1976-03-19

ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Mr. Rene Matte (Champlain):: Mr. Speaker, under the provisions of Standing Order 43, I ask the unanimous consent of the House to propose a motion on an important matter of pressing necessity.
Considering the tense and shaky situation the producers of manufacturing milk have to face as they never know what to expect from year to year and considering that our imports of butter and cheese are mostly responsible for such a situation, I move-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The hon. member must know that it is the subject matter of the motion of the Social Credit Party of Canada which will be discussed today. I understand that the hon. member is asking leave to alter the motion to be discussed today with the unanimous consent of the House. If I am right, it is precisely the subject matter of the Social Credit motion to be discussed today.


René Matte: Mr. Speaker, we are only asking the unanimous consent to move:
That the House ask the government to put a stop as soon as possible to our imports of butter and cheese, which could easily be produced in Canada.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The House has heard the motion of the hon. member. Pursuant to the provisions of Standing Order 43, such a motion requires the unanimous consent of the House. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


Mr. Speaker:: There is not unanimous consent; the motion therefore cannot be put.
[DOT] (mo)



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Mr. Joe Clark (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Minister of Public Works. I want to go back to some of the responses given yesterday in the House. The minister was referring yesterday, in answer to questions I had asked, to what he thought, to use his words, were "baseless rumours" relative to an alleged ganging-up against Francophone ministers or French speaking Canadians. He said in the House he thought they were baseless rumours, yet he is quoted in La Presse of March 17 of this year as indicating that the suggestion had come from the then minister of consumer and corporate affairs. My question to the minister is: prior to the former minister of consumer and corporate affairs asking the Minister of Public Works to approach the judge, did the former minister indicate in any way that he believed his contempt of court proceedings constituted a ganging-up by the English speaking establishment?


Hon. C. M. Drury (Minister of Public Works):: I think the hon. gentleman is asking me to disclose the substance of conversations between colleagues and I have indicated that I regard it as improper for this to be revealed in public.


Charles Joseph Clark: We know both what the minister considers to be improper and, regrettably, what he considers to be proper. What I should like him to do, so that the House might have at least this piece of information, is to deny categorically, if he can, that any minister of the Crown including specifically the former minister of consumer and corporate affairs raised this aspect with the minister prior to the telephone call by the minister to the judge concerned? Will he, without revealing what went on-


Some hon. Members:: Oh!


Charles Joseph Clark: -at least tell us that that kind of thing did not go on? Will he at least give us a categorical denial there was that kind of suggestion by the former minister of consumer and corporate affairs or by anyone?


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: I think this is established cross-examination technique. If you select, as has been tried before, a number of unlikely issues and get enough denials you can eventually glean some idea of what the substance of a conversation was.
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March 19, 1976
Oral Questions


Charles Joseph Clark: It would be a great deal easier if the government would simply come clean and give all the information.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Charles Joseph Clark: Let me direct a supplementary to the Prime Minister. When asked yesterday if he would deny categorically that the ganging up had been discussed formally or informally by members of cabinet, the Minister of Public Works said: "I am utterly appalled that the distinguished House leader of the Conservative Party should expect to get information from a member of cabinet on details of proceedings in cabinet." The Minister of Public Works referred specifically to details of proceedings in cabinet. Will the Prime Minister tell the House, now, whether the question or the idea of any kind of ganging-up was, in fact, discussed in cabinet, and, if so, when?


Right Hon. P. E. Trudeau (Prime Minister):: I always hesitate about indicating what went on in cabinet. I will attempt to answer this question but I do not want it to be seen as a precedent. In the overwhelming majority of cases I prefer not to discuss what went on in cabinet. I do from time to time comment to the press on what items were on the agenda and what were not. I would think it remiss of me to go beyond that. I can give an answer here, and even if it were an answer to the contrary I would not mind giving that either. The answer is that the issue was not discussed in cabinet, but had it been I would not see anything so scandalous about that.
The hon. member heard yesterday a motion in this House from the Creditiste party. They know something about the problems of Quebec. They know that this kind of issue is sometimes raised. If it is raised, either by way of rumour, as the minister has said, or by way of reality, it is the duty of the government, which is the government of all Canadians, to know about these rumours and discuss them if appropriate. In this particular case it just so happens it was not discussed, but I would not be ashamed if it had.


CONTENT OF CONVERSATION BETWEEN MR. DRURY AND JUDGE HUGESSEN
Mr. Eldon M. Woolliams (Calgary North):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask a question of the Minister of Public Works. Mr. Justice Hugessen's letter indicates that they discussed a great deal more than the sociology of baseless rumours. My question is to seek information. Now that the Deschenes report is out, would the minister tell the House, as alleged earlier last week, whether in fact he told the judge that the accused was a very important person, presumably to the government, and that the proceeding was politically very sensitive and potentially explosive?


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: Mr. Speaker, I think that statement, if I recognize it, is attributed to me, allegedly by a certain Mr. Holden. It is quite without foundation.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Well, I did not get many facts out of that.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


PRIME MINISTER'S CONVERSATIONS WITH MR. DRURY AND MR. OUELLET-REASON FOR ACCEPTING MR. OUELLET'S RESIGNATION
Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Mr. Speaker, I would now like to put this question to the Prime Minister. On March 9, 1976, which was before the Deschenes report came out, the Prime Minister said: "I listened to their version"-meaning the version of the two ministers- "and feel that their explanations indicated clearly that they were not attempting to influence in any way the judgment of the courts". Then on March 17 the Prime Minister said: "That is right, I got the answer from the minister on Monday". There were two periods when the Prime Minister examined the ministers or cross-examined them or discussed with them. Did the Prime Minister get a different version from one or both ministers-that is, the Minister of Public Works and the former minister of consumer and corporate affairs-during the two periods of discussions and, if not, why did he accept the resignation of the former minister of consumer affairs following that Monday?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I got different versions because I asked different questions. If the hon. member refers to the text that he has just read, in the first instance I was concerned with illegalities and that was the burden of my questions. Once we had asked Justice Deschenes to look into the matter, then I felt that in all propriety I should wait for him to give his version of the facts. Having heard his version of the facts and that there was no illegality in everyone's judgment but an impropriety, I then went back to the ministers and asked them further questions relative to this impropriety.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: A further supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. Now, we are getting somewhere. We find that there were two versions. I take it from the Prime Minister's answer that what was said in the second version led to the resignation of the former minister of consumer and corporate affairs?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: The answer is no, Mr. Speaker.


ALLEGATION OF INTERFERENCE WITH JUDICIARY-METHOD BY WHICH ALLEGATION INVESTIGATED
Mr. T. C. Douglas (Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the right hon. Prime Minister. When the Prime Minister suggested to the House that he would have the Minister of Justice write to the Chief Justice of the Superior Court of Quebec to ascertain whether or not any of the judges in question felt that they had been aggrieved, the reply of the Chief Justice makes it perfectly clear that he was dealing only with the matter of the judges, as the Prime Minister has suggested. Chief Justice Deschenes said in his letter:
-it is obviously not one of my functions to set myself up as a semi-official investigator on behalf of the House of Commons.
Further on in his report he said:
I therefore do not want to set myself up here as a judge of your colleague nor of mine.
March 19, 1976

Since it is apparent that Mr. Justice Deschenes has passed this ball back to the House of Commons and to the Prime Minister, who is its chief member, I would ask him what steps he proposes to take by which the House of Commons can properly discuss two cases of impropriety, one of which the Chief Justice says was a very grave matter? Since it is our responsibility, and I contend primarily his, how does he propose we discharge that responsibility?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I think the answer is very simple. The hon. member wants to know what means the House of Commons has to discuss this matter. It seems to me it took all day Tuesday to discuss this very matter.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister knows perfectly well that in the traditions of the House of Commons a matter can be discussed in one of two ways, either by having the matter referred to a standing committee of the House or by having an official inquiry. I am asking the Prime Minister which of those courses he proposes to follow, or whether he proposes to leave this matter in the air, which is the worst possible thing that could be done for parliament and for the members concerned.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I do not think it is fair to say it has been left in the air. The minister has issued an apology and so has the former minister issued an apology. Of course, it is to be expected that the House might not think this is enough. I have given reasons why I do not think it would be proper for the House of Commons to inquire into an issue which would mean subpoenaing judges before it. The hon. member mentioned another course, being the one of a committee of the House. I have invited hon. members opposite on several occasions to use this course if they so desire. If they know their duty they should lay a charge and we will examine it, then the prosper consequences will follow.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Mr. Speaker, I would suggest it is not necessary to lay a charge because the Chief Justice has accused two ministers of impropriety, and one of being a party to a very grave matter, so the charges are already here. The Prime Minister said the other day he did not agree with Mr. Justice Deschenes on certain points. Surely, those points ought to be cleared up. I ask the Prime Minister whether or not he is prepared to accept his responsibility and do either one of two things; refer this matter to a committee of the House or institute proper public inquiry?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, this is the same question over and over and over again. I suggest that perhaps the hon. member made-


An hon. Member:: But it is true.


An hon. Member:: And the same answers.
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Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Yes, Mr. Speaker, I would gladly refuse to give them, if that is what the opposition prefers. The hon. member said I had said I disagreed with Justice Deschenes. I believe, and my recollection is to this effect, that I said I disagreed in some aspect with Mr. Justice Mackay, if the hon. member would want to look it up.


An hon. Member:: Are you laying a charge?


AGRICULTURE
Mr. Gilbert Rondeau (Shefford):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to put a question to the Minister of Agriculture.
As we expect the minister to announce his new dairy policy for 1976-77 within a few days, has he made sure with his colleague on his right whether he can, for that year, forbid the entry into Canada of cheeses or dairy products that can be produced in Canada?


Hon. E. F. Whelan (Minister of Agriculture):: Mr. Speaker, if I understand correctly, the debate later this day is to be on the dairy situation and I will be speaking during that debate. I am sure the hon. member concerned and others will be participating in the debate also, and the information should be forthcoming.


EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
Miss Flora MacDonald (Kingston and the Islands):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Acting Secretary of State for External Affairs. Since it is now two weeks since negotiations took place in New Delhi about the resumption of nuclear aid to India, and since the minister said at that time, on March 5, that the government has every reason to want full disclosure of all the facts, given this two-week interval in which I presume this matter has been analysed in detail by cabinet, is the minister now in a position to inform the House as to the content of those negotiations and understandings?


Hon. Mitchell Sharp (President of the Privy Council):: Mr. Speaker, the hon. lady is misinformed. The matter has not yet come before cabinet.


Flora Isabel MacDonald: Mr. Speaker, in light of the statement by the Secretary of State for External Affairs on March 11 that the negotiating team was acting under instructions- "Its terms of reference were established by me"-I should like to ask the acting minister, since the terms of reference at least were well known and clearly defined, whether he could inform us as to what the terms of reference were under which the negotiating team was operating?
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March 19, 1976
Oral Questions


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I will pass this suggestion to my colleague who may or may not want to reveal the terms of reference. At any rate, he will be quite happy to make a statement when the negotiations are completed.


Flora Isabel MacDonald: I have one final supplementary, Mr. Speaker. Given the commitment of the Secretary of State for External Affairs of March 11 that he would co-operate with any effort that might be made on a bilateral basis to have the subject ventilated in the House, would the minister undertake to table the tentative accord with India before it is ratified and put down a motion to debate it. I am sure the House leader understands that this is appropriate parliamentary procedure, even if the Prime Minister would dispute it.


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, there has been no agreement yet reached between India and Canada so that most of the discussion is quite premature. There has been, I understand, an initialling of a tentative understanding. That has not yet been approved by the government, so there really is nothing yet to talk about.


ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE
Mr. Walter Baker (Grenville-Carleton):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Public Works. It arises out of answers to questions of the Leader of the Opposition and the Prime Minister's answer with regard to his categorical denial that those rumours were not discussed in cabinet. In view of what the minister and what the Prime Minister have said, is the minister prepared to say to this House that not one minister of the government expressed the view that this matter was a ganging-up of the English-speaking establishment, and that he did not refer to the cabinet or any minister in the cabinet when he told the judge that this view was held in some quarters in Ottawa.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: Mr. Speaker, I am not quite sure but I think probably what the hon. gentleman is trying to do is ascertain what I have said to my colleagues or what they have said to me. It does not seem to me to be very profitable to try to pursue a line which I repeat I decline to be led down.


Walter David Baker: Mr. Speaker, I want to say, through you to the Minister of Public Works, that that is exactly what I am not doing. I hoped the answer to the question would be no. Yesterday the minister said he would not tell us what passed between his colleagues and himself privately. The Prime Minister has said that the matter was not discussed in cabinet. Is the minister now saying to us there were some other sources in Ottawa who brought to his attention what might be called baseless rumours, other than a cabinet minister, and if that is the case who are they?


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: Mr. Speaker, it is difficult to pin down the source of information as to a particular rumour. I think the

hon. gentleman is aware of the fact that such a story is on the record of the House of Commons, in view of the attempted motion yesterday. I quite frankly would be unwilling to try to attribute to a particular source my first hearing of this story.


ALLEGATION OF GANGING-UP ON FRENCH SPEAKING MINISTER-POSSIBLE SUPPORT FOR ALLEGATION IN ACCEPTANCE OF MR. OUELLET'S RESIGNATION
Mr. J. P. Nowlan (Annapolis Valley):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Prime Minister and it is on the same issue. In view of what I suggest is a double standard in accepting the resignations from the two gentlemen involved in the same impropriety, would the Prime Minister not agree with me that that double standard would add support to the very rumour which the Minister of Public Works says is baseless?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I think I can now answer the question of the Leader of the Opposition where this kind of rumour originates. It originates in the kind of question that was just put to me.


Some hon. Members:: Shame.


ALLEGATIONS OF INTERFERENCE WITH JUDICIARY-KNOWLEDGE OF PRIME MINISTER IF MR. OUELLET'S DISCUSSIONS LIMITED TO MR. DRURY
John Patrick (Pat) Nowlan: Again I direct a question to the Prime Minister. Not taking the full two week moratorium on asking questions from ministers but whenever the Prime Minister finally did ask detailed questions of the ministers involved about what happened, did the Minister of Public Works say to the Prime Minister that only he, the Minister of Public Works, was involved in a conversation with the former minister of consumer and corporate affairs, or were other ministers involved in this discussion, separate and apart from any cabinet discussion?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I did not
ask him this. I did say to the House that I know the former minister of consumer and corporate affairs probably discussed it with several of his friends and ministers. I know he discussed it with me and he probably discussed it with the Minister of Public Works alone and in the presence of others.


INQUIRY WHETHER MR. DRURY ADMITTED IMPROPER CONDUCT PRIOR TO RESIGNATION
Mr. Lincoln M. Alexander (Hamilton West):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Public Works. On the Friday at issue the Minister of Public Works thought it necessary to tender his resignation. Subsequently he had a conversation with the Prime Minister, following which his resignation was not accepted. Did the Prime Minister ask the Minister of Public Works whether his conduct was one of wrongdoing and improper and, if so, what was the answer?
March 19, 1976


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: Mr. Speaker, the question is whether the Prime Minister asked me if I had been guilty of any wrongdoing or whether the conduct had been proper. I responded that in my view it had not been in any way illegal. It had, however, been improper, and as a consequence I was tendering my resignation.


INQUIRY WHETHER MR. OUELLET ADMITTED IMPROPER CONDUCT PRIOR TO RESIGNATION
Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: Mr. Speaker, my supplementary question is for the Prime Minister. Apparently the Prime Minister must have had a conversation with the former minister of consumer and corporate affairs regarding this entire matter, particularly with respect to the resignation of the Minister of Public Works. Did the Prime Minister in fact ask the former minister of consumer and corporate affairs whether he thought his conduct was one of wrongdoing and improper and, if so, what was the answer?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I have answered this question before.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


PENITENTIARIES
Mr. Mike Landers (Saint John-Lancaster):: My question is for the Solicitor General, Mr. Speaker. Would the minister care to clarify an alleged statement attributed to him in the Saint John Telegraph Journal of March 13, 1976 in which he is quoted as saying:
The police department and other groups who had studied the idea-
The reference is to a prison within the Saint John city limits.
-have also come out in favour of the location.
The Solicitor General is alleged to have made that statement in Fredericton, New Brunswick.


Hon. Warren Allmand (Solicitor General):: That report is incorrect. I said that the chief of police was in favour of the location of the prison in the city in question. But it is also known that the police association has come out against the site. So one part of the police community is for it and the other is against it.


ANTI-INFLATION BOARD REQUEST FOR MEASURES TO SPEED UP PROCESSING OF APPLICATIONS
Mr. Lome Nystrom (Yorkton-Melville):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Right Hon. Prime Minister. Since up until yesterday the Anti-Inflation Board had made only 93
Oral Questions
decisions and now has a backlog of some 1,000 cases, and since the chairman of the board, when the program was first started, promised decisions within 30 days, can the Prime Minister tell the House and the working people about the procedures the government is taking to speed up the processing of applications before the board so that decisions may be reached more quickly?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I will take note of the question on behalf of the minister responsible.


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Would the Prime Minister ask the minister responsible, who is not here today, to make a statement on this issue before Monday when the CLC will present a brief to the cabinet?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I am sure that if he were to do that it would be made outside the House, and the hon. member would not like that.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


BARLEY-LOSSES RESULTING FROM WIDE SPREAD BETWEEN PRICES FOR TWO GRADES-GOVERNMENT ACTION TO COMPENSATE
Mr. Craig Stewart (Marquette):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister responsible for the Canadian Wheat Board or his parliamentary secretary. However, since they are not present here today, I will direct it to the Acting Minister in charge of the Canadian Wheat Board. Many farmers are annoyed at the fact that in the 1974-75 crop year when they shipped cars of barley for malting, one car would be graded 2CW and the next, No.l feed, yet both cars ended up for malting. Then, this year the final payments of 99 cents per bushel for 2CW and 18 cents for No.l feed were announced. Can the acting minister tell the House what the government plans to do to compensate the farmers for this unrealistic spread in the final payments between 2CW barley and No.l feed which amounted to losses of $2,000 per car for many farmers?


Hon. Ron Basford (Acting Minister of Transport):: Mr. Speaker, as the Acting Minister of Transport I will be happy to take notice of the question.


HUMAN RIGHTS
Mr.  R. Gordon L. Fairweather@Fundy-Royal: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Parliamentary Secretary to the Secretary of State for External Affairs. Have the necessary arrangements now been put in place between the government of Canada and the provinces so that Canada can ratify the UN Declaration on Human Rights? We were promised a month or six weeks ago that that ratification was imminent.

March 19, 1976
Oral Questions


Miss Monique Begin (Parliamentary Secretary to Secretary of State for External Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, as the hon. member knows, at the federal-provincial conference held on December 11 last, we reached an agreement on principle. I wish I could tell him that the agreement has been signed, but that I do not know. However, I shall take note of the question of the hon. member and look into the matter.


AGRICULTURE
Mr. James A. McGrath (St. John's East):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct my question to the Minister of Agriculture and ask him whether a decision has been reached with respect to the establishment of a broiler marketing agency under the Farm Products Marketing Act.


Eugene Whelan: No, Mr. Speaker, I met people from the different provincial marketing boards and told them I would consider their request but that I wanted to make it plain to any marketing agency with which I was involved that I would have to have more federal authority than we had in anything they were proposing at that time.


BROILERS-POSSIBILITY OF ACTION ON FOOD PRICES REVIEW BOARD REPORT CONCERNING MARKETING PRACTICES
James Aloysius McGrath: Is the minister able to tell the House what action, if any, the government has taken on the recommendation of the Food Prices Review Board or at least in respect of their report of October 1975 with regard to the broiler industry in Canada and what appear to be certain questionable marketing practices in contravention of the BNA Act?


Eugene Whelan: The marketing practices referred to by the Food Prices Review Board are under provincial jurisdiction and I have very little if anything to do with that. The broiler producers in Canada at present are practically being put out of business by cheap imports from the Southern United States.


NATIONAL DEFENCE
Mr. Dan McKenzie (Winnipeg South Centre):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of National Defence. Could he inform the House of the status of project Samson, the new system which is to update communications in the Department of National Defence?


Hon. James Richardson (Minister of National Defence):: Mr. Speaker, the Samson project is continuing and will be completed in the near future.


A. Daniel McKenzie: Has Computing Devices of Ottawa fulfilled its $6 million contract with the Department of Supply and Services to supply terminal equipment for the $24 million Samson project?


James Armstrong Richardson: No, Mr. Speaker, I understand that Computing Devices have not been able to complete their part of the contract.


A. Daniel McKenzie: Will the program be in operation as scheduled for mid 1976?
[DOT] (U40)


James Armstrong Richardson: I do not know if the difficulties which Computing Devices have encountered will in fact have the effect of delaying the program. That is possible.


ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE
Mr. Pierre De Bane (Matane):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to put a question to the Minister of Justice.
Can he ask the Chief Justice of the Quebec Superior Court to find out whether there is any truth or not behind the rumours now circulating that Mr. Holden helped, directly or indirectly, to write the letter Judge Mackay sent, and whether the judge's letter was motivated only by the fact that his former associate's fees have not been paid, and whether his former associates' firm still owe him some money?


Stanley Ronald Basford: Mr. Speaker, my view of any such rumours would be that, even if true, they would clearly be within the management of the court which, as I have stated many times in the House and as the Chief Justice of the Superior Court documents in his letter to me, under the Quebec Judiciary Act is clearly within the hands of the Chief Justice.


POSSIBLE REFERENCE OF ALLEGED INTERFERENCE WITH JUDICIARY TO CANADIAN JUDICIAL COUNCIL-REQUEST FOR TABLING OF REPORT
Mr. Allan Lawrence (Northumberland-Durham):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the Minister of Justice if he regularly or even occasionally receives the determination of matters which come before the Canadian Judicial Council.


Stanley Ronald Basford: No, Mr. Speaker. Under the law I would receive those matters which I have directed the council to take under consideration under section 32(1), I think it is, but apart from that, no.
March 19, 1976


Allan Frederick Lawrence: Because the whole question of the dial-a-judge scandal has been referred to the Canadian Judicial Council by one of the judges involved, and because it is a matter of importance and has received much publicity, I wonder if the Minister of Justice would be good enough to make sure that he receives a report from the Canadian Judicial Council on the matter, which it is now obviously discussing because it has been referred to it, and if the minister would undertake to release that report to the House and to the public?


Stanley Ronald Basford: I am not aware that matters have been referred to the Judicial Council, and I point out to the hon. member, who has for two weeks in this House been talking about the independence of the judiciary, that I am in no position to demand reports from the Judicial Council except those provided by law.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


POST OFFICE
Hon. W. G. Dinsdale (Brandon-Souris):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Postmaster General. Has the Postmaster General received a complaint from the Kinsmen Rehabilitation Foundation of British Columbia with respect to the failure of the Vancouver Post Office to deliver to apartment blocks in Vancouver, under bulk permit 3229, several thousand brochures appealing for funds? Because of the importance of this appeal to the fund raising activities of the foundation on behalf of the handicapped of British Columbia, I wonder if the minister could inform the House what action he has taken on the matter.


Hon. Bryce Mackasey (Postmaster General):: Mr. Speaker, I understand that immediately upon complaint the matter was referred to the investigation department of the Post Office. It has virtually completed its investigation, but a very important part of that investigation is a meeting with the executive director of the Kinsmen Club, and for one reason or another they have been unable to arrive at a suitable date for such a meeting. When that meeting is held with the executive director of the Kinsmen Club, I would then consider the investigation completed and would then be in a position to see what corrective measures might be taken, if any.


Walter Gilbert Dinsdale: In view of the fact that the Kinsmen Foundation complaint has provided specific details as to where delivery failure took place, I wonder if we could have the assurance of the Postmaster General that delivery will take place without further costs to the foundation.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: The hon. gentleman can have my assurance that, once the investigation is completed, if upon reading the results of that investigation I find that in any way the Post Office has been remiss in its duty, then certainly we would want to make that type of adequate
Oral Questions
compensation, but I am still not convinced that the Post Office is necessarily at fault. The meeting with the executive director of the Kinsmen Club is very germane to the decision.


UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE
Mr. Eudore Allard (Rimouski):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to direct a question to the Minister of Manpower and Immigration.
Since the Unemployment Insurance Commission continues to apply internal regulations, which do not even have force of law, concerning the deadline for benefit claims, in spite of the fact that an umpire of the federal court has qualified this policy illegal and that a number of unemployed are thus deprived of benefits, could the minister tell this House whether he intends to take steps to put an end to these administrative practices of the Unemployment Insurance Commission?


Hon. Robert K. Andras (Minister of Manpower and Immigration):: Mr. Speaker, to the best of my knowledge with few exceptions the regulations made by the Unemployment Insurance Commission under the authority of the Governor in Council have to pertain to, and have their power from, the act itself. If in the odd case there is a regulation which does not meet favour in the appeal system through the courts, then that is corrected. That is normal procedure.


TRANSPORT
Mr. Robert Muir (Cape Breton-The Sydneys):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Transport. However, in his absence I will direct it to the Acting Minister of Transport. I was wondering if the minister is aware of a new steamship service commencing in the first part of April, 1976 from the Great Lakes direct to St. John's, Newfoundland. May I ask the minister if a subsidy is being provided from the national treasury for this new service? Has a study been made by the department to ascertain what effect this will have on Canadian National shipping through the port of North Sydney into Newfoundland, with particular reference to employment at those docks and at Port aux Basques and also the general employment with the CN system in the Atlantic provinces?


