1962-03-16

Mr. J. A. McGrath (St. John's East):: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a question of privilege to ask the house to bear with me while I move the clock ahead 24 hours to wish you, Mr. Speaker, on behalf of all Irishmen in this house the top of the morning.
May I also on this, the eve of the feast day of the great patron saint of Ireland, on behalf of all Canadians and particularly on behalf of Irish Canadians, avail myself of the opportunity to raise the old Gaelic cry "Erin go bragh".


Mr. H. W. Herridge (Kootenay West):: Mr. Speaker, in view of the remarks of the hon. member for St. John's East, I should like to say that members of this group for years have urged that fast time be established on a national basis but, of course, we trust that it will apply to all groups in Canada when it is established. However, we approve his supporting this principle openly in this house at this time. We also join with him in his recognition of March 17 as a great day for many of our Canadian citizens.


Mr. Speaker:: I take it that it has been unanimously agreed that we move the clock ahead 24 hours. I am not sure what effect that course will have on today's proceedings.


Hon. Lionel Chevrier (Laurier):: Mr. Speaker, may I be allowed to join with the hon. member for St. John's East and all others in this house in wishing to those of Irish extraction our very best wishes on the eve of St. Patrick's day.



PRIVILEGE


Lionel Chevrier: Mr. Speaker, I rose on a question of privilege at about the same time as the hon. member for St. John's East, but Your Honour saw him first.
My question of privilege is one that affects the rights of all hon. members of this house.
Yesterday the Minister of Finance made a statement which has been interpreted to mean that members of the opposition were preventing civil servants from being paid. One of the local radio stations headed its newscast this morning as follows:
Will some civil servants not get paid? According to finance minister Fleming it's possible.
I am informed, sir, that a question directed to the central pay office produced the reply that no mid-March cheques for civil servants' pay had been held up. In other words, the minister yesterday sought by misleading information to curb debate in this house. Notwithstanding this-


Mr. Hellyer:: False and misleading.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. Is the hon. member referring to a statement made in the house yesterday?


Lionel Chevrier: Yes, Mr. Speaker.


Mr. Speaker:: When statements of that kind are made in the house objection to them, if any is to be taken, should be taken at the time they are made.


Lionel Chevrier: But, Mr. Speaker-


Mr. Speaker:: I invite the hon. member to hear me out. In the heated debates that take place it would be impossible to go back and correct all the infractions of the rules of the house that have been made during the course of the day. I think the hon. member will agree with me that if we follow that course we would never do the work of today but would spend our time on yesterday's affairs. So I suggest to the hon. member that he take other means of correcting what he says is misinformation.


Lionel Chevrier: Mr. Speaker, on the point of order, I feel I should bring to your attention the fact that yesterday no one could have known that the statement made by the Minister of Finance was misleading. This was not known until today when the reference I cited was broadcast on a local radio station to the effect that it was possible that civil servants' pay cheques were being held up. When we made a check today we discovered that no mid-March cheques had been held up, despite what the minister said.


Mr. Speaker:: Well, having gone that far-


Mr. Fleming (Eglinlon):: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a question of privilege-

Question of Privilege


Mr. Speaker:: I should like to give the minister an opportunity to comment on the question of privilege which has been raised since it has been carried to the extent that it has.


Mr. Pickersgill:: On the point of order-


Some hon. Members:: Sit down.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I am speaking on the point of order.


Mr. Speaker:: If the hon. member's point of order relates to hearing the Minister of Finance, I will hear him first.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Yes, Mr. Speaker. My point of order is this. I quite agree with Your Honour that the minister should be allowed to speak. However, I also feel that my friend the hon. member for Laurier who has raised the point should be allowed to complete his sentence before the minister is allowed to reply.


Mr. Speaker:: I indicated to the hon. member for Laurier that I thought the point was not properly taken at this time, but that he has made his point to the extent that I think it is only fair that the minister should be allowed to comment.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Particularly, Mr. Speaker, when the hon. member for Laurier has used the expression "sought to mislead" and the hon. member for Trinity (Mr. Hellyer), whether you heard him or not, just now used the expression "false and misleading" as applied to the statement I made. The hon. member apparently is not acquainted with the rules of this house. When I have made my statement to you, Mr. Speaker, on the question of privilege 1 hope you will direct him, in accordance with the rules of the house, to withdraw his words.
My remark yesterday on this subject is to be found at page 1823 of Hansard, in the second column. This is what I said, and I was referring to March 15:
This is normally the day when cheques are payable with respect to a number of the liabilities of the government. I must inform the committee that by reason of the fact that these supplementary estimates have not yet been disposed of, notwithstanding the warnings given to the house by my colleague some days ago, it will not be possible now to pay on their due date certain accounts of suppliers in various departments, and certain employees cannot receive their mid-March pay until supply is released.
That statement is correct, Mr. Speaker. The information given to the house this morning by the hon. member for Laurier is wrong. If there is anything misleading, it is the statement made by the hon. member for Laurier.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I think the minister has had ample opportunity now to comment.


Donald Methuen Fleming: With respect, Mr. Speaker, may I point out that I have something further to say on this subject, and I think I am quite within my rights after language such as that which has been used this morning by those two hon. members with respect to the statement I made yesterday.


Lionel Chevrier: Who is in the chair?


Mr. Speaker:: Order. May I say to the minister that I curtailed the remarks of the hon. member for Laurier, who raised the question of privilege originally. The reason it seemed proper that the minister should be allowed to comment was that the hon. member for Laurier had gone far enough to make a statement which required to be dealt with. However, unless the minister is raising a new point I suggest to him that in view of my restricting the hon. member for Laurier, the matter has now been satisfactorily disposed of. It should not have been raised at all.



LABOUR CONDITIONS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Lionel Chevrier: I should like to direct to the Prime Minister a question suggested last evening by his colleague the Minister of Labour. Can the Prime Minister tell the house what officials are making the study of the question of early retirement, to which he referred in his television broadcast on Wednesday evening, March 14, and what minister is in charge of this study?


Right Hon. J. G. Diefenbaker (Prime Minister):: As the hon. gentleman knows, Mr. Speaker, the names of officials, should there be such officials, are not revealed in the house. I remember an occasion many years ago when a similar question was asked and that answer was given. Furthermore, as I stated on the television broadcast, I am having this whole matter looked into. Opinions are being secured from those who are knowledgeable on the subject, and when it is appropriate to bring the matter to the attention of the house it will be done.


Lionel Chevrier: I should like to ask a supplementary question arising out of what the Prime Minister has said. Surely when public funds are being expended on a matter

of this kind parliament should at least be entitled to know what minister is in charge of the study. That was the question I asked, and I wonder whether the Prime Minister would not reply to that part of the question.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, there was no complication, except from the lips of the hon. gentleman, that public funds were being spent.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: It is the minister in charge of
mysticism.



COLUMBIA RIVER


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Herbert Wilfred Herridge: Mr. Speaker, I wish to address a question to the Prime Minister. Has the Prime Minister received a letter from President Kennedy seeking an indication of Canadian government plans concerning ratification of the Columbia river treaty and suggesting that the United States government will seek alternative power sources for the Pacific northwest if ratification is not given soon?


John George Diefenbaker: No, Mr. Speaker.



INQUIRY OF THE MINISTRY

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. P. Deschatelets (Maisonneuve-Rose-mont):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Prime Minister. When the Prime Minister speaks to the Progressive Conservative association in Montreal this evening, is it his intention to announce-


Some hon. Members:: Order.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. Party meetings are not considered public administration, and to inquire in advance what a minister proposes to say at a party meeting seems to me to be going beyond the scope of either questions on the orders of the day or written questions.



PUBLIC SERVICE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. Noel Dorion (Secretary of State):: Mr. Speaker, the question asked yesterday on the orders of the day by the hon. member for Timmins, which related to the divulging to private parties by employees of several government departments of information contained in the records of these government
Inquiries of the Ministry departments, was presumably directed to the Secretary of State in his capacity of dealing with questions involving more than one department. I assure the hon. member that this role of the Secretary of State is confined to questions and motions for papers which appear on the order paper and not to verbal questions raised on orders of the day. Since, further, I have no over-all responsibility for the security of information in departmental records, I suggest to the hon. member that he direct his inquiry to the ministers responsible for the departments concerned.



PUBLIC BUILDINGS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Hubert Badanai (Fort William):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the Minister of National Defence. Has the minister received a letter from Lieutenant Colonel L. T. Poulter urging the construction of an armoury in Fort William? If so, is the government giving favourable consideration to the establishment of armoury facilities in that city soon, or in the foreseeable future?


Hon. D. S. Harkness (Minister of National Defence):: Mr. Speaker, I did receive such a letter two days ago. The hon. member will remember that he raised the matter of the provision of an armoury for Fort William when the estimates of the department were being considered, and we had considerable discussion. At that time I explained the general armoury situation in Canada and the fact that we more or less have a priority list, and informed him where Fort William stood on that list.



DEFENCE PRODUCTION


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Guy Rouleau (Dollard):: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Defence Production. Has the government decided to order from Canadair a number of CL-41 jet trainers for the Royal Canadian Air Force? If the government has not reached a decision on this matter, in view of the impending layoffs at Canadair will the government make an early decision on it?


Hon. Raymond O'Hurley (Minister of Defence Production):: Mr. Speaker, the only announcement on this program was made by the Minister of National Defence during the last session of parliament when he said the

Inquiries of the Ministry air force was considering the acquisition of the CL-41 trainer. Since that time negotiations have been going on with Canadair and other companies with regard to the manufacture of the engine required for this trainer. This program has not yet been approved in its entirety, but negotiations are continuing. I wish to state that we are looking seriously into the situation with regard to the work force at the Canadair plant, and if the CL-41 program goes ahead it will mean for some months or for a year or so work for not more than 1,000 men.



ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Herbert Wilfred Herridge: should like to direct a question to the Minister of National Defence based on a telegram I received since I appealed to him yesterday from Mr. T. A. McRae, of the Kootenay boundary citizens' committee. It reads as follows:
Request you again call for troops in this area on a training basis. Do we have to have a hydro power plant destroyed before action taken.
In view of the concern felt, would the minister communicate with the attorney general of British Columbia to see if some satisfactory arrangements cannot be made?


Douglas Scott Harkness: I have nothing to add to the two answers I have already given with regard to this matter. The procedure is very plain. If troops are required, the attorney general has to requisition them. Until he does so, as I explained before, I have no legal authority so far as I can see to send troops, in effect, in aid of the civil power. The responsibility, therefore, is that of the attorney general if he considers troops are necessary to send a request for them.



INQUIRY AS TO QUOTA POSITION

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. C. S. Smallwood (Battle River-Cam-rose):: I have a question for the Acting Minister of Agriculture. Would the minister bring the house up to date on the grain quota situation in western Canada? How many points are on open delivery quotas at this time?


Hon. Gordon Churchill (Minister of Veterans Affairs):: Perhaps I could answer that question

on behalf of the Acting Minister of Agriculture. A most remarkable change has taken place in the quota distribution, compared with other years. Of the 1,942 points at which grain is delivered, 92 per cent are now on the open delivery quota. This, I believe, is a record. By provinces it runs this way: Manitoba, 352 stations, all on open delivery quotas; Saskatchewan, 1,038 stations, of which 921 are on open delivery, 83 on a 7 bushels per specified acre quota, 27 stations on 6 bushels quota and 7 stations on a 5 bushel quota; in Alberta, 545 delivery points, of which 523 are on open delivery quota and 22 on a 7 bushel per specified acre quota. This is the remarkable record of government policy with regard to the sale of western grain.
(Translation):



SHIPPING


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Lionel Chevrier: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Transport.
Did the minister receive representations from pilots on the St. Lawrence river and the seaway concerning a new formula whereby, according to this morning's Gazette, part of their salaries would pay for navigation aids?
If so, could the minister tell us what stand his department would take following those representations?


Hon. Leon Balcer (Minister of Transport):: Mr. Speaker, officials of my department did consult the pilots' association to find out what their opinion was on this matter. They suggested that pilots attached to the Escou-mains and St. John, N.B. stations might pay part of the special equipment which is to be supplied to them. They only wanted to know the views of the pilots' federation in this regard, and, as could be seen in this morning's newspapers, those views were not long in coming.
(Text):



IMMIGRATION


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Paul Theodore Hellyer: I should like to direct a question to the Prime Minister in order to clear up a misunderstanding that

apparently exists amongst the Chinese community in Winnipeg. Would the Prime Minister indicate whether he did give them any assurance last November, and if so what was the nature of the assurance?


John George Diefenbaker: I believe that the details of this question have been brought to the attention of the house on two previous occasions, by the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration and by the Minister of Justice. This whole question is one that is receiving the earnest attention of the government. All recognize that the Chinese are fine citizens, and our purpose is to assure in every way that they receive fairness and justice.


John Whitney Pickersgill: As a supplementary question I would ask the Minister of Justice whether he thinks this whole matter could not be brought to an early termination.


Hon. E. D. Fulton (Minister of Justice):: We
have been bending our efforts in that direction since long before the hon. member made his suggestion.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Pretty poor efforts.

The house in committee of supply, Mr. Martineau in the chair.
DEPARTMENT OF LABOUR Technical and vocational training assistance-
636. To carry out the purposes of the Technical and Vocational Training Assistance Act and agreements made thereunder-payments to the provinces -further amount required, $28,400,000.


The Chairman:: The hon. member for Timmins.


Mr. Marlin (Timmins):: I listened very carefully to the debate which arose in connection with this item in the supplementary estimates and to the very excellent case that has been built by the hon. member for Peterborough and the hon. member for Port Arthur. Combined with the complete lack of answers by any spokesman for the government to the questions raised by these hon. members, their case underlines the fact that all the boo-boos this government has pulled over the last four years in its efforts to solve the problems of our society, this measure ranks as the biggest.
It would be interesting to try and analyse it a little bit in order to find out how the government got into this particular mess. To do so we would have to go back to 1957 and 1958 when the present government in-
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herited the mess of 22 years of misrule by the Liberal government, not to mention the five years of worse misrule by the previous Conservative government. Among the many problems it had to face, possibly the most urgent was that of a steadily rising and steadily more consistent problem of unemployment.
For the first two years the government adopted two tried and true former solutions; first trying to ignore the problem and seeing if it would go away by itself, and the other being optimistic and hoping everything would turn out all right. It took two years for the government to realize that optimism and ignoring the issues were certainly no solution and so it started to look for some answers. It looked back through history but found no answer, because there never had been one under any previous Liberal or Conservative government. The only answers previously tried, were the two I have mentioned, optimism and ignoring the problem. They did not work any better now than they had in the past, and in fact did not work as well because there were two new problems involved, the automation problem and the fact that we did not have a world war come along to bail us out as we had always apparently been fortunate enough to have in the past. "
Not being able to find any solutions in history, the government finally started looking for new solutions. As always, of course, when they look for new solutions they had to start listening to the members of this group. The trouble was, they only half listened. They heard members of this group get up time after time and point out the need of a retraining program for displaced employees and for the unemployed of this country, and the need for better training of our young people going into the work force. They listened to all this and thought "Maybe we should try that".
But they were then faced with a dilemma. How were they going to apply such a solution and save face? We had the picture of the Prime Minister going around the country mouthing talk about free enterprise, and on the other hand there was this democratic socialist measure which the government intended to adopt. How could they go about employing democratic socialist measures while at the same time preaching free enterprise?
I admit it is a difficult job, but they finally found what they thought to be a solution. They thought they could adopt the measures without using the methods. They thought

Supply-Labour
they could use the ideas with no thought or planning or anything else of that kind. In fact they believed the solution was to put a free enterprise mask on their faces and try to carry out socialism behind their backs. That is how this government achieved this monstrosity that we face at the present time, the greatest of all the blunders they have made in the last five years. We find an expenditure of close to $200 million to build the wrong kind of schools in the wrong places for the wrong purposes to teach students we do not have through the services of teachers who do not exist. If any government has done anything more insane than that, I should like to know when it was.
The only conclusion I can come to is that this government lacks the courage and the honesty to carry on with the free enterprise they talk so much about, and lack the brains and intelligence to take democratic socialist measures and apply them properly. The result is-and I think this was pointed out very ably yesterday by the hon. member for Peterborough and the hon. member for Port Arthur-that consternation is spreading throughout the country and that we are amassing a colossal debt without anything to show for the money spent. Finally they will make this government and the country a laughing stock throughout the world whenever anyone of any intelligence looks at the solutions we are trying to apply to these problems.
(Translation):


Mr. Flynn:: Last night, Mr. Chairman, in spite of the objection I raised to the effect that the matter he wished to discuss was irrelevant because it concerned the principle of the act and indeed a matter of a wider scope than that principle, the hon. member for Levis took the opportunity of that discussion to set out part of the Liberal platform and put questions to ministers and to members from the province of Quebec.
The hon. member for Levis managed to set before the house the Liberal party's attitude concerning joint schemes and here is what he quoted at page 1862 of Hansard, page 4 of the English translation:
Although tax sharing is essential, other forms of co-operation between the provinces and Ottawa exist which will provide a better balanced development of Canada.
Such are the federal-provincial joint programs in the field of welfare, for example old age assistance, pensions to the blind and the disabled-
A little further, the hon. member stated:

A new Liberal government, after having made arrangements with the provinces, will withdraw from those joint schemes which are now well established everywhere. At the time of its withdrawal, the federal government will confer on the provinces direct taxation powers and increase its equalization payments to a degree equivalent to the federal contribution to those programs.
Mr. Chairman, I have already stressed that the statement made by the hon. member for Levis covered more than the principle of the legislation, that it dealt with a far reaching question which would best be discussed during a separate debate.
I would not want to follow the bad example set by the hon. member for Levis; consequently, I shall not enter upon an over-long discussion of the matter he raised. I think he will agree with me that the adoption of those supplementary estimates should not be unduly delayed, since they are urgent.
I merely wish to point out, Mr. Chairman, that the hon. member for Levis created the impression that the new formula of the Liberal party would apply to any joint program.
I say that the member for Levis is surely not speaking for the Liberal party when he makes that suggestion, because nobody will convince me that the Liberal party is ready to provide a compensatory formula for joint programs coming under federal jurisdiction.
These are joint programs that fall well within the jurisdiction of the federal parliament; there are some for which the responsibility can be shared and, finally, there are others to which some provinces object because they feel that those schemes deal with matters which are their sole responsibility.
Surely the hon. member for Levis will not tell me that his party has changed its policy to the extent of saying that it will apply a form of compensation to all the joint programs, whatever the problems of legislative jurisdiction they create.
For example-


Mr. Bourget:: Mr. Chairman, I am sorry to interrupt the minister, but could he specify which joint programs or plans he has in mind? I would ask him to be more specific so that we may understand each other.


Jacques Flynn: Mr. Chairman, it is the hon. member for Levis (Mr. Bourget) who was not specific yesterday. I would suggest especially that he expressed a very general opinion on this bill. Now, does the hon. member for Levis mean to say that his alternative formula would apply to the trans-Canada highway?


Maurice Bourget: Certainly.


Jacques Flynn: Indeed. That is precisely what I expected the hon. member for Levis to say, because when this bill was discussed in this house, he never offered any compensatory formula. He laughed at the Quebec government which was against it and he always emphasized that Quebec would lose millions through its own fault, but he has never suggested an alternative formula. This is a shameful turn-about.


Maurice Bourget: If the minister wants me to reply immediately, I am ready to do so.


Jacques Flynn: If the hon. member for Levis wishes to reply, he may do so, provided he does not make a new speech before I have finished mine.


Maurice Bourget: I will answer the minister right now because he knows full well that when our party was in power, that is until June 1957, we never had the opportunity of discussing that with the then Quebec premier. The minister knows that I am telling the truth. We never had an opportunity for such a discussion because Mr. Duplessis always refused to co-operate with the Liberal government of the time.


