1969-03-03

[Stage Direction]
Fourth report of the Standing Committee on Miscellaneous Estimates, in French and English-Mr. Fernand-E. Leblanc (Laurier).
[Note: Text of foregoing report appears in today's Votes and Proceedings.]


Hon. Paul Hellyer (Minister of Transport):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to table in English and in French two copies of the report prepared by the Canadian Transport Commission following the inquiry by the water transport committee into the operations of the provisions of the Canada Shipping Act governing the ownership and registration of ships in Canada.


An hon. Member:: Was that a study in depth?



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Mr. G. W. Baldwin (Peace River):: Mr. Speaker, last December the Prime Minister made a statement in the house in regard to the question of offshore mineral rights in which he indicated that he would be in touch with the provincial governments with regard to a proposal he outlined. I wonder if I could ask the Acting Prime Minister if responses have been received from all the provincial governments, premiers and prime ministers, and if so whether an agreement has been reached. If that is the case, can the minister tell us when the house would be made aware of what the agreement is?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: I am sorry that I am not in a position to report on this matter this morning, but 1 did not realize it would be raised. However I will be glad to bring it to the Prime Minister's attention.



CANADIAN OWNERSHIP IN NORTHERN ARCHIPELAGO

Right Hon. J. G. Diefenbaker (Prince Albert):: Mr. Speaker, I do not know whether the Acting Prime Minister would be able to answer this question, but in recent days maps have been issued by the United States indicating ownership of potentially valuable oil areas in islands in the northern archipelago. Have representations clearly defining Canada's right to the sovereignty of the north been made to Washington and has Washington been informed that the fact that United States technicians are in the northern areas or that United States investment is being made in the area in large, or potentially large amounts, in no way derogates from Canada's sovereignty and that we insist on the ownership of all those northern areas?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: Mr. Speaker, I think I will take this question as notice for the Secretary of State for External Affairs. I am sure there have been discussions and representations although I would not care to make an offhand reply to the question.
February 28, 1969

Inquiries of the Ministry



INVITATION TO COMPANY TO PLACE OBSERVER IN VESSEL &quot;MANHATTAN&quot;

Mr. Paul Sl-Pierre (Coasl Chilcolin):: supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Would the minister also inform the house whether an invitation was issued to the Panarctic Oil consortium to put an observer on the ship Manhattan when she attempts to force the ice of the northwest passage this summer? If the invitation was issued, was it accepted and if not why not?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: Mr. Speaker, I will be glad to take this question as notice.



SEA TRIALS IN TRANSPORTATION

Hon. W. G. Dinsdale (Brandon-Souris):: supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Was the Government of Canada consulted in connection with the sea trials of oil transportation in the northwest passage to be undertaken by the United States this summer?



HOUSING


Mr. T. C. Douglas (Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands):: May I direct a question to the Minister of Transport. In view of the fact that the minister has indicated that he is not going to make a statement on motions regarding housing, I want to inquire if he is asking the government for any priority in introducing his amendments to the National Housing Act and if he can give the house some idea when that legislation is likely to come before us.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: Mr. Speaker, as my hon. friend is aware, when the business for the balance of the session was announced the other day by the house leader amendments to the National Housing Act were included. I hope they can be brought forward at an early date.
Mr. Douglas (Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands: I have a supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. May I ask the minister with respect to recommendations 11, 12, 19 and 25 of the task force which have to do with the private sector of the economy and the representations which are to be made regarding the reduction of insurance fees, legal charges and estate commissions, whether any representations have been made to the responsible bodies having to do with these matters and what responses the minister has received.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: I am not sure I can answer that question without notice, Mr. Speaker. I

think I recall correspondence with one or two interested parties in which, if I remember correctly, it was suggested they might use their good offices to see what could be done to reduce costs in these areas. I would hope that in the weeks and months ahead additional representations can be made to all interested parties, including labour unions presently engaged in wage negotiations with the building industry, to use moderation so as to keep down as far as possible the cost of housing to all Canadians.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Will these representations be accompanied by some investigation into the sharp rise in the cost of building materials which has occurred in recent months?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: I do not want to indicate exactly what action may be taken in this field but as the hon. gentleman is aware we did point out that this is an area which should be investigated. It has been referred to the appropriate people for investigation and I would hope that if there is any evidence to warrant action being taken, action will follow.


Mr. John Gilbert (Broadview):: Is it the
intention of the government to assist the Ontario government with regard to the implementation of rent controls in view of the experience the federal government has had in this field?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: I am not a constitutional expert, but I believe that other than in wartime this is a matter which lies exclusively within provincial jurisdiction.


Mr. Leonel Beaudoin (Richmond):: I have a question for the Minister of Transport, Mr. Speaker.
Since he indicated here that he would arrange meetings in order to bring down the interest rate for the beginning of the building season, would he tell us whether there have been any results yet?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: I am not sure which meetings the hon. member is referring to but we have, of course, made representations to the various lending institutions with respect to the supply of more money during the current year and the initial reaction to that inquiry has been most favourable and most encouraging.
With respect to the cost of money, I would not wish to comment on that question at the
February 28. 19G9

moment, but I still believe the suggestion in the report of the task force, that we should free the interest rate rather than set an artificial ceiling as is the case under the law presently, would result in some reduction in the interest rate-perhaps not dramatic but at least worth while-and that this should be considered by parliament at an appropriate time.


Mr. Robert Simpson (Churchill):: In view of the fact that no C.M.H.C. money is available for urgently required multiple housing, particularly of the high rise type, in Thompson, Manitoba, would the minister take a look at this situation and see whether something could not be done about it?


Mr. David Lewis (York South):: I was about to ask the Minister of Transport in his capacity as minister responsible for housing in what way the Goldfarb report was, according to Mr. Goldfarb, improperly used in the report of the task force. Would the minister consider tabling the Goldfarb report so that members of the house can see exactly what Mr. Goldfarb found?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: If I might answer both these questions, Mr. Speaker: first of all I shall be glad to inquire into the mortgage situation in respect to Thompson, which was one of the areas of urgent need that we visited. It is my intention to take every possible step to make sure that enough mortgage money is available to meet the needs of that growing community during the coming building season.
With regard to the second question, personally I have no objection to tabling the report. As far as I know there is none, but I will make inquiries and if that is the case I will be glad to table it. I do not think any improper use was made of the report, or that Mr. Goldfarb said there was. I think what he said has been misinterpreted; at least, he indicated to me that that was the case. He had no real quarrel with the conclusion of the task force report that a very careful look should be taken at this whole area before any permanent policy is announced.


David Lewis: A further supplementary
question.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I wonder whether the hon. member does not think that we should move on to another subject. We have spent ten minutes on the same subject and various other members are rising. I suggest we move on to another matter.
Inquiries of the Ministry


David Lewis: With great respect, Mr. Speaker, there is a question that is directly related to the Goldfarb matter, but if Your Honour wants to pass on to another subject-


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member may proceed with a further supplementary.


David Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I did not use the word that Mr. Goldfarb used. He said that the report had been bastardized. In order to avoid using that term, I said that it had been improperly used.
I should like to ask the minister whether he has in writing from Mr. Goldfarb a statement to the effect that he has no disagreement with the task force report's conclusion regarding public housing. If he has anything in writing from Mr. Goldfarb, would he also table it?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: Mr. Speaker, to the best of my knowledge there is nothing in writing. He gave me this information during the course of a telephone conversation, so I presume that that is his view. Concerning the other allegation just made by my hon. friend, if I recall correctly I think Mr. Goldfarb said that the report of what he had said bastardized what he intended to say.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: So that rather than speak for him-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The hon. member for Prince Edward-Hastings.



EXHIBITIONS


Hon. George Hees (Prince Edward-Hasiings):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Acting Prime Minister. Since the government announced it is willing to assist Man and his World does it intend now to honour a pledge which was given on behalf of the federal government by former prime minister Pearson in a speech at the opening of the Canadian National Exhibition in 1965, and repeated two years later on a similar occasion, to the effect that the federal government would give financial assistance to the Canadian National Exhibition in order to make it, as he said, a great national showcase?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: I can only say, Mr. Speaker, that members of parliament from Toronto sitting on the government side of the house are fully aware of
February 28, 1969

Inquiries of the Ministry the advantages to the City of Toronto of revitalizing the Canadian National Exhibition, and of changing its form and shape in order to make it even more attractive to visitors from our province and outside our province. The hon. member may be sure we will do everything possible to co-operate in the development of that great Canadian exhibition.


Mr. Ricard:: That's why nothing is done.


George Harris Hees: The minister has made a most interesting hometown speech. My question was, does the government intend to honour the pledge of former prime minister Pearson?
While I am on my feet, Mr. Speaker, may I be permitted to ask a supplementary question. Now that the principle has been established that the federal government is to assist local exhibitions, is the government to designate the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce or any other minister as its representative to whom local fair boards should apply for financial assistance?



HIGHWAY SAFETY


Mr. Barry Mather (Surrey):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Minister of Transport which has an important bearing on certain transportation matters. Bearing in mind the massive recall of millions of General Motors cars and trucks for examination of suspected defects, will the minister look into that situation as it affects Canadian consumers and the safety of Canadians.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: The answer is yes, Mr. Speaker. The director of auto safety has already had meetings with officials of General Motors. Every necessary action will be taken in this country to assure the safety of the travelling public.


Mr. David MacDonald (Egmoni):: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Considering recent disclosures, are members of the minister's department charged with auto safety prepared to introduce regulations setting standards of minimum safety in order to obviate in future incidents such as we have been discussing here.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: Mr. Speaker, as I indicated to the house a few weeks ago, at the conference I attended in Quebec City of provincial ministers of transport, and ministers responsible for auto safety, it was agreed that the federal government would introduce legislation with


respect to minimum safety standards for automobiles at the point of manufacture or at the point of entry into Canada. So far as I know that proposal will be proceeded with as soon as reasonably possible. I should point out however that that kind of legislation gives no guarantee that the kind of fault that has just been found will not occur again. Often there are design faults which show up only after weeks, months, or in some cases, years of service. Although design standards to protect the travelling public will be set there will always be the possibility that experience will disclose errors in design. When that happens, corrective action must be taken at the earliest opportunity. That has been done in this case.



FINANCE


Mr. Douglas A. Hogarth (New Westminster):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Minister of Finance. Did the federal government directly or indirectly at any time recommend to the government of British Columbia that that government should extend a $3 million loan, or any loan, to Commonwealth Trust Company of British Columbia to subsidize the losses of that company or its subsidiaries?


Hon. E. J. Benson (Minisier of Finance):: No, Mr. Speaker.



INCOME TAX


Mr. Eldon M. Woolliams (Calgary North):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Minister of Finance. It affects many Canadians holding annuities and insurance policies, and I ask it to clear up a misunderstanding. Does the new income tax apply to the interest element on annuities before and after maturity? I am interested in what happens before maturity. Does it apply also in a similar way to annuity planned insurance policies, even if the person in question elected to postpone acceptance of benefits prior to the implementation of the new tax?


Mr. Speaker:: I would suggest to the hon. member that he is asking the minister for an interpretation of the statutes, and that therefore is not a proper question.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Maybe I could rephrase it. It is not an interpretation. I might just mention, Mr. Speaker, various people who are
February 28, 1969

holding policies and annuities are now questioning how they can shape their affairs. Maybe I can put it more succinctly. Does the tax now announced apply to those interest elements of the annuities and insurance policies prior to maturity?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I still think the question as asked is not in order, because we might have a number of members asking the minister to interpret the statute involved here, or any statute, and particularly taxing statutes. I doubt very much whether the question can be asked.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: I would like to debate it at ten o'clock. I still say with the greatest respect this is a question of policy, and not interpretation.


Some hon. Members:: Order.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Surely we can find out the taxes of the land. That is what I am asking the minister. Where do the taxes apply?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.



AIR TRANSPORT


Mr. W. B. Nesbitt (Oxford):: I have a question for the Minister of Transport. Has the Canadian Transport Commission given approval to the announced merger of Eastern Provincial Airways Limited and Nordair Limited? I ask the question, Mr. Speaker, because such an amalgamation of major regional carriers if allowed could easily introduce a third main line, which is contrary to C.T.C. policy.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: I will be glad to refer this question to the Canadian Transport Commission, Mr. Speaker, and get a definitive answer for my hon. friend.


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. When the minister is making an inquiry regarding the merger of Nordair and E.P.A. would he also ensure that the service to be provided, particularly in E.P.A. runs, will be up to the standard set when they received their initial application to fly from Montreal through Charlottetown and the Magdalens?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: I will refer that question also, and get the answer.

Inquiries of the Ministry CANADIAN NATIONAL RAILWAYS



TRANSFER OF DIRECTION OF WORK AT TRANSCONA SHOPS

Paul Theodore Hellyer: While I have the floor, Mr. Speaker, perhaps I might reply to a question asked two or three days ago by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre in respect to the C.N.R. Transcona shops. May I say, Mr. Speaker, that any report of reduction in personnel, work or possible closing of the C.N.R. Transcona shops is completely false, as I am sure the hon. member is aware. No such move has ever been considered. The only change is an administrative one where the works manager of the Transcona shop reports to the systems headquarters office, rather than the regional offices as was done in the past. The systems headquarters office is in Montreal.


Mr. Stanley Knowles (Winnipeg North Centre):: Mr. Speaker, can the minister give assurance that this is not the thin edge of the wedge for a wider change?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: On the basis of information given to me, I can certainly give that assurance. I can give unqualified assurance, and perhaps go even further and say that the present plans indicate a quite enlarged work force in the Transcona shops requiring additional personnel rather than contracting the work force.


Mr. Ed Schreyer (Selkirk):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a supplementary question to the Minister of Transport. While the minister gave the assurance to the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre that the transfer of C.N.R. administrative offices from Winnipeg to Montreal was not to be followed by any transfer of work force, does he recall that 20 years ago when Air Canada transferred its administrative offices from Winnipeg to Montreal this was followed by the transfer of the work force?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.



RAIL MOVEMENT TO SHIPPING POINTS

Mr. Jack McIntosh (Swift Current-Maple Creek):: My question is directed to the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce. In view of the fact those responsible for the movement of grain have 20,000 freight cars in their commitment to deliver grain, what steps is the minister taking to ensure the Vancouver fiasco is not repeated at the Lakehead, where
6062	COMMONS DEBATES	February 28, 1969
Inquiries of the Ministry
terminal elevators are only 50 per cent full a that I have to interpret the rules in the way few short weeks before the opening of Great that in my opinion they ought to be Lakes navigation?	interpreted.


Mr. Speaker:: I am not quite sure the question is put in the correct terms, but in view of the importance of the matter the minister should be allowed to reply.


Hon. Jean-Luc Pepin (Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce):: At the last meeting in Winnipeg with the wheat transportation committee, the situation at the Lakehead was studied. A certain objective was assigned to the railways with respect to filling the elevator capacities at the Lakehead, and the two railways have assured me formally that this will be done on time before the opening of navigation.


John (Jack) McIntosh: As a supplementary question -and I might say to you, sir, this question is just as important as the fairs in Montreal or Toronto so far as national urgency is concerned.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


John (Jack) McIntosh: I ask the minister, in view of the fact that he mentioned the Winnipeg conference between the railway companies, was there a difference of opinion between himself, the self-appointed supervisor of this, and the railway officials, as to who was responsible for the fiasco that happened at Vancouver?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I suggest to the hon. member that the supplementary as asked is argumentative.


John (Jack) McIntosh: Well, I will rephrase my question, Mr. Speaker. Was there a difference of opinion between the officials of the railways and the minister at Winnipeg late this week?


Jean-Luc Pepin: I will say there was a good healthy debate on the subject between all parties represented at the Winnipeg meeting; but we, I think rightly, decided not to emphasize differences but to move forward with the solution to these problems.


John (Jack) McIntosh: Was it determined at that meeting who was responsible for this fiasco at Vancouver, with respect to the handling of grain?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member persists in asking questions in a way which is not in accordance with the practice in this house, and I would point out to him


Mr. A. B. Douglas (Assiniboia):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce. Now that spring has arrived in British Columbia can the minister assure us that grain unloadings by rail at Vancouver will meet our grain export requirements this spring?


Jean-Luc Pepin: Mr. Speaker, that is too complicated a question to be answered by a yes or no.


Hon.  W. G. Dins@: As a
supplementary question, Mr. Speaker, will the ships lying at anchor at the head of the lakes, which are now empty, be loaded in anticipation of the shipping season and, if so, when will this take place?


Jean-Luc Pepin: This is part of the accepted objective, Mr. Speaker.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, for several days we have been endeavouring to find out from the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce why box cars are not made available on C.P.R. lines. Did the president or one of the highest officials of the C.P.R. on the occasion that the minister met with him in the last few days say that the responsibility was that of the minister, because when wheat was not made available last fall the C.P.R. had many cars prepared to transport wheat?


Jean-Luc Pepin: That is a debatable point, Mr. Speaker.


John George Diefenbaker: That is what he said to you.



REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT


Hon. Jean Marchand (Minister of Forestry and Rural Development):: Mr. Speaker, in response to questions asked yesterday I am happy now to announce that I expect to be able to sign the development agreement with Prince Edward Island on March 7, a week from today. I understand there were earlier reports of this from Charlottetown, but I should say that they were premature. For some time we have been aiming at that date but it was only this morning that I completed the negotiations that make it possible.
February 28, 1969


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: Mr. Speaker, in view of this agreement, because of its importance to the province and the country, and its comprehensive nature, would the minister prefer to make a statement on motions some time next week indicating to some degree the nature and details of this plan?


Jean Marchand: I am willing to consider that, Mr. Speaker, but I cannot make the statement before the agreement is signed.



VIOLENT DISTURBANCES


Mr. Steven E. Paproski (Edmonton Centre):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the Solicitor General. I have a very serious question for him arising out of a statement made yesterday in the Quebec legislature by Mr. Lesage, the leader of the provincial Liberal party. Is it a fact, as indicated by Mr. Lesage, that the government of Quebec has declined or at least not requested the assistance of the R.C.M.P. in investigating terrorist attacks in that province?


Hon. G. J. Mcllrailh (Solicitor General):: Mr. Speaker, I have no knowledge of the statements made yesterday in the provincial assembly in Quebec, but it is a fact that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police are cooperating with and assisting both the Quebec Provincial Police and the Montreal City Police.


Hon. Marcel Lambert (Edmonton West):: Is
the minister in a position to answer the question I asked him two days ago on this area?


George James McIlraith: No, Mr. Speaker, I prefer to answer that question on Monday.



NATIONAL DEFENCE


Mr. Andrew Brewin (Greenwood):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the Minister of National Defence. Inasmuch as Governor Milliken of Michigan has made representations to the government of the United States against the placing of a proposed A.B.M. site near Detroit, and as there is considerable concern in Windsor and vicinity about this whole matter, will the minister look into it and discuss it with his colleague, the Secretary of State for External Affairs, and perhaps make representations to the United States government about it?
Inquiries of the Ministry


Hon. Leo Cadieux (Minister of National Defence):: I will consider this question very carefully, Mr. Speaker.


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: Mr. Speaker, as a supplementary question, in view of the importance of this matter to our country can the minister tell us whether the government is giving consideration to including in its report on defence, to be made at the end of March a statement as to its own position with respect to this matter?


Léo Alphonse Joseph Cadieux: Mr. Speaker, I think the position of the government was stated last year when the renewal of the NORAD agreement was announced by the Secretary of State for External Affairs. I think he said at that time that Canada was not participating in A.B.M.'s.


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: As a further supplementary question, I wonder if the minister would see to it that in this statement at the end of March there be included some statement as to our position with respect to installations near Canadian territory?



EXHIBITIONS


Mr. Barney Danson (York North):: Mr. Speaker, my question is supplementary to that of the hon. member for Prince Edward-Hastings to the Acting Prime Minister in relation to the Canadian National Exhibition. I would like to ask the Acting Prime Minister if he is aware of any positive representations that have been made to the government regarding specific plans for assistance to the Canadian National Exhibition?
I would also like to ask if it is improper for members from metropolitan areas to ask occasional questions, as suggested by the hon. member for Swift Current-Maple Creek?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.


Gerald William Baldwin: As a
supplementary question, Mr. Speaker-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Before a supplementary question is asked, may I inquire whether the hon. member is asking a supplementary to the question asked by the hon. member for York North, because I found it difficult to determine whether the hon. member for York North was asking a question or making a representation?


Barnett Jerome Danson: I am sorry, Mr. Speaker. My question was in relation to any specific
February 28, 1969

Inquiries of the Ministry proposals for the Canadian National Exhibi-	TELEVISION
tion that might have been made to the transaction between government and Canadian government.	Geoffrey Stirling


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Peace River.


John (Jack) McIntosh: On a point of order-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


John (Jack) McIntosh: Seeing he mentioned my name, and he being a new member in this house-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


John (Jack) McIntosh: Just a moment. The hon. member, being a new member here, should be acquainted with the rules and regulations of this house, and as you know well, Mr. Speaker-and maybe he does not know,-any question at this period in the day should be of national importance and of urgency and-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


John (Jack) McIntosh: -and as I said before-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


John (Jack) McIntosh: -I think it is your duty, sir-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Perhaps the hon. member might be allowed to complete his remarks. I have the impression that what he is saying would be of interest to many members of the house.


Gerald William Baldwin: My supplementary question is directed to the Acting Prime Minister. Would he use his good offices to make sure that the members of parliament from metropolitan Toronto are given the freedom asked by the hon. member for York East (Mr. Otto) to make representations in standing committees regarding matters such as this?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: Most certainly, yes, Mr. Speaker; and I agree that a renewed, revitalized, modern Canadian National Exhibition is a matter of national concern and interest.


George Harris Hees: Then would the minister answer my question? Is the government going to fulfil the pledge of the former prime minister to give this great national exhibition the financial assistance it has asked for?


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I have the impression that this question has given us enough difficulty this morning. The right hon. member for Cape Breton-East Richmond.


Mr. Donald Maclnnis (Cape Breton-East Richmond):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the Acting Prime Minister whether representatives of the C.R.T.C. discussed the ethics of any transaction between Geoffrey Stirling and a minister of the Crown.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: Mr. Speaker, I really do not know, but I will refer the question to the responsible minister.


Donald MacInnis: Mr. Speaker, I would think the Acting Prime Minister should be responsible. However my question is this: Why is it that the minister who had this question put to him several months ago did not come up with an answer? I suggest this question cannot be ruled out of order because the ethics of a cabinet minister are of urgent national importance. I ask just what he is hiding.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.


Donald MacInnis: I rise on a point of order, Mr. Speaker, because of the urgency and importance of the ethics of any cabinet minister. This is a question which has been before this house on a number of occasions. If the ministers in the cabinet do not feel the ethics of any of their colleagues is their responsibility, then I think it is time this government took the responsibility and came forward with the truth. If need be, this urgent and national question will be put before them every week.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: On the same point of order-


Mr. Speaker:: This is not a point of order. The hon. member knows similar questions have been raised before. My feeling has always been that if a member wishes to make a charge against another member on one side of the house or the other there is a way to do it, according to the rules. For the protection of all members on both sides of the house I think we should adhere to the rules in this regard.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a question of privilege. I too, think the ethics of ordinary members of parliament are important. I think for ordinary members of parliament to commit character assassination through innuendo is beneath contempt.


Donald MacInnis: Mr. Speaker, my question of privilege
February 28, 1969

now arises from the remarks of the Acting Prime Minister, who mentioned character assassination by innuendo. All I ask the Acting Prime Minister to do is prove that this is innuendo, and prove to this house that there is-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. It is obvious to me that this certainly is not the House of Commons at its best, but I will hear the hon. member.


Donald MacInnis: Mr. Speaker, it is pretty hard to have the house at its best when the Prime Minister himself refers to them as bums and idiots, and some of them now refer to themselves as fools. They seem to be taking objection to their Prime Minister's words. These were not my words: It was the Prime Minister who referred to them as bums and idiots.


Mr. Speaker:: I suggest the hon. member has made his point. The Minister of Transport has replied and I am wondering whether we are accomplishing anything by proceeding with this matter. I have no objection, because I must sit here, whether it is to hear points of order, questions of privilege or questions during the question period. However it seems to me that hon. members would like to go on to the other business before the house.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


Donald MacInnis: On the question of privilege, Mr. Speaker, may I make it quite clear that it was not any member on this side of the house that had the press indicate they had borrowed $2,000 for video equipment.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.



THE BUDGET


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Finance. It is based on an interview he had a few days ago with Victor Mackie, whom we all know to be a veteran reporter of high repute. Has the minister now decided to make an economic report to parliament in May or June and if so will it be a budget, a non-budget or something else?


Edgar John Benson: As
I have stated in the house I intend to make a report regardless of whether or not any tax
Inquiries of the Ministry changes are to be brought forward. There are various definitions of a budget. One definition says it can be simply an economic report, and another says it involves a change in fiscal measures. Nevertheless I have indicated that from time to time, whether it is through a formal budget speech or through other methods-and this could be arranged of course, because budget days are really opposition days

I would bring forward a statement to indicate how well the economy is moving forward and how good the forecasts were that we made last October.


Gerald William Baldwin: In spite of the government.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Can
the minister give a definite date for this and, particularly, will he make his statement before the boom busts?


Edgar John Benson: I do not think the boom, as my friend calls it, is going to bust. I think Canada can look forward to a very good year economically this year. I cannot give the exact date.


George Harris Hees: I have a supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. As the minister in his interview with Mr. Clive Baxter of the Financial Post indicated the government is considering the imposition of a capital gains tax, has he made any decision on this?


Edgar John Benson: I gave exactly the opposite impression, as my hon. friend would see if he would read the article. I simply said the government had not made up its mind in this regard. That is all I said.



FINANCE


Mr. Gordon Ritchie (Dauphin):: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question for the Minister of Finance. Will he clarify whether, after the introduction of the white paper on taxation, the public will be invited to make submissions to the parliamentary committee and be given the widest possible latitude.


Edgar John Benson: It
is to be referred to the parliamentary committee. It will be up to the committee to decide whether or not public hearings are held, but I would sincerely hope they would have them.
February 28, 1969

Inquiries of the Ministry EXTERNAL AFFAIRS



THE SICOTTE CASE-POSSIBLE ABUSES OF DIPLOMATIC PRIVILEGES BY CANADIANS

Mr.  R. Gordon L. Fairwealher@Fundy-Roy-al: Mr. Speaker, this question is for the Acting Prime Minister. Does the government recognize that the public interest is seriously involved in the Sicotte case, as it has been for some years, and if so may I ask what steps have been taken to have an independent inquiry made into this situation.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: Mr. Speaker, I have nothing further to add to what the Solicitor General has already said in respect of this question. He has already indicated that the facts are being investigated. I do not think it will be helpful for me to say anything beyond that.


Mr. Fairwealher:: Mr. Speaker, will the Acting Prime Minister undertake to bring this question, which is presented seriously, to the attention of the Prime Minister for an answer by him when next the right hon. gentleman is in the house.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: The representations made by the hon. member will of course be brought to the Prime Minister's attention.



MEETING BETWEEN PRIME MINISTER AND PRESIDENT NIXON-MARKETING POLICIES DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE

Mr. John Burton (Regina East):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct this question to the Acting Prime Minister. Will future oil marketing policies be discussed by the Prime Minister when he meets with President Nixon, and will Canada's policy be one of integration with United States supply, or will there be greater emphasis on developing Canadian and other markets for Canadian oil?


Jean-Luc Pepin: Mr. Speaker, as the Prime Minister said the other day, the agenda for the meeting is not yet set.
Mr. Speaker, may I use this occasion to say, on behalf of the Acting Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources that after full consultation with the Canadian government, the government of the United States has made publicly available the text of an exchange of correspondence dated September 25, 1967 between our two countries relating to arrangements for the export of Canadian oil to the United States. The immediate occasion for the
[Mr. Benson.1
declassification of this correspondence has been a request from a company involved in proceedings before the Interstate Commerce Commission relating to the supply of Canadian oil to the Chicago area.
May I now, on behalf of the Acting Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources, ask the permission of the house to table the documents.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: have a supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. In view of the statement by the minister in reference to a question asked by an hon. member, would he be prepared now to table this correspondence which may cover the period 1967 and 1968, so we may analyse just what the negotiations were?


Jean-Luc Pepin: Would my hon. friend help me get support from the rest of the house to do so?


Mr. Speaker:: Has the minister leave to table these documents?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.



ST. ROMUALD, QUE.-USE OF WESTERN OIL IN NEW REFINERY

["The first, second or third questions usually go on for 15 or 20 minutes, with seven or eight supplementary questions being asked. When the Chair attempts to disallow a supplementary there is always a very convincing argument put forward by hon. members, as to why the supplementary should be allowed. I might mention also that the question period was allowed to go on this morning for four minutes longer than the prescribed time, in the hope that a few more questioners might be allowed to participate.\nI do try from day to day to take note of hon. members who have unsuccessfully attempted to ask questions, and I make an effort the following day to recognize them. I will certainly keep in mind the suggestion made by the hon. member for St. John's East."]
John Stratford Burton: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Is the government carrying on any discussions with oil or refining interests with respect to the possibility of using western Canadian oil as a source of supply for the new refinery at St. Romuald, Quebec, or does the government intend to undertake such discussions?


Jean-Luc Pepin: I am not acquainted with the details of this matter, Mr. Speaker, but it would certainly be a complete change from the national oil policy as it now stands.



Mr. P. V. Noble (Grey-Simcoe):: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Prime Minister perhaps his parliamentary secretary will take this question as notice. Has the Prime Minister done anything about his undertaking to sample public opinion in regard to Canada's recognition of the Vatican?


Mr. J. E. Walker (Parliamentary Secretary to Prime Minister):: I will see that this question is brought to the Prime Minister's attention, Mr. Speaker.
February 28, 1969	COMMONS


Mr. James A. McGralh (St. John's East):: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. A number of members on this side of the house have been trying, without success, to get Your Honour's eye since the question period started. Many members have not been able to get Your Honour's eye, although they have attempted to do so. I ask Your Honour to take this into consideration at the next sitting of the house.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member realizes that there are only 40 minutes allowed for questions. Nothing would please me more than having an opportunity of calling on all hon. members. This is why I very often suggest to hon. members that the questions asked in the first instance sometimes take, in my view, too much of the time of the question period.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


Mr. Speaker:: The first, second or third questions usually go on for 15 or 20 minutes, with seven or eight supplementary questions being asked. When the Chair attempts to disallow a supplementary there is always a very convincing argument put forward by hon. members, as to why the supplementary should be allowed. I might mention also that the question period was allowed to go on this morning for four minutes longer than the prescribed time, in the hope that a few more questioners might be allowed to participate.
I do try from day to day to take note of hon. members who have unsuccessfully attempted to ask questions, and I make an effort the following day to recognize them. I will certainly keep in mind the suggestion made by the hon. member for St. John's East.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Thursday, February 27, consideration in committee of the whole of Bill C-173, respecting the organization of the government of Canada and matters relating or incidental thereto-Mr. Trudeau-Mr. Faulkner in the chair.
DEBATES	6067
Government Organization
The Chairman:: Order. When the committee rose last night clause 2 of part I of the bill, relating to the Department of Fisheries and Forestry, was under consideration.
On clause 2-Department established.


Mr. Harding:: Mr. Chairman, it is not my intention to hold up the passage of this clause but I would like to say a few words on fisheries and forestry. Before commencing my remarks on this matter I must say that it is rather nice to have a little touch of British Columbia in the chamber today. The beautiful daffodils that most hon. members are wearing are just a sign of the early spring which we usually get in British Columbia. It gives me just that much more pleasure to be able to speak on a day like this.


James Hugh Faulkner: Order, please. I wonder if we could have quiet in the chamber, please, particularly from behind the curtains.