Stanley Ronald Basford: Mr. Speaker, I will have the Minister of Transport determine what, if any, subsidies have been paid and what, if any, analyses have been made of that service.

March 19, 1976
Oral Questions


Robert Muir: I realize the minister is at a disadvantage today, being in several portfolios at once, but would he ask the Minister of Transport to advise the House if it is the intention of this government to take people's money and give it to private corporations as a subsidy, thereby competing against Canadian National ships and creating more unemployment in Port aux Basques, Newfoundland and North Sydney, Nova Scotia? I refer particularly to Clarke Steamship.


Stanley Ronald Basford: I will determine the precise answer to that question, but it is the objective of the Minister of Transport and this government to spend public moneys in providing to Canada and Canadians the most effective and efficient transportation system possible.


FOREIGN INVESTMENT
Mr. Bill Kempling (Halton-Wentworth):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce. Will the minister advise the House of the situation regarding Westinghouse Canada, White Consolidated and General Steelwares? Has a decision been reached on this matter?


Hon. Donald C. Jamieson (Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to thank the hon. member for giving me notice of this question. As he, I think, knows, I returned only Tuesday of this week. There was not time for me to review the new evidence which came in during my absence, but I have scheduled a full meeting with regard to this for next week, and barring some unforeseen circumstances which I do not anticipate at the moment, it should be possible to announce a decision late next week.


COMMUNICATIONS
Mr. Louis Duclos (Montmorency):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to direct a question to the Minister of Communications.
Wednesday in Montreal, referring to the federal provincial dispute over communications, the minister said, and I quote:
Nobody has ever even tried to negotiate concrete agreements to know how far the federal government was prepared to go in its proposals.
Could the minister tell the House whether the government soon intends to take the initiative of indicating to the provinces how far it is prepared to go in its proposals, and when will the minister be ready to outline in the House the major principles of those proposals?


Hon. Jeanne Sauve (Minister of Communications):: Mr. Speaker, in that part of my speech, I referred to the attitude of some provinces which took a take-it-or-leave-it

position, that is to say we had either to deny that the federal government had a predominant responsibility in the field of communications, or to have no negotiations whatsoever. Now, my whole speech was to say that apart from that take-it-or-leave-it logics, there are parameters on which there can be some discussion. For the hon. member's information, I intend to visit the provinces to meet my provincial counterparts to determine what the needs of the provinces in the communications field are exactly and to see, in the light of offers which were already known by the provinces, what arrangements the federal government can make to meet these needs.
[DOT] (USO)


AGRICULTURE
Mr. Bert Hargrave (Medicine Hat):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct my question to the Minister of Agriculture? It relates to a new development to do with the livestock disease, blue tongue. I thank the minister for passing along the background paper relating to the new embargo in Great Britain preventing the entry to that country of Canadian livestock. The reason for the embargo is the disease, blue tongue. May I ask the minister how this particular outbreak was detected? I am thinking particularly of the outbreak on the border between British Columbia and the United States. Was it detected as a result of our own, Canadian health of animals tests, or as a result of the recently announced United States policy under which U.S. authorities monitor shipments of live Canadian cattle to that country? Did they do the testing, and were we advised of the result?


Eugene Whelan: Mr. Speaker, I think the disease was detected by our own inspection service, which checks on all imported animals. We believe the disease may have been transmitted by an imported bull brought into the herd from the United States. The herd is right on the border between British Columbia and the state of Washington. Or, it could have been transferred to the herd over the fence. We are concerned.


An hon. Member:: That's enough bull, now.


Eugene Whelan: We still feel that our herds in Canada are free of blue tongue and we have done everything possible to eradicate the disease.


Herbert Thomas (Bert) Hargrave: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. May I ask the minister if there has been a response from the United States health of animals authorities with regard to this specific incident?


Eugene Whelan: Mr. Speaker, I am not sure if there has been a response on this specific instance.
March 19, 1976


NORTHERN AFFAIRS
Mr. Wally Firth (Northwest Territories):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development. A news report in one of today's newspapers alleges that the cabinet has delayed for one month issuing a permit to Dome Petroleum for the drilling of oil in the Beaufort Sea. Why was the decision delayed for only one month?


Hon. Judd Buchanan (Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development):: Mr. Speaker, the government felt that additional information was required before it would be in a position to take a final decision. Pending receipt of necessary information, we delayed for one month.


Walter (Wally) Firth: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. For what information are we waiting? Would the minister consider delaying this decision for more than one year? Also, can he estimate how an intervention by the United States would affect the decision?


J. Judd Buchanan: Mr. Speaker, there are indications from the United States that they would like to study the information. The authorities there are concerned about the effects of a blowout on the north coast. They are worried about the ramifications. These and other factors we shall need to examine further, prior to taking a decision at the end of one month.


AGRICULTURE
Mr. Don Mazankowski (Vegreville):: Mr. Speaker, my question to the Minister of Agriculture arises from the government's intention to remove, effective April 1, the subsidy paid for the transportation of flour and grain which is to be exported from eastern Canadian ports. Has the minister examined the impact of this proposal on the flour and grain industry, and on other related industries in Canada? If so, can he say what impact this action will have on our flour and grain export trade? I ask this as Canadian flour exports in the past 20 years have declined dramatically, and the government's action will reduce further our penetration of the important market for these commodities.


Eugene Whelan: Mr. Speaker, may I answer the last part of the question first? I think the hon. member knows that more countries now mill their own flour. It is easier to transport grain to many parts of the world than to transport flour. We are concerned about what milling in other countries may do to the flour milling industry in eastern Canada especially. At present we have studies under way. I have been in touch with the President of the Treasury Board, to discuss this in detail.
Oral Questions


Donald Frank Mazankowski: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. What action is the minister's department, or associated departments, prepared to take, in order to increase Canada's penetration of the export flour market, our share in which declined by 50 per cent in the past 20 years while world demand increased by 50 per cent.


Eugene Whelan: Mr. Speaker, I can only repeat what I said earlier. As the hon. member knows, many countries have received help for establishing milling facilities within their own borders. Our wheat is being moved to those countries. They are using our commodity. This is how they want to do it and we are selling all the wheat we can, as I am sure the hon. member knows.


ANTI-INFLATION PROGRAM SUGGESTED PROVISION OF SAFEGUARDS AGAINST POSSIBILITIES ENVISAGED BY MR. TURNER
Mr. F. Oberle (Prince George-Peace River):: Mr. Speaker, my question to the Prime Minister relates to the revealing statement recently made by the former minister of finance who described the government's incomes control program as being extremely restrictive of personal freedom and suggested that because of its open-endedness, it will lead to totalitarian rule. Has the Prime Minister discussed these revelations of the former minister with the cabinet? If so, is the government prepared to review the program and provide safeguards, to guard against eventualities to which the former minister alluded?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, as I said earlier, I do not think it is proper for me to reveal everything which goes on in cabinet. When the matter is of such high importance as the alleged quotation of the hon. member I, of course, could not answer the question.


MANPOWER
Mr. Roger Young (Niagara Falls):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Manpower and Immigration. As large numbers of Canadian helicopter pilots, who, incidentally, received expensive training in this country are unemployed-


Mr. Nielsen:: At Niagara Falls?


Roger Carl Young: -and as foreign pilots still seem to get the best if not the largest number of available jobs, especially in the far north, would the minister consult on this matter with his manpower officials, to make certain that unemployed Canadian pilots are given job preference and thus ease our unemployment difficulties?


Robert Knight Andras: Mr. Speaker, I shall certainly take note of
11950

March 19, 1976
Oral Questions
the hon. member's question and look into the matter immediately.


ENVIRONMENTAL AFFAIRS
Mr. Bob Wenman (Fraser Valley West):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of the Environment. In view of the decision to delay issuing oil drilling permits in the Beaufort Sea, and as the Minister of the Environment said that drilling operations in the Beaufort Sea would cause substantial environmental impact, whether or not polluting incidents occur, would the minister consider referring the question of environmental impact of drilling in the Beaufort Sea to the appropriate standing committee of this House for special study?


Hon. Jean Marchand (Minister of the Environment):: Mr. Speaker, a committee of technicians has studied the matter. We have the report and I think the hon. member, too, has a copy of the report. I think it was discussed this morning in the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Forestry. Now, the matter is before cabinet and I am waiting for an answer.


INDUSTRY
Mr. John Reynolds (Burnaby-Richmond-Delta):: Mr. Speaker, my question for the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce concerns Trident Aircraft Corporation of Richmond, British Columbia. As the British Columbia Development Corporation and the shareholders of the company agreed to put up a considerable sum of money if the federal government will either guarantee a PAIT loan or grant, can the minister say if there is to be a favourable decision shortly, or any decision at all on the matter?


Donald Campbell Jamieson: Mr. Speaker, I was not aware of the most recent development concerning the British Columbia government, but I am glad to see that it supports the company. Prior to this question this morning, about three or four weeks ago, I instructed our officials to be in touch with Trident with regard to any additional help that we might give. The hon. member already knows that we have put a significant amount into that project. I will certainly follow up this new information to see if it helps matters.


AGRICULTURE
Mr. G. H. Whittaker (Okanagan Boundary):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Agriculture. Earlier

in the question period the minister stated that the broiler industry is being put out of business because of cheap imports into Canada. Does his government condone this type of action? If not, what are they going to do about it?


Eugene Whelan: Mr. Speaker, we are concerned about it, but it is up to the broiler producers themselves. We have legislation to give them protection if they follow proper procedures and prove that they have supply-management within their industry at the present time. I stated there were cheap imports being brought in from the United States. I did not say they were being dumped.


TOBACCO-GOVERNMENT ACTION TO INCREASE RETURNS TO PRODUCERS
Mr. Bruce Halliday (Oxford):: Mr. Speaker, my question is also for the Minister of Agriculture. In view of the low prices prevailing this year at the tobacco auctions and the difficulty tobacco farmers are having in meeting their costs, does the minister feel these concerns are justified? Is this something within the purview of his ministry? If this is a problem, what will he do about it?


Eugene Whelan: Mr. Speaker, I think that some of the concerns are justified. I will not go so far as to say they are all justified. I met with tobacco growers from Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Quebec and Ontario this week. They are concerned about the buying authority in the tobacco industry and how much real competition there may be in the buying authority. They are concerned about the fact that they have an 18 months supply and there are imports coming into Canada from the United States and other parts of the world which take away the markets from these producers. They also talked about a national marketing board for tobacco.



ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Mitchell William Sharp: I would draw your attention, Mr. Speaker, specifically to the reference to "the judge's affair" and then to the way in which, in relation to that affair, it is alleged that certain ministers have acted illegally. The Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Lalonde), in accordance with proper parliamentary practice, immediately rose on a question of privilege, inviting the hon. member for York-Simcoe to specify which ministers he had in mind, or completely to withdraw the charge of illegality. He indicated that if the matter was not disposed of at that time, it would be pursued. My parliamentary secretary also indicated that in the absence of an immediate ruling from the Chair, the matter would be pursued. The Acting Speaker merely admonished the hon. member for York-Simcoe for imputing motives.
The proprieties of this House in matters such as these are quite clear. Not only must a member wishing to charge another with misconduct be specific, but he must be willing to stake his seat on being able to prove his charge.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mitchell William Sharp: This practice was developed in order to prevent the destruction of order in this House by reducing its deliberations to innuendo and smear. I therefore demand, Mr. Speaker, that the member for York-Simcoe either make a specific charge of illegality against specific ministers, and stake his seat on being able to prove it, or that he withdraw his statement.


Walter David Baker: Mr. Speaker, quite frankly, I am rather surprised-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


An hon. Member:: You are always surprised.


Walter David Baker: I am glad the members are enjoying themselves. I repeat that I am rather surprised to see the government House leader rise, in these circumstances, with regard to matters that have been described as acts of wrong-doing by the government, by columnists and, indeed, by the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau). In fact, I am extremely surprised. Perhaps, before I deal with the merits of the question of privilege, the fact that the government House leader has seen fit to rise on this matter, which indirectly affects the judiciary and the ministry in Canada, is the best argument we have heard yet for the judicial inquiry we are demanding.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Walter David Baker: I would now like to get to the merits of the question of privilege. With respect, what you have to decide, Mr. Speaker, is whether this is indeed a question of privilege, carrying with it certain responsibilities, or whether it is simply a further development of a basic disagreement that has become apparent in this House over the last 12 days of intensive discussions on this important public matter. My respectful submission to you, sir, is that it is nothing more, in the final analysis, than the latter rather than the former to which I am referring. I want to give some examples. On July 30, 1975, the hon. member for Central Nova (Mr. MacKay) rose in this House on a question of privilege arising out of
Privilege-Mr. Sharp
remarks made to him by the Minister of Labour (Mr. Munro) with regard to certain very contentious and questionable matters about the conduct of the minister. He said, and I quote from page 8075 of Hansard for July 30, 1975:
-Mr. Speaker, as recorded at page 8026 of Hansard, the minister accused me of "indecency in casting innuendoes"-
Your Honour ruled at that time. You said:
The only question which remains is that raised by the hon. member for Central Nova concerning the language used yesterday by the Minister of Labour, indicating that what I understood to be remarks made by the hon. member, always in the House and always recorded in Hansard, were indecent in their innuendo and disgraceful in the conduct of the hon. member. That is an opinion that has been expressed in this House openly by the minister. The hon. member for Central Nova has taken offence at this. This is the chamber for disagreements. That is a classic case of one of them. It would have to be otherwise, in my opinion, in order to found a prima facie case of privilege, namely, that the language of the Minister of Labour was unparliamentary.
In examining the precedents I am unable to find the expressions he has used and the way he has used them are in any way unparliamentary. They simply contain and inflame the disagreement between the two hon. members. If we are to adjourn for a prolonged period later this day, or some day soon, perhaps it will be a pity, because the disagreement is becoming entertaining. Nevertheless, it is still a disagreement and not a question of privilege.
This was your ruling with respect to those extremely strong words at that time. My respectful submission is that there was nothing wrong with that ruling then, and that it applies now. The second matter which I should like to bring to your attention, Mr. Speaker, is this: I have looked at Beauchesne's fourth edition to determine whether or not the word "illegal", in the context in which it was quoted by the House leader, appears there. I can find no substantial authority to support the submission he made, and I note that the government House leader failed to bring forward any substantial authority from May's, Beauchesne's or any other learned work. At best, it is a matter of debate, in my respectful submission.
I now turn to another matter. How should we view questions of privilege or alleged questions of privilege when they are raised in the House of Commons? I am returning to an incident which occurred in this chamber and which led to a ruling by Your Honour on June 4, 1975. The Prime Minister had accused a former prime minister, my right hon. friend from Prince Albert (Mr. Diefen-baker), using these words:
-he made the largest land grab when he was in office that was ever made by any private citizen of Canada.
That was the accusation directed at that time by one prime minister against a former prime minister. The Prime Minister went on to say of my right hon. friend that he was "adding thousands of acres of land for his private enjoyment." That, Mr. Speaker, was a fairly strong accusation, even in a chamber which you said is a House of debate. Dealing with questions of privilege and how they should be regarded, Your Honour had this to say:
The definition of privilege is one which has been strictly adhered to and narrowly interpreted constantly ... In my view-
Here the view of Mr. Speaker Michener was being expressed.
21419-64'/2

March 19, 1976
Privilege-Mr. Sharp
-parliamentary privilege does not go much beyond the right of free speech in the House of Commons and the right of a member to discharge his duties in the House as a member of the House of Commons.
That was Your Honour's first point in defining what constituted a question of privilege. In the second place, you said, and I am quoting from page 6431 of Hansard for June 4, 1975:
The second thing which seems to be agreed upon is the way in which privilege should be interpreted and that we ought not to extend it lightly.
Further, Mr. Speaker, you said:
The third point on which there is agreement is that a dispute as to facts, a dispute as to opinions and a dispute as to conclusions to be drawn from an allegation of fact is a matter of debate and not a question of privilege.
If there is anything which is a matter of debate or a question of conclusions to be drawn, it is the item which has just been raised by the government House leader. Your Honour then went on to say this, as reported at page 6432 of Hansard:
Accordingly there is some wisdom in the process that if one wishes to complain about what another member has done or said it should be done in the form of a complete charge rather than by way of an alleged question of privilege.
That is the onus which lies upon the government House leader or upon whoever might wish to lay a charge. I have to say there have been occasions in the House where the words "illegal" and "illegality" have been used, and nothing has come from those words other than their strength in a hotly-felt issue involving disagreement and debate. A debate, I know, has to be carried on within certain bounds of taste, but those bounds of taste should not be construed so as to prohibit the widest ranging discussion of matters of public interest.
What indication is there that the word "illegal" was used and went unchallenged? I would remind Your Honour of what took place on September 21, 1971. The issue at that time was whether or not the government was acting illegally in the withholding of certain payments to farmers in western Canada. The peace-loving member for the constituency of Peace River (Mr. Baldwin) said this, referring to what he later called an illegal act:
I would add in this regard that if the action of the Minister of Finance who, under the act is charged with responsibility is, as I assume it to be, the collective action of the government and the cabinet, then they are all tainted with the same misdemeanour and this would be in effect a collective agreement to break the law, a form of conspiracy.
Those were words even stronger than were used on this occasion. The government was not so thin-skinned on that occasion and did not object to those words at the time. In conclusion, I want to say it is an arguable point whether the word "wrongdoing", as used to describe the conduct of one minister by the Prime Minister himself, cannot by definition include the word "illegal".


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Walter David Baker: The Prime Minister himself said he purposely left the expression fuzzy. It is important that the debate be allowed to carry on within reasonable bounds. Many things might be said about the hon. member's statement, but certainly not that there has been a breach of the privileges of any of the members of

this House so that they, to use Your Honour's own words, could not carry on their duties as members of parliament. That is the issue.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Stanley Knowles (Winnipeg North Centre):: Mr. Speaker, it is true that last night the Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Blais) reserved his minister's right to raise this matter today. I suggest he had such a right anyway, but no one is challenging it and I think there is a point in the fact that this reservation was made last night. But I do object most strongly to the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Sharp) alleging he is quoting the record but not quoting all of it.


Mr. Paproski:: Shame!


Stanley Howard Knowles: He said, for example, that all the Acting Speaker did last night was to admonish the hon. member for York-Simcoe (Mr. Stevens) and to tell him to get back to the bill. It is true that, as reported at the second column of Hansard for March 18 at page 11926, the Acting Speaker said words to that effect. But I would point out that immediately after the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Lalonde) raised his question of privilege against the hon. member for York-Simcoe, in the first column of Hansard, at page 11926, the Acting Speaker said:
Order, please. I do not believe the hon. member made any specific charge. He did not name a specific minister.
I suggest that is part of the argument. I also suggest that when the government House leader attempts to raise a matter and quote the record, he should quote all the record and not just part of it.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Stanley Howard Knowles: I commend the hon. member for Grenville-Carleton (Mr. Baker) on the case that he has just made, and I commend him in particular on the quotations he found and used, notably from yourself, concerning the fact that this is a place of debate. We have had far more serious incidents than this one in which Your Honour has told us that this is a place of debate. I suggest that that is the way to view the incident that occurred last night.
On the question of the word used by the hon. member for York-Simcoe, the word "illegality"-


Mr. MacFarlane:: No, "illegally".


Stanley Howard Knowles: The word "illegally". As I suggested to the President of the Privy Council, I want to quote the record correctly:
-allowing cabinet ministers who have acted illegally to carry on in their posts.
The Acting Speaker said, by the way, that that was not a specific charge. On this very question we have for two weeks or more had the Prime Minister of this country trying, under the guise of semantics, to find some differ-
March 19, 1976

ence between "acting illegally", "acting improperly", and "indulging in wrongdoing".


Some hon. Members:: Shame!


Stanley Howard Knowles: I suggest, Mr. Speaker, that the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) has used semantics to evade the issue. It is not what you call it, whether an illegal act, a wrongdoing or an impropriety that identifies what happened. I can think of many improprieties that are far more serious than certain illegalities. I suggest that what Your Honour has to look at is the quality of the act. In our view, the quality of the acts of certain cabinet ministers, and the quality of the act of the Prime Minister in covering up this whole thing for the last two weeks, is bad-and, in my view, calling that a wrongdoing or an impropriety makes it just as bad, if not worse, than if I were to call it an illegal act. So I suggest to Your Honour that in considering this case you will have to review your own pronouncements about this being a place of debate, and you will also have to do some very careful analysis of semantics as to the meaning of these various words.
My hon. friend from Grenville-Carleton has done the job very well, but there is just one further thing I should like to say. It is a bit annoying, speaking of the double standards there are around here-


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Stanley Howard Knowles: -that almost every time some criticism or accusation comes from this side of the House we have these fellows on the other side jumping up and saying, "Lay a charge. Put your seat on the line".


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Stanley Howard Knowles: And the backbenchers applaud, as they are doing now. But when accusations come from the other side, we do not hear the cry, "Lay a charge". The Prime Minister, by innuendo, has been downgrading Mr. Justice Mackay through the whole of this affair, but he has laid no charge.


Some hon. Members:: Shame!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The problem itself is complicated enough without seeking other fields to complicate it further. I think it would be better if we stuck to the question of whether or not a question of privilege exists regarding the language of the hon. member for York-Simcoe.


Stanley Howard Knowles: I agree with you, Mr. Speaker, but I remind you that the closing words of the President of the Privy Council were a demand that the hon. member for York-Simcoe lay a charge and put his seat on the line. I suggest that if the opposition is being told that it must lay a charge, the standard should apply both ways. Today the hon. member for Matane (Mr. De Bane) made accusations against Mr. Justice Mackay. But did he lay a charge? The President of the Privy Council likes to attack me all over the place, but he never lays a charge.
Privilege-Mr. Sharp
I suggest that the basic procedural issue is whether or not the hon. member for York-Simcoe went beyond the bounds of propriety in his words last night, and that is for you to decide. I suggest the issue is not one for the President of the Privy Council to becloud and fudge by this old cry that members of the opposition, every time they make an accusation, must lay a charge. It is a form of evasion; we have had enough of it.


Hon. Jean Chretien (President of the Treasury Board):: Mr. Speaker, my own privileges are being affected by the hon. member for York-Simcoe (Mr. Stevens). He referred to ministers, without naming my name. I was not in the House and this is the first occasion I have had to ask him to make a charge or withdraw and apologize. The hon. member has said that some ministers acted illegally. When this incident was first printed in the newspaper, I sent a letter to the judge who made the accusation, and within 48 hours he withdrew his charge and apologized. The week after that, the paper that printed the story withdrew its charges and apologized to the hon. member for Saint-Mau-rice officially on the front page of the paper. I think the hon. member is making a very serious accusation and he should at least apply the standard used by the two people I mentioned earlier who withdrew their charges in my case.
In addition to that, the Minister of Justice (Mr. Basford) the other day, as the legal adviser to the Crown, stated there was absolutely no illegality in the actions of the three ministers mentioned. Since my personal privileges are affected, I ask the hon. member to withdraw his charge or to face the consequences of his actions and put his seat on the line.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I have been brought into the debate by both members opposite. Perhaps in one case it was by way of a red herring, but in the other case it may have been more important. In the first case, the hon. member for Grenville-Carleton (Mr. Baker) referred to the land grab during the regime of the right hon. member for Prince Albert (Mr. Diefenbaker). I know Your Honour would be impatient if we returned to that one, but it was brought in as a precedent. I just want to remind the House of your judgment, sir, in that matter. It was that I did not allege anything wrong or any illegal wrongdoing or impropriety. Your judgment was to the effect that I said this had been done to the benefit of the institutions of this country and that I had personally said the facts were known to the House: they are that around 1958 these acres which were in the NCC were suddenly used for the purpose of the prime minister. Those were the facts on that. I say this is probably a red herring.
On the other point, the semantics about wrongdoing, I want to make it quite clear that I did use the word advisedly. If hon. members remember my statement and the questions asked by the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Clark), they will note I used it as a general and-and I specify-a vague term because I meant to cover, and I say this quite clearly, illegalities and improprieties. I indicated that I used this term, but I asked the House what should follow from each of these courses. I said the wrongdoing, which is the illegality, is not alleged by anybody. As a matter of

March 19, 1976
Privilege-Mr. Sharp
fact, we now have opinions that there was no illegality, but there was some wrongdoing which was an impropriety, for which there was an apology.
Members talk about a cover-up. They say we are not coming clean, and so on. On the contrary, there was no illegality, but there was an impropriety, and in the case of the impropriety there was an apology. The House disagrees, or some of its members do, as to whether the punishment was proportionate to the offence, but that is an arguable point.
The point I am making is that for that impropriety there was an apology. If we are charged with an impropriety, we do not hurl back a privilege, we answer it. We say either it was improper and we apologize, or it was not improper and we argue it. There is no attempt to hurl back any charge of being out of order or, indeed, of anyone trying to make innuendoes which are not substantiated. We argue a point that is not very different from what Mr. Justice Mackay himself said. He obviously accused the President of the Treasury Board (Mr. Chretien) of doing something presumably illegal-interfering with the courts. He then had to withdraw, and he apologized. The minister accepted his apology. Should Justice Mackay resign because he has committed the impropriety of a false allegation?


