
What, then, is the situation which I have described as serious for this country? In his statement today the Minister of Labour gave us no new reason for confidence that he is
aware of what is happening to our economy, or that there has been any great departure from the position taken by the government in previous debates in this house on this subject that all we have to do is to be optimistic and all will be well; just wait. It is up to business and to labour, or even up to Mr. Kennedy. Our criticism of the government's ignorance of the underlying seriousness of this problem is, as I have said, not modified by anything that the minister has said or has not said this afternoon.
The minister did mention as an important contribution to the knowledge and understanding of the problem the proceedings of the committee of the other place on manpower and employment. Indeed, that committee is doing a most valuable work. It will be recalled that at the very beginning of the last session and the session before that we pleaded with the government to set up that kind of committee in the House of Commons so that the members of this house could participate in that kind of investigation and analysis and call before them the experts to explain the situation as they saw it.
The committee will recall that every time we tried to get this kind of investigation established in the House of Commons we were turned down. Even when we tried to persuade the government to associate the House of Commons with the investigation which had been set up through the Liberal majority in another place, we were unable to persuade the government to let us participate in what has turned out to be a most constructive and important work. It is largely on the basis of the reports before that committee that I have drawn my own conclusions of the seriousness of the trends in the economy in this country. When I talk about them, when I use the word "seriousness", I do not want anyone to think that this country will not eventually face up to and overcome those problems and once again remove that seriousness through expansion and growth. We have met very difficult and dangerous economic and employment problems before in this country and have overcome them, and we will overcome this one. But we will not do that in the way it should be done and in the time it should be done without strong, effective leadership and sound and strong policies.
Let us look at the situation, which was not explained to us by the minister at least on this occasion. We hope he may do so later. The figure I am about to give are all bureau of statistics figures which were used in reports made to the committee on employment in the other place. In the period from 1950 to 1960 there was a net increase in the labour force in this country of 1,230,000. That was accounted for to a very considerable extent by

additional female labour, particularly married women, coming into the labour force, also by men under 20 and, of course, by new immigrants to Canada.
While the labour force increased by that amount during that ten-year period, the farm labour force decreased by 340,000 which threw a greater burden on industry to supply jobs to take care of this labour force increase. Yet during that period the number of persons with jobs in this country increased by only 992,000. There is the explanation for unemployment.
If we extend the trend of the last ten years forward over the next five years, as was done in the report to the committee of the other place by Mr. Denton, an economist, and if we take a low figure for increase through immigration during the next five years-he took a figure of 100,000 per year-with the present average unemployment to be absorbed during that five years we will need 1,020,000 nonagricultural jobs to take care of our growing labour force and our present unemployment.
Are we getting these jobs? Government spokesmen say, "Oh, yes, we are getting them because employment is higher now than it has ever been in our history". They quote figures every time they speak on this subject to show that the number of people employed in the country is higher than ever before and that, of course, is quite true. However, the significant factor is not the number of employed but whether the employed are increasing at a rate sufficient to take care of the increasing labour force. If that is not happening then we get more unemployed. This increase is not taking place.
In January, 1961, it is true there were 47,000 more jobs than a year earlier. That is an increase of less than 1 per cent while during the same period unemployment increased by more than 26 per cent. As we are not getting the jobs to take care of the increase in the labour force the result, inevitably and obviously, is an increase in the percentage of unemployment. Until the economy expands so that this increase in the labour force can be taken care of the unemployment problem will be with us in the serious way in which it is today. Perhaps the figures will decrease. We hope they will, and they ought to go down in the summer. However, as I have tried to show by averaging these figures over the years, we are going to be living with this problem for some time unless there is a decided expansion in our economy.
We have had four periods of what I might perhaps call abnormal unemployment and recession since 1947, the period of 1949-50, the period of 1954-55-I am taking two during the time when my hon. friend and his party
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had no responsibility for government-the period of 1957-58 and the present period from the summer of 1960 to where we are in 1961. In an analysis of these four periods of what one might call recession in the economy since the war the most striking feature is that in each successive slow-down, and we have had four, the rate of unemployment has risen higher than in the previous period and in each period of recovery we have had the rate of unemployment has fallen less.
There are three peak unemployment years, 1950, 1954 and 1958, and I think the statistics for those years will support what I have just said. In 1950 the average rate of unemployment was 3.6, in 1954 it was 4.6, in 1958 it was 7.1 and in 1960 it was just about 7 per cent. In the recovery year of 1951 unemployment fell to 2.4. In the recovery year of 1956 it fell to 3.4. In the recovery year of 1959 it feel only to 6 per cent. In January, 1961, a recession year again, the rate had reached about 11 per cent.
This indicates, I think, the validity, and importance, of an article which I read just a few hours ago during the lunch hour in the current issue of Life magazine by Dr. Heller, president Kennedy's chief economic advisor and chairman of the council of economic advisors in Washington. He is a very well known economist indeed. What he had to say on this particular point, is just as applicable, if not more so, to Canada than it is to the United States.
The economy has not been taking up the slack alter its periodic slumps and, going deeper, there is a disturbing slow-down in our rate of economic growth. The intervals between our recessions have been steadily shrinking. The up-turns have not regained the ground lost by the recession. The unemployment figures make this painfully clear.
They also make it painfully clear for Canada as well as for the United States; so clear that at the present time we have the highest percentage of unemployment in this country for 20 years and, I am informed, the highest in any industrialized free country in the western world. That, Mr. Chairman, is something to worry about.
This problem would be serious enough if it were evenly national in its impact but it is made more serious by its regional incidence, something which has been characteristic of our country ever since our country was born. The rates of unemployment are much higher in some parts of our country than they are in others. That gives us a regional problem to deal with as well as a national problem. The average in 1960 in the Atlantic provinces was 9.4 per cent and the average in Quebec was 8.5 per cent while the figures were much lower in the prairies and in Ontario.

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All this shows, Mr. Chairman, that we have with us a persistent, deep-rooted problem which has, of course, no single cause and which will be susceptible to no single treatment. It is deep-rooted, it is chronic, it is regional and it is seasonal. The nature of the unemployment also adds to its complexity. A study that has been made-I confess this was a surprise to me-shows that the greatest extent of unemployment is now among young people under 20 years of age and the least extent is among women where the over-all rate of unemployment is less than half the male rate. Figures from the bureau of statistics show that whereas the average rate in 1960 was 7.3 for all ages, for women it was 3.3 and for men under 20 it was 15.6. As the minister mentioned this afternoon in his statement when dealing with vocational training, these figures emphasize the importance of vocational training and the strong relationship of education to unemployment.
A dominion bureau of statistics survey, taking the week of February 20, 1960, shows that of the people out of work 19 per cent had not completed their primary school education but only 3 per cent had completed their secondary school education. The gap, therefore, is from 19 per cent to 3 per cent.
In reporting to the employment committee of the other place, Mr. Denton summarized the situation as follows. I think this is a very good paragraph:
In summary, then, the rates of unemployment have shown a tendency to Increase with each successive recession since the war. In particular, the rates have been substantially higher for men than for women, and have consistently been highest among young people, the unskilled, and the less educated. The service producing industries have continued throughout the post-war period to provide rapidly expanding opportunities for employment, but in recent years the opportunities available in the goods producing industries have actually contracted. These changes reflect some of the basic forces which are operating in our economy.
This quotation reminds us of another very significant factor, the nature of not only unemployment but of employment in our economy today. This nature has changed considerably over the years, as the figures show. In 1950, the goods producing industries of this country were responsible for 58 per cent of the employment, whereas in 1959 they were responsible for only 48 per cent of the employment. In that category of the goods producing industries, agriculture was responsible for 20.4 per cent of the employment in 1950 and only 11.8 per cent in 1959. Manufacturing industries were responsible for 26.6 per cent of the employment in 1950 but by 1959 the figure had gone down to 25 per cent, not quite holding their own.

We know that nothing took up this slack completely, but what helped to take up some of the slack? The service industries provided 42 per cent of the employment in 1950 and 51.7 per cent of the employment in 1959. This explains among other things the increase in the number of jobs for women and the decrease in the number of jobs for men. Those manufacturing industries which are declining most in terms of employment such as gold mining, coal mining, motor parts manufacturers, farm implements, textiles and leather manufactures, are those which traditionally have employed men for the most part. All this helps to explain the nature and the seriousness of the problem that faces us. The basic reason for it, as I have already said, is a decline in the expansion of our economy. It has now reached a position of stagnation.
This afternoon, the Minister of Trade and Commerce produced a statement on private and public investment in Canada, the outlook for 1961. He gave the most optimistic interpretation possible to that statement. Since he had not sent me a copy of it in advance, it was only after I secured a copy of the press release that I had an opportunity to study it. I have had some chance to look at it while I have been in the chamber. It does not give any ground for encouragement that the situation which I have mentioned is going to be substantially corrected in the year ahead.
In so far as this particular report is concerned the minister said that, for 1961, it represents a continuation of the high and relatively stable level of capital spending realized in recent years. Well, I have just one or two comments to make on that. The proposed increase, if it is realized, will be only 1.6 per cent over 1960, and that is much too low to provide the job opportunities required by even the normal increase in our labour force let alone the high number of unemployed we have at the present time.
According to the minister's statement this afternoon, the proposed expenditures in 1961 amount to $8,330 million. This amount will actually be lower than the amount spent in 1957, 1958 or 1959 and, if expressed in constant dollars, the proposed expenditures will probably be lower than in 1960. Therefore, the declining trend which has been persistent since 1957 will unfortunately, in the light of this report, likely be continued. The report also shows that investment in business capital will be lower in 1961 than in 1960, but will be compensated by higher expenditures in the field of social capital. This does indicate the continued underlying weakness of the private sector of our economy. I hope that the forecast which we got this afternoon will not prove to be as wrong as the one that was made last year by the Minister of Trade and

Commerce. Last year the proposed expenditures were estimated by the minister at $8.77 billion, but we now see from the statement that the realized expenditures were only $8.2 billion. Instead of the forecast increase of about 4 per cent in 1960 as compared with 1959, we had a decline in 1960 of about 2 per cent as compared with 1959.


William Moore Benidickson: Would the hon. member permit a question? I believe the minister forecast an increase of 8 per cent in the private sector. Has that been realized in 1960?


Lester Bowles Pearson: No, it was not. The minister was as inaccurate in his total calculations as he was in his break-down.


An hon. Member:: What does all this show?


Lester Bowles Pearson: All this goes to show that unless we get the kind of expansion in the economy about which I have been talking, then the economy is not likely to pick up in the way it should pick up to take care of this unemployment. The report which we got from the Minister of Trade and Commerce this afternoon does not give us very much ground for hope in that regard. Indeed, the reports for the last three quarters of 1960 indicated a decline in most of the significant indices of economic activity, including general industrial production even though the minister, early in 1960, claimed the recession was over.
The fact is, Mr. Chairman, that the annual increase in our gross national product in real terms from 1950 to 1956, inclusive, on an average, was 5.6 per cent but from 1957 to 1959 the increase was 1.3 per cent. Unemployment, as a percentage of the labour force during the same period rose from 3.4 per cent on an average to 6.2 per cent. This tells the story of what has been happening to our economy in the last three or four years. It reflects a slowing down of that economy, a pause or recession, call it what you like. The governor of the Bank of Canada and the President of the United States are willing to use this word "recession", but this government will not use it. I ask the government and the minister, in the light of what I have just said and the evidence I have brought forward, if they feel that this recession is likely to continue further in 1961 or is it likely to recede? If it is likely to continue and our unemployment problem is likely to be with us, what are they doing about it in any effective way?
What is the outcome in respect of economic growth and resulting employment? Will the minister tell us that before this discussion is over? So far the minister has left us completely in the dark. Yet we know he receives two reports each year from a branch
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of his department-the economics and research branch-the work of which he rightly praised this afternoon as being important and efficiently done. Now that we no longer have the report from the Department of Trade and Commerce-it is not only hidden but buried-perhaps the Minister of Labour could give us some information concerning what the experts of his department are telling him about the situation, the conclusions which he draws from that information and the plans he has as a result of those conclusions, if any. Perhaps he would also tell us how the plans to which he referred this afternoon are working out.
All we learned from the minister this afternoon is that President Kennedy is copying them; the plans which were put forward by this government in the autumn of 1960, three years after this unemployment problem hit this country. President Kennedy, not more than two or three weeks after his administration came to office, is carrying out plans which it took this government three years to put into operation here. On the face of it, that comparison does not make any sense. But even if the comparison were accurate, President Kennedy put his plans into effect two or three weeks after his election though it took hon. gentlemen opposite more than three years to do so. They took so long, it is obvious, because for three years they refused to admit there was any problem. When they took an attitude of that kind how could one expect them to adopt effective steps to deal with the situation?
All one has to do to realize the absurdity of the comparison which the minister has made with action taken by President Kennedy is to examine the proposals put forward by the president, and particularly the statement he made a couple of weeks ago to the national industrial conference in Washington; to examine the programs he is submitting to the United States congress, and compare them with the so-called emergency program which this government put forward last November and December.
Take, for example, the question of areas where there is chronic unemployment, depressed areas or whatever you may wish to call them; Mr. Kennedy is not afraid to call them depressed areas. Compare what he has done down there in three weeks, the action he has taken and the results which are already beginning to flow, with the statement we got from the minister the other day on the regulations which have been hanging fire for all these months to deal with areas of chronic unemployment here; regulations which have been well described by a paper which is traditionally a strong supporter of the government, the Globe and Mail. This is

