1970-05-28

[Stage Direction]
Third report of Standing Committee on Agriculture-Mr. Beer.

[Stage Direction]
First report of Standing Committee on Procedure and Organization, in English and in French-Mr. Lambert (Edmonton West).

[Stage Direction]
Eighth report of Standing Committee on Health, Welfare and Social Affairs-Mr. Emard.

[Stage Direction]
Thirteenth report of Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs-Mr. Tolmie.

[Stage Direction]
Third report of Standing Committee on Regional Development-Mr. Morison.

[Stage Direction]
Fourth report of Standing Committee on Miscellaneous Estimates-Mr. Guay (St. Boniface).
[Editor's Note: For text of above reports, see today's Votes and Proceedings.]

Mr. Gaslon Clermont (Gatineau) moved: that the seventeenth report of the Standing
Committee on Finance, Trade and Economic Affairs, presented to the House on Monday, May 25, 1970, be concurred in.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
[DOT] (2:10 p.m.)

Mr. Eldon M. Woolliams (Calgary North):: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. It is a very serious one which affects all hon. members and the administration of the committees of the House. I bring this matter to the House Leader's attention through you, Mr. Speaker. For example, this morning the Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs was sitting at the same time as the Special Committee on the Constitution. Some hon. members are members of both committees, and it was impossible for them to attend both committee meetings because it is impossible for one to be in two places at the same time. We on this side of the House have heard criticisms from various sources that we are not the most effective opposition.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: I am pleased to see that some hon. members who are suffering from similar difficulties with respect to committees approve of what I am saying. But there have been criticisms of that kind.
This government has always stood on words and phrases like "dialogue" and "viable force". How can one carry on a dialogue if one is supposed to be in two different places at the same time? How can we carry out our functions as Members of Parliament if the administration of the House is to be carried on in this fashion?
I draw your attention to something else, Mr. Speaker. The situation is even worse this afternoon. The Standing Committee on Privileges and Elections is to sit at the same time as the Committee of the Whole House will be considering a matter of concern to the members of the standing committee. The personnel of both committees is in part the same, and committees dealing with the same subject will

May 28, 1970
Committee Proceedings be sitting in two different places. No wonder the image of this place is such that the people of the country think it is a lit-up cemetery.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: I am raising a serious point, and I hope Your Honour will bear with me because I will not be long. We cannot do our work and create an image of this institution as a viable force if we have to be in ten places at the same time. When the government was in opposition the standing committees were not entrusted with the function of dealing with legislation in the way they now do. They merely studied bills which then came back for further study in the House. I recall that when the right hon. member for Prince Albert (Mr. Diefenbaker) was Prime Minister the opposition of that day refused to allow the committees to sit while the House was sitting. What is goose for the gander-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. Perhaps the phrase I first used explains what has been happening to this institution. There should be some direction in our affairs and the House Leader ought to pay some attention to this aspect of our operations because right now the operations of this institution are a mess. We cannot perform our tasks.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Hon. Donald S. Macdonald (President of the Privy Council):: Mr. Speaker-


An hon. Member:: Here is the gander.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: -I do not want to deal with the hon. member's misplaced goose. My impression of the hon. member is that even though he may be a member of two committees, if he speaks in one he can be heard in both.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Donald Stovel Macdonald: It is precisely because of these problems that we have established a co-ordination committee under the chairmanship of my colleague, the hon. member for Vancouver-Quadra (Mr. Deach-man) to co-ordinate committee work.


An hon. Member:: What are they doing?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: I do not know whether the hon. member has brought this matter to the attention of the co-ordination

committee-I gather he has not-but the fact is that there will inevitably be conflicts in committee sittings and this can never be positively resolved in all cases. This is just one more argument for seeing that effective use is made by the official opposition of the co-ordination committee. I am sure that these representations will be taken into account.


Mr. Horner:: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I hope we do not spend the afternoon on a point of order. I see quite a few hon. members who apparently want to take part in the discussion. I doubt very much whether we should get involved in a general discussion on the point of order, important though it is, raised by the hon. member for Calgary North. For the moment the Chair will recognize the hon. member for York South.


Mr. David Lewis (York South):: Mr. Speaker, without laying blame on anyone and without entering into the particular matter which was raised this afternoon, I wish to suggest to the House that there is a very real and serious problem with regard to committee meetings.
There is a large number of committees. They meet very frequently. There are many overlaps in the personnel of committees. Frequently a standing committee meets at the same time that the subject with which it is dealing is before the House. The members of the standing committee representing the various parties are obviously the people most concerned with the subject matter being debated on the floor of the House.
I wish to raise again for consideration by Your Honour, members of the House and the House Leaders of all parties something that members of my party have suggested on a number of occasions. We should organize our parliamentary work so that at least on one day a week the House would not sit and the committees would be busy.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


David Lewis: In this way we could avoid this terrible timetable of rushing from one committee to another or from a committee to the House of Commons.
I have known committees to sit for an hour without a quorum. I have known them to start hearing evidence with only two or three members present. They have sometimes spent an hour or an hour and a half waiting for a
May 28, 1970

quorum in order that matters which had been discussed could be dealt with as motions of the committee. Then a quorum is reached at the last minute and members vote without having heard the discussion or in effect knowing what the matter is about. This is an inefficient and ineffective way of carrying on the business of this Parliament.
In saying that, it is not my purpose to lay the blame on the Government House Leader or on anyone else. I suggest that we ought to arrange the work of the House so that on at least one day a week the House will not sit, perhaps on occasion on two days a week. The committees could then do their work without the burden and the inefficiency which are now present.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John (Jack) Henry Horner: I rise on a point of order, Mr. Speaker, related to the point of order of the hon. member for Calgary North (Mr. Woolliams) with regard to committee operations. I wish to point out to Your Honour, the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Macdonald) and the House one serious problem with which the committees are faced. I do not blame anyone, but I hope a solution can be found to the problem.
The committees are sitting continuously. They have to make reports on their findings following their studies of given matters. However, the printing of the committee proceedings is running over a month behind. The last report we have of the Standing Committee on Agriculture covers the proceedings of a month ago today. The last report we have of the Standing Committee on Transportation covers proceedings of over a month ago. These committees are trying to draft reports based on the studies they have made. I understand that the situation with regard to the finance committee is just as bad. I suggest that the government should take notice of this problem. In light of the serious unemployment throughout the country, possibly some students could be hired so that the printing could be brought more up to date than at present.
Committees cannot deal with the legislation they have studied. They cannot present reports on the problems they are studying. I urge the government to take note of this problem and, if necessary, make use of job printing so that the job can be done. In this way the committees could present worthwhile, thorough and comprehensive reports on which the House could act.
Committee Proceedings [DOT] (2:20 p.m.)


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Hon. members will realize there is no formal motion before the House at the present time. There is a point of order, well taken I am sure, which has been raised by an hon. member and there has been comment on it by the President of the Privy Council. I am sure we could spend a whole day debating these points. The question is, of course, one which is very important, very material, but I am wondering whether hon. members, by agreement, might not decide that perhaps one of the supply days we have left between now and June 26 might be set aside for the consideration of this most important problem.


Mr. Lambert (Edmonton West):: A government day.


Mr. Speaker:: Or a government day, as the hon. member for Edmonton West suggests. I doubt whether such an important matter should be discussed on the basis of a point of order. I think it might be better if due note were taken by the Chair and by all hon. members of the points made by those who have raised-to be more precise-the two points of order, one in the name of the hon. member for Calgary North and the other in the name of the hon. member for Crowfoot.
Perhaps the matter might be considered in consultation between representatives of the parties. However, the hon. member for Lotbiniere has not yet spoken-no one has spoken so far on behalf of his party-and for the moment the Chair will recognize the hon. member for Lotbiniere.


Mr. Andre Foriin (Lotbiniere):: Mr. Speaker, your suggestion that representatives of all parties discuss the problem of committees is an interesting one. For our part, we approve of it heartily and wish to assure the House of our utmost co-operation.
I rose to indicate that we endorse fully the remarks of the hon. member for York South (Mr. Lewis) to the effect that committees should be given a chance to operate in a more efficient way. Mr. Speaker, we Creditistes are every day subjected to serious discrimination because of the way our committee system operates at the present time.
Due to the great number of government and Conservative members, these two parties have no difficulty in ensuring representation on the committees. Now since we are only 13

May 28, 1970
Committee Proceedings members-we will soon be 14-and as there are more committees than members our group, that means that each of us would have to sit on two or three committees, and that because of an obvious lack of co-ordination in the present committee system. Although each member of the Ralliement creditiste is eager to play an efficient role in committees, he cannot indeed sit on two or three committees at the same time.
Mr. Speaker, we want to request publicly that each hon. member be automatically entitled to appoint a replacement so that, in case of conflicting engagements, the replacement could sit on the committee and enjoy the same privileges and rights as the member he represents, that is, the right to speak and, above all, the right to vote. I consider that this suggestion is positive and important.
The New Democratic party and the Ralliement creditiste seem to suffer discrimination each day and the government, as it is always talking about participation, should take upon itself to accept this proposal.
We want to object to the present system and to invite the representatives of the different parties to positively and seriously study our suggestion at forthcoming meetings.


Mr. Speaker:: Obviously it will be judged from the contribution made by the hon. member for Lotbiniere that we are now getting into a discussion of a substantive nature on the question. A point of order has been raised. The objections made by hon. members have been noted.
Perhaps I should refer to the fact that some objection has been made by the hon. member for Crowfoot in connection with the printing of documents. This, of course, is a responsibility of the administration of the House. If there has been something lacking there, I am sure it is a matter which should be looked into by the Chair and by the officers at the table, and perhaps also in consultation with the Committee on Procedure and Organization.
This having been said, I respectfully suggest to hon. members that we leave the matter at that for the moment, because if we do embark on further discussion we will be having a general debate and, as I have said, I do not think this should be done without a substantive motion being before the House. I will take into due account the points made by hon. members, and perhaps we will have an opportunity very soon to hear representations

from other hon. members, who obviously feel as strongly as the two hon. members who raised these points feel. For the moment the Chair suggests to hon. members that we go on with the business of the House.



HUMAN RIGHTS


Hon. G. J. Mcllraiih (Solicitor General):: Mr. Speaker, while we are on motions I ask leave of the House to table the exchange of correspondence between the principal of Queen's University and myself, as requested by the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby on May 26.


Mr. Speaker:: Is that agreed?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.



JUSTICE AND LEGAL AFFAIRS


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, there have been discussions between those responsible for the work of the justice committee, and I gather there is some hope that they might be able to continue their survey of the correctional institutions of Canada next week. On that basis it will be necessary to constitute them with an order of reference and also the power to travel. If there is general agreement, perhaps the following can, be made an order of the House:
That the annual report for the year ended 31st December 1968, made pursuant to Section 30 of the Penitentiary Act, contained in the third annual report of the Department of the Solicitor General, tabled in the House of Commons on 3rd November 1969, be referred to the Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs; and that, during its study of the aforementioned report, the committee be empowered to adjourn from place to place in Canada.
As I say, if there is agreement, perhaps that could be made an order of the House.


Mr. Speaker:: Hon. members have heard the proposal by the President of the Privy Council. Is there agreement?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Mr. Speaker:: It is so ordered.
May 23, 1970



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Hon. George  Kees@Prince Edward-Has-iings: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Acting Prime Minister. In view of the urgent need to have the present postal negotiations terminate without the dispute ending in a strike and the need to resolve the matter in a way that is satisfactory to both sides, would the government give consideration to placing responsibility for these negotiations under the Minister of Labour who has demonstrated that he, among the members of the cabinet, is best able to handle dealings with organized labour? I ask this question because of reports about the negotiations which indicate that particularly as a result of the uncomprising attitude of the Treasury Board the negotiations are leading to a stalemate and a national strike.
Hen. G. J. Mcllraiih (Acting Prime Minister): Mr. Speaker, responsibility for conducting negotiations with the staff of the federal government is fixed by statute.


Mr. Hees:: Is it not true that in cases of national necessity changes can be made in government regulations? Since a strike would be a national calamity, could not the government bend a little, make a change in this regard and try as best it can to stop a strike taking place?


George James McIlraith: Mr. Speaker, I believe that the government does not have the right to overrule legislation.


Mr. David Orlikow (Winnipeg North):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a supplementary to the President of the Treasury Board. In view of the expression of opinion by postal workers that one of the major issues, if not the major issue, is the problem of job security and in view of the statement of the Postmaster General that there will be no lay-offs as a result of automation, would the President of the Treasury Board consider making a specific offer to the postal employees spelling out job security and placing that first in the negotiations?


Hon. C. M. Drury (Presideni of the Treasury Board):: Mr. Speaker, the Treasury Board staff have taken some pains to devise what 22375-52
Inquiries of the Ministry appears to be an adequate formula covering the problem of job security. This has been presented to the other side of the bargaining table. I do not think the presentation of this by myself would in any way enhance its virtues.


David Orlikow: Mr. Speaker, would the President of the Treasury Board tell the House whether the offer is in accord with the statement made by the Postmaster General that there would be an increase in staff and therefore there would be no lay-offs?


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: I think the House would agree it is a little difficult to follow the suggestion of the hon. member and negotiate across the floor of the House.



WHEAT-CO-OPERATION WITH SASKATCHEWAN GOVERNMENT IN COMPLETING BARTER DEAL WITH JAPAN

Mr. T. C. Douglas (Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Minister without Portfolio in charge of the Wheat Board regarding the statement by Premier Thatcher in which he indicated that his government will complete the current $3 million wheat barter deal with a Japanese firm for a power turbine. Are the minister and the Canadian Wheat Board giving full co-operation to the Saskatchewan government in the endeavour to complete this deal, and can he assure the House that the deal will be completed?


Hon. Oito E. Lang (Minisier without Portfolio):: Mr. Speaker, I am not sure at what stage any contact between the Saskatchewan government and the Wheat Board may be in connection with this transaction. The Canadian Wheat Board, of course, takes every opportunity to sell wheat, particularly to the extremely good Japanese market. I would have to know whether there is any real prospect involved in the suggested deal and whether anything different would have to be done to move the maximum amount of wheat into that market.



WHEAT-FOLLOWING UP OF BARTER DEALS ABANDONED BY SASKATCHEWAN

Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Mr. Speaker, in view of the fact that Premier Thatcher has said he will now drop several other barter deals, including one which is nearly ready for completion involv-

May 28, 1970
Inquiries of the Ministry ing some three million bushels of wheat and other negotiated deals which altogether would involve 25 million bushels of wheat, may I ask whether the minister or the Canadian Wheat Board is in touch with Premier Thatcher to follow up these deals which he now proposes dropping in order to work out, if possible, a barter deal for the disposal of Canadian wheat?


Otto Emil Lang: Mr. Speaker, for some time we have made it very clear to Saskatchewan that the various deals referred to from time to time as barter deals in our view are not really barter at all and certainly do not in any way move any additional wheat. We have also made quite clear that in our view the only thing they do is constitute some threat to the stability of wheat prices. For that reason we have urged that they in fact withdraw from the practice of purported barter. I am very happy indeed that they have now done so.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Mr. Speaker, do I understand the minister correctly that he and the Wheat Board take the position that they will not negotiate any barter deals at all even though those barter deals are on the basis of a price for wheat in keeping with the International Grains Arrangement?


Otto Emil Lang: Mr. Speaker, I was not referring to any general policy concerning the basis on which the Wheat Board or the government might endeavour to move wheat. We are indeed endeavouring to move wheat on every possible reasonable basis. I was referring to some specific proposals which have been made which, as I said, in our view were not in any real sense barter at all, were not moving any additional wheat and only had the danger of threatening the price. We had previously taken the position with other exporters that barter was an undesirable method of competing for the sale of wheat because it in fact constituted price cutting and this, of course, could only lead to further price cutting on all sides with a weakening of prices which would have nothing but a bad effect on the income of farmers.



MOVEMENT TO TERMINAL ELEVATORS

Mr. George Muir (Lisgar):: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question for the Minister without Portfolio. In view of the fact that it seems it might be possible that sufficient grains will not be moved to fulfil the quotas 
anticipated by the government, could the minister inform the House why these shipments were not started earlier? It was the view of one of the witnesses who appeared before the agricultural committee that their terminals could have handled much more grain much earlier than they were supplied with it.


Otto Emil Lang: Well, Mr. Speaker, the only delay which occurred essentially in the shipments out of Thunder Bay, to which I presume the hon. member is referring, took place mainly because of delays in the complete opening of navigation and availability of shipping, although it was necessary for the terminals stocks to drop down to more convenient working levels. I am happy to report that at the present time the carloadings for the Thunder Bay region and the unloadings there are beginning to hit the target figures, and I am hopeful that all the grain can in fact be moved there which it is necessary to move.



WHEAT-DEFINITION OF &quot;BARTER&quot;

Right Hon. J. G. Diefenbaker (Prince Albert):: Mr. Speaker, I should like the minister to assist us by explaining to the House when barter is not barter. When there is a trade of Canadian wheat for machinery from Japan, that is not barter, according to the minister. Will he explain when in fact barter is barter?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I wonder
whether the question is quite in order. As I understand the question, the right hon. gentleman is asking the minister to explain when barter is not barter. I have the impression that is perhaps an exercise in semantics. I wonder whether the question as asked is in order. I am sure the right hon. gentleman is very anxious to rephrase the question and the Chair is anxious to give him the opportunity to do so.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, I am always anxious to do that if I can get an intelligent answer. What explanation does the minister give for the proposition that when $25 million worth of wheat can be disposed of from Saskatchewan the farmers are to be denied the benefit because of government-I could use an expression-


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!
May 28. 1970


John George Diefenbaker: I never use a strong word when the word "stupidity" is sufficient.


Otto Emil Lang: As usual, Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleness of the right hon. member for Prince Albert in his choice of language. It would probably be more appropriate for me to write out in long story form the history of the recent transactions which have been referred to as barter in a little economic treatise for the right hon. gentleman so he can better understand what is and what is not barter.
Som


a hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I was about to suggest that the debate between the minister and the right hon. gentleman did not seem to be too conclusive one way or the other. I think that pretty soon we should move on to another subject. There are a number of other hon. members who are anxious to ask questions. Is the right hon. gentleman rising on a supplementary?


John George Diefenbaker: Yes, surely. When the minister was out west did any of the people state to him that he was about to write his autobiography because of the way in which he has treated the western farmers?


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.



POST OFFICE

[Stage Direction]
MONTREAI____INVESTIGATION OF MAIL SERVICE

Mr. Heaih Macquarrie (Hillsborough):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Acting Prime Minister. Can he advise if it is the intention to initate an inquiry into or investigation of the handling of the disruption of mail delivery service in Montreal, and particularly the already announced expenditure of over $2 million in connection therewith and the purchase by the government of over 400 trucks of varying ages?


George James McIlraith: No, Mr. Speaker.


Heath Nelson Macquarrie: 

ACTION TO OFFSET CONSTRUCTION TARGET SHORT-FALL

Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the Minister without Portfolio in charge of housing. In view of the minister's admission that the government program for housing this year will have a 25,000 short-fall on the present arrangements, will the minister advise the House what other arrangements are envisaged by the government in order to get closer to the target, or does he anticipate that there will be a further short-fall?


Hon. Robert K. Andras (Minister without Portfolio):: This was not an admission that there would be a "downage" of 25,000. It was an estimation of the projection of the present rate of building and of the intentions of the approved lenders. I would hope that the actual performance would exceed those projections this year. I would also draw the hon. member's attention to the great emphasis we are placing on the real shortage in the housing field, which is in the low income sector, and on that score our performance in two years 1969 and 1970 will be equal to 75 per cent of the production in the previous 20 years.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Will the minister state whether or not there will be a short-fall of 25,000 houses for residential accommodation in this year's program?


Robert Knight Andras: Mr. Speaker, our stated objective was one million new homes over the five-year period 1970 through 1974, and I can assure the hon. member that the government will take all measures necessary to achieve that objective.



GOVERNMENT ADMINISTRATION


Mr. G. W. Baldwin (Peace River):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Acting Prime Minister. Was the Minister of Justice enunciating government policy when, in his position paper to the Conference on Privacy and Freedom of Information at Queen's University, he stated that the government's need for privacy may well be a denial of the public's right to knowledge, which is fundamental

May 28, 1370
Inquiries of the Ministry to any participation in democracy? If this is now government policy, when was the change made?


George James McIlraith: Mr. Speaker, I assume the minister was stating a position on this subject that is well known to all hon. members, and it does not represent a change in government policy.