Jacques Flynn: Mr. Chairman, I do not have enough time to discuss that point but, whether he is right or wrong, the hon. member for Levis is not in a better position, since he states today that any province will be entitled to a compensatory formula, whereas in the past he took a take it or leave it attitude.
I have read the official report and the statements made by the hon. member for Levis. He is not going to come and tell me that his attitude was one of conciliation at that time. Never did he suggest that the government of which he was a member was willing to offer the province of Quebec some compensation in that field.
I said that there are programs which fall perfectly within the federal jurisdiction. I shall only say a word about the legislation concerned, since, irrelevant as that might be at this stage in our proceedings, its principle has been discussed. That act was passed by parliament last year because the federal government recognized its responsibilities in the employment field, employment being directly related to trade and economy. The measure was introduced with these considerations in mind.
Now, because technical training comes within the field of education, which is under provincial jurisdiction, the act provides for
Supply-Labour
an agreement with those provinces which may wish to take advantage of it, precisely to organize this technical and vocational training. When the act was introduced last year, did the hon. member for Levis and his friends offer a compensation formula?


Mr. Tremblay:: No.


Jacques Flynn: Did they suggest there should be one? Not at all.


Maurice Bourget: You are the ones who refused it.


Jacques Flynn: You repudiated your own past, From considerations of opportunism, the Liberal party, at their convention, adopted this formula, this compensation idea which is a complete reversal of the Liberal party philosophy, as formulated in Mr. Maurice Lamontagne's book on Canadian federalism. I suggest the hon. member for Levis read it again and he will see once again the tremendous turn-about he has made.


Maurice Bourget: You are past-masters in turnabout.


Jacques Flynn: Not at all. One last point. As far as we are concerned, when a province feels that some legislation affects what is its exclusive jurisdiction, we are ready to consider changes, and especially to bring in a compensation formula.
When the previous government initiated the university grants system, neither my hon. friend from Levis nor the hon. member for Laurier (Mr. Chevrier), nor any one of their colleagues said a word about compensation. Take it or leave it, they said. Indeed, as a result of that stand, the province of Quebec lost millions-


Mr. Brassard (Lapointe):: We did not lose millions.


Jacques Flynn: -millions were lost until 1955. The hon. member for Lapointe (Mr. Brassard) should check before he tries to contradict me. It is only later that the previous government decided that the amounts would remain in the custody of the Canadian universities foundation.
When we came to power, we recognized the claims of the province of Quebec and offered a compensation formula which the former administration had accepted and which the new administration of the province of Quebec -which is much closer to our hon. friends- has accepted again.
That was a practical attitude. It was not only wind and idle talk. Those were not meaningless and unrealistic formulas which could

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not apply under the present legislation. That is not what we offer. We keep both feet on the ground and we shall not imitate the political expediency of the Liberal party; we shall not follow them on that road.
Mr. Chairman, I do not wish to clear up that point for the time being, but if my hon. friend insists, I shall come back to it.


Jean-Paul Deschatelets: Mr. Chairman, I think the moment would be well chosen for the minister to explain why, during the last election campaign, he and his friends kept on criticizing all joint plans and promising they would abolish them all, and why now, in spite of such statements, they have maintained them.


Jacques Flynn: Mr. Chairman, during the last election campaign, I never said a word about abolishing joint plans. I could send my hon. friend the publicity pamphlets I had distributed in my constituency. What I did say was that our government was in favour of a return to maximum fiscal responsibility for the provinces. That is what we have achieved. My hon. friend is talking through his hat when he attributes to the Conservatives from the province of Quebec the attitude he has just described.


An hon. Member:: We will prove the contrary to you.


Maurice Bourget: Mr. Chairman, I should like to say a few words following the remarks made by the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys (Mr. Flynn).
I think the people, especially the people of the province of Quebec, will be anxious to read the remarks he has just made. I find it strange that the government members from Quebec, including the minister, the Secretary of State (Mr. Dorion) and the Minister of Transport (Mr. Balcer), after four and a half years in power, should say to us today: the Liberals are to blame for the fact that these joint programs must continue to exist.
Well, I remember the stand taken by our opponents during the 1957 and 1958 electoral campaigns, and even before. I do not have here the statements made by the ministers, but I remember, among other things, that during a television broadcast the Minister of Transport, speaking about the joint programs and the trans-Canada highway in particular, said that they violated the autonomy of the provinces. I hope that the minister will not contradict me on that point.


Jacques Flynn: I am sorry, but I did not hear him.


Maurice Bourget: Well, the minister is not the
whole party but he is well aware of the impression that was created; he knows that what has been said in the province of Quebec in 1957 and 1958 was to the effect that all these joint programs encroached upon the autonomy of the provinces. The minister may deny it, but I believe that the whole population of the province of Quebec admits it is true.
Well, once again, I say that during the elections of 1957 and 1958, you stated that you had found a means to put an end to those joint schemes. Yet, you have been in power for four and a half years, and have changed absolutely nothing. It is not up to the Liberal party to change the situation or legislation. You are the ones in power at this time, and you are responsible for the administration. Well, why don't you change those schemes?
What are you waiting for? Are you waiting to be defeated in the next general election? And that, indeed, is what will happen.
As far as we are concerned, Mr. Chairman, nobody can accuse us of having swerved from our course. Indeed, we have always expounded a policy-


Léonard-David Sweezey Tremblay: Now, that is a good one-a very good one indeed.


Maurice Bourget: Mr. Chairman, I again hear the hon. member for Roberval (Mr. Tremblay). I am told he will rise in a moment, and I hope he will be present-


Léonard-David Sweezey Tremblay: Certainly.


Maurice Bourget: -when the question is put. I hope his colleagues from Quebec on the government benches and himself will not scurry out when the vote is taken. If they vote against that item, we will be able to see the division which now exists within the Conservative party. On the other hand, if they vote in favour of it, they will deny not only their past, but all the speeches they made against those joint programs.


Léonard-David Sweezey Tremblay: Not at all.


Jacques Flynn: Mr. Chairman, I formally deny that, during the last election, the Conservative party in the province of Quebec as a whole adopted an attitude of complete opposition to the joint schemes, and it is, anyway, very easy to establish that many of those joint plans were accepted by the province of. Quebec-


Maurice Bourget: Which plans?


Jacques Flynn: -and therefore it would have been completely inconsistent for us to oppose them, even from a tactical point of view.
Hon. members in the opposition should know that our main course during the last election was to relieve the provinces from the fiscal burden that had been placed upon them. I formally deny the statement just made by the hon. member for Levis.
Last year, we voted in favour of this act. We shall now vote for this item, and if anybody reverses his course it will not be on this side of the house, but on the side of my good friend, the hon. member for Levis.


Mr. Denis:: Mr. Chairman, the only conclusion which can be drawn from this discussion is obviously that, due to the famous provincial autonomy of the Union Nationale, the province of Quebec lost hundreds of millions of dollars by re-electing the Union Nationale government, which has fortunately disappeared.


Jacques Flynn: You did not offer any compensation at that time.


Azellus Denis: You have repudiated what the Liberals had done-


Jacques Flynn: Not at all.


Azellus Denis: -from 1954 to 1957, and not only do you approve today what you repudiated at the time, but you go still further and vote twice.
Mr. Chairman, I notice that the hon. member for Roberval, having been expelled from this side of the house for being too noisy_


Jacques Flynn: Order.


Paul Raymond Martineau: Order. I do not believe that it is the responsibility of the hon. member for St. Denis to discuss the question of the distribution of seats in this house. His comments are not relevant to the present discussion. I would therefore ask him to stay on the item now before us.


Azellus Denis: I simply pointed out the fact that the hon. member for Roberval is now in a seat that is not his, and I did so in the interest of the hon. member to whom this seat was given, for I am convinced that he would not be too happy to be mistaken for the hon. member for Roberval.


Jacques Flynn: Order.


Mr. Caron:: The hon. member for Roberval should also be called to order.


Paul Raymond Martineau: The hon. member for
St. Denis has the floor, and I would ask the hon. members-
Supply-Labour


Alexis Pierre Caron: And also the hon. member for Roberval.


Paul Raymond Martineau: -not to interrupt him. I would moreover ask the hon. member for St. Denis to confine his remarks to the estimates now before us.


Alexis Pierre Caron: And especially the hon. member for Roberal. I suggest he should be named.


Azellus Denis: Mr. Chairman, we are now being asked to vote an additional sum of $28 million, and I would very much like to know from the Minister of Labour (Mr. Starr) what proportion of this additional sum will be handed out to the province of Quebec.
If I understand correctly, the item deals with joint plans, and also with certain works concerning the construction of schools for technical and professional training, or for the teaching of certain trades which come under the purview of the federal government.
Thus I am asking the minister to tell the house if, as a result of this great project which is being promoted by Conservative ministers and members from Quebec at Lauzon, the Sulphur Converting Corporation proposes to look after the building of a technical school in that community-


Léonard-David Sweezey Tremblay: Order.


Azellus Denis: -since, for the construction of these wharves which cover a distance of 30 miles, tradesmen, craftsmen and divers, will probably be needed, for the carrying out of federal works?


An hon. Member:: You would have been an excellent one yourself.


Azellus Denis: Mr. Chairman, I wonder how much money the province of Quebec will receive under this vote, for this project should give employment to more than 4,000 unemployed in the province of Quebec, and we shall probably need mechanics and mining experts and workers to build wharves, etc.
I also ask the minister if, in this increase we are asked to vote, an amount is provided for the construction of industrial arts and trades schools in the Lauzon and Levis areas so that, should this project become a reality, the province of Quebec will not be caught off guard but will be in a position to train skilled workers, experts who could successfully carry out the famous project of the Surphur Converting Corporation.


Léonard-David Sweezey Tremblay: I do not intend, Mr. Chairman, to get involved in a lengthy debate and try to answer the arguments put forward

Supply-Labour
by some members opposite who indulge in too great a complacency. But some hon. members have tried to involve me in the discussion of a project which I feel did not, as was indicated by the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys (Mr. Flynn), called for an examination of the principle of the act, since we are now asked to vote an additional amount required so that this technical and vocational training program may be carried out as it should be.
I do not know that it is relevant to bring up the general principle of the act as well as the general economics of the act. It seems to me that this is simply a matter of finding out from the minister concerned to what extent and under what conditions those additional millions we are asked to vote would eventually be spent. However, the hon. member for Levis (Mr. Bourget)-following the example of hon. members of the ex-C.C.F. party, now known in the province of Quebec and elsewhere as the New Democratic party- extended the debate and set out to examine the general principle of the act, bringing up the economics of all those measures. That is why I should like, for the information of the Liberal members, to make some remarks which I hope are as much in order as those of our excellent comedians opposite-I regret that this is not a parliamentary expression- I should rather say our very good friends opposite.
Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Levis challenged us last night to take a stand on that question of joint plans. 1 should like right now to calm his over-scrupulous conscience and put the facts before him.
As far as I am concerned, never have I stated that those joint plans should be abolished. I have never made such a statement but, in the election campaigns in which I had the pleasure to take part, I have been critical of the federal fiscal policy of the Liberal party. I have said and promised to my constituents that the Conservative party would throw off, as the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys said, the yoke under which the Liberal party had held the province of Quebec. That is our stand and it is in that light that I promised to insist in this house on the rights of the provinces. That is what we have done, I think, and as for results, the public will be in a position to assess them in due time and, I hope, in a very near future.


Maurice Bourget: So do we.


Léonard-David Sweezey Tremblay: Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Levis challenged us to speak out on that question, but he did not do so with a view to enlightening this house in a positive and efficient way. He did not do so with a view to clearing up the confusion

which his party has maintained, but simply in order to save face and with the clear intention of saving the Hon. Jean Lesage, who having previously been an anti-autonomist has now shifted to a verbal autonomy, and who would like to get us involved in a conflict which he has himself helped to bring about and maintain when he was the instigator of all those centralizing measures which the province of Quebec had to put up with and still has to put up with now.
The hon. member for Levis was very shrewd last night-that is as much as he can be-and in reading his pamphlet he gave us a foretaste of the odious propaganda of the Liberal party during the next general election.
He read us an advertising booklet in which his party states that it intends to give up joint programs. I understand that the advertising booklet he read last night mentioned that question of joint programs because Mr. Jean Lesage came here barely a few weeks after his election, draped in the cloak of autonomy, and said to whoever would listen to him that the province of Quebec wanted the federal government to withdraw from all the joint programs. That is why the members opposite are embarrassed today and must take a stand they always opposed when they were in power.
I challenge them to say the contrary, in particular I challenge them to ask Mr. Jean Lesage to claim now what he announced when he took part in the federal-provincial conference in 1960.
If Mr. Lesage has decided to withdraw from joint programs, he should say so, just like Mr. Duplessis used to tell the government in Ottawa what he considered to be an encroachment on the autonomy of the provinces.
Under those circumstances, we shall be extremely pleased to examine the concrete proposals made by Mr. Jean Lesage, but we hope that he won't turn about, as he did very recently in the matter of university grants. He had come here, all primed to the occasion, and he had requested much more than he is now claiming.
Mr. Chairman, coming back to my point about that article of the Liberal joint plan program, I would point out to the hon. member for Levis, who admitted his legal ignorance yesterday evening, that the article of his party's program is merely a diversionary measure designed to save face and minimize the embarrassment of Hon. Jean Lesage in Quebec.
This significant article reads as follows:
In this field, Ottawa must help set up such assistance programs throughout the country; how-

ever, the federal government should not remain in those programs indefinitely, because it would lead to administrative difficulties in the long run.
And further on:
Thus, the federal government could propose other joint programs if they should prove necessary.
This last paragraph is a cause of concern to me, because it seems obvious that the Liberal party, if it should unfortunately return to power, intends to set up other joint programs and disregards the views of the provinces in this matter.
Besides, Mr. Chairman, the hired thinker, the thinking master of the Leader of the Opposition expressed himself most clearly on this subject in his book "The Canadian Federalism". On page 254, I find this paragraph that I want to read into the official report.
Finally, the fight against recession requires a preliminary phase of preparation, especially when a program of public works is involved. You have to be prepared to prevent crises. Public investment projects are fully effective only when it is known beforehand what they will cover, when and how they will be carried out. Since the provinces are unable to finance such projects by themselves and since the federal government cannot take them over exclusively, the implementation of joint programs to prevent a recession calls for previous agreement between the various levels of government.
Mr. Chairman, I would ask you to pay close attention to the end of the paragraph which condemns the autonomist attitude of the province of Quebec. I should like to have the comments of the hon. member for Levis after I have finished reading the following:
Every time the federal government has tried to discuss such projects in the past, some provinces have refused to co-operate, with the result that we have no agreements at present and we are far from being properly protected against any crisis that may occur.
I would be most happy to see how the hon. member for Levis can reconcile these words with those expressed by Mr. Maurice Lamontagne, his leader's adviser. The hon. member insisted, last night, that taxation powers be returned to the provinces, a view which is not shared by Mr. Lamontagne. Here is what he said-


Paul Raymond Martineau: At this stage, I feel it is my duty to interrupt. Much as I want the hon. member to have every possible chance of answering questions which have been raised in this house, nevertheless, I do not think he should go farther away from the item before us. His observations should relate to this item and he should set aside references and comments not connected with it.


Léonard-David Sweezey Tremblay: I thank you, Mr. Chairman. In compliance with your request, I am quite willing to deal, as much as possible, only with the matter we are now discussing.
Supply-Labour
I merely wish to insist on what the hon. member for Levis said concerning the return of taxation powers brought about by the withdrawal from the joint schemes he mentioned. Here is what Mr. Maurice Lamontagne had to say and which seems to illustrate the Liberal policy:
In a system marked by economic instability, the federal government cannot consider taxation only as a source of revenue: it becomes above all an economic control instrument towards stability.


Paul Raymond Martineau: It is precisely at that point that I intervened to ask the hon. member to abide by the rules I had laid down and I do hope he will do so.


Léonard-David Sweezey Tremblay: I thank you. I now come back to the subject matter.
I was saying, at the beginning of my remarks, that the C.C.F. and Liberal members-


Azellus Denis: And the separatists.


Léonard-David Sweezey Tremblay: -showed, yesterday evening, perfect unconstitutional collusion, in connection with this additional amount for the technical and professional training program, in criticizing education in various provinces, and in indicating that the federal government had certain responsibilities in the field of technical and vocational training programs. The federal government's responsibility is that which the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys has defined a moment ago.
Before closing my remarks, I should like to come back to what the hon. member for Essex East said about the matter, which seems to me very ambiguous, and which is to be found on page 1801 of Hansard:
I suggest to the minister it is possible without violating the constitutional provisions of the British North America Act for the federal government to take cognizance of this fact.
Well, expressions such as those seem extremely ambiguous and appear to extend beyond what is strictly constitutional the responsibility of the federal government.
I repeat that I shall be very glad to hear the hon. member for Levis explain to us how he reconciles his attitude with regard to joint programs with that of Mr. Maurice Lamontagne and with the attitude adopted by his party for so many years, which finally brought about the constitutional crisis the Conservative party has tried to solve ever since it came to power.
In this connection, I would very much like to hear also from the hon. member for Lapointe (Mr. Brassard) who, I imagine, does not go so far as to share the opinion of his colleague from Hull (Mr. Caron), who considered that provincial jurisdiction in educational matters did not extend beyond elementary teaching.

Supply-Labour
I should like the hon. member for Lapointe to explain to us his exact attitude with regard to joint plans. I also should like him to tell us once and for all before the wave of Liberal demagogy swamps the province of Quebec, what attitude the Liberal party exactly did take in the past, what part of that attitude is today repudiated by the Liberal party and what the new principles and the new criteria of Liberal policy are in matters of constitutional relations.
That is what I should like to know, learn and hear from the very lips of those who promoted the constitutional disintegration of this country.
(Text):


Mr. Winch:: Mr. Chairman, the discussion on supplementary estimate No. 636 has been lengthy, interesting and upon occasion somewhat heated. I have not risen to speak on this item until now, so I hope I will be allowed to say a few words about it. One of the reasons I felt I wanted to speak was the continuation of remarks such as those made by the hon. member who has just resumed his seat. In discussing these supplementary estimates we are not discussing the constitutional issues revolving around education. These have been settled by the British North America Act.


Jacques Flynn: Would the hon. member permit a question?


Harold Edward Winch: Nobody has challenged the constitutionality-


Jacques Flynn: Would the hon. member permit a question?