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what that newspaper had to say about them on March 6th. I read from an editorial: They constitute a poorly thought out and thoroughly inadequate approach to a serious problem. The old saying about a mountain labouring and bringing forth a mouse applies.
I do not think President Kennedy copied this particular kind of approach.
Now let me ask the minister if he will tell with regard to one effective and exciting program, as he referred to it this afternoon. He said something about winter works. Well, we expect to learn a lot more about the winter works program than we learned from his opening statement. The minister indicated that it had given employment to 200,000 people. Let the minister break down that figure and show us the nature of the employment provided to these 200,000 people. How many man hours does it cover? How many municipalities are concerned? What about the municipalities which have so much unemployment and are so poor in consequence that they cannot afford to take advantage of the government's program? What about the suggestion we have been making over the years that some special consideration should be given to those municipalities which need help most?
Will the minister tell us how many sewer projects have been started; how many students residences are now being built by the universities; how many loans have been made to small builders? These are all matters which have been put forward by the government as part of its answer to the question of unemployment. It is in our view an inadequate answer but if the minister is convinced that it is a good and effective answer, then perhaps he will give us more information instead of the present approach which is ineffective, hesitant, belated, piecemeal. This country in the face of 11 per cent or more unemployment needs something bold and imaginative, something worthy of the seriousness of the problem.
I tell the minister that this problem will never be solved in the way it should be solved and within the time during which it should be solved by the kind of approach which this government has been making. I refer the minister to the order in council which was tabled yesterday by the Minister of Trade and Commerce dealing with income tax regulations and the question of depreciation. That was dated March 3. When my hon. friend from Kenora-Rainy River on March 2, the day before this order in council was passed, did his very best to obtain from the Minister of Finance some indication of what was being done in this field he could get no information at all from the minister. Yet

the day after the Minister of Finance had refused to divulge that information, the order in council was passed giving all the details and it was tabled in this house yesterday. I do not know why we should have so much difficulty in getting information from the government about what it is doing in this important field unless the government has no information to give because it is not doing enough.
In Washington, where the new administration is tackling this problem with energy and vigour, they are worried whether they are doing enough. Professor Samuelson, a chief economic adviser to the President of the United States, said recently that an average rate of growth of 3J per cent to 4 per cent- and that is a modest rate of growth to take care of the increased labour force in this country-would have to wait until the second and third years of President Kennedy's term of office. This is another indication of how seriously they regard the situation south of the border.
Another United States economist, Dr. Heller, who is chairman of the council of economic advisers said to congress as reported in the New York Times of March 6 that:
Even if some success were encountered in improving the economic situation in the second and third quarters of 1961-
And we all hope that this success will be realized in terms of growth of the economy, and that the optimistic forecasts which are being made by some analysts will turn out to be right. I continue:
-much more serious in the long run is the "chronic slack" in employment production and the potential rate of growth-the growing gap between what we can produce and what we do produce.
Whenever it occurs the reversal of the recession is only the beginning, not the end, of the task of restoring momentum to the American economy.
If the ratio of unemployment to the total working force increases from the present 6.6 per cent to 7 per cent by the end of the year our fiscal policies would have to be viewed with great concern.
Here is the chief economic adviser to the United States government saying that if the unemployment ratio of the working force in his country goes up to 7 per cent, their whole fiscal policy will have to be viewed with great concern. He went on to explain what he meant by that, indicating that some pretty important and even drastic actions might have to be taken. The figure he mentioned is 7 per cent. The ratio of unemployment in this country today is 11 per cent, or it was almost 11 per cent in January.
Even making allowances for perhaps the exceptional seasonal character of employment in this country at that time, which they may not have in parts of the United States, our ratio of unemployment will still be above

the 7 per cent which the chief economic adviser to the United States government says requires drastic, effective fiscal action.
If that is true in the United States, it is even more true in this country because our situation-as I tried to show, Mr. Chairman- has certainly not been better, and indeed it has been more difficult, more complex and in some respects worse than the situation in the United States. It is deep-seated; it is deep-rooted; it is difficult, I know. It has expressed itself in this country in terms of 700,000 men and women being out of jobs in 1961, and it is time this government did something effective about it.


Mr. Brunsden:: Mr. Chairman, would the Leader of the Opposition permit one question?


Lester Bowles Pearson: Yes.


Edwin William Brunsden: The Leader of the Opposition has remarked on the growing labour force in the United States. Will he recognize, or will he admit that the growing labour force in Canada, in its relationship to unemployment, might have been encouraged at least in part by the wide-open door immigration policy of the preceding government?


Lester Bowles Pearson: Mr. Chairman, there was no wide-open door immigration policy on the part of the previous government. There was a policy which admitted into this country new Canadians from Europe who could be absorbed in an expanding economy, and they were absorbed.


An hon. Member:: That's what you think.


Lester Bowles Pearson: If our economy today were expanding, we could absorb them. I have just pointed out to the committee that in the projection I made for the next five years I took the lowest possible immigration figure, and even on the basis of that projection the figures for unemployment are far too high.


William Moore Benidickson: In 1957 the present Prime Minister said that we should open our gates wider to immigration.


Jacques Flynn: Order.


Frank Howard: Mr. Chairman, I have listened with a great deal of interest to the frank admission of delinquency on the part of the Leader of the Opposition for that period of time when he and his colleagues were the government of this country. Surely to heavens, in view of the analysis that he has just given us, he should have been able to foresee these things when he sat on that side of the chamber. Perhaps if we had not had a moribund government at that time we would not have got into the difficulty that we are in today.
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However, apart from that, the fact is that the opening remarks of the Minister of Labour were extremely disappointing. In view of the crisis that exists, in view of the things which we all hoped this government would be doing, to have a reference of perhaps two or three minutes duration on this particularly critical problem contained within remarks lasting for three quarters of an hour is, as I say, extremely disappointing.
The other parts of the minister's remarks about the expansion of the technical aspects of his department and its functions will undoubtedly be interesting and perhaps enlightening to a number of people, but they will not be of much help in this situation. The minister's department, so he has claimed, has in recent years been engaging in extensive research programs to assess what is existent within the economy, and to attempt to discover why the problem exists they have come up with all sorts of answers on different types of employment.
I do not recall them all offhand, but there are cyclical, seasonal, fractional and a variety of other descriptive words to classify types and reasons for unemployment. If this extensive research has been going on into the types and causes of unemployment, surely we could expect that the same sort of research would come up with some answers.
Perhaps they did come up with answers. Perhaps suggestions have been made and have been kept secret because the government did not wish to make them known to the public, thus indirectly admitting that there is a crisis existent in Canada today and that it has been in existence for a long period of time.
When there are no announcements of plans or programs in this regard, or for the reassessing of growth factors for the future, for this coming year and the following year, we can only come to the conclusion that the government has a barren and bankrupt mind on this particular problem.
The minister's comments in this regard were substantially the same as they were last year, the year before and the year before that. For all the time he has been Minister of Labour, including this year, the approach has been to gloss over the fact that there is a critical condition existing in the economy, and the government rests upon the hope that somebody else will be able to deal with it. "Let George do it", is obviously the attitude of this government.
I think this government fails to realize that the longer this crisis exists, the greater will be the destruction of the ability to work of individual, unemployed people. This is what existed during the depression years of the 1930's, when we also had a Tory government.

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Long periods of unemployment in fact make psychological wrecks out of individuals who want to work more than anything else, who want to be employed, who want to do something constructive, who find regularly day after day after day that they are not accepted by society, they are not accepted by the economy, and the only place for them is in the soup kitchen or the breadline, begging for a hand-out or relying on welfare.
What does this do to the individual's ability to work? It wrecks, ruins and destroys it. It drives and forces that individual into a continual state of misery. This is what happens to individuals, apart from the fact that it is degrading enough not to have work. This is illustrated by the situation in Toronto, where children have to go, in effect, to soup kitchens for free meals because their parents obviously cannot find employment. I am referring to an account given in a newspaper that this is a situation which does exist.


An hon. Member:: Make sure you read all of it.


Frank Howard: My hon. friend says, "Make sure you read all of it". If my hon. friend would read as much about this problem as I do, and exert as much of his energies as he should in urging that action be taken by his colleagues in the cabinet, perhaps we would not be discussing this serious problem at this time. If he and his comrades had the intestinal courage to face the fact that there is and has been unemployment year after year, perhaps this condition would not exist.
These unemployed individuals will come to look upon themselves as outcasts. The Minister of Labour knows this full well; he should know it, if he does not.
What are the psychological problems the individual must overcome after he has been unemployed for a long period of time? I feel that such an individual psychologically will not fit into the economic structure. This problem arose following the unemployment of the 1930's and accounts for the great number of derelicts in this country today. The existence of this type of individual following a period of unemployment is of little use to the general economy.
I feel that this government simply does not have the courage to admit the unemployment situation. It has not had that courage since it took office. The government has continued to ignore the situation by saying that to admit it would be to lose face. The government sits back with the hope that the economic forces, upon which the government and the Liberals rely, will heal the economic situation and everything will be rosy again. The minister and his colleagues have fiddled around with this problem like a modern day

Nero. There has been nothing done to deal with this problem in the way of concrete or lucid action. The taxpayers support inmates of penitentiaries to the extent of $5 a day while the government treats the unemployed workers of this nation as though they were members of an even lower class.
The minister refers to this exhilarating program including the productivity council, vocational training and double depreciation and the winter works projects, but they are merely ineffective first aid treatments for a very serious ailment and may be likened to treating a broken leg by the application of a band aid. The government has made no effort whatsoever to get to the basis of the problem. The minister speaks often of the incentive provided by the winter works program but admits by his actions in amending the program each year that it is not the cure-all it was supposed to be. He has brought this program forward again this year but suggests that if it is required next year it will be handled by supplementary estimate. He is in effect laying the groundwork for his answer to its failure.
I am sure that many individuals express the view that it is a waste of time for a member of parliament to stand here in this chamber urging the government to do something in respect of the unemployment situation. I am sure they feel that such an approach is an obvious waste of time in view of the government's blindness to the existing conditions. The government has done nothing to change this situation apart from putting into effect weak, ineffective measures such as those I have mentioned. I feel that we must persist in this approach in the hope that perhaps the government will take more effective action because one is alarmed by the fact that lives are being destroyed and children are without food because of the unemployment situation. Perhaps if we speak loud enough and long enough the minister and his colleagues will come to the conclusion that there is a problem and attempt to take steps to deal with it.
Mr. Chairman, my time is limited but I would like to mention two or three other specific items before I conclude. I am sure other hon. members will have an opportunity of dealing with the specific unemployment question from a philosophical base but I intend to limit my remarks to an attempt to convince the government that it has failed to deal with this question because of its political blindness regarding a society which is not working well, an economy that is not working well and a situation which needs a strong dose of socialist philosophy. I realize

that this suggestion is repugnant to the government even though it is actually the only effective one.
I should like to deal now with a question which the Leader of the Opposition briefly touched upon this afternoon namely, the functions of the Industrial Relations and Disputes Investigation Act. Last year the Leader of the Opposition quoted rather extensively from an article appearing in Saturday Night regarding a new approach to collective bargaining. Unfortunately I was not present in the house at that time when there was some discussion between the Minister of Labour and the Leader of the Opposition as to whether I was the author of the article. I belatedly admit that I was.


Lester Bowles Pearson: It was a good article.


Frank Howard: I thank the Leader of the Opposition for his remarks of that time regarding the substance of the article itself and must say that I also think it was a good article. It was my intention when writing that article to deal with a different approach to negotiations.
The Industrial Relations and Disputes Investigation Act provides for the payment of the expenses of the chairman and members of a conciliation board. The act provides for the payment of $30 a day but authorizes the governor in council to increase this amount. It is my understanding that the payments exclusive of expenses have been in the neighbourhood of $50 to $75 per day. I feel that conciliation boards are a waste of time and certainly involve a waste of the taxpayers' money. When one takes into consideration the value a conciliation board contributes to the resolution of labour and the management difficulties one feels that the taxpayers' money might well be saved in this regard.
I have several orders in council with me today in which the name of Mr. David Lewis appears. I am now looking at one dated September, 1958 which indicates an allowance of $50 a day payable up to 16 days. I must indicate of course that it makes little difference to me whether it is Mr. Lewis receiving this money or someone else; I feel it is a waste of money. I feel the abolishing of these conciliation boards is a means of saving the taxpayers' money. I feel that conciliation boards are not beneficial in regard to industrial-management disputes. I feel the Industrial Relations and Disputes Investigation Act is outdated and has outlived its usefulness. The province of British Columbia has a similar labour act which outlines steps similar to those in the Industrial Relations and Disputes Investigation Act. There are differences between the two in regard to time
90205-6-179
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limits but substantially they outline the same steps in regard to negotiations, a conciliation officer and board, strikes, lockouts and perhaps subsequent negotiations.


Mr. Macdonnell:: Mr. Chairman, I am very interested in the hon. member's views regarding the Industrial Relations and Disputes Investigation Act and Mr. David Lewis but I am wondering whether, before his time expires, he is going to make a single suggestion which will result in the employment of a single unemployed person?


Frank Howard: My hon. friend and his uproariously applauding colleagues are perhaps in the same position as myself regarding research facilities but I will gladly sit up all night going through Hansard in order to supply him with specific references to suggestions I have made in this regard in the past.
As I said before, there are many people who think it is a complete waste of time to tell anything to a government that is deaf and blind to this particular problem, but I have made suggestions galore; specific, concrete proposals. They are all on Hansard. What happens? No interest is shown in them. They are there; they are still applicable.
My hon. friend may be interested in David Lewis and so on; maybe if this employment for David Lewis were cut off he might lose his income from conciliation activities. Nevertheless, I hope I am answering his specific question about proposals. They are on Hansard. I know how hon. gentlemen opposite dislike the truth, but it is there and if any hon. member wishes to read the numerous proposals I have made I will look through Hansard and pick out the positive suggestions which have been made, if that will do any good.
Let us get back to the conciliation board system. I am leading into industrial disputes and strikes. Unions and management have used the present system of negotiation toward the signing of collective agreements not for the purpose of bargaining in good faith-and I have used it myself, I am frank to admit- but for the purpose of delaying for one reason or another and wasting the time of the negotiating procedures either merely to get to the next step or in the hope that someone else will bail the two parties out of a difficult situation. This merely protracts and delays and takes them into a strike situation which is not too helpful.
But, in any event, the minister dealt briefly with this and, as I understood him, dealt with the accusation of the shifting of the responsibility which was levelled against him by the hon. member for Essex East. I think it is a shifting of responsibility if the minister says to those two groups, as he is prone to say to almost everybody else, "Do it yourself; get

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yourself out of this difficult situation". This is not only a shifting of responsibility, it is an abandonment of responsibility, just as it is an abandonment of responsibility for the government to do nothing concrete about the unemployment situation.
Certainly if there were any sort of sensible approach to labour negotiations within the Department of Labour we undoubtedly would not be in the awkward position we are today, and the major railway unions and the railways might not be in the awkward position they are today. They were put there by this government merely because it abandoned or did not recognize its own responsibility in this field.
If the previous announcement means anything we are, I suppose, to have amendments to the Unemployment Insurance Act. I should like to deal with the question of unemployment insurance for fishermen which is of prime importance to me not only because I have many fishermen in my constituency but by force of interest also. I think some pretty scandalous accusations have been levelled against fishermen because of their participation in the unemployment insurance fund.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Hear, hear.


