PRIVATE BILLS.


[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 207, respecting a patent of the Commercial Acetylene Company of New Jersey.-Mr. Schaffner.

[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 183, respecting the City of Ottawa.-Mr. Fripp.

[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 208, respecting a patent of Maurice Delvigne.-Mr. Barker.

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

*Mr. KYTE:: 1.	Is the Government aware of a short article which appeared in La Patrie on the loth April, 1913, in the text of a letter signed ' An elector of Maskinonge '-	_
' The Government is going to spend the handsome sum of $150,000 in various public works in the county of Maskinonge, which represents here the sum of $9 per head of the population of 16,000 which we have.'
2.	Will the Government furnish a complete list of the various works which are to be carried out in the county of Maskinonge ?
Mr OLIVER.


Mr. ROGERS:: 1.	No.
2.	Louiseville, public buildings, $18,000, Riviere du Loup, lock and dam, $10,000.


MOOSEJAW CUSTOMS APPRAISER.
Mr. KNOWLES:: 1.	Who has been appointed appraiser of customs at Moosejaw?
2.	When was he first employed by the department, and what experience has he had to-fit him for his new position?
3.	What salary is paid to him?
4.	What are the names of the employees at Moosejaw, and the dates of their appoint ment, and their salaries, respectively ?


Mr. REID (Minister of Customs):: 
AUDITOR GENERAL'S OFFICE.
Mr. FOWLER:: 1.	What promotions are proposed to be made in the office of the Auditor General for the present year?
2.	What are the names and period of service in each case?
3.	Upon whose recommendation are those promotions to be made?
4.	What audit is made of the Auditor General's Department, and by whom made?
5.	What was the custom under the predecessor of the present Auditor General regarding the auditing of his department?
6.	Who is the secretary of the Ottawa Improvement Commission?
7.	Is he employed in any of the departments of the public service? If so, in what department, and at what salary?


Mr. WHITE (Minister of Finance):: 1 and 2. The promotions for the present year are under consideration, but have not been finally determined upon.

3.	The promotions are to be made by the Auditor General under the provisions of 7-8 Edward VII, chapter 6, section 2.
4.	Audited by the staff of the Auditor General.
5.	The same as at present.
6.	Mr. Wm. Kearns is the secretary of the Ottawa Improvement Commission, serving without any remuneration, as provided by 62-63 Victoria, chapter 10, section 6.
7.	He is employed in the office of the Auditor General, at $2,900 per annum.


UNOPPOSED AND UNDISCUSSED MOTIONS.
[Stage Direction]
for a copy of all telegrams and correspondence on file relating to the mail service between A.ntigonish and Livingstone Cove, and of the tenders received, and the contract entered into for this service.-Mr. Chisholm (Antigonish).
For a copy of all correspondence, complaints, petitions and reports connected with the dismissal of fishery overseer Migneault at Seven Islands, and the appointment in his place of Iilzear Levesque.-Mr. Beland.
For a return showing a comparative and detailed statement of costs of production, maintenance, operation and management, and receipts of the dog fish reduction works at Clarks' harbour, N.S., for the years 1910, 1911 and 1912.-Mr. Maclean (Halifax).
For a copy of all papers, tenders, contracts, accounts, and Orders in Council, between the Department of Public Works and any other person or persons, relating to the purchase of a site for the public wharf being erected or recently erected at Bear river, N.S., and also relating to the construction of said wharf, and anything in connection therewith.-Mr. Maclean (Halifax.)
For a return showing the per capita taxation for the year ending 31st March, 1913, and for each of the 12 preceding years.-Mr. Hughes (Kings.)
For a copy of all petitions and correspondence relating to the dismissal of Mr. Pesha,
postmaster at Kent Bridge, Ontario.-Sir Wilfrid Laurier.

[Stage Direction]
On motion of Hon. W. T. White (Minister of Finance) the House went into Committee to consider the following proposed resolution :
That it is expedient to revise the laws respecting certain savings banks in the province of Quebec, now carrying on business under chapter 32, of the Revised Statutes; to continue until the first day of July, 1923, the charters of these banks, and to authorize the payment out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund of remuneration to auditors for such special examinations of the affairs or business of these banks as the Minister of Finance may require to be made.
(Mr. Deputy Speaker in the Chair.)
William Thomas White: This resolution relates to the Montreal City and District Savings Bank and La Caisse d'Economie de Notre
Dame de Quebec, savings banks of the city of Montreal and the city of Quebec respectively. These banks were incorporated not under the Bank Act, but under separate charters, which charters expire upon the same day upon which the charters of the several chartered banks of Canada expire, that is, on the 30th of June next. It is necessary to renew these charters, just as we are now renewing the charters of the other banks of Canada. Provision is made in accordance with the provisions made in the Bank Act for the audit of these savings banks by auditors appointed by their shareholders at their annual meeting. There is further provision similar to that we have inserted in the new Act that the Minister of Finance may make investigation into the affairs of these banks, and for that purpose may engage the auditors appointed by their shareholders or any other auditor or person that we may deem advisable. It is therefore necessary that the Bill which I propose to introduce should be preceded by this resolution, because it is possible that expense may be incurred in connection with such investigation, should it be necessary to have it at any time. If there is further information I can give the committee at this stage, I shall be glad to give it. Of course, I propose to introduce the Bill immediately after this resolution is adopted.