Randolph Harding: Thank you, Mr. Chairman; it was rather noisy.
The few remarks I would like to make on this clause deal with the matter of the conservation of our forestry and fishing resources. There is today more than ever before in the history of this country a desperate need for very close co-operation between the federal and provincial authorities on all aspects of the forest industry. The minister may say that forestry is primarily a provincial responsibility, and this is so; the provincial governments do the cropping, and there is no doubt that they lay out the program which companies must follow as far as forestry resources are concerned. But it must be remembered that the forest industry supplies many hundreds of millions of dollars to the federal treasury. We have our hand in the forestry till right up to the elbow. I am of the opinion, and have been for years, that we do not return a sufficient sum of money to perpetuate this resource. I believe this applies to every province in the Dominion of Canada.
A few years ago the general feeling was that we had such a vast abundance of trees and fish that we did not have to bother too much about conservation measures. As a consequence, we embarked upon a wild spree to see how quickly we could, in effect, get rid of some of these resources, and today, in 1969, we find we are in serious trouble on all fronts in this respect. The other day an hon. member asked the minister which cap he will wear when dealing with fisheries and forestry. The hon. member was referring to the
February 28. 1969

Government Organization spraying of various type of trees to prevent disease, and the spray getting into the rivers and killing some runs of fish. I will come back to this problem. I think the members of this house have a job to do in regard to resource conservation, and we must face up to that job.
I believe we need a co-ordinating committee to co-ordinate the activities of all departments as far as resource conservation and management are concerned. I have all the respect and regard in the world for the minister's abilities, but he will have a tough job ahead of him. I know he is not in a position to go to a provincial government and say: You cannot build a pulpmill here, or a pulpmill there. But this is part of the planning that I am talking about. This is an area in which we must have far more co-operation provincially and federally than we have ever had before.
e (12 noon)
Someone has mentioned that this problem should be taken up at another constitutional conference, and I certainly agree with that. I think we should sit around the table with the provincial authorities and come to some clearcut, definite agreement on how and where the two levels of government can augment each other's programs for the benefit of all Canadians. It would be a tragedy if we were to allow the depletion of a resource. For example, let us consider the case of a pulpmill. If we were to allow the effluent from the pulp mill to pollute the streams it would wipe out the product on which the livelihood of a number of people depends, namely, the fish which spawn in these streams.
To date there has not been sufficient cooperation between the two levels of government to wipe out the problem I have mentioned. I can give instance after instance- and the minister is well aware of them- where we have started to develop one resource without any over-all plan. The consequence has been that within a few years' time another resource has been adversely affected. We are trapped in plans of our own making because, as I said, there has been a complete lack of liaison and co-operation between the two levels of government. It is absolutely essential for us to break this down if we are really to plan for proper resource development both at the federal and provincial levels.
I should like to come back to forestry for a few minutes, but I will not spend too much time on this subject. I am well aware of the

programs which are being carried out by the federal department concerned with forestry and of the research that has been undertaken in this field, but I believe that better use should be made at the federal level of the economic returns which come into the federal treasury and that this should be done in cooperation with the provincial authorities.
Let us consider reforestation. There has been great negligence in this area and every provincial government is almost equally as guilty. Our forests have been cut down and there have been insufficient replanting programs. This has occurred in practically all the provinces with the exception of Saskatchewan where a pretty good program was initiated a number of years ago under the C.C.F. government. They looked to the future in their replanting and cutting programs. We find in British Columbia today that many thousands of acres are lost every year through burning and cutting and that different types of trees grow on them which form a cover over the acreage. The first thing we know we find millions of acres of good land in British Columbia covered by rough growth which could and should be producing crops. This is one field where further assistance could be given by the federal authorities. There is also a shortage of nurseries for growing nursery stock, but most of all there is a shortage of money to hire people to replant some of these areas.
I suggest to the federal government and to the minister that the returns to the federal department justify more thought on the subject, and more effort should be made to replant this waste land. It can be called waste land because it will take a long time before natural regeneration can take place and another crop of trees can mature. The return is in the hundreds of millions of dollars, and I believe that this problem must be taken care of if our forestry program is to be satisfactory.
There is another aspect of forestry where federal assistance could be provided 'and that is in the prevention of forest fires. A vast co-ordinating system should be set up in this country and expenditures should be made by the federal government to assist the various provinces when the scourge of forest fires hits them. This is another aspect which I would like to bring to the minister's attention, and I suggest that something should be done along these lines. There are all kinds of training programs and techniques which some of the provinces possibly cannot afford, and in this
February 28, 1969	COMMONS
regard they should be assisted by the federal government.
We were speaking about resource conservation, a subject in which I have been interested all my life. Over the years I have collected much interesting material on what can happen when resource conservation is not properly carried out in the cropping of some of our resources. There is a good example on Vancouver Island which I should like to give to the house. Four or five years ago there was an improvement in the situation due to federal planning, I am glad to say. One cannot blame the federal government for the small problem which I will describe. It has really been a provincial program which has allowed a logging operation to be carried out at the headwaters of the small streams on Vancouver Island with the result that an entire run of salmon yielding over $1 million a year was wiped out. The minister cannot tell the department of forestry of British Columbia that they must prevent this from happening. This is where the careful nurturing of these resources must take place. There are some difficulties to be faced. For example, where does logging in the watersheds stop for the good of the community generally?
I have here a few notes which I would like to read to the house. They deal with a little river called the Tsolum, a small stream on Vancouver Island that runs into the sea. A few years ago before logging took place in the upper reaches of this river it had a fine run of different types of salmon which normally come to the coastal rivers as my friend the minister probably knows better than I. Pink and chum salmon used to swarm up the 22 miles to the foot of Mount Washington from which this stream came down where the shale outcrops formed walls and halted the salmon in their search for spawning ground. Just about every mile of this stream was used by the fish prior to the logging operation taking place. More than 150,000 chum, 200,000 pink salmon and, later in the fall, 50,000 coho use this little stream for spawning. Year after year they return to the river to spawn and, of course, the fry make their way to the ocean eventually to mature.
[DOT] (12:10 p.m.)
Hon. members can try to estimate their value in terms of dollars if they like. The International Salmon Commission estimates, that for each salmon on the beds, between 2.4 and 4.2 salmon have been caught by the fishing fleet. Let us take an average of three.
DEBATES	6069
Government Organization This produces a figure of 450,000 to 600,000 pink salmon from this one little stream. They are worth about 50 cents each to the fishermen, so the total amount would be between $225,000 and $300,000 derived from this one species of fish alone. There are the runs of chum at 18 cents a pound. These fish weigh about eight or nine pounds each and the return to the fishermen runs between $675,000 and $900,000. Then there are the coho. Fifty thousand used to spawn and they too have value. Making allowance for natural disasters the value to the fishermen derived from this one little stream would be at least a million dollars.
What happened? Logging of the watershed began. This illustrates the point I am making; we are so foolish and stupid about these things. Trees were removed from the watershed and in the absence of forest covering the stream dwindled to a hot trickle. The federal government attempted to divert water from elsewhere to build up the flow during summer and repair some of the damage done. This was a good conservation move but it would not have been necessary if proper care had been taken by the provincial authorities who were responsible for the trouble in the first place. Last year, was a wet year and conditions were relatively good, but the year before there was only a trickle of water flowing. As a result, the number of chum spawning in the channel was cut to less than 100 and in 1963 it was down to 25 from the vast number which had used the stream earlier. This is what I have in mind when I talk about the conservation of resources. These are things to weigh in the balance. I am thinking of the log run which might have harmed the salmon fishery last year, of the dispute between the province and the federal government, of the continuing pollution in our streams, of the continuing pollution of the Fraser. If we are not careful, we are going to destroy some of the finest salmon spawning beds in the whole of Canada.
These are some of the realities we must face. The minister will find himself in a difficult position. I understand that his responsibilities are federal, but the need for a coordinated attack is essential. More work has to be done. This is my appeal to the minister and to the house today. The fishing industry perhaps does a good job in trying to preserve certain species of fish. But then we allow some stupid move, some unco-ordinated action by another department, to destroy all the good which has been done. This is why I appeal for better co-ordination in the over-all
February 28, 1969

Government Organization set-up. For example, if the debris from strip mining is likely to pollute our streams and desecrate our countryside, it should be checked. Each one of us has a share in this work and every single Canadian has to play a part. Some people will be hurt. Some unpopular decisions will have to be taken. But we are reaching the point at which our resources are dwindling. A good deal more could and should be done.
There is one more point I should like to make in connection with forestry. Every year we see the raw material leaving Canada in increasing amounts. It is time members of this house, members of provincial legislatures and members of organizations all over this country rose up in protest. We are shipping logs to Japan from British Columbia in ever-increasing quantities while half our own labour force is out of work because there are no logs for their mills. When will we learn that it is the fabrication in our own country of raw materials of this kind that provides work for our people? We are losing tens of millions of dollars by shipping out raw material which could and should be fabricated in Canada, giving jobs to Canadians in the Canadian setting. We have been negligent in this connection. Again I thank you, Mr. Chairman, for this opportunity to put the subject of resource conservation before the house.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


James Aloysius McGrath: Mr. Chairman, it is not my intention to unduly delay the passage of this particular clause of the bill. Friday seems to be becoming a traditional fish day in the house, perhaps to the chagrin of the Minister of Fisheries, but I am grateful to have this opportunity to refer briefly to the statement made by the minister on February 20 which to my mind is certainly the most important statement ever made in this house on the subject of the fisheries and one which amounts to a real breakthrough in fisheries development in Canada.
I am glad the opportunity is afforded to me in connection with part I of this bill to say to the minister that I think his statement was an excellent one. This is a view shared by the groundfish industry and by the government of Newfoundland. It is also shared by the fishermen's union in Newfoundland and, I submit, by most of the members of this house. The minister is to be complimented on his statement. My only regret is that he did not make the statement last fall.
fMr. Harding.]
[DOT] (12:20 p.m.)
Having said that, there are a few matters I should like to mention to the minister. I particularly wish to express a concern of mine which is shared by a number of hon. members. Will the fishermen be the ultimate beneficiaries under this plan? I hold no brief for the operators of fish plants with the exception of their role in fisheries development and operation. But in my view I do have a great deal of responsibility for the ordinary fisherman.
It was pointed out last night by one hon. member that one of the features of this new policy will be the raising of price levels for frozen groundfish products. My concern is whether this will have the effect of raising the income level of the fisherman. As pointed out last night, and it bears repetition, the commodity item we are talking of here, frozen cod blocks, range in price anywhere from a low of 19 cents a pound to a high of 29 cents. The price to the fisherman who does most of the work and takes the risk will range anywhere from one and a half cents a pound, depending on buyer and area, to three and a half cents a pound if he is lucky. As a consequence of this injustice, the fishermen of Newfoundland enjoy the lowest income of any group in Canada, an income so far below the poverty line that it makes one wonder how they can possibly survive. I realize that the minister shares this concern. I should like to hear him say at some future date, or perhaps during the course of this debate, that the government will take steps to ensure that the level of income of our fishermen is raised to the point where they can at least retain their self-respect in the community.
I invite any hon. member to go to a settlement where there is a fish plant. The disparity of income is obvious. In a big house on the hill lives the owner and operator of the fish plant. In modest little frame houses below the hill live the fishermen who are denied the amenities of life to which as Canadians they should be entitled. They are denied these amenities because up until this point they are, as primary producers, the forgotten segment of the industry.
Hon. members will be interested to know that when the minimum wage law of Newfoundland was amended last year to bring the minimum wage for men up to $1 per hour from 70 cents and for women up to 70 cents from 50 cents, the people really deserving of the protection of that minimum wage law were excluded from the provisions of the act.
February 28, 1969

Fish plant workers, who work 50 to 60 hours a week, were excluded from those provisions, and as a result it can be said that in Newfoundland the industry is being subsidized by the fishermen and workers.
The minister has been to fish plants. He knows that workers there have to stand at a table in the cold and damp for ten hours a day cutting fish that has been packed in ice in a trawler. It is the most difficult and uncomfortable type of work that a person could engage in. Yet these people are excluded from the minimum wage legislation in Newfoundland. I hope that the Minister of Fisheries will show a greater sense of justice and fair play to the fishermen and plant workers of Newfoundland than has been shown them by the government of that province.
I should now like to refer briefly to the centralization program in which the federal government is engaged co-operatively with the government of Newfoundland. To my mind the government has not taken sufficient precaution to ensure that the consequences of the centralization program are such as to improve the lot of the people who will have to be moved. I am very much afraid that the government of Canada has been hoodwinked in this regard.
I say that because in my view one of the principal features of the centralization program is that the administration of welfare programs by the government of Newfoundland is made easier. I urge the government to look very carefully at what they are doing here. After all, when human beings are moved from one settlement to another it is almost a forced migration. These people dare not resist the government since, owing to circumstances over which they have no control, they are totally dependent on the government. They are forced to move from villages and ancestral homes to centralized welfare ghettos-regrettably, that is what they are -where they very rapidly lose their dignity and sense of security, having been uprooted from their own homes and villages in which they grew up and in which they felt at least some sense of security both from the elements and from the bureaucracy.
I am not suggesting that everything about the centralization program is wrong; it has many good features. What I am suggesting is that human lives are involved in it. We are not talking about herding cattle into central areas; human beings are involved. It is not
Government Organization enough for the minister to say that mistakes have been made but that the program is being improved all the time. I submit that not a single Canadian ought to be obliged to leave his home unless the government has satisfied itself of the wisdom of its action and has examined very carefully the social consequences flowing from this type of move as well as all other circumstances. In my view, those who have been moved find themselves living under conditions considerably below the standards they enjoyed in the villages from whence they came. I am concerned about the matter and I hope my remarks do not fall on deaf ears.
[DOT] (12:30 p.m.)
In his statement on February 20 the minister indicated that the government was contemplating bringing in a measure to set up a marketing board for salt codfish. We await the announcement of the establishment of that board with anticipation. To my mind, the fishermen of Newfoundland who catch and cure the fish have benefited little in the past 20 years from any advances made in sales of cod, largely because they are the victims of ruthless competition in this field. Our exporters who sell cod to low income Latin, Mediterranean and Caribbean countries have had to compete with highly subsidized exporters from countries like Spain, France and, I believe, Norway. A salt fish marketing board will cure this injustice. After it has been established I hope it will be permitted to come under the aegis of the Minister of Fisheries and not the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce. In my view, the peculiarities of marketing salt cod can only be dealt with adequately by the Department of Fisheries. All the same, despite the great promises in the new policy enunciated by the minister on February 20, I cannot help feeling concerned about the future of the salt cod industry. Steps must be taken to protect this important Canadian industry from setbacks it might suffer as the result of fluctuations in foreign exchange rates. The more quickly the minister makes his statement about the new marketing board, the happier I shall be.
I now wish to raise the matter of river wardens' pay. Anyone who has had the golden opportunity to fish for salmon in our rivers no doubt has come up against the river warden who must work 24 hours a day in season. Poachers do not operate in daylight, and our wardens have great responsibilities in conserving the fish stocks of our rivers. For their duties they are grossly underpaid, not having
February 28, 1969

Government Organization had a pay increase for a great number of years. Even 20 years ago our wardens were underpaid. They are the forgotten men of the Department of Fisheries. I hope the minister will have a chance to wet his line and go salmon fishing this year. He may then talk to some of these fine men who protect our rivers and conserve our salmon stocks. When the estimates are finally brought down for the next financial year I hope that consideration will be given to the plight of the river wardens and that they will be recompensed not only for the work they do but for the period during the winter months when they cannot work. These dedicated men love their work and protect our rivers. Unfortunately they are not being paid enough.
I hope that forestry matters in the new department will not absorb too much of the minister's attention at the expense of our fishing industry. In my view, it was a mistake to merge the fisheries and forestry portfolios. Nevertheless, in its wisdom the government has decided to merge them. I hope the minister will not lose sight of his tremendous responsibilities to our fishing industry. Perhaps he will consider enlarging his department and appointing two deputy ministers of fisheries, one responsible for the west coast and the freshwater fish industry and the other responsible for the Atlantic fish industry.


Mr. McCleave:: Mr. Chairman, I wish to make three brief comments. It might be apt for me to say to the minister who comes from British Columbia, which is celebrating the arrival of spring, that the Halifax area had springlike weather from mid-December until the first day of this week. We are not grateful to British Columbia for getting rid of its winter weather and dumping it on the Halifax area.
The first point I wish to raise concerns conservation. Lobster fishermen in my area advise me that scuba divers operating from yachts out of Halifax have been terrorizing the lobster population in places like Sambro harbour. Pretending they are out on innocent scuba diving operations, the divers go down to the bottom and, with hand pots, take the hapless lobsters. By the time our lobster fishermen get to the area the lobsters have been devoured. I submit that the enforcement officers of the department ought to examine this problem which is of serious import to our lobster fishermen. For the fellow on the yacht the exercise is simply a playful diversion, but for the fisherman it means a loss of livelihood.

My second point concerns the amplification of the lobster licensing program announced by the minister. In particular I wish to deal with the provision which says that where lobster boats were jointly owned and operated in 1968 and were permitted under the regulations of that year to fish with 50 per cent more lobster pots they may continue fishing with 50 per cent more lobster pots. Apparently permission to fish with the increased number of traps is withdrawn when one of the partners in the enterprise withdraws from lobster fishing. I point out to the minister that very often a lobster fishing boat is run as a father and son operation. In most instances the partnership is broken up on the death of the senior lobster fisherman, the father. With a certain class of boats it is an absolute requirement that at least two people be fishing from them if the boat is to work effectively.
[DOT] (12:40 p.m.)
The minister may find that new problems will be created by suddenly wiping out the 50 per cent extra privilege. As an example, the capital burden will have to be borne by the survivor rather than by the two people. In the case of a father and son, if the father dies the surviving owner would have to hire somebody and would not be able to give him the advantage of joint ownership of the boat. In addition, the survivor would have to bear the financial burden involved in a catch only two-thirds of what was previously permitted. I realize the minister and his officials have shown good will and great adaptability in listening to the points of the fishermen, for which I thank them, but I utter the warning that this is a problem that may cause them great difficulties in the future.
I am sorry that the reorganization bill does not give the minister more power in the building of wharves. The wharf program as it relates to fisheries should be handled by the Department of Fisheries rather than the Department of Public Works. The Department of Public Works could still supervise the building, but the capital program should be the responsibility of the Minister of Fisheries. The disadvantage of it being the responsibility of the Department of Public Works is that when the government cuts down spending public works programs are affected, and I think this is to the detriment of the fishing industry.
Part of my constituency is the Sambro area where the swordfishery has developed to the point that it is the swordfishing capital of the North Atlantic. It is operated from a wharf
February 28, 1969

built in the days of R. B. Bennett. The underpinning of the wharf is reaching a serious stage of deterioration. Some day the wharf may float out to sea. The Department of Public Works has looked at the problem of replacing the wharf and this has been recommended to the central authorities in Ottawa. On one occasion before the election I persuaded the then Minister of Public Works to have this project included in the estimates. After the election new estimates were presented; the Sambro wharf was not included and it was not included in this year's estimates. I am at present taking this matter up with the Minister of Public Works and I hope to have the assistance of the Minister of Fisheries in having the estimate restored. A new wharf in this successful fishing village will promote revenue in an area that now suffers because of a lack of such facilities. I think the minister is aware of this type of problem.
Government reorganization is a recurring phenomenon of our times. When reorganization is dealt with again I hope the Minister of Fisheries will have his own wharf program to enable him to build up growth in natural fishing areas in all parts of Canada.


Mr. Davis:: I would like to comment, Mr. Chairman, on some of the remarks by hon. members. The hon. member for South Shore asked if a market study is being carried out by the Atlantic Development Board. I am informed that this study is nearing completion and the results will be made available not only to the new Department of Regional Economic Expansion but also the fisheries department. This information will be used in our own evaluation of the frozen groundfish market. I know the information will be most useful to the Fisheries Price Support Board when it is determining what action to take in order to stabilize prices for frozen groundfish, particularly in the United States market.
The hon. member also asked about the timing of our announcement with regard to frozen groundfish. One of the considerations was the state of the market itself. I think the timing of the announcement has been fortunate as our selling price is now beginning to move up and I hope will move up appreciably in the next few weeks. As several members have stated, the price for codfish blocks has been in the 20 to 21 cent range. It is now firming up, rising several cents since my announcement. I am hopeful it will rise in the near future to 27 or 28 cents.
The hon. member for Fraser Valley West asked about the Indian fisheries program in
Government Organization British Columbia. The Department of Indian Affairs has a joint program with the Department of Fisheries. The budget for this program is $4J million. This fund is available to fishermen wishing to purchase old or new vessels or gear. It will also enable the Indian people to instal inshore processing facilities and otherwise to expand their role in the fishing industry. This is a special provision for the native people on the west coast, and I hope it will go a long way toward overcoming the serious unemployment problem in the inshore fishery in B.C.
The hon. member for Coast Chilcotin raised the question of offshore limits and also the question of the establishment of base lines. I am hopeful that in the relatively near future we will be able to satisfy him in that regard.
The hon. member for Victoria asked about sports fishing licences on the west coast. I assure the hon. member I have no intention of setting up a sports fishing licence scheme in respect of the salt water fishery of the west coast of Canada.
The hon. member for Skeena was concerned about what he called the abuse of sport fishing privileges. He must realize that particularly in those areas near Vancouver there is a large number of sports fishermen who have a very substantial investment in sports fishing gear. The recreational interests of those numerous taxpayers should also be borne in mind.
The hon. member for Kootenay West stressed the need for conservation of our resources of both fish and trees. We need a co-ordinated approach to resource development for all our renewable resources, including forests, fish and wildlife. The maximum benefit as far as the Canadian community is concerned must be paramount. This thought must be uppermost in our minds.
I have had discussions with a number of provincial ministers responsible for resources development in an endeavour to co-ordinate our activities, both federal and provincial, in the areas of fisheries and forestry. In particular I have had discussions with the hon. Ray Williston, provincial minister of lands, forests and water resources in British Columbia, in this connection. I am confident he and I will be in touch with one another with regard to joint resource development problems, like river drives, as floating logs can interfere with the salmon resource, and the efficient operation of the forest industry in river systems which are also vital to our fishery.
February 28, 1969

Government Organization
[DOT] (12:50 p.m.)
There are particular cases where pollution from forest industries, for example, pulp mills, is a problem. I am keeping a close eye on a possible new pulp mill in the vicinity of Ashcroft on the Fraser River in British Columbia, and I am working closely with the hon. Ray Williston in this connection. I am hopeful we will be able to work out a program which in no way will be harmful to the salmon industry and yet will allow a new forest industry to go ahead in B.C.
We have a similar problem in New Brunswick. However, there is another element of federal participation in the sense that federal funds are, or will soon be, made available for the construction of additional pulp mill capacity on the Saint John River. In this case I think the federal government must insist that the necessary clean-up facilities be installed in the mills, and indeed the performance of those facilities to a very high standard be guaranteed, before federal money is paid out for the construction of these plants.
We must rehabilitate the Saint John River in New Brunswick for the salmon. We have already spent a great deal of money there on a fish hatchery. It must not be wasted by wilful exploitation of the forest resources upstream, and I am working with the minister of resources for New Brunswick to ensure that we will have the best of both worlds, the best in respect of the fishery as well as the best in respect of forestry.
The hon. member for Kootenay West referred to the problem of exports of logs in the round from western Canada to Japan. I have had a quick look at this problem. My understanding is that less than 2 per cent of the total timber cut in British Columbia is exported to Japan on the average. However, we have had a problem with winter snows this year, and there is now a shortage of available logs for the sawmills in what is a rising market, a very demanding market.
With the prospect of some unemployment in the mills we have, jointly with the minister of lands, forests and water resources in British Columbia, been in touch with the companies responsible for log exports. These exports have now been terminated or will shortly be terminated. This suspension will continue until the log supply problem is resolved, or until September of this year.
I am also taking a look at our longer term policy with regard to log exports, and have some reservations in this connection. Members should know, however, that most of the

logs we export to Japan are not acceptable to our mills in any case. Because the Japanese value wood, any wood, more than we do and because they cut more selectively, the Japanese are able to use what we call culls to make useful products, and so a trade of this nature has some desirable features.
The hon. member for St. John's East raised three important issues. One was the question of whether the fishermen will benefit from the policies we have announced with regard to frozen groundfish and whether they will benefit as a result of the policies we have yet to announce with regard to salt fish. I would like to reassure him to this extent, that the main purpose of these policies is to maximize the income of the fisherman. The hon. member knows as well as I do that the fisherman in the Atlantic region gets on the average three to four cents for his fish in the round. He also knows that the delivered price of frozen groundfish in, say, Boston has been of the order of 21 cents.
That looks like a big spread, but the hon. member also knows those figures are not comparable. The price that the fishermen get, say three to four cents, must be multiplied by a factor of three to allow for the two-thirds of the fish which disappears in the processing phase. It follows that the comparable price to the fisherman is of the order of 9 to 12 cents out of the 21 cents. Roughly speaking, this is true of the fishery all over the country. The fisherman gets about half of the wholesale price of the finished product.
Having said that, I again want to underline the fact that the intention of our policies is to maximize the price to the fisherman. I am sure we will be able to do this in large measure by stabilizing the wholesale price for export. We will endeavour to stabilize this price at as high a level as possible so that the return to the fisherman is also as high as possible.
The hon. member for St. John's East also touched on the difficult problem of what is called centralization. This is really a program for helping people to move where the great majority of them want to move to another centre. As I understand it, the centralizing program, which is a joint federal-provincial program, helps people to move by giving them financial aid if 80 per cent of the people indicate that they want to move.
This program, which runs for another 12 months, is under very active review. Undoubtedly another program will take its place, but whether this new program is to be
February 28. 1969	COMMONS
administered by the new Department of Regional Economic Expansion or the Department of Fisheries and Forestry remains to be seen. Personally I think a lot can be said for the regional development approach because some of these people, perhaps a majority, will not continue in the fishery or at least will not be able to find gainful, productive, and satisfactory employment in the fishery in their new location. It is not exclusively a fisheries problem. It is a problem of employment regardless of the type of occupation that these people take up after their move. So I would say this is a program for the future which must be continued, which must be modified to suit the circumstances, and which most certainly must have regard to employment opportunities over and above those available in the fishery itself.
Finally, the hon. member for Halifax-East Hants raised the question of lobster fish boat regulations. We have instituted a program of licence limitation on the west coast in order to raise the income of fishermen. That is the main purpose of the licence limitation scheme in regard to the lobster fishery on the east coast as well. Mr. Chairman, I think I have covered very briefly most of the points raised by hon. members.


James Aloysius McGrath: The minister forgot to mention whether it is the intention of the department to raise the unjust income of the fish game wardens. I think they now get about $270 a month for long work and tremendous responsibilities.


John (Jack) Davis: I will look into that matter.
[DOT] (1:00 p.m.)


Mr. Crouse:: The program that the minister has announced is one designed to strengthen and stabilize the market price for frozen groundfish products. Could the minister indicate the species of fish that will be supported by this program? This has not been made known in any phase of his announcement. Does it cover all groundfish products or is the minister at the present time at liberty to tell the house the types of fish that are covered by this program?


John (Jack) Davis: I would say it covers all groundfish products. I would not want it to be inferred that the support would necessarily be there for all groundfish products at any one point in time. If the price for flatfish or flounders should be higher than the long-term trend, we would not be endeavouring to support that price. But if the price on cod blocks,
DEBATES	6075
Government Organization for instance, was lower than the long-term trend we would undoubtedly be in the market supporting the price of that particular species.


Robert Jardine McCleave: Would the minister make a comment on my suggestion that the Department of Fisheries undertake the wharf program?


John (Jack) Davis: It is an interesting idea. I will confer with the Minister of Public Works on that matter.


[Stage Direction]
Clause agreed to.
Clause 3 agreed to.
Mr. Kierans:: One o'clock.


The Acting Chairman (Mr. Isabelle):: There
are just a few more clauses.


Mr. Drury:: Mr. Chairman, I believe it is the unanimous wish that we dispose of clauses 4, 5 and 6.


John (Jack) McIntosh: The minister has called it one o'clock, Mr. Chairman.


Joseph Gaston Isabelle: It
being one o'clock I do now leave the chair.
At one o'clock the committee took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The committee resumed at 2 p.m.
On Clause 4-Duties of minister.
Lloyd Roseville Crouse: Mr. Chairman, clause 4 of the bill provides that the duties, powers and functions of the Minister of Fisheries and Forestry shall cover not only the seacoast and inland fisheries but the forest resources of Canada as well. When the bill establishing the Freshwater Fish Marketing Corporation was brought before the house, it was piloted through the house by the Minister without Portfolio. Can the Minister of Fisheries now tell us whether the functions of the Freshwater Fish Marketing Corporation come under his authority, under the authority of the Minister without Portfolio, or under the authority of the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce? Perhaps this point could be clarified in respect of clause 4.


John (Jack) Davis: Mr. Chairman, as the hon. member knows, the act has yet to be proclaimed. The minister responsible can be a minister of
February 2S, 1969

Government Organization any department, as designated by the Prime Minister. The final disposition of that legislation has not yet been determined in that regard.


Lloyd Roseville Crouse: Mr. Chairman, I find myself still in a somewhat confused state. Even though this clause provides that inland fisheries will come under the responsibility of the Minister of Fisheries, am I to understand that the minister cannot inform the house yet whether he will have responsibility for inland fisheries when the act establishing the Freshwater Fish Marketing Corporation is proclaimed? Is this the situation? I submit this creates considerable confusion, and heaven knows we are confused enough already in dealing with a bill of this magnitude which contains 106 clauses and combines apples with oranges and horses with rabbits. Can we not get down to some basis whereby on fisheries matters we can speak definitively and direct our inquiries to the Minister of Fisheries or the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce with some certainty that they are being directed to the proper minister? Unless something is done to establish direction, I submit we will-


James Aloysius McGrath: We will end up like the wheat farmer.


Lloyd Roseville Crouse: One of my colleagues has said that we will end up like the wheat farmer and the problems he faces. We will be like the story that is told about Columbus; we will not know where we came from or where we are going, and when we get there we will not know where we are. Surely the minister can give us a more definite answer than that this matter is still in the hands of the Prime Minister. Anything he can tell the committee by way of information at the present time will be of assistance to us. It will be better than being told that the situation is still up in the air. Does such a situation still exist?


John (Jack) Davis: It is not up in the air, Mr. Chairman. It is in the hands of the Prime Minister.


An hon. Member:: He is up in the air.


John (Jack) Davis: The hon. member has alluded to Christopher Columbus. He arrived at a very good place, and I am sure the freshwater fisheries legislation will do likewise. In any event, the Canadian constitution gives the federal parliament authority with respect to all fisheries wherever they may be carried out, whether offshore in the oceans or inland.


The hon. member also knows that the freshwater inland fisheries have in large measure, been delegated by the nation to the provinces. That was a unilateral act and theoretically can be reversed at any time. But the hon. member has a good point with respect to the freshwater fisheries and I can assure him that the ultimate destination of the responsibility for the freshwater fisheries will be one which is satisfactory to him and to the House.


[Stage Direction]
Clause agreed to.
Clauses 5 and 6 agreed to.
Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: Mr. Chairman, could we now proceed to part II of the bill, dealing with communications ?


Stanley Howard Knowles: Clause 7 is the next clause.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: I would hope we would not deal only with clause 7 but with part II, communications as a whole, which would be clauses 7 to 12 inclusive.


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.
[DOT] (2:10 p.m.)


The Deputy Chairman:: We are now on
clause 7.
On clause 7-Department established.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Chairman, I rise on a point of order. I assume the understanding is that on clause 7 we will have latitude to discuss the whole communications department and that this will not preclude discussion of the other clauses after we have passed clause 7.


Eric William Kierans: Mr. Chairman, the second section of this bill concerns the creation of a new department of government, a Department of Communications, to be headed by a Minister of Communications who will, at one and the same time, be responsible for the Post Office. Involved, therefore, is a new cabinet title, a rearrangement of existing ministerial responsibilities and, most important of all, the creation of a new department responsible for a field of activity that is relatively new in terms of its importance in national affairs, which is undergoing rapid and decisive change and which has, quite aside from its scientific and industrial importance, profound implications, social, cultural and political. For these reasons my speech will take a slightly unconventional tone; it will also be relatively long, which is not, I am afraid, unconventional. The duties and the areas of responsibility
February 28, 1988

of the new department are described in the bill itself and in necessarily juridical prose. These, I believe, can best be studied at the clause by clause stage of the bill. Instead I intend to address myself to more basic questions: What the department is, what it is doing and, above all, what it hopes and intends to be doing.
First, what is the department? The simplest explanation is usually the most descriptive: It is a department of communications. Communications, to resort to a dictionary definition, means "to transmit information". The word is derived from the Latin, com-municare, meaning to transmit, or to participate. These two root meanings of communications, the one a passive act the other an active one, are both integral to the purpose and functions of the department as I shall explain later in my speech. The origin of the department dates back to July 12, 1968, and a statement by the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) which I quote:
The growing importance of communications and the government's increasing involvement necessitates that one department and minister be made responsible for all government activities in this field. Consequently, a new department will be formed, to which will be transferred the functions of the Post Office Department.

This legislation executes the Prime Minister's statement of intent, with one change in structure which I will explain in a moment. Combined and rationalized under a single minister are all of the government's activities in the field of communications, that is both communications in its modern, electronic sense, and communications in its traditional sense of the Post Office. Our responsibility will be with the medium, not with the message, but, as I shall describe at the end of my speech, these two functions are inter-related and inter-dependent, and we intend to be fully aware of the inter-action between the two.
As the Prime Minister stated, the object of this legislation is to make a single minister responsible for all government activities in the field of communications. As honourable members will see from the departmental chart which has been distributed to them, the Minister of Communications is responsible for two departments, each headed by a deputy minister, and also for a number of government agencies. The departments are, of course, the Department of Communications itself and the Post Office. The agencies which will now report to parliament through the
29130-3S5J
Government Organization Minister of Communications are the C.O.T.C., the Canadian Overseas Telecommunications Corporation; the Canadian Transport Commission, but specifically only that segment of the C.T.C. concerned with the regulation of telecommunication rates, and, once it is established by legislation, the domestic satellite corporation. To ensure that all these institutions operate in the closest co-operation and consultation, there will be created a policy review committee, coordinated by the Deputy Minister of Communications, and comprised of the senior officials of the two departments and of the crown corporations.
Before dealing with the Department of Communications, which is totally new, I would like to deal with a department which is old, and familiar to all-namely the Post Office. This legislation directly affects the Post Office only to the extent that the responsible minister will now carry the title of Minister of Communications.
There is here, perhaps, a small element of confusion. The Minister of Communications will be at one and the same time the Postmaster General. The title Postmaster General will remain on the statute books and for administrative reasons will continue to be used to an extent within the department itself. It will, however, disappear from public usage, much in the same way that the Minister of Finance is also, but is rarely so referred to as, the Receiver-General.

Postmaster General is an old and honourable title, one of the very few portfolios unchanged in name through the 100 years of political history since confederation. I am the 47th minister to occupy the portfolio. The most renowned Canadian to hold the title was the first, Sir John A. Macdonald, although I must add that he held it for only 24 hours.


An hon. Member:: He quit while he was ahead.


Eric William Kierans: The Post Office, as hon. members know, is today undergoing rapid and radical changes. It has to if it is, almost literally, to survive. Lawrence O'Brien, the former postmaster general of the United States, has described the post office in his country as in "a race with catastrophe". These changes may take many forms but their end objective is a post office restructured as a modern, efficient system of communications able to serve the public by finding its proper place in this age of electronic, total and instant communication.
February 28, 1969

Government Organization
One possible change under study is that of the desirability and feasibility of recreating the Post Office as a Crown corporation. In the meantime, no matter what may or may not happen in the future, the mail must still be delivered. The Post Office payroll is 48,000, easily the largest of all civilian departments. In a sense it is the most "national" of all departments: There is a post office in every sizeable community in the country, more than 8,000 in all which is more, I might point out, than all the branches of our nine chartered banks combined. Because of its size, because of its complexity, and because it is undergoing massive change, the Post Office will continue to operate as an autonomous department, responsible to the new Minister of Communications rather than become, at least until its future is defined, one arm of an integrated Department of Communications headed by a single deputy minister.
[DOT] (2:20 p.m.)
Between the two departments of Post Office and of Communications there will be the closest possible working relationship. To give one concrete example, the research component of the Department of Communications will undertake, as one of its prime responsibilities, research into the vital area of electronic sorting and distribution equipment. We intend, as I have said before, to consider the Post Office not as an organization in the business of moving mail but as an organization in the business of communications-that is, of print communication as opposed to audio or visual communication as with the telephone and with television-and hence as an integral part of a total national system of communication. All I have said to this point, Mr. Chairman, is essentially explanatory background. I intend, now, to address myself directly to the new Department of Communications.
The operations of the new department will fall into four broad categories: administration, planning, operations and regulation, research and development. The administrative component is identical with that of all government departments so I need say no more about it at this point.
The function of research and development will be headed by an assistant deputy minister, Dr. John Chapman, who was formerly deputy chairman of the Defence Research Board. Under his guidance there will be established a research and development office which will, essentially, generate research policy. It will identify research projects of prime interest, either because of their indus-
[Mr. Klerans.l
trial potential or because of their relationship to actual or planned government communication operations. In other words, it will be concerned about the future. For example, it would direct research into future types of communication satellites, particularly those able to broadcast directly to homes.
The actual research work will be performed at the communications research centre, as well as at other facilities across the country such as the satellite earth station at Mill Village, Nova Scotia, where, I may say for the information of hon. members, I will formally open a new commercial satellite earth terminal in a few week's time.
The Communications Research Centre, to which I have referred, is being formed from the existing defence research telecommunications establishment, a branch of the Defence Research Board. Its staff currently numbers 520 and is composed of five principal laboratories: the national radio propagation laboratory; the national space telecommunications laboratory, which was responsible for the Alouette I, Alouette II and ISIS-A research satellites, the last of which was launched last month; the national communications laboratory and defence telecommunications institute and, finally, the electronics institute which conducts research on a range of electronic systems such as solid state devices and lasers. In terms of broad policies the communications research centre will be mission-oriented, geared to meet the needs of government as well as those of industry. Our resources are limited and to make the most of them we will have to, and we will, work in close co-operation with industry and with universities.
As hon. members will have noted from this broad description of the research programs, the Department of Communications will be concerned both with telecommunications and with satellites. The communications research centre, as the repository of satellite expertise in this country, will assist in the development of our planned communications satellite and, more directly, with our next research satellite, ISIS-B, due to be launched early in 1971 and intended, like its predecessors, to gather information about the ionosphere. In a broader sense, the department will represent Canadian interest in negotiations at INTELSAT and other international bodies on such crucial issues as allocation of frequencies and of orbital "parking spaces", and it will be required to co-ordinate any future government telecommunication satellite systems,
February 28, 1969

such as those which might be used for surveying earth resources, for meteorology, or a satellite able to broadcast directly into the homes of Canada.

The Operations and Regulation section will also be headed by an Assistant Deputy Minister. Mr. Gilles Bergeron is the designated official, and many will recall him from his work on the Centennial Commission. The bulk of the staff of this section of the department-some 630-have moved over from what was formerly the Telecommunications Policy and Administration Bureau of the Department of Transport. They will continue to administer the Radio Act, that is the technical regulation of radio-frequencies and the licensing of users, whether these be for taxi radios, microwave relays, telephone systems or television broadcasting transmitters. In addition, as I shall explain more fully later, this branch of the department will be deeply involved in a far-reaching review of telecommunications legislation and regulation.
Lastly, Mr. Chairman, there is the area of planning. Planning must start with the acquisition of comprehensive information about the national communications industry, and we will have to work fast in a field that is in a state of constant and rapid change. We will, shortly, be appointing a Director General of Policy and Plans who will in turn report directly to the Deputy Minister, a post for which the designated official is Mr. Alan Gottlieb, formerly Assistant Under-Secretary of State for External Affairs. The purpose of planning will not be regulation for regulation's sake but regulation, where and when needed, for the public good. We intend to evolve a national communications plan and a national communications policy to integrate and rationalize all systems of communications whether those of today such as telephones, microwave relays, telex, TWX, telegraph and the Post Office, or those of tomorrow: communication satellites; sophisticated information retrieval systems linking computers which exchange and store information of all kinds; waveguides; lasers, and on up to the 'wired city' of tomorrow.
All of this is what the department will be doing. I intend now to describe what it is doing.
Our largest single current project, as everyone knows, is the development of a domestic communications satellite system to go into operation by 1971-72. Legislation to set

Government Organization up a mixed, public-private, satellite corporation will shortly come before this house and hence I cannot, at this time, add anything useful to what is already public knowledge. It would be, Mr. Chairman, a mixed satellite corporation. Full information, I can assure my hon. colleagues, will be provided at the appropriate time.
However, I can perhaps usefully define the three essential objectives of this major project. We intend to use it as a means to promote Canada's scientific know-how and industrial potential in the vital field of communications. We intend to use it to bring the North and the under-developed parts of this country closer to the mainstream of Canadian life by means of instant telecommunications and by live television-a northern vision of the 1970's, and I deliberately use that phrase in acknowledgement of the foresight of the great parliamentarian who first coined it. Finally, Mr. Chairman, we intend to use the system to place in space above us a satellite that will speak both French and English to all Canadians, no matter where they live. Confederation was built upon the mile upon mile of steel rails laid across this country; Confederation will be renewed, as the Prime Minister put it so well yesterday, by a communications system that meets the needs of all Canadians and which provides them with the go into operation 1971-72. Legislation to set means to fulfil their talents.
[DOT] (2:30 p.m.)

