1966-11-22

PRESENCE IN THE GALLERY OF THE PRIME MINISTER OF MALTA

Mr. Speaker:: It gives me much pleasure to bring to the attention of hon. members the presence in the Speaker's gallery of a most distinguished visitor, the Prime Minister of Malta, Dr. Borg Olivier. On behalf of the House of Commons, I wish him and his colleagues a pleasant and fruitful visit in Canada.



COMMITTEES OF THE HOUSE

[Stage Direction]
Report of the joint committee of both houses on the library of parliament dated November 17, 1966 concerning salary revisions in the library of parliament-Mr. Speaker.
Third report of standing committee on northern affairs and national resources, in French and English-Mr. Badanai.
[Note: Text of the foregoing reports appears in today's Votes and Proceedings.]


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Right Hon. J. G. Diefenbaker (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker, I direct my question to the Prime Minister. Since the talks aimed at settling the strike of Air Canada employees have now reached an impasse, the situation being described by one union official as worse than it was, and in view of the fact that for the last nine days passenger and freight air traffic has been at a standstill, to the detriment of all parts of this nation, would the Prime Minister in these circumstances have any plans to name a government mediator in order that bargaining will be continuous, rather than haphazard as it has been to date? What are the prospects of this strike being ended?


Righi Hon. L. B. Pearson (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, it is not accurate to say that talks have reached an impasse or have broken down. If and when that unhappy development does occur, the government will then consider what steps should be taken. Meanwhile I point out to the house that the two parties to the dispute are meeting again tomorrow morning, I think at 10 a.m


John George Diefenbaker: Negotiations have not continued over the last two days, and the description of them in the newspaper is that they have broken down-though I do not know what "broken down" means.


Mr. Nicholson:: That statement-


John George Diefenbaker: Does the Minister of Labour want to get in on this? I will give him every opportunity if he does. Why does he not take over and appoint a mediator? The mayors of the various cities have told me that the situation is serious, and this government is taking no action.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.


Mr. T. C. Douglas (Burnaby-Coquiflam):: supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. In answer to a question from me on Friday last the Prime Minister said the question of appointing a government mediator was under active consideration. In view of the fact that the chairman of the union negotiating committee has said that the situation is now worse than ever, which I take to mean that the company is now making an offer which is less favourable than the offer made prior to the strike, does the Prime Minister not think that this type of hit or miss negotiations is no longer likely to be fruitful, and that the government should now undertake to give immediate consideration to the appointment of a mediator?


Lester Bowles Pearson: Mr. Speaker, if the union side to the dispute felt that my hon. friend's statement of the situation was justified, then I do not think they would be meeting tomorrow morning with officials from Air Canada. I hope that the meeting tomorrow morning will be more productive than my hon. friend thinks will be the case.

November 22, 1966
Inquiries of the Ministry


Hon. Michael Siarr (Ontario):: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. In view of the fact that the union has given its opinion that a federal mediator might be more successful than the present negotiations have been, would the Prime Minister consider putting a federal mediator into this dispute?


Lester Bowles Pearson: Mr. Speaker, while negotiations are going on between the parties surely it is unwise for the government to intervene. Any suggestion that the government should intervene while these negotiations are going on does not seem to me to be helpful to the success of the negotiations


Michael Starr: A further supplementary question. In my question I have not asked that the government intervene. All I was asking was whether the government would offer the services of a mediator in this dispute?


Lester Bowles Pearson: It may well be, Mr. Speaker, that when the time comes-if it does come; I hope it will not-and negotiations break down finally and completely-if they do-then the government will discharge its responsibilities.


Mr. David Lewis (York South):: A further supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. May I ask the Prime Minister whether it is not true that the meeting yesterday lasted for about two hours only and that Air Canada then requested an adjournment until tomorrow? In view of that, would the Prime Minister undertake that if the negotiations tomorrow go the same way as they went on Monday the government will take steps to appoint a mediator,-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


David Lewis: If I may complete my question, Mr. Speaker-because everyone knows that negotiations which are carried on during a strike do not last only two hours if they mean anything.



NATIONAL DEFENCE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Real Caouette (Villeneuve):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of National Defence.
Has the minister received protests or representations from the citizens of Rouyn-Noranda regarding the commanding officer of

the 9th engineer squadron, (reserve unit) at Noranda, who allegedly stated last week that French Canadians were ignorant and ought to be educated. Is the minister aware of such a statement by the commanding officer of that reserve unit at Noranda?


Hon. Paul Hellyer (Minister of National Defence):: The allegation was brought to my attention, Mr. Speaker, and I have asked for a report.



UNITED NATIONS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. R. N. Thompson (Red Deer):: My question is directed to the right hon. Prime Minister. Could he inform the house what stand Canada has taken or is to take on the Italian resolution before the United Nations which would establish a committee to recommend the formula for the seating of Red China in the UN.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Mr. Speaker, the matter is under consideration in New York and the Secretary of State for External Affairs is discussing developments with other delegations. These consultations and discussions are going on and the Secretary of State for External Affairs has postponed his own intervention in the debate until they are completed. It is not possible to say at this time what the position will be on this particular resolution.


Hon. Marcel Lambert (Edmonton West):: supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. I ask the Prime Minister whether it would not be helpful, as has been suggested by members on this side, for the house to contribute something to the adoption of Canada's position in this regard. There should have been a debate on this subject prior to Canada's adopting its position.


Lester Bowles Pearson: There have been a good many opportunities to debate the position of the government on Chinese Communist representation at the United Nations. The principles on which the government has acted are plain. Surely it is not wise to discuss in detail in the House of Commons negotiations that are continuing on a matter of such international importance.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, has the government abandoned the specific proposals of a week or
November 22, 1966

so ago designed to bring Red China into the United Nations? What is the meaning of press references indicating that Canada, as a result of United States action, had been manoeuvred out of its position in the United Nations?


Lester Bowles Pearson: The words "manoeuvred out" are the right hon. gentleman's words. We have not been manoeuvred out of any position at all. We are discussing the matter with our friends in the United Nations in the hope that there will be negotiations which will bring about a forward movement in this matter.



INDIAN AFFAIRS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Frank Howard (Skeena):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the Minister of Justice or to the Solicitor General-to whichever hon. gentleman has jurisdiction over this matter-and ask whether an inquiry will be launched into allegations made today before the Indian affairs committee that certain Hudson's Bay Company store managers have interfered with Her Majesty's mail by burning Eaton's, Simpsons-Sears and other competitors' catalogues so that they could not get into the hands of people whom Hudson's Bay serves. Another allegation is that these managers have been opening other people's mail containing money or cheques.


Hon. L. T. Pennell (Solicitor General of Canada):: I undertake to look into the matter and I shall discuss it with my officials. If it appears that further action is necessary, action will be taken.


EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Milton L. Klein (Cartier):: My question is directed to the right hon. Prime Minister. Will he tell us if there are any conditions under which the allied powers may reoccupy West Germany in the event that neo-nazism continues to grow?


Mr. Speaker:: Will the hon. member agree that this is a matter of very general purport, and the type of question which should hardly be asked at this time.
Inquiries of the Ministry NATIONAL DEFENCE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. D. S. Harkness (Calgary Norih):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of National Defence. Is it correct that Canadian naval tracker planes and pilots have been assigned or are to be assigned to United States aircraft carriers and, if so, is this a first step in turning over to the United States navy our anti-submarine commitments to NATO?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: Mr. Speaker, this is the normal practice followed when the Bonaventure is in for refitting. I suspect that this practice was adopted when the hon. member was Minister of National Defence, although I have not checked that. It certainly goes back to previous occasions when the Bonaventure was in for refitting. This practice has none of the overtones suggested by my hon. friend.


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Douglas Scott Harkness: have a supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. When is the Bonaventure going to come out of refitting and will there be sufficient personnel to man her if she does come out?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: She will come out of refitting as soon as repairs are completed.


An hon. Member:: When will that be?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: I presume that will be some time next year, and I am advised that we will have personnel to man her at that time.


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. R. W. Prittie (Burnaby-Richmond):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of National Defence supplementary to the one asked by the hon. member for Calgary North concerning the Bonaventure. Is the Department of National Defence giving serious consideration to scrapping the Bonaventure altogether, thereby saving the taxpayers a great deal of money?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: No, Mr. Speaker; we feel this would not be wise at the present time, the Bonaventure can provide an adequate service for some years to come.

November 22, 1966
Inquiries of the Ministry [Translation]



LABOUR RELATIONS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Gilles Gregoire (Lapointe):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to put a question to the Minister of Labour. Since a great number of C.B.C. employees of the French network have chosen the C.N.T.U. as their negotiating agent, even though the latter is not recognized by the C.L.R.B., could the Minister of Labour tell me whether the C.N.T.U., even if not participating officially in the vote secured the majority of votes of C.B.C. employees of the French network, would be recognized by the Department of Labour as the agent of those employees?


Mr. Speaker:: I wonder whether the question as put by the hon. member is not hypothetical. Since it is based on conjecture, it seems to me that it is out of order.


David Réal Caouette: Mr. Speaker, I should like to put a question to the Minister of Manpower and Immigration.
Since most members or almost all the members of the province of Quebec have met during the week-end with the representatives of the C.N.T.U. in connection with its existence within federal organizations, would the minister have a statement to make so that we may know whether or not he is ready to recommend that the rights of the C.N.T.U. and the labour unions be respected?


Hon. Jean Marchand (Minister of Manpower and Immigration):: Mr. Speaker, like the other members from Quebec, I met during the week-end with the union members of the city of Quebec and, on that occasion, I made all the statements which, it seemed to me, I should make.


Gilles Grégoire: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question. In view of the fact that, at his week-end meeting with the C.N.T.U., the Minister of Manpower and Immigration mentioned that he was bound by cabinet solidarity, can he tell the house whether he is making representations to the members of the cabinet, with a view to correcting the present injustice done to the C.N.T.U.?


Jean Marchand: Mr. Speaker, with regard to the first part of the question, my statement to the effect that I could not be

bound to any particular group is derived from our political mandate, which is not strictly a labour union mandate. One cannot accept a mandate, Mr. Speaker-that is what I mentioned-and carry it out differently; in other words, one could not get a federal mandate and carry it out in a separatist way.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


Mr. Speaker:: Order.


David Réal Caouette: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker.
First of all, the minister has not answered the question put by the member for Lapointe. Then, can he tell us if, in view of this government or cabinet solidarity, he cannot recommend that the C.N.T.U. be recognized by the C.L.R.B.?


Mr. Speaker:: Order. As the hon. member is starting a debate or making an argument, I do not think his question is in order.


Gilles Grégoire: Mr. Speaker, here is my supplementary question: I would like to ask the Minister of Manpower and Immigration whether he wants to answer my question now that he has answered all kinds of other things?


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The minister has answered the question put to him. Perhaps the hon. member is not satisfied, but an answer has been given and I would now like to recognize the hon. member for Halifax.


Gilles Grégoire: Ten o'clock, Mr. Speaker. [English]



ITALY-REQUEST FOR GENEROUS AID TO STRICKEN AREA

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. E. D. Fulion (Kamloops):: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Secretary of State for External Affairs I should like to ask the Prime Minister whether, in light of reports that further flood disasters with accompanying loss of life and damage to property and works of art in Italy are likely to occur, the government will consider making a really generous offer of aid to that country whose people have so many ties with hundreds of thousands or perhaps even millions of Canadians, and whose treasures of art and culture are in a very real sense the heritage of the whole world?
November 22, 1366


Lester Bowles Pearson: Mr. Speaker, I believe I said to the house previously that this matter had been under active consideration. It was discussed this morning at a meeting of the cabinet. We have been obtaining advice from the government of Italy as to their most needed requirements at this time. When we have that information we hope to help meet those requirements.



CANADIAN NATIONAL RAILWAYS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. R. Keays (Gaspe):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to address a question to the Minister of Transport. Will the minister inquire immediately into why the C.N.R. has issued orders that all passenger, freight and mixed trains operating in the Chandler and Cascapedia subdivisions travel at less than 30 miles an hour and that the railiner carrying 99 per cent of the passengers travel at 50 miles an hour? To assure our people of safety and comfort will the minister inquire into the motives behind this decision?


Mr. Speaker:: I am sure the minister has noted the representation made by the hon. member. Unless he wants to discuss the matter during the adjournment debate perhaps this question could be placed on the order paper.


James Russell Keays: Mr. Speaker, with all due deference to your ruling on this matter, there is a deep concern on the part of the travelling public because they feel if 30 miles per hour is a safety factor they should not be subjected to speeds of 50 miles per hour.



HOUSING


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Michael Starr: I would like to address a question to the Minister of Labour. In view of the report of the Economic Council of Canada to the effect that swift action is needed to head off a severe housing shortage caused by tight credit conditions and rising costs, will the minister consider making money available for the construction of homes and the re-institution of the $500 bonus for winter construction of houses?
Inquiries of the Ministry Hon. J. R. Nicholson (Minister of Labour):
Mr. Speaker, the problems arising out of the housing situation in Canada are under active study by the government. In fact we have had a discussion today and several times within the last week. There will be further discussion by some of us this afternoon and I hope the government will have some announcement to make within a day or so.



FINANCE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Barry Mather (New Westminster):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the Minister of Finance. Can the minister say what consideration he will give when preparing his second-look budget to exempting from sales taxes the purchases made by municipal type agencies, such as drainage and diking boards?


Hon. Mitchell Sharp (Minister of Finance):: Mr. Speaker, this question has been considered before every budget I have prepared and, I gather, before every budget prepared by many of my predecessors. It will be given serious consideration again, but this may have the same result.



REQUEST FOR REMOVAL OF SALES TAX ON BUILDING MATERIALS

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. G. L. Chatterton (Esquimall-Saanich):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Finance. In view of the fact that the report of the Economic Council of Canada indicates that the 11 per cent sales tax played a significant part in the increase in price of building materials, would the minister now consider removing this tax?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, when government policy is made in this respect, it will be announced in the ordinary way.



BILINGUALISM AND BICULTURALISM


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. William Slcoreyko (Edmonton East):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to direct a question to the Prime Minister. Is he now in a position to advise the house regarding the progress being made by the commission on bilingualism and

November 22, 1966
Inquiries of the Ministry biculturalism in concluding its final report, and when can we expect this report to be tabled?


Lester Bowles Pearson: Mr. Speaker, I cannot add anything to my last reply to this question except to say I have been urging the commission to complete its work at the earliest possible date, subject to the importance of the work. I have also been urging it to produce a report before the end of the year.



REQUEST FOR RECONSIDERATION OF DECISION

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. A. D. Alltenbrack (Prince Edward-Lennox):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the right hon. Prime Minister. Would the Prime Minister and the cabinet reconsider their decisions in respect of bilingualism, in view of the vote of the Quebec Liberal Federation last week end against bilingualism and for unilingualism?


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


Almonte Douglas Alkenbrack: Ten o'clock, Mr. Speaker.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member realizes that a question is not automatically accepted for the adjournment debate. It would have to be considered by the Chair and a ruling made whether the question is in order. I have serious doubts about this question, which seems to have provincial implications. In any event, I would be pleased to look into the matter if the hon. member gives notice of his intention to raise the question at the adjournment debate.


Almonte Douglas Alkenbrack: On a question of privilege, Mr. Speaker, and with due respect to your observations, those provincial implications also have serious national implications.



SHIPPING


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. M. Forrestall (Halifax):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Minister of Transport. At this particular time of the year can he give the maritime ports, particularly Halifax and Saint John, an assurance that his department has made no basic changes in its icebreaking policy with respect to the lower and middle parts of the St. Lawrence river, and if there have been any changes would he point them out to us?


Hon. J. W. Pickersgill (Minister of Transport):: Mr. Speaker-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I wonder
whether the question asked should be answered. The hon. member is asking for a statement of policy. Perhaps there is an argument in favour of allowing an answer, if it can be brief.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Speaker, I think I can do it briefly. It is very difficult in the matter of icebreaking to keep warm, but as I have a warm heart I may say that there is no change in policy.



FINANCE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Colin Cameron (Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands):: Mr. Speaker, my question is addressed to the Minister of Finance. I wonder whether the minister is today in a position to answer a question I asked a few days ago. Could he tell us when we may expect the report of the Carter Commission on taxation?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I should like to give an answer in supplement to something I said the other day in reply to the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre. First of all, may I say I am not yet in a position to say when the report will be brought down.
The hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre asked a question on November 15 relating to the report of the Royal Commission on Taxation. He asked whether the commission is making revisions in any of the chapters on which advance drafts had earlier been sent by the commission to officers of my department. I am advised that during the past year all of the chapters have been revised in greater or less degree. I am told that the commission is working on some chapters now which the department has not seen at all.
In reading the hon. member's question, I find that an unfortunate inference might be read into it. In order that there be no misunderstanding, I should state that none of these revisions has been sought by the officers of my department, to whom advance drafts have been sent on a confidential basis. As I advised the house last January 24, and in a written reply February 9, draft chapters have been sent to some officials of my department in
November 22, 19G6

order that they might carry out a detailed analysis of the various proposals being considered by the commission, so that the department would be better prepared for consideration of the report after it is published and the preparation of any legislation that the government may decide to introduce after such consideration.
On a few occasions individual officers in the public service have been asked by the commission to comment on particular matters, because of their specialized knowledge or experience and they have done so. No instructions in regard to any such comments have been given by ministers. The commissioners have of course full responsibility to decide on what they wish to say and recommend in their report.
I have not read any of these drafts myself and do not intend to read any of them until the government receives the report. I am informed by the chairman of the commission there will be six volumes in all of the report, and that some of these, in both languages, are now at the printers.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I would hope the answer now is completed, because it seems to me the reply is inordinately long and, I suggest, is not the type of reply which should be made on questions.


Mr. Stanley Knowles (Winnipeg North centre):: May I ask a brief supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. In view of the time which has elapsed, and in view of various other considerations, would the minister now give thought to the possibility of tabling tomorrow the documents which have been requested as set out in a motion of mine which has been on the order paper since January 31, 1966.


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, the reason I have not wished to answer this question is that I have been told by my officials that to publish this correspondence would be to reveal by that fact some of the contents of the report which might lead to unnecessary speculation about the report itself.


Edmund Davie Fulton: Mr. Speaker, in the light of what has been revealed by the Minister of Finance, would the Prime Minister consider at this stage directing that the practice of submitting draft copies of a report to government departments before publication is a practice which breaks every precedent, and should be discontinued.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Mr. Speaker, I cannot agree with what my hon. friend said about the practice, and the way it has been carried out on this occasion.
Inquiries of the Ministry UNITED NATIONS



COMMITMENT TO SELECTIVE OBLIGATORY SANCTIONS

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, I do not know whether or not today the Prime Minister is in a position to give the house some information regarding the Rhodesian situation, and in particular to advise us whether Canada has agreed to accept a certain list of selective commodities to be placed on the embargo list by the United Nations if and when this matter is transferred or submitted to the United Nations.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Mr. Speaker, all I can say is that if the talks break down that well might happen. I understand the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom may be making a statement on this matter to the House of Commons at Westminster tomorrow. I do not wish to anticipate what he may say, but if the talks break down, then the United Kingdom is pledged to take up the matter with the United Nations. As agreed at the last conference of prime ministers, it is expected that a resolution will be submitted to the Security Council by the United Kingdom, if it secures Commonwealth support for the resolution, which will deal with selective obligatory sanctions. Discussion of the details of that resolution, if and when made, is still going on. But as a government we are committed to the principle of selective obligatory sanctions against Rhodesia if talks break down.


John George Diefenbaker: Could the Prime Minister advise the house whether any of these selective commodities to be placed on the embargo list would affect Canada in any way and, second, is there any foundation for the suggestion that, should the embargo not be any more successful than the hoped for success of last January or February, any of Canada's forces will be made available to bring down the Smith administration.


Lester Bowles Pearson: Mr. Speaker, our position in respect of the use of force against Rhodesia has been made quite clear. We are against that, as indeed the United Kingdom and certain other governments are against it. The question of obligatory sanctions under chapter 7 of the United Nations charter is something quite apart from the voluntary sanctions which have not been successful. Sanctions under chapter 7, if accepted and applied by all

November 22, 1966
Inquiries of the Ministry members of the United Nations, might be much more effective.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, when did the government first realize that its expectations in respect of the voluntary embargo and sanctions being successful had no basis in fact?


Lester Bowles Pearson: Our expectations were based on the information secured earlier from the United Kingdom government, which is in close touch with these matters. As a result of the report of the United Kingdom, at the last meeting of the Commonwealth prime ministers it became quite clear that the voluntary sanctions had not had the success some members of the Commonwealth had hoped for.



DONALD REPORT-INQUIRY AS TO GOVERNMENT ACTION

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources with regard to the action the government proposes to take arising out of the Donald report and assistance to the coal mining industry of Nova Scotia. Could the minister tell the house whether before the end of this session or before Christmas an announcment will be made regarding the government's program in this connection?


Hon. Jean-Luc Pepin (Minisier of Energy, Mines and Resources):: I hope so, Mr. Speaker.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Gerard Laprise (Chapleau):: Mr. Speaker, I wanted to direct a question to the Minister of Public Works as government house leader, to ask him-I think he is returning to his seat-whether he could assure the house that we will be able to consider Bill No. C-170 before the end of this session, this year?

Hon. G. J. Mcllraifh (Minister of Public
Works): Mr. Speaker, I am not able to give an assurance as to when the committee will return the bill to the house, or how long the house will take on any given piece of legislation. I will do all I can, though, to see that the bill does get early attention by the house.



IMMIGRATION


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Jean Marchand: Mr. Speaker, on Friday last, following a question put to me by the hon. member for Wellington South (Mr. Hales), I promised to give the house some information on our recruiting program.
This year the Civil Service Commission, in accordance with section 39 of the Civil Service Act, delegated the authority to my department to recruit and select university graduates as employment service officers for the Canada Manpower Division. This was done because the requirement this year is approximately 500 such employees. The actual appointment of those selected, however, remains with the Civil Service Commission.
This delegated authority from the Civil Service Commission was specifically to meet current needs in the Canada Manpower Division and does not extend to the requirements for university graduates in other parts of my department. The Civil Service Commission will recruit other university graduates needed for immigration's foreign service officers and junior executive officers.



YUKON QUARTZ MINING ACT


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Erik Nielsen (Yukon):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development and ask whether, in view of representations he has received from the Yukon Chamber of Mines, it is the intention of the government to introduce amendments to the Yukon Quartz Mining Act this session.


Hon. Arthur Laing (Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development):: Mr. Speaker, I doubt whether that will be done this session. I would tell the hon. member that I think we have arrived at a position where there is pretty general agreement among the operators and the other sections of the industry in respect of the amendments desired. The association has asked us to restrict the amendment to a single item; I believe it is to section 12. We are of the opinion that this would not be beneficial, and would prefer to see the entire act renovated at one time.
November 22, 1966



AGRICULTURE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Michael Starr: Mr. Speaker,
I wish to address a question to the right hon. Prime Minister. In the interests of humane action, will the Prime Minister not consider legislation placing some restraint and supervision on the use and housing of laboratory animals, and their sale and transportation, similar to the legislation enacted by the United States Congress on August 24 last? Would the Prime Minister consider introducing legislation similar to or better than that passed in the United States?


Lester Bowles Pearson: Mr. Speaker, I would be glad to look into the matter, but I cannot hold out any particular hope that such legislation will be made available to the house this session.



POST OFFICE DEPARTMENT


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. Jean-Pierre Cote (Postmaster General):: Mr. Speaker, yesterday the right hon. Leader of the Opposition asked me the following question as reported in Hansard:
Is it a fact that his department has made arrangements with the penitentiaries branch for the manufacturing or making of mail bags with "Royal Mail" deleted therefrom, and with "C.P." or "P.C." in its place?
I replied as follows:
Mr. Speaker, I am not aware of this. I will take the question as notice, but I must say that the words "Royal Mail" have never been used on mail bags.
Today I received more information from my department on this subject. The reason I was not aware of it is that the last contract for the production of mail bags given to the penitentiary was on May 2, 1966. The term "Royal Mail" was not deleted because, as I said yesterday, it never appeared on Canada Post Office mail bags, and no action has been taken to have "C.P." appear on these mail bags.


John George Diefenbaker: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Does the minister say that mail bags are not being produced in any of the penitentiaries having on them the superscription "C. P." or "P. C.", as the case may be? I did not hear the minister clearly.
Inquiries of the Ministry


Joseph Julien Jean-Pierre Côté: That is what I said, that the last contract given to the penitentiary was on May 2, 1966; and no action has been taken to have the letters "C. P." on these mail bags.


John George Diefenbaker: I think the minister had better get in touch with the penitentiary at Dorchester, I think it is.



PENITENTIARIES


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Frank Howard: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a supplementary question to the Solicitor General and ask whether he would not consider giving the inmates of penitentiaries something a little more productive to do than mending mail bags.



UNITED NATIONS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. David MacDonald (Prince):: Mr. Speaker, my question refers to an early question with regard to the present policy being espoused by our government with regard to a two-China policy. Could the Prime Minister tell us whether in this two-China policy there is included the policy of self-determination for Formosa?


Lester Bowles Pearson: Yes, Mr. Speaker. The position we have taken-and I am sure it is supported on all sides of the house-is that no decision should be taken in regard to the future of the people of Formosa without the consent of the people of that country. Perhaps I may put it in a word by saying that our policy in this matter has been universality without expulsion.



AIR TRANSPORT


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Eldon M. Woolliams (Bow River):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the Minister of Transport whether he has had any discussions with his departmental officials and the transport board in reference to allowing and permitting other air companies to give passenger and express services in those areas where there is now an emergency and no service whatsoever?



November 22, 1968
Inquiries of the Ministry


John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Speaker, there was a certain-and I say this without any disrespect-imprecision about the hon. gentleman's question. I wonder whether he would frame it precisely, so that I can give an accurate answer?


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: My question, briefly, is this: Has the minister had any discussions with the transport board-


John Whitney Pickersgill: The Air Transport Board?


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: -yes, the Air Transport Board and his officials in reference to permitting other air companies to land and get permits in those areas where there is no passenger service whatsoever because of the strike and the government's decision with reference to the strike?


John Whitney Pickersgill: I of course have had several discussions with the chairman of the Air Transport Board since the Air Canada strike took place and while it was being anticipated. The conclusions of those discussions I set out in a very careful memorandum which I read to the house the other day. I do not think I can add anything to that.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: A supplementary question. Has the minister had an interview with the Mayor of Calgary and other officials in reference to an application by C.P.A. to obtain the right to land in that city, which is a centre of the petroleum industry and other industrial interests?


Mr. Speaker:: I suggest to the hon. member that it is not in order simply to ask whether the minister has had a conversation with the mayor or with another individual.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Speaker, with due deference I think I should be permitted to answer the question. I think it is an urgent one and it would be desirable for me to give accurate facts concerning this matter. Before there was any strike I received a delegation from Calgary, which did not include the mayor but which included an alderman, who I believe was speaking for the mayor. This delegation urged that as a matter of policy, Canadian Pacific Airlines should be allowed to land in Calgary on transcontinental flights. This meeting had nothing whatever to do with the strike. Since the strike occurred I received a telegram from the mayor of Calgary, and I am afraid I have perhaps been discourteous in not yet replying to him, in which he suggested that something might be done with relation to the strike. My position
[Mr. Woolliams.)
in that regard is the one I explained the other day in reply to the hon. member for Kamloops, and I have not suggested any deviation from it.


Edmund Davie Fulton: As a supplementary, Mr. Speaker: On Friday, November 18, the minister undertook to make inquiries of the Air Transport Board as to whether they had received any indications from any of the carriers that their operations, seeking to extend their runs to areas normally served by Air Canada, would be interfered with. May I ask the minister whether he has received an answer to that inquiry?


John Whitney Pickersgill: I made inquiries of the Air Transport Board and I was given an answer that no official representations have been made to them by any of the air lines suggesting any action on their part. Certain observations were made in an informal way by one of the air lines, but I think this was under cover of the confidentiality which usually prevails in matters of this kind, and I would prefer not to be pressed for an answer.

The house resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Sharp for committee of supply, and the amendment thereto of Mr. Douglas.