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: The House may think so, but everyone accepted his apology, beginning with the minister, and that ended the matter. This is what I have to say about the use of the word "improper", that I used it to cover both aspects. What I do find extraordinary is the argument made by the hon. member for Grenville-Carleton that the point argued by the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Sharp) just shows that an inquiry is needed. This brought great applause from the ranks of the Tories.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I would urge Your Honour to think of this in bringing down your ruling on the point argued by the hon. member for Grenville-Carleton and the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles): all I would have to do is accuse them both of illegality. There is nothing wrong with accusing them of being thieves and committing crimes. There would be no question of privilege and no point of order here. But if they then objected, I could say, "Okay; we will start an investigation into the hon. member for Grenville-Carleton and the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre and that will prove my point." They are objecting to my saying that they are crooks, and because they are objecting we have a mandate to investigate that. Mr. Speaker, this does not make sense.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Stanley Ronald Basford: Mr. Speaker, the question of privilege raised by the House leader involves the use of the word "illegal" by the hon. member, and I would just like to make a short intervention. Clearly, "illegal" means contrary to the law. The Table has run out of dictionaries, but I should like to quote from Fowler's second edition, which states:

Illegal is most precise, with its meaning of contrary to the law of the land.
In considering the question of privilege before you, Mr. Speaker, I would urge you to consider my statement on page 11855 of Hansard as follows:
Upon receipt of Chief Justice Deschenes' letter, I immediately and forthwith referred it, as I have informed the House, to the law officers of the Crown, as was my duty, obligation, and responsibility as Attorney General. I have also informed the House, as reported at page 11749 of Hansard, that it was referred to the senior law officers of the Crown and that the contents of the Chief Justice's letter disclosed to the chief law officers no violation of any law by any minister, and I so advised the Prime Minister of that fact. If there is any doubt on that question, Mr. Speaker, I would be happy to table my letter to the Prime Minister.
That is what I then did, Mr. Speaker. The hon. member for York-Simcoe (Mr. Stevens) used a very precise word in the allegation which previously has been very clearly stated in this House, and very clearly stated this as untrue. He has affected not only the privileges of the three ministers involved but my privilege as Minister of Justice. If he wants to get up and say I have misinformed the House, he had better damned well do so.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


An hon. Member:: Oh, is that Basford tough!


Erik Nielsen: Mr. Speaker, I intervene because I think there are one or two serious, overriding questions Your Honour has to decide. I am not so certain, as appears to be the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles), that there is a right to raise this question of privilege in the manner in which it has been raised, in light of the proceedings which transpired last night. Let me quote from the current edition of our provisional standing rules. Standing Order 17(1) sets forth the following:
Whenever any matter of privilege arises, it shall be taken into consideration immediately or at a time appointed by Mr. Speaker.
The matter arose last night and there was no time appointed by Mr. Speaker last night at which the matter would be discussed. Notwithstanding the caveat filed by the parliamentary secretary, the Speaker last night appeared to have dealt with the matter. He said, as reported at page 11926 of Hansard when the question of privilege was raised by the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Lalonde), after calling the House to order:
I do not believe the hon. member made any specific charge. He did not name a specific minister.
There followed a caveat filed by the parliamentary secretary, and the Speaker again said, as recorded in the right-hand column of the same page:
Order, please. I would suggest that the hon. member should not impute motives in that way, and that we get back to Bill C-89.
My submission to you, Mr. Speaker, is that the matter was disposed of last night and that rule 17(2) was never put in the Standing Orders to be used in the fashion attempted to be used now. Even if that argument is not acceptable to you, Mr. Speaker, there is the suggestion in the concluding part of the notice of the question of privilege that in the event the Chair finds that the use of the term "illegal" was not parliamentary and was improperly imputing motives to a minister or ministers, the consequence of that action would be that the member would
March 19, 1976

either have to make a specific charge against a specific minister or ministers and follow that by substantiating the charge or charges, and failing that, his seat would be forfeit. I think a very careful examination of the precedents will disclose that there is no Standing Order, rule or precedent that would require that consequence.
I have had occasion to be fairly close to this particular question in the past, on more than one instance in this House of Commons. I can assure you, sir, that the best opinion I obtained after advice from the officers of the House was that there simply is no rule or precedent of the House which would require a member to stake his seat on the outcome of an unsubstantiated charge.
With regard to the question of illegality, the use of the term "illegal" and other parliamentary expressions, there is a list of them in May's eighteenth edition at page 434. There is a further list of those expressions in Beauchesne's fourth edition which starts at page 130 and continues. I could call the member for St. Boniface (Mr. Guay) a jackass. I will not do it, but the fact is that in the past this has been held to be rather unparliamentary. May I draw the attention of the Chair to the fact that during the sitting of 1975 I charged the government with being illegal. Today I so charge it with continuance of an illegal act in not tabling the financial statements that the government is required to table on the Northern Canada Power Commission-


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Erik Nielsen: -which it is clearly required by the law to do and which it has refused to table since 1971. So I do not think any great exception should be taken to an assertion by a member on this side of the House that an act of the collective ministry is an illegal act. That is the situation in respect of the hon. member for Simcoe-North (Mr. Stevens) last night.


Some hon. Members:: Sit down.


Erik Nielsen: Hon. members on the other side of the House are experts in arrogance. The hon. member was speaking of the collective ministry when he was describing conduct. I have been sitting here throughout the questions on the so-called "judges' affair". I heard the Minister of Justice (Mr. Basford) say that the law officers of the Crown had been asked for an opinion as to the nature of the actions complained of, and their view is that the acts were not illegal. I ask, sir, how in the world could they come to such a conclusion without being in possession of all the facts which this side has been trying to elicit from the government?
I ask, in respect of the term "illegal", how can the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) or any other minister prejudge the issue of conduct and whether it is legal or illegal, proper or improper? Surely, that is not their province. I can lay a charge and I can express the same kind of opinion, with equal validity, as the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister and, obviously, the government House leader came to the conclusion that the conduct of the Minister of Public Works (Mr. Drury) was not illegal but was improper. It is just as proper for me to reach the contrary view. A reading
Privilege-Mr. Sharp
of section 127 of the Criminal Code leads me to the conclusion that there is sufficient evidence to constitute a prima facie case of obstruction.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Erik Nielsen: I do not think it is my province to reach a judgment as to whether that conduct is legal or illegal, proper or improper: that is the province of the courts, or of a special inquiry.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Erik Nielsen: Surely, we on this side have the same right and the hon. member for York-Simcoe has the same right to express an opinion in respect of the conduct of the Minister of Public Works as does the Prime Minister. It happens to be a contrary opinion. The member did not say that any minister broke the law.


Mitchell William Sharp: Of course he did.


Erik Nielsen: The words of the hon. member for York-Simcoe were:
What administration at a senior level of government in Canada other than this administration would be allowing cabinet ministers who have acted illegally to carry on in their posts?


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Mr. Speaker-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I am trying very hard to consider the relevancy of the argument being put forward. So far the hon. member for Yukon (Mr. Nielsen) is making an argument that is relevant, and I should like to hear its conclusion. There is one difficulty: everybody involved in this argument up to this point has been trying to give us an interpretation of what was meant by the hon. member for York-Simcoe. Perhaps we should leave that to him.


Erik Nielsen: Mr. Speaker, I will make one final point which is extremely basic and which has been expressed by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles). I listened with alarm to the hon. member for Champlain (Mr. Matte) when he moved his motion under Standing Order 43. I listened with the same alarm today when the hon. member for Matane (Mr. De Bane) raised his question with regard to Mr. Justice Mackay. It is my submission that it is highly improper to reflect in this House upon the conduct of any member of the judiciary.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Steve Eugene Paproski: Shame!


Erik Nielsen: There is ample precedent-


Pierre De Bané: Mr. Speaker-


Some hon. Members:: Sit down.


Erik Nielsen: There is ample precedent-


Some hon. Members:: Sit down.


An hon. Member:: Watch your blood pressure.


Erik Nielsen: There is ample precedent for that. I should like to quote from May's eighteenth edition, commencing

March 19, 1976
Privilege-Mr. Sharp
at page 361. Once again I shall try to be brief. In the same publication, at page 417 we find this these words:
Unless the discussion is based upon a substantive motion-
This is what was being referred to by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre.
-drawn in proper terms, reflections must not be case in debate upon the conduct of the sovereign, the heir to the throne, or other members of the royal family, the Lord Chancellor, the Governor-General of an independent territory, the Speaker, the Chairman of Ways and Means, Members of either House of Parliament, or judges of the superior courts-


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Steve Eugene Paproski: Resign.


Erik Nielsen: I am not attempting to smuggle this in as another question of privilege.


An hon. Member:: But you did.


Erik Nielsen: An extremely serious matter has been raised in the debate on this question. While I do not insist, I suggest that the hon. member for Champlain and the member for Matane have a responsibility, amounting at least to a courtesy, to make apologies for their transgressions. I hope sir, that in future, whatever happens in the discussion of this matter, no further reflection will be made upon the members of the judiciary.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for York-Simcoe.


Mr. Guay (St. Boniface):: On a point of privilege-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I would remind hon. members that we are in the process of discussing a question of privilege raised by the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Sharp). The hon. member for York-Simcoe.


Mr. Sinclair Stevens (York-Simcoe):: Mr. Speaker, in addition to the arguments that have been advanced by members on this side of the House, I should like to add the following comments. First, I wish to point out that the statement which I made last night was in collective terms as opposed to being specific. Also, the last sentence was a rhetorical statement; it was a question.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: When we are considering the implications of the word "illegal", I believe that essentially we must weigh what is legal and what is illegal. It is a question of opinion, surely, and it is a question of debate. The Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) has repeatedly stated that no illegal acts were involved in the affair commonly referred to as the "judges' affair". A few moments ago he stated that there had been no wrongdoing and that he had used that term deliberately. That is his opinion. Others may have a contrary opinion as to when there are illegal acts.
The Oxford dictionary-the Minister of Justice (Mr. Basford) referred to dictionary definitions-states that "illegal" is defined as being contrary to law. The hon. member for Yukon (Mr. Nielsen) has referred to section 127(2) of the Criminal Code which deals with the obstruction or the perversion of justice. As hon. members probably

know, that section states that any one who wilfully attempts in any manner to obstruct, pervert or defeat the course of action is guilty of an indictable offence. The fact is that if the government wishes this record to be clear in order to protect itself from any inference of illegality in connection with what has transpired with the "judges' affair," they should facilitate that with a proper adjudication.
The Chief Justice of Quebec has made no judgment except to say that the matter is grave. Certain officers of the Crown have indicated that they feel there is no illegality. That is a legal opinion; there could be other legal opinions. The Prime Minister has said that certain actions have been improper and he has referred to the actions as being wrong or at least as being in the context of wrongdoing. Let us check the Oxford dictionary on this. The Oxford dictionary defines "improper" as meaning "wrong." "Wrong," in turn, is defined by the same dictionary as meaning "contrary to law" which, of course, is the Oxford dictionary's definition of "illegal." In short, the Prime Minister's view that there have been no improper acts' means that there have been no wrongful acts, which in turn means that there have been no illegal acts if you follow the Oxford dictionary's definition of these words.


An hon. Member:: Wow!


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: In using the word yesterday evening, I did it in the context to which I referred in my remarks today. The House leader has referred to the Acting Speaker, to use his term, as "rebuking me" by saying:
Order, please. I would suggest that the hon. member should not impute motives in that way-
I believe the House leader has possibly taken the statement of the Acting Speaker out of context because, as I heard that statement last night, I thought the Acting Speaker was rebuking not me but the Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Blais).


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: If you read the full text you will find that it was the parliamentary secretary who had last spoken. He ended by saying:
If the minister wishes to raise the matter further, then at the time he raises it I hope the Chair will take into consideration that the question of privilege has been raised now seriously, that Your Honour has heard him, and would wish to hear further representations.
I understood that to be an observation that he hoped that the previous decision, that there was no question of privilege, could be left open. The Acting Speaker then said:
Order, please. I would suggest that the hon. member should not impute motives in that way-


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Mr. Speaker, I attempted earlier, and I apologize for it, to ask the hon. member for Yukon (Mr. Nielsen) a question. We have done this for the last 10 or 12 years in these types of debates, and it was meant to be objective. I agree with most of the arguments put forward by the hon. gentleman, particularly when he pointed out that the word "illegal" has different connotations in different circumstances. He pointed out that he himself had once used the word "ille-
March 19, 1976

gal" in referring to the late tabling of a document as being an illegal act. Last night, in his usual persuasive manner, he put forward his point and stated, from Hansard:
What administration at a senior level of government in Canada other than this administration would be allowing cabinet ministers who have acted illegally to carry on in their posts?
He then went on to persuade the House that the word "illegal" is really a word with different connotations, as I have already said, depending on certain circumstances. But what the hon. gentleman failed .to point out is that the word "illegal" in this case is clearly tied to something specific. He neglected to read the first part of the paragraph where he said:
"Do as I say, not as I do" appears to be the creed of the present administration. Surely, Mr. Speaker, this type of thinking is shown up so clearly in the judges' affair that is now before us.
In other words, the hon. member for York-Simcoe (Mr. Stevens) was using the word "illegal" in respect of the judges' affair and not in any other connotation which, as the hon. gentleman quite properly pointed out, could give a different definition to the word "illegal". So the hon. gentleman has prejudged or predetermined, without the benefit of this inquiry which the opposition has been seeking so desperately, that the acts of the ministers were illegal in the sense that they were in contravention of the law. He compounded this when he blatantly rose in the House today and spoke of all ministers, collectively, which puts a different connotation on it so far as I am concerned because then the hon. member should be prepared to tell the House how the Postmaster General has acted illegally as part of that collectivity in relation to the judges' affair.
The hon. gentleman should have withdrawn his statement entirely, which anybody with any sense of decency would have done. The hon. member has ignored this entirely, and he had full opportunity to act as an honourable gentleman in this House by taking advantage of the opportunity that all hon. members have, which all of us at one time or another have done, including myself, to apologize when sometimes we get carried away. The hon. member has had all evening to reflect on whether or not he had been carried away, as many of us are in debate. He should have asked himself whether perhaps he had not prejudged the event without the benefit of some form of inquiry.


Some hon. Members:: Order.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Having had that opportunity he still refuses to apologize.


Some hon. Members:: One o'clock.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. There are other hon. members who have indicated their desire to participate in this discussion. I would like some guidance from the House as to whether we should allow these arguments to expire shortly after one o'clock, or whether we should return at two o'clock and continue this discussion.


Some hon. Members:: Return at two o'clock.


Mr. Speaker:: It being one o'clock, I do now leave the chair until two o'clock this afternoon.
At one o'clock the House took recess.
Privilege-Mr. Sharp AFTER RECESS
The House resumed at 2 p.m.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Mr. Speaker, I wish to keep my remarks very brief, because before the break I had not realized the significance of the opposition day and the fact that there are many visitors in town who are interested in the future of the dairy industry who, quite properly, want to have the Social Credit party proceed with its day.
I just want to summarize very briefly the point I was attempting to make, that the word "illegal" certainly is very broad in its definition. It can mean a number of things. To a sports buff it can be as simple as an offside in a hockey game, which is an illegal act. As the hon. member for Yukon said, the late tabling of a paper or a document is illegal. However, in this particular case the question of an illegal act has taken on the precise connotation, as it relates to the judges' case, of a criminal act or not a criminal act. It is certainly well beyond propriety, wrong, or even stupid, and I hope the hon. gentleman, who has shown that he is basically a House of Commons man, will understand that some of these rules to which we seem to overreact are really to make the House of Commons work as it should, which is the concern of most of us. As the hon. member for Fundy-Royal (Mr. Fairweather) put it the other day, democracy depends on this House of Commons and the House of Commmons depends on certain basic rules which may look rather silly but in the general context of things make the difference between this House operating and not operating.
This is not Sunday school, it is a debating society, and if we are going to debate, periodically we are bound to go beyond the normal realm of things. We are bound to go beyond what we really intended to say. I had hoped, and still hope, that the hon. gentleman will reflect on my point. By virtue of his own words, "illegal" is related to the judges' case, as we call it, which in the opinion of the House obviously-and I have sat through the question periods-has been unresolved.
If the opposition were firmly of the belief that everything had been resolved, it would not be asking for an inquiry. Rightly or wrongly, the hon. gentleman has left the impression that at least in his mind there is no doubt as to guilt, wrongdoing or illegality which, in the legal sense-as the Minister of Justice (Mr. Basford) pointed out today-has a very narrow context. In the opinion of the hon. member, he does not need an inquiry to establish it; his mind is already made up-and that is very serious.
That is why we have this opportunity of retraction. It is a wonderful opportunity for honourable members-and I stress that phase-to take advantage of the rule which simply says that an hon. member can get up and apologize if he has perhaps gone too far. The hon. member could get up and say that he used the world "illegal" as he uses it in everyday jargon to cover a broad spectrum of acts, some which are simply improper, some stupid and, as I mentioned, some where rules are clearcut and defined in sports as illegal acts.
This is why we have this opportunity, and this is why, despite the fact that we say we should refer this to a special committee or "put your seat at stake", in the 15 years I have been around here that has happened very

March 19, 1976
Privilege-Mr. Sharp
infrequently. As a matter of fact, it happened in one case when Liberal members were brought to a committee on the pretext that they were trying to seduce certain members of parliament to join our party.
I say, in conclusion, that if I rose to participate in the debate, it was because I am a House of Commons man. I think the House of Commons is the greatest guarantee we have that democracy, as we understand it, will function, because we debate here in front of the press. Some people may not like the press. I happen to respect it and consider it an extension of the House of Commons. We have a chance to debate here. This is a debating chamber, and when we go beyond the law we have an opportunity to take back what we say. I have taken advantage of that. I have stood in my place, apologized and said I had been caught unawares or spoke in the heat of the moment and went beyond what I had meant to do. I have risen in my place because I had to apologize for a leak of documents in my department.
It is one of our fundamental rules that the word of an hon. gentleman is accepted without question. However, I have become a little uneasy in the 15 years I have been here. I think the rules of the game are important to this whole matter, not just to the hon. member. I often sit here uneasy because I sat here through the sixties. We have a tremendous privilege. We have immunity from the normal laws of slander, libel, smear and innuendo which the man on the street does not have. This is the kind of thing which is precious and which should not be abused. I remember in the sixties-and I am not talking about ministers-innocent, junior people in certain ministerial offices, like Guy Lord, whose career as a lawyer was completely destroyed. Never once was he accused of anything; there were simply questions as to whether Guy Lord knew this or that. As a young rookie, I rose and said, "Supposing the events two months from now prove that he was completely innocent of the inferences in those questions: how do we make up for or redress that grave injustice?" That man's career was ruined and was never recovered. Events proved that he was completely, utterly innocent of any wrongdoing.
When the hon. gentleman who likes to lecture now and then, and who seems to be getting crabbier as old age sets in-


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: -says he is just a little tired of our suggesting that people put their seats at stake, we are getting a little tired of the lectures of the hon. gentleman as though he had replaced Beauchesne around here. Well, he has not done so yet. I hope that may come in his retirement years, in the late 1980s, but the hon. gentleman should address himself to the point I am making.
How many times in th^ question period do questions become facts in the minds of newspaper people who may not have been present, but who get their news third or fourth hand, or in the mind of the man on the street who unintentionally transfers the questions into statements of fact? When an honest question is asked about the conduct of a minister or a backbencher, or about the integrity of a member of parliament or his actions, we all know this quite often becomes translated into fact through the gossip mill of this country. People's careers can be ruined in the

question period if questions are not framed with a degree of responsibility.
[DOT] (MIO)


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Simply because the sense of responsibility permeates and dominates the House of Commons we, the recipients of the questions, are given the opportunity to say, when we think hon. members have gone too far, "Look, that is an accusation, a reflection on my integrity, on my character, on my name, on my family and on my future. If you have any facts, put up or shut up."


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Because this is a civilized chamber in which there are civilized people, members usually stand up, swallow their pride and apologize. No one has ever been thought in this House less of for making a mistake and admitting it. The hon. gentleman opposite, who had all last evening to reflect, should remember that my seatmate, the President of the Treasury Board (Mr. Chretien) has been exonerated. The media of this country apologized to him. Mr. Justice Mackay exonerated him.


Erik Nielsen: Not quite.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Perhaps the hon. gentleman opposite is used to abusing the House of Commons because of his great knowledge of the rules. Perhaps the hon. member for Yukon has lost his respect for this chamber.


Erik Nielsen: Certainly not.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: I have not.


Mr. Andre:: You are wasting the Creditistes' time. Come to the point.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: The hon. gentleman talks about wasting time. Why did he not go back to Alberta? He is there, anyway, 40 days out of 50.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Mr. Speaker, my point is this: Mr. Justice Mackay did not find it difficult to apologize to my seat-mate, the hon. member from Shawinigan. The Chief Justice did not in any way minimize or limit the complete exoneration of that minister . The responsible newspaper which broke the story apologized, which was a courtesy because this matter was not raised in an editorial; it was a news story and they wrote it in good faith. Everybody has apologized except the hon. gentleman who last night raised certain questions. By implication, they point to ministers, and the suggestion is that they committed an illegal act, even though Chief Justice Deschenes said otherwise.


Erik Nielsen: No, he did not.


Mr. Munro (Esquimalt-Saanich):: He did not judge them at all.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: If hon. gentlemen opposite want to play around with the law, I ask them this: What was Mr. Justice Mackay's motivation in writing the letter of apology?
March 19, 1976


Harvie Andre: That is privileged. You cannot reflect on the judiciary.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: I am not reflecting on him; I am praising him.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. We have had a lengthy discussion but today, after all, has been set aside specifically for the Social Credit party. It is now 2.15 p.m. Other hon. members want to participate. I wonder if the minister has nearly completed his remarks.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Yes, Mr. Speaker. I am glad Your Honour has brought us back to the point to be considered. I think I meticulously stayed on it until the hon. gentleman opposite, who is noted for his asinine interventions, interrupted me. In conclusion, it is not too late for the hon. gentleman opposite to stand up and explain in what way he used or meant to use the word "illegal". Hopefully, he will have the courage to get up and apologize to ministers collectively, particularly to my hon. friend who sits next to me.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Mr. Speaker, I will be brief. I wish to make a couple of points only. I suggest that the question of privilege is res judicate. Yesterday, as reported on page 11926 of Hansard, the Acting Speaker, the hon. member for London East (Mr. Turner) said:
Order please. I do not believe the hon. member made any specific charge-
Finally he called on the hon. member who had the floor to continue his speech. It seems to me that the matter is res judicate. I suggest that the government made a mountain out of a molehill. Let me deal for a moment with the meaning of the words "illegality," "wrongfully" and "improper."
The Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) a number of times has used the words "wrongdoing" and "wrongfully." My authority for the definitions I shall give are the dictionary and the Supreme Court of Canada. I shall mention a case in which I was involved as counsel and in which the court defined these words. According to the court, "improper" means "wrong", "wrongfully" means "illegally," and "illegal" means "wrong" or "improper." So those words mean more or less the same thing. I think the government has made a mountain out of a molehill; it is supersensitive.
I agreed with at least one thing the Postmaster General (Mr. Mackasey) said in his long speech. You can do something illegal without committing an offence under the Criminal Code. The action may involve a quasi-criminal matter. For instance, you could have parked your car in the wrong place. I repeat, I think the government is making a mountain out of a molehill.
A case was determined on this very point, that is, on the definition of "wrongful" and "illegal." Allow me to refer to 1952 Supreme Court Reports, page 335. In the case of Marsh v. Kulchar I acted for the appellant. A very simple point of law arose which I know would appeal to Your Honour. According to the Saskatchewan statutes, an owner is responsible for what happens to his automobile unless the automobile was stolen or wrongfully taken from him or out of his possession. The defence held that the car was stolen or wrongfully taken out of the owner's possession. The
Privilege-Mr. Sharp
court held that "wrongfully" and "illegally" are identical in meaning. In some circumstances, anyone who takes a car wrongfully could be accused of joyriding, which is an offence under the Criminal Code.
The Prime Minister today, I think, used the word "wrongfully." Also, the Minister of Public Works (Mr. Drury) apologized. In any event, as I said before, the government has made a mountain out of a molehill. My distinguished colleague used the word "illegally." It really means "wrongfully", a word which the Prime Minister himself used today. I think hon. members opposite are supersensitive. None of this would have flared up if the government had agreed to establish a public inquiry at which we could learn all the facts.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Mr. Speaker, I would not have intervened on this question of privilege had not the Postmaster General (Mr. Mackasey) lectured the opposition. After complaining that the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) lectured the House, he spent about 25 minutes lecturing the opposition. I will not take as long as he did to make one point. He told the opposition all the harm they had done in the past, and could do in the present, by asking questions. He ought to know that one of the functions of the opposition is that of asking questions. That is the only way we can discover what is going on in this secretive government. Let the minister refer back to some of the things which arose in the past. I will not embarrass him and the government by enumerating some of the scandals which have been brought to light in the last 10 or 12 years because the opposition asked questions. He did not mention that in the Rivard case, to which he alluded, one of the persons about whom we asked questions ended up being sent to jail.


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Do you think that was justified?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Hon. members are seeking to put interesting points on the record. However, we are constantly depriving one caucus which wishes to raise important matters today to raise those matters. They cannot do this while the question of privilege is being debated.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Mr. Speaker, may I deal with one point which the hon. member raised? He is suggesting how the House should condemn the use of the word "illegally." I point out that this involves a matter of opinion. The Prime Minister is of the opinion that, on the basis of what his ministers said to him, nothing illegal or improper was done. We have not had the advantage of knowing what the Prime Minister said to his ministers or what they said to him. It seems to me that we are entitled to say that in our opinion actions have been taken which, until further information is divulged, could be both improper and illegal.