A second project under way, our interest in which is reflected in the joint study with Sweden carried out for the United Nations committee on the peaceful uses of outer space, is on the feasibility and implications, technical, political, cultural, sociological and diplomatic, of direct broadcasting by communication satellites. I have already tabled in the house the first paper to be produced as a result of this study. It represents a significant and imaginative initiative by Canada and Sweden. Direct broadcasting communication satellites are some seven to ten years away from economic use, but that point will be progressively reached as the signals emitted by satellites become more powerful and the necessary earth stations become smaller and, most important of all, cheaper.


Albert Béchard: Order. I regret to interrupt the minister, but the time allotted to
February 28. 1969

Government Organization him has expired. Does the house agree to let him finish his speech?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Albert Béchard: Is it agreed?
Agreed.


Eric William Kierans: A vital first step will be an international agreement on the use of frequencies, and this will be dealt with by the World Administrative Radio Conference scheduled for late 1970 or early 1971. I will keep hon. members closely informed of developments because I know they will be keenly interested, both from the standpoint of the implications of such technology upon national sovereignty and from that of the far-reaching implications for developing countries of such a low-cost system of television.
Finally, among projects under way I want to describe one that is, considered over the long term, unquestionably of special importance. Telecommunications legislation and regulation as it now exists is, to a considerable degree, unco-ordinated and in certain areas inadequate. Much of this existing legislation developed as a by-product of transportation considerations, as can be seen by the titles of the relevant acts-the Railway Act, the Telegraphs Act, the Canada Shipping Act.
In March, 1968, the government's white paper on the satellite communications system drew attention to the increasing need for comprehensive telecommunications legislation and regulation to cover telecommunications services, both satellite and terrestrial. With the transfer of responsibility for telecommunications from the Minister of Transport to the Postmaster General, earlier studies have been continued and much preliminary work has been done.
We now intend to move one major step further. As the basis for a complete overhaul of telecommunications legislation and regulation, and coincident with the approval by Parliament of a new Department of Communications, I will set up a special task force to collect comprehensive information on the national communication industry, to study present and future communication needs both of the public and of the industry, whether carriers or users, and to draw up recommendations for a national communications policy and plan. This task force, a sort of telecommission, will be chaired by the deputy minister of communications. Its membership will be drawn from the department itself and other government departments and agencies. In
[The Deputy Chairman.]
addition, the telecommission group will work closely with, and request information and advice from, industry, universities and other governments. In addition to in-house studies, research contracts will be placed with outside experts. The report of the telecommission is intended to be completed by the end of 1970.
That concludes my summary of what the department is and of what it is doing. I will conclude by attempting to describe the kind of department we intend to become.
Communications is the nerve system of our society. No field of science, with the possible exception of space technology, is changing at as fast a rate, and no field of science, with the possible exception of genetics, contains within it greater implications, good or bad, for society and for the individual.
The Department of Communications, as I have said, will concern itself with the medium, not with the message. But the two cannot be separated. Without accepting uncritically the dictum that the medium is the message, it is obvious that the former affects the latter and that any message is altered and conditioned by the medium through which it is communicated. Television has had a galvanic effect upon our society, irrespective of whether its content has been good or bad, entertaining or dull. Those effects have not always been predictable. Television, on the one hand, expands our horizons by bringing an image of the whole world right into our living rooms; on the other hand, it contracts our horizons by reducing the opportunity and need for personal conversations and relationships. And, specifically, television has robbed parents of part of the responsibility and joy of passing on their stored wisdom to their children. Telephones have had the same schizophrenic effect. On the one hand, they unite people who are living or working at a distance from one another; on the other, they make it less necessary for people to go out to meet each other in person.
Communications constitutes the most important single element in the technological revolution that has overtaken us and which is carrying us along-willingly or unwillingly is virtually irrelevant-toward a kind of society which we can as yet only dimly perceive. As politicians hon. members will be aware, perhaps uncomfortably so, of the extent to which technology is altering our political system, and specifically of the extent to which technology is draining the ideological content, the traditional ideological content, from our political wars. A machine is non-political, neither Liberal nor Conservative nor New
February 28, 1969

Democrat nor Creditiste. Nor tor that matter is it a capitalist machine or a communist machine. No matter who designs it or where it is designed, a machine is a machine. How to grapple with the problems created by burgeoning technology, how to ensure that machines serve men and not the other way around, is, I suggest, a challenge that is going to thrust itself more and more into the forefront of our political consciousness and into national affairs.
I have made that excursion into, if you like, philosophy to indicate to hon. members that the Department of Communications will not become a two-dimensional institution concerned only with means and not with ends. We will be a highly technical department and highly science oriented, and must be if we are to execute our specific mandate. We will keep our place on the advancing frontiers of science wherever they may lead-to the second generation communications satellites, to laser pipes carrying great volumes of traffic-voice, data, visual-between major cities, to the possibility of three-dimensional television offered by the new science of holography.
Having said that, I want to make clear that while we will be scientific savants we will not be idiot savants obsessed with scientific problems and projects and unconcerned with their effects upon society, upon our politics, our culture, our social system.
[DOT] (2:40 p.m.)

The danger for any government institution, in fact for any institution, is that as time passes it does become composed of idiot savants, of individuals who are expert in their own field and rank amateurs at everything else. If we, in the Department of Communications, possess no clear-cut solutions to this familiar problem we are at least conscious of it. We intend to remain a small department- our payroll for 1969-70 is 1,339-and our mandate is not to operate new telecommunications systems such as the communication satellite but to bring them into being and to regulate them once in existence. If we will be small in quantity we will be high in quality. We will also recognize that quality is not enough. Communications is so complex, so fast-changing and so far-reaching a field that no group or institution could command adequate let alone comprehensive knowledge of every facet of the science. We will therefore, be an 'open' department, working as closely as possible with those in industry, in the universities and in governments here and
Government Organization abroad. One technique of co-operation and consultation which we intend to employ will be that of consultative committees composed of the ablest specialists we can find in the various disciplines of communications who can feed into the department a broad spectrum of knowledge and experience, to generate ideas for us and to criticize our performance.
By this means we hope to arrive at some answers to some of the problems and challenges which confront us. But let me make it plain-far from as yet knowing all the answers we don't even as yet know all the questions.
I will give three examples of areas where questions, the right questions, will have to be asked, and soon. No branch of communications is expanding at a greater rate than that of information retrieval, sometimes known as the knowledge industry, by which computers provide information on real time in response to requests from distant access terminals.
Here are some of the questions that need to be formulated: should the acquisition and distribution of information be regulated? What knowledge should be sorted? Who should have access to it? What protection can be provided for the rights of personal privacy?
Another area to be investigated is that of the inter-relationship between communications and transportation. In its most sophisticated forms-such as video-phones and inter-city closed circuit conference television-communication competes with transportation; it does away with much of the need for travel. We will have to consider what effect the communication systems of the future, most significantly that of the wired city, will have upon our transportation systems within, and between, major cities. And finally, there is the apparent contradiction, which I have already mentioned, that while communication unites people, it can also isolate them. It was in this context that I recently threw out the idea of using our nationwide complex of post offices as locations for communication centers, perhaps by bulletin boards, perhaps by a system of hot-line telephones by which individual members of the public could communicate directly with their government.
In sum, Mr. Chairman, the Department of Communications faces a challenge the dimensions of which are impossible to define with any kind of satisfactory precision. The communications systems, such as the communications satellite system, which we will either
February 28, 1969

Government Organization develop or regulate, are merely tools capable of being used for the public good, and capable equally of being misused. The department will have to grapple with the problems of the relationship between technology and sociology and of the conflict between mechanical efficiency and human individualism where nothing is black or white and where the best we can probably hope to achieve is a lighter rather than a darker grey. Nevertheless, despite all those qualifications, and imprecisions, I believe Canada has taken a long step forward in identifying the need for a Department of Communications. How effective a step will depend upon the department itself.
Now, Mr. Chairman, it is time for the opposition to start asking me questions.


Mr. Macquarrie:: Mr. Chairman, may I congratulate the minister on his address. I always like to read his speeches, especially those dealing with matters for which he is responsible as minister. In 20 minutes I will not be able to do justice to his 15-page address, a copy of which I received a few minutes ago together with a chart. Except for the fact that the chart was rendered illegible in stencilling 1 would have enjoyed studying it.
I congratulate the minister on his future exalted status of Minister of Communications. In passing, may I congratulate him for choosing an excellent man to become his deputy minister. I already know Mr. Gotlieb. In my opinion he is a man of outstanding ability and the minister is to be congratulated on obtaining his services. My remarks apply similarly to Dr. Chapman, who is an outstanding scientist and has brought credit to this country. I do not know so well others who will assist the minister. In general, I must say I have the highest regard for what the scientific community of this country has achieved in the field of communications.
I, for one, have no desire to delay the establishment of this new department because with it will come the establishment of important agencies like the satellite corporation. Creating that agency will be commenced more easily once the minister is finally ensconced in his new role. Since I am most anxious for the department to assume these new roles I will not indulge in any delaying tactics. Nevertheless, I hope that the establishment of the new Department of Communications will not be beset by difficulties similar to those encountered in the establishment of the Department of Industry some

years ago. Quite obviously, creation of the latter department was an error. I hope it will never again be necessary, as happened recently, for a minister to confess to wastage of half a billion dollars on regional development. I hope, and I say this most sincerely, that we are more ready for the establishment of this department than the government obviously was for the imposition of five-day delivery and attendant changes which were apparently insufficiently discussed and prepared for beforehand.
The Prime Minister spoke about the illusion of change. A cynic might say that we talk so much about the waves of the future, new techniques, new developments and new vistas that there is a danger we may create an illusion of modernity. What a word! I doubt that this is the case. At any rate, these questions come to mind.
I have read carefully the clauses in the bill dealing with the Department of Communications and I wonder how embracing and all-pervading the functions of this new department will be in the field of communications. The minister gave us a lesson in the first conjugation using the Latin word com-municare. I wonder whether in this communications field the minister is to become Caesar or just one of the consuls.
[DOT] (2:50 p.m.)
I wonder what is in store for the C.B.C.? It would be very easy to have that controversial organization report to the house through the Minister of Communications. This would seem to be a logical development. I notice that the Minister of Communications will replace the Minister of Transport in regard to the Broadcasting Act. As time goes by, will the C.B.C. come even more under the wing of the nation's chief communicator?
I notice a small change has taken place in the allocation of subject matters and estimates to standing committees. The estimates of the Post Office and those of communications formerly went to the committee on transport and communications. In terminology at least, this is the logical committee. The Post Office, communications, and C.O.T.C. have now been placed on the agenda of the Standing Committee on Broadcasting, Films and Assistance to the Arts. Is this a coincidence, a mere housekeeping matter, or is it portentous ? This committee was always a normal arena for the Secretary of State, our minister of culture. Is he now going to become number two consul instead of number
February 28, 1969

one in this realm? The hon. Mr. Cardinal speaks of satellites as blackboards in the sky and refers to provincial competence and concern since culture and education are involved. Is there a growing acceptance of this point of view?
These are speculations one is prompted to make. While these are only speculations, there are important questions we should ask as we legislate the creation of the new Department of Communications. I like the forward-looking and splendid statements of intent regarding the telecommunications field, but I wonder about the actual functional scope and the planned activities of this new department. How involved, financially and otherwise, are we going to get in programs such as satellite development?
I am very interested in the domestic satellite program. The McIntosh report has become one of those hidden reports about which Mr. Patrick Nicholson wrote so graphically a few months ago. It has been prepared by a very competent and outstanding man. We have been expecting this report. Where is it? I agree with the minister that this is an important phase into which we are moving, and therefore we should know something about it. In January the minister assured an audience in Toronto that the bill would be introduced this spring to set up a satellite corporation. We have been told today by the people of British Columbia that spring is here. So where is the bill? I would like to know what Mr. McIntosh thinks of this whole operation.
Canadians are interested in knowing what this country is doing on the international scene. We talk about Canada competing for the sale of component parts of satellites and for recognition of our industrial and technological competence. There is perhaps an opportunity for industrial innovation and expansion. How did the Whitehead commission, if I may call it that, get along? Where is that report? That commission reported many months ago and as yet we have not received this information. A spokesman for the C.O.T.C. recently expressed the opinion that Canada should have a larger share of what is available in this particular field.
I also wonder what is being done in connection with intra-national problems. The Prime Minister stated the satellite program was a sort of 20th century railroad to sustain confederation. Unless we see some evidence of more thoughtful consideration of some people in the provinces who have an interest in some aspects of the satellite program, it may 29180-386

Government Organization not be such a unifying force as it could be. I am interested to know how much co-operation there is between technicians and technologists of Quebec and of Canada. These developments should be discussed before a situation arises resulting in conflict and controversy over something which could potentially be a great unifying agent. I hope there is nothing in the bill which will diminish the role of the C.O.T.C., a well established and important corporation. When I read Bill S-5 and certain clauses of the measure now before us, there seems at best to be an overlapping. It could at worst be pre-emption. This I would not like to see.
The powers of the C.O.T.C. are certainly ample. They are empowered to carry on the business of public communications, by cable, radio, telegraph, radiotelephone and any other means of telecommunication, between Canada and any other place. Their position should be secure. I listened to the minister's excellent speech on this whole program. The minister is a stimulating man. He speaks often and well, but frequently he speaks on many other subjects. It is a temptation at times to rise in the house to ask the Minister of National Defence how everything is going in the Post Office Department, but the rules would not allow it. I suppose it would be an impropriety to ask the Minister of National Defence to settle some of the problems developing in the Post Office Department.


An hon. Member:: Ask him what he thinks of the five-day mail delivery.


Heath Nelson Macquarrie: Being a kindly man and having the highest regard for both ministers, I would not make such a flippant suggestion, but it does go through my mind.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: It sort of follows the de Gaulle line.


Heath Nelson Macquarrie: I am aware that I have limited time to speak on this very large bill. I am not going to say all that I would like to regarding the question of communications, but I would like to say a word about regulations. Every so often I note in the minister's speeches that he refers to the importance and need of control as we become more and more integrated in the so-called global village. The minister has stated we would not have regulations for regulations sake. I fervently hope not!
It is of the essence that we move quickly into the satellite field, not only because we need an exercise in technical competence for
COMMONS DEBATES	February 28, 1969
Government Organization
our people and not only because we must get what is rather strangely called a parking space for our satellite. There is no shame in mentioning that there are also good and sound financial reasons why we should get into this field early. There is revenue to be gained. There is, one might say, gold up in "that thar" space area. It is conceivable, because the minister is having trouble with his Post Office Department, that he might be able with his right hand to drawn on something which might help the deficits on his left. I want him to know that when he is able to move on the implementation of a Canadian role in domestic satellites he will find every support and every encouragement from me.
[DOT] (3:00 p.m.)
I noticed the hon. gentleman's reference to the vision of the north. He paid a very fine tribute to the former leader of our party, the right hon. gentleman from Prince Albert. I concur in that. I would only say in passing that that right hon. gentleman, while he was prime minister of this country, was capable not only of looking to the north but he also looked to the east and to the west. The people of the maritimes and the people of the prairies remember this very well and very vividly.
With reference to the Post Office, I hope we are not going to have a development where-under the Post Office Department will become the step child of the communications department. I note very carefully what the minister said in their regard on page 4 of his statement. He said that "at least until its future is defined," the Post office will not become one arm of an integrated Department of Communications headed by a single deputy minister. I repeat that phrase, "at least until its future is defined." The thing that would frighten me is that it would become the left arm, the weak arm. I have the nagging thought on occasion then I note the minister talking about telephones in the sky and interesting developments in foreign policy, that perhaps he is diverting his thoughts from some of the real problems in the Post Office. I would not impute motives. Of course, you cannot do that. It is ungentlemanly. But I wonder if he might be engaging a bit in diverting the thoughts of the patrons of the Post Office Department from the problems which his policies are visiting on them.
We want satellites in the sky. Good Lord, we are all for that, but we want mail to move rapidly on the ground as well. There are
[Mr. Macquarrie.l
some things happening in the Post Office of late which would cause people to wonder if somebody does not have his mind on something else while these things are developing. The imposition of the five day delivery has been changed in time and in scope. The original plans had to be abandoned. I wonder if the whole thing may not yet have to be abandoned.
I do not know whether I am plugged into the computer age, but I find it difficult to be convinced that you can move mail as rapidly by processing it five days out of seven as six days out of seven. This is a thing that has not yet been demonstrated by the backlog of mail in many parts of Canada. The half million letters lying around in Montreal were not only for the people of Montreal. Mail laid up in any important centre is inhibiting delivery of mail all over the country. This is very important and very serious.
There was insufficient consideration for the needs of letter carriers on the sort-through system. Without going into details, I would say there was insufficient consideration of very basic needs and working conditions of the most elementary kind. I am not at all surprised that there is controversy and indeed adjudication over this matter right now. There was insufficient consideration of the categories of mail which cannot properly be processed under the five day system.
I read in the Ottawa Citizen of February 26 a great concern expressed by medical people. I quote from the article in that newspaper:
Medical laboratories fear some patients may be endangered by the cut in mail delivery from six to five days.
Specimens mailed by doctors to the laboratories on Fridays will not undergo tests until Monday or even Tuesday.
Patients could wait almost a week, instead of about three days, to hear the verdict.
Another danger is that specimens will break down chemically or be affected by temperatures while lying in Post Office stations an extra day.
A change in the specimen could result in some disease going undetected-
"It very well could hamper a diagnosis," said a director of Douglas Laboratory Services, 150 Metcalfe Street. "Doctors depend on us for fast and accurate results."
The director of another laboratory said:
"It doesn't do the test samples any good to be hanging around in postal offices another day... There could be a chemical change in some of the substances, particularly the proteins-they can break down very easily."
So, this is a very important question that was obviously not considered, although the
February 28, 1969	COMMONS
Post Office must have been carrying laboratory supplies for a good many years.
I think, Mr. Chairman, and I have said this before-I have not been alone in saying it- that I find many Canadians are saying there is too little concern for purely Canadian publications under the impending new rates, particularly the non-profit publications. The minister has heard about this very directly and critically from some of the largest bodies of people in Canada, most recently the Canadian Labour Congress and the Canadian Federation of Agriculture.
Learned societies and many people who publish scientific and technical journals have tried to point out their problems. Some have expressed anxiety, and that is a mild word. It is known that Canadian associations of professional men have great difficulty in getting out publications, but they also have great need to get out publications. It is also known, and I am sure the minister knows this, that many of these publications are now already subsidized out of general membership funds.
Even in the electric age, even if the satellite is functioning, beaming messages and programming magnificently, the printed word is still of importance.


Albert Béchard: Order. I regret to interrupt the hon. member but his time has expired.


Some hon. Members:: Carry on.


Albert Béchard: Is it agreed that the hon. member may continue his remarks?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Heath Nelson Macquarrie: 
Edward Richard Schreyer: Mr. Chairman, the hon.
member for Hillsborough has shown a very profound and genuine interest in the field of communications policy. He told the house he would speak for only 20 minutes and then proceeded to speak for a much greater length of time only because, as I say, he has this
Government Organization genuine interest in the matter under discussion. If I speak for a shorter period I hope it will not be taken to mean I am any less interested.
I should like to begin by saying that I think it augurs well for the future of Canadian communications policy that this department will have at its head the former Postmaster General. The minister has the reputation of being a no-nonsense type of man who is action oriented. The minister, for some time now, has been involved in this new area of responsibility. We hope before the passage of many months he will be able to use his energies to come up with a communications policy that will have much greater definition and precision than is the case at the present time.
I for one feel it is rather difficult to speak on the merits of the bill before us because it refers to the creation of a new department of communications but does not mention the policy which will lie behind the department. This policy will have to be implemented and administered by the minister and, in large part, it is still an unknown factor.
I should like to make reference to some comments made yesterday by the Leader of the Opposition and by my leader when they said, in effect that a bill to reorganize various government departments in itself means very little. I would go further and say it means almost nothing until such time as we can see clearly what kind of policies these departments will be putting into effect. Fortunately, in the case of the department of communications there seems to be something genuine about reorganization. It is logical that we should consolidate the Post Office Department and certain other communications branches under one minister in one department. It is more logical than certain other aspects of the reorganization bill which is before us.
I do not mind saying that I believe the reorganization of other departments into a Department of Regional Economic Expansion will likely be a hoax. The references that have been made in the past few days to the government being committed to some kind of new policy in respect of regional economic development or changing the policy with regard to ARDA, FRED and all the other programs, is nothing but window dressing and may well prove to be a fraud. Only a short while ago in this House of Commons we gave approval to the establishment of a Department of Consumer and Corporate Affairs. That, in itself, was a piece of governmental administrative reorganization. Since

February 28, 1969
that department has been organized and .headed by the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs the increase in the cost of living in this country has escalated beyond what it was before that minister took office. It seems to me the kindest thing the minister could do would be to remove himself from the office and recommend that the department be disbanded.
When a policy lacks definition one might ask what the point is in having such a department at all or what the point is in having a reorganization to change its name. I do not wish to take any more time in venting my dissatisfaction in respect of many aspects of this reorganization bill because I understand today we are expected to deal primarily with the subject matter of communications and communications policy. I should like, however, to take another second or two to say that my disenchantment with the Department of Consumer and Corporate Affairs and the minister is equalled by my disenchantment with the minister responsible for housing. We can have all the administrative reorganization we like in this area and it will prove to be of no consequence at all so long as we have interest rates which are at the present levels. Only if the government is really serious about doing something relative to interest rates in this country will anything effective be accomplished in respect of housing construction. It seems to me it is futile and is perpetrating a hoax to pretend that the establishment of a task force or division or branch within a department will have any concrete effect on the problem of housing.
If I might return to the establishment of a Department of Communications, 1 should like to say that I found the minister's remarks earlier this afternoon enlightening and edifying, as they usually are. He used one analogy in particular which I thought was very appropriate. He referred to communications in our time as being the central nervous system of a society. This is an analogy which I like and in which I concur. If communications is the central nervous system of our society, it is all the more important that the government, the political instrument of the people, have some definite and close regulation of and involvement in that central nervous system. I refer particularly to the advent of communications by satellite. The minister said much about this in his speech this afternoon, as he has over the course of the past several months.
We all await with interest information concerning the policy of the government with

February 28, 1969
regard to the establishment of a domestic communications system by space satellite. Leaving the technological aspect aside, I would be very interested to find out what the government has in mind relative to the ownership, regulation and control of such a system. I can imagine that the minister is under tremendous pressure from the private sector of the communications industry to leave the ownership and management of this communications system to them. Personally, I have nothing against the notion of utilizing the capability that exists in our private sector of communications to the fullest possible extent in research and development. I see nothing wrong with the concept of joint public-private capitalization of this system.
a (3:20 p.m.)
But I hope that if it is to be a joint public-private venture, the government will avoid the error that it made, for example, in the establishment of the Panarctic oil exploration venture. As I recall, 45 per cent to 50 per cent of the capital required for that venture was put up by the government but with regard to control, of the 14 directorships on the board only one was accorded to the government. I am not suggesting that there is any need to have government representation on the board of directors in exact proportion to the subscription of equity capital; but it is rather ludicrous to have the government using the taxpayers money to put up half of the capital and then having only one of the 14 slots on the board of directors. Not only is it disproportionate, but I think it is putting the one government representative in a very difficult position which may prove to be untenable. It would seem to me logical to have more than one, preferably three or four out of 14, for example.
In the case of this domestic communications space satellite corporation, I hope that between now and the enactment of the legislation the minister will correct any mistakes he may have already made if he has, in fact, agreed to have the government put up most of the risk or development capital but have only one or two slots on the board of directors of the corporation. I think this kind of arrangement is simply unacceptable.
The minister should look to the experience in the United States. About six years ago the U.S. Congress threshed out this question at the time of the establishment of the Comsat Corporation. My understanding is that the United States government did not put up very much investment capital, but despite
Government Organization this they have representation on the board of the corporation. This is important. I think the best arrangement, although on ideological grounds I suppose the minister would not accept it despite the fact that from time to time in the past he has sounded like a Social Democrat, for the development of a domestic communications space satellite system would be to have ownership vested in the public through a public corporation.
I do not mind saying that I am one of those who is enthusiastic about the notion that Canada should be developing such a communications system. We should be developing the scientific capability that goes with it. Some of the reasons for my enthusiasm about it are these: First of all, I agree entirely with the assertion made in the white paper tabled last April that this technology, this space satellite system, will enable us to do a great deal in the way of providing programming in both French and English to all parts of the country. It may well serve as an instrument for greater national unity in future years. That is one reason why it seems to me important.
The second reason is that when you look at the coverage provided by present microwave systems, you see that vast stretches of our country are not able to receive communications signals of any kind, television or commercial. With the advent of a space satellite system, for all practical purposes all of Canada, including the vast northland, would be within reach of television entertainment or communications signals of the commercial variety. All parts of Canada would be within reach of these signals. Perhaps because I am a westerner I believe this is very important. Therefore, even if the cost should be somewhat higher in the case of a space satellite system compared with building up a large ground relay system, I believe it would be worth the extra cost. I hope the minister will not let himself be talked out of the notion that the government should proceed, as a matter of firm commitment, with the research and development needed to launch and have in orbit our domestic communications satellite system.
As I said in a speech a few weeks ago, it would be helpful if we had comparative costs as between building a space satellite and a ground relay system which would provide equal coverage. I know it is difficult to compare these costs, but surely the minister concedes that we must have some comparitive figures before us. Otherwise, how is it possible for us to make any valid, worth-while

February 28, 1969

Government Organization series of suggestions with regard to the direction the minister should take in this respect?
Even if it costs more, it is worth it. I believe it is important for another reason in addition to the factors having to do with national unity and servicing our north country and frontier areas. The third reason is this. We must do whatever is practically possible, whatever is feasible, to build up a larger pool of scientific knowledge and technological capability in our country. Too often in the past we have seen instances where, because we did not go ahead with a particular project that required scientific expertise, Canada suffered the loss of some of its best scientific minds. Why should we allow this to happen if we have before us a concrete prospect of being able to employ and take advantage of the brains that exist in our country? The benefit and advantages gained would be shared by the country if these people were given an opportunity to work on projects which would use their talents.
I do not want to leave this subject without making some further extensive reference to the matter of a communications space satellite system and the relationship between government and private sectors in developing and owning such a system. I should like to quote to the minister an excerpt from an American business journal. This excerpt bears on the very point with which I am dealing:
A number of decisions are now coming up- some of them to be made by the F.C.C., some by Congress, some by the White House, and some, in all probability, by the courts-that will largely determine the shape and direction of communication in the U.S. and the world for several decades to come. Hence a titanic struggle is under way, involving an impressive array of private, government, and quasi-public contestants in a bewildering variety of contests. Some of the contests are between governments-e.g., Great Britain and France against the U.S. Within the U.S. itself, some of the conflicts are between different agencies of the federal government-e.g., the F.C.C. versus the Defence Department. Some are within industry -e.g., Comsat versus A.T. & T. Some are between industry and government-e.g., Comsat versus the F.C.C; and some involve quite new and unexpected lineups-e.g., the Ford Foundation versus Comsat and A.T. & T. The stakes are huge-
I repeat that, for emphasis:
The stakes are huge-for the governments, corporations, and foundations involved, and for everyone who uses the telephone or watches television.
Although this kind of jockeying for position or advantage does not exist to the same degree in Canada, and I have not pretended that it does, one must assume that it exists to

some degree. That is what led me to ask just what pressure the minister was under, what pressure he was being subjected to from the private sector and those who were jockeying for advantage in this undertaking. The way in which these questions are decided will determine the shape, not only of the communications industry but of economic developments generally. The decision may set precedents that could determine how technologies as yet undeveloped are to be introduced in the future. I submit that we in Canada should try to avoid the mistakes that were made in the United States in 1962 relative to the communications policy and legislation. In the United States, although the research and development that went into the communications satellite field was and still is largely a product of government financing, and although the promotion of satellite communications is said to be an object of national U.S. policy, the corporation that was eventually established to operate in this area was a private body.
[DOT] (3:30 p.m.)


James Hugh Faulkner: Order, please. I regret to interrupt the hon. member but the time allotted to him has expired, unless it is the wish of the committee that he should continue.


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Edward Richard Schreyer: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will conclude in five minutes. In my opinion the fundamental question is: Who should have the right to put up and operate a domestic satellite system? That question has not been answered in Canada and it has not even been answered yet in the United States. Congress has passed legislation in this general area of communications by satellite, but the question as to who shall own and operate a domestic system in the United States, for example, has been left deliberately shrouded in ambiguity. Almost by general consensus the word is out that it was left deliberately shrouded in ambiguity so that there would be no dog fight in Congress when the bill to establish the concept was brought before it. I hope we can avoid this in Canada. I hope that members of all parties will not go back to the old cliches of yesteryear about private enterprise and socialistic state ownership, etc. The important thing is that if we are to accept the minister's own definition that communication is the central nervous system of our society, what member here can argue with logic and
February 28, 1969	COMMONS
feeling that it could possibly, therefore, be left outside of public ownership? It seems logical to me that if something is the central nervous system of a society, the society must own its own nervous system. We await with interest the response that the minister and his colleagues will want to give to this question in the next few weeks and months.
I would like to conclude as quickly as I can by posing a number of questions to the minister on the record so that the minister will have something on which to ponder and to which to reply. In addition to the question about the ownership of new communications media such as satellites there are the following questions I would like to put on the record. Is the new department we are creating definitely committed to a domestic communications space satellite system of a more expensive synchronized orbit kind or is the department still weighing the alternative of cheaper types of domestic communications space satellites? There are cheaper kinds in terms of development and launching, but one presumes that in the long run they would not really be cheaper.
Another question I would like to pose is as follows: Is the government committed to a policy whereby television signals, for example, emitted from a domestic space satellite could be received directly by individual television sets, or is the government still considering a system whereby signals from the satellite would first have to be picked up by powerful ground receiving stations or by community antenna systems of one kind or another? I have no doubt that the latter would be much cheaper, but it would also be putting the owners of TV sets in many communities of the country, especially in the northland and in our frontier areas, at the mercy of any private operator of a community antenna system. Of course if the government intends to put up a number of ground receiving stations across the country, that is one thing; but if it is going to send up a satellite whose signal will have to be picked up by a ground receiving station or a community antenna system, either the government must own the latter or else the people who own the television sets will become captive customers of private operators and price regulation will become very important.
There would have to be more government regulation. Quite frankly, if there were a choice between a growing bureaucracy to
DEBATES	6089
Government Organization regulate on behalf of the public and government ownership I would prefer government ownership in this particular domain because it is logical. Since it would be a utility it could well be publicly owned. We have some experience to go by already. If the government pauses to look at the present state of public policy relative to cablevision and if this government is fair, it will have to admit that our present policy is chaotic. I presume the minister will be involved, if not directly at least indirectly, with cablevision and community antenna systems because there is more involved than just television. The broader aspects of communications are also involved in these systems.
I have here a long article that the minister can read at his own convenience. It appeared in a local Ottawa paper a few days ago and states that the growth of community antenna systems in Canada in recent years has Ottawa in a dither. Ottawa is in a dither because there is a lack of a clearly articulated and designed policy. The result has been that over the past few years there has been a proliferation of community antenna and cablevision systems without adequate regulation and public control. When that occurs there can be no surprise that chaos results, which has been the case. All I am saying to the minister is that I hope whatever policy he adopts relative to the television aspect of satellite communication he will not opt for a policy that will leave the owners of television sets in the more remote communities dependant on private cablevision or community antenna operators. For $50,000 these operators can put up a community antenna system and draw the signal from the satellite. They are the only ones then in a position to relay the signals to the set owners. In effect, they have a monopoly, so the public will be at a tremendous disadvantage. Needless to say there is much more that can and should be said with respect to the establishment of the Department of Communications.
I will conclude now by making reference to one other item to which the minister referred, that is that his new department will have a research and development function. This is fine. I am sure the department will be capable of co-operating closely with the privately-owned communications industry and that much good will come of it. However, I want to know whether included in this research and development function of the department
February 28, 1969

Government Organization is responsibility for probing into the aspects of new electronic communications systems which affect public health and safety. This is nothing to be complacent about. If the minister thinks the Department of Transport or the Department of National Health and Welfare have been doing a job with respect to protecting public health and safety as far as radiation from appliances used in the communications industry is concerned, he is mistaken. It is generally acknowledged in the United States, where they have been doing much more research than we have been doing in this field, that a great deal is still unknown as far as electronic radiation is concerned.
[DOT] (3:40 p.m.)
Today when there is a virtual explosion of activity in the electronics industry and a proliferation of the amount of radiation, the hazards posed to public safety are growing. Unfortunately, there has been no proportionate increase in the efforts of those responsible for protecting public health and safety to provide against this hazard. I hope the minister will take a personal interest in this aspect at least to the extent of activating some branch of his department and encouraging them to look into it. I thank hon. members for their indulgence.


Mr. Laiulippe:: Mr. Chairman, I wish to say a few words on Bill C-173 regarding the government policy in the field of satellites.
We, of the Ralliement Creditiste, are in favour of every form of progress. We shall never do enough as far as education and information of the public is concerned. We are in favour of the greatest possible development in this field. We want every possible step to be taken in order to allow us to collect more and more information and to give the population of Canada the adequate services we need in this era.
The minister asked us: What should our policy be in the matter of satellites? Should the state have complete control over satellites or should private enterprises co-operate with the state? Should the state have complete control over all information? Does it have to take all necessary steps regarding satellites?
Mr. Chairman, I would answer that by saying I do not quite agree with our socialist friends who say that the state must take over everything, do everything and control everything. I say that this applies only to the international field. In the national field, private

enterprise has already successfully passed the test, and it has the right to exist. As a matter of fact, it is able to take care of communications, because in education as well as in communications by satellites, in transport or in technology, private enterprise is very much advanced. I believe we would be taking a step backwards if we removed these fields from the control of private enterprise because it can do the job. Is it not true that in a number of areas, it can provide better administration than the state at half the cost?
In that field, as in others, I believe that private enterprise can provide valuable service; honest competition and more diversity. In the case of a single state station, you push the button and get one program only; however, what we need is the possibility of pushing several buttons and getting several stations.
At the present time, private enterprise is active in the fields of communications and transport, as well as in others, and it plays its part adequately. It pays taxes to the government, contrary to the Crown corporations, since, in their case, the enterprise is the government. The only source of income allowing the government to make up the deficits of those corporations is the taxpayers' contributions, since such corporations do not succeed in administering themselves as economically as private-enterprise.
Mr. Chairman, I am not making that up. As everyone knows it can be proven that private enterprise can operate more economically than the government because it looks after its own business. In private enterprise the owners have control while in state owned companies every citizen is boss and owner. Employees of such undertakings do as they please and that explains why such companies cannot compete with private enterprise.
Mr. Chairman, with regard to financing these satellites or agencies, we approve the millions spend on them by the government, because I do not know exactly how much they will cost. I speak of millions because millions of dollars have already been mentioned. Since it is a question of public funds, those millions should be used only to liquidate the national debt, so as to avoid having to pay endless debts, at interest rates of 8, 9, or 10 per cent on the millions we will have to borrow to build communications satellites, which will benefit a few people at the most. The government must assume its responsibilities in this field. The minister should
February 28, 19G3

insist that the millions he needs be provided by the federal bank, carrying the administrative costs only, and not at the fantastic rates of interest which are current today. Such rates represent nothing less than exploitation of the people and serve -to throw out of balance the country's whole economy.
Mr. Chairman, if this government company is unable to find the necessary funds at a reasonable rate of interest, we will oppose this program, because it is a matter of saving the nation rather than putting it in a strait-jacket. It is not fitting to compel the present and future generations to pay eternal debts. If those debts were reasonable, as well as the rates of interest, we would agree, but we are primarily for progress. And as I was saying earlier, we can never do enough to promote development and education for our people.
We have an urgent need of satellites, these modern means of communication, but if it is physically possible to establish them, it should also be possible to finance them at a reasonable rate of interest, in the same way as external aid, by lending them the money, free of interest, for 50 or 70 years.
I think that the same thing could be done with the telecommunication services needed by the Canadian people. We agree with the minister that they should be established, but on the other hand we do not want them to create hardship through the imposition of more taxes on the taxpayer.
That is the situation now. We should be able to provide these communication media for the country through low interest loans. The minister should work in this direction by including in his program-


Mr. Mongrain:: Mr. Chairman, I rise on a point of order.
I just heard the hon. member for Compton make an uncorrect statement, and knowing his concern for truthfulness, I wish to give him some information so that he will no longer make wrong statements.
[DOT] (3:50 p.m.)
He speaks of companies which are taking unfair advantage of the government. However, the Canadian Overseas Telecommunication Corporation is a Crown corporation which never showed a deficit. Moreover, it was about to ask the government for $5 million this year to ensure its normal expansion and it has just stated that it would not need it and that it can operate through its own
Government Organization returns. Thus, the hon. member is not entitled to say that government companies are taking unfair advantage of the government.