INCREASED COST OF LIVING

Mr. Richard Cashin (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Fisheries):: Mr. Speaker, I have now had an opportunity to read the remarks made yesterday by the leader of the New Democratic Party and I would suggest to you, sir, that this is the latest and most blatant attempt by the leader of that party to discredit not only other political parties, which I suppose is fair game, but also to attack the very institution of parliament. To say the least, these remarks represent an exercise in flamboyant demagoguery the likes of which we have seldom seen in this chamber. The hon. gentleman has surpassed himself in his exploitation of half truths and the dissemination of misleading information. The leader of the New Democratic Party, in his parliamentary smugness, would like Canadians to believe that they are the only party concerned with the well-being and welfare of Canadian citizens.
I suggest that the hon. member for Bur-naby-Coquitlam (Mr. Douglas) has seriously
November 22, 1966

damaged his own case by introducing a motion which completely ignores the very significant achievements of parliament and the government in the past three and a half years. While the present administration is quite within its rights to claim justifiably that these achievements are largely the result of initiatives and policies introduced by the government, nevertheless they are, in a large part, measures and policies which have received support from both sides of the house. I deplore the insidious campaign, aided and abetted by the New Democratic Party, which challenges the institution of parliament. This kind of malignant propaganda can serve no useful purpose in helping to build parliament into a greater and more effective institution. In democratic societies there is always room for constructive and useful criticism. Indeed, democracy thrives on intelligent and constructive debate. Flamboyant demagogues, masters of half-truths and those who take liberty with facts are the primary enemies of democracy.
The leader of the New Democratic Party, in playing the familiar role of a parliamentary god, demands that there be a better distribution of national income in Canada on economic and humanitarian grounds. This is a goal toward which all of us strive. I ask you, Mr. Speaker, how will this laudable goal be achieved? I suggest it will take more than romantic flights of oratory; it will take considerable intelligence and well thought out programs; it will take a determination to plan programs and policies which will achieve desirable results.
We may ask ourselves, what was the record of the present administration and of parliament in the past three and a half years. I suggest that the record is quite clear; it is there for all to see. Unfortunately, we have been experiencing a certain phenomenon in Canada in the past three and a half years. We are learning to live with controversy and healthy debate in parliament, and this debate, sometimes on the less important issues, has often been deliberately used to obscure the major accomplishments of the government and-and this is very important-to give a false impression of what is parliament's job.
[DOT] (3:30 p.m.)
Too many people in Canada-a country without a revolutionary tradition and without the great tradition of debate and controversy-are led to believe that somehow parliament should become more compatible with the age of automation and that, in fact, it should be filled by robots. However, I suggest
Increased Cost of Living to you that in contrast with the fields of science and technology those who are dealing with human resources and human affairs must carry on a healthy, controversial and democratic debate. I deplore tactics, both in the House of Commons and elsewhere, by those who do not have a true and mature understanding of democracy to discredit our institutions. The flamboyant and unrealistic speech, which I think represents the zenith even for the leader of the New Democratic Party, was aimed not so much at debating the issues before parliament as at discrediting the institution of parliament. These tactics have been used before in other countries. Let us hope that as we try to uphold a more mature democracy in this country we will recognize the difference between the approach which presumes ab initio that all our past is for nought, one that does not recognize that our politics are in the process of evolution, and one that does not recognize that in that context we must be cognizant of the real issues and real facts.
I suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, that being the leader of a minority group in this house is not to be interpreted as a licence to be irresponsible. I am not suggesting, that all the members of the New Democratic Party or of any other party are irresponsible at all times. Indeed, many of us on many occasions have had the pleasure of listening to some very responsible speeches from all quarters of the house, and some of the criticisms which have been made of the administration or of parliament have indeed been valid. But I think there is one basic difference between that criticism and the approach taken last evening by the leader of the New Democratic Party. They recognize the context in which we are operating. They are realistic. They are able to bring idealism to temper the realities of time.
By introducing the word "idealism" I am not suggesting for one moment that the speech of the leader of the New Democratic Party last night was itself idealistic. It was almost the antithesis of idealism. Someone has just asked me what the antithesis of idealism is. It is the motion introduced in the House of Commons yesterday by the leader of the New Democratic Party.
I mentioned last evening the record of accomplishments on the part of this government during the last three and a half years. I pointed to the 80,000 new jobs which have been created in the Atlantic provinces, largely during the last five years. But this is not to say that there are not still too many people today

November 22, I960
Increased Cost oj Living in the Atlantic provinces, as in other parts of Canada, who do not enjoy the full advantages of being a Canadian in the 1960's. I suggest, Mr. Speaker, that their cause is not helped one little bit, in fact, it is hindered, by the demagogic approach used yesterday by the leader of the New Democratic Party.
Does the hon. gentleman not recall that during the past few years much legislation has been introduced aimed specifically at the problems he discussed in his ill-advised speech yesterday? The results of this legislation have in many cases been dramatic and favourable. In other cases, the results are still disappointing. I can give many examples of significant results which have been achieved. There is the ARDA program, introduced by the previous administration and which is in fact one of the great concepts put forward by the opposition when they were in office. This concept has been enlarged by the present administration.
I point, Mr. Speaker, to the problems of the province of New Brunswick. Has the leader of the New Democratic Party any information about the progress that is being made, the plans that have been announced and the work already started in the province of New Brunswick to increase opportunities among the people of the province? I suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, that the new approaches, the real, practical, progressive approaches, which have been introduced to solve the problems in New Brunswick redound to the credit of the present administration and to the credit of this parliament for enacting the kind of law needed. Credit must also be given to the dynamic leadership of the Liberal premier of New Brunswick, Hon. Louis Robichaud.
My good friend from Nanaimo-Cowi-chan-The Islands (Mr. Cameron) last night introduced some questions about Newfoundland, and the report of the Economic Council. I was able to point out to him at the time that Newfoundland took second place to no province in recognizing the value of what was contained in last year's report of the Economic Council. Indeed, they did not have to wait for that report to recognize the tremendous importance of education in the continuing battle against poverty.
Perhaps the hon. member for Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands is not as informed as he might be on the developments in that province in connection with education. We have not only free education for our university students in the province, but the government of Newfoundland is now paying salaries to
[Mr. Cashin.)
people to attend university. I think this is a great, progressive step.
Newfoundland still has many problems in this area, perhaps more than any other part of Canada. But let me point to the record of achievement of the past 17 years, and to the fact that a Liberal government has remained in office in that province for 17 years. This government has not lost its enthusiasm or its idealism. It has been able, with the co-operation of the federal government, to introduce programs and policies which are aimed at the very problem which the leader of the New Democratic Party said has been completely ignored.
As I listened to his speech, Mr. Speaker, it was almost as if I were listening to someone who had never before set foot on earth, who had never before been in touch with reality. It was as if all of a sudden he had descended upon earth from some other solar system, as a member of some other race of men-if that is what they have up there-who were advanced far beyond the civilization we are apt to achieve in this country even in the next century. The hon. gentleman deplored what was happening.
Similarly, it was almost as if you yourself, Mr. Speaker, had been carried away on a cloud and deposited in some far corner of Asia Minor in the year 7000 B.C. and had thereupon been called on to deliver an address. How realistic would your address have been in relation to the practical problems which those poor souls in Asia Minor had to cope with in those days, Mr. Speaker?
If this kind of approach on the part of the hon. gentleman is born of innocence, Mr. Speaker, then we forgive it. But if it is an attempt to discredit the very institutions that have made this country great, then we deplore it. I leave it to you, Mr. Speaker, and to other members to decide which is the case; it is not for me to say.
I could go on at great length, and if time permits I may do so, with regard to other policies and programs in the field of social welfare. No government of any other country on earth-and it is this planet that we are dealing with, Mr. Speaker; it is the problems confronting those on this planet we are talking about-has done as much during the last three years in the field of social security as this government.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


Richard Joseph Cashin: I hear laughter, but I am not surprised. When for the first time in this
November 22, 1966

country the present government introduced the Canada Assistance Plan, which recognized that we had to develop a philosophy of social security and that no longer could we work with the old tools but had to have a more imaginative and flexible program, what do you think the Conservatives did, Mr. Speaker? They looked at it and probably thought that this could be creeping socialism. Nevertheless, they examined it. A number of them realized the advantages of the program. Others were perhaps a little critical, but they did discuss it realistically.
On the other hand, Mr. Speaker, what did the members of the New Democratic Party do? They completely disowned it. What was their motive for doing this? Was it one of innocence, or of ignorance, of not understanding what it was? Can we say this of the party that holds itself up as the masters of reform? Is this the reason they did not understand the Canada Assistance Plan, or was there another reason, one which goes to the very roots of their whole approach to politics today and their efforts to exploit some of the growing pains that we are experiencing as a democracy? I leave it to you, Mr. Speaker, and to other hon. members to decide.
As I said at the beginning of my remarks, Mr. Speaker, in three years the record of this government in the field of social security is quite clear. The same can be said of the policies adopted by this government in other areas.
Far be it from any of us to say there is no room for discussion and debate of other questions which this government and this parliament might be tackling. Far be it from me to suggest that some things have been overdone and others not done well enough. But it is legitimate in debate to talk in these terms. However, to talk in terms of the speech of the hon. member for Burnaby-Coquitlam yesterday is either to talk completely unrealistic nonsense, or I suggest, Mr. Speaker, it is to attempt to misinform and mislead the Canadian public as to the very functions of parliament. It is part of their whole, insidious campaign.
For too long, Mr. Speaker, has this little group sat. Many able men have sat with them in the past and there are many able men sitting with them at the present time. But the great thing they have forgotten, at least their leader has, is that they are out of date. The speech made by the hon. gentleman yesterday might well have had some relevancy 40 years ago. Let me tell the hon. gentleman that the
Increased Cost of Living world has changed but that he has not changed with it.
In the area of reform today we have to be more sophisticated. We must recognize that although we have made progress in the last 30 years we have not made enough progress. There are still too many problems facing us, and we must ask ourselves how we are going to cope with them.
[DOT] (3:40 p.m.)
I draw the attention of this house to the speeches made by the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. MacEachen) and the Minister without Portfolio (Mr. Turner). There we have two men who, in their speeches, look forward to the legislation this house must introduce. We must remember what they said if we are to have a meaningful debate. Are we not all in the same ball game? Unless we talk about the same things, how can we have a meaningful discussion. I suggest that the leader of the N.D.P., completely innocently I suspect, has done much damage to his cause. He should read some of the speeches made by his supporters, because they appreciate what has to be done more than he does.
Somebody has suggested that the leader of the N.D.P. is an anachronism, and that is the kindest thing I can say at this time, because I deplore the tactics he used last night in his speech. It is realistic to say, in a debate which is to have meaningful results, that this government or any government has not done enough. What the hon. member said sounded a great deal like contempt for the intellect of the average Canadian, because when that kind of speech is read by the average Canadian it must have a hollow ring. Some members of the house, among whom the leader of the N.D.P. is foremost, enjoy playing God. There are, none the less, many ways of going forward.
I suggest that the approach of the N.D.P. leader goes against the former approach adopted by his party. His approach will take us back, not forward.


Colin Cameron: We have had two, shall I say, remarkable speeches in the course of this debate. We had one yesterday afternoon, and we had one begun yesterday and completed today.
First of all, I wish to deal with the remarks the hon. member for Medicine Hat (Mr. Olson) made last night. I had great sympathy for

November 22. 1966
Increased Cost of Living the hon. member because I realized the appalling dilemma facing him, the conflict he had between fulfilling his appointed task of what in my youth they called carrying the bucket for the government and the necessity of expressing support for the ideas contained in the amendment of the hon. member for Burnaby-Coquitlam (Mr. Douglas): I have no quarrel with the hon. member for Medicine Hat (Mr. Olson) if he likes the role of water-boy or, shall we say, of Gunga Din to the government. But I take strong exception to the hon. member's misrepresentation of the terms of reference and work being done by a committee of which, like himself, I was a member until I had to leave to attend another committee.
At no time has the committee on consumer prices and cost of living been discussing the question of distribution of income. In no place in the committee's terms of reference will you find that it has been asked to do so. To pretend, as the hon. member did last night, that the matter of maldistribution of income has been referred to a committee of this house and is being discussed there is, to my mind, the grossest misrepresentation.


Mr. Olson:: The rising cost of living is in this resolution.


Colin Cameron: It merely says "particularly in view of the rising cost of living". It says nothing about the terms of reference of the committee. The committee had nothing to do with distribution of income. At no time while I was there and at no time since then, from what I have been told, has the question of income distribution been produced for discussion.
There are other remarks of the hon. member for Medicine Hat to which I take exception. And here, let me say, that I do not believe even the hon. member for St. John's West (Mr. Cashin) would for a moment suggest that in Canada, under our present economy, there is a direct connection between effort and reward. I suggest to the hon. member that he should examine the matter about which he was so contemptuous yesterday. He was contemptuous when I asked the question in the house about the skulduggery, or whatever it is, that brings about the freezing of creditors' claims against the Prudential Finance Corporation. Is this how you get rewards for effort, for the effort of making the best of your neighbour's troubles and taking advantage of your neighbours? Is that what the hon. member meant by effort, because

then, certainly, such efforts are rewarded in our economy.
The hon. member for Bow River (Mr. Woolliams) suggests that this is an extreme case. I am sure that the gentleman with whom I deal in the committee on which I sat today would not take it amiss were I to suggest that some rewards in our society are granted for a very minor effort that is sometimes of dubious social value.
I recall the other day, when I was lunching with four leading figures of the Canadian banking world, telling them that I was in a very bad way. The Liberal party involved with the Mafia; the Conservative party had been involved with Gerda, but I was in worse shape than anybody. I was involved with the temple of Mammon.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: I can say something about that.


Colin Cameron: I am sure you can. I have never known an occasion when the hon. member could not give an opinion, whether he knew anything about the subject or not.
I wish to deal with, shall I say, a more legitimate defender of the Liberal party, the hon. member for St. John's West. In the first place, I wish to reciprocate the kind remarks he made yesterday, perhaps with his tongue in cheek. I have considerable affection for this young man. I have always had a soft spot for ebullient and boisterous children, having raised four children myself who now, with the march of time, have become middle aged parents rearing another generation of ebullient and boisterous children. They never miss the opportunity to teach their grandfather to suck eggs. I have learned to combat them effectively. I have thought to myself that, after all, even the most ebullient and boisterous children grow up. But since last night and this afternoon, I have entertained some doubts whether this is always so.


An hon. Member:: They may be arrested.


Colin Cameron: Yes, their development may be arrested. I was amused to find that the young member for St. John's West appeared to equate the minority group to which he belongs in this house, with the parliament of Canada when he suggested that the leader of my party had mounted an attack on the institution of parliament itself. We have not yet come to the sorry pass in Canada where the beleaguered and discredited Liberal party, a minority group in
November 22, 1966

this chamber, is the equivalent of the parliament of Canada. I think the young man should be careful about what he says. I was not quite sure, when he spoke, if he was fighting a provincial election campaign for his provincial premier, because I noted he told us how greatly the educational system in Newfoundland had improved. I am glad to hear that, because if we sent to the hon. member's constituents the third annual review of the Economic Council of Canada, his constituents would be able to read a certain table. They could do some simple arithmetic, to be drawn from that table, which would show something very strange.
[DOT] (3:50 p.m.)
In 1965 the average income in Newfoundland was a smaller proportion compared to the average Canadian income than it was in 1961, so this province which is going ahead so well under the aegis of a provincial Liberal government and the Liberal government here seems to be rather like the red queen in "Alice in Wonderland". Perhaps they are not in as good a position as that, because they are running very hard and not even staying in the same place, they are going backwards. The hon. member is quite satisfied with what his government has been doing for his part of Canada. But I am wondering what his constituents will think when they read his speech, and I presume he will send it to them. I should be very interested to go to that part of Canada, which I have never had the pleasure of visiting, and take with me the third review of the Economic Council of Canada. I should like to point out some of these things to them and point out the relevant passages of my young friend's speech.


Richard Joseph Cashin: I should be very happy to invite the hon. member to come to St. John's West. I am sure that he and the people of St. John's West would learn something from his visit.


Colin Cameron: I am sure that is true.


Stanley Howard Knowles: That is more than can be said for the hon. member.


Colin Cameron: Let me refer again to the amendment presented yesterday by the hon. member for Burnaby-Coquitlam (Mr. Douglas). I am surprised at the antagonism that has been raised by the suggestion that in Canada we do suffer from a very serious maldistribution of income. I am not going to bandy statistics back and
Increased Cost of Living forth because that is not necessary. We do not need a statistical survey; we do not need a report from some welfare agency to know that there is a gross maldistribution of income in this country. All we have to do is walk through some of the poor areas of our cities, including the capital city of Ottawa; all we have to do is look at the sort of housing these people live in; all we have to do is read about the conditions that obtain in the large metropolitan areas of Canada, to know that this is a fact. I am sure that a walk through some of the streets of these areas, or even a drive through some of the rural areas of Canada -perhaps in the Atlantic provinces-would reveal the fact that all too many Canadians lead stultifying lives in deprivation in this atmosphere of an affluent society in which we live. Any attempt to deny that is, to my mind, a refusal to face reality.
More important perhaps from a general economic point of view than the fact that we have 20 per cent to 25 per cent of our people in this so-called affluent society living under conditions that have been described by accredited welfare agencies as conditions of poverty, and perhaps even more important for the future and for our plans to deal with the situation, is the gross mis-allocation of resources in Canada.
I always wonder when we are told, as we were told not long ago by the Minister of Finance, (Mr. Sharp) that we have reached almost the limit of our productive capacity and that all our resources are occupied in the production of goods and services, whether we are not confusing the shadow with the substance. I often wonder how anybody could suggest that all our resources are being used. I asked some questions of the Governor of the Bank of Canada and the President of the Banker's Association about this matter within the last few days I asked them how they determined that we had achieved an overheated economy, to use the words of the Minister of Finance. I asked them about the yardsticks they used.
The situation finally boiled down to this. There were two yardsticks used; one was the level of employment and the other was the cost of living index. I pointed out to those witnesses that the level of employment tells us nothing. It merely tells us that a certain number of people in the country are employed at certain jobs. It does not tell us the type of jobs and it does not tell us how much those jobs contribute to the national wealth or welfare. All that tells us is that a certain

November 22, 1966
Increased Cost of Living number of people are registered as holding
jobs.
The price index, of course, tells us nothing of the forces that may be contributing to the rise in prices. The price review committee, referred to last night by the hon. member for Medicine Hat, has been digging into some of these problems and has apparently reached the tentative conclusion that the answer is not the simple one which many people think it is, but that it lies deeply imbedded in the procedures and institutions of our distributive system.
Witnesses before that committee have suggested that there must be steps taken to curb excessive advertising and excessive proliferation of various packaging methods. All these things contribute to the rise in the price index and make a mockery of the traditional definition of inflation, as too much money chasing too few goods.
Of course, it is perfectly true that we cannot have unnecessary high-rise luxury apartments and also housing for people of modest income. We cannot have unnecessary shopping centres and at the same time have schools, libraries and hospitals. We cannot have, as we do have in my part of the country, a vast rash of pulp and paper mills far outstripping, as has been admitted by the industry itself, the available market now or in the foreseeable future and at the same time have something that will build a decent Canada in the form of expanded social capital.
I am always surprised when I find that we are spending all this money to build such things as pulp mills, which are not needed because we are well equipped with them now, when at the same time we fail to put any investment into the development of secondary industries. I am still more disturbed when I find that the most wealthy of these companies in Canada, which has some of its operations in my own constituency, has taken the capital extracted from the natural resources, which are the property of the people of Canada and have been developed by the workers of Canada, and invested it in a foreign country when here in Canada we have a grave need for investment for the development of our economy.
The suggestion that we have reached the end of our productive capacity for the time being, and that our economy is so overheated we must pull in our horns, is one that cannot be justified by any statistical evidence. I know of no way by which we can determine the
[Mr. Cameron (Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands) .1
level of our unexploited natural resources because we do not even know where they all are, and I know of no way by which we can tell that we are utilizing our human resources to their best capacity. I know of no way by which we can judge the quality of production that is included in our gross national product.
To suggest that we have statistical evidence which proves that we must pull in our horns and must start moving backwards is, to my mind, the counsel of despair. There are things -which can be done. I took occasion, during the hearing before the finance, trade and economic affairs committee, to question some of the authorities who appeared before us as to the means by which we could overcome this gross mis-allocation of resources, and as to the means by which we could ensure an adequate housing program for Canadian people. I think even the supporters of the government would admit that we are lacking such a program today. I always received the same answer, which I think is probably a very reasonable one. I examined the possibility of allocating resources by means of interest rates, but it is perfectly obvious that would not work. It is perfectly obvious that we are not going to obtain a proper allocation if we continue to depend solely on market forces to distribute the credit that needs to be distributed for the development of social capital.
[DOT] (4:00 p.m.)
All the witnesses before that committee, including the Governor of the Bank of Canada, told me the same thing. They said the only way this problem can be solved is by fiscal measures which, of course, is an economist's way of saying that the government must tax and receive enough revenues in order to make the necessary public investment.
One of the things we must do if we are to overcome this poverty and maldistribution is to improve the productivity of our economy. I have not found anyone who can adequately explain to me why it is represented by the Economic Council of Canada, among others, that Canada's productivity per capita is some 23 per cent less than that of the United States. As a Canadian I refuse to believe that Canadian workers are lazier or stupider than United States workers. I refuse to believe the population of this country is not as well educated and capable as the Americans. I can only think that it is the method by which we have organized our industrial economy that leaves us in this position of lacking control over investment policies, of investment going into merely the most profitable areas without
November 22, 1966



concern for raising the general level of productivity which is the source of more new wealth for every one of our citizens.
If we are to overcome the forces in our society that lead to maldistribution we have to face some serious problems. I agree with the hon. member for St. John's West that we must approach them in a sophisticated way, but the sophisticated way is not to pretend that to proceed with the same sort of policies that have been used in the past, even in the last two or three years, is the way to solve the problems of the modern age.
We have to face the fact that the most important and significant factor in modern industrial society is the rise of vast corporate enterprises which can largely insulate themselves from the rest of the market. They are, for instance, not to be touched at all by any change in the interest rates because those corporations are now among those who contribute that 70 per cent of all capital investment which comes from undistributed profits.
We have to deal with those corporations. We have to deal also with the financial errors or incompetence, or both, which have led to three crashes in recent months which I think, whether the hon. member for Medicine Hat does or not, is a very serious and dangerous situation in Canada.
We have to deal with those people. We have to deal with those who connive to keep prices high, to take every opportunity to off-set any increases in monetary income that the workers may gain by increases in prices. This, of course, is the means by which the share of labour has been kept static for the last 15 or 20 years.
But more important still, Mr. Speaker, we have to decide what sort of values we want to obtain in our society. I suggest to you, sir, that the time has gone when we can no longer rely on the savage values first of all suggested by Thomas Hobbes in his "Leviathan", with his concept of a human society of every man against every other man. This concept was further refined by Adam Smith into a philosophy that each seeking his own selfish ends would contribute to the general welfare.
It is true enough that each seeking his own selfish ends did produce the present great economic organization that we have today. It did produce the enormous funds of capital by which the modern industrial corporation was built. But now we are in another era, and we have to find some way to make these great corporations, and the delicate and precariously balanced productive
Increased Cost of Living machine of which they are the components, evolve and without wrecking that machine we have to make it work in the interest of all the people of Canada.
I suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, that it is not good enough for government supporters to point to the very minor advances that have been made by the faltering Liberal government as proof of significant advance in the solution of this problem. We have had before us in recent days an example of the way in which a large corporation can thumb its nose at the welfare of the Canadian people, can twist the arm of the government, can make the government abjectly change its mind and reverse its policy without any consideration whatever for the responsibility that that company had to supply cheap energy to Canada before exporting it to the United States.
If the government thinks, and its supporters think that they have shown any sign whatever of dealing with this modern age for which, as the hon. member for St. John's West has suggested we require some sophisticated solutions, then I suggest they do a little more thinking. Our second century, Mr. Speaker, must surely be devoted to making sure that the affluent society which is now within our reach will be affluent for all of us, and not a hollow ring of derision in the ears of some 20 per cent to 25 per cent of our population. You cannot escape that 20 per cent or 25 per cent just because you are well fed, well housed and have a good income. I suggest every member of the house should go down to the slum districts of all our large cities and come back properly humbled, realizing how ineffective this parliament and government have been in solving the great problem of distribution which is the chief problem of the modern age.


Hon. Rene Tremblay (Malapedia-Maiane):: Mr. Speaker, the 22nd of November is a date which has become famous, not only in the history of the United States, but in the whole world. This date reminds us of the dramatic death of President Kennedy, who was suddenly removed from one of the most important positions in the world and mourned not only by his country, which has profited from his services, but by people of the whole world, who were accustomed to seeing him as the defender of their interests and possessions.

November 22, 1966
Increased Cost of Living
[DOT] (4:10 p.m.)
In my opinion, the lesson to be drawn from that anniversary is that, in all our work and our efforts, and this applies to the whole world, we should continue to seek inspiration from the courage and the lucidity shown by that American president.
This date of November 22, 1966 will also be remembered in our parliamentary history by the attempt of our Conservative friends to introduce a motion to consider the problem of a pension increase, before the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. MacEachen) could bring before the house a motion to that effect.
Mr. Speaker, since you ruled that motion out of order, our Conservative friends have been frustrated, as they were prevented from launching a debate they hoped to turn to their political advantage. Let us leave our Conservative friends to their problems. The New Democratic Party has won lately, at the expense of our Conservative friends, the sympathy of a great number of Canadian voters who, reluctant to support the Conservative party in such great numbers, are wondering whether the New Democratic Party would not provide an alternative as an opposition party in the country.
On this occasion, a motion has been introduced by the New Democratic Party, that is, an aemndment to the supply motion, and the speech of the N.D.P. leader (Mr. Douglas) was supposed to clarify the basic position his party intends to take in the present situation in Canada.
Our friends of the New Democratic Party chose inflation as their theme. But contrary to the previous motions which offered a familiar solution, the arbitration of prices, the N.D.P. amendment now raises the problem of disparities in income with regard to that same inflation problem.
I should like to make three brief comments on this stand taken by the New Democratic Party.
The first one will be as follows: The problem of inflation was and still is serious, but what we will soon have to deal with in Canada is not so much inflation as the prospect of an economic recession. Moreover, this has been indicated by many economists in the United States and Canada. I do not know whether the Minister of Finance and Receiver General (Mr. Sharp), in the budget which he is supposed to bring down, will suggest some

action to curb this economic recession which could occur in the near future, but I think that the motion introduced by the New Democratic Party comes much too late. I know that some attempts were made in March to introduce a motion on inflation, but I think that, at that time, conditions were more consistent with the objective of curbing inflation.
But I submit, Mr. Speaker, that as indicated in the Economic Council report, we must at the present time worry much more about increasing productivity within the Canadian economy, increasing the mobility of resources as well as increasing public investments in some sectors where the social and cultural needs are great.
Therefore, here is my first proposal. We cannot now be concerned with the problem of inflation in an over-all way, although I admit that some sectors of the economy are still experiencing price increases due to special conditions, and I know that the joint committee of the Senate and the House of Commons on consumer credit is studying a special area, where sharp price increases have occurred and still exist.
But I submit, Mr. Speaker, that we should not worry now about the steps we should take concerning the problem of inflation but rather direct our efforts toward solving the problems I have mentioned.
Second, I would like to deal mainly with the text of the amendment moved by the New Democratic Party and also with the explanations given us by the leader of the New Democratic Party. I contend that this amendment relating the inflation problem to that of income structures is at variance with the whole tradition of economic theory as accepted in all the countries of the world.
The inflationary problems are among those which cannot be considered except by an analysis of supply and demand as a whole. The problem of income structures has very low incidence and, as I will point out in a moment, if one wants to consider the problem of income structures in relation to the standard of living, I would say, what has been indicated to us very properly by the hon. member for Burnaby-Coquitlam (Mr. Douglas), concerning the discrepancies in the distribution of income, that such incidence is more deflationary than inflationary. If substantial amounts of income growth are directed to the profits sectors and to the annuities sectors, it is not inflationary, but deflationary. If such income structures are more
November 22, 1966

and more oriented toward the sectors of actual demand, such as salaries and incomes, then this represents an inflationary pressure. But nevertheless, there remains that those are merely components much less important than the total factors of demand as a whole.
Third, I will say that we cannot, under present circumstances, simply limit ourselves to an analysis of income structures, to ascertain whether inflationary forces are too strong or too weak, but that it is necessary instead to consider budget problems and monetary problems.
Let us take the first point: the present inflationary situation.
Mr. Speaker, the general rise in prices, which affects all sectors of the economy, is the result of an over-all demand in the public sector, at all levels of government, in the private sector of investments or consumption and in the export sector. Those four sectors are the source of that extremely powerful demand that we experienced last year and that we have known in the first six months of the current year.
But the information at our disposal indicates that this over-all demand for consumer or business investments, even as far as our export markets are concerned, will decline or, at least, that its upward trend will ease considerably. That is, therefore, the problem before us, or rather the problem which will soon have to be faced, and the traditional tools of taxation and monetary policies will have to be used to avert, following a period of excessive growth, an economic recession characterized by lower revenues and greater unemployment in the country.
It will be necessary to make adjustments as concerns this situation, and I know very well that the budget which the Minister of Finance will bring down shortly will permit a reassessment of government policies, in view of an economic situation which has changed considerably in the past few months and which might require measures different from those announced in the spring budget.
Mr. Speaker, that is the reason why I think the stand taken by the New Democratic Party regarding inflation is completely devoid of realism.
The second point concerns the relationship between revenue structures and the problem of inflation.
Mr. Speaker, I admit, as stated in the N.D.P. amendment, that there is a moral problem or a problem of equity each time 23033-644J
Increased Cost of Living we see that the national revenue is not equally or more equally distributed among all the participants in the economic activity of the country.
The figures quoted on the very special situation which prevails among farmers are disquieting. I believe that the policies planned by the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Greene) concerning an increase in the price of farm products, and the policies which will come before us soon, I hope, concerning the production costs to the Canadian farmers, will reach to the core of this problem of disparity between the farmers' income and the income available to the other classes of society.
Consequently, Mr. Speaker, there is a real problem in our economy, and although we do not accept the N.D.P. amendment, certainly this will not mean that we disregard the need for more equity in the distribution of national income in Canada.
What we cannot admit is the disparity or the lack of equity in the distribution of income, which constitutes the very root or the main source of the inflationary situation that we have experienced up to now.
As I said a few moments ago, if we wish to relate that problem of disparity of revenues to inflation, the inequality that we find at present indicates a slackening in the effective demand for products-that is a deflationary factor instead of the main inflationary cause about which the members of the New Democratic Party express regrets in their proposed amendment.
[DOT] (4:20 p.m.)
Mr. Speaker, the remedies to such a disparity of incomes cannot be easily identified or catalogued. The problem related to the disparity of incomes and the measures capable of reducing the injustice come under government activities as a whole. It is the over-all budget and taxation that can condition that phenomenon of the greatest inequality of incomes. And I fully agree that, as we are all in favour of virtue, we all want Canadians, throughout this whole country, to get more and more incomes that are less dissimilar. But in order to bring this about, there is not just one particular measure, and it is government activities as a whole, concerning both collection of revenues and expenditures, that should be concerned with such a policy. And I contend, Mr. Speaker, that this government always set as one of its objectives, either through its social security measures or its purely budgetary measures, to have lower
November 22, 1986

Increased Cost of Living income groups, be they in particular areas or belonging to certain social categories, benefit by government expenditures or tax reduction, so that the disparity we regret so deeply may be reduced and that the general distribution of income may be more equitable.
Our efforts, Mr. Speaker, must therefore be continued in order to increase that equality of income in our society. But I do not believe we can say at any given moment that the government made no efforts to increase such equality or reduce the inequality everybody thinks so unfortunate. That is why, Mr. Speaker, I shall vote against the amendment moved by the New Democratic Party. First, because this amendment concerns a problem that does not exist anymore, except on the surface, price increases in some areas which are being dealt with by a joint committee of the House of Commons and Senate; second, because this amendment is based theoretically on an analysis of inflation which, by no means, can be accepted by someone who accepts conventional economic theories; and, finally, because from that standpoint, this government certainly has a record that can be favourably compared with that of any other previous government.