Frank Howard: These accusations are based-


Michael Starr: Who made the accusations, the hon. member for Bonavista-Twillingate?


Paul Joseph James Martin: That interjection by the Minister of Labour is most unfair. The suggestion is that the complaints that were made against the fishermen were made by the hon. member for Bonavista-Twillingate. There is no stronger champion of the fishermen of Canada than my colleague the hon. member for Bonavista-Twillingate.


Hazen Robert Argue: Other than the hon. member for Skeena.


Frank Howard: I thought the hon. member for Essex East was rising to a point of order. In any event, these scandalous accusations have been made against fishermen because of their participation in the fund. The accusations are that the fisherman takes out $9 for every dollar he contributes, because fishermen are singled out as one separate element, but this is a false and incorrect picture of the situation. The $9 of benefit for every dollar of contribution does not take into account-I asked this question of the minister the other day and the answer is on Hansard -the contributions that fishermen may make and do make while they are employed in a non-fishing occupation.
On the west coast we have many fishermen who also work in the logging industry. They alternate between the two. The statistical

figure, however, takes into account only that contribution which they make in the form of those special, coloured fishing stamps; it does not take into account the contributions they make in the logging industry. This is a distortion of the true picture. If you took the loggers, or any other group of workers in seasonal employment, and singled them out of the unemployment insurance fund and looked at their contributions while engaged in that employment, and their benefits you would find somewhat the same picture. It would run between $8, $9, $10 and $1, which is a false and incorrect picture.


Mr. McDonald (Hamilton South):: Eighteen to two is still nine to one.


Hazen Robert Argue: Tory arithmetic.


Frank Howard: That is about it. I do not see why people want to blame fishermen for this. In the first place, I think it was an incorrect way of dealing with them when the Liberals were in office. I understand that extreme objection was taken by the minister and the Department of Labour. It was done because one of the cabinet ministers at that time happened to come from the west coast. In using the approach-


Hazen Robert Argue: Was it not the east coast?


Frank Howard: No, the west coast; in fact, he was the minister of fisheries at that time. This was the incorrect method adopted. It singled out fishermen and put them in a group by themselves. They should have been integrated into the act. This is the main reason why we have all the difficulty and all these scandalous accusations, as I have said, that fishermen are using the fund when they should not use it. Unfortunately, I think what will come out of it-I hope it does not -is that this will be used as the basis for making the regulations against fishermen even more restrictive and putting them in an even worse position than they are today. I hope that when the amendments do come before us-if they do-steps will be taken, as they should have been taken a long time ago, not to distort further the Unemployment Insurance Act but to integrate fishermen into it so that they are an integral part of the act along with other workers.
(Translation):


Mr. Morissette:: Mr. Chairman, in this debate that has been stirred up on the employment problem in Canada, I should like to attempt to bring out some of the underlying causes of the present uneasiness. In doing so, I shall stick to the facts as closely as possible in the firm belief that it is the only way to make a useful contribution to this type of discussion.

I shall not follow the example of certain members of the opposition in their demagogic efforts to please the electorate, especially the members for Essex East (Mr. Martin) and for Laurier (Mr. Chevrier). Those two members, deprived of their official prompter, would be hard put to state sound scientific arguments in the field of economics. I admit that this prompter, Mr. Maurice Lamontagne, enjoyed a good reputation at the time he was my teacher. Unfortunately, since he specialized in the writing of election pamphlets, he has lost track of economic realities.
Before starting my speech proper, I should like to denounce the blindness of all those who to better condemn the government define the present uneasiness solely in Canadian terms. This is either an outrageous aberration or a monstrous piece of dishonesty. The present unemployment is a problem throughout North America and the petty politicians who pretend to overlook this fact for vile partisan purposes, deserve to be denounced.
Only yesterday I read in the paper that the number of unemployed in the United States increased by 320,000 in February and reached 5,075,000, which is a record for the last 20 years. I read also that the 320,000 increase in February is three times the expected figure of 100,000. I only quote these figures, Mr. Chairman, to show the unfairness of these would-be politicians who, in a partisan spirit, have deliberately distorted the purpose of this debate.
A feature of the immediate aftermath of the war was the extraordinary development of private investment in Canada. This was only normal, since many big projects had been put off during the second world war. To illustrate this point, an economist mentioned the nearly complete dieselization of the railway systems in 1956 and 1957.
Industry as a whole had to make a huge effort in order to renew their plant and equipment.
There was new expansion of house building, which had been neglected for the sake of other industries of greater importance to our war effort.
There was a heavy demand for new houses, and thousands more were in urgent need of repairs. Canada turned to new production, to satisfy the demand from countries whose industrial equipment had been destroyed by war. This process has been excellently described by the president of the Montreal City 90205-6-1791
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and District Savings Bank, Mr. Guy Vanier, who stated in its 114th annual report:
The ravages of war and the destruction of its means of production had made Europe dependent upon America. Owing to the tremendous accumulated demand, Canada was able to find outlets for all its products. That was an exceptional opportunity for a country with a great variety of raw materials but whose productive capacity was not yet up to the desirable level of development.
And yet, in spite of its material losses, Europe was not without any resources. Its population is traditionally given to hard work, and has always been renowned for technical know-how of the highest calibre. Thanks to the liberality of the United States, the countries of Europe found themselves with a considerable buying power in the very midst of all their trials, and they systematically reconstructed their plants. Nowhere in the world today can better equipment be found: because of the skill of their workers, and the lower wages paid, those countries have not only become largely self-sufficient but have been able to take over markets which we had temporarily made our own. Instead of warring between themselves and weakening one another, the countries of Europe have grouped themselves into a Common Market with the result that today Europe is the most powerful industrial unit after the United States.
It is obvious, Mr. Chairman, that artificial post-war conditions have created an equally artificial prosperity. We are justified to-day in blaming those who were then governing the country, who let themselves be blinded by a spurious prosperity and, either through ignorance or laziness, failed to take the necessary steps for an adjustment.
The lack of care and of foresight shown by the former Liberal administration is largely responsible for our present difficulties. So much for private investment.
Let us now turn to the many problems created by what is known as automation, the bitter effects of which have been felt in recent years and constitute a major challenge for managers and businessmen at this time. To fail, as did our opponents, to take into consideration the many consequences of this new phenomenon is, to say the least, a sign of a lack of insight and of realism. The replacing of men by machines cannot be accomplished without shaking the whole economy. Studies published in Canadian Labour which, as everyone knows, is the official organ of the Canadian Labour Congress, reveal disturbing facts. I would like to quote a few of them.
According to these statistics a 25 per cent reduction in the number of railroad workers, that is 35,000 workers, has resulted from railway dieselization. By using jet planes, T.C.A. has been able to effect a considerable increase

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in the capacity of its aircraft and a 300 per cent increase in their speed. When one aircraft does the work of three, the effect on air line employment is readily seen. In the iron mining industry, production per man has gone up 250 per cent between 1952 and 1959, because of automation. From 1948 to 1958, the number of smelter workers has dropped 22.1 per cent but the output has risen 50 per cent while the value of production has almost doubled.
Let me quote a few other figures concerning the lumber industry, which I have found in a recent publication by the Canadian Pulp and Paper Association. The lumberman's average daily production has increased 38 per cent in the last decade due to improved equipment. If you take into consideration the total number of on-site workers the increase is 40 per cent.
According to Mr. R. Dymond, director of the economics and research branch in the Department of Labour, production increased 49.8 per cent in the car industry between 1949 and 1959. In the same period, the number of jobs available went up only 11 per cent. In the automobile parts industry, during the same period, production rose 19.7 per cent and the number of jobs available, only 6.8 per cent. In the electrical appliances industry, for the same period, production rose by 81.6 per cent, as compared to a 40.6 per cent increase in the number of jobs available. In the machine industry, the increase was 33.7 per cent in production and 16.8 per cent in the number of jobs. In the home appliances industry, it was 53.7 per cent in production and 19.3 per cent in the number of jobs. Those figures alone significantly demonstrate the effects of automation on unemployment.
The statistics I have just mentioned do not mean that I wish to over-simplify the problems created by technological developments and the introduction of modern mechanical, electrical and electronic devices. I do not want to dispute the fact that the development of improved means of production can, in general terms, represent a blessing for our economy. But it can never be too strongly emphasized that, over a short period, accelerated automation such as we have seen in recent years creates upheavals from which workers are the first to suffer.
The long term object of automation is increased output. It is a most desirable object for Canada whose main economic problem is to reduce the cost of production
[Mr. Morlssette.l
in order to successfully compete with foreign countries on the national and international markets. However short term policies must be adopted right now to protect workers displaced by machines.
May I insist on the fact that, in a country such as Canada, which is importing a large proportion of the new machines and new equipment, automation might well have particularly nefarious consequences for the workers. I like to think that the new productivity council will attach special importance to this problem. Problems of productivity cannot be divorced from those of the workers.
I see in the act providing for the establishment of a national productivity council that one of the objects of the council will be:
-to foster and promote the maintenance of good human relations in industry, the use of training programs at all levels of industry, the use of retraining programs to meet changing manpower requirements.
When it has discharged those necessary duties, the productivity council which, when it was established, was so violently criticized by our opponents, will have been of outstanding service to the country's economy.
I should like now to continue with what I would describe as a brief social study of unemployed manpower. To properly understand the problem of low employment, it is necessary to break down the total figure of unemployment into its main components. For instance, how can we not be deeply impressed by the fact that about 20 per cent of the jobless are young people still in their teens? In fact, out of the 429,000 unemployed registered in November, about 80,000 are from 14 to 19 years old. Out of 100 young people leaving school before they are 20 years old, 10 per cent and more are unemployed the year round. I refer to the November figures but, relatively speaking, the problem remains the same throughout the year. The problem is becoming more and more important, while it may be explained by the fact that there are a greater number of young people in Canada, as a result of the higher birth rate about 15 or 20 years ago.
Young people of 15 to 19 years old today were bom during the war when the birth rate was increasing. There were 60 per cent more births in the first five years following the war than during the five previous years. A great part of that surplus population is now overcrowding the labour market. I have given a few examples in connection with the number of unemployed among young people of

less than 20 years old. We now see that the number of workers among young people of 14 to 19 years old, reached 593,000 on January 14.
Therefore, it is obvious that the labour market is prematurely overcrowded by thousands of young people who could more usefully prepare themselves for the tasks of life by attending school, because education, as was indicated to the Senate committee on labour and employment, is directly related to unemployment.
In February 1960, the dominion bureau of statistics made a special survey of the education level of the unemployed. The results were simply astonishing. Among those who had not completed their primary studies, the proportion of unemployed was twice as high as among those who had completed them. It was six times higher than among those who had been through high school.
Statistics have shown also that the proportion of unemployed is much higher among non-specialized workers than among those who have a trade. In the light of those facts, it is easier to understand all the advantages which will result from the Technical and Vocational Training Assistance Act and from the setting up of the productivity council.
I referred a moment ago to the possible effects of automation. I should like to stress here that automation is being felt in agriculture perhaps more than anywhere else. The obvious result was a transfer of the labour force from the farming sector to the non-farming sector of the economy. In the last ten years, the number of farm workers has decreased by 340,000. In 1950, it reached a million and it was less than 700,000 in 1960. In other words, the non-farming sector had to absorb a supplementary labour force of
340,000	people.
Now, that transfer of farm labour is noticeable especially among young workers. Children of agricultural families, after less than elementary schooling, leave the land to seek jobs. The rate of transfer among young men and young girls of less than 20 years old is extraordinarily high. Among young people of 15 to 19 years old who were living on farms in 1951, two fifths had left the land in 1956. These young rural displaced workers, going to cities, generally belong to that category of workers who are more tragically affected by unemployment on account of their lack of education.
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This is an alarming problem and it is extremely urgent that we take all means possible to provide these young people with the education, vocational and technical training that will allow them to find jobs more easily. That would offer a very wide field for the application of the technical and vocational training program undertaken by the federal government in co-operation with the provinces.
Economists are unanimous in forecasting that while the farm labour force, especially on account of automation, has substantially decreased, the same trend will continue in the next few years. In the last five years, the farm labour force has dropped by 150,000 workers; it is expected that it will lose some
70,000	more in the next five years. It has been estimated that employment in the non-agricultural sector will increase by 18 to 20 per cent from now until 1965.
Another important factor to note here, which might somewhat explain the present situation, is the fact that, in the last few years, the labour market has been invaded by a very great number of women. The rate of unemployment among women is less than half the rate for men. The female population has provided, these last few years, almost half the labour supply, but it has suffered much less than the male population from economic fluctuations. This is a relatively new sociological phenomenon, which those who analyse the employment situation should consider closely.
Mr. Chairman, I wanted to discuss briefly some of the problems resulting from the present employment situation in Canada. In describing these phenomena, I was able to show that their urgency and scope did not escape the government's attention. Ignoring the easy criticism and demagogy of political opponents who have been shamefully exploiting a serious problem and a difficult situation for election purposes, the federal government has adopted several long term policies, the advantages of which will certainly be felt in the future. I have mentioned more particularly the creation of the productivity council whose task it will be to try to solve the more basic problems in our economy. I have also referred to the legislation concerning technical and vocational training, which will also help to solve one of the most urgent problems of our times.
I shall not mention here all the legislation of more immediate application, which is also aimed at correcting the present situation.