Harold Edward Winch: Yes, as soon as I sit down you can ask all the questions you like.
We are interested in one thing only, and that is vote No. 636. Unfortunately, for some reason or other the debate on this estimate has evolved into a series of charges and countercharges and the trading of abuse, to some extent based on statements which are politically expedient or used as camouflage. If they have to be said at all, then they should be said on the hustings and not in the House of Commons. Vote 636, Mr. Chairman, is very definite, and is to carry out the purposes of the Technical and Vocational Training Assistance Act and the agreements made thereunder. The further amount required is $28,400,000.
The first basic principle we have to accept is this. It is necessary and constitutional that, a further amount being required under an act previously passed, the government has come to us for that additional money. This is being done today. It is also a basic fact that we are

now faced with a fait accompli. This money is already owing to the provinces or the municipalities or has been committed. I say, therefore, that this is a fait accompli because if this parliament does not vote this money then, if my memory is correct, those who sign the contracts on behalf of the government can be held legally responsible to pay the money. Let us not have all this talk about voting for or against the estimate before us. Certainly we can all agree on that, so let us not have any more talk about how you are going to vote. If you have been in parliament for any length of time, you know what you have to do.
This additional sum of $28 million is required to carry out the purposes of the Technical and Vocational Training Assistance Act. We must then consider the question of the planning which has been done in connection with this expenditure, and properly so, and particularly how the purposes of the act are being carried out.
I do not know of anyone in this house, and certainly I do not know of anyone in our group in this corner, who is opposed to the principle of technical and vocational training. We have been speaking on the need for it for years. We completely support the principle, and we are glad the federal government has actually taken the position of offering to pay 75 cents of every dollar expended for capital equipment, construction and so on for vocational training.
However, surely this is the time for questions to be asked as to the planning that has taken place between the federal and provincial governments to ensure 100 per cent efficient use of these buildings, and to ensure the fulfilment of the purpose for which the act was originally passed. I believe these are very simple questions and they were clearly put, despite all the sham battle that was put up in an attempt to overcome what was said by the hon. member for Peterborough. The questions are there. Because we want to see these expenditures lead to efficient results, because the federal government has now accepted responsibility for almost $200 million of capital expenditure for construction and equipment, we feel that the government can tell us they are not just offering this as a gift from Santa Claus but have done some planning in co-operation with the provinces so they can tell us we are not going to have thousands of empty classrooms and dozens of beautiful schools.
Surely this has been done in co-operation with the provinces who have knowledge as to their jurisdiction in connection with both teachers and curriculum. We are asking what the minister knows, because by the time we

have passed this item we will have voted $200 million. I know the provinces recommend, but surely the federal government examines what the provinces recommend in so far as teachers and the training of the students is concerned. Now, this is a series of simple questions. Why it has got beyond that and has gone through a number of speeches I completely fail to understand.
I said I was only going to speak for two or three minutes, and that is all 1 shall say. Will the minister, recognizing the interest of a great many hon. members in the construction of vocational and technical schools and technological institutes, and their interest in knowing this capital expenditure is being made on such a basis of federal-provincial understanding, knowledge and planning, ensure that the students will receive the training which our advancing system of technology requires, and that the teachers will be ready and available when the schools are opened? To me the entire issue is as simple as that.
I hope we can have some comment from the minister and that he will take these questions in the spirit in which they are asked. We are asking only reasonable questions, not political ones, because irrespective of party differences and differences in political philosophy we all agree in regard to education that everything should be done for the future of our children and that every dollar should be spent on a basis of a dollar return for a dollar spent.


Mr. Slarr:: I am glad we have come to the basic things for which this vote stands. So far as the questions asked by a number of hon. members who have participated in the debate are concerned, I would point out there is provision under the technical assistance training act for federal government participation up to 50 per cent of the financial cost of training teachers for the courses that will be undertaken in the schools being built under this program. This is something which certainly had to be, because schools are not of any use unless you plan to have proper teachers manning them and also proper administrative staffs. There is also provision in the act for 50 per cent participation in the cost of training of administrative staffs.
The provinces have undertaken a program which will accommodate up to 850 teachers per year. Broken down, the figures are British Columbia 50, Alberta 50, Manitoba 50, Ontario 400, Quebec 100 and New Brunswick 200.


Harold Edward Winch: Are they teachers of a vocational and technical nature?


Michael Starr: I want to give further information which I think will answer that question.
Supply-Labour
The University of Alberta has established a division of vocational teacher training in its faculty of education and New Brunswick, Ontario, Quebec, Manitoba and British Columbia have all greatly expanded their facilities to meet the anticipated needs for teachers.
Technical and vocational teachers in Ontario are required to be (a) qualified journeymen in whatever trade may be necessary, (b) qualified technicians, and (c) graduate engineers. Each must have completed high school matriculation and each must have five years' experience in industry or occupational life, and must have professional training. In Ontario, in particular, there is a requirement of one year of such training.
These are the criteria that have been established, adopted and undertaken by the provincial governments to bring about the proper qualifications, and teacher quotas have been set based on the number of teachers needed. The provinces are pressing on with the training of these teachers. In Ontario 300 are presently undergoing such training and another 300 will start training as soon as the first group have finished their course.
Several questions have been asked and certain criticism has been directed at this program. For instance, it has been said that the training classes now being carried on would not meet the training needs of the day by virtue of the fact that training was being given in obsolete trades. Perhaps the committee is not aware of the fact that there are trade advisory committees for almost every school in the country and every program, and in addition there is an advisory committee in each province, each committee having representatives from both labour and management. There are also provincial selection committees who are responsible for making recommendations with regard to the training needs of the provinces in relation to the unemployed and disabled and the apprenticeship trades. There is representation on these committees from the national employment service acting in an advisory capacity, as well as from employer and labour organizations in most cases.
It has been stated that there was no consultation with labour and industry with regard to this training program. However, I would like to emphasize that this consultation is constantly maintained by virtue of the fact that there is representation not only at the local level but also at the provincial and national levels. During the past year the Department of Labour has also retained the services of a consultant from industry to assure that our approach to industrial training is in line with the needs of industry in Canada. The department has also worked very closely

Supply-Labour
with various committees in the Canadian Manufacturers' Association, the Canadian Chamber of Commerce and other labour and management groups, in order to assist us in ensuring that training programs are in line with industrial needs. I am sure the hon. member for Vancouver East will be interested to know that this consultant has crossed Canada several times, consulting with employers and other groups.
In addition to this we have a research program dealing with the impact of technological changes on manpower, and this is specifically designed to ensure that the development of our training programs is in line with the change in technological needs of the Canadian economy. We have all this research. We know where we are going in this respect and we are trying, as we go along, to find out what the needs will be in the days ahead so that we can plan to meet them, along with the provinces.
An accusation has been made that schools are being built where there is no need for them. If any hon. member of this committee knows where a school is being built where there is no need for it I would wish he would give us that information; because we are advised through these various committees, the provincial departments of education and the school boards that these schools are needed. Each and every school board is pressing this need, and I am certain that pressure is based on actual need as shown by research and after consultation with labour and management in each area. Certainly it has never been brought to our attention that there is no need for any of these schools that are being built.
When we approached the provinces at the beginning of this program we asked them to estimate their needs during the next five years in regard to facilities for this type of training. We compiled the information that the provinces gave us and found there would be a need for a 50 per cent increase in the next five years. That is fine, and we hope we will be able to provide these facilities in two and a half years instead of five years. That is all to the good, and is good planning.
We are told that technological changes in industry will be brought about at a more rapid rate. We realize by what was said by President Kennedy not too long ago that the United States expects technological displacement of the labour force from industry at the rate of 25,000 a week. The United States labour force is ten times as large as ours. If that is going to happen there, we can expect displacement at the rate of 2,500 a week as a result of these changes. If you are going to set up a family life you build yourself a house, and I think it is good that

we should be planning for the need with which we shall be faced in the years to come.
We are not forcing this program on the provinces. We are asking them to ascertain their needs, and they do that through advisory committees which are at the local level, the provincial level and even the national level. All these people are represented on such bodies, and their views are taken into consideration. I wish to point out also that the provinces are paying 25 per cent of the capital cost of these new schools. Surely they have the immediate responsibility for determining the location of these schools. The charges which have been made imply that the provinces have been wasting the taxpayers' funds in determining the location of these training centres by putting these schools in areas where they are not needed.
I pointed out earlier that the teacher training program is an integral part of our technical and vocational training agreement with each and every province, and that the provinces are rapidly expanding their facilities and courses for teacher training to the extent of 850 teachers per year. The hon. member for Burnaby-Coquitlam made reference to classes for painters at Burnaby. He thought they were ridiculous and a waste of the taxpayers' money. I should like to tell him that these courses are offered as a part of the apprenticeship program of the province following the recommendations of both industry and organized labour, through an apprenticeship advisory committee of which they are members. Surely if there was no need of this training that advice would not have been put forward by these people who are vitally interested in these matters.
With regard to the suggestion that displaced coal workers in the maritime provinces have not been provided with the skills which would enable them to take up other work, I would say that at the present time there are many classes in a variety of occupations which are required by the economy. I can say categorically that every miner who wishes to take up such training has an opportunity to do so.
It has been brought to our attention during this debate that many workers among those who are employed lack the elementary training to enable them to take courses which would give them the skills to enter upon new employment. Some speakers inquired whether any province had asked for financial assistance to enable this type of training to be provided. I am sure the members of this committee will be happy to learn that courses of this kind for unemployed workers are in operation in most of the provinces, and we participate financially to help the provinces to

upgrade the standard of these people so they can take part in further training. I do not think we should dovetail the two aspects of the program. This is a building program to provide the facilities we shall need in the future.
There is also the training of the unemployed under schedule 5, which is an entirely different program. This is a program in which we participate to the extent of 75 per cent of the cost of the training and equipment with respect to training courses established by the provinces in areas where they are needed. I know that in the city of Oshawa, for example, advantage has been taken of this program. When the first class for the training of unemployed was undertaken, some 80 people took part, and the result as reflected in the placement of these people was excellent, well over 60 per cent. All those who completed their training were placed in useful employment. Consequently another course was undertaken, and it is in progress now. This is due to initiative on the part of the province, and we as a federal government can only offer them an incentive to undertake such a program. This we are doing, and we note that this program is gathering impetus and momentum. We are glad that this is happening.
I do not know whether there is anything I can add to what I have said. I hope I have answered the questions which were in the minds of those who took part in this discussion. I do want to assure the committee that we feel this is a worth while program, and that the schools are most necessary to deal with the situation with which we shall be faced in the future. In my own experience and down to earth thinking on this matter I have seen the following situation time and time again. Young people in grades 9 and 10 leave an academic school because they may have an opportunity of getting jobs in industry at that time. However, after a year or possibly two years they find themselves unemployed, and it hits them very hard at that time that they do not possess the skills required to get jobs. They are reluctant to reenter the school system because their classmates are probably two or three classes ahead of them. These facilities which are now being provided will enable them to re-enter the school system in order to learn a trade and equip themselves so as to fit into useful life again.
Anyone can enter a technical school and take a training course. It is fine and dandy for people to say that the technical institute in Toronto is a marvellous institute. So it is; but how can a person from Belleville attend that school? It is almost as expensive as going
26207-1-119
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to a university. A student has to pay room and board to live in Toronto while attending the school. The facilities now being set up will provide similar opportunities in localities which can easily be reached by those in the area, and will bring about more of this kind of training.


Mr. Carter:: I should like to ask the minister two questions arising out of the remarks he has just made. We all want this program to be successful, but I think it is evident to everyone that it can only be successful if it is properly integrated into the educational systems of the different provinces. We know that the systems vary from one province to another. The system in my own province is different from that which exists anywhere else in Canada.


Michael Starr: That is why there should not be federal direction.


Chesley William Carter: Yes. If the minister would let me continue, I should like to say that the degree of integration in connection with this program will vary from one province to another. Take, for example, the supply of teachers. In my own province we have no facilities whatever for training teachers for technical or vocational schools. We have to secure these teachers from outside the province, probably from the mainland, from England or other countries. When they are brought in they might have to be paid salaries that are out of line with what is paid to the ordinary teacher. That, too, is going to create problems for the province.
The first question I wish to ask the minister is this. Have the minister and the department satisfied themselves that the plan for integration of this program into the various school systems in Canada is satisfactory and meets the requirements?
The background of my second question is this. In my own province additional accommodation is going to be provided for 3,000 students. Taking an average of 20 students to a class, there will be a requirement for 150 teachers, which represents a significant training program in itself. In Ontario the student accommodation will be increased to make provision for 70,000 students, which means there will be required at least 3,500 additional trained teachers.
In his statement the minister told us that in Ontario there are facilities for the training of only 300 teachers at a time. He went on to say that the qualifications require at least a year's training. If I understood the minister correctly this means that Ontario can train approximately 300 teachers a year to match the facilities that are going to be provided. Unless the training can be speeded up,

Supply-Labour
Ontario will require 10 years to provide the additional teachers needed to match the increased accommodation that is going to be provided by the end of this year.
One of the problems arising out of this whole business is the responsibility of the federal government because we put a limitation on the period during which the provinces could benefit from the legislation. All these facilities have to be provided and in being by the end of this year. The provinces cannot afford to pass this up. Of course many cannot afford to take advantage of this opportunity, either, and are caught between the upper and nether millstones. They must try to adapt their finances and plans to accommodate this extra program. Some have telescoped into one year a plan that would probably have been spread over four or five years.
I wish to put these two questions to the minister. Has the minister satisfied himself that the provinces are able to integrate this program into the different systems, and is the department satisfied with respect to the ability of the provinces to train and acquire the additional teachers who will be required to carry out the expanded program and teach the additional number of students?


Michael Starr: Mr. Chairman, in reply to both questions I would say yes. Elaborating on the second point, I would say that the date of termination applies only to the federal participation of 75 per cent up to March 31, 1963, and then there is a continuation of participation of up to 50 per cent after that date. The federal contribution of up to 50 per cent of the cost of training teachers carries on for as long as the legislation is on the books. (Translation):


Augustin Brassard: Mr. Chairman, it would be ungracious of me not to accept the kind invitation which the hon. member for Roberval (Mr. Tremblay) extended to me a short while ago. He asked what is my stand on the estimate now before us. In other words, he asked me to do what he himself did not do in the course of his remarks.
My stand on joint plans is very clear: it is the same as that of the leader of the Liberal party.
I should have liked to hear other Conservative members from the province of Quebec, the Secretary of State (Mr. Dorion), the Minister of Transport (Mr. Balcer), the hon. member for Joliette-L'Assomption-Montcalm (Mr. Pigeon), and especially the hon. member for Chambly-Rouville (Mr. Johnson).

The hon. member for Roberval has quoted an excerpt from Mr. Lamontagne's book on joint plans. I hope he understood perfectly that Mr. Lamontagne in that paragraph refers to depression and recession times. I think there is an important difference of meaning there. Perhaps the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys (Mr. Flynn) should read this paragraph. In my opinion the difference is important.


Jacques Flynn: I have read the whole book.


Augustin Brassard: That was the first comment I wanted to make. The second deals with the joint plans policy we adopted in 1961 and which is supported by Mr. Lamontagne.
This is one of the basic differences between the Conservative and the Liberal parties. We are not prisoners of the past and of outmoded formulas. The very name of our party indicates that we keep our eyes open, that we are looking forward and that we are trying to adjust ourselves to the present and to the future. This is one of the basic differences between the two parties.
The item discussed today is not the result of a new policy, because ever since 1951, the federal government has contributed financially to the construction of technical schools in this country. In fact if we go back a little, we from Quebec know that it was a few years before the previous government would accept that participation of the federal government and that, even when it had been accepted, some people kept on talking against those federal grants for the construction of technical schools.


Jacques Flynn: Are you talking about the Bilo-deau-Rogers plan?


Augustin Brassard: I did not hear
the hon. minister's question.


Jacques Flynn: Is the hon. member talking about the Bilodeau-Rogers plan?


Augustin Brassard: I am talking about the plan adopted in 1951, under which financial assistance was provided for the construction of technical schools.
Besides, such attitude is not new. The same thing happened in Quebec with the Colombo plan, the university grants and the trans-Canada highway. Yet, the Conservative members from Quebec came here and supported wholeheartedly an increase of the appropriations in that field, but they did not go back to the scarecrows they had spread about in the province of Quebec for some years.


Jean-Paul Deschatelets: Shame.


Mr. Dupuis:: Nonsense.


Augustin Brassard: Mr. Chairman, in his long-winded speech, the hon. member tor Roberval has misrepresented the statement made by the hon. member for Levis (Mr. Bourget) concerning joint programs.
If I understood him well, he stated that the hon. member for Levis had favoured doing away with the system of joint programs. Now, what my hon. friend from Levis said -the hon. member for Roberval knows French well enough to have understood-was that the next Liberal government would allow any province that wishes to do so to withdraw from joint programs without losing any advantage in the process.
Mr. Chairman, before I resume my seat, I should like to point out to the hon. member for Roberval and to all his colleagues from Quebec, who have expressed their views most vaguely, that we still do not know where they stand. Do they take the stand of the leader of Quebec's Union Nationale party or that of the Prime Minister of Canada (Mr. Diefenbaker)?


Léonard-David Sweezey Tremblay: Mr. Chairman, I would not take any notice of what the hon. member for Lapointe has just said, but since he suggested that I had not expressed my opinion on the matter we are now discussing, I am compelled to put the record straight. The statement he made is false. I did say this: that there was no need to come to a decision at this stage, since we have already expressed our views on this matter. In so doing, I endorsed the statements made by the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys (Mr. Flynn).
On the other hand, I put a very precise question to the hon. members of the opposition. I asked them to what extent they were repudiating the past stand of their party on joint schemes-


Jean-Paul Deschatelets: He just told you.


Léonard-David Sweezey Tremblay: -and according to what principle they were repudiating their past and exactly how they can reconcile their present stand with the one they adopted in the past when they were themselves the sponsors of those joint schemes.
I wish to put once more on record this statement of the hon. member for Laurier, formerly from another province-


An hon. Member:: So what?


Léonard-David Sweezey Tremblay: -which I quote from the Nouveau Journal of October 17, 1961:
Hon. Lionel Chevrier stated last night that the Liberals in Ottawa were in favour of the progressive abolition, as requested by Mr. Lesage, of the joint federal-provincial programs such as old age assistance and disability pensions.
26207-1-119i
Supply-Labour
I am quoting that statement merely in order to address again to the members opposite the question which I asked them, and I would add this. As far as joint programs are concerned, do we find, as is the case for the "patronage" of their friend Mr. Lesage, some programs which are good and some which are bad? What are their principles and how can these gentlemen repudiate their past? I ask them to explain that to us.
(Text):


John Whitney Pickersgill: I would not have risen to take any part in this discussion at all, Mr. Chairman, had it not been for the very important declaration of principle which, if I understood him correctly, the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys made on behalf of the government today. I wish to be sure that I understand him correctly. I therefore wish to repeat what I understood him to say and to underline it so that we shall know where the government stands.
Last evening my hon. friend for Levis set out the position of the Liberal party with respect to the joint programs, and he challenged a member of the government to set out the position of the Conservative party and the position of the government which has the responsibility. After all, as long as we are in opposition all we can do is put forward a program which we will carry out when we come back into office. However, hon. gentlemen have the responsibility for carrying out these programs right now.
Today I understood the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys to say something that has never been said before, to my knowledge, by any member of this administration. I understood the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys to say that it was the policy of the government that if any provincial government approached them and indicated it did not wish to participate in one of these programs, they would consider giving that government compensation. If he did not say that, I wish he would tell me what he did say and I will allow him to interrupt me right now.


Jacques Flynn: When the hon. member reads Hansard I think he will find that is not what I said. I said that whenever a province objected to a joint program because it felt that it violated its autonomy or was beyond its legal capacity, we have shown in the past in connection with the university grants that we were prepared to adjust or to adopt a form of compensation. This is the attitude that I think this government has taken, and this is the interpretation that should be given to the attitude of this government, not that

Supply-Labour
contained in wide, sweeping statements like the ones made by the hon. member for Levis, which mean nothing and which it is impossible to carry out.


John Whitney Pickersgill: If the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys means anything by his words-and it almost appears that he does not mean anything-he has said exactly what I said.


Jacques Flynn: No.


John Whitney Pickersgill: If he has not said it, of course, it is an example of the usual case with this government. They express themselves so badly that no one can understand what they say, just as was the case with the Minister of Finance who gave notice that certain people were not being paid and then when we inquired into the matter we found they were being paid.


Jacques Flynn: I will leave the hon. member with the last word.


John Whitney Pickersgill: The minister is not going to get off with that statement. I am glad the minister wants to leave me with the last word. However, I would rather leave him with the last word, as the people of this country are entitled to know where the government stand.


Paul Raymond Martineau: Order. I think I shall have the last word and call it one o'clock.