Mr. Andre Fortin (Lotbiniere):: Mr. Speaker, today I propose a motion on the dairy policy in general in order to launch a debate on this subject. It is necessary as much for its economic and social implications as for the security of income for dairy producers who are justifiably worried

March 19, 1976
Privilege-Mr. Sharp
about the future of their production. Mr. Speaker, clearly this is a complex issue because of numerous implications such as domestic marketing of the exports of similar products which compete with our own production-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. There is already a question of privilege before the House concerning the comments made last night by the hon. member for York-Simcoe (M. Stevens). Does the hon. member for Lotbiniere (Mr. Fortin) have a contribution to make on this issue or does he wish to put a question of privilege other than that which is being debated now?


André-Gilles Fortin: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It has long been a day to day life in the dairy industry. Each year we have to start from scratch and, at the last minute, like-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Once again, I ask the hon. member for Lotbiniere if he has anything to add to the discussion on the question of privilege raised by the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Sharp)?


André-Gilles Fortin: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. All right, let us talk about the question of privilege. It has now been exactly one hour and a half since the House of Commons, under the influence of the President of the Privy Council, began debating a question of privilege which, in my opinion, is rather unimportant at least for the time being because the government refuses to conduct an inquiry. And, Mr. Speaker, this day was most important. It was to be devoted to the dairy producers from eastern Canada, and we have to do just that.


An hon. Member:: He does not want to talk about it!


André-Gilles Fortin: Mr. Speaker, this is why I ask before the discussion on this question of privilege is over and before you make a decision let the President of the Privy Council rise with the same willingness he showed when he rose on his question of privilege and let him extend the debate by at least one hour after five o'clock, otherwise, Mr. Speaker, this situation is ridiculous.
I therefore ask the President of the Privy Council, before this question of privilege is disposed of, to show as much equity for the producers as for the ministers.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. Of course, the hon. member for Lotbiniere has raised a question of privilege which is completely different from the one raised by the President of the Privy Council. It may be a very worthwhile and important question of privilege, but it is distinct from the other.

The several questions that have been raised in respect of the question of privilege raised by the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Sharp) are very important and complex. There are two aspects that I should deal with now: I prefer to reserve on the remaining aspects. The first is with respect to the argument that the matter ought not to have been raised procedurally today. If it is a valid interpretation of the rules and practices of the House, I think that would be strict to the extreme. Indication was given, as a result of the remarks, that argument would be made today: notice was given to me this morning. I have indeed never taken the position that that kind of intervention,

between last night and this morning, is not really at the first reasonable opportunity and I do not think I should. Second, insofar as the question of privilege is concerned, we have been listening to argument which mixes up three questions of procedure in the House.
The first has to do with a question of privilege, the second with unparliamentary language, and the third a rather vague practice relating to charges made if they are specific, withdrawn or in some way connected with an offer to put a member's seat at risk. That practice is very vague. In any case, it is the third aspect of procedure. I have no difficulty with the first not being a question of privilege. I should lay that to rest now. No motion has been attached and no request has been made for action by the Chair in respect of a question of privilege. I can, therefore, hold at this moment that no question of privilege exists in those terms.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: There remain, however, two questions. Did the hon. member for York-Simcoe (Mr. Stevens) use unparliamentary language, which relates to the second question, that is, it constitutes a charge which ought to be very specifically made, or withdrawn. The interpretation that the Chair has to go through in order to come to some decision is a difficult one. In order to finalize those two specific questions, I prefer to reserve on this matter until Monday.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. It will be brief. In the course of my question during the question period, I suggested that the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) and Chief Justice Deschenes had differed. In answering, the Prime Minister said that he thought I was in error, that he had referred to Mr. Justice Mackay. He asked me to look up Hansard. I have no wish to misrepresent the Prime Minister's position. My question, however, was based on a statement which appears in Hansard. I leave it to the House and the Prime Minister to see whether my interpretation was correct or incorrect. At page 11866, the Prime Minister said:
I wanted to assure myself from the ministers, that this was not the case. I did assume myself from the ministers that that was not the case. I even had the assurance it was not illegal and not improper. Mr. Drury, obviously, would not have done something he believed to be improper. I had his version of it and Mr. Ouellet's version. According to both their versions, there had not only been no illegality; there had been no impropriety. Obviously, Justice Deschenes and Justice Hugessen do not share that point of view.
That seems to be a perfectly sound conclusion to draw since the Prime Minister agreed, after talking to his ministers, that there was no impropriety or illegality. The Prime Minister said that both Mr. Justice Deschenes and Mr. Justice Hugessen do not share that point of view. It therefore appears that the Prime Minister was differing with Mr. Justice Deschenes.


Mr. Peters:: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. Because of the surreptitious question of privilege that has been raised, and the difficulty it has caused to the Credi-tiste party with regard to presenting their case, I would ask Your Honour to ascertain from the House whether they would agree to extend the sitting hours today so that
March 19, 1976

the Creditistes might have an opportunity of presenting what in my opinion is a very important issue.
Some hort. Members: Hear, hear!


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, it would probably be rather inconvenient to many members to extend the sitting today for an hour. I can undertake, on behalf of the government, that when we have some time of our own, which will not be next week, we will give an hour of government time. I suggest that a week from Wednesday there might be another hour's debate on this subject.


Walter David Baker: Mr. Speaker, obviously the hon. member for Timiskaming (Mr. Peters) asked for the unanimous consent of the House to extend the time today for one hour because many people are interested in this matter. They have come a great distance to hear it and the debate is of interest to all. That unanimous consent has now been refused.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. There is no machinery, procedurally, whereby the House can be asked at this point to give unanimous consent to extending the hours. There is time in the last hour or half-hour, as the case may be- which will approach very quickly-to determine whether it is the disposition of the House to extend the hours. That question can be taken up at that time. It is not, procedurally, in order at this point.


COMMITTEES OF THE HOUSE
[Stage Direction]
Eighth report of Standing Committee on National Resources and Public Works-Mr. Martin.

[Stage Direction]
Sixteenth Report of the Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs-Mr. MacGuigan.

William Warren Allmand: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 41(2), I wish to table, in both official languages, copies of the commission of inquiry relating to public complaints, internal discipline and grievance procedure within the RCMP, known as the Marin commission report.


ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE
Stanley Ronald Basford: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to an undertaking given to the hon. member for Grenville-Carleton (Mr. Baker) I wish to table, pursuant
Order Paper Questions
to Standing Order 41(2), three documents, in both official languages, relating to criminal activities as follows: Questions and answers relating to the capital punishment issue: statistics relating to the gun question; statistical handbook-selected aspects of criminal justice.


QUESTIONS ON THE ORDER PAPER
[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk.)
Mr.   J.-J. Blais@Parliamentary Secretary to President of the Privy Council: Mr. Speaker, the following questions will be answered today: 4,106, 4,142 and 4,596.
I ask, Mr. Speaker, that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.


Mr. Reynolds: 1.	Were environmental reports responsible for the halting of the dyke work at Roberts Bank in Delta, British Columbia and, if so, which ones?
2.	Did the Department of the Environment find technically inaccurate conclusions in such reports and, if so, what effect did this have on the halting of work on the dyke?
3.	(a) Who was the contractor on the dyke (b) what was the value of the contract (c) how much work was completed?
4.	Was the contract paid in full and, if not, what compensation was given the contractor for the delay?


Jean Marchand: 1. Yes, investigations of the utilization of the Fraser estuary by commercially and recreationally important fishes and wildlife were undertaken in 1973 primarily in response to proposals to expand the Vancouver International Airport and the Sturgeon Bank Port facility. The resulting technical reports are entitled The Vancouver International Airport Expansion Proposals and Possible Impact on Wildlife of the Fraser River Estuary (Canadian Wildlife Services, Environment Canada, 1974) and Fisheries Resources and Food Web Components of the Fraser River Estuary and an Assessment of the Impacts of Proposed Expansion of Vancouver International Airport and Other Developments on these Resources (Fisheries and Marine Service, Environment Canada, 1975). Coincident with the initial decision to halt dyke construction, a field investigation of the Tsawwassen marsh was conducted. The results are presented in a Fisheries and Marine File Report, August, 1975, entitled Salt-marsh Vegetation, Fish and Invertebrate Survey, Roberts Bank. The dependence of fishery and wildlife resources on intertidal estuarine environments is further documented in the following reports: An Environmental Assessment of Nanaimo Port Alternatives, Environment Canada, 1973. A Biological Assessment of Fish Utilization of the Skeena River Estuary with Special Reference to Port Development in Prince Rupert, Fisheries and Marine Service, Environment Canada, 1973. Effects of Existing and Proposed Development on the Aquatic Ecosystem of the Squamish Estuary, Fisheries and Marine Services, Environment Canada, 1972. In addition to the foregoing, an analysis of

March 19, 1976
Order Paper Questions
the historic alienation of Fraser delta wetlands for flood control and developmental purposes is contained in a technical report entitled The Fraser River Estuary: Status of Environmental Knowledge to 1974, Special Estuary Series No. 1, September, 1974.
2.	The Fisheries and Marine Services has not been advised of technically inaccurate conclusions in any of the referenced reports.
3.	(a) The contractor was Miller, Cartage and Contracting Ltd. (b) The value of the contract was $2,353,889. (c) Construction $270,000 Materials in store $127,000 Only a portion of the whole contract was affected by the stoppage. The remainder of the work north of the Indian Reserve was completed. Of the $1 million cost of the planned work on the reserve about $397,000 worth of work was carried out, comprising $270,000 of construction and $127,000 of materials and equipment which is now in storage.
4.	No, the contract was not paid in full. Compensation is still under negotiation.


Mr. Jones: 1.	Under the proposed user charge for flying clubs, what will be the increase in (a) dollars (b) percentages for lease rates and landing fees for each flying club in Canada?
2.	Does this comply with the guidelines under the Anti-Inflation Act?


Hon. Otto E. Lang (Minister of Transport):: 1. (a) A
proposal was made to the Royal Canadian Flying Clubs and the Canadian owners and Pilots Association on January 27, and a follow-up meeting was held on March 9, 1976 to increase national fees as they relate to flying clubs by $1.60. These fees include a $1.30 landing fee for the last landing of a flying training flight and a 60 cents service charge. This proposed increase is subject to ongoing consultation. (b) Based on the 30 cents landing fee in effect since 1947, the increase to flying clubs is 533 per cent. However, when passed on to the trainee by the clubs, it represents an increase of about 5 per cent to the instruction fee charged by the flying clubs. As far as lease rates are concerned, they are administered locally and are subject to change at various times during a year on expiry dates with various lessee's across the country. During the fiscal year 1975-76, there were approximately five leases renewed out of 22 leases for flying clubs. The average increase was 90 per cent during the same period. However, as rental rates are for a duration of 5 years or more, the aforementioned increase represents a compounded annual rate of approximately 14 per cent.
2. The Government's anti-inflation program does not restrict the government from reexamining its programs and priorities in order to obtain a larger amount of revenue from the user rather than the general taxpayer.


Mr. Matte: 1. Since its creation, did the Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce make grants to promote the development of tourism in the Constituency of Champlain and, if so, how many?

2. In each case, what is (a) the name of the projects (b) the municipality concerned (c) the amount granted (d) the year it was granted?


Mr. Marcel Roy (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce):: Insofar as the Canadian Government Office of Tourism is concerned: 1. Nil.
2. Not applicable.


Mr. Speaker:: The questions enumerated by the parliamentary secretary have been answered. Shall the remaining questions be allowed to stand?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


André-Gilles Fortin: That this House deplores the fact that the government (a) has not provided the long term dairy policy to which it formally committed itself in April 1975 (b) has not provided income security for the milk producers (c) continues to encourage the importation of dairy products, thereby allowing undue competition against Canadian production (d) did not take into account, in calculating the amount of the subsidy, ever increasing costs, and in particular, that the government has not given any consideration to the establishment of a broad marketing and distribution program for dairy products and by-products through proper legislation, in order for production to meet truly the interests and needs of consumers.
He said: Mr. Speaker, at last, I now propose, through this motion backed by my colleagues and a number of other members in this House, to open a debate on a dairy policy for milk producers for the year 1976-77.
Mr. Speaker, the motion is couched in negative terms as provided for in the Standing Orders, but we endeavour to make it very positive by giving elements to solve the problems now confronting producers.
Clearly this is a complex issue because of numerous implications such as domestic marketing, exports, the import of equivalent products, so more so because production is subsidized by the federal government, not to mention problems caused by an alleged overproduction and the Canadian Dairy Commission's operations that leave much to be desired.
Mr. Speaker, it has long been a day to day life in the milk industry. Every year we start from scratch. At the last moment, as happened the years before, government policy is dumped upon producers with little or nothing in the way of consultation.
This year the government is taking the joke one step further: it is circulating the result of so-called studies from last November. The allegation is that subsidies would be cut back, that the overall milk production would be reduced by 500 million pounds, and that imports would be
March 19, 1976

increased. These rumours have been circulating since November 1975 without any formal denial by the government. After considerable efforts on the part of producers in special meetings, particularly meetings with Quebec members and their Ontario counterparts, the only answer received by the producers is that Quebec Liberal members have created a special committee to study the matter and make suggestions. But this committee reports to the caucus, it is not a committee of the House: therefore it is not a parliamentary committee but a political committee, which explains why today's national debate is so important.
It is essential that the elected representatives of the people firmly state their position, their concerns and their convictions, without hiding anything and without beating around the bush. Further, it is only normal that the milk policy be discussed in this House on occasions, just as we discuss wheat production with pleasure and enthusiasm.
Mr. Speaker, in April 1975, the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Whelan) announced a new long term dairy policy, and
I	underline "long term". He stated among other things that a basic price of $11.02 would be set and would be regularly adjusted in the five following years to changing production costs. An adjustment formula was therefore proposed by the minister to the House. An amount of $266 million was earmarked for subsidies of $2.66 per hundredweight on 10 billion lbs. of milk, that is the estimated needs of the Canadian market, which meant a 5 per cent increase in the production to be subsidized.
Finally this policy established the principle of Canadian self-sufficiency, which means that Canadians managed to meet their requirements of dairy products, in other words Canadian consumers would absorb Canadian production, except in unusual circumstances. That, Mr. Speaker, was a year ago, almost to the day. The minister then concluded his policy statement by saying, and I quote:
I believe that this new policy will put the dairy industry back on the right track and that the next years will bring to the producers and processors a period of stability and expansion.
But then, Mr. Speaker, as early as November, something happened namely the deterioration of the net anticipated income. The producers did not get, in spite the government's formal commitment, their $11.02 as promised, the processors increased their share by 8c., which reduced the price received by the producers to $10.94, from which must also be deducted the export levy which amounted, to 15c. at that time.
The overall quota for cheese imports has increased to 50 million pounds for the year, without any restriction on the kind of cheese, whereas in the last five years the annula average was 39 million pounds. The result of the surplus 11 million pounds of cheese which are imported is an increased production of 5.77 million pounds of butter and
II	million pounds of milk powder, while these markets are already overloaded. Finally, in spite of the express commitment the federal government made a year ago, the cost of milk powder exports increased from 15 cents before April 1 to 45 cents in April and 90 cents in July. The producers' pressures resulted in a drop to 65 cents and in the establishment of a compensation fund for the export costs.
Dairy Policy
Mr. Speaker, on November 4, 1975, the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Whelan) revealed the basis of the new dairy policy for the year 1976-77. This announcement was sort of a great blow to the producers. They called it "the great blow of November 4". You will agree with me on the value of these arguments. Storage and marketing costs become payable from this budget following the announcement of November 4. If, as shown in the estimates these costs amount to $40 million in 1976-77, the budget for subsidies themselves will drop from $266 million in 1975-76 to $222 million in 1976-77.
Since it is estimated that the market will require 9.5 billion pounds of milk, this will mean a $2.34 subsidy per hundred pounds to the producers compared with a $2.66 subsidy in effect last year. Therefore, this represents-and I am drawing the attention of all my colleagues in the House on this point-a 32 cents cut. The price paid to the producers would come down to $9.97 per hundred pounds from the previous $12.06 and $11.02.
Mr. Speaker, this is a radical change in policy brought about by the government. The Minister of Agriculture, in his long term policy statement of April 1975, has made a formal promise to the producers associations not anywhere, but here in the House of Commons. He has toid them that he would do his share as a member of the cabinet to achieve long term production, domestic self-sufficiency guaranteed producers income and maximum control over imports.
Mr. Speaker, I am quoting the Minister of Agriculture; it is important that this should be recalled, more especially as the minister is honouring us with his presence here this afternoon:
The government has been committed for a long time to develop a long term dairy policy. Now it rests entirely with the industry to accept its responsibility and contribute to the success of the policy.
So the Minister at that time was committing himself and saying to the producers: Go out in the fields, and start producing, do not be concerned; we will stick with you; we garantee minimum prices.
That was his commitment, and the Minister was saying:
Now it rests entirely with the industry to accept its responsibility and contribute to the success of the policy.
Mr. Speaker, that is exactly what the producers have done. They went back home, worked methodically, respected their production quotas, paid export rates and followed the guidelines of their respective associations. They have provided food for the Canadian people and nobody can deny it. Mr. Speaker, today, less than a year later, the minister is reversing his position, instead of negotiating face to face-like with equal partners with the authorities, the representatives duly elected of the federations; he lets rumours run wild why hypocritically delivers a big blow, and appreciates the response in order to achieve an equilibrium, and I would swear, Mr. Speaker, that next April 1, the minister will stand in this House announcing his policy, and saying that after-


An hon. Member:: Another April Fool!


André-Gilles Fortin: Another April Fool!
-saying that after lengthy negotiations with the producers' federations, after one year of experience, thank to

March 19, 1976
Dairy Policy
its generosity, this government has honoured its pledge. Nevertheless, Mr. Speaker, this is not the case. Many meetings were held all across Quebec. Many demonstrations were held, showing the discontent among producers, because they had given their word and respected it, whereas the government had not.
Mr. Speaker, last March 2, I was asking the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Whelan) what he intended to do concerning the dairy policy for 1976-77.
His answer is recorded on page 11403 of Hansard for March 2, 1976. I wish to attract his attention on his very words which I shall quote:
We do not have that much money for them to waste products and that is what they are doing.
Mr. Speaker, producers have produced only according to the request of the government. And now, just because they have, they are being accused of squaundering, of unreliability, of a breach of promise and agreement.
Mr. Speaker, the minister should clarify that point this afternoon. The minister also said-like several other hon. members, I received a telegram from dairymen in my riding requesting a debate in this House, to ventilate the issue-there is nothing wrong with discussing dairy policy. Some hon. members will probably accuse the Social Credit Party of playing politics with the issue this afternoon. But, Mr. Speaker, who are we, if not politicians? Members of Parliament must raise those questions. We had meetings. I do not think that the Social Credit members can be held responsible for this debate this afternoon. Meetings were held with other opposition parties. The Liberals refused. They said: "We meet in caucus." We, of the opposition, said: "We were elected by the people and are expected to meet not in an obscure caucus room, but in the House." So, I asked-


Mr. Loiselle (Chambly):: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member for Chambly (Mr. Loiselle) on a point of order.


Bernard Pierre Loiselle: Mr. Speaker, I think my colleague from the Social Credit Party is raising very good points, and has put forward very good arguments, but he just said that he does not want to be partisan on this issue, and that he does not want to play politics at the expense of the milk producers. I would then appreciate it if he would stop playing politics right now since the Liberals have definitely agreed to meet with the producers, and on many occasions.


André-Gilles Fortin: Mr. Speaker, his ease is hopeless; he still does not understand! I did not say that they had not meet with the producers, I said that we were asking for a debate.
And on March 2, 1976, as recorded on page 11403 of the Hansard, I asked the minister whether he agreed. That was an official request for a debate. It was not to be a debate for one party or for three, but for the four parties. I put the question to the House on March 2. The minister gave the following answer:
Mr. Speaker, I understand that the dairy farmers of Canada are coming to meet members of the Parliament of Canada. Before we have a [Mr. Fortin.}
debate in the House I think Members of Parliament should talk directly to dairy farmers and discuss their problems with them.
What the producers further wanted was that their problems be discussed here in the House. They have nothing to hide. And the minister added:
Then, if they feel it necessary to come to the House, I do not think there would be much wrong with that.
That is what the minister said and that is how the debate got organized. Therefore, Mr. Speaker, I insist that this debate be kept within terms of reference where it will be possible to make progress and that something beneficial for the producers come out of it. Mr. Speaker, that was to explain the circumstances of this debate. We are living in a dilemma regarding milk production. Should production be cut back? That is the first question. Should we consume more? That is a second question. With regards to self-sufficiency, what is the situation in Canada? Mr. Speaker, there are the three fundamental questions on which I would like to draw the attention of my hon. colleagues from both sides of the House, in order that together we may try and find solutions.
The quota system is a policy aimed precisely at controlling production. What is the basis for the CDC conclusions? Consumer demand. There is a third factor which fits into the picture and that is the importation of milk products and by-products.
Mr. Speaker, I suggest therefore, that producers are caught in some kind of a vise: they have to increase their production to cope with consumer demand while enjoying guaranteed income and self-sufficiency in this country. The government-and I think that many people have noticed it-covers up under the threath of a retail price increase. Whenever the producer asks for increased subsidies, he is told he will be held responsible for any increase in the retail price of milk.
Actually, within fourteen months, there were six increases in the price of milk. In December 1970, milk sold for 28 cents a quart. In March 1975, it sold for 51 cents. There were six increases within a period of fourteen months. This goes to show that, in the final analysis, the producer is against the consumer and the consumer is under the impression that he is fleeced by the producer. While they argue, the general dairy policy continues to be the major victim and the problem stands unresolved. Mr. Speaker, under the existing system, the consumer pays too high a price for what he consumes and the producer loses part of his production and part of his income.
Mr. Speaker, that is why, while this war is being waged, on the one hand by those who want income security for legitimate work, and on the other by those who must feed themselves, the federal government washes its hands of the whole thing, passing the buck to the producers by saying: You are too efficient.
Mr. Speaker, the Canadian dairy producers are just about the only category of people who are told that they are too efficient and are penalized for it. At the same time, and for the same reason, the government forces the producers to pay for their surpluses. Fines are levied when production is exceeding the quotas. That is how work is rewarded. That is why export costs keep going up. Mr. March 19, 1976

Speaker, the year the government has allowed doubts to hover over that dilemma and finally it hopes that the producers will accept, as usual, whether they like it or not, higher export costs, because that is surely what will happen.
Mr. Speaker, in view of the production capability of our milk producers and the fact every day the World Food Organization and other groups find that two thirds of world population suffer from hunger, it is nonsensical to hear that in Quebec particularly and in Canada in general, our producers are penalized for being "too efficient".
Nutrition experts are already telling us that the world food reserves are rapidly being depleted and that high-protein foodstuff are becoming more and more scarce. How can we agree then that because of the stupid milk policies of the government which profit, and I emphasize this, financial and commercial interests, how can we agree to restrain our organization and the expansion of our own production in Canada? That is why I say

and I would like to conclude with this so that other members can take the floor-I say that we must not increase the price of milk for consumers. We must rather lower that price in order to increase consumption. It is time for the government to stop trying to be on both sides and burying its head in the sand.
This government should take position once and for all and encourage production but not at the consumers' expense and encourage consumption but not at the producers' expense. Mr. Speaker I think that this afternoon we should ask the government for a proper legislation allowing for a reduction in consumers price through consultation with provincial marketing boards. To encourage milk consumption we should not reduce production when consumption declines. It is nonsensical.
We are asking producers: Reduce your production when consumption declines, increase your production when consumption increases. It is crazy. Ever since I came here every year it is the same kind of argument. We are told about some kind of over production. But where is this over production if at the same time we have an under-consumption, if consumption is declining?
Mr. Speaker, there is no overproduction at this time. The only weakness is with our distribution and marketing system. There is nothing wrong with our production. The minister accuses producers of waste and overproduction. Therefore, the problem does not lie there. Moreover, this government lets the consumer milk price go which reduces the quantity of milk sold affecting once more the producers. For those reasons I think that in 1976, considering the formal commitments he made in 1975, the minister should protect consumers concerning milk price increases. We should reduce consumer milk prices to ensure a larger supply in Canada and allow Canadians to drink the milk we produce in our country and which is of a very high quality while at the same time the government would ensure a "guaranteed" income to producers. Then, we would have peace in agricultural and those excellent products with a high protein content would get to the consumer.
Otherwise, Mr. Speaker, this government will foster a battle between consumers and producers and we shall never get out of it. I think this is a basic point. Once again I call the attention of the minister to this point. It is
Dairy Policy
important that our production should meet our needs. This is what implies the principle of self-sufficiency mentioned by the minister himself last year.
Mr. Speaker, what about milk distribution in our schools? What has been done in this regard? What is CIDA doing to distribute milk in the world? It is still to come. That method is only used in case of major disasters. However, we are told that we have a surplus.
Within the near future, it will be immoral and dangerous to get rich and try to exploit hungry people. That is more or less what is going on today. All my colleagues, and particularly all members from Quebec, Mr. Speaker, join with me to ask the minister this afternoon, first, to control and to reduce our imports of dairy products and by-products when it is possible to produce them in our country. However, it is not enough to simply advocate that principle.
I know some colleagues opposite who have already said that. I heard them myself. But is is still to come. What we are trying to do by this debate this afternoon is to show the Minister that all eastern producers agree about the necessity of controlling and restricting our imports in order to promote production in Canada.
The second point we want to ask the minister this afternoon is this: to maintain at the 1975 level at least the income of the dairy farmer. If the impending threats are carried out, such as the bombshell of November 4, 1975, the producers' income would drop. In that case, the producers would be the only ones to suffer a loss of income, while the principle of the anti-inflation act is that all workers are entitled to a 10 per cent increase. I think that the minister must first guarantee the producer a 10 per cent increase in income, plus the catching up formula for the loss incurred last year. That is a minimum. It is important.
This government introduced with great fanfare the antiinflation legislation in this House saying that inflation had to be crushed, that people should exercise restraint. I submit that milk producers most likely are the group of Canadians showing the highest degree of patience and restraint.
Unless it be a provocation on the part of the minister, I do not see why there should be an increase in export costs. This would deprive milk producers of the 10 per cent increase in revenues allowed to every other Canadian worker.
Mr. Speaker, we have no right to fight inflation at the expense of the self-employed milk producers. Let them be recognized as having the same rights as any other group of workers.
Moreover, we ask the minister to foster and increase milk product and by-product distribution in the underprivileged countries of the world through CIDA, the Canadian International Development Agency. In a country such as we have here in Canada, a rich country where there is plenty of wheat, milk and milk powder, where we have quality products and an automated industry, where we are able to produce, where we have transportation, where we are capable of shipping our products, there is no reason whatsoever to invest $1 billion in CIDA, a govern-