Henry P. Latulippe: Mr. Chairman, I do not know whether the hon. member for Trois-Rivieres is a newcomer in this house, but I believe he is not very conversant with that matter, because I can refer to several Crown corporations that do not succeed in operating by themselves, that run at a loss and are financed with the tax payers' money. If he is not aware of any, I am. So that is how I reply to the hon. member for Trois-Rivieres (Mr. Mongrain).
I should also like to deal with community antennas. Someone said that the satellites will put out signals which will be picked up by community antennas. Once again, our friends of the New Democratic party say that those community antennas should belong to the state.
Several community antennas are now being operated by private enterprise, and they give very good service at fairly reasonable rates. I do not feel the state should step in and take over the responsibility of controlling everything.
The state should allow private enterprise to enter the field of communications by community antenna and get its share of the profits to be made. Indeed, individuals have the right to make a living. The government is not the only one who has the right to live, levy taxes and take money away from everyone. Private enterprise must find the money somewhere with which to pay government taxes. It is unthinkable that the government should take over all the profitable businesses, leaving only crumbs to private industry, and then depend on taxes from private enterprise to operate state undertakings.
Private industry has the right to live and to make reasonable profit. It has the right to exercise controls and to do business with other profitable enterprises. The State gets hold of everything. In the provinces for example, every efficient business is under the control of the provincial government.
The government controls the buying and selling of alcoholic drinks. It also controls electricity. Then, the citizens are taxed to pay for these controls and nothing is left to them. In short, they have no longer the right to live.

February 28, 1969
Private Bills
I wish to make a few remarks on this subject, Mr. Chairman. I would like corporations dealing with community antennas to enjoy the same rights they enjoy today, when that corporation is established. Again private enterprise should have the right to play a part in the development of the state in the fields of communications and transport. Private enterprise has certainly some rights and I think that we would go backwards if we did not allow these corporations to live and to operate properly what they can operate and to give the services that they are as capable as the state of giving.
As far as big business is concerned, Mr. Chairman, I think the state must exercise that control, as it were, because this responsibility is too heavy for private enterprise. As for everything that is not too expensive, the state should let private enterprise deal with it.
Mr. Chairman, thanks to satellites, we will have access to new mass media and we need them badly. All these mass media, all these instruments of publicity, and education should be available to the people. Indeed, it is for the government to provide them with these means. Again, as I said earlier, we should leave to private enterprises its due share in those fields. The state would then truly act as a pater familias. A father must not take everything for himself without leaving anything to the rest of the family. Every member of the family has the right to live.
A father must do his best to enable each and every member of the family to fulfil himself and freely enjoy the wealth of the family.


James Hugh Faulkner: Order.


Henry P. Latulippe: I shall conclude by thanking you, Mr. Chairman. Private enterprise-


James Hugh Faulkner: Order. It being four o'clock shall I rise, report progress and request leave to sit again at the next sitting of the house?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.
Progress reported.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: It being four o'clock, the house will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's order paper, namely private bills.
[Mr. Latulippe.l



PRIVATE BILLS


Mr. Hyliard Chappell (Peel South) moved: the second reading and reference to the Standing Committee on Finance, Trade and Economic Affairs of Bill S-18, respecting Canadian Order of Foresters.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order. Is the President of the Treasury Board asking for the floor?
[DOT] (4:00 p.m.)


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: Mr. Speaker, I apologize for not rising a little earlier. May I ask the unanimous consent of the house to revert to motions in order that we may receive a message from His Excellency?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: I beg your pardon, Mr. Speaker. I was under the impression the table had the requisite document. Perhaps we could defer this matter.


Hyliard G. Chappell: The change is further desirable because the identity of the society as a purely Canadian association operating only within Canada would be strengthened. In addition, administrative work would be simplified.
The Canadian Order of Foresters Act, 1968, a special act of the legislative assembly of the province of Ontario, which was sponsored by Mr. Makarchuk, N.D.P. member for Brantford, Ontario, authorized the society to bring this petition which, if granted, will have the effect of terminating its Ontario corporation.
What the society requests could be accomplished by incorporating a new federal society and then selling the assets of the provincial society to the federal society but this would involve a great deal of administrative work and expense in the transferring of thousands of mortgages from the Ontario to the federal society as well as in the transferring of policies and matters to do with the investments of the society.
To avoid the expense of continuing as a provincial society doing business in the other provinces or incorporating a new federal society and then selling or transferring assets, the society requests a change or an amendment to its corporate life in order that it may continue as if it had been incorporated in the first place by special act of the Parliament of Canada. To put it another way, the society is asking for a special act incorporating it as a federal society under the name of Canadian Foresters Life Insurance Society and, in French, Forestiers Canadiens, Societe d'Assurance-Vie.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Mr. Speaker, as is customary we feel that applications for this type of incorporation should pass the second reading stage after the sponsor has made his explanation. This matter is to be referred to the Standing Committee on Finance, Trade and Economic Affairs, where witnesses will appear and go into the matter in detail. We, therefore, reserve detailed comments on this application until the bill appears before the committee. I recommend that the house give passage to the bill and refer it to committee.


Edward Richard Schreyer: Mr. Speaker, I wish to address a few remarks to Bill S-18, an act respecting Canadian Order of Foresters. I do so not because I wish to oppose the organization of the Order along the lines of an insurance company but because there seems to be considerable dissention within the ranks of the organization with regard to
Private Bills
what is being applied for in this bill. As I understand it, the Canadian Order of Foresters is seeking merely to change its form of incorporation. It wishes to operate under a federal instead of a provincial charter.
As many hon. members are aware no doubt, Canadian Order of Foresters is a fraternal benefit society and many of its members wish to preserve the fraternal aspect of it. I am informed by society members that the executive and rank and file membership disagree about certain steps that ought to be taken. Some members allege that the executive has acted in a high handed manner which borders on the improper. Although notice of intended action was given to the membership it was felt that, considering the time of year it was given, what was done barely met the terms of the constitution. The rank and file consider the notice inadequate.
When this bill was before the Banking and Commerce Committee of the Senate, Senator Grosart, I believe, in questioning a witness appearing on behalf of the executive, was assured there was no substantial body of opposition within the society to implementation of Bill S-18. It was also said that there was no significant opposition with respect to what the executive of the Canadian Order of Foresters proposed to do.
I am in no position to say categorically that the executive acted wrongly, but I am in a position to say that members of the organization feel quite sincerely that during the last two years the executive has acted in a high handed manner to suit its own convenience. The executive, further, seems determined to extend fewer and fewer privileges to the rank and file members and to convert the Canadian Order of Foresters into a full fledged insurance company. The rank and file maintain that they want the fraternal aspect of the company kept alive. They do not want the society turned into an insurance company only. They object to the drastic curtailment of the number of lodges, or courts, as they are known.
[DOT] (4:10 p.m.)
The executive has tried to disband existing courts. In some cases they have amalgamated courts in order to reduce the number of delegates representing lodges at a new convention. The next convention of the Canadian Order of Foresters will be held this July in Edmonton. It is the intention of the delegates attending this convention to discuss with the existing executive of this organization many

February 28, 1969
Private Bills
points including the procedure followed by the executive in seeking a transformation from provincial to federal charter. I cannot explain, Mr. Speaker, why more information has not been given to hon. members by form of letter or circular from members of the local courts who feel opposed to the bill and to the recent action taken by the executive. This body of opinion exists.
I intend to quote from a circular prepared by the Foresters Information Committee, P.O. Box 636, Winnipeg, Manitoba. Part of this circular relates to internal operations of the organization, but part bears directly on this bill and points out the present mood that exists within the organization towards the executive. I quote:
To the officers and members of all courts of the Canadian Orders of Foresters:
Please have your Court consider the attached Notices of Motion which have been sent to High Court for debate at the High Court Meeting at Edmonton in July, 1969.
I would emphasize the following:
These motions are designed to bring back to our Subordinate or Local Courts and their members the authority that is rightly theirs. There are changes being initiated by the Executive that will, if unchecked, destroy our Court system. The Canadian Order of Foresters will then be a fraternal society in name only.
There are strong feelings on the part of many members regarding this point. I continue quoting:
Surely your Court cannot calmly watch the reduction of our Courts from 700 a few short years ago to somewhere around, or less than, 300 and still reducing in numbers.
Our Executive-[DOT]
This refers to the headquarters organization of the Canadian Order of Foresters.
-now boast they do not disband Courts any longer. They simply amalgamate them. What a farce that is. Tell that to a Court that has been forced to amalgamate (and we believe most amalgamations are forced) with another Court in another town with which it has no natural connection. Sometimes these areas are 20 -30, 40 or more miles apart. When this happens, that Court has been disbanded.
The circular then goes on to deal with other proposed notices of motion for changes within the internal constitution of the organization. There is one more paragraph contained in this notice to members which I would like to put on the record:
There is no reason why members and especially delegates should not know who attended a High Court meeting, what courts they represented, and their addresses. This information has been refused by High Court. It should be available.

The net effect of all this, Mr. Speaker, should be to point out to hon. members that there does exist an obvious and significant difference of opinion between rank and file members of this organization. Many members feel rather strongly about the fraternal society aspects of this organization, the function of the local court in the social life of their own town and the prevailing attitude within the executive. I understand the executive is now of the view that they must sell insurance and not bother with the fraternal court aspect of this organization. I do not think we as members of parliament, should take any action that will either intentionally or unintentionally have the effect of siding with one of the two sides in this disagreement.
We should not pass the bill at the present time; it should be left in abeyance for six months until after the biennial convention of this organization in Edmonton. The membership of this organization should decide whatever action they propose to take by majority vote. The results of this vote could be communicated to this house and if it is the intent and wish of the majority of delegates, the bill could be re-sponsored.
I wish to emphasize the fact that the authority which the executive feels it has is being questioned and challenged by some members who have spent many long years in this organization, who have attended conventions and high court meetings for many years, who know the organization intimately and have some feeling of attachment to it. Some of these people feel strongly opposed to the action being taken by their executive and they oppose the passage of Bill S-18 at this time. Do hon. members have the right to deliberately or otherwise show favoritism to one of the two opposing groups?
I do not think it will harm the organization to delay this bill six months. The convention will be held in four months at which time the membership could make their own decisions. Once this matter has been properly decided in their own organization, the bill requesting a federal charter could be re-introduced in September or October. A witness appearing on behalf of this organization assured hon. Senators that the requirements of their constitution relative to the procedure they must follow had been followed. I suggest it was abided by in the most technical way possible and that there was not an adequate opportunity for the full membership to have any say in this connection.
February 28, 1969

[DOT] (4:20 p.m.)
For these reasons I do not feel I am asking my colleagues to do anything rash or out of the ordinary when I simply ask them to withhold making any judgment in this connection, and to withhold giving consent to this bill for a few months at least.


Mr. Andre Fortin (Loibiniere):: As for us,
of the Ralliement Creditiste, we do not object to Bill S-18, entitled an Act respecting Canadian Order of Foresters, being carried on second reading, for the simple reason that the passage of this bill would allow us at the committee stage to examine its consequences more thoroughly than we could in this house.
Mr. Speaker, we are pleased with such a move which would enable the Canadian Order of Foresters to obtain a federal charter, in order to increase its social endeavours and to give Canadians in other provinces the increased benefit of the services it now provides to the people of Ontario.
Mr. Speaker, we would be pleased to see this bill carried on second reading, mainly on account of the "brotherhood" aspect of that corporation, as we are in favour of any measure to encourage groups whose guiding principle is brotherhood or co-operation.
Therefore, we support this bill and we would like it to be carried as quickly as possible on second reading, whereupon we could consider it clause by clause in committee, and finally approve the motion for third reading.


Mr. Arnold Peters (Timiskaming):: Mr. Speaker, I was very surprised on reading the proceedings in the Senate where this matter had been raised to learn that the question was asked which has to be asked in all cases, a question which is probably in a much different category with respect to a mutual insurance company than it is with respect to general life or general insurance companies.
In our form of government, the parliamentary agent has not really been an effective instrument. In England, the parliamentary agent is governed by very stringent legislation. Part of the responsibility of the parliamentary agent is to ascertain that certain steps which must be taken before officials of a company are able to take a specific action, have been taken. But in Canada it is doubtful whether the parliamentary agents have personally met with many of the people they
Private Bills
represent, and I believe they serve only a very dubious function in our parliamentary and committee system.
However, as the committee system grows this will have to change. In this instance, it is very important that we have the type of protection that the parliamentary agent should provide by being able to assure members of the House and of the Senate, the sponsors of bills and others, that he has gone through the documents necessary for the filing of a petition and can say that matters in connection with them are correct in every form.
I notice, as recorded in the Senate Hansard of November 26 last, that Senator Grosart asked the question that is now being asked by the hon. member for Selkirk (Mr. Schreyer), as to whether the steps necessary in establishing this change in the act had been taken. At that time the sponsor of the bill said he did not know, but he would check and would be in a position to say yes or no when the bill came up before the Senate Banking and Commerce Committee. When the matter came before the Senate committee the spokesman for the company, Mr. R. T. S. McIntosh, general counsel of the Canadian Order of Foresters, said:
First of all I would suggest that by the constitution the members of the fraternal organization and the policy holders are one and the same. There are different classifications of members, but the beneficiary members-that is, those who have voting privileges-are one and the same. I believe this is the answer to Senator Grosart's question which appears in Hansard of November 26.
He also wished to make clear to your committee that the provisions of the constitution had been fully complied with in all respects. The proposal to proceed with the application now before you originated from the Need and Welfare Committee of the Canadian Order of Foresters, which is composed of the membership itself. They suggested before and after the last biennial meeting, the last general meeting of the membership, held in July, 1967, that this be proceeded with. Following that presentation of the committee the matter was considered by the Executive Committee, and it was then suggested by the former Senator Ross Macdonald, who was legal counsel at that time, that every possible step should be taken to see that this was brought to the attention of each and every member of the Order of Foresters, of whom there are some 40,000.
The matter was then dealt w'ith by the Executive Committee, who announced the holding of a special general meeting of the membership, which was ultimately held on February 1, 1968. Notice of that, in accordance with section 5 of the constitution, was duly sent to our subordinate courts and to each of the recording secretaries. The resolutions proposed to be dealt with at the time of the general meeting were outlined and were also sent with the notice.

February 28, 1969
Private Bills
In addition to that, notice of the general meeting to be held on February 1 was also published in a magazine that periodically goes out to each of the members, so this reached each of the members personally. All this was in accordance with the provisions of section 5 of the constitution, which states that 60 days' notice of such meeting must be given. The notices went out on November 15, 1967, which was in excess of the 60 days' notice required.
In addition to the general beneficiary members there is also a classification of affiliate members. These are individuals who do not belong to a local court; they are not sufficient in number to belong to a local subordinate court of the organization. Section 40 of the constitution, which deals with affiliate members, states that there must be 300 of them in any province before there is an association, say, of the affiliate members.
Notice was given to each of the affiliate members in the provinces of Ontario and Quebec on November 13 advising of a general meeting to be held on December 1, 1967. Twenty-five members constitute a quorum of affiliate members, but there was no such quorum at either of the meetings held in Ontario and Quebec. Incidentally, none of the other provinces is affiliated in this respect. Therefore there were no appointees of affiliate members because they did not have a quorum.
I would therefore suggest that proper notice was given in accordance with the constitution, and further that it was publicized in the magazine that goes out to each member to ensure that every member had full and adequate knowledge of the meeting on February 1, 1968. The meeting was then held. The resolutions were considered in detail; they were voted upon and received approval of more than two thirds of the voting members there, again fully in accordance with the constitution. Following the meeting of February 1, a notice was ^ again sent out to each member, and again published in the magazine, advising each member that the resolutions had been passed.
Senator Pearson: What is the percentage of the voting members compared to the regular members?


Léonel Beaudoin: About 5.000 out of 40,000.
This, of course, is the crux of the matter. This is a fraternal organization and certain steps must be gone through to comply with the wishes of that organization. It seems to me that there is a considerable change involved in moving this insurance company out of the position it has held as a fraternal organization under the provincial government and granting it a federal charter. This is particularly so when we realize that it really was constituted before the change in the Insurance Act and therefore has the benefit of the provisions of the federal legislation prior to the early 1940's.
[DOT] (4:30 p.m.)
A number of changes are to be made which are fairly important. Most of us are aware that fraternal organizations should operate their own business in their own manner; but

their constitution is very important. If you note the statement made by the representative and general counsel of the Canadian Order of Foresters you will see that in each case when he was talking about the calling of a special meeting he did not say each and every member had been informed through the magazine of the decision of the general executive which heard the representations at the annual convention or that executive were charged with bringing forth a number of resolutions in keeping with the discussion at that time. This is not what happened. The general counsel did not place the resolutions in the magazine for the knowledge of the general membership. What he put in was a notice that there would be a meeting and discussion of this general subject on February 1.
It seems to me there is a great difference between the publication of resolutions and the permission for lodges to make a decision concerning whether or not t.hey wished to send representatives to oppose the holding of a general meeting for the purpose of discussing a subject the details of which are not within their knowledge. I believe the sponsor probably could clarify this matter if he would indicate, as has been done on a number of occasions what information was given to the general membership. Then, we would know that the terms of the fraternal organization and the terms of the right of an organization to petition parliament had been followed. In respect of an organization which is spread all across Canada, I do not consider 4,000 or 5,000 people from one general area to be sufficient representation for that organization. The leader of such an organization, especially when he is located far away from the individual lodges, could conceivably come to this parliament to ask that legislation be passed to allow the organization to become a common insurance carrier to provide insurance to anyone under such rules as the executive may establish.
One might ask where they would get the money. They would not have to get it off the street. They have it already. This is an old established organization. It would be very easy for someone who wished to obtain control of the organization to operate the organization for his own benefit. The information I have and some of the information given by the hon. member for Selkirk (Mr. Schreyer) would indicate that this may have happened. I, therefore, do not believe there would be any particular hardship on anyone except the
February 28. 1969

Private Bills
members of the executive if it were necessary for them to delay the passage of this legislation until this fall. I would think the sponsor might consider this. Also I believe the hon. member who spoke favourably about referring the matter to the committee might be interested in this particular proposition because he is well aware that the convention is to be held in his home town in July of this year. Therefore, he should be able to attend the convention as a member representing that area. Then, he would be in a much better position when he returns in the fail to tell us whether or not in his opinion the executive have been given the authority to do this.
It is unfortunate that our private bills legislation does not carry with it the obligation to provide the information that would normally be provided in England. It bothers me when a fraternal organization comes before us and we receive correspondence which indicates the members are not in the least satisfied with some of the tfiings that are going on. One motion which has come to my attention is in respect of subsection (6), section 8, page 9 which reads as follows:
This would allow any employed officer of High Court to run for an Executive position. There is reason to believe there are those, who because they are deeply disturbed by the direction our Fraternity is going, would contest seats on this Executive. Why refuse them this chance?
This relates of course to the argument that the general executive is not operating in the general interest of some of the lodges. It seems to me this is an indication they are not completely satisfied. Then, there is another motion which relates to subsection (5), section 8, page 9, which states as follows:
There is no need for such a subsection in our Constitution. If these officers are doing a good job the members of the Canadian Order of Foresters will re-elect them.
If they are not, why restrict replacing them to only six people from amongst our many thousands of members.
As long as the Subsection is in force it will prevent our Society, even if the need should ever arise, from quickly ridding itself of leadership that is poor or unresponsive to the needs and wishes of the Canadian Order of Foresters as a whole.
The Canadian Forester Echo, official publication of the Winnipeg council, for March, 1968 contained this headline:
Brantford High Court Delegates Defer Final Action Till Edmonton High Court in 1969. High Court Officers Claimed Ignorance of Federal Insurance Act Regulations.
The article goes on to outline the fact that the executive did not have the answers. And then the article reads:
One delegate's comments were that the officers seemed to answer most questions with "perhaps, maybe, not sure, don't know, never heard of this, etc."
o (4:40 p.m.)
These facts have emerged. Our executive had approached the federal Department of Insurance about a federal charter in January of 1964. This is a full four years before the Brantford High Court meeting. A regular High Court meeting was held last July in Hamilton. Despite the importance of a federal charter and name change, they were not mentioned in the motions for July.
In other words, at the Hamilton meeting these matters were not raised, although they had been raised originally by the executive in 1964.
These items were introduced to the July convention by a Good and Welfare committee report (which report we all know is prepared by the High Court officers) in the dying moments of the session. The delegates accepted this report to let information of the issues at stake.
As near as we can make out, it seems instead of investigating the executive actually tried to incorporate federally. But a committee report was not enough for the federal Insurance Department, they insisted on a proper notice of motion.
Next High Court calls a special High Court meeting at Brantford.
Here is the comment from a court delegate "notices were sent out at a time when the High Court knew that it would be hard to arrange meetings for delegates elections" also "the meeting day itself is the most inconvenient day of the week."
High Court called a meeting but gave no facts. The members of our society should not be denied information of the issues at stake.
Head office treats the courts like children "you can be seen but not heard, you can listen but not talk." Can we be blamed for thinking that head office's attitude is "If the members know nothing, they can say nothing and if they say nothing they can do as we please." The courts in this area initiated an investigation of the issues and found good reason to oppose the motion at Brantford.
Our delegates to Brantford have effectively stopped either change of name or charter until it can be debated at Edmonton.
This was done by adding a section to the original executive motion that defers final action on the questions until the High Court meeting in 1969.
If they have deferred action, the sponsor of this bill is not aware of it. Certainly, the Senate were not told that the Brantford court felt it had been able, by certain action taken under their charter, to stop this action. If we pass this bill the matter will not be referred to the convention at Edmonton in July of this year. Yet, the people who have investigated
60S3

February 28, 1969
Private Bills
the matter seem to think they can discuss it and make the final decision at Edmonton.
We are dealing with an organization of fraternal members, benevolent members, members who belong to the beneficial side of an insurance company. They have the right to make the decision and use the machinery with which they are provided. This is not being allowed them. This article continues:
Between now and Edmonton High Court every member should ask "Why was full information as to the effect of these proposed changes not sent out to the courts?"
"What right has the executive to call a meeting to change our charter act, etc., if they do not know what these motions will do to the Order?
All should ask-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Richard):: Order. I regret to advise the hon. member that his time has expired. The hon. member for Spadina (Mr. Ryan).


William Arnold Peters: Mr. Speaker, could I ask the indulgence of hon. members to put on the record just a few more remarks made by the Brantford council, because I think it is important and I may be the only one who has this information?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Richard):: Has the
hon. member the consent of the house to do this?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Richard):: The
hon. member for Spadina.


William Arnold Peters: You don't want information, eh?


Mr. S. Perry Ryan (Spadina):: Mr. Speaker, this bill, S-18, should not be impeded in its course, particularly because it is going to committee in the customary way. This is a simple rearrangement and is being made, as I see it, strictly for the purposes of convenience.


William Arnold Peters: The convenience of whom?


Sylvester Perry Ryan: An Ontario charter will be replaced by a federal charter. It is a simple matter of rearrangement. My hon. friends across the way, despite all the verbiage, are simply making, I submit, a very large mountain out of a very few small molehills. There is every thing to be said for the passage of this bill. I think it has been said pretty well by the hon. member for Peel South (Mr. 
Chappell). I am assured by the hon. member for Peel South that he has sworn declarations in his file which prove that all the necessary legal proceedings of the company were carried out with propriety in this connection.
We have the further assurance of legal counsel in this respect. An Order of this size, and as responsible as it is, would not attempt to put through a rearrangement of this kind without proper legal advice. The hon. member for Selkirk (Mr. Schreyer) must realize that the other place must have been thoroughly satisfied in this respect.
There are across Canada 40,000 members of the society affected by this measure. I understand that about one-third of them are in the province of Ontario. The head office of the Order is in Brantford, Ontario. The strange thing is that Mr. Mitro Makarchuk, the N.D.P. member of the Ontario provincial legislature from Brantford, sponsored the first part of this rearrangement by helping process the necessary bill through the Ontario legislature. In fact, he led it through.


An hon. Member:: Shame.


Sylvester Perry Ryan: So what goes on in this connection? Does the Socialist, two-headed, firebreathing dragon, not know what is happening? Does one head not know what is going on in the other head? Why this quibbling by the hon. member for Selkirk (Mr. Schreyer) and the hon. member for Timiskaming (Mr. Peters) with regard to such a routine matter? Are there subsequent bills that the hon. members opposite are trying to block? Is this the answer? Why this filibuster? This is the kind of ploy which makes one wonder just what kind of marbles rattle around in the noggin of a Socialist. This bill should be sent to committee without further ado.


Mr. Frank Howard (Skeena):: Mr. Speaker, I listened very attentively to the hon. member for Spadina (Mr. Ryan). I heard the very best reason one could possibly hear from him as to why we should not proceed with this bill-the simple question of the difference of opinion as to whether things were, or were not, done properly.


Sylvester Perry Ryan: Mr. Speaker, would the hon. member permit a question?


Frank Howard: I would be very happy to accept a question.


Sylvester Perry Ryan: Does the difference of opinion exist between the federal arm of the N.D.P. and the Ontario arm of the N.D.P.?
February 28, 1969


Frank Howard: There is one thing I would like to say to the hon. member for Spadina. I appreciate the narrow concept he has, belonging to the party to which he belongs, and the difficulty he has in understanding this; but we do not deal with things on the basis of politics. We deal with them on the basis of propriety and what is correct.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


Frank Howard: If a member of the legislature of the province of Ontario, who belongs to the same party to which I belong, advances a certain course of action, this does not mean, as it does in the Liberal party, that everybody bows down and says, "That is correct". We do not have that sort of suppression of thought in our party. We are independent-minded in this party. We are concerned about what is correct with regard to this organization.
e (4:50 p.m.)
Am I to accept the declaration of the hon. member for Spadina (Mr. Ryan) that he has been informed that the sponsor of the bill, the hon. member for Peel South (Mr. Chappell), has affidavits in his possession that everything is hunky dory and correct, or am I to believe what is in the official publication of the Winnipeg Council, the Canadian Forester dated March, 1968 which points out that there is a serious difference of opinion as to whether the proper thing was done, and raises serious objection to the manner in which the executive were operating? The editorial signed by the editor goes into great detail and says that everything was not right and correct so far as the group in Winnipeg is concerned. Whom am I to believe?


Sylvester Perry Ryan: Would the hon. member permit a question? Does he not think that if this were the situation, if there were anything really behind it, legal proceedings of a civil nature would have been taken long before this?


Frank Howard: I really do not think so. I am inclined to think that the Winnipeg Council of the Canadian Order of Foresters hopefully has enough faith in this parliament to believe we will not follow blindly what has been presented but will look at things in a subjective way. I see the sponsor of the bill rising and I think he wants to ask me a question. I will gladly give him that opportunity, but perhaps I can precede it with the suggestion that he should withdraw the bill
Private Bills
because of the doubt and objection. In addition, within a few months a bi-annual convention will be held in Edmonton when all this may be resolved and then parliament will not be in the position of having to pick and choose sides. However, I will gladly submit to the question.


Hyliard G. Chappell: Does the hon. member realize that he is referring to a publication dated March 1968, the bill did not receive royal assent in the Ontario legislature until April, and that this society is in the riding of the sponsor, Mr. Makarchuk, the N.D.P. member of the legislature for Brantford? The head office of the organization is in his riding, and he of all people would know if anything were wrong.


Frank Howard: This is the sort of question that does not need any comment. If there were any validity in it I am sure the hon. member would have mentioned it earlier. If he read the Senate committee proceedings he would realize that, regardless of the fact that this publication is dated March, 1968 and that the bill proceeded through the legislature at a later time than that, practically the entire evidence before the Senate Banking and Commerce Committee was based upon one little question. Mr. McIntosh went into extreme detail about the internal activities of the organization, about notices and meetings, whether there was or there was not a quorum, and so on. He wound up not being sure himself of the constitutional correctness of the meetings that were held. At page 95 of the committee's proceedings Mr. McIntosh, after a long and detailed explanation in which he seemed to be mostly protesting against the fact that anyone should question what the hierarchy was doing, said the following:
I would therefore suggest that proper notice was given in accordance with the constitution, and further that it was publicized in the magazine that goes out to each member to ensure that every member had full and adequate knowledge of the meeting-
And he goes on and on in this way. Is the sponsor of the bill able to say with certainty that there was no difference of opinion and that everything is sweetness and light? Can he tell us that Premier Walter Weir of Manitoba, who, I understand, is a member of the Foresters presumably in the Winnipeg area, endorses this and that everything is hunky dory there?
This assurance cannot be given because the sponsor of the bill is not in a position to do so

February 28, 1969
Private Bills
regardless of the affidavits, which he must be able to guarantee, that everything went through perfectly legitimately and that there were no disagreements in the Canadian Order of Foresters. I believe the sponsor of the bill, being a generous member of parliament, agreed to move the motion for the endorsa-tion of this bill. Many hon. members find themselves doing such things out of courtesy and decency, although they do not endorse the principle of the bill. The hon. member for Grenville-Carleton (Mr. Blair) is the sponsor of some insurance bills here, and yet I know very well that in his heart he does not endorse the concept of foreign ownership of life insurance companies. This does not carry with it any simple endorsation.
The editor of the Canadian Forester wound up the article in this way:
We end with the comments from a member who has attended many High Courts "at High Court after High Court our executive brought out the 'Old Bogey Man'-The Superintendent of Insurance". Remember how we were told of his displeasure because we held High Court meetings every two years. And the terrible things he might do if we did not go to three or four year conventions. If this ever was, he should have been in the Jolly Baron convention hall raising his voice, because now we hold High Court meetings every six months.
This is the end of the editorial and follows on the references of my friend, the hon. member for Timiskaming (Mr. Peters). Surely, the high court officials do not refer to Mr. Humphrys as a bogey man, a man to be feared. If he is looked upon as a bogey man by the executive, then perhaps the executive has not been doing things correctly. If you live by the book you have nothing to fear from the law enforcement officers, but if you live outside the book then there is reason to look on the one who enforces the rules, who in this case is the Superintendent of Insurance, as a bogey man who is able to crack down.


Sylvester Perry Ryan: You are killing a just bill.


Frank Howard: I am doing no such thing.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Richard):: Order. It being five o'clock the hour for private members business has expired.



SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATES (B), 1988-69 TABLING OF REVISED ESTIMATE FOR LABOUR

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Richard):: I have a message from His Excellency the Governor General which reads as follows:
Government House,
Ottawa,
28 February, Ottawa, 1969
The Governor General transmits to the House of Commons Revised Supplementary Estimates (B) of sums required for the service of Canada for the year ending on the 31st March, 1969, and, in accordance with the provisions of "The British North America Act, 1867" the Governor General recommends these Estimates to the House of Commons.


Jean-Luc Pepin: Mr. Speaker, the purpose of this estimate is to allow Labour, Vote 12b to cover all of the persons now receiving compensation for disability caused by silicosis as a result of their employment in the coal mines on Cape Breton Island which were taken over by the Cape Breton Development Corporation.
This purpose is to be accomplished by the addition of the words "and other persons" to the wording given in the original supplementary estimates (B) for this Vote which referred only to persons who are employees of the Cape Breton Development Corporation.
I should add that this addition is in keeping with the explanation given for this Vote before the Standing Committee on Miscellaneous Estimates, and in these particular circumstances I assume the house would not wish this revised estimate to be referred to the standing committee. On Monday next we will be proceeding with this revised estimate and will not proceed with the of original Labour Vote 12b.
The Aciing Speaker (Mr. Richard): Is this
agreed?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Richard):: It being five o'clock this house stands adjourned until two o'clock Monday afternoon. I hope hon. members enjoy the excellent weather that Ottawa is providing.


[Stage Direction]
At five o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.
[Stage Direction]
Monday, March 3, 19S9	There were no executions during this
period in the Provinces of Nova Scotia, New-The house met at 2 p.m.	foundland and the Yukon Territory.

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

Mr. Rose: 1.	Has the federal government participated in any discussions about the alleged need to rationalize the railway systems in the Fraser Valley?
2.	If so, when did the discussions take place and what progress was made?
3.	If not, does the government contemplate initiating or being party to such discussions?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: Parts 1, 2, and 3. It is impossible to answer this question in the form presented since the meaning of Part 1 is not clear.


PRISONERS SERVING LIFE SENTENCES
Mr. Beaudoin: 1.	How many prisoners in federal penitentiaries are serving life sentences?
2.	What is their average age?
3.	How many have escaped over the past five years, and how many have been recaptured?
4.	How many prisoners have been hanged by law since 1940 (a) in Canada (b) in each province?


George James McIlraith: 1.	As of 19 December, 1968, there were 387 prisoners in federal penitentiaries serving life sentences.
2.	Their average age was 36.7 years.
3.	Four of these inmates have escaped over the past five years and all have been recaptured.
171. Province No. of Executions	
Ontario	53
Quebec	49
British Columbia	23
Alberta	22
Manitoba	10
New Brunswick	7
Saskatchewan	3
Prince Edward Island	2
North West Territories	2


DEFENCE DEVELOPMENT SHARING PROGRAM
Mr. Broadbent: 1.	What are the terms and conditions under the Department of Industry's Defence Development Sharing Program?
2.	For each fiscal year since its inception, what have been the annual number of projects and the annual expenditures of this program shared by the federal government, Canadian Industry and other foreign governments?
3.	(a) Of the successful development projects under the program, what percentage of the total number of projects did the government award the originator of the development project with a contract for production (b) what percentage were transferred for production to companies other than those undertaking the research and development project?
4.	What is the total federal government expenditure commitment to this program in the current fiscal year?
5.	When were changes made in the Defence Development Sharing Program to allow civil-oriented projects to be eligible for the financial grants provided by the program?
6.	What are the reasons for these changes?


Jean-Luc Pepin: 1. Vote 5 is to develop and sustain the technological capability of Canadian defence industry for the purpose of defence export sales or civil export sales arising from that capability; (a) by supporting selected development programs; (b) by paying one-half of the cost of the acquisition of new equipment required for plant modernization, and (c) by supporting the establishment of production capacity and qualified sources for production of component parts and materials, on terms and conditions approved by
the Treasury Board. 2. Federal Development		No. of
Year	Expenditure	Projects1959/60	$ 1,851,108	41960/61	$ 2,901,667	141961/62	$ 4,420,424	331962/63	$ 8,000,000	281963/64	$19,000,000	391964/65	$20,500,000	481965/66	$23,994,897	601966/67	$22,626,897	561967/68	$22,904,217	53
Questions
The above expenditure represents approximately 50 per cent of the cost of the development projects, the remaining 50 per cent is shared almost equally by Canadian industry and allied governments. Cost sharing for a given project may be between the Canadian Government and Canadian industry, between the Canadian Government and an allied government or all three.
3.	(a) The Defence Development Sharing Program is concerned with development of defence equipment for sale to allied governments. The Canadian Government is not usually a customer. If the development project is successful and a production order is received it will normally be from a foreign government; (b) Less than 1 per cent.
4.	Expenditure commitment for the development portion of this program in the current fiscal year is $24 million of $32 million authorized.
5.	Changes were made on May 8, 1968 to include projects aimed at civil export markets arising from defence technological capability in Canadian industry. This change was associated with the combination of the Defence Development Sharing Program and the Industry Modernization for Defence Exports Program effected at that time.
6.	The results obtained from the Program have shown that civil exports also arose from defence technology. The change permits recognition of this civil market potential of Canadian defence industrial capability and enables its exploitation in line with the objectives of the Program.


CAR TIRE SAFETY STANDARDS
Mr. Maiher: What federal control exists in the field of setting and enforcing car tire safety standards?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: At present, the federal government is not enforcing tire safety standards throughout Canada. However, consideration is being given to legislation requiring minimum safety standards for new motor vehicles and parts manufactured in, or imported into Canada. It is contemplated that tire safety standards will be considered within this context.
The Canadian Government Specifications Board has issued the following two tire safety standards:	CGSB 97-GP-109: New

Pneumatic Tires, Passenger Cars; CGSB 97-GP-110: Tire Selection and Rims, Passenger Cars.
The CGSB standards are currently used by the federal government in purchasing tires for its own use.