Supply-Labour
The Minister of Labour (Mr. Starr) has just announced that the winter works program promoted by the federal government in cooperation with the provincial governments has supplied direct work opportunities to about
100,000	people. There again, you have a policy which was violently critized by our opponents.
At the beginning of my remarks I pointed out that the slowdown in private investment is at the source of our present situation. When private investment slows down, it is the government's duty to provide assistance.
The Conservative government has had the courage to apply a contract-cyclical policy of budgetary deficit. Its public expense program has been quite impressive and has produced impressive results. Let me state only one example in that connection. Members will recall the extraordinary impetus given to the home construction industry in 1958 through the policy of the Conservative government. Again this year, extensive changes have been made to the National Housing Act and are about to produce more development in that industry.
The Minister of Public Works (Mr. Walker) announced in the house on March 1, 1961 that due to widening in the scope of the National Housing Act loan applications have reached a peak which was never equalled in Canadian history, except for a short period of a few weeks in 1958. Here is what the Minister of Public Works had to say:
Activity during the week of February 24, 1961 was extremely buoyant, with 1,205 requests for National Housing Act loans. This brought the total for the first eight weeks of the year to 7,381, compared with 650 in the same period last year. Of the 1961 total, the life insurance and trust and loan companies received 2,921 requests and Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation 4,460.
The Minister of Public Works pointed out that once the loans are converted into starts, employment opportunities will be provided for 35,000 men, and this is only for the first eight weeks of 1961.
I have tried, Mr. Chairman, in my remarks to the house, to bring out the effort made by this government to face up to the difficult situation we are going through at the moment and indeed to the problems confronting North American nations at the present time. I would like everybody to realize perfectly that the government did not bank on chance to solve the problems. It could not, under the circumstances, take advantage of certain developments like that of war and post-war. The

facts did not make ix good and easy for the government, as they did for the Liberal administration-
We should recall in this regard that in 1935, when the Liberals resumed power under misrepresentations, they were to restore Canada's economy and put an end to the serious unemployment of that time; we know that in 1939 they had done so little that the employment situation was worse that it has ever been recently as shown by the figures the Minister of Labour gave us recently. But war came to settle everything, if I may put it this way; after that came the post war period and the Korean war. It is only later that came to light some indication of the difficulties the government had to readjust our country's economy to peacetime conditions; those indications multiplied later to the extent that, in 1957, alarmed and concerned about the result of the oncoming elections, the Liberals had to hide from the public a report warning them to take immediate measures to check the rising recession.
This proves the Liberals have never been able to control a situation. Improvisers by profession and necessity, they showed themselves unable to realize the magnitude of those causes which were to subject our economy to the disturbances of which we are now aware. I cannot see how they could have authority now to play the busybodies. They place themselves quite imprudently in the situation of their swashbuckling former colleague, the present premier of Quebec; he also, as his former associates are boasting now, was to eliminate all trace of unemployment. All he did was to increase it. So, it will be up to the people, under the circumstances, to choose between sincere politicians and power thirsty demagogues.
(Text):


John Whitney Pickersgill: I do not intend to follow the hon. member for Rimouski who began by saying he was going to make an impartial and non-partisan speech and ended by blaming the present premier of Quebec for the unemployment in Quebec, saying, at the same time, that the government in Ottawa should not be blamed in any way for the unemployment in Canada. That represents un manque de logique que je ne comprends pas.
Moreover, I do not intend to waste any time, either, on the hon. gentleman's argument that when this government came into

office the Liberals were responsible for the unemployment which, in fact, did not exist in Canada at that time, but they say was a heritage from the Liberals, although there was virtually full employment in this country in June, 1957, when this government took over. But now unemployment has nothing to do with this government, because it is a continental phenomenon. Perhaps the hon. member can explain that to his constituents, though I doubt it. I do not think he could explain to many Canadians that a government which went out of office when there was the highest degree of employment known in Canada is responsible for the unemployment in the United States which is, of course, the only logical deduction one could draw from the statements made by the hon. member for Rimouski. It apparently depends on who is in office, who is responsible for unemployment.
The hon. member for Medicine Hat asked the Leader of the Opposition at the end of his speech if it was not the unrestricted immigration permitted during the period when the Liberals were in office; that period, it would be recalled, when we were flooding this country with English immigrants according to the Secretary of State. The hon. member for Medicine Hat suggested that was the cause of the unemployment. But he forgot to tell the committee that his leader, the present Prime Minister, in May and June of 1957 was complaining because we were not, he said, allowing enough immigrants into this country. That was the program on which this government was elected. Hon. members opposite now say it was the immigration permitted under the late government which left them a legacy of unemployment.
The plain fact is that the most important single contributing factor, not to the original unemployment-because there was a recession, as everyone knows in 1958 and the most important contributing factor to the continuation and accentuation of the recession in this country-is the complete confusion and mismanagement of the affairs of this country by the hon. gentleman and the lady to whom they are at present entrusted. I do not say they are entirely to blame but they are apparently incapable of doing anything about the matter.
The Minister of Labour said that he would not take the time to recount all the things they had done. That would not have taken very long. I suggest the reason he did not recount them was because there was nothing substantial to recount.
Supply-Labour
The hon. member for Skeena made some observations with which in the main I completely agree. There is a campaign in this country at the present time-I do not know who is responsible for it-to try to deprive the fishermen of unemployment insurance by suggesting that the main drain on the fund has been what has been received in the way of benefits by fishermen since as a result of Liberal legislation they qualified for unemployment insurance. This is not true. The losses through the mismanagement of the fund by this government have been a very much more substantial drain on the fund than anything paid to the fishermen. The fact of the matter is the granting of the benefits of unemployment insurance to fishermen as to other seasonal workers was long overdue. The hon. gentleman said the Liberals did not do it in the right way. Well, I did not think it was perfect. I thought it could be improved but I was content with the best I could get at that time until it could be improved. That is what happened in those days.
I recall that the hon. member for Skeena had something to say about this, and I sent for Hansard of August 6, 1956. The hon. lady who is now Minister of Citizenship and Immigration had this to say about unemployment insurance for fishermen;
I am sure the present regulations that are being brought in are in part due to the keen interest that was taken by the Minister of Fisheries and also by the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration.
I was the minister of citizenship and immigration at that time and I am more proud of having had some part in that legislation than of anything else I have done as a member of parliament.
A member of the C.C.F. party a good deal more distinguished than I am afraid the hon. member for Skeena is ever likely to become, the late Mr. Gillis, one of the most respected members of this house in his day, also had this to say:
I know that the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration worked hard as well, but of course he has a motive in that a large part of his riding is a fishing area. He is working for his riding, and rightly so.
If I never do anything else for my riding and1 for the fishermen who are engaged in the first of all industries in Canada, I am proud to be associated with that legislation and I resent these efforts, wherever they come from, to try to sabotage it.



THE ROYAL ASSENT

[Stage Direction]
A message was delivered by Major C. R. Lamoureux, Gentleman Usher of the Black Rod, as follows:
[Stage Direction]
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Mr. Speaker, the Honourable the Deputy Governor General desires the immediate attendance of this honourable house in the chamber of the honourable the Senate.
Accordingly, Mr. Speaker with the house went up to the Senate chamber.
And being returned:
Mr. Speaker informed the house that the Deputy Governor General had been pleased to give, in Her Majesty's name, the royal assent to the following bills:
An act to repeal certain laws relating to the signal station at Halifax.
An act to amend the Indian Act.
An act respecting the construction of a line of railway in the province of Quebec by Canadian National Railway Company from a point at or near mile 72 of the Kiask Falls subdivision in a northwesterly direction to a point in the vicinity of Mattagami Lake.
An act respecting Queen's University at Kingston.
An act to incorporate Canadian Federation of Music Teachers' Associations.
An act respecting The Canadian General Council of The Boy Scouts Association.
An act to amend the Pension Act.
[Stage Direction]
The house in committee of supply, Mr. Rea in the chair.
DEPARTMENT OF LABOUR General administration-
178. Departmental administration including a grant of $10,000 to Frontier college and the expenses of the international labour conferences, $1,373,104.
At six o'clock the committee took recess.

AFTER RECESS

The committee resumed at 8 p.m.
John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Chairman, this afternoon, on the orders of the day, the Minister of Labour was asked a question by my hon. friend from Welland, the general purport of which was to this effect: could the minister, if any hon. member wished to have it, get the details of the application for employment of any person before the commission? The minister chose to identify this general question with that particular case about which he made a statement yesterday, and when he did that I made the charge that the minister in his statement of yesterday in answer to a question, which was not a spontaneous question and obviously had been planted by someone, was in breach of the law which was enacted by this parliament, namely section 98 of the Unemployment Insurance Act which reads as follows:

Information, written or verbal, obtained by the commission from any person pursuant to the provisions of this act or any regulation shall be made available only to the employees of the commission in the course of their employment and such other persons as the commission deems advisable-
The minister told us yesterday-and I will not trouble to read his statement unless anything I say is challenged; I have it here if it is-that the information he imparted to the house he obtained from the Hamilton office of the commission. He suggested that the officer who gave it to him was a person authorized to do so. I again draw your attention to the words "such other persons as the commission deems advisable". The act is quite specific about who is the commission. It reads:
There is hereby established a commission called the "unemployment insurance commission" consisting of three commissioners, appointed by the governor in council, of whom one shall be chief commissioner.
It is straining our credulity well beyond the breaking point, sir, to suggest for one minute that the commission met yesterday morning and that three commissioners, after due deliberation, particularly when one knows that the chief commissioner was not in Ottawa yesterday, decided that it was advisable to communicate this information to the minister for the purpose of making it public in contravention of the act.


Mr. Baldwin:: Will the hon. member permit a question?


John Whitney Pickersgill: Not until I have concluded what I have to say and then I will only be too happy to answer the hon. gentleman's question because, knowing him, I know it will be a sensible one.
I am seeking to make an argument and it is, of course, a well-known device to try to prevent argument by asking questions, not that I am imputing an improper motive to the hon. gentleman. I want to go on and say that under the law this information is communicated to the commission which was set up as a body to be independent of the day to day administration of the government.
If parliament had wanted the Minister of Labour to administer the Unemployment Insurance Act parliament would have given that job to the Minister of Labour, but parliament in its wisdom saw fit to create a commission for that purpose precisely so that it would not be used for political and improper purposes. Parliament decided in its wisdom that this confidential information about people's private lives would be used only for the purpose of assisting them to

get jobs, not for the purpose of making political propaganda for any political party. I think, sir, in all my experience in parliament this is the most outrageous conduct I have ever seen on the part of any minister of the crown save one, and I shall have a word to say about that before I am through.
It so happens that yesterday also there was a motion on the order paper in the name of the hon. member for Assiniboia which was allowed to stand very shortly before the Minister of Labour made this outrageous statement. The hon. member for Assiniboia asked for certain correspondence regarding the discontinuance of the publication of statistical material relating to steel operating rates and steel producing capacity by the dominion bureau of statistics. What did the Minister of Trade and Commerce say about that? This is what he said:
Mr. Speaker, some doubts have been raised as to whether tabling of the information requested would be a violation of section 15 of the Statistics Act. Would the hon. member be agreeable to this motion standing until this point has been investigated?
Now, that was a very proper attitude to take, of course, and the hon. member properly allowed his motion to stand. But consider the difference between the two. The Minister of Trade and Commerce was afraid that he might give some information which would be prejudicial to two or three great producers of steel, great corporations in this country. On the other hand, the Minister of Labour, thinking he could smear a Canadian citizen who was out of work, and thereby discredit all Canadian citizens out of work, broke the law, defied the law made by parliament in order to make political propaganda,-


An hon. Member:: Nonsense.


John Whitney Pickersgill: -under his immunity in this house. In other words, if it is a poor unemployed person, you can disregard the law. If it is a steel company-


Michael Starr: Mr. Chairman, I rise on a point of order. When the hon. member for Bona-vista-Twillingate says that I used my immunity I say to him now, to tell the truth I tell it to the world, not only to the House of Commons.


Edwin William Brunsden: On a point of order-


John Whitney Pickersgill: I submit there is no point of order before the Chair.


The Deputy Chairman:: I will have to hear the hon. member's point of order.


Edwin William Brunsden: The point of order is that the hon. gentleman whom we all respect and admire is imputing motives to this government against the word of a self-confessed gentleman who-
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Charles Edward Rea: Order; this is a question of argument; it is not a point of order.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Well, sir, I ask the Minister of Labour this question. What would the Minister of National Revenue be likely to answer if we asked whether a member of the treasury benches had paid his income tax? If we demanded the papers about the income tax returns of a member of the treasury benches-say the Minister of Labour himself-what would they say? The government would cite section 133 of the Income Tax Act, which is well known to hon. members, which makes it an offence for any member of the income tax branch, and properly so, to communicate that information because it is the private affair of that person. Well, of course, if it is your income tax it must be secret, but if it is your chance to earn a livelihood you can be smeared in defiance of the law by a minister of the crown sheltering under his immunity in this house. I say, sir, this is an outrage.


Mr. Horner (Jasper-Edson):: The telecast was an outrage.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I have never, sir, in all the time I have been here, seen such a clear-cut revelation of the difference between the Tory mentality and the Liberal mentality, as was revealed yesterday in this house. When the minister got up with all his power and might to smear this poor fellow who had been trying to earn a living-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


John Whitney Pickersgill: -what did they do? They all applauded with the greatest of glee. Why? Why did they do this? Because they want to discredit all the unemployed; because they have been trying for three and a half years to pretend there is no unemployment in this country. When their bluff was called in dramatic fashion it became a crisis and the Minister of Labour had to come into the house and break the law made by parliament in order to score a debating point and to smear the unemployed.
Now, sir, what did the minister say? He said today that the unemployment commission has an office in Hamilton which operates under the provisions of the act, that an employee of that commission is perfectly within his right to use his judgment and that when a minister who reports to parliament requests certain information the employee is certainly doing his duty in supplying the minister with it. Of course, that is not what the law says nor is it what parliament says but this minister, who thinks himself above the law,

Supply-Labour
disregards the law. If the minister had wanted this information he should have gone to the commission.


Michael Starr: May I ask a question on that point? Is the hon. member saying at this point that there should be no information issued by any of the local offices to any member of parliament, let alone the minister? Is that what he is implying?


John Whitney Pickersgill: Of course, I might characterize that question in terms the minister is very fond of using by saying that it is a stupid question. However, that is not the way I deal with questions. That is what the minister does. I will answer the minister's question and I will answer it this way. If it is information that the law does not forbid them to impart there is no reason, of course, why they should not give it to the minister although the minister does his best to see that they do not give it so far as we are concerned. When we want statistics he makes it as difficult as possible for us to get them. But the law says that you cannot give details of an individual's case. It says that specifically and the minister chooses to break the law in order to make propaganda for the government and to exploit the suffering of Canadians.