Gerald William Baldwin: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a supplementary question to the Minister of Justice. Will the minister convey his views in this regard persuasively enough to the Minister of National Health and Welfare to induce the latter to make public the interim report of the LeDain Commission on the use of drugs which, having been paid for by the public, should be made available to the public?



VETERANS AFFAIRS


Mr. Stanley Knowles (Winnipeg North Centre):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the Minister of Veterans Affairs. In view of the glowing tributes which no doubt the government will be paying to our veterans at the forthcoming convention of the Royal Canadian Legion, is the government in a position to back up these tributes by announcing that legislation respecting veterans will be introduced in this session?


Mr. Speaker:: I am sure the hon. member will recognize that this question was asked yesterday. Again I cannot remember whether it was answered, but it seems to me the question was asked of the Acting Prime Minister yesterday. It may be that the hon. member is asking it because the minister is in the House today. If that is the case, perhaps the minister might reply.


Stanley Howard Knowles: That is correct.


Hon. Jean-Eudes Dube (Minister of Veterans Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, the government has already backed up its glowing tributes by allowing me a budget of close to half a billion dollars, the highest in 20 years.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, yesterday I asked the question in the absence of the minister and I now ask him whether, when he represents the

government at the national convention of the Royal Canadian Legion beginning next week, he will announce a fair and reasonable increase in disability pensions and war veterans allowances because veterans everywhere across Canada, despite the half billion dollars available to his department of which he boasts, are today in a very serious condition?


Jean-Eudes Dubé: Mr. Speaker, I wish to assure the right hon. member that I do share his sympathy for the needs of the veterans. However, these matters of disability pensions and war veterans allowances are before the government now and are receiving consideration. When announcements are to be made they will be made in due course. However, I shall be very pleased to forward to the right hon. member a copy of my address to the Legion on Monday.


John George Diefenbaker: The question was simply this: are you going to act now instead of still procrastinating and postponing action?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.


Stanley Howard Knowles: wonder if the minister is now in a position to answer my original question as to whether any veterans legislation will be brought in by the government at this session of Parliament?


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member is of course reiterating the question which has already been asked. He may feel that the answer was not an answer to the question he asked, but the question has been asked and an answer has been given, and the Chair has to recognize-


Stanley Howard Knowles: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, the minister has given answers to other parts of the question that has been posed, but he has not answered this question or given any indication of answering it. The question was asked yesterday when he was not here. It is asked now out of courtesy because he is here, and I believe we are entitled to an answer.



RESUMPTION OF STANDING COMMITTEE SITTINGS

Mr. Jack Marshall (Humber-St. George's-St. Barbe):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a supplementary question to the minister. Would he induce the Chairman of the Standing Committee on Veterans Affairs, if the department has half a billion dollars to spend as a nest egg, to reconvene the committee because we have been delayed over a month now, and
May 28, 1970

war veterans allowances are so miniscule and minor that they could use some of this half billion dollars?


Jean-Eudes Dubé: Mr. Speaker, the very competent chairman of the committee was away from this country on duty. He is now back and I am sure he will want to resume the writing of the committee report very quickly.



INTERIM INCREASE IN PENSIONS AND ALLOWANCES

Mr. Mark Rose (Fraser Valley West):: Does the minister plan to announce any special interim pension benefits at the Legion convention, to apply until the time the Woods Report legislation is ready?


Mr. H. Russell MacEwan (Central Nova):: Mr. Speaker, does the minister intend to bring in legislation for increases to these pensioners before the white paper is brought forward by the Minister of National Health and Welfare which he is now preparing on the matter of welfare payments generally?


Jean-Eudes Dubé: Mr. Speaker, I do not believe it is necessary to bring down legislation to increase pensions or war veterans allowances, but it will be necessary to enact legislation to carry out the white paper proposals, and I presume this legislation will be before the House next fall.



NATIONAL ARTS CENTRE


Mr. Murray McBride (Lanark and Renfrew):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the Secretary of State. In view of the actions of certain individuals last night inside the National Arts Centre, is the minister prepared to assure the House and all Canadians that individuals, organized or otherwise, will in future be prohibited from the distribution of international political propaganda within the confines of the National Arts Centre in such a manner as to imply the concurrence of the National Arts Centre management in their actions?


Hon. Gerard Pelletier (Secretary of State):: Mr. Speaker, that is already prohibited. The National Arts Centre advises me-I obtained the information in advance, because the hon.
Inquiries of the Ministry member gave me notice of his question-that any distribution of booklets or tracts is prohibited, without the manager's special authorization, at the entrance or in the foyer as well as on the grounds of the Centre. People are warned. Transgressors are evicted and the RCMP is called when they refuse to comply with the regulations.
The occurrence last night must have been of short duration because the manager was not even aware of it. No authorization had been granted.



FISHERIES


Mr. Rene Maiie (Champlain):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct my question to the Minister of Fisheries and Forestry.
We have heard about a wave of protests on the Magdalen Islands about herring fishing. Government authorities are blamed for not having intervened in the matter of seine-equipped foreign boats. Could the minister indicate to the House what is his position in that matter?


Hon. Jack Davis (Minister of Fisheries and Forestry):: Mr. Speaker, as soon as legislation currently before the House is passed we will be able to take appropriate action.



ATLANTIC SALMON-REACTION TO DANISH PROPOSAL

Mr. Lloyd R. Crouse (South Shore):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Fisheries and Forestry and ask whether he has any statement to make on Canada's position on the catching of deepsea Atlantic salmon and whether he is satisfied with the counter proposals put forward by the Danish Fisheries Minister this morning and what Canada's stand will be at the forthcoming conference on high seas fishing to be held in St. John's, Newfoundland, next week?


John (Jack) Davis: Mr. Speaker, in the conversations we had with the Danish Minister of Fisheries this morning, Denmark put forward the proposal that Denmark itself should limit its own salmon catching capacity in the North Atlantic. While this is a welcome suggestion I

May 23, 1970
Inquiries of the Ministry do not think it is sufficient in itself to cause us to depart from our stand of a total ban on Ashing for salmon on the high seas.


Mr. James A. McGraih (St. John's East):: 1
have a supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. In the absence of such an agreement from Denmark for a total ban on the harvesting of Atlantic salmon, is the minister prepared to recommend to his cabinet colleagues that economic sanctions be imposed against Denmark?


John (Jack) Davis: Mr. Speaker, that is an interesting suggestion from a member of the opposition.


Mr. John Lundrigan (Gander-Twillingate):: Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the minister would accept an invitation, while we still have Atlantic salmon, to join me for one week's Ashing on the Gander this year. It is a beautiful place to spend a week's holidays.


Mr. David Anderson (Esquimalt-Saanich):: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Could the minister indicate whether Denmark is also prepared to limit its Atlantic salmon catch within its own territorial waters off Greenland as well as on the high seas?


John (Jack) Davis: Yes, Mr. Speaker, the limitation it proposed applies both to its own territorial waters off Greenland and to the high seas.



RECOMMENDATIONS BY MR. CARTER OF INTERNATIONAL ATLANTIC SALMON FOUNDATION

Mr. Gerard Laprise (Abitibi):: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question for the Minister of Fisheries and Forestry.
Has he read the book of Mr. Carter, from the International Atlantic Salmon Foundation, on the problem of salmon Asheries in waters adjacent to Greenland, and does he intend to implement the recommendations of the author?


John (Jack) Davis: Some of these suggestions merit close attention, Mr. Speaker.



POLLUTION


Mr. G. H. Aiken (Parry Sound-Muskolca):: have a question for the Minister of Transport, [Mr. Davis.l
Mr. Speaker, but in his absence perhaps I could ask the Acting Prime Minister who is no doubt right up to date on the matter. Was any serious damage done in a reported collision between the icebreaker St. Laurent and the tanker Manhattan and, if so, is an investigation under way?


Mr. Gerard Loiselle (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Transport):: If the hon. member is referring to last week's incident, Mr. Speaker, the department has advised me that damages incurred were not extensive and that the collision was not likely to cause any pollution.


Gordon Harvey Aiken: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. I should like to ask the Parliamentary Secretary whether there was any underwater damage?


Gérard Loiselle: No, Mr. Speaker. As I have just said, the damage that occurred to the Manhattan has no relation to the possibility of pollution.



NATIONAL ARTS CENTRE


Mr. John L. Skoberg (Moose Jaw):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct my question to the Secretary of State. In view of complaints by various groups and individuals across Canada that they are unable to have a complete tour of the National Arts Centre even when no functions are in progress, would the minister state whether he will conduct an investigation into the touring arrangements at the all-Canadian National Arts Centre so that all Canadians may have an opportunity to see the complete facility?


Gérard Pelletier: Mr. Speaker, similar complaints have already been reported to me and I personally referred them to the National Arts Centre. Additional costs are involved in this matter, but the Centre has assured me that, within its means, it is doing everything possible to satisfy all visitors.



INCREASE IN SHIPMENTS THROUGH PORT OF CHURCHILL

Mr. S. J. Korchinski (Mackenzie):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to address my question
May 28, 1970

to the Minister without Portfolio from Saskatchewan. In order to facilitate a greater turnaround of boxcars, is the Wheat Board actively promoting sales through the Port of Churchill over other ports, or will the block offer of January constitute the volume of grain to go through that port this year?


Otto Emil Lang: Mr. Speaker, I do not have anything to add to the recent exchanges in the House on this subject to the effect that probably the greatest amount of wheat that can go through Churchill has in fact been placed, in practical terms. The turnaround of boxcars, of course, is being facilitated in addition by the increase in the number of boxcars being made available for the movement.


Stanley James Korchinski: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. In view of the minister's statement that some 375 million bushels of wheat will still be sold this year, can he indicate to what extent Churchill will share in this increase in wheat sales over last year?


Otto Emil Lang: I do not have the exact figure at the moment, Mr. Speaker, but I do know from the Wheat Board that it is in the order of the figure for last year.



BUILDING OF MORE BOXCARS TO MOVE PRODUCT

John (Jack) Henry Horner: Mr. Speaker, my supplementary question is for the Minister without Portfolio in charge of the Wheat Board. With regard to the question of grain movement and the study that he is proposing for the rationalization of the complete grain movement, will he also study some methods to be developed to promote the building of more boxcars? This seems to be a perennial problem so perhaps we need more of them in order to facilitate complete grain movement from the prairies to the shipping points.


Otto Emil Lang: Of course, Mr. Speaker, the study of transportation and handling includes all aspects of the transportation and handling system including the best ways of moving grain from one point to another. The question of boxcars being available at the present time if often one of their being available as against hauling other goods. At the moment there is nothing to indicate a shortage of boxcars for moving grain.
Inquiries of the Ministry ANNOUNCEMENT OF INCREASE IN BARLEY QUOTA FOR MANITOBA AND SASKATCHEWAN


Mr. Don Mazankowslci (Vegreville):: I have a question for the Minister without Portfolio, Mr. Speaker. Can the minister indicate to the House whether an announcement will be made in the next day or two by the Canadian Wheat Board or by the minister or his office, in or out of the House, with respect to a substantive increase in the barley quota for the three prairie provinces?


Otto Emil Lang: Mr. Speaker, I believe such an announcement by the Wheat Board of an increase in the barley quota for the provinces of Manitoba and Saskatchewan of ten additional bushels per seeded acre was made yesterday. This special quota, of course, indicates the very rapid movement of barley which will be required. The immediate part of this movement is required in most rapid fashion for Thunder Bay and therefore is being called forward from the eastern portion of the prairie region with the expectation that later good sales will allow a similar movement from the western portion.


Mr. A. B. Douglas (Assinifcoia):: A supplementary question. Could the Minister without Portfolio tell the House whether there is a termination date for this new barley quota or whether it will last for the balance of the crop year?


Otto Emil Lang: Mr. Speaker, this is a fairly large quota and it is called in a way which will allow the Wheat Board to terminate it if the barley which comes forward into the system is adequate for the need.



MOVEMENT TO TERMINAL ELEVATORS

George Robson Muir: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask a supplementary question for clarification as the minister misunderstood my original question. I was not referring to delay in shipments out of Thunder Bay but delay in shipments to Thunder Bay in the early part of this year when the terminals could have been filled.


Otto Emil Lang: The problem, Mr. Speaker, is that without an adequate unloading and return of cars for reloading there is a slowdown of the movement generally. This did certainly take place in the earliest part of the season after the official opening of navigation. The number

May 28, 1970
Inquiries of the Ministry of cars in the movement has increased very rapidly recently. For the last two days for which I have a record, on May 25 there were 1,199 cars loaded and on May 26 there were 1,359 cars loaded for Thunder Bay.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Five or six members are rising for supplementaries on this very important question but 1 suggest we might pursue supplementaries tomorrow or later during the question period if there is time. There are a number of members who have been waiting for an opportunity to ask questions.



MANPOWER


Mr. John Gilberi (Broadview):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to address my question to the Minister of Manpower and Immigration. In view of the major lay-offs at the Dunlop and Canadian General Electric plants in Toronto and the report that less than 10 per cent of the men laid off were placed in alternative employment or retraining courses, would the minister make a statement on motions and set forth how many people were placed in alternative employment or retraining courses so that we may evaluate his manpower policies?


Hon. Allan J. MacEachen (Minister of Manpower and Immigration):: Mr. Speaker, I think I can clarify part of my hon. friend's concern by stating that at the earlier stages the workers at Dunlop, for example, were not prepared to take alternative employment or to take training-at least some of them-because of an expectation that the plant might be kept in operation. That possibility having been removed, it may now be easier to facilitate the entry of these workers into other jobs or training'.



CORPORATE AFFAIRS


Mr. Mac T. McCufcheon (Lambfon-Kenl):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs. Recently, the Federal Trade Commission in Washington has been reported to be undertaking anti-trust and anti-combines investigations of certain very large cereal companies which also operate in Canada. Is the Depart-

ment of Consumer and Corporate Affairs conducting any investigation into the affairs of any breakfast cereal companies in order to ascertain if excess profits are being made and if excess prices are being charged?


Hon. Ron Basford (Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, I am not aware of any anti-trust action that is being taken in the United States. I am aware of a study that was conducted by the commission in the United States with regard to the relationship between concentration and levels of expenditure on the part of certain food, breakfast food, retailing and manufacturing companies. If that is what the hon. member's question refers to, may I say that we are studying the report to see of what use it may be in Canada.


Maclyn (Mac) Thomas McCutcheon: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Did I understand the minister to say that we are studying the report, or are we investigating the corporations?


Stanley Ronald Basford: All that was published in the United States, if that is what the hon. member's question refers to, was an economic study that raises some rather interesting questions and shows a rather interesting relationship between the levels of advertising and the degree of concentration in certain manufacturing industries and their dominance of the market. It is a rather interesting report which we are studying to see whether it is of use to us in Canada.



HEALTH AND WELFARE


John (Jack) Henry Horner: Mr. Speaker, may I ask the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs a question about another product. The United States has banned the importation of Australian mutton. On its arrival at the docks it was found that 9.5 per cent of that mutton was not properly slaughtered and that percentage has, therefore, been rejected. Is the government of Canada aware of this and is it prepared to take similar action, because a great deal of Australian mutton is used in the processing of wieners and prepared foods in Canada?


Stanley Ronald Basford: Mr. Speaker, I am confident that as a result of the work of inspectors under our health services, the Food and Drug Directorate and the Department of
May 28, 1970

Agriculture, mutton that enters Canada and is sold in Canada meets Canadian health requirements.


John (Jack) Henry Horner: Perhaps the minister had better look at Canada's health requirements.



COMMUNICATIONS


Mr. Rod Thomson (Ballleford-Kindersley):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Postmaster General and Minister of Communications. In view of the problems of some sections of the communications industry, is the minister considering making grants to selected sections of Canada's electronics industry in order to help them keep abreast of current developments?


Hon. Eric W. Kierans (Postmaster General and Minister of Communications):: Mr. Speaker, I think the hon. member ought to be more specific.


Mr. Speaker:: Perhaps that question could be placed on the Order Paper, with specifics.



FISHERIES


Mr. E. B. Osier (Winnipeg South Centre):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Minister of Regional Economic Expansion which arises out of a question asked yesterday. The minister referred yesterday to the fact that his department had made an offer to the Freshwater Fish Marketing Corporation in Manitoba. Does this proposal, applying to a possible plant in Selkirk, amount to more than $1 million and does it still stand?


Hon. Jean Marchand (Minister of Regional Economic Expansion):: Mr. Speaker, it still stands.



ACTION OF QUEBEC BOARD CONCERNING


Mr. Gordon Ritchie (Dauphin):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Minister of Justice. Does the action of the Federation of Quebec Egg Producers, a provincial marketing board, in controlling the entry of eggs into that province constitute a barrier to interprovincial trade? If so, has the minister
Inquiries of the Ministry consulted anyone to ascertain whether this action is contrary to Section 121 of the British North America Act?


Gerald William Baldwin: About which the minister had so much to say this morning.


Hon. John N. Turner (Minister of Justice):: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member is asking for a legal opinion. I will certainly look into the matter.



POST OFFICE


Mr. Robert McCleave (Halifax-East Hants):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Postmaster General. Would the minister say what steps, if any, have been taken to deal with the complaints of postal workers on a part of Vancouver Island that between $60 and $70 in back premiums for medicare was deducted from pay cheques in a lump sum instead of, as originally planned, spreading these deductions over several months? I suggest that this is an urgent matter in light of the feelings of the postal employees toward their employer.


Eric William Kierans: Mr. Speaker, I will take that question as notice.



ANNOUNCEMENT OF INCREASE IN BARLEY


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, my question is supplementary to the previous question I directed to the Minister without Portfolio regarding the barley quota announcement. I wonder if the minister could assure the House and producers in Alberta that the delivery points in Alberta will be granted similar quota provisions to those which have been granted delivery points in Manitoba and Saskatchewan, as recently announced by the Canadian Wheat Board? I wonder if this additional quota will be granted prior to the current crop year?


An hon. Member:: Surely that should be before the end of the crop year.


Otto Emil Lang: Mr. Speaker, as indicated earlier,
in the announcement, I understand that the Canadian Wheat Board made clear that the movement to the west would require additional barley for that area as well. Of course, the quota that has been opened is one, as has

May 28, 1970
Inquiries of the Ministry been indicated in answer to the question of the hon. member for Assiniboia, which is terminable depending on the movement of barley into the system. This indicates that the important thing the Canadian Wheat Board has to bear in mind is to bring forward into the system and to the terminals the barley which is required immediately for marketing.


Stanley James Korchinski: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. I wonder if the minister would indicate what special provisions have been made to have boxcars spotted at many of these elevators that could possibly take in the barley but have no space at these points and have no boxcars available to them?


Otto Emil Lang: Mr. Speaker, as indicated earlier, the number of boxcars in the movement to Thunder Bay, which is the relevant movement for a large part of this question, has been increased rapidly until earlier this week I had indications that there were now 8,000 boxcars in the movement. Certainly the objective of the Wheat Board will be to use the block system in such a way as to spot the cars where the barley comes into the system because the barley is very badly needed.


John (Jack) Henry Horner: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a supplementary question to the minister in charge of the Wheat Board without portfolio-he might as well be without a portfolio. Since he has stated that there is no shortage of boxcars and that barley is urgently needed, is he aware that over 50 per cent of the barley is produced in Alberta? Why has Alberta not been given some of the huge delivery quota that has been announced for Saskatchewan and Manitoba?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon.
member seems to be going beyond the limitations of a question. Perhaps the matter might be pursued tomorrow. Perhaps the hon. member for Qu'Appelle-Moose Mountain might be allowed to ask a supplementary question even though the question period has expired.



INQUIRY AS TO SALE OF WHEAT TO BRAZIL

Mr. R. R. Soulham (Qu'Appelle-Moose Mouniain):: Mr. Speaker, I have a related or supplementary question to direct to the minister with respect to the movement of grain. Is it a fact that a substantial sale of wheat has been made to Brazil and will an announcement be made within a short time regarding this sale?


John (Jack) Henry Horner: In or out of the House?


Otto Emil Lang: Mr. Speaker, as hon. members know, announcements are made about sales from time to time as they are completed.


Gerald William Baldwin: And from place to place.


Otto Emil Lang: I would say in answer to the asides from hon. members opposite that, as I have indicated earlier, it will by and large be my intention to make these announcements outside the House rather than in the House.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, I wonder if I might make the weekly announcement of the business of the House.


