1966-09-07

[Stage Direction]
On the order: Government notice of motion:
That a joint committee of both Houses of Parliament be appointed to inquire into and report on the expediency of presenting an address to His Excellency praying for the removal of Mr. Justice Leo Landreviile from the Supreme Court of Ontario, in view of the facts, considerations and conclusions contained in the report of the Honourable Ivan C. Rand concerning the said Mr. Justice Leo Landreviile, dated the 11th day of August, 1966 and tabled in the House of Commons on the 29th day of August, 1966;
That 12 members of the House of Commons, to be designated later, be members of the joint committee on the part of this house;
That the committee have power to appoint, from among its members such subcommittees as may be deemed advisable or necessary; to call for persons, papers and records and to engage counsel; to sit while the house is sitting and to report from time to time;
That the committee have power to print such papers and evidence from day to day as may be ordered by the committee for its use and for the use of parliament; and that standing order 66 of the House of Commons be suspended in relation thereto;
And that a message be sent to the Senate requesting that house to unite with this house for the above purpose and to select, if the Senate deems advisable, some of its members to act on the proposed joint committee.
Mr. Cardin:: Stand.


Mr. Speaker:: Pursuant to standing order 21(2), this notice of motion stands transferred to and ordered for consideration under government orders later this day or at the next sitting of the house.



QUESTIONS

[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk.)

Mr. Isabelle: 1.	Since 1956, was any money spent by the Federal District Commission and the National Capital
Commission in the constituency of Gatineau (a) for the expropriation of lands and buildings (b) for projects on these lands, such as buildings, roads, parks or lakes and, if so, how much?
2.	Since 1946, has any land been expropriated and have any houses under construction been demolished by the National Capital Commission in the constituency of Gatineau and, if so, how many pieces of land and how many houses remain unused?
3.	Does the National Capital Commission employ any persons in the constituency of Gatineau and, if so (a) how many (b) how many live in the constituency?
4.	Does the National Capital Commission have any immediate projects planned in the constituency of Gatineau with regard to roads, parks, lakes, or buildings and, if so (a) what are these plans (b) where will these projects be carried out?
Answer: 1. Since 1956, money was spent by the Federal District Commission and the National Capital Commission in the constituency of Gatineau (a) for the expropriation of lands and buildings, yes. (b) for projects on these lands such as buildings, roads, parks, or lakes, yes, $6,102,776.
2.	Yes. Since 1946 the National Capital Commission has expropriated lands in the constituency of Gatineau. Two houses, considered to be under construction, have been demolished. Approximately 100 parcels of land are vacant, pending its planned use and five houses considered suitable for rental purposes are available on a lease basis.
3.	Yes. (a) The commission has 21 full time employees and 58 seasonal employees working in the constituency of Gatineau. In addition, approximately 10 employees may work occasionally in the constituency of Gatineau, (b) 20 full time employees live in the constituency; approximately 50 seasonal employees live in the constituency. The 10 occasional employees live outside the constituency.
4.	Yes. (a) (i) The National Capital Commission and the government of the province of Quebec are negotiating an exchange of lands within the boundaries of Gatineau park in order to provide land needed for the construction of a student city and route No. 11. (ii) The commission will construct a structure to carry the Philemon Wright parkway over new route No. 11. (iii) Improvements are planned in Gatineau park to extend picnic and camping facilities. This will include the

September 7, 1966
Questions
construction of a new service building with change rooms, toilets and a first aid room; the resurfacing and enlarging of parking areas; the clearing and marking of Gatineau park boundaries; and the construction of an addition to the maintenance building.
(b) (i) Land for student city is located partly in the municipality of Lucerne and partly in the municipality of Hull West. Route No. 11 will use land located in the city of Hull, (ii) The Philemon Wright overpass will be located in the municipality of Hull West, (iii) The addition to the maintenance building will be erected at Old Chelsea in the municipality of Hull West. The construction of the picnic, camping and parking areas and the service building will take place at Lac Philippe in the municipalities of Masham and Eardley. Clearing and marking of Gatineau park boundaries will take place in the municipality of Masham.


AGRICULTURAL ADVISORY COMMITTEE OF N.C.C.
Mr. Bell (Carleton): 1.	Has the national capital commission established an agricultural advisory committee?
2.	If so (a) when (b) what are its terms of reference (c) who are its members and what is the occupation or ordinary position of each (d) how many meetings has the committee held?
Answer: 1. Yes.
2.	(a) A decision to form the committee was taken on the 25th February 1966, and the first meeting was held on the 30th March 1966, and reconvened on the 1st April 1966. (b) The terms of reference of the agricultural advisory committee are as follows: Committee formation: The committee shall be called the agricultural advisory committee to the property division of the National Capital Commission. Basis: The committee is formed as set out in a letter to Mr. S.C. Barry, deputy minister of agriculture, from Lt. Gen. S.F. Clark, chairman of the National Capital Commission, dated 25 February 1966. Purpose: The purpose of the committee is to afford the property division of the National Capital Commission professional and technical aid and advice with respect to matters of terms of development of the agricultural and forestry portions of the lands owned by the commission. Meetings: Meetings shall be at the call of the chairman of the committee, depending on the references which are made to him by the property division requesting advice on management and development of

agricultural and forestry lands. Secretary: A secretary shall be provided by the property division of the commission. Scope: The agricultural advisory committee shall consider, investigate and report on matters relating to the use and development of land for agricultural and forestry purposes in which the commission may be interested, as requested by the property division. Such matters will include: (i) The rental, maintenance and rehabilitation of agricultural properties of the commission, (ii) Use of agricultural lands with specific reference to land capabilities and classification, (iii) The maintenance of lands, fences, buildings and drains, (iv) Matters of good farming practices, leasing methods and terms, (v) Economic feasibility of agricultural projects and practices.
The agricultural advisory committee shall not consider or investigate any matter contemplated by paragraphs (a) to (e) of part I of subsection 5 of By-law No. Ill (4) respecting the land committee of the National Capital Commission.
(c)	The members and their occupation are as follows: Doctor Grant Carman, Director of Information, Information Division, Canada Department of Agriculture, Confederation Building. Doctor Peter C. Stobbe, Director of Soil Research Institute of Canada, Department of Agriculture, Central Experimental Farm. Mr. R.C. Hodges, Regional Director Ontario, Agricultural Rehabilitation & Development Section, Canada Department of Forestry.
(d)	Three meetings have been held to date.


SALES TAX ON RETREAD TIRES
Mr. Scoil (Victoria: (Oni.)):
Will the government consider removing the 11 per cent federal sales tax from (a) tread rubber used in retreading tires, or (b) the retail sale of retread tires?


Hon. Mitchell Sharp (Minister of Finance):: (a) Upon enactment of amendments to the Excise Tax Act recently passed by the House of Commons all retreaders of tires will be licensed as manufacturers and will be allowed to purchase materials, such as tread rubber, to be incorporated into retreaded tires free of the 11 per cent sales tax. (b) This is a matter of government policy. If any amendments are to be proposed to the Excise Tax Act concerning sales tax on retreaded tires they will be announced at the appropriate time.
September 7, 19G6


ALEX PRATT-EMPLOYMENT BY C.B.C.
Mr. Ormision: Has Mr. Alex Pratt ever been employed by the C.B.C. and if so (a) in what capacity was he employed (b) what was the period of his employment (c) what were the terms of his contract(s) (d) for what reason was his contract terminated (e) was a C.B.C. administrator responsible for the decision not to renew his contract and, if so, what is this person's name?


Hon. Judy V. LaMarsh (Secreiary of Siaie):: I am informed by the C.B.C. that Mr. Alex Pratt was employed by the corporation, (a) and (b) Co-ordinating producer from May 13, 1957 to May 31, 1959; production assistant from June 1, 1959 to November 30, 1960; t.v. producer from December 1, 1960 to November 6, 1964. (c) The terms were those of the standard C.B.C. contract for t.v. producers. (d) and (e) It has not been customary to require crown corporations to disclose information of this kind and the C.B.C. believes that deviation from this policy could only prove detrimental to the corporation and its employees.


NCO'S AND ENLISTED MEN IN ARMED FORCES
Mr. Enns: 1.	How many NCO's and enlisted men are there in each of the three armed services?
2.	How many of these are engineers possessing university degrees?
3.	How many NCO's and enlisted men in each of the three armed services have (a) applied for release since February 1, 1966 (b) have been retired, having reached the compulsory retirement age (c) have been recruited since February 1, 1966?


Hon. Leo Cadieux (Associate Minister of National Defence):: 1. 30 June 1966 R.C.N.	C.A.(R) R.C.A.F.
15,136	37,166	35,735
2.	Nil.
3.	(a) Prior to 1 April, 1966, the number of people who applied for release was not recorded as many applications are withdrawn before approval is given for release. However, as of 1 April, 1966, this information is being tabulated and from 1 April to 30 June, 1966, the following have applied for release.
R.C.N.	C.A.(R)	R.C.A.F.47	146	319(b)	1	February-30	June	1966R.C.N.	C.A.(R)	R.C.A.F.12	130	108(c)	1	February-30	June	1966R.C.N.	C.A.(R)	R.C.A.F.805	1,728	982
Questions


LENGTH OF SERVICE OF RETIRED OFFICERS
Mr. Lambert: 1.	What is the total length of service in Canada's armed forces respectively of the following officers whose retirement is announced as effective July 16, 1966; Vice Admiral K. L. Dyer; Lt. General R. W. Moncel; Lt. General F. J. Fleury?
2.	When was each (a) promoted to his present rank (b) appointed to his present position?
3 Were such retirements effective on reaching normal retirement age, or on voluntary request or for any other reason?


Léo Alphonse Joseph Cadieux: 1. and 2. Vice Admiral Dyer has had continuous service with the Royal Canadian Navy from September 1, 1933, totalling 32 years and 317 days. He was promoted to his present rank on August 1, 1964, and was appointed chief of personnel the same date.
Lt. Gen. Moncel has had service in the Canadian army (active) and Canadian army (regular) totalling 25 years and 278 days, together with service in the Canadian army (reserves) totalling 3 years and 344 days. He was promoted to his present rank on August 1, 1964, and was appointed vice chief of the defence staff on September 2, 1965.
Lt. Gen. Fleury has had service in the Canadian army (active) and Canadian army (regular) totalling 25 years and 328 days, together with service in the Canadian army (reserves) totalling 8 years and 347 days. He was promoted to his present rank on September 2, 1965, and was appointed comptroller general the same date.
3.	As stated in the House of Commons on 7 July, 1966, these retirements were by mutual understanding.


PUBLIC WORKS PROJECTS, CAPE BRETON ISLAND
Mr. Muir (Cape Breion: North and Vicloria):
1.	As of this date and until the end of 1966, what projects are planned by the Department of Public Works for the island of Cape Breton?
2.	What is the nature of the planned projects and in what areas of Cape Breton will they be carried out?
Hon. G. J. Mcllraiih (Minister of Public
Works): 1 and 2. Listed below;
Location	Project
Arrow Point	Deck repairs.
8122
Location
Baddeck
Bay St. Lawrence
Big Bras d'Or Black Point Bras d'Or
Breton Cove Broad Cove Marsh Caplin Cove Capstick Chapel Cove Cheticamp
Cheticamp Beach

Questions
Project
Paving Wharf reconstruction. Interior painting of postal accommodation in Federal Building.
Dredging entrance. Breakwater repairs.
Boad improvements.
Haul up cable. Dredging.
Exterior painting of federal building.
Dredging.
Skidway and breakwater repairs.
Skidway repairs.
Breakwater repairs.
Breakwater repairs.
Exterior painting of federal building.
Wharf repairs.
Christmas Island	Construction of new building.
Cleveland	Construction of new building.
Creignish	Dredging.
D'Escousse	Improvements to grounds of revenue building. Wharf improvements and slipway.
Dingwall	Improvements to grounds of revenue building.
Dominion	Renovation of front en-
Donkin
East Bay
Englishtown
Finlay Point Florence
Fourchu
French River
Friars Head Glace Bay
trance and railings at federal building.
New lawns at revenue building.
Improvements to grounds at revenue building.
Improvements to grounds at revenue building.
Harbour improvements.
Repairs to concrete walks at federal building.
Dredging-presently under review.
Haul up repairs. Dredging.
Skidway repairs.
Dredging. Wharf improvements. Painting basement hallway walls and ceilings at federal building.

Location Grand Etang
Inverness
Judique Baxters Kings Cove L'Archeveque Little Harbour (L'Ardoise) Little Judique Harbour Little River Louisburg
Louisdale
Mabou
MacKays Point
MacKeigan's Pond MacNeils Pond Main-a-Dieu Marble Mountain Margaree Harbour
Margaree Valley
Marion Bridge
Meat Cove Neils Harbour
New Campbellton New Victoria
New Waterford
North Sydney
Orangedale
September 7, 1966
Project
Construction of new building.
Paving courtyard and driveways and repairs to lawns at federal building.
Wharf. Wharf repairs.
Wharf.
Protection wall.
Dredging.
Dredging.
Dredging.
Wharf widening. Completion of wharf extension. Replacement of aluminum front door assembly and interior painting at federal building.
Improvements to grounds of revenue building.
Replacement of furnace at federal building.
Dredging. Approach repairs.
Dredging.
Skidway repairs.
Engine and winch.
Approach repairs.
Improvements to grounds at revenue building.
Improvements to grounds at revenue building.
Improvements to grounds at revenue building.
Dredging.
Deck repairs. Improve-new well system at revenue building.
Sheathing.
Improvements to grounds at revenue building.
Paint chain link fence at federal building.
Pipe rail fencing and chain link fencing, lawn repairs and replacing two pairs of aluminum doors at federal building.
Improvements to grounds at revenue building.

September 7, 1966

Location Path End Brook Pleasant Bay (The Ponds) Point Aconi (McReadyville) Port Hastings
Port Hawksbury
Port Hood
Port Morien
Rabbit Island Reserve Mines
River Denys
Rockdale R.C.M.P. (Old Naval Base) St. Peter's
Schooner Pond Sydney
Sydney (South Bar)
Sydney Mines
West Arichat
West Bay Road
Project
Skidway repairs.
Harbour improvements.
Skidway.
Improvements to grounds at revenue building.
Paving courtyard and driveways at federal building.
Interior painting, heating plant renovation and canopy, roof and flashing repairs at federal building.
Improvements to grounds at revenue building.
Dredging.
Replacement of furnace at federal building.
Improvement to grounds at revenue building.
Dredging.
New building proposed.
Repairs to fence and painting, paving driveways and courtyard at federal building.
Dredging.
Exterior painting, railings, etc., lock box installation and renovation, interior painting, glazed dado, rear halls and stairways, repairs and painting of ceilings at federal building. Exterior painting (area-ways) at U.I.C. building.
Harbour repairs and improvements.
Lawn repairs, pipe rail fencing and walks, repairs to doors and windows, instal areaway grilles and gravelling parking areas at federal building.
Improvements to grounds at revenue building. Breakwater repairs. Dredging.
Improvements to grounds at revenue building.
Location White Point Whitney Pier
Whycocomagh
Wreck Cove
Questions
Project
Approach repairs.
Repairs and rebuilding lawn areas at federal building.
Furnace conversion or replacement, pipe rail fencing, concrete curb and repairs to lawn at federal building.
Dredging.
Under the terms of the trans-Canada highway agreement the planning and scheduling of construction on the highway is a provincial responsibility. No requests have been received from the province for approval of new work subsequent to July 7, 1966.
The following sections of the trans-Canada highway are presently under contract in Cape Breton island:
From 0.3 miles east of the junction of trunk 4 at Port Hastings to 0.9 miles west of Baddeck west boundary-upgrading work to improve the load-bearing capacity of the highway.
From 0.9 miles west of Baddeck west boundary to 0.5 miles east of Swamp Corner -construction of subgrade and gravel surfacing.
From 0.2 miles east of the junction of Old Trunk 5 at Swamp Corner to west end of the Great Bras d'Or bridge-upgrading work.
From 560.0 feet north of North Sydney town line to Purves street-grading and structure.


ROUNDEL INSIGNIA, R.C.A.F.
Mr. Dinsdale: 1.	What roundel insignia was used to designate aircraft of R.C.A.F. squadrons during World War n?
2.	Has a decision been reached to change this roundel insignia and, if so (a) by whom was it made (b) for what reason has it been decided to depart from this tradition identified with the heroic efforts of Canadian flyers during two world wars?


Hon. Paul Hellyer (Minister of National Defence):: 1. In 1924 when the R.C.A.F. was formed the standard red, white and blue roundel insignia of the R.A.F. was used on R.C.A.F. aircraft and continued to be used until world war II.
2. During world war II the R.C.A.F. had various versions of the roundel painted on its aircraft. From 1940 to 1942 the design was revised by the addition of a yellow ring

September 7, 1966
Questions
around the red ring to make the roundel more readily visible against the camouflage paint of fighter aircraft. On bomber aircraft, such as the Lancasters and Halifaxes, the customary white circle was deleted because it was easily seen in the glare of enemy searchlights and the roundel was only a red circle surrounded by a blue ring. Later in the Far East and in the Aleutians the roundel on R.C.A.F. aircraft consisted of a blue circle surrounded by a white ring.
(a)	In 1946 the air council, presided over by the Minister of National Defence for Air, approved that the red circle in the roundel insignia be replaced by a red maple leaf and this was effected later that year. By virtue of the Aeronautics Act, the Minister of National Defence, subject to the governor general in council, is authorized to make provision for the proper identification of military aircraft. Within these terms of reference it became policy for the maple leaf in the roundel insignia to be identical in pattern to the maple leaf in the armorial bearings of Canada depicted on the Canadian flag which also is displayed on R.C.A.F. aircraft. Following the adoption of the new Canadian flag the design of the maple leaf in the roundel markings was altered to conform to that in the flag.
(b)	Recently air transport command, with the approval of the chief of defence staff, has been experimenting with a roundel consisting of a red ring around a red maple leaf on a white field and a few aircraft carry this marking. No decision, however, has been reached with respect to a change in the official roundel insignia.


RETIREMENT OF SENIOR OFFICERS
Mr. Fulion: 1.	What were the ranks of the officers who respectively occupied the positions of vice chief of the defence staff, chief of personnel, and comptroller general on June 1, 1966?
2.	Have these officers retired from the Canadian armed forces since that time?
3.	What were their respective ages at the date of retirement?
4.	What is the retirement age specified for officers of these respective ranks?
5.	To what annual pension will these officers be entitled respectively following their retirement?
6.	With reference to the statement by the Minister of National Defence (Hansard, page 7306) that there was "mutual understanding" with respect to these retirements, did the discussions preceding these "mutual understandings" include reference to the part these officers were expected to play in their respective positions or other positions they might occupy in the forces with relation to the program of integration and with respect to their relationship

to the minister, and were these roles or those alternative positions and those relationships acceptable to the officers in question?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: 1. (a) Lieutenant general, (b) Vice admiral, (c) Lieutenant general.
2.	Yes.
3.	(a) 49 years, (b) 51 years, (c) 52 years.
4.	55 years.
5.	Approximately (a) $11,680 (b) $15,496 (c) $11,699.
6.	It is not departmental policy to make public discussions held by the minister with members of the Canadian armed forces.


DIRECT BANANA SHIPMENTS FROM CARIBBEAN
Mr. McCleave: 1.	Are any restrictions, governmental or otherwise, imposed upon the direct shipment by sea to Canada of Caribbean-produced bananas from any source, which have been the subject of complaint by any department?
2.	If so, what has been the nature of the complaint, to whom was such directed, and with what result?


Julia Verlyn (Judy) LaMarsh: I am informed by the Departments of Agriculture, External Affairs, Finance, National Revenue and Trade and Commerce as follows:
1.	No.
2.	Not applicable.


'FLOUR EXPORTS TO RUSSIA, CHINA, CUBA
Mr. Diefenbaker: Has flour been exported from Canada to (a) Russia (b) China (c) Cuba, since the first day of January, 1966, by (i) The Quaker Oats Company (ii) Robin Hood Flour Mills (iii) Pillsbury Flour
Mills?


Mr. Albert Bechard (Parliamentary Secretary to Secretary of State):: Both the minister and his parliamentary secretary being absent on official duty I was asked to answer this question in their place.
In reply to the right hon. member's question concerning flour exported from Canada to Russia, China and Cuba since January 1, 1966, by The Quaker Oats Company, Robin Hood Flour Mills and Pillsbury Flour Mills, I am advised by the Dominion Bureau of Statistics that information about individual companies cannot be released in view of the secrecy provisions of the Statistics Act.
September 7, 1966

However, I can inform the right hon. member that in the six month period January 1 to June 30, 1966, exports of flour to Russia amounted to 234,583 hundredweight (value $1,052,000) and to Cuba 2,756,312 hundredweight (value $14,676,000). No flour was exported to China during this period.


PENSIONS OF RETIRED ARMED FORCES PERSONNEL IN PUBLIC SERVICE
Mr. Bell (Carleton): 1.	Has any action been taken by the government to promulgate regulations as authorized by the Statute Law (Superannuation) Amendment Act 1966, relating to the pensions of retired armed forces personnel subsequently employed in the public service?
2.	If not, when is it anticipated such action will
be taken?


Léo Alphonse Joseph Cadieux: Mr. Speaker, the answer to this question is yes, the regulations to which the hon. member refers were made by order in council P.C. 1966-1586 dated August 24, 1966 and were effective the 1st day of September, 1966. The regulations will be published in part II of the Canada Gazette, on September 14, 1966.


FEDERAL BUILDING SITE, AMHERST, N.S.
Mr. Coates: 1.	Has the government secured a site for the new federal building at Amherst, Nova Scotia?
2.	Has an architect been appointed to produce the plans and, if so, on what date?


Hon. G. J. Mcllrailh (Minister of Public Works):: 1. Yes.
2. An architect was appointed on December 13, 1965 to produce the plans.



QUESTIONS PASSED AS ORDERS FOR RETURNS


Mr. Laprise: 1.	Has Canada imported any butter since 1960 and, if so (a) how many pounds each year (b) what quantity from each country each year (c) what was the average price each year (d) was any of this butter intended for domestic consumption and, if so, how much each year?
2.	If any of this butter was intended for processing for re-export (a) how much each year (b) what factories processed it (c) how much did each factory process each year (d) how much did this processing cost the government each year (e) in what form, to what countries and at what price was this butter sold each year?
Orders for Returns
3.	In 1966 and subsequent years, does the government intend to import butter and, if so, how does the government intend to dispose of it?
Return tabled.


EMPLOYEES IN PUBLIC SERVICE
Mr. Irvine: What was the total number of employees in each department and/or agency, as listed in schedules A, B, C and D of the Financial Administration Act R.S.C. 1952 chapter 116 as amended, on March 31 of each of the years 1950 to 1966, inclusive?
Return tabled.


DAMAGE CLAIMS, TRANS-CANADA HIGHWAY, N.B.
Mr. Flemming: 1 Regarding the answer to question No. 1649, have any claims been presented which contained expenses of moving buildings in the area mentioned in the question named above, which called for 90 per cent contribution by the federal government?
2.	If so, have they been paid either in full or partially?
3.	What are the names of the parties on whose behalf claims were made and the amounts claimed for each of them?
4.	Have any claims for moving buildings been disallowed or are any presently unpaid?
5.	If so, what are the names of the parties on whose behalf claims have been made?
[DOT] (2:40 p.m.)



NATIONAL DEFENCE


Mr. J. M. Forrestall (Halifax):: Mr. Speaker, I ask leave to move the adjournment of the
house in accordance with standing order No. 26 in order to discuss a matter of urgent public importance, namely, that the Minister of National Defence is pursuing an improper course without statutory or parliamentary authority in dictatorially proceeding with and, as he himself stated, in accelerating the unification of the armed forces despite strong objections; that there is grave danger that his illegal actions will be irrevocably completed before parliament under its ordinary rules has the opportunity to debate the matter and before fulfillment of the minister's assurances that ample opportunity would be afforded service personnel to air their objections; that he interfered with the deliberations of the defence committee by tampering with the evidence which Admiral Landymore intended to present to the committee, thus being in contempt of parliament; and that by all these
8126	COMMONS
Motion for Adjournment of House actions he has created a further serious decline in service morale and a state of widespread concern about Canada's ability to maintain an effective defence force.


Mr. Speaker:: Will the hon. member for Halifax address the Chair on the question of urgency of debate?


J. Michael Forrestall: Mr. Speaker, to bring the matter before the house properly, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Saskatoon (Mr. Brand), that the house now stand adjourned.


Mr. Pickersgill:: Oh, oh.


J. Michael Forrestall: I suggest to the Minister of Transport this is not very funny. I am trying to do something properly and I do not want to be shot down improperly.
The urgency of this matter, Mr. Speaker, may be summed up briefly in this way.
Unless the minister or the house refers to the defence committee at this time the question of unification as set forth in the motion, total unification of our Canadian forces will be irrevocable before the members of the house will have had an opportunity to discuss or review the matter in any way, or to record their views. Yesterday in response to a question by the hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre the minister stated, as recorded in Hansard at page 8053:
No, Mr. Speaker. I do not think it would be desirable or in the public interest to do that at the present time.
The minister was talking about referring this matter to the defence committee. By this action and by that statement he had denied the members of this house an opportunity to place on record their pertinent and useful views. It has been clearly stated that the minister is not prepared now, and will not be until some vague time in the future, to let this matter go before the defence committee, thus depriving members of the house an opportunity to discuss the matter.
All the main requirements under rule 26 concerning the urgency of debate have been met. The importance of the matter is demonstrated also in the public concern that has been voiced not only by members of parliament but by thousands and thousands of Canadian servicemen as well as by senior, high ranking military officers who have found it necessary to make public statements. They are concerned about our ability to mobilize in

DEBATES	September 7. 1966
the event of a national emergency. I suggest this is an important matter.
I should like to mention one further point, Mr. Speaker. The Department of National Defence accounts for nearly one quarter of our total annual budget. If this policy were forced through without full knowledge of all the facts it would be a disservice to this house. I suggest that on these grounds there is urgency of debate at this time.
Hon. Paul Hellyer (Minister of National
Defence): I should like to speak to the question of urgency of debate, Mr. Speaker. Before doing so, however, I should like to suggest to the hon. member that if he is serious in his suggestion that I have acted illegally he should have the courage of his convictions and lay a charge-


Some hon. Members:: Shame.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: -rather than slip a phrase into a motion of this kind and attempt to take advantage of whatever publicity may accrue to him by casting reflections upon me in a way which is not in accordance with the facts, and which I defy him to substantiate. He is a very junior member of this house, and for that one must make some allowances.