CANADIAN EMBASSIES
Mr. Beaudoin: 1.	In how many countries does Canada have Embassies?
2.	In what countries is Canada represented and what is the name of our ambassador to each of them?


Hon. Mitchell Sharp (Secretary of Slate for External Affairs):: 1. 48
2.
Country	Ambassador
Argentina	Robert Choquette
Austria	J. A. McCordick
Belgium	Paul Tremblay
Brazil	Vacant
Cameroun	J. E. Thibeault
Chile	G. B. Summers
Colombia	J. H. Cleveland
Congo, Democratic Republic of	Marc Baudouin
Costa Rica	D. W. Munro
Cuba	Leon Mayrand
Czechoslovakia	T. B. B. Wainman-Wood
Denmark	M. H. Wershof
Dominican Republic	B. I. Rankin
Ecuador	J. H. Cleveland
Ethiopia	Michel Gauvin
Finland	H. H. Carter
France	P. A. Beaulieu
Germany	R. P. Bower
Greece	H. F. Feaver
Guatemala	S. F. Rae
Haiti	Leon Mayrand
Indonesia	A. P. Bissonnet
Iran	C. C. Eberts
Ireland	J. J. McCardle
Israel	R. L. Rogers
Italy	G. G. Crean
Japan	H. O. Moran
Lebanon	C. Hardy
Mexico	S. F. Rae
Netherlands	Vacant
Norway	G. K. Grande
Peru	J. F.-X. Houde
Poland	Miss P. A. McDougall
Portugal	J. E. Morin
Senegal	J. J. M. Cote
South Africa	C. J. Woodsworth


Country
Spain
Sweden
Switzerland
Thailand
Tunisia
Turkey
Union of Soviet Socialist Republics United Arab Republic United States of America Uruguay Venezuela Yugoslavia
Ambassador Benjamin Rogers A. J. Andrew J. A. Roberts
J.	C. Britton A. J. Pick
K.	Goldschlag R. A. D. Ford
Thomas Carter
A.	E. Ritchie
Robert Choquette
B.	I. Rankin B. M. Williams
For more detailed information the hon. member may wish to consult the December 1968 edition of "Canadian Representatives Abroad".


QUEBEC-REFORESTATION AGREEMENTS
Mr. Lambert (Belle-chasse): Considering that the federal government has signed an agreement with the Province of Quebec for the implementation of a reforestation program in nine counties of Eastern Quebec in order to provide work for welfare recipients, I ask:	(a)
That the government release the list of these counties, (b) What is the nature of this agreement, (c) What amount has been spent on this program in the 1968-69 Estimates, (d) What amount has been provided for this program in the 1969-70 Estimates, (e) Will the federal government have any supervisory authority over the work done according to this agreement?


Mr. Russell C. Honey (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Forestry and Rural Development):: (a) Yes: Kamouraska, Riviere-du Loup, Temiscouata, Rimouski, Matane, Ma-tapedia, Bonaventure, Gaspe South and Gaspe North; (b) This agreement is a project under the federal-provincial rural development agreement for the Lower St. Lawrence, Gaspe and lies de la Madeleine pursuant to the Fund for Rural Economic Development Act; (c) None; (d) The amount of the total budget to be allocated to this particular project has not been decided; (e) No.

HOUSING TASK FORCE COMMISSIONERS Question No. 1,294


Mr. Godin:: 1.	How many commissioners were employed on the federal Task Force on Housing, chaired by the Honourable Paul Hellyer?
Questions
2.	What are their names and addresses?
3.	At what salary were they hired?
4.	How high was their expense accounts?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: 1.	Six.
2.	Dr. Doris Boyle, 12 Tain Street, Sydney, Nova Scotia; Mr. Robert Campeau, Campeau Corporation Limited, Box 450, Terminal "A", Ottawa, Ontario; Mr. Peter Carter, 159 Dex-hill Drive, Beaconsfield, Quebec; Dr. Pierre Dansereau, 76 Maplewood, Outremont 153, Quebec; Dr. James Gillies, 73 Fairway Heights Road, Thornhill, Ontario; Mr. C. E. Pratt, 430 Stevens Drive, West Vancouver, B.C.
3.	$150 per diem.
4.	As of February 6, 1969, their expense account payments have totalled $9,268.75. Final expense account figures are not yet known.


POST OFFICE DEPARTMENT OVERTIME
Mr. Macquarrie: 1.	How much overtime was paid to employees of the Post Office Department in each of the following months: November 1968, December 1968, January 1969?
2.	How much overtime was paid for the period of January 23 to January 31, 1969?


Eric William Kierans: In so far as the Post Office Department is concerned:	1. November 1968, $1,161,440;
December 1968, $2,420,903; January 1969, $1,062,774.
Note:	In December 1968 an additional
holiday, Boxing Day, was granted which increased the overtime costs. Also in December 1968, in addition to the overtime resulting from the Christmas Operations, a large amount of retroactive overtime payments were made because of the salary revision granted through collective bargaining with effect from 1st August 1967.
2.	To determine the overtime costs for the eight day period from Thursday, 23rd January to Friday, 31st January 1969, would require a manual review of approximately
80,000	time records. Overtime is normally reported in hours for the whole month and the amount is calculated and cheques printed mechanically.


Questions


CANADA CORPORATIONS ACT CONSULTANTS
Mr. Burton: What are the names, addresses and occupations of the team of experienced businessmen and lawyers who are being consulted respecting proposed changes in the Canada Corporations Act?


Hon. Ron Basford (Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs):: Three panels of lawyers, accountants and businessmen were formed and met early in 1968 to review and comment, in confidence, on the recommendations for changes that were made by the Task Force on the Canada Corporations Act. These individuals are not involved in the current drafting of the Bill and will of course bear no responsibility for its contents. The panels were composed as follows: Panel of Lawyers: Mr. D. A. Berlis, Q.C., Toronto, Ont.; Mr. G. E. Creber, Q.C., Toronto, Ont.; Mr. Charles Scott, Q.C., Ottawa, Ont.; Mr. Jean A. Desjardins, Montreal, Que.; Mr. Gerald McCarthy, Montreal, Que.; Mr. Pierre Le-grand, Montreal, Que.; Mr. G. B. Robertson, Q.C., Halifax, N.S.; Mr. Alan Sweatman, Q.C., Winnipeg, Man.; Mr. Harris G. Field, Q.C., Edmonton, Alta.; Mr. C. Francis Murphy, Vancouver, B.C.; Mr. Purdy Crawford, Toronto, Ont.; Mr. Michael Greenblatt, Q.C., Montreal, Que.; Mr. J. S. Woods, Calgary, Alta. Panel of Accountants: Mr. A. Irvine Barrow, C.A., Halifax, N.S.; Mr. R. B. Dale-Harris, F.C.A., Toronto, Ont.; Mr. George Keeping, F.C.A., Toronto, Ont.; Mr. W. R. C. Patrick, F.C.A., Vancouver, B.C.; Mr. Jean Valiquette, C.A., Montreal, Que.; Mr. A. G. Watson, F.C.A., Toronto, Ont.; Mr. Francis Winspear, C.A., Edmonton, Alta. Panel of Businessmen: Mr. Jack Austin, Vancouver, B.C.; Mr. Ralph M. Barford, Toronto, Ont.; Mr. W. J. Cheesman, Hamilton, Ont.; Mr. J. W. Dobson, Montreal, Que.; Mr. Robert T. Morgan, Toronto, Ont.; Mr. Claude Tetrault, Montreal, Que.; Mr. J. W. Younger, Hamilton, Ont.


TOBACCO RESEARCH
Mr. Douglas (Assiniboia): In each of the three most recent fiscal years for which the information is available, what was the cost to the federal government, of research performed by the Department of Agriculture in relation to the production of tobacco in Canada, and any other assistance given to the industry?


Hon. H. A. Olson (Minister of Agriculture):: 1965-66, $403,724; 1966-67, $466,533; 1967-68, $850,416; Total, $1,720,673.
[Mr. Kierans.l


&quot;MAIL EARLY CAMPAIGN&quot; AWARDS
Mr. Macquarrie: 1.	How many newspapers, radio stations and TV stations were presented Award of Merit Certificates by the Post Office Department for generous assistance and co-operation in the 1968 "Mail Early Campaign"?
2.	What other groups or individuals were so honoured and what was the total cost of these certificates?
3.	What were the requisite qualifications for such awards?
4.	In what previous years were such Award certificates presented?
5.	What was the total cost of advertisements in
(a)	daily, and (b) weekly newspapers, for the "Mail Early Campaign" in 1968?
6.	What was the comparable figure for the years 1964, 1965, 1966 and 1967?


Eric William Kierans: In so far as the Post Office Department is concerned: 1. English, 490; French, 85.
2.	A small number of business firms were so honoured and are included in the totals quoted in question No. 1. The certificates were provided free of charge by one of the department's suppliers as samples of available paper stock and designs. The purchase price of the envelopes used for mailing the Certificates was $11.69 including 12 per cent sales tax. Cost of overprinting envelopes before mailing amounted to $3.53.
3.	The awards were based on assistance rendered beyond the paid advertising for promoting the program for the 1963 "Mail Early" Campaign.
4.	No such Award Certificates previously presented.
5.	(a) Daily newspapers, $27,972; (b) Weekly newspapers, $11,732.62.
6.	Daily Newspapers Weekly Newspapers
	$	$
1964	17,500.00	7,500.001965	25,950.30	7,247.191966	24,905.89	6,705.001967	32,402.50	13,954.37


BELLECHASSE, QUE.-ASSISTANCE TO INDUSTRIES
Mr. Lambert (Belle-chasse): 1.	Has the federal government assisted a number of industries located in the constituency of Belle-chasse through the Industrial Development Bank and, if so (a) which industries (b) what amount was given to each industry?
2.	If no assistance was given, have any industries requested assistance and, if so, which industries?
March 3, 19S9	COMMONS


Edgar John Benson: 1.
and 2. The Annual Report of the Industrial Development Bank for the year ended September 30th, 1968, contains information regarding the number and amount of loans by size, by province and by type of business. Information on the amount or business classification of loans by constituency is not published.


OTTAWA-LEASED SPACE
Mr. Schreyer: 1.	Does the Government of Canada lease space in the following buildings (a) City Centre Building
(b)	Sir Guy Carleton Building, 161 Laurier Ave. W.
DEBATES	6105
Questions
(c)	Gillin Building, Laurier at Elgin (d) building at Metcalfe and Slater Streets (e) Fuller Building, 75 Albert St.?
2.	What is the period of the lease in each case?
3.	What is the lease price in each case?
4 What is the date, in each case, at which such leased space was put into actual use?
5.	In each case, where leased space has not been put into actual use until after a period of one month after commencement of lease, what are the reasons for the continued unoccupancy?


Hon. Arthur Laing (Minister of Public Works):: 1. (a) Yes; (b) Yes; (c) Yes; (d) Yes; (e) Yes.
2,	3, 4, and 5. Listed below:
Building	Period of Lease Annual Rental	Date of Occupancy	Reasons for UnoccupancyCity Centre	12/11/64 to 30/9/69	$ 11,016	12/11/64	n/a15/9/67 to 30/9/71	117,780	15/9/67	n/a15/9/67 to 30/9/72	93,852	15/9/67	n/aSir Guy Carleton	29/6/66 to 30/6/76	499,596	29/6/66	n/a161 Laurier Ave. W. Gillin	22/1/65 to 28/2/75- \	286,400	22/1/65	n/aLaurier at Elgin	15/2/65 to 28/2/75- /	15/2/65	n/a1/10/65 to 28/2/75	29,702	1/10/65	n/aMetcalfe	18/7/68 to 31/12/74	54,150	18/7/68	n/a88 Metcalfe St.	27/6/66 to 31/12/72	168,264	27/6/66	n/a22/2/65 to 28/2/66	5,824	22/2/65	n/a(now month to month) 1/9/67 to 31/8/69	7,020	1/9/67	n/a1/5/68 to 31/3/69	70,623	1/5/68	n/a1/6/67 to 31/5/68	567	1/6/67	n/a(now month to month) 1/7/66 month to month	1,458	1/7/66	n/a24/10/66 to 30/4/68	972	24/10/66	n/aFuller	(now month to month) 1/1/67 to 31/12/71	257,193	1/1/67	n/a75 Albert St.	1/9/67 to 31/12/71	2,658	1/9/67	n/a1/5/68 to 31/12/71	1,440	1/5/68	n/a9/9/68 to 30/9/69	8,175	9/9/68	n/a


HILLSBOROUGH, P.E.I. POST OFFICE CLOSURES
Mr. Macquarrie: 1.	How many post offices have been closed in the constituency of Hillsborough since January 1, 1966?
2.	Where were they located?
3.	What were the reasons for the closure in each case?
4.	As a result of these closures, how many people either postmasters or rural carriers lost employment?
5.	What further post offices are scheduled to be closed in this constituency in the immediate future?


Eric William Kierans: In so far as the Post Office Department is concerned: 1. Three.
2.	Stanhope, P.E.I.; Tracadie Cross, P.E.I.; Union Road, P.E.I.
3.	Limited usefulness.
4.	Three postmasters and three rural couriers.
5.	The Bedford Station, P.E.I. post office is to be closed in the near future.
Note: Further studies are being conducted with a view to closing additional post offices


Questions
within the closing program criteria but no decision has been made on any particular case as yet.


&quot;MUNICIPAL AUTHORITIES IN THE PILOT REGION (BAEQ) &quot;
Mr. Monieilh: 1.	What was the first date of publication of "Municipal Authorities in the Pilot Region (BAEQ)"?
2.	How often is this report published?
3.	How was the mailing list for this publication determined?
4.	How many copies of Condensed Report CR-No. 16 of this publication were mailed?
5.	What was the total cost of study made to produce the material contained in above-mentioned CR-No. 16?
6.	What annual salaries are or were being paid to Mr. Jean-Guy Frenette, Mr. Leo Jacques and Jocelyn Breton, and how long were they involved in conducting their studies and preparation of the material going into CR-No. 16?
7.	What was the total cost of conducting the studies, preparation of material, actual publication and mailing of CR-No. 16?
8 What was the total cost of producing this publication from the time of its inception to the completion of CR-No. 16?
9.	What are the basic reasons for conducting these studies and the preparation of these reports?
10.	Are such studies conducted in other parts of Canada and, if so, where?


Russell Clayton Honey: 1. November 14, 1968.
2.	Condensed reports in this series are published whenever interest warrants.
3.	According to interest categories on a computer mailing list.
4.	4,560.
5.	Study costs were not costed separately relative to CR-No. 16.
6.	The individuals mentioned were not engaged by the federal government.
7.	Not costed separately.
8.	Material and printing $1,009.66.
9.	These studies were conducted as part of the research leading to the implementation of a Comprehensive Rural Development Plan for the Lower St. Lawrence, Gaspe and lies de la Madeleine area. The condensed reports provide information in English to interested Canadians.
10.	No.


R.C.M.P.-AIRPORTS PROTECTION
Mr. Robinson: 1.	How many members of the RCMP are located at each airport in Canada and where is each of the airports located?
2.	How many members of the RCMP are involved in (a) traffic control (b) security measures (c) criminal investigation (d) airport administration?
3.	What legislative acts does the RCMP administer within the airport environment?


George James McIlraith: 1.
Toronto International Airport, 26; Montreal International Airport, 22; Vancouver International Airport, 14; Ottawa International Airport, 6; Winnipeg International Airport, 1; Edmonton International Airport, 1; Calgary International Airport, 1; Halifax International Airport, 1.
2.	(a) All members in varying degrees; (b) Answer 2(a) applies; (c) Answer 2(a) applies; (d) NIL.
3.	All Federal Statutes and Provincial Statutes where we have primary jurisdiction, or whenever a peace officer is required in the absence of another police department having primary jurisdiction.


AVERAGE TAX PAYMENTS
Mr. Caouelfe: In each of the last five years, by province, what was the average amount paid in taxes to the federal government by Canadian citizens?


Hon. Jean-Pierre Cote (Minisier of National Revenue):: The information is not available in the form requested.


LANGUAGE TUITION FOR CANADIAN FORCES
Mr. Caouelfe: In each of the last five years, what was the amount paid by the Department of National Defence in tuition fees and school transportation costs, in order to permit all residents of Canadian Forces bases to attend (a) French-language schools (b) English-language schools?


Mr. David Groos (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minisier of National Defence):: Tuition Fees	Transportation Costs
	(000)	(000)
1963-64	$2,929	$ 901964-65	3,027	1451965-66	4,084	2491966-67	4,269	2301967-68	4,942	261
Records are not maintained in a manner which would indicate whether such costs cover attendance at, or transportation to, either French or English language schools.


NEWFOUNDLAND POST OFFICE CLOSURES
Mr. Marshall: 1.	What post offices are to be closed in the Province of Newfoundland?
2.	What is the reason in each case as to why such decision is being taken?
3.	What was the annual revenue of each post office to be closed and the cost of operation?


Eric William Kierans: In so far as the Post Office Department is concerned:	.
1 and 3.
		Cost of
Post Office	Revenue	Operation
	$	$
Champneys	541.00	1,800.00Champneys West	455.00	1,400.00Cuslett	226.00	1,000.00English Harbour T.B.,	515.00	1,600.00Point au Mai	234.00	800.00Steady Brook	556.00	1,200.00Trinity East	835.00	1,800.00Fox Island River	49.00	600.00Angels Cove	202.00	1,000.00North Boat Harbour	110.00	800.00
2. Limited usefulness.
Note: Further studies are being conducted with a view to closing additional Post Offices within the closing program criteria but no decision has been made on any particular case as yet.


MAPLE SYRUP
Mr. Aiken: 1.	What action, if any, has been taken by officers of the Food and Drug Directorate with regard to the use of the word "maple" as it pertains to the use of pure maple syrup?
2.	What action, if any, has been taken by the Department of Consumer and Corporate Affairs to ensure that containers purporting to contain maple syrup do in fact contain pure maple syrup?


Mr. Yves Forest (Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Privy Council):: I am
informed by the Departments of National Health and Welfare and Consumer and Corporate Affairs as follows: 1. Under the Food and Drugs Act objection is taken to the use of the name "maple syrup" in advertising, labelling and on restaurant menus, if in fact the product referred to is not pure maple
Questions
syrup. During the past few months a number of restaurants have been visited by inspectors of the Food and Drug Directorate. In two cases it was found that while menus indicated that maple syrup was being served, this in fact was not the case. The owners of the restaurants were sent warning letters and subsequent inspections have indicated that both restaurants have corrected the situation. Surveillance is being maintained by the Food and Drug Directorate of the Department of National Health and Welfare at the present time. However, it is the intention of the government to transfer this responsibility to the Department of Consumer and Corporate Affairs.
2. Until recently the General Service Division of the Production and Marketing Branch, Department of Agriculture, was entirely responsible for enforcing the Maple Products Industry Act. The inspectors of this Division were responsible for taking samples from stores at the retail level and sending them for analysis to the food and drug laboratories operated by the Department of Health and Welfare. While the inspection continued on a year round basis, it was at its most vigorous during and just after the maple syrup season. Since the transfer of the retail inspection service to the Department of Consumer and Corporate Affairs, the responsibility for enforcing the Maple Products Act at the retail level now rests with the Operations Branch of the Bureau of Consumer Affairs. Maple syrup products will continue to be inspected at the retail level and the inspection service will be extended, where necessary, to give the broadest coverage possible.


LAWYERS IN CANADA
Mr. Fortin: 1.	During each of the past five years, what was the number of lawyers in Canada?
2.	During each of the past five years, what was the average salary of lawyers in Canada?


Jean-Luc Pepin: Insofar as the Dominion Bureau of Statistics is concerned: 1. At the 1961 Census, there were 11,777 males and 311 females who reported their occupation as that of "lawyer or notary". The detailed occupational structure of the Canadian labour force is determined only at decennial censuses, and no data are available from DBS covering the past five years.


Questions
2. Based on a 20 per cent sample of lawyers and notaries reported at the 1961 Census, (including salaried persons as well as self-employed), the average employment income amounted to $11,310 for males, and $4,589 for females, relating to the 12-month period prior to the census date of June 1, 1961.


EFFECT OF ROBERTS BANK ON MIGRATORY BIRDS
Mr. Anderson: 1.	Has the Canadian Wildlife Service commissioned studies to determine the effect of the Roberts Bank development on migratory birds using the Pacific flyway?
2.	Is the Canadian Wildlife Service represented at the planning and development levels of this project?
3 Will federal legislation on pollution and contamination control in the Roberts Bank area be placed before the House this year?


Hon. Jean Chretien (Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development):: 1. No
studies outside the Canadian Wildlife Service have been commissioned or contracted. However, the Service itself has carried out studies at the Roberts Bank area and plans to do so in future in order to evaluate the effects of the superport development there on waterfowl habitat.
2.	The Service was consulted unofficially early in the planning stage but is not represented on any planning and development board.
3.	No new legislation on pollution and contamination will be placed before the House under the auspices of the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development.


CANADIAN PBX STORES
Mr. MacLean: 1.	Is it the policy of the Government of Canada to allow personnel of other NATO forces stationed in Germany to shop in Canadian PBX stores and, if so, does this amount to the subsidization by Canada of purchases by the Armed Forces of other countries?
2.	To which countries are these privileges extended?
3.	Have there been complaints, either official or unofficial, by Canadian Forces Personnel that personnel of other countries are allowed to shop in Canadian stores?


David Walter Groos: 1. Yes, except for the host country, NATO forces personnel are permitted to use non-public fund

retail outlets at Canadian units in Germany. Except for space provided by the Canadian Forces, stock, shipping, salaries, etc., are paid for from non-public funds.
2.	This is a reciprocal arrangement and extends to all NATO forces personnel except those of the host country.
3.	Some minor complaints are received from time to time from personnel who do not appear to realize that reciprocal agreements exist with other NATO countries.


PSYCHIATRIST IN YUKON AND NORTHWEST TERRITORIES SCHOOLS
Mr. Orlikow: 1.	Is there a full-time or part-time Psychiatrist working with school children in the Yukon and Northwest Territories?
2.	How much time does he spend each year on this task?
3.	How many schools has he visited in each of the past three years and how much time did he spend in each school?
4.	How are the children examined by the Psychiatrist chosen?
5.	When teachers refer children to the Psychiatrist do they submit written reports to the Psychiatrist before he sees the children?
6.	After the examination, does the Psychiatrist report or make recommendations regarding each child to the principal or the teacher?


Hon. John C. Munro (Minister of National Health and Welfare):: 1. No, but teams of consultants visit periodically.
2.	N/A.
3.	N/A.
4.	Children may be selected for psychiatric examination by parents, teachers, welfare workers, public health nurses or physicians. Visiting consultant psychiatrists from Toronto in the Eastern Arctic, from Winnipeg in the Central Arctic and from Edmonton in the western districts carry out examinations and if evacuation is necessary examinations take place in major referral centres in the south.
5.	There is no mandatory procedure. Public Health Nurses or local physicians are usually involved in the referral. The psychiatrist may review such information from teachers and medical reports as is pertinent, and may elicit further information by directing questions toward knowledgeable persons and to the patient.
6.	This could involve a report to the teacher or principal where the school authorities will continue to be associated with a particular


patient. As in southern Canada a psychiatrist takes whatever action is necessary and ethical in relation to patients who are referred to him.


EXEMPTION OF TEACHERS FROM INCOME TAX
Mr, Howard (Skeena): 1.	What number of teachers have applied for
an exemption from Income Tax since the date of, and pursuant to, Information Bulletin No. 41, May 21,	1968, of the Department of National
Revenue listed numerically by the home country?
2.	What is the estimated amount of money which would have been received by the Crown if it had not been for the said exemption?


Hon. Jean-Pierre Cole (Minister of National Revenue):: The Department of National
Revenue has no knowledge of the number of teachers who have claimed the exemption, their home country or the amount of tax that might have been collected in the absence of the exemption.


FREEZE ON BUSINESS EDUCATIONAL FACILITIES
Mr. McCleave: 1.	Has the federal government imposed a freeze on a federal-provincial cost sharing program concerning business educational facilities?
2.	How long is such freeze expected to last?
3.	How many programs, and in what provinces, are affected by the freeze?


Hon. Allan J. MacEachen (Minister of Manpower and Immigration):: 1. The federal government has not imposed a freeze on payments by Canada to provinces of contributions in respect of the capital expenditures incurred by the provinces on business educational facilities.
2.	Not applicable.
3.	Not applicable.


C.M.H.C.-MORTGAGE INSURANCE PAYMENTS
Mr. Orlikow: 1. What is the amount of mortgage insurance monies paid to Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation in the form of mortgage insurance in each of the years since the introduction of this scheme?
2 How is this money allocated, whether by way of reserve or possibly purchase of insurance from outside private agencies?
3.	What is the amount of losses which required payment out of the insurance fund?
4.	What reserve still exists?
Questions
5.	Is the government giving consideration to reducing the present 2% mortgage insurance fee to a lesser amount?


Paul Theodore Hellyer: 1.	1954, $2,389,850; 1955, $9,237,250; 1956, $9,839,746; 1957, $7,278,911; 1958, $13,816,071; 1959, $13,146,403; 1960, $8,456,279; 1961, $10,970,952; 1962, $11,576,518; 1963, $9,868,797; 1964, $12,063,480; 1965, $13,483,365; 1966, $14,290,873; 1967, $16,491,251; 1968, $14,640,563.
2.	Money not required to pay claims is invested in obligations of or guaranteed by Canada.
3.	$81,486,253 to 31 December 1968.
4.	$224,393,164 at 31 December 1968, including real estate acquired as a result of claims, $6,336,025, and mortgages arising from the sale of real estate acquired as a result of claims, $69,166,611.
5.	The report of the Task Force on Housing and Urban Development recommended a reduction in the mortgage insurance fee. This, with other recommendations of the Task Force, is now being considered by the government.


WAR REPARATIONS COMMISSION
Mr. Laprise: Did Canada establish a War Reparations Commission after the Second World War, and, if so (a) when was this commission established (b) what amount of money was assigned to it (c) how many naturalized Canadians benefited under this Act, and (d) from what countries did these Canadians come?


Stanley Ronald Basford: (a) No, but a War
Claims Commission was established on October 9, 1952; (b) $1-pursuant to Vote 696, The Appropriation Act No. 4, 1952, 1-Elizabeth II, Chapter 55, which authorized the Minister of Finance to establish a special account in the Consolidated Revenue Fund and to which were to be credited, all moneys received by him from the Custodian of Enemy Property or from other sources by way of reparations by former enemies in respect of World War II; (c) The records do not distinguish between naturalized and natural born Canadians; (d) See (c) above.


CANADIAN WHEAT BOARD WHEAT PRICES
Mr. Dumont: For what reasons did the Canadian Wheat Board, on October 15, 1968, offer $1.86 at the Lakehead for No. 4 Northern Wheat and $1.99J at the ports on the St. Lawrence?


Questions


Jean-Luc Pepin: The Canadian Wheat Board offered No. 4 Northern at $1.86 basis in store the Lakehead and $1.99J C.I.F. St. Lawrence ports on October 15 in order to make sales of that grade. The difference in the two prices reflects the cost of transporting wheat from the Lakehead to St. Lawrence ports.



QUESTIONS PASSED AS ORDERS FOR RETURNS


Mr. Orlikow: 1.	(a) How many teachers were on the staff at the school at Fort Smith for each of the years
1965-68, 1966-67, 1967-68 (b) what was the total teaching experience of each teacher (c) what was the length of teaching experience with the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development of each teacher (d) what was the length of teaching experience at Fort Smith of each teacher (e) what was the university education, academic and teacher training, of each teacher at Fort Smith?
2.	What percentage of the teaching staff at Fort Smith in the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68, possessed Canadian Citizenship?
3.	How many Eskimo or Indian teacher aides were employed at Fort Smith in each of the years 196566, 1966-67, 1967-68?
4.	(a) What was the length of administrative experience in each of the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68, for School Principals and Vice-Principals at Fort Smith (b) what was the length of the administrative experience with the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development?
5.	(a) What was the number, duration, purpose of visits from the Department in Ottawa and of regional supervisory and consultative personnel in the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68, to Fort Smith (b) what was the number, duration, purpose of in-service training sessions held by the Department in Fort Smith for teachers in the years
1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68 (c) what was the form of pre-service preparation, if any, for teachers going to Fort Smith for the first time in the years
1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68?
Return tabled.


YELLOWKNIFE, N.W.T.-TEACHERS ON SCHOOL STAFF
Mr. Orlikow: 1. (a) How many teachers were on the staff at the school at Yellowknife for each of the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68 (b) what was the total teaching experience of each teacher (c) what was the length of teaching experience with the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, 
of each teacher (d) what was the length of teaching experience at Yellowknife of each teacher (e) what was the university education, academic and teacher training, of each teacher at Yellowknife?
2.	What percentage of the teaching staff at Yellowknife in the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68, possessed Canadian Citizenship?
3.	How many Eskimo or Indian teacher aides were employed at Yellowknife in each of the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68?
4.	(a) What was the length of administrative experience in each of the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68, for School Principals and Vice-Principals at Yellowknife (b) what was the length of the administrative experience with the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development?
5.	(a) What was the number, duration, purpose of visits from the Department in Ottawa and of regional supervisory and consultative personnel in the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68, to Yellowknife (b) what was the number, duration, purpose of in-service training sessions held by the Department in Yellowknife for teachers in the years 1965-66,
1966-67, 1967-68 (c) what was the form of preservice preparation if any, for teachers going to Yellowknife for the first time in the years 1965-66,
1966-67, 1967-68?
Return tabled.


INUVIK, N.W.T.-TEACHERS ON SCHOOL STAFF
Mr. Orlikow: 1.	(a) How many teachers were on the staff at the school at Inuvik for each of the years 1965-66,
1966-	67, 1967-68 (b) what was the total teaching experience of each teacher (c) what was the length of teaching experience with the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development of each teacher (d) what was the length of teaching experience at Inuvik of each teacher (e) what was the university education, academic and teacher training, of each teacher at Inuvik?
2.	What percentage of the teaching staff at Inuvik in the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68, possessed Canadian Citizenship?
3.	How many Eskimo or Indian teacher aides were employed at Inuvik in each of the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68?
4.	(a) What was the length of administrative experience in each of the years 1965-66, 1966-67,
1967-	68, for School Principals and Vice-Principals at Inuvik (b) what was the length of the administrative experience with the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development?
5.	(a) What was the number, duration, purpose of visits from the Department in Ottawa and of regional supervisory and consultative personnel in the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68, to Inuvik (b) what was the number, duration, purpose of inservice training sessions held by the Department in Inuvik for teachers in the years 1965-66, 1966-67,
1967-68 (c) what was the form of pre-service preparation if any, for teachers going to Inuvik for the first time in the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68?
Return tabled.


FROBISHER BAY, N.W.T.-TEACHERS ON SCHOOL STAFF
Mr. Orlikow: 1.	(a) How many teachers were on the staff at the school at Frobisher Bay for each of the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68 (b) what was the total teaching experience of each teacher (c) what was the length of teaching experience with the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development of each teacher (d) what was the length of teaching experience at Frobisher Bay of each teacher (e) what was the university education, academic and teacher training, of each teacher at Frobisher Bay?
2.	What percentage of the teaching staff at Frobisher Bay in the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68, possessed Canadian Citizenship?
3.	How many Eskimo or Indian teacher aides were employed at Frobisher Bay in each of the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68?
4.	(a) What was the length of administrative experience in each of the years 1965-66, 1966-67,
1967-68, for school Principals and Vice-Principals at Frobisher Bay (b) what was the length of the administrative experience with the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development?
5.	(a) What was the number, duration, purpose of visits from the Department in Ottawa and of regional supervisory and consultative personnel in the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68, to Frobisher Bay (b) what was the number, duration, purpose of in-service training sessions held by the Department in Frobisher Bay for teachers in the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68 (c) what was the form of pre-service preparation, if any, for teachers going to Frobisher Bay for the first time in the years 1965-66, 1966-67, 1967-68?
Return tabled.


HUMBER-ST. GEORGE'S-ST. BARBE-LOCATION AND GRADE OF POST OFFICES
Mr. Marshall: Of all post offices in the Electoral District of Humber-St. Georges-St. Barbe under the following headings, what are the location, grade, salary of postmaster, income from operation, and cost of operation?
Return tabled.


HEALTH INSURANCE EXPENDITURES
Mr. Fortin: 1.	What amounts have been spent by the federal government for health insurance?
2.	What steps are being taken by the federal government to prevent disease?
3.	What costs have been incurred by the federal government in connection with diseases resulting from (a) cigarette smoking (b) consumption of liquor?
4.	Is the federal government considering the establishment of programmes designed to promote good health?
Return tabled.
Questions


QUEBEC-SUBSIDIES UNDER AREA DEVELOPMENT INCENTIVES ACT
Mr. Lambert (Bellechasse): 1.	What is the postal address of each Quebec industry which has benefited from subsidies under the Area Development Incentives Act?
2.	What amount was granted and paid under this Act up to and including November 30, 1968
(a)	for all of Canada with the exception of Quebec
(b)	in each of the provinces with the exception of Quebec?
Return tabled.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Hon. Robert L. Stanfield (Leader of the Opposition):: I had a question for the Postmaster General which I thought was important, and I was wondering whether the Secretary of State for External Affairs can inform us whether the Postmaster General will be in the house today.


Mitchell William Sharp: No, Mr. Speaker, he is not here. The Acting Postmaster General will reply.


John George Diefenbaker: The decimated ranks of Tuscany.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: I have no doubt the attention of the Acting Postmaster General has been directed to the announcement on Friday by the council of the Postal Union denying the earlier statement of the Postmaster General concerning the morale of the Post Office and describing the present situation as explosive. Can the Acting Postmaster General say whether /the Postmaster General intends to take any action to provide for third party adjudication of this problem? Can he, in short, say what action his colleague proposes to take?


Hon. Gerard Pelletier (Secretary of State):: Mr. Speaker, I am not in a position to say what are the intentions of the Postmaster General in that regard. He is not here today because he is negotiating with some mail transport services in the city of Montreal.
6112	COMMONS
Inquiries of the Ministry



FINANCE


David Lewis: Mr. Speaker, even though the Minister of Finance is not here there is a question that I should like to address to the Acting Prime Minister. In view of the widespread effect on higher loan and mortgage interest rates that is bound to result from the increase in the bank rate from 6J to 7 per cent, may I ask the Acting Prime Minister whether this step was taken with the approval of the government, after consultation with the Minister of Finance and other ministers?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I think the hon. gentleman is aware that these decisions are made by the Governor of the Bank of Canada. If, of course, the government had any reason to disagree, this would be indicated.


David Lewis: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. In view of the effect of this important step, may I ask the Acting Prime Minister whether the government will take the necessary steps to refer the matter of the increase in the bank rate, and the tightening money policy resulting therefrom, to the Standing Committee on Finance, Trade and Economic Affairs so that the Governor of the Bank of Canada may be called to give evidence on the subject?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I would think that this is a subject that could be discussed generally when the estimates of the Department of Finance are before the committee. I do not think the government would be disposed to make a particular reference on this question.


David Lewis: A further supplementary question. In view of the fact that the Governor of the Bank of Canada could not come here to express his views and give his reasons for the increase in the bank rate, would this cause the government to reconsider, and to have the standing committee deal with the matter so that the Governor of the Bank of Canada could explain the policies involved and also the objective of this increase in the bank rate?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I will be very happy to talk to the Governor of the Bank of Canada, so that he is available when required for this purpose; but I repeat what I said before, that it would not be the intention of

DEBATES	March 3. 1969
the government to refer this specific matter to the committee.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Since the minister feels that there would be difficulty in discussing this matter with the Governor of the Bank of Canada when the Department of Finance estimates are before the committee, would the government refer to the committee the annual report of the Bank of Canada and enable us to discuss these matters in committee?


Mitchell William Sharp: I think that the committee could deal with this question on many bases; I do not think there would be any difficulty whatever. Therefore I see no reason for any special action on the part of the government at the present time.



APPLICATION OF INCREASED RATE TO SALARY OF GOVERNOR

Mr. Bernard Dumont (Frontenac):: Mr. Speaker, in view of the answers we were given, I ask the minister whether the interest rate was increased in order to raise Mr. Ras-minsky's salary from $50,000 to $75,000 a year?
At ten o'clock, Mr. Speaker.