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Tomorrow, the order of business will be as follows. The first item will be Government order 97, the amendment to the Canadian Labour (Standards) Code. The second item will be Government order No. 100, the amendment to the Aeronautics Act. The third item will be Government order No. 6, Bill C-4 with regard to the Canada Corporations Act. Monday will be an opposition allotted day. On Tuesday next, we shall be considering the Canada Water Act, to be followed on Wednesday and Thursday by the Arctic Waters Bill, Government order No. 87, and the Territorial Seas Bill, Government order No. 88.
It might also be of some assistance to the House if I indicated our intention of calling opposition days for the remainder of this session. In addition to the opposition day next Monday, June 1, the opposition days will be Friday, June 5; Monday, June 8; Friday, June 12; Monday, June 15 and the final opposition day, Thursday, June 18. These dates, of course, are subject to eventualities which might occur in the interval.


Mr. Danforih:: I wish to direct a question to the Government House Leader. In view of the importance and general interest in the farm marketing bill, C-197, could the government bring this forward for debate at an earlier date?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, the items I have indicated were all discussed among the House Leaders, and I think there
May 28, 1970



was general agreement on this Procedure. I think there is agreement on the priority attention being given to the items I mentioned.


Gerald William Baldwin: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I wish to say that the discussion consists of the Government House leader telling us what the business will be.


Mr. Benjamin:: I rise on a point of order. It is related to the point of order raised earlier. My point of order relates to today's business.
I wish to draw to the attention of the hon. member for Montmorency (Mr. Laflamme) and the hon. member for Yukon (Mr. Nielsen), as well as all other hon. members of this House, that today we are debating Bill C-215, dealing with the electoral law of Canada. This afternoon the Standing Committee on Privileges and Elections is meeting. The members of that committee spent many hours studying the matter of electoral reform and should be in the House for this debate. I request, through Your Honour, that the meeting be postponed until later this evening or tomorrow.


Mr. Speaker:: Is the hon. member for Yukon rising on the same point of order?


Mr. Nielsen:: Yes, Mr. Speaker. I have sympathy for the request raised by the hon. member. However, there are two reasons which impel me to speak against it. One is that arrangements were made with the Chairman of the committee to set the dates of meetings of the standing committee. On the basis of those arrangements, long-term personal arrangements were made. I am sure other members are in the same position. The other point is that arrangements have been made to call evidence before the committee. This involved some preliminary work. I hope the committee will proceed as planned.


Mr. Speaker:: Obviously, these arrangements cannot be made in this House. There should be discussions outside the House to try to make proper arrangements.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from Wednesday, May 27, consideration of the motion of Mr. Macdonald (Rosedale) that Bill C-215, respecting
Canada Elections Act
the franchise of electors and the election of members to the House of Commons, be read the second time and referred to committee of the whole.
Hon. George  Heas@Princa Edward-Has-fings: Mr. Speaker, I think it is a well recognized fact that Parliament is only as effective as the people who are elected to this chamber. In order that the best people will be elected, we must do everything we can to remove as many of the difficulties as possible which normally stand in the way of good candidates being elected, particularly those who are young and do not have too much of this world's goods with which to finance an election campaign.
One of the main obstacles today is the very high cost of conducting a campaign as a result of the increased use of that very costly medium, television, the increased use of radio, direct mail, billboards and other costly means of advertising both the candidate and his platform. Some years ago the United Kingdom overcame this difficulty by imposing a strict limit on the amount of money a candidate could spend in his riding during an election campaign. By enforcing that restriction, and supervising carefully the expenditures made by each candidate during an election, the election of a candidate could be nullified if it could be proved that he exceeded the funds he was legally allowed to spend.
The amount of the allowable expenditure was worked out according to the number of voters in the riding. When I covered the British election in 1950, the amount allowed was 11 pence per voter in a riding, which was roughly three cents in Canadian currency at that time. I do not know what figure is allowed in Great Britain today, but if we allow for the inflation that has taken place in all countries during the intervening 20 years, I believe it would be safe to assume that it would be in the vicinity of 10 cents per voter in Canadian currency.
This system, which has worked so well in Great Britain, would work equally well in Canada. If we limit the expenditures of a candidate to 10 cents per voter in his riding, we will cut the cost of an election in the average size riding in Canada to approximately $4,000 per candidate. I think every member of this House agrees that this would be a very sizeable reduction in election expenditures in the majority of ridings in Canada. If we do this, we will accomplish two important improvements.

May 28, 1970
Canada Elections Act
The first will be to make it possible for a potential candidate to stand for his party's nomination irrespective of his personal means. He could count on receiving a great deal or all of the money required from his party or his supporters who always rally round a candidate at election time and contribute to his election expenses. The second accomplishment would be that a candidate would be required to do a great deal more personal campaigning than is usually the case today.
[DOT] (3:20 p.m.)
This has been the case in Great Britain ever since this regulation I have described was brought into force. Most of the means of campaigning which money makes available in Canada and other countries are not open to candidates in Great Britain. Candidates have no choice but to do a great deal of personal campaigning. The same would be true in Canada if we adopted this plan. This would be a tremendous step forward towards ensuring that the best people are elected to Parliament. If a strict limitation of expenditures were imposed on all candidates, the candidates would have no choice but to do a great deal of personal campaigning, calling door to door, going to a great many meetings, presenting their views and submitting to questions. When any of us campaign door to door we submit ourselves to questions by the people in each house. This is very useful and constructive.
Such a regulation would also mean that candidates could not wait until an election is called to take a nomination. If a candidate is going to cover his riding very carefully by personal campaigning, it is necessary to do what candidates in Great Britain have been doing for many years. In Great Britain, candidates are nominated many months, and in some cases several years, before an election is due. They spend a great deal of time getting around the riding, meeting the people, discussing their views with them and expressing their opinion on behalf of a particular party in the next election. They learn what the people in that riding want them to do in Parliament if elected to represent them. It would also enable the voters in a constituency to judge the quality of the candidates far more accurately than is the case today, resulting in a far greater likelihood that the best candidate would be elected on election night.
This would, of course, in turn improve the quality of Parliament; it would improve the quality of those available to be chosen to be members of the cabinet to run the country, 
and this, naturally, would be of tremendous benefit to the country as a whole. It would also make it impossible in the future for a rich man literally to buy his way into Parliament by hiring extensive public relations staff and spending a great deal of money on radio and television time during which he may read speeches which he may not have written and which, indeed, he may not even understand. In fact, he may not be the best man standing in that constituency.
I should like to suggest another change in our election procedure, one which would both reduce the cost of elections and improve the quality of the presentation by the candidate and the party. I believe the length of the campaign should be cut from its present eight weeks to four. The eight week campaign was devised many years ago in the days when the principal means of transportation over long distances was by rail. Eight weeks was required for the party leaders to travel round the country and discuss the issues of the day in all parts of Canada. Today, jet travel and television enable these issues to be discussed in all parts of the country in a maximum of four weeks. Usually, after a campaign has been under way for about three weeks the leaders run out of new issues, and from then on it is a matter of rehashing things that have been said over and over again until the public becomes tired of the campaign.
I believe the initial expenditure needed to maintain a permanent voters' list would be worthwhile. It would make our elections less costly and more interesting. The attention of voters would be attracted more positively than is the case today. Better candidates would be chosen to become Members of Parliament and this would result in the country getting the benefit of better government.


Mr. J. A. Jerome (Sudbury):: Mr. Speaker, I am delighted to be able to take part in this debate, in which I have been preceded by a number of members who served with me on the Committee on Privileges and Elections which began a review of the Elections Act early last session.
At the outset, I wish to echo the remarks of those who testified that the work of the Committee was carried out on a very dignified and non-partisan plane. Even in our travels, when we went east to discuss certain questions with election officials in New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Quebec, once a small problem as to whether or not the committee ought to be travelling had been settled, the
May 28, 1870

work of the committee was carried out on a very high plane throughout. I echo the commendation which has been put forward by hon. members opposite with respect to the calibre of the committee and also with respect to the fine work of the chairman.
Anyone who has been through an election campaign, and of course this includes all members of this House, is keenly aware of the glaring weaknesses in our electoral process. Many hon. members have been through more than one campaign, not all of them successful. I can include myself among that number. Not only have I been through more than one campaign, one successful and one unsuccessful, but the one which did not succeed was the subject of a recount. I must say I found this an enlightening experience and worthwhile background for my tour of duty with the committee. Examining carefully, ballot by ballot, the votes which had been cast one could not help but learn a good deal about the difficulties faced by electors when seeking to exercise their franchise accurately and freely.
One might list the weaknesses which were most obvious to members of the committee. They were connected, first, with inaccurate registration of voters; second, with the marking of ballots; third, with the question of party identification; fourth, with the age of voters. Perhaps this should be a general classification covering the ability or disability of a person seeking to exercise a franchise whether because of infirmity, or illness, or age; one could include in this category the question of eligibility by virtue of citizenship as opposed to residence. These were the questions which were in the forefront of the minds of all members of the committee following their experience at the polls.
There is a further consideration, and in this respect I declare my interest as being more aggressive than that of others on the committee. I refer to the opening of liquor outlets on election day. I admit this does not rank in importance with the other considerations I have listed, but I made it clear in my contribution to the committee deliberations that the law which keeps liquor outlets closed is another example of our antiquated thinking on this question. The proposal, now, is that liquor outlets should remain closed only during voting hours instead of all day, as formerly. We have long reached the stage at which resort to alcoholic beverages for social reasons has become a way of life throughout the world. Attempts to restrict the availability of
Canada Elections Act
alcohol ought to have been discarded long ago, not only with respect to election day, but other occasions. I refer to all kinds of restriction, such as restricted hours, the restrictive licensing of premises, restricted hours of sale, and so on. These, I maintain, are vestiges of antiquity which ought to have disappeared. We have prescribed by law that an employee should be entitled to a certain number of hours off duty to ensure that he may exercise his franchise; the motion that the pub might be more attractive to him than the polling booth is one that we ought to shed. Therefore,
I maintain there should be no change made in the status of hours of licensed premises on election day, because I do not think they are a factor at all in the voting process. In any case, we have settled upon what I consider to be a compromise, opening the doors after the polls close, and I welcome at least that development.
[DOT] (3:30 p.m.)
Going back to my list with regard to inaccurate registration, I doubt that anyone opposes in principle the view that has been taken by so many members respecting a permanent electoral list. This would be a great idea. It works in many countries; certainly, it seems to work in Australia. However, the salient difference is that registration for voter identification is compulsory, as is, theoretically at least, the casting of a ballot in that country. I do not find myself opposed in principle to that kind of system. If we had it here, certainly a permanent electoral list would be much more feasible.
However, we have not yet progressed to that stage. The subject of compulsory registration for voting is one of immense proportion from the constitutional point of view, from the point of view of civil liberties, from the point of view of emotions, freedom and so on. I am sure it is something that we will debate at some other time, but I believe that unless we do adopt some kind of system like that a permanent electoral list is not possible in this country.
First of all, think of the formidable expense involved. In addition, Canada is a large country and we do so much to encourage mobility among our people. We already have government programs underway which endorse and subsidize movement across the country of people who are unemployed for various reasons. Through our immigration and manpower policies, we attempt to encourage people to move to different parts

May 28, 1970
Canada Elections Act
of the country. As I say, Canada is a vast land, a developing nation, and immigration and rapid expansion of the population is encouraged. In this kind of atmosphere any attempt to have permanent registration of voters or a permanent electoral list would not only be expensive but I suggest unrealistic.
Short of that, I welcome and endorse these changes in the electoral law to clarify what are the proper functions of the enumerators and the election officials. I also welcome the new methods by which certain clerical errors and oversights can be corrected in the electoral list, particularly the changes that enable voters to present themselves and obtain a certificate if they have been enumerated but by error have been left off the list.
Too frequently are we caught in a sort of political byplay when we find, through enumeration errors or clerical errors in the process of establishing voter's lists, that certain people have been left off. In such a situation we have fallen into the game of having political workers of all parties taking to the streets early in the campaign, covering their particular area and attempting to find people who have been left off the lists, and triumphantly bringing them before the revising officer and getting them restored to the list. By that act alone, they supposedly win a supporter for their particular candidate.
This is not the way that we should do our electioneering. I think that we do this country a great service when we try to eliminate these kinds of errors, when we try to widen as much as possible the powers of officials to restore to the list people who have been left off through no fault of their own. I think this sort of system should be made as flexible as possible in order to avoid anyone being disenfranchised through no fault of his own. I take pride in the amendments, as far as they go, and some day I hope we will feel that we have completely overcome our problems.
With regard to the marking of ballots, here experience and the opportunity for recount is of particular value. One has only to examine a series of ballots in any election to find that we are required to adhere to the practice of using the marking pencil that is provided in the polling booth. Not only that, but we are required to mark an "X", formed by two lines intersecting diagonally, which is placed beside the name of the candidate in a little box.
Although we were enforcing the letter of the law, we were running contrary to the spirit. There is no doubt that the original 
intention of the legislation was to make it impossible for a person to demonstrate that he had cast his ballot in favour of a certain candidate, for the obvious reason that this would prevent him from being able to sell his vote. In other words, if he were able to prove that he had marked his ballot in a certain fashion, he could be effectively rewarded for having cast his vote for a particular candidate.
Experience has taught us, I am sure, that the onus in this matter was badly misplaced; that we were approaching the problem in the wrong way by saying that we must assume that, unless the law has been complied with in every technical detail, the ballot is spoiled. By the simple change that is made to the wording, we have shifted the onus in this sense. We have shifted our approach and have come about it in precisely the opposite way, which I submit is a very laudable change and is definitely progress. We now say-I certainly hope the judiciary will accept this line of thinking when deliberating over a recount-that unless there is clear indication that the voter is attempting to identify his ballot by means of a very peculiar mark, or is using a type of writing instrument by which he can clearly claim to identify himself, we are going to assume that his ballot has been properly marked.
I suggest that this is a much more appropriate approach to the problem. In order to give weight to that, we have proposed a changed form of ballot with a circle beside the name. Reference has been made to the fact that this idea originated in Belgium. There, the idea was that no specific mark should be placed in the circle opposite the candidate's name but the circle was to be shaded in by the voter. I think this would probably be preferable, but we have at least done quite a bit by providing that no ballot is spoilt because the mark takes a certain form. We are letting in any kind of mark made by a pencil or ball point pen, so long as it does not display some sort of identification.
Along with that is the question of party identification on the ballot. I do not know whether my constituency is typical, but in Sudbury we have a very wide representation of people of ethnic origin other than French and English. I have found that these people have two characteristics pertaining to party identification which are quite significant and important to them. The first, found mostly among the senior citizens in the ethnic
May 28, 1970

groups, is a strong sense of party loyalty. Whether one argues that this is a laudable or a lamentable aspect of their approach to politics, I do not know, but it is nevertheless the privilege of any citizen of Canada to be fiercely loyal to a particular party. I have found people of ethnic origin other than French or Anglo-Saxon are not only fiercely loyal to the party of their choice, but tend to remain so throughout their lives. Therefore, the question of party identification is extremely important to them.
In addition to that, the first generation immigrants to this country have difficulty in reading and understanding much of the election material that is circulated to them, as well as the advertising material they hear over television and radio. Therefore, frequently when they go to the polls they are very confused because they are not able to determine or to ask somebody in the poll which candidate on the ballot represents the Liberal party, the Conservative party, or the New Democratic party, as the case may be. For those people alone, if not for the nation as a whole, it is a great advance to place identification by party affiliation of the particular candidates on the ballot papers. I also think it is a great advance to replace the address and occupation of the candidates with their party affiliation.
[DOT] (3:40 p.m.)
Much has been said about the importance of political parties in the democratic process. Here again, the debate could rage on and on but, being as non-partisan as we can about the subject of politics, I think we must agree that if the political party functions properly it is the key instrument in the democratic process in our country. It is important, therefore, that this connection with our democratic and representative process be strengthened by the placing of the party identification on the ballot. In addition to that, however, I say it is more important to have the party affiliation on the ballot than to have the profession of the candidate.
Another reason I believe it is more important to have the party affiliation on the ballot than it is to have the profession is that often the description of the profession of a candidate is something which absolutely challenges the imagination of the public relations and advertising people. There have been legendary stories concerning the chosen occupations and there are certain members of this House who could regale other members concerning
Canada Elections Act
the manner in which they described their occupation on the ballot and the reason they adopted that particular description of their profession. I think showing the party affiliation on the ballot will better enable the elector to cast his ballot for the party of his choice.
On the subject of the reduction of the voting age to age 18, much has been said. There was scarcely any discernible disagreement in the committee. Some members expressed concern that the youth vote was a dangerous thing and that there would be a concerted movement among people between ages 18 and 21. I think it has been demonstrated that this fear is ill founded. Past election results in areas where the voting privilege has been extended to people of 18 years of age have shown that the pattern in the age group 18 to 21 is very similar to the pattern in the group over 21 years of age. Therefore, I do not think there is any well-grounded fear in this regard.
I also observe that those who have this fear believe that candidates of 18 years of age would be proposed and emphatically supported en bloc by people 18, 19 and 20 years of age. I have not noticed, and I would invite other members of the House to relate when they have noticed, that any group in the ages 21, 22 and 23, in Canada or in other parts of the world, have united to elect a 21 year old candidate. I do not believe there has been a concerted effort by persons between age 21 and age 25 to nominate and elect their own candidate. I think when there has been action by people in the age group between 21 and 23 it has been through the process of the party system. This is another aspect of the importance of the party system. I do not think there has been an important trend towards the nomination of young candidates in cases where the franchise age has been lowered to 18.
The question of the party system comes up again here. I think everyone will agree there is a definite advantage in being the official candidate of one of the recognized parties when seeking election to this House. Certainly, in the last general election no independent candidate was elected.


Stanley Howard Knowles: rise on a point of order. There was one independent candidate elected at the last election. He is the Speaker of the present House.


James Alexander Jerome: Far be it from me to be one of those who would ever question the independence of the speaker. It was my impression,

May 28, 1970
Canada Elections Act
however, that at one time Your Honour was among the ranks of one of the recognized parties. Please forgive my oversight. Also I gather there is a certain advantage, no matter in what capacity, to run unopposed.


An hon. Member:: He was.