Mr. More:: On a point of order, Mr. Chairman, the allegation has been made by the hon. member that the minister has broken the law. It is my understanding that a charge of that kind must be supported by a motion and that it is out of order if it is not. The hon. member made the statement that the minister broke the law and I demand that he withdraw or support it.


Hazen Robert Argue: C. D. Howe used to break it every other day.


Charles Edward Rea: Order. This is a question of argument.


John Whitney Pickersgill: There is no point of order at all, and if the hon. gentleman had been here when some of these paragons were over on this side of the house he would realize how ridiculous that sort of statement is.


An hon. Member:: Watch your apoplexy.


Mr. Monteiih (Perth):: I gather you support this type of thing?


John Whitney Pickersgill: The minister says that I support this type of thing. I support observance of the law. In every circumstance in all my life I have supported observance of the law and the upholding the law. I may say, sir, that I could have obtained a cheap advantage many times when I was minister of citizenship and immigration-


An hon. Member:: You did.


John Whitney Pickersgill: -by revealing what was in the files of private individuals. There was nothing in the Immigration Act to say I should not, but I considered it would have been immoral to do so and I did not do so. But this is not just a matter of immorality; it is a matter of the law made by parliament and disregarded by a minister who took his oath to uphold it. What is the justification for this breach of the law? The minister gave it himself. He said, "In any event, Mr. Speaker, when there is any misrepresentation of any kind to the detriment of our economy..." Imagine this poor fellow going on television and being a detriment to our economy. It must be a pretty fragile economy if the television appearance of one man and his wife and three children is going to destroy it.


An hon. Member:: Did you write the script?


John Whitney Pickersgill: I suggest that the real destroyers of the economy are the gentlemen who are trying to prevent this sort of thing from happening. "In any event", said the minister, "when there is any misrepresentation of any kind to the detriment of our economy"-what the minister should substitute for that is "to the detriment of the Diefenbaker government", the government that was not going to allow anyone to suffer because of unemployment.
The minister went on to say, "I feel that it is my duty as a member of this government to reveal the true facts". The law says he cannot, but it apparently does not matter what the law says. No doubt some public relations adviser told the minister this would be a smart thing to do and this minister, who is above the law, disregards the law, disregards his oath of office to make a little capital out of the situation.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


John Whitney Pickersgill: How do we know, sir, whether or not what the minister told us was true?


Edwin William Brunsden: Oh, for heaven's sake.


John Whitney Pickersgill: A minister who would break the law would be quite capable of giving part of the story instead of the whole story. We do not know whether this statement is true and I am not saying whether or not it is true. But I do say that I have very grave doubts whether the minister gave us the whole truth. I have very grave doubts if the minister gave us the whole truth and, of course, he would have a marvelous precedent for not doing so because we remember

well the debut of this government. We remember well how a page with the word "confidential" on it was torn off a document and how selected bits were taken out of that document misrepresenting it for the sake of producing some cheap political propaganda. If the head of the government can do that sort of thing, what would you expect of his disciples? Once you start on that road of bad faith-


Mr. Marlineau:: How well you know.


John Whitney Pickersgill: -you can never stop. I say, sir, that we do not know, have no means of knowing and have no right to know whether or not what the minister told us was the whole truth. I am not accusing the minister himself.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I am accusing him of a lot. I am accusing him of breaking the law, which he clearly did. I am not accusing the minister himself of suppressing any information given to him by the employment service but how does he know that he got the full story when he called them frantically and hysterically after caucus yesterday morning and had to arrange to have someone ask him what was an obviously planted question?


Mr. Henderson:: That is not so.


Michael Starr: Mr. Chairman, I rise on a question of privilege that involves every member of the house-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


Walter Clarence Henderson: On a question of privilege, Mr. Chairman, when the hon. member says that the question was planted he is absolutely wrong.


John Whitney Pickersgill: As a matter of fact, perhaps I might admit that it was planted in rocky soil and if it would do the hon. member any good I would say that the roots were visible. At any rate, I think we can all draw our own conclusions. 1 think it is perfectly obvious to anybody who witnessed what happened yesterday why this was done. I have no brief for the broadcast one way or the other. I know nothing whatever about it because I did not even see it but I do know there are tens of thousands of people in this country who are either unemployed and having a dreadfully difficult time or who are afraid they are going to be laid off next.
When the government realized that this performance was making an impact on the public they said: we must discredit the unemployed at once; we must give the impression that they are frauds and fakes because otherwise people might remember the Prime 90205-6-180J
Supply-Labour
Minister's speeches all through this country in 1958 when he said, "No one will suffer". The suffering is going on now, sir.


An hon. Member:: We are suffering right now.


Walter Clarence Henderson: We are suffering listening to you.


John Whitney Pickersgill: The fact is that suffering is going on now. This government has tried for 3J years to hide this fact from the people of Canada and to pretend it was not there. However, when hon. members opposite can pretend no longer their next tactic is to try to discredit the unemployed. I say, sir, if you could ever find a perfect example of the difference between the Tory attitude and the Liberal attitude you had it in the conduct of the Minister of Labour yesterday.


Mr. Thrasher:: Mr. Chairman, may I at the outset associate myself with the remarks of the Leader of the Opposition this afternoon when he paid tribute to the retiring deputy minister of labour. I know that their friendship extends back for a long period of time, perhaps even before my advent on this earth. I have known the retiring deputy minister only for the short period since my appointment as parliamentary secretary but I have come to share the same high regard and affection for him that the Leader of the Opposition has.
I understand that when the Leader of the Opposition was speaking this afternoon he, in turn, associated himself with some remarks the minister made concerning the officials of the Department of Labour and the unemployment insurance commission. It is unfortunate that the Leader of the Opposition has not been able to inculcate in the hon. member for Bonavista-Twillingate this same high regard for the civil service of this country that he has. Yesterday the Minister of Labour rose in this house to defend the employees of the national employment service from a fraudulent portrayal of the type of service they are giving to the Canadian people. This afternoon the hon. member for Bonavista-Twillingate described this defence of the employees of the national employment service as a cheap political trick. In his remarks this evening he made the assertion that possibly the manager of the unemployment insurance office in Hamilton did not give the minister the whole truth.


Some hon. Members:: Shame, shame.


John Whitney Pickersgill: He had no right to give him any facts.


Mr. Hellyer:: Remember the sailing club.


Richard Devere Thrasher: It is obvious that this hon. gentleman does not have any regard for the

Supply-Labour
civil servants of this country, for their loyalty and their devotion. The employees of the national employment service for many years under the previous administration sought an adjustment in their rates of pay to bring them into line with those in other departments. The people sitting over there refused this request. The Minister of Labour, after a few years in office, was able to bring about an adjustment which resulted in these people being properly compensated. When the minister rose in this house to defend these employees, the hon. member gets up and calls it a cheap political trick.


John Whitney Pickersgill: And a breach of the law.


Richard Devere Thrasher: The hon. gentleman is known as "jumping Jack", and I believe that name is consistent with his character. I would suggest to him that perhaps he ought to continue the law course he has been taking because it is apparent he is not too well acquainted with the law.
The hon. member during the course of his speech mentioned something about unemployment. Apparently he has lost his liaison with the premier of his province, Mr. Smallwood, who is now in ill health and forced to take a rest even while the house of assembly of that province is in session. I should like to quote now from the March 5 edition of the Newfoundland Herald in which the premier is reported as saying that 52,400 new jobs have been created in that province. If this is the case and these jobs have been created in that province, much of the credit must go to the federal government which provides over 60 per cent of the money expended by the province of Newfoundland as well as many millions more by way of family allowances, increased old age pensions, public works and so on.
I listened with interest this afternoon to the very admirable and scholarly address given by the Leader of the Opposition during which he analysed the present economic difficulties and the employment situation in this country. In his analysis he dealt at great length with the causes of this situation. He showed an admirable grasp of the subject. There was only one thing he forgot. He did not say anything about a cure. We were all interested-


Lester Bowles Pearson: I will be speaking again on that.


Richard Devere Thrasher: -in hearing about a cure, but we heard nothing. We heard this speech a year ago, at which time we heard nothing about a cure, and I look forward to hearing it again a year from now.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Why don't you do something about it? You are a member of the government.


Richard Devere Thrasher: This afternoon the Leader of the Opposition asked the minister to comment on the manpower committee of the other place. Surely, he must know that it would be improper for the minister to make a statement on a committee sitting in the other place.
The Leader of the Opposition also made some reference to the unemployment insurance fund and to its depletion. Presumably, the unemployment insurance fund was established to assist people who were suffering from unemployment. This fund is bound to suffer depletion in a period when there is high unemployment. The opposition speaks from both sides of its mouth at once. It criticizes us for spending money out of the fund. Which way are they going to have it, Mr. Chairman? They cannot have it both ways.
The Leader of the Opposition also took exception to the Minister of Labour dealing with the affairs of this department. He apparently is not interested in such matters as vocational training, municipal winter works, civil rehabilitation and the other services provided by the department. If he were, he would have made some mention of them. He could hardly wait, Mr. Chairman, to give us a little lecture on the causes of unemployment. We are still waiting to hear about the cure, but I understand now that perhaps we will hear something from him later in this debate.
The Leader of the Opposition asked the minister about the Industrial Relations and Disputes Investigation Act, and wanted to know why it had not been amended. We are interested in hearing about the amendments he considers are necessary to this act. However, if he wants to know what the holdup is, I can tell him that labour and management have been so far apart in the amendments they have suggested it has not been possible to bring about any reconciliation in their respective views. One of the problems in this country may be that we have not been able to reconcile the views of management and labour. We are attempting to do so, Mr. Chairman, and we have called a meeting for that purpose for March 15 of this year.
The Leader of the Opposition spoke a great deal about President Kennedy. One would have almost thought President Kennedy was the new leader of the Liberal party, since the hon. member spoke in such glowing terms of him. I am not so sure President Kennedy would be prepared to accept such an honour.

However, I believe the reason why hon. members opposite do this is that what we have done to combat unemployment in all sectors stands out in shining contrast to their own dark and dismal record in this respect. They turn, therefore, to President Kennedy for a basis of comparison. Certainly this comparison is far more favourable than it would be if comparison were made with anything the Liberals had done.
I would point out, too, that President Kennedy is in the United States and we are in Canada. The Leader of the Opposition went to great lengths to quote the opinions of United States economists. This is quite all right and we do not take exception to it. However, I point out to him that the problem we have to solve is in this country and I would suggest that he turn his attention to what is happening here. I might add that we do not hesitate to compare our program with that presently being suggested by Kennedy. He is an energetic and aggressive young man with tremendous power at his disposal.
It is interesting in this connection to note that many of the things he is suggesting now are things that are already being done in this country or which are presently being introduced. Even the Leader of the Opposition will, I think, admit this. The other day President Kennedy said that labour and management must forget their differences and concentrate on areas of mutual interest. Apparently this statement has failed to come to the attention of the Leader of the Opposition.
On February 3, President Kennedy made certain proposals to congress. The Leader of the Opposition has invited an examination of those proposals and I hope he will not be disappointed by the results of that examination. TOiere were 12 matters. The first dealt with expansion in housing. This we brought about two years ago and we are still taking action in this field. He proposed an extension of the unemployment insurance benefit period to 39 weeks. It may surprise the Leader of the Opposition to learn that at the present time in Canada unemployment insurance benefits can be collected over a period of up to 77 weeks.
As far as the opposition are concerned I think they are just bankrupt of ideas and have tried to hide behind President Kennedy's success. We had a 40-minute economic analysis this afternoon but we did not have a minute for the cure. I commend the Leader of the Opposition on his analysis; I commend him for his bedside manner. But I cannot commend him for any prescription he had to offer.
9, 1961
Supply-Labour
President Kennedy suggested before congress that the national employment service should be extended. This we have done, and the Minister of Labour made some reference to it this afternoon. The president recommended aid to dependent children of unemployed persons. One of the first things we did when we came to office was to extend the provisions of the Unemployment Assistance Act. He recommended aid to distressed areas. We have already taken action along these lines. It is clear from the attitude of the opposition in the speeches we have heard today that their psychology is one of depression. They have no real policy in this field. They ask what we are doing.


An hon. Member:: What are you doing?


Richard Devere Thrasher: First of all, I will refer again to the suggestion regarding assistance to surplus manpower areas. We asked the municipalities, if they feel they are entitled to double depreciation allowances, to apply for that type of assistance. We would then investigate the situation in the light of figures available from the Department of Labour and the Department of Trade and Commerce. If we are satisfied in the light of this examination we shall grant double depreciation allowances to any new industries setting up in those areas. The opposition say they would not have done it this way. The real answer is that they would not have done it at all.
This afternoon the Leader of the Opposition quoted from Mr. Coyne. Apparently he overlooked Mr. Coyne's reference to the effect of United States tariff barriers on Canada's economic advancement. In his analysis of the economic situation the Leader of the Opposition pointed out that one of the softest spots in our economy was the manufacturing industry. He said the manufacturing industry had not kept pace with developments elsewhere. Why did he stop there? Why did he not take up Mr. Coyne's argument? He must be familiar with it, because apparently he read the speech. The reason is that the Liberals have put themselves in an untenable and indefensible position by opposing the legislation dealing with the revision of the definition of class or kind made in Canada. It seems to me that every time this government takes some action which will be of some benefit to the economy of the country we are told by the opposition that it is no good, that it is unsatisfactory. Yet this afternoon-and,
I understand, not too long ago in Montreal_
the Leader of the Opposition stated there was no one cure for the problem which exists in Canada today. Certainly this government recognizes that fact. That is why we are introducing a wide variety of measures to deal with this problem. But every time we intro-

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duce a measure in this house we are met with cries from the opposition that it will not do any good. They fail to relate the whole package. They take each individual effort, or part, and try to separate it from the complete economic program we are offering this country. They attemnt to create fear in the minds of Canadians and to give the impression that Canada is going backwards instead of moving forward.
Recently in Windsor we saw a significant attitude displayed by the Liberal and C.C.F. parties in this country. I intend to quote, now, from a column which appeared in the Windsor daily Star of March 4, written by Mr. W. L. Clarke in which he said:
Windsor has lost two big orders for transmission towers. The fabrication is to be done in Europe. The C.C.F. government of Saskatchewan passed up Windsor for one order.
The Liberal government of New Brunswick passed up Windsor for the other order.
As both the C.C.F. and Liberals have been harping on unemployment for months, it is surprising that they passed up these two golden opportunities to place manufacturing orders in Canada where Canadian workmen could do the fabrication.
Perhaps they only like to talk about unemployment, but when they get a chance to do some* thing to help, they turn the cold shoulder on Windsor and Canadians.
That is the attitude of the opposition, Mr. Chairman. That is the attitude of the people who sit on your immediate left. They attempt to sow in the minds of Canadians a fear that this country will go backward instead of forward.