Mr. Starr:: Talk about arrogance.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: At the same time there are certain rules that apply to all hon. members-


Mr. Grafftey:: And he wants to be Prime
Minister some day.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: -and I would suggest that he learn to abide by those rules.
With regard to the question of urgency of debate, Mr. Speaker, the subject referred to here is no more urgent today than it was yesterday or a week ago or a month ago. As a matter of fact the urgency of debate on this subject arose in 1964 when the white paper on defence was presented to the house and to the Canadian people. It was stated quite clearly in the white paper on defence what was the policy of the government-
[DOT] (2:50 p.m.)


Mr. Churchill:: It was not stated clearly.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: -that it was to integrate the armed forces of Canada as a first step toward a single unified armed force.
This question was considered at length at the time by the special committee on defence. That committee reported to the House of
September 7, 1966

Commons. Its report was adopted by the House of Commons, and this became the policy of the government and the policy of the land. So far as integration is concerned, it has proceeded through its various stages from that time to this and it is now virtually complete; it is a fait accompli.
So far as urgency is concerned, there is nothing urgent about considering at this time the integration of the armed forces. As a matter of fact, Mr. Speaker, the opportunity was made available to discuss this matter earlier in this session before the committee on defence. Witnesses were available from the various commands to give evidence with respect to the integration process and how effective were the commands; and full opportunity was given to members of parliament to raise questions and to learn about this policy.
So far as unification is concerned, if this is the object of the debate, it is not the custom in this house to refer matters to a committee before the legislation in respect thereto is introduced. The government stated in the Speech from the Throne its intention to introduce amendments to the National Defence Act. My hon. friend did not at that time take the opportunity afforded by that debate to state his views with respect to this very important matter, when a number of days were available for discussion on the Address in Reply to the Speech from the Throne. Again when the budget was under consideration full opportunity was afforded all members of parliament in a general debate of that nature to state their views with respect to this matter if they wished to do so.


Gordon Minto Churchill: That is not right; it is a restricted debate.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: Other ample opportunity has been given from time to time to express viewpoints with respect to the policy which is laid down in the white paper. So far as integration is concerned, it is well advanced. So far as unification is concerned, it cannot be accomplished until there is a further amendment to the National Defence Act.


Mr. Bell (Carlelon):: That is not what you said before.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: That has been forecast and will be introduced in parliament later this session in the normal manner. It will be debated at that time, and full opportunity will be provided members on all sides of the house to stand up and state their views, and
Motion for Adjournment of House then to stand up and be counted with respect to the proposals which will be laid before the house. This legislation will afford full opportunity, first of all for general debate and then for specific consideration of all of the various aspects in the standing committee once the legislation has been referred to that committee for consideration.


Gordon Minto Churchill: When will that be; December?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: In view of that fact, Mr. Speaker, I respectfully suggest to Your Honour that there is no urgency whatever with respect to having a general debate at the present time on this subject, but that the proper time will be when the legislation is presented to the house when it can be given full and adequate consideration.


Right Hon. J. G. Diefenbaker (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker, I address myself to the question of urgency, but in doing so I cannot deny myself the luxury of referring to that cynical attitude displayed by the minister toward the hon. member who moved a perfectly responsible motion for adjournment. He referred somewhat sarcastically to the youth and inexperience of the hon. member. I would refer the minister, when he speaks of self advertisement, to that article which appeared in the rotogravure section of the Toronto Globe and Mail, which set out in detail this new defence policy. It referred to the hon. gentleman and Mr. Lee as "those clean cut kids".


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


John George Diefenbaker: There is urgency-


John Whitney Pickersgill: That is sheer envy.


John George Diefenbaker: The hon. gentleman who has just spoken can speak with authority on that subject. He is soon to be elevated to another place where age does not count.


John Whitney Pickersgill: That is also envy.


John George Diefenbaker: I refer to the question of urgency. The hon. gentleman spoke of the opportunities that were available. There was a white paper in 1964. I defy the hon. gentleman or any other hon. member to show in that white paper any anticipation of the kind of dabbling policy that has become so apparent during the past few weeks.
Sir, yesterday we endeavoured to get some information from the hon. gentleman with
September 7, 1986

Motion for Adjournment of House respect to national defence. At page 8053 of Hansard he showed his attitude:
I do not think it would be desirable or in the public interest to do that at the present time.
Why? Simply because ever since the adjournment the minister has been going faster and faster along the road of unification, without regard to parliamentary legislative authority. The minister says it is not urgent. Yesterday the minister refused parliament an opportunity to look into this matter.
I say, sir, in sections 15, 16, 17 and 18 of the National Defence Act there is no authority whatsoever for the kind of conduct that has continued with accelerated force since the house adjourned early in July. What will the position be if we do not act now, if we wait until the minister completes his unification program? How can it be unscrambled? He has proceeded with this matter in a way that is a denial of parliamentary rights. Undertakings were given that changes made would not be of any serious nature. Indeed, when Admiral O'Brien took over on July 20, in a press conference he said:
I did not accept this appointment lightly. Before I did so I met for a considerable time with the minister, chief of defence staff, and defence staff. As a result I have been assured that there is no intention of making changes in the identity of the forces-
That is one of the points raised:
.-the uniform or the conditions of service before legislation governing the unification has been passed by parliament.


An hon. Member:: Order.


John George Diefenbaker: Continuing:
Furthermore, each one in the forces will be advised well in advance of the implementation of such legislation and how it will affect him.
Then he says:
He will be afforded-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I do not want to intervene without cause at this time, but I should like to remind the right hon. Leader of the Opposition and hon. members that the question before the house now is the urgency of debate, not the subject matter raised in the motion by the hon. member for Halifax. It seems to me it would be difficult to distinguish between the speech the right hon. member is making and the speech he might make if the motion were allowed.
[DOT] (3:00 p.m.)


John George Diefenbaker: I assure you, sir, that if there is debate on the subject and I have an 
opportunity to express myself regarding this contemptuous action on the part of the government, the house will find no difficulty in making a distinction.
Yesterday we were told that the minister intends, regardless of parliament and regardless of undertakings which have been given in the past, to proceed with this policy. He intends to do this irrespective of the attitude of parliament. Indeed on July 24, in the course of a national television program with Mr. Lynch, he stated his intention to accelerate the unification program, as well as his belief that further enabling legislation was necessary only in respect to a change of name for the armed forces. In other words he said on July 24 that he intended to accelerate the unification program, for which he has no authority and for which parliament has given him no authority.
This is why, when questions were asked yesterday, we found ourselves met by an attitude of mind which disregards every principle of parliamentary control. He intends to go ahead. In effect he told Charles Lynch in "The Nation's Business" on July 24 that there was no one to stop him. Well, we heard that some years ago from another minister.


John Whitney Pickersgill: You made it up in both cases.


John George Diefenbaker: The hon. gentleman was a colleague of his and they both went down to defeat when the first opportunity given to the Canadian people made it possible. That is an attitude which I thought was cured in 1956 and 1957. Yet the minister says, now, "I do not care about parliament; I intend to go ahead".


John Whitney Pickersgill: The exact opposite.


John George Diefenbaker: What is this noise which comes from the Minister of Transport?


John Whitney Pickersgill: I rise on a point of order. That is the noise. My point of order is the same as the one I made the other day. There is a rule in this house which applies to all hon. members and even to the arrogant and insufferable Leader of the Opposition.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


John Whitney Pickersgill: 
Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


John George Diefenbaker: I do not know whether the hon. gentleman intends to take over your place, Mr. Speaker. He must recently have been in communication with a former prime minister extramurally, because those words are practically what Mr. King said on one occasion regarding another leader of the opposition, which indicates that the hon. gentleman has not learned anything with the years.


John Whitney Pickersgill: That gentleman was humble compared with the right hon. gentleman.


John George Diefenbaker: It indicates that the hon.
gentleman does not regard parliament as being of any importance, and I had always thought he did.
Parliament has had no say on this issue. Parliament will have its say only after the minister of defence has done all his work. He admitted on July 24 that he intended to go ahead with the unification policy because he had the authority to do so; all that required legislative enactment was the change of name. Yesterday, he gave his answer. That answer was, "I will act as I please."


John Whitney Pickersgill: He said nothing of the kind.


John George Diefenbaker: His answer was "I, along with Mr. Lee, the two clean-cut kids, will determine Canada's policy on defence; after we have done it and made it impossible for any legislation to remedy what we have done, then we shall give parliament a chance."


Mr. Frank Howard (Skeena):: On the question of urgency, I would simply say that since
we have now had the speeches we might as well have the debate too.


Mr. G. L. Challerlon (Esquimalt-Saanich):: should like to address a few words to Your Honour on the question of the urgency of debate.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


George Louis Chatterton: In exactly the same manner as the Leader of the Opposition has done.


Some hon. Members:: Oh.


George Louis Chatterton: I too wish to demonstrate the urgency of debate on this important subject of unification. The Minister of National
DEBATES	8129
Motion for Adjournment of House Defence very cleverly tries to confuse integration with unification. The fact is that there was no exodus of our most valuable people from the armed forces until he began this process of unification. I have first hand information that all the senior staff tried to help him with his policy of integration. It was when he started implementing unification that the trouble began.
I maintain that the minister has laid all the groundwork for effective unification without approval or consent from parliament and without making any statement in parliament in explanation of his policy. I maintain he should have taken no action with regard to unification before a bill had been approved by parliament giving him the necessary authority. The minister is now carrying on a process of education among the junior ranks of the armed forces for the promotion of unification.


An hon. Member:: Brainwashing.


George Louis Chatterton: I heard someone say
"brainwashing". Perhaps that is a better word. I contend that before the hon. gentleman does greater harm to the armed forces of Canada than he has already done with his unification policy, it is essential, as a matter of urgency, that parliament should have the opportunity to discuss this subject today. We intend to get a clear statement from the minister as to precisely what he proposes when he speaks of unification.


Mr. Real Caouette (Villeneuve):: Mr. Speaker, just a few words to point out to the house that when we were called last week it was to examine Bills Nos. C-230 and C-231.
At that time there was no question of unification of the three services and neither was it understood that we would examine this matter of unification of the armed forces of Canada. Normally, we should have come back here for the session on October 5 only.
The Conservatives would have had no opportunity to introduce their motion of urgency at this time, if we had only convened on October 5.
I feel, Mr. Speaker, that under the circumstances we should limit ourselves to the discussion of the bills for which we were called in emergency session. And, if the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Diefenbaker) and his colleagues hold the matter of the unification of the armed forces so much at heart, they will be free to discuss it after October 5, and this
September 7, 1966

Motion for Adjournment of House will not impede the operations of our three services, and will not remove any soldier from our Canadian forces at the present time.
Therefore, Mr. Speaker, I believe the urgency the Conservatives wish to bring forward at present simply amounts to a political football so as to play partisan politics in parliament.
[DOT] (3:10 p.m.)


Hon. Marcel Lambert (Edmonton West):: Mr. Speaker, notwithstanding the statements made by the hon. member for Villeneuve, who fails to recognize that the Minister of Finance has indicated he wants to talk about something else besides railways sometimes later this week or next week-he has not indicated when-I would like to draw Your Honour's attention to some of the factors I think you will be considering as to whether there is or has been an opportunity to discuss the matters raised by this particular motion.
First of all, there are no items on the order paper concerning unification. There are no committee reports for consideration. There has not been a committee report for consideration. There are no estimates to be called. There are none of these things. There is no supply motion. There is no general debate, and the general debate referred to by the minister is almost a laughable reference, a mere scribble in the Speech from the Throne saying that there will be amendments to the National Defence Act. I think the minister is trying to strain credibility when he wants us to believe that this would point directly to unification.
But the point is that since the last meetings of the defence committee on June 23 and June 29, when a no comment report was tabled in the house, there have been very important events. As a matter of fact the minister has changed his mind, because he assured the committee that no decision had yet been taken on unification. However, now we know for a fact that he did tell senior officers that certain steps were going to be taken.
Why were so many senior officers forced to resign? Were they all wrong and the minister the only one who was right? These are things the house has a right to know; because it is also a fact that many times the minister has indicated that by October 1 he intends to implement possibly a change in pay rates, a common rank structure, a concentrated trade classification structure; and if this is done

the house will be presented with a fait accompli when we meet on October 5.
I contend, as is suggested in the motion, that under the provisions of the National Defence Act the minister does not have the power to do these things. In fact he is forbidden to do them. This is what the house wants to know.
I suggest, Mr. Speaker, that we have dealt with the major emergency of last week. We are now considering a long term bill and, because we do not know when the house will adjourn again, I suggest this matter must be discussed now. Respectfully I suggest to Your Honour that you accept the motion.


Mr. Speaker:: I wonder if hon. members feel there is any case to be made in favour of pursuing the argument at this time. If there is I shall hear other hon. members who may have arguments to contribute in addition to those that have already been submitted for consideration by the Chair.


Mr. Robert McCleave (Halifax):: Yes, Mr. Speaker, I have such an argument. Admiral Landymore was dismissed by the minister after giving evidence before a parliamentary committee. I think that is a gross abuse of the privileges of the house, and I think that is a very impelling reason for debate on the whole matter at this stage.


Mr. Maurice Allard (Sherbrooke):: Mr. Speaker, I grant the hon. member who moved that motion that this is an important matter. But as the hon. member for Villeneuve (Mr. Caouette) pointed out so well earlier, it is not urgent in view of the circumstances under which we have been meeting for a week. What is important for the Canadian people, and the railway workers in particular, is that the government agreed to submit two bills last week and we are now at the stage preceding second reading of the second bill. That is what matters and that is why we were called back. There has been for a few days a lot of talk about a new recess this week to allow us to go back to our respective ridings where our constituents are waiting for us to deal with problems as important and even urgent. If I may be allowed a suggestion, it would be a good thing if the house adjourned on Friday and came back on October 5.
But coming back to that highly important matter, and even if General Allard bears a very dynamic and sympathetic name, I would like it if, when orders of the day are called, the minister would indicate clearly if an
September 7, 1966

army man at the head of our forces has the right here to make political statements. It seems that those who bear the name of Allard often speak too long and to often.


Mr. Gilles Gregoire (Lapointe):: Mr. Speaker, a while ago, the Minister of National Defence (Mr. Hellyer) said that this house has already had the opportunity of discussing the subject mentioned in the motion made by the Conservative party. I believe, Mr. Speaker, that since we have had the opportunity to discuss the unification of the armed forces there have been new developments, new facts which not only add a significant factor to the situation in the present circumstances, but also an element of urgency.
Among those facts there are the statement of the admiral, the statement of the minister and especially another fact directly related to unification, that is the notice posted at the base in Bagotville to the effect that French Canadian service men should speak English when on duty.
Well, Mr. Speaker, if that is one of the effects of unification, I think it is important and even urgent to discuss that matter today.


Hon. George Hees (Northumberland):: Mr. Speaker, I believe this whole matter of urgency revolves around the statement which the minister made on national television to Mr. Charles Lynch, and if he meant what he said then it is a matter of urgency. He said at that time that unification was to be accelerated, and that the only matter for which he needed the consent of the house was the change of name. If that is the case, if that is what he meant-and I take it he meant just that-then obviously this is a matter of great urgency to be debated at this moment.


Mr. Speaker:: I thank the hon. members who took part in the discussion on the motion
made by the hon. member for Halifax (Mr. Forrestall). I want to assure them that I took into due consideration the arguments they submitted to enlighten me before making such a difficult decision.

The hon. member for Halifax (Mr. Forrestall) has asked leave to move the adjournment of the house in accordance with standing order 26 in order to discuss a matter of
Motion for Adjournment of House urgent public importance. We have had argument as to whether there is sufficient urgency of debate at this time to adjourn the ordinary business of the house. As hon. members know, the day to day order of business in the house is the responsibility of the government, and it is only when the conditions prescribed by the rules and the practice of the house are strictly met that we can adjourn this business and go on with the consideration of unannounced business.
Hon. members know as well as I do what are the relevant citations. They have been quoted on a number of occasions in the past. There is citation 100 in Beauchesne's fourth edition which prescribes:
"Urgency" within this rule does not apply to the matter itself, but it means "urgency of debate", when the ordinary opportunities provided by the rules of the house do not permit the subject to be brought on early enough and public interest demands that discussion take place immediately.
It is not easy to decide whether, in relating a particular item which is on the order paper to another item proposed by an individual member of the house, which one should be given precedence and whether there is such urgency to debate the new subject matter that the ordinary affairs of the house should be set aside. On balance I would doubt that the matter raised by the hon. member does meet the requirements of the citations and the precedents of the house.
I would also refer hon. members to citation 100(8) in Beauchesne's fourth edition, which reads in part:
"I do not think that, under the standing order of 1882-
-which is a similar standing order to the one we are considering now-
-a motion on a subject of this kind, having such a very wide scope, was ever contemplated. What I think was contemplated was an occurrence of some sudden emergency-"
This is the second requirement. It should be a matter of sudden emergency, something completely new.
[DOT] (3:20 p.m.)
I realize that the subject matter of the motion is extremely important, and that has been recognized by the minister and other hon. members who have made comments for the guidance of the Chair. There is no question whatsoever that it is an urgent matter in itself, but the question I have to decide now relates to the urgency of debate, and whether it relates to such a sudden occurrence that the adjournment of the house should be allowed.

September 7, 1966
Motions for Papers
If I may judge on the basis of questions that have been asked from time to time in the house, editorial comments and news reports, of which I assume the Chair is allowed to take judicial notice, this is a matter of long standing, not a sudden occurrence. It is therefor my duty at this time to reject the motion of the hon. member for Halifax.



MOTIONS FOR PAPERS

Albert Béchard: Mr. Speaker, notices of motions Nos. 157 and 158 are acceptable to the government.
Mr. Speaker, would you be so kind as to call notice of motion No. 161? I ask that the remaining notices of motions be allowed to stand.



PRESS RELEASE RESPECTING ARDA REGIONAL OFFICES

[Stage Direction]
Motion No. 157-Mr. Coates:
That an order of the house do Issue for a copy of the press release issued by the Minister of Forestry in January, 1966, in which the four areas selected as regional offices for ARDA operations across Canada were named.
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Motion No. 158-Mr. Coates:
That an order of the house do issue for a copy of any communications exchanged between the government of Canada and individuals, corporations or commissions, dealing with the proposed move of the regional headquarters of ARDA for the Atlantic provinces from Amherst, Nova Scotia, to Moncton, New Brunswick.
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Motion No. 161-Mr. Forreslall:
That an order of the house do issue for copies of all communications between the Minister of National Defence and serving members of the armed forces with respect to their personal views on unification of the three services.
Paul Theodore Hellyer: In respect of this motion, Mr. Speaker, there are no formal documents, and any communications that might exist would be privileged. I therefore have to decline the motion.


Mr. Speaker:: Is the motion dropped?


Gordon Minto Churchill: You can't just decline it.


J. Michael Forrestall: I must beg your indulgence, Mr. Speaker, as I am not sure what I am required to do at this time, but I am not prepared to drop the motion.


Mr. Speaker:: The motion will be transferred for debate pursuant to standing order 47.


Hon. E. D. Fulton (Kamloops):: Mr. Speaker, am I not right in understanding that before this motion can be transferred the minister must so move? I did not understand the minister to move that it be transferred for debate. I understood the minister to say merely that he declined to accept it, and it is my understanding that in such case the matter must be decided immediately by a vote.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member would be right if a motion had been made, but no motion was made. The minister made a statement before a motion was made and it has been the practice, at least in the last few months, that at the request of the government or the minister such a motion before the house is transferred for debate pursuant to standing order 47.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: Mr. Speaker, I have no objection to the motion being put if that is the wish of my hon. friend.


Edmund Davie Fulton: Just to keep the record
straight, Mr. Speaker, let me point out that the hon. member for Halifax is at a rather oblique angle to you. I assure you that he did rise to move his motion when it was called. It was in response to that indication that the minister said he was unable to accept it.


Mr. Speaker:: It is obviously contrary to the practice which has been followed for the Chair to put a motion which is not before the house. Although the hon. member sits very far to my left he is very much in my vision; perhaps the Chair has Vista-vision. In any event I did see the hon. member, but I do not think this point of order can be accepted.


Gordon Minto Churchill: Mr. Speaker, I rise on the point of order. The heading in the order paper above these notices of motions reads "Notices of Motions for Production of Papers". Surely we are dealing with motions in this instance.
It has been my experience here that when an hon. member indicates his assent it means he wants the motion put. If the minister
Seplembei 7, 1966

accepts the motion then we do not have a vote, or it can be transferred for debate. However, if there is a refusal by a minister to do anything about the motion, then it is up to the member to call for a vote if he so desires.


Mr. Speaker:: If it is the desire of hon. members I shall put the motion. Is it the pleasure of the house to adopt the said motion?


Some hon. Members:: Yea.


Some hon. Members:: Nay.


Mr. Speaker:: Does the house wish me to put the motion in a formal way?


Some hon. Members:: Yes.


Mr. Speaker:: All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.


Some hon. Members:: Yea.


Mr. Speaker:: All those opposed will please say nay.


Some hon. Members:: Nay.


Mr. Speaker:: In my opinion the nays have it.
And more than five members having risen:


Mr. Speaker:: Call in the members.


Mr. Speaker:: I declare the motion lost.


Mr. Robichaud:: I was paired. Had I voted, I would have voted against the motion.
September 7, 1966

Inquiries of the Ministry


Frank Howard: I was paired with the hon. member for Burin-Burgeo. I have no idea how he would have voted had he been here.



EXTERNAL AFFAIRS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, would the Acting Prime Minister advise the house what, in his opinion and that of the government, will be the effect of France notifying NATO that after January 1, 1967 that country will make no further contributions to the military expenditures of NATO? To what extent will the failure of France to make that contribution add to the amount that may have to be paid by Canada and other nations?


Hon. Paul Marlin (Acting Prime Minister):: The information that I have, Mr. Speaker, in addition to what has been given publicly, is not clear as to whether this decision of France refers only to obligations that she might have with regard to the infrastructure program of NATO. Until I know the precise answer to that I do not believe I would want to answer the question at this time. There has been no final decision, of course, with regard to the disposition of French forces in Germany, nor has there been any decision with regard to overflights. I think I should like to take my hon. friend's question as notice and, if there is more information tomorrow, perhaps give a precise answer.


NATO-MOVE OF CANADIAN AND U.S. AIR BASES FROM FRANCE
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Harold E. Winch (Vancouver East):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to address a question to the Secretary of State for External Affairs. Can he explain the report that as a result of the policy of General de Gaulle which requires that the United States and Canadian air forces must leave France the Canadian air force is moving to Germany and the United States air force to the United Kingdom? Can he explain why there is this peculiar arrangement?


Paul Joseph James Martin: 
Harold Edward Winch: A supplementary question. May I ask the minister whether he can explain to the House of Commons why it is that the Canadian air force is being transferred to Germany but the United States air force is going to Great Britain?


Paul Joseph James Martin: I am sure that the United States is not transferring all of the bases that it had in France to the United Kingdom, only a portion.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Stanley Knowles (Winnipeg North Centre):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Acting Prime Minister. It is supplementary to questions I put to the Prime Minister on Monday and Thursday of last week. I asked whether we would proceed during this portion of the session with action on old age pensions and medicare. The Prime Minister said there would be a statement in a few days as to what we would do. What day may we expect that statement?


Paul Joseph James Martin: Mr. Speaker, I will take a look at what the Prime Minister said and perhaps be in a position to answer this question tomorrow.


David Réal Caouette: Mr. Speaker, could the Acting Prime Minister tell us whether it was agreed that the old age pension and social security questions would be revised as the session would resume on the normal date set for that, next October 5?


Paul Joseph James Martin: Mr. Speaker, I wish to thank the hon. member.
That is the question which was asked by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) and which I had promised to consider in the light of the reply given by the right hon. Prime Minister (Mr. Pearson) a few days ago.
September 7, 1966



THE CANADIAN ECONOMY

[Stage Direction]
INQUIRY AS TO STUDY OF INFLATION On the orders of the day:
Mr. Robert C. Coates (Cumberland):: Mr. Speaker, my question is also for the Acting Prime Minister. Is it the intention of the government to establish a committee or commission to study the cause and effect of the present inflationary situation in the hope of finding a solution?


Paul Joseph James Martin: The government takes a very serious view of this problem, Mr. Speaker, and when the Minister of Finance is given an opportunity, immediately after the disposition of the transportation bill, the government's views on that and other questions will be made known.



INQUIRY OF THE MINISTRY

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. C. A. Gauthier (Roberval):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to put a question to the Minister of Labour.
It has to do with the railway strike. Is the minister aware that the senior officials of the railroads got a 5 per cent salary increase retroactive to January pending final readjustment? Does he feel that that is normal?


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The question is inadmissible in its present form.



INTERNATIONAL LABOUR ORGANIZATION


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Howard Johnston (Okanagan-Revel-sloke):: Mr. Speaker, can the Minister of Labour advise the house if the International Labour Organization conference is to be held on Monday and if members of this house will be able to sit in on this conference?


Hon. J. R. Nicholson (Minister of Labour):: The short answer, Mr. Speaker, is yes. All hon. members who are interested will be welcome. The session will open in the Commons chamber on Monday morning but where it will continue after that time, whether here or in room 200, will depend on the decision or action of the house later this week. I certainly hope that interested members will take advantage of this opportunity.

Inquiries of the Ministry This is the first time a regional conference of the Inter-American members of the ILO has been held in Canada. I hope all interested members will take advantage of the opportunity to attend as many sessions as possible. It is to begin on Monday morning, and I might say it will be opened by the Acting Prime Minister.



INDUSTRY


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Eric A. Winkler (Grey-Bruce):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Industry, since he has had to decline an invitation to attend a meeting of the Georgian Bay Development Association. Does the minister intend to make any changes in the near future in the boundaries of the designated areas?


Hon. C. M. Drury (Minister of Industry):: Mr. Speaker, a statement will be made to the association meeting in that connection.



REPORTED GRANT TO SUBSIDIARY OF CANADIAN JAVELIN COMPANY

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, may I ask the
Minister of Industry whether it is a fact that the government of Canada has granted $5 million to one of the Doyle companies, Melville Chemical and Cellulose, a subsidiary of Canadian Javelin?


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: Mr. Speaker, the terms in which the question is phrased make it somewhat difficult to answer. If the enterprise to which the hon. gentleman refers is a manufacturing or processing enterprise intended to be located in a designated area it will qualify like any other manufacturing or processing enterprise located in a designated area for the incentives approved by parliament under the area incentive program.



NATIONAL DEFENCE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Gordon Minto Churchill: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of National Defence regarding his proposed visit to maritime command
8136	COMMONS
Inquiries of the Ministry when he intends to meet a very large crosssection of men and officers of all ranks who will express their views freely. Will the minister now give an assurance that the proposed meeting will be held openly and in the presence of the press?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: I would think not, Mr. Speaker.