CANADA-U.S. NEGOTIATIONS RESPECTING DISCOVERIES

Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Mr. Speaker, I had hoped to ask this question of the Minister of Trade and Commerce but I will address it to the Secretary of State for External Affairs. I wish to refer to something that was proposed by the Canadian ambassador on behalf of the Canadian government.
In view of the letter dated September 25, 1967, which was tabled in the house, covering negotiations between Canada and the United States of America, have there been any negotiations since that date, particularly in light of the Prudhoe Bay discovery and other discoveries in the north?


Mitchell William Sharp: No, Mr. Speaker; there have been no direct negotiations between Canadian and United States governments


recently on the matter. The implications of these discoveries are very much the concern of the two governments. I hope when the Prime Minister meets the President, as well as on other occasions, these matters will be discussed between the two governments.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Mr. Speaker, may I ask a supplementary question on this matter, that is important to our nation. Is the Canadian government prepared to consider discussing a continental oil policy? When the Prime Minister meets with President Nixon will he consider discussing a new approach to the oil industry? I ask this question because the minister seemed unaware of the extensive nature of the recent oil discoveries.


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I am sure all aspects of oil policy will be discussed between the governments in the near future.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: A further supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Has the Alberta government made the suggestion to the appropriate minister in the Canadian government that a continental oil policy should be the heart of negotiations with the United States in maintaining and accelerating our exports, particularly at a time when there is serious danger of a deterioration in our oil market comparable to the deterioration of our wheat market?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, that was quite a speech.


An hon. Member:: And a good one.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


Mitchell William Sharp: No such representations have been made to me, as Secretary of State for External Affairs. I think that question ought to be directed to the appropriate minister when he is in the house, tomorrow.


Mr. Max Saltsman (Waterloo):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a supplementary question to the Acting Prime Minister. In view of the severe limitation that has been imposed on all oil exports to the United States, will the government re-examine our oil policy and consider the possibility of building a pipe line to Montreal, as an alternative to a continental oil policy?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I think that sort of question ought to be reserved for the minister who reports to parliament on these matters.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for St. John's East.


James Aloysius McGrath: Mr. Speaker, my question cannot be asked because of the absence of the Minister of
Inquiries of the Ministry Transport and the Minister of Fisheries. I do not say that in any flippant or irresponsible manner. My question was one of urgency on Friday; obviously it is not considered urgent today.



NATIONAL DEFENCE


Mr. J. M. Forrestall (Darlmoulh-Halifax East):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Secretary of State for External Affairs in his capacity as Acting Prime Minister. Did his recent comments in Calgary on the subject of NATO reflect government opinion, or was he expressing his personal viewpoint?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I shall be happy to send a copy of my speech to the hon. gentleman. He will find a clear explanation of the circumstances under which I made it.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: You are backing down.



EXTERNAL AID


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Acting Prime Minister in his capacity as Secretary of State for External Affairs. In the light of reports of unrest in Pakistan in connection with projects for which Canada is providing external aid, for reasons that also prompt us to give aid to India, will the minister kindly advise the bouse whether these projects are in jeopardy and whether Canadians involved in the Pakistani project are safe? Can he also say whether there will be any further trouble with these projects.


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, as a result of disturbances at the site of the joint Canadian and Pakistani nuclear power project near Karachi, which are a reflection of the general pattern of unrest throughout east and west Pakistan at the present time, construction on the project has been temporarily suspended. Officials from Canadian General Electric are going to Pakistan to investigate the situation and to discuss with Pakistani officials the arrangements under which construction may be resumed.
The injuries that were reported to Mr. Pullen were not serious. The Canadian High Commission has now secured from Pakistani authorities concerned round-the-clock protection for Canadians at the site.


Inquiries of the Ministry EXTERNAL AFFAIRS



IRAQ-PROTESTS AGAINST EXECUTIONS

David Lewis: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Secretary of State for External Affairs. In view of reports that further public executions are to take place in Iraq tomorrow, I think, will the minister inform the house whether the Canadian government has made any representation to the Iraqi government on these proposed executions, protesting against them and asking that government not to carry them out?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, the Canadian government is profoundly disquieted by reports that there may be further mass executions in Iraq following those which took place on January 27 and February 20. As hon. members are aware, we have conveyed to the Iraqi authorities our humanitarian concern about the developments of the past two months. In addition to humanitarian considerations, there is the danger that actions of this kind may reduce the prospect of achieving a peaceful and accepted settlement in the Middle East. I know that the Secretary General of the United Nations has been following this question very closely.
I asked my officials today what it was that the Secretary General had said. I am informed he gave a very careful statement which reflects the concern which we all have that we should not do anything to exacerbate the difficulties. The Secretary General said that he has been following this question very closely, has indeed been in touch with the two governments concerned over the week end, and that it would not be in the public interest to say more. I should very much hope therefore that the Iraqi authorities will avoid steps which may cause a further deterioration of the situation and prolong the search for peace.


David Lewis: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Can the minister inform the house which two governments the Secretary General of the United Nations is referring to? Are they Iraq and Israel? Would he also inform the house whether he has requested our ambassador in Teheran who, if I remember correctly, is also assigned to Iraq, to make personal representations on this matter today?


Mitchell William Sharp: It is my understanding, Mr. Speaker, that the Secretary General was referring to Iraq and Israel. As the hon. member

knows, I have had some representations! from the Canadian Jewish Congress, and others, to try to take whatever action we could to help the position of the Jews in Iraq. It is in the light of that consideration that I feel I ought to act carefully. I will take his suggestion into account that we should make further representations. I would also ask him to consider that we may find there are other ways of achieving some benefit for those unfortunate people.


Mr.  R. Gordon L. Fairweather@Fundy-Roy-al: I have a supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Can the minister say how the arrangements are progressing regarding the possible acceptance by Canada of Jews from the Middle East, particularly from Iraq?


Mitchell William Sharp: These matters are progressing, Mr. Speaker, and I hope in a few days to be able to make a report.



LABOUR RELATIONS


Mr. H. Russell MacEwan (Central Nova):: My question is to the Minister of Labour. I do not know whether he can answer at this time, but I would ask the minister in regard to the Woods task force report whether the government intends to proceed by way of legislation based on the report, or by referring the report itself to the Standing Committee on Labour, Manpower and Immigration?


Hon. Bryce S. Mackasey (Minister of Labour):: It is my intention, Mr. Speaker, to amend or revise the Industrial Relations and Disputes Investigation Act. Certainly I will take into consideration the recommendations of the Woods report. How we are to proceed with that report has not as yet been determined.



IMMIGRATION


John George Diefenbaker: I direct this question to the Minister of Manpower and Immigration. My recollection is that Jerry Rubin, the yippie leader, was in early January officially declared ineligible for entry into Canada. My information is that he has been making speeches for the last week. Would the minister say what the circumstances were which changed the order which was made in January so that this revolutionary trouble-maker could come to Canada?


Allan Joseph MacEachen: Mr. Speaker, Mr. Rubin did spend a couple of days, or less than that, in Canada last week. He was admitted at Toronto airport. He attended three universities and the results were rather harmless. He did not make much of an impression.


John George Diefenbaker: I wasn't asking about the harmless results. I was trying to find out who slipped up, so that he got in through the immigration checkpoint?


Allan Joseph MacEachen: Mr. Speaker, the admitting officer in Toronto admitted Mr. Rubin. I think if he had known the full facts he might not have admitted him, but in any event he did admit him.


John George Diefenbaker: Has this immigration
officer, and have immigration officers in general, received word or advice from the minister's department that Rubin was persona non grata in Canada and should not be admitted?


Allan Joseph MacEachen: Mr. Speaker, I think it was last October, and then in December we determined in the department that he should not be re-admitted into Canada, and this word was sent out to the officers. In this particular case at the Toronto airport, the particular officer did not recognize the man he was dealing with.


John George Diefenbaker: Under what name did he come in?


Mr. Lincoln M. Alexander (Hamilton West):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a supplementary question to the Minister of Manpower and Immigration. In view of the fact that the government has arrived at a conclusion with respect to a known agitator, Jerry Rubin, has it arrived at other conclusions with respect to the admission or non-admission of other known agitators who have been in Canada in the past year or so, and as a result of whose admission the whole country seems to be living in fear of what is going to happen, in terms of student riots and the like?


Allan Joseph MacEachen: Mr. Speaker, the expression "known agitators" is not very helpful to the department in reaching a decision of this kind. The case of Rubin was clear cut. He had been in Canada last fall and had taken certain actions which we thought were not in accordance with the public order of the country. For that reason we did make a decision that his return to Canada would not be 29180-388
Inquiries of the Ministry desirable. He did come back and he made some speeches, but the speeches did not have that earth-shaking effect that they might have had.


Francis Andrew Brewin: As a
supplementary question, Mr. Speaker, would the minister discuss with the Chairman of the Parliamentary Committee on Manpower and Immigration the possibility of arranging shortly for a discussion of this matter, and the related matter of deserters and draft dodgers which has come up from time to time in the house and which is causing a great deal of confusion and unhappiness generally?


Allan Joseph MacEachen: Yes, Mr. Speaker, I would be glad to discuss that matter with the committee chairman.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, in view of the fact that a decision was made to bar Rubin could the minister let us have the expurgatorious list covering the names of individuals who were in Canada last fall and who have since, as a result of a declaration by the department, been rendered inadmissible to Canada? Could he give us that list?


Allan Joseph MacEachen: Mr. Speaker, I am not aware of any list of that kind.


John George Diefenbaker: Have you any other list?


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


Allan Joseph MacEachen: Mr. Speaker, we must deal with these cases on an individual basis. I have explained the circumstances surrounding Mr. Rubin's entrance into Canada.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, I have a further question arising out of earlier questions asked of the Minister of Manpower. Canada is about to be visited by "Red" Rudi Dutschke. "Red" Rudi has been refused admission to the United Kingdom I think and by the United States, and other countries in Europe. Is he on this list of those who will not be welcome? In addition to that, what about Alan Ginsburg who is about to visit British Columbia, not because of the salubrious climate there, but in order to disseminate his ideas about pornography about which he is an expert, having recently been convicted?


Allan Joseph MacEachen: Mr. Speaker, I


Inquiries of the Ministry am not as familiar with these characters as the right hon. gentleman. I will attempt to brush up on these matters.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, it is very-obvious that the department needs brushing up.



TELEVISION


Edward Richard Schreyer: Mr. Speaker, I wish to ask a question of the honourable and wise Secretary of State.
Could the minister tell us when the task force he set up four months ago to study educational television will conclude its work and report to him?


Gérard Pelletier: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to say that the task force is scheduled to complete its report somewhere around June 1, and up to now I have received no disturbing indications that they would not be in a position to do so.



LABOUR CONDITIONS


Mr. A. D. Hales (Wellington):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct this question to the Minister of Manpower and Immigration. Is the minister or the government giving any consideration to changing the policy whereby people are imported or are brought into Canada to assist in the harvesting of Canadian crops while our own Canadian students are without work and are seeking employment?


Allan Joseph MacEachen: Mr. Speaker, as my hon. friend may be aware, I did announce on Friday the continuation of movement of farm workers from the Caribbean countries. It is a very important element in the development policy of these countries and is important to the farming operations in certain parts of Ontario. However the number coming into Canada will be a very small part of the total labour demands in Canada this summer, and there will be opportunities for students.


Alfred Dryden Hales: I was aware of the announcement, Mr. Speaker, but I was asking the minister whether he had decided to change his policy since that announcement was made, because of the great number of representations.
[Mr. MacEachen.,1


Allan Joseph MacEachen: I have received no representations since Friday.


Mr. John Lundrigan (Gander-Twillingale):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Manpower and Immigration. In line with his promise of last week concerning a statement regarding initiative by his department on behalf of students in Canada, would the minister tell us with a little more certainty when he will be prepared to make such a statement,-because I have received an increasing number of representations from a large segment of the Canadian student body, asking for such a statement.


Allan Joseph MacEachen: I cannot tell my hon. friend when such a statement will be made. A statement will be made, however, at an early date.



QUEBEC-MEASURES TO COMBAT UNEMPLOYMENT

Mr. J. Edward Broadbeni (Oshawa-Whifby):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Labour. In view of the minister's recent statement that separatism in the province of Quebec is substantially due to the very high levels of unemployment in that province, I should like to ask whether he is prepared to announce to the house any program his department has for immediate implementation in that province to deal with that situation.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: I perhaps paradoxically said that to a great degree unemployment is due to separatism. Perhaps also separatism is due to the rate of unemployment. So, it is a question of the chicken and the egg. However any concrete proposal to alleviate unemployment in the Montreal region is primarily the responsibility of the new department of regional expansion, and the department of manpower, which is doing a very adequate job in retraining the chronically unemployed in that province.



INQUIRY OF THE MINISTRY

Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, may I direct this question to the Minister of Manpower and Immigration. This seems to be his day. In view of the report that General de Gaulle is going to make a visit to the United States, may I ask the minister whether his department has instructed its border officials concerning what they are to say to him if he seeks to come back to Canada.
COMMONS DEBATES	6117
Inquiries of the Ministry HEALTH AND WELFARE



RESTRICTIONS ON EXCHANGE OF GOODS WITH ITALY

Mr. Cliff Downey (Battle River):: Mr. Speaker, this question is for the Acting Minister of Trade and Commerce. Have any changes in Canadian tariff or import rates or regulations been made recently which would have the effect of restricting Italian exports to this country, and hence the purchase of Canadian goods, particularly livestock, by Italians?


Mr. Speaker:: I would think this question should be placed on the order paper. If it is a matter of urgency it could be placed on the order paper or notice could be given to the Chair for the purpose of debate at the time of adjournment then the question would be given priority.



EXTERNAL AFFAIRS


Bernard Dumont: I wish to ask a question to the Secretary of State for External Affairs.
Can the minister assure us that representations have been made to every country selling arms to Biafra or Nigeria?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, the attitude of the Canadian government on this question is well known to the world, as well as to them, by the statements made by the Prime Minister of Canada.


BIAFRA-STEPS TO IMPLEMENT RECOMMENDATION OF STANDING COMMITTEE
Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question. In the light of repeated and contradictory reports on bombings in Biafra, will the Secretary of State for External Affairs say what steps he has taken since November to implement the first recommendation of the Committee on External Affairs and National Defence.


Mr. Speaker:: I would think the question as asked by the hon. member is very general. He is asking the minister to make a general statement as to steps which may have been taken by his department or the government. The question as asked is not according to the rules.


MEDICARE-PARTICIPATION BY ONTARIO IN NATIONAL PROGRAM
Mr. Stanley Haidasz (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the Minister of National Health and Welfare whether his department has any special proposal, or is willing to make any concession to meet the objections of the government of Ontario and thereby facilitate Ontario's entrance into the national medical care program as soon as possible.


Mr. Speaker:: I would think that this question is perhaps of the same nature as the one asked previously. It is very general. It seems to me the hon. member is asking for a statement concerning policy. I would think in the circumstances the question could not be asked unless put in very specific terms. I would suggest it should be discussed at the time of adjournment.


Stanley Haidasz: Mr. Speaker, may I reword my question. Is it the intention of the Minister of National Health and Welfare to meet the Premier of the Province of Ontario to discuss the problems of that province so far as the national medical health care scheme is concerned.


John Carr Munro: Mr. Speaker, I would be happy to, if the premier would request it.


NATIONAL HOCKEY TEAM-INVITATION TO CANADIAN HOCKEY ASSOCIATION
Robert Simpson: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of National Health and Welfare. With reference to the meeting which the minister had recently with hockey executives in connection with the future of Canada's national hockey team, could the minister say whether an invitation was extended to officials of the Canadian Hockey Association, and if not why not.


Mr. Speaker:: I think this is a question which might well be considered at the time of adjournment.


Robert Simpson: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: With great respect, it is a question which deals with Canada's national hockey team, which the government is sponsoring to a certain extent. The minister announced in the house that he would be having a meeting with hockey executives on this question, and I merely wish to find out whether one of the


Inquiries of the Ministry main groups of hockey executives in Canada had been invited.


Mr. Speaker:: Perhaps the minister could answer this very properly and more easily at the time of adjournment.


RESEARCH
Mrs. Grace MacXnnis (Vancouver-Kings-way):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct this question to the house leader. In view of the public alarm and indignation over bills now before the Ontario legislature which would force animal shelters and pounds to turn over unwanted dogs and cats to experimental research would the federal government ask the Standing Committee on Agriculture or some other standing committee to study and report forthwith on the matter of the treatment of animals.


Hon. Donald S. Macdonald (President of the Privy Council):: I would be glad to discuss that with my colleagues.


ABSENCE OF MINISTERS
Mr. Thomas M. Bell (Saint John-Lancaster):: Mr. Speaker, this question is for the Acting Prime Minister. Will he take up with his fellow colleagues in the cabinet the fact that four members of the cabinet who are supposed to be here today are not here, on a day when most of us are ready in our places to undertake the week's work.


An hon. Member:: It doesn't look like it.


CANADIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION
Hon. J. A. MacLean (Malpeque):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to address to the Secretary of State a question which is related to previous questions which have been asked of the Minister of Manpower and Immigration. What is the policy, if any, of the C.B.C. with regard to the broadcasting of statements and opinions of persons who have been declared by the Department of Immigration to be so undesirable that they should not be allowed into the country.


Gérard Pelletier: Mr. Speaker, I am not too well aware of the C.B.C.'s policy in that regard, but I will

gladly pass on the hon. members' question to the corporation and make the answer known to him.


Alfred Dryden Hales: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question for the Minister of Manpower and Immigration. When the officials of his department are listing the group of people they deem to be undesirable for entry into the country, could they send a list of these names to the officials of the C.B.C.?


INDIAN AFFAIRS
Frank Howard: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Solicitor General asking him whether any complaints have reached his ears about harassment, to say the least, and brutality in some cases by the R.C.M.P. in respect of native Indian people living at Sechelt on the coast of British Columbia and, if he has heard such complaints, what action is being taken in respect thereto?


George James McIlraith: Mr. Speaker, I have heard no such complaints.


Frank Howard: Mr. Speaker, I
should like to ask the minister whether he would mind inquiring into this matter which I understand, incidentally, was raised in the legislative assembly of that province not long ago?


George James McIlraith: Yes, Mr. Speaker, I will be very glad to inquire into the matter.


PUBLIC WORKS
John Howard Lundrigan: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the Minister of Public Works whether his department is reconsidering negative decisions in respect of capital projects in some regions of Canada in order to co-ordinate the work of his department with that of the Department of Regional Development?


Arthur Laing: Mr. Speaker, I gather from the question the hon. member has asked that he regards the distribution of work under my department as unfair in respect of the mari-times. I had a look at the program over the weekend, and I cannot agree with him. As a


matter of fact, I think there is a very fair distribution of work in all parts of Canada.


John Howard Lundrigan: My concern is that this department has given up the ghost. I want it to take up the spirit.


POST OFFICE DEPARTMENT
Barry Mather: Mr. Speaker, 1 should like to ask the Secretary of State a question in his capacity as the minister answering or reporting today for the Postmaster General. Having in mind the very large number of representations coming to members of the house from all sections of the non-profit press as to the very heavy increase they are now having to pay under the new rates, will the Secretary of State ask his colleague to take a second look at this situation?


Gérard Pelletier: Mr. Speaker, I will gladly draw that question to the attention of my colleague.




Mr.  R. Gordon L. Fairweather@Fundy-Roy-al: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the Acting Prime Minister when the government proposes to respond to my question of Friday about the public interest aspect of the Sicotte case?


Mitchell William Sharp: Not today, Mr. Speaker.


MACE-TESTS TO REVEAL POSSIBLE DANGERS
Max Saltsman: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the Minister of National Health and Welfare whether he has had a chance to consider the question I put to him a few weeks ago about making a statement in the house regarding any experiments his department might have conducted on the use of Mace?


John Carr Munro: Mr. Speaker, I have had an opportunity to look into this. I apologize to the hon. member for not reporting on it earlier. As far as I am aware it is not being used by any of the law enforcement units in Canada.
Inquiries of the Ministry


Barry Mather: Could the minister tell the house whether his department has conducted any experiments on its use and whether a report on its effects is available?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I doubt whether this supplementary question is in order. It might be placed on the order paper.


VIOLENT DISTURBANCES
Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Mr. Speaker, is the Solicitor General in a position to answer the questions I asked last week relative to the degree of investigation carried on by the R.C.M.P. in respect of bombings in the province of Quebec?


George James McIlraith: Yes, Mr. Speaker, I would be glad to give what information I can. The responsibility for investigating the bombings is, of course, primarily that of the Montreal city police force, the Quebec Provincial Police and other Quebec authorities. I want to add very quickly however that the R.C.M.P. is and has been co-operating fully, offering every possible help to those two forces. Meetings take place between the heads of the three major police forces from time to time and the general problems are considered.
In addition the R.C.M.P. is giving those two forces all the co-operation requested, and these other forces are completely satisfied with the co-operation they are receiving. I have assured myself on that point. The Montreal police and the R.C.M.P. have the best possible working relations at the working level as well, and they know that they can rely on the R.C.M.P. for any additional help that might be suggested or might be felt to be useful.
In addition to the work actually being carried on by the R.C.M.P. in conjunction with those two police forces in investigating bombings, the R.C.M.P. in carrying out its general responsibilities in other fields of law enforcement, is also very much aware of the need for any information which may be obtained in their work which would be of assistance to the provincial or municipal police forces, being made available to those forces.
I should also like to assure the house that I have checked and am satisfied that the matter of manpower is not a problem in carrying out investigations into bombings. I cannot of course go into the details as to the method of investigation or other matters in carrying out those investigations. I am sure the house will understand that.


Inquiries of the Ministry HIGHWAYS


REQUEST FOR CONSTRUCTION OF SECOND TRANS-CANADA ROUTE
Frank Howard: Mr. Speaker, on an earlier occasion I asked the Minister of Public Works whether he had any plans for a national highway building conference in order that we could deal with the prospect of building a second trans-Canada highway, with federal government assistance. Is the minister in a position to make any response to that question?


Arthur Laing: Mr. Speaker, at this time the answer would have to be the same as I made the last time. There are no plans at present.


Frank Howard: Is the minister
aware that he gave no answer the last time, but that his parliamentary secretary has drawn this to his attention?


CANADIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION
Mr. Les Benjamin (Regina-Lake Centre):: Mr. Speaker, in view of the fact that negotiations have been going on for almost a year and a half and there was a final take-it-or-leave-it offer from the C.B.C., can the Minister of Labour advise the house whether he or people from his department are involved in any direct discussion with either the C.B.C. or ARTEC and, if not, will he offer the services and offices of his department to obtain an early settlement of this dispute?


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member knows that the dispute between ARTEC and the C.B.C. is before a conciliation board headed by Dr. Arthurs. Until I receive a report from the board it would be improper for the minister or anyone in the department to intervene in this dispute. I understand however that the report is due within a matter of days.


Leslie Gordon Benjamin: Mr. Speaker, can the minister advise the house whether the conciliation board has ceased conciliation and is bringing down a report because the offer by the C.B.C. was on a take-it-or-leave-it basis?


Mr. Speaker:: I suggest that the supplementary question is argumentative.
IMr. Mcllraith.]


Robert Lorne Stanfield: I have a supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. I would like to ask the Minister of Labour whether he would exercise the now well recognized right of any minister and give advice to the Postmaster General on how he should straighten out the staff problems in that department.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.


TRANSPORT AND COMMUNICATIONS
Edward Richard Schreyer: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order, which is not a point of order as much as it is a question. I notice on today's order paper a motion standing in the name of the hon. member for Manicoua-gan (Mr. Blouin), which was presented exactly three months ago. I should like to ask the government house leader when that motion for concurrence will be moved.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, I will be glad to deal with that matter. I have made suggestions to the hon. member's colleagues, to the house leader of his party and to other hon. members opposite that in view of the fact that the first part of that report deals with a motion that has already been passed providing for a study of maritime transportation, and in view of the fact that the second part of the report deals with a non-existent railway company, it seemed to me on the whole preferable that that particular motion be withdrawn.
However, to make it possible for the question to be dealt with which particularly interests the hon. member for Selkirk (Mr. Schreyer), namely the question of the Great Slave railway, we propose to refer the annual reports of the Canadian National Railways and Air Canada to the Standing Committee on Transport and Communications. As I said, I have furnished opposition house leaders with copies of the draft motion, and if it is now found to be generally acceptable that we make such a move, perhaps the hon. member for Manicouagan could be given unanimous consent to withdraw his motion and we could move a motion referring the annual reports to the committee.


Mr. Speaker:: Is this agreed?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Mr. Speaker:: Is it so ordered by the house.
Order discharged and motion withdrawn.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. In accordance with paragraph (4) of standing order 58 when two or more opposition motions are set down for consideration under the order Business of Supply, it is the duty of the Chair to decide which motion shall have precedence at this sitting. The two opposition motions set down for consideration at this sitting are almost identical, as hon. members will note on looking at today's order paper. Therefore in connection with this aspect of the matter, the task of the Chair is somewhat eased.
After the first of these motions has been debated, I have some doubts as to whether the second motion should be proceeded with, as this procedure would then be inconsistent with tjie usual practice of the house, and it might be difficult to proceed with the debate of the second motion when we have completed the debate of the first one. I therefore suggest that preference at this particular sitting should be given to the motion proposed by the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin).


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, I beg your indulgence merely to say that I agree with the choice you have made between the two motions, since they are more or less the same. I also agree with Your Honour that if we have a debate on the first one it will be unnecessary to have a debate on the second one, which stands in my name.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Perhaps it might be helpful if I could refer to discussions which have taken place. I understand there is a general disposition to commence the discussion with the question of the one dollar items, and that after that subject matter has been dealt with adequately it is the proposal of hon. members opposite that we should proceed to the details of the estimates. My understanding is that their preference is to deal with the item in regard to housing first, and with the item on manpower and immigration second. I should like to indicate that I and my colleagues would be agreeable to that course of proceeding, and I would like to take this opportunity to make these discussions generally known to the house.
Business of Supply


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, may I also have a moment to concur in what the government house leader has said. I would just like to say that it was also agreed that the appropriate ministers would be here when we deal with their items.


Gerald William Baldwin: That this house concurs with the views expressed by the Standing Committee on Miscellaneous Estimates relating to the use of $1.00 items in estimates as set out in paragraphs one and two of the fourth report of the said committee on February 28, 1969.
He said: Mr. Speaker, before I launch into a discussion of the subject matter of this motion I think I will be pardoned for referring to the matter which was brought up by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) with regard to ministerial attendance. I would be quite out of order if at this stage I were to comment on the fact that during the course of the question period fewer than half of the ministers of the Crown were present. Nevertheless I am in order when I say that on a motion which affects the government as a whole-not necessarily any one minister, but a government practice which forms the basis of my motion, and one to which we object strenuously-one would have thought that a large number of ministers would be here, not necessarily to hear what I and other members may have to say but to hear also the criticisms which have been and will be voiced, not only by members on this side of the house but also by members on the other side. Apparently however, in so far as this matter is concerned they have slipped their leash, and I therefore voice a very serious criticism of a bad practice on the part of this government.
I also want to say at once that I will not go into much detail on the particular items in question. In the first instance I was not a member of the committee, and in the second it is only a few minutes ago that the transcript of the proceedings of the last meeting of the committee have been made available to members of the house who are concerned about this matter, and who may wish to participate in the debate. I am not placing any blame upon the functionaries who are involved, but we on this side did agree to an order to facilitate proceedings whereby the Standing Committee on Miscellaneous Estimates would entertain a discussion of the final supplementary estimates. Then, it was agreed that today, tomorrow and Wednesday would be days upon which at the appropriate


Business of Supply
time the opposition would have an opportunity either to launch substantive motions or to have a discussion of the items in the supplementary estimates.
I must point out that it is very difficult for hon. members who are not on the committee to deal with this in detail unless the transcript of the proceedings is at hand. I only hope that in other situations which develop these proceedings will be made available.
Having said that, I should like to point out that since the motion which I have made deals with the fourth report of the Standing Committee on Miscellaneous Estimates I think I should put on the record the particular paragraphs of the fourth report of that committee which are referred to in the motion.
Paragraph 1 on page 2 reads as follows:
Your committee expresses its concern at the extensive use of $1.00 items for the purpose of statutory amendments particularly in final supplementary estimates which are under time limit as to examination in the standing committee and for debate in the house. Appropriate legislative amendments should be made in all but the most exceptional and urgent cases.
The second paragraph reads:
Your committee also noted with concern an even greater use of $1.00 items for the transfer of moneys from one account to another. In a number of cases an under-expended item served as a prolific source of funds for unrelated purposes in the same ministry.
These motions were proposed by my colleague, the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert); and to show that this was approached in a non-partisan way, I am given to understand that they were seconded by the hon. member for Battleford-Kindersley (Mr. Thomson). They were passed in the committee and now form the subject for discussion by this house.
[DOT] (3:00 p.m.)
As I said, Mr. Speaker, my hon. friends will deal with specific charges related to definite items. I intend to make a general statement. Before doing so I would call attention to the fact that out of 29 pages of these supplementary estimates, dollar items appear on all but two, and a number of these pages have nothing on them but dollar items. This is the basis of supplementary estimates which, at first blush, are in terms of $150 million but which, having regard to these dollar items, amount in fact to a much larger sum.
These dollar items are the target of our criticism. I shall direct it to two areas in

particular. The first is the improper use of these items in lieu of legislation. The principle involved here is not something we have just dreamed up for the occasion of this particular motion. For a number of years I, together with other members of this party, have subjected the government to what we consider to be valid and well-deserved criticism for including in estimates, supplementary estimates and even in final supplementary estimates, one dollar items which have the effect of legislation.
When we legislate we go through a complex process in parliament. Measures are introduced and given first reading. A fairly wide-ranging debate is permitted on second reading. Bills are referred to a committee where members have opportunities to pursue discussion and propose amendments. There is a report stage during which the house considers carefully and in detail the value of the proposal and the advisability of spending money in the direction indicated. Amendments can be proposed as considered necessary. Then there is third reading. Here, in place of this reasonable and necessary process, we find that in the form of a few lines in a vote in supplementary estimates appears a dollar item which in effect constitutes an appropriation of money to be used in most cases as the government thinks fit, with complete freedom and discretion. This amounts to a travesty of parliamentary control over the executive and in particular of control by this house over expenditures of money by the executive.
I agree there is a case to be made occasionally for dollar items in urgent situations where such items might be needed to give the government the right to expend money at some future date for a purpose in respect of which a minister must come before the house and make an explanation in great detail. This is not the case in the present circumstances. We are talking now about final supplementary estimates in respect of the fiscal year which ends on March 31, only a matter of weeks from now. Obviously, every one of these dollar items deals with expenditures which have already been made by the government without regard to securing prior legislation authority, and which they are now trying to cover up.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


Gerald William Baldwin: In order to avoid strong criticism from the Auditor General the government must obtain, by means of these dollar items, authority for expenditures which have


already been made and for which there is no legislative approval at all. This is the development of a trend which has been apparent year by year, slowly eroding the right of parliament to say to the government: You must tell us what this money is for, how it is to be spent, and give us the right to propose changes. Bearing in mind the financial situation generally and the fiscal arrangements which concern us, I maintain this is a valid criticism and I hope the President of the Treasury Board (Mr. Drury) and other ministers whose departments are concerned will appear to answer the charges which I and other hon. members will bring forward with respect to this issue.
Now I come to my second point. In these dollar items the government is seeking, post facto, the right to take money voted for one purpose and use it for something entirely different. There can be no question about that. Dozens of these items are accompanied by a provision that moneys unexpended under one particular appropriation may be used for something entirely different, something which parliament has not authorized. Anyone who takes the trouble to go through the pages of this supplementary estimates booklet will be able to find the votes in question. No doubt the government, possibly with the best of intentions, found reasons for spending the money in a different way, and no doubt its friends will put forward these explanations. But the principle that there should be wholesome restraint of the executive is being stretched to the point where there is no restraint, wholesome or otherwise.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


Gerald William Baldwin: Taxation, I suppose, is inevitable, but what we are seeing now is taxation without effective representation and without the consent of the people who pay the taxes. This is a habit which I suggest is capable of growing until ultimately it becomes a chronic disease, and for this reason I sincerely hope hon. members on the other side of the house will join with me in rejecting it. I trust they will have an opportunity to indicate their support for the basic principle upon which this motion is founded.
The practice with which we are concerned today is but another indication of the tendency on the part of this government to oust the Commons and I push it to one side. We have seen this trend developing. There was the statement by the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) a year ago about mastery of the house
Business of Supply
which he attempted to exemplify by his endeavour to force rule 16A down our throats. We have seen it exemplified in the increasing use of orders in council, and in almost every legislative proposal which has come before us. Increasingly, the government is arrogating to ministers, to departments and to emanations of the administration the right to deal with the lives and the property of our people by orders in council and ministerial decrees rather than by acts of parliament.
I know I have raised this question before. It was pointed out then that a committee is presently investigating this aspect. But if the trend continues it will take not one parliamentary committee but a dozen to cope with the extent to which the government is taking from parliament the right to legislate, thus preventing members of the house and of the other place from voicing their objections, if any. This is an unhealthy trend and one to which we must call attention. In this connection we recall a recent directive by the government to its supporters: Follow our line when you go to committees, you must do as we tell you; there must be no deviationists in the Liberal party. I have dealt with this before. The hon. member for York East (Mr. Otto) is a wholesome exception to the general restraint. Having in mind the extent to which members of the other place have become increasingly independent of government, I am wondering when we can expect the hon. member for York East to be elevated and placed in a climate he would better fit.
[DOT] (3:10 p.m.)
Then there is a change in the office of the Prime Minister. There is a tremendous increase in regional desks, which will mean a bypassing of the House of Commons. I am not being irrelevant; I am merely trying to indicate, within the four corners of the final supplementary estimates for the 1968-69 fiscal year, yet another illustration of the serious movement toward too great government control which takes away from the House of Commons and from parliament the right they should exercise.
I think it is a tragedy that too many people accept this trend and take it for granted. They say it is quite normal. Many people say that governments are entitled to exercise this extraordinary power, and particularly to have increasingly unfettered authority to spend money. This is a dangerous frame of mind into which to allow ourselves to fall. I blame for this the government, the members of this


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house and parliament, and I also place a measure of blame upon the public media which see this happening but all too often are inclined to deal with matters which, politically speaking, have more sex appeal. In addition I blame the public for accepting this situation.
I think that an opposition party is not worthy to represent the people of this country unless it takes every opportunity, as we have in the past and as 1 am sure we intend to in the future, to call to the attention of the government, the house, parliament, the press and the public the dangerous situation that has now been brought about. All too often we are falling into the belief, one that has been sedulously encouraged and nourished by the government and its apologists, that all that our democratic process should now consist of is to elect a dictator every four years, hopefully a benevolent dictator but nevertheless a dictator, who will in fact have complete control, through the use of devices such as this, over the operations and fiscal policy of the government.
This would be bad enough if it worked, but it has not worked. It has not worked with this government. Our constitutional difficulties, the problem of poverty-the gap between the people in the lower income brackets and the rest of society is growing wider-our housing and our agricultural problems are still with us. For this reason it is becoming increasingly evident that governments alone, whether they are headed by a benevolent dictator or not, are unable to deal and incapable of dealing with these problems.
This is why I have taken it upon myself, with the support of our party and I believe of other hon. members on this side of the house, to move the motion I have. I am using it as a caveat to warn the house, parliament and the public of what is happening here. It simply is not good enough that this state of affairs be allowed to continue. This is part of the iceberg that is showing. I direct my words particularly to hon. members opposite when I urge them to join with us in this party and express their concern, their dislike of and apprehension of the kind of policy I have objected to and which forms the subject of the motion I have moved in this house.