John Whitney Pickersgill: In the meantime I shall be able to get the minister's words.
At one o'clock the committee took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The committee resumed at 2.30 p.m.
John Whitney Pickersgill: Your Honour will recall that when we adjourned for lunch I was trying to reconstruct in my mind and with the assistance of the minister, which assistance I will still welcome, precisely what was said about the rather obscure attitude of the present government with respect to these shared programs. About the only way in which I think I can do this is to do so by way of catechism, which the minister will understand, and see if I arrive at a correct interpretation; because I assure you, sir, that the last thing I want to do is to do any injustice to the minister who is zealous, young and inexperienced and who, unlike his colleagues in the government from the province of Quebec, actually seems to want to debate the issues before us, which

is a refreshing change. I say that in all sincerity, sir, and without wishing to injure the minister by complimenting him.
I reflected during lunch time about something that had temporarily escaped me when I first spoke in the minute or two before lunch, and it seemed to me that I recollected that the minister had said that there were three kinds of joint programs. If I am wrong in anything I say I should like the minister to correct me because I am merely trying to get the basic facts straight. I think the minister said that there were certain kinds of joint programs that were within federal jurisdiction. I know we cannot debate that point now. I would love to debate it with the minister and I should like to ask him to name one, because I have had long experience in dealing with provincial governments in one capacity or another, as a bureaucrat and then as a politician, and I have never seen a provincial government yet that was ever willing to spend one plugged nickel on anything that was within federal jurisdiction. If there is any such joint program that is within federal jurisdiction, it has certainly escaped my eye. However, I think the minister said there were such programs and perhaps on some other occasion we can debate them. In any event, I think no one would suggest that the provinces should get compensation for the abandonment of any program that is exclusively within federal jurisdiction. That would be ridiculous.
I thought the minister then said that there were some programs that were really joint. They could only be in agriculture, in immigration or in old age pensions because under the British North America Act those are the only three fields in which parliament and the legislatures have concurrent jurisdiction. There are a few projects in the field of agriculture I know about, such as maritime marshland development and things of that sort, that presumably come under the legislative jurisdiction over agriculture, which this parliament shares with the provincial legislatures.
I have never known a province to show much enthusiasm with regard to doing very much about immigration, except to criticize it. Perhaps that statement is a little bit unfair. There was a period at the time of the refugee program when some of the provincial governments were very generous indeed: I do not want to make any unfair reflection on them. But that is a very restricted field and not the field about which I think we were talking.
With regard to the third type of program I want to be very careful to choose the right words and as far as possible words that lend

themselves to easy translation from one official language to the other. I have reference to those programs that deal with fields of jurisdiction within the legislative competence of the provinces, and that is all that the hon. member for Levis, the hon. member for Lapointe and I have been talking about. Those are the only fields to which the program of the Liberal party has any reference, only those things that are exclusively within provincial jurisdiction.


Jacques Flynn: I am very glad to hear that.


John Whitney Pickersgill: From the date it was inaugurated the trans-Canada highway was recognized to be competely within provincial jurisdiction.


Jacques Flynn: That is not what your friend said.


John Whitney Pickersgill: The federal government undertook to assist financially, and that is all that we have ever done. Nobody has ever pretended that the highway itself would be owned by Canada. The highway is owned by the provinces. But the friends of the friends of the minister-I have to be very careful about this-


Jacques Flynn: When you go as far as that I think we both have the same friends.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Oh, no; I was referring to the Union Nationale, if I may put it plainly.


Jacques Flynn: The friend of the friend was Mr. Smallwood.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I am using the word "friend" in the correct parliamentary sense of political friends, and I have never made any pretensions of being a political friend of anyone connected with the Union Nationale. One hon. gentleman over there objected. He considered it an insult for me to refer to them as his friends, but I take it that the minister does not. At any rate, it is a well known fact that Mr. Duplessis objected very strenuously to the trans-Canada highway and to a great many other joint programs as invasions of provincial rights. It is also well known to some of us who were here before the minister came to this parliament that the hon. member for Three Rivers also objected violently to these programs and voted against them in this house on many occasions. I noticed that the minister was very skilful and clever in his reply in talking about the election in 1958. In the election of 1958 the Conservatives were rather muted about this, but if it were not out of order we could easily document the main line taken in the election of 1957 and taken for a while afterwards by the hon. member for Three Rivers who is the leading spokesman for the Conservative party
Supply-Labour
in Quebec in this house. That line was that these joint programs were an invasion of the provincial field.
It is very interesting to observe what is said in a little booklet called "Four Years of Action for Canada and Canadians" published by the Tory party. I do not know whether they published a French translation-


Jacques Flynn: They did.


John Whitney Pickersgill: -but if they did it shows even greater effrontery because whereas they formerly said that these joint programs were an invasion of provincial rights they are now boasting that they have more than doubled them in four years. So if the Liberals were invading the provincial field-


Jacques Flynn: I rise on a point of order, Mr. Chairman. The hon. member for Bonavista-Twillingate has been going very far indeed. As I said before to the hon. member for Levis, I do not mind discussing everything that the hon. member is now raising. However, he is going very far and I think he should restrict himself to the point with which he started.


Lionel Chevrier: He is answering you.


Jacques Flynn: I am willing to clarify any obscurity the hon. member may find in what I said. However, if he continues as he has been, I submit the debate will never end. We will not only be discussing joint programs, but the estimates of every other department. In this regard, I agree with the hon. member for Vancouver East.


John Whitney Pickersgill: On the point of order, Mr. Speaker, I should like to say that I am discussing exclusively the point made by the minister. I am seeking to find out what the policy of the government is in respect of these joint programs. I had to eliminate all these things the minister created by devising three kinds of joint programs. One kind does not exist at all; the other kind has a very limited application, and we are discussing the only one that has real application.
I am sure the minister would not dare claim that the federal government could go into any province in this country and establish technical schools because that would be a clear invasion of provincial jurisdiction.


Jacques Flynn: I did not say that.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I am not saying that the minister said that.


Jacques Flynn: You are clouding the issue.


John Whitney Pickersgill: The hon. gentleman did more to cloud the issue than anyone else, but his cloudiness was moderate compared with the cloudiness of the hon. member for

Supply-Labour
Roberval and not one member on this side sought to raise a point of order or to restrict the debate. It is only when an opposition member tries to speak that we have these constant points of order-


An hon. Member:: Not at all.


John Whitney Pickersgill: -and particularly by the retired chairman, who should make his retirement complete.


Jacques Flynn: Will the hon. member permit a question? Does the hon. member know what closure iii reverse might be? That is about what the hon. member has been doing.


John Whitney Pickersgill: The hon. member has asked me a question which is quite in order, and if the Chair would permit I should like to speak for about 40 minutes on closure. I would have a great deal to say. I know 'the Chair would not allow it, and I am not suggesting it. I say that the minister should realize he has retired from the chair now and is a minister of the crown. He has a very heavy responsibility of his own, so he should leave to the Chair the responsibilities of the Chair and we would make more progress.
1 realize that the minister, who is not a stupid man-I Concede that at once-is trying his best to get me off the point. I want to stay on the point because I want to find out, if I can, whether or not the minister was expressing the policy of the government this morning. Every time I attempt to define *it, the minister says it is not that and then he gets up and says the same thing in exactly the same words. I should like to know if I have this correctly. As I understand it, the minister said-I am referring to the notes I made when he spoke before lunch-it is only when a provincial government feels the federal law affects its exclusive jurisdiction, and I am not sure I got his exact words, that the federal government would consider a formula for compensation. Is that it? Then, I suppose this is the policy of the Minister of Finance and the Prime Minister as well as the other members of the cabinet.
We had, under our constitution, until the present government came into office, the doctrine of collective responsibility. When a minister of the crown speaks in his place in the house, he is speaking for the government, so we are entitled to assume that is now the position of the Diefenbaker government. I use that term advisedly because the old terms are not in much favour any more with this government. In other words, sir, and I think even the minister will find it hard to declare this question irrelevant, that means that if Mr. Lesage comes to Ottawa and says, we feel that this federal

law we are now discussing affects the exclusive jurisdiction of the province, the federal government is then ready to discuss compensation to the government of Quebec in substitution for this program. This is the plain meaning of what the minister has said, and the only meaning which can be attributed to it. I may say that was the precise position that was taken by Mr. Lesage in July, 1960, at the federal-provincial conference and was the precise position taken by the Liberal party at its national rally in January, 1961.
It is interesting to discover this degree of progress being made in the government since the minister joined it. Usually it takes about a generation for the Tory party to accept the position taken by the Liberal party, but it has only taken a little over a year this time. A year ago in January the Liberal party laid down this policy of compensation in the case of a province which wished to withdraw from a joint program. Today, on March 16, and this should be a red letter day, through the mouth of the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys the Diefenbaker government has accepted that Liberal program as enunciated in January, 1961.
Now, that is the point, sir, and you will appreciate that it would have been very unfair to the government to leave this matter in any doubt. It was for this reason I sought to carry the minister along on each point and make sure he did not disagree with anything I said. I say this marks a great advance on the part of the government and I congratulate the minister for having moved his colleagues so far so fast. I just wonder if the Minister of Finance will not be in here before the day is out or on Monday at least, to repudiate what the minister has said.
(Translation):


Jacques Flynn: Mr. Chairman, I will not speak very long because I know that my hon. friend from Bonavista-Twillingate would like to have the last word, but it is obvious that I cannot leave his question unanswered in the official report.
He interpreted what I said rather well. I said that we had established, under the terms of the legislation concerning grants to universities, the principle of compensation in case a province should consider that a law enacted or a decision taken by the federal parliament violated its legislative jurisdiction. My learned friend can draw the conclusions he will from my remarks, but they stand.
Second, I will explain my thoughts to him a little more clearly by saying that our position is to allow the provinces to initiative all the programs that fall within their jurisdiction.

That is why we thought it was essential, first of all, to hand back to the provinces the fiscal capacity, and especially the fiscal responsibility which would allow them to get rid of the obligation to fulfil duties imposed upon them by the constitution. That was all I said.
Of course, the hon. member could lead me into other fields, and I shall gladly meet his challenge in those fields, when I have the time and when my taking the floor here is not too demanding on the house's time.
(Text):


John Whitney Pickersgill: There is just one word I should like to say in reply to the diversion created by the minister. I am not going back to my other point. The minister, who was so anxious to observe the rules a while ago, is now talking about the fiscal agreements. The minister knows, or ought to know, that so far as Quebec is concerned no change has been made whatever by this government in the juridical position. Quebec never had a tax agreement. Its taxing rights were never in any way limited, so this government has made no change in that respect whatever. All the words the Tory ministers and members may use will not alter the plain facts which are known to every objective person.
(Translation):


Azellus Denis: Mr. Chairman, may I put a
question to the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys? Is it not true that this morning-


An hon. Member:: Go and consult your charter of Mr. Martineau.


Azellus Denis: Is it not true, Mr. Chairman, that this morning, the Minister of Labour stated that out of the amount provided for under this item, a certain amount was earmarked for the training of technical and vocational school teachers? Therefore, that concerns education and since the minister states that education comes under the jurisdiction of the provinces, is it not true that the minister is now approving what he rejected in the good old days of the Union Nationale?


An hon. Member:: Do not bother to answer that, it is not worth it.


Jacques Flynn: Mr. Chairman, this refers to the training of technical school teachers, which comes under the province and is accepted by the government which is sympathetic to my hon. friend.


Azellus Denis: Is it not true, Mr. Chairman, as regards another joint program, unemployment insurance, that the minister is approving today what he was opposed when the Union Nationale party was in power?
Supply-Labour
Is it not true that, together with the Union Nationale and its supporters, he denied workers unemployment assistance, a fact which our Conservative friends today refuse to admit?


Maurice Bourget: I should like you to call
the yeas and nays on the item now before us.
(Text):
Item agreed to: Yeas, 63; nays, nil. (Translation):


Guy Rouleau: Mr. Chairman, I rise on a question of privilege. On two occasions, that is before lunch and again a while ago, the hon. member for Roberval said that the hon. member for Dollard should pay his debts in L'Abord a Plouffe. There is absolutely no truth in that statement and I publicly declare, in this house, that I have no debt whatever. I feel the hon. member should accept my word. Furthermore, insinuations such as these are not allowed in this assembly.
Mr. Chairman, pursuant to the question of privilege I have just raised, I ask the hon. member for Roberval to withdraw his words.


Yvon Dupuis: Certainly.


Guy Rouleau: The insinuations made by the hon. member for Roberval reflect on a member of this house. I declare that I have no debts and I ask him to take back his words.


Paul Raymond Martineau: On the question of privilege, I suggest that the hon. member for Dollard (Mr. Rouleau) should have raised it when the statement was made.
Moreover, I am not sure whether the words that the hon. member takes exception to are on the record, but in any case, I think that the subject should be closed.


Guy Rouleau: Mr. Chairman, I appeal from your decision.


Alexis Pierre Caron: Report to the Speaker, that is the only procedure to follow.


Jacques Flynn: Mr. Chairman, with regard to the question of privilege raised by the hon. member for Dollard, I do not believe that the decision of the committee chairman could be appealed unless a formal motion is introduced. I feel that the hon. member for Dollard will agree with this point of view. (Text):


Maurice Bourget: Ask him to withdraw. It is simple. If he is a gentleman he will.


John Whitney Pickersgill: On the point of order raised by the hon. member, I think perhaps Your Honour did not appreciate that the remark to which my hon. friend took exception was made while the vote was being taken and it would be against the rules for the hon.

Supply-Labour
member-indeed it would be impossible for him to rise while the vote was being counted. He rose immediately afterwards and perhaps Your Honour did not observe that.


Paul Raymond Martineau: I did not hear the remarks alleged to have been made and I was under the impression these were remarks made in this morning's session.


Lionel Chevrier: Oh, no.


Paul Raymond Martineau: As the hon. member for Bonavista-Twillingate has informed the house that the remarks have just been made, and as the hon. member for Roberval is here, I would like to hear the hon. member on that point. The hon. member for Roberval.
(Translation):


Léonard-David Sweezey Tremblay: Mr. Chairman, could you tell me exactly what you expect of me?


Paul Raymond Martineau: The hon. member has no doubt heard the hon. member for Dollard rise on a question of privilege to say that the member for Roberval had made personal remarks. I would ask the hon. member for Roberval to explain in that connection.


Léonard-David Sweezey Tremblay: Mr. Chairman, I should really not want the people concerned to be deprived of the benefits they will derive from this excellent measure introduced by the Minister of Labour (Mr. Starr). Consequently, so as not to delay the proceedings of the house, 1 will just say that the hon. member who has risen on a question of privilege is most sensitive indeed and that he seems to be overimpressed by facts. However, if there was something offending for the hon. member during the verbal exchange which you did not hear, I am willing to withdraw what I said. Of course, that changes nothing in the situation.


Guy Rouleau: Mr. Chairman, I ask the hon. member for Roberval to withdraw his words without reservation. I have been in the house for the last nine years, and never, until now, have I heard a member speak thus of one of his colleagues, on whatever side of the house he was on. I would ask you, sir, to invite the hon. member for Roberval to withdraw his words without reservation, because the statement he made about me is completely false.


Paul Raymond Martineau: If I rightly understood, the hon. member for Roberval stated that if his words were of an offensive nature, he was withdrawing them.


Guy Rouleau: Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Roberval said that this would in no way alter the situation, and I do not think that this is the right way to withdraw one's remarks.
[Mr. Pickersgill.l


Léonard-David Sweezey Tremblay: Mr. Chairman, in order to
close this discussion, I want to say that I make no reservation with regard to facts.
(Text):


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Unemployment insurance commission-
669. To authorize the Minister of Finance, notwithstanding the Unemployment Insurance Act, to credit to the unemployment insurance fund in the fiscal year 1962-63 sums not exceeding in the aggregate $25,000,000 on such terms and conditions as the governor in council determines, $25,000,000.
Paul Raymond Martineau: Shall vote 669 carry?


John Whitney Pickersgill: No, sir. Surely the minister is going to make a statement.


Michael Starr: This item of $25,000,000 represents a loan to the unemployment insurance fund which will be taken up only in case of necessity between the end of May, when payments are at the accumulated peak, and the beginning of June when contributions once again begin to overtake payments. The officials of the unemployment insurance commission inform me that if economic conditions continue as they have for the past three months the fund will carry us over the critical period of the month of May.
However, this would not provide a safety margin in the event, for example, of heavy layoffs in some part of the country or, to take another example, the possibility of some regional unemployment arising from the effects of a labour dispute. Neither of these possibilities is envisaged at the present time. Nevertheless the officials feel it is wise to provide for such contingencies in order that no possibility may arise of a delay in payment of benefits for those who are entitled to have them.
At the end of January the balance in the fund was $135,877,305. The outgo from the fund for the payment of benefits is at the present time 17 per cent less than last year- another indication of the general economic improvement. The amount requested here in the form of a loan is, therefore, more in the nature of a safety measure to carry us over a critical period. If the money is not required, it will not be touched.


Mr. McMillan:: I do not think the minister told us what is the actual condition of the fund at the present time. He said the outgo from the fund was 17 per cent less than last year but he did not say by how much it exceeded income.
For a considerable time the advisory committee of the unemployment insurance fund has been making reports to the government. Ever since 1959 the government could not help but be aware that this fund was being rapidly depleted and would soon become

bankrupt. We constantly drew this situation to the attention of the government at the time, and the government promised to do something about it in the speech from the throne of November 1960. But they ended by doing nothing at all, and now they have to call on the treasury to put money into the fund and help to carry on. Perhaps I should not have said that the government has done nothing, because last year I remember there was an announcement that 44 sleuths, or detectives, had been appointed to watch this fund, particularly in Toronto and Montreal. Also, I heard the Prime Minister say on television that anyone who cheated this fund would either be put into jail or fined. That is the only contribution the government has made in respect of this fund since we heard the speech from the throne in November 1960. I think the minister should tell us how many prosecutions have occurred under the act. He should tell us, also, how many people have been put into jail as was threatened by the Prime Minister. He should tell us how much money has been recovered and how much it has cost to hire these 44 detectives.
I have read various reports of the advisory committee to the unemployment insurance fund. The one I have here is dated July 6, 1961 and it shows that in the fiscal year 19601961 the fund again experienced substantial losses. In the preceding fiscal year a total of $181 million was paid out; in other words, benefits had exceeded income by $181 million. At that time, as of June 30, there was only $184.6 million in the fund. Payments out of the fund had been exceeded only in the year 1958-59. Now we have had five years of heavy unemployment, and in each of those years the level of unemployment exceeded that which existed before 1957. In each year there has been a constant drain on this fund.
One indication of the level of employment and economic activity is the percentage of labour out of work and looking for work. The percentages are given here in table 1 of the report of the advisory committee of July 6, 1961. In January 1956, the percentage of unemployed stood at 5.6 of the labour force. It is important to notice that in the same year, or in four months of that year, unemployment fell to 1.7 per cent of the labour force. When we come to January, and to March of 1961, we see that unemployment has risen from 10.8 per cent to 11.3 per cent of the labour force. During 1960 it never once fell below 5 per cent of the labour force, and in the summer months of 1961 unemployment was still high. I think it is significant to note, as reported in some of these reports from the advisory committee, that in the last five years the civilian labour force has increased by 15 per cent while the increase in employment 26207-1-120
Supply-Labour
has only been at the rate of 8 per cent. When we bring up the question of unemployment in the house, the minister talks about the increase in the number of people who have found work. I would point out that this meagre increase is not even enough to look after the new people coming into the labour force; it only looks after about half of them. It does not look after any of the people who are referred to as being the hard core of unemployment.


An hon. Member:: What did you do about it?