Gordon Minto Churchill: A supplementary question. I would ask the minister whether it would not be possible for him to revise that decision in view of the fact that security matters are unlikely to be discussed. The matters to be discussed will concern only the minister's proposed plan of unification, will they not?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: It would be possible, but I would expect that that kind of encounter would not produce the full and frank exchange of opinions which I would desire.


John George Diefenbaker: Behind closed doors.


Gordon Minto Churchill: If the minister would allow debate here he would have a full and frank exchange of opinion. May I ask him a supplementary question. Will this very large crosssection of men and officers which the minister mentioned be very carefully selected in advance? Will they be screened?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I am sure that the hon. member will agree that that question is not acceptable.


Mr. Donald Maclnnis (Cape Breton South):: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question for the Minister of National Defence. Since he is going to appear in Halifax to allow a cross-section of service personnel to express their views freely, am I to understand that the rules and regulations will be changed to allow this to take place or has the minister taken upon himself the responsibility of permitting free expression of opinion, which is against the written rule?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: I will take full responsibility for what occurs, Mr. Speaker.


John George Diefenbaker: The rules notwithstanding.



UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Albert Béchard: Mr. Speaker,

DEBATES	September 7. 1966
I should like to put a question to the Minister of Labour.
Could the minister tell the house and the Canadian people in general whether the government intends to implement the arbitrary and unrealistic policy advocated by U.I.C. officials with a view to closing most unemployment insurance offices in Canada?


John Robert (Jack) Nicholson: Mr. Speaker, as I think I said on an earlier occasion, it is not a case of the government acting arbitrarily or otherwise. Certain responsibilities have been delegated by parliament to the Unemployment Insurance Commission. I have the assurance of the commission that they will receive and consider representations even though their preliminary thinking and plans may involve the closing of offices. But I wish to reiterate that the responsibility rests with the commission.
[ Translation]


Gilles Grégoire: Mr. Speaker I should like to ask the Minister of Labour whether, before those unemployment insurance offices are closed, the matter will be brought before parliament so as to give us the opportunity to discuss it in this house?


John Robert (Jack) Nicholson: I would think not, Mr. Speaker. Parliament has already delegated this responsibility to the Unemployment Insurance Commission and a number of offices have been closed by them. I might say that this is not surprising since for many years the work of the National Employment Service was conducted by the Unemployment Insurance Commission. Since the functions of the National Employment Service have been transferred to another branch of government there does not remain anything like the same volume of work for the Unemployment Insurance Commission.
In the interest of good administration the commission is making these decisions, but they are not making them arbitrarily. They are listening and will listen to the representations which are made from time to time by members of this house and others interested.


Hon. Theogene Ricard (Sainl-Hyacinlhe-Bagot):: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Will the Minister of Labour use his good offices to see that the office in Saint-Hyacinthe is retained, because it is one of the oldest?
September 7, 19S6


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I hope we will not engage in a discussion about individual offices. Perhaps even the Chair might have something to say about this.


Mr. E. Nasserden (Rosthern):: A supplementary question for the Minister of Labour. Have the provincial departments of labour been consulted by the Unemployment Insurance Commission before these offices have been closed?


John Robert (Jack) Nicholson: I would have to take that question as notice, Mr. Speaker. I know that discussions have taken place with some of the provincial governments, but I cannot say whether the question has been discussed with all of them. I will take the question as notice and answer it as soon as possible.



WATER RESOURCES


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. G. H. Aiken (Parry Sound-Muskoka):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys. Has the government yet received a formal invitation to the water conference called by President Johnson for next May?


Hon. Jean-Luc Pepin (Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys):: I have not personally, Mr. Speaker. It may be that the Secretary of State for External Affairs has, but I have not personally received one.


Gordon Harvey Aiken: A supplementary question. In accordance with the preliminary advice that the minister has received, will his department be able to make full and complete submissions within the time indicated in the original notice?


Jean-Luc Pepin: Mr. Speaker, the answer I gave yesterday is still valid today. The fears I expressed are also valid.



WHEAT-REQUEST FOR HIGHER INITIAL PAYMENT

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, I would ask the Minister of Finance, as the minister responsible for matters having to do with the wheat board, whether any favourable consideration has been given by the wheat board to increasing the amount of the initial payment
Inquiries of the Ministry for wheat delivered this year in view of rising costs and so on, to which the minister will no doubt allude when he speaks on the subject of inflation?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, a question was asked several days ago by the hon. member for Medicine Hat on exactly the same subject. I said at that time that we had received representations on both sides of this question, some in favour of increasing the initial price and some not in favour. I said that the matter was before me since, as the right hon. gentleman knows, this is a matter for the governor in council rather than for the wheat board. The wheat board itself has also been considering the matter at my request.


John George Diefenbaker: And the matter is now before the governor in council to determine whether or not there shall be an increase. Can it be expected that the government will act with celerity in this regard?


Mitchell William Sharp: I gave a very candid reply to the question which was asked by the hon. member for Medicine Hat. I said that I did not expect there would be an early decision.


Edward Nasserden: A supplementary question. Will the Minister of Finance take into consideration the recommendations which he might receive from the Minister of Agriculture in this regard?


Mitchell William Sharp: I always pay the greatest possible attention to the views of the Minister of Agriculture.



NATIONAL CAPITAL COMMISSION


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
David Réal Caouette: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Minister of Public Works?
In March 1966, the minister received several delegations from the city of Hull requesting that the federal government grant to the city of Hull some water lots located on the Hull side of the Ottawa River. Has the minister or his department reached a decision concerning those lots which the city of Hull would like to obtain from the department?


George James McIlraith: Mr. Speaker, I am not clear as to

September 7, 1966

Inquiries of the Ministry which parcel of land the hon. member has referred. Several parcels of land have been discussed with various authorities in Hull at one time or another.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. This seems to be the type of question which should be placed on the order paper, for it pertains to particulars which the hon. member could obtain much more easily if his question were put in writing.



ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. R. N. Thompson (Red Deer):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Solicitor General. In view of the growing public anxiety, fear and concern, both in North America and Europe, over the recent rise in multiple murders of both ordinary citizens and policemen, will the government not consider the appeal made yesterday by the Canadian Association of Police Chiefs for the cabinet to make known to the public the reason why on each occasion the death sentence is passed that sentence is or is not being commuted?


Hon. L. T. Pennell (Solicitor General):: Mr. Speaker, there are some related questions on the order paper from the hon. member for York-Humber. In view of this, perhaps I might take the hon. member's question as notice so that I might deal with the questions of both hon. members at the same time.



EXAMINATION OF MATERIAL SEIZED FROM SEAFARERS UNION

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. H. W. Herridge (Kootenay West):: Mr. Speaker, at the request of some good Canadian trade unionists I wish to ask the Solicitor General a question. Has he anything further to report with respect to developments in the examination of letters, documents and other material seized by the R.C.M.P. from various locals of the seafarers international union?


Lawrence T. Pennell: Mr. Speaker, the members of the R.C.M.P. have completed their investigations and a report of their findings has been forwarded to the Department of Justice. I understand that the Minister of Justice and his officials have been 
in touch with the appropriate provincial authorities and that the report is under study.



SPENCE ROYAL COMMISSION-INQUIRY AS TO REPORT

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Michael Starr: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Prime Minister may I ask the Acting Prime Minister whether the Spence report has been received by the Privy Council office and whether a copy of that report has been sent by air to the Prime Minister in England?


Paul Joseph James Martin: Mr. Speaker, I am not aware that the report in question has been received by anyone in the government. I am not aware that it has been received by the Privy Council office but I shall make inquiries at once.


An hon. Member:: Don't they keep you informed of anything?



LABOUR CONDITIONS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Andrew Brewin (Greenwood):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Labour. Has the minister, with other members of the government, received representations with regard to substantial lay-offs at McKinnon Industries in St. Catharines and with respect to the applicability of the transitional assistance benefit plan which was announced by the former minister of labour last year?


John Robert (Jack) Nicholson: Mr. Speaker, in late August employees of McKinnon Industries of St. Catharines, along with employees of General Motors and other affiliated companies, met here in Ottawa with the Minister of Industry, the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, and myself. We had a very useful discussion. Representations of the nature referred to by the hon. member were made.
After the meeting my colleagues and I discussed the matter. I might say that the representations impressed me-at least, some of them did. They were rather persuasive. I hope they had the same effect on my colleagues.
We have asked for a special study and report which I think should come before the cabinet within the next week or so.
September 7, 1966


Michael Starr: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Did this delegation ask that in addition to the supplementary unemployment benefits, TAB benefits be paid also? What was the reaction of the government to that request?


John Robert (Jack) Nicholson: That was one of the suggestions put forward, and it is being carefully studied along with other suggestions and submissions made by the delegation.



HARBOURS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
J.-H.-Théogène Ricard: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the Minister of Finance and Receiver General.
Will the Minister of Finance tell us if next spring the Montreal harbour will be able to handle American grain before the harbours at Fort William and Port Arthur are open?


Mr. Speaker:: It seems to me that this question is a little premature and could easily be put on the order paper.


J.-H.-Théogène Ricard: Mr. Speaker, last April the minister had talks with the Board of Grain Commissioners and the Montreal harbour board and was to report to us, but we never heard anything more. That is why I am asking this question today.


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I do not like to disavow responsibility, but this matter really concerns my colleague the Minister of Agriculture, who is responsible for the Board of Grain Commissioners.


J.-H.-Théogène Ricard: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. May I then direct my question to the Minister of Agriculture?


Hon. J. J. Greene (Minister of Agriculture):: Mr. Speaker, I believe we intend to hold a meeting with the Montreal port authority soon.



NATIONAL DEFENCE

[Stage Direction]
SUPPORT OF UNIFICATION PROGRAM A PROMOTION FACTOR?
On the orders of the day:
Gordon Minto Churchill: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for
Inquiries of the Ministry the Minister of National Defence. Has information been relayed from the minister's office or from the department to any officers or men in the services to the effect that enthusiastic support for the minister's program of unification will be a factor in considering matters of promotion?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: Certainly not to my knowledge, Mr. Speaker.



LABOUR RELATIONS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Paul Theodore Hellyer: Mr. Speaker, while I have the floor I should like to answer the question raised yesterday by the hon. member for Vancouver East who asked a question with respect to allegations that non-commissioned officers have been driving taxicabs in their off duty hours through the picket lines at Millhaven Fibres Limited near Kingston.
In general terms, it has been departmental policy not to interfere with servicemen engaged in part time employment outside the armed forces except in cases where their duties in the armed forces are affected.
According to our information no suggestion has been made that the servicemen off duty and in civilian clothes have acted illegally. Therefore we can only presume that it would be a matter for the individual taxi drivers to decide according to the dictates of their conscience. In this case it would appear that servicemen are subject to the same laws as ordinary citizens.


Harold Edward Winch: Mr. Speaker, in view of the answer given a few moments ago by the Minister of National Defence and in light of the interest which I know he takes in the existence of good public relations between members of the armed services and the civilian population, may I ask whether it is not possible in some way, as a matter of urgency, to stop members of the armed forces from moonlighting, scabbing and going through local picket lines? The minister is interested in good public relations
September 7, 1968

Inquiries of the Ministry and so am I. Cannot something be done in this direction?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: I will be pleased to take note of this suggestion and perhaps pass it along to the individuals involved.


Mr. R. W. Prittie (Burnaby-Richmond):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of National Defence which may be related to moonlighting by members of the armed forces. Can the minister say approximately when an announcement of a general pay revision for the armed forces will be made?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: Mr. Speaker, subject to the kind and courteous co-operation of the Minister of Finance and my other colleagues, I still hope it will be October 1.


Robert Jardine McCleave: And will it be 14 per cent?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: It would not be proper for me to give any indication of what my colleagues might approve until the announcement is ready to be made.



PRINCE RUPERT, B.C.-INCREASE IN ELEVATOR CAPACITY

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Frank Howard: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct my favourite question to my favourite minister and ask the Minister of Agriculture whether over the summer recess he has come to a favourable decision about the grain elevator in Prince Rupert?


John James Greene: Mr. Speaker, in answering my favourite New Democratic Party member, after the hon. member for Kootenay West, I might say that the decision with respect to Prince Rupert is under review at the present time.



APPOINTMENT OF CONSTITUENCY RETURNING OFFICERS

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Raymond Langlois (Meganiic):: I would like to direct a question to the Secretary of State or the minister responsible for the appointment of returning officers in the various electoral ridings in Canada.
Could the minister tell the house if the new returning officers have already been appointed and, if so, if it would be possible to get the names of those 265 returning officers?


Julia Verlyn (Judy) LaMarsh: Some have been, Mr. Speaker, but I could not possibly remember any of the names. I think there has been no change-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I believe this question is not so urgent that it could not be placed on the order paper.



AGRICULTURE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Robert Carman Coates: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Forestry. Is the minister in a position to indicate when he might meet with a delegation from the town of Amherst over the intended move of the regional ARDA office from Amherst to Moncton?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. This question of course is of importance to the hon. member, and perhaps to other hon. members, but it is not, I think, of the type that should be asked at this time. It is local in character and I suggest to the hon. member that it should be placed on the order paper. Perhaps he might get in touch with the minister directly.


Robert Carman Coates: I have placed the question on the order paper, Mr. Speaker, but I anticipate that the answer is going to be available before the question on the order paper can be answered.



ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Ed. Schreyer (Springfield):: Mr. Speaker, my question is addressed to the Secretary of State for External Affairs and relates to the arrest and current detention in the United States of four escapees from a Canadian penitentiary.
Is the minister aware that a statement has been made by the United States Attorney General's department to the effect that two of these four escapees, being of Indian origin, are not to be returned to Canada and, indeed, that they may not be extraditable to Canada? If the minister is aware of this, can he say whether any action is contemplated with a view to challenging this statement and the position taken?


Paul Joseph James Martin: Mr. Speaker, I will take this question as notice and deal with it tomorrow.

September 7, 1966

[Translationj



POST OFFICE DEPARTMENT


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. Auguste Choquette (Lotbiniere):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to put a question to the Postmaster General, to whom I extend my congratulations for a brilliant tour of the lower St. Lawrence.
I should like to ask the minister if the report of Mr. Justice Montpetit on the working conditions of the postal workers has been turned over to him and when it will be made public?


Hon. Jean-Pierre Cote (Postmaster General):: No, Mr. Speaker, it has not yet been referred to me, but I expect to receive it before the end of the month.


Auguste Choquette: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. In view of the fact that the postal workers have indicated through the press their intention to go on strike, have representations been made to the minister by representatives of the said postal workers?


Joseph Julien Jean-Pierre Côté: No, Mr. Speaker.



TRANSPORTATION


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed, from Tuesday, September 6, consideration of the motion of Mr. Pickersgill for the second reading of Bill No. C-231, to define and implement a national transportation policy for Canada, to amend the Railway Act and other acts in consequence thereof and to enact other consequential provisions.
Mr. W. H. A. Thomas (Middlesex West):: Mr. Speaker, when the house adjourned last evening I was seeking to make the point that while our railway legislation is before us for consideration particular attention should be paid to providing by statute for the disposition and rehabilitation of railway rights of way after abandonment has taken place.
I pointed out that I had private bills on this subject in 1962 and 1963 on which there was debate. However, no action was taken. There is another bill on the order paper in my name this year dealing further with the matter.
Transportation
Now that the general revision of railway legislation is being considered I feel this is a most appropriate time at which to deal with the problem presented by abandoned rights of way. I cited our experience in Middlesex West when the Courtright branch of the New York Central Railway was abandoned in 1960 as an example of what is likely to happen. Business disruption was slight because there had been virtually no business over this line for years, but the abandoned right of way created serious and very irritating problems. The rails and ties and any remaining useful culverts were torn out, leaving an unsightly mess. The fences, which had been neglected for some years pending abandonment, were left in deplorable condition and resulted in a livestock nuisance. The right of way subsequently was covered with a growth of brush, burdocks, thistles and an inglorious assortment of all noxious weeds known to the district.
Railways are always a nuisance in farm areas because almost invariably they divide farm losts into awkward parts. They create a crossing problem and they create a problem of cultivating odd-shaped fields.
While the railway continues to operate, this inconvenience is ameliorated by properly maintained fences, gates and grade crossings. When abandonment takes place the crossings are torn out, the drains blocked, the gates and fences are left in useless shape and the right of way becomes an unrestricted multiplying ground for noxious weed seeds. The New York Central right of way has now been sold en bloc to private speculators who have proved very difficult to contact. The county weed inspector has been unable to get action on the weeds. This right of way has become an eyesore, a nuisance and a menace to the community.
For further details of the tribulations and frustrations encountered by the people along this abandoned railway line, I refer hon. members to the debate of February 9, 1962. These difficulties are continuing. No one seems to know or care about cleaning up this mess. Surely the members of this house do not wish this most unsatisfactory experience to be repeated in other parts of the country. Although the difficulties in this New York Central case were not connected with rail-tied investments, grain storage, or alternate transport facilities to the same extent as they might be in other cases of abandonment, these problems of field separation, fencing,

September 7, 1966
Transportation
drainage and weed control are both irritating and unnecessary.
This parliament has set up a number of
planning boards to help avoid confusion and mistakes in our future development. Surely we are justified in giving the most careful consideration to some form of planning and regulation which might help to smooth out the process of railway abandonment.
The Railway Act occupies 203 pages of the Revised Statutes of Canada, 1952. It was passed in its original form when railway construction began and was intended to protect the interests of all concerned, both under conditions of construction and of operation. It has been amended from time to time to meet changing requirements. Railway abandonment now makes further amendment a prime necessity.
The Railway Act provides for a Board of Transport Commissioners to administer the act. This transport board has authority over all aspects of railway construction and operation. It can grant permission for a company to abandon a railway line but holds itself bound by a judgment in the case of Cairns Bros., written by Chief Commissioner Guthrie, November 17, 1936, which rules that the board has no jurisdiction over abandoned rights of way.
[DOT] (4:30 p.m.)
Once the rail lines are tom out, the board's jurisdiction ends. The board has no right to enforce conditions for abandonment. I am urging this parliament to provide the Board of Transport Commissioners, or the new authority, with both the authority and the responsibility for setting forth the conditions under which any railway abandonment may take place.
I suggest that one of the conditions for abandonment should be the appointment of an abandonment planning board for each line abandoned. This board should be representative of the various interests which will be affected. Such a board should have on it representatives of the railway company, of labour unions, of agriculture and of the municiplities concerned. The board should have the responsibility of recommending to the transport board the conditions under which abandonment could be permitted. Their recommendations should concern the best disposition of the right of way in the (public interest, the disposition of the workers involved, consideration of compensation for rail-tied investment, and any other matters of vital public concern.

Where the right of way separates farm lands the right of way should be restored wherever practicable to the farm lot from which the land was originally taken. This would do away with crossing problems and the nuisance of working odd-shaped areas of land and cultivating odd-shaped fields. It would permit the farmer in each case to re-incorporate the right of way to the best possible advantage on his farm, and to control drainage and weed menace. Larger areas of property such as those in town sites should be disposed of in the best public interest after consultation with the municipalities concerned.
It is proposed that whenever an application for abandonment is granted by the transport board a waiting period should be allowed during which such a representative abandonment planning board as suggested could prepare a plan for abandonment. Provision could be made for settlement of disputes by arbitration. The services of municipal and provincial planning boards might be used where available.
I think this is most important. Boards have been set up under our conservation legislation for the purpose of planning in rural areas, and their services might be used to advantage in conjunction with the abandonment planning board I have suggested. Conservation authorities at various levels of government should be consulted.
These unnecessary railway lines have served their day and generation well. There is no sound reason why we should now abandon them in such a way as to leave ghost towns, broken fortunes and unsightly scars across the face of our country. I hope the government will recommend such action as is necessary to take care of this situation.
In the debate in 1963 the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Greene) had something to say in regard to this proposal, and I quote from his opening remarks on that occasion as recorded at page 4038 of Hansard for October 25, 1963:
Mr. Speaker, may X, first of all, commend the sponsor of the bill before us. I think this measure .is certainly a step in the right direction.
Those are very kind words from the minister. Later he went on to say:
The railways will make no attempt, as businesses in competitive spheres must do, to make these lines pay and to make them effective and efficient. If they decide the line does not make money easily their attitude is: "Let us get rid of it; let us fold it; never mind the effects on the localities and on the people." I suggest that any corporation that has had a monopoly from the
September 7, 1966

people of Canada and has milked it for all it was worth when the cream was good has no right to abandon a line to the detriment of the people in the locality, without making very adequate compensation to the people there for the abandonment of the line.
The hon. member who proposed the bill has taken a step in this direction and, as I said earlier, I think he is to be complimented and highly commended for this step.
Again very kind words.
I wonder whether he has gone far enough. In hearing his well presented and documented speech-
Again very complimentary.
-I wondered whether it would not be advantageous to the people in these areas and more proper, in view of the fact that the railways have used these lines which were very largely granted from the public domain, if the railway when it wished to abandon a line would have to return the right of way to the public domain. I wonder how many applications for railway line abandonment we would have if the railways were told: "That is fine; you can abandon the line if it is in the public interest of the locality, but if you do so any land-"
The hon. member for Rosedale (Mr. Macdonald) also took part in that debate in 1963. He raised an objection to the bill under discussion at that time on the grounds that it was ultra vires the parliament of Canada, that property rights properly come under the jurisdiction of the provinces, and if the parliament of Canada undertook to dispose or direct the disposal of property owned by a corporation such as a railway company, after the line was torn up and the service discontinued, this would be wrong because the property reverts to the original owner and is held as any ordinary property is held. In other words, for the federal government to direct the disposition of such land would be beyond its powers.
This matter was not decided at that time. The point of law still remains unsettled. Arguments were presented in favour of and in opposition to it, but I would like to put on the record again some of the comments of the hon. member for Rosedale, as recorded at page 4042 of Hansard for October 25, 1963. Aside from the position of the federal government in the matter he said:
I do not disagree at all with the concern expressed by the hon. member for Middlesex West (Mr. Thomas) with regard to the fact that a piece of industrial wasteland may have been created, nor do I disagree with the remarks made by the hon. member for Renfrew South (Mr. Greene) that the particular railway should not be able, without any financial cost, merely to abandon the line and let it lie. But the point I was making is that this should be governed by the local planning authority. The jurisdiction over this should be exercised by local people who make
Transportation
plans for the use of real property within a particular community.
That fits in with the suggestion I have made that for each abandoned line there should be an abandonment planning committee established to plan for the conditions under which abandonment might take place.
What I am saying in connection with land which is purely the land of a particular locality, is that the locality should decide. The people should not have to come to Ottawa. They should not be forced to the expense of coming to the Board of Transport Commissioners to say how the land is going to be used.
[DOT] (4:40 p.m.)
From a legal standpoint this question is amply clear for the reasons I have cited. We have already got pronouncements of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council with respect to jurisdiction over land declared to be for the general advantage of Canada. We have the clear statement of the Board of Transport Commissioners, a statement of law on which appeal was available, but upon which no appeal has been taken, that in fact the land has ceased to be part of the railway operation.
He goes on later to say on the same page:
It is not so much a question of whether something should be done about this problem created for a community, when industrial wasteland exists after railroad tracks are torn up. I agree it is not that question, but the question is by whom should it be done?
Now that we are considering amendments to the Railway Act in general, I submit that this is a good time to make provisions in the legislation to take care of these abandoned rights of way and those other things which have to be taken into account when a branch line is abandoned.
We have acclaimed the Agricultural Rehabilitation and Development Act which aims at the creation of economic farm units as a good conservation plan. We should apply some of these principles of conservation planning to the rehabilitation of farm lands which are affected by abandoned railway lines. Provision should be made through the Board of Transport Commissioners for suitable disposition of abandoned railway property to prevent its becoming a nuisance, a source of damage or a menace in the communities where abandonment takes place.
Mr. Justice Rand, at page 290 of the reports of the Supreme Court of Canada for 1958, in discussing property rights under the Railway Act describes section 198 of this act as:
An extraordinary power created by parliament which, being its creator, could modify it to whatever extent or in whatever manner may be considered advisable.

September 7, 1966
Transportation
It is submitted that parliament, having created the Railway Act to govern the operation of railways, should also have the power to provide for the conditions under which they should be abandoned. That is what I am proposing.
The proposed amendments to the Railway Act as contained in this bill are of paramount importance to this country. This bill is one of the most important pieces of legislation this parliament will have to consider and we must approach it with great caution. There are overriding differences of opinion about the changes which should be made in our railway legislation because these changes affect different regions of the country.
The prairie provinces-the great grain growing areas and the so-called bread basket of Canada-require certain concessions under our railway legislation. They have always had certain special rights under this legislation, one of which is the Crowsnest pass agreement. The Atlantic provinces are in the same position. Special privileges and rights have been given them under our railway legislation. We should avoid any hurried amendment to this legislation. We must take our time and give careful consideration to every step in this process. For that reason I wish to move an amendment.
My amendment seeks further investigation by the standing committee on railways before the house proceeds further with this legislation. I think it would be of great advantage to the members of this house to have before them a report of a committee which had heard representations by interested parties in Canada, including provincial governments, wheat pools, railway companies, shippers, consumers and others who will be affected, before second reading is given to this bill.
I move, seconded by the hon. member for Kent (Ont.) (Mr. Danforth):
That all the words after "that" be deleted and the following substituted therefor:
This house, while prepared to support the principle of a national transportation policy, is of the opinion -that, owing to its complexity, the subject matter of this bill be referred to the standing committee on transport and communications for consideration and report, without prejudice to the further proceeding with the said bill later this session.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Speaker, before you put the motion perhaps I could ask Your Honour to consider at this time or subsequently whether or not a motion of this sort is in order at this stage of our proceedings.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Before I make any comment on whether or not the amendment is acceptable, perhaps hon. members would like to express their opinions.
[DOT] (4:50 p.m.)


John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Speaker, it does not seem to me that this is a proper amendment because it does not say whether the house should or should not proceed with second reading of the bill. It makes the suggestion that something entirely different should be done without prejudice to the order paper. I do not see how an amendment can be moved that does not prejudice the order paper and still be a proper amendment, if the word "prejudice" means anything at all. Moreover, it seems to me that this amendment, or purported amendment, deals with the subject in another way entirely, though the subject is perhaps the same as the subject matter of the bill. What the amendment proposes is something that is so essentially different that it would appear to me that if this kind of motion was in order at all it would require to be treated as a substantive motion requiring notice. I would have thought, Mr. Speaker, that unless the amendment proposes to do something substantially different from the second reading of the bill it is not at this stage in order.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, it may be that the form in which this amendment has been moved varies somewhat from second reading amendments that have been allowed in the past.


John Whitney Pickersgill: It certainly does.