Mr. P. B. Rynard (Simcoe East):: Mr. Speaker, I have listened to many interesting speeches and many differences of opinion on the question of whether the amendment of the hon. member for Burnaby-Coquitlam (Mr. Douglas) should have been discussed at this time. I am one of those who believe that if a person sincerely believes in something, he has a right to raise it, because he is answerable to himself and his conscience and should not be criticized for so doing.
I was very interested in the remarks of the hon. member for Burnaby-Coquitlam because I believe few problems today are of more urgent concern to the average Canadian than the steadily spiralling cost of living. This trend has continued during the last three years. I am not blaming the government for this situation, but would point out that in 1962 President Kennedy said that no country in the world managed its economy so well as Canada.
I think we must look back over the record and study this problem. As the hon. member for Burnaby-Coquitlam suggests in his amendment, we should study this matter very carefully, because something has gone wrong. We must find the answer to the problem. It is

all right to say that this government has introduced many social reform measures. I could ask that they be listed but the list would not be impressive. But this is not the problem we are discussing; we are discussing the problem of spiralling consumer prices, which has caught almost everyone. Let us remember, however, that this situation has most seriously affected those people living on fixed incomes; the old age pensioners, those in receipt of mother's allowance, the disabled, the blind, our veterans and those living on annuities.
As a doctor, I have visited some of these people in their homes and know how they are penalized and punished by the rising cost of living. It is all very well to say that the government enacted the Canada Assistance Act, but the other day I wanted to use the provisions of this act and found it was not operating in the province of Ontario. The hon. member for Burnaby-Coquitlam pointed out that from 1957 to 1965 the wastage of our productive capacity amounted to $21 billion.
[DOT] (4:30 p.m.)
This is an astonishing figure, but I do not doubt the accuracy of his figures. It means that in Canada, over that period of time there has been a per capita loss of $1,200. For every man, woman and child. I contend that we should look into this matter and try to find some solution to correct it. I also strongly believe something should be attempted to tie wages to productivity. Perhaps it is not practical to do so, but I do not see why in this day and age we have to have strike after strike with the resulting unsettlement and difficulties not only to the working people but to those who have nothing to do with it but are victims nevertheless. Surely, we could reach a point at which the increases in wages should be tied to our productivity. This has to be done if we are to keep our competitive position in the world. These strikes do not bring any advantage to anyone. I am sure that most of my labour friends will agree with me that strikes are becoming, seriously outdated. I know many working people who take pride in their work, in the machinery with which they work, and in the factory in which they are employed. They would no more want to hurt that factory any more than they would hurt themselves because they feel a loyalty to it. Surely, it is time we devised a system which would do away with those crippling strikes.
A statement was made in the house earlier, and I studied it carefully, that in the early days wages did not keep up with our increasing productivity and increasing profits. If we
November 22, 1966

are to tie wages to productivity, then why can profits not be tied to productivity to promote greater co-operation and co-ordination between labour and management and to ensure a fair deal to both? There must be both incentives and fair wages for labour and Industry.
I should now like to say a few words about another factor in the high cost of living. It might be that profits have risen too fast, that what we earn in too high a profit is not in the best interest of Canada and that perhaps sometimes the pricing of products is too high to be compatible with the best interests of Canadians as a whole and to retain export markets. I will have something more to say on this subject a little later on. I think that artificial increases in prices must be stopped, as well as strikes.
I also wish to speak about agriculture because not much was said on this subject in the house on this amendment. It is a very important subject because our most basic need in life is food; we cannot live without food. Is our agriculture well organized? Lets take a look. Over the last 10 years our agricultural productivity has increased by over 50 per cent. This increase has not been matched by industry for which the figure is, I believe, around 35 per cent.
Although our productivity in agriculture has increased by 50 per cent, there has been a 60 per cent increase in the cost of farm machinery and equipment which the farmer has to buy. And yet the sale price of farm products, of cattle and dairy products, in the last 10 years, has only increased by 7 per cent. This seems to me to be a gross injustice. Canada ranks lowest in the northern hemisphere in the price of its food on earned income. This is an amazing tribute to the Canadian farmers. In spite of this, more dairy farms have been sold this year in Canada than ever before. Farmers have gone out of business. I asked one person who is well acquainted with agriculture in Canada what was the reason for this, and he told me that the more progressive farmers have sharpened their pencils. They felt they could use their brains to better advantage, in other fields and earn more. Consequently, they have been selling their farms. The best proof of this is that the average age of the Canadian farmer is over 50. Most of them are in their fifties, sixties and seventies. It does not take much imagination to realize that in a few short years not many of them will be left. We have to take action in a short time. There are three billion people in the world today and, according to our statistical exports, approximately half of them are going hungry.
Increased Cost of Living
In the year 2000 they estimate that there will be six billion people on this earth. Mr. Speaker, what does this convey to you? To me it immediately conveys that there will be two mouths to feed in place of the one we have today, and that twice the amount of food which we have today will be required. Even if we double our production, 50 per cent of the population will be inadequately fed according to our present standards. We must remember that this is not the only problem because these extra three billicin people will need space, in which to live. Schools churches, etc. will have to be devoted to looking after the increasing population. This is a very serious problem, and I hope the house will spend some time in looking for solutions to the disparity between the income of the farmer and the price he has to pay for the equipment he uses. If we do not do that we will soon be importing into this country milk, butter, cheese, beef and hogs. Already we are importing lamb and other food. I wonder how many of us realize that Canada is now importing $500 million worth of agricultural products. In fact, the figure is a little higher than that. If we are forced to import many other products, we will have a big problem. At present our balance of payments deficit amounts to about $1.5 billion. We just cannot put ourselves in this position even if we thought it was smart to import that food. So, Mr. Speaker, we may be ceasing to be the cheapest and best fed people in the northern hemisphere. Agriculture is basic to life and must be protected. Farmers must be given incentives. Industry has been given incentives. We thought it good business in this parliament to give the automobile industry $50 million. However, everyone will agree with me that we do not necessarily require automobiles because we can walk; but we do need something to eat. In other words, it is much more important to grow food than to build automobiles, if you have to choose. We entered the automobile agreement because we felt it might help create employment, and so forth.
[DOT] (4:40 p.m.)
Now, Mr. Speaker, what are we doing to help the farmer? As I was waiting to speak, I was thinking of the western farmer and I did a little figuring. It is interesting to note that over the years he has been receiving about $1.65 a bushel for his wheat. Let us not forget that agriculture in this country has played a tremendous role. Last year we exported $1 billion worth of wheat. Therefore, I ask members on all sides of the house; If we

November 22, 1966
Increased Cost of Living had not sold $1 billion worth of wheat last year, what would our financial situation be today?
This figure of $1.65 a bushel is the approximate price the farmers have received for the last ten years. Let us apply a little rule of thumb and be honest about this, Mr. Speaker. Wages for labour have gone up about 30 per cent in the last two years. I do not begrudge them this; I think our workers deserve an increase. But if we had increased the price of wheat by 30 per cent, it would today be selling at about $2.10 a bushel. This shows how unfair the situation is, and I think it is about time we took a good look at this question.
I should like to make one or two suggestions as to what we should do in this regard. For example, we should provide the farmer with incentives and encourage him to develop marginal land which we will need very badly. The situation is urgent,-not forgetting the space another 3 million will need.
Having said that, I want to turn to another important reason that salary earners require more money. One of the reasons we have had so many strikes lately has been simply that government taxes have been piled on government taxes, and this has led to inflation. Government taxes at all levels, plus various deductions amount to nearly half of every dollar the salary earner takes home today. Income tax has gone up and up. There has been imposed by this government an 11 per cent sales tax on building materials and productive machinery during the last two years. The Canada Pension Plan takes close to a 2 per cent bite out of every earned dollar. A further 2 per cent bite is taken out of the income of the employer, who must add on that cost to his product. This he does by raising the price of the material or service he is selling.
In addition, Mr. Speaker, we also find that this government is head over heels in deficit financing. Even the government of the province of Ontario is in debt. They are engaged in deficit financing in a period of boom which has run from 1961 to 1966. What is wrong with the principle that when times are good we should have a balanced budget? Today this principle is disregarded. I not only criticize this government but I also criticize the provincial government of Ontario for deficit financing in good times. Where in the name of conscience do they think they are going with their deficit financing? Somewhere along the line the accounts will have to be balanced and they can only be balanced by inflation-

ary practices.
So I say, Mr. Speaker, that today government taxes are one of the major causes of the increase in our cost of living. I have mentioned sales tax, the increase in income tax and Canada Pension Plan deductions. In the province of Ontario we find a 5 per cent sales tax in effect. There is a 15 per cent sales tax on each gallon of gasoline. Granted, we have good roads, but all these taxes mean less and less take home pay for our labour force. This all adds to spiralling costs, and it is stealing from people on fixed incomes.
That, Mr. Speaker, is the situation we are facing today and all of us, as good Canadians must try to face up to these serious problems. I am not being hypercritical of the government when I say to them that they must cease increasing taxes. They must return to a balanced budget. We have had, as I say, the longest boom period in the history of this country, yet last year the government had a deficit of $1.5 billion. What would happen if there were a recession tomorrow? The government holds the purse strings and should control fiscal policies in Canada. This is a serious problem.
In conclusion, I say to the government that they must stop building castles and spending money. Give the taxpayer a break. Second, they must stop taxing the people and leave them a little more in their pay cheques. Let the people make a few decisions for themselves. It is the ordinary people, Mr. Speaker, who are our greatest resource. Without them, their abilities and their dedication, Canada can go nowhere.


Mr. Eric A. Winkler (Grey-Bruce):: Mr. Speaker, I will be very brief in what I wish to say. It is because of the situation which developed in the house yesterday that I wish to address myself to the tenor of the amendment which is currently before us. I pay particular attention to the words "equitable distribution of rising productivity and national income".
I do not think the intent of this amendment is necessarily socialistic. I noticed that several supporters of the government have taken strong positions on the meaning of the amendment, but I really do not feel they have been justified. During the course of this year, particularly in view of the alarming rise in our cost of living, I have felt that some solution should be sought on a national basis to deal with this problem. I regret to say that this government, in the course of its tenure of office, has not sufficiently recognized the need in Canada for national policies.
November 22, 1966



[DOT] (4:50 p.m.)
We need policies to make our nation more complete, to bring all segments of the economy together with a common interest so that the economy may return those things which we are able to produce to the people, and so that the people may have a high standard of life.
You will recall Mr. Speaker that I placed a motion before the house yesterday that His Honour saw fit to rule out of order. The members who moved the motion currently before us presented strong arguments supporting the motion then before the house. Because of that, I felt impelled to make a contribution to the debate this afternoon.
There is a great need for a board having national responsibility to keep a watchful eye on costs which affect the housewife and every day living costs. I have heard the suggestion that a prices review board, or whatever one may term it, be established. I urge the government to move hurriedly to do this. Another body might be constituted to lay down guidelines, though I understand that the Economic Council does not think that guidelines, such as laid down in the United States, should be laid down in Canada.
Surely, in our enlightened times there is a relevancy between the cost of living, productivity, gross national product, and that which is a reasonable return for labour or which we endeavour to pledge to our labour organizations. I feel that the labour disturbances we have recently had in Canada might have been avoided had there been a properly constituted body to bring various segments of the economy together. Had there been certain guidelines under which those segments might have operated much difficulty might have been avoided, because the different segments would have felt they were being properly used.
It has been said that the government is responsible for the present labour situation because of the way it handled the dockers' strike and the seaway workers problem. Certainly, the labouring people of this country are entitled to any benefits meted out to other segments of the economy. One cannot blame certain groups for putting their interests forward, and if need be, going on strike. The hon. member for Simcoe East (Mr. Rynard) has suggested that the day of the strike is passing; that surely, in our enlightened age, we shall come to the point where there are no more strikes. I believe this house should look at national policies which ought to be evolved to deal with problems in the field to which I
Increased Cost of Living have referred. The government acted with the seaway workers, and that action has rebounded because the government has participated in other, similar strikes that are having an adverse effect on our economy. Not too many days ago, before negotiations resumed in the Air Canada dispute, I asked the Minister of Labour (Mr. Nicholson) if he would not call the parties to Ottawa to reach a settlement. There is a responsibility on the Minister of Labour in many of these arguments. He has a duty to Canada, particularly where federal corporations are involved, to bring the parties to Ottawa and keep them here until settlement is reached.
It did not take the cabinet long to bring about a result in the seaway workers' dispute. Surely, if the minister realizes his responsibilities, he will bring the parties in the present dispute here.
I have a document in my possession concerned with the state of the economy in the United States. I will not use it because it is a United States document, but it illustrates clearly the course of events economically in the future. In the next 10, 15 or 20 years we shall reach a pattern in our economy higher than any we have ever realized. I believe there will be an industrial boom, and that all segments of the economy will advance beyond what we have seen in the past despite this government being in office. I will not go into details because the report in my possession contains no figures. I do wish to say, however, that the government has failed the senior citizens of this country.
We have legislation on the order paper, but we fear how that legislation is to be implemented. We think of the principle established by the Liberal government in 1950, first in committee then unanimously in the House of Commons, giving security to our senior citizens as of right. Now, in 1966, with the tremendous pattern of development in front of us that I referred to, this government may turn away from the principle that it enunciated and supported unanimously in 1950. I say to you, Mr. Speaker, that the people of Canada are cognizant that the government has abdicated the position it took 16 years ago. The government will not deal with the rights of the senior citizens. The government may eliminate the additional $500 deductible benefit extended by the Conservative party to those between 65 and 70, thus bringing about a saving. But there is over $320 million in the old age security fund now, and a substantial amount of that money, were it given to the

November 22, 1966
Increased Cost of Living old people who would normally receive any increase as a matter oi right, would be recoverable through income taxes.
What is the government trying to do to the senior citizens of Canada? Even the people on the government side will stand up and support the measure that the Minister of Health and Welfare (Mr. MacEachen) has on the order paper today, but they will directly oppose the position the government took earlier in support of the senior citizens. It has taken the government almost one year to bring the old age pension legislation before the house. I wonder if the legislation will be retroactive when it comes into force? This is something which greatly concerns the people who need this support. I say to the government that people today living on $75 a month are suffering from the high cost of living. These people are our responsibility, and I say that the government has abdicated its responsibility in the economic field, in the field of labour relations, and most of all, I regret, in the field of senior citizen care.
[DOT] (5:00 p.m.)
I supported the medicare measure that the Minister of National Health and Welfare brought before the house, and I am not going to stop anybody from having what the government is prepared to mete out in its new legislation. I want to give notice at this time that I will fight against the legislation the government has on the order paper concerning our senior citizens because it is not fair and breaches the principles established by the Liberal government in 1950. I hope the members of that party will have the intestinal fortitude to support the amendments which we will bring forth.


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I rise during this debate to take issue with the amendment now before the house and with many of the points raised, particularly those of the leader of the N.D.P. when he proposed the amendment.
That amendment, as the house is aware, is to the effect that:
-since the income of wage and salary earners has remained approximately the same and farm income has fallen as a proportion of the total national income over a period of years, this House regrets the failure of the government to introduce policies designed to produce an equitable distribution of rising productivity and national income among all groups in Canada, particularly in view of the rising cost of living.
This amendment is factually incorrect. It is based on too narrow a view of our country's

economic and social objectives. It ignores the very remarkable strides made in this country in recent years in sharing fairly and equitably the record gains in production we have managed to achieve.
Let me begin with the factual record. The hon. member for Burnaby-Coquitlam (Mr. Douglas) quoted from the proceedings of the special joint committee of the Senate and House of Commons on consumer credit, when my deputy minister provided some statistical material drawn from official sources at the Dominion Bureau of Statistics. I am pleased that he did so, since these are objective statistics upon which useful discussion can develop. My hon. friend drew attention to the remarkable stability of the share of income going to wage and salary earners over long periods of time-about which I shall have something to say in a moment. Indeed, the amendment before us is based on this fact. But then, as sometimes happens, confusion overtook the hon. member and he claimed that since 1949 the share going to capitalists increased far more than that going to labour. This confusion arose when he compared the average annual rate of increase in wage and salary incomes since 1949, which amounted to 7.7 per cent per annum, with that going to capital. He then pointed out that profits rose by 6.6 per cent per annum and other investment income, much of which incidentally goes to wage and salary earners from their savings, rose by 10.7 per cent per annum. He therefore concluded that income going to capital rose by the sum of the two annual increases, some 17.3 per cent annually, more than twice as fast as that going to labour. I find it extraordinary that the hon. member should have fallen into such an obvious error and based his whole case upon a simple and obvious misinterpretation of the facts.
Of course the conclusion he drew from these figures was quite wrong. The sum of corporation profits and other investment income has increased, not by 17.3 per cent annually, as the hon. member suggested, but by the average of the two components, which works out to the same 7.7 per cent increase that labour enjoyed. This is to be expected since, as the hon. member has pointed out, over long periods of time shares going to labour and capital-this is before the effects of taxation and other measures that redistribute income-had been relatively stable. This is a very serious error on the part of the hon. member, and it seems to me he has based his whole case on that error.
November 22, 1966

If I were inclined to be technical about the amendment, I could point to another of the tables in the document used by the hon. member which shows the percentage composition of the gross national product. It proves conclusively that the distribution of income has, since this government took office in 1963, moved in favour of labour.
In 1963, labour's share was 49.6 per cent of the gross national product. In the first half of 1966, the latest official figures available, the per cent had increased to 50.6 per cent representing a 1 per cent increase in the share going to labour. During the same period, the share going to profits declined from 9.6 per cent to 9.4 per cent; that of other investment income declined from 7.1 per cent to 6.7 per cent. If one were inclined to take account of capital consumption allowances, which includes business depreciation, it had declined from 12 per cent to 11.6 per cent. If I wanted to be technical and use those figures I could draw exactly the opposite conclusion to that drawn by the hon. member for Burnaby-Coquitlam.
I would not base my position solely on those figures, but I merely draw attention to the fact that higher prices, which have been a source of concern to all of us and I suppose an even greater source of concern to the government since we have responsibility for administration, have not been the result of huge profits being squeezed out of the wage earners. The figures do not support that conclusion. Indeed, if they mean anything at all they mean that profits went down relative to the share gained by labour. Whatever may be the case in any one specific company, that surely cannot be attributed to the economy as a whole. The facts simply will not support that conclusion.
While I am discussing the relative figures about wages and profits, let me say a word about movements of wages and profits over a period of years. It is true that the shares of income going to each is remarkably stable, but they do fluctuate sharply during the course of a business cycle.
I was looking at the report of the Economic Council of Canada, which has just been published, and I noticed at page 67 a pertinent comment which I should like to read to the house. The following is stated:
While shifts in the distribution of income do indeed take place ... it is a most intriguing and relevant phenomenon that in the long run the broad sharing-out of industrial income between wages and salaries on the one hand and profits on the other exhibits a fair degree of stability.
Increased, Cost of Living


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: From what page are you reading?


Mitchell William Sharp: I am reading from page 67. Let me continue:
This has been observed and commented upon in a large number of countries, including Canada. Over the course of the short-term business cycle, the struggle visibly ebbs and flows, with the share of profits retreating as economic expansion approaches a peak and gives way to recession, then advancing again as a trough is reached and general expansion resumed; but over the longer run the great battle for income shares turns out to be much more of a saw-off than the tumult and the shouting might lead one to expect.
When business conditions soften, profits fall off sharply, and when business conditions improve, profits recover from their lower levels. Wage movements tend to be considerably steadier. There is a tendency on the part of some to compare movements during dissimilar periods of business conditions. Thus, it may appear as if profits have been rising too fast, if one compares a recession period with one of prosperity, and that they are the culprit causing rising prices. On the other hand, it may appear that profits have not risen fast enough and that wages have risen too fast, making them the culprit.
[DOT] (5:10 p.m.)
All of these statistical manipulations avoid the central point that the shares going to capital and labour, over long periods of time, remain remarkably stable. This is true not only in Canada but in many other industrialized countries as well. A conference on this very subject was convened in 1961 by the National Bureau of Economic Research in New York, and a great variety of explanations were given for this phenomenon. I shall not try, nor would I pretend to give, the full answer here today. But I would point out to members of the house that the increase in income going to wage and salary earners consists-and in this I may be very simple and obvious-of the numbers of workers on the one hand and the increase in their average pay on the other. Similarly, increases in returns to capital consist of two elements: increases in investment on the one hand, and changes in the rate of return on capital on the other.
We are all aware that there has been a very large increase in the amount of investment in Canada in recent years. A considerable part of increased returns to capital represent incomes to cover the increases in physical capital investment, which makes possible growth in productivity and job opportunities.

The suggestion in this amendment that the government is less aware of these responsibilities of the state, and less concerned to promote them, than the members of the N.D.P. is just one of the myths created by that party and assiduously promoted by it from time to time. But we have to do more than this. This must be one of our main objectives as a government and as a people, but we must ensure that proper policies are developed and a proper environment created so that the vast energies of the country can be fully and effectively utilized to increase rapidly our real wealth, our real production, our national productivity. We would not be satisfied with redistributing poverty; we want to abolish it by increasing our real wealth and make sure that this increase in wealth is shared by all.
To accomplish this, we must ensure that our economy retains economic stability, and resources are not lost through unnecessary unemployment. This is a proper function of broad government economic and financial policy, one at which we have been working hard and, I believe, successfully during the past few years. There has never been in the history of this country a period of such steady and rapid economic expansion as we have seen since this government took office.
We must also ensure that our productivity improves, to give us better living standards and allow us to participate in the world economic scene competitively. Here also there is a whole series of programs which government, business, labour and others in the community can, and are, working hard to achieve.
My third criticism of the amendment is that it ignores the very remarkable strides made in this country in recent years in sharing fairly and equitably the record gains in production that we have managed to achieve. This we have done through our taxation system, on the one hand drawing resources from those able to afford them and, on the other hand, through our transfers to individuals and to other levels of government.
[DOT] (5:20 p.m.)
Let me mention but a few of our accomplishments in recent years: old age pensions have been increased; the eligible age has been lowered and the guaranteed income supplement for the old people that will shortly be before the house will add substantially to the income of those who need it most. A contributory pension plan is now in operation. Youth allowances for students have been introduced, as have interest-free loans to students. A comprehensive Canada "assistance" plan has been
23033-645J
Increased Cost of Living passed by this house to take care of the disabled, the widowed and the orphaned. Transfer payments from the federal government to individuals have increased from $2,133 million in 1963 to an annual rate of $2,424 million in the first half of 1966.
At the same time we have increased our transfer payments to the provinces and their municipalities, to allow them to carry out programs designed to provide equitable distribution of our income gains, and to provide the basis for higher productivity. From 1963 to the first half of 1966, these transfers increased from $1,715 million to $2,388 million. These latter figures do not include the very large transfers we shall be making to the provinces with respect to education, and with respect to a more broadly based equalization formula. These transfers will ensure that the poorer provinces have a better opportunity to provide an adequate level of public services to the citizens, without imposing an intolerable level of taxation.
Mr. Speaker, there is more to be done by government to effect a more equitable distribution of income. There is more that could be done by trade unions in organizing the unorganized groups of workers. There is more to be done by industrialists and by employers. But already much has been done, and therefore, I submit that this motion should be rejected.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Mr. Speaker, as so often happens in debates, sometimes when one hears speakers of different calibre and kind, one forgets what the motion is. I might review just the motion which is now before the house as presented by the leader of the New Democratic Party:
That all the words after the word "that" be struck out and that the following words be substituted therefor:
Since the income of wage and salary earners has remained approximately the same and farm income has fallen as a proportion of the total national income over a period of years, the house regrets the failure of the government to introduce policies designed to produce an equitable distribution of rising productivity and national income among all groups in Canada, particularly in view of the rising cost of living.
I should like to say at the outset that no matter where you stand in respect of political philosophy or where you sit in this House of Commons, you can support this motion to some extent. I never have recognized the philosophical difference some people seem to be able to recognize; that is, that a right
November 22, 1966

Increased Cost of Living winger cannot support this motion, but a middle-of-the-roader could support it and a left winger could support it. I am going to set out some of the facts in Canada today, particularly in respect of inflation. Before I do so I should like to take a moment to congratulate the minister upon the speech he made this afternoon. I might have thought he was attempting to influence some people to join his philosophy. He has a son in Calgary teaching my daughter, and I have a good deal of difficulty in that regard because she is learning to become a Liberal. I have to try to get her back on the rails. He is a good teacher. I should like to say to the minister that most of us on this side of the house are happy that he is the Minister of Finance and that the hon. member for Davenport (Mr. Gordon) has sort of dropped into oblivion now. Perhaps he is going to lead the Liberal party in Ontario.
Today when the minister was speaking he referred to page 69 of the Economic Review of the Economic Council of Canada. I, too, wish to refer to page 69, because I should like to deal with one subject only; that is, the Air Canada strike. I feel this is one of the most important problems facing the nation. The reason I feel it is most important is that since the 15th of this month on the orders of the day I have continually asked questions of the government, particularly the Prime Minister, (Mr. Pearson) the Minister of Transport (Mr. Pickersgill) and the Minister of Labour, (Mr. Nicholson). I have received the kind of wishy-washy answers which show the philosophical attitude of these ministers. I enjoyed the minister's philosophy because he referred to the Third Annual Review of Prices, Productivity and Employment and said that the men who prepared this report were men who, in their own capacities in the fields of labour or management, were experts. I agree with that. But philosophy is one thing and practicability is another.
On November 15, as shown at page 9899 of Hansard, I asked the Prime Minister this question:
Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question for the Prime Minister. In view of the fact that the air strike seems to have caused an emergency similar to the railway strike, is the government anticipating bringing in legislation to end the strike similar to that with which they ended the railway strike?
The reply by the Prime Minister was as follows:
Mr. Speaker, I believe the two situations are not the same and I do not think it would help to bring this strike to a conclusion for the government or

parliament to step in at this time in this way. I hope we will not be required to do so in a strike of this kind.
None of us know particularly what is going on, but we do know that the meetings of labour and management in a monopolistic industry which is a crown corporation are such that the headlines today state:
Air Canada talks fail once more, situation worse.
For once I agree with the leader of the New Democratic party in this regard. When the parties are only meeting for two hours a day and there is a national emergency, but the government says, "Let them take care of it, let us hide it under the carpet for a while. This is no national emergency, it is only Air Canada", then I think the government is not accepting its responsibility. If the minister were sitting in my place, I think he would agree with me that this is an emergency. This is 1966; it is not 1926, 1936 or 1953 when we had the railway strike. Air carriers today, in passenger service, in express and in freight, have somewhat supplanted the railways. I should like to draw an analogy in my own city. In the city of Calgary today, as the minister knows, we have a railway which is trying to get out of the passenger service. They have a station which is so small that it discourages passengers from taking the train. So, Air Canada has a monopoly in the city of Calgary.
[DOT] (5:30 p.m.)
I am pleased to see that the Minister of Labour is in his place. The passenger service in Calgary has been pretty well completely taken over by the air carriers. I do not have the exact figures, but I believe that 90 per cent of the people in Canada today travel by air. Here we have the Prime Minister of this country, supported particularly by the Minister of Labour, saying that this is not a national emergency. At the time of the rail strike they were prepared to call parliament back into session to end that strike. I was absolutely in favour of that decision. Yet today, when parliament is sitting, they are prepared to sit out the strike. The Minister of Labour has said that he is so happy they are meeting and negotiating. He said that at least they were talking and that was the policy of the government, to wait out the national emergency. I ask the Minister of Labour and the Minister of Finance to go to any major, urban centre today, where they have most of their support, to find out what the feeling of the average Canadian is in respect of this matter. If they would do so, they would find that the average person living in this area is
November 22, 1966

against this kind of wait and wish policy. That is what it is, a wait and wish policy; wait and wish that something will turn up like Mi-cawber in "David Copperfield". Not only that, but they would find that the people in Canada are fed up with this policy. I was home the week end before last, and when I went to buy my ticket the personnel of Air Canada-I cannot name them, of course-said: We sincerely hope that this government and parliament will not let the strike occur.
Yet the government waits and wishes. Let us see what the government said in reply to questions on the orders of the day. I asked this question on November 16, as reported at page 9955 of Hansard:
A further supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. I wonder whether the Minister of Labour would make this very clear because there seems to be some misunderstanding on the question. Are the parties still meeting? Is mediation going on? If the answer is in the negative it should be made clear in the House of Commons.
The Minister of Labour replied:
Mr. Speaker, I have no knowledge of any such proceedings going on at the present time. I believe the atmosphere is somewhat tense-
Isn't that wonderful? The atmosphere is tense. Of course it is tense. It is tense in Vancouver, Winnipeg, Calgary, Montreal and Toronto because industries in these areas are not able to attend to their businesses. But the minister quotes, with great approval, from the report of the Economic Council of Canada and talks about productivity. Our industries are at a stalemate because this government will not measure up to its responsibility by appointing a Government mediator so that talks can proceed intelligently. I am sorry the Minister of Labour has adoped this attitude. Up to this point, I had a great deal of respect for his administrative ability, but on this particular issue he has failed not only his party, the government and the House of Commons, but the country. I have no hesitation in saying that. Then I asked the following question:
A further supplementary question. In view of the fact that the minister says he has no knowledge of any such proceedings going on at the present time, does he not feel that he has some responsibility to determine the situation and let us have this information as soon as he can?
There was no answer to that question, Mr. Speaker. Do you know why we have not had answers to the questions we have asked day after day about the air strike? It is because this government does not have the answers.