Dairy Policy
ment agency over which Parliament has practically no control at all, an agency that is distributing money around the world without interest, while our producers here are penalized under the pretence of overproduction, while two thirds of the people of the world die of hunger.
Mr. Speaker, that is an utter paradox. I believe the government, not only as Canadians but as Christians, should start now setting up a distribution system for milk products and by-products. Our products are of very high quality and we should not be ashamed of them. Let us distribute them in those countries, so that the people there may also have a healthy, protein-rich diet and get back on the road to good health.
Mr. Speaker, I think this is a basic point. The scandal in fact is the scandal of production. An individual who produces is penalized because he over produces, because he is too efficient, while two thirds of the world is literally starving to death. One only has to attend the conferences, one only has to visit those countries, one only has to read on the subject to realize it.
The government is making every possible effort to sell wheat. Every now and then, in the evening, on television, you can see the minister boast that he sold a few bushels of wheat to some countries. I do not remember seeing a minister boasting on television or radio about selling some of our surplus milk to other countries. I do not recall any instances. The government rather hides behind the European Economic Community and handle its little business there in the interests of those countries and at the expense of our producers.
Mr. Speaker, I think those things must be said and this afternoon the Minister of Agriculture, both as a Canadian and as a Christian, cannot turn down this request to ensure the sharing of wealth throughout the world, particularly surplus food.
The fourth point we want to make is the following: That the milk subsidy as a general principle-and we are not talking about figures, we could produce lots of them but we want to stick to general principles-that the milk subsidy be increased in proportion to the reduced quota, if the government wants to reduce the quota.
If the government rejects this principle then the producers will take a drop in income, they will have to slaughter several of their cattle because we already have overproduction. Therefore, I urge again the minister that the milk subsidy be increased in the same proportion as the quota is reduced. The same proportion means a minimum and that amounts in my opinion to taking into account the minimum increase of 10 per cent, as provided in the anti-inflation act.
We are asking in addition-and I think that once again many members of all political parties agree with us-we are asking that a distribution program of milk products and by-products be setup in our Canadian schools, considering the food value of those natural products.
Mr. Speaker, several studies have shown that our children eat badly in our schools in Canada. They have shown as well that the health of our school children was poor. Considering the value of a product such as milk, there is no reason why it should stay in storage and why it should not be distributed to the pupils of our schools, and to our 
children. After all, we are the ones paying for their education, building those schools, making our children and producing the milk. I do not see why all this could not be combined in our schools in order to meet once again, and this is our principle, the needs of our people.
I want to conclude with this remark in order to give other members the opportunity to speak, but this is the spirit that we would like to see in today's debate, in order for our production to meet the needs of consumers, but not at the expense of producers. Whenever the government has asked the producers, either in difficult times or in wartime, to ensure the necessary food supplies to meet the needs of the people, they have never refused. All they have asked, after having invested on their farmers to increase the production, at the government's request, is to be able to pay off their debts and live on their farms with their families.
Mr. Speaker, on behalf of the Canadian people and of my colleagues, I respectfully urge the minister not only to formally promise to help the interest of consumers with its dairy policy but to take all the necessary concrete measures to do so.


Mr. Roch La Salle (Joliette):: Mr. Speaker, it is with great pleasure that I take part in the debate this afternoon and I would like to congratulate my friends of the Social Credit Party of Canada for having responded to the needs of the Dairy Producers Federation, and in particular of Quebec producers, and for having brought up such an important question in the House just before the new dairy campaign is announced at the beginning of April.
Of course, Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Lotbiniere (Mr. Fortin) made some very appropriate comments. I believe he did so with all due objectivity concerning the problem which dairy producers have been facing for much too long. I know that the minister will have the opportunity later on to reply perhaps not to the arguments, but at least to the recommendations and representations that we are making. I expect that we will hear that Canada has the greatest and the most productive cows in the world, but dairy producers still have rather serious problems.
Also, when the government or the minister responsible say that they have made great efforts to improve the dairy industry, we recognize that they have indeed made some effort, that they have placed credits and certain services at the disposal of dairy producers, but we must also recognize the commitment and investment risks of producers who agreed, first of all, to meet a real need for efficiency, and to make the industry profitable while providing some stability for the Canadian dairy industry.
Mr. Speaker, this industry is quite interesting when we consider how dairy producers have reacted to the services given to them by the government. However, it would be too easy to accept today that the government leave the producers with the same problems that they have been facing so long. The government is always saying: Yes, we are making some efforts and we have helped the producers enormously by urging them to organize. They have done so, I am sure that they are still ready to cooperate with government policies to the extent that its proposals are reasonable. However, a situation which has lasted too long at the competition level-it was mentioned a while ago-
March 19, 1976

give rise to serious difficulties for milk producers, that is the minimum income. I think it is fair to demand for them the same as for any other individual, and we admit it. All workers, through experienced labour unions, have succeeded in making gains on certain points.
Now if we consider our facilities, I would like to say a few words on that matter. First, at the level of my constituency where that industry is important. I know that some other hon. members will give their views on national conditions.
For us in the province of Quebec, it is a quite important industry at the agricultural level, the most important moreover, and we are increasingly trying to promote more than ever before the dairy industry in that province. Therefore any policy which does not meet those minimum recommendations can be and will be quite prejudicial, especially to Quebec producers and to the Quebec economy, since that industry in a very important part of the economy.
Last year, as I recall, Mr. Speaker, and I regret to have to remind the minister of this, because for a whole year we have made these comments in this House where numerous subjects have been discussed. It cannot be said that everything is going well. There are problems in many areas. More and more, we feel that the government cannot find or does not want to introduce solutions to these problems. Again this afternoon, we are discussing the same matter as we did a year ago and even eight years ago, as I recall very well, when I first came to Ottawa.
And every year, it is always the same thing. At the last minute, we have to put pressure on the government. I do not recall that the government has ever adequately answered our representations and give any assurance to the producers who commit themselves, invest funds, who want to live like everyone else while offering to Canadians products of high quality. The government has never yet given this assurance to help each producer to survive, in Quebec as well as across the country.
Now, Mr. Speaker, last year, the government made some proposals. They led the dairy producers expect an indexing formula roughly equivalent to the production costs established by the producers association, and later recognized as accurate by the Plumptre Commission, which was created by the government. In spite of that, the government did not pay that minimum price that was based on production costs and would have given the producers a decent income. A few months later, far from answering the essential needs of that industry, the government announced a levy, because of a temporary problem perhaps, but a problem that still exists. One should say a few words about it, I believe. That levy on powdered milk exports, because of the competition of the European Economic Community, obviously causes hardships to our industry. How can one explain, Mr. Speaker, that the government should fight competition from the EEC on the backs of our producers, while their European counterparts are well subsidized and protected, and thus able to interfere to some extent with our markets? How can one explain that the government should have penalized our producers with this levy after having refused them the minimum requested? I know, Mr. Dairy Policy
Speaker. That argument has not often been discussed in the House. I know the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) made a highly interesting trip to Europe, that he expected and is still expecting, I believe, some interesting answers with regard to the possibility of trading with the EEC, but I do not feel that is it is acceptable that the government, which intends to open up markets for various products with the EEC, should have decided to discriminate against the dairy industry and to let the producers face the problem alone. It was fair, and it will always be fair that the government should accept right away to help our producers and to compete with other countries equal to equal. Besides, it is the only way the producers could get out of this very difficult situation, which is probably a cyclic thing.
Up till now, the government would not do it, and the producers, have been penalized. So, as a result of this levy the producer's net income was reduced.
This year, still more recommendations have been made, and I have read those from the UPA in the Province of Quebec. It was also given to me to read a proposal submitted by the Quebec caucus to the Cabinet. There are leaks, Mr. Speaker, and you will forgive me if I point it out in this manner. Anyway, this had to come eventually. We are therefore aware of the fact that the government members seem ready to correct some anomalies.
Of course the brief submitted by the members of the Dairy Producers, Federation deals with cheese imports. I think that in five years we had not known imports of more than 30 million pounds.
Last year, the Federation of Milk Producers and the Agricultural Producers' Union asked and recommended to the minister to reduce or at least restrain a possible increase in imports. But no imports were allowed to go up to 50 million pounds.
The federation also asked that import licences be transferred to the Canadian Dairy Commission which could better understand and control these imports according to our consumption and production. No answer has been given to that and, to my knowledge, the Department of Trade, Industry and Commerce controls import licences. That often enables the minister to answer us: You will understand that since licences are delivered by my hon. colleague, it is not my fault. He can thus get away with it easily enough when he meets milk producers.
It is also very clear that as regards the 65 cent levy on powder milk, the commission considers increasing that levy to $1.50.
In their brief, our friends opposite recommend that this amount does not exceed $1. We believe that for the moment, the producer cannot afford to give one cent more than the amount of 65 cents they had to accept. They did not negotiate nor accept it willingly. They were forced to accept this amount of 65 cents and it seems that our friends across are prepared to penalize them again to the tune of another 35 cents.
We do not believe that this is the best way to help them and to meet this minimum.
In the circumstances, I certainly ask the minister for his attention so that he respect this wish and at the same time the capabilities of these producers by freezing the levy at 65 cents. He is free to accept the whole amount because I

March 19, 1976
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have always believed that the government was dishonest when it imposed this levy after having made milk producers dream of a reasonable price.
We also speak of the necessity of having several million dollars for storage costs. The brief states very clearly that producers cannot absorb these costs which are very high. Once again, if we have surpluses and storage costs, it obviously comes from different factors. The hon. member for Lotbiniere (Mr. Fortin) spoke earlier of the establishment of an agency which would be responsible for the distribution of our milk products. I think that makes great sense. I think we should set up these agencies as soon as possible. I also think that if the government had taken its responsibilities with regard to the European Economic Community, our producers would not be facing these problems today. Of course, I do not hesitate to ask the government to pay the storage costs in full and with an extra effort, to ensure a better distribution of our products, a better control of our imports. At the same time, we could reduce this surplus or those products in storage today, and as a result, reduce storage costs.
Mr. Speaker, I know our time is always limited, and I will end my remarks, leaving it to my colleagues to put the best possible arguments to the minister and to ask him whether it would be possible today, in view of the presence in our galleries of several people interested in dairy production, not to let them go back to their respective ridings, to their respective parishes without a spark of hope, or with their wish unfulfilled.
I think that on the eve of the announcement of the dairy policy, the Minister can answer rather positively in order to satisfy those who came here, and this is not the first time. This always means additionnal expenses because measures are not taken on time. We have to be sure that the coming year will be much more interesting. The Minister could allow them to look forward not only for a way to survive but for an opportunity to live decnetly like any other worker or professional in our society. To achieve that, he will have to answer, to a great extent, to the brief submitted by the Agricultural Producers' Union. I did not have time to read it now. The Minister got it like all other hon. members. I think this brief is presently acceptable, not only if we are going to guarantee the milk producers a minimum income, but also for the future of our dairy industry, if the government really wants this industry to advance in the interests of all Canadians. I dare hope, Mr. Speaker, that by asking the Minister to consider the brief submitted by the APU, I am the spokeman of all hon. members in this House as well as all milk producers of our country who ask for this minimum, for those guarantees, for the betterment of an industry which should and must survive. I hope the Minister will answer the questions which are found in this document.


William Arnold Peters: Mr. Speaker, this would have been a good time for one of my colleagues to have written out a few words for me in French, but I hasten to add that I read as badly in French as I do in English, and I would not want to subject anyone to that.
[Mr. La Salle.)
I wish to congratulate the hon. member for Lotbiniere (Mr. Fortin) for the speech he made this afternoon. He spoke not only of the problem which affects the farmer, but also talked about the larger problems of the role of the dairy industry in relation to world food supplies and our inability to handle that in any way, shape or form.
In the Standing Committee on Agriculture during the last few days we have been listening to a report by the National Dairy Commission on this subject, and after listening for several meetings I am of the opinion that it has done as good a job as possible, considering the direction it has been given by the minister, the relationship we have with the provinces, and the jealousy with which they exercise control over each provincial industry.
That still leaves the farmer knowing he is not getting a reasonable return for the work he is doing, and he is not receiving the benefits of the increases in production per unit which he has been able to implement over the last few years. For that reason we have an obligation to see that this industry, which is so highly controlled, highly dependent on commercial markets within our country and highly dependent on our international trade structure, is given every type of assistance possible so that it can remain in business.
Three or four years ago Canada was facing a desperate shortage of dairy commodities. We were importing butter and cheese in sizeable amounts. There were a number of small industries coming to us in Ottawa saying that there was not enough milk for them to operate their businesses and that they would have to go out of business. In asking the farmers to increase their production at that time, the federal government and provincial governments were offering them subsidies and all kinds of inducements to go into that type of operation. Only this past year have we seen the milk marketing quota committees being asked to reduce the amount of milk they were putting on the market during the year period because of the surplus.
The argument has been used this afternoon, and I am sure it will continue to be used-it is a bona fide argument-that in asking for a contractual link with the European Economic Community we put the dairy industry on the block for trading negotiations. We said, and the minister is reported to have said in November of last year, that in effect the government dairy policy as now stated calls for an administered shrinkage of the industry through, first, allowing imports to capture a share of the Canadian market equal to not less than the equivalent of 10 per cent of manufactured products; and second encumbering the consumer of dairy products with the full cost of dairy products by removing the subsidy over a number of years.
What we were saying was that if we were going to get into that European market, we were going to do it by allowing industrial production to come into this country at the expense of the dairy industry, we were going to relate our two industries without our knowing how the European common market subsidizes that market, and we were going to allow the elimination of our subsidies in this country for the benefit of our international trade in that European market.
The difficulty we have maintaining full production in this country which can be purchased at the full price, without the farmer having to subsidize to a very large
March 19, 1976

extent any surpluses which may develop and to subsidize any sales we should make in other countries around the world, has been pointed out.
I agree with the minister when he says it is not his responsibility to sell milk in the schools and to sell or give milk away in other countries of the world. That is the responsibility of all the Canadian people, and we must assume that responsibility. I think it is high time the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Lalonde)- and I doubt if he will-was doing his job. He should be talking to his counterparts in the provinces and indicating to them that the federal government will put up a subsidy so that milk could be sold in all the schools and to the public.
I am told that in hotel rooms in Australia a person will find free milk. There is free milk in the lobbies of all the hotels and in all the schools, and that milk is produced by Australians. It is produced for the people because they have decided that that is a very economic way of helping their health program. They supply milk free. That is not the responsibility of dairy producers in this country. It is not the responsibility of the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Whelan). It is the responsibility of all of us collectively, and it should be administered through the Department of National Health and Welfare so that milk can be provided to Canadians who are not able to afford milk. It should be provided to children whose parents have not decided it is essential that their children have milk for the sake of their health. Benefit would accrue to all of us by way of reduced medical costs, hospitalization costs, and all the other costs of retaining a healthy and fit nation.
We have to make some decisions as to the requirement of the nation rather than in terms of sales. We will have to look at the monopolies which have developed in the distribution of milk. Farmers are paying a very high price due to the fact that Canadian dairies of last year raised the price of fluid milk. This happened in Ontario, I understand, and decreased the consumption of milk considerably. The farmers did not receive any more money, and this certainly did not help the consumer.
Certainly the consumer was not helped when dairies raised prices. Production was affected. Also, farmers were asked to pay more for the distribution of a product we could not sell. It should be noted that when we talk about giving away milk powder to Europe or to underdeveloped countries, the government is not giving it away. The dairy farmers who produced the milk are being asked to give it away. They pay the shot. Why should our farmers by themselves subsidize other countries, when the government offers to provide food aid? Farmers have become totally disillusioned with the government's marketing policy. They were asked to increase production by 10 per cent.


Eugene Whelan: We did not ask for 10 per cent more.


William Arnold Peters: The government asked for increased production-I do not know exactly how much. They were urged to increase production as, in 1974, Canada had to buy 37.1 million pounds of butterfat. In the fall of 1974 it was estimated that in 1975 we should be short of 24 million
Dairy Policy
pounds of butterfat. By April, 1975, this estimate was revised. It was felt that we needed only six million pounds. An alternate estimate, using the CDA dairy industry model, indicated a potential surplus of nine million pounds.
I cannot understand why milk should ever be in short supply or surplus. Its consumption is relatively stable. For example, it is used in the form of fluid milk, butter and cheese. The consumption of these commodities remains stable. Therefore it is not hard to meet requirements. The minister tells the dairy commission to reduce production, not because there is lack of demand but because that is the price we must pay for becoming involved with the European Economic Community. The government decided that it would reduce milk production by 10 per cent in order to gain access to that larger market abroad for our industrial products. So, the policy has nothing to do with the market or the consumption of milk. That decision is the government's responsibility.
The dairy farmers of Canada have for long acted responsibly. They have been willing to abide by quotas and even willing to pay for the transport of their commodity. My brother is a dairy producer. Sometimes he pays transport costs from northern Ontario to Toronto. He regularly pays for the transport of milk from northern Ontario, on the Quebec border, to Thunder Bay. Farmers are willing to pay milk transport costs, are willing to distribute milk, and even are willing to listen to the Ontario Marketing Board. I suggest that the government should pay some attention to the needs of our dairy producers and allow them to establish equitable quotas which will allow them to plan up to five years ahead.
In addition the government ought to make sure that dairy producers obtain a fair and reasonable return for their product, which should include reasonable profit plus costs of production. This would allow dairy farmers to build up better herds and increase the yield per cow. We ought to help our dairy industry as, in my opinion, the Canadian dairy industry has been the best operated, efficient dairy industry in the world. For proof, consider the number of farmers in other countries who want to buy our livestock. We produce the world's best dairy livestock. Unfortunately it is difficult to transport livestock to foreign markets because the government will not contribute to the cost of transport. Our farmers do their bit. The rest is up to the government.
I endorse the views put forward by the hon. member for Lotbiniere, the mover of the motion. His presentation was excellent, and he alluded to the difficulties arising from jurisdiction being divided between the provinces and the federal government. I suggest dairy farmers would be better off if the federal government were to set national quotas and allow our farmers to fill them. No one wants to see the kind of bickering which takes place between provinces. The provinces, too, must enter into agreement with farmers, and provincial agreements must be similar to the sort of agreement into which the federal government should enter. In the absence of national quotas we shall see a repetition of the kinds of difficulties we saw last year.
I wish the minister well in any suggestions he may make for the year 1976-77. I hope that April fool's day will provide the sort of pleasant surprise it can provide, and

March 19, 1976
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that the farmers of this country will not be made April fools.


Eugene Whelan: Mr. Speaker, I congratulate the Social Credit party for raising the present topic for discussion this day. They have shown leadership in raising it. The other parties have not seen fit to talk about agriculture on their opposition days. They would rather talk about something else, about other subjects which, to me, are less important.
I am amazed at what Conservative and Social Credit spokesmen have said. This does not apply to the NDP spokesman, who attended the last three committee meetings when dairy policy was discussed. I do not recall seeing the other spokesmen in attendance at committee meetings when dairy policy was discussed. I wish the hon. member who spoke on behalf of the Social Credit party had attended the committee when the dairy commission attended, as he could have asked his questions then.


Donald Frank Mazankowski: But he would not have received answers.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Super bull has spoken.


André-Gilles Fortin: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: The hon. member for Lotbiniere (Mr. Fortin) on a point of order.


André-Gilles Fortin: Mr. Speaker, that is not in order. I know the minister is not used to sitting in the House, therefore he may not know the following rule. We are not supposed to judge the actions of hon. members in this House and we are even less entitled to make comments on them in Parliament. The minister should have the honesty to acknowledge that members sitting in a parliamentary committee do not make up the whole House.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. It is no more permissible to question a minister's integrity than that of an hon. member.


Eugene Whelan: Mr. Speaker, I had no intention of reflecting on the integrity of anyone. I was just saying how informative it would have been had they been there.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Eugene Whelan: In the announcement that I made last year, what I said about the dairy policy was very plain. I said this means that it is absolutely essential that the market share quota system be effective in balancing domestic supply with the requirements of domestic and export markets and that unmanageable and costly services cannot be tolerated.
When we suggested we wanted an increase in production, we got one. We wanted a 5 per cent increase in production across the whole nation. If I am guilty of anything it is of underestimating the ability of the dairy

farmers of Canada to be as productive as they are. They are in essence what some of my colleagues in cabinet would love to have. We asked for a 5 per cent increase in production. It appears that before the end of the year we will have about a 15 per cent increase in production. How envious the Postmaster General (Mr. Mackasey) would be of that position. The minister in charge of housing would also be envious of that position.


Walter David Baker: How about the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Lalonde)?