Stanley Howard Knowles: But it does seem to me that Your Honour should take a good look at the amendment in the light of citation 382 of Beauchesne's fourth edition. I know it is very easy for the government to rise every time there is an amendment on second reading, every time there is a request for the subject matter of a bill to be considered before second reading is voted on, simply to say that it cannot be done.
I suppose it is foreign to procedure as we practice it in the House of Commons to suggest that we should follow common sense, but it seems to me that there is common sense in the suggestion that as complex a bill as this might be looked at by a committee, with that committee reporting back to the house before the house decides on the principle on second reading.
September 7, 1966

I suppose I have quoted citation 382 in this house scores of times, but having read it again just now it seems to me there is a phrase in it which does provide a basis for the validity of this amendment. May I read citation 382 in its entirety and then draw to Your Honour's attention one particular part of it. I might point out that the citations previous to 382 refer to the second reading stage of debate. Then citation 382 says:
It is also competent to a member who desires to place on record any special reasons for not agreeing to the second reading of a bill, to move as an amendment to the question-
That is what the hon. member to my right has done. He has moved an amendment to the question for second reading.
-a resolution declaratory of some principle adverse to, or differing from, the principles, policy, or provisions of the bill, or expressing opinions as to any circumstances connected with its introduction, or prosecution; or otherwise opposed to its progress; or seeking further information in relation to the bill by committees, commissioners, the production of papers or other evidence or the opinion of judges.
The part of that citation to which I think Your Honour will have to give a great deal of weight is the phrase "or seeking further information in relation to the bill by committees." Could you ask for a more apt description of the amendment which the hon. member for Middlesex West has moved? He says in his amendment that this is a complex bill, that we should not be asked at this point to make a decision on it, that in some way it should remain before the house with regard to what our decision on second reading is to be but that before making that decision we have the right to seek further information in relation to the bill through a committee.
I know how long is the list of amendments to the second reading of bills which have been ruled out of order. I know the citations and the precedents that have been quoted. But surely this is an unusual situation in that we have before us a bill with so many principles in it that one cannot talk about the principle of the bill, a bill that amends several acts, a bill that, as the Minister of Transport himself says, affects our life and concerns us almost more than language and religion. Surely it is the part of common sense to have such a bill discussed and examined by a committee before we are called upon to make a decision on second reading.
I am speaking to the point of order raised by the Minister of Transport, but I cannot help but say that I like what this amendment
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asks for. The amendment seeks to avoid saying no to the bill at this point. It asks the House of Commons to take the common-sense approach of letting a committee of this house study it carefully and report back to us, whereupon we might continue with the debate on second reading and reach a decision on principle.
I am fully aware of the fact that what I am arguing for is a departure from what has so often been the practice. I realize that it may seem to come right up against the whole theory of responsible government namely, that the government brings in its bills and we have to take them or leave them as they are. But times are changing; there are revolutions, quiet and otherwise, around the place, and it seems to me that if what we are asking for has common sense on its side it ought to be considered by this House of Commons.


Edmund Davie Fulton: Mr. Speaker, I do not wish to add very much to the comprehensive argument put forward by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre on the point of order, but I should like to refer Your Honour to some precedents whereby parliament, the parliament of Westminster at any rate, has allowed the second reading of a bill to be deferred and the bill to be referred to a committee for consideration and report, exactly as has been suggested here.
May I first of all remind Your Honour that the authority for this proposition is found in the citation of Beauchesne that has been referred to, and it is quoted there as a precedent applicable to proceedings in the Canadian House of Commons. Beauchesne rests his authority on May, and the relevant citation is to be found in May's 17th edition at page 527, subparagraph (3).
[DOT] (5:00 p.m.)
It-
That is the house.
-may seek further information in relation to the bill by committees.
This is a citation with respect to the English parliament which is carried forward on the authority of Beauchesne as applicable to the Canadian parliament. The citation then gives some examples of cases where it has been done in the English House of Commons. I admit freely that the citations refer to instances some scores of years ago but, Mr. Speaker, the point is that they are there as citations and authorities still binding and applicable in the English House of Commons.

September 7, 1966
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Notwithstanding their age, what is good tor Sir Erskine May's Parliamentary Practice, 17th edition, is good enough authority for me.
I now want to refer to one typical example which took place in 1875. A bill entitled The Bankers Act Amendment Bill was under consideration and a motion for second reading had been moved. An amendment was proposed that the words after the word "that" be left out, as is the English form or amendment, in order-I am now eliding the actual form of the amendment but not its substantive parts-that the following words be substituted therefor:
A select committee be appointed to consider and report upon the restrictions imposed and privileges conferred by law on bankers authorized to make and issue notes in England, Scotland, and Ireland respectively.
In other words, the amendment asked that instead of giving the bill second reading the subject be referred to a select committee in order that they might consider the whole scope of the matter which was proposed to be covered in the bill, the second reading of which had been moved. That amendment was allowed to stand, was subsequently voted upon and was carried. An order of the house then issued that a select committee be appointed, etc.
I have chosen that particular example because this was a case not just of a simple reference to a committee without any qualification but a reference to a committee in order that it might consider the whole ambit of the subject matter of the bill. This is exactly what is sought to be done in the amendment now before the house. Therefore, in addition to the argument put forth by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre, the argument of common sense, and the application of the citation in Beauchesne, I submit this precedent-and others referred to in May-as having been actually accepted and in accordance with our parliamentary practice.


Mr. Turner:: Mr. Speaker, first of all I wish to reply on the point of order to the argument just adduced by the hon. member for Kamloops. He referred to May's 17th edition, page 527, the third subparagraph. That section of May deals with what has been termed a "reasoned amendment". It reads:
It is also competent for a member who desires to place on record any special reasons for not agreeing to the second reading of a bill, to move what is known as a "reasoned amendment." This amendment is to leave out all the words in the main question after the word "that" and to add other words;-

A reasoned amendment according to May may be one of several categories. There are three categories and the hon. member for Kamloops referred to the third one. The first is that such an amendment may be declaratory of some principle adverse to, or differing from, the principle, policy or provisions of the bill. The amendment before you does not do so because it says:
This house, while prepared to support the principle of a national transportation policy-
In other words, it does not contain a principle adverse to the bill. The second category in May's opinion reads as follows:
It may express opinions as to any circumstances connected with the introduction or prosecution of the bill, or otherwise opposed to its progress.
That, with respect, this amendment does not do. It is obvious therefore that the hon. member for Kamloops had to rely on the subsection which reads:
It may seek further information in relation to the bill by committees, commissioners, the production of papers or other evidence.
What he did not do, and I am sure he did not do this deliberately but in order to save the time of the house, was to continue reading the citation. It continues:
Such amendments have tended in modern times to become rather stereotyped and are confined generally to the first two categories.
In other words, the citation from May suggests that the third category recited by the hon. member for Kamloops has become rather stereotyped and has been abandoned. It then goes on to say:
An amendment, urging the setting up of a select committee to consider the subject matter of a bill, might be moved and carried, if the house were averse to giving the bill itself a second reading and so conceding its principle.
This amendment concedes the principle of the bill. If I may refer Your Honour to its terms, it reads:
This house, while prepared to support the principle of a national transportation policy, is of the opinion that-
I want to refer you to page 528 of May, which follows the citation brought to Your Honour's attention by the hon. member for Kamloops. It is said there that the effect of carrying a reasoned amendment is to delay and impede the progress of the bill. It then reads as follows:
It must be borne in mind, however, that the amendment, if agreed to, does not necessarily arrest the progress of the bill, the second reading of which may be moved on another occasion. The
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technical effect of such an amendment is to supersede the question for now reading the bill a second
time.
That being so I would suggest, as the Minister of Transport has already submitted, that this is a substantive and superseding motion and therefore would require notice.
I now wish to refer to the citation brought to Your Honour's attention by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre. He referred to Beauchesne's fourth edition, citation 382, which is to be found at page 277 of that reference. It reads:
It is also competent to a member who desires to place on record any special reasons for not agreeing to the second reading of a bill, to move as an amendment to the question, a resolution declaratory of some principle adverse to, or differing from, the principles, policy, or provisions of the bill, or expressing opinions as to any circumstances connected with its introduction or prosecution; or otherwise opposed to its progress; or seeking further information in relation to the bill by committees, commissioners, the production of papers or other evidence or the opinion of judges.
It then refers to the citation in May recited to you by the hon. member for Kamloops. However, I suggest to Your Honour that the governing words are:
-a resolution declaratory of some principle adverse to, or differing from, the principles, policy, or provisions of the bill-
Here again this amendment states in broad terms that this house is prepared to support the principle of a national transportation policy.


Edmund Davie Fulton: That is only one of the principles.


John Napier Turner: If I may in turn refer to another citation, citation 202 (15), found at
page 170 of Beauchesne's fourth edition, I would point out that Beauchesne is referring here to amendments on second reading. The citation reads:
An amendment approving part of a motion and disapproving the remainder is out of order . . . An amendment was moved that the house welcomed certain terms of the agreement and condemned several features of it. The speaker ruled it out because (a) the portion of the amendment which approved the agreement was useless as it suggested no change in the main motion, and also, (b), an amendment to disapprove what the main motion approves is nothing but an expanded negative.
In other words, this amendment is in the form of a disguised negative. It purports to support the principle of the bill but would have the effect of killing it because it would indefinitely postpone second reading.
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[DOT] (5:10 p.m.)
The hon. member who introduced the
amendment said, and the amendment itself says, that the matter is so complex it ought to be referred to the standing committee on transport and communications for consideration and report. The rules of this house provide, and the minister has given an undertaking as well, that this will happen after second reading is accorded to the bill. There will be, therefore, the same opportunity for witnesses to be heard and for the bill to be examined clause by clause. The advantage of that procedure is that the bill will be moving forward in accordance with the usual procedure of this house. If the subject matter only were to be referred to the committee rather than the text of the bill, witnesses would be heard but there would be no direct reference to the clauses which comprise the intended statute. I suggest to Your Honour that the amendment would have the effect of placing the committee in limbo without anything specific before it except the vagueness of the words "subject matter".
The hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre admitted that if the course outlined in the amendment were followed it would be a departure from the standard practice of the house. If the ordinary procedure were followed we would move this bill forward with no prejudice to the rights of this house, to the rights of the committee or to the rights of the people of this country to be heard. We should proceed with second reading of the bill and in the ordinary course the bill will arrive before the same committee with the same personnel as the hon. member seeks to have consider the bill by way of this circuitous amendment.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Perhaps Your Honour
would permit me to draw attention to the nearest parallel case which I have been able to find. It is not exactly parallel because, in this particular case when the farm machinery bill was before the last parliament on September 28, 1964, an amendment was moved by the hon. member for Edmonton-Strathcona. A subamendment was attempted to be moved by the hon. member for Peace River. I admit that to that limited extent that is a difference. The subamendment was ruled out of order by the present Speaker, who was then Deputy Speaker, on the ground that the subamendment proposed at one and the same time to take the question out of the house

September 7. 1966
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and keep it here. The subamendment contained the exact words that are in this amendment, "without prejudice to the right to proceed with the motion for second reading." As I say, the present Speaker, when Deputy Speaker, ruled the subamendment out of order. In those days we could appeal the Speaker's ruling, which I am glad we cannot do now. An appeal was taken and the house sustained that ruling. I suggest this precedent is more relevant than precedents in the British parliament in the eighties of the last century.


William Howell Arthur Thomas: If I may say a word on the point of order, I should
like to stress the view that was expressed by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre. This appeals to him as a sensible amendment. It does not seek to stall the bill or destroy it. All that is sought here is further information. I submit to you, Mr. Speaker, that the members of this house will be in a better position to vote on second reading, which is a very important stage in our procedure. If we vote for second reading we accept the bill in principle. I understand that it then goes to a committee for consideration, but when we accept this bill on second reading we have committed ourselves irrevocably to the processing of the bill.
It is true that we can vote against it on third reading, but we are going rather far in giving it second reading. There are serious questions in the minds of many members concerning some features of the bill. Generally speaking, we are in favour of a national transportation policy. However, I know that some members have grave doubts about the advisability of certain features of this bill. If the bill were sent to a committee before second reading I am sure that the information that would be brought forth would be of great value to every member of this house in reaching a conclusion on second reading.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Perhaps the Chair is in a position now to render a ruling on the amendment moved by the hon. member for Middlesex West. I should like to thank the hon. members who have given me advice and referred me to certain citations. I recognize, of course, the difficulty that faces us when we read Standing Order 77 which says that no bill can be committed without being read a second time. I recognize the difficulty in discerning the difference between the bill itself and the subject matter of the bill. Whatever personal views I may have about how a

difficult bill of this nature should be handled by this house, the Chair is faced with the problem of deciding whether or not the amendment is in order in accordance with our rules and our precedents.
May I first of all refer the house to that section of the amendment which reads:
-without prejudice to further proceeding to the said bill later this session-
I am not sure what this means. If it means that the bill is to remain on the order paper for second reading and at the same time the subject matter is to be referred to a committee, then we arrive at the position where we are trying to have it both ways. We arrive at' a position similar to the one upon which Mr. Deputy Speaker Lamoureux ruled on September 28, 1964.
May I refer hon. members to citation 386 on page 278 of Beauchesne's fourth edition which reads:
On the second reading of a bill, the house may decide to refer the subject matter thereof to a commission although the bill could not be referred to a committee of the house before its second reading. (The subject matter of the bill and the bill itself are two different things).
Also from the same page I read the following:
This amendment was as much a declaration of policy as if it stated that the question of adjusting the railway rates on grain should be investigated by the Railway Board.
I would take it from this citation that referring the subject matter of this bill to a committee is a declaration of policy. Having said that, may I refer members to citation 393 which reads as follows:
An amendment purporting to approve the principle of a bill and at the same time enunciating a declaration of policy cannot be moved to the second reading.
It is for this reason that I declare the amendment out of order.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I wonder if at this stage of the proceedings, in order to give a reasonable amount of notice to hon. members, I might move, pursuant to standing order 6(2), that the house continue to sit after six o'clock.
[DOT] (5:20 p.m.)


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: The hon. member for Skeena.


Frank Howard: Mr. Speaker, I am not sure just what is going to occur and I was waiting to see. I want to enter the debate on second reading. If you are going to do anything with respect to the proposal put forward by the
September 7, 1966

Minister of Transport, I wonder whether that should be done first or just what is the procedure with respect to it.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order. It has been moved by the Minister of Transport (Mr. Pickersgill), seconded by the Minister without Portfolio (Mr. Turner), that pursuant to standing order 6(2) the house continue to sit after six p.m.


Michael Starr: Is any time for adjournment specified in the motion? Normally when a motion of this nature is put the time of adjournment beyond the hour the house normally rises for adjournment is stated. Would the mover of the motion stipulate the time of adjournment after six o'clock which he proposes?


John Whitney Pickersgill: I do not think it would be reasonable to suggest sitting beyond ten o'clock.


Michael Starr: Could that be included in the motion?


John Whitney Pickersgill: It could be understood.


Michael Starr: I think it better to stipulate it.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I would be quite happy to have it made an order. It is a moral guarantee.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: I must point out to the house that this is not a debatable motion. Standing Order 6 (2), which I will read to the house, states:
A motion that the house continue to sit after the hour specified in section (1) may be made at any time without notice. If any member objects to the motion, Mr. Speaker shall request those members who object to rise in their places-


Frank Howard: I am not objecting, Mr. Speaker; I just want to speak on second reading.


Mr. Souiham:: Put the motion. There is no objection.


Gilles Grégoire: Mr. Speaker, I also want to address myself to the motion for second reading.
I do not want to object, but I do want to speak on the motion.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Does the Minister of Transport wish to change the motion?
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John Whitney Pickersgill: No. I am putting the motion and I am agreeing at the same time that it should be understood that there is an order of the house that we will not sit beyond ten o'clock.


Michael Starr: I think it is understood that the minister has said it will be understood that the house will not sit beyond ten o'clock.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: I will read again standing order 6(2).
A motion that the house continue to sit after the hour specified in section (1) may be made at any time without notice. If any member objects to the motion, Mr. Speaker shall request those members who object to rise in their places and if ten or more members then rise, the question shall not be put on the motion. If no member objects or if fewer than ten members rise in their places, the motion shall be deemed to be carried.


Some hon. Members:: Carried.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Are members of the house objecting to this motion?


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, now that the motion has been carried may I ask the minister whether he feels the need for a meal this evening? Could we not take one hour off for that purpose?


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order. Less than ten members having risen in objection to this motion, the motion is deemed to be carried.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
Stanley Howard Knowles: I was not objecting to the motion Mr. Speaker; I was asking the Minister of Transport a question.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I should like to reflect on the question for a while.


Frank Howard: Mr. Speaker, there are times when I have a certain amount of compassion for the Minister of Transport (Mr. Pickersgill) but as he is not really interested in listening to me I will not bother expressing my views in that regard at the moment.
There are certain aspects of the bill which are appealing. One is that it seeks to consolidate into one agency the regulatory functions relating to a variety of modes of transportation. Another is that there is an enunciation of national policy with respect to transportation itself. There are, however, other facets of the bill which are not appealing and which tend on balance against a favourable disposition being made of it. One of these is the fear

September 7. 1966
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of the establishment of a bureaucratic monstrosity, as the Minister of Transport expressed it. At the time he said that, he said that he hoped it would not become such, that it really was not the intention of the government that it would become such.


John Napier Turner: On a point of order, Mr, Speaker, I would respectfully say to the hon. member that I do not think that was the minister's expression. He said that some other people may have called it that.


Frank Howard: I will accept that correction, Mr. Speaker. Some people may have called it a bureaucratic monstrosity, but without referring to the minister's exact words I think he said that he hoped it would not be and that it was not the intention of the government that it should be. However, regardless of whether the minister felt that it might or might not be, nowhere in the legislation is there any guarantee that it will not be. Nowhere is there any check or balance against its being a bureaucratic monstrosity.
We now know that certain boards and commissions established under the aegis of federal law are in fact bureaucratic monstrosities. They do exist at the moment, so much so that some of them are in effect able to thumb their collective noses at what parliament may desire and go along in their own merry way regardless of the desires and opinions of the Canadian public. That is the fact in certain areas.
As there is no guarantee, check or balance in the legislation against this commission becoming a bureaucratic monstrosity, I doubt that we should give the final stamp of approval to something of this nature. That is one of the facets of this legislation which is not appealing to me.
Another facet is that there is an open-ended and unenunciated quality in the matter of freight rates. If there are adjustments upwards in freight rates we all know that the freezes and guarantees established at the moment, and which apparently are to be perpetuated, will be paid for in large measure by those of us who live in the western extremity of the nation. For instance, the north line of Canadian National Railways has perhaps as high a freight rate structure attached to the commodities carried along it as any other area in Canada, and those of us who live in that part of the country certainly do not feel tne frozen rates structure that exists in other that we should have to subsidize even further
parts of the nation. This is another facet of the bill which does not appeal to me.
[DOT] (5:30 p.m.)
Perhaps the most important reason why the bill does not have the appeal it should rests in the very history of the Liberal party. I am making special reference here to the history of the Liberal party with regard to the one form of transportation to which the minister studiously avoided referring-shipping. He made a couple of passing references to water transport but he did so in the historical sense that this was the way Canada had developed and so on, and that there was a competitive feature about water transportation on the lakes. Beyond that there was not a single mention of the very important question of shipping and of the manner in which it affects the people of this nation, particularly those who live in the coastal extremities.
The needs of both the east and west coast have not been given, in my hearing at any rate, any examination in this house. Certainly, as I said, the minister avoided reference to this subject. Representing a constituency on the Atlantic coast, as he does, the Minister of Transport above all others should automatically have thought in terms of the effect that shipping would have on the communities on the Atlantic coast and he should have outlined the intention of the legislation with respect to shipping as a means of transport. The British Columbia coast undoubtedly has such needs.
With regard to the history of the Liberal party one cannot help remembering that it was in office at a time when our merchant shipping fleet was almost wiped out of existence, at a time when that fleet was transferred to other nations, and at a time when we could have established and maintained a merchant shipping fleet in this nation. It was a Liberal government that refused to take cognizance of the necessity for a country such as Canada to maintain a shipping fleet to carry commodities in domestic trade as well as commodities in import and export trade.
We cannot help but recollect that it was a Liberal government that permitted the subsidy provisions for shipbuilding, instituted by Mr. Balcer, I believe, when he was minister of transport in the Conservative government, to lapse. The shipbuilding subsidy had had an effect on the activity in the shipyards of this nation. When it came time for the shipbuilding subsidy to be reinstituted it was reinstituted in such a way and at such a level
LMr. Howard.]
September 7, 1966

that it favoured only a few of the larger
shipyards in Canada and did nothing really worth while to promote a healthy shipbuilding industry and consequently a healthy shipping industry.
It is a Liberal government that has so far steadfastly refused in respect of shipping to deal with such matters as manning scales, and safety measures with regard to sailors and ships sailing in our waters. That matter is still up in the air. Admittedly it is not within the scope of the bill, but it is a subject with which the government should be concerned. Those are just a few examples of the attitude that the Liberal party has historically had to shipping, an attitude that makes the whole bill less appealing to me than it otherwise might have been.
May I speak about the coast of British Columbia. I do so because I am familiar with it, and I leave the analogies with respect to the east coast to hon. members who are more familiar with that area than I am. I have discussed extensively over a long period of time with my colleague, the hon. member for Comox-Alberni (Mr. Barnett), what I am about to raise. The communities on the coast of British Columbia are at the mercy of the shipping interests and suffer from the whims of the shipping interests and shipping companies. I should like to quote a case in point.
We have in the north coastal area, within my constituency, the Queen Charlotte Islands which are separated from the mainland by a body of water varying in width from 40 to 50 miles at one point to somewhat greater distances toward the southern tip of the islands. Shipping is the only way in which heavy materials and commodities can be transported to the Queen Charlotte Islands. The only other mode of transportation is by Canadian Pacific Airlines which carries only passengers and relatively light freight and express items.
Northland Navigation, a shipping company, at one time serviced the Queen Charlotte Islands. The company received, as does the present company, a subvention from the Canadian Maritime Commission of $3,000 to $4,000 a year. Northland Navigation Company, regardless of the fact that it was receiving from the public treasury a subsidy to provide passenger service to certain communities, admittedly not only the Queen Charlotte Islands, decided that it was no longer worth while or no longer of interest to it to service the Queen Charlotte Islands on the direct run from Prince Rupert. It discontinued the service and left the people living
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on the northern part of the islands, who relied to a great extent upon Northland's schedule to travel between Prince Rupert and the Queen Charlotte Islands, completely up in the air with no shipping transportation. This condition prevailed for some period of time until the former owners of Northland sold their interest to somebody else.
That example is one of a number of similar ones on the west coast which show that communities have had their interests completely disregarded because of the whims of shipping companies. Even in the midst of the Christmas season, when people expect Christmas gifts to be transported, when people expect to use the shipping on the coast to go home or to visit friends or relatives in other parts of the province, communities have found that the shipping company involved has suddenly decided it was not in its interest to make a particular run at Christmas time. The result has been that hundreds of people have been left stranded, unable to go where they wanted, and Christmas parcels have been left on the dockside or in the warehouse simply because the shipping company felt it was not in its interest to make a trip at that particular time. As we see it, the only way in which there can be any sort of reasonable or rationalized, if that is the word, transportation system on the coast of British Columbia is if there is an integrated structure involving aircraft, ships, highway transport and the three railroad facilities.
I have taken up this matter on a number of occasions with both the Conservative government and Liberal governments but to no avail. It appears that regardless of how knowledgeable the Minister of Transport and his officials may be about the needs of the people living along the coast of British Columbia, those needs have been completely pushed to one side in the preparation of this bill. Certainly they were completely forgotten in the introductory remarks of the minister.
[DOT] (5:40 p.m.)
It is interesting to compare our treatment of Canadian shipping with the way in which United States shipping is treated by the authorities of that country. I understand that in the United States there is a law which provides that commodities cannot be transported from one port to another in the United States except by United States ships. There was an incident at Prince Rupert when a transport truck carrying cement, I believe, from somewhere in the United States boarded the

September 7. 1966
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Queen oj Prince Rupert and left that vessel at Prince Rupert with the intention of proceeding to some part of Alaska by way of the Alaska state ferry system. The truck was detained or confiscated. In any event something happened to it because United States officials said the law had been contravened in that part of the trip had been made in other than a United States ship.
However, when Canadian goods are being shipped we take a much more lenient point of view and permit without question the shipping of goods from one port in Canada to another port in Canada by way of United States vessels, for example, from Prince Rupert by the Alaska ferry system up to the Skeena River. A portion of these goods could be transported by us but this is not being done. If we had a government which took the least interest in the development of northern British Columbia and had continued assistance to that province under the roads to resources program we might not have to tolerate a situation where our goods are shipped in vessels owned by the United States. We might by now have seen the Stewart-Cassiar road in such a condition that the transfer of heavy materials by truck into the areas being developed north of Stewart and Prince Rupert would be possible.
This is an example of the history of blindness on the part of the present government concerning the need for the development of transportaton on the coast of British Columbia and in the northern areas, and nowhere in this bill do I see even an inkling of an understanding of these problems. If the Canadian National Railways had any hope of promoting northern development, either that company or the government would have at least undertaken some time ago a survey looking toward the extension of the line northward through Hazelton to the Yukon panhandle and the Cassiar district so that the transport of goods and materials to this rapidly developing area just north of where I live might be possible.
It is incongruous that in his presentation of this bill the Minister of Transport should be making a great play about the necessity for expediting grain shipments while his colleague, the Minister of Agriculture, is saying on the other hand that we do not need additional facilities at the grain elevator in Prince Rupert. The Minister of Transport talked about the great need for shipping large volumes of grain faster and more economically. I am certainly not unfavourably disposed

toward more efficient grain handling or heavier grain shipments to other parts of the world, because this is a vital part of our economy and is no doubt of great value to the grain farmers on the prairies. But I am disturbed when I find one minister talking about the necessity for increasing grain shipments while another minister in the same government refuses to build the necessary extensions to a publicly owned terminal elevator in the city of Prince Rupert at the C.N.R. terminal point on its northern line.
There are two other aspects of this subject which I should like to mention before I finish. They are matters with which I believe the bill should have been concerned and which make me feel I cannot support the measure in its present form. They are the two vitally important questions with which this house and the whole nation were concerned only a few days ago.
I refer to the position in which railway workers find themselves not only with regard to their wages, hours and working conditions but as individuals faced with automation or technological change and the desire of the railway companies to run trains greater distances with the same crews. We appointed a royal commission to look into this question in great detail. Recently we have also seen more than 100,000 rail workers out on strike, not so much because they were concerned about their wages, though this was an important factor, but because they were concerned about the steadily declining opportunities for continuing work within the railway system. The men are concerned about the future of their jobs and the effect of automation and technological change upon their employment. They have lived in this atmosphere for the past 15 or 20 years since the advent of the diesel engine replacing steam. They have seen the decline of the old roundhouse, the laying off of certain classes of employees, including men with 15 to 20 years of service. They have seen terminal points closed because facilities were no longer needed. They see no end to the process.
We spent nearly the whole of last week dealing with one aspect of conditions on the railroads of this nation. Railway workers and others have been concerned for years about automation and the potential working life of a railroader. This is a question whose answer melts into vagueness when one considers the possible effects of automation. But the bill before us is silent on these matters. It is as
September 7, 1966

though the government wished to ignore completely the real cause of the difficulties and deal only with the superficial aspects. For these reasons I cannot bring myself to support the bill in its present form regardless of how appealing some parts of it may be.