John Robert (Jack) Nicholson: Mr. Speaker, would the hon. member give us the date of that statement?
Increased Cost of Living Will he not admit that within a matter of hours that the statement was made the parties had voluntarily resumed negotiations?


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Yes; they met for two hours, had coffee and then dismissed. The press today says, "Air Canada Talks Fail Once More, Situation Worse." What is the situation? Let me summarize it, and then I will put the rest of the record straight in this regard. This morning I made it my business to find out the facts of the Air Canada situation by talking to someone who knew something about it. I will not tell the government whether I talked to somebody on the labour or the management side of the company. I had a long conversation with this person and made four pages of notes. I did this because I am one member of parliament who believes this strike is the responsibility of government. I speak for myself in this regard.
I believe we must do everything possible to assist our essential industries to function properly. The government cannot just sit down and wait and wish in this situation. That is what this government is doing, and it is failing to measure up to its responsibilities. The situation is that 5,200 people brought on this strike. This strike is tying up all the air avenues of Canada. Air Canada has a monopoly in this field. They have a monopoly in the city of Calgary; C.P.A. cannot land there on a trans-Canada flight. C.P.A. cannot even land in Great Britain; they must land somewhere in Europe and their passengers are ferried across the Channel to Great Britain or take an alternative aircraft. Air Canada is a crown corporation, not a free enterprise company, and has this monopoly in Canada. The situation in this strike is not like that which occurs in the United States, where they have free enterprise and other companies flying to and from their cities. Air Canada has a monopoly, and when they cease flying, air services cease, business ceases and productivity ceases.
This strike is tying up the air express, mail and passenger operations of the country. There has now been instituted a substitution service in respect of mail, and perhaps in respect of express traffic. But try and get out of Ottawa, try and get out of Calgary, try and operate the petroleum industry in the city of Calgary; and try and operate a business economically in Toronto, Vancouver or Montreal. The maintenance department of Air Canada are on strike, as are the stores department and the ramp and station attendants. What are the mechanics earning today? They

November 22, 1966
Increased Cost of Living are earning $3.17 an hour and are working a 40-hour week. This amounts to $507.20 per month.
As the minister knows, they were offered, according to the Geddes recommendation, a 12 per cent increase for the first year and a 6 per cent increase for the second year. Labour turned down that offer. I ask hon. members to calculate what an increase of 12 per cent and 6 per cent would have meant. These people want only a year contract. The responsibility of any government is to settle this strike. I may be sorry that this government is in office, but it is and has to take the responsibility. Do you realize, Mr. Minister, that there are 12 groups of employees working for Air Canada?
I found out today that under their contracts with Air Canada any one of these groups strike at any time.
Therefore, this strike could be settled tomorrow, another contract would become due for renegotiation and we could be faced with another strike next Monday morning. This government talked about productivity and getting our economy rolling, which was a great Kennedy phrase the government borrowed to get back into office. Is it not about time the government measured up to its responsibility? These groups must be brought together; you cannot have 12 groups with 12 different contracts lapsing at any given time.


John Robert (Jack) Nicholson: Mr. Speaker, would the hon. gentleman permit another question?


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Certainly.


John Robert (Jack) Nicholson: Does he not agree that a recommended increase of 18 per cent over a period of two years is a reasonable one, whether or not it is acceptable to the workers being another matter? Also, was the proposed increase not over two years, and not just for one?


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: My answer is categorically yes. But that offer was made and the strike is still on. The government is doing nothing about it. It has the responsibility to solve this problem. I asked the Prime Minister the other day to introduce legislation-I speak for myself in this regard-to bring the strike to an end, because we cannot allow the continuation of a strike that is adversely affecting an essential industry of this country.
I was very impressed with a speech made today by one of the Liberal members, the member from St. John's West (Mr. Cashin). We have the New Democratic Party playing ducks and drakes with the economy of this

country and then crying about the state of our economy because of strikes. But they are praying for strikes and confusion; this is what they want. I emphasize again that there are 12 different groups-


John Robert (Jack) Nicholson: Mr. Speaker, the hon. gentleman has not replied to my question. I asked whether the proposal did not cover a two-year period. Does the hon. member not realize this?


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: I know it is for a two-year period; a 12 per cent increase the first year and 6 per cent the second year. Air Canada is desperate. They say: If we sign a one-year contract with these people, a year from now they will be out on strike again, and we will have 11 contracts with 11 other groups falling due. This sounds terrible, but it is the fact. I believe the settlement offer was fair, but I am not on the negotiating team. If the minister thought it was fair, he should have appointed a mediator to tell both sides what the situation was, and talks should have continued on a 24-hours a day basis, not two hours a day. This is where the irresponsibility of this government lies. The situation today is that we are faced with this strike, and there is no air passenger or express service in Canada. Let us look at what the newspapers say about the situation:
After day-long talks that proved fruitless in breaking the deadlock, the Air Canada strike involving 5,200 mechanics, ramp and station attendants will enter its tenth day Wednesday when the parties reconvene.
The government has waited 10 days for the strike to be settled. They will wait 20 days or 30 days, because its policy is wait and wish. This article, which appeared in today's edition of the Montreal Gazette, continues:
Michael Pitchford, general negotiating chairman for the International Association of Machinists (CLC), described the situation as "worse than it was". The union had given evidence of flexibility, he said, by reducing its fringe demands by three per cent, but there had been no change in the company's position.
The union's contract renewal demand now stands at a pay increase of 20 per cent plus six per cent for fringe benefits.
[DOT] (5:40 p.m.)
If one can rely on newspaper reports, there is very little difference today between the offer made and what they are trying to negotiate except that Air Canada wants to have a two year contract. The company says it cannot have a one year contract with 12 different groups. I wish to make one correction, that does not mean that there could be a strike of 12 groups unless it was a sympathy
November 22, 1966

strike. We know that these organizations work together; when one strikes, the rest of them picket. We then hear the New Democratic Party saying that somebody is breaking the picket line, and you have a strike because the New Democratic Party speaks for labour.
I will emphasize my position. I believe in essential industries. I know there are Liberal members and other members in other parties who agree with me that we have reached the position in Canada today where the idea and concept of a strike in essential industries means violence. I am not speaking of pugilistic violence, but of violence toward the economy.
Surely in 1966, in a nation fighting for its life in the competitive world, we should be able to set up some kind of a body to ensure that planes continue to fly. We should be able to establish a tribunal which would make a judgment fair to both labour and management. Out of this decision, both parties would get an equitable share of the national income and of national productivity in the form of income. It is time we came to grips with this problem. If I am accused of being reactionary, I will ask: Is it reactionary to believe that strikes in essential industries must end? I say my view is progressive. We had to put an end to the strikes of the railways. We should come to grips with strikes which involve the essential industries in Canada, and we must say they must end. Strikes are not good either for labour or for management; they are not good for the economy of the country.
Let us go back to some of the questions I asked in the house. I have been asking them every day since November 17 on which day I asked the following question:
Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question with reference to the statement of the Minister of Transport. I wonder whether he could clarify one point for me. In the case where C.P.A. does not have landing rights for which it has applied such as applies in Calgary, is it the intention of the Air Transport Board to allow C.P.A. with the approval of the minister to operate in those areas where at present there is no service whatsoever owing to the present strike?
The minister answered me in the following way:
Mr. Speaker, if I got the purport of the hon. gentleman's question correctly, and I think I did, my understanding would be that if Canadian Pacific Airlines have any existing licence which would permit them to serve these places, under the terms of the document I read they would be able to do so.
C.P.A. have been asking for years for the right to compete with Air Canada. I know that when Air Canada was first established as
Increased Cost of Living a crown corporation we had to give it protection, but just try and get reservations in the tourist season out of the city of Calgary or out of Vancouver. You cannot do it.
You will be told you have to wait 20 or 30 days, and you almost have to resort to a discourteous conversation to get on the waiting list. If such is the situation today, why did the government not try to give a competitive organization the right to operate long before the strike occurred? This is a necessity in a country with a population of 20 million, and we must remember that Air Canada was born in a country of only 8 million. These are the questions I put to the government which only sits around, waits and wishes. Their policy is to wait and wish. They only read articles out of the third annual review on prices, productivity and employment.
On November 17 I asked the following question:
I have a supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. In view of the question put by the leader of the New Democratic Party I should like to ask the Minister of Labour the present position and condition in reference to the Air Canada strike. Has a mediator been appointed; are the government going to appoint a federal mediator, or are they just going to allow this matter to lie domant, in spite of the emergency?
The Prime Minister said there is no emergency. I would like him to say that on the hustings now, at the time of a strike. In answer to my question the Minister of Labour said the following:
Mr. Speaker, my information is that the members of the bargaining committee for the employees of Air Canada have been communicating with their local groups with a view to ascertaining their views. As I said yesterday, if either of the parties were to approach the government the matter will be given prompt consideration.
Those parties have since approached the government but nothing has been done. In answer to questions from the right hon. Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Diefenbaker) and from the hon. member for Ontario (Mr. Starr), the government has admitted that the negotiations have broken down. The parties only met for two hours. They might meet tomorrow, after two hours of negotiating time, while the country suffers.
On November 18 the same situation continued and we received the same answers. On November 21 I asked the following question as recorded on page 10114 of Hansard:
Mr. Speaker, my question is related to the previous question. I should like to ask the Minister of Labour whether he has any information to report in respect to the Air Canada strike, and whether

November 22, 1966
Increased Cost of Living he can tell us at this time what steps if any the government is taking in an effort to bring it to an expeditious conclusion.
The Minister of Labour replied as follows: Mr. Speaker, as X had hoped, the parties came together over the week end of their own accoi'd, rather than as a result of government intervention. This is the way the government-rather this is the shape that the government-hoped the negotiations would take. The parties now are actually negotiating in Montreal.
I thought of the minister's answer when other members from the opposition asked him questions related to this matter. The minister agreed with them yesterday while the negotiating parties were still meeting. While they meet, the government's policy is to wait and wish. All the government can do is to answer questions on the orders of the day in a glib fashion. They wait and see; they wait and wish.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I do not like to interrupt the hon. member in the course of his very interesting remarks but I wonder whether he is satisfied that the grievance he is airing now is related to the amendment which we are presently considering. As he knows, during a supply debate we have to deal with one grievance at a time. If the hon. member is satisfied that the grievance which he is now putting forward is related to the debate on the amendment moved by the hon. member for Burnaby-Coquitlam (Mr. Douglas) I will not interrupt him, but I think he should give that some consideration.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Mr. Speaker, I gave that some thought before making my speech. I have been preparing this speech for some time and I do not wish to get into a procedural argument with you, sir, because I always bow to your good judgment. The amendment reads as follows:
Since the income of wage and salary earners has remained approximately the same and farm income has fallen as a proportion of the total national income over a period of years, this house regrets the failure of the government to introduce policies designed to produce an equitable distribution-
Since the reason for a strike at present in an essential industry-and as I pointed out another 11 strikes might occur-is that labour is not getting an equitable proportion of the profits of Air Canada and that the government does not have any policy with regard to inflation, this subject matter is relevant to the issue which we are discussing. In fact, the resolution before us is so broad that I think you, Mr. Speaker, will agree with me that it permits the discussion of practically any topic.

I think what I am saying is very relevant to the subject matter under discussion. What subject is more important now, when we have a national emergency, and the government adopts a "wait and wish" policy?
[DOT] (5:50 p.m.)
Everybody says that we have to have collective bargaining, but let me conclude this particular subject with one observation. The Minister of Finance is one minister for whom I have a lot of respect. He has brought the government's economic policies out of the doldrums. They had slipped so far in a socialistic direction that hon. gentlemen opposite did not know they were socialist until the minister took over and put things back on the rails. Surely the government should be preparing today to appoint somebody in this country who, having considered the evidence with regard to labour and our economic situation, the views of management and the competitive position in which air lines find themselves, will be able to render a judgment which will be fair and equitable to labour, fair and equitable to management, and above all, fair and equitable to the country. If we play around in this way like children, then in a competitive world we will fail economically as a nation and inflation will continue to be a problem.
During the course of the minister's remarks, while Mr. Deputy Speaker was in the chair, he referred to page 69 of the report of the economic council, where the following sentence appears:
We expect and desire that collective bargaining and other aspects of the contest for income shares should go on as vigorously as ever-
His interpretation of the word "vigorously" was to work two hours a day to try to settle a national emergency. This is the reason I thought it most relevant that I speak this evening. The report goes on:
-they are a facet of human nature, a sign of life in the body economic and social.
For days, Mr. Speaker, the parties to this dispute did not meet. They then met for two hours, and the meeting folded up. The government has refused to appoint a mediator. My last thought is that I hope that the government will take heed of the representations of members of parliament, particularly those who represent the city of Calgary, which is a fast growing metropolis situated in the heart of the petroleum industry. It is a city which needs better air service than it is getting today.
November 22, 1966

The mayor, councillors and the chamber of commerce of Calgary have proved that we have lost three or four chances to estabish head offices of companies engaged in that great industry simply because there was not the kind of air service to and from that city which was essential to its growth and development. In this regard I would refer the Minister of Transport, the Minister of Labour, the Minister of Finance and even the Prime Minister to the application which sets forth the evidence to substantiate a better air service for the city of Calgary.
It is necessary sometimes, Mr. Speaker, to get back to the grass roots when making a speech. One half of the city of Calgary is in my constituency, together with the constituencies of the hon. members for Calgary South and Calgary North. We have a grievance here. An air strike is taking place at a time when the minister of resources-and I congratulate him in this regard-has an application before the federal authorities in the United States to export a surplus commodity, natural gas, which we have in abundance in Alberta. If this application is approved it will mean jobs and increased productivity in this country, in spite of the narrow and parochial arguments put forward by the members of the New Democratic Party.


Mr.   J.-A. Mongrain@Trois-Rivieres: Mr. Speaker, at first I had decided not to take part in this debate for several reasons, and more particularly, because so much has been said by authoritative people. And I also told myself, thinking of the Scriptures, that if-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION


Mr. Speaker:: It is my duty pursuant to provisional standing order 39A to inform the house that the questions to be raised at ten o'clock this day are as follows: the hon. member for Sherbrooke (Mr. Allard), labour relations-attitude of the C.L.R.B. toward the C.N.T.U.; the hon. member for Skeena (Mr. Howard),	fisheries-participation of
Russia in north Pacific treaty; the hon. member for Gaspe (Mr. Keays), Canadian National Railways-directive respecting travel speeds.
Royal Assent


Mr. Speaker:: I have the honour to inform the house that I have received the following communication:
Ottawa, November 22, 1966
Sir:
I have the honour to inform you that the Honourable Robert Taschereau, P.C., Chief Justice of Canada, acting as Deputy of His Excellency the Governor General, will proceed to the Senate chamber on Tuesday, November 22, at 5.45 p.m., for the purpose of giving the royal assent to certain bills.
I have the honour to be, sir,
Your obedient servant,
A. G. Cherrier
Assistant Secretary to the Governor General
A message was delivered by Major C. R. Lamoureux, Gentleman Usher of the Black Rod, as follows:
Mr. Speaker, the Honourable the Deputy Governor General desires the immediate attendance of this honourable house in the chamber of the honourable the Senate.
Accordingly, Mr. Speaker with the house went up to the Senate chamber.
[DOT] (6:00 p.m.)
And being returned:
Mr. Speaker informed the house that the Deputy Governor General had been pleased to give, in Her Majesty's name, the royal assent to the following bill:
An Act to amend the National Housing Act, 1954.

The house resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Sharp for committee of supply, and the amendment thereto of Mr. Douglas.
INCREASED COST OF LIVING [Translation]


Mr. Mongrain:: Mr. Speaker, when the
fatidical knock of the messenger of the other place interrupted me, I was just about to say that it was with much hesitation that I had decided to take part in this debate and for more than one reason, one of them being that I recalled the Scriptures stating that one will have to account for every unnecessary word one has spoken. I have heard so many unnecessary remarks, or so many of them are spoken here at times, which serve no useful purpose except perhaps the political interests of each member, that one hesitates before taking part in this rigmarole of useless words.

November 22, 1966
Increased Cost of Living
But, on second thought, I think I would have a slightly more personal point of view to stress in this debate, concerning a matter which I think has not been brought up, at least by any of the speakers I have heard.
[DOT] (6:10 p.m.)
I was greatly impressed by some remarks, particularly by those of the Minister of Finance and Receiver General (Mr. Sharp) who refuted the arguments of the leader of the New Democratic Party. In my opinion, he did it in a masterly and dispassionate manner. But here is my point. The amendment before us-and I have read it over and over as well as the arguments put forward by the leader of the New Democratic Party-is only a dilatory and untimely amendment, it is political opportunism bordering on filibustering. I cannot help but reach that conclusion.
I would think, Mr. Speaker, that we all agree that the cost of living is becoming prohibitive; we all agree also that the wealth of this world must be distributed more equitably. I think also that we all agree that the farm sector is particularly in need of improvement but I tell myself that the way to improve these things is not through endless debates on nebulous amendments because, try as I may, I fail to see that it means anything in particular, except that it blames the government for not introducing a program to produce what it should have produced.
But, Mr. Speaker, if we want the government to introduce legislation which might meet the needs of the people of Canada in 1966, I think that the best thing for us, the opposition, to do would be to give it the opportunity of introducing its legislation and of giving us the chance to discuss it objectively, point by point, to move, if need be, constructive, specific and objective amendments. As far as the amendment under consideration is concerned, I must repeat that the more I study it the more I find it nebulous and meaningless.
And I see here among the measures proposed by the government a bill to provide for the establishment of a Canadian film development corporation; another bill to authorize the payment of contributions by Canada towards the cost of insured medical care services incurred by provinces pursuant to provincial medical care insurance plans; another bill respecting pension plans organized and administered for the benefit of persons employed in connection with certain works; another bill to amend the Export Credits Insurance Act; another bill to encourage the

initiation of programs and the extension of existing programs of scientific research and development; another bill to amend the Old Age Security Act, etc. And we are aware that the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Greene) is having talks with his colleagues from Quebec and Ontario, whom we know a little better, and who seem very well informed about the farm problem. We know that another department is now engaged in developing a legislation comprehensive enough to provide for the mobility of manpower; in another field, consideration is being given to legislation and integration. In still another field, we are told that the Carter report recommending fiscal reforms will soon be presented. Now, all those things will give us the opportunity to discuss constructive pieces of legislation which will tend directly or indirectly to fight against this bad distribution of worldly goods and alleviate the bad effects of the cost of living. I submit also that we, members of parliament here, would take a much more constructive action by urging the government to expedite the presentation of its legislation to which we could take part by constructive discussions. When all that legislation has been passed and the time has come to weigh the value of the government legislation, if the government has not faced up to the task, the electorate will impose the deserved penalty.
Mr. Speaker, I think that the days are over when members of parliament could enjoy using dilatory measures, to prevent the government from passing constructive legislation, so that it did not have too good a reputation; when someone could try to outrival the government in discussing matters very worthy in themselves, but before the proper legislation was presented, to get the credit; when one could take advantage of certain inevitable crises which occur in the economy of all countries, to try to put forward electoral interests in a demagogic manner.
I think the electorate today is well aware of the problems and the way legislators operate. I believe the electorate is sufficiently well informed to realize that, at a given moment, such or such member of parliament or political party, in its intervention, is much more interested in promoting electoral interests than those of the population, and that the latter will be severe towards those among us who use dilatory measures, who try only to make political capital, to delay the passing of constructive legislation and, obviously, to confuse the minds.
November 22, 196S

I believe that the amendment before us tends to all this and I am a little surprised, because I admire certain elements of the New Democratic Party. In fact, I think that the New Democratic Party-I say that objectively -has in its ranks parliamentarians who are very serious, very sensitive to social matters, to present needs, and who are sincerely seeking measures to cope with the situation. I think that the matter has not been settled when one simply says: They are socialists.
I believe that many among them are extremely serious. But they precisely distort this quite orthodox opinion when they forget their serious concern as a group, to resort to what I would call political expediency. I believe that this lowers them before public opinion and that this attitude is particularly ill-advised at the present time, since conditions are favourable to the New Democratic Party due to the severe trials experienced by some political parties.
I would like to suggest, in all objectivity, to my friends of the New Democratic Party to apply their talents, energy and goodwill to something more constructive. We agree once again that the increase in the cost of living is prohibitive, but we will not solve this problem by discussing day after day amendments which are so obscure and as inconclusive as the one now under consideration.
I think that we will settle the problem by telling the government: Hurry up and introduce your legislation; we are anxious to discuss it. We are anxious to see your next budget, for instance, to analyse it, to discuss it objectively and to perhaps propose some amendments. In my opinion, it would be a more constructive approach. Mr. Speaker, it is not the first time that we have seen such a stand taken in the house. For instance, some time ago we saw it on the matter of unification. Some have attempted here to make marathon speeches, for days and days, on the matter of unification and integration, probably-and I do not think that it is a false accusation-to pave the way for a political convention, but during that time no constructive legislation was passed. The matter of unification and integration may have some merit and some significance, but we know that it is already being carried out and that we shall have the opportunity eventually to discuss it in detail, when the committee concerned submits its report.
Increased Cost of Living
The same thing applies to the cost of living. A parliamentary committee is hearing witnesses and it is going to submit a report to the house.
We shall have the opportunity, when these specific pieces of legislation are submitted to us, to discuss quite objectively every aspect of the legislation introduced by the party in office and perhaps to offer objective criticism by moving some amendments involving something complete, something definite.
[DOT] (6:20 p.m.)
Mr. Speaker, even though I feel, like everyone else, that the cost of living is becoming unbearable, I submit that it is not with amendments of this type that we shall solve the problem.
Moreover, the high cost of living is not a Canadian phenomenon. I have just been to Europe, and I would have liked my hon. friend's members in this house to see what we witnessed in France and Germany; they would find that the cost of living and the poor standards of living which befalls certain citizens is not comparable to ours. We live like millionaires here, even in modest income families, and this we have to admit.
Nevertheless, I also feel that we should not resign ourselves and say: let us be satisfied with this situation and not endeavour to improve it.
Mr. Speaker, I suggest that we will not remedy the situation by introducing amendments meant simply to filibuster and to give rise to political outbidding. This procedure is not fair, and I believe the electorate will judge such procedures severely.
I am among those who will sometimes severely criticize the government when it is unable to cope with the situation. But to show that it can deal with it, the government must be given the opportunity to introduce its legislative program. Until it has introduced all its proposed legislation, we will not know what the government intends to do in order to solve these problems, and I am willing to trust it until that time. If it proves unable to deal with the situation, we will criticize it and we will again ask the electorate to mete out the punishment as deserved.
Mr. Speaker, this is why I shall vote tonight against the amendment introduced by the New Democratic Party.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.
10194	COMMONS DEBATES	November 22, 1966
Increased Cost of Living


Gérard Laprise: Mr. Speaker, could we not obtain unanimous consent of the members of the house to adjourn the debate, say for one hour, so that some members may go and have lunch?


Hon. Jean-Pierre  Coie@Postmaster General: Mr. Speaker, if it pleases the house, the government agrees to a one-hour recess.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Is there unanimous consent to suspend this sitting until-


Joseph Julien Jean-Pierre Côté: Until 7.30.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: -until 7.30?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Mr. Allard:: Mr. Speaker, I object to this because I have something to say.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: There is no unanimous consent.


Mr. H. W. Danforth (Kent (Ont.)):: Mr. Speaker, when listening to various speeches that were made on this amendment I found it interesting to hear some hon. members agree with the amendment and then explain at great length why they must support the government motion. My position is simple in this regard. I have no hesitation whatever in fully supporting the amendment because anyone who is cognizant today of the conditions across this country, who knows the plight of the farmer, who knows the plight of the small businessman, who knows the plight of our many citizens who are on fixed income and facing rising prices due to inflation, could not help but be in sympathy with the terms of the amendment.
I listened with much interest to the address given by the Minister of Finance (Mr. Sharp) this afternoon. He did a fine job of trying to explain fully not only the government's position but the various facts and figures that have been accumulated and put on the record. But, Mr. Speaker, it soon became evident, as is so often the case, that figures can tell both sides of a story.
Tonight, I would like to deal for a few minutes with the plight of our great agricultural industry and that of the small businessman. This afternoon, when explaining the slow increase in the rate of growth of farm income, the Minister of Finance said that this year we have had one of the greatest bumper crops in our history, and that the efficiency of the agricultural industry was increasing, thanks

to government action. No one will disagree with his statement that there has been a bumper crop of grain this year. It is fortunate that we have such a bumper crop and that we are able to find markets for it. But, Mr. Speaker, anyone inside this house or outside it would have the greatest difficulty in finding a single piece of legislation or action by the government that had anything to do with the increased efficiency of agriculture.
Over and over again the word "efficiency" creeps into discussions about the plight of agriculture. We are told that the farmer must increase his efficiency, and that in order to survive the family farm must increase its efficiency. We talk about the efficient large farm, the efficient family farm, the efficient co-operative farm but, Mr. Speaker, what do we mean?
Efficiency in agriculture could be looked upon with a great deal of envy by every other Canadian industry because the figures show that since world war II the average yearly efficiency rate of increase in farm production has been in the neighbourhood of 5.2 per cent, while the same figure for other Canadian industry has been 2 per cent. This is a remarkable record achieved by the farm industry.
I would like to give another set of figures to show how great the advance of agriculture in this direction has been. This average yearly increase in efficiency of 5.2 per cent has been created by 37 per cent fewer farmers, working with 32 per cent less labour, on 5 per cent less land.
Various government supporters, by illustration and debate, have sought to indicate that farmers have never had it so good. I wonder if they have stopped to consider what the facts actually are. Have they stopped to consider the reason that this great industry is losing farmers at the rate of 900 a month? When an economic survey of Canada was made about ten years ago it was estimated that between the years 1963 and 1970 the farm industry would lose 100,000 farmers. In actual fact, however, instead of losing 100,000 farmers by 1970 the industry, in a three year period from 1960, lost 100,000 farmers.
There is something radically wrong when we see farmers riding tractors on the roads, protesting that they are not receiving enough for their products. Surely, this must be a last resort for them to take. They must have taken it because they felt reason, argument and persuasion were of no avail. There is something wrong with the industry when, instead of being in a position to produce surpluses of all
November 22, 1966

food products for home consumption it cannot produce enough to meet our own demands.
[DOT] (6:30 p.m.)
There is something wrong when each month we find that the very best cattle we have in this country are being exported and sold, not in the hundreds but in the thousands. There is something drastically wrong when we find that many of the fruits and vegetables which previously were so common in this country are either in short supply or are not grown. The reason is that those who have produced these products, sometimes for three generations, find it no longer is economically feasible to do so. There is something wrong when in this nation of 20 million people, where we have for so long been producers of surplus agricultural supplies, we now import an estimated $14 billion to $2 billion worth of food and food products annually.
"Never had it so good"; well, Mr. Speaker, my considered opinion is that the fruit and vegetable industry in Canada has never been in a more precarious position than it is at the present time. I do not think so many of our efficient and successful farmers, and so many of our corporate farms, should be on the edge of bankruptcy as there are today. Yet, the government suggests that we never have had it so good.
The farmers of this country and the small business men are looking to this government for leadership. They are looking for policies. It is all right to say an entire program is being introduced for the war on poverty. Does one have to be absolutely destitute, does one have to be on bended knee with arms out for alms before this government will take any action? These citizens of Canada want leadership, and they want a policy while they still have businesses in which they can incorporate this policy to earn a livelihood for themselves and their families. "Never had it so good"-well, when you see businesses, small construction companies, small lumber dealers, the corner grocery store, the dry goods shops, automobile agencies and all the small businesses in town after town across the country closing their doors because they find it is not economically sound to operate, then something is drastically wrong.
To be absolutely fair, all of these people cannot and will not be helped by any government policy. There certainly are changing circumstances. There are changing market trends; there are changing buying patterns; there are changing products and different territories. All of these things come into this
Increased Cost of Living problem and are causing small businesses to face grave hardships. However, I think one of the greatest threats facing businesses and farmers today is the fact that under this government they never are certain of their credit rating. During the time this government has been in office, there has been either a feast or a famine; there has appeared to be either no limit on the credit or no credit at all.
As one who has been and is associated with farmers, I took very violent exception to the fact that this government was doubling the amount of money farmers could obtain under the farm improvement loan fund and the farm credit corporation. I was afraid of the outcome. Events have proven that we on this side of the house who took that stand were correct, because all this money which some two years ago was placed in the hands of young farmers and established farmers did not help these men. All these millions of dollars which were put into the hands of these farmers did nothing but inflate the value of farm land and bring about a drastic increase in the price of farm machinery. This has made it much more difficult for a young farmer or an established farmer to operate a farm. It did not settle anything; it did not solve anything. There has been absolutely no progress toward a solution.
When one considers that this government has been in office since 1963, it would seem that they certainly must have had time to initiate and put into effect some policies which would help this great industry of agriculture, the small businessmen and which would do something for these small country towns and villages which are dying. One would have thought that they would have implemented some of the promises they have made in this regard.
I do not intend to go step by step through the record of the Conservative government when it was in office; nor do I intend to go step by step through the record of this government since it has been in office. I do not think the farmers and small businessmen are interested in the records. They are interested in knowing what the plans are for progress in the future. They want to know whether or not the government knows where agriculture is going; they want to know whether the government has any idea at all what the future is for small businesses; they want to know whether there is a concerted plan of action or whether the government is going along day by day and, as a matter of political expediency, deal with the problem which is creating the greatest havoc at this particular time.