Eugene Whelan: His main responsibility is for those who cannot be productive. His main programs are for the unfortunate people in our society who do not have the resources to be productive. That is something I want to touch on later, the social policies for which he is responsible and the tremendous job he has done for our society.
Some people in our society suggest that we should give away our surplus products. They say we should distribute them in a free and happy fashion, just as though we were Santa Claus. The other day someone asked me if I thought the dairy farmers should have an increase this year with the surpluses we have in this nation. I asked him if he knew of any person who, this year, is not going to be entitled, according to the Anti-Inflation Board, to some increase in pay. There are 800,000 unemployed people in Canada. There is a surplus of people for the available jobs. Do you know of any companies that will take less profits this year?
There are people who say we should give this product away. They are suggesting we take away the security, livelihood, and interest of these people in their investment. They suggest we take away an income for their managerial ability and their labour. There are even those in my party who suggest that, and others from other parties who make the same suggestion. They say that because the farmers have a surplus product we should distribute it holus bolus all over the place, just throwing it onto the market regardless of what it does to any other segment of our economy. They are not concerned about what effect that may have on some other commodity in that market. We must be very, very careful about this.
The hon. member who spoke on behalf of the New Democratic Party stated that the Dairy Commission only does what I direct it to do. I suggest that he read the act. The act does not give the minister or the governor in council permission to direct the commission except with respect to the importation or exportation of dairy products.
If the dairy commission followed the act, it would only have to report to me once a year and I would report to parliament. It is a Crown corporation. It is an independent corporation. That is the way I want it to be. I said in this House last year that we want the farmers to run this organization as much as possible. However, because of world conditions last year and unforeseeable conditions, such as perfect grazing and perfect forage that we had right across this nation last year except in one or two small areas in Prince Edward Island and central Canada, and we have never had better weather conditions, there was an over-production.
I was told by the dairy advisers that we could ask for a 5 per cent increase but we would be lucky to get a 2Vi per
March 19, 1976

cent increase. As I said earlier, we got much more than that. We got an increase that in many ways has become an insurmountable problem. It is difficult to solve.
We must be very careful that we do not create the impression, and I may have been guilty of this at times, that whatever is produced will be distributed on world markets or given to everyone in the world. Skim milk powder for human consumption has a limited life. In some cases it will not be accepted after 60 days of age and, in many cases, not after 90 days because it deteriorates. Because of the distribution system and storage facilities, as well as weather conditions, some countries do not want to keep it too long because it deteriorates.
To give the impression that skim milk powder is the same as cereal grains is wrong. It cannot be kept as long or distributed as easy, although it can more easily be distributed as a world food aid product than, for example, eggs. It is nearly impossible to use eggs in the world food aid program.
Let us talk about the world food aid program. The hon. member from the NDP, as well as the two others who spoke, talked about food aid. Last year, as we do every year, we sent about 23 million pounds of milk to world food aid. However, we must not use these countries as places for our scraps, just to dump our surpluses there. We do not want to create the impression that that is what we can do with all our surplus products. Many countries will not accept skim milk powder because it is not part of the diet of their citizens. They may react to it violently and, in some cases, it may even cause death. Therefore we must be very careful.
We spent $230 million on food aid items in the last year; milk, fish, beans, beef and so on. Food aid is paid for by taxes. The hon. member agrees with me it should be paid for by the total society, not only the agricultural segment that makes up about 6 per cent of our population. We are the largest contributor per capita to the world food aid program of any nation in the world, including the nation to the south of us.
At the present time there is a world surplus of skim milk powder of over 1,600,000 tons. It should be clear that many of these countries with surplus skim milk products do not have any kind of supply management program. The treasuries of those countries finance this to a great degree. Some finance it totally. It is called a food aid program, when some countries sell at under world prices. Maybe if you stretched the point a bit, you could say that.
Australia and New Zealand together have 225,000 tons of surplus skim milk powder. The United States also has around 225,000 tons. The European community is next. Canada has about 150,000 tons of skim milk powder.
I want to make some comment on what has been said about who caused the problem and about what the government has done to assist dairy farmers. There has never been a government that has reacted more to the requests of dairy farmers than this government since this Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Whelan) has been here. We have adopted a dairy policy which is a good dairy policy. No other nation has a dairy policy which can compare with it.
Dairy Policy
I have a document before me which I would like to have the permission of the House to have appended to Hansard-it would take too long to read. It underlines how each province administers the dairy program. That is one of the difficulties. There are not two provinces in Canada which administer their dairy programs in the same fashion. Yet the Canadian government, through the Dairy Commission, is responsible for trying to make sure the industry enjoys decent security and that the economic welfare of the industrial milk producers of the whole country is good.
I want to make it clear that we will be announcing no new policy until April 1. We will be announcing a program under the policy which was accepted last year, a policy largely in accordance with what the dairy farmers have requested. By law we have to announce that program by April 1, and we shall do so. It will not be a new policy, because we have hammered out, together with the provinces, a policy which is workable.
Every dairy organization which has anything to do with industrial milk, every provincial government which has any milk production of significance within its jurisdiction, knows that on April 1 a strict quota program will be introduced for them to operate under, something which was not the case last year. Some of the provinces, some of their marketing organizations, had asked for an extension of time to establish the production which they felt was desirable. This year the quota will be strict. They have agreed among themselves what the program will be this year as far as they are concerned, controlling production in the fashion they see fit. To say that we have not cared, that we have not shown concern for the dairy industry of Canada is, I repeat, just not right.
Hon. members talk about governments of Canada not paying any attention to the needs of producers. Consider the situation with regard to the import of specialty cheeses. Up until last year there was no control over the entry of specialty cheeses into Canada at all. We established control by means of a permit system, and the dairy farmers and producers agreed that this was a good thing.
The hon. member who spoke for the New Democratic Party mentioned the fact that I made an announcement on November 4 that we intended to increase the supply of imported cheeses up to 10 per cent of our needs. Mr. Speaker, I made that announcement on purpose because the Dairy Commission had asked me, as Minister of Agriculture, to make announcements and speeches designed to bring some order into dairy production because we were producing more milk than could be used in the industrial sector for both the export and the home markets.
We have announced there will be no increase of imports of specialty cheeses into Canada this year. We have also announced that we will be negotiating with those countries which presently export specialty cheeses to us. There are 16 such countries, so we are not being very fair if we point a finger only at the EEC. Exports from some of those 16 countries are subsidized very heavily. We are reviewing the position, and if there is some way in which we can reach a fair agreement on a better program covering these exports, we shall do so. The United States has been successful in stopping virtually every cheese product exported

March 19, 1976
Dairy Policy
which benefits from an unfair subsidy-it would be wrong to say these have been completely eliminated.
Let hon. members not'forget that ever since the Dairy Commission was established in 1967 it has not been possible to import a pound of butter. To try to say there has been no control over imports is wrong. Butter could not be imported into this country without a permit from the Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce which, in turn, had to be recommended by the Canadian Dairy Commission, the body which imported the butter and distributed it on the market to those who wanted it. And the Commission distributed it at the going price for domestic butter. Any profits which were made could be put toward the cost of administration of the Dairy Commission.
This was a fair arrangement, an arrangement which would not disrupt the economics of that part of the industry. But our production went down, and in two years we had to import 110 million pounds of butter. In the last dairy consumption year we had to import 50 million pounds of butter. Was it wrong to do that? No, because we had to make sure that consumers who wanted to buy that product would still be in the market when we ourselves were producing enough to meet the demand.
Part of the problem in this country arises because in some areas the consumption of fluid milk has gone down. Some people say it has gone down because milk is too expensive for consumers to buy. Mr. Speaker, there has never been a time in our history when the productive people in our society have been in a better position to buy more milk or other dairy products for an hour's pay, and any politician who says anything different is doing an injustice to the dairy industry of this country.
The long term dairy policy we have adopted indexes producer costs returns for changes in input costs and labour costs. If they go up over 4 per cent in one quarter you are entitled to an increase. The dairy farmers of Canada have agreed to that. This is a tougher program- the program they agreed to last year is a tougher program than anything the Anti-Inflation Board is doing to labour or industry at the present time. All the dairy farmers want is a decent return for their efforts. They do not want to rip off the public, and under this program there is no rip-off, regardless of what the former chairman of the Food Prices Review Board or anyone else has said. If critics argue otherwise, let them prove it. The National Farm Products Council has not yet brought down a verdict, but as far as I am concerned, from reading the evidence put forward by the Canadian Consumers Association, there is no evidence whatever that the formula used to set egg prices in Canada was wrong. If they want to demonstrate that this view is not the correct one, let them produce real evidence. They have not done so yet.
The motion before us today says also that the government has given no consideration to the establishment of a broad marketing and distribution program for dairy products and by-products through proper legislation so as to enable production to truly meet the interests and needs of consumers. I have already touched on that aspect and pointed out that we have one of the finest distribution systems in the world. We enjoy some of the cheapest food in the world, and we have too much of it. Recently in the U.S.S.R. they fired their Minister of Agriculture. Why?
[Mr. Whelan.)
Because they did not have enough food. Here in Canada one finds some of the editorial writers in this country suggesting I should be fired because we have too much food. Mr. Speaker, if I were in Russia they would give me a medal for producing commodities in the very efficient manner in which they are produced here.
I suppose the hon. member over there who is making a little noise at the present time-and most of his contributions never amount to any more than a little bit of noise- will be telling us how the dairy farmers of Canada and the Canadian Dairy Commission and other bodies should be giving away this product, something he has never suggested anybody else in society should do except the food producers. I notice he is always careful not to say that of the fishermen of Newfoundland.


Walter David Baker: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, unfortunately there was a fair amount of time lost in the early part of the day on the motion advanced by the President of the Privy Council, and I think this subject matter is certainly worth giving this time to the opposition. Therefore I move, seconded by the hon. member for Elgin (Mr. Wise):
That the sittings of this House be continued this day to six o'clock for the purpose of the consideration of the opposition motion which deplores the action, or lack of action, on the part of the government with respect to the dairy industry and which is now before the House.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bechard):: All those who object to the motion please rise. No member having risen to object, the motion has been adopted.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
Eugene Whelan: Mr. Speaker, members who have already spoken in the debate have never mentioned very much about the actual income of the dairy farmers. I thought they would have accused me of paying dairy farmers too much, or have been more charitable and say that if there was anything this minister did wrong it was that he made the dairy farmers and industrial milk producers the best paid industrial milk producers in the world. I am a little taken aback that they have not done this, but I see some other members are going to speak so possibly they will say that. People have been saying what the Food Prices Review Board has said, that my problem is that I have treated the dairy farmers of Canada too well. I do not think I have. But I have tried to be fair with them.
The policy we have, as I said, indexes the producers' returns for changes in their input costs. It also indexes and takes into consideration global conditions. A lot of people do not understand that this is one of the things to which the dairy farmers agreed. The dairy farmers of Canada subsidize and take care of their own exports in the world. To suggest that what CIDA buys is cheaper is not true. CIDA paid the going world price for skim milk powder and they sent it to those countries in dire need today.
The dairy farmers of Canada through their over-all organization, asked that we buy this year 100 million pounds of skim milk powder for food aid. However, it is a very difficult thing to try and force commodities on anyone. We have offered assistance through church groups, through all our trading offices, embassies, etc., to every world food aid program we know of. But countries in need
March 19, 1976

have their sovereign rights and they tell you what product they are going to use. We cannot tell them what product they are going to use. This is their right and it will always be their right as far as I am concerned in any world food aid program. We can offer a product that we have, but this is not necessarily a product that they are going to accept.
I mentioned provincial boards. I do not know if I have the right to table this or ask to have it printed as an appendix to Hansard, but I have a document showing in an abbreviated form how our provincial boards operate in Canada. I feel this is so important. We are calling a meeting next Tuesday to discuss the dairy policy for Canada. People have to understand what we are trying to do. When they read about the different programs the provinces have for marketing milk and then put them all altogether to make an over-all national program for milk, they can see the weaknesses, how the program can be unfair and discriminatory against certain producers, which I do not think anybody in this House wants at all. I do not think a producer of dairy products in one province wants to see a producer in some other province discriminated against in any way, regardless what province he comes from.
Mention has been made of the excessive amount of cattle in the country. We do have cattle in this country that should have been culled from the herds. There is no doubt about this. The problem was compounded by low prices for beef, especially in the cutter and canner market for cows. This situation has improved. There are more cows going to market at the present time. It is estimated that our dairy herds should be depleted by about 200,000 cows. The average dairy production per cow in Canada is about 8,200 pounds a year. With an average yield of 8,000 pounds per cow, this means a tremendous amount of milk is on the market that should not be on the market at the present time.
I do not think we are going to get out of the predicament the dairy industry is in this year very easily. As I said earlier, the problem was not entirely caused by the dairy producers of Canada; it was caused by world conditions, something a lot of people have forgotten. It was caused by some over-production in our country. We are going to solve the problem only by working together; by making sure that the provinces work very closely together in setting their proper quotas, and by the federal government working with the Canadian Dairy Commission to make sure that the dairy farmers in the industrial milk sector are treated in an equitable and fair fashion.
If I could have the concurrence of the House to ask to have the different provincial dairy programs printed as an appendix to Hansard, Mr. Speaker, I would appreciate it.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bechard):: Does the House agree?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.
[Editor's note: For document referred to above see Appendix "A".]
Dairy Policy


René Matte: Mr. Speaker, I am that much happier to take part in the debate on this motion that it is so definitely realistic that it deals with so actual a subject that it contrasts with the issue previously discussed, namely the question of privilege which delayed our proceedings by almost two hours.
Mr. Speaker, after having heard the remarks made by the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Whelan), we must, above all, refrain from closing our eyes and see the situation as it is. I feel it is appropriate at this point that we should consider the factors which brought about the situation in which our industrial milk producers now find themselves. If the minister feels, as he has just shown, that there are no solutions, that the problems cannot be overcome, for the very same reasons we have been hearing for years, and year after year, we must come to one of two conclusions: either the government is not progressing at all, or it has no idea whatsoever of what progress is; and I would even go further and prove right then and there that the minister is not aware of the situation.
The government is criticized for allowing into this country products that can easily be manufactured in Canada in adequate quantities. The minister referred to that a moment ago; he said the Canadian Dairy Commission, in co-operation with his department is preventing the importation of butter; yes, he said that, barely five or ten minutes ago. But, on the other hand, import permits are being issued. Where is the logic in that? Imports are forbidden but permits are issued. I have proof if it here. This is a country where producers are penalized for producing over and above their quotas, while importation is allowed! I have here a question asked by the hon. member for Bellechasse (Mr. Lambert) which is on the Order Paper. I quote:
1.	Did Canada import butter in the first eight months of 1974 and, if so, a) how many pounds of butter were imported, b) during what months?
2.	a) From what countries was it imported, b) what quantities were imported from each country, c) at what cost per pound?
I hope the minister will not tell me again that butter is not imported.


Mr. Tessier:: The hon. member should refer to 1975?


René Matte: The same thing occurred in 1975. You could ask about 1975 but the same would be true.
Mr. Speaker, let us look at the figures for New Zealand in January: 3,330,400 pounds of butter; the United States, 392,000. In February, for Ireland, Australia and New Zealand, 8,287,800 pounds of butter altogether. This makes a total of 24,949,700 pounds of butter at a cost of $13,505,000. Mr. Speaker, people should stop giving explanations like those coming from the minister. It is true we are applying a madhouse policy. In fact, the problem the industrial milk producers are facing today stems from the orientation of the government milk policy for so many years.
Mr. Speaker, I will go even back to the famous speech our Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) made in New Zealand in 1968 when he clearly stated that because of the policy that his Department of Agriculture would henceforth apply in
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March 19, 1976
Dairy Policy
Canada, it could be foreseen that milk and cheese imports would increase in New Zealand. He said that in 1968, eight years ago. So this situation is the result of the very thrust of the government policies.
The same thing prevails in respect of cheese. Even if the minister were to stand in his place and say: There is no solution, we cannot even market our products-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bechard):: Order, please. The hon. minister of Agriculture (Mr. Whelan) rises on a point of order.


Eugene Whelan: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, I am sure the hon. member would not want to misinform the House. The only time butter was imported into this country was when we did not have enough to supply our own market. We are not importing butter now.


René Matte: The minister is giving weight to what I am saying.
Mr. Speaker, I said that the causes of the present situation ought to be analyzed. And in all fairness, we should also mention what should have been done by the government. What I have said, what I have proven, cannot be denied. Here is another example of what he has told us. That is all very good, but he says that powdered milk may be dangerous for people who are not used to it. However, if the government does not try to open stable markets in Guatemala, in South America, in Africa or in Asia, people over there will never get used to it. But the minister knows quite well that those people lack proteins, vitamins and that they are literally starving. Consumers must be given tthe option to buy or not to buy our products. I claim, as my hon. colleague from Lotbiniere (Mr. Fortin) said, that we have a responsibility not only as Canadians but also as Christians. Mr. Speaker, we have no right to ignore people who are starving to death. And if they do not know how to feed themselves, it is our duty to teach them how. We all know that milk and dairy products such as cheese are wholesome, completely nutritious foods; therefore, it is our duty to arrange to train them to eat those nutriments which could make up for all the food shortages prevailing in those countries.
The hon. member for Hull (Mr. Isabelle) does understand that and this is why he is planning to go there as a doctor and I can see his point.
Mr. Speaker, if we look at things the way they are, we realize why we are in such a predicament; it is simply because we have not applied elementary principles. We do not seem to know yet that we are producing for the purposed consuming. We do not understand that yet.
If we were to apply this principle and if instead of avoiding the problem and justifying the lack of action in this area, the Minister of Agriculture had said today that from now on, in order to settle the problem of production surplus and of milk producers' revenues, he would set up a policy which would open the Canadian market "exclusively" to Canadian producers, that if we say to the industrial milk producers that they will have the exclusively of a market of 24 million people, in may opinion, this would settle the problem and prevent any surplus of milk powder.

I already said a word about that; it would be easy to solve the problem through appropriate studies and research and by urging those concerned to conform to this consumption.
Mr. Speaker, I submit that we should not continue to dodge the question and say: No, we do not import cheese, no, we do not import butter. Yet millions of pounds of these products are imported into Canada and the problem will never be resolved that way.
It has always been noticed that there is a lack of consistency between the attitude of the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Whelan) and that of the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce (Mr. Jamieson), since we are, as in other industrial areas, invaded-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bechard):: Order, please. I apologize to the hon. member for Champlain, but there is a rule which states that we are not allowed to drink anything but water in the House. I think that the Minister of Agriculture is giving good example by drinking milk, but this is not consistent with the Standing Orders.
The hon. member for Champlain.


An hon. Member:: Good show!


René Matte: Mr. Speaker, if the minister drew out the slice of bread and butter he has in his desk, we might find out it comes from New Zealand.
Mr. Speaker, it is therefore essential to urge the Minister of Agriculture, in particular and the government in general to finally introduce a sound policy in such a vital area. It is not even a matter to be discussed, it is fundamental. Con-senquently, never should measures have been implemented which might discourage if only some of those who remain, so that they can continue to earn their living.
I would even say that it is a kind of sacrilege or scandal to deprive a class of producers as essential as farm producers and, as far as today's debate is concerned, the industrial milk producers. My colleague for Lotbiniere (Mr. Fortin) emphasized this and I shall repeat it, since statistics published in the newspapers last week actually mentioned that there was underconsumption in Canada.
The minister puts forth all kinds of reasons, such as powder milk does not keep. Mr. Speaker, it is also difficult to keep natural milk. But solutions can be found if enough research is made, and everybody knows the milk now being distributed under the brand name Evangeline. That milk is good as long as the container remains closed, and it can keep for months, even years.
As to powder milk, the minister feels that we face a major problem because it does not keep for more than 60 or 90 days. But heaven knows how much research is necessary to develop containers like those produced by the Quebec dairies. They designed a container which makes it possible to keep milk almost indefinitely and which is on the market right now. It is on the market right now. We should do the same in other fields. Particularly, as I said, we should never give such reasons when we know that consumption falls far short in Canada. In the morning when you see a single quart of milk at the door and you know that five children under 10 are living in the house,
March 19, 1976

you realize that something is wrong. There should be five quarts of milk. So you see that because of inflated prices, of inadequate policies, people do not eat enough cheese or butter-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bechard):: Order. The Minister of Agriculture on a point of order.


Eugene Whelan: Mr. Speaker, again I am sure the hon. member does not want to misinform the House and the people. Under our constitution when a product is sold or produced within the boundaries of a province it is totally under the jurisdiction of that province. Let us keep this on the right plane. We have no authority over the fluid milk about which the hon. member is talking. We have authority over industrial milk. Under our subsidization program for industrial milk we get four quarts of skim milk from one pound of powdered milk subsidized to the tune of 34 cents a pound, which amounts to a cost of 17.5 cents a quart.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bechard):: Order. This is not a point of order but a matter for debate.


René Matte: Mr. Speaker, I think that the government is there to govern. If there is a problem of constitutional authority distribution in Canada, as we always say we should deal with this problem. If every province should be given more power, the governement should say what kind of policy should be implemented to deal with that problem. We try to make a distinction for instance between the fact that natural milk is under provincial jurisdiction, particularly the province of Quebec in the case I am talking about, and that industrial milk is under the jurisdiction of Ottawa. The cow in the pasture does not see any difference. It does not know if it gives its milk to Ottawa or Quebec.
Mr. Speaker these realities might appear simplistic but we have an administration that gives a simplistic-not to say stupid-direction to milk production. This is why, to conclude, I wish to make people understand that we would like to deal with this problem once and for all. I have been here for eight years and every year the same problem arises. Why does it? As I said before it is because of the basic direction of this government. Then, this direction should be changed.
To change that direction, it is quite simple, it is quite clear, one of the most important points I think is first to guarantee to Canadian milk producers that they will have exclusive access to the Canadian market. Second, then build policies on common sense. That is to say we should go at it on the basis of the needs, that production must be made as to meet all needs. Since people do not consume enough it is normal that we should demand increased production, not that it be reduced. Let us take the necessary steps.
If it is simply a matter of money, it is normal, Mr. Speaker, that producers should be paid on the basis of the work they have to do. I would say that particularly in their case it is perhaps more of a profession than a trade since nobody suspects the basic part of the work being done. It would even be normal that they should have an income
Dairy Policy
and profit even a little above that of the average worker. They do not even ask that. So if on the other hand prices must be adequate and appropriate to promote consumption of that product, Mr. Speaker, we have solutions to all that.
How many times did we say: If you no longer want to give grants to producers, give discounts to consumers. So if you want to promote a rational consumption for a basic product like milk or its by-products arrange those prices in that way by giving discounts to consumers according to their needs no consumption of milk and milk products can be promoted and the problem of milk producers of this country can be solved once and for all.


Mr. Denis Ethier (Glengarry-Prescott-Russell):: Mr. Speaker, it is somewhat of a problem to speak after the hon. member for Champlain (Mr. Matte). Although I may show less eloquence, I can however assure the gentlemen in the gallery who are interested in agriculture that I will be more sincere.
I would first commend the hon. member for Lotbiniere (Mr. Fortin) for having chosen for this opposition day such an important matter, that is no doubt of concern to every member in this House. The fact is we are now at the end of the 1975-76 milk production year, the fact is we are awaiting with anxiety the news of the 1976-1977 milk policy. I am convinced that my hon. colleagues are sincere in their concerns for farm producers, and especially milk producers. I would like that we limited ourselves with constructive, positive suggestions, rather than taking this opportunity to draw the attention of farmers and milk producers, and indeed to play politics.
The hon. member for Lotbiniere, in his motion, seems to have limited himself to hypothetical comments, because I am convinced he does not know the details of the 1976-77 milk policy any more than I do. He can no doubt think of certain assumptions, he can even criticize because such is the opposition's role. The opposition can even detect some malaise in the industry. I repeat this is the opposition's role to stress them. But above all, their role is to cooperate and share their vast farm knowledge, in order that we may together help an industry that has no other goal than survival. The industry want no more than their fair share, like the businessman or the tradesman. They simply want to be understood by the people. It is the opposition's role indeed to raise such problems, but I feel they are somewhat late in their offer for cooperation. This is why I say they are playing politics.
We, in the Liberal party, since we were made aware of the surpluses and know that the dairy industry would have problems, we got down to work and arranged many meetings with various groups representing the dairy industry in order to obtain suggestions for the formulation of the 1976-77 dairy policy-and I can say that those meetings were always most interesting and friendly.
Various groups explained their problems and made also suggestions, even gave some advice which I am sure has been conveyed to the minister and hopefully will be taken into account in our dairy policy for 1976-77. But, Mr. Speaker, the advice, suggestions and even positive criticisms of those great experts opposite have never been voiced.
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March 19, 1976
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An hon. Member:: They are not here.


Denis Éthier: On the contrary, every year they speak out just before the dairy policy is announced and once again they play politics. In part (b) of the motion, Mr. Speaker, the Social Credit Party of Canada seems to forget how much assistance farmers and not only milk producers have received under federal programs since the appointment of the hon. Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Whelan) in 1972.
It is true that we are now facing an overproduction problem for 1975-76. However, as I said earlier, following many consultations with milk producers and the pressures brought to bear by all the rural members of our caucus, the cabinet will hear us and I hope that the Treasury Board whose minister is here today, will follow up on our recommendations.
I would be remiss if I did not mention in particular the work of the hon. member for Compton (Mr. Tessier) and the hon. member for Beauce (Mr. Caron) who have devoted many hours of work to the preparation of a working paper which was submitted to the cabinet. In part (b) of his motion, the hon. member for Lotbiniere blames the government for its failure to introduce adequate legislation which would protect producers and enable them to get a fair return for their work and investments, so that the production may be available to the consumers at a reasonable price.
This raises grave doubts about the validity of the motion since it is precisely the dairy policy for 1975-76. But like for every good thing or every good program, we shall go from difficulty to difficulty from 1975 to 1976 because of overproduction. The hon. member for Lotbiniere started his speech by making fun of the issue and saying that there was no overproduction. Well, let him make fun and say that there is no overproduction. I see several of my friends in the gallery. When we discussed the problem, they understood that there was overproduction, just like we understood it ourselves. We want to solve this problem.
The hon. member also talks about a secret committee. He says that they had a secret committee, that they were not able to say what was their concern about agriculture so as to help rural and dairy producers in their constituencies. I am not a member of the committee on agriculture. I work for the whip with my friends. However, I have seen the attendance records and I did not see the name of my hon. friend, Mr. La Salle. Not a single one of my friends of the Social Credit Party of Canada came to discuss the dairy policy at the last four meetings. Some people claim to be sincere today and ask us to spend an additional hour in the House. Sir, I would simply-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bechard):: Order, please. I should like to remind the hon. member for Glengarry-Pre-scott-Russell (Mr. Ethier) before recognizing the hon. member for Joliette (Mr. La Salle) that members should not refer to other members by name.


Denis Éthier: Mr. Speaker, I am sorry and withdraw what I said if I have offended-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bechard):: Order, please. The hon. member for Joliette (Mr. La Salle) on a point of order.


Roch La Salle: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I would like to say a few things to the hon. member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell (Mr. Ethier) who persists in remarking about the absenteeism of some members of a new committee. Mr. Speaker, I think this in an important matter and that it should be raised. I have not accused anyone of not attending a committee because I know that government members have many responsibilities. We all have our responsibilities but the House should know that we have met them in the last four months.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bechard):: Order, please. The hon. member for Joliette knows very well the rules of the House; this is not a point of order but a point of debate.


André-Gilles Fortin: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bechard):: The hon. member for Lotbiniere, on a point of order.


André-Gilles Fortin: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order and I should even say that I rise on a question of privilege, since the hon. member-and I refer here to our Standing Orders-mentions the fact that a member is being present or absent. I want to tell the House, on behalf of the hon. member for Bellechasse (Mr. Lambert), whom the hon. member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell (Mr. Ethier) and our other friends sitting opposite know very well, is now ill and that the hon. member for Bellechasse is one of those who attended committee meetings most regularly. If the hon. member want to play such petty politics as to give such a low blow and direct his attacks to members who are ill, perhaps we should mention his own illness which, so far, has never referred to in this House-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bechard):: Order, order. The hon. member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell (Mr. Ethier).