William Hector McMillan: We did not have them.
Many of these people are now receiving welfare payments. Moreover, we are exporting some of our unemployment. We know that in the last year more people have left Canada than have come to Canada. Among those leaving Canada are some highly trained professional people. The present bankrupt condition of the unemployment insurance fund indicates two things, first, that the government has not come to grips to any extent with this problem of unemployment. The depletion of the fund was highest in 1959 when it was $244 million. In 1960 it was down to $133 million, and then it began to climb again. Last year, as I have said, it amounted to $181 million. The other point which is evident is that the losses taken through bad investments in Canadian government bonds and other Canadian securities exceed the amount of this loan of $25 million. If the government had not had these investment losses it would not be calling for this vote of $25 million.
The Minister of Finance announced in the house last year, I believe, that he was taking over these securities into the Department of Finance. It is up to the minister now to tell us whether these securities were taken over at par or at their face value. We have a right to know whether the losses will be taken by the unemployment insurance fund or by the treasury. From the report of the advisory committee we know there will be definite losses. These losses according to the report, will vary from 8 per cent to 9 per cent from their face value because of the depressed value of these securities.
If the Minister of Finance continues to hold these bonds he cannot get more than an average of 31 per cent for them and the minister cannot borrow money that cheaply. There will be a loss even if he holds them.
Many people who have exhausted these benefits have gone on direct welfare payments. The municipalities and provinces have had to assume further burdens as their share of these welfare payments. Not long ago I saw a newspaper article which indicated that the number of people in Ontario who were on

Supply-Labour
welfare increased by between 14 and 19 per cent. I notice that the hon. member for Stormont is not here. He is always coming to the rescue of the Minister of Labour when we are talking about people being unemployed. It was indicated that in Cornwall the increase in the number of those on welfare was higher than in any other place in Ontario.


Mr. Pugh:: Caused by the building of the seaway.


Lionel Chevrier: A lot you know about it.


William Hector McMillan: I do not know whether that is right but that appeared in the Toronto Globe and Mail.


Lionel Chevrier: That is completely false.


John Whitney Pickersgill: At least the seaway was built, unlike the Columbia.


William Hector McMillan: That was reported in the Globe and Mail two weeks ago. I do not know whether it is correct.


Mr. Pallell:: On a point of order, Mr. Chairman, the hon. member made reference to the fact that the hon. member for Stormont was not in the chamber. I appreciate that the hon. gentleman may not have seen the hon. member for Stormont sitting in his seat but perhaps he should correct that statement now.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Surely the hon. member for Stormont is capable of speaking for himself. If he is not, it is the first time.


An hon. Member:: He just came in.


Mr. Campbell (Stormont):: On a point of order, Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Stormont has been in his seat all the time. He has been conferring with a colleague. Open your eyes.


William Hector McMillan: What was that?


John Whitney Pickersgill: The hon. member said he has been in the house all the time but you just did not notice him.


William Hector McMillan: I am sorry. The hon. member was not in his seat when I looked a few moments ago.


Grant Campbell: That is better.


William Hector McMillan: May I say I am sorry there are so many more people on welfare in Cornwall than in other parts of Ontario.


Grant Campbell: May I ask the
hon. member a question? I think if he were to ask his colleague and my predecessor he could tell him the reason for the number of unemployed people in Cornwall. It is due to the fact that the locks have been removed from a canal which for 120 years flowed by our door. There is just a blank wall now.


Lionel Chevrier: Mr. Chairman, on the point my hon. friend has raised I feel I would be entitled to say that what the hon. member has stated is not only untrue but is inaccurate and wholly unfounded. As he well knows, or should know, the reason for the large unemployment figures is because this government has shown no interest in the unemployment problem-


Grant Campbell: What about the harbour?


Paul Raymond Martineau: Order. We are now getting into a matter of debate. The floor belongs to the hon. member for Welland. I would ask him to continue.


Grant Campbell: On a point of
order-


Lionel Chevrier: Mr. Chairman, if the hon. member is allowed to make the statement he made by way of interrupting the hon. gentleman who was already speaking, surely I am entitled to give in reply the reason for the unemployment figures being so high in Cornwall-


Paul Raymond Martineau: Order. Here is the situation. The hon. member for Stormont asked leave to direct a question to the hon. member who has the floor. That hon. gentleman has not yet replied nor has the hon. member who has the floor continued in the course of his remarks. If the hon. member for Stormont or the hon. member for Laurier have remarks to make they may make them in due course but their remarks are in the nature of a debate and at the moment I cannot entertain them. I can listen only to the hon. member for Welland who has the floor.


Alexis Pierre Caron: On that point of order, Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Stormont in putting his question to the hon. gentleman who has the floor spoke about the former member for Stormont, and the present member for Laurier is a former member for Stormont.


Paul Raymond Martineau: Order. I said and I repeat that in my judgment this is a matter for debate. Every hon. member who feels implicated by any remarks made, and provided they are pertinent to the debate, will have ample opportunity to make his position clear. The floor belongs to the hon. member for Welland.


Alexis Pierre Caron: These interruptions and remarks should be stopped by the Chair.


Paul Raymond Martineau: That is what I am trying to do.


Alexis Pierre Caron: But with success only on one side.


Paul Raymond Martineau: I am sure the hon. member for Hull would not wish to leave that remark on the record.
(Translation):


Paul Raymond Martineau: The hon. member for Hull (Mr. Caron) has just accused the chairman of being partial. I am sure he made that remark in the heat of the discussion. Therefore, I shall give him the opportunity of changing the words he used.


Alexis Pierre Caron: Mr. Chairman, we have noticed that you often look on this side and seldom on the other side when interruptions are made. That is why I made that remark.


Paul Raymond Martineau: I insist that the hon. member unconditionally withdraw the words he just used.


Alexis Pierre Caron: The chairman is more strict for the members on this side of the house than he was for the hon. member for Roberval (Mr. Tremblay).


Paul Raymond Martineau: I ask the hon. member for Hull to comply with the instruction that I am giving him with all due consideration. I am sure he agrees with me that no one should make such remarks to the chairman of this committee. I hope that he will take the opportunity I am offering him to withdraw unconditionally the remarks he has just made.
[Editor's note: The hon. member for Hull having given no reply.)


Paul Raymond Martineau: Do I understand that the hon. member refuses to withdraw his remarks?


Alexis Pierre Caron: Mr. Chairman, it is most difficult for me to withdraw remarks which are known to be true.


Paul Raymond Martineau: Then, I must report to the
Speaker.


Alexis Pierre Caron: Some remarks have been made from the other side of the house which should also be withdrawn.


Paul Raymond Martineau: I expect hon. members will refrain from further remarks until the arrival of Mr. Speaker.


Jacques Flynn: Dirty fellow.


Alexis Pierre Caron: The minister has just made an ungracious remark about me and I would ask him to withdraw.


Guy Rouleau: Mr. Chairman, I would ask you to have the hon. member for Quebec South (Mr. Flynn) withdraw the expression "dirty fellow" he just used concerning the member for Hull.
26207-1-120J
Supply-Labour


Paul Raymond Martineau: For the time being, this committee stands adjourned and it is not in order to continue this debate.
(Text):


Mr. Peters:: He will not make the other side withdraw.
Mr. Speaker resumed the chair, and the chairman of the committee made the following report:
While the committee of supply was considering the estimates of the Department of Labour the hon. member for Hull accused the Chair of displaying partiality in his ruling. He was invited to withdraw these remarks but persisted in his refusal to do so. I am therefore making the present report to you, Mr. Speaker.


Mr. Speaker:: Hon. members have heard the report of the chairman of the committee which involves the hon. member for Hull (Mr. Caron). In consequence of the report it is my duty to call upon the hon. member for Hull to make such explanations as he wishes to make to the house and then to withdraw so that the house can deal with the matter.


Alexis Pierre Caron: Mr. Speaker, 1 am willing to accept the consequences of my words, hoping that my action will ameliorate the situation in the committee of the house when we are sitting.


Mr. Speaker:: 1 think perhaps the hon. member for Hull should withdraw while the house considers what action should be taken.
And Mr. Caron having withdrawn:


Gordon Minto Churchill: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask a question at this stage. Were the words of the hon. member for Hull fully reported in Hansard? Is the record clear so that we know exactly what was said?


Mr. Speaker:: I can only consult with the chairman of the committee, or perhaps hon. members who sat in the committee would know. There was no interruption, 1 take it, in the reporting of the proceedings.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I would have thought, sir, that it was not competent to the house to inquire what went on in the committee beyond the report that was made to the house by the chairman.


Gordon Minto Churchill: That being the case, under the circumstances, Mr. Speaker, I have no other course than to move, seconded by the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys (Mr. Flynn):
That the hon. member for Hull (Mr. Caron)
be suspended from the house for the remainder of this day's sitting.


Lionel Chevrier: Mr. Speaker, I desire to say something on this motion, if I may.


Mr. Speaker:: The motion is not debatable. I must inform the hon. member for Laurier

Supply-Labour
that this is not a debatable motion. Is it the pleasure of the house to adopt the motion?


Some hon. Members:: Carried.


Some hon. Members:: No.


Lionel Chevrier: No, no. We are against it.


An hon. Member:: It is about time you woke up.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. Then I shall put the motion.


Lionel Chevrier: This is a shame.


William Hector McMillan: I am sorry to have had my remarks interrupted in the way in which they were. I did not mean to refer to Cornwall more than any other place that had a lot of unemployment and welfare because of the policies of this government. I know the hon. member for Stormont is very industrious and I believe his work here in this house should be directed towards overcoming that condition in his constituency, as we have been trying to do all along because of what we think has been the futility of the government's policy in overcoming unemployment.
Today we are asked to vote $25 million, and we are asked to vote it for two basic reasons. One is that for a long time the government did not admit that unemployment was a problem at all and, when they did, they did little or nothing to come to grips with it. The second reason is because of investment losses in the unemployment insurance fund.
The fiscal policies of the government could not be much better devised to cause high interest rates, stagnation in our economy, and unemployment. They could not be much better devised also to cause losses on securities held in that fund. They certainly depressed the value of bonds and other securities in the portfolio of the fund. Now the government try to evade responsibility for unemployment and for the investment losses in that fund, but they must take responsibility for both.
The unemployment insurance fund was built up to $928 million under the former government but this government have depleted practically all of it. The mere presence of the fund and the fact that this government could fall back on it to cushion the effect of unemployment has caused the government to take a laissez faire attitude towards many problems. In fact the government have just coasted along, depending on that money. I hate to think what would have happened if this fund had not been in existence. Undoubtedly the public would have been very vocal and the government would have long since started to snap out of their present lethargy.
The government have not been frank with hon. members regarding the unemployment insurance fund and I do not think the minister was frank today. He did not give us many figures at all. The advisory committee of the fund brought in a special report on October 27, 1960. The government kept that report for

six weeks and then tabled it in the dying hours of the last day before we adjourned at Christmas time, in December, 1960.
The speech from the throne in November, 1960, indicated that the government would bring in some amendments to the Unemployment Insurance Act, and on various occasions in 1959, 1960 and 1961, we in the opposition warned the government about the serious situation in the unemployment insurance fund. We knew the losses they were taking because of bad investments and we also knew, and brought it to the attention of the government, that they were paying out much more than they were taking in. The government, however, did not have any ideas of their own to incorporate into amendments to restore the fund to a healthy state.
What have they done? They have appointed a royal commission to take the heat off, and they did just the same thing in connection with their fiscal and monetary policy when they appointed a royal commission. The composition of these two commissions, no matter how distinguished they may be, can only come up with one answer, one finding, and that is that you cannot spend more than you take in, unless you go broke. This is a basic truth which we have been bringing to the attention of the government ever since they came to power. Now they have two expensive royal commissions to tell them that truth.
The trouble with both royal commissions is that they are about three or four years too late. The funds have disappeared and they are called on to act as caretakers or advisers for bankrupt funds. The appointment of the royal commission in connection with this fund as well as other funds has just put off the day of reckoning, the day when the government have to account to the people for funds now bankrupt that were formerly healthy.
The Liberal government set up the unemployment insurance fund and saw it grow to a total of $928 million. To do that they did not have to appoint a royal commission, but this government want a royal commission to help them get back on the right track. However the government must look deeper than this fund. They must put people back to work and keep them at work.
There has been gross mismanagement of the fund. I know working people who have been paying into the fund ever since it came into existence nearly 20 years ago. They helped to build up the fund. Now they have to help replenish it through their taxes, and later they will have to pay higher contributions to put the fund in a healthy state again and make it solvent. I say the working people
Supply-Labour
of Canada have been taken for a ride and I hope this $25 million will not be used in the coming election to help buy the electorate.
I know that before the last federal election it was much easier to qualify for benefits under the Unemployment Insurance Act than it was afterwards, and I brought that up in the house. I also said in this chamber that I have heard of some people who were notified by one unemployment insurance office to go and get their cheques after they had been on a pension for some time. I take exception to this mismanagement of the fund. I do not think there should be any relaxation of the rules before an election. But, certainly it was much easier before the last election. Many people do say that it was much easier to qualify before the last election on March 28, 1958, than it was afterwards.


Grant Campbell: Would the hon. member permit a question? Does he not know that the unemployment in Cornwall has been caused by difficulties in the textile industry, and that the efforts of this government to relieve that industry have been frustrated by the Liberal Senate? Does he not know that the other cause of unemployment is the fact that the seaway locks were constructed on the United States side of the river?


John Whitney Pickersgill: Who has been in office for the last five years?


An hon. Member:: No one.


John Whitney Pickersgill: No one, as my hon. friend from Trinity says.


William Hector McMillan: I have heard of some of the actions taken by this government to help unemployment but I do not think they will help Cornwall or any other place in Canada. I do not know what has caused the present conditions in Cornwall, but the hon. member seems very active and I think he should get up in the house once in a while to try and influence his government in connection with unemployment. I have not heard him do that yet.


Grant Campbell: Does the hon. member not approve of the spending of more than $500,000 on a harbour in Cornwall to provide jobs, in replacement of those lost to the Americans? Does he not approve of the spending of more than $1.5 million on technical schools in Cornwall? Does he not regard that as desirable?


William Hector McMillan: I do not want to get into a debate with the hon. member from Stormont. I do not know how much has been spent on the harbour in Cornwall. But if you spend money on harbours you must also get the plants to locate there. I do not know

Supply-Labour
whether they expect any new plants there or not. I do not know whether just building a harbour is the answer. They may never secure a new plant as far as I know.


Harold Edward Winch: If my memory is correct, it is only a few years ago that there was something in the neighbourhood of $900 million in the unemployment insurance fund. Now this fund has reached such a low ebb that the government finds it necessary to ask the House of Commons to authorize a loan of $25 million to be available should a contingency arise, such as an increase of unemployment in the next few months because of industrial disputes or because of heavy layoffs in certain areas.
This situation must lead one, of necessity, to one of two conclusions, or perhaps to both: first, that no solution has been found to the problem of unemployment; second, that changes are necessary in the Unemployment Insurance Act so as to place it on a more stable foundation. The necessity for this supplementary estimate which is before the committee at the present time demonstrates that the problem of unemployment has not been resolved, though this is also evident from a study of the monthly returns issued by the dominion bureau of statistics. I am not particularly interested in statistics. I cannot become excited by them because, to me, whether there are one million people unemployed or 100,000 unemployed there is still a serious problem to be tackled.
But the fact we must all try to remember is this: in the event of unemployment the only protection an unemployed person has, is either a reliance on unemployment insurance or reliance on welfare. It must also be recognized that reliance on either of these means of assistance does not produce much in the way of security; it means a bare subsistence. However, it is necessary that these two means of help be available so as to provide some protection for those who, unfortunately, become unemployed.
There is one phase of this question which interests me. If a person is not eligible for unemployment insurance and has to rely on welfare, he receives assistance which is financed jointly by the federal government and the provincial government. That help is paid out as required, and no loans are made to the welfare fund. The money is paid out because of the necessity that exists. When the farmers are in trouble because of crop failure or a drought we have such a situation as was witnessed this session when the house was asked to approve the spending of $43 million for the assistance of these farmers because of their economic situation. Everybody voted for it. That was not a loan to the farmers. That was an
[Mr. McMillan.[
outright gift to them because of the difficulties in which they found themselves. I fail to understand the reason for the difference in policy in the two cases. A farmer who was in difficulties on account of drought last year cannot recoup his losses; his crops have been lost. An unemployed man cannot do so either; his employment has been lost. I cannot understand why there should be an outright gift in one case and a loan in the other.
There is no question that we have to build up the fund so that in the case of need the money is there to take care of the unemployed in accordance with the regulations of the act. However, I wish this was an outright grant to the fund, and therefore a grant to those who are unemployed, in the same way as we make grants to assist agricultural producers, not merely to the extent of $42 million, as we recently did, but to the extent of hundreds of millions. They are both workers in different phases of our economy.
First of all, of course, we must get down to tackling the problem of unemployment in all its aspects. But there is another matter which arises in this connection. After all the years during which we have been told that something was to be done to overhaul the Unemployment Insurance Act, surely the fact that this particular supplementary estimate is before us today demonstrates that the time has long passed when a complete study of the act should be undertaken with a view to a thorough overhaul of its provisions so as to place it on a sure and firm foundation.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Chairman, the reason we have to lend $25 million out of the treasury to the unemployment insurance fund is the fact, as the minister himself has indicated, that the fund must have enough money in it to meet its obligations until that season of the year arrives when the minister hopes and we all hope the intake into the fund will exceed the outgo, some time in the spring. It seems to me, as the hon. member for Welland said so well earlier this afternoon, that this is an evidence of the irresponsible and ostrichlike approach of this government to the whole problem of unemployment, it seems that we are faced with a confession by the government on March 16, 1962, when according to rumours the government is contemplating an appeal to the country, that they have let the fund get into this appalling mess and did not do anything about it.
It has been perfectly apparent to everyone in this country except the government that this situation was developing. As early as three years ago the government themselves mentioned in the speech from the throne- indeed they promised it before the election

of 1958-that they would amend the Unemployment Insurance Act. The only amendment they made was to increase the contribution in a desperate effort to overcome the bleeding of the fund.
This government has pretended ever since they got into office that the amount of unemployment has been grossly exaggerated by other people, notably by the opposition, and that it was not really serious. Indeed they pretended that it was not any more serious than it was when the previous government was in office. But the best evidence of the blindness of the government and their utter refusal to face facts or reality is the fund itself, this fund which from 1942 to 1957 built up to the point where it contained at its peak, as my friend the hon. member for Welland pointed out, nearly $1 billion; I think $928 million was the figure to the nearest million.
All that except $100 million has been dissipated, and indeed the government is afraid it will all be dissipated and that the fund may require a loan. Therefore it is asking parliament to authorize this loan.
Now, at the very time this is happening in the house, what kind of picture is given to the country by the leader of the government? Surely one would have expected the Prime Minister speaking on "The Nation's Business" to face up to the problem and to put the facts before the people, to put the grimness and seriousness of the situation with respect to the fund before the population. But not a word was said of that nature in the broadcast the Prime Minister gave on Wednesday night at the very time this matter was before the house, when the minister's estimates were brought before us.
Listen to what the Prime Minister had to say about unemployment. He said:
And I come to the employment situation. It's been better every month during the last six or seven months-
Not a suggestion that the period before the past six or seven months were the worst months since the thirties. Not a hint of that. Just:
-It's been better every month during the last six or seven months.
As a matter of fact one cannot help but suspect that the Prime Minister had the assistance of the incomparable Minister of Public Works in the preparation of this extraordinary document.


An hon. Member:: It is true.


John Whitney Pickersgill: No doubt it is true. I would suggest that they are eminently suited to one another.


Mr. Walker:: I thank the hon. member.
Supply-Labour


John Whitney Pickersgill: And it serves them both right. The Prime Minister said, and I repeat: It's been better every month during the last six or seven months compared with the corresponding month in the previous year.


David James Walker: Is that not correct?


John Whitney Pickersgill: I say, sir, that was the worst period since the thirties.


Mr. Cardiff:: Doom and gloom.


John Whitney Pickersgill: What more doom and gloom could you have than the minister's statement that he had exhausted $928 million and was having to ask the treasury to lend money to this fund after only four years of administration by this government. The real gloom and doom came with this government and it will not go as long as we have this government.


David James Walker: Turn off that record.