An hon. Member:: It is.


Richard Devere Thrasher: We are moving ahead, perhaps not at the rate all Canadians would like to see, and perhaps not at the rate that this government would like to see; but we are bringing in measures to deal with this situation and we shall continue to bring in measures which are suggested to this government as long as they are adaptable to the conditions which exist in this country.
May I say that the program of this government is the most massive program ever brought before a Canadian parliament to deal with the economic situation of this country. We are giving the type of leadership that is needed. I just mention in passing that my own university, Assumption University of Windsor, has an application before the central mortgage and housing corporation for a loan to make possible the construction of a new students' residence. That loan will be granted and it is another indication of what we are doing as a government to aid the economy of this country. It is also an example of what this government is doing to aid my own area, that is, the county of Essex.


Hazen Robert Argue: 
Mr. Hodgson:: The Leader of the Opposition will not like your talking that way.


Hazen Robert Argue: There has been a good deal of comment about the ethics of the Minister of Labour in revealing the circumstances of Mr. Exelby who appeared on this now very famous C.B.C. program. I do not condone any person going on public television to portray in any way a situation which is not in accordance with the facts. If that has been done, the gentleman in question has made a mistake and the C.B.C. with him has made a mistake. But even if those mistakes have been made, in my opinion that does not justify the Minister of Labour standing up in the house to smear the person in question, to smear the C.B.C., but more important than that, to bring into question the situation affecting 693,000 unemployed persons in Canada.
It actually matters not to the unemployment situation in Canada whether or not this program was aired. The fact is that all over this nation there are tens of thousands of homes in which there is real suffering, in which there is heartache; and this government hides behind an error of one person, if in fact it was an error. The Minister of Labour, as has been said so well already, has himself broken the law and contravened the statute, but this is not the first time this method has been resorted to. After all, when a number of cards came to hon. members of this house there was evidence-


Mr. Woolliams:: Mr. Chairman, will the hon. member permit a question?


Hazen Robert Argue: -brought to our attention that some of the people who had signed the cards had been brought into the unemployment insurance offices and a great deal of pressure had been applied to them. They found that

the kind of gruelling they were given was not very pleasant. When the minister had this matter brought to his attention in the house he made some very tar-ranging and far-sweeping statements. He smeared well-known people in the labour movement that day, and when I asked him whether this matter would be referred to the industrial relations committee there was no reply.


Paul Joseph James Martin: It never sits. It has a chairman, but it does not sit.


Hazen Robert Argue: I suggest that this question should be referred to the industrial relations committee. I suggest that we call before the committee the trade union people in question and these loose-tongued employees of the national employment service. Let us get to the facts; let us bring the minister before the committee and let us confront him with the evidence that has been brought to our attention.


Paul Joseph James Martin: Hear, hear.


Hazen Robert Argue: This question is now more important than merely whether or not there has been some misrepresentation in certain matters. The present matter concerns whether or not confidential information in the hands of the government affecting the lives and happiness of Canadians may be disclosed at any time.
Surely our society has not reached the point where Canadians dare not give truthful and confidential information to government employees for fear that the minister may direct that this information be made available. In reply to this charge the parliamentary secretary said, "Look; we increased their salaries". I think that is entirely beside the point. Does an increase in salary mean that an employee, on instructions, must disclose information of a confidential character to be made public in the House of Commons?


Mr. Aiken:: Mr. Chairman, would the hon. member permit a question?


Hazen Robert Argue: When I sit down I will permit all the questions you wish to ask. This summer we are going to have a census in our country. There will be information requested of every Canadian citizen. If the Minister of Labour will disclose confidential information, what guarantee is there that the Minister of Trade and Commerce will not disclose confidential information of this type for political advantage?
I say that Canadians are not safe in reporting information to the government or information in the census inquiry just so long as any member of this government may disclose information of a confidential character. Where is the bill of rights? Where is the protection to
Supply-Labour
ordinary Canadian citizens, when their private circumstances may be disclosed at any time by the Minister of Labour in the House of Commons and they have no opportunity to reply?
I suggest that this whole question regarding what took place at Galt should be brought before the industrial relations committee. Let us put on it the spotlight of a public inquiry, where one can hear the defence as well as the prosecution. The government's attitude to unemployment is apparently this. If the unemployment figures are high, they say, "We are making a massive attack to reduce unemployment and the main reason we cannot reduce it is because of what is said by the prophets of doom and gloom". Then they say, as a kind of last ditch argument, "Well, after all there are a lot of people who do not want to work. They have been forging names on cards. They have been offered employment, but they do not want to work".
How is it that so many Canadians became indolent and lazy during the time of this administration, when apparently there were so many less in this category a few years ago? If in 1956 the average unemployment was 200,000 persons, and we then heard no accusations that people were indolent, were sponging unemployment insurance and did not want to work, how is it that for last year the figure was up to 448,000? Does the minister say that 248,000 people are getting unemployment insurance in an illegal fashion?
We hear a great many excuses these days as to why there is so much unemployment. A few weeks ago the Minister of Finance said in this house that one of the reasons why there is so much trouble today with regard to unemployment is because of the wartime babies. He said there were too many wartime babies and they are now old enough to be on the labour market. He said, "We cannot deal with the love life of Canadians and the new citizens we have who are coming of working age. There were too many wartime babies". We asked why so many people are on the unemployment rolls. "Too many pregnant women drawing unemployment insurance who should not be receiving it". Some answer.
Everybody is responsible for the mess but the government, and it was this government that was going to clean up the mess; and there was a mess when the government came to office. The only trouble is that mess is bigger today and conditions are worse than they were before the government started this massive attack on unemployment.
The Minister of Labour and his parliamentary secretary apparently have the same scriptwriter. A lot of the same phraseology

Supply-Labour
appeared in the text of both statements. But they say that the government is on the job. The Minister of Labour said this afternoon, "We are constantly developing our understanding of unemployment and are obtaining a more effective utilization of our manpower resources through the work of the economics and research board".
There is more understanding and knowledge but less done with that understanding and knowledge, with more unemployment. Then the minister played an old record with an old theme. I heard the Minister of Labour speak to the Canadian Labour Congress delegation and thought he made a rather impressive speech. He outlined a lot of things that the government said it was doing but his conclusion bothered me. He said that the government had done its job and it is up to management and labour to carry on. We have asked him in the house if he has done anything to bring management and labour together; his answer was no. We have asked him in the house if he has made any recommendations to management and labour; his answer was no, the government has done all it is going to do and it is now up to management and labour.
The government said it wanted some ideas. It said it is making a massive attack on unemployment but would like more ideas. I can give the government more ideas. I mentioned over 25 points this afternoon which the Liberal party had suggested last year and most of them had to do with conferences bringing people together in talk fests. I can remember when the Prime Minister was in the opposition and every time the government made a mistake he suggested it call a conference-let us have another conference- and it had so many conferences that the leader of the opposition of that day became Prime Minister. We can have too many conferences. We need some action.
I would suggest that one of the things the government should do is change the financial policies of this country so that the interest rates are reduced. Just imagine that three quarters of a million Canadians are unemployed. The minister may say that they are indolent, he may say that they are lazy and do not want to work, he may say they are falsifying their evidence and making false statements on television but the statistical fact is that three quarters of a million people are unemployed and the provinces and municipalities are having to pay the highest interest rates they have paid in 20 years in floating their debentures.
We heard this evening that the main trouble is that the provinces are not doing their jobs. Let the government cut interest rates in half and the provinces will be able to

do a much more effective job than they can do when the government is choking provincial economies and choking provincial governments with this fantastically high rates of interest. I would suggest that this is the time for expansion in the money supply. This is not a time for tight money and high interest rates.


Paul Joseph James Martin: You are adopting our program.


Hazen Robert Argue: I am not adopting your program at all. I am just saying that you were wrong when you were in government and the present government was wrong in opposition and that now they are just as wrong or perhaps worse in regard to interest rates than the Liberals were with their tight money policy. I would suggest that there should be a great national development program in which public money-the Liberals will never buy this one -should be invested in business and in industry. I would suggest that public money from the provinces be invested with federal moneys in a great national development program but the Liberals would not buy that program. That would be socialism and they do not want to have anything to do with socialism.


Lester Bowles Pearson: We will not even talk about it.


Hazen Robert Argue: After all, they have got Joey Smallwood and the leader of the Liberal party in Saskatchewan so they will never adopt a great public investment program.


An hon. Member:: And you have got Tim Buck.


Hazen Robert Argue: We are suggesting that this government should not be satisfied with embarking upon this one ribbon trans-Canada highway program that was started by the former administration. There should be a national highway program in this country and there should be public money invested in a main highway program in the provinces providing highways north and south. We suggest that the government should do something with the Clark report rather than allow it to sit on the shelf gathering dust.


An hon. Member:: The government is studying that report.


Hazen Robert Argue: The government is not studying it. The government has not opened it since it received it, or at least the Minister of Labour has not. He does not have a clue as to what it contains and has not told the Prime Minister what is in it. Nothing is being done in regard to the Clark report. It is just gathering dust.
We believe that there is a need for a portable pension system in Canada. We feel

this is something that should be embarked on at this time. I have in my hand a report regarding the number of C.N.R. pensions being paid at various levels, which I received in reply to a question I asked in the house some days ago. This report indicates that there are 4,800 pensions being paid in the category of $100 or less. It indicates there are 2,708 individuals receiving a basic pension of $25 a month. This is an area where suffering exists. This is an area where purchasing power should be increased. We need a portable pension system, and that kind of system would not be a great financial drain on the public treasury. That type of pension system could be actuarially sound; money paid in during younger working years and taken out on retirement.


Edwin William Brunsden: Mr. Chairman, on a point
of order.


Jacques Flynn: Order.


Hazen Robert Argue: I thought you wanted some suggestions.


Edwin William Brunsden: We are asking for some intelligent suggestions. We are discussing the labour estimates. My hon. friend, who is so loquacious, introduced the subject of portable pensions and national development programs. I am wondering if he is in order in doing so.


Paul Joseph James Martin: Mr. Chairman, I should like to speak to the point of order. The hon. member for Assiniboia has been outlining a program which in the main is a very acceptable one but it is a program of this party. The hon. member for Medicine Hat is now objecting to a contructive proposal being put forward. Surely that is not a point of order. I suggest that is the characteristic well-known effort of government members, interfering with constructive suggestions made in this house.


Jacques Flynn: Order.


Hazen Robert Argue: Mr. Chairman, may I speak to the point of order.


Jacques Flynn: I think the hon. member for Assiniboia should speak to the point of order.


Hazen Robert Argue: Mr. Chairman, I do not think that the Chair would rule that the discussion regarding a portable pension plan under item 1 of the Department of Labour estimates is not in order. However, the member for Essex East would have been more convincing had some of the hon. members of his party put forward suggestions in regard to these programs which he claims are those of his party.


Paul Joseph James Martin: We have been doing just that for over three years.
Supply-Labour


Hazen Robert Argue: Mr. Chairman, when these people are in opposition they have a program but when they were in government they did not have a clue. There is no doubt that this proposal is in order, but if it were not then it would be in order in reply to the challenge of the Minister of Labour and his parliamentary secretary when they asked for ideas. We have many ideas, Mr. Chairman, and we are now trying to give them to the government. We believe that they are good ideas. I feel it is a disgrace to Canada to have over 2,000 persons on C.N.R. pensions at a base of $25 per month, 747 persons with a pension of between $25.01 and $29.99. Surely this is a disgrace to the nation, to the government and to the Prime Minister who said he was going to do something about these very low pensions.
I would also suggest that the old age pension in Canada should be increased. People who live on $55 a month and pay rent, are suffering from malnutrition. Let us increase the old age pension to $75 a month. Our old people will not put the increase in a jam can, stick it under the bed and leave it there. They will go out and spend it, and they will buy some of the goods that could be produced in some of our idle factories.


Walter Clarence Henderson: He's my boy.


Hazen Robert Argue: I am glad the hon. member for Cariboo follows the practice of a former prime minister when he reached that age of accepting his cheque and cashing it.


Walter Clarence Henderson: I will.


Hazen Robert Argue: He will, but I suggest to him something that is very obvious. Most people who reach the age of 70 years and receive a pension of $55 a month do not have a supplementary allowance paid out of the national treasury of anywhere near the size of the allowance that is received by the hon. member, and I get the same amount less the $55. I am not casting any reflection on the hon. member whom I consider a good friend and who sometimes makes a pertinent contribution to the debates in this house.
I suggest that at this time the government should endeavour to put purchasing power into the pockets of our agricultural producers. Export the wheat surplus and you will start the farm implement factories in this country operating once again. Export the surplus of Canadian grain and you will put some of the unemployed automobile workers back to work producing automobiles and trucks. There is a need for more consumption of goods in our country. Two thirds of the people of the world need more goods. In the 1940's Canada waged a very successful war effort in a time of national crisis. We never want to see another

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fighting war, but I would suggest that now is the time for the government to declare war on unemployment and poverty in Canada and come to the assistance of underdeveloped countries by producing some of the goods that our idle factory workers would like to have the opportunity to produce.
Before I take my seat I should like to quote the words of a very famous Conservative, the Right Hon. R. B. Bennett, who had this to say in a radio broadcast in January, 1935:
X told you in 1931 I would end unemployment. That was a definite undertaking. By it I stand ... when I say I will correct the system, I mean that I will reform it. And when the system is reformed and in full operation again, there will be work for all. And in my mind, reform means government intervention. It means government control and regulation. It means the end of laissez faire. Reform heralds certain recovery.
I suggest that when the Prime Minister told the Canadian Labour Congress that come what may he was tied to the free enterprise system he admitted failure and until he starts putting into action these words which were given to the nation by a prime minister who was on his way out of office and which words were in fact a deathbed repentance, unemployment will be with us. We need a massive attack on unemployment. We submit the government has not yet started that attack.