Richard Russell Southam: September 7, 1966
Transportation
across Canada have already expressed concern due to the fact that in 1964 this same government, in its wisdom, introduced Bill No. C-120, and it is now history that that legislation fell flat on its face. To illustrate that I quote a headline from the Western Producer of October 1, 1964 which read, "Legislation On Branch Line Abandonment Totally Inadequate, Says Pool President." Criticism is again being directed against us on this very matter and it behooves all members of the house, whether in opposition or supporting the government, to work toward a final solution to the best of our ability and enact legislation that will meet the needs of present-day Canada.
I myself have been greatly and directly interested in the problem of rail line abandonment. I do not pretend to be an expert on cost accounting. I think we should leave that angle for the experts to discuss when we deal with it in committee, but I do have quite a lot of experience with rail line abandonment because it so happens that in my own riding, one of the longest branch lines in western Canada was abandoned in 1961 after lengthy consideration by the Board of Transport Commissioners. As the member for the area strong representations were made to me regarding the abandonment of that line.
At the time I felt action should have been delayed until the MacPherson royal commission had completed its report, at which time we could have considered the abandonment of the Wolseley branch line in the light of that report rather than in the context of piecemeal abandonment. In view of that experience I have become alarmed about abandonments and am naturally sympathetic to the concern of so many people in western Canada about the future prospects of abandonment because the railroads directly affect their lives and aspirations and particularly the well-being of those people whose economy is tied in with the agricultural industry and who depend on the railroads to move their grain to market without undue cost.
Because of my concern about this matter, in 1963 I introduced Bill No. C-70, in 1965 Bill No. C-20, and this year Bill No. C-86, which is presently on the order paper, dealing with the principle of a moratorium on rail line abandonment. There is a vagueness in the government's bill with regard to this principle. It is understood that the MacPherson royal commission report with respect to railway line abandonment will be acceptable in some areas, but when abandonment is

recommended I believe a definite moratorium should be provided before actual abandonment takes place. In the bill I have on the order paper I have suggested a five year period.
[DOT] (6:00 p.m.)
I am very disappointed that the government has not seen fit to be more specific in its bill. Here again there is a certain vagueness. The reason it should be more specific is the importance of this matter to people who are affected by rail line abandonment. It is hard to give a definite figure of how many people will be directly affected by rail line abandonment in Saskatchewan but if further abandonment takes place many thousands of farmers will be affected. It is estimated that in western Canada something like 4,000 miles of railway line could be abandoned. I do not think all this mileage will be abandoned because, as I suggested earlier, the economic picture has changed so much within the last six or seven years that we can prove western rail lines are not so uneconomic as they once appeared to be.
Nevertheless it is understood that there will be some line abandonments. The farmers living along these lines have for many years depended upon them for the marketing of their grain. Elevator companies have built elevators along these lines, some of which are in a very good state of repair and some of which are relatively new. In the case of abandonments the farmers will have to travel greater distances to deliver their grain and the elevator companies will have to dismantle their elevators. New techniques have been found whereby the elevator companies can move an elevator lock, stock and barrel to a new site. In some cases they may have to and will repair these elevators because they feel they can be used for several years after the railway line abandonment.
Many small family enterprises are adjacent to these lines in western Canada. We do not have large cities on the prairies and our communities are serviced by small self-contained villages and towns of perhaps 300 to 500 in population, some even smaller. Often there are two or three elevators in these villages, a family store, a service station and a hardware store. Often one will find also an independent garageman or, as was the case in days gone by, a blacksmith shop. These are small self-contained units, and many of the residents are now wondering whether there will be a definite time limit set with regard to the proposed abandonments. Surely they
September 7, 1966

should have the opportunity of disposing of their businesses and re-establishing themselves in other areas.
In areas where lines are abandoned the farmers will have to haul their grain greater distances by truck which means that the municipalities will have to budget in order to provide a better road system or, as we refer to them in Saskatchewan, grid systems. In Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan there are programs under which the provincial governments contribute to municipalities for the purpose of building market roads or grid roads. There is definitely a need for a time limit in this regard to give municipalities an opportunity to budget for the extra expense because they cannot assess their taxpayers in one year to cover the total cost involved. In this regard I think there should be a five year limit to allow these municipalities to provide for the additional roads which will be required.
I believe my remarks have covered some of the basic arguments in favour of a moratorium principle. I hope the government sees fit to bring in an amendment to provide for such a principle. I am sure we will have a full discussion on this subject during our committee meetings. If such a principle is incorporated in the bill a great deal of worry will be removed from the minds of those who are going to be directly affected by this new legislation.
It is interesting to consider the economics attached to increased grain handling. I have had an opportunity to consult with a number of elevator companies' agents along some of these lines in my area, and I am thinking particularly of the Kipling-Maryfield area where over the last few years, as a result of improved agricultural techniques and the provision by mother nature of adequate moisture, there have been wonderful increases in production. I have figures in this regard which indicate that in many cases grain delivered per mile has almost doubled, in some cases from 40,000 to 80,000 bushels per mile. This has taken place over the past seven or eight years and indicates that we should take a very optimistic view about grain handling by the railways in western Canada. We should not talk about subsidies on the basis of the railway companies' figures which show that they are continually losing money in the grain handling operation.
In this regard 1 was very interested to read an editorial which appeared in the Winnipeg Tribune of April, 1964, at the time when Bill
Transportation
C-120 was before us. The heading of the editorial is "Odd Increase", and I think it would be of value to place at least a portion of this editorial on the record. It states:
The Canadian Pacific Railway seems to have had a pretty good year in 1963 judging from the annual report made public this week. Railway revenues-that is the part of C.P.R. income coming directly from railway operations-amounted to more than $477 million, an increase of more than $24 million over 1962.
Freight revenue accounted for $419 million of the total take. This represented an increase of $25.3 million over the preceding year or 7 per cent. Freight traffic volume increased by 12 per cent and, according to the report, grain shipments resulting from the Chinese, Russian and other wheat sales contributed heavily to the increase. But it was not only revenues that increased, profits increased as well. The net earnings actually rose by more than $6.2 million over 1962.
The editorial then goes on to state, and this is a very salient argument:
It's rather odd that C.P.R. freight profits increased at a time when grain shipments increased. The railways have long and vigorously contended that they were losing money on the Crowsnest Pass rates charged for hauling grain. If this contention is valid, the railways should have shown a marked decline in revenues when they hauled record shipments of grain to seaboard.
Maybe the railway accountants should take another look. Or better still, maybe some outside accountants should sharpen their pencils in a definitive examination of the Crowsnest rates.
I think that is a very valid comment which applies even more so today than it did at that time, particularly in view of the evidence we heard before the committee and in light of what was pointed out by the hon. member for Qu Appelle in his speech the other evening In view of the fact that gross tonnage volumes have increased by leaps and bounds in western Canada and the prospect that this will continue, perhaps we should be concerned about throwing this whole thing open and allowing the railways to increase their freight rates in order to recoup what they feel they may lose as a result of the Crowsnest pass rates.
There has been a good deal of reference to the Crowsnest pass rates and I do not intend to deal with this subject at any length. It is paramount to the success or failure of western Canada agriculture that we have equitable and fair freight rates. The hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin) last night in his eloquent address referred to this provision of the bill and pointed out that there was a certain vagueness in respect of this matter. This vagueness is a matter of great concern to the people of western Canada and should

September 7, 1966
Transportation
be a matter of great concern to the people of eastern Canada as well. This should be a matter of grave concern to all members of the house whether on the government or opposition side.
Before concluding my remarks I should like to deal with a matter specific to my riding because I have had some experience in this regard. I refer again to railway line abandonments in the Moose Mountain area and specifically to the Blewett-Luxton branch. On this line there are three elevators at three different points with a total capacity of 77,000 bushels. These figures are about two years old but are indicative of the situation in the rural area with which I am familiar. In the areas around these three points and three elevators there are 76 farm families who will be directly affected by any rail abandonment that may take place.
[DOT] (6:10 p.m.)
Along the Corning-Peebles-Hansworth branch line there are three points, seven elevators and 279 farm families who will be affected by the proposed abandonment. The volume of grain handled up to the end of 1963 averaged 289,000 bushels at these points. In the Goodwater-Radville area in the southwest corner of the riding of Moose Mountain there are two points and five elevators. In this area 164 farm families will be affected. The average volume of grain in the area was 289,200 bushels. In the Kisby-Weyburn-Stoughton area, there are four points which would be affected. This area has seven elevators, 198 farm families and a volume of approximately 214,000 bushels of grain.
At the 12 points I have mentioned in this relatively small area of western Canada there were, at the time these figures were compiled, 22 elevators and approximately 750 farm families producing an average of one million bushels of grain per year. These figures point up the number of people who would be affected by the proposed rail line abandonments. They also illustrate how seriously these abandonments are viewed in my part of the country.
This brings me back to one of the reasons I felt compelled to speak, namely, that before this bill is pushed through the House of Commons a long and fair study should be given it in the committee, I was disappointed that the amendment of the hon. member for Middlesex West (Mr. Thomas) was not accepted by the minister. It was put forward in a spirit of co-operation following what the hon.

member for Qu'Appelle mentioned the other evening, namely, that we should in a spirit of co-operation in the house consider this legislation in all its aspects, that we should consider it very fairly and not do anything to hinder its passage but at the same time make sure that when we do pass it we will have something that will be adequate to meet the needs of this great country of ours over the next 25 or 30 years.


Stanley Howard Knowles: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, I wonder whether the Minister of Transport has had time to reflect on the question I asked him some time ago. I would suggest that for the sake of the staff and all the rest of us we might take one hour off at this point.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Speaker, I have been reflecting on the question and I think that since the house did not have a great deal of notice of the desire to sit this evening it would not be unreasonable to take some time off for dinner. But in order to give the maximum number of speakers a chance to speak I wonder whether we could not agree to reassemble at seven o'clock.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Chiseler.


Mr. Speaker:: Is it agreed that the house rise until seven o'clock?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.



SITTING SUSPENDED

[Stage Direction]
At 6.16 p.m. the sitting of the house was suspended.

[Stage Direction]
The house resumed at 7 p.m.
Mr. Jack A. Irvine (London):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to take this opportunity as member for the riding of London to say a few words on what I consider to be a very complex bill. Whether or not I may be below the average level of understanding I am not sure, but at the same time I am aware that this feeling is prevalent among many hon. members in this house. I have spoken to some of my friends on the other side of the house and to many of my friends on this side and I have asked them whether they had a thorough and profound understanding of this bill. The answers I have received are: "I don't know anything about it" or "I don't understand it" and even in some cases, "I haven't even read it". Perhaps this has been so because it is a massive piece of legislation, and it is very difficult for the average person to
September 7, 1966

study adequately the entire contents of the bill as quickly and profoundly as it should be studied. I am sure there are many people here in the house, including myself, who recognize the fact that a bill is necessary and who would like to vote for it, but before voting on it we should like to have a better understanding of it.
I think that perhaps when this piece of legislation was put together three or four persons could have sat down and condensed it into capsule form, containing maybe 20 chapters. I find on reading the bill that some of its clauses are quite contradictory.
For example in the explanatory notes which appear on the unnumbered second page of the bill it said:
Part X of this bill deals with the proposed Canadian Transport Commission which would replace the present Board of Transport Commissioners for Canada, the Air Transport Board and the Canadian Maritime Commission. Parts II and III would make provision for two other modes of transport, namely commodity pipe lines and extraprovincial motor vehicle transport.
This is quite clear to most of us. However, if we refer to page 6 of the bill we will find an outline of the personnel of this board, which is to consist of 17 members. I believe that previously these three bodies were manned by 13 people. I will not attempt to suggest that this is another effort at empire building because I do not think it is intentionally so. I do not want to be particularly argumentative in this matter, because I think we should approach the bill, not in a partisan manner but as fellow Canadians with a common interest.
I would also like to congratulate the minister on his description of the bill. Perhaps it would have been better to have heard not quite as lengthy a description from several hon. members on both sides of this house.


John Whitney Pickersgill: That is what an opposition is for.


John Alfred Irvine: Now, Mr. Speaker, I have some questions to ask of the minister which I hope he v/ill answer at the end of this debate. I would like to know how many states of the United States are served by the C.N.R. branch or subsidiary lines. I am referring in particular to the Grand Trunk line which runs through to Chicago and serves intermediate points. It is my understanding that 13 states are served by this line but I would like to have this corroborated by the minister. I would also like to know whether that portion of the railway system is subsidized by
Transportation
our government and if so to what extent. Can the minister also inform us whether the intent of this bill is to bring an end to transport subsidies? Nowhere in the bill is this actually spelled out in black and white.
As everyone knows, we have recently been hit by a severe rail strike. Having carried a union card myself some years ago I am well aware of the trials and tribulations of the railway workers. I am of the opinion that as a result of Bill C-230 we will find ourselves saddled with an expenditure of an extra $100 million. I would like to know where this money will come from. Will it come from increased freight rates? It is my understanding that the rates in the west are somewhat higher than they are in this part of the country. I understand further that in some instances, the rates in the east are higher than in the provinces of Ontario and Quebec. Ontario and Quebec comprise what we might call the economic breadbasket, or at least the industrial breadbasket, of Canada. I am afraid these areas are going to have to carry the brunt of the increases. The people of Quebec and Ontario should be apprised of this situation in advance. This is going to be a tough blow to us industrially. It could also be a tough blow to us in trying to capture and keep some of those foreign markets, which are so important to our balance of payments picture.
[DOT] (7:10 p.m.)
Now, Mr. Speaker, there has been a great deal said in this bill with regard to rationalization. What about rationalization? In the riding I have the pleasure to represent, the city of London, we have a service that runs from London to Windsor, a distance of about 120 miles. We have one Canadian National and one Canadian Pacific line paralleling each other. So far as passenger trains are concerned, the schedules are almost identical. What a waste of money this is. These are double-tracked lines and there is no reason in the world why an arrangement could not be made whereby one line would be used. I feel that the direction for this course should come from us. There are many savings which could be effected. For instance, what about the grade separation program, toward which I believe we pay 75 per cent or 80 per cent of the cost? I know of two or three grade separations that are under study at the moment in the city of London. I do not know about Chatham or Windsor, but I am sure the hon. member for Kent, Ont. (Mr. Danforth) would have some information about that.

September 7, 1966
Transportation
What about the savings that would be effected in the upkeep of tracks and in the upkeep of roadbeds? What about the savings that would be effected by the use of one station at each place, instead of two stations? Then, of course, there are the other buildings that are appended to such an operation. One more very important factor to consider, Mr. Speaker, is land use. Here we have two rights of way running through some of the greatest agricultural areas in Canada. Economists well believe that before too many years, if not now, there will not be enough land available in the world to feed all the people in the world. Therefore we must conserve these areas particularly. I am sure there must be many other areas in a similar position throughout this country of ours. I say that there are many facets of this subject of rationalization to consider. There are many things we should be considering, some of which we have not considered.
This problem we are having in connection with transportation is not something new; it goes back many years. I am going to quote some of the thoughts of Right Hon. Arthur Meighen on this subject back in 1932 or 1933, and for this purpose I shall read from the third volume of a book written by Roger Graham. There is one chapter here about which we should think for just a moment. This is written about a man who was a champion of private enterprise, and of giving all kinds of people an opportunity in this competitive country of ours. I quote:
The question of how to deal with the railway problem, which had been before the country for so long, was one of the few important subjects on which Meighen ever changed his mind. Up to the 1930's no one had resisted more adamantly or outspokenly than he the notion, consistently advanced by C.P.R. officials and always finding some political support, that the two great railway systems should in some way be merged. By the time the Duff Commission reported, however,-
I think that was 1934.
-he had become convinced that unification of some sort was the most hopeful way out. "Confidentially," he wrote to a member of the commission, "I may tell you that I have been for two years firmly of opinion that the interests of the whole nation would be best served by a placing of the one road under the other for co-operation, and a distribution of the earnings among the securities of both in an equitable manner . . . The public interests will be looked after by the railway commission supplemented by additional powers from parliament, if desired." What had brought him to a conclusion he had so often rejected in the past? For one thing, what seemed to him the carnival of extravagance which marked Thornton's presidency of the C.N.R. has disillusioned

him somewhat with public ownership of railways in practice. The trouble lay not in the experiment of public ownership having been tried in the first place, as Beatty was contending in a series of public speeches, but in the way the experiment had been conducted after 1922 when Thornton had succeeded D. B. Hanna.
Perhaps, Mr. Speaker, the time has come when we should give very serious thought to a scientific and economic study of transportation, a study in depth taking into consideration air, rail, shipping, pipe lines, etc. I mean a study in depth and not just one of those superficial things. For instance, after the second world war the then Liberal administration-I am going to throw them a bouquet because I think it is due them-set aside $50 million a year for the development of atomic energy for peaceful purposes. This was a good thing. As a result of this move Canada today is recognized as one of the leading nations of the world in the use of atomic energy for peaceful purposes. This was a far sighted program. What about the future now? Are we far sighted?
When the last spike was driven in the trans-Canada railway, we sat back with a feeling that we had it made. Things have changed. We are in a new era. We have to look for new means of transportation. Perhaps some of these things may seem to be away out in left field. Our big problem today is simply this, that we have to move goods and people and move them quickly and economically. In so far as bulk products are concerned, for instance, we may consider the pipe line. The movement of oil and gas by pipe line has been a great boon to this country. One cannot imagine moving such a great volume of oil or gas by any other medium at the present time.
[DOT] (7:20 p.m.)
Let us consider this in terms of other bulk items, because there may be ways more economical than those now used. The University of Alberta at the present time is studying new techniques-techniques which would amaze you-for the movement of bulk products by pipe line, such things as coal and sulphur. And why not?
I recently read an article-which I did try to find, but failed, because I thought it particularly interesting-which reported that a group of economists in the United States had stated that in ten years sulphur would become one of the most valuable items in our way of life. Put packages wrapped in neoprene, or whatever they wish to use, into a
September 7, 1966

pipe line, and it takes very little effort to move them great distances.
These ideas may be somewhat tar out, but we have to look ahead to new ideas and techniques. For example, has it ever been considered that instead of using railway lines it might be cheaper to ship our wheat year round from the lakehead? Of course, this would entail the use of icebreakers and nuclear reactors, but how much would this cost us? Has a study ever been made to determine its feasibility? It might be more expedient to do this, in view of the volume of bulk products which can be carried in ships.
Has any thought been given to the movement of wheat through a pipe line from, say, the prairies to Halifax, or from the prairies to Vancouver, or from the prairies to Churchill? There are of course complexities and difficulties here. These are some of the things we should be thinking about.
According to the information I have, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology is doing preliminary research at the present time into the high speed movement of commuters and commuter traffic through pneumatic tubes at speeds of up to 350 miles per hour. What have we done to study such a possibility? Would it not be wonderful for the members who live in Toronto, if they could hop into a capsule and arrive in Ottawa 45 minutes later. Or, for example, the members who live in Montreal could commute back and forth each day in 20 minutes Think of the advantages of this system when a vote was called, and we would not have to ring the bells for any longer than an hour and a half before every member was here. These are matters we should be looking into.
This proposal is nothing new. Let me take members back to the old-fashioned store we used to visit 35 years ago. Perhaps some of those present did not do so, but I did because I am in that age bracket. We remember the tubes which used to hang above the counters. Your money was put in a little capsule, shoved into this tube, and whoooosh!-away it went to the office, and then came back with your change. This new idea is exactly the same system, only on a much larger plane. We must project our thinking into the future and consider these new technologies and what we can do with them.
What will be the modern way 10 or 20 years from now of transporting something or somebody from Edmonton to Montreal? Will it be by pipe line, will it be by hovercraft,
Transportation
will it be by rocket, or will it be by pneumatic tube? People may laugh at this, but they laughed at the Wright brothers who 65 to 70 years ago said that they were going to fly in an aeroplane. Since that time aviation has done pretty well; but at that the time they were ridiculed. People thought they were a bunch of kooks. This is a time for reflection and thought, a time to use imagination, foresight and initiative in planning tomorrow's transportation. I would suggest that such a study is a very important consideration at this particular time.
1 was much in favour of the amendment proposed by the hon. member for Middlesex West (Mr. Thomas) but which was not allowed by your deputy, Mr. Speaker. It was an unfortunate thing because I feel that it would be only fair and sensible to refer this bill to the committee on transport and communications, where it could be further studied. An opportunity would be given to hear witnesses in order that many members, myself included, could go into the complexities of the bill, ask questions and receive responsible answers.
The action we take today may be binding upon us for many years to come, so let us not be in a hurry. I do not think there is any point in our trying to hurry this legislation. We have given up the major part of what was to have been a summer recess. I do not think that anyone feels sorry for himself for that. Most hon. members feel that their responsibility is to this country of ours, and if we are needed here we should be here. I would suggest that we sit right on, take our time and make sure of this legislation before we complete second reading.
It would not be fair to mention names, but people on both sides of the house have confided to me that they do not know what this bill is all about. I suggest they should have knowledge of this legislation before deciding to stand up and be counted-instead of being counted on something about which at the present time some of them may have no knowledge. Let us review the matter in committee and get the answers we want to our questions.
I think many people want to vote for a transportation bill, and I am one of them. I should like to vote for this transportation bill if it were amended in certain respects, and if we were given the opportunity to discuss it in committee so that we might have a more complete and profound understanding of it. If that were done, Mr. Speaker, would it not be

September 7. 1966
Transportation
nice to pass this bill unanimously in the house? I submit that this would be very, very refreshing.
[DOT] (7:30 p.m.)


J.-H.-Théogène Ricard: Mr. Speaker, I assure you that I shall not delay the study of this bill too long. I should like very much to share the enthusiasm shown by the minister, but like the previous speaker, I have some doubts about the bill now before us.
If I decided to say a few words, it is because I feel I owe it to my constituents to express their views about a piece of legislation as important as the one under consideration. Some will say perhaps that I am practising obstruction. I could not care less, and if I want to speak this evening, it is because I feel justice should be done to certain parts of the country. If we do not express our views, the minister will be unable to make the necessary amendments and corrections so as to make the bill really beneficial to the Canadian people.
There are too many things we know nothing about in this piece of legislation of national significance for us to give the minister a free hand. In the past, we, from Quebec, have not been too interested in railway rates, since the province of Quebec and especially, the province of Ontario, are served by a water and highway transportation system at relatively low rates.
When the minister says this measure will increase competition, it is only logical to infer that certain rates, in the fields of railway, highway or water transportation, will go up. Who will then pay for such an increase? It will surely be the people of Quebec and Ontario, since this bill assures us that the rates now in force in western Canada and in the Maritimes will remain at the same level for at least two years.
On the other hand, no mention is made of freight rates with regard to the provinces of Quebec and Ontario. This means that sooner or later, if it becomes necessary to obtain additional revenue, it will be sought in Quebec and in Ontario. For that reason, I am asking the minister to reconsider the bill and to give Quebec and Ontario industrialists and farmers the same guarantees he has given to those in other provinces. Mr. Speaker, we are not envious of the treatment given our sister provinces but as representatives of 
constituencies in the central provinces we have a duty to make sure that the interests of our electors are treated equitably.
There is nothing in clause 68 of Bill No. C-231 to guarantee that the tolls will be just and reasonable for the areas mentioned. No mention is made of the areas. It is stated, for instance, that tolls must be just and reasonable. We all agree on that point. In fact, no one would tax one group more than another. And it is added that they shall always be charged equally to all persons. There is no mention of the areas at all, but some areas could be hurt because in none of them can the situation within a province be compared to the situation of another group of persons in a sister province, or even within the same province if it should happen that regions are not respected.
These, Mr. Speaker, are the weaknesses that should be brought to the attention of the minister for correction. If such legislation is hurriedly passed, what will the repercussions be on the small industry in our province as well as in Ontario, where small industry is the very framework of economic life?
The passing of a bill detrimental to the industrialists of our provinces would place them in an unfavourable position to compete with foreign manufacturers. Our fellow Canadians would bear the brunt of this and would suffer the consequences. The Canadians would also have to pay the piper and provide the additional amounts required for the operation of railroads.
The bill also provides that the federal government will intrude in a provincial field, that of truck transportation. I know that up to now trucking companies have been provincially licensed. I suggest that the provinces will surely object to this intrusion. Is it the intention to foster misunderstanding or to legislate in order to create good will?
For all those reasons, Mr. Speaker, I suggest it would be advisable and logical to first refer this legislation, before second reading, to the committee specially charged with consideration of this matter. The bill, as someone said, and there is nothing wrong for me to repeat it, is highly complicated and requires a comprehensive and full examination.
Should we refer without delay that bill to a committee especially created to study it, we would give the municipalities, the provinces, the trucking firms and the experts in that field the opportunity to express their views;
September 7, 1966

I feel that we would get something out of it as well as all the people of Canada.
Too often in the last few years half-baked and poorly drafted bills have been submitted to us, and each time the government had to retreat, there was a weakening of its authority.
That is why I think that the minister should heed the advice given him not only by the members of this side of the house but also on the government side, because I am convinced that he was given the same advice in caucus by his fellow-members. He would be well advised to listen to those who sit here and improve as much as possible the legislation submitted and see to it that when these matters have been thoroughly studied, we pass quickly a measure which will give satisfaction to the Canadian people.
Those, Mr. Speaker, are the remarks which I wanted to make on that matter.