James Alexander Jerome: I think we can consider that to be something of a unique situation. Obviously, there is an advantage in being the official candidate of a recognized party. That being the case, one has to consider the possibility of
18	year old or 19 year old candidates being nominated. In principle, there is nothing the matter with an 18 year old or a 19 year old being nominated. If indeed an 18 year old or
19	year old who had intelligence, energy and responsibility were nominated and elected, I would be the first to welcome him to this chamber. On many occasions I have said that the relevance of what happens in this chamber in the eyes of the public is a very vital issue. When we pass into history, one of the issues upon which we will be judged will be whether or not we insured that the public would continue to believe our actions in this chamber are relevant because the young people of our country, as I have said during rules debates and on other occasions, have a very clear choice. Certainly, they intend and want to change the old order. God bless them for that. But their choice is whether they want to change the old order through their own efforts within the existing system or through more revolutionary methods. I say it is vital to encourage them to come here and participate in this and other institutions of our government. In this way we will make sure they have an opportunity to make a very effective contribution which will satisfy them this is the kind of place in which they would be proud to participate. In other words, they will be satisfied it is a very relevant and dynamic institution. I feel that lowering the voting age to 18 to include those people in our electoral process, as well as making them eligible to come here and participate, is a step in the right direction.
On the question of eligibility, may I say that I come from a constituency with a very high incidence of people who emigrated to this country from Europe who are of neither French nor Anglo-Saxon origin. I have always been very sensitive indeed concerning these people. In my experience with and exposure to them, I find these immigrant people who come to our country take their responsibilities as citizens extremely seriously. We have

among them the type of people who helped build this nation. Although they may be humble, quiet and not active in public affairs, we find among them the kind of fibre we want in order to build this nation. The preference in respect of people who come from the British Isles or other Commonwealth countries, who are not required to become citizens of the country in order to vote while immigrants from other countries are required to do so, is something about which I have always been very sensitive. I am glad to see that this is to be changed and these British subjects, if they wish to participate actively in the political life of our country, will have to apply for and obtain citizenship. I believe that is proper.
The move towards the proxy vote I think is a very daring one. We have moved into an area in which I can scarcely blame those who are fearful about abuses of this political process. This is a system in which, unless there are safeguards, there could be very wide abuses. To begin with, Mr. Speaker, we have built into this legislation the necessary safeguards, providing they are watched and regulated by a very careful organization under the guidance and direction of the Chief Electoral Officer. In addition, with those safeguards built in, I feel that the purpose is extremely worthwhile. All of us who have run for office have been sensitive to the fact that many people in hospital and otherwise disabled, and many people in certain occupations, through no fault of their own have been unable to cast their ballots. Every effort is made by the electoral officer to reach these people with a ballot box, but there are certain very severe limitations. It is impossible to fit the law into every little corner of our society, but by embracing a proxy system, very strictly controlled, we tend to extend the privilege of exercising the franchise, and we get into a great many corners that previously we were unable to reach. I embrace that as a very progressive step, provided we rigidly control it. I see in this system an opportunity for a great many people, who would otherwise be unable to cast their ballots, to cast their ballots. I think that is a laudable step.
[DOT] (3:50 p.m.)
When we sum it all up, what we are trying to do is to see to it that the election result is a true expression of the will of the people. That means that all of those people who want to vote have an opportunity to do so, that they are able to cast their ballots in freedom, and
May 28, 1970

that they are able to the greatest degree to understand the requirements for becoming eligible to vote.
We have attempted to clarify our election law, and we have up-dated the language in certain sections. By these amendments I have spoken about, we have attempted to sweep away some of the inequities that existed in the past. This new act will be a compendium of all election rules and regulations so that anyone who wishes may examine them all in one place at one time.
We have done a great deal of work on the provisions for the registration of the voter and the process whereby the voter casts his ballot. We have done almost all that has to be done in that area, but I feel very strongly that a great deal still remains to be done on the other side of the process, that is to say, the selection, or eligibility, or availability of candidates who seek membership in this House. I know that it is somewhat self-serving and suspect when I refer to recent amendments made by the House to the members' pension plan, amendments which have been so widely criticized in the press. But be that as it may, it is a move which is taking away some of the risk from seeking membership in this House. There are a great many lawyers, and I am one, who are members of the House. It is no surprise that this is so. Aside from the fact that lawyers are close to the political process as a result of their study of the law, the fact is that there is less risk for lawyers to make themselves available for an election campaign, than there is for people in other walks of life. It is more advantageous for lawyers to seek membership in this House, and moreover there is less financial risk for them in doing so. They can accommodate their business here with their own personal practice more easily than can many other citizens. That is an inequity. It is an advantage which falls to lawyers, and which is a weakness in our system.
We have done a great deal when we remove the financial risk for people in other walks of life, such as teachers and merchants, engineers and craftsmen, persons in occupations of that sort, who seek membership in this House and who do not have the flexibility to maintain contact with the practice of their professions while here. These people would suffer from being out of contact with their professions because they would miss the new technology, the new terminology and the new ideas being developed in their own fields. When we take any step in the direction of
Canada Elections Act
making it easier for such people to come here, then we are moving in the right direction and are doing a good thing.
When we have taken out the financial risks to the greatest degree possible, and have made it more feasible for those people to come here, the next thing we have to tackle is the question of election expenses. We have to develop a system like that which is in vogue in some provinces and some countries whereby candidates are subsidized to such a degree as to enable them to carry out sensible and vigorous campaigns. If funds are made available to them from government sources they will not have to rely on private contributions, on financial support which is available to some but not to others. This is a situation which makes it difficult for people in certain lines of work, or in certain professions, who lack contact with the business world. Such people have more difficulty in making the plunge into politics.
Associated with this is the question of party affiliations on the ballot. When we are dealing with the question of party affiliations on the ballot we could talk all afternoon about the number of candidates that a party should nominate in order to qualify for party affiliation to be shown. In committee we said we should make it such a number that a frivolous group could not get on the ballot, but at the same time we should not place the number so high as to place a genuine impediment in the way of organizations which wish, in good faith, to become established as political parties. We talked about figures from 25 to 100, and now the government has recommended the figure of 75. I think the exact number of 75 with respect to placing party affiliation on the ballot is not nearly as important as it will be when we come to deal with the question of financial support for candidates running in national elections.
When we discuss the question of eligibility for subsidization by the government to cover election expenses, I think we have to be fairly careful to stipulate a high number of candidates for any party. I believe that 75 is not an unreasonable number. For all the difference it makes concerning party affiliation on the ballot, I think we should be consistent and fix 75 as the number with respect to government financial support. I, therefore, endorse the number of 75 for the purposes of party affiliation on the ballot, and say the number should be the same when we come to deal with the question of subsidies to cover election expenses.

May 28, 1970
Canada Elections Act
I feel that in so far as enabling the voter to make his choice freely and accurately is concerned, we have gone as far as we can go under present information and knowledge. I think the committee has done a good job, and much has been accomplished here in clarifying this process and making it easier for the voter to cast his ballot. However, I hope we will do more on the other side to enable candidates to come forward and offer themselves for office. I share the pride, which other hon. members have expressed, in the work done by the committee.


Leslie Gordon Benjamin: Would the hon. member accept a question?


James Alexander Jerome: Indeed.


Leslie Gordon Benjamin: Regarding the points he made, and the ones I made yesterday about party affiliation on the ballot, that is the argument as between 26 candidates and 75 candidates, would he not agree that there is no good reason, when it comes to the question of election expenses and public funds being provided, why there could not be a differentiation between the number of candidates in the field and the number which is required in order to have party affiliation appear on the ballot?


James Alexander Jerome: There is no doubt, Mr. Speaker, that it is possible to have different numbers for these two purposes. I thought a lot about that prior to making my remarks, and I am inclined to think that we should remain consistent with respect to the two. My experience at the polls, and I am sure it is that of the hon. member, is that there is much that seems very clear to us when we are closely associated, as we are as candidates, with the election process, but which is very confusing to people who are not as experienced as we are. It is very easy to create confusion in the minds of the electorate about things of this sort. I am very much inclined to think that if we have one number for the purpose of establishing party affiliation on the ballot, say 25 or 26, and a higher number, say 75, for qualification for election expenses, we are bound to create confusion among some people as to their eligibility for subsidization of election expenses. I think this would be an extremely dangerous thing and I therefore say, purely for purposes of consistency and simplicity, that I endorse the one number.
[DOT] (4:00 p.m.)


Leslie Gordon Benjamin: May I ask one further question, Mr. Speaker? Does the hon. member not

feel that there is some danger of discrimination against a legitimate and serious group forming a new party, or a party that is presently in existence but not represented in the House, in terms of the privilege of having the party affiliation on the ballot? In such a case does he not foresee that this is discriminatory and works against their right to be a recognized party?


James Alexander Jerome: Mr. Speaker, the law is discriminatory in that sense even if it requires ten candidates. If you want to call it discrimination you are only dealing with a degree of it because if you require ten candidates, someone could claim that is being discriminatory and indeed it would be. The number 75 virtually requires that a party be genuinely national. It is possible to field 75 candidates in Ontario or Quebec alone, but it certainly is preferable, when putting a party's name on a ballot, that we encourage it to be a party which expresses national interests and therefore spreads its candidates over as wide an area as possible. That is another reason for going to the number 75. If you stop at 25 or 50, that is discriminatory in a sense, at least in the sense in which the hon. member has put his question. In so far as numbers, are concerned, I think the number 75 is probably as fair as any other.


Mr. Andrew Brewin (Greenwood):: It may
seem odd, Mr. Speaker, that I should make the nub of my complaint against Bill C-215, which is an immense volume of 355 pages, that it does not contain enough. But the fact is that the bill is more notable for what it leaves out than for what it contains. It is a repair job. What our election law needs is a complete reconstruction. In introducing this bill, the government has shown its unwillingness and its failure to accept the real and genuine reform of our electoral system required to make it truly democratic.
Nearly four years ago the Barbeau committee made its report on election expenses. Distinguished and experienced people from different parties served on that committee, including the Honourable M. J. Coldwell, long a leader of the party I supported. The report proposed a number of practical and fundamental recommendations which, if adopted, would have put an end to the present undemocratic, unjust system of secret and unlimited campaign contributions and expenses.
The bill before us ignores the report. It contains a vast number of small, and perhaps
May 28, 1970

useful, changes in detail in our electoral law. Most of these changes will receive our support, although we have some amendments to present. But what is truly significant is that the major reform is postponed. The President of the Privy Council (Mr. Macdonald) tells us that at some future date a special committee will be set up to study the Barbeau report. What is needed, if this government is serious about electoral reform, is not further study by some committee, whether of this House or some other forum, but legislation implementing the report's recommendations which can then go to the committee.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: I wonder if the hon. member will permit a question? Does he realize that the suggestion of having a study of this measure by special committee emanated from the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles)?


Francis Andrew Brewin: I have discussed it with him, Mr. Speaker, and he says he made it long ago and it should have been acted upon. As far as I am concerned, I think the committee should study the matter in the light of draft legislation presented by the government. The basic proposals have been clearly laid down in the committee report.
The failure of the government to do anything about this report to date, nearly four and a half years after it has been issued, after one election has been held and now that Parliament is half way through its normal life and heading in the direction I would say of another election, raises very serious doubts about the sincerity of the government's commitment to the implementation of the report. After the report was published in October, 1966, I put a question to the Prime Minister of the day, Mr. Pearson, asking if the government proposed to implement its recommendations. He replied that the government was studying the report with that in mind, and he indicated that legislation would be drafted and presented to the House.
I had an opportunity to speak to the minister then in charge, the Honourable Judy LaMarsh who was secretary of state at that time. She represented what I would call the hard headed school of politicians under the Liberal party, those who could not have cared less about election reform. She said it would take at least a year for the government to find draftsmen able to produce the legislation in draft form. At the time I offered to do it for her in a month but she would not accept my offer.
Canada Elections Act


An hon. Member:: For free?


Francis Andrew Brewin: Yes, I would have done it for free. It is now three and a half years later and no draft legislation is available, nor does it look as though any is to be made available.
I wonder if the legislation flowing from this report will be available by the time of the next election? I suggest this is history, and an indication of the government's enthusiasm for electoral reform.
I should like to remind the House of the essence of the Barbeau report. It recited the history of huge, secret campaign contributions from government contractors and other interested parties throughout this country. It recalled the Pacific and Beauharnois scandals which revealed to the public something of the corruption of an electoral and political system which depended for its efficient operation on large, hidden contributions to campaign funds. It recited the weaknesses of all legislative efforts to date to deal with this evil. I should like to read a passage from the report: Even though the device of publicity, which has been at the heart of all the attempts at legislation, has not been effectively realized, the idea should not be dismissed as impractical or meaningless. The fact is that the device of publicity has never been really tested. Two fatal weaknesses have vitiated ail efforts in that direction: the failure to recognize political parties as essential units of political finance, and the failure to provide effective machinery for enforcing the laws. It is not possible at the moment to conclude that publicity has failed, only that it has never been properly tried. Other devices, such as subsidies, limitations, and tax inducements have yet to be explored.
At page 28, Mr. Speaker, the report underlines something which I should like to emphasize, namely, if any democratic government is to be effective it is important to have good legislation on political finances. The report reads:
If we wish to improve the workings of democratic government in Canada, we must have legislation that will suppress any parasitic elements that might weaken democratic mechanisms. At best, campaigning is an expensive business: and if expenses run high, income must be significant.
[DOT] (4:10 p.m.)
The source of income must not be such as to prevent parties and legislators from adopting legislation that is in the public interest. I am abandoning for a moment the rather studied language of the report. It seems to me that the committee is saying that the present system of election financing does not operate in the public interest. I could not agree more
7444	COMMON
Canada Elections Act
with that statement. We have a distorted, inefficient and unsatisfactory system by reason of this situation in election financing.


Leslie Gordon Benjamin: We now have too many Grits.


Francis Andrew Brewin: The present system gives undue influence to those corporate interests which alone are able to supply moneys that are required to operate modern election campaigns on a national scale.
We recognize that there is a need for the elector to be informed, if he is to make a simple choice. We realize that if the electorate is to be informed we must use methods which, apart from that most important and secret weapon, individual contact, involve radio, television, newspapers, leaflets, billboards, etc. These all cost money. It is important that the source of these funds, necessary if the electorate is to be informed, should be open and known. These funds should not confer on the donors any special rights or privileges in the process of government. We shall not see a genuine democracy until each Canadian citizen has equal influence on the process of government. That is not so under our present system.
The committee had very little difficulty in finding that "sources of funds for political parties and candidates are shrouded in mystery. ' Those are the words of the committee. The committee makes recommendations, which I shall list in more detail in a minute, to meet this situation. The committee recommends that the state provide a reasonable scale of funds for election expenses, something which ought to be acceptable to those who speak of participatory democracy. It also suggests that individuals should be encouraged to make modest contributions to campaign expenses, and that these contributions ought to be deductible for income tax purposes.
At page 34 of the report, after a number of suggestions have been made, the committee says this:
Should Parliament accept these principles-
Those being the principles enunciated by the committee.
-the parties and candidates will be freed from reliance on special interests, and elected members will be freer to perform their duties in the general interests of the people as a whole.
That puts the case in a nutshell. The committee found that if this principle were not accepted, parties and candidates could not be freed from reliance on special interests. In 
DEBATES	May 28, 1970
other words, elected members and their parties are not as free as they might be to serve the people as a whole. That is the actual situation now facing us, and we must change this by implementing the committee's recommendations.
May I read the last paragraph on page 35? The disclosure of funds and their sources seems to the Committee to be indispensable if the electorate is to have confidence in the democratic system. It is emphasized that with the best legislation in the world nothing will be changed if candidates and their parties do not assume their responsibilities, or are the first to violate the laws. For this reason the Committee has concluded that enforcement of the law must be a specific duty of an administrative agency as suggested in this chapter.
May I again underline the paragraph's first sentence?
The disclosure of funds and their sources seems to the Committee to be indispensable if the electorate is to have confidence in the democratic system.
We live in an age when many people view our institutions with grave doubt. What the committee has found, I suggest, is absolutely true. Unless the source of election funds is made clear, how can we ask our people to display confidence in our democratic system?
I wish to deal with another aspect also. Fears are frequently, and I think justifiably, expressed as to what may happen as a result of the overwhelming penetration in this country of foreign ownership. We are told that economic power may lead to political power. It would be the easiest thing in the world, so long as we preserve the same system of financing our political parties as we now have, for there to be a massive intervention from outside in our affairs through the medium of financial contributions in election campaigns.
I understand the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert) wishes to raise a question of privilege. I will therefore gladly yield the floor to him.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Is the hon. member rising on a question of privilege?


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Yes, Mr. Speaker.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: I wonder whether the hon. member ought not to do so when the hon. member for Greenwood has concluded his remarks? I am uncertain of my ground, but I must say that my initial reaction is that the hon. member for Greenwood ought to be
May 28, 1970

allowed to continue, unless there is unanimous consent for the hon. member for Edmonton West to raise his question of privilege.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Mr. Speaker, I do not think that is necessary.


Francis Andrew Brewin: I am perfectly willing to consent, Mr. Speaker.


An hon. Member:: No; continue.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: There does not seem to be unanimous consent.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Mr. Speaker, I doubt that there needs to be consent with respect to the raising of a question of privilege. A time element is involved, and I do not wish to wait until the hon. member has finished his speech. It is for this reason I am rising at the earliest opportunity to raise the question of privilege. It may be that as time goes on the fears which have given rise to the question of privilege may be allayed, and I may be satisfied. I assure Your Honour only that I will be brief. But I wish to raise this matter now, because I am fighting the clock.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: In the circumstances, I am prepared to accommodate the hon. member. However, I have misgivings about this approach. In view of what the hon. member has said, perhaps there is a disposition on the part of the House to permit him to proceed. The hon. member for Greenwood has the floor, but I am prepared to hear the hon. member if there is no objection.


Francis Andrew Brewin: Mr. Speaker, I will yield the floor.



PRIVILEGE


[Stage Direction]
Hen. Marcel Lambert (Edmonton West):
Mr. Speaker, I am grateful to the hon. member for yielding the floor. I am raising the question as a result of information that came to me a few moments ago when I was attending the proceedings of the finance committee regarding the order of business called for tomorrow. Without going into detail, I understand that the third item of business to be called is Government Order No. 6, Bill C-6, respecting the amendments to the Canada Corporations Act. It is conceivable that that item may be reached tomorrow, and amendments to the bill to be considered at
Privilege
the report stage must be submitted by six o'clock this afternoon. The bill, in its revised form, containing some 60 pages of amendments moved by the government in committee was delivered late yesterday afternoon. As a matter of fact, some members saw it for the first time this morning. The transcript of the last day's committee evidence was delivered late on Tuesday. I put it to Your Honour that not much time has been left us to look at the bill, which is only slightly less thick than the bill which is presently before the House.
I want to say this: I protest that a bill of such complexity and such length has been called for consideration at the report stage in the House almost on the morrow of its presentation back, without there having been adequate time for hon. members, whether they were on the committee or otherwise, to consider the bill, consider the transcripts of evidence and post any amendments with respect to it. The committee is sitting, morning, afternoon and evening today on the white paper, and I do not want to be prejudiced in any way. How are hon. members, in the time available, to prepare the necessary amendments? I know that some amendments are coming from the government side as well as from the opposition. How can members prepare their amendments and become acquainted thoroughly with the subject matter of the bill if they have not had the opportunity of studying the transcript and the whole, complex bill? I, therefore, want to protect the position of the members of the committee and hon. members of the House with regard to this item. Surely to goodness, it need not be called as an item of business for tomorrow. That is my point of privilege.
[DOT] (4:20 p.m.)
Donald Stovel Macdonald: I would like to speak on that point, Mr. Speaker. The proposal to call this particular bill tomorrow was the subject of discussion at the House leaders' meeting earlier this week. At that time the business was set out. The hon. member has not come to me personally, nor by way of his House leader, to object to this course of action. If the House leaders' meetings are worth having, then the hon. member should take advantage of these consultations in advance for the purpose of making this information known. If there are to be consultations in this regard, we on this side are entitled to be told about these objections rather than having them raised as a question of privilege.

May 28. 1970
Canada Elections Act I am not going to insist on the point. It seemed to be a reasonable course of action to call it for tomorrow. We arranged the business with this kind of advance notice. If the hon. member insists, we will not call it tomorrow. It will be an inconvenience to some of my colleagues who have other business. I conclude by saying that if there are to be consultations, and there are, and this information is made known in advance, then the courtesy of a personal response is something I might expect rather than this kind of intervention.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: I say with all due respect to the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Macdonald) that his preliminary discussions took place before the bill was available for distribution. Nor was the last evidence available. The discussions were entirely premature.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: May I point out if that objection existed, the hon. member could quite easily have come to me and said so.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: How are
we to know?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Ask the House leader.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. I think we have pursued this as far as I am prepared to allow. I take it that the subject raised by the hon. member for Edmonton West will be discussed by the House leaders.



CANADA ELECTIONS ACT


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Macdonald (Rosedale) that Bill C-215 respecting the franchise of electors and the election of Members to the House of Commons, be read the second time and referred to committee of the whole.
Francis Andrew Brewin: I wish to make it clear that, although I was willing to have the hon. member intervene for the purpose of a point of privilege, I do not wish it to be a precedent such as is followed in the American Congress where people frequently yield to their colleagues. I do not want to suggest that I am always in such a yielding mood.
I was speaking about the very real threat to Canadian democracy which is incidental in the fact that we have a very large measure of 
foreign ownership of our businesses and corporations. As long as we have an electoral system which permits secrecy in so far as contributions to campaign funds, there exists a very real danger. Without the Canadian people knowing it, contributions can be made by people whose allegiance is not to this country. This provides for the possibility of a very serious undermining of our political independence. I tend to be moderate in my fears and views on this foreign influence. I believe the Canadian people are capable of forming an independent judgment. I am not suggesting that foreign corporations, as long as they are domiciled in this country, should be forbidden from contributing to campaign expenditures, but this should be known by the Canadian people.
It is of the utmost importance that we accept the proposals of the Barbeau Committee, including the recommendation of full publicity and limitation of campaign contributions. There is a political danger which threatens the independence of this country. This should be studied by this government. The government should be prompted to bring in the reforms proposed by the Barbeau Committee at an early date. The reforms proposed by the Barbeau Committee are basic to any fundamental reform of our political system.
Although the proposals of this bill are voluminous, they are peripheral. We do not object to these proposals, although we will be suggesting some changes. This debate should not end without a specific pledge by the government to introduce legislation containing the main recommendations of the Barbeau Committee. I say to the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Macdonald) that if this debate ends without a clear indication from the government along this line, we will know that the government is dragging its feet on serious reform of our electoral system.
Your Honour may be surprised to hear that I have friends within the Liberal party, both outside and inside this House. Usually they speak to me in confidence, but perhaps they would speak openly because they are left wing Liberals. They are reformers at heart. They joined the Liberal party because they believed it was a genuine instrument of reform.