Sir WILFRID LAURIER:: These two
banks, so called-savings banks-are well-known in the province of Quebec, and I understand they are doing good work. They were given special charters. For my part, I never knew the reason for giving these special charters or with what special powers these banks, were invested different from those of other banks. For one thing, they have no note circulation. I understand that they do not discount paper for other banks. It would be well if the minister would give to the House some information as to why they do not come under the general banking law.


William Thomas White: They do not possess as
wide powers ,as the chartered banks in Canada. They are savings banks in a strictly limited sense. They receive money on deposit and lend it always on collateral security, and that distinguishes them from chartered banks. They are limited to particular districts, as, for, instance, Montreal and Quebec, and they do not open branches throughout the country as the other banks do. In other words they are not engaged in the business of commercial banking, but they do loan upon collateral securities. They are exceedingly useful institutions.


Mr. LEMIEUX:: They are benevolent
institutions too. I understand that the City and District Savings Bank distributes each year certain amounts out of its earnings among the various hospitals.

Resolution reported, read the first and the second time, and agreed to.
Mr. WHITE thereupon moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 212, respecting certain Savings Banks in the Province of Quebec.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, and Bill read the first time.

[Stage Direction]
On motion of Hon. W. T. White (Minister of Finance), the House went into Committee to consider the following proposed resolution:
Resolved, that it is expedient to authorize that the provisions of chapter 43 of the Act of 1908, an Act respecting the Payment of Bounties on Lead contained in lead-bearing Ores mined in Canada shall, subject to the modification herein set forth, be extended until the thirtieth day of June, 1918, and that the provisions of the said Act limiting the payment of such bounty to five hundred thousand dollars in any fiscal year, be changed to two hundred and fifty thousand dollars in any fiscal year; provided, however, that the total sum to be paid by way of bounties, under the said Act of 1908, and antecedent Act (chapter 31 of the Acts of 1903), and under any Act to be founded on this resolution, shall not exceed the sum of two millions four hundred and fifty thousand dollars.
Mr. CARVELL:: Would the committee
state what has been the result of granting this bounty up to the present time? To what extent it has stimulated the production of lead in Canada, and what would likely be the result if the bounty were discontinued?


William Thomas White: I dealt with the matter
somewhat fully in the budget, and the figures I gave then were somewhat striking. The information which I then gave is to be found at page 9896 of the unrevised ' Hansard.'


Wilfrid Laurier: This legislation was tentative, in order to encourage the mining of lead in British Columbia by securing to the miner that, happen what might, he could obtain a certain minimum price for his lead. That was the whole subject and the only justification of the legislation. It would be interesting to know whether it has had the desired result. The late Government were responsible for this legislation, which I think was wise legislation; but it was only tentative, and it could not be justified unless the result was what we anticipated.


Mr. R. F. GREEN (Kootenay):: I would say for the benefit of the committee that the result has been very marked. In the six months preceding the introduction of this bounty the lead production in Canada was only 6,000 tons. Since then the produc-Mr. LEMIEUX.
tion of lead has been increasing very largely from year to year. In 1903, a portion of which was under the bounty, the production was 9,045 tons. The production since that time has been as follows:
Calendar years.	Tons.
1903		.. 9,045
1904		.. 18,323
1905		.. 28,290
1906		.. 26,204
1907		.. 23,869
1908		.. 21,598
1909		.. 22,198
1910		.. 17,329
1911		.. 13,436
1912		
The falling off of production in 1910 and 1911 was due very largely to difficulties that arose in the Slocan silver lead mining district where most of the lead produced in British Columbia is obtained. This part of the country was visited by forest fires which cleaned out nearly all the mine buildings and some of the mills. The properties in that particular vicinity were not working for several months during that year. It is estimated that this year there will be something like 30,000 tons of lead produced in British Columbia. That has been possible owing to the fact that there is stability of the price. The producer knows that it is going to net him so much money. The smelters all deal on the price in the London market. While a great deal of the lead is not disposed of in London, it is disposed of on the valuation of the London market. They are always sure then of getting the minimum price fixed by the bounty for their lead. In 1903 most of the lead mines in the province were closed down. Since that time, there has been an awakening in the mining industry, and nearly all the old properties are now being developed. I believe I am safe in saying that the production of mineral in the province of British Columbia, during this year will be greater than it has ever been. At the mines at Rossland to-day the pay-roll is greater that it was in the palmiest days, and the Slocan country is also doing very well indeed. Some of the older mines are being opened on more businesslike principles than when they were operated before. The element of the speculator and the middleman has dropped out of sight altogether, so far as the mining in the older portions of the province is concerned, and money is now being furnished by actual mining men who have legitimate mining properties, with the result that there is no question but that a revival of the mining industry all through the province is in sight. I have not the slightest doubt in the world that the lead industry will continue to advance, and that it will be very beneficial, not only to the province of