Edward Richard Schreyer: Mr. Speaker, it would seem that the Minister of Transport (Mr. Pickersgill) simply cannot win. On the one hand he has been exhorted, in the past, to bring in a new, revised national transportation policy, and when he does so he runs into the opposition of hon. members opposite. Perhaps it is because the transportation policy incorporated in the bill now before us contains so many different facets of principles that hon. members may find themselves able to support many of those principles while being unable to support others.
[DOT] (7:40 p.m.)
After listening to the debate of the past few days it seems to me almost all hon. members agree that the intent of the bill as far as it relates to the desire to rationalize transportation in this country and bring about the integration or co-ordination of the various kinds of transportation services, is a good one. As to the expressed intention to bring the administration and regulation of transport under one so-called super board; it is difficult to be impressed by the proposals for administrative reorganization. It could be argued that the nation's transportation would be better co-ordinated if the various commissions now in existence were brought under one over-all commission. On the other hand, it could be argued that there is a point at which an administration body becomes too large and cumbersome, and at which it becomes desirable to reorganize it into subdivisions.
Transportation
I do not attempt to say I have sufficient
technical competence to pass judgment on this matter. But I do wish to say that the minister has caused a great deal of uneasiness and uncertainty in the minds of many of those who sit in this chamber, particularly those who come from regions in the country which are on the geographical periphery. The minister may not have meant it, but he gave the impression a few days ago that the effect of this bill would be to allow the railways to charge rates which were fully compensatory, the intention being ultimately to free rates from restriction and return to an ever greater degree of competition within our transportation system. I know that since this first impression was given the minister has taken the time to elaborate on some of these points and clarify certain areas of misinterpretation.
We understand, now, that certain classes of commodities will retain the benefit of freight subsidies from the national treasury for a number of years. There are some profound questions to be raised when discussing a national transportation policy and perhaps the first of these is whether a national transportation policy should be determined almost exclusively as a result of economic analysis and cost studies, or whether it should be determined after an analysis of the social factors involved in any change which might be made.
I have no doubt it could be shown that by allowing the railways freedom to set freight rates, abandon branch lines and so on, we would enable them to increase their revenues and, in consequence, reduce the need for subsidies. This would mean ignoring or forgetting the social consequences in certain regions and localiites.
It seems to me we should not seriously be talking about basic changes in transportation policy without having regard also to tariff policy. I believe it is generally accepted as a proposition that tariff policies benefit the central part of the nation somewhat to the detriment of outlying regions. If it is part of national policy to maintain tariffs and other restrictions on imports, it follows that there should be acceptance of the need and of the justification for the continuance of transportation subsidies to the benefit of regions which are placed at a disadvantage because of those tariff policies. I have little doubt that this is the position taken by all members in this chamber who represent areas removed from the centre.

September 7, 1966
Transportation
When we speak of the national interest in connection with transportation policy we should first be clear as to what is meant by the national interest. It may well be that when added up in terms of dollars and cents a change of transportation policy would show a net gain. But this gain may be experienced almost entirely in the central region of our country, and may be most detrimental to the economies at the geographic extremities. I do not believe this kind of reckoning is a true indication of what is in the national interest.
I support completely the proposition put forward yesterday by the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin) when he said that what is in the national interest is a policy which benefits all the regions of a country, or a policy which does not discriminate against the balanced development of the several regions which make up a nation.
I am sure that by now the Minister of Transport (Mr. Pickersgill) is becoming impatient of members as they rise to take part in this debate, because most of the substantial points with regard to this bill have been made.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Would the hon. member permit me to interrupt him for a moment? I am far from impatient. I have been listening with the greatest interest to what he has to say. Perhaps he would allow me to ask him a simple question. He seems to find an antithesis between economic cost analysis and policies prescribed by parliament which would contribute to balanced growth in the country. The question I am putting to him is, does he not think that if policies of that kind are to be intelligently devised it is desirable to use the best modern techniques to find out what the facts are, instead of guessing at them as earlier generations had to do because they did not have those techniques?
[DOT] (7:50 p.m.)


Edward Richard Schreyer: Mr. Speaker, I agree completely with the Minister of Transport (Mr. Pickersgill). I did not mean to suggest that he was showing impatience right at the present time. I was merely saying that I would not be surprised if he were becoming impatient, for the simple reason that already there has been considerable discussion.
What I was trying to establish in the past few minutes is my contention that many hon. members, and many people in different regions of this country are getting the impression that this new transportation policy will

do no particular good for the economies of their regions.
Obviously the more time that can be spent on fruitful analysis and discussion of the various terms of this bill, the more information we will have and the better kind of policy we will be able to arrive at when a report is made to the house by the committee. It is not that I am faulting the minister for bringing in the legislation. I am merely trying to say that there is cause for uneasiness, because when a statement is reported in the press to the efEect that the policy is intended to allow for the freeing of rates, then it takes a few days, perhaps even a few weeks subsequently to clarify that statement and to give the minister and others time to elaborate as to just how it is intended to protect the economies of the various regions from too sudden and harsh a change or disruption.
It is my contention that the two most difficult parts of this bill are those having to do with freight rates and with branch line abandonment. In the past few years there has been a pretty strong indication that almost every community in western Canada has shown a marked antagonism towards the idea that because of cost factors, and the like, railway branch lines may have to be removed. There is the problem of cost analysis; but we must take several other factors into consideration, and it may well be that with the passage of time people in some of these communities in western Canada will be less reluctant to accepting the idea that certain branch lines will have to be abandoned. They may do so because of a continuing trend among people to identify rather more with their regions and regional economies rather than with their own immediate local areas. But if you expect these people to accept the idea of branch line abandonment it must first be demonstrated to them that their regions and regional economies will not be disadvantageously affected by changes in transportation policy.
In other words, it will have to be demonstrated that all other means of railway rationalization and cost accounting have been investigated and attempted before the railways are given permission to abandon lines servicing some of these communities. That, of course, raises a very moot point, one which the minister touched upon in his introductory remarks, namely that when we speak of railway rationalization, cost accounting, and adopting more efficient techniques, surely we
September 7, 1966

must consider the proposition that the possibility of public ownership of all railway lines in this country should be very much a part of a study of railway rationalization.
If we are really serious when we talk about railway rationalization we must be willing to say that we will investigate to the fullest extent possible, by acquiring the fullest data possible, the feasibility and desirability of actually bringing both major railway lines under single management. Otherwise how can we ask people to accept certain changes for the sake of rationalization, for the sake of efficiency and cost accounting, unless we are able to say to them that all-simply all-alternatives were looked into when parliament and parliamentary committees were considering ways and means of rationalizing rail transportation in Canada?
I do not think anyone here can get up and say, with any amount of concrete data at his disposal, that it would be better or worse to have railway transportation in this country under single management. Of course I know it is a matter of ideological dispute, with some people contending that it would be better because duplication would be avoided and the costs of duplication thus eliminated. On the other hand, others will argue that competition as between two railway systems provides for greater efficiency. Therefore I would hope that the proposition of bringing railway transportation under single management would be carefully considered and analysed in depth before we go about the country advocating or insisting upon branch line abandonment.
Some hon. members who have participated in this debate have dealt at considerable length with the effect that some of the proposed changes in the bill would have on western agriculture. I have some fairly strong views on that point but if I were to voice them now X would merely be repeating much of what has already been said.
However, I do want to make this point which I do not believe has been touched upon, namely, that it would strike me as very strange for us to remove certain kinds of subsidy on rail freight, since this is one means of giving an advantage to some of our export commodities in world markets. Of course direct subsidization as such is not permitted under the provisions of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, but indirect assistance, such as is provided by freight subsidies, has been regarded in past years as permissible under GATT.
Transportation
[DOT] (8:00 p.m.)
We would be foolish to adopt the general proposition that it would be desirable to free freight rates and allow the railways to charge ever increasing rates, even though this would be directly disadvantageous to many of the industries which are producing commodities going directly into the export trade. I do not believe that the mood of the Canadian people today is such that they would oppose the passage of legislation which would modernize transportation in this country and bring it under more efficient and effective regulation. It is my belief that such legislation would be accepted by the vast majority who think about our problems and discover that it is desirable to have legislation providing for a co-ordinated administrative body charged with the responsibility of regulating freight and passenger transportation rates, and the conducting of research and investigation into factors entering into transportation problems. Surely the mood of the people is such that they will accept that concept readily and with great approbation.
Those of us who represent regions in this country considerably removed from industrial centres would be derelict in our duty if we did not take pains to point out to the government and the responsible ministers why we cannot accept this bill in its present form. There are too many unanswered questions and too many principles involved. A vote on second reading is really meaningless. By voting in favour of the bill an hon. member would simply be indicating approval of some of the principles. At the same time that hon. member may have grave reservations and. in fact, outright opposition to other principles. Yet that hon. member cannot be sure of the advantages or disadvantages of this bill because we do not have the technical competence here in parliament which would allow us to ask specific questions. Perhaps this difficulty does not relate only to the competence of members, but to the fact that this forum does not lend itself to this kind of search for information.
The only part of this proposed legislation about which I have an emotional reaction is that part which impinges upon the economies of various regions in this country. Government action has a very direct effect upon the growth and development of regional economies, and the government has a responsibility to intercede or intervene in economics generally in an attempt to help these regions grow, in so far as that is possible.

September 7, 1966
Transportation
There is no need to apologize for accepting
the principle of freight subsidies as we have known them in the past. They have been necessary to compensate for the results of tariff policies of this country for the past century. It is in the national interest that various regions develop to the maximum. Let me refer to a specific case.
It was not in the national interest to allow the relocation of the overhaul base from Winnipeg to Montreal, simply because it was demonstrated on a cost basis alone that it would be cheaper to conduct that operation in Montreal as opposed to Winnipeg. In addition to a cost factor, one must also consider desirability. Surely it is desirable to have more than one jet overhaul service base in Canada; yet by simply looking at the cost factor it was decided that this skilled jet overhaul service should be consolidated in one area in this country.
One of the last things we would want to see happen in this country is a development whereby the economy and the population became increasingly centralized, to the point that some regions stagnate while one or two metropolitan areas in the country grow at a rapid rate. Such a development would create complex cities to the point where the phenomenon of megalopoly sets in. I do not think it is desirable to have one, two or three centres in the country growing at such a rate that problems in terms of urban life and living develop while at the same time other areas are relatively stagnant. We are all aware of the phenomenon that has occurred in Latin and central America, and some of the so-called banana republics, where the whole economic strength is concentrated in an area restricted to one city. This is an extreme illustration but I fear if we bring in transportation changes and policies based almost entirely on the concept of competition and private enterprise we will move somewhat in the same direction.
It must be a deliberate policy of the government to embrace transportation policy which will have the effect of giving various regional economies in this country sufficient assistance, by subsidies and in other ways, to allow them to enjoy a rate of growth comparable to other regions. This will in turn add to the strength of the whole nation.


Mr. A. B. Patterson (Fraser Valley):: Mr. Speaker, it is not my intention tonight to go into detail on the bill now before us, but I

should like to make some general observations in respect of its general purpose. We should have a national transportation policy enunciated and implemented in Canada. 1 do not intend to go into detail, as I have said, because my colleague, the hon. member for Medicine Hat (Mr. Olson), dealt at some length with the major parts of this bill which are causing concern.
[DOT] (8:10 p.m.)
I am sure that his concern and our concern has been shared and is being shared by a great many members or this house because of the far reaching effects that these proposed changes may have on our whole economy.
Over the years there has been an increasing cry for a national transportation policy. I believe this has been occasioned by changing conditions in our country, by the development of forms of transportation other than the one mainly under consideration at the present time-that is, rail transportation- and also by the failure of our transportation systems to meet the challenge of the present day. I am thinking especially of the movement of grain throughout the past months. We all remember that on a great many occasions those from the prairie provinces have constantly brought to the attention of the government the failure of our transportation systems to meet the need, so far as the transportation of grain products is concerned.
Therefore, Mr. Speaker, when we consider the clamour that has been evident in days gone by it is rather difficult to reconcile the attitude taken, now that the government has enunciated a transportation policy. It may not be all that we desire, and certainly it is not. We all recognize that there are inadequacies in the measure now before us. I am sure that we all acknowledge the fact that further study will bring to light additional weaknesses that must be corrected if this policy and plan are to meet the need of Canada in this day and age. Therefore I believe that as we look at the bill before us we must look at it not as a finished product, not as something that is all cut and dried-I would not like to think of it as such-but as something like a working paper, if I may put it that way, that can be gone over, forming a basis for consideration, study and analysis; and then I trust the government will be prepared to accept recommendations, suggestions and amendments that this house believes will be necessary in order to make it an effective piece of legislation.
September 7, 1966

We have before us, of course, a bill that outlines the government's thinking with respect to a national transportation policy and the means of achieving that objective. A number of methods have been used to try to explain the contents of the bill and the effect it will have upon the transportation systems in Canada. We had the statement of the minister when introducing this measure. It was a rather complete statement and outlined the role transportation has played in the development of our nation, and the need for a realistic transportation policy to enable Canada to develop, prosper and progress as it ought. In addition to the minister's statement we have had presented to us what I suppose we might call the layman's guide that was drawn up by the minister in an endeavour to put into understandable language for those of us who are laymen in the field the meanings, purposes and objectives of the bill, and the way it will work out in reaching the objectives enunciated.
Then just yesterday noon we had a briefing session at which the Minister without Portfolio (Mr. Turner) and some of the officials of the department made themselves available for questioning and explanations in connection with this measure. In addition we have listened now to a considerable number of participants as they have made their contribution to this debate. I for one have endeavoured to listen to all of them, and think I have succeeded to a large degree in an attempt to understand more fully just what is comprehended in this particular measure. I say, Mr. Speaker, and I think others share the same view, that in spite of all these things there are many questions that remain unanswered; there are many fears that are still not allayed; there are many clauses which are so controversial that it will take a considerable amount of discussion, debate and analysis before we can really understand their full implication.
Mention has been made of the branch line abandonment suggestions. I believe that my colleague the hon. member for Medicine Hat (Mr. Olson) brought out a very important point when he stated that care must be taken to ensure that in a case where a line is to be abandoned other forms of transportation are available so that those areas will not be left out in the cold. Another aspect of the bill that is causing grave doubt is that having to do with the rates structure and the suggestion that this will enable the railways to recoup their losses, as it were, or increase their
Transportation
revenue in order to take up the slack and meet the other provisions of the bill.
Many have expressed grave concern about the effect of the application of the provisions of this bill upon the various regions of Canada. I know we all like to think in terms of a national policy, and we must do so. We like to think of Canada as a great and growing nation, and so we are. But in spite of that fact I think we must be forced, and we will be forced, to realize that although we are one nation there are several distinct geographical areas, and the effect of the implementation of any measure must be considered in the light of its effect upon our regions.
Therefore I think the members from the maritimes have a right to express grave concern about the possible effects of this bill in relation to the maritimes area. Those from the prairie provinces have expressed their doubts and fears. Those from the two central provinces of Ontario and Quebec are fearful lest they will be called upon to bear the major share of the increased cost that may be involved through the implementation of this measure.
We in British Columbia also fear that this measure will have a detrimental effect upon our province. The question has been raised and the fear expressed that British Columbia may find its adverse position aggravated still further if this bill becomes law and its provisions implemented. It is always a cause of concern that the freight rates are higher when shipping east from Vancouver than the rates to ship toward Vancouver. I think this is a discriminatory position that must be rectified in the very near future. British Columbia is developing rapidly as an industrial part of Canada, and therefore I believe the people of British Columbia should have the right and the facilities for access to the markets of Canada to the same degree as those in the provinces of Ontario and Quebec. Therefore I believe that the fears which have been expressed with respect to the various aspects of this bill are well founded.
Many references have been made to the complexity of Bill No. C-231. I for one share that particular view, namely, that it is practically impossible for one who is not accustomed to dealing with these particular matters to understand just what is involved and what the over-all effect will be of the application of such a measure. Clarifications, explanations and additional information must be secured, and I believe that the best place to secure this is in a committee. Therefore, if

September 7. 1966
Transportation
we face the fact that this measure, if passed, will go to the committee on transport and communications, we will be prepared to seek out the information we desire, look for the clarifications that are necessary and get those explanations which it is very probable we will be able to secure at that particular stage of the bill. When this measure is before the committee all those who are interested will be able to make their representations. It will be possible to call expert witnesses and to question them on the effects of the application of such a bill. Provincial governments will be able to make their representations, as well as farm organizations and other interested parties.
[DOT] (8:20 p.m)
I therefore believe that this bill will form the basis of a very interesting and constructive analysis and study, once this measure reaches the committee on transport and communications. And so, Mr. Speaker, while indicating our intention at the present time to further analyse the bill and to suggest amendments to its various clauses, we will support the principle of the bill, which we understand is to define and implement the national transportation policy of Canada.
As I have said, we reserve the right to offer suggestions, recommendations and amendments, but at the same time we believe that the time has come for the enunciation and implementation of a national transportation policy which will be more up to date and will meet more realistically the challenges that we face at the present time. It is therefore our intention to support the second reading of this bill while reserving our right to participate actively in the further stages of the bill and to contribute to the improvement of the measure now before us.


Mr. F. J. Bigg (Athabasca):: Mr. Speaker, in my view this bill represents an attempt to bring our transportation policy up to date. I hope that our future policy contained in this bill will take advantage of what we have learned in the past. We hear much about regionalism, and the impression might be gained that the big crop which is being reaped in western Canada today will solve all other problems in that part of the country. However I would suggest that if western Canada did not harvest a large crop from year to year this country might still remain a somewhat backward colony.
It was the opening up of the west which gave Canada the great impetus. It was the

building of the railway that made us a nation. I hope that in implementing this new transportation policy we will avoid some of the mistakes of the past and go forward in the building of a bigger and better country. I suggest that one of the mistakes we made in the past was in seeking to bind our country in perpetuity or, to put it another way, to let ourselves be bound by the hands of the dead. I hope that our new policy will be a dynamic one, one that is attuned to varying circumstances.
I believe that we should establish a knowledgeable transport board to handle Canada's tremendous problems in this field and I support wholeheartedly the setting up of such a body. At the same time we must make sure that this group does not become a little empire unto itself and does not forget the important reason for which it is established. I am therefore opposed to the creation of a sort of super crown corporation. I would like to see it become an advisory board not only to the Minister of Transport but to parliament as a whole. It is my hope that the parliamentary committee on transportation will work hard and become more knowledgeable, and that, together with this new super board of transport commissioners, it will work for the betterment of transportation in Canada. I am convinced that this can be achieved.
It might sound like sheer heresy for a western Canadian to say that we should perhaps take a second look at the Crowsnest pass rates to see whether or not there is a better and more equitable way of sharing the cost of transportation across our nation. Perhaps preferred rates might not be necessary if we found some way of stabilizing the price of agricultural products at a level at which we could pay competitive freight rates. I would like to think that when this commission is set up it will have a bold vision of our future. It is possible that if we calculated our present gross national product and divided it by 20 million we might find that we cannot support a railway; but if we approach this problem with the vision which we had when we built the Great Slave railway we will be encouraged to build new railways into the hinterland and into undiscovered areas where Canada's great wealth lies, and where perhaps still greater wealth will be discovered. I therefore hope that when this commission is set up it will not be restrictive but will act with vision and enterprise, that it will plan for a bigger and better Canada, not only able
September 7, 19G6

to support itself but able to come to the aid of the less privileged countries of this world.
I venture to say, Mr. Speaker, that the western farmer produces more wealth per hour of labour than any other worker in the world and it is therefore not surprising that he demands a fairly decent standard of living in return for this work. After all, a bushel of wheat can be made into so many loaves of bread. The western farmer is entitled to a raised standard of living in return for the tremendous efficiency with which he performs his tasks. To those people who look at him with envy I will say: Come on out and help us reap this harvest. We are short of thousands of labourers and we cannot get them because other industries in Canada are draining our labour force. We are reaping great wealth from our crops. One of the reasons I hope the Crowsnest freight rates will be continued in the future is that these people are entitled to a fair return for their labours, which are bringing to Canada sufficient wealth to make a substantial change in our balance of payments.
[DOT] (8:30 p.m.)
When we consider this transportation policy, 1 want the board which is going to be set up with regard to freight rates and railroads to consider seriously the effect on the trucking industry. I suggest that from time to time the railroads have not performed the services they might have performed, so we have developed a tremendous trucking industry in this country. I do not believe the people who have put their life's work and their life's savings into this business should be brushed aside. When we think about the rationalization of the railways, let us think also about the rationalization of the highways. Let us tie in the whole of our national highways program with this transportation program. I do not suggest however that we should put all the highways in Canada under this board. I am a little bit alarmed about the power the board could gather unto itself, unless parliament watches very carefully and puts in some safeguards to see that they do not become an all-absorbing empire. After all, an empire may not have the vision which I hope this board will have, and we might hold up the development of Canada in this last half of the twentieth century which rightly belongs to her.
I should like to make sure that when the railroads come forward with their figures parliament will take a good look at those
Transportation
figures, to ascertain whether or not the excuses the railroads give for not making money are real. In the past there has been a tremendous amount of waste, and not due to branch lines. If you look at a map of Canada today you will see the way these railroads radiate out from the main business centres, instead of being linked up properly across the country. Then you can understand why it is difficult for the railroads to haul any tonnage between the major centres without waste. As an example, we may take the city of Edmonton. The railway lines branch out of Edmonton like the fingers on your hand. In at least two places in Saskatchewan near the Alberta boundary the railway links are not closed. In one case there is a gap of almost 40 miles and in another case there is a gap of 125 miles. If you want to ship something from one point to another, although the two points may be only 40 miles apart your goods have to travel over 600 miles because of this gap in the railway lines.
I personally took up this matter with officials of the Canadian National and they told me that this was one method they used in trying to balance their books, that is charging freight rates over 600 miles. They did not think it was economic to close the 40 mile gap. These are things which I believe tend to put our railway system 50 years out of date.
I believe that this rail system of ours quite rightly should be tied in with a proper air policy. The air system in Canada today is far from adequate. Again, I should like to refer to the north. If you were talking about building an airport in a place like Fort Chipe-wyan, the air line officials would tell you that there are so few planes going into Fort Chipewyan there is no justification for building an airstrip. This is true because airplanes cannot land there. I do not know how in the world one can just sharpen a pencil, divide by 20 and say whether or not an airstrip should be built in a territory which so far has never been adequately covered. After many years Fort Chipewyan has an airstrip, but there are many places in the north country where airstrips are needed for development. We cannot take a cost figure or a per-ton mileage figure and say it is economic to build a railroad at some place, unless we guess. Unless we plan for the future, I think big mistakes will be made.
I hope this commission will look into the question of what they call pioneer rates. It is possible today for the railroads in northern

September 7, 1966
Transportation
Alberta to charge those pioneer rates. They can charge double or treble the ordinary freight rate because some lines have not been completed. This situation is supported by the statutes of Canada. Thank goodness we are going to scrap these statutes. However when we scrap these old, worn out statutes, let us put in statutes which are going to develop Canada in the most equitable manner. Let us stop the situation which finds the trappers in northern Alberta and the Northwest Territories, the pioneers of mining and the prospectors, being charged treble and quadruple the ordinary freight rates, merely because the railroads have a monopoly.
I hear a great deal about the trouble in which the railroads find themselves. I am sorry, but I cannot weep for the railroads. We own the Canadian National and are responsible for the policies of that company. I will not worry about them. The great Canadian Pacific railroad, which at one time helped to link Canada into a great nation, has been delinquent in recent years. Part of their contract was to provide transportation. So far as passengers are concerned, we knew they would not make money by taking settlers out to the west to develop the land. However this company was willing to accept the hundreds of thousands of acres of land, including oil rights, in return for this gamble. Their gamble has paid off, and it has paid off again and again. Now they own great steamship lines and great air lines, but they want to get out of the transportation business because it is on the red side of the ledger. If we add up all the money this company made out of its contracts with the Canadian people, I do not think they have lost the amount of money they say they have in running the Canadian or the Dominion across Canada.
We do not want to rake over old ground. However, we do want to make sure that this great railroad company does not get out from under. If they are no longer going to keep their side of the contract by supplying passenger service across Canada in return for the enormous profits which they have put into other endeavours, such as oil leases and mining, then I say we should make it abundantly clear that if they want us to take over that form of transportation we are going to be hard bargainers. Parliament, one hundred years from the time the company was set up, can draft a bill to make sure we take over on the basis of a fair contract. I do not suggest a lawsuit, but this new statute should make certain that, when we make a contract with

them in which they are given tremendous rights in our country, they are obliged to pay their share. I do not believe the Canadian people can be accused of being niggardly during the depression years. We dug down deep into the pockets of the taxpayers and saved the Canadian Pacific from bankruptcy. Now that the company is flush, I would appeal to them to pay their share in building up this integrated transportation system which Canada needs so badly.


Mr. G. D. Clancy (Yorkion):: 
Gordon Minto Churchill: Mr. Speaker, I have been encouraged to speak tonight because of the extension of hours. I judge that that is what the Minister of Transport (Mr. Pickersgill) wanted. He wanted to hear from more people with regard to this bill of his in which he takes considerable pride, so-


John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Speaker, I would have asked to have the hours extended until midnight had I suspected that that would bring the hon. gentleman out.


Gordon Minto Churchill: If the minister interrupts me as he has interrupted almost every speaker up to this point, then what I have to say will be extended. But I like to accommodate the minister. I do not rise to praise him, sir, as many members who spoke earlier in the debate have. I have known him longer than some of the members in this house and I realize that he does better without too much praise. Consequently I will not praise him for his efforts; in fact, during the course of my remarks I will point out some of his deficiencies.
Somewhat left-handedly though I think I should say of our hon. member, who may be transported to another place, that I will miss him if and when that happens.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Let's go together.


Gordon Minto Churchill: Just think of the loss to the House of Commons. Nevertheless it is a thought that I will turn over, and perhaps I will consult him about that. I will miss him in the House of Commons because he is a stimulating influence and keeps people, whether they be on the government side or on the opposition side, on their toes, to make sure he is not carrying out some action which deserves a second look. That is rather euphemistically phrased, I think, but I believe the minister will get my idea. I always examine every proposition that the minister makes to the house, every bill that he presents and every question that he brings forward to see where the hidden meaning is. I suggest, sir, that this is the type of activity that keeps people in the House of Commons alert, and for this I pay my compliment to the Minister of Transport.
Now and again he does something I like very much. When he was speaking the other day he commented upon the question of keeping politics out of transportation. He had apparently seen some article in the paper that was critical of this, though I did not see
Transportation
the article myself. The minister gave a defence of politics and said there are two kinds. If I may quote him, he said that there is the one where the house attempts to get some kind of consensus about what will be suitable to bind this country together. The second type of politics was-if I may quote him again-the kind that tempts all of us to see the selfish interests of individuals, groups, or sometimes even of regions above the broader interests of the whole community. I think it is useful for people to understand what is meant by the term "politics", and in this house his first definition would mostly apply.
There is, of course, nothing new about this. The minister is as interested in history as I am and he will not mind if I direct his attention to the situation in the House of Commons on April 11, 1919. At that time the house was discussing transportation and considering a resolution to incorporate the Canadian National Railway Company. During the course of the debate on the resolution the leader of the opposition at that time, Daniel D. McKenzie, member for Cape Breton North and Victoria, used these words, to be found at page 1397 of Hansard:
Politics is the science of government. When people say: "We must take this matter out of politics," they mean that it shall be taken. away from patronage, graft, or mismanagement. I am willing that works of this kind shall be taken out of politics in that sense, but I do not agree that the people who own and operate enterprises shall have nothing to say about their management. Politics must exist in public ownership in so far as that involves the fullest possible control by the people.
I draw that to the minister's attention simply to show that he is following in the footsteps of parliamentarians of the past who had a similar idea with regard to the meaning of politics, and the fact that you cannot divorce politics from a consideration of matters of public concern.
When we were summoned to the house some time ago the impression was given both to us and to the public that we had two important and urgent pieces of legislation to put through because a railway strike was going on in the country. Quite obviously the bill to terminate the railway strike which we dealt with last week was of very great urgency, and you can imagine my surprise when during the course of one of those debating days four members of the Liberal party filibustered their own bill. It should have been passed very quickly.