November 22, 1966
Increased Cost of Living [DOT] (6:40 p.m.)
Mr. Speaker, it is the considered opinion of farm leaders and businessmen's associations across this country that in order to survive in this competitive world we face today we can no longer go by the rule of thumb but have to accept every bit of advice, knowledge and recommendation which is available from the various scientists, technicians and economists who are in a position to judge where we are now and where we should go in the future. This is the reason I have nothing but the greatest admiration for the provincial ministers of agriculture and provincial departments of trade and commerce which have initiated what this government should have initiated three years ago. I refer to the conferences at which they bring in the leaders of all groups to find out what is necessary for agriculture and where agriculture should go. How can men, whose every waking hour is directed toward the production of quantity and quality produce here in Canada, take the necessary time from their busy lives to investigate future market trends. How can they investigate the needs of all these new and developing countries, the new processes whereby raw products can be used to form new products acceptable to other parts of the world? How can they investigate the drifting and changing patterns of buyers both abroad and at home, the quantities of food, that will be needed for the home market in the next 20 years? Will our production exceed the domestic and export demand? If our production increases at the present rate, will it become greater than we will need? In other words, Mr. Speaker, where do we go from here?
I fail to see how any sound businessman in agriculture today can formulate any production plans for the future unless he has available some real source of information. Where is it more natural for him to turn than the federal government, with all its vast departments and resources which are capable of foretelling and forecasting markets and providing him with the necessary information? If this government does not initiate such programs; if it does not know where agriculture is going, if it does not care for long range programs, then its members have no right to say to the farmers and small businessmen of this nation: You have never had it so good.
There is a standing committee of this house dealing with consumer credit and the high cost of food products. I believe that every man on that committee is putting every bit of effort possible into finding a solution and

finding out just where we are going. But this committee was initiated by the housewives across the nation who felt that the price of food was too high and decided to do something about it. It was not initiated by the government. There was a cry of distress that came from the people. Is it not strange that, on one hand, we have this cry of distress from the housewives of our nation over the tremendously high prices they are constantly being asked to pay for foodstuffs and, on the other hand, we have a mass migration of farmers off the farms? We have tractor parades protesting the low prices which the farmer receives for his products.
When you have these two great factions mounting protests and directing them to the government in Ottawa, is it not time that the government enunciated a policy in this respect? I am one of those who believes that the time has come, and is perhaps long overdue, when the Department of Agriculture should concern itself not only with the production of food for Canada and for export but should maintain standards of quality in the production of food for our people. I favour a step taken by the department of agriculture of Ontario in this respect. They felt that the department should be responsible for all the different stages of food production, from the harvesting of the raw product until it falls into the hands of the consumer. I believe this is a field into which the Department of Agriculture could move and try, by careful analysis and deliberation, to bring some sort of regulation out of the chaos in which we find ourselves today.
There is certainly something wrong when the price of the finished product to the consumer can be many, many times the price paid to the farmer. I am not one who believes that there is any particular culprit in this situation. I cannot believe that in every instance there is excess profit-taking. It may be that our methods of marketing do not lend themselves to the most economic way of placing food in the hands of the consumer. It may be that there are services that are either not as efficient as they might be, or there is a duplication of services. This matter should be investigated.
But surely, the time has come when all the segments of this country that are crying out for relief should have their supplications to the government answered. As I said before, it is not sufficient to cite facts and figures in an economic report. It is not enough to say that according to the records the gross production of the farms of this nation is on the increase,
November 22, 1966

when the farm population is dropping to the drastically low figure to which it has dropped. This fact was corroborated by the Minister of Finance this afternoon when he stated that at one time there were over one million families in this great nation of ours engaged primarily in the production of food, and today there are about half this number. Something is radically wrong if this is the situation.
The only place to which we can go for redress is the federal government. The provincial governments are doing everything they can, but their scope is limited. They have to deal with specific problems in a specific, designated area. Very often measures designed at the federal level to help one area work to the detriment of farmers in another area.
I want to give this government credit; it is endeavouring to set up various commissions which it feels will settle some of the problems which face our agricultural industry today. The government has set up the dairy commission and the feed grain commission. These are new bodies and they will be on trial. I hope they can solve the problems they were designed to solve. But it seems to me we are delaying and procrastinating to such a degree that the farm industry may face economic ruin before concrete steps are taken on a large enough scale to provide the relief that is necessary.
There is one other point with which I should like to deal, and I am sure it is one with which many members of this house are directly concerned. I speak of the trade negotiations going on in Geneva at the present time under GATT, where they are considering an eradication or reduction of tariffs on goods entering this country.
[DOT] (6:50 p.m.)
I think one of the greatest sources of uneasiness, especially among farmers engaged in the production of fruit and vegetables, is their worry that they will have to face once again drastically reduced tariffs on their particular products in exchange for favourable consideration of industrial products or other services. They fear a situation in which their businesses might absolutely collapse over night. I was very young when the last collapse occurred, but I shall never forget walking through farm after farm and seeing acre after acre of fruits and vegetables rotting on the ground. The newspapers were full of advertisements by the farmers begging people to come and pick the crops for nothing. They wrote "you can have it if you come and get
Increased Cost of Living it". The price of those crops was so low that the town population would not bother to go to the farms and get them; they asked the farmers to deliver them. We do not want to see this happen again. We do not ever want to see the green belt industry which was built up in Ontario collapse as a result of negotiations with which these farmers and small businessmen had very little to do.
These men, for the most part, have not the faintest idea who the Canadian negotiators are who are dealing with the very lifeblood of their industry. They have no idea of the proposed reductions in their particular crops which the Canadian government is prepared to accept. All they know is that the basis of this entire treaty was a proposal by the United States government for an across the board 50 per cent reduction in the tariff rates in many of the commodities that are grown in Ontario. This 50 per cent reduction in tariffs would mean the absolute ruin of families which, in many instances, have invested $500,000 in their farms and businesses. When these industries have to survive in an economic climate in which they have no idea what will happen in the next 12 months, do you not think they deserve an answer to some of these questions? Is it not time that the government enunciated a policy for agriculture and small industries? It is not sufficient for the government to say: "We have initiated plans for a war on poverty. You never had it so good. The national productivity of this country is increasing at a more rapid rate than ever before."
This may be true in the cities, but it is not true on the farms. It is not true when many small business men have to move out of establishments which have been operating sometimes for as long as 20 years. There is something radically wrong when these people are forced out of business. When this happens, at least they have the right to know what government policy forced them out.
This is why, when we have an amendment before us which states that the government has failed to introduce policies over a three year period which would indicate that the people of Canada can move forward, I fail to see how anybody could decline to support such an amendment. I have absolutely no patience for any representative of the people who understands what the citizens of Canada are going through and then says: "I cannot support such an amendment." The people of Canada will no longer tolerate a party which

November 22, 1966
Increased Cost of Living straddles the fence on economic issues. Indeed, it grieves me to walk down the streets of some of the towns which I represent and see another empty store.
There is something wrong when, as a result of this government's changed policies, a construction man who had a crew of 12 men engaged in the business of painting houses finds that because of the numerous obligations with which he was forced to comply, the reports which he had to fill out, and because of a scarcity of money, he cannot pay for the necessary accoutrements his business requires. To see such a man tell his employees they have to seek work elsewhere, and to see him become an employee himself after years of being an employer is a sad state of affairs.
We often hear that agriculture no longer represents a political force in the country today, and will no longer exert the same influence on politicians which it did formerly. In the province of Ontario, which is probably more industrialized than any other province in Canada and which contains approximately 40 per cent of our population, 30 per cent of the labour force is directly engaged in agriculture or in allied industries. Let no one say that today agriculture no longer represents a political force in the world.
May I say in conclusion that I have not the least hesitation in supporting this amendment which points out to the country as a whole that this government has failed in its obligation to the Canadian people to bring forth policies which will aid the ordinary Canadian to provide a living for himself and his family. It is not sufficient to point to social legislation and to say: "We will take care of you when you are old; you will get a government grant when you are sick; if you are injured, we will help you". The people of Canada want an economic climate which will enable them to make an honest living. They want an honest return for an honest day's work in the production of goods. They are entitled to this. I cannot support a government which does not provide the people of Canada with this opportunity.


Mrs. Grace Maclnnis (Vancouver-Kings-way):: Mr. Speaker, I am sorry the hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard (Mr. Bas-ford) is not in his seat, because I wanted to thank him for the kind references he made yesterday and also to tell him in return that I think he makes an excellent co-chairman of the consumer prices committee. However, I cannot follow him when he indicates

that this motion represents a lack of confidence in what the committee is trying to achieve. I have every confidence in what the consumer prices committee is trying to do, but this does not mean that I have every confidence in our present system of distributing goods and services in Canada. Indeed, the consumer prices committee, beyond the shadow of a doubt, has served only to confirm my solid conviction that our method of distributing goods and services to the consumers of Canada leaves a great deal to be desired.
For one thing, our system of getting goods and services to the consumers at the present time is riddled with abuses of all sorts. I am not going to take the time tonight to detail these abuses, but anyone who has attended two or three sessions of the committee will have become conscious of the way the consumer is being conned, gulled and deceived and is taken for a ride at every turn. Also, from the standpoint of the consumer our present system of distributing goods and services is wasteful, inefficient, unjust and in many respects out of date.
[DOT] (7:00 p.m.)
I feel, Mr. Speaker, that the committee is doing a good job in bringing this fact to light. From my own observations may I say I do not think there will be anything left to be revealed if the committee has its way. However, in this regard I cannot help but remember the price spreads commission which reported in 1934 and the more recent royal commission, the Stewart commission, which reported less than ten years ago. What happened to the results of the very heavy work of the members of those commissions? Their reports were pigeonholed and they have been gathering dust ever since. My only fear is that when this committee finishes its work and completes its very onerous task its report too may join the others in gathering dust in a pigeonhole.
This is where the government comes in, Mr. Speaker. If it is sincere in setting up this committee to investigate rising prices in Canada and cares for the interests of the consumers, the government will see to it that the report of the committee does not suffer the same fate but will be prepared to deal with it. But I fear, that the government has not yet shown that it understands the significance of what is being revealed by the consumer prices committee or, if it does understand the significance of these revelations, that it is not prepared to give the leadership necessary to bring about the required changes.
November 22, 1966	COMMONS
Before I turn to the motion specifically there is one other matter to which I should like to add a bit of information. The hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard referred yesterday to the fact that the Swedish equivalent of John Deutsch, if you want to call him that, Professor Kragh, appeared before the committee. The hon. member and others have subsequently said that Professor Kragh referred to Canada's until very lately relatively steady price level and to the fact that Canada's price level was so much less than that in other countries. Indeed, these hon. members produced figures to show that in a survey of the cost of living in 27 countries during the period 1958 to May, 1966 Canada had the second lowest increase in prices, namely, 15 per cent. Sweden, with an increase of 33 per cent, was among the highest.
The moral they drew from this, Mr. Speaker, was that we in Canada should not be making complaints about rising price levels because prices in Canada have risen only 15 per cent whereas in Sweden they have gone up 33 per cent. But the part of the story given by Dr. Kragh that these hon. members left out was this. Under questioning Dr. Kragh said that pensions and allowances in Sweden were geared, and I quote his words, "100 per cent to the cost of living in that country". In other words, Swedish old age pensioners, veterans and others who receive social allowances of various kinds do not need to worry when the cost of living goes up because their pensions and allowances are geared to the rising cost of living. When price levels rise these pensions and allowances rise automatically. This means that the people of Sweden know that rising prices do not mean in turn lower living standards for the lower income groups in the country. I wanted to point that out because I think it is tremendously important.
It was suggested, Mr. Speaker, that Dr. Kragh might be envious of our prices record in Canada. Dr. Kragh might find some things to be envious about, but I am sure that he would not be envious of our record of price rises, particularly if he were to reflect upon what they have done to the poorer groups of the country, our old age pensioners and others.
I now come to the specific amendment we are debating. It has been read a number of times so I do not need to read it again. I feel it is exceedingly significant that at the beginning of the debate the government seemed disposed to brush the motion aside as of little consequence. Indeed, it seemed to be considered far out, crackpot, and all the usual things
Increased Cost of Living said by way of objection were trotted out. However, as the debate has proceeded I have noticed much more of a disposition on the part of hon. members to reflect on what the amendment means and upon the conditions which brought it into being. There has been a tremendous change in atmosphere and the amendment has been taken very seriously.
I will not refer to the oratory of the hon. member for St. John's West (Mr. Cashin). As a matter of fact, I think this thing hit him so suddenly that he was unable to adjust to it. His first reaction was one of blind indignation. He rather reminded me of the story I heard about the young lawyer who was very nervously going over his brief, marking places with instructions to himself for the awful moment when he would be addressing the jury. He marked certain instructions like "Go slow", "Pause here", "A little greater emphasis", and so on. Finally he marked one spot in this way: "Case here very weak, shout like hell". I felt that this was a little like what the hon. member for St. John's West was doing, just shouting in order to obscure the fact that this question should be taken very seriously indeed.
Other members, Mr. Speaker, have taken this amendment as symptomatic of a very serious condition indeed. I was interested in the appeal made by the hon. member for Simcoe East (Mr. Rynard) that in face of the situation now confronting us we should consider all ideas, no matter whether or not they came from the newer groups in the house. If they were ideas which gave some promise for dealing with the situation and tackling the problem in a new way, they should be considered.
The hon. member for Grey-Bruce (Mr. Winkler) spoke in the debate and I was very pleased to see his conversion to the idea of a prices review board. He voted against such a board on March 22, but evidently the logic of the events which have taken place has convinced him, as it also convinced the hon. member for Ontario (Mr. Starr), that a prices review board is a very necessary part of the machinery that the government should be using today. I congratulate these hon. members for not hesitating to change their minds when they saw it was a good thing to do so.
I feel that the ultimate tribute to the seriousness with which this amendment is taken was to have the Minister of Finance (Mr. Sharp) enter the debate. He saw fit to lock horns with the hon. member for Bumaby-Coquitlam (Mr. Douglas). I am not going to

November 22, 1966
Increased Cost of Living get into this battle of figures because I have heard figures used in different ways to prove so many things that I do not intend to muddy the water still more. But I believe that the minister knew only too well the seriousness of this amendment when he referred to the fact that one of the grave problems confronting us today is the lopsidedness of income distribution in Canada.
[DOT] (7:10 p.m.)
The Minister of Finance knows that no amount of playing with figures will disguise what is revealed in government figures and submissions, that a quarter of our population is living either in poverty or in various degrees of destitution under the poverty line. You cannot get that out of the way by running down this party's amendment to deal with incomes. Neither can you ignore the facts presented by the hon. member for Kent Ont. (Mr. Danforth) when he showed what has been happening to the farmers. In Canada 30 per cent of the farmers are producing 70 per cent of farm products, and the government has to use policies to get marginal farmers off the land to bolster our agriculture. Old farmers have to be retrained or if they cannot be retrained they must be given a subsistence allowance for the rest of their days. This is new in Canada, and you cannot get away from what is happening by shouting that the amendment is far out and beside the point.
Neither can you ignore the strikes we are having in this country. Strikes do not occur for fun or for the heck of it. Through strikes workers attempt to redress a balance and try to get their share of productivity, because the workers know that productivity in this country has been going up. Now the workers are beginning to catch up, but there is no denying that the situation has been lopsided, it is lopsided income distribution which will continue causing strikes.
The Minister of Finance pointed to certain things which have been done by way of the Canada Assistance Plan and handouts of various kinds. That does not blur for a moment the clarity of the picture, because in Canada incomes are lopsided and are becoming more lopsided as the cost of living rises. This is the picture you cannot get away from and this is the picture to which we draw attention in our amendment. All session we have been asking, as have the Canadian people, what the government intends to do about the rising cost of living. Every time we have asked we have been told, "Wait until the Economic Council brings in its report before the end of the year;

then we shall be able to answer your questions." Well, we have been reading the report and some of us have done some work on it, but we are not reassured that the central problems facing us will be solved.
I will not go into anything deeply tonight but one can read in the press-I have here the Globe and Mail-that the Economic Council says that guidelines will not work in Canada. On the other side of the page I see a heading, "Delay Major Policy Changes, Economic Council says". In other words, the suggestions made will not work and this is no time to make major policy changes. In the actual report the Economic Council points out that there is nothing new, there is no magical formula, just the old trusted and tried remedies to be tried and tried again. I say to the government that it is the opinion of this group and other members of the house that these tried and trusted remedies which have brought us to this mess will not get us out of it. The suggestions in the report are in the category of thinking you can cure yourself with the hair of the dog that bit you.
We do not believe that playing along with the same methods of a bit here and there, the Canada Assistance Plan today and medicare put off once again till tomorrow, certain relief provisions to parts of our population and the proposal to raise the old age pension but undercut the raise by a means test, which will set us back to before 1951, will work. These things and this way of carrying on will not solve our problems.
Somebody has suggested that we ought to have what is known as an incomes policy. I do not know what we shall do about an incomes policy but I do know that on page 160 of the third annual review of the Economic Council of Canada we see that they say:
-the policy would apply to both prices and wages: a more one-sided approach would be a political and economic non-starter.
In the rest of the paragraph there is not a single word about profits. They talk about prices and wages but there is not a word about profits. The time has come for the government to realize that productivity, profits, prices, wages, salaries and income, that is, pensions and allowances and income of all kinds, are inseparably tied together in one package. You cannot deal with one of these things satisfactorily without dealing with the whole package. Productivity, profits, prices, wages and salaries, and incomes such as pensions and allowances are tied together inseparably and must be treated together and
November 22, 1966

brought together into some kind of meaningful relation. Otherwise we shall have no way or redressing the lopsided income picture which this government's policies have created. Doing what I suggest is the only way by which there can be an adequate and suitable division of the production of our industrialized country.
The Minister of Finance said he had no objection to a fair distribution of the industrial products of this country. I say that there is only one way we can have fair distribution, and that is by the government's giving leadership in looking at those factors mentioned today and yesterday. The government must examine the relation among productivity and profits, prices, wages and salaries, pensions and allowances. Until the government gives leadership in examining this whole picture we shall not get the sort of thing we have referred to in the amendment. Hon. members may remember that it refers to an equitable distribution of rising productivity and national income among all groups in Canada, particularly in view of the rising cost of living.
Let me point out that introducing measures for housing, trade or anything else will not do the job because if you deal with only one of the factors in the picture at a time one part of the population will be in competition with the other and the result will not be good. Taking these things piecemeal may have been all right in more simple times but today we have automation and already in our economy we have great competition. It adds up to chaos and injustice, and disorders of one sort or another such as strikes, farm marches and housewives' demonstrations will continue to plague us unless something is done. The Economic Council says that certain things can be done.
[DOT] (7:20 p.m.)
Today Sweden has reached a stage of maturity-it has taken a long time-where representatives of the manufacturers' association for the whole country and representatives of labour for the whole country sit down together to plan the bargaining for the year for all the country's industries. They plan within a fairly narrow range and they plan with the productivity of the country foremost in their minds. Both parties know they cannot get all they want and they sit down to bargain keeping the productivity of the country in mind. Manufacturers and trade unions have to bargain back and forth in order to work these
Increased Cost of Living things out, but the Economic Council has indicated that this policy will not work in Canada at this time in our present stage of immaturity and lagging development. This is what we must work toward. There is validity in what the Economic Council has suggested but I feel that the government is not trying to find methods which will engender development and solutions to the difficulties that lie ahead. Instead the government is using these difficulties as a reason for not working toward a policy of income balance with productivity with a resultant equality of distribution in all sectors.
The Economic Council is using the constitutional rights established by the B.N.A. Act as the reason for not providing more social equality in Canada, just as the government in the 1920's used them in an attempt to avoid providing old age pensions. That government successfully hid behind that act until it realized that people in this country did not intend to put up with any more of this nonsense.
When we have experienced enough strikes, housewives' marches and farm tractor slowdowns perhaps this government or its successor will settle down and find ways and means of providing the necessary income redistribution programs in spite of our constitution. The government has suggested that the provinces will not stand any interference in this regard but I was impressed by what Laurier La-Pierre said the other day to a group of teachers in the province of Quebec, and I quote from the Montreal Star of November 19, 1966:
Too long, also, have we been presented with a false picture of the priority of provincial needs based on a concept of superior and inferior levels of government, and of the exclusive jurisdiction of the provinces in certain areas.
Farther on the article states:
Professor LaPierre suggested that Quebec did not have much catching up to do with the rest of Canada "because there's nothing much to catch up to". He struck out at what he called the "era of oratorical nationalism. It doesn't really matter what you say, as long as you yell like hell about it." And the situation, he added, was not peculiar to Quebec, but "to all of Canada."
The Canadian people are waiting for this government to give leadership in solving the difficulties which stand in the way of obtaining a proper distribution of income in this country. These difficulties are regional, constitutional and organizational. Perhaps they are the result of immaturity among various sectors of this country. It is too bad that the Economic Council considers these problems cannot be solved at this time because this

November 22, I960
Increased Cost of Living government will have to solve them soon or we will have to get a government that will. The people are becoming thoroughly sick and tired of being fobbed off by the adoption of inefficient security legislation only when they yell hard enough and long enough. The people are seeking a fair and equitable relationship between prices and income.
Let me say quite seriously that the kind of legislation referred to in the amendment proposed by this party is the kind of legislation we will hear about increasingly in this day and age. This is not a hangover from the old days when social justice was desirable. Social justice has now become imperative because of our rapidly changing economy. The government can no longer get by with promises or the provision of a modicum of assistance. The government must provide leadership in obtaining an equitable distribution of income. Canada is a growing country and the people expect our income distribution programs to grow at the same pace.


Mr. B. S. Mackasey (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Labour):: Mr. Speaker, I listened with a great deal of interest to the representative of the socialist party who just spoke and I was rather surprised to hear that hon. lady refer to social welfare measures as handouts. I always thought this was the main plank of the N.D.P. program.


Winona Grace MacInnis: I
was referring to the Canada Assistance Plan.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: We on this side of the house have great respect for social welfare measures and we do not consider them as handouts.


Winona Grace MacInnis: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a question of privilege. I was referring in that context to the Canada Assistance Plan.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: The hon. lady has just repeated what I thought she said. She now tells me that the Canada Assistance Plan is considered by her party as a handout. We do not consider measures of this kind as handouts but assistance to which our senior citizens have a right as a result of their contribution to the development of Canada over a period of 60 or 65 years. The hon. lady and I differ in this regard about social welfare measures.


Eric Alfred Winkler: Mr. Speaker, would the hon. member permit a question? Is he referring to the rights of all people who have contributed to the development of this country or just a few?


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: The hon. member and I have shared enough after-hour activities that I can read between the lines of his question. I know that when I suggest that this is the right of all Canadians he will ask me whether it is a right of those senior citizens who enjoy incomes over $105 per month and I would rather not get into a debate on that matter at this moment.


Eric Alfred Winkler: We want to know the answers to these questions.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: I will elaborate on that subject later if I have time. I know the hon. member who has just asked that question has always recognized the rights of our senior citizens.
The hon. member of the N.D.P. who has just concluded her remarks has been an advocate of every welfare measure one could imagine; yet tonight she referred to them as handouts. In this regard she referred specifically to the Canada Assistance Plan which I believe is the most elaborate assistance measure ever passed by this house. For the first time we have recognized that there are a great number of people in Canada who require assistance, including younger individuals, people with five or six children and parents whose mates have had breakdowns through mental illness or other diseases. For the first time in Canadian history the provinces in co-operation with the federal government have taken a realistic look at the plight of these people. I am surprised that an hon. member of the socialist party could have the audacity to stand in this house and reflect unfairly on social assistance plans which after all are the products of this house as a whole.
I was pleased this afternoon to note that the hon. member for Simcoe East (Mr. Rynard) participated in this debate. His speeches are always accurate, objective and reflect his sincere regard for the plight of senior citizens in Canada. I was delighted to note that he was able to partake in this debate because it is an indication he has regained his health. All of us, I am sure, shared in the grief of the Tory party when that hon. member was stricken with a heart attack not too long ago. We are pleased that he is back in the house and will welcome again his contributions to our debates.
[DOT] (7:30 p.m.)
I listened this afternoon to the hon. member for Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands (Mr. Cameron) and I will refer to him from now on
November 22, 1966

as the hon. member because such a picturesque and beautiful constituency name should not be distorted by my inability to pronounce it correctly. I was rather surprised and a little bit upset when the hon. member made reference to a link between the Mafia and the Liberal party. I was disappointed when he made that reference and in the next sentence referred to the Munsinger case and the Tory party. I was disappointed that any member of the New Democratic Party would introduce this into the debate because I had hoped it was a closed chapter in the House of Commons. I was also surprised because obviously it is a deviation from their plan to portray at all times to the Canadian people the rather sanctimonious attitude that they are above this type of mudslinging. It became obvious to me that the hon. member, irked because of the aggressive but correct parliamentary tactics of the hon. member for St. John's West (Mr. Cashin), thought this was one way to retaliate. I only hope the hon. member now realizes he has shown the people of Canada that the members of the N.D.P. are human also.
The amendment before the house is very cleverly designed-


Mr. Schreyer:: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a question of privilege. Would the hon. member be so kind as to indicate what the context was in which the hon. member from our group made reference to the Munsinger affair? I am sure that the reference which my colleague made to the Munsinger affair may have been quite harmless.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Mr. Speaker, that is not a question of privilege. It is a question and I prefer to answer questions at the end of my speech. But I do not think any reference to that sordid affair or to a link between the Mafia and the Liberal party could be considered harmless when introduced in the house. Even if it were intended to be harmless it could be misconstrued. That type of thing is ancient history, and repeating it does not help.
I should now like to deal with the amendment, which was skilfully put together by the leader of the N.D.P., and I think predictably so, because it seems to be part of a master plan which that party has to represent itself to Canadians as all things to all people. The amendment skilfully appeals to the farmer because possibly the farmer is not getting his fair share of the prosperity that is in vogue in Canada today. It is designed to appeal to those people who for one reason or another have
Increased Cost of Living been denied the prosperity that is synonymous with Canada at the moment, such as those on fixed incomes and senior citizens.
I am one of the admirers of the hon. member for Vancouver-Kingsway (Mrs. Maclnnis) and so I listened very carefully to her speech. But it offered no alternatives. It did not suggest anything. She talked confidently about productivity, about the B.N.A. Act and about that socialist, Laurier Lapierre. She did not identify the speech she was quoting from but it was made by that new disciple of the socialists in the Montreal area. She told everybody in the house that we must have increased productivity in Canada-


Winona Grace MacInnis: Leadership.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: *-and she, as usual, did so in a very delightful and knowledgeable manner, but not once in her half hour speech did she offer one concrete suggestion as to how increased productivity is to be obtained. In fact her only contribution to that particular point was to offer the opinion that, having glanced through the third report of the Economic Council of Canada, she felt it was not adequate, that the government must disregard it and push on and do things regardless of the fact that the Economic Council has suggested that certain actions should not be taken at this particular time for reasons it outlines in what I think is an excellent report.
In case hon. members think that the socialists do not know what they are doing so far as politics is concerned, I think it only fair to point out that a recent Gallup poll has shown that the fortunes of war of that party, at least temporarily, are on an equal basis with those of the Tory party in Canada. I do not think they will remain that way because, while none of us relish the problems that the Tory party may be having at the moment, the one fundamental difference between the two major parties in this country and the New Democratic Party is that the two major parties stand for the free enterprise system while the N.D.P., despite all its propaganda at its periodic conventions, has never really strayed too far from the Regina manifesto of the 1930's.
The hon. member for Vancouver-Kingsway went on to say that we must control prices, that we must control wages and, of course, that we must deny profits. She said that the Economic Council had never mentioned profits in its report and, of course, profits is a

November 22, 1966
Increased Cost of Living dirty word in the socialist system. At least the hon. member is honest in that respect.
The success that the N.D.P. has had with 26 per cent of the Canadian electorate has been due to its ability to confuse the electorate and hide the fact that basically it stands for socialism while the two major parties in this house stand for the free enterprise system. That would not be too bad if at least hon. members of that party modified or refined their philosophy. But there was a noticeable similarity in the remarks made this afternoon by the hon. member for Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands (Mr. Cameron) and the hon. member for V ancouver-Kingsway.
The hon. member for Nanaimo-Cowi-chan-The Islands put all the blame for Canadian economic problems on corporations. He said that big corporations in some mysterious fashion were responsible for all our problems. Instead of members of the socialist party standing up here whining and crying about the economic problems of Canada, I contend that at least they should be objective and quote those sections of the report of the Economic Council which state quite emphatically that all countries in the western world that have a free enterprise system are in the midst of an economic boom.
It is true that there are Canadians who cannot share in the boom, but the N.D.P. skilfully creates the impression that it and it alone is interested in these people. This is unfair to the other parties in the House of Commons. Members of the N.D.P. have tried to discredit the benefits of the Canada Assistance Plan, but I can tell them that people in my riding, such as widows at the age of 38 left with three children under four years of age, are very thankful for the Canada Assistance Plan. A father who is left with four children and who is able to get financial assistance to hire a housekeeper also knows the benefit of that plan, which is the first of its type we have ever had in Canada. I suspect that the hon. member spoke without thinking and on reflection will on another occasion apologize for her remarks about that particular piece of welfare legislation.
It is time that the N.D.P., through the medium of parliament, told the Canadian people what it stands for. If the hon. member for Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands has such a dim view of large corporations and takes pleasure from the fact that he went out to lunch with big money men as if they were something to be sneezed at, then let him say so. Let his party say in its pamphlets and
[Mr. Mackasey.l
speeches by Laurier LaPierre and others, that once elected they will destroy corporations as they exist today. At the same time let them tell the Canadian people not about the record in Sweden, not about the record in Denmark or in other countries that have some form of labour or socialist government but the story of the sorry mess that the N.D.P. made in Saskatchewan when it was known as the C.C.F.
[DOT] (7:40 p.m.)
Look at the problems that this party left behind it. Why do they constantly refer to Sweden, Denmark and England? Why do they not tell us about the sorry mess they made in Saskatchewan? Why do they not tell us about the untapped mineral wealth that lies beneath the ground in the form of potash and which lay dormant during the 15 or 20 years of the socialist regime? The reason is that no private enterprise would risk the capital to exploit those projects.