Stanley Howard Knowles: 
deal with estimates, but so far as actual control of the public purse is concerned, it has gone.
Perhaps we should try to get back that control. I am not one of those who say we should return to the old methods that worked when the budget was a mere fraction of what it is today and when life in Canada was much simpler. It may be we are going to have to use other methods. Perhaps we will have to develop something in the nature of a public accounts committee of the house that will deal with expenditures before they are made rather than after. I think it is fair to say that since it has been the practice to appoint an opposition member as chairman, the public accounts committee has done a good job. But it can deal only with expenditures after they have been made.
[DOT] (3:20 p.m.)
The fact is that every month, every week and every day millions of dollars of public money are being spent. Those expenditures go through a computer or machine with which we in parliament have only a passing acquaintance. The point the hon. member for Peace River and I are trying to make, and which other hon. members no doubt will take up, is that the way these supplementary estimates are being handled demonstrates that parliamentary control over expenditures has gone through the window.
Reference has already been made to the fact that before us we have about 29 pages of supplementary estimates, most of them being made up of $1 items. There are 51 of them, as a matter of fact. Every one of these $1 items is either a piece of legislation being put through parliament by means of a shortcut or a proposal to transfer money from one account to another, something the Financial Administration Act says cannot be done.
The practice of inserting $1 items has been growing in recent years. I recall occasions in the past when 25 such items were included in the estimates; I do not recall ever before seeing 51. In the past when nine or ten $1 items were included in the estimates we objected so strongly that the government withdrew some of them and promised to reverse the trend. Nevertheless, the trend to include more such items has increased in recent years to the point where today the computer looks after our expenditures and we, in parliament, carry on a somewhat irrelevant debate on them.
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In these supplementary estimates the $1 items may be divided into two main categories. One group of items legislates. In other words, we are not being asked to vote $1 in those items; we are being asked to use this device to legislate on something that ought to be done by way of an act of parliament. Because there is authority to include these $1 items, the matters they legislate on become the law of the land. I point out that it is not only the $1 items in these supplementary estimates that legislate. The government seems to be quite open and above board in item 5b of the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development. Ostensibly it is asking for $3,185,000; yet when one looks at the detail of the item one finds the wording, "to include authority to spend", "to authorize the transfer", and so on. The government wants to spend money which has previously been voted for one purpose on another purpose. In other words, not only the $1 items are being used to give legislative authority for something to be done. Larger items in these supplementary estimates are seeking to do the same thing.
For instance, item 15b of the estimates for the Department of Manpower and Immigration seeks $6,200,000. When one examines the item one sees clearly that it is a legislative enactment. I will not take the time to read the wording of the vote but it, too, authorizes certain things. In earlier days what this item seeks to do would have been asked of parliament in the form of a bill. The same is true of vote 10b of the Department of Regional Development. Again, that item has legislative effect.
I wish to comment especially on vote 5b of Treasury Board and I shall do so later. The government seems to be quite open and above board in asking for $105 million. Yet when one examines the wording of the item one sees that what the item asks for would, in earlier days, have been the subject of an act of parliament. In other words, this item ought to ask for $105,000,001 to emphasize that it, too, is a legislative item.
As I have said before, for the government to bring in this mass of legislation under the guise of supplementary estimates and for it to think that somehow the house can exercise its function shows that what is being done is not only a gross abuse of the use of estimates but also that parliament does not control the pursestrings of the nation.
Many of these $1 items legislate, and many others have the effect of transferring money


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from one account to which it was previously voted to another. As everyone knows, I am sure, the Financial Administration Act says this cannot be done. It is not possible to transfer money voted for one purpose to another account where it may be used for another purpose. In fact, once a single appropriation has been made in the estimates a department must submit details of how it intends to spend that money. Any change in the original breakdown of how the money is to be spent must meet with the approval of Treasury Board. But the transfer of money from one vote in the appropriations to another is expressly forbidden and cannot be carried out, even with Treasury Board approval, unless there is parliamentary approval for that action.
What has been happening in these cases is that not all the money voted for other items has been spent and the departments in question say: Let us not go before parliament and ask for another $1 million-that would not look good-let us transfer the money we have left over, and we will get by if we insert a $1 item in the estimates. That demonstrates the validity of what I have been saying, that parliament has lost control over expenditures. The computer turns out bills in the form of $1 estimates; parliament has the right to discuss and vote on the items, but the job they undertake to do has already been done. As a matter of fact, most of these moneys that are being transferred have already been spent. This is March, and the fiscal year ends on March 31.
We are not children, Mr. Speaker; we know how these things work. We know that departments may be short in one area and long in another and they decide to spend the total amount of money they have been voted before the end of the year. Really, these supplementary estimates are a fiction-and I could use stronger language to describe them. The computer age will not overtake us in 1984; if we have lost control over our expenditures, it has already arrived.
[DOT] (3:30 p.m.)
I was a member of the Special Committee on Procedure which developed the new rules under which we are operating. I agreed that it was a farce to discuss many of these items in committee of supply, and that it was better to refer them to the various standing committees. I hope the various committees will be allowed sufficient staff and facilities to enable them to do a good job. But with the government legislating by means of items in the [Mr. Knowles (Winnipeg North Centre) .1
supplementary estimates it becomes very difficult for Members of Parliament to keep in mind the relationship between the government and the way money is spent. As I suggested a moment ago, it may be necessary to develop more machinery or some new way to keep parliament in the picture. It cannot be done here with only three days to discuss supplementary estimates with Your Honour in the chair. It was not done when we had a committee of supply, and I doubt that it was done in the committee on miscellaneous estimates. I think it will be necessary to have a standing committee which would replace the Comptroller General. Such a committee could check on what is going on at the start rather than after the fact.
It is in that light, Mr. Speaker, that we complain about this whole process. In the whole picture, it has now proceeded beyond the danger point. Parliament has now lost control over the public purse. This is underlined and brought forcibly to our attention by what is before us now, namely, 29 pages of estimates, most of which are merely asking the house to approve the shuffling around of new ideas, new appropriations and new authorities that the government's financial computers have set up for approval.
There is one item to which I referred when I talked about these items having legislative effect, not only the $1 items but some of the larger ones, which I would like to comment on. I refer to vote 5b under the heading of Treasury Board, contingencies, in the amount of $105 million. We are far enough post-C. D. Howe that even $105 million is not a large sum of money.
We are being asked to approve $105 million under vote 5b. We are being asked to approve of the proposition that money approved for the 1968-69 year for public service salary increases which is not spent before March 31 can be used in the new fiscal year for that purpose. It has been a rule in parliamentary control of financial matters that moneys not spent during the fiscal year lapse. As long as that rule was in effect, the government was under certain pressure to reach agreement with its employees, formerly by negotiation and now by collective bargaining, before the end of that fiscal year.
When in Winnipeg over the week end 1 found that the usual grievances against the government still persisted. People want to know when something is going to be done about old age pensions, housing, and the-pensions of retired civil servants. But I had a


particular grievance brought to my attention two or three times during the week end by federal civil servants who wanted to know when the salary increases being negotiated will come into effect. I had to say that I did not know the answer, and the reason for this is in vote 5b. If this item is passed it will no longer be possible to put pressure on the government to settle negotiations with its employees before the end of March because the government will be able to carry that money over into the next fiscal year. This vote goes even farther than that. It provides that not only can the government spend money in 1969-70 which was voted for 1968-69 but also that the government will have authority to set up a reserve fund for the years ahead. We are being asked to legislate by this item a whole new policy in respect of money for public servants' salary increases, the result of which will take the pressure off the government to act expeditiously in the handling of negotiations with its employees.
I agree with the hon. member for Peace River that this is a very important matter, concerned as it is with the control by parliament over finances. I think parliament has lost this control and something must be done or parliament will become irrelevant. We are also concerned with policies such as the one I just referred to, namely, public servants' salary increases. I hope the government will take a close look at this matter before the computor takes over the complete control of our finances. If this occurs, parliament will be indulging in irrelevant debate when it deals with estimates such as those now before us.


Mr. Gerard Laprise (Abilibi):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to speak early in this debate on the supplementary estimates (B).
I have noticed, as previous speakers have done, that there is much concern about this new method, especially about the abuse made in the estimates of $1, $2, $3 or $4 items.
The motion of the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin) reflects precisely the concern of the Progressive Conservatives who disapprove of this method.
I have also noticed, like the previous speaker, the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) that he himself had brought forward such a motion. In fact, most of his speech was on that subject.
[DOT] (3:40 p.ra.)
I should like to point out that while he did not move a motion, the leader of the Rallie-ment Creditiste (Mr. Caouette), through a
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question put to the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Munro) a few days ago, meant to ridicule and criticize this new method of getting money through $1 or $2 items.
Mr. Speaker, we are asked to pass after three days of debate supplementary estimates exceeding $200 million to enable the government to administer public affairs until the end of 1969. We feel that, on the whole, government needs	money to	pursue its
administration.
A very well recall, Mr. Speaker, that during the last election campaign, we were promised a just society, the abolition of regional disparities and the opportunity for everyone to earn a decent living. Well, we still do not know exactly what the government is driving at with this concept of a just society, because, on the whole, its policies have not been clearly defined yet. In fact, before the house is a bill authorizing the creation of a new department, to be headed by the hon. member for Langelier (Mr. Mar-chand), the present Minister of Forestry and Rural Development.
During the discussion of these supplementary estimates, I wish mainly to deal with an important question, bearing on a large segment of the population of the province of Quebec and particularly of northwestern Quebec, and not exclusively on my own constituency, since the whole of Canada, of which-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bechard):: Order. I find it appropriate to indicate to the hon. member, that as he has just said, his speech will bear on the development of northwestern Quebec. I must remind him that the motion under study is that introduced by the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin), which reads as follows:
This house concurs with the views expressed by the Standing Committee on Miscellaneous Estimates relating to the use of $1.00 items in estimates as set out in paragraphs one and two of the fourth report of the said committee presented on February 28, 1969.
Therefore, I think the hon. member's remarks should be limited to the very contents of that resolution.


Gérard Laprise: Mr. Speaker, I thank you for calling me to order. However, if I refer to the motion moved by the hon. member for Peace River, I think the discussions will not last three days, especially if we limit ourselves to that sole item.


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I was under the impression that we were, during these three days, to duscuss the whole of the supplementary estimates (B), but I realize that for three days our discussions will deal exclusively with an amount of $1 to enable the government to carry on.
I imagine that I shall be brief, Mr. Speaker, if our debate is to be limited to this subject. I have listened attentively, not to the beginning, but to a large part of the presentation made by the hon. member for Peace River, and also to that of the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre. However, I would have liked to know beforehand what the views of the government were on the matter. Both the previous speakers have discussed at length the practice, which is gaining ground, of transferring credits from one account to another. Does this mean that some departments are unable to spend the money that the government or the house has allotted them, since such moneys are to be transferred to another department?
Mr. Speaker, I think that such a practice is really ridiculous. It shows that the government does not necessarily respect hon. members' viewpoint and, in my opinion, changes should be made in the way the estimates are introduced or in the manner in which the house is called upon to vote on them. The requirements of each department should be clearly explained. The supplementary estimates should inform hon. members as to how the government wants to spend the money it asks the house to vote, so that we may know what it wants and make the necessary recommendations.
Mr. Speaker, if such a practice does not change soon, opposition members will take the necessary steps to change it.


David Lewis: Mr. Speaker, may I ask whether it is the intention of the President of the Treasury Board to deal with this matter? Having heard the initial statements, perhaps he could do so now so that we would know what his answers are.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: Mr. Speaker, it had been my hope to listen to all the observations and then attempt some kind of an answer to them because I am persuaded that a more than adequate answer exists. From what the hon. gentleman has suggested I assume that no other hon. members wish to take part in the discussion of this motion.


David Lewis: Not necessarily.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, may I say that I happen to know that the hon. member for Edmonton West wishes to speak. He happens to be in the phone booth in the lobby and he wishes to speak when he returns to the chamber.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: Mr. Speaker, if the opposition cannot quite organize its troops perhaps I should go ahead and say a few words with the possible danger of making irrelevant all that the hon. member for Edmonton West would like to say. However, I would be glad to yield my position to him right now as I see he is back in the chamber.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Mr. Speaker, I apologize to hon. members but I was called out of the chamber on an urgent matter. My first concern, as indicated by other hon. members, is the impression created by the minister in a news story on Wednesday last which quoted him as saying that parliament had lost or was losing control over the expenditure of public funds.
I was surprised that greater attention was not paid by the press and other commentators to what was happening in the Standing Committee on Miscellaneous Estimates. Many editorials have been written urging parliamentarians to make sure that every penny is accounted for and to insist that the government trim things to the bone.
[DOT] (3:50 p.m.)
In the committee we tried to get down to the real nub of the question. We examined these final supplementary estimates in a way that brought forward a lot of information. I commend to hon. members the transcripts of evidence which have now all been published, the last one coming in this afternoon, a little late in the day, and I shall have something to say about that in a little while. From these transcripts hon. members can see that full information was given. But how little comment!
I want to make it quite clear that I have no complaint at all to make to the minister about his availability to the committee. He was with us at the beginning of our studies, and following that the officers of the Treasury Board were very frank and open. On the last day, when committee members asked for certain ministers to be present, they came, I know at some inconvenience to one of them. I was appreciative of that effort. This is the sort of performance that will generate a degree of confidence between the government and the


members of the various committees looking at estimates.
Members of committees will have to be reasonable about the attendance of ministers, but if ministers adopt a high and mighty attitude and will not come before committees then we will have difficulties. However, on the basis of last week's performance I have no cause for complaint at all either with the ministers or with the officials.
Having said that, Mr. Speaker, I now want to complain about what I think was the deliberate action of the government house leader in devising the schedule for the study of these estimates and their re-appearance in the house. I complained about this matter in the committee, in particular in relation to the $1 items upon which we should have had much more extensive examination but which was not possible because the guillotine was falling.
A house order with reference to the committee's handling of the estimates was made almost concurrent with the tabling of the estimates, and hon. members did not have a chance to look at the final supplementary estimates and consider their implications. These matters cannot be fully appreciated in a period of five minutes. One has to study them and see what is involved. Yet the house was asked on Monday last to approve an order which sent these estimates to the Standing Committee on Miscellaneous Estimates, and that committee started its hearings at 9.30 the following morning. Study of the estimates was to be completed by Thursday evening, if not sooner, and I suppose members of the government hoped it would be sooner. The net result was that we sat on Tuesday. On Wednesday there was a vote in the house and I think we sat in committee for about an hour and fifteen minutes. Then, of course, we started again at 9.30 on Thursday. I object to this kind of performance. True enough, the government was only asking for about $200 million. There is about $50 million transferred and about $150 million new money. But is the time to be spent on these estimates to be rationed on the basis of the amount of money involved? In other words, are there to be so many millions of dollars per hour allotted to the committee? To this I must object.
There is another very important point. I do not know how many people had to devote almost the whole week end in overtime work in the preparation of the Minutes of Proceedings and Evidence so that they would be
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available to the house this afternoon. By special effort I was able to obtain my copy of Thursday's transcript at about 2.45 this afternoon after I had come down to the house. I had to send out for it in order to get it. That is not good enough.
Hon. members are asked to participate in a debate and are expected to have acquainted themselves with the detail of what went on in the committee and yet they do not have the evidence. This is what I complain about. It is in the spirit of the proposed 16A. In other words, the government house leader reaches down into a committee and tells that committee it must have its business done by such and such a time regardless of whether or not it is complicated and regardless of whether or not the members unearth many things which require investigation. In effect he says that this does not matter one iota, that it must be done by that time and if it is not the house order has authority behind it and if it is put to a vote there will be no question but that the iron heel will prevail. I object to this procedure because it is an iron heel. The President of the Treasury Board may wince a bit at that, but it is nothing more than an iron heel. I say here and now that we do not find that acceptable.
I should like to refer hon. members to the proceedings and evidence of the committee, particularly pages 91 and 92. First of all, what attracted me most was the contingency item of the Treasury Board, item 5b. I agree with my friend the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) that it lends itself to abuse. I think the purposes have been stretched rather more than they should have been. I understand what the minister is trying to do, as I told him during the committee proceedings, but this is the wrong item for it. The contingency account of the Treasury Board is not a catch-all item; it is not a fund in which reserves are to be accumulated as is provided for in this item. There is nothing here that says there cannot be raiding. I can assure you this is something I am watching with a great deal of apprehension. Unless the house expresses its disapproval of the instructions in respect of the use of this account, on some occasion in the future when an emergency may arise because of the fact that the government cannot get legislation or certain estimates through, certainly not the type of contingency or emergency that this account is intended to cover, there will be a raid on the contingency account because the money happens to be there. I am fearful of what might happen.


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So all I say is I do not like the practice, and other hon. members signified they did not like the practice. The minister himself did not like the practice. Here is what he said as recorded at page 91 of Minutes of Proceedings and Evidence No. 7 of the Standing Committee on Miscellaneous Estimates for Tuesday, February 25:


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: I am interested in, first of ail, the use of the contingency account. I think perhaps you are establishing a general grab-bag here, Mr. Minister. I fully subscribe, I think, to the purpose that you are setting out, and we realize that you must have some funds available for paying these retroactive pay increases. But why use the contingency fund? This is the wrong use, I think.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: I agree. It does not confine or meet strictly the notion that the contingency fund is for the sole purpose of looking after unforeseen, unpredictable contingencies. And I find the necessity for this not entirely satisfactory-
The minister was quite frank. I say to him that he and his officials must tax their ingenuity to find some other method of dealing with this problem with which they are faced and not hide it in a contingency account. I should like to refer hon. members again to the last paragraph on the right-hand side of page 91 and the top paragraph on page 92. My question was this:


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: But, Mr. Minister, is it proposed to, shall we say, get away from the use of this contingency account? There is unfortunately also the temptation that, having put this money in here in a vote and you come up against some other emergency where the government might be pushed by reason of opposition or one thing or another, you resort to the contingency account to tide over in an emergency. That is not the purpose of the contingency account. The contingency account as such, is there for a purpose and it is a question of parliamentary control over government. I, for one, would insist upon that.
This business of creating this fund for your labour negotiations, this is something new, but I think you are going to have to find some other device, to place your money in some position, or in your votes, or in some other place. Using the contingency account is an abuse, and it certainly is an abuse of parliamentary control. It is for that reason that I question it. You have been frank with us here in saying what it is. But I personally think that it is not to be repeated, that some of your staff have got to use their ingenuity for something else.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: As I have indicated to you, from the point of view of conveying information, this does not entirely please me. What we have been trying to do is to make the estimates as clear a representation of both past and future expenditures as we can. In this particular case, the object is not clarity.
It was clearly stated that the object was perhaps rather concealment, not parliamentary control. If the government is allowed to

do this once with regard to this contingency account, it becomes very tempting to do it in other accounts and to conceal or, shall we say, simply leave the purposes not clear. I do not think that should be the purpose. The government must be frank with hon. members. If this administration feels parliament should not have control over the pursestrings, why does it not say so? Why do the members of the government not say clearly that they feel there must be another form of government, that we should no longer have responsible government and that parliament itself should no longer have control over the spending of money?
As to the $1 items, of course we saw eight statutory extensions at least. We have seen them in the past. I have here the Appropriation Act for 1967-68. Certainly these supplementary estimates are replete with $1 items. I have not counted the actual number but there must have been between 20 and 30. In appropriation Act No. 7, (1967-68) there is one item creating a statutory extension under the National Housing Act.
[DOT] (4:00 p.m.)
When one considers how these estimates were passed and how little attention was paid to them, now that we have examined them I say that this is a bad practice, certainly in respect of the $1 statutory extensions of which there are eight. The hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre suggests there are others in some of the larger amounts and I think he may be right.
It is not that I object to the purpose of the vote. Let us take one item in the estimates of the Department of Labour, vote 12b. This is to provide for continuing compensation to some miners on Cape Breton Island who are suffering from silicosis. Of course we agree that the Government Employees Compensation Act should be amended to provide for this compensation and make it legal. But I do not see why an act could not have been put through with a proper schedule to provide for this compensation rather than using a $1 item. Someone will question this procedure in the future and suggest that it does not provide for payment to these people and others in similar circumstances. It will have been done through a $1 item in the Appropriations Act for 1969. This does not make for good administration. I think we should know about these things and I am sure it would have taken no time at all to pass this item as a direct legislative change.


We then have vote 25b in the estimates of the Department of Manpower and Immigration. Again this is for some additional purpose not spelled out. I am sure it is of a kind that would be acceptable. I think I remember correctly that the assistant secretary to the Treasury Board said it was for types of training agreements that were not quite covered under the legislation or the votes provided, but still it is an extension.
Under Regional Development we have vote 10b which is a statutory extension. Under the Department of Finance the last item, L27b, is another extension.


Stanley Howard Knowles: This is more an omnibus than the Criminal Code bill is.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: It has to do
with the Canada Student Loans Act. Very definitely that act provides for a limitation in respect of the amount of money lent or guaranteed in every province. This item provides for an extension over and above that limitation. Why not come in with an amendment to the act? If you are going to get additional amounts through the estimates or in respect of the administration, why not do it legitimately?
The last four items for C.M.H.C. are inexcusable. This will entail a debate, but having brought it on through the estimates with a guillotine, this is a guillotine imposed upon a housing debate. The situation today cries for a housing debate. As an individual member of parliament I cannot accept this practice and I certainly know that my colleagues on the committee did not accept it. Strangely enough, in respect of the first paragraph of the committee report to which I referred there was no dissenting voice. There were three Liberal members present with the Chairman and I can tell you that at least two put their hands up in full support.


Stanley Howard Knowles: They did not get the message.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: In so far as
the second paragraph is concerned, there are some items under agriculture such as item 65 of Appropriation Act No. 4, the western feed grain subsidy estimate. In the supplementary estimates this particular item has served as a milk cow for the whole of the Department of Agriculture. In the same way, in the estimates of the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development the Atlantic provinces national parks development item has
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provided well over $2 million for purposes within the Indian Affairs branch. Because of financial stringencies imposed by this government on that particular branch-and they have had some cut-backs-the department has now had to go and raid the national parks construction account. This is a bad situation.
As I pointed out to the President of Treasury Board, there may be a tendency in the future for various departments to set up accounts such as these where expenses may be justified in order to get them through the Treasury Board and the House, but with the intent that they shall be a prolific source of funds for other purposes within the ministry which have no real relationship to the original purpose. It is a long way from national parks in the Atlantic provinces to welfare and other services for Indian and native populations.
I am not objecting to the new and ultimate purpose of the expenditure. Undoubtedly it is well intended, but these should have been handled in the proper way from the beginning. It may be said that in respect of every $1 item the department has to come before the Treasury Board but-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bechard):: Order, please.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: I can be
finished in 30 seconds.


Some hon. Members:: Continue.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: It may be
said that they have to come before the Treasury Board with their new expenditures and justify them, that whenever there is a $1 item it is posted in the supplementary estimates and has to be justified. The tendency is to say that parliament has voted the money so why not go ahead with these expenditures? It will be suggested that under the old practice, if there was going to be a short-fall in expenditures in respect of an item, there was a tendency to say the money is there and it had better be spent or it will lapse. However, departments are going to ask for supplementary estimates and the practice will be the same. There will be no improvement and in some ways I think there will be a tendency to say that the money is there anyway and they should spend it.


Stanley Howard Knowles: That is how your wife gets a fur coat without it costing you anything.


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Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: With those remarks I intend to limit myself to the time allotted, but I must say I do not like these $1 items. They represent a bad practice that has been extended and which must now be curtailed.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: Mr. Speaker, I think there are a few points which have been made to which I should like to reply. First, let me refer again to the remarks of the committee:
Your committee expresses its concern at the extensive use of $1.00 items for the purpose of statutory amendments particularly in final supplementary estimates-
The report also states:
Your committee also noted with concern an even greater use of $1.00 items for the transfer of moneys from one account to another.
The hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert) drew attention to the fact that even Liberal members of the committee supported this expression of concern. I go along with those members and I share their concern. I think parliament should be concerned about the unwarranted extension of so-called legislation by $1 items. However, in the present circumstances I suggest that worry is unwarranted.
[DOT] (4:10 p.m.)
The hon. member for Edmonton West, and I think also the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles), expressed some worry that the government was endeavouring to strip parliament of its control over public funds. Here they were trying to look into the supposed motives of the ministry without producing much evidence, I must say. I would remind them in respect of parliamentary control that for the past year we have endeavoured to present and to explain to parliament a new method of preparing and presenting the estimates so as to make parliamentary control over funding easier to achieve than has been the case in the past. In any event, as members of the public accounts committee are aware, the new method of presenting estimates will provide members with a sounder basis of knowledge regarding programs and purposes for expenditure than does our current scheme of presenting estimates.


Stanley Howard Knowles: More knowledge but not control.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: The purpose is to provide more knowledge, and I submit that knowledge in

the parliamentary forum is power and ignorance is weakness. There is no scheme of procedures that will assure that ignorance will be in control. Indeed, I do not think we want such a dispensation.


An hon. Member:: The government is in control.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: I agree it is, and if the government has control it is because of knowledge. If the opposition lacks control and authority, it is because of ignorance.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Smile, Bud.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: I think members of the opposition cannot help but agree with this. What we are trying to do is to make it easier for members on both sides of the house to have more knowledge and consequently to exercise real powers in making proper and, I hope, enlightened decisions. This is exactly the reverse of what the hon. gentlemen to whom I have alluded have suggested is our approach to these supplementary estimates.
As I explained in the committee, these $1 items fall under two heads: One authorizes transfers of funds which, as the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre pointed out, under the Financial Administration Act cannot be transferred without the authority of parliament, and it is this authority we are seeking. Why are transfers being made? The hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin) exhorted the government to restraint and charged it with lack of restraint and with spendthrift qualities. The purpose of these items is to be able to say to departments: If you wish to do things which appear to have a higher priority now than they had at some earlier date, then you must be able to select things which are less important and which are going more slowly. This accounts for the necessity of departments finding, where additional money is needed for an item emerging with a higher priority, a source which has a lower priority, and this means a transfer of funds.
These particular changes of priority are indicated in all these $1 items for the benefit of the house and the members of the committee. I suggest that this is a step in providing to members the kind of information they need to make intelligent judgments. The alternative to this would be merely to seek the additional amounts needed for the newly emerging priorities, and I think all hon. members will agree that even during the short space of


one year priorities in a number of areas change. Things are changing very rapidly and we must be able to accommodate ourselves to change. The alternative would have been to seek supplementary estimates for the amount of the additional items and, to say nothing of those where slow-downs were being imposed, to find compensatory funds. I suggest that this would have been less informative to the house and to the public.
The $1 items authorizing such changes are in fact a demonstration of a real policy of restraint in relation to government expenditures rather than the reverse. Further, I suggest they provide more information to members, which should be the source of greater knowledge and consequently greater authority.
In respect of the $1 items which do not represent a transfer of funds from one account to another, I think the house would probably have to look at the individual items, as the committee did, to reach a conclusion whether these items represented substantial and meaningful legislation or some relatively minor change in the statute referred to.
The hon. member for Edmonton West made reference to Vote 12b of the Department of Labour as being a means for amending legislation relating to employees' compensation. The present legislation contemplates a certain framework of conditions under which compensation would be paid by the government in respect of its employees for disabilities incurred as a consequence of such employment. It is quite a comprehensive and long act which is accompanied by a schedule indicating those classes of employees to whom this legislation applies. In this particular case we do not want to change the philosophy nor do we want to change the legislation substantially. However, we do want to include under its provisions a group of men who appear, as a consequence of a recent corporate transaction, to have been left out in the cold.
As the hon. member for Edmonton West suggested, this is the kind of thing the government should do. We have done it, and the only question to be asked then is: How do we get this legislation amended to take care of this special circumstance? One way is to introduce a one or two-line bill amending the Government Employees Compensation Act and put it through all the deliberate and deliberative procedure of first and second reading, reference to committee, and report and third reading, or to provide the same kind of consideration in the house and in committee followed again by consideration in
Business of Supply
the full house under a supplementary appropriation act. As this is more a question of money than of the underlying philosophy of the act that is being changed, this would appear to be the more appropriate mechanism. Again, where various acts impose fiscal or chronological limitations, where a change is designed for specific purposes but without changing the underlying purpose and philosophy of the act, this seems a more convenient way of doing it and a more effective one having in mind the time of the members of the house.
[DOT] (4:20 p.m.)
As the hon. member for Edmonton West pointed out, there are already tremendous pressures on members' time. There is a tremendous amount to be done and most of us feel we cannot find the time in which to do it. If a method can be found which consumes less time while still providing adequate opportunity for consideration by those who are interested, then I favour it. I suggest it is in this spirit that $1 items, having the effect of legislating rather than merely transferring funds from one account to another, appear in these estimates. The purpose is not to deprive parliament of its control over the executive. The purpose, rather, is to allow parliament more time to deal with the larger issues. In other words, the time of parliament is not consumed in dealing with a series of relatively minor measures which nevertheless engage the whole majestic apparatus of this institution.
I do not believe there is much more I can add. The hon. member for Edmonton West referred to a news story quoting me as saying parliament was losing control over government spending. If there was such a story- and I do not doubt the hon. gentleman's word -I say it did not come from me. I myself think our new system of preparing and presenting estimates will increase, not decrease, the effectiveness of parliamentary control over spending.
Our present system is not good and it should be revised. With this, I agree. I believe parliament should have more effective control, not more control in detail but more effective control, over spending, and in my opinion the system to which we are moving will accomplish this. But I do not agree with the hon. member for Edmonton West that providing more roadblocks, more delays, more obstruction, without increasing our knowledge, will have the effect of improving parliamentary control. I suppose the ability to


Business of Supply
sandbag, the ability to delay, is a demonstration of control to some extent because, after all, stopping things amounts to controlling them. But this is control in the negative sense whereas what we are looking for is effective, positive control.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: Mr. Speaker, the President of the Treasury Board (Mr. Drury) and the Treasury Board generally continue to amaze me. I should like to take a few minutes of the time of the house in order to discuss some of the things which have been on my mind and some of the things to which the hon. gentleman has just referred. I shall not try to make anything of t.he proud boast he made about the government having everything under control, because it is not even necessary to refute that kind of statement at the present time.


Stanley Howard Knowles: He
knows better himself.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: The President of the Treasury Board is talking to us about the desirability of increasing the information available to the house but really he is not paying the slightest attention to the criticism suggesting there is something wrong with the present procedure. I have been on my feet recently complaining about the inadequate support which the government is providing for the Auditor General who is an officer of this parliament very well able to ensure that the house does get information not only about expenditure-after the fact, admittedly-but also about appropriate procedures. I have put forward the case for important changes in the relationship between the Treasury Board and the house, but I cannot get the hon. gentleman to pay the slightest attention to this point, one which I think and will continue to think is of the greatest importance until someone on the government side at least takes the trouble to persuade me I am wrong.
I am not really surprised that a member of the government should not pay much attention to me, but I am surprised to find the President of the Treasury Board sweeping aside the opinion of a committee of this house with regard to the appearance of these dollar estimates. He sympathizes with the concern of the committee as though it were, so to speak, an abstract proposition, and then, without any real explanation, he goes on to say that in this case its concern is not justified. If we put the two sentences together and try to make sense of them, we find it amounts to this: in the opinion of the President of the

Treasury Board the committee did not know what it was talking about. So it is not only a question of the relation between the Treasury Board and the Auditor General; the government is really not paying any attention to representations made by a committee of the house with regard to this matter.
The minister spoke about giving the house more information. He told us the aim of the government was to provide more information thereby giving the house greater control. Well, I suppose there will not be any more dollar items in the future with regard to transfers of money within departments. They will not be necessary since I understand there are to be so few votes that the government will not need to make any transfers. Hon. gentlemen opposite are arranging things in such a way that in future they will not even have to make reports involving dollar items. I think this is the case. Yet the President of the Treasury Board-and I do not like to be too critical of so honourable a gentleman-comes before us and pretends that the aim of the government is to provide the house with more information. In fact, though, it is clear that the government intends to place itself in a position where it will not be necessary to present any dollar items. Certainly, with a smaller number of votes the minister will not be obliged to report to the house that there has been some change in priorities here or there, that some money has been saved, and that it will be moved over and used for something else. He will be spared the embarrassment of coming before the house, if there be any embarrassment, with regard to these dollar items.
As to these new procedures, I believe the Auditor General has criticized the government for reducing the number of votes, not necessarily for the reason I have given but because the ultimate result will be to reduce the control exercised by the house over the expenditures of the government. It may be that initially the estimates will be presented in a manner which will give a more intelligible picture of what is going on. But if the President of the Treasury Board is suggesting that this change will give the house more control over the expenditures of the government, I dispute that contention. The debate this afternoon indicates this clearly. In future we shall not have even the kind of information which is given to us in these supplementary estimates. There will be no estimates involving changes of this sort because the government is taking the precaution to arrange things to ensure we shall not have


supplementary estimates in the ordinary way. If I am wrong, I hope someone on the other side will correct me.
[DOT] (4:30 p.m.)
With regard to the use of this technique to bring about legislative changes, I think it is highly dangerous to make use of such an informal method. If this parliament is going to authorize a new procedure that permits legislative changes in this informal manner, then this procedure should at the very least be carefully defined. Who is to draw the line between the kind of legislation that is considered sufficiently minimal in importance to be proceeded with in this way and, on the other hand, the kind of legislation that is sufficiently important to be dealt with in the way we normally expect legislation to proceed through the house? I have no wish to exaggerate and if I am wrong I hope I will be corrected, but I regard this as a very sweeping change in the rules of the house without any proper consideration or authorization being given to it.
I think we have to regard this matter as a serious one. I do not accept for a moment that the changes that are being made by parliament are going to give this house more control over the expenditures of the government. I think they will give the house less control. I can only assume that this is a deliberate move in this respect on the part of the government.
I have also said that the government is making changes in the rules of the house relating to the passage of its legislation without such changes receiving the proper consideration of parliament. The government has just taken it upon itself to make these changes without prior discussion. I do not think this is a proper way to proceed. I will regard with a little more sincerity the protestations that have been made on the government side of the house that members opposite are anxious to facilitate the giving of information to the house and to safeguard the control of the house when I see that the Auditor General really is independent of Treasury Board and can go ahead and get his own staff, with some more adequate way of enabling parliament to pass judgment upon the matter, instead of having him hemmed in by the Treasury Board without our knowledge.
There are ways, important ways, to obtain increased control by this house, and the Auditor General is one of these ways. Far
Business of Supply
from increasing the control of the house, the proposed changes we are now contending with will have the result of reducing the number of the estimates, and the general behaviour of the government will obviously lessen the ultimate control of the house of the expenditures of this government.


Gerald William Baldwin: Mr. Speaker, I rise not to participate again in the debate; whether or not I would be entitled to do so, since this is a substantive motion, is beside the point because I am rising on a point of order. I wish to lay before Your Honour and the House the question of the procedure that might now be considered in order to bring this matter to a conclusion. I do so with more readiness since we have agreed that when the consideration of the supplementary estimates reaches the stage of the appropriation bill we will deal first with the housing items that appear in the supplementary estimates.
In response to a question of mine on Thursday or Friday the Minister of Transport (Mr. Hellyer) indicated that he wanted to be in the house to deal with this question. He is not here, though I make no point about that. However, the issue I am now raising may well want to be considered by your Honour after hearing members' views, and I suggest that after the question has been debated Your Honour might wish to devote some time to it and we might consider an adjournment.
The question I ask is whether or not a vote is permissible-and I am not indicating that our party is going to move for a vote on this particular motion. We are now treading in the uncharted waters of the new rules. This is the first time we have dealt with supplementary estimates since introducing the rules changes. It is quite certain that this motion is not a non-confidence motion. There is no question about our urging that it be considered a nonconfidence motion. My original thought was that a vote might not be possible, that is to say, a vote where the house divides.
Reference to Standing Order 58 (3), (7) and (11) raises some doubt on this score. Certainly the three days are not part of the 25 days that are allotted to and divided among the three so-called semesters. In these cases you either have an allotted day on which you can move a non-confidence motion, limited to two in each semester, or you can move a motion that is not a non-confidence motion but is simply used as a peg upon which the relevancy of the debate will be considered.


Business of Supply
The three days are in a somewhat different category. I am raising this point for consideration since the Standing Committee on Organization and Procedure is meeting from time to time. By its terms of reference the committee was directed to pay attention to the manner in which these rule changes would be considered. It is obvious that a vote would be permissible, even though it were not a non-confidence motion, if the committee were moving to delete an item in the estimates. Since this is the first time this question has arisen. I raise this matter for consideration so that we may have a ruling on it and know how to proceed in the future.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Peace River has brought out into the open, if I may put it in that way, the fact that there have been some discussions on whether or not a vote of the house on this motion is one that it is proper for the house to take. I should like to argue that it is proper and that if five members of the house wish to have a vote on this motion they are entitled to have one. I may say that in my party we are unanimously of this point of view.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: You are not right now.


Thomas Miller Bell: Your attendance is as bad as the government's.