An hon. Member:: That's what it is.


Francis Andrew Brewin: That is what they told me. They believe that they can effectively advance needed changes in our political and social system. I say to them that here is the
May 28, 1970

acid test: the Barbeau Committee has proposed a detailed, practical and sweeping reform of our present undemocratic system which is biased in favour of the corporate elite. I challenge the government to produce draft legislation to implement this reform. There is no need of another committee study before the legislation is introduced. The committee study can come after the government has decided on the basic principles. I challenge the left wing Liberals and reformers in the Liberal party, if there are any, and the present Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) who used to be counted among them, to make sure that this government means business on this issue of electoral reform and will not come in with some sort of half-baked, inefficient, useless so-called compromise, but with the full recommendation of the committee.
If before the next election the government has not added to the bill now before us, which only deals with detailed repairs to our electoral system, the whole new structure of election finances and expenses proposed by the Barbeau Committee, we shall know how hollow the government's claim is of their belief in reform and genuine democracy.
[DOT] (4:30 p.m.)

Mr. Yves Forest (Parliamentary Secretary
to President of the Privy Council): Mr. Speaker, I had the honour to be on the Committee on Privileges and Elections, which made recommendations for amendments to the Elections Act-recommendations which were for the most part incorporated in this legislation-and I must say that the committee was presided over with tact and efficiency by the hon. member for Montmorency (Mr. La-flamme).
Mr. Speaker, as did many other hon. members, I would like to point out that we received the valuable help of the chief electoral officer, who let us benefit by his experience and advice, a fact that all those who have taken part in this debate so far were pleased to mention.
Mr. Speaker, my speech will not be very long since the main provisions of this bill were explained yesterday by the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Macdonald) as well as by other members of this House. I will merely make a few remarks about the bill before us which deals with the consolidation of the Elections Act.
In reply to the previous speaker who talked only about election expenses, I should like to
Canada Elections Act
point out that this question has been allowed to stand and will soon be the subject of a study by a special committee, according to the suggestion made by a colleague of the hon. member for Greenwood (Mr. Brewin). Had the government followed his suggestion and introduced a bill on election expenses, it would have been blamed for it because its action would supposedly have been taken without referring the matter to all the members of the committee. I believe the government is quite right in referring this important study to a committee made up of representatives of all parties, that could look into the matter and consider the Barbeau Committee Report which contains some good recommendations while others have to be studied in depth.
Mr. Speaker, we have before us a very important piece of legislation. The Elections Act ensures the operation of a sound democracy and is one of the essential elements of our government system.
When we consider the various procedures in the provinces and in other countries, we come to the conclusion that our Elections Act may not be perfect, but it seems to be the best that could have been passed and the most consistent -with our traditions, our customs and our needs, taking into account the vastness of our country and the mobility of our population.
The committee made recommendations and the bill includes improvements and changes intended to enable the greatest number of qualified citizens to exercise their franchise, a principle members of the committee constantly bore in mind.
For example, by instituting a system of proxy voting for certain classes of persons such as fishermen, mariners, prospectors, persons who because of illness or physical incapacity are confined in hospitals or elsewhere, fulltime students in educational institutions-when the election takes place during an academic term-and public service electors on duty abroad as well as all dependent electors who are dependents of such public service electors, and also by extending the right to vote at advance polls, I believe the new Canada Elections Act fully achieves its objectives, while remaining in the realm of the possible and the practicable, in the absence of a permanent voters' list, which should be necessary to permit the absentees to exercise their franchise.
Mr. Speaker, on several occasions, and mainly at the time of the recent elections in

nated in at least 10 per cent of the electoral districts in Canada on the 28th day before polling day, a necessary delay as that day is nomination day, I believe, in the 21 constituencies listed in Schedule III of the Act.
The government has modified that provision by stipulating, in the bill, that this advantage will be reserved to parties with candidates in 75 electoral districts that is to parties of national standing, and not to those fly-hy-nighters, that sometimes crop up, as in the last election, when a party known as, I believe, the Rhinoceros had several candidates. As the hon. member for Regina-Lake Centre (Mr. Benjamin) pointed out himself yesterday, this will be all the more necessary when the matter of reimbursing electoral expenses comes up. I for one do not feel that it is necessarily anti-democratic to require that a party have candidates in just over 25 per cent of the electoral districts in order to be considered as a national party, instead of a minigroup, a local or regional party.
Mr. Speaker, it was also said that in the future the right to vote should be reserved to Canadian citizens only, and the committee was in favour of that idea. But, after long discussions, they agreed that it might be irregular, if not unfair, to deprive of their franchise those who had it in 1968, at the time of the last general election, and who have had it since. The government adopted a similar attitude, but it may be only temporary. There may be changes which might encourage people to ask for their Canadian citizenship.
Mr. Speaker, many other provisions should be discussed, but I do not want to delay any further the passing of this excellent legislation, which will, in any event, be studied in committee. I presume that study will be rather lengthy because of the great number of changes. But, precisely because of those changes, and the increasing publicity which doubtless will be given those amendments and the new provisions in the bill, I trust some progress has been made. The government had committed itself to recasting the Elections Act and I am sure that such a move will be welcomed by the people.


Francis William (Frank) Maine: Mr. Speaker, a step by step study of the Elections Act seems to me a sound and relevant way to deal with the overall reform of the legislation.
The minister's decision-supported by all the members of the House-to proceed step by step is therefore most welcome. One 22375-53
Canada Elections Act
cannot expect to complete at one fell swoop and within a few months all the reforms our Elections Act calls for.
It is very wise, for example, to set up a special committee to study in depth and in detail the item dealing with the electoral expenditures.
This study should not, however, be delayed. The expenditures are one of the main hindrances to a true democracy, where, at long last, ideas and opinions would supersede powerful and sometimes nefarious influence of money.
It is therefore imperative that we should all be involved in the cost of elections. This is one way for Canadians to come closer to government by the people.
On this side of the House, we, the Credi-tistes in particular, have always felt the regrettable influence of slush funds which jeopardize the free play of democracy. The sooner is passed a legislation which will control expenditures, the sooner the people will exert a healthy influence on their rulers. It is therefore to be hoped that by the end of 1971 at the latest, this most serious matter will finally be settled.
The arguments put forward by the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Macdonald) with regard to the permanent list of electors, have almost convinced me. If in fact the experience of various countries such as France, England and Australia which already have a permanent list, proves to be quite questionable and ineffective, we should, I agree, think twice before establishing one in this country.
However, I fear that the minister might have let himself be overly influenced by a piece of legislation passed in this House in 1934 and which was immediately repealed in 1938. The vastness of Canada, its widely scattered population, the little information available to a great many of our people in more or less remote areas, all these things do not exist nowadays, due to all the modern facilities brought about by progress.
At first blush, I feel that many more arguments will have to be put forward before we are really convinced that a permanent election list would not be workable. The cost of such a list may seem greater since it would be difficult and expensive to bring it up to date. But, considering the numerous and various uses it could have, perhaps the cost would not be outrageous after all.

May 28, 1970
Canada Elections Act
It is easy enough, for instance, for the Department of National Revenue, to know who is who. There is the census, there are reports from municipalities, parishes, provinces or other offices who keep an eye on the population. A good co-ordination of all those sources of information should be seriously considered. In brief, we should explore every avenue to find out whether it would not be worthwhile considering again the possibility of a permanent election list. If the committee has done this, I shall accept their conclusions.
As far as Canadians voting abroad are concerned, indeed, those whose duties allow them to keep abreast of what goes on in this country deserve to be able to vote. However, I would make some reservations, if not some objections.
I can hardly imagine someone totally unaware of what has been happening in the country for years and who might be told of the government's competence and generosity right before the poll, casting a truly free vote.
Mr. Speaker, I still have fresh in my memory a judicial recount in my constituency, after the last election. Having had the opportunity to see each ballot paper, I noted some peculiarities, for instance, similar handwriting among Canadian forces men, or the name of the candidate appearing on a special ballot paper.
A few weeks later, I met a soldier who told me that, while he was in hospital in Ontario, a returning officer had come to see him and had told him, among other things, that he was to vote in the Champlain riding where there were four candidates, two of which bore the name "Matte". The soldier asked him which one was a Creditiste. The returning officer answered immediately "Jean-Paul Matte", thus giving another vote to the liberal candidate.
There are so many possible ways of circumventing somewhat the democratic process that I wonder if, for a few hundred or a few thousand people, we should risk getting votes that are more or less sincere and reasonable. We should first of all, I think, make every effort to enable someone who is abroad to vote in his riding-thus many votes cast abroad would be rejected-and we should also seriously consider whether it can be truly useful to have ballot boxes travel around the world in a Canadian election.
Even though it may well be understood, I cannot see any difference between a person who works for the government or one who is

self-employed, although the President of the Privy Council seemed to make a case of it in his remarks. I cannot see any difference whether one or the other happens to be away from his usual place of residence or his constituency on election day.
Is it not the same, for instance, if an individual from Champlain riding happens to be in Vancouver during the month of the election or if a person is working for NATO in Europe on behalf of the government?
So naturally I think that a more reasonable method should be found to enable the greatest number of Canadians to vote, but there will always be some who will have to be sacrificed to safeguard true freedom.
In my opinion, this reform of the Elections Act is timely, Mr. Speaker, and I hope that it will be considered with adequate seriousness, so that when the time comes for the people to elect a new government, they will vote themselves power instead of leaving it all to the government. That is democracy, and I believe that the act which regulates elections must safeguard at any cost the basic principle of human freedom.
[DOT] (4:50 p.m.)


Mr. Paul St. Pierre (Coast Chilcotin):: Mr. Speaker, time is short today and, therefore, I do not have sufficient time to review even a portion of this very voluminous bill which is before us. I should like, however, to bring to the attention of the House the clause which deals with proxy voting and which represents the committee's resolution of the problem concerning voters who are absent from their places of residence in which they are registered on voting day. In my riding, and in many ridings of the west, northern Canada and portions of eastern Canada, this is a serious problem. After due study of the matter the committee chose the proxy balloting system in preference to the absentee balloting system. I know members of the committee studied this matter long and hard, and the majority came to the conclusion that the absentee balloting system is not workable in federal elections.
I am disturbed to find that the classification of workers who would be given the opportunity to register their vote through a proxy is limited pretty well to fishermen and prospectors. Therefore, it is my intention when this debate reaches the committee of the whole stage to move an amendment in this regard. Certainly, in relation to my own
May 28. 1970

riding and several other ridings of which I am aware in British Columbia, it would be quite improper that loggers not be included in this clause. With my eye on the clock, I thank the House for its attention.


Mr. Randolph Harding (Kootenay West):: Mr. Speaker, it is close enough to five o'clock to call it five o'clock if the chair would agree.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: It is not a question of the chair agreeing. It is a question of the House agreeing. I take it that the House agrees.


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION


Mr. Deputy 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 Regina East (Mr. Burton)- Grain-provision of freight cars for special delivery permit wheat; the hon. member for Calgary North (Mr. Woolliams)-Trade- Negotiations on export of petroleum and natural gas to United States; the hon. member for Fraser Valley West (Mr. Rose)-Veterans Affairs-pensions.
It being five o'clock the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's Order Paper, namely Notices of Motions (papers).



PRIVATE MEMBERS' MOTIONS FOR PAPERS


Mr. J. Edward Broadbenl (Oshawa-Whitby) moved:: That an order of the House do issue for a copy of the cabinet directive on summer employment for students referred to by the Minister of Manpower and Immigration in his press release of April 30, 1969.
He said: Mr. Speaker, my speech will be brief since last week in the House I argued a matter of principle identical to this. It seems to me what is required in our system of gov-22375-531
Summer Employment jor Students ernment at this time is for the government to show cause for not disclosing any document which has been referred to publicly in the manner in which this document has. It is, in effect, an argument that we reverse the traditional parliamentary procedure whereby the government retains all it can in the hope that the opposition does not manage to gouge out some bit of information. In the interests of freedom and democracy, it was argued last week that we should accept as a principle in the House what has been accepted as a principle in Sweden.
I refer to the right of a citizen, the right of the opposition and the right of people in general in this country, to have access to government documents unless cause can be shown for keeping them secret. Last week I suggested two or three principles which it seemed to me could be invoked by the government in justification of keeping documents private or secret. I have no intention at this time of repeating the argument and look forward to hearing the government's defence to this particular motion.
Mr. Yves Fores! (Parliamentary Secretary to President of the Privy Council): Mr. Speaker, I cannot add very much to what was given in answer to the hon. member's motion last November 19 by the parliamentary secretary to the Prime Minister. At that time he told the hon. gentleman that the motion called for the production of a cabinet directive.
[DOT] (5:00 p.m.)
This is a cabinet document, and it has always been the practice in this House that cabinet papers and directives were privi-ledged documents which could not be made the subject of a motion for production of papers. This is the main reason this particular document cannot be produced in the House. This would create a precedent. I do not think it has been done in the past, and it has not been the rule or practice in the House to ask for the production of documents which are for the use of the cabinet and not for the members generally.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, I must take sharp issue with the comments just made by the Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Forest). It seems to me that merely to say this is a cabinet document and that cabinet documents are not produced, does not settle the issue at all. Indeed, in
May 28, 1970

Summer Employment for Students addition to the argument advanced by my colleague, the hon. member lor Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent), which I think is very sound, I would point out that there is a general rule that documents that in any way have the force of law have to be made public. That has been accepted time and time again.
I am not arguing that this is a document that has the force of law. But it looks to me as though it is a document on the basis of which it can be determined whether or not a person gets a job. It is a cabinet directive on summer employment for students. It is a matter of public policy. It is a directive or set of guidelines, on the basis of which students either get employment or do not get employment. I suggest that for a document like this to be kept secret under the general statement just made by the Parliamentary Secretary, that you do not table cabinet documents, just does not wash. There are compelling reasons why this document ought to be tabled, and I hope the House will support the motion.


Mr. Bell:: May I ask the hon. member a question because I am having some difficulty on this one, although we have supported most of these motions for disclosure. Has the hon. member any precedent for a document, identified as a cabinet directive, to be tabled?


Stanley Howard Knowles: I do
not have any precedents at hand, Mr. Speaker, but I have some common sense and it seems to me that, as I have already said, any document on which a person's livelihood can depend is something that should not be kept secret.


David Orlikow: Mr. Speaker, we now have on the Order Paper something in the neighbourhood of 459 motions for the production of papers. While I have not made an actual count, a rough calculation is that the government has agreed to the tabling of not more than 10 per cent of the documents requested. So, in effect about 400 of the 459 requests for documents and reports have been turned down by the government, because if the government asks that such a motion be transferred for debate it is in fact turning down the request.
It seems to me that we have had 400 different reasons given as to why these documents should not be produced. I see the Minister of Regional Economic Development (Mr. Mar-chand) in the chamber. He is a relatively new member of the Liberal party, and that party has not changed since long before he became a member of it. Possibly he has changed but

the Liberal party has not changed. I believe that all of these reasons are founded on the inherent belief of members of the Liberal party that they have a divine right to rule this country. Along with that goes the belief that the Liberal government has a God given right to information, and that the rest of the country, including members of the opposition and backbenchers on the Liberal side, who have even less rights than members on this side although most of them are too stupid to know it, do not have any right to that information. All they have a right to do is accept what the government says, or what the minister says must be so, and of course the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) thinks, just like de Gaulle the former president of France, that every four or five years we can have some kind of referendum which will confirm or not confirm the government in office. However, as long it is there, it can do anything it wants.
I submit that the question of employment for students is a very important matter to students. They have a right to know the basis upon which the policy is set. I am not so concerned about what the precedents are because I have never been in cabinet, and I don't expect ever to be in a cabinet,-


An hon. Member:: You are so right.


David Orlikow: -but I would like to get some explanation as to why this document would be harmful if it were made public. Before the Minister of Regional Economic Expansion became a member of this House, he was interested in workers and unemployment, but he does not seem to be very interested any more. Surely workers, whether they are young or old, have the right to know the basis on which governments, or any other organizations, decide whether they shall or shall not have employment, and if there is employment, what the criteria will be for deciding who gets it, and so on.
What earthly reason can there be for not disclosing this information, except arrogance on the part of Liberal governments, to which the Canadian people have become accustomed?


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


David Orlikow: I wish the trained seals, the baboons at the back, would get up and speak. Why don't they make speeches instead of shouting interjections?


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.
May 28, 1970	COMMONS DEBATES	7453
Summer Employment for Students


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: I would invite the indicate this had ever been done by this hon. member for Winnipeg North (Mr. Orli- House. It certainly would constitute a danger-kow) to continue his remarks.	ous precedent.


David Orlikow: I would be glad to continue, Mr. Speaker. However, if there are going to be interjections I wish they would be intelligent, so that I could deal with them. There is no reason for the government to refuse to table this document, except its belief that it does not have to account to anybody.
A professor at Carleton University who, if memory serves me correctly, is a pretty committed Liberal, has pointed out the vast difference between the policy we follow in Canada and that which is followed in Sweden. In Canada, everything is considered secret unless there is a special order making it public. In Sweden, the exact reverse is the case. Everything is considered public except in special cases, particularly security, when documents ought not to be made public. Surely a government which talks so much and so eloquently about participatory democracy, which is so interested in letting the people know in a non-partisan way what is going on that it set up Information Canada, would want the people to know its policy for summer employment. If that is the case, then I would suggest to the government that it accept not just this motion but all such motions on the Order Paper. It should reverse its earlier policy and make available to the members of Parliament, the press, TV and to the general public, all information which ought to be and could be given to them. This, Mr. Speaker, I submit comprises probably 97 per cent of all the requests for information made by members of the opposition up to now.
[DOT] (5:10 p.m.)
I would urge the government, although without a great deal of hope, to accede to the request of the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent).


Mr. Forest:: Would the hon. member accept an intelligent question? Does the hon. member not realize that it is not so much a question of content that is so important in this case, as a question of the principle involved? A cabinet directive or document which is for the information of government members only should not be submitted to the House of Commons. Even that learned authority, that walking dictionary, the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles), could not submit any authority to


David Orlikow: Mr. Speaker, since I am not a
lawyer-neither one of the old fashioned type nor one of the new fashioned type-I do not have the respect for precedent which the hon. member who just asked the question has. If it makes common sense, if there is reason or justification for doing this, then I am not concerned whether or not it has been done in the past.
With regard to the specific question of a cabinet directive, if it were dealing with something like security, something highly secret or confidential, and the minister advanced that argument I would be quite prepared to listen to it. But I submit there is nothing in this directive that ought to be kept from the public. That is my answer to the specific question the hon. member asked. I would pay a great deal more attention to that argument if it were the only objection to motions asking for the production of papers, but as I said earlier every time there is such a motion we are given a different reason why we ought not to get the document. It is either a cabinet directive or an interdepartmental communication not considered to be in the public interest-I would have to list 400-odd reasons given on one occasion or another why documents ought not to be tabled.
I say again that I reject completely the arguments put forward, most of which have no validity. The arrogant attitude of the government that nobody should have any information except the government is the reason for refusing these requests.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Question.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Is the House ready for the question?


Some hon. Members:: Question.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: The question is on the main motion. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the said motion? All those in favour will please say yea.


Some hon. Members:: Yea.


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


Some hon. Members:: Nay.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: In my opinion, the nays have it.

May 28. 1970
Division
And more than five members having risen:


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Call in the members.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: I wonder if we might call it six o'clock, Mr. Speaker.


Mr. Speaker:: Is that agreed?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.
At 5.43 p.m. the House took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The House resumed at 8 p.m.