Edward Richard Schreyer: Would the hon. member permit a question? Is the hon. member completely ignorant of the fact that multi-million dollar agreements were entered into between the government of the province of Saskatchewan and the resource development corporations relative to the development of potash in that province before 1964?


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: All I know is that these agreements could not have pleased the population too much because the people got rid of the government in 1964 and all indications are that it will be a long time before they bring them back.


An hon. Member:: It is the same situation which occurred in respect of Mr. Lesage in Quebec.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: I could go on speaking about many other things which obviously bother the hon. gentleman but which please me no end. There have been other experiences in Saskatchewan including the fact that all the young people in that province fled as fast as they could into Alberta, Manitoba and British Columbia where there were orthodox forms of government. The fact still remains that when I was out in Saskatchewan not too long ago I found there are not sufficient drilling outfits, engineers or labour available to exploit the potash mines properly. The change of government in Saskatchewan brought into being a spirit of confidence, the same type of confidence you have when there is a Liberal government in power. This is the reason I am fully convinced that when the people of
November 22, 1966

Canada take a good look at the socialistic philosophy of the New Democratic Party the 26 per cent support which is now shown by the Gallup poll will return to what it was in the 1950's.


Mr. Nasserden:: Mr. Speaker, would the hon. member permit a question? Would he agree that perhaps the centralizing tendencies put into effect when Hon. C. D. Howe was minister of trade and commerce had a great deal to do with the number of people who left the province of Saskatchewan?


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: I do not know what the hon. member is getting at. He is talking about the centralizing policies of Mr. C.D. Howe which I think got out of hand although possibly they were policies which were necessary during the war years. It is interesting to note, however, that the hon. member who just spoke for the socialists mentioned a few moments ago that according to the Economic Council many of the steps she has advocated such as price control, wage control and profit control are unconstitutional because of the terms of the B.N.A. Act. Yet she stands up and says in effect, "To hell with the B.N.A. Act. There must be some way around it; we got around it when pensions were introduced." But at the same time New Democratic Party spokesmen in the province of Quebec who are going back and forth trying to induce English speaking and French speaking Quebeckers to endorse their policies are exemplifying themselves as the greatest advocates of provincial rights ever discovered in this country.
In this day of modern communications the time has come when representatives of the New Democratic Party cannot get up in the House of Commons and say in one breath, "To hell with the B.N.A. Act, we do not recognize provincial rights under the B.N.A. Act", and the next day make a speech at McGill University, the University of Montreal or at the university in Trois-Rivieres saying, "We stand for provincial rights". You cannot have the best of two worlds. You might have been able to do it 50 years ago when we did not have the sophistication we have now in the field of communications. You cannot do so any more. You have to be consistent in what you say. So I simply think that perhaps the New Democratic Party should realize that expressing one philosophy in the House of Commons and another on the hustings in the province of Quebec is going to catch up to them sooner or later. People will compare notes and ask how a party can on the one hand favour something which is a complete violation of provincial
Increased Cost of Living rights and then on the other hand stand up before the voters of Quebec and say, "You must vote for us because we are the one party which respects provincial rights". You cannot advocate both.
The hon. member who referred to Mr. C. D. Howe knows as well as I do that many of the problems which we are suffering from today have arisen from the kind of attitude which existed during the war years when we could not be quite so fussy about provincial rights because of the war effort. But those days have gone by. If we are to have the peace and prosperity in this country which everyone wants, the federal government will have to learn to respect the rights of the provincial governments, whether that government happens to be Quebec, British Columbia, Saskatchewan or Manitoba. There are certain things according to the B.N.A. Act which are sacred, such things as education for example, and some areas about which the hon. member said, "Well, to hell with them, let us introduce price control". You cannot do this in Canada. You could do it in Sweden. The N.D.P. could have done many of these things in Saskatchewan because they were the provincial government.


Edward Nasserden: Is that the reason the present government has not gone forward with its scholarship program?


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Is what the reason?


Edward Nasserden: Is the reason a healthy respect for provincial rights?


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: We have had a healthy respect for provincial rights. I was under the impression the hon. member also had the same healthy respect. If he does not, he should get up and say so. At least that is what the hon. member in the New Democratic Party did.


Winona Grace MacInnis: Mr. Chairman, I have let this go on for quite a little while. I did not say "To hell with the B.N.A. Act" and that we have no respect for provincial rights. Hansard will prove that. I said that if the government wants to show leadership it can find ways and means to cope with the difficulty in respect of the constitution just as a Liberal government did in 1926 when it knew it had to bring in old age pensions.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: I do not wish to get into a battle with the hon. lady. She did mention the B.N.A. Act. She did admit that the Economic

November 22, 1966
Increased Cost of Living Council report stated that such controls were unconstitutional and illegal, but then she went on to say that there must be some way in which we can circumvent the constitution as was done in 1926. That is what she is saying. The trouble with the N.D.P. is that the major parties in the House of Commons are supposed to sit here day after day and listen to the N.D.P. tell us what is wrong with our two parties. They lecture us rather than enter into the debate. Somehow they have created the illusion in Canada that the happy little band of warriors in the New Democratic Party have some God-given right to lecture others because they know what it is that is bothering Canada. They lecture us about our responsibilities to the senior citizens, creating the impression that they and they alone are concerned about the senior citizens. Then the hon. lady stands up and says there is nothing good about the Canada Assistance Plan. If the hon. lady thought so, she should at least have stood up on second reading and said so. During the 1930's in the depression days the people did not have an opportunity to put away money to look after their retirement. We should not regard our social welfare measures as constituting handouts.
What we are debating here is the amendment and this is the reason my remarks are directed to the New Democratic Party. The amendment reads:
[DOT] (7:50 p.m.)
-since the income of wage and salary earners has remained approximately the same and farm income has fallen as a proportion of the total national income over a period of years, this house regrets the failure of the government to introduce policies-
If the leader of the New Democratic Party were honest he would at least have said in his amendment "regrets the failure of the policies introduced by the government". To create the impression that no policies have been introduced by the government is unfair. The amendment goes on to say:
-designed to produce an equitable distribution of ...national income among all groups in Canada-
I am sure hon. members would agree that social welfare measures fall into that pattern. What do social welfare measures do? The philosophy behind family allowances was to put in the hands of particular people in Canada, presumably the mothers or the parents, money to spend. This is distribution of wealth. This is what social welfare measures do. This is why I do not share the fear of many people that if we introduce too many social welfare measures in Canada we shall be
[Mr. Mackasey.l
on the road to bankruptcy or will be creating debts which we cannot meet. The idealistic solution to depression is to put as much money as we can into the hands of the people, provided that they will go out and spend it and not hoard it under the mattress. So social welfare measures certainly should not be belittled as having an adverse effect on our distribution of wealth.
We should be proud of our private enterprise system which has given us one of the highest standards of living in the world. This system has been able to generate the money necessary for the two major parties which have formed the government in this country to live up to their moral commitments to our senior citizens. When we pass the legislation increasing the old age pension, which will be fairly soon, and now that the principle of the medicare program has been adopted, the social welfare measures enjoyed by Canadian citizens will be second to none in the free world.
Last summer I spent the better part of a month with the hon. member for York South (Mr. Lewis) in a country behind the Iron Curtain. There you have all the ingredients necessary for the implementation of socialistic philosophy. There the workers have nothing to worry about. Food is supplied in huge quantities, even if there is a great deal of potatoes and very little meat. Rent is paid and there is free hospitalization. Everything is supplied. But what is denied these people? They are denied the incentive, the drive that the private enterprise system generates in this country, the United States and the free world.
How many people behind the Iron Curtain, who are denied the right to live under the private enterprise system with all the imperfections we have been hearing about today, would not come here if they had an opportunity? I felt sick in Poland and got to know a doctor very well. She was a young lady of 28.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: I will continue quickly, Mr. Speaker, before I am misunderstood. Her husband was 32 years of age. This young lady was the administrator of a hospital and was only 28 years of age, Her husband was a top-notch surgeon. They explained the system to me. They do not want for food, they do not want for housing. They are among the fortu-nates; they have a television set. With her job in the hospital and his job as a surgeon, plus the fact that they can both work at night teaching at the university and on Sunday are
November 22, 1966



able to take in the occasional patient by the back door, they calculate that in three years time they will be able to afford a scooter and in five years time they will be able to afford a little automobile. These are professional people.
I asked the minister of labour of Poland when they last had a strike in that country. We were talking about the large number of strikes other countries had been experiencing. She said to me-I say "she" because the minister of labour of Poland happens to be a lady and is also president of the textile unions -quite gravely that the last time they had a strike in Poland was 1956. I am not the greatest historian in the world but I remember what happened in Poland and Hungary in 1956. If you call that a strike, I say it is an understatement. So I would not exchange one ounce of our private enterprise system, with all its imperfections, for the whole of socialism.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: I should like to say something else about the amendment. It appeals to the farmers of this country. The New Democratic Party had an opportunity to do something for the farmers of this country. They dropped them in 1960. They changed their name from the C.C.F. to the N.D.P. and in effect said to the farmers: Here is the end of the merry-go-round, fellows. We had better infiltrate the labour movement because it is obvious that as long as we stick with the farmer we will not have an opportunity of forming the government of this country.
At least the Tory and Liberal parties stand for a system that respects the dignity of man and includes a degree of incentive. This incentive is not part of the socialist philosophy. We share with the New Democratic Party concern for the senior citizens and the unfortunates of this country. We share their concern for the plight of those farmers who live in uneconomic regions. But are we really being fair to the farmer by keeping him on land that cannot possibly be profitable to operate? How many of the western farmers in the house have told me, including the hon. member who was with me in Poland when speaking to a group of farmers in that country, that they do not want anything to do with the co-operative movement? The farms out west are profitable because they are now efficient. The farmers have learned to operate huge pieces of machinery which have made their operations more efficient. This has made it possible for 23033-646
Increased Cost of Living us to sell our wheat in markets across the world; we have found that we are able to reap and market it economically.
If there are farmers in this country whose plot of land is too small, who live too far from markets, who find it impossible to live on the income obtained from their farms, we are not doing them any favour by giving them handouts. Neither is any member of this House of Commons doing them any favour by rising and saying that the government is unfair to the farmers because their income is so low. There are many farms that are uneconomic today. This was the whole basis of the principles of ARDA, which the Conservative party introduced and we enlarged. This amendment tries to tell the people of Canada that we have introduced no measures to share the wealth. The leader of the New Democratic Party has been accused of many things, but he is not naive. He knows, as all of us know, the efforts that have been made in this house since 1962 by our government and, I presume, by the previous government before 1962 to create the Utopian type of living whereby everybody is without want and disease. We are getting closer to that ideal.
No mention was made by the hon. lady or others of that party about the effects of the Canada Pension Plan which in a few years will do a great deal to alleviate the worry, concern and anxiety of our senior citizens. We are now trying to look after those people caught in the time gap until the Canada Pension Plan reaches full maturity. For the New Democratic Party members to rise sanctimoniously and say, "Put us in office, we will correct everything", is nonsense. I spent half an hour listening to the hon. lady because I consider her to be one of the most intelligent members of that party and certainly the best looking. Not once did she say how she would increase productivity.
I think the leader of the New Democratic Party insulted our intelligence yesterday in the example he put before us. He pointed out that if it cost $2 to produce one little gimmick and we were able to reduce the cost of production, the cost to the consumer would be that much less. This is elementary. We all agree that prosperity in this country is tied to our ability to increase productivity. This is the message all the way through the third annual review of the Economic Council of Canada. This is the message we got the other day from the gentleman from Sweden. This is the message we have had from the Minister of Finance (Mr. Sharp). This is the message of
November 22, 1966

Increased Cost of Living every economist in the country. We must increase productivity; we all agree with that. We are waiting for suggestions from the New Democratic Party on how to do it.
I remember the longshoremen's strike in the spring because I had an opportunity to pay close attention to it. Hon. members opposite are fond of rising and referring to the Pearson formula. Those hon. members are denying an economic fact about which we have just finished talking, namely, that increased salaries could be offset by increased productivity. We cannot castigate labour because they want their share of the profits. They are entitled to it for they are the ones who generate profits in this country. They should also play a role in increasing productivity, which was one of the opportunities offered to the longshoremen of Montreal.
[DOT] (8:00 p.m.)
One of the things that disappointed me about the unions representing the longshoremen-I am sure tomorrow one of my friends in the New Democratic Party will acquaint them of my words-was their reluctance, at a time when they held their hands out for increased wages, to accept more sophisticated methods designed to increase productivity on the waterfront. You cannot have your cake and eat it too. They have to stop fearing technological change. They are espousing the same doctrine we used to hear from labour during the industrial revolution.


Mr. Orlikow:: Would the hon. member tell the house and the more than 6,000 automobile workers who have been laid off as a result of the U.S.-Canada auto pact what is the answer for them during this long period of lay-off?


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: The answer does not lie in members of parliament, particularly those who represent the labour party, running up and down the country crying gloom and doom. This afternoon the hon. member for Nanai-mo-Cowichan-The Islands (Mr. Cameron) spoke about productivity. He asked why we do not enjoy the same productivity as the United States. The answer is the size of markets. We all know it. I remember learning this lesson not too many years ago when I was in the manufacturing business producing sporting goods items. I went to a personal friend of mine in Brooklyn, of all places, who was manufacturing a particular item, which I wanted to manufacture, at a cost which seemed ridiculously low. It was so low that I could import it to Montreal and even after paying duties, tariffs and everything else, sell

it for a lot less than the cost of its manufacture here.
We searched for the reason and the reason was simple. That particular factory in Brooklyn sold more of that product on the island of Manhattan than there were potential customers in all of Canada. This is one of the reasons why we are at a disadvantage when we compare ourselves with American workers. This is one of the fundamental philosophies behind the automotive pact, that for the first time factories, particularly those producing auto parts in Canada, can have the benefit of extended runs because under the automotive pact they are able to supply auto factories in the United States on a competitive basis. This type of forward-looking and enlightened legislation is bound to have a disruptive effect on the labour market of Canada. It is unfortunate that it has turned out that one man's meat is another man's poison, but we are helping those who have been laid off.
Another by-product of the automotive pact is that it has spotlighted the fact that too many of our small secondary industries are inefficient and have fallen by the wayside. Those that had something to sell, were established and could compete once given a bigger market have flourished beyond the greatest expectations. While there may be lay-offs in some areas, there is tremendous employment in others, for instance, in the Windsor area where an acute housing situation was brought about by the hundreds and thousands of workers who flocked to that area because of the benefits of the automotive pact.
The very fact that the hon. member asked the question shows the isolationist and inward-looking type of thinking of his party. Certainly you cannot expect him to approve of the auto pact when every second speech we hear from them in the House of Commons from that party is anti-American. The only thing we do not hear from the New Democratic Party is that they are opposed to international unions because they do not dare say it. However, corporations are no good if their head offices are not in Canada.


Mr. Herridge:: What did the hon. member say? Who did he say would not dare? Would he repeat it, please?


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: I should have made an exception because there is one member of the New Democratic Party whom I would not classify as a socialist. I am not too sure whether I consider him to be more Conservative than the member for Winnipeg South
November 22, 1966

Centre (Mr. Churchill) but they would make a happy match.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: Would the hon. member say what we would not dare do?


Mr. Churchill:: You would not dare oppose international unions.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: I have yet to hear a member of the New Democratic Party, in the same speech in which he is castigating corporations and head offices in the United States, castigate labour movements whose head offices are in Washington and St. Louis and who in some instances are holding onto their workers by reason of union pension plans.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: I have done that successfully in my own riding when I promoted the formation of the Pulp and Paper Workers of Canada, a strictly Canadian union.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: I am not surprised. I have often said that the hon. member is certainly one of the more intelligent members in that misguided little band.
All of us have seen the third annual review of the Economic Council of Canada and its recommendations on prices, productivity and employment.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. 1 regret to interrupt the hon. member but the time allotted to him has expired.


Some hon. Members:: Let him carry on.


Gordon Minto Churchill: Let him carry on as long as he keeps attacking the N.D.P.


An hon. Member:: No.


Mr. Speaker:: Apparently there is no agreement to let the hon. member continue.


Almonte Douglas Alkenbrack: Mr. Speaker, I do not have the time to offer the criticism which I would like to make of the remarks of the hon. member for Verdun but apparently he and his party are so divided in their policies that they can do nothing else but criticize other parties. It was most interesting to hear him, bankrupt of policies, frequently refer to the sound policies of the Conservative party which of course are lacking over there. As a matter of personal conviction and principle I feel compelled to place a certain matter before the house at this time. It will be recalled that on November 18 I
Increased Cost of Living asked a question of the Prime Minister (Mr. Pearson) in the house in the following terms:
Mr. Speaker, will the new bonus to be paid bilingual civil servants also be paid to civil servants who are bilingual in any language combination other than English and French?
The Prime Minister replied as follows:
Mr. Speaker, I think the regulations in that regard are quite clear. I believe the bilingual bonus applies only to those having knowledge of the two official languages of Canada. If my friend the Minister of National Revenue and President of the Treasury Board could add anything to that, perhaps he would do so now.
The Minister of National Revenue and President of the Treasury Board said he would send me the regulation. In the meantime I had the opportunity of speaking to the Minister of National Revenue before he sent me the news release governing this policy. I asked him not to grant any bonuses or pay differentials along the narrow line adopted without including all those secretaries, stenographers and typists in the courts and in the federal service who, because of their position and location in the country, may be bilingual in other languages besides French or English.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I wonder
whether the hon. member is suggesting to the house that the matter he is seeking to discuss relates to the amendment now before the house. As he knows we are only allowed to consider one grievance at a time and there is already one enshrined in the amendment proposed by the hon. member for Burnaby-Coquitlam. The debate should be limited to that point as much as possible.


Almonte Douglas Alkenbrack: Yes, Mr. Speaker. My grievance is certainly in order at this time because it refers to salaries. It refers to the equitable distribution of the national income, as mentioned in the amendment. I remind the house that many questions arise from this latest policy of the government of giving a 7 per cent bonus to certain civil servants. What about the government clerk in Vancouver who may have to handle business between Japanese speaking, Chinese speaking or Hindustani speaking people and Her Majesty? If this clerk can speak any of these languages, and some people in British Columbia cannot fluently speak English, is he not entitled to this bonus?
[DOT] (8:10 p.m.)
What about the federal civil servant in the far north who has direct dealings with the Eskimos on behalf of Her Majesty and who

November 22, 1966
Division
speaks Eskimo as well as either French or English? What about federal civil servants in the prairie towns of the west who can and do speak Ukrainian, Polish, Hungarian, Russian or any of those other noble languages which are spoken by Canadians in these various localities? When a government clerk uses any of these languages to facilitate the necessary contacts between the government and these people, does he or she receive the 7 per cent bonus, a bonus which they deserve just as much as these more fortunate people referred to in this Liberal government news release?
What about the civil servant in Toronto dealing on behalf of the government with many thousands of Italian Canadians, many of whom cannot yet speak English or speak it well enough to converse fluently in a government office? If the government clerk or secretary can speak Italian as well as English and/or French, is not he of she just as deserving of this 7 per cent bonus as the more fortunate ones who have been given preference in this Liberal government news release?
The people of Canada are starting to ask questions, Mr. Speaker. They are dubious of the motives behind this Liberal measure by which the Prime Minister and his administration patronize and select a few at the expense of the rest of the people. This is nothing but discrimination almost bordering on something criminal in nature. This is typical of Liberal policy and it is nothing but a vote-getting stunt. It is nothing but an application of the nefarious Liberal characteristic of divide and conquer. This narrow, ill-conceived measure expounded in this news release of November 10 is discrimination at its worst. Under this measure we will have nothing but more trouble and discontent.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I have to interrupt the hon. member to advise him that the grievance which he has sought to discuss is not relevant to the grievance that is now before the house.
It being 8.15 o'clock p.m., pursuant to section 4 (d) of standing order 56 I must interrupt these proceedings and put forthwith the question on any amendment now before the house.


Mr. Speaker:: O'Keefe
Olson
Orange
Patterson
Pelletier
Pennell
Pepin
Pickersgill
Pilon
Prud'homme Reid Richard Rideout (Mrs.)
Rinfret
Robichaud
Rock
Roxburgh
Ryan
Sharp
Simard
Stafford
Tardif
Teillet
Thomas (Maisonneuve-Rosemont)
Thompson
Tolmie
Tremblay
Tucker
Turner
Wahn
Walker
Watson (Chateauguay-Huntingdon-Laprairie) Whelan Yanakis-118.
the amendment lost.


Miss LaMarsh:: Mr. Speaker, I was paired. Had I not been paired I would have voted against the amendment.


Mr. Valade:: Mr. Speaker, I abstained from voting on this question of procedure because I felt it was useless and meaningless.


Mr. Macquarrie:: Mr. Speaker, I was paired with the hon. member for Essex East (Mr. Martin). Otherwise I would have voted for the amendment.


Mr. Nowlan:: Mr. Speaker, I was paired with the hon. member for Antigonish-Guysborough (Mr. Stewart). Had I voted I would have voted for the amendment.


Mr. Speaker:: Is the house ready for the question?


Some hon. Members:: Question.


Mr. Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the house to adopt the said motion?


Michael Starr: On division.
Supply-Public Works
Motion agreed to on division and the house went into committee, Mr. Batten in the chair.

The house in committee of supply, Mr. Batten in the chair.


Herman Maxwell Batten: The department of the Solicitor General, vote No. 1. Shall this item stand?


Some hon. Members:: Stand.
[DOT] (8:50 p.m.)


Herman Maxwell Batten: The committee will now proceed to consider the estimates of the Department of Public Works for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1967.


[Stage Direction]
1. General Administration, including grants as detailed in the estimates, $15,772,000.
James Russell Keays: Mr. Chairman, is the minister going to make a statement before we proceed?


Mr. Mcllraith:: Mr. Chairman, I do not know that it would meet the wishes of members of the committee if I were to make a statement on the estimates of the Department of Public Works tonight other than to say that I am looking forward, in another year, to having the estimates examined by a standing committee. I believe we made a commitment in respect of the National Capital Commission estimates that they would be referred to such a committee. I believe that undertaking was made a year or so ago.


Michael Starr: Have you been a good minister?


George James McIlraith: I think so. In any event, unfortunately it is not my opinion on that which counts. The moneys in the estimates largely have been used up. Because by their nature the estimates are distributed over so many items, perhaps the time would be taken up more usefully if I permitted members opposite to have the floor so that they could raise questions in respect of the items they wish to have discussed, rather than listen to me. I would very much like to point out the virtues of the department and the good work it has done, but I think it would be more in the interest of the committee as a whole if I give way to hon. members who wish to speak.


James Russell Keays: Mr. Chairman, it is very interesting to hear the Minister of Public Works use such very delicate words at the beginning

November 22, 1966
Supply-Public Works
of his speech. I am sure he wishes his estimates to go through as quickly as possible. We regret that during the year a committee was not set up so that we could have had an opportunity to look into the estimates.


Herman Maxwell Batten: Order, please. It is a little difficult for the Chair to hear the remarks being made by the hon. member for Gaspe.


James Russell Keays: Now that we have the promise from the minister that the next estimates to come before the house will go to a committee, we know we will have the opportunity to examine them more thoroughly. The minister tells us that the money has practically all been spent, so we will not quibble about that either. There are a few items about which I think the minister must inform the house. These concern projects which were to be cancelled because they were of an inflationary nature. At least they were not to be proceeded with this year. I think the minister should tell us which projects have been cancelled and which originally were cancelled and later proceeded with.
Everything is not wrong in the Department of Public Works. I can assure the minister of this. A first look at the blue book tells us that there has been a net decrease of 109 positions in all the votes in this department. I hope this has been as a result of efficiency and not as a result of there having been fewer projects across the country.
We all are happy with the increase in the grant to the Canadian Better Roads Association from $2,000 to $14,000. I would ask the minister in preparing the next estimates to consider making available a larger amount to this association so that in conjunction with research branches of the government it will be able to proceed further with research not only in respect of aggregates and other materials used on highways but also in respect of the problems involved in connection with drainage. Then there is the matter of the excessive damage done to the bodies of automobiles because of the erosion caused by the calcium and other chemical products. The expense which results from this erosion is serious, especially to the person who needs his car and considers it as a necessity because he loses much of the value of the automobile when he trades it in. There should definitely be more research along this line so that we may be able to eliminate this erosion.
I think the minister should explain to us how the amounts in the contingency fund are allotted. He should tell us how long this has

been included in the estimates and what purpose it serves in respect of salary increases. I know the minister is a busy man and he does not leave Ottawa very often, but I am wondering whether he should perhaps leave his office more frequently. I am sorry that during the past summer he did not make the trip to the lower St. Lawrence with the Postmaster General that he had planned, because I had a program outlined for him. I was going to take him to every harbour and wharf in the area. I had planned to show him what our problems are in that area. I am sure there are similar problems across the country. I would advise him to take some time off from his office duties occasionally so he can get out into the country to see how people are getting along. I think he would learn much more by visiting the areas in which the money administered by his department is being spent. Perhaps in this way he would be in a position to realize that possibly our requests of him are sometimes very sincere and very pressing.
The minister has varied interests to supervise. I should like to ask him, however, whether he contemplates closing down regional offices across the country, following the lead of the Unemployment Insurance Commission and the Department of Fisheries. I hope the minister is aware that these moves by the Unemployment Insurance Commission and the Department of Fisheries have been criticized severely because they are putting people in a very disadvantageous position in these localities. Only last evening I was approached by one person who asked me whether it is true that a certain unemployment insurance office was being closed down. I said "yes". He said, "How am I going to be able to get my benefit cheques on time when I have to mail in my application and wait approximately a week or ten days?" This presents a problem because, as the minister must realize, when Canadians have to wait a week or so for a pay cheque in many cases their budgets are very seriously affected.
[DOT] (9:00 p.m.)
There is a rumour abroad that the department intends to close down the regional office at Rimouski. I should like to speak for a few moments on this subject. There are approximately 200 establishments which the Department of Public Works looks after in this area. They are now going to move the regional office 200 miles away from the bulk of the activities in the area. This will make it rather difficult for the fishermen and commercial establishments in the area to get in touch
November 22, 1966

with the local engineers. If we are to double the number of engineers in the field, we are not being very efficient. Such a move must be considered a waste of money.
I have said before in the house that we are putting the administration on wheels. We will have no office close to the activities of the fishermen and the commercial establishments, and very often these facilities are needed by the fishermen. It will be impossible for these departmental people to be reached unless the fishermen or other business people are lucky enough to have them in the immediate area. I ask the government to reconsider this move, because if proceeded with it will adversely affect the fishermen of my area and, I am sure, those of many other areas.
The fishermen encounter many difficulties. They encounter difficulties with equipment which needs immediate repair, and so on. I would ask the minister whether the district engineers have sufficient authority to deal with these matters or are they limited in such a way that their efforts are ineffective? I know that in some cases we seem more concerned about being penny wise and pound foolish, but I know of cases where the taxi fares of employees are paid but the department will not pay the parking meter charges of its employees who use parking facilities for their cars in the exercise of their duties. This complaint may seem trivial but the employee is hindered in carrying out a really effective job.
My main concern about the administration of this department is its lack of co-ordination with other departments of government. I am not so concerned about the co-ordination of efforts in Ottawa but those in the field. There does not seem to be any integration of policies. Has the time not come when we should have regional co-ordinators? Only today I was reading the third annual review of the Economic Council of Canada, which recommends that there be co-ordination of all departments to see that there is no duplication of effort or loss or waste of money. Projects which we believe are important for an area are discarded or sent into limbo for years, while other projects which could wait for execution or realization are proceeded with.
Some research has to be carried out in this area. Projects should not proceed by guesswork. A little later I will deal with some of the plans drawn up by the Department of Public Works. Economic developments must be watched closely and the government's alertness must be evident. It must step in, if
Supply-Public Works
necessary, so that the impetus of a project will not be hindered or slowed down. Co-ordination in the different regions across the country would definitely be effective in ensuring that no time or effort is lost.
I can give the minister many examples of loss of time or effort in projects. If a federal regional co-ordinator had been present in these cases we could have avoided wasting money and priority jobs would have taken their rightful place. I can give the example of a public building where approximately 4,000 feet of floor space is not being utilized at the moment but only recently floor space was rented in an adjoining building to house federal employees. I am sure that if there had been co-ordination between the two departments of government this situation would not have occurred. There was a waste of money in this case.
I can also think of projects which have been proceeded with and given priority and on which we have spent as much as $4 million or $5 million, and on occasion only after the project was practically completed did we hire engineers to make a feasibility study. This in itself is quite all right if other projects do not suffer.
I can think of cases where producers have asked for the extension of a wharf. These are people who are shipping overseas to foreign markets. They have had to pay an additional $2, $3 or $4 per thousand feet to store their product some miles away from their establishments. If the minister, his department and the government would look closely into some of these projects they would find that such an investment by the government would encourage the producers and make it possible for them to realize a profit. It would make them competitive and enable them to remain in the market.
The employment of 1,000 people in one industry in one area is a matter of major importance. Therefore we should take a close, second look at these matters and give priority to the construction of wharves in the areas in which they are needed. I have written to the minister two or three times about such a project. I regret to say that his decision so far has not met with my approval or caused me any happiness.
Research must be undertaken in these fields. There must be co-ordination among departments. There must be co-ordination in the field among employees of different departments of government. I am certain that if we had this co-ordination we would attain a more