Mr. Churchill:: Will the hon. member permit a question? He said he will accept questions at the conclusion of his speech. May I ask him now to give the page reference in Hansard of his statement that the Minister of Finance said that there were too many wartime babies?


Hazen Robert Argue: The Minister of Finance did not say that. I can look it up and if the minister will give me a few minutes I will be glad to do it, and I shall quote it to him. The Minister of Finance said that one of the reasons the government was having a difficult time achieving a full employment economy was the high birth rate during the war. If the hon. gentleman will read the remarks carefully he will find this in the speech.


Gordon Minto Churchill: On a point of order, I have the remarks in front of me. They appear on page 1001 of Hansard, at the bottom of the first column. The Minister of Finance made this statement:
However, the growth of our labour force is now more directly attributable to the coming of age, from an employment point of view at least, of the large number of babies who were born in Canada during and immediately after the war.
He said nothing about there being too many wartime babies. The hon. member for As-siniboia was quite incorrect in his statement.


Hazen Robert Argue: No. He said that this was the reason unemployment was so high and he could not do anything about it.


Gordon Minto Churchill: He said nothing about the problem being so big at all. There is nothing there relating to the problem of unemployment.


Hazen Robert Argue: Except there were too many people coming of employment age and the government could not do anything about employment.


Gerald William Baldwin: Is the hon. member's description of the statement made by the Minister of Labour this afternoon in connection with Mr. Exelby based on a completely erroneous interpretation of the law by the hon. member for Bonavista-Twillingate or did he himself come to that conclusion on his own?


Hazen Robert Argue: It is based on my own knowledge of public statutes and on a long experience in the House of Commons, much longer than that of the hon. member for Bonavista-Twillingate.


James MacKerras Macdonnell: Will the hon. member permit a further question? Does he think that we should look to Saskatchewan for proof that it is desirable for the government to go into competition with private business?


Hazen Robert Argue: I think the Saskatchewan government has made a wonderful success of its crown corporations.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Oh, oh.


Hazen Robert Argue: All that I know of. The Conservative party and the Liberal party in the province say, "If we get elected to office we will not touch them, we will leave them alone". They have been paying a return on investment in excess of 10 per cent, and my hon. friend from Greenwood would agree that that is a reasonable and satisfactory return.


Mr. Rapp:: Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to be given this opportunity to take part in the debate on the estimates of the Department of Labour. My interest in this debate is precipitated by the remarks of some hon. members in the opposition, who state that our serious unemployment situation is unbearable in this country. But let me say right at the start that I am not minimizing the unemployment situation, far from it. I am just as much concerned as anybody else. Not one of us in the house enjoys the thought of men and women able and willing to work and unable to find it. At the same time, the cause of the unemployed people is not going to be helped when the impression is given in the country of a collapsing economy and blue ruin is shouted both here and abroad. Such far fetched distortions of gloom and doom undermine public confidence in our country and abroad.

To substantiate what I have just said let me give the committee an example. The other day I read a story in the Carillon News, Stein-bach, Manitoba, of Friday, February 10, 1961, about a grateful refugee lady from Russia who secured permission to leave Russia just about two or three weeks ago after trying unsuccessfully for about 15 years. This story went on to say that she was on her way to Vancouver when she met another lady on the plane "Britannia", which took her to her destination. This lady from Steinbach, Manitoba, was able to speak her own language and conversation ensued. The refugee lady told the Steinbach lady her life story and how it came about that she was now in Canada.
But this is not what I wanted to tell you, Mr. Chairman. What struck me most in this story was what the refugee lady from Russia had heard about Canada while still in Russia. She told the Steinbach lady that she had heard so much propaganda about the terrible unemployment in Canada that she was astonished and amazed at the evidence of prosperity everywhere in Canada. She was particularly struck by the difference between the Russian plane that brought her to Amsterdam and the Canadian plane that brought her the rest of the way, and was particularly pleased with the good food and excellent service on the Canadian plane. She said that everything looked so nice and clean and tidy in Canada in comparison with Moscow.
This story from Russia about the terrible unemployment in Canada comes from a country where the people have very little chance to get the real facts about Canada. They have no opportunity of reading our Canadian newspapers or magazines or of visiting our country to see for themselves the terrible unemployment in Canada. This one-sided propaganda emanating from Russia can certainly give an untrue picture of Canada to the Russian people in their homeland.
But, Mr. Chairman, this story about our terrible unemployment not only comes out of Russia. One can hear similar stories that emanate from other foreign countries about our terrible unemployment. Our own Prime Minister while visiting Ireland on his way to the conference in London was asked whether it was true that Canada's unemployment situation was so terribly serious. Yes, you can read these stories in our own press and you can hear them from the mouths of our own people, some of them, I must say, in very responsible positions. And, above all, you can hear about our terrible unemployment in the House of Commons of Canada.
We are all aware of our seasonal unemployment situation. We know there are more
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Canadians out of work than any of us like to see and it is entirely proper that we should know about the situation and the reason for it. On the other hand, let us keep the record straight. How many Canadians, for instance, know that there is a labour force of 6,396,000 now in Canada, the highest in our history? It is 3.1 per cent higher than a year ago. How many know that in the last five years alone 800,000 people have been added to the working force? So much has been said about the rise of 165,000 in unemployed in January of this year but has anybody said that the employment figure in January was 47,000 higher than a year earlier? Has anybody said that 250,000 more Canadians have jobs today than at the same time three years ago or that more than 70 per cent of those without jobs have been unemployed less than three months, or that 60 per cent of the jobless come from families where one or more persons are still working?
Who would seriously deny the fact that there is much less hardship in being temporarily out of a job in these days of unemployment insurance than was the case 25 years ago? I can speak from personal experience because during the winter months at that time I had to work for board only and had to take care of my family at the same time. I am not citing these figures and facts in order to minimize the problem but they are relevant and significant facts and figures and they do make nonsense of the grossly misleading comparisons being made with the dirty 30's.
So, then, let us be clear on this point. If it is a serious problem, let us do something about it. Let us not only point a finger at the federal government and claim that unemployment is solely its responsibility and that the federal government should employ all those who are out of work. Let me tell you, Mr. Chairman, that all governments combined, federal, provincial and municipal, can only provide a very small portion of the jobs needed to keep our people employed. The great majority of jobs must be provided by industry engaged in the production of products that people will buy.
We must also realize that if we are to continue to have high employment in Canada we can only do so by industry producing products which will be competitive and will sell against competition. This is something which is clearly understood by the peoples of European and Asian countries and this is the reason why these countries are today our toughest competitors. If you ask them how they are able to do this, their answer is cooperation, co-operation between management and labour to bring about better design, higher quality and lower costs.

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I must give them credit for that. These people are realists and they have always known that if a product is not competitive it will not sell and people will not be employed producing it. It is evident that such a result is not brought about by chance but by a planned effort by management and labour. Both these groups realize that by working separately they can accomplish very little whereas by working together they can accomplish a great deal. These countries are setting us an example which we would do well to adopt here in Canada.
Yes, Mr. Chairman, I believe that this co-operation can only be brought about by heads of companies inviting union representatives to study what is needed to increase sales, to make products more competitive and to work out co-operative plans to bring about increases in sales. If this co-operative planning and production were not possible to achieve in the past, it is high time that management and union leaders got together now. In an industrial world that is more competitive every day management, labour and government must work together as a team and, as a team, they can accomplish much.
Yes, Mr. Chairman, to provide employment we must produce goods either of better quality at the same price or of equal quality at a lower price than our competitors. Only then can we export our Canadian goods abroad and also sell Canadian-made goods in the home market at competitive prices. If we cannot compete effectively in export markets and if we cannot cope successfully with growing competition from imports in our own domestic markets, then I must say most regretfully that unemployment will stay with us for a long time.
Let us wake up to these facts and let us remember that the world does not owe us a living. We have to mould our own destiny and the sooner we realize this the better off we will be. Let us also remind ourselves that Canadians in the past have withstood many trials and tribulations but only when they were united in their efforts to overcome hardship and disaster. Let us never forget this.
We Canadians should not fail now when unemployment conditions are unavoidable and the government, with the best intentions in the world, cannot correct the situation immediately and consequently must rely on long range legislation to alleviate the unemployment situation.
The question is being asked, what is the government doing to help create work and combat unemployment? The answer to this, I would say, is that vigorous measures for combatting unemployment have already been implemented by the government. The winter works program is one. The Minister of Labour

described the response to the government winter works program for immediate employment as phenomenal in all respects, but he also said that he did not regard this type of work as the final cure for the economy or for the problem of unemployment.
This new Bill No. C-49, an act respecting technical and vocational training assistance to provinces, introduced by the minister, is another important piece of legislation. It has been heralded by many as a timely step taken by this government to increase technical training, combat unemployment and foster national development. Canada has never had sufficient trained manpower to meet the needs of industry. In the past, this country has relied on immigration to meet the need for trained manpower. The demand for skilled and technical workers is increasing far more rapidly than employment generally. The fastest growing occupations are those that require a high level of training. These are the occupations that are being pushed to the fore by rapid technological changes.
There are two kinds of training jobs to be done. First, we must train those already in the labour market who have left the regular school system, and are now unemployed, and second, we must provide more training for those now in school to ensure that the ranks of the unemployed will not be increased in the future. This bill indeed merits commendation. It provides for a program of education that could be characterized as a co-operative program with the provinces. It is designed for the immediate present and also for the future.
This government also introduced Bill No. C-52, an act for the establishment of a national productivity council. The Prime Minister made the suggestion at a conference on unemployment held in Ottawa in October last that a productivity council should be established. This specific proposal, which outlined the need for such a council and the function it might undertake, was accepted by leaders from commerce, industry, labour, finance and education. It has now become law and members of the council have already been appointed. In making this proposal, the Prime Minister stressed the need for full and active participation of Canadians in all sectors of the economy.
At a time when markets at home and abroad are becoming increasingly competitive, it is essential that Canadian industry be as efficient as possible. The national council should act as a policy making body and should assist in the establishment of regional and industrial productivity committees. In view of the progress made by other countries in the field of productivity, Canada cannot ignore this field of endeavour. As in other

countries where these councils have been so successfully used, Canada can achieve equally successful results if governments, management and labour co-operate fully to make Canadian products competitive in both quality and price.
Another thing that I should like to mention is the export trade promotion conference. Our trade commissioners from the 49 countries in which we have posts were called home so that they could advise our producers about the possibilities of selling their products in the various countries. Some 1,268 companies requested more than 10,500 interviews during the two-week period. It is too early to say what the conference accomplished, but we know that it enabled businessmen to gain information which it would have taken months of travel and an expenditure of thousands of dollars to acquire. It also convinced them that there is a market for their products abroad and that there is a far wider opportunity for selling their products in the countries of the world. These are some of the things the government is doing.
In conclusion, I should like to say that gloom should not pervade our spirits, even though we have many obstacles to overcome. With the co-operation of all governments, federal, provincial and municipal, as well as the people of our country, we should be able to overcome these temporary problems and build a better Canada for the benefit of all citizens of our country. Surely no one in this committee would deny the fact that this government, and in particular the Minister of Labour, is working toward this goal. If anyone questions this let him look at the minister's record over the last years and also at the record of this government since 1957.


Julia Verlyn (Judy) LaMarsh: Mr. Chairman, the debate this afternoon has been a most interesting one since it seems to have centred around a most peculiar point, that is the attempt by the Minister of Labour and those who sit on his side to take unto themselves the democratic President of the United States. There has been an attempt also by the hon. member for Assiniboia to take unto himself the mantle of the democrats in the United States. We in the Liberal party, Mr. Chairman, know with whom there has been a traditional alignment of the party to which the President of the United States belongs. I suggest to hon. members of this committee that they might consider the fact that hon. members opposite are led by a man whose name was not known and could not even be pronounced by the president prior to their first meeting.
This leader of the C.C.P. who, it seems, stands again for socialism, although the party to which he has long adhered has already
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expired-a party which has had to deny socialism in order to elect the most intelligent and interesting young member from Peterborough-


An hon. Member:: They are going steady now.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: His face is pink.