September 7, 1966
Transportation
However, it was also indicated that the second bill, this one dealing with transportation, was of great urgency and should be passed with great speed, and 1 think this was a little misleading. I was not the least bit surprised when I read in some column in one of the papers that the Minister of Transport had dreamed up an idea.
[DOT] (8:50 p.m.)
He considered that this would be a great opportunity, with the house meeting under urgent conditions, to compel or urge the House of Commons to pass in double quick time his pet bill-this one on transportation- and linking it up with the railway strike to give the idea across the country that the two bills went together, and that one could not pass without the other. Then the House of Commons, seized of this urgency, would immediately pass those bills, and the minister would be very happy.
We discovered after we assembled here, began to discuss the railway strike bill, and had a look at the present Bill No. C-231 dealing with transportation problems, that although initially it might pass before the House of Commons very, very quickly, nevertheless it would require weeks, if not months, of intensive study by way of committee before it would come back to the house for final approval. So the urgency of the second bill was not anything like as great as pointed out to us, or as we were given to believe before parliament assembled.
Relating that fact to my earlier remarks about the stimulating influence of the Minister of Transport on the House of Commons, one can understand why I examined very carefully the situation that confronted us. I think the article in one of the newspapers was fairly accurate when it said that this situation gave the minister an opportunity to get rapid consideration of a bill under what was almost a pretence that it was essential to do so at this time, because of the railway strike legislation.
We now know that even if this bill were passed very quickly at this stage, and considered by committee very quickly, it would not alter the financial position of the railways for the year 1966, We know from our experience here that the bill will not pass through all the stages very quickly, and it would be very unwise if it did, because ever so many organizations, in addition to the provincial governments, will wish to make representations.

During the course of his speech the other day the Minister of Transport told us this:
I like to think there is a sense of urgency about this legislation that has not existed at any time since the MacPherson report was received.
I consider that this is a spurious sense of urgency. The urgency has been present with the minister and his colleagues for over three
years. Why the minister failed to act after he withdrew his railway legislation in 1964, until September of this year, escapes me. What was he doing for over two years with his transportation legislation? Quite a bit of the early work had been done by his predecessor, the present Minister of Public Works (Mr. Mcllraith), who was then minister of transport. Yet, well over two years elapsed before the minister was seized with a sense of urgency which happened to coincide with a railway strike and with a special session of parliament. This is the stimulating influence that this minister has on the House of Commons, and this is how he leads some people down the garden path.
Then, not content with that, when he was entertaining the House of Commons the other evening while speaking, he said something about hoping that there would be-and these are his words-
-a relatively brief general debate on second reading.
Earlier we had conceded a point for the minister, and had passed the resolution stage without debate. Not content with that he wanted a brief discussion on second reading.
We have reached the stage of what I now call instant legislation. Everything has to be done the day before yesterday, and I rise in protest against this attitude of mind which wants everything done before you have even time to consider it. If there is one bill which should not be classed as instant legislation, it is the bill presently before us. It has taken the government years to prepare it. It has taken the present minister over two years to get it ready. Its ramifications, as pointed out by many speakers, are profound and will affect our country for many years to come. This is not a bill which should be subjected to this new fangled idea of instant legislation.


Eric Alfred Winkler: Will the hon. member permit a question? Is he not aware that the Minister of Finance (Mr. Sharp) this evening on the national broadcasting network blamed the
September 7, 1966

opposition for pushing everything through
the house too hastily.


Gordon Minto Churchill: I find myself co-operating now with the Minister of Finance. I am glad that he does not agree with the Minister of Transport. The Minister of Finance wants this bill to be considered very carefully. I suggest to my colleagues that they should take note of that fact and make preparations to speak tomorrow on this bill, in order to accommodate both ministers.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I wonder if I could ask the hon. gentleman a question? He was flattering enough to quote my reference to a relatively brief general debate on second reading, perhaps unwisely observing things in retrospect. Would he be kind enough to quote the last part of that same paragraph on page 7998 of Hansard?


Gordon Minto Churchill: I have never found that putting the minister's words in speeches of mine does any good at all, and I do not know why I should give him additional publicity by repeating some of his badly phrased sentences. I think I will just leave it there, for everybody to read. He has drawn attention to the fact that he made that remark on September 1, 1966, at page 7998. I record that in Hansard for the edification of the next generation of parliamentarians.
I want to comment on some other matters that the minister mentioned, before dealing with certain general aspects of the bill. As I say, I realize the damage I am doing to my speech by quoting the minister's words, but I want to be fair to him. At page 7991 of Hansard, in the second column, when he is dealing with the very large board that he is setting up, he uses these words:
I have reached the conclusion that one of the most important things of all is to have one unified organ of government divorced from any of these different modes of transport which would look at all of them, compare one with another and, when considering the regulation of one, would take account of what was happening in the other fields.
And so on.
Now the minister has been affected by the Minister of National Defence (Mr. Hellyer) and he wants to put everything together. I am surprised he did not use the word "integration". He has got the word "unified" in, anyway. He wants to unify, and so he set up a board. He has integrated three boards. He has put them together and added four members, one of whom will be the head. He is
Transportation
appointing a czar, and he is going to have an organization similar to that of the Minister of National Defence, with a chief of staff under the minister.
[DOT] (9:00 p.m.)
I am sorry he has been infected by this desire to unify everything. The Minister of Transport did not tell us, though he is much more frank about these matters than is the Minister of National Defence why the system now proposed will be better than the present arrangement. There may be some value attached to integrating various boards. The strange thing I noticed when I looked over the bill was this, that having integrated the boards, the hon. gentleman then separated them again. They are to carry on their present functions and, from time to time-it is not very clear as to when this will happen

they are to assemble together and compare notes. So we will have a body of experts on maritime affairs, and a body of experts on railway freight rates, and a body of experts on air transport trying to have a meeting of minds. I do not think this is likely to work at all. I believe we are better off under the present arrangement whereby these specialists advise the minister. He can call them together and say: Gentlemen, our national policy is such and such; in your particular field you do not meet requirements of these other boards and I wish to reach a consensus here and arrive at a modification of policy.
This, I would think, is the function of a Minister of Transport. It is for this that the minister exists. But the hon. gentleman has delegated that authority to a very large board and put a man at the head of it who will have tremendous powers. That is his excursion into unification.
I wish to comment now, on something else which I think should be corrected in the minister's thinking and in subsequent speeches he makes. The following appears on page 7991 of Hansard. I will quote most of the paragraph-this will really please the hon. gentleman:
I do not think anything illustrates this more clearly than what has happened in the seven years since 1959. In those seven years, on three occasions, however this may have been disguised, the greater part of the increased wage bill of the Canadian railways has been passed on to the taxpayers of Canada-$20 million in 1959, $50 million in 1961 and another $20 million in 1966.


John Whitney Pickersgill: That is a misprint. I thank the hon. gentleman for drawing attention to it. It should be $30 million. He will find that

September 7, 1966
Transportation
it does not add up properly and I would not like it to be thought that I cannot add.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


Gordon Minto Churchill: You know, sir, that escaped me. That was not what I had in mind. But I am glad to help the minister correct Hansard.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I have already done that.


Gordon Minto Churchill: I continue to quote:
So we are now paying out of the treasury $100 million a year.
What I think is wrong-and I appeal to the better nature of the Minister of Transport which, from time to time, I recognize-is this: I think it is wrong to suggest that the greater part of the increased wage bill of the Canadian railways has been passed on directly to the taxpayers. The suggestion here is that a subsidy of $100 million a year is solely related to wages from 1959 to 1966.


John Whitney Pickersgill: So it was.


Gordon Minto Churchill: Why is it not related to other operating costs? Surely in that period from 1959 to 1966 the men working for our railways were entitled to increases in their wages, just as many others in Canada have received increases in their wages. Why do we say this is paying the wage bill? Are we sure it is not paying the cost of extra locomotives or freight cars, or the repair of trackage or something like that? I do not think it is fair to the men who operate our railways to saddle them with the statement that this amount of money paid out of the treasury over the period of seven years has all gone towards their wage increases.


John Whitney Pickersgill: It iust happens to be a historical fact. The first $20 million was paid as a result of the wage increase of 1959. The second payment in 1961, was disguised by the hon. gentleman's friends who said they were awaiting the MacPherson report and that they would pay the extra wage bill in the meantime. In the case of the 1964 increase we did not disguise it. That is a historical fact, whether it is fair or unfair. All I am saying is that we really must try to enable railways to earn enough to pay their men so that we do not have to saddle the taxpayers with these costs.


Gordon Minto Churchill: The minister is now smuggling words into my speech which I did not put there. My point is this: The minister could rightly draw attention to the fact that
[Mr. Pickersgill.1
in 1959, 1961 and 1966 additional moneys were paid the railways in order that they might remain in operation. But it is not necessary to say that these additional moneys are directly attributable to increased wages. That is my point.
Of course, it was in that area that there was trouble, and when the issue finally came before the government it centred on a wage dispute. So it is natural to say: Oh, well, this money is for wages. I have sympathy with management but I also have some understanding of those who operate the railways. Why are not wages regarded as an initial charge on revenue, and why cannot any deficit incurred be attributed to something else? Cannot the C.N.R. come here and say-as they do, from time to time: Our operating costs are so much, and they include everything, wages as well; we cannot maintain our trackage, and we need additional funds. That is all I am saying. I do not think we should continue to suggest that the sums of money which have gone to the railways from the treasury over this long period should be linked solely with wages.


John Whitney Pickersgill: May I ask the hon. gentleman a question? He was a responsible minister when $70 million of that $100 million was paid to the railways. About 40 per cent of it was paid to the C.P.R. This is now a matter of history and I do not think the hon. gentleman would be breaking any cabinet confidences. Would he tell us why the government of which he was a member gave this huge handout to the C.P.R.? Would it be to buy locomotives?


Gordon Minto Churchill: We have come back to the minister's definition of politics. He is indulging in a type of politics which he defined in the second part of his phraseology. He says partisanship. I was rising above that. I hope, on the minister's transmission to the other place, that he will rise above this petty partisanship he is talking about.
[DOT] (9:10 p.m.)
I fully realize what happened in those years when we were in government, and the troubles over railway matters. I was mixed up in them to a very considerable extent. I took a great interest in the problems of railways and the problems of freight rates.
I do not know whether I should quote any more of the minister's speech, although I think it pleases him. He went on to deal with rates and the abandonment of lines and
September 7, 1966

things of that nature, but I shall spare the house any more of his words.
I should like to direct the attention of the house to something else along general lines. The minister has made a great deal out of the fact that he is now declaring a national transportation policy. One would have thought there had not been such a policy in the past, but of course there has always been a transportation policy for Canada, and it has to be modified from time to time.
In 1919 when they were incorporating the Canadian National Railways the gentlemen who then occupied this chamber discussed matters of policy. They said what they were then doing was bringing in a policy of public ownership, taking over privately owned railway lines, incorporating them into the Canadian National Railways, assuming the financial obligations, and naming a board of directors to run the Canadian National Railways as a crown corporation. They said that the policy then being adopted was one of public ownership. Therefore if the minister is going to give us a definition of national policy he should include historically some of the things that happened in the past.
What was the transportation policy in the years when the C.P.R. was being established? What was the transportation policy when the various privately owned lines were assembled together to make the C.N.R.? That policy holds to this day, but the minister has not incorporated that in his statement. But with a bit of fanfare he gives us a national transportation policy, and in it he treats us to the platitude that an economic and efficient transportation system, making the best use of all available modes of transportation at the lowest cost, is essential to the well-being and growth of Canada. There is nothing new about that. I do not think the minister dreamt that up himself.
Then he suggests, in his declaration of national policy, three matters that should be considered. He mentions regulation with due regard to the national interest, each mode of transportation bearing a fair proportion of the real costs of resources and facilities provided at public expense, and compensation for each mode of transportation for facilities and services that it is required to provide as an imposed public duty. This, he says, constitutes Canada's national transportation policy; but I do not think it is comprehensive enough.
Several hon. members have dealt with the interpretation of the words "national
Transportation
interest." It would be rather difficult to define the national interest. It appears differently to different people and to different areas of the country. I am speaking tonight as a representative of the province of Manitoba, and what is good for Manitoba is good for Canada. That is the national interest because we are a wealth producing province and if we are strong and wealthy all Canada benefits. I suppose every province in Canada could say the same thing, but when a minister considers that as breaking new ground in announcing a national transportation policy he should enlarge it and make it complete and comprehensive. I think he should have added that no area of Canada should bear a disproportionate share of freight rates.
This is what has concerned people in western Canada for many years. This was my concern in 1958 and 1959 when we were faced with another horizontal increase after I don't know how many had been imposed since the end of the war. As a representative from western Canada and the province of Manitoba I was naturally disturbed that this would happen. As a result of the situation at that time grants were made, always with the hope that they would be temporary. But they never are, and subsequently the MacPherson commission was appointed to make a full investigation and to give us the facts.
On the question of national transportation policy I think that the minister has not done justice to the ability which resides in him and to the advice he might be able to receive from his competent officials. How people are going to interpret national interest when they are dealing with the regulation of modes of transport will be an interesting controversy to observe. A 17-man transport board is going to determine some of these matters in relation to the national interest, and the national interest may differ depending on individuals and where people live.
When he was urging us to have a short debate and pass second reading, the minister suggested that there were two principles in the bill, and if we voted for it on second reading all we would be approving was that there should be a Canadian Transport Commission and that there should be railway rationalization. The hon. member for Medicine Hat (Mr. Olson) immediately pointed out that there was a third matter, the matter of rate making.
When we come to the point of deciding whether or not to vote for this bill on second reading, which is approval in principle of the

September 7, 1966
Transportation
bill, are we just to accept the bland assurance ot the minister that we have only those two things to decide and that our votes are just with regard to those two matters? I say we have to include the one stressed by the hon. member for Medicine Hat.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I wonder if the hon. gentleman would not agree that the question of
appropriate freight rates is obviously an aspect of rationalization?


Gordon Minto Churchill: Of course, and I hope we get appropriate freight rates; but I think this is the major concern. When you are asking people who have felt the pressure of freight rates over the years to vote in favour of this bill on second reading, you are asking a great deal if they have not yet received all the information that should be made available to them.
[DOT] (9:20 p.m.)
That is why we on this side of the house have repeatedly requested that the subject matter of this bill be referred to the committee before we are asked to vote on second reading. One can become trapped as a result of a vote on second reading.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Speaker, may I ask the
hon. gentleman another question? He has been very courteous about answering my queries. In 1964 I yielded to exactly the same request and sent the subject matter of a bill, which had provisions very similar to these with regard to freight rates, to a committee. There was an exhaustive examination made by that parliamentary committee, which heard representatives from all over the country, as a result of which certain modifications were made as represented in the present bill. May I ask the hon. gentleman how many times this same process has to be carried out before we can get on with the job that the hon. member's leader promised to do, when he was in power within six months of the time the 1960 bill to keep the railwaymen at work was passed?


Gordon Minto Churchill: There is no question about the fact that the government of which I was a member made improvements to the legislation, because the minister constantly refers to them. The minister can certainly look to our term in office as an example for his government to follow.
I recall that the subject matter of the 1964 bill was referred to the committee for study; but what is wrong with that? If that was

done in 1964 and it proved to be helpful, as the minister has said it was, why should we not follow that practice again? The minister has now enlarged the bill, provided for another board and declared a national transportation policy. Conditions have altered materially in the past two years. I suggest that these conditions should be re-examined and that the subject matter of this bill should be sent to a committee. Perhaps once again improvements will be suggested. The minister admits that improvements were made as a result of the committee examination in 1964. That was a good procedure to follow then and I suggest it should be repeated now.
I object to the sense of urgency the minister has imported into this discussion by his suggestion that we should get on with this business now. I am opposed to this kind of instant legislation. When we do things rapidly in this house we are doing things in a hurried and stupid manner.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Six years have passed since your leader promised legislation of this kind.


Gordon Minto Churchill: We received the reports of the MacPherson commission in the summer of 1962 and we produced a bill and put it on the order paper. I well remember the session of 1962-63 when we were not able to persuade the opposition to be anything like as co-operative as the present opposition is. This opposition has been sustaining this government for over three years. Were it not for the efforts of the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Diefenbaker) and his supporters the present government would find itself in worse trouble than it has been in during the past three years. Who was it that saved the situation last week but the Leader of the Opposition, with the support of his colleagues and the members of the New Democratic Party? Canada's greatest blunderers are sitting over on that side of the house.
All the information attendant upon the preparation of the MacPherson report and the bill which followed has been available to the present, unfortunately incompetent government which Canada selected in 1963. Three and a half years have elapsed between the time of the election of this government and the presentation of the bill now before us. The minister now says: Let us get on with this bill, which should have been dealt with yesterday. I say there is no need for haste and that if we move too quickly we may make mistakes. We have found out from bitter experience that mistakes can be made when parliament moves too hurriedly.
September 7, 1966


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please.


Gordon Minto Churchill: I thought you would take pity on me, Mr. Speaker, in view of the many interruptions.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: I must inform the hon. gentleman that his allotted time has expired.


Gordon Minto Churchill: I am sure that I could conclude my remarks by nine thirty, Mr. Speaker.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Does the house give its unanimous consent to allow the hon. member to continue?


John Whitney Pickersgill: I think the hon. gentleman should have another round.


Gordon Minto Churchill: Let me conclude my remarks then with this sentence. I hope that those who follow me will ask the Minister of Transport to indicate the hidden features of this bill. Perhaps the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. MacEachen) and the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration (Mr. Marchand) will come into the house and advise us about the hidden features of this bill. What must we take on trust, and what is being concealed from us? What do we not understand about this bill that is clear to everyone else? Perhaps my colleagues will pursue that line of thought.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Does the hon. gentleman seriously expect anyone to tell him what he does not understand?


Gordon Minto Churchill: There is so very little I do not understand it would be a waste of your time to point it out.


Hon. W. G. Dinsdale (Brandon-Souris):: Mr. Speaker, I am sure that most of the members of this house wanted to take part in the debate last week in respect of the emergency legislation dealing with the railway strike. We refrained from doing so because of our desire to expedite matters pertaining to the critical situation which faced Canada. Like my colleague, that hon. member from the keystone province of Manitoba, 1 am grateful to the minister for making it possible to extend our normal hours of sitting tonight so that as many members as possible can speak. I think it is particularly important for members from the province of Manitoba to speak on this bill, because that province, more than any other, is very deeply concerned with and involved in national transportation problems.
Transportation
As I understand the situation the government has linked this bill with the one highlighted by the discussion last week, in an attempt to provide a complete approach to the problem of rail transportation. It has been suggested that the legislation now before us has been designed to rationalize not only rail transportation policy, but transportation policy generally in this country, in an attempt to avoid the periodic crises which have rocked the nation and this house. Perhaps these crises have occurred in part as a result of the failure of parliament to deal adequately with the revolutionary changes which have taken place in the Canadian economy over the past few decades.
It is unfortunate that we must debate this matter in an atmosphere of crisis. I shall not be discouraged in any way during my participation in this debate tonight by the government's attempt to carry over the atmosphere of crisis that existed last week. Having endeavoured to interpret this bill, having attended the special seminar that was set up to enlighten members of the house, and having listened to the comments of those individuals who are most knowledgeable about railway matters in this country, it is my opinion that this bill in no way resolves the problem that precipitated the crisis which necessitated the recalling of parliament for this special emergency session.
[DOT] (9:30 p.m.)
The authority, of course, for that statement, as has been quoted several times during the debate, is the president of the C.P.R., Mr. Sinclair, who made the statement that the legislation contemplated makes no advances and gives the railways nothing that does not already exist in the present legislation under which railways operate in this country.


John Whitney Pickersgill: So far as 1966 is concerned.


Walter Gilbert Dinsdale: As far as 1966 is concerned-and I think we are dealing with the year 1966. If it does not meet the problem in 1966, with the rapid processes of soc'al and economic change in the country I would conclude it would be even more out of touch with reality in the ensuing years.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Speaker, I wonder whether I might ask the hon. member a question?


Walter Gilbert Dinsdale: Certainly.


John Whitney Pickersgill: The hon. member does recognize that the increase in wages for 1966

September 7, 1966
Transportation
was 8 per cent and that the increase over the two years ends up at 18 per cent; and is it not true, therefore, that the problem of meeting the wage bill in 1967 is a much bigger problem than it is in 1966; and therefore it becomes much more urgent in 1967 that anything this parliament can do should be done to put the railways in a better position to pay that wage bill themselves, and that it is desirable to do so?


Walter Gilbert Dinsdale: Certainly I agree with that statement. This is a subject that will be touched upon more effectively and appropriately when we come to the next matter before the house, which 1 presume will be in the hands of the Minister of Finance (Mr. Sharp), when we endeavour to enlighten ourselves and reach some consensus as to what might be done about the process of galloping inflation, which is at the root of a great many of the difficulties of not only the railways and railroad employees but most of the economic groups in Canada. The point I should like to deal with has been discussed by other members of the house. I am only the second member from Manitoba to take part in this debate, and I am sure-


John Whitney Pickersgill: There have been three this evening.


Walter Gilbert Dinsdale: -that my hon. friend from Winnipeg South Centre (Mr. Churchill) would have dealt with this problem had he not run out of time.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, perhaps the hon. member would like to make that statement a little more accurate. The hon. member for Springfield (Mr. Schreyer) is also a member from Manitoba, and he spoke this evening.


Walter Gilbert Dinsdale: I was not in the house when the hon. member for Springfield made his remarks. I am sure he represented well the viewpoint of Manitoba and I am very pleased to hear that he has taken part in the debate. The problem that concerns me is the emphasis on national policy that predominates throughout the 68 pages of the legislation before us. It seems to me that there is a failure to pay sufficient attention to the regional problems, which are actually the basic difficulties in the field of transportation. It is all well and good to emphasize national policy but I think the minister himself is on record as having quoted that old expression that Canada is a difficult nation to govern,

largely because of the problems of regionalism, and any economic approach must take into consideration the specialized difficulties of the various regions of Canada. This has been the cause of some of our greatest economic and political upheavals in the past, and it is not necessary to retrace Canadian history in this regard. The minister himself is a native Manitoban-


John Whitney Pickersgill: No; I was born in Ontario.


Walter Gilbert Dinsdale: Well, he is an adopted son of Manitoba, shall we say, and was a lecturer in that province at one of our universities during a period when the west was involved in rather distressing economic circumstances, largely because of the failure of the national government to take into consideration the particular difficulties of the western part of the country.


John Whitney Pickersgill: The hon. gentleman will recall that during most of that time there was a government of his party in office in this country.


Walter Gilbert Dinsdale: I am thinking particularly of the 1920's.


John Whitney Pickersgill: It was in the 1930's that I was a teacher.


Walter Gilbert Dinsdale: Well, Mr. Speaker, the minister was a student during the 1920's. During the early part of the 1930's, of course, Canada was rocked by a depression that was not only felt in this nation but throughout the western world. My emphasis since coming to this house some 15 years ago has been on the need to recognize the primary necessity for diversification and decentralization of industry across the nation. I would suggest to the minister and the government that great strides have been made in this direction during the past decade.
I want to bring to the minister's attention, because this is the only manner in which we will have the opportunity to bring it to the attention of the ministry, that in my humble opinion the emphasis in this bill militates against the progress of decentralization and diversification that has moved forward in a rather encouraging way in the past decade.
During the briefing session the other day I was concerned with discovering whether there had been preliminary consultation with the provincial governments before bringing down this legislation. On that point I was
September 1. 1966

assured that there had been extensive consultation. I had not seen any press reports to this effect nor had any special meetings been called, and I would presume therefore that these consultations were by letter, telephone calls or some other process that did not come to the attention of the press and the mass news media of the nation.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Speaker, I would ask the hon. member, is it not true that agencies of the provincial governments as well as of interested bodies made representations to the parliamentary committee on Bill No. C-120, the bill preceding this one?