British Columbia, but to Canada as a whole. I believe that some of the lead ore produced in British Columbia is shipped as far east as Kingston. It comes very largely from the Monarch mines. But we have still difficul-'ties in connection with our mining of lead and zinc in British Columbia. We have the duty to contend with, a duty of a cent and a half per pound upon the lead going to the United States. A duty of a cent per pound on zinc has been imposed since this legislation was first placed on the statute-books by the late Government. Prior to that ores containing zinc could go into the United States free, but now we have to pay a duty of a. cent per pound upon all ores containing over 25 per cent zinc. The United States being our greatest market for zinc, it makes it very hard for the people who have properties containing zinc to dispose of their products. Zinc is found almost altogether in connection with lead. The ordinary smelter in Canada penalizes the producer of lead for every unit of zinc over 8 per cent contained in the ore. In other words, if you ship ore to the 3melter cmtaining 30, 40, 50 or 70 per cent of lead, and only 8 per cent of zinc, you will get the best possible rates for the treatment of your ores, and they will not penalize you for the zinc contents. But for every unit of zinc in that particular ore above 8 per cent you will be penalized. If you have say 15 per cent of zinc, you will have to pay a penalty of 50 cents per cent over the 8 per cent which they treat free. As some of the ores are low-grade silver lead, containing from 15 to 25 per cent of zinc, it would be impossible to handle them profitably without the assistance of the bounty. If you get from 30 per cent to 35 per cent of zinc in the ores, it can be marketed as zinc, for which you get a very good price, but get nothing for the lead content. These are difficulties that will have to be worked out. I think it would be well for the Government to consider the advisability of appointing a commission to inquire into the whole matter of mining and marketing silver lead. The producers must have some relief from time to time. Whether that relief should be continued in the way of bounties or not, is a question to be decided. The bounty has certainly acted very favourably so far as lead is concerned. But it does not apply to zinc, and, if we are to continue the bounty system, I think it ought to apply to zinc. I suggest that the Government should appoint a commission to inquire into the whole matter, and to decide what assistance should be given to the lead and zinc industries in the future.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: The hon. member for
Kootenay has defended this bounty in a very modest manner indeed. Listening to him, I thought I should like to live long
enough to see in 'Janada one industry that would exist without being pap-fed by the Government.


Mr. CLARK (Red Deer):: Come to Alberta.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Yes, they can raise
wheat out there, and they do not ask for any bounty. In Quebec they raise hay without any bounty, and in New Brunswick we raise a few hundred thousand barrels of. potatoes without a bounty. Then some millions of dollars worth of fish is marketed from Nova Scotia without a bounty. They do not have a bounty for wheat in Alberta, for hay in Quebec, for fish in Nova Scotia, or for potatoes in New Brunswick, and they do not have a minimum price guaranteed by the Government.


Mr. GRAHAM:: Or for cheese in Ontario.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: What a millenium there would be in this country if the Government could see its way clear to guarantee a fixed price to all the agriculturists, all the lumbermen, and all the fishermen in Canada for their produce. It seems to me that if we want a millennium in this country, that would be the way to go about it.


Mr. MORPHY:: There are the steel companies too.
Mr. CARVeLl : I am happy to say that the steel companies have got out of that category at the present time, and from the attitude of the Minister of Finance I do not think he is disposed to put them back where they were. I think I am safe in assuming that he does not intend to do so. My right hon. friend the leader of the Opposition takes upon himself the blame or praise, whichever it may be, for this legislation, and therefore I do not suppose I can fight it very hard. But I hope the Minister of Finance will not pledge himself that it will be renewed after 1918.


William Thomas White: I never give any pledges.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I hope it will not be renewed. Why on earth the man who produces lead in British Columbia or, in Ontario, or in any other place in Canada, should be guaranteed certain minimum rates for his product is something I cannot understand. If the miner could do business when lead was $60 a ton, why is it necessary to pay a bounty to aid him when the lead is worth $90 a ton?


Mr. BRADBURY:: It might cost a great deal more to produce.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Even if it does cost more to produce, the miner is getting fifty per cent more on his price. I would not like to divide the committee and refuse to grant it, but I hope we will have a declaration from the Minister of Finance that if he should be in control of the affairs of this country five years hence, which I very

much doubt, he will not ask for a renewal of this guarantee of a minimum price on an article of ordinary commerce which is worthy fifty per cent more to-day than it was ten years ago.


Michael Clark: If, like my hon. friend from Carleton (Mr. Carvel), I feel disinclined to divide the committe, I should like the committee to understand it is not from any lack of courage, but from excess of modesty, because I should be sorry to reveal the fewness of my supporters on such an occasion. I want to make personal protest against the renewal of these bounties now, and I express my regret that the Minister of Finance seems disposed to follow the evil examples of the previous Government.


Wilfrid Laurier: He is always doing that.