Denis Éthier: Mr. Speaker, if I offended one of my colleagues by naming him, it is because I got carried away. Perhaps I have too much at heart the matter before the House today. I want to single out the hon. member for Bellechasse (Mr. Lambert) and I can say that he is really sincere. I often saw him at the sittings of the committee on agriculture and if he is ill today, I wish him a speedy recovery. I can say he is really devoted to agriculture.
Mr. Speaker, I wonder whether we should go witchhunting and find out who is the villain, or whether we should not work together to find a solution to this problem. [English]
I think we could gain much from working together, approaching this problem in a co-operative manner, and everyone concerned accepting part of the blame, the Canadian Dairy Commission, the marketing boards, the Producers' Association, the producers themselves, the excellent weather we had last year, and perhaps we should also blame the cows for giving too much milk. I sense the feeling in our discussions with the producers that they all agree there was a surplus in production and they all agree to reduce production this year.
When we asked the producers to reduce their production, they agreed to the tune of some 10 per cent, 15 per cent, and for some of them, perhaps 20 per cent. That will mean a
March 19, 1976

gross revenue minus of some 10 per cent or 15 per cent, but when it comes to a net revenue, that will mean something in the vicinity of 25 per cent or 30 per cent less for them. This we cannot accept, and that is why we have made strong recommendations to our cabinet and strong recommendations to the Treasury Board.
Since I suggest we are responsible for the surplus on hand, and the producers agreed to reduced incomes, I also suggest that the cabinet consider our working paper which was presented so that the government will take its share of the blame. The dairy commission should also accept its part of the blame and during this coming year monitor the production on a much more precise and regular basis, and report to the government and to the marketing agencies so that the over production of this year will not be repeated. [Translation]
Of course, this would be done with the co-operation of the management committees who are also parity responsible because they are in charge of marketing.
In his motion, the hon. member for Lotbiniere (Mr. Fortin) refers to a long term policy. I would appreciate it if he would follow more closely the discussions on agriculture and the changes effected in the dairy industry. In my humble opinion, as long as we have two markets for a single production, there will be some confusion and it will be practically impossible to implement a long term policy. It will be possible as soon as all our producers are integrated. It is quite difficult to understand an integration system for those of us who are not farmers. A cow has four teats, two connectd to the industrial milk tube and two on the whole milk tube, and it is rather difficult to explain the price margin to consumers. During the few months I have attended their meetings in the three years I have spent here, those matters have been explained to me. Now I understand that whole milk producers have incurred more expenditures. If eventually total integration in carried out, the producers will be refunded the extra expenditures they incurred on their farm.
It is our fondest wish to see along term policy established for the dairy industry, but as I said earlier, I suggest that there should be a single market for a dairy product. Then a long term policy would be feasible.
I am convinced, as the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Whelan) said earlier, that if workers in other sectors were as productive as those in the agricultural sector, and I would even point out to the President of the Treasury Board that if his public servants were as effective as our farmers, we would have a lot more services, and perhaps our production and service costs would be reduced here in Canada.
I will conclude by saying that I have read a press report about a provincial minister criticizing the federal government. I would instead invite him to join with the federal minister in trying together to develop a policy that will help farmers rather than hurt them.


Mr. John Wise (Elgin):: Mr. Speaker, it is indeed a pleasure for me to address the House this afternoon on the subject raised by the Social Credit Party of Canada.
Before I do so I feel obligated to utilize this opportunity to draw to the attention of the House the comments made
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by the minister when he began his speech. The minister indicated that the official spokesman for the opposition party had not attended the meetings of the Standing Committee on Agriculture. I want to make it clear that I have the pleasure of being the official opposition dairy spokesman, and I believe the record will indicate that the Standing Committee on Agriculture has held four meetings and that I attended them all and participated in them all.
The record will also indicate that my colleagues and I put forward many constructive suggestions and criticisms, and if anyone wishes to examine the record of the standing committee he will see that in fact the minister agreed with some of the suggestions made. I mention this in case it might prove embarrassing-


Mr. Malone:: Lay a charge, Gene.


An hon. Member:: Put your seat on the line.


Eugene Whelan: I just want to say that I meant the official spokesmen who were speaking for the party on the lead off speeches today. The hon. member is a diligent member of the committee and the House, and is fairly knowledgeable, most of the time, on dairy issues.


John Wise: It should be stated at the outset that the responsibility for the dairy industry, as far as governments are concerned, must be shared both provincially and federally. Fluid producers are more closely associated with their respective provincial governments and milk marketing boards or agencies, while on the other hand the producers of industrial milk are associated with the federal government, the fate of the latter being almost entirely in the hands of the federal government and its over-all policy enunciated by the Department of Agriculture and the Canadian Dairy Commission.
The Canadian Dairy Commission is also responsible for the purchase of that which is surplus to the fluid milk trade. The support payments to the dairy industry are not recent developments or policies. Rather, they began in 1935 and have continued in some form or another over the past 40 years.
Dairy subsidies were first initiated and continued for three main reasons: first, to maintain and hopefully to build a strong dairy industry in Canada; second, to ensure an adequate supply of milk and other essential dairy products to the Canadian population at reasonable prices; and third, to improve the incomes of dairy farmers and dairy producers. The federal government agencies entrusted with this program were the Agricultural Prices Support Board formed in 1946, the Agricultural Stabilization Board established in 1958, and later the Canadian Dairy Commission established in 1966.
Dairy farming is one of the most important and oldest agricultural industries in Canada. It is interesting to note that history records the first arrival of dairy cattle with the United Empire Loyalist movement to Upper Canada in 1785, and that the first cheese factory was established in 1864 in the constituency of my colleague, the hon. member for Oxford (Mr. Halliday).
It is estimated that cash receipts from dairy products, excluding government supports and sales of livestock,

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Dairy Policy
exceed $1.1 billion, and that receipts including these two exceed $1.7 billion.
Dairying finds its home in every province and constitutes the most important single source of farm income in Quebec, British Columbia and Nova Scotia, and the second most important source in Ontario and New Brunswick. Quebec and Ontario are the leading production provinces, both receiving approximately $400 million, and in turn returning those dollars into their business communities. British Columbia, Alberta, and Manitoba as well possess sizeable dairy industries.
It is important to note that when the dairy industry is in trouble a large percentage of the entire agricultural sector is in trouble as well. I make that statement because 71 per cent of all commercial farms in Quebec, for instance, are dairy farms. The same comparison for Nova Scotia reveals 46 per cent, New Brunswick 32 per cent, Ontario 30 per cent, and in Newfoundland 29.8 per cent of commercial farms produce dairy products. The national average is 22.6 per cent.
In view of the foregoing it should be recognized that if governments ignore or fail to deal adequately and fairly with the dairy industry, then they are failing to deal with a major group within the Canadian economic structure.
A healthy thriving agricultural industry benefits all Canadians, both consumers and producers. It is estimated that 40 per cent of Canadians derive their income, or at least a large percentage of it, either directly or indirectly from the agricultural industry. The rather drastic changes within the industry and the painful adjustments made during the past decade have left a large proportion of the national dairy herd in the hands of competent producers. These producers have developed a superior command of modern dairy production technology. Their record clearly illustrates unmatched efficiency. What is now required is an economic climate in which these operators can employ these skills, and at the same time have the confidence that their capital management and labour will be rewarded with, at least, normal financial returns.
Extremely large investments are required. We are aware of the fact that the creation of a modern but modest sized dairy operation involves a capital outlay of between $100,000 and $300,000. In addition large capital outlays are also required to expand the scale of operation in order to build viable units and to meet health and production standard demands and requirements.
In numerous cases, Mr. Speaker, these expenditures have been made and large amounts of money have been borrowed at high interest rates. The reduction in allocation to the Farm Credit Corporation and the reluctance, or in some cases absolute refusal, of chartered banks to lend under the Farm Improvement Loans Act have compounded the producers' financial difficulties with respect to the cost of capital. Many of these expenditures have been made quite recently, and many of these were made on the basis of assurance of a long-term dairy policy commitment by the government.
Many will recall the hundreds of representations made to the government by members, agricultural organizations, producer groups, and dairy industry people prior to 1974

and early in 1975. We recall the minister unveiling what he termed a long-term dairy policy almost a year ago. Events of the past year reveal the only resemblance to a long-term commitment to Canada's "12-month-old" long-term dairy policy is the long list of changes and revisions, all of which proved disappointing and detrimental to dairy producers.
Private outlays by producers were made on the basis of reasonable government assurances of a year ago, and they were made to enable the producers to improve their position and at the same time to succeed in obtaining the most additional milk per dollar of outlay of public moneys.
In the rather brief time allotted, Mr. Speaker, and with the thought of allowing as many members as possible to participate in this debate today, I do not intend to recite a description of the events surrounding the government's actions in past months. For similar reasons I do not intend to repeat arguments on many aspects of the dairy industry, arguments I have raised previously in the House; but I must indicate my doubt about the government's real concern and real desire to maintain a strong and healthy Canadian dairy industry. Producers often relay to me similar feelings; and in view of the minister's statement of November 4 one wonders if the real desire of the government is to have Canadian markets largely if not totally supplied by imported dairy products.
In a recent speech on March 5, to dairymen in Uxbridge, Ontario, the minister commented:
I'm also looking at the possibility of stopping importation of subsidized milk products. The United States does not allow imports of dairy products that are subsidized by the exporting government. Why should Canada be different? Why should Canadian dairy farmers be expected to compete against foreign treasuries? I don't think they should and I'm looking into the possibilities of cutting off subsidized imports.
I questioned the minister in the House about these comments of March 5. His answer was somewhat fuzzy, his words lacking the confidence and determination that were evident in his address to the Uxbridge dairymen. Although the minister has spoken I hope that he will in future expand on this possibility with vigour, and relate news of some progress in this regard as well. The continued importation of dairy and milk products is extremely damaging to the industry, particularly at this time when stocks are high. It goes without saying that it is contrary to the government's commitment to a supply management program.
A brief example to illustrate such damage, Mr. Speaker, would be the case of cheese imports. If cheese imports could be reduced by nine or ten million pounds, a saving would result to dairy producers of approximately $3.6 million; or, more simply stated; every million pounds of imported cheese cost the dairy producers $360,000. I recognize and appreciate the recent decision of the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce (Mr. Jamieson) not to increase these imports at present. This was a step in the right direction. However, I remain convinced, and I am certain that industry people are equally convinced, that in view of present circumstances a move by the government to reduce import quotas is nothing short of a necessity; if such a move is not taken shortly, a breach of good faith will have been clearly demonstrated.
In dealing with the Uxbridge speech I could not let this opportunity pass without questioning the wisdom of the
March 19, 1976

minister's advice to these dairymen regarding the easing up of feed rations. The minister said, "This will save you money in feed cost and has the effect of lowering output per animal." Such advice is unsound and, I am certain, unacceptable to producers. Successful operators will be familiar with the terms breeding, feeding, and weeding. Emphasis on these practices is necessary for success, and I am certain that much sounder advice could have been given on that occasion if the emphasis had been placed on weeding rather than feeding.
Skim milk powder, we agree, is in abundance on the world market. However, this does not excuse the government's dismal record regarding its commitment to CIDA for the world food aid program. The record indicates quantities that are well below previous years, only 14 million pounds for this fiscal year as compared with 25.5 million pounds for 1972-73, 23.6 million pounds in 1973-74, and 23.9 million pounds in 1974-75. The dairy farmers of Canada have indicated their willingness to participate in a program that would involve 100 million pounds of skim milk powder for this purpose on a long term basis. I am certain that most Canadians would agree that the need for world food aid has drastically increased over the past years and that the government should earnestly explore this commendable offer.
May I conclude, Mr. Speaker, by making a few recommendations and by issuing a word or two of caution. First, the Minister of Agriculture should explore every possible avenue in order to create an effective supply management program for industrial producers similar to that now functioning for fluid milk producers.
Second, the Canadian Dairy Commission should institute an effective incentive program to even out year round production. Both of these suggestions, if properly adopted, would reduce surpluses, match supplies more closely with demand, and eliminate present discrimination against those producers who on their own have developed a regular and even year round flow of milk.
Third, the minister and the Canadian Dairy Commission, in conjunction with the producer organizations, must decide which party can do the most successful job of selling and marketing dairy products, both domestically and for export, and then get on with the task.
Fourth, there must be more discussions between federal and provincial governmental officials and those in the industry regarding not only changes in dairy policy, but also other changes in the field of financial incentive schemes and capital grant programs.
My main concern, Mr. Speaker, is that when the minister announces his revisions to the dairy policy for 1976-77, that, in the interest of both producers and consumers, he does not over react to our surplus position. I am confident that he is well aware of the fact that from 8 per cent to 10 per cent of overproduction was due to the favourable weather conditions that existed last spring and summer. This is a situation that will probably not repeat itself in the next 12 months.
The minister should be aware of the large numbers of dairy heifers now added to the milking herds because of declines in exports 24 to 36 months ago. It is estimated that
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there could possibly be some 30,000. We remind the minister that there is a good indication of a strong recovery in export sales. He must share some responsibility for the large number of older dairy cows remaining in herds simply because of low beef prices.
The minister must recognize as well that the dairy cow, like the chicken, does not turn on and off with the flick of a toggle swich. Indeed, as many producers in Elgin and throughout southwestern Ontario who experienced the devastating ice storm earlier this month are aware, the dairy cow not only continues to produce in the dark, but she must be milked at times in the dark as well.
One can only speculate as to what the changes in federal dairy policy might be. I trust that some of the foregoing factors that have been placed before the minister on this and other occasions will be taken seriously at cabinet level.
I am confident that producers will accept the challenge that is before them. It is hoped that the announcements and actions of the government will demonstrate a willingness to maintain this important industry which is so vital, not only in financial terms, but important and vital to the health and well-being of Canadians and to countless thousands in under-privileged countries around the world.


Claude Tessier: Mr. Speaker, the social crediters opposite are probably among those who shout that the government ought to cut down on expenses. They also want the government to reduce borrowing to lower taxation and stop paying interests. Could they clearly tell us how the government could work its way out of this dilemma, and on what conditions?
Mr. Speaker, are hon. members opposite prepared to admit that their suggestions to-day would result in increasing prices to the consumer to a fantastic degree or in increasing taxation and decreasing our exchanges to the extent of endangering our exports, and finally putting our dairy policy in complete jeopardy. To seek to maintain the income of the dairy producer is one thing but to understand its implications is quite another. We think it can be done but it will require imagination and courage and that is why I take pleasure in accepting to participate in this debate. I ask the sponsor of the motion today to go that far and if such is the case, we shall have worked for milk producers without attempting to desperately save a few members who lose their credibility day by day with unrealistic and irresponsible solutions.
What is at issue now is an industry of $400 millions at least. If we refer to the budget of 1975-76, which was of $279 millions, we see that this represents an increase of some 30 per cent. This is not surprising, since each dairy year we see a declaration of war between the good and the bad guys. What is strange is that the good guys always seem to be on the same side, that is on the side of producers and their partners, however short-lived that partnership may be, and the bad guys are always on the government's side, that is on the side of those who foot the bill and who are blackmailed with old political and demagogical lines. In addition, Mr. Speaker, in 1976-77 new problems arise, namely the budget cuts that all Canadians consider as necessary, even if they must be considerable and be added

March 19, 1976
Dairy Policy
to the surplus of 1975-76, whose effects must be distributed over the next years and particularly the dairy year 1976-77.
The problem is as follows: Who must pay in 1976-77 for the errors of 1975-76? What will be the payment conditions? And more particularly, will industrial milk producers and consumers be the only ones who pay? What will be the influence of such a decision on consumer prices, on the producer's income, on agriculture in general, and on the economy in rural areas bearing in mind that the Canadian dairy policy was at first designed to help both producer and consumer? Who will in fact bear and share the financial burden and what will the consequences be?
On this side of the House, we are confident we are talking after having proved our agricultural skill and efficiency. In discussing milk policy, in particular as far as eastern Canada is concerned, we are proud to be in an advantageous position and milk policy is a liberal policy, a policy which is clearly to the advantage of eastern Canada, and of Quebec in particular. And the year 1975 is a brilliant proof because if you read as we did about the income of different cooperatives like producers associations, it can be regarded as very satisfying. Even if we are proud, Mr. Speaker, we are aware of the adjustments which must be made; they will be included in the 1976-77 policy.
I too ask myself why our friends of the Social Credit Party opposite are suddenly concerned with milk producers. I have been a member of the Committee on Agriculture for two years and I wonder whether they represent rural constituencies and if so, where they are in the committee? I would like to give a precise example which has already been mentioned. We had three meetings with the Canadian Dairy Commission and we discussed precisely the dairy policy for 1976-77 while the representatives of the Social Credit Party were conspicuous by their absence. I would even say that I am surprised we have such a consistent policy because it has been established mostly by hon. members from urban constituencies. Today the members of the Social Credit Party do not know what to be concerned with, it seems so they suddenly turn to agriculture. One thing remains however: they discuss a subject they are not familiar with. They think they can get away with simply setting up commissions while they do not even take the trouble to check whether or not their demands are in keeping with the administrative capabilities of the country. In fact this administration is so complex that the only way a competent M. P. can make a meaningful contribution is by dealing only with local and regional grievances. Today's motion only vindicates what I have just said. Who said that the dairy policy proclaimed early in 1975 had been abandoned? It was not the government, it was the management committee. Who said that the dairy policy would not ensure the dairy farmer's income security? That was the management committee and not the government. Who said we should shut the door to all dairy imports since it is a well known fact that we have about $250 million stocks and we keep hoping to sell those goods? So, I think that if we believe in trade we must also believe in buying. It is a matter of balance which we have just discussed.
Who said the subsidies would include the increased cost of inputs since this increase has been covered by an auto-

matic adjustment formula which is part of the 1975 policy? Who said the federal government should take over marketing? Must more be added to costs we already have a hard time to meet? Those are as many statements that prove our Social Credit opposites do not know the basic elements of our dairy policy, its objectives, nor to they know the partners in that dairy policy.
To discuss the matter requires competence, professional conscience and an understanding of administration, and not just a feel for political hay and "blah-blah", as the hon. member for Shefford (Mr. Rondeau) said, which more often than otherwise just mixes up the problems. Our position is known and clear, and our recommendation is this: That the support price for 1976-77 be set at $11.40. We recommended that the subsidy be kept at $2.66 a hundredweight of milk, that the quota be set at 95 million hundredweights of milk and that the levy, in fact, be set at a maximum of $1, conditional upon an agreement between the parties, so that once and for all it is recognized that export costs must be covered by that levy. There are implications here for the government and we have just asked the Treasury Board, merely for holding the subsidy at $2.66, for an amount of $40 million.
We also ask the Cabinet to respect and maintain the producer's income and the income indexing principle, as stated in the 1975 policy. Accordingly, we ask the Treasury Board to pay the amount of $40 million since we claim that storage and interest costs must be paid by the government.
We also want the government to pay a larger share, but we reaffirm at the same time that exportation costs must be borne by the producers. This request is based on the fact that we want and require from the Cabinet the opportunity to have a profitable agricultural industry. We also want to have the assurance that our agriculture will be supported because we want to protect the economy of our rural areas. As the year 1976-77 moves in, if we want to talk seriously about this country a dairy policy, we have to raise the specific problem of surpluses. Various reasons can be put forward, but basically, 1 think that the Canadian Dairy Commission must be blamed for its lack of control. If it cannot provide a necessary and efficient control, it should be replaced.
Second, we say that the principle of maintaining income is acceptable, and we fully support it. Third, we blame the Canadian Dairy Commission for having changed the $2.66 subsidy the government had committed itself to, and I think the Canadian Dairy Commission ought to honour this government's commitment.
Fourth, I suggest the Canadian dairy commission be modified as follows, in order to achieve full representation of the different partners to the dairy policy. On the government side, the Treasury Board, the Department of Industry and Commerce, the Department of Agriculture and the Department of Consumer and Corporate Affairs should be represented. On the side of the producers, let us have a representation of the Canadian federation of Agriculture, the federation of milk producers, and the UPA.
As far as surplus is concerned, I would like to mention a few specific reasons for it: first, I think that the 1975 surplus was due in part to the lack of effective and appropriate control by the Canadian dairy commission, and the lack of authority on the part of the Canadian supply
March 19, 1976

management committee. Second, we recognize that weather played its part. Third, the normal increase in fluid milk we expected turned to be a decrease of 1.1 million, which causes a surplus of 3.3 million hundredweight of milk.
The government is also responsible, on the one hand, because it did encourage to produce more. And looking at our production in past years, we were right in asking for an increase in production. Fifth, manufacturers produced less cheese, perhaps to cut back their inventories by shipping their surplus milk and butter to the Canadian Dairy Commission, thereby increasing their profits by not having to pay storage costs. But, by the same token, they were forcing the Canadian Dairy Commission to support inventories. Sixth, that was the first opportunity the milk producers had to increase their quotas without charge, without having to hand out a large sum of money. Seventh, the difficulties encountered with respect to the price of butter caused the producers to keep their cast cows which, although not champions, still were giving milk and substantially contributing to the surplus. These examples: There are 90,000 cows too many in Quebec in 1975-76. Eight-


Gilbert F. Rondeau: Come on. After all!


Claude Tessier: I was not referring to the member for Shefford (Mr. Rondeau). Eight, the possibility for the producers of fluid milk of adding a second quota of up to 900,000 pounds of industrial milk.
Nine, the lure of "income", stirred up by the inclusion of a $1.00 increase in the long term policy for 1975-76 was also conducive to increased production. Ten, we have seen cattle breeders come back to the dairy industry. The result was that we had to deal with a surplus and with tremendous maintenance costs. Mr. Speaker, the question is this: who must pay the consequences of the solution to this problem for which the producer is not the only one to blame? At this moment, the responsibility lies with the government and more particularly with the Canadian Dairy Commission. On the other hand, the Treasury Board seems to be willing to free the Government from this problem by referring it to the Canadian Dairy Commission, which, because of budgetary constraints and the obligations assumed with respect to the surplus has no alternative but to switch it back into the hands of the producers.
True enough, we on the government side say that we do not agree with such a cut. If we were to listen to the supply management committee, and I repeat, the supply management committee, would not the real culprits be required to pay for their mistake? The answer is no, if we only go after the producer.
Are we not by the same token distorting the dairy policy of which it was said only in 1975 that it was a long-term one? We must then absolutely reject the management committee proposals. Are we not having the minister of Agriculture (Mr. Whelan) facing the fact that there are various solutions to similar problems in the area of agriculture? How shall we explain them, and we insist on being consistent with ourselves in order to provide our producers with a similar solution, wherever they are in this country? The government must require a certain amount of control
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and, indeed, producers are ready to accept it, because they consider it as absolutely necessary. Nevertheless, let us not confuse-and this applies to members of the Social Credit Party of Canada as well-control and production reduction.
We should implement, and we do insist on it, a genuine system of control. We should be provided with the necessary tools to apply such a control; otherwise, what would be the base of such a legislation? Producers will be justified to ask whom they shall trust. It will also make clear that if we are to approve the supply management committee's proposal it is the farm producer's income that will be directly affected and moreover it will go against the dairy policy announced previously and strongly defended in the past. Not only will the farm producer's income be affected but so will the rural economy which has no other way out than compensate for the present economic fluctuations.
Let the management committee control and let us assume our own responsibilities. That is the kind of message the minister should make and if he should ever meet dear Mrs. Plumptre, he could pass her the word.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Clermont):: Order, please. The time allotted to the hon. member for Compton (Mr. Tessier) has expired. He cannot carry on without the unanimous consent of the House.
Does the hon. member for Compton have the unanimous consent of the House to proceed?


Some hon. Members:: No.


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Clermont):: Order. I regret, but I have heard some nays. Therefore, I will recognize the hon. member for Shefford (Mr. Rondeau).


Gilbert F. Rondeau: Mr. Speaker, first I should like to sincerely thank the hon. member for Lot-biniere (Mr. Fortin) for having given us today the opportunity to hold a debate on such an important and vital matter as that of the dairy industry in Canada.
I also wish to thank all farmers who, in spite of their heavy task, have covered long distances in such bad weather in order to come here once more and state their problems and listen to those hon. gentlemen who stay in the same rut unless we provoke them in this House. Even if we are accused of indulging in petty politics, Mr. Speaker, it is the only means at our disposal to get a reaction from the hon. members opposite who are as mute as a fish on agricultural issues when farmers are absent from this institution.
I shall not waste my time and answer the nonsense of the hon. member for Compton (Mr. Tessier). I shall try to consider the weak answer we were expecting from the minister responsible for agriculture in Canada. I shall not waste my time with such nonnense because the few minutes at our disposal are too valuable.
Mr. Speaker, I must say that if some hon. members thought that Social Creditors do not know anything about dairy matters, I for one, and particularly the hon. member for Lotbiniere who introduced the motion today-his riding alone produces 10 per cent of the milk production in
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the province of Quebec-know something about the subject.
As concerns the riding of Shefford, it has the largest milk processing industry in the world, the Societe cooperative de Granby and I happen to live in that town about 1,500 feet from that industry which is the pride of the province of Quebec.
It seems to me that we have the right to speak and that even if we are in the opposition, we can speak as sensibly as the hon. members opposite, and that if we transpose the problem and say in the House what the farmers think, what they have written to us, what they tell us when we meet them, we shall speak even more to the point.
I am afraid that I do not have much time, but I would like to quote from a letter written by a farmer to the hon. member for Bellechasse (Mr. Lambert) who unfortunately could not be here today, and I am sorry about this since he is our official spokesman on agriculture. But even if he is not in the House or in Ottawa, we have taken our responsibilities because we represent urban as well as rural constituencies.
A while ago the hon. member for Compton (Mr. Tessier) said: Who said that the government has not honoured its commitments?
I would not like to say that it is the Social Crediters or the Conservatives or the New Democrats, but I would like to quote a letter from a worthy farmer who runs a fine operation. He quotes figures which are truly representative of the situation of the dairy industry in Quebec.
Mr. Lambert, Member of Parliament for Bellechasse, Ottawa.
March 18, 1976-
And I am not ashamed to mention his name. This letter could have been written by an economist, and no economist could have stated the problem better than this farmer who lives with farming problems every day in his field, in his barn, on his farm and not in the offices of the Liberal government which hires economists to try and lull the farmers with false problems and say that farming problems are caused by weather conditions, by exports, by everyone except the government, and especially by the farmers, as the Minister of Agriculture suggested earlier.
Dear Member of Parliament:
Further to your request for information about the loss incurred by industrial milk producers I bring my case to your attention. During the first months of year 1975 the Canadian Federation of Industrial Milk Producers made a survey-

that was done I suppose by the Canadian Federation of Industrial Milk Producers. They cannot be stupid, they represent farmers-
During the first months of the year 1975 the Canadian Federation-
I am sorry, Mr. Speaker, I do not have time to lose to help the hon. member if he is all mixed up-
-the Canadian Federation of Industrial Milk Producers made a survey to determine the cost of production per hundredweight of industrial milk for the period from April 1, 1975 to March 31, 1976.
It was not ten years ago that they made that survey, but April 1, 1975 to April 1, 1976.
That price was set at $11.60 per hundredweight of milk plus escalation every three months. That was the target of all producers.