Walter Gilbert Dinsdale: Quite definitely. Back in 1964 when Bill No. C-120 was before the house there was consultation, and as a result of the criticisms that came forward, from the provincial governments largely, and also economic groups such as the pool associations of western Canada, the bill was not proceeded with. I am pointing out the emphasis that is placed on national policy and I shall come to the other point I wish to mention in a moment, namely that there is a new feature of the bill. This new feature of the super board is an entirely new concept. It was not contained in Bill No. C-120 nor was it one of the recommendations of the MacPherson report. In addition, I am led to believe that there has been no preliminary consultation with provincial governments or any other major economic groups in the country on this point. My reason for saying this, as the hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre (Mr. Churchill) has pointed out, is that the approach of the government in bringing the bill before the house has been that of enacting instant legislation.
[DOT] (9:40 p.m.)
We had a transportation crisis on our hands, we had to grapple with the emergency bill, and this present bill before the house has been presented as an integral part of the total solution. Because of the unseemly haste in the matter there has not even been the opportunity to get a response from the press and certainly from the general public, but I have received some telegrams and have seen a few editorial comments from the west which indicate that they are somewhat distressed by the fact that we are proceeding to establish an act without preliminary consultation. To the western way of thinking this bill overemphasizes the national policy aspect, and in particular moves forward in the direction of a bureaucratic body which will tend to aggravate and accentuate the national
23033-517J
Transportation
approach, rather than to give adequate consideration to the necessary regional approach which must be made if we are to deal satisfactorily with any of the major economic problems of Canada.
Manitoba has always taken a keen interest in the formulation of a transportation policy. The Manitoba government has been a leader in encouraging the concept of regional development both within the provinces and across Canada as a whole. It is because of the encouragement that was given to the province of Manitoba under the leadership of her present government that certain significant developments which I think I should bring to the attention of the minister have occurred within the past few months. I admit quite freely that these developments also have been encouraged and assisted by the area development program put forward by the present Liberal administration.
For example, it was only in August that the southwestern part of the province of Manitoba established what is known-and I think it is a unique economic organization-as the Westman Development Corporation. It is largely based on a group of local municipalities, both rural and urban which, encouraged by the efforts of the government of Manitoba and the government of Canada, have seized the initiative in establishing the co-operative co-ordinated approach of dealing with the problems of economic underdevelopment in western Manitoba.
It is this group which has expressed to me some concern about the national emphasis in the legislation and has pointed out that the spirit of the legislation seems to be at odds with the encouraging trend which has prevailed in Canada in recent years toward decentralization and diversification.
In my own city of Brandon, if I may speak on a strictly local basis, we have recently been featured in magazines, such as the Weekend Magazine, as a community which has demon-started amazing progress, notwithstanding the limitations and handicaps of an isolated geographic position. I have not the date before me, but most hon. members will have read Peter Gzowski's feature article under the title of "Brandon in Mink" which is merely a euphemistic way of expressing the fact that a new wave of prosperity has hit this community as a result of the encouraging trend toward decentralization and diversification. This has been done, notwithstanding the fact that there is a considerable disability at all

September 7, 1966
Transportation
levels of transportation. Rail transportation has been going through a transition in that part of the country, as it has in many other parts of the country.
We have lost all our branch lines; we are down to one passenger train a day, as hon. members will recall from the discussions that took place earlier on in this session. We even have difficulty with truck transportation because we are under the overwhelming influence of that large metropolitan urban community in Manitoba, the city of Winnipeg, where truck activities tend to be concentrated and where rates tend to be established.
We are also facing another difficulty at the moment which I hope will be overcome shortly, and that is uncertainty which has existed now for the past several months regarding the regional air policy. As the minister assured me yesterday, a hearing is to take place in October to determine the future of a regional air policy for this particular part of western Canada.
The point which I am making and which I wish to bring to the minister's attention is simply that it is fine to emphasize national policy but I hope he will ensure that the undue emphasis on national policy will not overshadow the new and encouraging trend which has been manifested in the Department of Industry to overcome a natural handicap which has affected particularly the extreme eastern and extreme western parts of Canada ever since confederation. It is because of this fact that hon. members become so exercised whenever any major change is made in the transportation policy. By all means let us rationalize transportation policy, but in the process of rationalization let us remember that Canada cannot be regarded as one, integrated economic entity.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I wonder whether I could
ask the hon. gentleman a question? Is he not in favour of one Canada?


Walter Gilbert Dinsdale: I am in favour of one
Canada in the political sense, but I am also aware of the fact that we have four or five Canadas in the economic and geographic
sense.


John Whitney Pickersgill: The hon. gentleman had
better be careful or he will be excommunicated by his leader in the morning.


Walter Gilbert Dinsdale: I am just repeating the belief of the leader of this party that there is one Canada in terms of political unity. This has

been the remarkable achievement of successive governments, particularly the government of John A. Macdonald, whose achievement will be commemorated next year when we celebrate our hundredth anniversary. However, we still have the facts of geography, typography and economics to deal with.
Let us now deal with the super board which has not been recommended in the MacPherson report and so far as I can determine has not been discussed with the provincial governments most concerned. It is a part of the current trend toward bigness in almost every major aspect of life.
[DOT] (9:50 p.m.)
In so far as the military are concerned, the government's emphasis is on unification and integration. We talk about big government, about solidarity forever and big labour; big bureaucracy. Even in the church we are engaged in discussions about the possibility of church unity. I remember a discussion I had with a member of the United Church when I was overseas, as a matter of fact a United Church padre. The good folk in England were not familiar with the concept of the United Church, and being a member of a non-conformist group I had to explain that we were of the opinion it was not so much a case of being united as it was a case of being frozen together.
This is always a problem with bigness in any sphere of life. The chairman is going to be all powerful; the deputy minister is going to be all powerful and certainly the minister is going to be all powerful under the legislation that is contemplated. He knows, of course, that the essence of democracy is the separation and division of powers. I know that integration is put forward in the interests of efficiency. The argument is always presented that if you have unification and integration of this kind you have greater efficiency. One of the nations that has been most forthright in this whole policy of integration and unification has been the Soviet state. It of course, has become almost one great monolithic unit in terms of bigness. However, it is faced with the inevitable situation that always confronts a big bureaucracy or a monolithic government, namely that when a mistake is made it is always a great, big blooper. It is not a small mistake, it is a big one.
At the transport seminar the other day I raised this particular point, and it was suggested to me this would be avoided because of the cross fertilization that would occur
September 7, 1966

from the various committees or entities making up the super board, that is from the air transport committee, the maritime commission and so forth. This term "cross fertilization" is borrowed from the jargon of social science. It originally of course comes from the world of genetics. I would remind the minister that when it is applied in the field of genetics it very often produces a monster. This is the possibility that can occur if we carry this notion of a super board to the ultimate degree.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Does the hon. gentleman prefer inbreeding?


Walter Gilbert Dinsdale: The minister has a great knack for anticipating speeches. I was just going to refer to another term that comes from the field of genetics, and that is the possibility of too much inbreeding which could result in bureaucratic rigidity.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I think you had better go back and take another course in biology.


Walter Gilbert Dinsdale: I come to the point I want to bring to the minister's attention and that is there is a better way of achieving co-ordination than the establishment of a super board of this kind. We have cabinet committees which are supposed to co-ordinate regional policies. Our whole cabinet structure is predicated on the notion that the various regions of Canada must be adequately represented on the treasury benches. While it is true that at the present time there is no representation from the province of Saskatchewan, for obvious reasons, I am sure the minister has had brought to his attention in rather forceful terms the position of that province by the Premier of Saskatchewan, who has been a rather outspoken critic or commentator on federal policies within recent days. I point to the fact that the province of Saskatchewan is not thinking in terms of railway line abandonment as much as it is thinking in terms of railway line construction. Recently the premier has been talking about a railway line into the north. I say that the minister should heed his words.
I hope the minister will not repeat the mistake that was made back in 1959 and 1960 when he opposed the construction of the railway into the Pine Point mine area. I believe his thinking on these matters is far too negative. I know the hon. member for Qu'Appelle (Mr. Hamilton) pointed this out the other day, that the Canadian economy is
Transportation
moving forward. He was speaking as a western representative in this house. We have all sorts of new industries in western Canada and in northern Canada and this is going to require the accentuation of the positive in railway transportation matters rather than the accentuation of the negative.
In my own community, we are opening a fertilizer plant this fall which is related to the other great development that has taken place in the province of Saskatchewan during the past two or three years, the development of the potash industry.


An hon. Member:: Ten o'clock.


Walter Gilbert Dinsdale: So, Mr. Speaker, without trespassing further on the time of the house, and at the same time expressing appreciation to the minister for his generosity in providing an opportunity for extended debate, I point out once again that there is strong feeling growing in western Canada that the bill ignores the necessity of taking into consideration the specialized interests and needs of the various regions of Canada. Second, this problem is aggravated by the fact that under this legislation we are going to move toward a super board.
May I call it ten o'clock, Mr. Speaker?


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Lapointe.


Mr. Scott (Danforlh):: On a point of order. Mr. Speaker, it is ten o'clock.


Mr. Speaker:: I fear the point is not well taken. What the Chair has at the moment is an order adopted by the house that the house shall sit after six o'clock. I understand there has been an agreement amongst hon. members or a suggested agreement that we should adjourn. In so far as I am concerned, I cannot leave the Chair until there is a motion put that the house adjourn.


Gilles Grégoire: Mr. Speaker, I have a few remarks-


John Whitney Pickersgill: I made an undertaking-


Gilles Grégoire: Mr. Speaker, I shall only take ten minutes-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The Minister of
Transport on a point of order.

September 7, 1966
Transportation


John Whitney Pickersgill: I hope, sir you will allow the hon. member for Lapointe to call it ten o'clock so that I can make the motion to carry out the undertaking I gave.
[DOT] (10:00 p.m.)


Gilles Grégoire: Mr. Speaker, according to the standing orders, in view of the fact that you have recognized me, I think that I am entitled to speak before some one else can move a motion. Mr. Speaker, I should like to tell my hon. friends-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The hon. member can only speak if the house agrees to carry on beyond ten o'clock. I understand the Minister of Transport (Mr. Pickersgill) now wishes to make the motion agreed on previously today. In the circumstances, the hon. member for Lapointe may agree to call it ten o'clock which would enable the minister to move his motion.


Gilles Grégoire: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order. You now have before you a motion that the house will continue to sit beyond six o'clock. Now, under standing orders, you recognized me and gave me the floor even before you recognized the point of order of the Minister of Transport (Mr. Pickersgill). That is why, before giving the floor to the Minister of Transport to move a motion, which he cannot do under a question of privilege or on a point of order, I believe that he will not be able to do so until he is properly recognized, that is when I have finished speaking. Mr. Speaker, I believe that such is the standing order.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The point made by the hon. member is obviously well taken and I am sure that not a single member will dispute his point at this moment. I simply wanted to remind the hon. member that there seemed to be a gentlemen's agreement arrived at earlier today.


Gilles Grégoire: Well, Mr. Speaker, if there has been a gentlemen's agreement-


Gordon Minto Churchill: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. If there was an agreement among gentleman that this house would adjourn at ten o'clock tonight, that agreement should be kept. Otherwise we cannot operate this institution effectively.


John Whitney Pickersgill: I feel perfectly confident that the hon. member for Lapointe intends to do just that.


Gilles Grégoire: Mr. Speaker, it is precisely what I did not intend to do. I was not aware that such an arrangement had been made in this house. Now that I have been told, I am ready to co-operate with all the others, and that is why I would tell the member who called it ten o'clock-I believe it is the member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) or the member for Danforth (Mr. Scott)- that I am willing to call it ten o'clock. Now, I would ask him as a favour to grant me ten minutes, since he is the only one to have called it ten o'clock earlier. I would be grateful to him if he would grant me ten minutes to express my views. If he accepts, I think I can complete my remarks within ten minutes.


Gordon Minto Churchill: Disgraceful. A shocking
exhibition on the part of the government.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, on the point of order, I think that the understanding clearly entered into around six o'clock should be carried out. I think that the Minister of Transport, who was acting house leader at the time, should himself carry out that undertaking by moving that we adjourn.


John Whitney Pickersgill: In so far as it is possible under the rules for me to do so, that is exactly what I desire to do. I think that the Deputy Speaker was in the chair at the time, but if I remember the words which were used I said that it would be understood that this would be an order of the house.


Stanley Howard Knowles: That is what we thought.


John Whitney Pickersgill: That is my recollection, and it seemed to me that was so understood at that time. I feel quite certain that the hon. member for Lapointe, who did not happen to be in the house at that particular moment, would not wish to interfere with that understanding, which was perhaps a little loosely entered into but was, according to my understanding, intended to be an order of the house. I feel sure that the hon. gentleman, having got the floor, will be recognized first tomorrow and his remarks will be equally welcome at that time.


Frank Howard: Another case of mismanagement.
September 7, 1966


Gilles Grégoire: Mr. Speaker, I understand that the Minister of Transport made an undertaking this afternoon and would like to keep it. However, I wish to remind the house that the standing orders allow me to speak, as I was recognized before the motion was introduced. If the Minister of Transport wishes to introduce his motion after I have completed my remarks, he has a right to do so.
Mr. Speaker, I feel quite at ease to continue my speech after ten o'clock, all the more so because I believe it is my duty to work as much as I can in the house in order to earn the indemnity of $18,000 that the taxpayers in Canada agree to pay us.
That is why, Mr. Speaker,-


Edward Nasserden: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker-


An hon. Member:: Ten o'clock.
f Trnn	1


Gilles Grégoire: Mr. Speaker, while on the subject of the motion for second reading-


Gordon Minto Churchill: This is a disgraceful breaking of a word by the government.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. Surely it is clear from the testimony of all of us who were in the house at the time in question that there was a definite understanding that the house was to rise at ten o'clock. How can we carry on in this place if we break agreements that have been clearly and solemnly made?


John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, I would maintain that there was more than an understanding. There seemed to be double acquiescence when I indicated, as the acting house leader, that this was an order of the house. I think it was so recorded in the records. If, perchance, there was a slip, I would ask Your Honour whether the record could not be examined, and whether this matter could not be determined, because I completely agree with other hon. gentlemen that if an hon. member who was not present when these arrangements were made, and were made orders of the house, can upset such arrangements, it is going to be virtually impossible to carry on our business in this house.
Transportation


Gilles Grégoire: Mr. Speaker, while on the subject of the motion for second reading of the bill before us-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I regret very much, after studying the record, of what was said this afternoon, that though there was a suggestion that there might be an order of the house, there was no such order made. There is no record of an order of the house having been passed. The only thing we have was an exchange between hon. members on both sides of the house saying that there would be an agreement that we would adjourn at ten o'clock. The hon. member for Lapointe is not reported as having commented at the time.


Stanley Howard Knowles: He was not here.


Mr. Speaker:: Certainly hon. members will recognize that the Chair has to submit to the rules. The only thing before the Chair now is the motion to sit beyond six o'clock. If the hon. member for Lapointe wants to speak now I do not think he can be prevented, on the basis of the motion which was adopted earlier today.


Gordon Minto Churchill: I rise on a point of order, Mr. Speaker. As I understand it, you have informed us that an agreement was reached by the hon. members then in the house that this house, or these proceedings, would terminate at ten o'clock. Surely that is a binding as a formal order recorded in the Journals, and would correspond to the customs and usages of the House of Commons of which the Speaker is the custodian. If there has been a gentlemen's agreement, I think it should be honoured and should be enforced by Mr. Speaker.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. There is no entry on the scroll, I am informed by the clerk. If there were such an entry it would be in the form of an order. The scroll of the house does not show and will not show that there was an agreement to the effect previously mentioned.


Edward Nasserden: On a point of order, I take it that the hon. member for Lapointe wants to speak now because he has reservations to go home. He talked about duty a few minutes ago. Perhaps his duty would be to cancel his reservation and make his speech tomorrow.


An hon. Member:: He will not be here.

September 7, 1966
Transportation


An hon. Member:: That's O.K. So much the better.
[DOT] (10:10 p.m.)


Gilles Grégoire: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. If it was the intention of the Minister of Transport that the house should adjourn tonight at ten o'clock, he only had to provide in his motion that the house should sit from six to ten.
You read the motion a moment ago, Mr. Speaker, and it does not contain anything of the sort. It simply provides that the house continue to sit after six o'clock. It is the motion passed by the house this afternoon and it must be adhered to.
If an agreement has been entered into, we, independents, are not aware of it. Let us be kept informed of what goes on in the house and we shall abide by the agreements which may be concluded.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to say a few words on the bill now under consideration.
I do not know if the other members of the house noticed it but when we discussed the first railway bill asking that the strike be suspended, I abstained from saying anything, because I recognized the urgency of the bill and of its being passed as soon as possible for the greatest good of the Canadian economy. On the other hand, I would not like to remain silent on this bill and I will therefore make a few remarks.
We have today in Canada a situation where the railways are, under an act, prohibited from increasing their tariffs, which are frozen at a certain level, and, on the other hand, the railway employees are asking for a salary increase and cannot get it as long as the tariffs are frozen, because if the C.N.R. decided on its own to increase the salary of one C.N.R. employee, right away the C.N.R. deficit increases and if it does, it is the budget of Canada itself which will have to make up that deficit and that automatically opens the door to the president and the authorities of the C.N.R. to decide on their own how the money of the Canadian budget will be spent, without previous consultation with the Canadian parliament.
Any salary increase of one cent to the C.N.R. employees would automatically mean that that money had been taken out of the budget of the Canadian government and that would indicate that the C.N.R. had the right to take over the estimates of the Minister

of Finance without previous consultation with the Canadian government.
And that is the reason why, during the negotiations, there were really no actual and effective negotiations because, on the one hand, under an act, the railways could not increase their tariffs and, on the other, under an act or the constitution, the C.N.R. does not have the right to spend money if such money has not been voted by the Canadian government, the Canadian parliament, when such money comes out of the current budget of the parliament.
But, Mr. Speaker, there is more to it than that. It is just that through the granting of subsidies for several years already, subsidies granted by parliament to the railway companies, the latter have used them to compete unfairly, uncomprehendingly, to operate illogically a transportation system. Unfair competition because the railway companies did not use those subsidies simply to freeze their rates but to reduce them, which was not provided for in the legislation granting them subsidies.
And here are several examples. Here is what a transportation company of the lower St. Lawrence region wrote to me on March 10, 1966:
To give you a striking example of the bad faith of the C.N.R., allow me to tell you the following story: "When the government decided that truckers were entitled to subsidies for feed grains, for a locality in our territory, the railway rate stood at 49 cents for a carfull; after the government decided that the subsidies would be granted to the consignees, the C.N.R. published a rate of 57 cents. However, when the customer made up his mind to give his business to a trucker, the C.N.R. representative contacted him and offered him a rate of 29 cents, a rate which has in fact been published since.
That means that with the subsidies which the railways received, not only did they not maintain their rates, but they reduced them, which was not at all provided for in the supply bill. I have just given an example of the lowering of rates from 57 to 29 cents, which means that the transport companies could no longer compete with the railways.
Mr. Speaker, I have here another example from the Lac-Saint-Jean area and I would like to read this letter from a transport company in the riding of Lac-Saint-Jean:
I haul grain in bulk from Quebec to Lake St. John at the rate of 24 cents per hundredweight, which is the same rate as the railways.
Today, this takes the cake; up until now, this could be arranged, with great difficulty, but now the railways have suddenly decided to cut their
September 7, 1966

rates down from 24 to 20 cents per hundredweight, that is 4 cents lower than government subsidies. That is inadmissible and contrary to common sense. Who is going to make up for the difference? Well, as you already say, it is the one who pays taxes on his profits so that, in addition, the C.N.R's deficit of $60 million may be accounted for.
Mr. Speaker, I could quote more of these instances where not only did the C.N.R. not make use of its subsidies to maintain its rates, but rather used them to bring them down even to a lower level than those ordinarily charged by other transport firms or other transport media. That, Mr. Speaker, is how the C.N.R. and the C.P.R. have operated.
I have here another letter from a company of St. Germain de Grantham in which complaints are voiced over the same procedures. I also have another letter coming from a transport firm in Thetford Mines, in the county of Megantic, in which similar complaints are made, a Levis firm in Levis County, in which railway companies are being criticized along the same line; a Richmond firm, in Richmond County, in which criticism is voiced over the same procedures; another transport firm in Rouyn, Abitibi, says*
I do not approve of the government letting the railways indulge in disloyal competition with the trucking industry.
Another company on the north shore; and there are representatives of all those companies who will also have to protest.
From Seven Islands, we hear among other things:
-huge problems which the trucking industry must face in view of disloyal competition on the part of national railways.
And I have a dozen of these which I could quote, Mr. Speaker, and in each case mention is made of the national railways using federal government subsidies not to maintain their rates at the specified level but to bring them down, and I have examples here, where the rates were brought down to a level lower than prices in force with the trucking associations and truckers in the province of Quebec.
[DOT] (10:20 p.m.)
The examples that I give you come from Quebec. And how do you want the trucking industry in Quebec, employing thousands of Quebec citizens, to develop if a company directed by Ottawa uses taxpayers' money for unfair competition, to set prices inferior to cost prices, prices inferior to competing companies and plunge those transport companies into disquiet and lead them to ruin.
Transportation
Mr. Speaker, I say this: A crown company has no right to use the taxpayers' money to lead to ruin companies formed by citizens in Quebec and elsewhere, prevent them from living and operating. Because when those transport companies are prevented from living, Mr. Speaker, that means that thousands of Quebec citizens lose their jobs, because the Canadian National uses its taxes to lower its rates illogically and unfairly.
Mr. Speaker, this is a striking example of dissatisfaction which exists now in Quebec toward Ottawa. Here is a whole class of society going into the transport trade, working hard to organize a transport company, which is now driven to ruin and bankruptcy because a crown corporation, an Ottawa company reduces its rates in an effort to deprive it of its commercial operations.
And you think, Mr. Speaker, that the transport companies in Quebec, which are numerous and which employ thousands, I repeat it, of employees, are satisfied with the conditions inflicted upon them by Ottawa?
Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Transport, (Mr. Pickersgili) should take those remarks into consideration and realize that if the investigation is made seriously, the Canadian National during recent years, and the Canadian Pacific also used subsidies they received, not to maintain rates but to lower them, which is very serious, as I mentioned a while ago, from 57 cents to 29 cents. That is less than half the rates of the trucking industry. And after that, they complain that there is dissatisfaction. Well, that is one reason for dissatisfaction when private enterprise is taxed, so as to ruin its business.
Mr. Speaker, let the Minister of Transport investigate that and he will realize that this is a crown company which uses a power given by the federal government to dissatisfy a whole class of the population.
How can Quebec economy develop if Ottawa uses taxpayers' money to ruin industry in Quebec? How can Quebec have industries, develop its natural resources, if Quebec taxes are used to lead industries of Quebec to bankruptcy or ruin like the Canadian National is now doing?
Well, Mr. Speaker, this is a source of dissatisfaction. I know there is discontent in the province of Quebec over the doings of this crown corporation in this field. It is time to put an end to this. It is time to put an end to such unfair competition and all citizens should be allowed to face competition

September 7, 1866
Transportation
fairly; otherwise, the people will no longer admit, they are even no longer prepared to accept, such competition.
The doings of the C.N.R. affect a whole segment of our population. Well, if a stop is not put to this, if the new legislation does not put an end to this and if the C.N.R. is not brought to its senses, I will be the first, Mr. Speaker, to tell the people of the province of Quebec that they are in fact ill-treated by crown corporations.


Gordon Minto Churchill: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of personal privilege which affects all members of this house. We have witnessed tonight a shocking example of a misuse of the rules, customs and practices of this house. On the basis of information I have received from my colleagues, I should like to record the fact that there was an agreement made in this house between members of the government and the opposition side that the house would continue after six o'clock but would terminate its sitting at ten o'clock.
On many occasions in this house there have been similar agreements made without a written order being recorded in Hansard. I recall many occasions during five and a half years as party house leader on both the government and opposition sides when we have made arrangements like this,-on countless number of occasions. The flouting of this kind of an agreement tonight is the first time in my experience such a thing has happened. I should like to record this fact in Hansard so that parliamentarians today and in the future will realize that these agreements are agreements between gentlemen and are recognized in this house, despite our differences politically.
Let me also record the fact that a minister of the crown acknowledged there was an agreement to continue past six o'clock although, perhaps by negligence, the formal motion did not contain a reference to a ten o'clock termination. That arrangement should have been carried out by the House of Commons. I think our experience tonight has been a bad experience in the House of Commons and I hope it will never again be repeated.


John Whitney Pickersgill: Mr. Speaker, I want to apologize to hon. members if, through any negligence on my part, what I understood and believed to have been an order of the house was not so recorded in the scroll. If that is what happened I do not blame anyone
[Mr. GregoireJ
else but myself. There may have been some technical negligence on my part and, if so, I apologize.
I completely agree with the hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre (Mr. Churchill), that whether or not an agreement is formally entered, and I say this as a result of my long experience, a member does not have the right to consider that he is not bound by the agreement simply because he was not in the chamber at the time it was made.
I would hope, sir, that if there is any danger of this kind of experience being repeated, some steps could be taken right away to amend the rules so that this kind of thing could not happen again. I feel very humiliated, sir, that this should have happened in the circumstances in which it did, and any injury I did to hon. members I regret very much indeed.
I would now move the adjournment of the house.


Frank Howard: Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak on the question of privilege before the motion to adjourn is put. I think we should have one thing crystal clear here. Contrary to what both the Minister of Transport (Mr. Pickersgill) and the hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre (Mr. Churchill) said earlier-contrary to the opinions they expressed-it was undeniably the right of the member for Lapointe (Mr. Gregoire) to stand up and speak, having obtained the floor, and no gentlemen's agreement could wipe out that right of the hon. member.
If the Minister of Transport had wanted to make it an order of the house that we conclude at ten o'clock, he would have included it in his motion. In fact I submit to you, sir, that he was asked specifically if he would amend the motion. I believe the hon. member from Oshawa asked him for a cut-off hour at ten o'clock, and the minister refused point blank to do that. There was no order of the house and there was not any intention that there be an order of the house. There was just a conversation between two or three members, and that does not in my opinion constitute an agreement to ride roughshod over any individual member of the house.
The hon. member for Lapointe, regardless of what we may think about his speech and the fact that he may have inconvenienced some of us who thought we would go home at ten o'clock tonight, undeniably had the right
September 7, 1966

to speak, and I will stand up and defend that right. No gentlemen's agreement should be allowed to overrule the few remaining rights members have in the house.


Mr. Rapp:: Mr. Speaker, I was not one of those who met with the Minister of Transport (Mr. Pickersgill) but I am sure the minister acted with every good intention and it was just a case that he did not put it on the record. I fully accept his explanation.


Gilles Grégoire: On that same question of privilege, Mr. Speaker, in view of the fact that reference has been made to a misuse of the rules and to a breach of a gentleman's agreement, I would like to say this: In the past, I have been house leader of my party, of the party to which I belonged, and I always respected any agreement made between house leaders

and the hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre (Mr. Churchill) was there then and the Minister of Transport (Mr. Pickersgill) was also a party to them-and I am ready to continue respecting any such agreements so long as they are made known. And in the past, Mr. Speaker, when I held that position, if an agreement was reached and we were not in the house, we were advised. And when certain members of the group were not present in the house, I notified them. But today, I was not informed, we were not informed, we were not even aware of it and, had we been informed, we would have respected the agreement. But, not only did I use my right to speak but, I do not believe I have broken any agreement,
Transportation
because I was not a party to such agreement and I was not even made aware of it. Let us be made aware of such agreements and I shall respect them. But I do not accept at all the statement of the hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre to that effect.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. If the Chair may have the last word, I would simply like to read into the record the motion which was submitted to the house this afternoon:
Mr. Pickersgill, seconded by Mr. Turner, moved, pursuant to standing order 6(2), that the house continue to sit after 6 p.m.
Standing order 6(2) says:
[DOT] (10:30 p.m.)
6(2) An extended sitting under the provisions of this section, unless a closing time has been specified, shall not be terminated except by the adoption of a motion to adjourn and Mr. Speaker shall not deem that a motion to adjourn the house has been made by virtue of the operation of any other standing order.
I am in agreement with the minister and with others that there has been a very unfortunate misunderstanding. I certainly concur with the suggestion made by the hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre (Mr. Churchill) that we should not see a repetition of the very unfortunate circumstances of which we have been witnesses.
I understand a motion has been made by the Minister of Transport (Mr. Pickersgill) seconded by the Minister without Portfolio! (Mr. Turner) that this house do now adjourn..
Motion agreed to and the house adjourned at 10.35 p.m.


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Thursday, September 8, 1966