Mr. CLAEK:: I do not think it is a
good plan in me to follow the evil examples of any one. I notice a tendency on the part of hon. gentlemen opposite to use the tu quoque argument, and I am glad to be able to disarm any one of that weapon against myself, because it happens I protested in as vigorous language as I could against the steel bounties when the last Government was in power. I do not want to think my protest had much effect, but at any rate the steel bounty disappeared, and if I can make another protest which would synchronize with the disappearance of the bounty on lead, I can assure the Minister of Finance I would be a very happy man. When hon. gentlemen from British Columbia or anywhere else come here and ask me, as representing the independent and self-supporting men of the plains, to help them in their fruit growing or lead raising business I regard them as legalized mendicants and nothing else. I have just as much respect for the man who conies to my door-step and asks me to give him alms as I have for these fellows who come to Parliament and ask me to help them in their business for that is what a bounty amounts to. I would be more than human if I met such a request with any serious amount of sympathy because I wanted last election to get a little help in my business which would not hurt anybody else, which would be a help to all Canada, and these gentlemen of British Columbia took up arms to prevent me selling in what I thought to be the better market.


George Henry Bradbury: They were trying to
protect you.


John Arthur Clark: I know whom they were
trying to protect, and my hon. friend had better be careful about dwelling too much on that doctrine. I would like to meet him before the farmers of his constituency and 1 do not think he would go very far in airing protectionist views.
Mr. CARVELL.


George Henry Bradbury: I shall be pleased to meet you.


John Arthur Clark: The hon. gentleman ran
his course with such dubious results last election that next time it may be worse. However, I will take up that challenge, and the first place I visit in Manitoba for this purpose will be the constituency of Selkirk.


George Henry Bradbury: All right.


Michael Clark: I am sure we will have a good time because my hon. friend and I are always personally very friendly.


George Henry Bradbury: We will treat you
well.


Michael Clark: What I want my hon.
friend to understand is that I do not need protection; I came to Canada an English medical man, and I am making my own living without the help of protection. I do not need protection in the making of my living; what I want is protection from the political friends of my hon. friend from Selkirk (Mr. Bradbury). But, that protection is not afforded by the hon. gentleman, who, though he comes from the plains, joins with his political friends to legally rob me. Does my hon. friend see the point?


George Henry Bradbury: Not yet.


Michael Clark: When I was interrupted by the hon. gentleman I was remarking that I should be more than human if, as a dweller of the plains I had any sympathy with these demands made to me.
The Minister of Finance says there have been beneficial effects from these bounties, and my hon. friend from Kootenay (Mr. Green) produced the figures to prove it. I should be very much surprised if there were not some beneficial effects from them. If a man gives me a chunk of money, or if I steal it and get away with it, the beneficial effect is there all right to me. But so far as the lead bounty is concerned, what 1 should like demonstrated is the beneficial effect of it on me who helps to pay the bounty. Suppose I were a millionaire and the Minister of Finance were a burglar- which suppositions are very violent, and I could not say anything more flattering to my hon. friend than to say that he is just as likely to become a burglar as I am to become a millionaire.


William Thomas White: I
would be glad to see you a millionaire.


Michael Clark: Both suppositions are, of
course, absolutely out of the realm of human possibility, but, suppose the Minister of Finance should become a burglar and I should become a millionaire, and the hon. gentleman came to the safe where I kept a part of my millions and he scooped out ten thousand dollars and got away with it, he would have the beneficial effect so far as the ten thousand dollars were concerned, and

it would not so very much hurt me. But I want to represent to the Minister of Finance-whose mind it is a pleasure to address any thought or idea to-I want to represent to him that there is the question of justice which remains, and I am not at all sure that the Minister of Justice would take the same view of the theft of that ten thousand dollars as would my hon. friend the Minister of Finance, if he happened to be a burglar. The question of justice is a question which we in this House ought to consider in regard to these bounties, and upon what principle of justice can you defend the taking of money from the hardworking farmers of the plains and the hardworking labourers everywhere in Canada, and the giving of it to gentlemen who cannot make a living out of their lead raising, and who have to get some one to help them? That is what it amounts to. What sort of citizens will you produce in any country if you follow that line of policy? Beneficial effects-of course the beneficial effect is there but the question of justice remains, and these are the kiinj of questions we want to solve in this country. I have before quoted Mr. Gladstone's remarks; he denounced bounties as the worst kind of protection and that is as bad a thing as could be said about anything, because protection is so wholly bad that the worst kind of it must be something too bad to live above ground. When you put a tariff upon goods you get some benefit out of it because you get a revenue for the country. Mr. Gladstone, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, regarded bounties from that point of view as the worst kind of protection because it is simply a handing out of money from the community at large to one particular favoured interest without any corresponding benefit to the Government or to the people. Adam Smith of course put this thing in a way I have never heard successfully answered; he said: you can only give bounties to two different kinds of trade; it must be a gaining trade or it must be a losing trade; if it is a gaining trade it does not need a bounty, and if it is a losing trade-then, in a country like Canada, in Heaven's name why do you want to put your sous into it? There is the whole question. Let the lead lie in the ground if you cannot take it out with profit. That policy ought to please hon. gentlemen opposite, because they used the argument on the reciprocity treaty; that they wanted to conserve the existing resources of Canada, and we would be richer, according to their argument, if we let the lead remain in the bowels of the earth. To these hon. gentlemen opposite I appeal; stand by your own argument. If the lead cannot be raised by the individual, self-supporting, manly efforts of 321
well-bred Canadians, standing full abreast to the four winds of Heaven, full-sized men after they have grown up, let the lead stay in the bowels of the earth. Canada is big enough and offers opportunity enough to efforts in other directions which will give remuneration for honest industry.
They have been in the habit of paying bounties in other countries. They give them to shipping in Germany, and a remarkable fact is that there are two great shipping companies in Germany, one which receives a bounty and the other which does not and the one that does not get a bounty is in a better financial position than the one which does. That is only what I should expect. If I had two sons and I wanted to ruin one of them, I would give him plenty of money if I had it, and the Minister of Finance, whose personal record is one which this House and this country have reason to be proud of, knows that what I speak is true. If you want to get the best out of a youth put him on his feet and let him stand on his feet and let his own inherent manhood and strength be directed in a proper direction. There is no country in which that doctrine will apply better than in this country of Canada. If I want to ruin one of my children, if I had the money I would feed him with money and I would expect the others who did not get this particular pap-feeding to go right ahead of the one so fed. Every member of the committee knows that they used to give fishing bounties in the old country, and the effect of it upon the trade was summed up in the statement that the fishermen at last went out to sea to catch the bounty and not the fish. That is a matter of history. I do not know that we do not continue this system in this country at the present time on some of our coasts.
My hon. friends opposite are a British party; they, so they say, stand for all things English, but Britain rid herself of the payment of bounties in 1830, more than eighty years ago, and Canada having participated in these follies of youth should seriously consider whether she cannot get away from this particular folly. My hon. friend (the Minister of Finance) always gives serious attention, and very flattering attention, to anything I happen to address to him, and I hope he will seriously consider this question and get rid of this thing during his tenure of office.