John Whitney Pickersgill: No one can manage the affairs of the country when we have not a government; and we have had no government and no administration in Canada-just a collection of buck passers-ever since June 21, 1957. They have never faced a single problem.


Lewis Elston Cardiff: Find a new approach. You have worn that one out.


John Whitney Pickersgill: The people of Canada are going to have a new government just as soon as they are given a chance and the hon. gentleman who interrupts will be home in Huron county after that.


Lewis Elston Cardiff: How much do you bet? How
much money have you got?


John Whitney Pickersgill: I should think after the earlier experience this afternoon hon. gentlemen would allow me to deal with the subject that is before us-


David James Walker: The seventy fifth playing of the same record.


John Whitney Pickersgill: -without any assistance from that distinguished privy councillor the Minister of Public Works-


David James Walker: Hear, hear.


John Whitney Pickersgill: -who has done so much to elevate the tone of public life in this country-


David James Walker: Thank you.


John Whitney Pickersgill: -since he was elected to this parliament and who has the modesty to applaud himself.


Augustin Brassard: He does not recognize sarcasm.

Supply-Labour


John Whitney Pickersgill: I wish to repeat these words:
It's been better every month during the last six or seven months compared with the corresponding month in the previous year.
Then the Prime Minister goes on:
Unemployment has been a serious problem not only in Canada but the United States.
The occupants of treasury benches did not say those things in the winter of 1955 when they were preaching calamity about unemployment.


David James Walker: Oh, stop it.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Oh, I recall those words of the Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance. Hon. members will recall the day I read the speech made by the present Minister of Finance in 1954 about unemployment and he got up and asked why I did not tell the truth. He did not know I was merely reading his own words about a situation that was not very serious and applying it to a situation which it really did fit. I suggest that hon. gentlemen spend less time looking in the mirror and admiring themselves and a little more time looking about the country and seeing what the facts are in Canada.


David James Walker: You would not dare look in the mirror.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Well, I do not waste my time looking in the mirror. I really try to pay some attention to the task I was elected to do and do not devote myself exclusively to self-congratulation-


David James Walker: You are on the verge of a breakdown.


John Whitney Pickersgill: -which is the principal activity both of the Prime Minister and the Minister of Public Works. The Minister of Public Works says the Prime Minister is the greatest parliamentarian we ever had here-


David James Walker: Hear, hear.


John Whitney Pickersgill: -and no doubt he believes it. But in his famous words about the statistics from the dominion bureau of statistics that Mr. Barkway produced the other evening; he may believe it but nobody else would.
I return to this document. The Prime Minister went on:
And Canada has always faced unemployment in the wintertime because of our stern conditions.
That, sir, is not in fact true. Canada has not always faced severe unemployment in the wintertime although there is a tendency for a certain amount of unemployment to develop

in that season. Here is the Prime Minister giving a clear, honest and straightforward picture as he always does:
Unemployment rose to high levels on more than one occasion in the early 1950's.
That is typical. First he blames the Americans and then he tries to create the impression that the situation was bad in the days of the previous government.


Lewis Elston Cardiff: Well, wasn't it?


John Whitney Pickersgill: There was only one month, sir, in the whole post-war period until 1957- only one month-when the unemployment was as bad as it has been on the average since this government came into office at all seasons of the year, and yet this is the kind of picture the Prime Minister seeks to give the Canadian people, the kind of picture he presents of the nation's business, as it is now. I continue:
But the tremendous upsurge of the economy is providing more and more jobs.
I am sorry that we still have not the D.B.S. report in order to see how many more there were in February than there were in January. However, from the last figures we had one thing we know is this. The labour force of this country grew by only 13,000 in the year 1961, which means that more people left Canada to live elsewhere than came to Canada to live in that year and our own young people could not find jobs. That is what that terrible statistic means. It means that the country has ceased growing altogether. Those are the D.B.S. figures. I suppose everybody in the country except the Minister of Public Works would accept them. However, as I say, we get this kind of statement from the Prime Minister:
We've mitigated the effects of unemployment in a vast public works program.
May I say this. If they have mitigated the effect of unemployment, it is just appalling to think what it would have been if it had not been for the vast public works program as, notwithstanding this alleged mitigation, it has been at an intolerably high level during the whole period during which this government has been in office.
Then the Prime Minister continues-but really it is fruitless to read any more. It is of the same ilk, pretending that the facts are not there, refusing to face reality. However, he sends the Minister of Labour in here to face the reality; and the reality is that the minister has exhausted this fund, this $928 million which was accumulated. Why was it accumulated? It was accumulated because during the whole period from 1942 to 1957 there was virtually full employment. That is why the money was there. How did the

money get there? It got there because the people who were employed paid their unemployment insurance premiums as did their employers. That is how the money got into the fund. Why is it gone? It is gone because people have been unemployed. Oh, maybe the minister lost a bit, or at least maybe others lost a bit for the minister-the Minister of Finance, mainly-by bad management of the fund. I will leave that question to the hon. member for Welland who understands these things better than I do. However, most of it is gone because people have been unemployed and it has been paid out to the unemployed. That is why this money is all gone- unless the minister or rather the commission has been paying out millions to people who were not unemployed; and I do not believe that for a moment.


Lewis Elston Cardiff: We did not have two wars to boost our economy when we were in power.


John Whitney Pickersgill: May I say this; if the hon. gentleman wishes to start a war in order to boost the economy, he will not find many other Canadians who are with him.


Lewis Elston Cardiff: That is what boosted the economy.


John Whitney Pickersgill: It is extraordinary, is it not, Mr. Chairman, how the Tories always have an excuse for their failures while the Liberals are not obliged to make excuses because, when there is a Liberal government, there are not the failures. That seems to be the difference, as the hon. gentleman has aptly illustrated through his helpful intervention. I hope he will make some more interventions as he is extremely helpful in them.


David James Walker: We are straightening out your mess.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Oh, yes; that is another favourite theme of the Minister of Public Works.


David James Walker: That is right.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I will tell the hon. gentleman about the mess.


David James Walker: All right.


John Whitney Pickersgill: There was $928 million in the unemployment insurance fund and-


David James Walker: Louder.


John Whitney Pickersgill: -there was about 140,000 unemployed when this government took office. The figure has never got down to that level since these gentlemen took their seats on the treasury benches. There was a surplus in the treasury. That was the mess.
Let us look at the situation now, Mr. Chairman. The situation that we find is this. One billion dollars have been dissipated from
Supply-Labour
the unemployment insurance fund. Two billion dollars have been added to the national debt. We have the worst unemployment situation since the 30's. After five years in office the ministers are talking as though they could not do anything, as though they were helpless, as though they had no influence on events and as though, after five years in office, Mr. Howe, Mr. Harris and Mr. St. Laurent are still to blame for the fact that when these gentlemen took office the budget was balanced, the national debt was being paid off and there was virtually no unemployment and the fund was overflowing. That was the mess. If the Minister of Public Works has such a distorted vision-and I use the term advisedly-that this is what he regards as a mess, I would suggest that a great many of the people of Canada would be extremely glad to have that mess again compared with what we have now. However, that is not all.


David James Walker: Tell us about the hidden report.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Oh, I will tell you about the hidden report. 1 suggest to the minister that he read the Winnipeg Free Press lor this week with regard to the hidden report and he will not want ever to hear it mentioned again. I suggest to the hon. gentleman that he just walk out of the chamber, go to the library and read it right now.


David James Walker: I wish to hear the hon. member.,


John Whitney Pickersgill: The hon. gentleman will hear me in good time. However, I am speaking about the unemployment insurance fund at the moment and I intend to continue doing so regardless of the assistance 1 get from the Minister of Public Works.
It would be bad enough, Mr. Chairman, if they had just bankrupted the fund. However, what do this incredible government do? They published a little booklet called, "Still More Action for Canada and Canadians". This is the latest edition of Tory propaganda. I just hope the people of Canada all read it and understand what it is really saying. I am going to read just one paragraph and here it is:
The infamous Liberal "threshold clause" was removed from existing unemployment assistance legislation thereby extending benefits to all Canadians instead of those from only six provinces, as under the Liberals.
Whatever that incomprehensible sentence means I should not like to say, as I do not think anybody could make any sense out of it. Evidently some words were left out. However, the really important part is what follows:
Federal contributions have been increased by more than 847.7 per cent-from $7.9 million in the last year under the Liberals to $75 million in 1961-62.

Supply-Labour
They are asking for $88 million this coming year. Then they are boasting about increasing this unemployment relief. Did you ever in your life hear of any government in any country in the world boast about increasing unemployment relief by 800 per cent?


Mr. Baldwin:: It is my recollection of the rules that when a member reads from what appears to be a valuable public document, he should put the whole document on file.


John Whitney Pickersgill: This subject has been discussed a good many times here, and Your Honour knows very well that no one is permitted to table documents in the house except members of the government. I hope the hon. member, who is a very courteous member of the house, will not seek to join some of the less courteous ones in attempting to interfere with the continuity of what I have to say. What I am saying is that, not content with bankrupting the unemployment insurance fund and coming here and asking for a loan, which perhaps is not big enough, incidentally-and I wish to ask the minister a question about that matter at the conclusion of my remarks -they boast that they have increased relief or welfare by 800 per cent. I have heard governments make some queer boasts, but the queerest boast of all is to have increased relief by 800 per cent. It seems to me that one paragraph alone in this document is enough to destroy this government in every part of this country. Here is their list of achievements: increasing unemployment relief by 800 per cent. We on this side of the house regard unemployment relief as a necessary evil, something that should be as little necessary as possible, not something to boast about and say how big you are getting it, or how much you are spending on relief. That gives you, as I say, Mr. Chairman, an idea of this "Through the Looking Glass" attitude of this extraordinary government of mirror vision. That is the only expression one can apply. The Prime Minister looks at himself in the mirror, perhaps not as often as the Minister of Public Works does, and they admire themselves and see there what they want to see.


Paul Raymond Martineau: Order. I am sure the hon. member will agree that these remarks are not pertinent to this item.


Lionel Chevrier: There is nothing the matter with them at all. I rise on a point of order. There was absolutely nothing the matter and nothing contrary to the rules of the house in what the hon. member had to say concerning the Minister of Public Works, certainly nothing to compare with what the Minister of Public Works has been saying repeatedly about those of us who sit on this side of the house. I say to you with deference that the

hon. member has a perfect right to say what he has said. Surely the time has come in this house, Mr. Chairman, when we on this side ought to be able to say some things. After all, this afternoon we were given an example of nothing but complete obstruction on the part of hon. members on the other side of the house. All one has to do is to look at Hansard to see what happened last night. Those who sit on the other side of the house have continually interrupted every speech made from this side, the speech of the hon. member for Levis, and now the hon. member who has the floor is being interrupted because he makes passing reference to the Minister of Public Works, which I submit to you with deference is not contrary to the rules of the house.


David James Walker: What about the mirror?


Paul Raymond Martineau: Naturally the Chair deplores as much as anyone the interruptions that take place and I hope that there will be no more. There have been many interjections back and forth and I do not think it helps an intelligent study of this item. I think the hon. member for Bonavista-Twillingate will want to restrict his remarks to this item as he is trying to do.


John Whitney Pickersgill: My reference, sir, was primarily to the head of the government. I am one of those old fashioned people who believe that the head of a government is responsible for everything that government does. That is what we understand to be the situation under our British system. He has to take the responsibility for everything that is done by his colleagues whom he keeps in his cabinet, and 1 do not envy him, sir, particularly in some cases.
One of his colleagues is the Minister of Labour who has the misfortune to be saddled with the responsibility for this bankrupt fund. It seems to me that when 1 suggest that the Prime Minister is gazing in a mirror, and not facing facts, that is perfectly normal, valid criticism, and I may say that I did not think even this thin-skinned government was quite that thin-skinned. What I am saying, sir, is that the government refused to face the problem. That made it necessary for the government to ask for this loan for the unemployment insurance fund, and they certainly are not doing the things they said they would do about this problem. The only reason this vote is before us, the only reason this loan is being sought is unemployment, persistent unemployment at an intolerable level, a level so high that, notwithstanding the very marked improvement in business activity, the Minister of Labour cannot derive very much satisfaction from reading the leading editorial in the Financial Post this

week, which is a very accurate and sober appraisal of the situation. Nor can it give the minister much satisfaction to hear what Mr. Macaulay, the minister of trade and industry or whatever it is-they change names in Toronto so often that it is hard to keep up with them-said the other day. He said that we have to have a million more jobs in this country in the next few years, and that is true because our population continues to grow, and employment is not growing with it. That is the problem.


John Cameron Pallett: What was wrong with that statement?


John Whitney Pickersgill: It is a difficult problem. It is a problem that we on this side of the house are very anxious to co-operate in solving, if any solutions are offered; but this government refuses to offer solutions. It pretends that the problem does not exist. It is very difficult to co-operate with people who have to take the initiative but have no initiative to take, and do not know how to take an initiative. This is also, of course, completely out of accord with the pretensions of the government when it came into office with respect to this matter.
I want to say a word or two about those pretensions because they are very relevant. If the government had really done the things they promised we would not be asked to pass this vote now. Therefore what I am about to say is strictly relevant. We know that unemployment and, indeed, even employment were hardly mentioned at all by hon. gentlemen opposite five years ago when they were out of power and seeking office. They now pretend that unemployment then was a terrible problem and a terrible mess, but they were not bright enough to see it then. I have gone over the Prime Minister's utterances fairly frequently and I cannot find a reference to unemployment in any of them.


David James Walker: He did not have the hidden report.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Before June 10, 1957 it is true that on one occasion, April 25, 1957, he did say in Toronto that full employment with the highest possible standard of living would be one of the primary objectives of his government. Sir, if that has continued to be one of their primary objectives, no government has ever fallen farther from the achievement of an objective than this government has because, as I say, employment-wise they have taken the country back to the days when we last had a Tory government in the 30's. Then; the Prime Minister told the premiers in November, 1957, that there was just a brief pause and not to worry about unemployment. He had then been in office for five months and that
Supply-Labour
was his considered judgment given to the premiers at the federal-provincial conference. He told them it was just a pause, nothing serious. On December 10, 1957, the Minister of Labour went to Montreal and made a speech in which he said that all economists agreed that unemployment was not a bit serious and was going to go away in no time.
In 1958, when they finally had to face the facts during the election campaign, what did they tell the people? What kind of hopes did they hold out? Did they tell the people they were going to increase relief 800 per cent? Is that what the people were told? No; what they told them was that "no one will suffer from unemployment". There are many variations of this theme, sir, and since there has been a lot of dispute about it perhaps it would be as well if the record were set straight. In a telecast from Montreal on February 18, 1958, the Prime Minister said:
As long as I am Prime Minister ... everything that can be done-everything without regard to limit-will be done to the end that no one will suffer.
"Everything without regard to limit". At Coxheath, Nova Scotia, on February 28 he said-


John Cameron Pallett: What comes after the word "suffer" in that first quotation? You surely have not got the end of a sentence there.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I have given the complete quotation and the hon. gentleman can look it up for himself. If he thinks there is anything wrong with it he can refute it. The Prime Minister was reported in the Montreal Star to have said in Coxheath, Nova Scotia, on February 28, 1958:
No Canadian without work would suffer as long as I am Prime Minister regardless of whether we have deficit financing or not.
That was the second promise about "no one will suffer". Then, in a telecast from Toronto on March 4, 1958, he said:
As long as I am Prime Minister this government will not rest while one Canadian remains out of work. No one will be allowed to suffer.
Then we all know the Prime Minister's favorite quotation. It is one that has reference to public works. He did make a reference once or twice to public works in connection with this matter, but only once or twice. Most of the time he made other statements that he does not seem to like to remember so well. In one reported speech at Prince Albert on February 14, 1958, he was quoted as adding after "no one will suffer" the words "so far as public works can meet the situation". If anyone dares to suggest that promise has been kept, "so far as public works can meet the situation"-

Supply-Labour


David James Walker: May I ask the hon. gentleman a question?


John Whitney Pickersgill: Yes.


David James Walker: Does my hon. friend not agree that the average expenditure under Liberal administrations from 1945 to 1957 was less than $90 million a year and our average has been $210 million a year? Does that not answer the question? In addition, 660,000 houses have been built.


John Whitney Pickersgill: The hon. gentleman has asked his question but perhaps he might save his speech until I have finished. The hon. gentleman is boasting that this government has spent more than the Liberal government. I will not argue with him. They have spent more on everything. They have put the country hopelessly into debt, but they have not corrected unemployment with public works and that is what was promised. That promise has not been kept. Neither has the promise been kept that everything, without regard to limit, would be done. Neither has the promise been kept that there would be no suffering regardless of deficit financing.
But there was an even more far reaching promise than that, sir, and it is very directly related to this vote. At Brantford on February 17, 1958, the Prime Minister said:
The people who are unemployed will not be put in the false position of being put on relief.
Let me repeat that:
The people who are unemployed will not be put In the false position of being put on relief.


Paul Raymond Martineau: I hesitate to interrupt the hon. member, but his time has expired.


Lionel Chevrier: May I bring to Your Honour's attention the fact that the speech of the hon. gentleman was interrupted by points of order and in that case I submit to you, sir, he has the right to go on for another 30 minutes.


Paul Raymond Martineau: As I understand it, the hon. member only yielded the floor for points of order which do not constitute a ground for extending the time of the hon. member.


Lionel Chevrier: He yielded the floor to the Minister of Public Works.


Paul Raymond Martineau: That is so, he yielded the floor, but it was on his own time that the question was answered.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I have really reached the termination of my remarks, anyway. I just wanted to point out that, the Prime Minister having promised that no one would go on relief, the government now boasts about increasing relief by 800 per cent.
(Translation):


Augustin Brassard: Mr. Chairman, I should like to add a few words to those
(Mr. Pickersgill.]
of my colleagues concerning the $25 million which the government is about to grant to the unemployment insurance commission.
When, in 1958-59, we asked the government to admit that there was in fact an unemployment problem, we were accused then, as we have been again this afternoon, of being prophets of doom and gloom. Now, if we refer to the 1946-1957 period and determine the yearly average of the percentage of the labour force who were unemployed, we find that it did not exceed 3 per cent. I am speaking of the average per year. In June 1957, when we handed over the administration of this country to the present government, there were approximately 160,000 men and women without work. By early autumn, in that same year, there were already 225,000.
I do not wish to dwell on that question, but I would like to offer the Minister of Labour (Mr. Starr) a suggestion. Two years ago, while discussing the estimates of his department, I spoke about industrial mechanization. Our production methods are improving all the time. Some people say that automation only cuts down the number of jobs while others, on the contrary, claim that besides improving production methods, automation makes for new jobs which in many cases, are better paid.
It seems to me that efficiency in industry is today one of the main economic challenges of our time. Production is not everything. You must also dispose of your production. Since our domestic market, in many sectors, cannot consume all our national output, we must look for foreign outlets. We must then take into account the fact that we have to compete with other nations.
In their report number 8 on the advent of automation, the research services of the Department of Labour said that the impact of the technological advance on employment varies from one area to the other. Reference is made, for instance, to other jobs and to the ability of some peope to adapt themselves to other kinds of work. Reference is also made to collective bargaining and other factors.
Some people would resist automation. In my opinion, it is imperative that we adapt ourselves to the times in which we are living, and that we take the necessary steps to be able to do so. Even the most vocal advocates of industrial automation are showing some concern about the future of mankind, on account of that technological revolution now bursting upon the world, and in this country particularly.
I think we must be prepared to face a profound transitional period as well as a sort of industrial upheaval.