If the government does not know where it is going in the area of agriculture, farmers do. What they wanted to get was $11.60 per hundredweight of milk.
At the beginning of the month of April 1975 the Minister of Agriculture of Canada, Mr. Eugene Whelan, announced the new long term national policy; the basic price set at that time was $11.02 per hundredweight of milk. The difference of 58 cents results from the refusal to cover management costs, or 5 per cent. The Minister has stated that the basic price-$11.02-would be escalated on a regular basis during the next five years. So here is a table summing up the situation.
Speaking of a long term policy the minister is right in saying that he already announced it because farmers tell us the minister had promised to escalate that price every five years but he did not keep his promise. I continue reading from the letter:
Breakdown: April 1975-C.F.I.M.P. target price-$11.60 ...


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Clermont):: Order. The Minister of Agriculture rises on a point of order.


Eugene Whelan: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. Again I hope the hon. member is not trying to mislead the House because this program was indexed every quarter and input costs, etc., were all calculated. We said we had support of $275 million for one million hundredweight of milk. We have not welshed one bit in respect of that program, and have been paying 100 per cent of what we said we would. That index was used and it is being used today.


Gilbert F. Rondeau: Mr. Speaker, I don't believe this is a point of order, and anyway I will not reply to it. I would let the farmer speak, he may find his way faster through the indexation than the minister himself. I go on quoting:
C.F.I.M.P. target price-$11.60; export costs: 15c.; anticipated net price: $11.45.
Decreed by C.D.C.: $11.02.-received $10.94; export costs 45c.; anticipated net price: $10.57.
Conversion cost increase at the plant: 8c.-$11.02; export cost: 45c.; anticipated net price: $10.49.
July 1975-Export cost increase:-Base price: $11.02; export costs: 90c., anticipated net price: $10.04.
Export costs are in the order of 90c. per hundredweight of milk. The immediate levy is 65c.; the 35c. differential is covered by a $40 million margin credit by the C.D.C. Producers will have to repay principal and interest before 1980.
It is a loan.
I will now show you the results of the cuts in the estimates, based on certain percentages since September 1st, 1975. The subsidy rate is $2.66 per cwt containing 3.5 per cent of fat or 76 cents a pound of fat. Since the last figures issued by the Dairy Commission, the $2.66 per cwt of milk should become, after figuring out the expeditions at the end of March at $2.26 per cwt, which amounts to a production of 516,342 pounds of milk and a loss of subsidies of $2,065.37, which I did not anticipate in my operation. In addition to that loss, the proceeds from milk do not compensate for the cost of producing that milk.
Here are the figures which were calculated in a survey and not by Social Credit members, not by government economists who are paid to defend the stupidity of the
March 19, 1976

government. Those are the figures of the Federation on April 1, 1975:
April 1, 1975 Cost for one cwt of milk-$11.60 April 1, 1975 Price given (purchasing power)-$10.04
In 1975-76, there will be a loss for that dairy producer because of that gap, because the minister had promised something else which has not happened. That honest farmer produces more than Vi million pounds of milk a year. He is in fact a real farm producer who has invested high-risk money and who finds himself one day with an income loss of $8,054.93 only for that item.
So, this year I sustain a loss and if I anticipate for next year, after the Dairy Commission's budget and the article of the federal government... I am told that they are not sure yet of the policy; they are not sure of the policy but we know where they are going! It is for that very reason that the hon. member for Lotbiniere launched a debate today in order to make the minister more aware, because I do not believe that in the Liberal caucus .. . That has been proved, he was not too sensitive. The sensitivity was not too evident. I should decrease my production and have a lesser income. That means that my production of 516,342 pounds of milk should decrease by 15 per cent. That is it would decrease to 438,891 pounds of milk, which is a loss of 77,451 pounds. This is a farmer who can calculate, Mr. Speaker. He does not need the mathematicians of the federal government to put his accounts in order, to calculate his losses and income, to know what will happen in 1976 and 1977 which such a production cost. We have nothing to teach that farmer. This farmer could teach lessons to the federal government administration and to the government facing us, he could teach them how to administer a country as intelligently as he administers his own farm and with data as clear and as precise. The implications of the new dairy policy-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Clermont):: Order, please. The Minister of Agriculture on a point of order.


Eugene Whelan: Yes, it is, Mr. Speaker, because this Minister of Agriculture is a farmer and he does understand the dairy industry. He has not welshed on one thing he has said he would do.


Gilbert F. Rondeau: Mr. Speaker, if the hon. Minister-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Clermont):: Order, the hon. member for Grenville-Carleton (Mr. Baker) on a point of order.


Walter David Baker: On the point of order, Mr. Speaker, I realize that the minister by speaking has lost his right to speak again, but I think it is most improper for him to try to pitch-fork a second speech in by way of a point of order.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Clermont):: Order, please. The hon. member for Shefford (Mr. Rondeau).
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Gilbert F. Rondeau: Mr. Speaker, I regret to say that the frequent interventions from the Minister of Agriculture are evidence that his statement was weak. Now, he wants to interrupt me for the purpose of using up my time and preventing me from coming to the conclusion that this farmer has something to say about this dairy policy.
I would ask the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Whelan) to let me finish reading this very important document so that we may see what has become of our dairy farmers, who were prosperous, intelligent and good managers, as a result of his dairy policy. Mr. Speaker, I have now reached this paragraph.
I shall now deal with the consequences of the new dairy policy for 1976-77. I ask the minister to be patient and hear me out.
The consequences of the new dairy policy for 1976-77. Production costs on April 1, 1976, per hundredweight of milk, $12.02; basic price April 1, 1976, per hundredweight of milk, $10.94; promised indexation, he has not forgotten anything, 40 cents, total, $11.34; export charges, $1.00 per hundredweight-this is what the Liberals recommend in the brief that we were lucky enough to get hold of-$1.00 net, $10.34; increase in processing costs, 8 cents, net price after deductions, $10.26; increase in farm production costs-the farmers are affected as well by the cost of inflation and their production costs are rising-35 cents., which leaves us with another net price of $9.91; reduction of the subsidy from $2.66 to $2.34, 32 cents, which leaves us with another price of $9.59. Loss of net income for return on labour for processing 77,451 lbs of milk, at the cost of $6.00 per hundredweight, total, $4,647. The difference between the production costs of $12.02 and the net farm price of $9.59, or a loss of profit of $2.43 per hundredweight, or for the full year, a loss of $2.43 for 438,891 lbs. of milk, the remaining quota for 1976, that is a loss of $10,665.
The total loss so far, if the minister cares to listen and to wait until I have finished, is $15,312. In addition to those $15,312, we have to take into account a reduced purchasing power. This farmer does not need to be acquainted with serious economic theories to know that his purchasing power is getting weaker and weaker. His purchasing power is also weaker as regards the total levies at the plant; transportation, 38 cents for 438,829 lbs. of milk, total: $1,667. Advertising for the joint program: 5 cents for 438,829 lbs., $219,41. As for his export charges, there is probably a 35 cents difference on 438,829 lbs., that is a loss of $1,535. According to the projections for April 5, 1976 to April 1, 1977, the total loss of his purchasing power is $3,421.
I hope this information will help you to succeed in the task with which we entrusted you and I remain yours truly, Emilien Lacasse, overwhelmed, Honfleur, County of Bellechasse.
If the Minister wants to write to him, he may.


André-Gilles Fortin: That guy is calling for help.


Gilbert F. Rondeau: Mr. Speaker, when we are told: Who said that the government did not keep its commitment? It is simple enough, there is no need to argue very long. In proof of this, the farmers have come here. If the promise made last year to the farmers had been kept they would not have
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to come here again this year through snow and ice to try to refresh the Minister's mind, who says he did not keep his promise or respect the undertakings he made last year. The best proof that the government did not respect its commitments, is that the farmers are here today. They march this way every year, and I am tired of that, Mr. Speaker. This is the social group which still works the hardest at the present time, which has always worked the hardest and which has to beg most to get its small share. Yet, no one seems to pay attention to them, because we are told that farmers are not that important anymore in our society nowadays since there are few of them, and their number is decreasing.
I am amazed, Mr. Speaker. I was recently making this comment to farmers: the more we vote Liberal, the more we are in the red; the more we vote Liberal, the deeper we are in debts, the more we vote Liberal, the greater is our deficit. What do the farmers want?


André-Gilles Fortin: The more we are Liberal, the poorer we get!


Gilbert F. Rondeau: The more we are Liberal, the poorer we get indeed. What do farmers want, in short? They are at present suggesting that in order to stabilize the whole dairy industry in 1976-77, all that is needed in the matter of investments by the federal government for the coming year, is an amount of $40 to $50 million. Concerning those $40 or $50 million, Mr. Speaker, there is no need to make such a big fuss nor to make a very long speech. The hon. member for Compton (Mr. Tessier) could not understand that-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Clermont):: Order, please. The time allotted to the hon. member for Shefford (Mr. Rondeau) has now expired. He may only proceed with the unanimous consent of the House.


Some hon. Members:: No.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Clermont):: Order. The hon. member started to speak at five twenty-four, and I have already given him more than one minute extra.


Gilbert F. Rondeau: I thank you for that-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Clermont):: Order. I asked unanimous consent of the House; it was not granted. The hon. member for Yorkton-Melville (Mr. Nystrom).


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Mr. Speaker, I want to say first of all that I shall be brief because my colleague from Battle River (Mr. Malone) wishes to say a few words. I will endeavour to divide the remaining time between the two of us. I wish to congratulate the hon. member for Lotbiniere (Mr. Fortin) for introducing this motion. I believe it is very important. I cannot help but comment at this time that I am sure all of us have noticed in our gallery today we have many dairy farmers who have remained here late on Friday afternoon to listen to this debate. I think this is unprecedented. It shows the importance of this debate in the House.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: It also shows that they are very concerned about this issue.

Unfortunately, Mr. Speaker, I come from Saskatchewan and I have been speaking French for only a very short time-

I beg the tolerance of those people in the gallery from Quebec in respect of my speaking in English in this debate.
I want to make clear on behalf of our party that we support vigorously the principle of orderly marketing. We believe farmers must have orderly marketing if they are to plan their production and have a guaranteed income. They must have this if they are to plan for their livelihood and the livelihood of their families.
Our party believes in a system of supply management. We also know that when we have supply management, such as we are moving into in respect of some products in this country, there are bound to be problems which all of us will have to face, not just the federal government but the producers and the various provinces. When we look at a system of supply management that is giving the farmers hopefully a higher income we must also look at the cost of that product to some of the lower income Canadians.
Earlier in the debate today my colleague from Timis-kaming mentioned the possibility of a school milk program and the supplementation of the cost of milk or of the price of milk to the consumers at the lower retail end. I think that is something we as a nation should examine. It makes me quite ill to go into schools and see coke and pop machiners, but very little milk being consumed by the students. I think that is something the government should look at seriously in terms of the new endeavour. I know it cannot all be done by the federal government. I thought I made that point clear on many occasions in this House.
We have an over-production of milk in this country this year, a real over-production of skim milk powder. Some of that now is being sold by the Canadian Dairy Commission at a price as low as 14 cents a pound in Europe. I want to suggest I do not think the subsidy for that should be coming strictly from the dairy farmers of this country. The CDC pays 54 cents a pound for that milk. Some of it will be sold for 14 cents a pound. I think when there is a problem of over-supply which is not the fault of the farmers, and the produce has to be sold for a lower price, the farmers should not have to bear the entire cost of that bill. The larger part of it should come from the people of Canada collectively. The government should buy the surplus milk and sell it itself for 14 cents a pound rather than have it done by the Canadian Dairy Commission. I think that would be a much more equitable way to approach a problem like this.
I also want to say that as a country we should look at the entire world situation. It irks me, and I am sure it irks most Canadians to see an overproduction of food in this country and to see simultaneously millions of people going hungry every night in this world, and many more people starving today than five or ten years ago. We have overproduction of food in a certain area and cannot get rid of that food. I know there are reasons why food cannot find its own way to hungry bodies and hungry bellies, but I am
March 19, 1976

sure we can work out a delivery system not just in this area but indeed in many other areas.
I think the government should have as a principle and policy the maximization of food. The food in this country we cannot use must be channeled into a world food program for those people who need it. If we do not start doing some of those things, we will have in a few years, certainly within my lifetime, a very real food crisis in this world when thousands and thousands of people will be dying like flies because of the shortage of food. Much of that could be prevented because we have the land and all we need is a proper land use policy. We also have the technology and the wealth. It is a matter of nations sitting down and devising the proper type of world food policy.
We only have to look at some of the statistics in our country to know that we have a food crisis of sorts in Canada. I have the report of the Food Prices Review Board of February, 1975. I find in it, for example, that many Canadians are suffering from lack of proper nutrition. I will use the example of a calcium deficiency in the population. On page 8 of the report it is stated that approximately 70 per cent, perhaps 72 per cent, of people over the age of 65 in Canada suffer from a calcium deficiency. Of males between the ages of 10 and 19, young people in public schools and high schools, 55 per cent are suffering from calcium deficiency, and of females between the ages of 10 and 19 some 57 per cent are suffering from a calcium deficiency.
These statistics are available, and are only the tip of the iceberg. I think it is incumbent upon the Department of National Health and Welfare and the Department of Agriculture to look at this problem, to exhibit some leadership with the provinces toward establishing a proper food program in this country, not just for school children but indeed for all Canadians. One way of starting that would be to reinstate the 5 cent per quart consumer subsidy for milk because there is a correlation between the price of milk and consumer demand. That subsidy should be reinstated and the price of milk lowered in the country, and then I am sure that most of the milk would be sold and Canadians would be healthy. Mr. Speaker, I notice the clock. I would like to go on but I will stop now out of courtesy to my friend, the hon. member for Battle River.


Arnold John Malone: Mr. Speaker, one of the things that will be obvious is that far more problems will be left at the end of the time allotted to us than we have had time to deal with today.
I should like to thank the hon. member for Lotbiniere (Mr. Fortin) for bringing forward the motion, and the hon. member for Yorkton-Melville (Mr. Nystrom) for relinquishing some of his time to me.
It has often been said that the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Whelan) is a great guy, and you could recognize that most often in the speeches delivered by him. As might be pointed out by the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Sharp), there is nothing illegal about that. But I would like to say to the minister that I hope this day he will pay enough attention to a problem on which I want to comment relating to the dairy industry, which affects my area in the
Dairy Policy
province of Alberta quite significantly. Perhaps some of his department officials could pay special attention to it. It relates to how the dairy industry associates with the beef industry.
In the western provinces at present beef prices are severely depressed. One farmer told me recently he had the good fortune to have had his herd suffer from a disease as a result of which his animals died, and therefore he failed to incur the $20 a head loss which he would have had normally for raising them. The problem has to do with animal feed replacer products which have become so expensive that in many parts in the western provinces today young calves are simply being killed so that farmers do not incur the expense of feeding them high cost feeds. On the one hand the situation is that the milk replacers for animal food supplements have become so expensive that lifestock is being killed, while on the other hand the Minister of Agriculture-


Eugene Whelan: Mr. Speaker-


Arnold John Malone: Just a second, I hope the minister is not trying to intervene.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Clermont):: Order. The Minister of Agriculture on a point of order.


Eugene Whelan: Mr. Speaker, I think this is a very important point because again we are being misinformed. Anybody feeding calves today on calf replacers is making money feeding calves.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Clermont):: Sorry, Mr. Minister. The hon. member for Battle River (Mr. Malone).


Stanley Howard Knowles: This is not a point of order, Mr. Speaker.


Arnold John Malone: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Maybe that will warm us up a little. We know the minister is putting food into foreign markets at 14 cents a pound. The fact is that bringing it in from eastern Canada to western Canada is simply not viable at present. If the minister checked the record he would know he is doing a disservice to the western provinces by failing to take milk products from the east to the west where there is definitely a market for them.
The second thing that I would like to put on the record for the Minister of Agriculture is that he has failed to recognize the law in terms of the import of milk products into this country because, as we have pointed out to him, it has been illegal for some time to bring the dry milk product from the U.S. into Canada when it has milk content of over 40 per cent. That has been ignored for over a year, and it is causing serious concern among those who are producing animal food supplements.
I think the minister might well pay more attention to the fact that there is a large market in this country for surplus whey, and for surplus dried milk products, a fact which is not being considered or investigated by the Minister of Agriculture. I think it is high time he recognized that what he is doing is in effect forcing the price of animal food

March 19, 1976
Dairy Policy
supplements up so high that they are no longer competitive in Canada. The minister has shown in his intervention not his lack of knowledge of agriculture but his disregard for much of the western community. I think he should recognize that there is a market in this country for eastern surplus products to go into the production of animal food surpluses in the western provinces. The minister should recognize that and show some concern.
I should like to read a couple of paragraphs from a letter which I received recently from a manufacturer of animal food supplements. He writes:
We have recently had difficulty in obtaining the kind of whey powder we require. In desperation, we approached the Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce to try to obtain an import permit for a specified tonnage.
Needless to say, we were turned down.
If we had been able to import this product, it would have meant a considerable saving to us. There are mountains of surplus of dried whey in the U.S.A.
The fact is the government either has to take a position and allow it to come in from one area, or allow it to come in from eastern Canada. It should not stifle the industry which is looking after the market for animal food stuffs. According to the Toronto Globe arid Mail, the Canadian Dairy Commission is buying milk powder from Canadian producers for 64 cents a pound and then offering it to the communist countries in eastern Europe for less than 14 cents a pound. Those areas of the country where producers are trying to get the older surplus products off the shelf to use for the making of animal food supplements are being denied that by the Department of Agriculture.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Clermont):: Order. It being past five o'clock, it is my duty to inform the House that, pursuant to Standing Order 48(11), proceedings on the motion have now expired. The House stands adjourned until Monday at two p.m., pursuant to Standing Order 2(1).
At 6 p.m., the House adjourned, without question put, pursuant to Standing Order.
March 19, 1976



APPENDIX


[Stage Direction]
An industrial milk producer qualifies for graduated entry into the fluid milk market if he has:
1)	been in production for one year,
2)	been producing Grade "A" milk,
3)	a bulk tank,
4)	made application in January (of every year), then fluid quota allocated will be:
5)	equal to 100% of average daily production during the quota building period.
the fluid milk price in February 1976 was $13.57 per hundredweight and;
the industrial milk price ranged from $8.10 to $8.90 per hundredweight.

[Stage Direction]
An industrial milk producer qualifies for graduated entry into the fluid milk market if he has:
1)	been in production 12 months preceeding September 1 of year of application during which dairy production averaged 500 pounds per day,
2)	been producing Grade "A" milk,
3)	a bulk tank,
4)	made application by September 1 (of every year), then fluid quota allocated will be:
5)	equal daily production during quota building period up to 800 pounds.
6)	Presently fluid quotas are set at 115% of preceeding years fluid sales. If required to accommodate graduated entrants, fluid quotas will be raised to:
-120% of 1974 sales on January 1/75;
-125% of 1975 sales on January 1/76;
-130% of 1976 sales on January 1/77.
In addition, fluid quotas created from production cuts and sales increase over and above the amount earned by existing quota holders will be made available to graduated entrants.
the fluid milk price in February 1976 was $12.21 per hundredweight and;
the industrial milk price was $8.00 per hundredweight.

[Stage Direction]
An industrial milk producer qualifies for graduated entry into the fluid milk market if he has:
1)	been in production one year prior to application,
2)	been producing Grade "A" milk,
3)	a bulk tank,
4)	made application on or before July 1 of every year, then fluid quota allocated will be:
5)	equal to 100% of daily production during 5 lowest months of production during qualifying period, up to a maximum of 1,000 pounds per day.
6)	Limit on entry into the fluid market to the extent that total fluid quota for province shall not exceed 120% of fluid sales in year 1; 125% of fluid sales in year 2; 130% of fluid sales in year 3. Also, fluid quota shall not exceed 140% of fluid sales in any milk shed, the fluid milk price in February 1976 was $11.07 per hundredweight and;
the industrial milk price was $8.56 per hundredweight.

[Stage Direction]
An industrial milk producer qualifies for graduated entry into the fluid milk market if he has:
1)	been producing Grade "A" milk,
2)	a bulk tank,
3)	made application.
Since the quota system in Manitoba has been suspended, the percentage of total sales at fluid milk prices each month determines the percentage of producers' shipments to be paid at fluid milk prices.
the fluid milk price in February 1976 was $12.20 per hundredweight and;
the industrial milk prices ranged from $8.21 to $9.06 per hundredweight.

[Stage Direction]
An industrial milk producer qualifies for graduated entry into the fluid milk market if he has:

[Stage Direction]
1)	been producing milk or cream since July 1, 1968,
2)	farm premises and milk meeting provincial standards,
3)	a bulk tank,
4)	made application prior to May 15 of every year, then fluid quota allocated will be:
the greater of:
a)	89% of 9 months of 1965/66 excluding peak period;
b)	1973/74 production maximum of 400 pounds per day;
c)	1973/74 production if below 400 pounds per day;
d)	the free quota allotment is allocated over five years. PROGRAM B
1)	marketed milk or cream in Ontario for at least the two consecutive and complete dairy years prior to date of entry; marketed at least 400 pounds per day in the 12 months ending March 31,
2)	farm premises and milk meeting provincial standards,
3)	a bulk tank,
4)	application made prior to May 15 of every year, then fluid quota allocated will be:
5)	400 pounds per day over five years.
the fluid milk prices in February 1976 was $12.01 per hundredweight and,
the industrial milk prices ranged from $8.21 to $8.85 per hundredweight.
[Stage Direction]
March 19, 1976

[Stage Direction]
An industrial milk producer qualifies for graduated entry into the fluid milk market if he has:
1)	been in production two years prior to application
2)	farm premises and milk meeting provincial standards,
3)	a bulk tank,
then fluid quota allotted will be:
4)	a fluid quota equal to 60% of the Market Share Quota held prior to the date of application but,
not more than the average fluid milk quota held by all producers in the province on April 1 of the year of application
5)	the annual limit of quota that can be allocated to the graduated entry program is equal to 5% of the fluid sales in the proceeding year; there are other provisions which limit the program.
the fluid milk price in February 1976 was $12.30 per hundredweight and;
the industrial milk prices ranged from $8.13 to $8.20 per hundredweight.

[Stage Direction]
An industrial milk producer qualifies for graduated entry into the fluid milk market if he has:
1)	been in production for two complete and consecutive dairy years prior to application,
2)	farm and milk meeting provincial standards,
3)	a bulk tank,
then fluid quota allocated will be:
4)	equal to average daily production in the dairy year prior to entry.
the fluid milk prices in February 1976 was $12.86 per hundredweight and;
the industrial milk prices ranged from $6.71 to $8.61 per hundredweight.

[Stage Direction]
An industrial milk producer qualifies for graduated entry into the fluid milk market if he has:
1)	farm premises meeting provincial standards,
2)	a bulk tank,
3)	been production for two complete and consecutive years prior to date of entry,
then fluid milk quota allocated will be:
4)	equal to 300 pounds per day,
5)	OR, 50% of the producers average production during the two qualifying years, whichever is the greater.
the fluid milk price in February 1976 was $13.08 per hundredweight and;
the industrial milk price was $8.61 per hundredweight.

[Stage Direction]
An industrial milk producer qualifies for graduated entry into the fluid milk market if he has:
1)	produced milk or cream at least two years prior to application,
2)	been producing and been licensed to produce Class I or fluid milk,
3)	a bulk tank,
4)	made application,
then fluid milk quota allocated will be:
5)	based on 80% of the average daily production during the 24 months preceding the date of entry to a maximum of 1,000 pounds per day.
the fluid milk price in February 1976 was $11.57 per hundredweight and;
the industrial milk price was $7.80 per hundredweight.
[Stage Direction]
Monday, March 22, 1976