Mr. BURNHAM:: Will you allow me,
Mr. 'Chairman, to put on record my protest against this thing. If there is not some reasonable excuse given for it-and I have not heard any given yet-I must say that for my part I shall vote against it. Though I have neither the eloquence nor the brains of the hon. member for Red



Deer (Mr. Clark), I have more pluck than he has and I am not going to sit by and make a howl and having done that let the thing go on.


Michael Clark: I will vote
with you.


John Hampden Burnham: You will vote with
me; you funked the whole job because it emanated from your party when they were in power. That's what's the matter with you. So far as I am concerned, this is exactly like the steel bounty; I regard this thing as immoral and nothing else.
I do not see how we can possibly bring the principles of honesty and fair dealing to apply to a thing like this.


Robert Francis Green: Some gentlemen have become quite excited over this harmless proposition of ours. I would like to say to the hon. member for Red Deer, whether he likes it or not, or whether his arguments against protection are right or mine in favour of protection are wrong, the fact remains that we have protection in this country of ours. Therefore, if you are protecting a certain portion of the people of Canada who are producing the wealth of Canada, why should you limit your protection to those particular people and shut out others? I quite grant the hon. member for Red Deer that this is protection; protection of the lead industry. I cannot agree with the argument, the hon. member for Carleton (Mr. Car-veil) attempted to put forward in making comparisons of this industry with the fishing or any other industry of that nature. When you talk of these industries and these other things which are produced either from the earth or from the sea, you have to recollect that these things are in their finished state and ready for the markets of the world when produced. But, the silver lead industry is different, for when you have mined the lead you have to put it through a very expensive process'-a process that no ordinary individual or ordinary company can carry on-to manufacture it into a state which will enable you to put it upon the market. When the lead is mined you have to have recourse to another class of industry to reduce the product of your mine into its component parts so that it can be marketed. Before silver-lead was produced in the province of British Columbia, we had nothing in the way of a smelting industry in Canada. We were shut out of the smelters in the United States and so we had to build smelters of our own to reduce our products. We were debarred from the markets of the United States for our silver-lead products, because the duties were so high that we could not mine and pay the smelting charges and then sell our products Mr. BURNHAM.
at a profit. We therefore had to build up a smelting industry. There were at one time five or six lead smelters in operation in British Columbia and to-day, if my memory is correct, we have but two in active operation. One of them is an institution that the Dominion of Canada may be well proud of; it not only is making money for _ its shareholders, but it is enabling the mine-owners to get the products of their mines to market at a reasonable cost.


Wilfrid Laurier: Where is the market to-day?


Robert Francis Green: The market to day is our
own Canadian market and the market in the Orient. In the Orient we must compete with Mexico and Spain and other mining countries where they mine much cheaper than we do. The smelter at Trail *employs a very large number of men and it is to-day doing good work for the province of British Columbia and the Dominion of Canada. The mine-owners should be assisted by these bounties to a very large extent, and until we have a wider market, or until we are in a position to enter the markets of the United States, and are able to meet the competition of their protected lead on an equal basis, this lead bounty should be carried on.