November 22, 1966
Supply-Public Works
efficient operation and provide a better service to the public. I am sure the minister wishes to see the greatest amount of efficiency in his department and is conscious of the welfare of the fishermen and the commercial operators. The minister, I am sure, wants his staff to be aware of local problems whether of supply or accommodation.
I hope that my suggestion with regard to regional co-ordinators will be taken seriously. Only last week in this house I raised a problem which concerned the Department of Transport and the Post Office Department. I am sure that if there had been co-ordination in the field between these two departments we could have encouraged an improvement in the transportation service in the area and provided a better mail service. This is the sort of problem which a local co-ordinator who knows the problems could deal with, and I suggest to the minister that if we had had a co-ordinator, one who would work in close co-operation with the Department of Fisheries-I am now speaking of problems with which I am familiar-we could have given a more efficient and practical service to that area.
[DOT] (9:10 p.m.)
Recently I spoke about my regret at the lack of co-ordination between employees of departments and I feel that co-ordination is lacking between the Department of Public Works and the Department of Fisheries. The employees of the Department of Fisheries know what is required in order that fishermen can better pursue their trade. This may be a small item to discuss but let us look at the effects which a $1,000 installation can have on fishermen in an area where they use the haul-up system. The sprocket, the chain or other parts of the equipment may break, but before we can get authorization to have it repaired a period of one week or ten days may elapse. During this time the fishermen cannot pursue their trade and it is easy to understand that they cannot afford to lose money or to lose one day of fishing.
This is just a small example to show what greater co-ordination between the different departments could do. The same thing applies to dredging operations across the country, for which a priority list is made up every year. Very often the judgment of the Department of Public Works does not quite coincide with that of the Department of Fisheries. Sometimes fishermen are forced to go from one area to another to pursue their trade and because of this they are not able to operate

efficiently. The same co-ordination should exist between the Department of Transport and the Department of Public Works with regard to the lighting system which is required on public wharves and the directional lights needed by fishermen. I hope the minister will take these comments into consideration and will give thought to the appointment of a co-ordinator between his department, the Department of Fisheries, and other departments.
I should also like to know the policy of the Department of Public Works concerning protection walls. I believe that when erosion is caused by a public structure the department feel obliged to build a protection wall, but I do not understand their guidelines or criteria in determining whether a public structure has or has not caused erosion. What is the limiting line at which the engineer can determine that erosion is caused by a public structure up to line X and not line Y? I should like the minister to tell the house how this is determined.
I do not wish to criticize the engineers but I also find it difficult to understand the plan they use for hauling systems. In most of the areas I have visited I find that haul-ups are constructed in such a way that it is only at high tide and very often in a storm that a boat can approach these haul-ups directly. When a boat approaches a haul-up, how can one determine the ways and means of lifting it two or three feet out of the water to get it up on the haul? I am sorry that the minister did not make his projected trip last summer because I would have shown him some of the designs that are being used. Although he is not an engineer I am sure he is practical enough to realize that it is time we changed the design.
I hope the minister does not think I have criticized him but rather that I have brought up some of the problems which exist all across the country where public works are concerned, and as the appropriate items come before the house I will have more detailed questions to ask of the minister.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: Mr. Chairman, I cannot resist making a few brief remarks because I have had a long association with the Department of Public Works which has extended over 55 years. I have taken part in building bridges inspecting wharves and inspecting timbers and lumber used in small wharves. Possibly I feel more at home in this field than in some other quarters.
I was pleased to hear the minister mention that next session these estimates will be sent
November 22, 1966

to a committee. I think this is a very good idea because many members are interested in getting to know more about the operation of this department in Ottawa and in the various regional offices and districts. In committee they will be able to inquire into the various functions which the department performs at the present time and which have been greatly enlarged in recent years.
There is one matter I should like to bring to the minister's attention. The residents in my riding along the Columbia River are interested in the arrangements that are being made between the federal Department of Public Works and the British Columbia hydro authority or the British Columbia government, whichever is responsible, for the relocation of wharves until the time when the dam is completed. They would also like to know what is being done with respect to the rebuilding of certain riprap mattresses which are required to prevent erosion of the very steep sandy banks along sharp curves in the river which have to be protected if navigation is to proceed normally. The chamber of commerce in that area and the farmers' institute as well as other organizations are interested in these matters which are under the jurisdiction of this department.
I understand that the Department of Public Works has decided on the location of a wharf at one point for launches, tugs and so on. This has caused other communities to wonder what will be done in their areas. I would very much like to know about this, and if it is not possible for the minister to give details on it tonight possibly he could send me a few lines.
The next matter deals with the question of casual employees. All the men working on the repairing of wharves are experienced and many of them are getting on in years. I do hope that everything possible is being done to give these people as much employment as is possible. You need skilled men to build a wharf, run a pile driver or operate a dredge and you will not get these men unless you provide work for them between seasons even if you have to transfer them from one lake to another or from one interior district to another. I hope that everything will be done to maintain a corps of experienced men for the operation of a dredge, the running of a pile driver and the building of wharves and riprap mattresses which we know will be required in a year or two from now.
[DOT] (9:20 p.m.)
Another matter I wish to mention is the question of the pension fund, about which I 23033-647
Supply-Public Works
have had some correspondence. I understand that there are some of these casual employees who are out of employment for four or five months in the year but who are paying up to $30 a month into the civil service pension fund. This is another reason that everything possible should be done to give these persons as much employment as possible. As I said before, many of them are on in years and their families are resident in the district, but if necessary they could go to other points for a month or two to maintain their employment. I bring this matter to the minister's attention and I am sure that his senior officials know of the circumstances.
I am interested in the item dealing with testing laboratories, and next year when the estimates go before a committee I hope that those responsible for the operation of these laboratories will have the opportunity to explain to the members of the committee what work is being undertaken at this time. I suppose it is related to steel, concrete and the various materials used in the construction of buildings and wharves as well as other projects undertaken by this department.
Once again, Mr. Chairman, I refer to the question of the design of buildings. I think that the Department of Public Works could use a little more imagination than they have to date in the design of buildings, especially in smaller communities, in order that they will fit in, shall I say, with the locality in which they are erected. We have standard-size post offices throughout the country and standard-size R.C.M.P. buildings and other buildings of this type. I think something can be done to use a little more imagination to make these buildings more suitable to the locality in which they are erected so that they become a more worthy addition to the community, more artistic and satisfactory from the aesthetic point of view.
In view of the work which will have to be done on the Arrow Lakes and portions of the Kootenay Lakes owing to the building of the Columbia River treaty projects and because of the need for wharves to be replaced, I hope that the district office in Nelson will be kept open. The men on the job know more about the immediate work to be done than people here in Ottawa because they know the local circumstances and conditions in which they work. They know about the materials and so on. So I hope the district office will not be closed.
Another growing requirement in this district is the need for more launching ramps for

November 22, 1966
Supply-Public Works
the launching of boats by tourists. Last year over 150 boats came up from Portland via the Columbia River to the Arrow Lakes and many points as far north as Revelstoke. This traffic is increasing and provision is being made for these boats. In some cases they are taken around dams in the United States such as Grand Coulee, Boulder and so on by lowboys and in Canada they go through locks. This traffic is increasing and will increase even more in the years ahead.
In addition, large numbers of pleasure launches are being towed into the area by automobiles and there is a great need for launching ramps. I am not suggesting that this is something which is required immediately, but I would suggest that the engineers in the department should survey the district and in small communities which make the best part of their income from the tourist industry consideration should be given to erecting launching ramps at suitable points near the communities.
I think that is all I wish to raise at the present time, Mr. Chairman. I want to compliment the officials in Ottawa and the district officials in British Columbia, as well as the local officials and employees who work in my constituency. As I have said before, I have always had a close association with this department. I have known most of the local men for a great number of years and the work they do, and when I make a request on their behalf I am actually speaking for them.


Horace Andrew (Bud) Olson: There is just one point I want to discuss, Mr. Chairman, on the estimates of the Minister of Public Works, I refer the contribution made to the provinces under the provisions of the Trans-Canada Highway Act.
This matter has been talked about a number of times in this house. I notice there is an item of $52,600,000 for this fiscal year. The injustice of the present payment is that the provinces that went ahead and complied with the terms of the original Trans-Canada Highway Act are actually being penalized for having done so because the percentage of contribution has been changed two or three times since the original act was passed. I think that now the federal government is paying as much as 90 per cent of the cost. Furthermore, this very high percentage of cost applies to the most expensive section of the road passing through the provinces. One thing we object to is that payment is not made retroactive for those provinces which finished the highway long ago but now have to modernize it.

I am sure the Minister of Public Works will agree that when the house passed the original Trans-Canada Highway Act in the early 1950's the intent of the act was that there would at least be one modern highway across Canada from one end to the other. In many areas, particularly in Alberta and Saskatchewan, two provinces which finished their sections first, the highway is now ten years or a little more old and is not up to the specifications required today for a modern highway. One section I particularly refer to is from Calgary to Banff national park. When this section was built the specifications called for a certain width of highway, for certain compaction and so on, sufficient at the time for the amount of traffic using the highway. However, today the department of highways has found from surveys that there is a requirement for a four-lane highway and this is being built. Traffic counts have been made and today's requirements call for certain underpasses and overpasses which add substantially to the cost.
All I am saying to the minister is that the government ought to take another look at the legislation and its intent, because I am sure he will agree that this house directed the government to construct at least one modern highway from one end of the country to the other. But the specifications laid down in the early 1950's are no longer adequate for modern highway requirements. I hope that before the minister's estimates come before the house next session he will take into account the fact that the federal parliament has indicated that it wants the federal treasury to become involved in this kind of undertaking, whether to the extent of 50 per cent or some other figure, on a continuing basis so as to keep this highway up to modern-day requirements.
[DOT] (9:30 p.m.)
If a highway falls behind the times it becomes obsolete. I suggest to the minister that after ten years it is not unreasonable to say that in many areas this highway is old fashioned. Therefore the federal government should not withdraw from this project and leave the provinces to do all the maintenance and modernization. In some sections of Alberta the modernization that has gone on in the last two or three years has cost far more in dollars per mile than the original construction cost of the highway. I hope the minister will take this into account. I raised this question last year and had a sympathetic response. So far nothing has happened. I hope the minister will give consideration to what I have said.
November 22, 1966


George James McIlraith: It would be useful if I took a moment to clear up one or two points which have been raised. I will not attempt to deal with all but there are one or two items which I think should be clarified right away.
The hon. member for Gaspe spoke about the desirability of trips to different parts of the country and I think he had in mind the Gaspe region. If he had, I have no criticism of him for that because I had such a trip planned last fall. Unfortunately the railway strike occurred necessitating the sitting of parliament and the trip was cancelled. I assure the hon. member that I want to visit outlying areas of the country, particularly the Gaspe area, and particularly do I want to look at that large project under way at Matane. There are many other projects along the whole coast that I want to look at. There is one point I should clear up so that there will be no uncertainty about it. It has to do with the Rimouski district office. That office will be continued. There is no suggestion of closing it at the moment. I thought I should put that on the record.
As to the public building with 4,000 square feet of space not used, I would be grateful to the hon. member if he would let me have the details so that the matter can be looked into immediately.
With regard to protection works, that has always been a very difficult problem, as the hon. member indicated. I would be glad to set out in as precise a way as I can the criteria we seek to apply, though I am fully cognizant of the difficulties of making a determination whether damage is due to erosion, to natural forces, to navigation or to the erection of some structure by the federal government.
The hon. member for Kootenay West raised some questions and I will try to answer one or two of them. He made particular reference to the relocation of wharves because of the rising of the water by reason of the construction of the High Arrow dam. The arrangement is that the responsibility for paying for this will be that of B.C. Hydro but the work will be done in conjunction with the Department of Public Works, because some new wharves may not be in close proximity to others that are being flooded out. As the hon. member will agree, there may be some relocations necessary of a substantial sort and that can be done in conjunction with the Department of Public Works. But the actual liability, if you want to call it that, for reconstruction because of this dam is that of B.C. Hydro. The methods of protection against erosion are to be
23033-647a
Supply-Public Works
treated the same way. Perhaps I should extend my remarks on erosion to indicate that the federal responsibility in this field is only where erosion is due to navigation or to the erection of public works.
The hon. member made some extended remarks about personnel matters and I would prefer, rather than giving an off-hand answer, to look at the points he raised in a specific way to see what can be done to better the conditions of the employees who have less than full-time employment. I shall also look at the related matters he raised having to do with pension contributions.
The hon. member also made reference to the district office in Nelson. My understanding is that it is not a district office as such but that it is an arrangement whereby we keep one man posted at Nelson. I do not want to go on record that we are maintaining a district office at Nelson because that is not what we call it in the department and it might be misleading to call it that.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: I used a sort of local term for the office.


George James McIlraith: On the question of launching ramps the situation there is that the policy as announced in August last year has aroused tremendous interest in the country and the demands for assistance in this area are coming in at a pace really precluding a reasonable prospect of adequate servicing at the moment. It is a policy we are trying to develop. We are trying to examine each application to see how it meets the criteria laid down at that time. We are doing the preliminary studies so that a priority for this policy can be established that would have a reasonable expectation of being carried out.
The hon. member for Medicine Hat made some remarks about the trans-Canada highway policy. I should say that highway policy is a matter for the Min ster of Transport. But I want to deal in a more extended way with the hon. member's remarks. He pointed out what is quite true, that we now contribute to the cost of the trans-Canada highway in the maritime provinces to an extent far greater than the amount of contribution made when certain of the western provinces and other provinces built their major portions of the trans-Canada highway. I hope the hon. member will not seek to make that appear as unfair, as it may appear to be superficially when you look at it, because the truth of the matter is that when the policy was first developed those provinces which were able to pay

November 22, 1966
Supply-Public Works
their 50 per cent went ahead and took advantage of the act and got their contribution. But there were other provinces which were not able to proceed because they were not able to provide 50 per cent of the cost of the trans-Canada highway and, while I know that those provinces would not wish me to refer to them as poor, the simple fact is that the finances of certain provincial governments in some provinces which had fewer economic resources than others made it impossible for them to proceed.
Having said that, I am fully cognizant of what the hon. member was really pressing for, and that is a highway policy for the future. While I want to make it clear that the present trans-Canada highway legislation will come to an end, as indicated in the estimates, the large question of general highway policy is quite undecided and there is nothing I can properly or usefully say tonight that would be encouraging on that subject. This is something meriting the attention of the government and parliament in future. It is a matter of pure policy and it comes under my colleague, the Minister of Transport. I wanted to take account of the hon. member's remarks because I am aware of the interest which he has asserted publicly on the record and privately on many occasions also. I am sure that his views will be taken into account when matters of policy in that respect are being considered.
[DOT] (9:40 p.m.)


Horace Andrew (Bud) Olson: Mr. Chairman, I have one supplementary question. Would the minister not agree that the intent of the original Trans-Canada Highway Act as expressed by this parliament was that Canada should have at least one modern highway at all times and that some sections of this highway are not sufficient for today's requirements?


George James McIlraith: No, Mr. Chairman, I would not agree with that suggestion. The intent of the original act was that the federal government would contribute to the construction of this highway. In view of the fact that it is under provincial jurisdiction, it was intended that a highway be constructed across this country up to the modern standards which prevailed at that time. The highway having been constructed, the maintenance and reconstruction remained with the provinces.
It could be argued, and I believe this to be the case, that the purposes for which the Trans-Canada Highway Act was passed have been largely achieved. I am fully aware that highway standards and requirements have

sharply changed in the years since that act was enacted. Today's standards are not the same as the standards of ten years ago, but it would be wrong to suggest that the purpose of the act was to maintain the trans-Canada highway across this country to current modern standards. It was, rather, to assist the provinces to construct a modern highway across the country because of the large cost involved.


Mr. Brown:: Mr. Chairman, I should like to speak briefly about a matter that affects my constituency and several others situated between Lake Ontario, the Niagara River and Lake Erie. I have particular reference to the Grand River valley and the Grand River which flows through a very heavily populated area in the province of Ontario.


Michael Starr: Have they not done anything about that yet, Jim?


James Elisha Brown: No, they have not and that is why I thought I should say something about it during this debate. I have spoken about this situation before and quite recently I asked the minister a question regarding the redevelopment of the Grand River area. I received an answer from the parliamentary secretary which caused consternation and shock to the people of my area. He said that the federal government considered the Grand River as a provincial river. Let me remind hon. members that the Trent valley system and the Rideau River system are regarded as federal systems. There is a differentiation made here which has never before been expressed in parliament. Perhaps I should be sorry for having asked that question because I did not want the government to make that kind of a decision.
At this time let me refer to something said a moment ago by the hon. member for Kootenay West. He said that the minister is an imaginative man. I believe he is imaginative and I feel sure he is aware of that belief. He is also a very determined man when he makes up his mind and I do not want him to make up his mind in respect of this matter. It is my hope that he will leave the matter open for consideration before turning his back on one of the most important areas in Ontario and, for that matter, one of the most important populated areas in this country.


Michael Starr: They are just ignoring you, Jim.


James Elisha Brown: I am reminded by an hon. member that this whole matter is being ignored, but I know it will not be ignored for
November 22, 1966

long by this imaginative minister. I am sure that something will be done even though the parliamentary secretary has said that this is a provincial matter. I am pleased to note that another cabinet minister who resides in and represents a constituency which runs along the valley of this river is now in the house because I am sure he agrees with every word I am saying. I know he will back my request in the cabinet.
The Grand river from early times, from the opening of settlement in this country, has been one of the greatest water thoroughfares in Canada. It was one of the chief means of entering this country in early days. Since confederation successive governments have not done very much about developing this area. This is particularly true since the advent of the railway.
Today the country is becoming more heavily populated, particularly in this area of Ontario, and the need for recreational facilities is becoming greater each week. No better area could be found for recreational purposes than the beautiful Grand river valley. Many members of parliament on both sides of this house come from that area and I know they will back me in my request to the minister who is, as I said a moment ago, a very imaginative man.
Let me remind the minister that this river has in recent years been badly polluted but that the situation has been corrected as a result of the foresight of provincial authorities. These authorities have forced municipalities and commercial enterprises along the river to stop dumping sewage into it. Sewage disposal plants have been constructed in every major municipality along the Grand river. I cannot think of a more wonderful place for boating. It would be a Godsend to our area and sooner or later this will take place if this area is redeveloped for recreational purposes. I can guarantee to the house that following redevelopment, this area will form the largest single recreational area on the North American continent. It begins behind the city of Hamilton and continues along the historic waterway past the Six Nations Indian reservation where the flag of England was planted. This is an area where loyalty to the Crown is one of the most important characteristics of the population.
It was my feeling that I should not allow this debate to conclude without making a few remarks about this beautiful waterway. I know the minister is a very busy man and has perhaps had his back turned to this situation.
Supply-Public Works
I am sure his back will not remain turned and that the day will come when a review will be made. All I ask is that the department institute an engineering study into the cost so that we may then proceed with the betterment of one of the grandest parts of the province of Ontario.
[DOT] (9:50 p.m.)


Mr. Rapp:: Mr. Chairman, I fully agree with the hon. member for Medicine Hat that the trans-Canada highway is no longer serving the purpose for which it was built. We now need a second trans-Canada highway out of Winnipeg to Saskatoon, Edmonton and into British Columbia because the traffic going through the three provinces involved is very great. I would also like to see the highway approaches to cities like Regina, Moose Jaw and other places enlarged to four lanes. During the past summer many serious accidents were caused because of their being only one lane each way. I also believe that truck routes should by-pass cities instead of going through them.
I believe that the speed limits on highways should be uniform. In Manitoba the speed limit is 60 miles per hour, in Saskatchewan 65 miles an hour, and it varies in other places. When one is making a long trip one may not notice these changes in speed limits and as a result may get into trouble with the law. Last summer I travelled through some parts of the United States on two and four-lane highways which for long stretches had speed limits of 70 miles per hour and I discovered that accidents do not happen in greater numbers on these highways than on highways with 60-mile an hour speed limits. Many of the points on which I wished to speak have been dealt with by the hon. member for Medicine Hat. I hope the Minister of Public Works will give these matters his consideration.


Mr. Barnett:: Mr. Chairman, I am rather tempted to enter the discussion on the trans-Canada highway which was started by the hon. member for Medicine Hat and continued by the hon. member for Humboldt-Mel-fort-Tisdale. I have made a number of speeches urging broader federal participation in a highway development program, but I think the trans-Canada highway as it exists is fairly good. I have to admit that it is almost three years since I drove across it from Ottawa to the west coast, but it did not strike me as quite as bad as hon. members have made it out to be. I found it quite a satisfactory highway to drive on.

November 22, 1966
Supply-Public Works


Reynold Rapp: Three years ago it may have been all right, but not now.


Thomas Speakman Barnett: I really rose to pose two questions to the minister on which I would like his answers before his estimates pass. The first is one raised earlier by the hon. member for Gaspe to which the minister did not reply. What has been the impact of what might be described as the Liberal version of the Conservative austerity program, announced earlier this year by the Minister of Finance, on the spending programs of the minister's department? Inadvertently or otherwise the minister did not deal with that question when he replied to the hon. member for Gaspe.
Second, what has happened with respect to the marina program announced by the Prime Minister a year ago last summer? How many projects have been approved for construction under that program, where are they located and, generally speaking, what developments have taken place since the Prime Minister announced the program and since it was later spelled out in more detail by the Minister of Public Works?
I would like to take the minister on a conducted tour of the many projects, good, bad and indifferent, his department has constructed in the seacoast areas of B.C. Perhaps some day the minister will come out there and have a look for himself. In the meantime I shall try to keep him posted by correspondence and otherwise on these matters.


Mr. Loney:: Mr. Chairman, I understand that the estimates of the National Capital Commission will be dealt with in a committee but I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate the Minister of Public Works for improvements on Parliament Hill. I refer to the ban on parking. It has added greatly to the dignity of Parliament Hill, as has the improvement in traffic handling and the redesigning of the entry gates.
I hope consideration will be given as soon as possible to providing more adequate parking, which is greatly lacking for the staff and also for people who come from a number of miles out of town to see their members of parliament. It is very difficult for visitors to find parking space, and usually when they leave a member's office they discover parking tickets on their cars. They do not know what to do and as a result bring it to the attention of their representatives in parliament. Better facilities should be provided for people who travel 100 or 150 miles to meet their members of parliament.

I would now like to deal with the acquisition of property. There seems to be some misunderstanding in my riding about the acquisition of property and a public office in the community of Ripley. I have asked several questions in connection with it. The officials have been most co-operative but there still seems to be some misunderstanding or misinterpretation within the community itself and within the municipal council with respect to the department's intent.
[DOT] (10:00 p.m.)
I should also like to draw to the minister's attention certain projects which have been cancelled in the past several years. First, there is the Public Works project at Tobermory which was in the estimates and then cancelled in 1964-65. There is a great and pressing need for docking facilities there not only for the local fishermen but also to provide facilities for the yachts and small craft which come into the area at an increasing rate each tourist season.
There is another matter I should like to draw to the minister's attention. Very recently a contract was let at Port Elgin for the construction of a wharf. Recently a statement was made to the effect that this project would be held over until spring or next summer because of the lack of steel. The understanding is that the steel must be brought in from England. I should like to ask the minister to have his officials investigate this matter. It is very important that we provide winter employment for the local people. There is always a need for winter employment and, although these projects are not large, they do go a long way toward providing employment for seasonal workers in this area.
I am also wondering whether it would be possible for the local officials to undertake some feasibility studies in respect of the harbour at Kincardine. Every year a great amount of silt and debris comes down in the spring flood. Perhaps it would be possible to work out some scheme whereby the authorities would be able to provide some system whereby there would be a silt trap or control dam. We believe this would be of benefit to the department in this area and would mean a saving in dollars. It would also aid the conservation schemes which are in existence.
I would also ask the minister to investiagte the possibility of looking into the matter of the dredging of some of our inlets and rivers such as Sauble beach and the Sauble river. This was taken into consideration a number of years ago and nothing was done. This is
November 22, 1966

another area which is entirely dependent on the tourist trade. As we all know, there is a great increase in the number of small boats, especially those which require launching ramps and so on. This would be most beneficial to the local area.
That is all I have to say at the moment but I should like to ask the minister to draw these matters to the attention of his officials.


Mr. McCutcheon:: Mr. Chairman, I will not delay the committee too long. The hon. member for Brantford intimated that the minister had imagination and indeed I hope he has because my suggestion will require, I think, a little imagination. It has to do with the trans-Canada highway and has further reference to something which at first glance might appear to be unrelated, the tremendous increase in Canada of private and hobby aircraft. Registrations of such aircraft have increased markedly, as we all know. Canadians, being what they are, are going farther and farther afield all the time in such aircraft. Many of them are not equipped with instruments; they do not have radio and consequently do not have directional-finding equipment. These people fly over our highways and, believe it or not, they do it by visual flight.
My suggestion to the minister, in an effort to cut down on the number of fatalities in respect of these small aircraft on their crosscountry hops, is that it might be a good idea to consider putting in emergency landing strips. These would only need to be sod affairs 1,500 or 1,800 feet in length, spaced at intervals of 25, 50 or 60 miles across the country. These people with their small aircraft are using the trans-Canada highway as their roadmap. I suggest that emergency strips at intervals across the country could be of tremendous assistance in the saving of lives.


Maurice Allard: Mr. Chairman, I have one suggestion for the Minister of Public Works (Mr. Mcllraith). I want to submit to him, in very few words, the problem of the dredging of the St. Francis river in three adjoining constituencies, namely Sherbrooke, in the centre, Richmond-Wolfe at one end, and Stanstead at the other. I am sure the hon. members for the other two constituencies of Stanstead and Richmond-Wolfe (Messrs. Forest and Asselin) will agree, for I think briefs were also submitted to them in that regard.
For many years, because of certain constructions or certain installations made in the past on the St. Francis river, either at
Supply-Public Works
Bromptonville, between Bromptonville and Sherbrooke, or between Bromptonville and Richmond, and because of a certain rock in the river, we have in the spring obstructions which are responsible for serious floods in all the main municipalities of the constituencies and for the riparian owners.
Now, the government would do a tremendous service to those municipalities which, in the springtime, for many years, have experienced serious floodings, more particularly so in the case of Richmond, Windsor, Bromptonville as well as Sherbrooke, because of certain constructions, of certain installations within the St. Francis river and also because of that rock which has no use whatever. By so doing, the minister would make something useful of the St. Francis river in addition to helping to promote the tourist attractiveness of that area.
I should like the minister to take this request into consideration and to get into touch with the hon. members for Stanstead and Richmond-Wolfe, to realize that the problem is urgent and that its settlement would be greatly appreciated by the population of all those municipalities.


Herman Maxwell Batten: Shall vote No. 1 carry?


Thomas Speakman Barnett: Mr. Chairman, I think we should have some answers from the minister before this item carries. We all know what a shy, reticent minister we have in the Minister of Public Works. We have made our comments very brief, I think designedly so to encourage the minister to give us some answers to the questions we have raised.


George James McIlraith: Mr. Chairman, the minister
desired to be brief in his remarks in an effort to give other hon. members an opportunity to speak. I assure you that reticence on my part was not the reason.
On the question of the trans-Canada highway I do not think I can usefully add anything to the remarks I made earlier this evening on that subject since the matter of policy for the future is one not for me but for the Minister of Transport. When we embark on the area of future policy it simply is not my responsibility. The responsibility of the Minister of Public Works has to do with the administration of the trans-Canada highway legislation, but not with the matter of policy and whether there should be similar legislation covering other highways to be built in the future.

November 22, 1966
Supply-Public Works
With regard to the projects raised by the hon. member for Bruce, I think the most effective way of dealing with those matters, rather than trying to deal with each one individually at this hour, would be for me to tell the hon. member that I have taken note of the points he has raised. I will check through these projects on an individual basis and give him the fullest information that I have on them.
I noted with considerable interest the remarks of the hon. member for Lambton-Kent with regard to the situation that seems to be developing in the country respecting small aircraft. I am aware of the tremendous popularity of these craft and the extension of their use. Again, the creation of new airstrips is primarily a matter for the Department of Transport. It does not come under the jurisdiction of the Department of Public Works. However, I am aware of the use being made of certain other public property in a way which is hazardous in the extreme. I will keep these observations in mind.
[DOT] (10:10 p.m.)
I do not know what I can usefully say about the dredging of the St. Francis river because I am sorry to have to admit that I am not sufficiently familiar with this river to know whether it comes within federal jurisdiction. But in the light of what the hon. member for Sherbrooke has said I will look into the matter and discuss it with the members from the constituencies he has indicated. I will undertake to see to it that the points he has raised will get consideration. It would be unwise of me to indicate what the result of the consideration will be but we will give the matter serious thought. I do not know whether I can add much more that is useful at this hour.