Stanley Howard Knowles: But
I am here and we speak with one voice. The house has before it a motion moved by the hon. member for Peace River. I submit that in the absence of a standing order providing that there shall not be a vote on this kind of motion, it is proper for the house to have a vote.
Those who argue that this debate simply expires either at the end of the day or when no further members wish to take part in it will, I submit, find it difficult to cite a standing order that supports that argument. Standing Order 58 (3) provides for opposition motions on allotted days. As you go through Standing Order 58 there are various provisions as to what happens to opposition motions on allotted days.
It is my thesis that this is not what is now before the house. The house is not considering an opposition motion on an allotted day. I draw your attention, Mr. Speaker, to paragraph 5 of Standing Order 58 which provides for a certain number of allotted days in each

of the three semesters of the session. That Standing Order ends with this sentence:
These twenty-five days are to be designated as allotted days.
I urge on Your Honour the fact that there is no language anywhere else in these Standing Orders that says any other days are allotted days. It is clear that the five allotted days in the first semester, the seven in the second and the thirteen in the third make up the total of our 25 allotted days.
[DOT] (4:40 p.m.)
In paragraph 7 there is provision with respect to final supplementary estimates, which we are now dealing with. Incidentally, paragraph 7 speaks of those supplementaries as being introduced in the period between March 31 and June 30, but we passed a special order on February 24 that transferred the three days to that period prior to March 31. I therefore submit that the rules regarding the three days in the final period apply to the three days on which we are now launched.
The second half of Standing Order 58(7) reads as follows:
-three days for the consideration of the motion that the House concur in those estimates and for the passage at all stages of any bill to be based thereon shall be added to the days for the business of supply in that period.
It does not say those three days are to be added to the allotted days; they are to be added to the days with respect to business of supply. In other words, those three days are a different kettle of fish. They are outside the 25 allotted days.
Paragraph 11 of the Standing Order says: Proceedings on allotted days on opposition motions which are not "no-confidence" motions shall expire when debate thereon has been concluded or at the ordinary time of daily adjournment, as the case may be.
I contend, Mr. Speaker, that paragraph 11 cannot be made to apply to these three days because it clearly applies to what happens on allotted days. By definition, therefore, these three days are not allotted days but extra days added to the business of supply for the purpose of dealing with supplementary estimates. I suggest, therefore, that we have the right to have this motion treated as an ordinary motion which is subject to a vote. That is the general rule with respect to all motions moved in parliament. They are subject to a vote if the house wishes to take that vote. There are a few exceptions where we have provided otherwise. We have provided otherwise in Standing Order 26, under which a.


motion expires at the end of the day, and we have also provided otherwise with respect to non-confidence motions on allotted days. But we have made no such provision with respect to these three special days for supplementary estimates which have been added to the business of supply.
Therefore, now that debate seems to have ended, I submit that Your Honour ought to put to the house the question whether it wishes to concur. There may be no vote. After all, members of all parties were on the committee of the house that examined this matter, and agreement on many items was unanimous. It may be that we shall not come to a recorded vote, but I submit we have the right to test the will of the house.
It is also clear, I submit, that with respect to these three special days that have been added to the business of supply there is provision for us to vote against some of the estimates if we wish to do so. There is even provision for us to vote on the first or second reading of the supply bill to be based on these estimates and on the separate clauses. If there is the right to deal with the business of supply in that manner during these three days, I submit we have also the right to vote on the motion the hon. member for Peace River has moved. I support the principle that we take such a vote at this time.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Mr. Speaker, may I make a brief comment on the point that has just been raised. Your Honour will recall that last week, when we were considering the possible procedure for these days, I made representations to you indirectly that these were not allotted days and that under no circumstances could they be considered as such.
The motion that has been posted is that this house do concur in the supplementary estimates. The argument has been made that we should handle these three days as if they were allotted days. It is true that these are days on which estimates are being considered but, having heard the argument of the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre, I agree that they are not within the 25 allotted days. It is clearly spelled1 out in the rules that there are only 25 allotted days. Of course, one must determine what is meant by "allotted days". In my view, however, none of the procedures that apply with respect to allotted days applied here. We do not have the 24-hours notice for opposing or, shall we say, restoring or amending any item in the estimates. That is not required under the present procedure.
Business of Supply
We have here a procedure arising from the fact that the house made an order that these estimates were to be considered in committee for three days and in the house for three days. We shall consider an appropriation bill and it will go to committee where it will be dealt with on the basis applying to any other bill. There is a special procedure under which we set aside three days for final supplementary estimates. I put it to Your Honour that if a transcript of our discussions in the procedure committee were available you would see that it was contemplated there would be a special procedure for final, supplementary estimates. What is now developing is in accordance with that thought.
Therefore I put it to Your Honour that we can take a vote. A vote should be taken on the motion moved by my colleague, the hon. member for Peace River, after which we could proceed with the motion of the President of the Treasury Board. As I indicated previously, a difficulty would have faced the Chair and the house if the motion of the President of the Treasury Board had been put at the beginning of this afternoon's proceedings, because there is no way of disposing of a motion before the house except by voting on it. The house cannot entertain two motions at the same time.


Mr. Rene Matte (Champlain):: Mr. Speaker, I did not attend the meetings of the committee to which this matter was referred. However, having listened this afternoon to those who spoke before me, I understand that this is a substantial point which should be considered, so as to study seriously all the matters dealt with.
As a result, there is talk of putting this motion to a vote, and from the views expressed so far, I understand that if there is a vote, the minister's proposal will be left out. So, I believe that we should get back to the matters dealt with earlier and we should ask ourselves once again if the house has not sufficiently recognized the fact that items are transferred in the estimates without its having anything to say or its exercizing any control.
In my opinion, this a matter of principle and we should examine the problem very carefully. That is why I endorse fully everything that was said by the hon. members for Peace River and Winnipeg North Centre. I think we should devote still more time to a debate on a major principle that has already set a precedent but which is being amplified


Business of Supply
to such an extent that the privileges and the prerogatives of this house are in danger.
[DOT] (4:50 p.m.)


Donald Stovel Macdonald: I wonder, Mr. Speaker, whether I could make a brief reference to the arguments that have been made. I would rather indicate a viewpoint on the other side of the matter. Not only is there no authority in Standing Order 58, as produced by the special committee on Procedure earlier this session, for a vote in this type of motion, but when one looks at Standing Order 58(4) one sees there is no authority for a notice of motion of the kind put forward by the hon. member for Peace River or the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre.
I draw Your Honour's attention to the most relevant portion of Standing Order 58 (4)(a). It reads:
Twenty-four hours' written notice shall be given of an opposition motion on an allotted day-
This is not the case here, in the view of hon. members opposite.
*-or of a notice to oppose any item in the estimates.
For this purpose I take it the reference is also under Standing Order 58.


Gerald William Baldwin: You take it wrong.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: The hon. member for Peace River adds nothing to the discussion. The motions moved by the hon. member for Peace River and the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre do not relate to any specific item in the estimates but rather offer a general comment. This is the first opportunity I have had to discuss and debate the matter and I would like to indicate my own viewpoint. In my view these motions are not receivable and for that reason we should not support these two motions if they come to a vote.
Standing Order 58 generally is a rather elaborate Standing Order, as you know, Mr. Speaker. Elaborate provision has been made for votes under certain circumstances and for not having votes under other circumstances. Since we did not provide in the committee for a vote, since we did not provide for this kind of motion in the first place, and since we did not stipulate a vote under the special order, we should stick within the strict rules of the Standing Order and not have a vote at this point.


Mr. Aiken:: I would like to make two comments, Mr. Speaker, on the motion being considered. A most ridiculous situation could arise if a motion were placed before the House of Commons, particularly of the type with which we are dealing which concurs with views expressed by a committee, without having the opinion of the house expressed in some manner. It might be possible that when the time allotted expired no vote would be taken but on the other hand, a vote might be required. In this instance the house is being tested on a substantive motion. I feel it would be contrary to all the precedents of parliamentary practice if a motion put on the order paper were moved, debated during the course of a day and then not put to the house and decided in some manner.
The second point I wish to make is that the President of the Privy Council has raised the point that this motion should not have been made, that there is no provision for a motion of this type in the rules and therefore it is out of order and should not even be considered, much less voted on. If that is the case, Mr. Speaker, I suggest that objection should have been made at the time the motion was moved and debate commenced. That time having passed, the motion should now be put to the house and considered. It would be contrary to all the rules of parliament merely to let it drop in the middle of a proceeding.


Mr. Speaker:: I have listened very carefully to the arguments put forward by hon. members in connection with the interpretation of Standing Order 58 and the interpretation of the special order under which we are operating at the present time., I must say I agree with the general proposition advanced. What we have before us is a motion and that is the normal way for the house to consider its business. I believe also that this point of view has been advanced by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles). The House of Common must consider its business by way of a motion being put, discussion on a motion and the eventual disposition of such a motion ordinarily is by a vote. It is only where circumstances Eure such that a Standing Order specifically states, for example in the case of Standing Order 26, that there should be no vote, that the house will not proceed to a disposition of the matter by way of a count or by a division.
Perhaps it would be easier to make a ruling in this case along the lines suggested by the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin)


or by those who have spoken in support of his interpretation of the rule. But if from the start we had not placed ourselves in the position of operating in accordance with the Standing Order which some say could apply, and if these days are not allotted days, we would not be proceeding according to the terms which guide discussion on allotted days, I have trouble in deciding how the hon. member for Peace River and the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre could file such notices because according to my interpretation of Standing Order 58, this is the Standing Order under which members of the opposition may file such notices.
The suggestion made by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre is that although the Standing Order and the special order refer to allotted days, this is not an allotted day.
I have given the matter serious and careful thought during the last few days because it was discussed outside the house with the members who are considered experts and who I suggest are experts in the matter of interpretation of the rules and with hon. members who were on the committee which adopted this rule and recommended it to the house. I am still as uncertain as I was in the first instance as to how this Standing Order should be interpreted. But if hon. members think there is some virtue or merit to my suggestion, I would make the proposition that because until this afternoon we have adhered to the provisions of the Standing Order and have received the 24 hours' notice, it would be difficult all of a sudden to determine that we are no longer applying the Standing Order, and that we are not dealing with allotted days and therefore we should take a vote on the motion.
The way some hon. member have spoken, there does not seem to be any clear indication that there would in any event be a vote on the matter if my interpretation of the sense of the house is correct.
[DOT] (5:00 p.m.)
Perhaps it would be wise for the Chair to have additional time to reflect on this situation and to study in Hansard the learned arguments advanced by hon. members and perhaps then be prepared, when we are faced again with a similar situation and required to give a ruling as to whether, when we are considering so-called allotted days, or designated days dealing with the consideration of supplementary estimates, or where special provisions of standing order 58 should apply.
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My view is that we have gone too far at the moment to turn back the clock as the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert) has suggested all along: but in my opinion proceeded on the basis of a 24 hour notice because these are special days, not allotted days of the normal type.
I also suggest for the guidance of hon. members that we are dealing with a special order, and I wonder if hon. members would want to establish a procedure, once and for all, at this point, when we are not dealing with our standing orders but with a special order of the house. This is a complicating factor, and in view of this additional consideration, and because of the fact that we do not have before us at the present time, a normal situation, where a motion would have been made in an ordinary way under the provisions of the standing order for the consideration of supplementary estimates during three allotted days, it is my view that it would not be wise to make a decision which would bind the house on every occasion in the future when it is asked to study a motion under that part of the standing order.
I have tried to suggest that it would be better to proceed at this point as though we were under allotted days which, according to my interpretation of the standing order, is that, when this discussion is terminated, and no other notice having been given, we should go on and put the motion to the house, that is, the motion that will be proposed by the President of the Treasury Board (Mr. Drury) for concurrence in the supplementary estimates.
As a final word, it will be obvious that my decision is a non-decision.



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION


Mr. Speaker:: It is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 40, to inform the house that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: The hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles)-Old Age Security-Payment of income tax on guaranteed income supplement; the hon. member for York South (Mr. Lewis)-Immigration-Timing of distinction between deserters and draft dodgers; the hon. member for Dartmouth-Halifax (Mr. Forres-tall)-National Defence-C.F.B. Halifax-pay adjustments for personnel.


Business of Supply



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


Paul Theodore Hellyer: That supplementary estimate 12(b) Revised, relating to the Department of Labour, for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1969, presented to the house, Friday, February 28, 1969, be concurred in.


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


Some hon. Members:: On division.


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
Paul Theodore Hellyer: That Supplementary Estimates (B) for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1969, presented to the house Monday, February 24, 1969, less item 12(b) relating to the Department of Labour, be concurred in.


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


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
Paul Theodore Hellyer: That Bill C-177, for granting to Her Majesty certain sums of money for the public service for the financial year ending the 31st March, 1969, be now read the first time and printed.


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


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, bill read the first time and ordered to be printed.
Mr. Speaker:: When shall the said bill be read the second time?


Some hon. Members:: Now.


Stanley Howard Knowles: By
leave.


Mr. Speaker:: By special order made February 24, 1969, now.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: That Bill C-177, for granting to Her Majesty certain sums of money for the public service for the financial year ending the 31st March, 1969, be read the second time and referred to a committee of the whole.


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


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, bill read the second time and the house went into committee thereon, Mr. Bechard in the chair.
Albert Béchard: In accordance with section 1 of Standing Order 75 the preamble and clause 1 of this bill must stand. Clause 2. Shall clause 2 carry?
On clause 2-$222,254,283 granted for 1968-69.


Gerald William Baldwin: Mr. Chairman, by virtue of an understanding which was reached this afternoon it was agreed that we should turn our attention in committee to the schedule and that a certain order would be accepted in dealing with it. It may well be that the house will want to get through the clauses of the bill but hopefully, as the minister is here to defend what some of us think is indefensible and as other hon. members are concerned with this matter, the committee might agree to direct its attention to the schedule and those items which come under the responsibility of the Minister of Transport in his capacity of dealing with housing.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Chairman, I wonder whether the most defensible course of action would not be to pass the first six clauses of the bill, then proceed with the schedule, and then by special agreement call the item under C.M.H.C. first, notwithstanding that it appears last. If the committee were agreeable perhaps we could pass all the other items in the schedule and call the housing item, or perhaps we could reverse the order of the schedule and deal with the C.M.H.C. item first after passing the first six clauses.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Chairman, I do not mind the little exercise in which the President of the Privy Council has engaged, but I think it would be more sensible if we allowed clauses 2 to 6 to stand and called the schedule and proceeded as we agreed with the housing items.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: We did not
agree to have them stand.


Stanley Howard Knowles: thought we had agreed to go directly to the schedule.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: I thought we had agreed to move them and then go to the schedule and call the housing item first.


Stanley Howard Knowles: am sure discussion, on clauses 2 to 6 will be negligible, in tact nil, if first of all we have the discussion on the items in the schedule. May I interrupt myself and remind the minister that we are under a time limit of six o'clock on Wednesday, and if we spend our time on the detailed estimates in the schedule and then revert to the clauses we will not be able to debate them anyway. What we want to get at are the items under housing, immigration, and so on. The sensible thing would be to let all the clauses stand and call the schedule, and call as the first item in the schedule the C.M.H.C. item.


Gerald William Baldwin: Mr. Chairman, the position that many hon. members of the committee will take on these clauses may well depend on, for example, the Minister of Transport and other ministers making a substantial and reasonable defence of some of the items in the schedule. For this reason I had thought we could go to the schedule. If these matters are properly covered then, as the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre has suggested, when the time comes to deal with the substantive clauses of the bill it would be a routine matter provided we are satisfied on the other matters.
[DOT] (5:10 p.m.)


Albert Béchard: Is it agreed?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: That certainly was not the understanding I had. The understanding was that we would proceed right through the bill to the schedule and then agree to change the order in the schedule.


Stanley Howard Knowles: am not arguing with the minister. I am sorry if there was any misunderstanding. I was engaged in the discussions and my thought was we would move through all the other stages as quickly as possible to get to the schedule but I did not think that meant we would pass all the various clauses without debate. Frankly, what does it matter? Once we get into the schedule we will be on it until six o'clock on Wednesday and then the clauses will be called without debate.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: That seems to be the best argument for calling the clauses now.


Albert Béchard: Shall clause 2
carry?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.
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Some hon. Members:: No.


Albert Béchard: Clause 3.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Mr. Chairman, by passing clause 2 we in effect pass the schedule because that is the way clause 2 reads. How can we discuss the schedule, which may have many changes to the items depending upon the sense of the house, if we have already passed clause 2? That does not make sense to me.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Chairman, I submit that you have called clause 2, which is the proper thing for you to do. Clause 2 refers to the schedule. This would now permit us to discuss the items in the schedule, and that is where the housing items are.


Albert Béchard: Shall clause 2
carry?


Some hon. Members:: No.


Robert Jardine McCleave: Mr. Chairman, I understand it is the mood of the committee that we turn first to housing and deal with the four $1 items, this massive injection of new money into the housing problems that confront Canada. This is set forth at page 16 of the measures we are considering. It may be that the Minister of Transport would wish to make an opening statement on this subject. If so, I would defer to him because he obviously said very little before the Standing Committee on Miscellaneous Estimates the other day. Perhaps since then he has had an opportunity to do his homework and is now in a position to report to the house. If the minister wishes to rise now I will gladly bow to him; if not I propose to make a statement and ask questions to which I hope we will receive the answers which we did not receive during the hearings of the Standing Committee on Miscellaneous Estimates the other day.
First of all, an important occasion always demands a preamble so I shall turn to some of the housing pledges that were made by hon. gentlemen opposite as recently as last April, May and June. First, let us take the words of one of the outstanding members opposite in a speech made in Vancouver on May 11 as reported by the Canadian Press. This gentleman said that the national housing situation calls for increased help to C.M.H.C. an aid to low-cost housing projects. What could be more just than increased emphasis on low-cost housing projects because everybody in this chamber is familiar with the fact


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that more than half the poverty in Canada is rooted in the metropolitan areas and it is important that the government meet this particular problem. The gentleman said in Vancouver that a Liberal government would give increased aid to low-cost housing projects. His words have perhaps a little more than ordinary weight since he was the architect of the phrase "the just society".
Then we go to another statesman not as distinguished as the first; one might consider him also obsolete since he has gone to the other place. Nevertheless, in a speech at Winnipeg on May 29 this year the government house leader in the other place said that high interest rates on mortgage loans will be reduced if the Liberal government is successful in its drive to reduce expenditures and achieve a balanced budget. This is the Delphic oracle at its best. Most people presumably took from this that expenditures would be reduced, the budget would come in balanced, and therefore high interest rates on mortgage loans would be reduced. As we all know now, exactly the reverse has happened.
Not to leave the present minister responsible for housing out of the preamble I would quote his remarks, again in Vancouver, on June 13 as reported by the Canadian Press:
The Prime Minister has a policy of not making expensive election promises. This was in order to get a mandate that would give him a free hand in attacking high interest rates, unemployment and the housing shortage.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Who said that?


Robert Jardine McCleave: That was the present
Minister of Transport. The high interest rates have gone higher; the high unemployment has gone higher and the housing shortage has become more acute. These are the programs and policies-perhaps one could really call them prattle-that were given to the Canadian people last year on the important topic of housing.
Now, sir, in respect of the purpose of the four exercises in $1 amounts that we are being asked to give our blessing to, I think what is happening was well put forth in an exchange between the hon. member for Edmonton West and the minister before the Standing Committee on Miscellaneous Estimates at its hearing of last Thursday, February 27. I shall quote from page 241 of the Minutes of Proceedings and Evidence:


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: That is all I have on this except again the general proposition as to why this was done by supplementary estimate.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: In this case, Mr. Lambert, when we anticipated introducing amendments to the act

within a few weeks anyway, we needed sufficient statutory authority to get us over the period in between. In that event, it makes sense to do it this way.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: You just told me that you wanted to get through to March 31, 1970.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: There is always the possibility that Parliament might not approve legislation-
Well, that is something; we might not approve the legislation which is so necessary to get the program through.
-or we may get run over by a truck or something.
That is the royal "we". The quotation continues:
You never know, so it is wise to have a little ahead.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: This is going to be the cushion, is it? This was coming under a guillotine. Mr. Minister, I am going to repeat, you heard me tell Mr. Drury, that this is a bad practice as far as many of us are concerned. It would be far more open, and I think you will be further ahead in the end, to come forward legitimately with statutory amendments rather than these $1 items.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: We will be glad to note that. Also, as I say, I will be happy if we can introduce amendments to the act and provide larger limits which will obviate the necessity of doing this.
It seems obvious from that exchange and certainly from all the unanswered questions in the committee that this was a measure of expediency, although the minister must have raised many eyebrows in the committee when he suggested the possibility parliament might not approve legislation and therefore this was a very useful way to get it done. I suggest the housing problems of Canada need more than expedient treatment.
The questions I should like to ask the minister arise from the four $1 items to which I have referred. These are the items which increase the amounts that may be advanced for direct lending, and I should like to know how close we are to the present ceilings now. The present ceiling is $4,600, million. The proposed new ceiling would be $5,200 million. My first question to the minister in respect of direct lending under the National Housing Act is, at what point are we now? Perhaps the minister could indicate how quickly he anticipates that the new ceiling will be reached.
[DOT] (5:20 p.m.)
My second question is similar and refers to the next item, L117b dealing with student housing. The proposed increase in the ceiling is from $350 million to $475 million under section 36C of the National Housing Act. I


should like to know how close we are to the present ceiling of $350 million and how much student housing is anticipated over the next year.
My third question relates to vote LI 18b which deals with insurance of loans and the proposal to increase the ceiling for the aggregate amount of loans in respect of which insurance policies may be issued from $9.5 billion to $11 billion. How close are we now to the $9.5 billion and when is it anticipated that we will reach the $11 billion ceiling? I think this is a very important question because we are getting into the field of activity of private lenders.
Finally, under vote LI 19b, which deals with home improvement loans under section 26 of the National Housing Act, how close are we now to the ceiling of $500 million and when is it anticipated that we will reach the new ceiling of $550 million?
Of all the items we are asked to consider this afternoon I think none will give us more regret than the failure of the government to come to real grips with the problem of providing houses for the lower income groups in Canada. This is a conspicuous failure and it has been conspicuous in the past. The need certainly has not lessened because every day more and more people are being driven into the position of not being able to afford their own housing because inflation makes it less and less probable. Increasing interest rates make this dream less and less likely to be realized.
In spite of this fact one approach to the problem in respect of the poor people of Canada, and this is of particular significance in metropolitan areas where the problem is particularly acute, has been put in abeyance by this government as a result of a recommendation on page 55 of the report of the minister's own task force. It is that the federal government initiate a thorough research program into the economic, social and psychological issues of public housing, and that until such a study is completed and assessed no new large projects should be undertaken.
I do not blame people, certainly those in large public housing projects in Canada, for being angry and upset by what the minister has said or by what his task force has recommended in the paragraphs leading up to that recommendation. I cannot blame them for being angry about what one of the independent studies, on which the task force has partly relied, has said. I think people in public housing, particularly defamed projects, have
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a legitimate squawk. Those people who might qualify for public housing also have a legitimate complaint.
The fact is, though the task force report does not say this, that one of the reasons public housing has failed or encountered difficulties in Canada is that we have not gone far enough under the National Housing Act. We have not tried through the National Housing Act to create livable environments in many of these public housing projects because we have not provided any of the auxiliary features which make for good living. We have not provided assistance for the development of parks, recreational and community facilities which one would associate with large scale, high density projects. Every apartment of any size that is erected in the city of Ottawa has a swimming pool. This is at least a start on something in which the tenants can take pride, something in addition to mere bed and eating facilities.
When the task force categorizes public housing as it does, criticizes it and puts a stop to large projects without pointing out the reason for some of the difficulties that public housing has encountered, it can only annoy people without adding to an understanding for the poor who are in desperate need of decent accommodation. I regard the action taken by the minister through the four $1 items as partly to overcome difficulties of inflation and partly to place more appropriate ceilings on lending or insuring activities. This is nothing like the action one would expect a responsible minister to take to assist the low income groups.
It may be suggested that through the new approach to mortgages there might be help for these low income groups. Something was made of the fact that longer term mortgages should be allowed. The suggestion is that this would make it easier for people to own their own homes so that in some way the problems of the low income groups would be solved. There are some snares and delusions in this regard. I do not think this is a panacea to cure all ills. Let me refer to one very real snare or delusion. I refer to the suggestion that mortgages up to 35 years be permitted. Perhaps mortgages of an even longer period might be allowed but the interest tables I have are only calculated for up to 35 years. These figures are horrifying.
If one could get a $20,000 mortgage for a period of 35 years at 6 per cent the monthly payment would be $113.06, and the total amount payable over the 35 years would be


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$47,485.25. In other words, you will have noted, I am sure, the amount repayable over that 35-year term at 6 per cent would be $20,000 in principal and $27,485.25 in interest.
Let us see what a long-term mortgage would be at the cost of borrowing money today, and I have in mind about 9-J per cent. A mortgage for $20,000 at 9J per cent over a period of 35 years would cost $161.57 per month or a total over the 35 years of $67,859.40.
[DOT] (5:30 p.m.)
In other words, the amount paid, would be the principal, $20,000, and $47,859.40 in interest, or more than twice as much as the principal. Unless these figures are examined we may picture this plan as the smooth and easy way out of the housing shortage in Canada. I suggest that to assume an interest burden at least twice the principal burden is getting into a realm of financing that is almost unconscionable.
We are sorry that the minister has not brought in more proposals at the present time. I think there would be a disposition to give the green light and an accelerated consideration to proposals on housing. I do not think anyone in the official opposition or in any party in the house quarrels with that, but in the light of the interest created by the minister's housing report we are prepared to get our teeth into the changes to the National Housing Act very quickly.
Certainly, the real problems will multiply and will be aggravated the longer we put off consideration of these changes. These are the problems of the low income groups. The other problems are not as acute, but the poor or those with lower incomes are people to whom inflation makes home owning that much less of a possibility. This is what we should set ourselves to do at once.
I think the one dollar items are of uncertain practical significance and I do not suppose anyone will know, unless the minister can spell out for us, how much it is proposed to advance for direct lending in the next 12 months; how much it is proposed to use for student housing in that period; what kind of picture the private lenders have indicated; and what kind of forecast the Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation is making in home improvement for the next 12 months. One dollar for each of these fields does not tell us anything, and yet I think our purpose is to see whether the housing program of the government is adequate. I hope the minister
[Mr. McCleave.l
will take the opportunity to tell us exactly what he proposes to do.


Francis Andrew Brewin: 
out of the report on which, as he said, he believed urgent action was required. So this government apparently thinks the matter of housing is so urgent that when its own minister in charge says he has urgent recommendations we have to wait for more than five weeks to have any sort of report at all on the attitude of the government to any of the recommendations, including the recommendations described by the minister himself as urgent. As I said, it is nearly five weeks later and no statement is forthcoming from the Prime Minister, nor have we heard a statement so far from the Minister of Transport himself.
We are left in complete darkness as to which of the various recommendations the minister considers require urgent action. We are left in ignorance as to the reaction of his colleagues. We can guess the reaction of the Minister of Finance to some of the recommendations, but we have no information as to what action if any the government proposes to take to meet the crisis or to implement the recommendations of this highly-touted report that the minister and his task force produced.
In the absence of any information from the government on this admittedly urgent crisis, the opposition can only comment on the report itself. I suggest that seldom has a commission, a task force or any other fact finding body under any other name or description had such a fanfare, such a beating of drums and such a crashing of cymbals as accompanied this task force report. It is my view that the report contains one or two useful recommendations, for example the recommendation for the creation of a department of housing and urban affairs.
It hardly needed however, an expensive task force to travel across the country to see the need for such a department and for a minister to devote his full time to this urgent subject. Indeed, this proposal has frequently been made in the house. It was made by my former colleague, the then hon. member for Danforth, Mr. Reid Scott, and it was often repeated in the house by my colleague, the hon. member for Broadview. It is a good recommendation and we would like to know what the government proposes to do about it. We also heartily approve the recommendation for a capital gains tax on profits derived through land transactions. It is long overdue. Indeed, it was recommended, as members of this house know, by the Carter Commission as part of a general tax on capital gains. We are all in favour of this and say it should
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have been adopted years ago to cut off exhor-bitant speculative profits made by certain people. The task force urges the removal of the 11 per cent sales tax on building materials. This has been advocated by opposition parties on innumerable occasions as well as by hundreds of organizations and individuals outside the house.
[DOT] (5:40 p.m.)
I should like to know how likely the government is to implement this recommendation now that the Minister of Transport supports it. Can we expect anything different? I imagine it is anybody's guess whether the government is likely to do anything about it. I have observed the stern, upright rectitude of the Minister of Finance in opposing any suggestion of this sort and I suspect the plea of the Minister of Transport will fall on deaf ears. Will the worth-while recommendations of the task force remain a dead letter and gather dust like the useful recommendations of so many task forces and commissions in the past?
As to the report as a whole, despite the fullsome publicity surrounding it, the document, in my judgment, is a colossal flop. I am being more polite than the hon. member for Broadview who described it as a colossal fraud. While I do not dissociate myself from him, I would substitute the words "colossal flop" for "colossal fraud", perhaps because of my habit of understatement.


Leslie Gordon Benjamin: It is the minister who is a colossal flop.


Francis Andrew Brewin: Why do I say it is colossal flop? I cannot do better than use the words of Dr. Albert Rose of the University of Toronto, a well known expert in the housing field, as they appeared in the Globe and Mail of February 4. The minister shakes his head, probably in disapprobation. I am sure he has read what Dr. Rose has said, but I should like him to do so again. He wrote this:
These recommendations will do little or nothing to meet the housing needs of the two-thirds of Canadian families whose annual incomes are below $7,500.
If it is acknowledged that the major need in housing is felt by those earning less than $7,500. If these recommendations will do nothing to help such people, to call the report a colossal fraud or flop is to use very moderate language. In other words, once again it is proposed to take government action in the
field of housing to help those in the top


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income brackets, and ignore those who are in desperate need. This has come so customary a feature of government legislation in this field that one is entitled to believe it is orthodox Liberal theory-help those who have no need for help and ignore those in desperate need.
The report proposes to facilitate home ownership and it does so by suggesting, among other things, an increase in the maximum amount of an N.H.A. mortgage from $18,000 to $30,000. It proposes to allow mortgage payments to be amortized over 40 years instead of 35 years and it proposes to reduce down payments to virtually nothing. In short, it is a program for bigger and better debts for those who will be allowed by the financial institutions to contract such debts. As Dr. Rose says:
In our past experience an increase in the maximum NHA loan did not restrain the relentless march of house prices; nor is it likely that the proposed extension of the limit to $30,000 will mean anything more than the probability that typical new house prices will reach $38,000 to $40,000 within two or three years.
I say this is fine for the house builders, fine for the select few. But it is stones rather than bread for the average Canadian. As Dr. Rose says, there is little likelihood that Canadian families with less than $10,000 a year can possibly undertake a mortgage of $30,000 in addition to paying higher taxes and meeting the expense of heating and other overheads.
The minister appears to lay great stress on the value of exhortation. He exhorts just about everybody. He exhorts the financial institutions, the insurance companies, the banks, the lawyers, provincial and municipal governments. They are all exhorted to behave in ways entirely different from those they normally follow. Institutions in the private sector are urged to generate new housing capital in the order of $20 billion. We read that private lenders should be able to meet the bulk of the mortgage demand, that the federal government should encourage much more research and co-ordinate efforts among private lenders to an extent far greater than hitherto. What reason have we to believe this will happen? Is there any basis for this optimism, this reliance on the private sector which runs counter to all experience? To think along these lines is to refuse to accept the lessons of experience.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear.


Francis Andrew Brewin: No government initiative is suggested in the form of taxation to help in carrying out the accumulation of the $20

billion required to meet the urgent housing shortage. The proposal to reduce interest rates by means of a federal subsidy of 2 per cent or more is ignored and has presumably been rejected. Nothing is suggested in the report about bringing down the rate of interest. We do find a proposal to throw the rate of interest open, but from the way the market has been behaving lately we may anticipate higher rather than lower rates of interest. The most unrealistic expectation is that bar associations and real estate boards will promote the reduction of the fees of their members. This is na'ive but it is typical of the minister and of the report. It is rather like asking a shark to submit to an exodontist.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: Does the hon. member not belong to one of those professions?


Francis Andrew Brewin: Oh, yes I know them very well.


An hon. Member:: That is why he said what he said.


Francis Andrew Brewin: The worst feature of the report is the attack on public housing. After denigrating public housing the report calls for a thorough research program into its economic, social and psychological implications. It is as though the economic, social and psychological issues of public housing should not have been before the government for many years. Public housing is a widespread feature of the housing field and every civilized industrial society in the world has experience of it. Yet we are advised to conduct more research in this regard. But here are the key words: "Until such a study is complete and assessed, no new large projects should be undertaken." What are these new large projects which ought not to be undertaken? As I understand it, the Ontario Housing Corporation as well as other housing corporations have for a long time been against large public housing projects. But the hostile tone of the report indicates that public housing projects generally are to be taboo or restricted. This edict, this chill of death on public housing, spells the end to any reasonable hopes for decent housing for a large body of Canadians. The task force seems to brand public housing as an imported concept, as though there was something wrong about importing concepts that have worked somewhere else.
[DOT] (5:50 p.m.)
We are told there is something un-Canadian about public housing, that it runs counter to


the general Canadian concept of social welfare and security. I say this is rubbish. It is perfectly true that Canadian governments have lagged miserably in the development of public housing. Federal funds have provided for only 38,000 units of public housing. In a population of 20 million which is suffering from an acute housing crisis, this is a deplorable record and represents a mere drop in the bucket. Certainly, we have not had too much public housing; indeed we have had too little. No other industrial nation, including the United States, the home of free enterprise, has attempted to deal with its housing problems without making a massive effort in the field of public housing. The same is true in Canada; without a massive effort the problem will not be solved.
This task force does no service to Canada and to housing as a whole when it denigrates the idea of public housing. Who benefits from public housing with rents that are adjusted to ability to pay? In metro Toronto alone 35 percent of those who benefit are mothers on small incomes with a family who are alone and have nobody else at all to support their family. If there were no public housing, to whom would these mothers with small families turn for shelter for their families?
There are 14,000 pending applications for public housing with the Ontario Housing Corporation in metropolitan Toronto alone. This means that some 30,000 people at least are on the list waiting for housing. Hundreds of thousands of others who require public housing do not even apply for it because they know the situation.
I know something of this desperate need personally. In co-operation with the provincial member I have in my constituency what we call a service centre. We invite people with problems to come to us. There are no more tragic problems about which we hear than those raised by people looking for housing, who are desperately asking for advice as to where they can get housing. These are people with large families, people to whom landlords will not rent premises. They do not know where to go.
I want to pay tribute to the Ontario Housing Corporation. The minister speaks rather disparagingly of the provincial efforts from time to time. I am no friend of the provincial government, as he knows, but the Ontario Housing Corporation is the only place to 29180-390
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which people can turn in their search for public housing. There is a long waiting list and a points system is in operation. One has to be in the position where one is about to be evicted from one's house before getting enough points to qualify for accommodation.
I wonder why the task force did not discover this? I wonder whether they bothered to inquire from the people who are really in need. Certainly, there is no sign in their report that they did. I should like to inform this house that families are regularly being broken up because of the lack of an adequate supply of public housing-not because there is public housing but because there is an inadequate supply of public housing. These are not problem cases; these people are steady workers of moderate means. I repeat, we need more public housing, not less.
Public housing does, of course, present certain difficulties, but the solution is not to throw out the baby with the bath water and abolish public housing, or even restrict it. It is, as the hon. member for Halifax-East Hants said, necessary to provide proper management, adequate recreational facilities and to give people in public housing some control over their circumstances so that they can develop a community spirit. We have not scratched the surface of the real problem here. The task force rushes in and says that there are psychological problems involved and away with public housing. Although it would like to abolish public housing, the task force thinks that that would be going too far and it just proposes to slow it down.
Public housing should not be considered a refuge for failures and misfits. Tenants should be given every encouragement to have a say in the management of their own residences. We have a lot to learn in this field. In my view, the major problem facing Canadians today is housing. I prophesy that this is going to turn out to be the Achilles heel in the record of this government. The Prime Minister seems to be bedevilled in this field with constitutional doubts.


Albert Béchard: Order. I regret to interrupt the hon. member but his time has expired.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Chairman, I wonder if I could have the consent of the committee to report progress and to revert to motions for the purpose of putting a motion


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with respect to the standing committee on external affairs and national defence. The matter has been discussed generally.


Albert Béchard: Does the committee agree to rise, report progress and to request leave to sit again later this day?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.
Progress reported.



EXTERNAL AFFAIRS AND NATIONAL DEFENCE


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, may I have the permission of the house to revert to motions for the purpose of making a motion?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bechard):: Is that agreed?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the Minister of Manpower and Immigration (Mr. MacEachen):
That the members of the Standing Committee on External Affairs and National Defence be granted leave to travel outside Canada between March 8 and March 22, 1969, for the purpose of furthering their work; and that the necessary staff accompany them.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bechard):: Is it the
pleasure of the house to adopt the said motion?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bechard):: The
house will now resume its consideration in committee of the whole.