Wilfrid Laurier: The late Government was responsible for the introduction of this legislation, which I assume is not on all fours with the doctrine of free trade. I am a free trader myself, like my hon. friends from Red Deer and Carleton, but I have always acknowledged that doctrines have to be applied according to the conditions under which they are to be worked out. In this matter we found in 1903 that -the smelting industry had been started in British Columbia in connection with lead mining; we found also that on account of the geographical position these lead operations, if they were left unassisted, could have no other market than the United States. At that time the tariff of the United States was distinctly inimical to Canadian trade; and we were faced with the condition that this lead industry must die, notwithstanding all the money that had been invested in it, unless some assistance were given it. We gave it this assistance in order to enable it to get a market, the market of the Orient. We had to meet a hostile tariff which prevented the export of ores to the United States, although that market was at our doors, and we decided to give it this assistance. I noticed an expression which was used by the hon. member for Kootenay (Mr. Green) two or three times -that the industry was penalized by the American tariff. That is very true, but that may be a lesson to the Minister of

Finance. He was against reciprocity. I feel some pride, some justification, for our policy. Let us have reciprocity, and there would be no necessity for this bounty at all.


Robert Francis Green: Was lead in the schedule of the reciprocity compact?


Wilfrid Laurier: I do not know, as a matter of fact, whether it was or not. Perhaps it was not; perhaps in that respect the reciprocity compact was deficient, and that is the reason hon. gentlemen on the other side opposed it. Perhaps it was not large enough. There is a lesson for my hon. friend-he can make it larger. I think this only justifies our policy. Let us have a natural condition of things between this country and the United States, and there is no necessity for this bounty; and if my hon. friend is wise-I would not venture to give him any advice, but he has received a good suggestion from the hon. member for Kootenay, who wants a commission to look into the matter. Let us have the commission, and the first thing we shall do will be to try to have reciprocity with the United States.


William Thomas White: We must not lose our sense of proportion or perspective on the matter now before the committee. The Government of my right hon. friend, for reasons that have been fully explained, decided to grant a bounty not exceeding $2,500,000 to be availed of during five years. They afterwards extended that for an additional five years because the amount had not been fully availed of, in fact only $600,000 had been expended. There now remains only $600,000 of the amount voted and, having regard to the conditions explained by the hon. member for Kootenay, it was thought by the Government advisable that the benefit should be extended, that is to say the $600,000 which has not been expended should be expended if required over a period of five years. I think there is no doubt that beneficial results have flowed from the granting of the bounty in the first instance. My right hon. friend has stated that he is a free trader. I shall not say that age cannot wither because my right hon. friend is not old, he is as young as most of us.


George Perry Graham: Younger.


William Thomas White: But I will say that custom cannot stale his infinite variety. He was a free trader in his utterances but in his tariff he was not a free trader, and I do not know whether my predecessor, Mr. Fielding, pointed out to him that the tariff was not a free trade tariff. Possibly my hon. friend might not have studied the tariff and so was under (he delusion that it was a free trade tariff.
321 i


Wilfrid Laurier: I knew very well what it was.


William Thomas White: If so possibly my predecessor thought that where ignorance was bliss 'twas folly to be wise and did not disillusionize my right hon. friend. My right hon. friend is sometimes a free trader and sometimes not, in some of his utterances he is very much a protectionist. However, it is not necessary to go into that now. The hon. member for Carleton (Mr. Carvell) has some doubt whether praise or Dlame should be .accorded to my right hon. friend for this legislation. Personally I submit that he should be praised and if there is any blame we had better share it up because we are extending it for five years. As we say, it is not a matter of extreme consequence except as to the principle involved; but I would paint out to the hon. member for Red Deer (Mr. Clark), who is a free trader and discusses these matters in the House from the standpoint of economic principle as he understands it, an influence which is to a certain extent the key of the economic policy which has been in vogue in this countrv for the last thirty years, that is the hostile tariff to the south. There is no doubt about it that in British Columbia, in Nova Scotia, in Ontario, we have been shut out, our manufacturers are shut out from the American markets. The political confederation of this country would not be possible without the commercial federation.


Wilfrid Laurier: Do you approve of that hostile tariff of the United States?


William Thomas White: The tariff policy of the
United States is for the United States to decide upon. I do not wish to express any opinion as to that but I do say that our manufacturers, our producers, all have been prejudiced by a prohibitive tariff.


Wilfrid Laurier: Hear, hear,
there is no doubt about that.


William Thomas White: The tariff of the United
States on dutiable articles is over 40 per cent. Ours is a little over 25 per cent and the result is that we have had to build up an interprovincial trade in Canada. Political confederation would be absolutely impossible without commercial intercourse , of the freest character between the different provinces. I would submit to the hon. member for Red Deer that you cannot establish national industries without the expenditure of large capital. That capital has to be sought, for the most part, abroad, and there is this difference between the case of. a farmer, of a small producer and the case of a large industry, that your small producer is in a position to proceed with