The deputy minister of public health in Ontario, Mr. James S. Band, said, not more than a year and a half ago, that within ten years four workers out of five would lose their jobs on account of industrial automation.
I think that from a human and social stand point, this is an almost tragic consequence.
The Canadian Labour Congress bulletin quoted also, in its February 1961 issue, the result of a study made by Mr. W. R. Dymond, director of economics and research, Department of Labour, and submitted to the Senate manpower committee.
It is a very short paragraph, but I should like to read it for the hon. members:
(Text):
In the ten years since 1949, production in the Canadian motor vehicle industry rose 49.8 per cent, while employment rose only 11 per cent. In the motor vehicle parts industry, production rose 19.7 per cent, and employment 6.8 per cent; in electrical apparatus and supplies, production rose 81.6 per cent and employment 40.6 per cent; in the machinery industry, production rose 33.7 per cent and employment 16.8 per cent; in household appliances, production rose 53.7 per cent and employment 19.3 per cent.
(Translation):
Even though the Minister of Labour created, within his department, a research division which studied and is still studying the impact of industrial automation, I would ask him to extend further this survey on automation.
He could ask for the opinions of representatives of management and labour, of universities, of provincial and municipal governments and agriculture, and set up a commission, even at this late date. That should have been done long ago.
I think that the committee which is now studying the question, with the best intentions in the world and the most qualified people, does not go far enough in its inquiry, apart from the fact that its staff is not large enough to do the job entrusted to it.
Social implications and effects of technological progress must be considered with the thought of what is to be man's part in that progress, and above all of what the impact of automation is likely to be on our social structure.
I know that the Minister of Labour is concerned with these questions but he seems to be the only one among his cabinet colleagues to consider this problem. He should ask people from industry to help him.
Since 1957, the government has often urged an improvement in relationships between employers and employees. This is a good opportunity to get together representatives from those two groups because both employers and employees are interested in that
Supply-Labour
question. Canadians as a whole are particularly interested in that question.
A commission should be appointed to study the full impact of automation throughout the country, and I am sure that solutions will be submitted to it which-even if some are long term solutions-will contribute to eradicate or at least decrease to a great extent that social plague of unemployment which is a sore on our present system.
I already said on many occasions that I believe in free enterprise, but I also believe in the intervention of higher authorities whenever and wherever free enterprise cannot or does not wish to fulfil its duties.
Some companies may attach a little more importance to their profits than to their social role in the development of a country or its economy.
I urge the minister to consider those suggestions and I am looking forward to the day when, at last, concrete solutions will be found to unemployment.
(Text):


Lionel Chevrier: I wonder if I could have the attention of the house to make a suggestion to the house leader, which I hope will be of a constructive nature. It is not my intention in anything I intend to say now to be critical, but I am mindful of the fact that there is some urgency about getting these supplementary estimates through the house. Again I repeat I do not want to be critical of those who have taken up the time of the house, because they have been from the other side of the house as well as from this side.
What I want to say is that we are not prepared to give up our right to criticize these very large supplementary estimates, particularly when we have no assurance that we shall have a chance to debate the main estimates for next year. However we are not anxious to contribute to hardship which might result if bills were not paid, and particularly if salaries and wages were not paid. Therefore, if the Minister of Finance will give us detailed particulars of the votes where real hardship might result we shall immediately consider them first, for our part, and deal with them quickly, and if the minister wants to go a step further and wishes to incorporate the urgent items in a special appropriation bill we shall facilitate that procedure; but we do not intend to submit to indirect pressure to restrict debate on expenditures in this free parliament.
I thought, Mr. Chairman, that it might be helpful if I rose a few minutes before

Supply-Labour
five o'clock and made this suggestion. I understand it is not possible, in the two or three minutes that are left, to obtain a reply or an assurance from the minister, but from now until six o'clock I suppose there might well be that opportunity and I trust that the house leader will consider this suggestion in the light in which it has been made.


Gordon Minto Churchill: Actions speak louder than words. If the present item we are on had been passed, then these remarks of the hon. member for Laurier might have been more appropriate under those circumstances. His so-called constructive suggestion will have to be examined. Hon. members on the opposite side of the house had an extensive experience on the treasury benches and they fully appreciate, without any spelling out or any further detailed information, what is meant when supplementary estimates are not passed expeditiously through the house.
Were they inexperienced, why then we might give some consideration to the suggestion that was put forward; but we are not dealing here with inexperienced people, and parliament has been in existence for so many years. If the hon. member will examine the record he will find that in the past it was customary to get supplementary estimates through the house in one, two, or at the outside three days, not spending as we have done already this session one third of the session on supplementary estimates.


Lionel Chevrier: If I may be allowed, there is a great deal in what the house leader has said in connection with the procedure that has been followed in the past concerning supplementary estimates, but the circumstances in the past and the circumstances in which we find ourselves in this parliament are entirely different and, as I said earlier, I did not want to introduce a contentious note in the debate. I wanted to offer what I thought was a constructive suggestion because I am firmly convinced that the circumstances as we find them now, and the hon. house leader knows what I am referring to, are entirely different from the ordinary and normal circumstances concerning the passage of supplementary estimates through the house. Therefore I can only reiterate the suggestion I have made.


Gordon Minto Churchill: I can only add that 1957 was an election year and in the spring of that year we passed two groups of supplementary estimates in three days.


John Whitney Pickersgill: And hon. gentlemen on the opposite side of the house in 1957 were informed precisely what the intentions of the government were. There was no question of playing games with the public business in that year.


John Cameron Pallett: Perhaps we might carry this item now.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Certainly not.


Paul Raymond Martineau: It being five o'clock, so that the house may proceed to consideration of private members' business, pursuant to section 3 of standing order 15, it is my duty to rise and report a certain resolution and ask leave to sit later this day or next sitting day as the case may be.
Item stands.
Resolution adopted in committee of supply this day reported and concurred in.


Mr. Speaker:: It being five o'clock the house will now proceed to consideration of private members' business as listed on today's order paper, namely, public bills and private bills.


Gordon Minto Churchill: I am prepared to stand numbers 1 to 9 if it is agreeable to the house.


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Gordon Minto Churchill: I believe the hon. member for Kootenay West (Mr. Herridge) is prepared to go ahead with No. 10. Is that correct?


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: Yes.



BROADCASTING ACT


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: the second reading of Bill C-32, to amend the Broadcasting Act (human rights abuses remedied).
He said: Mr. Speaker, I must first of all express my appreciation of the nine hon. members with private bills preceding mine on the order paper who had them stood today and in so doing enabled me to proceed with a matter of very great importance to my constituents and which is important, so far as the principle is concerned, to all Canadians. I intend, Mr. Speaker, as is usual among members of this group, to strike a blow for freedom this evening, because it is obvious that legitimate free enterprise requires the benevolent surveillance of certain social democrats who have a sense of social responsibility.
I must outline the historical sequence of events which have caused me to introduce this bill. First of all, I was visited by the editor of the Kootenay Graphic News in November, I think, of 1960. He informed me that he had been in the habit of advertising the date of publication of his newspaper on radio station CKL.N, Nelson, drawing attention to the date on which it was being placed on the news stands, but he had received a letter from Mr. A. R. Ramsden, the manager

of that radio station, informing him he would no longer be permitted to use the services of the station. I intend to place that letter on record so that hon. members may have the facts.
Mr. M. Carlton 490 Baker Street Nelson, B.C.
Dear Mr. Carlton:
We seem to be on the horns of dilemma these days, a dilemma which must he obvious to everyone. Now that your paper is establishing itself as a regular advertising media, seeking its business from the same customers as ourselves, it is not reasonable that we should be defeating ourselves by building up in any way the success of a business competitor. We therefore, are invoking section 7 of our contract. As of today's date we are serving you with ten days notice of cancellation of your advertising contract No. 726. I would further bring to your attention items 4 and 6 of the conditions of contract.
Yours sincerely,
A. R. Ramsden,
Manager.
I had a conversation with the editor of the Graphic News. The major owner of the News publishing company is a gentleman for whom I have a high regard. He served overseas with the 54th Kootenay battalion and I would be surprised if he agreed to this treatment of a veteran who is trying to establish himself after fighting in the last war for freedom.
The Nelson daily News and the radio station in question are both owned by the News Publishing Company Limited of 216 Baker street, Nelson, British Columbia. This company was incorporated on May 18,	1908 with an
authorized capital of $200,000. The list of directors together with the shares they hold is as follows:
Shares	Name	Address1326	Robert H. Green	Victoria28	Cecil W. Ramsden	Nelson96	Robert F. G. Green	Victoria108	Gordon A. Green	Victoria5	Robert W. Phipps	Victoria100	Margaret G. Green	Victoria12	George G. Green	VictoriaShareholders	only :	5	Francis E. Winston	2270	Robert Green	
This news publishing company owns the Nelson daily News and radio station CKLN. Then, shortly after hearing from the editor of the Kootenay Graphic News I received visits from businessmen in Nelson who had become customers of the Graphic News. They complained that the Graphic News was being denied what they considered to be a right under the bill of rights, namely to advertise on a station which received its licence through an agency of the government, the board of broadcast governors. Other people mentioned
Broadcasting Act
the subject to me, and there was a good deal of discussion about it.
The same day I met the editor of the Nelson daily News, Cecil Ramsden, and told him what I thought of the matter. I dealt with him directly because I understand he is really the officer commanding all the interests of the news publishing company in Nelson. He agreed with the letter sent by the manager of the radio station and was of the opinion that they were justified, having had a monopoly in advertising for 60 years on Baker street, in preventing anyone else establishing themselves in the newspaper business by soliciting advertising from the same customers over CKLN.
I must say that the editor of the Kootenay Graphic News and his partners have been most successful and have received a lot of support from business people in Nelson. To indicate that sympathy and the objection to this monopolistic attitude on the part of the editor of the News Publishing Company, perhaps I might tell the house that in order to assist the Kootenay Graphic News some of these merchants, who also advertise on the radio station, are including a sentence or two at the end of their announcements such as: "You will see our advertisement in the Kootenay Graphic News next Wednesday", or Thursday, or what ever day it happens to be.
After talking with these people, I agreed to take the matter up with the Minister of Justice and with the chairman of the board of broadcast governors. I have done that. I discussed the matter with the chairman of the board of broadcast governors and he told me there was nothing in the act at present which would give him the power to prevent this practice. He said this was the first occasion on which such an action had been brought to his attention since he had become chairman of the board. Then I discussed the matter with the Minister of Justice. I raised it in the house and the minister later wrote to me and informed me to the following effect:
December 16, 1960 Herbert W. Herridge, Esq., M.P.,
House of Commons,
Ottawa
Dear Mr. Herridge:
Thank you for your letter of December 7, 1960, in connection with the policy of Radio Station CKLN in accepting advertising.
When you raised this matter in the house on November 18, 1960, it was brought to the attention of the director under the Combines Investigation Act. The director has considered the matter and has come to the conclusion that it does not fall within the Combines Investigation Act and that, accordingly, there is no basis for starting an inquiry under the act.
Yours sincerely,
E. D. Fulton

Broadcasting Act
In addition, I have discussed this subject with representatives of the private radio stations across Canada who also informed me that this is the first occasion on which this sort of thing has been brought to their attention. They were concerned lest a practice of this sort might cause resentment and build up opposition to the private radio industry. I have had long conversations with several people on this question.
I must say that the editor of the Nelson daily News is really a nice little fellow, but he is a Conservative who does not understand the principles of the bill of rights. He has allowed his keen business instincts temporarily to overcome his sense of justice and his understanding of the principles of free enterprise, although when election time comes around he writes some strong editorials inviting the people of Kootenay West to support the representatives of the party that stands for free enterprise as against other persons, and so on. But this, I am sure, is a temporary aberration and I am sure he will see the light as a result of the discussion in the house and the correspondence he receives from other sources.
Naturally, the result of this has been that the hon. member for Kootenay West has received very little mention in the Nelson daily News since the introduction of this bill two years ago. As hon. members are aware I am mentioned on frequent occasions in the Ottawa Ontario, papers. I am infrequently mentioned in the Nelson daily News. For a long time I received hardly any mention at all. Until recently Your Honour did not consider certain unfortunate events in Kootenay West as a matter of urgent public importance. Constituents wrote and wired me expressing their indignation. I quickly explained Your Honour was interpreting the rule according to the book. I know you do consider affairs in Kootenay West are of urgent public importance.
Then I was stepped on in another direction. Since 1945 I have been in the habit of giving a weekly broadcast over the radio. Suddenly the manager of the radio station decided that I should be heard from only once a month from then on. An arrangement was suggested under which the hon. member for Kootenay East and I would alternate with others. The station now allows me use of the facilities twice a month. I appreciate the courtesy extended to me throughout the years so I can inform the people of Kootenay West objectively of the news and occurrences in this house. Now the hon. member for Kootenay East assists me in this. I thank him for relieving me on some occasions. But there is no Liberal in British Columbia. It was suggested that the hon. member for

Bonavista-Twillingate or the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River go on the station. However these are supposed to be local reports to the people of the area delivered by local members of parliament like the hon. members of Kootenay West and Kootenay East.
I have received many letters from constituents telling me that they look forward to my reports and many have said they miss my weekly broadcasts although they also find the reports of the hon. member for Kootenay East interesting and informative.
The interest in this bill is considerable. I have had requests from over 100 of my constituents for copies of Hansard containing the debate on this bill, which shows the sense of responsibility of the people I have the honour to represent. They are indignant at the transgression of the principles of the bill of rights and of responsible free enterprise.
I discussed this matter with a number of members of other parties and have yet to talk to a single member who does not support the purpose of this bill. I have discussed it with trade union members and have their support in this respect. I trust before the debate concludes I will have the support in principle of all hon. members because it is an important question. There is a great principle involved.
The matter was brought to the attention of the special committee on radio broadcasting when representatives of private broadcasters were present. I quote from page 120 of the minutes and proceedings of the committee for Monday, February 27, 1961. The hon. member for Peterborough introduced the matter as follows:


Mr. Pitman:: I would like to bring up a particular problem which has caused some amount of concern in the house. This is the problem of a station which is in a position very much like the one Mr. Jamieson was speaking about, where the station has virtually complete control, and where it refuses advertising for what is considered to be competitors.
This happened at Nelson, British Columbia where a radio station refused to accept advertising of a competitor. Let me quote from this letter. This gentleman was starting a newspaper, and the radio station owned a newspaper as well.
That is not quite right. One company, the Nelson news publishing company, owns both CKLN and the paper. I will not quote from the letter. The hon. member for Peterborough went on to say:
What we have here is a situation which, I think, is rather fantastic, where a radio station can refuse advertising of its competitor. How do you feel about that? Should there be a regulation?


Mr. Brown:: Are you directing your question to me?


Walter George Pitman: Anyone at all is welcome to pick it up.


Mr. Jamieson:: May I say that I believe this is extremely rare. I do not recall in ten or eleven years of being in the broadcasting business in Canada another incident comparable to this one.
We have a lot of unusual incidents in Kootenay West. Mr. Jamieson went on to say:
I believe that the board of broadcast governors has had this matter called to its attention, so I would not want to anticipate what the board's feelings are on this matter, because X do not know them.
I have discussed the matter with the chairman of the board of broadcast governors, taken the matter up with the Minister of Justice, had the matter drawn to the attention of the special committee on broadcasting and discussed it with several hon. members. I have fulfilled the promise I made to merchants and other citizens of Nelson and district. It is a complicated question in some respects and therefore I discussed it with competent legal authorities. After receiving their advice I spent considerable time getting the advice of persons in private radio and government agencies and then I introduced this bill.
This bill is to amend the Broadcasting Act (human rights abuses remedied). I like those terms. Reading from the explanatory notes of the bill:
Both the English common law and the French civil law recognize the doctrine that the right of the businessman or industrialist to do business only with persons of his choice is subject to restrictions based on reasons of good morals or public order: such is the case where the state takes exclusive control of a commercial field and grants a special privilege or licence in that field to the businessman or industrialist to sell, under monopoly or quasi-monopoly, to the public; the licensee then assumes definite obligations, including the obligation to sell to anyone who is ready to pay the regular price. See Christie v. York Cory.. (1940) Supreme Court of Canada, p. 139.
Various other cases and authorities are referred to. I continue:
In the Christie case, Mr. Justice Davis said:
"If there is to be exclusion on the ground of colour or of race or of religious faith or on any other ground not already specifically provided for by the statute, it is for the legislature itself, in my view, to impose such limitations under the exclusive system of governmental control of the sale of liquor to the public which it has seen fit to enact."
The Canadian parliament, for public convenience, interest and necessity, has by the Radio Act allowed the crown to grant monopolies by licence to individuals and corporations to operate broadcasting stations for private gain. Under the common law and civil law, therefore, such stations must sell advertising time without discrimination. In 1960, parliament confirmed this law by statute. Section 2 of the Canadian Bill of Rights applies to provide that the Radio Act and the Broadcasting Act shall not be so used as to violate the rights or freedoms of any citizen: e.g., freedom of speech or freedom of the press. Presumably, the governor in council might make regulations to control such excesses or the minister of transport arbitrarily remedy violations by revocation or
Broadcasting Act
suspension of licence. Transport shall revoke forthwith the licence of such licensee and shall notify the licensee of the revocation so made.
I mention the following as getting at the principle of the bill:
Clause 1-For clarity, and emphasis of notice to the licensee, this clause provides, generally, that a licence is conditional upon observance of the Canadian Bill of Rights; and, specifically, that there shall be no discrimination by a licensee in providing commercial services to competitor applicants -e.g., freedom of the press includes liberty of circulation and distribution, as well as publication- and liberty of circulation and distribution includes the right to compete for advertising space on a government licensed advertising media-without discrimination because the applicant competes in the newspaper field with the broadcasting monopolist. Subsection 6(a) (i) is an adaptation of provincial public utility anti-discrimination law.
That subsection of the bill is an adaptation of provincial public utility anti-discrimination law as taken from the statutes of British Columbia. The subsection has been included for a number of years to prevent discrimination and refusal of service, and so on and has proved successful and operates well.
Subsection 6(b) follows the procedure-


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


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: In conclusion-


James Aloysius McGrath: Might I suggest that we allow the hon. gentleman a few more moments.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member indicates that he is about to conclude. Perhaps hon. members will give the hon. member a few minutes in which to do so.


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: I appreciate that courtesy, which has become necessary because of my having to give such a long historical sequence before I came to my legal argument. Anyway, upon violation, the Minister of Transport revokes the licence. The licensee, has a right to appeal on any question of law to the exchequer court which may suspend the revocation until the appeal is determined. I have received good advice and discussed this matter with counsel and I believe this bill is fair to all concerned and will remedy the abuse of which I have complained. I trust that I shall receive support from members on both sides of the house in my efforts this afternoon to strike a blow for freedom in defence of the Canadian Bill of Rights.


James Aloysius McGrath: Mr. Speaker, in rising to speak on second reading of this Bill No. C-32 may I say at the outset that I wish I could support the

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principle of it. However, I am afraid I cannot do so. Nevertheless, I am prepared to say that, without any reservation whatsoever I certainly support the hon. member for Kootenay West in what I consider a legitimate grievance. I think that it is most unfair-and it is certainly contrary to the laws of fair play-that the radio station in the hon. gentleman's constituency should deprive his constituents of the enjoyment of hearing the sage and wise utterances of the hon. member for Kootenay West more than once a month. In this regard, I think the hon. gentleman certainly has a legitimate grievance.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: May I say that I am now on twice a month.


James Aloysius McGrath: That is all to the good. I hope that before too long the hon. member will be on four times a month.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: A great many people hope the same thing.