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Macdonald (Rosedale) that Bill C-215, respecting the franchise of electors and the election of members to the House of Commons, be read the second time and referred to committee of the whole.
Randolph Harding: Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to have an opportunity to talk briefly on Bill C-215, the Canada Elections Act. It is a voluminous document. It is enough to frighten members of the House, having 355 pages of subject matter. One might well wonder why so much regulation is needed to rim an election, but on checking through the bill I find that although
May 28, 1970

there are a number of very interesting and good amendments suggested by the government and by the committee which did a great deal of work on the Canada Elections Act prior to the drafting of this document, there are still one or two areas desperately in need of amendment. It is not my intention tonight to go over the entire bill; I felt I would deal with two or three of the major points, points that the government and members of the House should take another look at before finally passing into law the huge bill that is under debate.
The first point I should like to deal with tonight is the problem of getting the vote to those Canadians who are entitled to be on the voters' list. I have been through a number of elections, federal, provincial and municipal, as have most members of this House, and over the years I have come to realize how desperately we have needed electoral change, not only in the federal field but in the provincial and municipal fields.
In going over the report issued by the Chief Electoral Officer following the last election that took place in 1968, a report supplied to all members, I find some very interesting figures that I think hon. members should take into consideration when making changes in respect of the new act. I should like to draw to the attention of members of the House and Canadians generally that in the 1968 federal election 10,860,000 Canadians were on the voters' list. Out of this total, 8,218,000 cast ballots, which means that 2,642,000 Canadians failed to go to the polls for one reason or another. This figure is staggering when you realize that about 24 per cent, or one out of every four Canadians, did not cast a ballot in 1968.
I am not naive enough to think you can devise a system that will provide 100 per cent voter participation. Some countries have compulsory voting. I do not know how successful is a system that forces people who have no interest in an issue to cast a ballot, and I am not sure that this is the solution. But when I think of the 2,642,000 Canadians who did not cast their vote in 1968 I wonder just how efficient we as legislators have been in drafting our Elections Act and setting up election machinery to enable Canadians to cast ballots.
[DOT] (8:10 p.m.)
I suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, and to hon. members that people do not cast their ballots for a variety of reasons. Sometimes they are
Canada Elections Act
just not interested. A number of Canadians do not cast their ballots because of religious beliefs. Then we have those people who are incapacitated and thus are unable to go to the polls. I believe we then come to the group which represents the greatest number of Canadians who do not vote: this is the group of electors who are absent from their constituencies on voting day. I should like to say a few words about this group.
I know that in this bill there are one or two minor amendments dealing with proxy voting. This, however, does not cover those Canadians who in this vast country of ours are for one reason or another forced to be absent from their constituencies on voting day. They are deprived of the right to participate in choosing the government of their country. I think this is an important issue because under our system of democracy the most precious thing we have is the right to cast a ballot for the party or program of our choice.
In the world of today we believe we have a good system of choosing representatives whom we wish to be elected. We should enact every measure we can to make certain the electorate of this country has as wide a participation as possible. I feel that one way to achieve this end is to set up an absentee system of voting. I am well aware that the committee studied this problem. I am also well aware of the tremendous difficulty that lies in the way of setting up an adequate absentee voting system in Canada. I say, however, we must devise a system that will allow Canadians who are absent from their constituencies on voting day to cast their ballots by means of absentee vote. I am convinced this can be accomplished if we are willing to spend the money required to set up the proper type of system and give it a try.
Who, primarily, are the people who are absent from their constituencies? It is difficult to pinpoint any particular group or individuals, but the bulk of those who are absent from their constituencies on voting day are involved in occupations which require that they be absent from home. They may be in another part of the province or in another part of the dominion in order to earn a livelihood. Another large group is composed of students many of whom are from the rural areas of our nation. They are forced to go to the cities to attend university, technical school or vocational school in order to further their education. Up to the present time this large group of voters has been unable to cast

May 28, 1970
Canada Elections Act
a ballot in federal elections. Then there is the group of Canadians who travel for business or pleasure. They do not always know when the government wishes to call an election. These people often have made their plans and find that on voting day they are in another country or in another part of our country. These people also lose their opportunity to help choose the type of administration they feel should be running our country.
I am very concerned that we are to have a new Elections Act which will probably serve the Canadian nation for many years and yet the most effective measure to give votes to people in the classes I have mentioned is not contained in it. I refer, of course, to the absentee ballot. I come from the province of British Columbia which for a number of years has had the absentee ballot for provincial elections. I was a member of the provincial House in British Columbia before coming to Ottawa and I know the problems connected with absentee voting. I also know that tens of thousands of absentee ballots are cast by voters who are absent from their own poll but are still within their riding. Again, absentee ballots are cast by university students. These are students who come from areas in the interior of British Columbia. They are allowed to go to a poll in Vancouver and vote for a candidate representing a constituency in the interior. This is important to the students because on election day they would be unable to get back to their constituencies 500 or 600 miles away and cast their ballot.
Other provinces have an absentee voting system. I suggest that if provincial governments can devise such systems and make them work, such a system could also work on a federal basis. I do not suggest I am too happy about the type of enumeration we have in British Columbia, but again this is a matter of a change in a system which the federal government could easily bring about in an effort to see that more people are in a position to cast their ballots. I do not see anything wrong with someone from my constituency, whether he or she happens to be in Toronto, Ottawa, Winnipeg or Vancouver, going to a ballot-box and having the opportunity to cast an absentee ballot for one of the candidates running in my constituency. In this day of electronic gadgets which are in the process of being perfected to an ever-increasing degree, the tallying of absentee ballots should not be too difficult.

[DOT] (8:20 p.m.)
Might I point out that we have enumerated Canadians for a number of federal purposes. We have lists of Canadians for the Canada Pension Plan, for unemployment insurance, for family allowances and for a host of other things. Surely, with the talent we have scattered throughout the various government departments it should not be too difficult to establish an enumeration plan which we could handle from a central base, effectively and well. Such a system would extend the franchise to many more hundreds of thousands of Canadians and would give us that much more democracy in our nation.
I wish to deal briefly with the system which the government seems to think will take the place of an absentee ballot, namely, the proxy system of voting. I know we will be dealing with the clauses of the bill in committee but, Mr. Speaker, I hope you will allow me to spend a little time dealing with this system of voting as outlined in the bill. We find on page 117 of the bill the reference to a system of voting by proxy.
Proxy voting means that if someone is absent from his home riding, a certificate may be obtained and one individual may cast a ballot for that person. I do not like such a system. I think it can lead to a host of abuses. Just to point out one of the weaknesses in it, I wish to read part of the clause outlining the people who may vote by proxy. The three relevant paragraphs are:
(a)	his absence from the polling division in the course of his employment as a fisherman, mariner or prospector,
(b)	his illness or physical incapacity, or
(c)	his absence from the polling division while a full-time student duly registered at a recognized educational institution in Canada during an academic term.
May I return to the first paragraph-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon.
member will understand that I have to interrupt him for a moment. He knows, as do all hon. members, that at this stage of the proceedings we should not get involved in detailed discussion of the individual clauses. I think the hon. member is going a little too far when he refers specifically to a clause and reads it. It seems to me that this is the kind of discussion we should reserve for the committee stage of our consideration. I realize that we have allowed quite a bit of latitude until now in this debate. I certainly do not want to prevent the hon. member from referring to the individual clause in the bill, but
May 28. 1970

we may be going a bit far when reading these clauses and studying them in detail. I hope the hon. member will not mind my bringing this to his attention and perhaps he will bear the suggestion in mind when continuing his remarks.


Randolph Harding: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It was not my intention to deal with these clauses. I want to point out just how many voters are being omitted from these provisions. I felt I had to make the point that fishermen, mariners and prospectors are not all that should be included. I was going to ask the government: Why have you excluded railway workers? Why have the construction workers been excluded? Why have those who work in the logging industry been excluded, those who have to be out in the camps and the bush, many miles from a polling booth, on election day? How about the longshoremen? There are other categories deliberately excluded which might also vote by proxy. This is the point I am making and it is the only point I have in bringing this clause to the attention of hon. members. You have included several groups who will be away from their ridings, but there are other groups who for various reasons will be absent. In my opinion this clause is particularly weak and ineffective for that reason.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, would the hon. member accept a question at this point?


Randolph Harding: Certainly.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: The hon.
member talks about "you", presumably meaning the government. Is he aware that the specific enumeration of the groups he mentioned, fishermen, mariners, prospectors and full-time students, as well as those suffering illness and physical incapacity, was the recommendation of the committee? The government has adopted its recommendations in this regard. May I also say that this afternoon the hon. member for Coast Chilcotin (Mr. St. Pierre) suggested further changes, and I would be glad to hear of possible amendments from him as well.


Randolph Harding: May 28, 1970
Canada Elections Act
Again, the reason for this is given in detail.
III.	An effort should be made to increase public participation in politics, by broadening the base of political contributions through tax concessions to donors.
IV.	Costs of election campaigns should be reduced, by shortening the campaign period, by placing limitations on expenditures on mass media by candidates and parties, and by prohibiting the payment of poll workers on election day.
V.	Public confidence in political financing should be strengthened, by requiring candidates and parties to disclose their incomes and expenditures.
Our party has always been willing to open its books to the general public to disclose campaign contributions, and we would like the other parties to do the same:
VI.	A registry under the supervision of a registrar should be established to audit and publish the financial reports required, and to enforce the provisions of the proposed "Election and Political Finances Act".
VII.	Miscellaneous amendments to broadcasting legislation should be enacted to improve the political communications field.
The committee found that many of the very large corporations were making heavy contributions and a limited number of companies were supplying the larger amounts of cash for political campaigns. This is not good in a democratic country and it can and does lead to abuse. I urge members of all parties to read this report and I trust they will accept the seven points laid down by the committee which I believe to be very sound.
There are several other matters which merit attention, Mr. Speaker, but I felt I should deal only with the two most important, the one concerning absentee voting and the other the costs of elections. The other points which should be discussed can be dealt with when the bill is before the House at the committee stage. I hope we will have discussion on the sections dealing with proxy voting versus absentee voting at that time.


Mr. R. N. Thompson (Red Deer):: Mr. Speaker, this is a most important bill: the size of the bill indicates this. Seldom are we asked to deal with a bill containing 355 pages and with more than three score amendments that have already been recommended by the committee. It is difficult to cover all aspects of a bill like this in debate. I commend the committee for the tremendous work they have done in preparing the many amendments already incorporated in the bill. I know more amendments are yet to be made.
I was very interested in the problem raised by the hon. member for Kootenay West (Mr. 
Harding) when he spoke of the small percentage of Canadian electors who participate in any specific election. We are all concerned with this problem and I do not think anything we add to this bill will result in bringing a greater percentage of the qualified electors to the polls.
It is up to us to ensure that our electoral legislation is just and equitable and provides an opportunity for every Canadian to participate in an election. Provision must be made for people absent from their constituencies to have an opportunity to vote. In many ways this bill has improved the situation in making it possible for people to participate in an election. There are more vital matters, however. While agreeing with the major part of the bill and supporting the bill in general, I think there are a number of ways in which it can be improved. There are some weak points in the bill and in several areas it must be amended to provide a more equitable opportunity to electors.
The recommendation in the bill to lower the voting age to 18 has resulted from a great deal of discussion. When I first became a member of this House I was strongly in favour of encouraging younger people to participate in the processes of democracy. I felt that we should encourage responsibility at as early an age as possible, but in meetings with young people, particularly students, I soon came to understand that there was no pressure from that group in this regard. It is a rather interesting aspect of this suggestion of lowering the voting age that general voting patterns in provincial elections where the voting age has already been lowered have not really changed from those in previous elections.
[DOT] (8:40 p.m.)
I have wondered why our young people have not been stronger in their demands for a lower voting age. However, I think this provision to give them the vote at 18 is good because it will give our young people the chance to participate in political decisions. Young people these days know much more about politics than we did or people of previous generations. I look forward to seeing how they meet the challenge. I hope they will understand that we are giving them the opportunity in this legislation to become involved in the political process. This should make democracy more real to them.
In addition to the provision lowering the voting age, the bill also contains the welcome
May 28. 1970


Mr. Alkenbrack:: Hear, hear!


Robert Norman Thompson: If the principle of identifying the political affiliation of any candidate nominated for an election is acceptable, why should we not extend that right across-the-board to all candidates? Why should there be discrimination against an independent candidate? Very often independent candidates run. It seems to me that if we think it fair that the candidates of a large party are to have their party affiliation noted on the ballot, we ought to allow even those who are running as independent members to show they are independent. After all, many of them have

May 28, 1970
Canada Elections Act
been elected in the past. I therefore question the justice of the decision to include on the ballot the political affiliation of only some candidates. I urge that this right be extended across-the-board to all candidates, or eliminated altogether.
Something else that interests me extremely is the recommendation of the bill that would eliminate a special privilege that British subjects have enjoyed. Immigrants from other countries have not been extended that same privilege. I know that across the country there are many people who feel this is a further breaking down of traditions. However, it is interesting to note that Great Britain has already changed this situation for the electors of that country, and thus has eliminated the concept of a Commonwealth citizenship. I can understand the feeling of the many Canadians who believe that the right to vote should extend to all people in an equitable fashion rather than in one way for some and another way for others. While this may be a controversial point in some areas and there may be some justification in objecting to this, there is equity and justice in Bill C-215 in this regard.
[DOT] (8:50 p.m.)
One of the best ways to encourage people to participate in the process of electing their representatives to the various legislatures and to the House of Commons is to eliminate all those grey areas where people believe there is injustice in the regulations as they exist. There are several major ways in which the bill falls short. I am disappointed that the bill does not deal with several rather important changes that could have been brought about. The President of the Privy Council (Mr. Macdonald) stated that a special committee has been set up to deal with party finances.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Will be.


Robert Norman Thompson: A special committee will be set up. I think this is good. I would be much more critical of the bill if this were not being done. I do not think that now is the time to deal with this subject at length. In this area, however, there is a very vital aspect which will tend to encourage people to realize that the voting process is just and that the political process represents democracy and is a reflection of the thinking of people in a fair way. Not only is it important that the question of political contributions be dealt with in an above-board manner so that people will know that patronage or influence is not being 
used in respect of political contributions, but it would be wise as well to make political contributions tax exempt. There is no reason why this should not be so.
I am strongly in favour of retaining the right to give a portion of our income to charitable and useful causes on a tax exempt basis. What more important cause could there be than the preservation of democracy? We should encourage our citizens to voluntarily contribute to the political process, not just during election years but every year. I am not just talking about individual citizens, but also corporate citizens. If there were facilities for income tax deduction as are now provided for contributions for charitable reasons, people would be encouraged considerably by knowing that we value the democratic process. Contributions would not pass under the table, but would be above-board. They would be recognized as a worth-while and a patriotic cause. The special committee that is to be set up will have a very important responsibility. I am glad it will be given the opportunity to properly discuss this matter and hold public hearings, with some change being brought about in this aspect of the electoral process.
The greatest omission of all in these recommendations is the failure of the legislation to establish a permanent voters' list. Many of the problems we have been and will be talking about in this debate would be eliminated if we had a permanent voters' list. There is the usual criticism relating to finances. I agree that the cost of a permanent voters' list is something to consider. It would obviously be more expensive than setting up a voters' list for each federal election. There is an aspect of the permanent voters' list which is far more extensive than just federal. I refer to the problem of enumeration every time there is a federal, provincial or municipal election. If the cost of enumeration at all levels were added together, I doubt that it would be greater than the cost of a permanent voters' list. The matter of absentee voting would be largely solved by a permanent voters' list. Where there is a permanent voters' list, each year there is an enumeration. Every voter carries his identification, including his picture. It has tremendous value in preventing double-voting which tends to take place in every election.
I have witnessed the permanent voters' list in operation in other countries. It is a far more efficient way of determining those who have a right to vote. It is a continuous process and is of benefit to provincial and municipal
May 28, 1970

governments as well as to the federal government. Another important aspect of a permanent voters' list is that it permits the shortening of the election campaign period. One of the reasons we in Canada require nearly two months is because nearly half that time is taken up with enumeration and preparation of the voters' lists. In Great Britain and other countries where the permanent voters' list is used, it is possible to have an election within four to five weeks from the time the election is called. We require eight weeks in Canada because it takes that length of time for the enumeration and preparation of the voters' lists. Further consideration should be given to this matter.
This bill does not adequately solve the problem of unsatisfactory participation with regard to the percentage of people concerned about the election process. This really cannot be changed through legislation unless there is compulsory voting. While compulsory voting seems to be effective in countries such as the Netherlands, I doubt if Canada is ready for compulsory voting at this time. If the electoral law could be improved in several additional areas, recognizing that a number of errors in the previous election laws have already been corrected, I think it would go a long way to convince people that they have a responsibility to vote and participate in an election.
To cover a bill such as this in debate requires a much longer time than is at our disposal. In closing, I wish to say that I support the bill. I recognize there are some areas where it could be strengthened. There are a few areas where there are omissions. Amendments will be proposed aimed at correcting some of these weak points and omissions. If that is done, we will be able to regard this as a good piece of legislation which the House can support. I do hope, however, that some of the weaker areas can be strengthened.
[DOT] (9:00 p.m.)


Almonte Douglas Alkenbrack: Mr. Speaker, I do not intend to take a long time with my remarks on Bill C-215, or to go into extreme detail on many of the issues covered by this document. As I was preparing my notes I made a quick calculation and found that if I were to deal for one minute with each page of this document I would have to speak for 355 minutes. Even on one of my very best days, Mr. Speaker, I would not entertain such a thought.
It is important to me, though, to be able to put my thoughts on record with respect to
Canada Elections Act
some of the points covered by the bill in which I have a special interest. In recent years there has been a noticeable tendency on the part of our young people to express their thoughts, and more often their displeasure, about what they call the older generation and often we find ourselves wondering why these same young people fail to recognize a basic truism with respect to the so-called generation gap. I am thinking, Mr. Speaker, of the simple and fundamental fact that yesterday we were their generation and that tomorrow they will be our generation.
This does not alter the fact that we should be cognizant of the expressions of our young people and we should be responsive to their appeals. But our response to their appeals should be carefully thought out and should be based on reasonable premises. Mr. Speaker, I cannot think of a more reasonable response to our young people than to put them where the action is and allow them to express their thoughts and their wishes where it counts most, in the polling booth.
I know that many people have recoiled in horror at the thought of giving radical young people the right to vote for Members of Parliament. We are told that the majority of young people are leftist, that they are communists and everything else that is inimical to our way of life and government. But I do not believe those arguments. I believe in the integrity of our young people and I believe that when the chips are down the majority of young voters will elect to preserve our way of government for themselves and for their children. In other words, I am saying that I am in favour of giving our 18-year old citizens the right to vote in federal elections.
We hear from every side that our young people want the right to decide their own destinies and to determine who shall represent them in their government. We have an opportunity here, Mr. Speaker, to put those people to the test and let them play an active part in the affairs of state. What they do with the franchise is up to them, but at least we should make it available to them.
I am opposed, however, to lowering the age limit to 18 for those who stand for public office. I do not agree we have to go that far to show our young people that we are with them and that we think it is time for them to become active in government. No man or woman who has just reached the age of 18 has had a chance to receive either a full education or an appreciable degree of practical experience. Education and practical experi-