such capital as is available to him in the production of the commodities that he intends to sell. The large amount of capital being required, as I have said, for the establishment of any industry and especially of such an industry as mining where in the first place, a great deal of money is required for the opening of the mine which is not productive at all in the meantime, and in the second place as the hon. member for Kootenay (Mr. Green) has pointed out, the establishment of smelters at great expense, you will not be able to get capitalists to establish those great industries unless they receive some assurance from the Government, either by way of protection or bounties, that .there will be at least a reasonable certainty of their making a profit. My right hon. friend gave extensive bounties at Sydney and 1 do not believe, and in this I am speaking with knowledge, that that industry could have been established without the granting of these bounties. I do not believe capital would have been attracted to the amount required in that industry if those bounties had not been given. They were of very material assistance. Large industries, are of benefit not only to the proprietors but to the community as a whole, the industrial population and the farmer. I do not believe that, having regard to the tariff that exists to the south of us which is under the control of United States, we can hope to establish and maintain in Canada large industries unless there is, some 'degree of protection, I say also to the hon. member for Red Deer that there is a phase of modern business which I believe was not- known to political economists some years ago. That is that . large and highly specialized organizations in industry will deliberately slaughter, to use the common expression, a foreign market; they will hold their own market at a price that will be remunerative to them and slaughter a foreign market. They will actually endeavour to drive new enterprises and business out of existence, they will seek to compel them to close down, will undersell them to such an extent that they cannot in that country conduct a business with a profit, with the ultimate intention of taking possession of that market themselves and raising prices. Now, we are confronted, to a certain extent, with that condition of affairs in Canada, and that it is a feature of modern economy that was not known some years ago but it is now a great factor, I believe that we must have in this country a reasonable degree of protection to our industries to save them from that hostile process on the part of highly specialized and powerful organizations existing to the south of Mr. WHITE (Leeds).
us or elsewhere. I will not enlarge now upon the question of different standards of living of industrial populations, that is a matter it is not necessary to go into now. All I have to say is that I think the bounty in the case of the steel industry in -Nova Scotia made profitable the establishment of that industry, and materially helped them after they were established. It inured not only to the benefit of the share-'holders but to the benefit of the whole province of Nova Scotia and the Maritime provinces, and, to a certain degree, to the benefit of all Canada. That bounty was introduced by my right hon. friend. The extension of this bounty to the lead industry of British Columbia, in the same way, has made for the ouilding up of a great industry there, and that building up, while it has inured to the advantage of the proprietors of the mines, while it has brought about the opening of the mines and the building of the smelters referred to by my hon. friend from Kootenay (Mr. Green), has also had a beneficial effect upon the whole province of British Columbia. And I think that if that lead industry continues to develop and keep up the rate of progress it has maintained during the last six or eight years, the province of which my hon. friend from Red Deer is a distinguished resident and representative, will also benefit, because anything that will establish a great industry in British Columbia, that will mean the employment of hundreds and possibly of thousands of men, will naturally be of advantage to the province of Alberta and to the province of Saskatchewan as well. Now, this discussion is more or less academic because what we are proposing here is not to establish a new bounty but to continue the amount of bounty available under existing legislation. I think it has been clearly shown that the result of granting this bounty was beneficial ; so far as that is concerned, I am willing to agree with my right hon. friend and to give him any meed of praise that he may deserve in connection with this matter. As to the extension, I am inclined to think that he would agree that, under the present circumstances, it is advisable, especially as we are only devoting to this object the residue of the fund which was specially allocated to the purpose of building up that industry.


Mr. KNOWLES:: I desire to ask a question of the minister, and to ask it in no controversial spirit. Would he say in what way the establishment of an industry of such a kind in British Columbia would benefit the province of Saskatchewan, beyond the natural pride that we would have in seeing our fellow Canadians prosper? What monetary advantage would it be to the province of Saskatchewan?
10]-;


William Thomas White: If the province of British Columbia became the seat of mining or other great industries employing thousands of men, of course the demand for agricultural products would be that much greater, in other words, there would be a greater consuming population.


William Erskine Knowles: Suppose there were.


William Thomas White: If there were a greater
consuming population, why should not they purchase from Alberta and Saskatchewan?


William Erskine Knowles: It would not affect the price of our wheat.


William Thomas White: The hon. gentleman has
his eye fixed on wheat alone. But what about oats? What about cattle? Alberta is a mixed farming country.


William Erskine Knowles: I spoke of Saskatchewan.


William Thomas White: I was speaking in answer to the hon. member for Red Deer particularly. Take the instance of Alberta, one of the most important provinces in Canada. I have been out there a number of times, and nothing struck me more than the number of cattle. There is not a farm that you pass but you will see a number of Polled Angus cattle. Between Red Deer and Edmonton, you will find an abundance of cattle and hogs, there is mixed farming everywhere, and a prosperous farming community. With a great new industry developed in British Columbia, that would be an increasing condition. Now, for my part, I have never told the western farmer what he ought to do-that he should go into mixed farming.


Mr. OLIVER:: The hon. gentleman is
entitled to a medal, for the only man who has travelled in the West who has not given the western farmer advice.


William Thomas White: Let me tell my hon.
friend my views on that point. When a man goes into a new country, I think he had better make up his mind that the people there are doing the thing that at the time is the best for them. I believe that the western farmer knows what is good for him better than I do. Of course, I could give him theoretical advice, I might tell him that in the end, and in time, he would make more money in mixed farming. But none the less, I believe that with the conditions as they are, the intelligent people of that country are doing the best in their own interest at the time, therefore I have refrained from telling the western farmer what he ought to do.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: What effect will all
that have on this bounty?