Julia Verlyn (Judy) LaMarsh: His face shows the colour to which he should properly adhere, the colour of all true radicals, namely red.
I consider, Mr. Chairman, that in debating the first item of the minister's estimates we should concern ourselves with what has been happening in Canada and not with the minister's attempts to mislead the people about what this government has been doing. He said this afternoon that unemployment is something which can be licked only by a massive attack. I suggest to hon. members of this committee that the sort of "no-cal diet" to which the government has been subjecting the people is not, by any definition, a massive attack.
Perhaps one indication of this massive attack is that panacea which was introduced last Friday by the Minister of Labour, double depreciation. The Leader of the Opposition referred to an editorial which appeared in a newspaper not noted for its support of the official opposition in this house. Some good points are made in this editorial and, oddly enough, some of them were touched upon by the hon. member for Port Arthur, who occasionally makes a remark worth listening to. On Your Honour's right are the hon. members who traditionally represent big business. However, through their spokesman, the Minister of Labour, they have shown a most abysmal ignorance of any kind of business, large or small, by attempting to say that this part of their massive attack, double depreciation, will in any way assist areas which need assistance.
Perhaps one of the things that is necessary is for hon. members of this committee to come to some agreement on the definition of terms. In my few short months in this chamber I have found it incredible that there was no agreement as to the meaning of words. One of the rather astonishing things, of course, was the speech from the throne in which the Prime Minister, through the Queen's representative, very carefully escaped using the word "unemployment". He carefully avoided using this until such time as he appeared on a television program and not before this house. Suddenly he decided that unemployment had made itself felt in the land and it was time he took his head from whatever snow bank it was hiding until the

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snow melted and the unemployment went away; and decided he had better at least acknowledge the word.
If hon. members opposite wish to say that they follow Kennedy I should like to draw their attention to an article which appeared in the New York Herald Tribune entitled: "Kennedy Spells it Out-and it Reads 'Recession'". There must be some things about which hon. members agree with the president of our good neighbours to the south but this apparently has not been one until they found he had the moral courage to come before the people and say: hold on, there is danger in the land; it must be dealt with now and over a continuing period.
I think that neither the Minister of Labour nor his colleagues on the front bench dared say there was trouble. I suggest that the Minister of Labour has a special responsibility to be candid with this house and with the country, to admit that there is a problem; it is also his responsibility, because of his ministry, once the problem begins, to initiate immediately not only short range but long term panaceas or answers, for it is his responsibility to look after the people of Canada. Well, when a minister is not permitted even to acknowledge that there is a problem perhaps it is small wonder that he cannot begin to do anything about it. But when he suggests that there has been a massive attack exemplified by this measure of double depreciation for one year, anyone who knows business knows that no industry can even find a site within a period of one year, much less amass its capital, survey the labour force which would be available and make its other necessary arrangements. Who would want to start a canning factory where the labour pool would be asparagus cutters?
Many matters must be taken into consideration before a new plant is constructed, and I suggest to the Minister of Labour that if he is really interested in using this gimmick it should not be limited to new plants entering an area which is already one of surplus labour but it should be allowed to be used, if it is worth anything, by plants which are already in that area but which have closed for one reason or another. In their modernization, in their capital expansion, in their assistance in a number of ways, real help could be given to a particular area which has suffered from chronic unemployment.
We have been worrying about words from time to time. We hear words such as "rolling readjustment" which have finally come to "a recession". We hear words such as "depressed area", "distressed area" and "area of surplus labour". It may be that men and women of good faith do not understand the same
fMiss LaMarsh.l
things by the same words, but I suggest to the government and particularly to the Minister of Labour that it is a simple thing to spell out exactly what is meant by an area which needs government assistance.
The Minister of Labour has only produced a gimmick which will be of assistance to areas which are so deflated, so flattened already, as almost to have passed out of existence as far as the general economy is concerned. There are in Canada a great many other areas which are in trouble, yet which are not so depressed or so distressed or so flattened as to entitle them to qualify under this niggardly definition, these niggardly criteria placed before us by the minister. Such areas in Canada cry out for assistance.
This problem is not a new one. The Leader of the Official Opposition gave figures this afternoon showing that there have been four recessions, each increasingly severe, from each of which we have made a poor recovery in the past five or six years. This is a problem which cannot be dealt with by nit-picking. Just a few years ago hon. gentlemen opposite were supposed to have a particular and sole advantage in dealing with this subject. Theirs was the vision, and I ask them now; where has it disappeared? The people of this country look to them because they made some of the most glowing promises ever made to an electorate; and they have sold out the people of this country. They have not attempted to deal with this problem in any way.
They have not attempted anything, but whatever attempts are made-and it may be they will be made by another administration which will take power at the next election- this problem is one which is going to take a long time to solve. First, one must acknowledge its existence, and, second, one must start to work on it, and I suggest that one of the greatest responsibilities of this government is to get down to a massive assault. This is a problem which it is said, probably arises from too many babies, and from my experience of hon. members of this house they have nothing against babies almost until the age of twenty one. This may be part of the reason, but there are a number of other factors represented by a number of studies, some undertaken in the United States and some undertaken through the sittings in the other place. This problem requires an attack from all sides and one which will be long drawn out. It requires the kind of attack, the kind of study, perhaps, first, which was made at the behest of the President of the United States, one which deals with a two-prong matter, short term and long term proposals.


An hon. Member:: Would the hon. lady permit a question?


Julia Verlyn (Judy) LaMarsh: I would be very pleased to at the conclusion of my remarks. The report which was made was one of great length and if the Minister of Labour has not seen it I shall be glad to lend him my own copy. He has been asking the house for ideas.
We are grateful to the hon. member for Assiniboia for putting forth Liberal ideas. We are grateful that he has finally seen the light after sitting in the house and listening to the hon. member for Essex East, the hon. member for Laurier and the Leader of the Opposition for a year, for two years, for three years, telling those hon. members who are sitting to the right of the chairman what should be done and hearing the answer that nothing is ever told you.
I should like to offer the Minister of Labour the report which was made for the President of the United States. This report deals with a great many things, beginning with the most immediate sort of aid to those who are unemployed. I have no means of knowing whether this television program was another divertissment or whether it was intended to be factual. Perhaps it is not even important enough to concern hon. members of this committee. The reason that lies behind it is one which causes disquiet to every Canadian, regardless of his political affiliation.
There are those in this country who are in need of food. They are not, we can all thank our Maker, in the ascendancy. I suggest this is because of certain measures which have been in force for longer than the four years for which this administration is responsible. They are the measures which have kept people from starvation. However, there are those who need food. In this country there are great surpluses of food. The Minister of Agriculture is always trying to give away these surpluses. I saw today that they were giving away some of the surplus to a very well respected young visitor from the minister's own province, who was here for education week.
We want to use our food, and particularly we want to use it for those who are in need. One of the proposals made was that food be made available, on a proper nutritional basis, to those who needed it. Another thing which is necessary is housing. Arrangements have been made in the United States with respect to long term mortgages, a reduction of interest rates and a number of measures which will put housing within the reach of those persons still employed.
There are page after page of proposals to assist in the reconstruction of industry, in its automation and in relocation of industry in the United States. One of the things which is possible in the United States is the direction of defence contracts. In the last few years
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there have not been too many defence contracts coming into Canada. However, there are some. The Minister of Labour may remember promising at least one to my riding not long ago. That is another promise in regard to which he has yet to make good. This is a way in which certain areas that are suffering to some degree, particularly industries, can be assisted.
The government has available to it all the experts who can tell them what industries and what areas require a shot in the arm. Not only is the government in a position to do this, but it is its real responsibility. Too many hon. members opposite appear to think that to be elected once or twice is enough. They appear to think that in the achieving of office they have done all that is necessary. May I suggest to the Minister of Labour and his colleagues that it is necessary not just to achieve office but to do something once you have arrived there.
Ideas to deal with unemployment have been placed before this house. I have seen them and I have referred to them a number of times. Suggestions were made in this connection on March 3 and 4, 1960 by the hon. member for Essex East. Earlier this session, on December 19, as reported at page 953 of Hansard, the hon. member for Laurier detailed what was being done in other countries of the world, such as Belgium, Germany, Sweden and Great Britain. But the minister has not seen fit to adopt these ideas. Not only in this house, but across this country otherwise hon. members have been saying that there have been no positive suggestions from the opposition. I suggest that if the Minister of Labour is incapable of remembering from day to day what has been suggested, a collection will be taken up on this side of the committee and a list will be printed and placed before him daily so that he will not forget them.
In January of this year there was a great meeting in Ottawa the like of which it is not expected will be seen even this month. Here the people of Canada, through their representatives, put forward certain proposals. These proposals were of many kinds, dealing with many of the problems which lie before the Canadian people.
I had the honour to serve on one committee which dealt with some of the problems of unemployment. We passed a resolution which I realize hon. gentlemen opposite cannot have seen, since they are not liberally-minded Canadians. Therefore, I place on the record what the party I represent has declared it stands for in the matter of dealing with depressed areas.
It was said in that committee that a new Liberal government today would co-operate

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with provinces and municipalities in providing tax incentives to encourage industries to locate in such depressed areas. It would see that more credit was available to business in these areas. It would help to finance power, transport and other basic economic developments. Through programs for urban and rural rehabilitation it would see that both credit for private business and money for public improvement was readily available. I commend these things to the Minister of Labour.
There was, in addition, a resolution to deal with accelerated depreciation, but of a kind not contemplated by this government. The resolution was to the effect that a new Liberal government today would use the proven types of accelerated depreciation in order to help all business firms, not just new ones locating in an area, that are eager to expand and to put in new equipment. Such enterprises would thus, at a time when they most need cash, be paying lower taxes than firms that stand still.
The Minister of Labour said both today and in a speech he made to the advertising and sales club in Montreal on February 22 last that things are being done by this government, and they are things which have been followed in the country to the south. I refer to a remark made by the Minister of Labour during the speech to which I have just referred when he pointed out that the measures now proposed by President Kennedy were gratifying to the government in that they followed pretty well along the lines of what it had been doing in dealing with a very similar set of problems.
I wonder whether the Minister of Labour can tell us at what time he or other hon. members of his government forwarded to the President of the United States the intelligence necessary for him to take over leadership in the United States and the free world with such dizzy speed. The Minister of Labour also told us in this and other speeches that it is only necessary to wait until the massive program of this government has had an opportunity to make itself felt on the body politic.
I say to the Minister of Labour that the country cannot stand any more of the effects of the last three years. If this government is not now prepared to be candid, to be frank and to make a real effort to get this country moving, there is the great possibility that when the people of Canada have the opportunity to say whether or not they are satisfied with this government it will be too late for those of us who have ideas and are prepared to put them into effect to do anything.


Douglas Mason Fisher: Call for an election.


Julia Verlyn (Judy) LaMarsh: An hon. member to my right says "Call for an election". I notice that this is the hon. member who has said on a number of occasions that he will not be standing when there is another election.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: The question is, will he be sitting afterwards.


William Moore Benidickson: Even if he stands he will not sit.


Jacques Flynn: Order.


Julia Verlyn (Judy) LaMarsh: There are those of us, Mr. Chairman, of the official and effective opposition who will be standing but not to Your Honour's left following the next election.
That which has been done by the Minister of Labour is something rather shocking to this committee. The Leader of the Opposition today posed question after question to the Minister of Labour, who sat only a few feet from him, and the minister made perhaps the weakest statement ever heard in such a debate. He countered these questions today with an ordinary routine speech about an ordinary routine department with no sense of urgency and with no realization of crisis in the country. The Minister of Labour may be content in his job and prepared to accept that the underbrush is being cleared, and that the massive program is sufficient to restore Canada's unemployed to full employment, but those of us who sit on this side are not prepared to sit silently while nothing is being done. Whenever, over the years, anyone rose on this side of the house to speak of the increasing unemployment figures it was not for political advantage.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


Julia Verlyn (Judy) LaMarsh: I call the hon. members' attention to the numbers of members present in the committee of the number there might possibly be, and to the advantage that they might take in this chamber. This situation is impressed upon us because the members of the government appear not to notice or to care what is happening in the country.


William Moore Benidickson: Where there is no vision the people perish.


Julia Verlyn (Judy) LaMarsh: The only answer given to the country by the government was that we are glooming and dooming. We heard this again this evening from the hon. member who preceded me. Mr. Chairman, if glooming and dooming would put Canadians back to work those of us in the opposition would stoop to it. If what the government is trying to indicate to the people of Canada is that we are attempting to make them afraid and uncertain, that is not correct. We speak here in this chamber to those who at least temporarily

have the responsibility of doing something about it. I suppose that next they will adopt the famous remark of another democrat, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who said to his people in the thirties, "We have nothing to fear but fear itself".
I would hope that as yet the Canadian economy has not been allowed in the last four years to slip so far that it cannot be recovered. If it has then we have considerably more to fear than fear itself. Those hon. members who sit opposite have a responsibility to the people and a responsibility which will not wait. I would suggest that rather than hon. members on the front bench travelling throughout this country making speeches and suggesting that the success of that administration to the south may be laid only to the fact that it has adopted the program existing in Canada, they should be here in this committee dealing with this massive attack of which they have so often spoken. If this cannot be done-


Jacques Flynn: Order. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. member but her time has expired.


Mr. McGee:: I was wondering if the hon. member's enthusiastic embrace of President Kennedy's administration referred to the 50 per cent tariff increase on bicycles about ten days ago, and if she does not find this a little inconsistent with some of the suggestions made by hon. members in the front benches?


Julia Verlyn (Judy) LaMarsh: It may be that it is part of this massive attack to which the hon. members on the opposite side have referred so often in this house.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I should like to ask the
Minister of Labour if it is true that a member of the national employment service took part in the television program about which he claims there has been so much complaint.


Jacques Flynn: Order.


Michael Starr: No one has complained about the program and it is true that national employment service persons took part in this program. All I have done is attempt to give additional facts in order to keep the record straight.


Jacques Flynn: Order.
Progress reported.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Lionel Chevrier: May I inquire what the business of the house is for tomorrow, and
Business of the House
perhaps the house leader would also indicate what is planned for Monday and Tuesday of next week.


Gordon Minto Churchill: Mr. Speaker, tomorrow by general agreement we will start with the debate on Bill No. C-71, an act respecting the civil service of Canada. I understand that there will only be two or three members speaking on that occasion. This bill will then go to a special committee to be studied there and then come back to the house to be studied in the committee of the whole. If it is agreeable to the house, and that debate is concluded in good time, we will follow it with the motion of the Minister of Finance to set up the special committee to consider that bill. We will then carry on with the estimates of the Department of Labour.
The forecast for next week, subject to change if unexpected circumstances require, is as follows. Monday will be private members' day. Tuesday we would like to consider item No. 2 on today's order paper, second reading of Bill No. C-51, an act to amend the Coastal Fisheries Protection Act, and then take item No. 9 on today's order paper which is my resolution dealing with the Army Benevolent Fund Act. The third item on Tuesday would be item No. 14 on today's order paper which is the motion in the name of the Minister of Agriculture, asking the standing committee on agriculture to inquire into the prices of farm machinery. Then, item No. 4 on Tuesday would be item No. 8 on today's order paper, the resolution in the name of the Minister of Labour dealing with the vocational rehabilitation of disabled persons.
On Wednesday we would commence with Bill No. C-73, to amend the Income Tax Act. Should that be completed, we would then follow with item No. 12 on today's order paper, the resolution in the name of the Minister of Agriculture dealing with agricultural development.
Thursday's business would be a continuation of the items that I have called for Wednesday. If they are finished the remainder of the time on Thursday and on Friday would be devoted to the estimates of the Department of Agriculture.


William Moore Benidickson: May I just make the record clear? Regardless of the completion of the business as outlined for Tuesday, would we start with the income tax amendments on Wednesday?


Gordon Minto Churchill: Yes.
It being four minutes past ten o'clock, the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.

mm


Friday. March 10, 1961