May 28, 1970
Canada Elections Act
ence cannot be given to any 18-year old the day alter an election in order to fit that person for a public office which he or she might have won at the polls. For very practical reasons, then, I must oppose reducing the age limit for standing for public office. I am making every effort to qualify my criticisms because I am most anxious to reach conciliation with the government members and speed this important volume of revisions to our electoral laws through this House. I am making an effort to be constructive and helpful.
It has come to my attention since Bill C-215 was tabled that the electoral office has mailed out questionnaires to returning officers in all federal ridings across the country to elicit their comments and suggestions as to how our electoral laws and practices might be improved. I have been informed that many of the returning officers have suggested that the three-day training period for returning officers is not long enough to be effective. On the basis of information I have gathered, I would suggest that the training period should be lengthened to one week. Nothing is to be lost by making such a change, Mr. Speaker, but we do stand to gain a great deal in improved efficiency and morale.
I have also learned that most of those questioned feel that the general content of the training course is sufficient with respect to administrative and financial matters but, as I have mentioned, the time period is not long enough. I would like to make a suggestion here with respect to the financial rewards given to returning officers in the discharge of their duties. In the first place, Mr. Speaker, these could hardly be referred to as financial rewards. It is my impression that payments to returning officers during the performance of their duties are scarcely sufficient to cover their expenses. It has also been brought to my attention that returning officers receive no honorarium or other financial assistance between elections. I suggest we consider paying some form of retainer to returning officers between elections. In this way we can compensate them for actual expenses incurred and also compensate them for their diligence and even their availability. It scarcely needs to be mentioned that we could not hold an election without the services of efficient and devoted returning officers.
Another point which I feel should be dealt with while I am on the subject of returning officers is the time alloted to them in which to finalize the appointment of enumerators. It is

my opinion that insufficient time is allowed. This is especially true in the case of rural ridings, Mr. Speaker, and I think we should have a close look at this aspect of returning officers' duties. It is the enumerator who provides the information from which the voters' rolls are compiled, and I cannot emphasize too strongly the importance of this phase of the election process.
I should like to turn, now, to some of the suggestions for amendments which have been made, in this case some of the items mentioned in Appendix A which is attached to the report of the committee. For example, it is recommended that with prior approval of the Chief Electoral Officer, for good and valid reason the returning officer may authorize the amalgamation of two or more polling divisions. The recommendations speaks of "two or more". I recommend that the number be limited to two only. This limitation would avoid too great a degree of centralization and the confusion which would result from the amalgamation of a number of divisions in one premise.
[DOT] (9:10 p.m.)
In many rural polling divisions and subdivisions there is no longer a post office in which to display notices of proclamations. Section 22 deals with the sending of proclamations to postmasters at post offices. Due to the closing of many post offices in rural areas of Canada by the Postmaster General (Mr. Kierans), we will be unable to send out proclamations in the usual way to the electors in rural areas. Several townships in the northern part of my riding have no post offices at all in which they can post these proclamations. The question that follows is: Where are we going legally to post these proclamations? This is the question the committee of the whole will have to deal with, and the matter will have to be resolved before final passage of this bill.
I see another problem in section 24, which provides, among other things, that the revising officers are authorized to take names off a preliminary list of electors on the request of the persons themselves to remove their names from the list. I claim that no names should be allowed to be taken off any list of eligible voters, regardless of the wishes of the persons named or any personal request that is made. On the contrary, if a request is made to remove a name from the list, it might be made by a radical or changeable sort of person who would afterwards complain at
May 28. 1970

what had been done. I submit that once the names are put on the list, if they are there legitimately, under no circumstances should we go to the expense and bother of removing them.
I also disagree with the provisions of section 29. I suggest this amendment is discriminatory. It refers to the now infamous limit of 75 nominations for recognition of a political party. If this bill passes, parties must have 75 officially nominated and registered candidates to be recognized as a party by the party name on the ballot. What about the case where a party could nominate only 74 candidates, which is possible? After all, you cannot force people to be candidates. Such a party would certainly be entitled to a measure of electoral recognition on the ballot in proportion to the parties that nominate 75 candidates or more. So you can see, Mr. Speaker, how ludicrous is this Liberal-loaded dispensation of so-called justice from the sponsors of the just society.
It has been suggested to me that this provision requiring any new party to have 75 official nominations is the new Liberal method of fighting separatism. This figure of 75 is one seat more than the present federal electoral potential in the province of Quebec. If this is the government's strategy, I say they will never fight separatism successfully. It cannot be fought by discrimination, by making two classes of federal candidate, one with the blessing of the government and the party name alongside that of the candidate, the other an electoral martyr with no party affiliation indicated on the same ballot. If it ever does become necessary to fight separatism, it must be fought out in the open on the hustings with no electoral discrimination against any party or its candidates.
I next have some brief remarks to make on section 39, which provides for the setting up of a system of proxy voting. I am not condemning this system completely; it may be all right. Some day we may be able to work out a good system of proxy voting. But we must be very careful to check into it, on the ground that it is open to abuse. For example, someone might take advantage of the absence of a neighbour to vote twice. Section 42 provides that the political affiliation of a candidate who is endorsed by the leader of a registered party or his designated representative will be printed on the ballot paper. Section 43 provides that the requirement to indicate the address and occupation of a candidate on the ballot paper will be dispensed with. Basically,
Canada Elections Act
I am against any change being made to the nature of the ballot. This amendment takes away much of a candidate's individualism from the electoral process. I am sure most members in this chamber depend on individualism more than anything else to get themselves elected. If this amendment carries, future candidates will no longer have the benefit of any local or constituency identification as part of their individualism.
For example, a non-resident candidate could be parachuted into a riding, as was done by the Liberal party in the constituency that I represent, in the last election in June, 1968. Such a candidate would not require any identification on the ballot and would suddenly and legitimately be in the business of votegetting. Although I realize that this can be argued both ways, I am putting the case against the non-resident, parachuted candidate.
Why the sudden electoral recognition of political parties? The Liberals say they are now going to put the name of the political party on the ballot. Since Trudeaumania is dying, the designation "Liberal" will be nothing but a millstone around the necks of future candidates for the Liberal Party.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Then you should be in favour of it.


Almonte Douglas Alkenbrack: I thank hon. members for their response, though I well understand why they are concerned. Generally speaking, do we members of this House so much lack the attributes of individuality as public servants that we have to have the crutch of the name of a political party alongside our own name on the ballot in order to get elected? I think not.
Our seats in this House are not marked with the names of parties. There is the name of the elected member only; no political affiliation is stated, not even the member's riding. This designation is correctly unbiased. We are permitted as individuals, by the combined electoral decision of the people of Canada in their might and indeed in their majesty, to speak in this House when recognized by you, Mr. Speaker, and to exercise our vote when asked to and permitted to do so. I am against any and all political parties getting a free ride on the ballot paper. The name of the individual candidate is sufficient identification. This has always proven true in the past and will suffice for the future.

May 28, 1970
Canada Elections Act
The indication of a candidate's address and occupation has always been useful information. The ballot showed whether the candidate was a farmer, a merchant or even a hockey player. If a candidate is running, for example, in Marshy Hope, Nova Scotia, and he lives in Kinbasket Lake, British Columbia-two places at the extreme ends of this country that I have visited and which greatly enthralled me-the voters in Nova Scotia are entitled to have knowledge of his domicile on the ballot. I am sure you will agree with me, Mr. Speaker, that any amendment such as this will not serve the electors of Canada. Any such amendment would be a gross and arrogant disservice to the electors of Canada. It would also be a disservice in respect of the type of information they have been able to expect on the ballot since the time of Confederation but which apparently now is to be eliminated.
[DOT] (9:20 p.m.)
The outlets for the sale of alcoholic beverages are to be closed on an ordinary polling day only while the polls are open. I am in complete agreement with this amendment which requires that all the outlets for the sale of alcohol be closed only while the polls are open. The former practice was that they were closed for the complete 24-hour period. I do not think that is necessary any more because we have a better informed and more considerate electorate than we had many years ago.


An hon. Member:: I will drink to that.


Almonte Douglas Alkenbrack: Amendment 52 states
that any form of tampering with the election material or campaign literature of a candidate is an offence. However, this amendment is without power or authority. Clause 73 states:
Every one who without authority, takes down, removes, covers up, mutilates, defaces or alters any printed advertisement, placard, poster or banner having reference to the election of a candidate is guilty of an offence against this act.
This clause has no power. It applies principally to roadside advertising, tree and pole signs, and so on. This type of advertising is put up and remains there only at the pleasure of the public. It is not completely lawful for anyone to put up a sign on or within the right-of-way of any public road. All public roads in Canada, except the beautiful and presently tulip-lined driveways in Ottawa, are within the jurisdiction of either the provinces or municipalities. Moreover, it is against the laws of hydro and telephone companies to

erect signs on hydro and telephone poles. The federal government, however, can convict no one of contravening clause 73 of this bill in respect of the removal of signs on roadways. Mr. Speaker, that is all I have to say at this time. I hope to place the remainder of my comments on the record during the debate at committee of the whole stage. We have not had such a debate for some time, and I shall look forward to the debate on this bill in committee of the whole.


Mr. Robert C. Coates (Cumberland-Colches-ter North):: Mr. Speaker, on entering this debate I should like to congratulate the members of the committee who assisted in putting together such a substantial number of amendments to the Elections Act which in the end will achieve what all Members of Parliament must desire, that is, making available as far as possible the franchise to every Canadian over 18 years of age. The objectives contained in the amendments will be discussed in detail during the committee stage of the bill.
At this time I should like to talk about some omissions from the bill which, had they been incorporated, in my opinion at least would have guaranteed the franchise to a great many more Canadians. The first item I should like to mention is the permanent voting roll. It is called by a number of different names in different places, but at least under this system every elector would have his name on a roll. This would mean, as is the case in Great Britain at the present time, that an election could be called and a vote taken in a very short period of time. I hope this system will be provided in the Elections Act in the days ahead.
I hoped the committee would take such a step. I realize it is a very expensive move, but once such a move has been made the system is established. No longer would there be the severe problems which face many Canadians who are disqualified from voting because they happen to be located in a constituency other than the one in which they resided at the time the writ was issued. I find it very difficult to explain to an elector why his name is not on the voters' list. I find it difficult to explain to him why he cannot vote. In my view this is a much more serious matter than almost anything else. I am certain that thousands of Canadians are deprived of the right to vote because we do not have a permanent roll. I realize it is difficult to establish such a system, but it must be done some day and I ask: Why should we not face up to it today,
May 28, 1970

rather than putting it off until a future Parliament finds it must undertake the task? Unless we do this now, many Canadians at the next general election will discover they are deprived of their vote.
The other subject on which I should like to spend a little time relates to another bill which I hope the Government House Leader will consider referring to a committee. If he does not do so, I shall endeavour to propose an amendment at the proper time in respect of this bill. I believe, however, that it warrants the consideration of a committee of this House designated by the government. I refer to Bill C-211, relating to polls. I do not have any objection to polls being prepared and used in any shape or form by political parties at any time. I do not object to their being used at election time if proper guidelines are associated with them. What concerns me greatly, however-and I have observed this situation in six elections-is that there are no guidelines. Polls can be misused and therefore can be very dangerous.
I introduced Bill C-211, not because I am opposed to polls as such but because I am opposed to them in the context of politics today when there are no guidelines in this respect. I believe they pose a danger to the Canadian public and also to the credibility of the news media. I say this because during the recent election in the province of Quebec, polls were used first by the French newspapers and then by the two English speaking dailies in the city of Montreal.
[DOT] (9:30 p.m.)
As far as I am concerned, they were used to do nothing more than stampede the electorate, especially the uncommitted electors, to the Liberal party. Liberals in that province might rejoice in that fact. As a matter of fact, I think the result in the province of Quebec on election night was something for all Canadians to rejoice in, because at least it gave them four more years in which to prepare for the next onslaught by the separatist party in that province. But what concerns me is that the polls that were produced had no more association with the facts and the reality on election day than the man in the moon. It was quite obvious that the polls, in combination with the business community and its great Brinks operation, were used to stampede and frighten the electorate into voting for the Liberal party. That frightens me, Mr. Speaker, because while it was for the benefit of Canada that time, it may well turn out at
Canada Elections Act
some future time that individuals in powerful places may try to manipulate and frighten the electorate in a way which may not be good for Canada. That is why I introduced my bill.
I feel that all too often in this country polls are being used for the benefit of a political party. It does not always happen to be the Liberal party that is using them, but I say that people who are subjected to polls that later prove to be inaccurate, sometimes gravely inaccurate, not only lose respect for the organization or group using the polls but lose respect for the media generally and lose confidence in what the media place before them. As a result, these polls are dangerous.
On the other hand, I believe there are good polls, produced by organizations that take a great deal of care, that have a formula or guideline that they rigidly follow because they have respect for their own reputations. I believe the Gallup poll is one such poll. There are few people who would argue against it, considering its history. But when you find a man who holds himself out to be a political analyst carrying out a poll with a base of 800 or so people, to cover 6 million or 7 million people, you can have little respect for that poll especially when it includes 35 per cent uncommitted voters. In order to protect the public we have to do one of two things. We must either lay down some guidelines or ban the public use of polls during an election campaign. I have no objection to polls being used by political parties for their own internal purposes, but I take strong exception to their being used to dupe the public.
Our television media in particular must give serious consideration to the way they use polls at election time. Referring again to the recent CBC coverage of the Quebec election, I remember the start of its coverage on election night, when the program included Norman Depoe, Charles Lynch and another commentator whose name I forget. They began by saying that in all likelihood a minority government would be elected that night. Even they were fooled by the polls, and as the wave of Liberal victories started coming in they began to back off and back off. This is what polls do. They are put before the public as facts and the public accepts them as the gospel.
When you get so-called experts like Depoe and Lynch repeating what the polls have said, polls based on a sampling of 800 people and including 35 per cent uncommitted voters, I object to this. This is what we have to be concerned about. You and I, Mr. Speaker,

May 28, 1970
Canada Elections Act
read the papers a lot. We know their political background; we know the political background of news. But the general public does not know this background, does not read the newspapers as carefully as we do and at election time places great dependence on what newspapers have to say. If the newspapers tell them, as in the recent Quebec election, that there will be a minority government, that the separatist party is coming on like a house on fire, that there is a great danger it will elect the largest group of members, the public must become very concerned. In that election campaign the polls and the business community combined. Business firms lined up the Brinks trucks, loaded them up with so-called company assets and started them on their way to the Ontario border.
You and I, Mr. Speaker, are intelligent enough to know that it did not make any difference whether those Brinks trucks stayed in Montreal, whether the paper assets stayed in the vaults or whether the trucks crossed the border and went on to Toronto, but unfortunately a great many unknowing people in Quebec were frightened to death and, so far as I am concerned, were deceived into voting for the Liberal party because the newspapers and the business community joined together to commit a fraud on them. As I have already said, I did not mind this in that election. I was quite happy to see the Liberal party roll to the victory it achieved, and not being a Liberal that is a fairly big concession for me to make, but I am frightened that this fraud could be perpetrated on the public at some future date when it was not in the public interest. As Members of Parliament we should be concerned to see that when polls are used in an election campaign a set of rules or guidelines will be followed to assure that to some degree the information given is authentic.
[DOT] (9:40 p.m.)
Mr. Speaker, I believe that the main objective of all members of the House of Commons should be to see that every elector over 18 years of age in this country, after this bill passes, has the right to vote. I believe that even at the great cost involved in producing a permanent roll we should move amendments to this bill to indicate to the Chief Electoral Officer that immediate steps should be taken to produce a permanent roll. We should not be concerned in the future about the disqualification of Canadian citizens from voting-because they did not happen to be in the [Mr. Coates.J
electoral district on the date the writ was issued, were not enumerated, did not realize their name was not on the list or did not discover the omission in time to have it placed on the list. These are the two matters that give me greatest concern.


Mr. Jack Cullen (Sarnia):: Mr. Speaker, I will keep my remarks brief because I know that my good friend, the hon. member for Broadview (Mr. Gilbert), has something stirring and brilliant to say that we will all want to hear. I shall keep my eye on the clock and give him some time.
Much has been said about the thickness of this bill, but to be fair it should be pointed out that the former Elections Act was almost as thick. We should devote ourselves to the very good changes that have been made to it. The first change that all members are expected to comment on and to be in favour of is giving the vote to 18-year olds. I doubt if many politicians in Canada will say they are against this proposition. I think we say we are in favour of it, despite what the cynics might feel, because of the arguments which have been presented in a non-partisan way to the effect that the young people of today are better educated and better informed, thanks to the mass media and to instant communication systems. Recently some children from Quebec came to my city of Sarnia, and I doubt very much whether such an experiment would have been tried 10 or even 15 years ago. What pleases me more than the fact that the 18-year old is to get the vote is that we have gone all the way and indicated: We are going to trust you with the responsibility of governing this country.
I know that some people genuinely feel that this is going too far. This thought has been sincerely expressed in this House tonight. But I would remind the hon. gentleman and those who object to this proposal that in 1939 we gave a much greater responsibility to our 18-year olds. We put them in charge of $6 million aircraft, we put them in charge of platoons and in charge of ships. They had the ability to make decisions whether someone should live or die. We gave them a greater responsibility than this bill is giving them by suggesting that they stand for election to this House.
The second matter on which I should like to comment is the permanent voters' list. When I first came to this House of Commons I thought there was much to commend a permanent voters' list. I have spent some time
May 28. 1970

studying with a constituent of mine, Mr. John McEachran, who served as secretary to the Barbeau Commission, because I knew he had devoted a great amount of study to it. There is much to commend it and that is why it is in the politically grey area; that is why politicians can argue fervently on one side or the other without being too far off base.
What politician or individual who has participated in a political campaign cannot see the benefit of shorter political campaigns? They cost less money, it is easier on the candidate and it is much easier on the individual who has already been elected and is well known in his constituency. He has a definite advantage When he goes back to his riding to oppose someone not so well known. When we look at the disadvantages we must consider the fact that it has already been tried. In his remarks the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Macdonald) commented on the bill which was scrapped in 1934. Even in 1934 the Canadian population was so mobile that this system would not work. I wonder about the mobility of our population today, those who live in the cities and, perhaps even more so, those who live in the rural communities. I know that within two years of leaving Sarnia when I went back to the service club to which I belonged, which formerly had 45 members, there were only eight. The remainder had moved out of the community. This is typical of Canada and I think it is one of the things that makes the country great-we do not think that we must settle in one particular area. Unfortunately, this situation defeats one of the benefits of having a permanent voters' list.
In Canada we have the expertise, the ladies who go around and do the enumerating. Greater than all the proclamations put in all the post offices across Canada is the fact that people are knocking on every door reminding us that there is an election. I think there is something to commend this approach. We have heard that Americans who have studied our system say that perhaps in the long run it is not so bad; that in fact it is better than theirs. Coming from an American, that is quite an admission.
I like the party affiliation on the ballot because the House of Commons and our democratic system operates on the party system. Finally, after all these years, we are going to recognize that fact. I do not think it is a question of feeling that you cannot stand on your own merits, that people might not
Canada Elections Act
know you. You won as a member of a party and if your party is elected it is the one that will govern. I think the suggestion that we have the party name on the ballot is commendable. I am sorry that one hon. member indicated it might be something the Liberal Party was doing in order to prevent separatism in Quebec.
I suggest there is nothing magic about the number 75. Perhaps there could be a saw-off at 50, but I think there is something to commend setting a certain number so that we will not get a frivolous or vexatious type of candidate. As a Liberal, of course I am particularly proud of my party and proud to have that connotation opposite my name on the ballot.
Who is to vote? We have already commented on the 18-year olds. We have already commented on the fact that British subjects who voted at the last election shall have the right to vote. I am rather sorry that we did not go one step further and recognize that there are in Canada some citizens who have not obtained Canadian citizen status. Some of them have been here for many years, some only for a few years; but they are making their living here. They pay land and other taxes here, have their children educated here, pay income tax and do their job. I wonder if there is not some way in which we can give these people the vote, because I think there is a grain of discrimination when we say, "You pay your taxes, but the British subjects and Canadian citizens will decide how your tax money is to be spent." I like the idea of proxy voting, though I would have preferred some system of mailing ballots. I prefer the secret ballot where only the voter knows how he has voted.
The act points out the benefits of majority government. A majority government has time to look at the hundreds of sections in these acts. A minority government constantly has the opposition looking over its shoulder and the tendency is not to tackle a bill of this nature. As a majority government we do not tackle this type of measure by halves; we know we have the time and the expertise with which to tackle it. If nothing, else I think this bill has pointed out one of the benefits of having majority government.
I am glad the question of election expenses has been dealt with. I am happy that the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) has suggested that this question be dealt with particularly. I think it is an important subject and one that all members should

May 28, 1970
Canada Elections Act
be studying in a non-partisan way. We will find that members of the public regard themselves as experts on how we are spending this money-not just those members of the public who have been candidates at one time or another or those who have worked for a political party.
We have gone a long way in this bill and we in the government party realize that this in itself takes courage. The committee may not have come up with all the recommendations we would have liked, but I think it did a good job. I commend the committee and the government for this bill. In particular, I commend all members of this House who have left partisanship out of their speeches and talked purely and simply about the bill and what it is endeavouring to do, that is, give the vote to as many Canadians as possible.
[DOT] (9:50 p.m.)