James Aloysius McGrath: However, I question the course adopted by the hon. gentleman, who is most sincere in his intent, in that he should have deemed it necessary to bring in a bill in this regard. He does so under the premise of being a champion-I do not know whether or not he used that word but that was his implication-of legitimate free enterprise.
The right to advertise is basic in our free enterprise society and in our democracy. However, with respect to advertising as we know it in Canada-that is advertising using electronic means and advertising using the printed media-may I say that it is not a right. Advertising is not an end in itself as far as radio is concerned and as far as newspapers are concerned. It is merely a means to an end. Under our system of public and private broadcasting it is a means whereby a private broadcaster can accept fees in return for advertising which goes towards the cost of his programming and his transmission. Indeed, usually in the case of a private station these advertising fees more than cover the cost of programming, production and transmission, enabling the broadcaster to make a profit and hence to stay in business. However, as I say, it is not an end in itself. It is just a means to an end. In return for these services the broadcaster agrees that for the fee in question he will deliver the sales message of the sponsor or advertiser to the widest possible audience. That is where his contractual rights end, of course, saving professional ethics.
What the hon. gentleman is trying to do in this bill is, by means of an act of the parliament of Canada, to say to a broadcaster

"You must accept every request you get for advertising". That seems to be the intent of the bill.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: No; only on grounds of competition.


James Aloysius McGrath: The hon. gentleman did not explain that part fully, but perhaps as I proceed he will correct me if I am wrong. What he has in mind is that where competitive media are concerned, he must accept advertising from all the media. Is that what the hon. gentleman is trying to say?


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: Yes; he must not deny advertising just on grounds that the person is competitive, or the company.


James Aloysius McGrath: In my opinion, that is precisely the grounds upon which he should be entitled to refuse advertising. It seems to me to be absolutely ludicrous for a broadcaster to find himself in the position of being obliged to advertise a sales message of competitive media. In Canada newspaper advertising and electronic advertising are very competitive, as the hon. gentleman illustrated in his introductory remarks in referring to the two newspapers in his constituency, and the private broadcasting station. However, I believe that the bill is misconceived although the intent is good. I believe it to be redundant. In my humble opinion what he is trying to do is very clearly set out in the Broadcasting Act. I would refer the hon. gentleman to section 10 of part I of the Broadcasting Act wherein the objects and purposes of the board of broadcast governors are set out. Section 10 states as follows:
10.	The hoard shall, for the purpose of ensuring the continued existence and efficient operation of a national broadcasting system and the provision of a varied and comprehensive broadcasting service of a high standard that is basically Canadian in content and character, regulate the establishment and operation of networks of broadcasting stations, the activities of public and private broadcasting stations in Canada and the relationship between them and provide for the final determination of all matters and questions in relation thereto.
Then the next section of the Broadcasting Act, namely section 11 deals with regulations. Subsection (1) (c) provides as follows:
11.	(1) The board may make regulations for carrying out the purposes and provisions of this part, and in particular, but without restricting the generality of the foregoing, may make regulations,...
(c) respecting the character of advertising and the amount of time that may be devoted to advertising;
Then in so far as appeal procedure is concerned, I think perhaps the hon. gentleman is more concerned with the fact that the newspaper to which he referred-I believe it was the Kootenay Graphic News-felt that it had a legitimate grievance. The hon. gentleman has stated that he checked with the various

government agencies concerned and that it was evident that there was no other way for this newspaper to redress its grievance than by a statute of parliament. I do not believe that is the case, as there is a further provision in the Broadcasting Act. If the Kootenay Graphic News, in its grievance against radio station CKLN, wished to pursue the matter, it should follow the Canada Gazette, for under the Broadcasting Act radio station CKLN would be required after several years have elapsed to appeal to the board of broadcast governors for the renewal of its licence. A licence is not granted in perpetuity. I do not know what the time limit is but I believe it is a period of five years. When the radio station applied for renewal of its licence the newspaper referred to as having a grievance with respect to the station could appeal to the board of broadcast governors and state its case. The board would then decide if it had a legitimate grievance and would take this into account in the extension of the licence or the board, if it deemed it necessary to do so, could formulate regulations to guard against just such alleged abuses, which it is permitted to do under the powers in the act.
It seems to me that to provide for regulation by statute is a very dangerous practice because what you are really doing is depriving the radio station of the right to be discriminating in the advertising it accepts. In all fairness I do not think that a radio station should be expected to carry the sales message of its chief competitor. That is really the whole crux of the argument as I see it. However, apparently the Kootenay Graphic News and the hon. member for Kootenay West unfortunately do not see it this way. The hon. member referred to the proceedings of the broadcasting committee and the fact that his colleague, the hon. member for Peterborough, had raised this matter in that committee. I have been a member of that committee for the past several years, and while I do not recall that particular reference I am grateful to the hon. member for bringing it to my attention. In his reference to the proceedings of the broadcasting committee the hon. member referred to the fact that the witness, Mr. Jamieson, who is president of the Canadian association of broadcasters, said in answering the hon. member for Peterborough that in his opinion this was an extremely rare case. In other words, it does not usually happen.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: That is what the chairman of the board of broadcast governors said.


James Aloysius McGrath: That seems to me to be another very good reason why we should not regulate such a matter by statute. It seems
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to me that would be an extremely dangerous course to follow. I refer now to the proceedings of the broadcasting committee to which the hon. member referred, and I read part of what Mr. Jamieson said in reply to the hon. member for Peterborough:
Again you would have to take the individual case and assess it on its merits. Let us suppose there were two television stations in a given market. Would the committee consider it reasonable that a station which was in difficulty, for instance, could move over to its competitor and run adds which say: "Don't you think this is a terrible program? Do not look at this. Switch over to our channel." This certainly would be refusing competitor advertising, and it is conceivable that it could happen.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: Would the hon. member mind my explaining something?


James Aloysius McGrath: Not at all.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: The point here is that the competition is not to a great extent with the radio station. The competition is with the Nelson daily News because the Graphic News is taking advertising away from that paper. There is where the competition lies. The Nelson News Publishing Company is using its influence in CKLN to overcome that, if possible.


James Aloysius McGrath: The hon. member has referred to a fact that I omitted mentioning, that the owners of the radio station are also the owners of the other competitive newspaper. To me that is another good reason why they should not accept advertising from the Kootenay Graphic News because they are already advertising the Nelson daily News. In our free society surely this man has a right to accept advertising contracts only from those sources he deems desirable. That is the crux of my argument. I submit with deference to the hon. member, to whom we enjoy listening and whose opinions we respect, that in this particular case I believe he would have been much more justified in bringing this matter before the house as a grievance. There is a period during our proceedings when the hon. member could have raised this matter as a grievance. He has brought it up on the orders of the day on several occasions and it has been brought up in the broadcasting committee.
I submit it would be a most dangerous practice for the house to consent of the passage of this legislation which would regulate advertising, because once you start to regulate advertising where do you stop? The next step is to regulate the sale of automobiles, for example. You could go to the most dangerous lengths and regulate the assimilation of news itself. For these reasons I cannot support the legislation.

Broadcasting Act
(Translation):


Augustin Brassard: Mr. Speaker, 1 should like to say just a few words with regard to the bill now before us.
I believe all hon. members are aware of the sense of justice and social sense which characterize the hon. member for Kootenay West. (Mr. Herridge), and I am not surprised to hear him take up the defence of anyone who seems to be victimized.
However, I was agreeably surprised to see him champion the cause of private enterprise, which he calls legitimate private enterprise. I commend him for this.
I also listened to the hon. member for St. John's East (Mr. McGrath) who stated that it would be most difficult to find a solution, by means of legislation, to the problem stated by the hon. member for Kootenay West.
I think that the hon. member for Kootenay West almost exhausted every means of finding some remedy for that problem in his riding, and I wonder whether this is not a case of abuse which comes very near to being a monopoly.
He stated that he had had some talk with the Minister of Justice (Mr. Fulton) and it seems that no steps have been taken to call to order the man who, it seems, proposes to control a certain geographical district.
I want to tell the hon. member for Kootenay West that I sympathize with him and that I am astonished he should have to remind the government which endowed us with the Canadian Bill of Rights, that there is still some part of this country were human rights are violated.
(Text):


Mr. Eldon M. Woolliams (Bow River):: Mr. Speaker, first of all I should like to congratulate the hon. member for Kootenay West on presenting this bill. From listening to him I take it that briefly these are the facts. In this particular area there is a radio station, CKLN, and two newspapers. One newspaper and the radio station are owned by one company, the Nelson News Publishing Company Limited which the hon. member said was incorporated in 1908. I want to say at the outset that I certainly agree with the spirit of the bill; but the situation is a little different from ordinary free enterprise because a radio or television station secures its right to operate under a licence. Because of that fact these stations enjoy a monopoly in certain sections of the country.
I think I can safely say that whenever I have spoken in the house or outside it I have always stood for free enterprise and against any kind of monopoly, whether it is a state monopoly granted by licence or a capitalistic monopoly as in this case which

is granted by licence by the government. A monopoly may also be a provincial monopoly such as we had in the province of Saskatchewan or a capitalistic monopoly such as this one created by a licence from some board.
Now, I want to say again that I agree with the spirit of the bill itself, and I would support the bill. However, there are two or three points I should like to bring to the attention of the house. I know that during the debate on second reading of a bill one does not refer to the sections, but I should like to deal with the spirit of clause 1(b) in which the draftsman has endeavoured to make the Canadian Bill of Rights apply to this bill. I feel that the Canadian Bill of Rights applies to all federal statutes. In so far as the bill of rights is concerned, it may be a good time to say that there are some people even judges and students of jurisprudence, who feel that some of our courts have not given the bill of rights the proper interpretation. This is a general feeling. I think if you read the debates with regard to the bill of rights, you will see it was intended that all federal statutes then on the books should be amended as well as those passed in the future, unless the statute said otherwise.
I should like to come back to a consideration of clause 1(b). I am certain the hon. member for Kootenay West has a legitimate complaint, not only because he could only speak on the radio once or twice a month but because this newspaper was not allowed to advertise over the radio. This would probably be a legitimate complaint. The hon. member read the letter in which the company stated the reason they were not advertising the other newspaper was that they were in the publishing business themselves and they did not want to advertise competition. If I may refer to clause 1(b), I find that the Minister of Justice, upon receiving any complaint, shall ascertain whether or not a licensee has breached in any particular the conditions set out in paragraph (a).
The first complaint that I have about the bill is that it gives too much power to the minister. I know that in this particular government we have a very fair Minister of Justice who has a sense of justice. This has been evident at any time we have heard him in debate. The fact is, though, that this clause gives the minister too much power. We may, at some time in Canada, have a minister of the wrong calibre who might exercise this right to take away the licence of a radio station. Then this bill would create a monopoly because if that happened the member for Kootenay West would not even be on the radio once a month. He would be off the radio because the station would be turned off.

Then, the Minister of Justice, after receiving the complaint may report to the Minister of Transport who can revoke the licence of the radio station.
It is true that in paragraph (d) the radio station may appeal to the exchequer court. As the hon. member for Kootenay West was saying, this was a legitimate complaint and if this bill had become law then station CKLN would have lost its licence because of its failure to advertise this newspaper. Let us suppose it was not a legitimate complaint or at least the radio station believed it was not a legitimate complaint. Then, the station has the right to appeal to the exchequer court. This is all very fine, but the person launching the appeal must pay a solicitor and pay the expenses of the appeal. Unless the court exercises a discretion, however, that licence has lapsed. Sometimes litigation can take from four to six weeks and sometimes judges reserve their decision so that the time may be considerably longer. This radio station might be off the air for a whole year and the hon. member for Kootenay West would not be heard by his constituents for a whole year. This would be particularly unfortunate if it were an election year.
However, under clause 1, paragraph (d) the court can exercise a discretion and allow the station to continue broadcasting. This is only a discretion and it might not be exercised. My first complaint with respect to the bill, therefore, is that it gives too much power to the minister. When you give power to a minister by legislation it really means you are giving power to some officer of the department to exercise a discretion. We often see how that discretion is exercised and sometimes it is not exercised judiciously. I would oppose the bill on that ground. There is also the fact that the radio station or television station would have to appeal then to the exchequer court at their own expense at a time when they may be off the air.
In so far as the bill of rights is concerned, I am happy to learn that the new leader of the N.D.P. group holds the bill of rights in such respect. This is one thing this government has done. The bill of rights has spelled out, for the first time, that we are to have freedom of the press. This is written right in the statute itself. I believe this provision illustrates the fact that the Conservative party and this government have always stood for freedom of expression. I recall that some years ago, and I am sure the hon. member for Kootenay West recalls this, the Social Credit party was elected to power in Alberta and they tried to control the press. They introduced a bill in the legislature which became law but was later declared ultra vires by the Supreme Court of Canada.
Broadcasting Act
The hon. member for Kootenay West referred to Mr. Justice Davis of the Supreme Court of Canada, and cited his judgment to which reference is also made in the headnote of the bill itself. When the hon. member quoted Mr. Justice Davis with approval, he was really quoting from the dissenting judgment of the Supreme Court of Canada. The Supreme Court of Canada stated in that case very carefully that everyone has a right to decide what business he wants or what business he will reject. The effect of the judgment was to extend what has been the common law of the Anglo Saxons for many years into the field of law covering companies that operate by licence.
Then, I have to agree to some extent with the remarks made by the hon. member for St. John's East (Mr. McGrath). Supposing a radio station did not want to advertise Hush magazine, or whatever it is called. Surely, they would have that right. Someone may come along and ask them to advertise "Lady Chatterley's Lover" and, although the Supreme Court of Canada has said it is all right for Canadians to read, perhaps the radio station would not want to lower its standards by advertising that kind of material. I do believe, therefore, that this would be a third ground for rejecting the bill. A person could make his motives look legitimate, convince an officer of the department that such was the case, and cause a station to lose its licence. In consequence, the station would have to appeal. Then the onus is on them to prove their innocence and that, of course, is contrary to our understanding of jurisprudence.
Again, I should like to congratulate the hon. member for Kootenay West because I agree with the spirit of the bill. However, the way in which the bill has been drafted has caused me to raise the points I have raised and I believe it may cause more harm than good. In other words, you cannot cure an evil by enacting something worse.


Mr. G. H. Aiken (Parry Sound-Muskoka):: Mr. Speaker, in making a few remarks on this bill I should like to start out by saying that I agree with the principle that if any person or body has been granted a monopoly that monopoly must be used in a fair and equitable manner. This principle that I have stated must specifically apply to competitors of that monopoly; but this is a very difficult situation because if you have a monopoly, who are your competitors? I submit that you do not have any if you have a monopoly such as is set forth in this particular bill.
I know that the hon. member for Kootenay West foresaw this difficulty because he went

Broadcasting Act
a little further and defined what he felt a competitor to be, in that he used the words in the section, and I quote:
-for reason only that the person so applying carries on a business that competes with a business in which the licensee has an interest;
In other words it is not to apply against a competitor in the business of broadcasting, but a competitor in some other business which is not defined in the bill.
I realize that the hon. member has taken an injustice, as he sees it, and has built around it a bill which he is presenting to parliament. However I believe that the bill has been narrowed down to such a point that it is not in effect a general matter of legislation but is merely to cover a certain, specific situation, and that it would not properly apply to a lot of other situations that might arise. So I say it would be very difficult, if not impossible, to say what some other person might have as a business which would compete. For that reason I think the bill is deficient.
The next matter relates to the question that certain broadcasting stations, particularly radio stations, do not keep scripts of many of the news items and other programs which are broadcast over them. This is a shortcoming that has turned up on many occasions. If certain things are said, or are alleged to have been said in a broadcast, particularly matters relating to news, on a good many occasions you cannot get the script to determine exactly what was said. Therefore it becomes very difficult to find what reason may have been assigned for refusal to do any broadcast or carry any advertising.
Also I think it would be ineffective because of the difficulty in proving that a refusal to accept advertising arises only for the reason that the competitor has an interest in the business. We have seen a good many instances where it would be practically impossible to say or prove that the only reason a station refused to accept advertising was that the other competitor had an interest in a competing business.
In the first place, if the bill were enacted you would not have the situation which the hon. member has put forward, where a broadcasting station has admitted, or in effect has admitted, that this is the reason it refused to accept the advertising. It would be very difficult, almost impossible, to secure such an admission by a person who is about to have his licence suspended for that very reason. You could not reasonably expect an admission and if you do not have an admission you must have proof that such a refusal was for the sole reason which was given in the bill. Could such a situation be proven?

I would foresee that any person who did not wish to accept advertising from someone could think of a dozen good reasons why he should not do it. He might put forward the excuse that the time which was requested was not available. He might make charges for that type of advertising which would be unreasonable and which would prevent the prospective advertiser from placing his advertising.
I would suggest that a person who wanted to contravene the very narrow provisions of this bill would have no difficulty in doing so.
There has been some reference made in the bill to the Canadian Bill of Rights. Certainly the bill of rights, as enacted, has done a great deal to remove discrimination in matters of this nature. I see it is six o'clock.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: Would the hon. member permit a question?


Gordon Harvey Aiken: Yes.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: I hope the hon. member understands clearly that I was not complaining about a reduction of my radio time or newspaper space, but does the hon. member realize there is some political advantage in being recognized as the people's David against the Goliath of monopoly?


Gordon Harvey Aiken: I would be very pleased to give the hon. member an answer when we resume this debate.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Lionel Chevrier: May I inquire whether the house leader has had any opportunity of considering the suggestion I made at five o'clock?


Gordon Minto Churchill: That will be considered over the week end. On Monday we propose going ahead with legislation. I shall name five items for consideration so that hon. members may be ready. The order in which I call them may be altered on Monday morning and, if so, I shall advise parties on the opposite side. The items are: the second reading of the Bill C-38, dealing with financial and statistical information, the resolution in the name of the Secretary of State dealing with the universal copyright convention, the resolution in my name dealing with the Veterans Land Act, the resolution in the name of the Minister of Finance dealing with the Currency, Mint and Exchange Fund Act, and the resolution in the name of the Minister of Finance dealing with crown corporations.


Lionel Chevrier: Mr. Speaker, I think I should bring it to the house leader's attention-and I am glad the Minister of Finance is here-

that we are dealing on Monday with legislation and not with the supplementary estimates. If it is a fact, as the Minister of Finance told us repeatedly in this house, and
as it was said-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. This is not a period for debate. The hon. member who leads the opposition is entitled to inquire about the business of the day but it appears to me that he is entering on a debate of what should be done.


Lionel Chevrier: I rise on a point of order because I think this is of utmost importance. There are two points I would like to raise in connection with the matter. I do not know if Your Honour was in the chair when at five o'clock I made to the house leader what I thought, after serious consideration, was a reasonable suggestion. I understood consideration was going to be given to that between five and six o'clock and now we are told it will not be considered until the week end.
We were told yesterday and today that the supplementary estimates were of such an important nature, but we are not being asked to deal with these on Monday.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member is entitled to inquire but not settle the order of government business.


Gordon Minto Churchill: That is news to him.


Lionel Chevrier: I am not trying to settle government business and there has been no such suggestion from me or the opposition on our part, but I did put a plan or suggestion which apparently has not even been considered.


Gordon Minto Churchill: With an ultimatum that it be considered by six o'clock. I said we shall consider it over the week end. We shall operate the business of this house and we
Business of the House
do not need to take instruction from the hon. member for Laurier.


John Whitney Pickersgill: You are making a rotten mess of it.


Lionel Chevrier: Mr. Speaker, I am not going to allow the leader of the house to make that statement.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The hon. member should resume his seat. There will be opportunities to discuss the issues that are involved.


Lionel Chevrier: Closure.


Mr. Speaker:: It being six o'clock I must declare-


Donald Methuen Fleming: Order.


Mr. Speaker:: Did some hon. member indicate an objection?


Donald Methuen Fleming: While you are on your feet the hon. gentleman said "closure".


Lionel Chevrier: Yes, sir, I said "closure" but my remarks were not addressed to you. They are addressed to those two hon. gentlemen on the other side of the house.


Donald Methuen Fleming: Eyewash.


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

[Stage Direction]
A-Department-
Technical and vocational training assistance-
636. To carry out the purposes of the Technical and Vocational Training Assistance Act and agreements made thereunder-payments to the provinces-further amount required, $28,400,000.
[Stage Direction]
Monday, March 19, 1962