Thomas Speakman Barnett: Mr. Chairman, perhaps the minister did not hear me. He answered everybody else's questions but mine. I asked him what cut-backs had been made in his estimates as a result of the action taken by the Minister of Finance. I also asked him what had happened under the new marina policy which was announced a year ago last summer or early fall. How many projects have been developed under that policy and where are they? My question is fairly specific on the general matter of the administration of the department.


George James McIlraith: I wonder whether the hon. member wants me to go through the list with regard to the question of cut-backs?


Thomas Speakman Barnett: Mr. Chairman, I am not suggesting that the minister give us the details of every project but I think we should have some indication of the results of the construction program of his department either in totals by provinces or in public buildings.


George James McIlraith: The construction of public works has been a delaying operation. The main impact was felt in the city of Ottawa. The next heavy impact was in the province of Ontario outside of Ottawa. There was very little impact in the province of B.C. and in the other provinces. I can say in general, without isolating individual projects, that they are all moving forward. It is a delaying proposition. One or two of them may not be moving forward immediately but they are all in one state or another of progress. The policy has been one of delay rather than cancellation. This is the point I wish to make. Can the hon. member tell me what his second question was?


Thomas Speakman Barnett: I asked the minister what has happened under the new marina policy which was originally announced by the Prime Minister and spelled out in greater detail by the Minister of Public Works. Can the minister tell me how many projects have been approved under that program.


George James McIlraith: The number on which actual work has been done so far appears to be seven. There are eight works approved for next year. The policy development was only put out in August of last year and nearly all of the work has gone into the planning and attempts to approve the projects with a view to then arranging priorities for them.
I do not want to disclose at this time next year's estimates. The hon. member knows that next year's estimates are already past the stage of departmental consideration. Certain items in the estimates have a bearing on this question. However, the best answer to his question is that the work done so far has been mainly the examination of different applications in conjunction with local authorities, trying to satisfy ourselves that they meet the criteria laid down. Then we attempt to approve them in order of priority with a view to proceeding with them.


Thomas Speakman Barnett: Has the minister the total amount of the federal commitment on these seven projects which are actually under construction?
November 22, 1966


George James McIlraith: No, not at the moment. In any event, the figure would not be too realistic because we are at a very early stage in the construction.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
(The following item was agreed to:)
la. General administration, including grants as detailed in the estimates, $13,200.
Accommodation services-
5. Maintenance and operation of public buildings and grounds, acquisition of furniture and furnishings for government departments, including the provision, on a recoverable basis, of accommodation and related services for Canada Pension Plan purposes, and authority to provide assistance to (a) the International Civil Aviation Organization in the form of office accommodation at less than commercial rates and (b) the Ottawa Civil Service Recreation Association in the form of maintenance services in respect of the W. Clifford Clark Memorial Centre in Ottawa, $69,317,000.
Herman Maxwell Batten: The hon. member for
York-Humber.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Ten o'clock.


Mr. Cowan:: I am willing to call it ten o'clock but if we are going ahead I have a question to ask. I did not ask any questions on vote 1 and I thought that vote 5 would be coming up tomorrow.


Stanley Howard Knowles: If you call it ten o'clock we cannot go ahead.


Ralph Bronson Cowan: On page 401 of the blue book, under vote 5 we have overtime for 1966-67 listed at $120,000 compared with $115,000 last year. Under vote 5 on page 402 overtime is listed at $175,000 as against $131,000 for last year. Under vote 1 there are four individual items of overtime.
One question I want to ask is this. On what basis does the Department of Public Works pay overtime? Is it on the basis of time and a half or is it just straight time? Does it include time worked on Sundays or time worked on holidays? I think the department should clearly point out on what basis they are now paying overtime because this will be a bone of contention when the much heralded collective agreement for the civil service comes into force. I should like to know now how overtime is paid.


Herman Maxwell Batten: Shall vote 5 carry?


Ralph Bronson Cowan: Might I have an answer tonight?


John Robert (Jack) Nicholson: Mr. Chairman, to facilitate the passage of these estimates and with the approval of the minister-
Supply-Public Works


Ralph Bronson Cowan: If the minister is not going to pay attention to me I will stay here all night till he does.


John Robert (Jack) Nicholson: -perhaps I can answer the question, because this is a matter that comes within the jurisdiction of the Department of Labour rather than Public Works. The wage rates for Public Works are governed by the Fair Wages and Hours of Labour Act which is administered by the Department of Labour. These employees get the regular holidays each year and are paid time and a half for overtime. They work a 40-hour week and overtime is paid for work beyond that period.


David Lewis: Have they much trouble with the Minister of Public Works on the issue?


John Robert (Jack) Nicholson: There has been no trouble with him yet, I can assure you.


George James McIlraith: Mr. Chairman, I am quite anxious to give the hon. member a full answer. I do not have the material available at hand in a precise and orderly form but I would be glad to give it to him in a letter or have an official come down so that I can give it to him now.
[DOT] (10:20 p.m.)


Ralph Bronson Cowan: A letter will be O.K.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
(The following items were agreed to:)
5a. Maintenance and operation of public buildings and grounds, acquisition o£ furniture and furnishings for government departments, $4,500,000.
10. Acquisition of equipment and furnishings other than office furnishings, $548,000.
10a. Acquisition of equipment and furnishings other than office furnishings, $365,000.
Herman Maxwell Batten: Shall item 15 carry?


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Chairman, I have something to ask on item 15 if you are going on, but if I call it ten o'clock we are not going on.


An hon. Member:: Let us go on.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Ten o'clock.
Resolutions adopted in committee of supply this day reported and concurred in.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


[Stage Direction]
Hon. G. J. Mcllrailh (Minister of Public
Works): Mr. Speaker, I wonder, before you
[Stage Direction]
November 22, 1966
Business of the House
call the adjournment motion, if I might deal with one matter. Pursuant to the provisions of the provisional standing order dealing with consideration of supply and estimates, the house leaders have discussed the requirements of that order and we have reached a consensus. I move:
1.	That on Friday, November 25, 1966, at 5.30 p.m., every question necessary to dispose of all outstanding main and supplementary estimates, tabled in this session, and thereafter all subsequent proceedings leading to the passage of the appropriation bill based thereon shall be forthwith disposed of, without amendment or debate, notwithstanding the provisions of any standing order;
2.	In the event that any items of these estimates are unreported by any standing committee, such items shall be deemed to have been reported by such standing committee and to stand referred to the committee of supply, and any motion referring such items to any such committee shall be rescinded and the order discharged.
3.	That on Thursday, November 24, and Friday, November 25, the Private Members hour shall be suspended, notwithstanding the provisions of standing order 15.
I would ask, Mr. Speaker, that it be so ordered. Then I shall announce the business of the house as best I can.
Gordon Minto Churchill: Mr. Speaker, I understand this has been arranged among the house leaders but I should hate to see it passed as an order of the house without mention being made that this is the application of the guillotine. I would think that it should be passed on division.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: The house has heard the terms of the resolution proposed by the Minister of Public Works. Is it so ordered, on
division?


Gordon Minto Churchill: On division.
Motion agreed to on division.



George James McIlraith: Mr. Speaker, as an indication of the business of the house, and this is again an attempt to meet the provision of the rules whereby the opposition have the right to designate the calling of the departments, on Wednesday the estimates of the Department of the Secretary of State will be up for consideration. On Thursday we will consider the estimates of the Department of External Affairs, to be followed by consideration of the estimates of the Department of National Health and Welfare and the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources. On Friday the
[Mr. Mcllraith.l
estimates of the Department of Transport will be considered first to be followed by the estimates of the Department of Agriculture. The estimates of other departments will be brought in for consideration during any other time made available. I suggest to hon. members that there may be requests for a variation of this order and they should be ready to discuss the estimates of any department at any time.


Michael Starr: Would the minister indicate the hours agreed upon for the consideration of these estimates?


George James McIlraith: Yes, I shall be glad to do that. On Thursday the first three hours have been set aside for the consideration of the estimates of the Department of External Affairs. The next three hours will be devoted to the estimates of the Department of National Health and Welfare. The balance of the time on Thursday will be devoted to consideration of the estimates of the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources. On Friday the first three hours will be devoted to the Department of Transport to be followed by consideration of the estimates of the Department of Agriculture.


Gordon Minto Churchill: Do you not feel you are doing an injustice to the Minister of National Defence by not calling his estimates and allowing about ten hours for their consideration?


George James McIlraith: Those estimates have been considered but I am in the hands of the opposition as to which estimates should be called.


Gordon Minto Churchill: I was speaking on behalf of the Minister of National Defence.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: I shall be instantly available if I am required.


George James McIlraith: Perhaps I should indicate for the benefit of hon. members that on Monday we propose to deal with the medicare bill at the committee stage which is to be followed by a consideration of the measure relating to supplementary payments to old age security recipients.



NATIONAL HOUSING ACT


George James McIlraith: Mr. Speaker, I understand there is a
November 22, 1966

request to be made to revert to motions for the purpose of making an announcement.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Does the house give unanimous consent to revert to motions for the purpose of an announcement?


Michael Starr: We are agreeable to reverting to motions but I think it should be understood that we will have an opportunity to comment.


George James McIlraith: That is understood.


David Réal Caouette: Mr. Speaker, could the minister not make his statement tomorrow? Will he be absent from the house tomorrow or what?
If he were to make his statement at the opening of the sitting tomorrow, we could comment upon it. I think he should wait until tomorrow, especially since ten o'clock has already been called.


John Robert (Jack) Nicholson: This announcement involves a question relating to the hours of the stock exchanges-la bourse. It had to be made late today and a new N.H.A. interest formula is now in effect. Because of that this announcement should be made as soon as possible.


David Réal Caouette: Do you not think it might have been a good idea to close the stock markets?


John Robert (Jack) Nicholson: Because of this special situation I gave the representative of that group in the house a copy of this statement some three quarters of an hour ago.
The statement which I wish to make, Mr. Speaker, relates to National Housing Act lending. The virtual withdrawal of private investment funds from the residential mortgage sector is seriously impeding the ability of Canadians to obtain home ownership. Under the National Housing Act the situation has perhaps been slightly easier because of the high level of direct lending by Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation during recent years. However, as I have stated previously both in the house and elsewhere the government cannot take up all the slack. It has already put more than $500,000 into direct lending this year.
[DOT] (10:30 p.m.)
Those borrowers who have been able to obtain loans on the conventional market are
National Housing Act
being forced to pay 8 per cent or better for the privilege of borrowing to build a house.
When I introduced Bill C-241 a short time ago, the bill amending the National Housing Act, I indicated that the rate of interest on N.H.A. loans was under active consideration. It is obvious that the current 6J per cent N.H.A. rate is unrealistic under present monetary conditions, and an adjustment in the rate is required if approved lenders are to resume their leading role under the National Housing Act.
The government now proposes to introduce a formula by regulation which will permit the maximum National Housing Act interest rate to fluctuate in relation to changing yields on long-term federal government bonds. Under this system the N.H.A. rate will be 1J per cent above that applicable to federal securities, and adjustments to the nearest one-quarter per cent will be made quarterly if bond yields increase or decline. Initially, and effective immediately, the rate of interest on home ownership and rental loans is established at per cent.


Some hon. Members:: Shame.


John Robert (Jack) Nicholson: This interest rate will remain in effect until March 31, 1967, and thereafter the rate will be reviewed at the end of each subsequent quarter and will be established in accordance with the formula that I have described.
It is my hope that the introduction of this new interest rate formula will now enable approved N.H.A. lenders to consider the residential mortgage field as a large part of their lending portfolio during the coming year. It is also my hope that more potential borrowers will be enabled to take advantage of National Housing Act terms rather than those prevailing today on the conventional market and which have prevailed for the last several months.
I ask hon. members to note that the increase in the interest rate, however, has no effect on the maximum rate of interest on other types of National Housing Act loans. Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation loans for elderly persons and low income families, and loans for sewage treatment projects and university housing projects-and that of course, also covers the colleges included by virtue of the recent N.H.A. amendments -remain at the current rate of 6J per cent.

November 22, 1966
National Housing Act


James Russell Keays: Mr. Speaker, the
minister's answers to many questions concerning the problem of housing and the scarcity of housing in Canada never revealed that the problem was as severe and as grave as it is. But now the government has had to take some action and the action it has taken is a severe blow to the lower and middle income bracket wage earners of the country.
Had the government been farsighted it would have introduced the Bank Act amendments much sooner than it did. Had this been done it would have stabilized the lending regulations, and I am sure many prospective home owners would have been able to benefit from money available to them at a much lower rate of interest than that just announced by the minister.
We can now see prospective home owners having to pay one-half of one per cent more in interest, and added to that there is the 11 per cent sales tax on building materials plus the extra cost of construction in wintertime. This new interest rate will have a grave effect on average wage earners and the government will be blamed for its shortsightedness in dealing with the problem that is facing us.
I am sure that by next spring we shall see that the changes in the regulations which have been proposed by the minister are not going to solve our housing problem. It is a problem that should have been faced up to a year ago. The government has been adamant in refusing to face up to the issues and now, with the advent of the more difficult conditions of winter, it is bringing forward a measure which is punishing those who have looked forward to the government giving them help when they needed it. Those who since early childhood have looked forward to owning a home will now have to wait many years for what they had hoped for.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, the only advantage in having permitted the minister to revert to motions to make this statement at this time of night is that our comments must be brief. Let me make my comments on behalf of this party as briefly as I can. The newly established rate of 7J per cent is far too high. It demonstrates the bankruptcy of the government so far as a housing policy is concerned. The government has been complaining about rising costs in other areas. This will add immeasurably to costs and will boost interest rates in other areas. It will further compound the difficulties our people are facing at the present time.

Some day this government or some government must recognize the fact that housing is a matter of deep public concern and that what is needed, if we are to get housing at a rate of interest which the people can afford, is the provision of government funds for this purpose. We deplore as strongly as we can the exorbitant rate of interest which now is being proposed by this decision of the government. We note that the guarantee is only until March 31, 1967. I suppose, if this government is still in power and is still bankrupt of policies, that at that time we will have an announcement of a still higher rate. We object very strongly to this action.
[DOT] (10:40 p.m.)


David Réal Caouette: Mr. Speaker, the statement made by the Minister of Labour (Mr. Nicholson) is likely to discourage all Canadians a good deal.
To increase the rate of interest does not provide an answer to the problem. At a time when the government is introducing pieces of legislation designed to check what it likes to call inflation, the minister comes up with a statement directly contrary to the aim pursued by the government, that is, to check inflation. What happens is just the opposite. Fuel is added to the fire, and once again, the Canadian people will have to pay the piper.
The minister said earlier that the almost complete withdrawal of long term investments by private companies in the field of mortgage loans is a great obstacle.
I have just attended a meeting of the committee on finance, trade and economic affairs. The banks are asking permission-banks are private institutions, private companies-to enter squarely into the field of mortgage loans.
Now the minister has announced further on that the government is unable alone to finance housing construction.
How can the actions of the government toward foreign countries be reconciled with its actions toward the Canadian people, our fellow-citizens?
The other day I asked the Prime Minister (Mr. Pearson) how we obtained the necessary credit to grant interest-free loans to Bolivia, Jamaica and other countries for the construction of residences and other developments?
Mr. Speaker, why does the government not use the Bank of Canada to assist housing construction? I do not believe the minister at
November 22, 1966	COMMONS
all when he states that the government cannot alone finance housing construction. Let us apply to the Bank of Canada and as houses are built, the credit should be used for that purpose.
A little further, the minister says that the government intends to pass, by regulation, that increase in the interest rate from 6| to 7J, that is an increase of j of 1 per cent. And the reason is that the National Housing Act varies according to changes in the return of the long term bonds of the federal government.
There again, the minister knows that when the government issues $1 million in bonds, the Bank of Canada buys them and the chartered banks multiply that amount 12 and a half times, creating $12.5 million, and the government gets funds from those controllers of credit. It is not surprising that the government has to ask for increases in the interest rate at the expense of the small people. And the minister concludes by saying that he also hopes that a greater number of eventual borrowers will thus be able to take advantage of the provisions of the Housing Act instead of having to go to conventional loan markets. We have almost reached that conventional loan market and the minister tells us that a readjustment of that interest rate will be made every three months.
But, Mr. Speaker, we do not approve at all of that increase in interest which makes the Canadian people pay more. The people should be relieved of those taxes, those increases in the interest rate, and instead of serving money the government should serve the people of Canada, and then it will be doing its duty.


Mr. Howard Johnston (Okanagan-Revel-stoke):: Mr. Speaker, we know that the Economic Council of Canada in its report urges swift action to head off a possibly severe housing shortage. I suppose the announcement we have heard is the government's reaction to that urging by the council.


Stanley Howard Knowles: It is a reaction all right.


Howard Earl Johnston: It was interesting to hear the member who spoke for the official opposition deplore the slowness of the government in bringing forward the amendments to the Bank Act. We know how much that group has contributed in the last few months to delays in bringing forth any kind of legislation during this parliament.
Proceedings on Adjournment Motion
Those hon. members who have been attending the hearings of the finance committee in the last few weeks will know too that this announcement will be part of an increasing series of pressures that will be put on parliament to raise the bank interest rate. Such pressure will be found increasingly difficult to resist. When the bank interest rate is raised, I predict it will add to the rising inflationary spiral in which we seem to find ourselves increasingly caught.
I suggest also that members on both sides of the house who have such a tremendous faith in the orthodox methods of financing might, as this situation builds up, begin to question that faith to which they adhere so rigidly. If the interest rate is increased, one area in which the government could move to alleviate the housing shortage is by removing at least part of the 11 per cent tax on building materials. If we cannot have alleviation in one direction, we can have it in another. In my opinion this tax is one of the most misdirected ever to be applied in this country and has had tremendous significance in the development of the inflationary spiral in which we are caught.



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION

[Stage Direction]
A motion to adjourn the house under provisional standing order 39A deemed to have been moved.
Michael Starr: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, in view of the lateness of the hour I wonder whether we could dispense with the proceedings on the adjournment motion.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Is there agreement to the suspension of proceedings on the adjournment motion tonight?


Mr. Hees:: Yes, Mr. Speaker, provided we are given priority at the next opportunity.


Gilles Grégoire: Mr. Speaker, we are being asked tonight not to debate the questions on the adjournment motion.
Now my colleague for Sherbrooke (Mr. Allard) has a problem dealing precisely with the injustice done to the union members of the C.N.T.U., and he has been waiting for some time to narrow it down to essentials. We now know that, in connection with this problem, there will be tomorrow, and not the day after tomorrow, a vote in the C.B.C., from which the C.N.T.U. is excluded.
10228	COMMONS
Proceedings on Adjournment Motion
If this speeeh were to be made three days from now, I am not saying we could not accept the proposal, but since the vote will take place tomorrow, I think that, under the circumstances, my colleague, the hon. member for Sherbrooke should be allowed to make his statement, and that is why we would ask that, as expected, these statements should be made tonight.


The Deputy Speaker:: The hon. member for Sherbrooke.



LABOUR RELATIONS-ATTITUDE OF THE C.L.R.B. TOWARD THE C.N.T.U.

Maurice Allard: Mr. Speaker, last Thursday I asked the hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Winters) the following question:
Is it true that the minister, as chairman of a ministerial committee, has received an address from the Quebec Liberal members at Ottawa concerning the grievanoes of the C.N.T.U. and the attitude of the C.L.R.B.? As the problem is urgent, will the said committee, or the government, make its decision known on that subject shortly?
I am pleased tonight, on the adjournment motion, to raise that matter again and urge the government to finally measure up to its responsibilities.
[DOT] (10:50 p.m.)
For more than eight months I have been putting before the house grievances of the C.N.T.U., either by asking questions, or by intervening, or by means of two bills which I have put on the order paper.
The cabinet, for its part, in spite of the urgency of the problem at this time, has appointed a special committee made up of five ministers, and this committee, we are told, has been considering all the aspects of the problem for eight months. I feel that the said ministers are not quick to grasp the problem and they are showing either great unconcern or incompetence.
Trade union freedom and the sacred rights of federal employees are being seriously threatened, if the government does not immediately rectify the anomalies pointed out by the C.N.T.U. with respect to the C.L.R.B., and if substantial amendments are not brought to the wording of Bill No. C-170.
C.N.T.U. and Q.F.L. representatives have each in turn come to Ottawa lately to inform all Quebec members and federal ministers of
[Mr. Gr6goireJ
DEBATES	November 22. 1966
their great concern. The C.N.T.U. is threatening to officially withdraw from seven federal organizations of which it has been a member until now. Rumour has it that the chairman of the ministerial committee received a message last week for Quebec federal members of the Liberal party. Finally, all federal members were invited last week by the C.N.T.U. in their respective county, and they have taken a stand.
The ministerial committee and the government are the only ones guilty of neglect and irresponsibility. The slumber has lasted long, enough. Canadians are tired of watching a government such as this one make use of all its talents to avoid finding answers. A quick decision has to be taken on these matters, and the most elementary decency and fairness suggest that the government has no right to put it oft any longer.
In the case of a dispute among unions involving an affiliate of the C.L.C. and an affiliate of the C.N.T.U., the C.L.C. and the C.N.T.U. must have an equal number of representatives, that is two representatives for the C.N.T.U. and two representatives of the C.L.C.
The parity of labour representation of those two national unions on the C.L.R.B. is a question of justice and fairness.
In order that employers should not have to decide to which union employees involved should belong, the president of the C.L.R.B. alone has the right to vote in a dispute among unions, unless all members unanimously agree.
Workers should not remain at the mercy of employers.
All members of the board, and especially the chairman, should be bilingual, so that the parties can be heard in either of the country's official languages, English or French.
English unilingualism in the C.L.R.B. is discriminatory and members of the board should know both languages; it is not enough to have an interpreter or simultaneous translation.
The bill concerning the public service provides for the setting up of bargaining units at the national level. Its provisions represent a serious threat to the freedom of unions and should be amended, so that natural units may be recognized.
The natural bargaining units must be admitted. This is an inviolable principle of union freedom. The natural units are an absolute and unquestionable right.
November 22, 19S6	COMMONS
I hope the minister will finally announce a decision to the house with regard to these important matters.


Mr. Jean-Charles Caniin (Parliamentary-Secretary to Minister of Trade and Commerce):: Then, Mr. Speaker, to arrive at a valid solution it is necessary to make a serious study of this whole problem, and not just a superficial study.


Maurice Allard: That was eight months ago.


Gilles Grégoire: That was eight months ago.


Jean-Charles Cantin: This is exactly the reason why the government created a committee.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member for Sherbrooke has had the opportunity to place his question before the house. I suggest he now listen to the answer from the parliamentary secretary.


Jean-Charles Cantin: Therefore, if the government set up a study committee eight months ago, it is precisely because it was conscious of its responsibility. The members of that committee are people already aware of labour problems and who take the time needed to find a solution which will-


Gilles Grégoire: It should not take Jean Mar-chand too long because he knows them.


Jean-Charles Cantin: Precisely because the Minister of Manpower and Immigration (Mr. Mar-chand), whose name has just been mentioned, knows the world of labour, precisely because of that, I say that the study of the problem is being made on a much broader and wider scope than the one the hon. member has just mentioned.
In any case, the committee will surely be in a position to report shortly. Besides, as mentioned a little earlier, and as you know, a special vote will be taken tomorrow within the C.B.C. That is another factor, although it will not necessarily produce a new policy, which might clarify to a certain extent the study now under way and that for the good of all Canadian workers.


Gilles Grégoire: How much longer will the study take?
Proceedings on Adjournment Motion [English]



FISHERIES-PARTICIPATION OF RUSSIA IN NORTH PACIFIC TREATY

Frank Howard: Mr. Speaker, it may seem a little like dealing with an inconsequential matter after the disgraceful statement tonight by the Minister of Labour, but I am in the position of having to address myself to the subject matter set down for debate.
I may say first of all that on November 18 I discovered that the Secretary of State for External Affairs (Mr. Martin) is a much maligned individual in this house. He has been variously classified as a verbalist whose loquacity is only exceeded by the scarcity of information which is contained in his verbose statements. However, this was proven the other day to be a base canard of the worst sort because I asked him a question on Friday, November 18, reported at page 10048 of Hansard as follows:
I should like to direct a question to the Secretary of State for External Affairs and ask him whether during his visit to the Soviet Union he discussed with officials there the prospects of the U.S.S.R. at least entering into talks about the entry of that nation into the North Pacific Fisheries Treaty pact?
To which the Secretary of State for External Affairs replied with a succinct "No, Mr. Speaker". I was so taken aback by the sharpness of that reply that I missed the opportunity to ask him a supplementary question. The fact is that his reply indicates that the government has absolutely no interest whatever in entering into discussions with a major fishing nation about the conservation and preservation of fishery stocks in the north Pacific ocean. Since 1953, Japan, United States and Canada have been signatories to a treaty to conserve the stocks of salmon, halibut and herring in the north Pacific ocean. The Soviet Union is a prime fishing nation of these species of fish, and as we all know its fishing fleet has ranged close to and perhaps within our 12 mile-limit off the coast of British Columbia.
Prior to the election the government now in office ranged across the country and, coming close to my community on the Pacific coast, promised that it was dedicated to bringing the Soviet union into the North Pacific fisheries pact. The Secretary of State for External Affairs had the opportunity to raise the matter when he went to the Soviet union with the heads of that state to see if they were interested in coming into the NORPAC treaty. He said that he did not even discuss the matter,
10230	COMMONS
Proceedings on Adjournment Motion that he completely ignored it. That is an absolute disgrace, and it should be an eye-opener to the fishermen on the Pacific coast it they listen to the bull about the desire of the Liberal party to take worth-while steps to conserve the fisheries stock off the Pacific coast.
The Secretary of State for External Affairs undoubtedly has valid reasons for not being here this evening to comment but I notice that the Minister of Fisheries is here. Perhaps that minister will now take this opportunity to give some worthwhile information to the house about what has been done to entice the Soviet Union into the North Pacific fisheries treaty. So far any information the government may have at its disposal has been kept secret. We want to know what it is, and certainly the fishermen of British Columbia want to know.


Hon. H. J. Robichaud (Minister of Fisheries):: Mr. Speaker, my reply will be brief and in line with what I said on this subject in this chamber on previous occasions and what I repeated publicly in Vancouver on November 7 following my remarks to the delegates at the thirteenth annual convention of the North Pacific International Fisheries Commission.
The North Pacific treaty covers three nations, Canada, the United States and Japan. This treaty is based on the principle of abstention. To be a success the treaty depends on the willingness of the participating countries to abide by this principle. Nobody can assure us at this time that the U.S.S.R. is prepared to recognize the principle of abstention-


Frank Howard: Have you asked them?


Hédard-J. Robichaud: -on the high seas. Furthermore, it is not for Canada to invite the U.S.S.R. to participate in this treaty. That invitation has to come from the three parties already participating in the North Pacific treaty. I have made that statement in the house and I have made public statements to the effect that personally I would welcome the U.S.S.R. in the North Pacific treaty provided they recognize the principle of abstention on the high seas.
The hon. member is well aware of the difficulty we have had in convincing Japan to recognize the principle of abstention. What would happen to the North Pacific treaty if two nations participating did not recognize this principle?


Frank Howard: That is a false declaration.

DEBATES	November 22, 1966


Hédard-J. Robichaud: It is a true declaration based on facts.


Frank Howard: You certainly have not used the facts-


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please.



CANADIAN NATIONAL RAILWAYS-CHANDLER-CASCAPEDIA-DIRECTIVE RESPECTING TRAVEL SPEEDS

James Russell Keays: Mr. Speaker, I intend to be as brief as possible. As the minister who I expect will reply knows, I have brought up a subject which I consider very important to large sections of the population of the province of Quebec and to the travelling public, those travelling the Campbellton to Gaspe route, because normally they pass through the Chandler-Cascapedia subdivision. I have raised this question before. On many occasions I have referred to the importance of the transportation system in this area. We have requested that the Chaleur travel directly from Montreal to Gaspe without stopping at Campbellton but we have not met with much success.
[DOT] (11:00 p.m.)
I am deeply disturbed by the new timetable issued on October 30 by the C.N.R. which lists as the maximum speed for passenger, freight and mixed trains 30 miles an hour and for the railiner, which carries 99 per cent of the passengers, 50 miles an hour. I believe our worries in this regard are well founded. If freight and mixed trains are allowed to travel at only 30 miles an hour because of the safety factor, then our passenger trains should not be allowed to travel at 50 miles an hour. We wonder whether the lives of these passengers are being endangered because of the 20 miles an hour increase in speed above maximum safety. Perhaps there is an ulterior motive involved.
As yet I have not been convinced that these speeds have been set because of a security reason. The people in this area are of the belief that C.N.R. officials are developing an argument against our request to have the Chaleur travel directly between Montreal and Gaspe. It is our belief that the C.N.R. will propose the argument that because the 30 mile an hour speed limit was ordered on October 30, 1966, our request cannot be met. This is of great concern to the people in this area.
I have been asked to bring this question to the attention of the minister and it is my
November 22, 1966	COMMONS
hope, as well as the hope of those whom 1 represent, that I am wrong in both my suggestions as to the reasons for these speed limits. We hope that our request for improved passenger service will be met and that the Cha-leur will travel directly from Montreal to Gaspe.


Hon. John N. Turner (Minister without Portfolio):: Mr. Speaker, I am sure that if the Minister of Transport were present he would want to inform the hon. member for Gaspe
Proceedings on Adjournment Motion that his representations will be brought to the attention of the officials of the C.N.R.
While I am on my feet, let me thank the members of the staff for staying so late this evening.
Motion agreed to and the house adjourned at 11.07 p.m.
[The following items were passed in Committee of Supply this day:]



PUBLIC WORKS

[Stage Direction]
1,	la, 5, 5a, 10 and 10a.
[Stage Direction]
Wednesday, November 23, 1966