John Gilbert: Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for Sarnia (Mr. Cullen) for his courtesy and kindness in permitting me this opportunity to participate in the debate. When one asks a politician, and more especially a lawyer, to confine his remarks to the seven minutes remaining, one is asking for quite a lot. I assure the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Macdonald) that I shall continue my remarks at a later date.
On the cover of Bill C-215 we read the words, "An act respecting the franchise of electors and the election of members to the House of Commons". After the words "House of Commons" I should like to see a comma and the words "and Members of the Senate". This is a very important issue because, as you know, our party stands for the abolition of the Senate. But I am a pragmatist and at times I am flexible. I think we should have an elected rather than an appointed Senate. This would be at least a first step in developing more democratic institutions in this country.
One wonders what are the qualifications of a Senator. First of all, he must reach the grand old age of 60, 65 or 70. He must be a member of one of the two major political parties. If he has made his contributions to the party in time, effort and money over the years he is rewarded with the high honour of being appointed a Senator. These are the main qualifications, although there have been exceptions in the past few years; some of the young blood of the Liberal party has been appointed to the Senate. They have a committee to study the news media, and now that 
grand old man of the Senate who was chairman of the Senate Committee on Aging is chairman of the Committee on Poverty. They appear to be trying to do good work to defend their existence. They want to make studies in this field and that and then report back to the House. Probably the Liberal party will make issues of these matters during coming election campaigns.
Let us look to the country to our south and at the august Senate there. Let us examine the great work they do and the power they exercise. If we must have a Senate, I should like to see not an appointed but an elected Senate. I should like to see some of these old Senators out on the hustings at election time with the rest of us, persuading Canadians that they are the men who should take that second, sober look at legislation that passes through the House of Commons. I hesitate in using the term "second sober look" because these days that is rather difficult to do that. Perhaps it would be better if we said that they reflect quietly.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Does the hon. member mean second, or sober?


John Gilbert: The President of the Privy Council has made an excellent point. Is it a second, or a sober look? At times it is difficult to say. In any event, considering the poor qualifications of our present Senators, I think it would be better if Senate members were elected rather than appointed.
I agree with the previous speaker that this bill is a forward step in that it lowers the voting age to 18 years. Since our young people, and more especially those at high school and university level, are receiving fine educations and are able to judge matters for themselves, I think that reducing the voting age from 21 to 18 will be seen as a step forward.


Gerald William Baldwin: Will the hon. member permit a question? Does he consider that 18-year olds will not make mistakes greater than the mistake made by the adult population in June, 1968?


Stanley Howard Knowles: That would not be possible.


John Gilbert: What worries me is that they may make the same mistake at the next election.


Gerald William Baldwin: Thank you.
May 28, 1970	COMMONS


John Gilbert: That worries me. In any event,
I think including these young people in a voting pattern is a step forward because they possess on the question of politics knowledge that many people in the past did not have. Having heard some of the subjects discussed by high school students, subjects ranging from political parties and their philosophies to some of the social issues confronting us, I have been made aware that they are training themselves to take their rightful place in society and to exercise that judgment which is necessary in dealing with our great social and economic issues.
There has been much discussion this evening about absentee voting. The government is to be commended for the enlargement of the proxy voting provisions to cover prospectors, students and other groups. My colleague for Kootenay West (Mr. Harding) indicated that groups such as railway workers, construction workers, logging workers and longshoremen should also be included. In closing, may I suggest that we include in our voting pattern the prisoners in penitentiaries. In days of old, when a person committed a crime he was sentenced and locked in prison. Not only was he confined there but he was stripped of his civil rights and was not allowed to vote. I can just picture the next election. In my riding there is the Don jail which contains many Torontonians who have misbehaved themselves. I can just picture myself, the Liberal candidate and the Conservative candidate addressing the captive audiences in our jails.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Gilbert: If I may be serious for a moment and close on this high note, I urge the government to consider giving the right of the vote to prisoners. This would be a step forward in their rehabilitation and reformation, and I am sure that the hon. member for Rosedale for whom I have great respect at times


An hon. Member:: How many of his constituents are in jail?


John Gilbert: -will give this matter serious consideration. Mr. Speaker, may I call it ten o'clock?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the House would be agreeable to giving the hon. member an opportunity to continue for a few minutes so that we could complete this stage of the bill this evening.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Is that agreed?
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Proceedings on Adjournment Motion


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: There is no
agreement.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, before we go on with the "late show" may I announce a change in the business for tomorrow. There have been discussions among those interested in the work of the Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs. I gather that concurrence in the Senate amendments to the Expropriation Act will probably be given without debate if that item is presented first. On that basis, the order of business win be changed so that that item may be called. The second item would be as announced, the Canada Labour (Standards) bill, and the third item would be the Aeronautics Act. In view of the request of the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert), the Corporations Act amendments will not be proceeded with. That bill will be replaced, as the fourth item, by the Canada water bill.



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION

[Stage Direction]
A motion to adjourn the House under Standing Order 40 deemed to have been moved.

Mr. John Burton (Regina East):: Mr. Speaker, on May 7 I directed this question to the Minister without Portfolio (Mr. Lang) in charge of the Canadian Wheat Board, as reported at page 6676 of Hansard:
In view of the fact that many of the delivery points still at the lowest quota levels are points which were unable to deliver a five-bushel quota last year and in respect of which provision was made for special delivery permits, may I ask whether provision is to be made for extra cars to take account of deliveries on special delivery permits?
The minister answered:
The grain to be delivered under special delivery permits is not treated differently from grain deliveries under other quotas.
[DOT] (10:00 p.m.)
He went on to state:
A purpose of the block system is to ensure in due course an equal opportunity for delivery as
May 28. 1970

Proceedings on Adjournment Motion far as possible. Often it is the individual elevator companies which decide which particular elevator within their ownership should receive cars ahead of others; responsibility often rests with them.
This situation first developed on July 30 when an announcement was made by the Canadian Wheat Board that special permits would be issued to farmers who were unable to deliver a five-bushel quota prior to the end of the last crop, that a special delivery permit would be granted up to a maximum of one bushel per specified acre and that there would be no deadline for applications. I agree with the principle involved in these special delivery permits. However, as the winter season wore on it became evident that much grain had not yet been delivered under the special delivery permits because of lack of space in country elevators. On February 9 last there were still 388 elevator delivery points in Saskatchewan which were on the unit delivery quota, while 567 points were handled on a one-bushel quota in that province. The tight delivery situation still prevails.
The minister has repeatedly said in the House of Commons that no provision was to be made for cars to handle shipments under these special delivery permits. He said that the block system would handle the situation. This would be rather difficult to do because the block system was only introduced during the current crop year. On April 13 there were still 22 delivery points in Saskatchewan on the unit quota, and 31 points in the province of Manitoba. I suggest that it is a very hollow policy to make provision for special delivery permits for farmers who could not deliver five bushels per acre in the crop year, while at the same time making no provision for the movement of that grain once it had been delivered or to allow for the movement of grain to create space for these special deliveries. This situation would have been remedied by an allocation of cars based on the special delivery permit applications. Since there was a deadline for those applications, this would have been possible.
The minister now says it will be possible to deliver four bushels per acre during the current crop year on current wheat deliveries. I hope that this extension includes full provision for the special delivery permits which were allowed. The block system of movement referred to by the minister in his answer has brought about some improvement. However, the absence of help for those points which have special delivery permits complicated the 
grain movement picture during the past year. The block system does not solve all the problems of grain movement. With respect to the provision of cars for movement, there have been reports that the railways were pulling cars out of grain movement last year. From time to time the Canadian Wheat Board has made requests for cars from the railways for particular blocks, and the railways have not been able to supply those cars. This does not show up in the figures of grain movement and the figures of cars made available to elevator points.
The minister says that elevator companies allocate cars to the specific delivery points within the block. This is true. However, on February 9 I obtained a report of all delivery points in the quota system as of that date. There were entire lines which were still on the unit quota. Most of those were CPR points. On February 9, over 230 of 388 delivery points of the unit quota were CPR points. In addition, there were a number of points on the unit quota where there were both CPR and CNR facilities. On April 13, there were 22 points in Saskatchewan still on the unit quota. Every one of them was on a CPR line. I suggest that the CPR has not done its job. A good deal of the difficulties have been with respect to the CPR points.
I trust that the minister will take the situation with respect to special delivery permits into account and ensure that there is an equitable delivery situation as of the end of the current crop year. I hope that action will begin shortly which will ensure that enough cars are allocated to those elevator points which were unable to handle five bushels per acre last year and for which special delivery permits were issued during the current crop year.


Otto Emil Lang: Mr. Speaker, in following up his question of May 7, the hon. member for Regina East (Mr. Burton) has confirmed what I suspected when the original question was asked. He seems to be under some misapprehension about the way in which the deferred delivery permits work. As far as delivery opportunity is concerned, they were an entitlement to individual producers to deliver as space was available. This meant that as space became available in the Prairie region the deferred delivery permits could be used by individual producers for the delivery of grain.
As the hon. member knows, the unit quota has been delivered in all points, all points are
May 28. 1970	COMMONS
now on at least a one-bushel quota and a rapid movement upward is occurring. At that stage with the delivery of unit quotas there should be no particular reason for any lack of opportunity for producers to deliver on their deferred delivery permits. Of course, with the deferred delivery permits really being treated in the same way as any other delivery opportunity, the programming of cars for the collecting of grain automatically takes care of the situation of having cars available for these particular delivery opportunities. The hon. member asks whether the four-bushel quota delivered during this crop year includes the deferred deliveries, and of course it does. Deferred delivery means that less grain can be taken into the system this year than might otherwise have been taken in under quotas this year because, of course, the deferred delivery amounts are included in this year's deliveries.
As I indicated in the House today again, a very rapid increase in the number of cars and in the movement of grain in Thunder Bay has taken place, a constant position is being fairly well maintained for Vancouver throughout the period, and a very high figure, something like 10,000 cars per week, are expected to be loaded in the Prairie region for both directions now and in the months immediately ahead. This will mean one of the record movements of grain out of the Prairie region compared with any similar period in the past. It is a movement not only of wheat to meet the very many sales demands which have accumulated for this period, but also to meet the need for moving the balance of the rape-seed crop and the very heavy barley shipments in response to demands which have occurred for this part of the year and on into the next crop year. All in all, the movement of grain will be extremely rapid and the hon. member for Regina East has really no need to worry further about the specific delivery opportunity to which he referred.



TRADE-NEGOTIATIONS ON EXPORT OF PETROLEUM AND NATURAL GAS TO UNITED STATES

Eldon Mattison Woolliams: hope, Mr. Speaker, that I did not inconvenience you or the House by being a little late. I was attending a meeting of a special committee.
The questions to which I shall refer at this time are those which I put to the minister on May 6, 1970, as reported in Hansard at page 7326. They are on the subject of trade, particularly in crude petroleum and natural gas
DEBATES	7471
Proceedings on Adjournment Motion from Canada to the United States. The United States is our best customer for these commodities; indeed, it is our only customer. I put this question to the minister:
Is the minister ready to forget his umbrage with the United States and get down to the hard bargaining necessary to ensure accelerated trade in our surplus crude petroleum and natural gas ... and thereby stimulate the employment of our young Canadians, graduates and undergraduates?
A person has only to drive along the Trans-Canada Highway to see young men and women from our colleges and universities thumbing rides from passing motorists just as people used to ride the rods in the thirties looking for employment. At this time we should be encouraging the development of our resources rather than discouraging it. The minister said, in reply to my question:
The government's position has always been and continues to be that we regret the unilateral decision to cut back our oil exports.
[DOT] (10:10 p.m.)
Let us get down to brass tacks. The present government signed an agreement with the United States, a secret agreement that I flushed out about a year or a year and a half ago in the committee, in which Canada agreed with the United States on certain quotas with respect to the export of crude petroleum. It was agreed at that time that the United States had the privilege to act unilaterally, and this I objected to.
If you look at the line of questioning I have directed on this subject over the last two or three years, particularly during the last few months, you will find I suggested that the government erred when they entered into that secret agreement. Nevertheless, it was entered into.
The minister has switched positions during the last month or two, and this puts me in mind of the position taken by Molotov and Von Papen who switched positions when Germany, having made a secret agreement wih Russia, a non-aggression pact, only a short time later marched into Russia. Because the minister feels it will be popular with university students and the young people who are now going to vote at 18, he has switched positions and come up with an anti-American policy that is good for home consumption but poor for trade and employment.
What happened today as a result of the minister's speech at Denver? If the minister was a responsible minister, a man steeped in the knowledge of diplomacy, he would not go down to a small place like Denver and insult
May 28, 1970

Proceedings on Adjournment Motion the United States; he would go to Washington and do some hard bargaining in confidence over the conference table, using the kind of diplomacy that brings confidence and respect between two nations. The press gallery in Ottawa had a report from the White House today, and it could not be more timely. This is what the president and his cabinet have now said about Canada, because of this childish diplomacy on the part of the minister:
Herewith excerpt from White House ... re Canadian oil imports.
In our view these imports create at least an indirect threat to the national security for two reasons.
It goes on to say what the reasons are. I do not have time to read them into the record, but they cut back further on exports of crude petroleum from Canada to the United States. Through the actions of this government, not only its antagonism of the United States, as with Great Britain and France, but its tax threat, and the fear that hangs over the extractive industries like an umbrella, we have now lost $62 million in oil revenue in the province of Alberta. What did the minister say? I wish the Minister of Finance (Mr. Benson) would take him more seriously, but maybe he takes him as seriously as the United States took this speech which took two hours to deliver. On one of the many pages in his speech he said:
In particular, I cannot see that it-
Meaning Canada.
-would legislate a tax climate in which the Canadian petroleum industry would be put at any significantly increased disadvantage compared with the industry in the U.S.
I think the white paper is going to be rammed through, with a few innocuous things having been withdrawn. But it has killed the confidence not only of Canadians but of foreign investors. Because of the expense involved the extractive industries have to attract foreign investment. I am a Canadian but I am practical and realistic enough to know that if you eliminate United States' investment in this country, as I said before, it will be like pulling the plug out of the bathtub-you will watch the water go down. There will be unemployment everywhere, and there is 8 per cent now as a result of the actions of the present government. It is a strange thing, but although the White House said today that Canada's government has undermined the security of the United States by its national oil policy, this policy was established by the Conservative government led by the right hon.

gentleman from Prince Albert (Mr. Diefen-baker) which at that time had the confidence of the United States.
It is strange when we think that we establish the national oil policy and today import from Venezuela $200 million more crude petroleum than we export. We in western Canada are now using only 40 per cent of our possible production either through export or domestically. The answer is that we are about to become involved in a trade war with the United States when approximately 8 per cent of our labour force, when we consider the students, is unemployed, when we have the biggest crash in the stock-market since 1930 and when we have this childish diplomacy going on which is ruining the markets. As if it were not enough for the Minister without Portfolio (Mr. Lang) and other ministers to lose our wheat markets, now they are trying hard to lose the western Canada oil and gas markets.


Mr. R. J. Orange (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources):: Mr. Speaker, I wonder what the hon. member has been talking about, particularly in respect of the question he asked to be raised at ten o'clock. I quote from page 7362 of Hansard for May 26 as follows:


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Was it government policy for Canada to enter into the secret agreement with the United States with regard to crude petroleum and natural gas that gave the United States the right to make the decision unilaterally, which is what the government did?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. This is argument. I would not think the question as asked is in order.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Ten o'clock, Mr. Speaker.
Having listened to the outburst of the hon. member I am a little shocked and surprised at his reaction to the way the resources of our country should be used for the benefit of countries other than ours. I have the feeling the hon. member wants to sell our resources in a raw state, so that they will be of no benefit to Canadians. He attempted to relate this question to university students who are unemployed. We do not want our country to become a gravel pit. The hon. member quoted excerpts from a statement issued by the White House today. This is the basis of his information. I cannot help wondering what the hon. member's purpose is in raising this matter. We know that Canadians wish to retain their resources and use them for the benefit of mankind and for the best use in our country. The hon. member spoke of a secret agreement in respect of oil and gas. Without accepting the fact that there was any
May 28, 1970	COMMONS
secret agreement, I point out that there was no reference to gas in his question.
The hon. member also knows that we have a proper market on the west coast of the United States. Let me remind the hon. member in respect of the question he raised in the House, and which he did not bring forward tonight, that the arrangement worked out and negotiated between Canada and the United States in 1966 was an effort to increase and establish continuity in oil production and in the level of exports between Canada and the United States. I should like to point out that at the moment our exports are just under 400,000 barrels a day for areas 1 and 4, which is an increase of about 33 per cent over what was arranged last year. Mr. Speaker, the hon. member is also aware of the recent announcement by the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Greene) in respect of protecting the Ottawa Valley line for western Canadian oil and petroleum products.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. I am sorry to interrupt the parliamentary secretary, but his time has expired.



VETERANS AFFAIRS-INTERIM INCREASE IN PENSIONS AND ALLOWANCES

Mark Willson Rose: Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to see the minister here tonight. I expect that next week will be an uncomfortable time for him, when one considers that the 23rd Dominion Convention of the Canadian Legion is to meet in Ottawa and the minister is scheduled to speak, I believe on Monday.
[DOT] (10:20 p.m.)
Essentially, Mr. Speaker, I asked the minister today whether, in view of the Canadian Legion convention being held here in Ottawa, he planned to announce any special interim benefits to that convention, because all members of the House realize but do not necessarily accept the fact that the Woods report recommendations will take a great deal of time before they are implemented. I asked my question about special interim benefits but the minister remained rooted in his seat in dumb silence. I asked my question about special interim benefits because there is a tragic need for disability pensions and war veterans allowances to be raised immediately because of the spiralling costs of living. But the minister did not respond today. I asked my question about special interim benefits because ever since the Woods task force was announced the veterans have been led to
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Proceedings on Adjournment Motion believe that the government really did care about their sacrifices and was going to do something. But the minister said nothing today.
I wonder how many veterans in need realize that the terms of reference of the Woods report did not allow the commission to consider the war veterans allowances nor the amount of the disability benefits at all. The thing that is vital to veterans' welfare, namely money, was completely excluded from the review of the Canada Pension Act. What good is tidying up the administration and making a big noise about it, and misleading the veterans to expect an increase? Some four years ago the government initiated a comprehensive review of veterans pension problems and published 148 findings and recommendations in a document which became known as the Woods report. This report was greeted with great hope and enthusiasm by veterans and their organizations throughout the land. At last, they said, Canada is going to right some of the past wrongs which condemned many who had served in our armed services to live in poverty, indignity and embarrassment.
During the intervening four years the problems for hundreds of veterans were solved forever-they simply died. The longer we await improvements to the Canada Pension Plan, the more problems will be solved in the same way. In spite of a year's excellent work by the Standing Committee, no action is contemplated by the government at least until the white paper on social security is tabled next fall. And the lethargic, legislative process could easily drag this matter out for another year. Contrast this, if you will, with the speed with which Members of Parliament raised their own pensions. The job was done in about two weeks.
I think the ex-military should become militant once more and demand an interim raise immediately. The Canadian Legion meets next week for its national convention. I hope it takes strong action. I know the minister is going to say, among other things, that nothing can be done until the government review of the whole fabric of social legislation is complete. He will probably restate the half billion dollar figure which he cited today, which he said the government gave him but which in fact is the statutory amount given not by the government but by Parliament. I wonder if the minister was not unintentionally misleading us today because this $500 million, while it is larger than in previous years, is the result of more people becoming eligible.
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Proceedings on Adjournment Motion
But the fact remains-and neither the minister nor the government can escape it-that many veterans desperately need a raise in both the disability and allowance benefits. The basic rate can be raised without amending anything and we do not need to wait for legislation on the Woods report. I urge the minister to fight for the veterans and to fight his colleagues on the treasury benches if necessary. The flim-flam has gone on long enough. The veterans need a raise now, and I hope the minister announces it next week.


Jean-Eudes Dubé: Mr. Speaker, first of all I would like to say that when the hon. member asked his question this afternoon I did not respond as I felt my reply to an earlier question from the right hon. member for Prince Albert (Mr. Diefenbaker) was a self-evident answer to this question and did not need to be repeated. However, since he insists on my repeating the answer I will be very pleased to restate it this evening.
I do not plan to announce any increase in either disability pension rates or in war veterans allowances when I address the Legion on Monday. The reason for this is a very straightforward one and is one which I have repeatedly explained in the House. It is the
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reason that the hon. member himself has just stated. The government at the present time is reviewing the total fabric of social legislation. Veterans pensions as well as war veterans allowances are social legislation. I agree that veterans pensions are not social welfare but they are part of the total fabric of social legislation in the sense that it is legislation dealing with people. Mr. Speaker, this review is progressing and its main object is to achieve greater consistency between the various elements within the broad framework of social legislation and to eliminate unintended gaps or duplications.
I share the interest, concern and sympathy of the hon. member for Fraser Valley West (Mr. Rose) in the cause of the veterans. On many occasions, in 1964, in 1966 and again in 1968 this government has shown concern by repeatedly increasing war veterans pensions. As a matter of fact, since 1964 war veterans disability pensions have been increased by more than 40 per cent. I should say that our past is a guarantee of our future, and action speaks louder than words.


John Stratford Burton: A disgraceful performance.
Motion agreed to and the House adjourned at 10.28 p.m.

Friday, May 29, 1970