William Thomas White: I was answering my hon. friend from Moosejaw (Mr. Knowles). But I will say generally that if there is a demand for produce of all kinds in British Columbia, that would undoubtedly inure to the benefit of the people of Alberta and Saskatchewan. When I was in Edmonton ten years ago, the chief product of that district was oats, and oats sold at very low prices because the district was so far from the market. I think the price then was about fifteen cents to seventeen cents a bushel; the hon. member for Edmonton will correct me if I am wrong. At that time it was supposed that the sole market for oats would be in British Columbia mining camps. Edmonton at that time was a place of about 2,500 inhabitants; now it is a splendid city of 35,000 inhabitants; that district has become one of the best mixed farming districts that I know of, and there is a market in Edmonton for butter, eggs and a great deal of other agricultural produce. It seems to me commonplace, almost a truism, to say that if the demand from British Columbia through the development of its industries becomes greater it must inure to the benefit of Saskatchewan and Alberta, if not immediately and for all parts, then in the future and for some parts. It is just the same as in the case of the establishment of the great works in Sydney which are of advantage to the whole of the maritime provinces. The farmers in Cape Breton now receive high prices because there is a market at Sydney for what they produce. The same is true at New Glasgow. And so the whole maritime provinces have been benefited by the establishment of the. works at Sydney. I do not see how the farming industries of Alberta and Saskatchewan would fail to benefit through a great development of the mining industries of British Columbia. I believe that the mining industries of British Columbia are only on the threshold of their development. I look upon British Columbia potentially .as one of the wealthiest provinces-I was going to say the wealthiest-in Confederation. It is not developed to anything like its potentialities. I am inclined to agree with my right hon. friend that it is unwise to lay down any hard and fast principle as to protection and free trade. I say that a policy of reasonable protection is the policy for this country, especially having regard to its geographical position. My right hon. friend may differ. He could hardly say that when in office he had a free trade tariff, because it was a tariff giving a moderate degree of protection. He might say he was a free trader, but he qualifies that, and I think properly, by saying that we must have regard to the existing situation. He is right in saying that we must have regard to the whole economic situation. You will find fair traders and free traders

and others who will have some difficulty in
explaining or expounding their positions.


Wilfrid Laurier: That would
not be so difficult as for the protectionist.


William Thomas White: My right hon. friend would have difficulty in explaining how he is a free trader. If I asked him to explain some items in his tariff he would have great difficulty in explaining how he is a free trader. I am not attacking my right hon. friend, I am rather disposed to agree with him in this, that in tariff policy you must have regard to the whole existing situation. The only difference is that I am in favour of a reasonable degree of protection to the industries of Canada and I think they must have it. I commend my right hon. friend for his assistance in establishing the great industry at Sydney and in this case in giving this lead bounty. My right hon. friend says he is a free trader, that is his pronouncement, but in reality his Finance Minister did not know that he was a free trader because his tariff is not a free trade tariff.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: What proportion of the products of the lead mines of Canada is consumed at home? The hon. member for Kootenay (Mr. Green) said that the market was principally at home and in the Orient. I find that under the tariff the lead industry of Canada not only receives a bounty, but a pretty fair measure of protection. Lead in bars and sheets is fifteen per cent and twenty per cent and manufactured lead twenty per cent and twenty-five per cent so it would seem that if any large amount of the lead mines in Canada were consumed at home the producer of lead must be making a pretty good thing out of it.


William Thomas White: I am sorry I have not
those figures to-day, but I had no idea that this discussion would be so full. I shall undertake to have such information on the second reading.


Michael Clark: The minister
said as he sat down, that the Finance Minister of the late Government did not know that the leader of the Opposition was a free trader. I think that Mr. Fielding knew very well that he was a free trader ior he lost his seat in the election which was fought largely on a matter of free trade. The minister will admit that some little credit is due to the late Government owing to the fact that they lost power by endeavouring to give a very large instalment of free trade, absolutely free trade in the articles with which it dealt. The hon. minister drew my attention to the hostile *tariff which we have to fight in the United States. Great Britain has to fight hostile tariffs the world over and she fights them the world over and beats the United States and every other country and in many things beats the United States Mr. WHITE (Leeds).
on her own soil. In the matter of screws, for instance, with which industry Mr. Joseph Chamberlain was connected in a commercial sense, the firm in Birmingham with which he was connected made screws under free trade so well that they surmounted a hundred per cent tariff in the United States and ended up by being paid a handsome sum by the United States dealers not to trade in their markets; they bought that firm off, the firm of which Mr. Chamberlain was a member were absolutely paid not to compete in a foreign country. When manufacturers in a protectionist country cannot in this way compete with any manufacturers, my hon. friend will understand my difficulty in appreciating the position taken by himself and his fiscal friends. I cannot say that as a small farmer and a small capitalist I receive much consolation from his statement that bounties are needed to induce large capitalists to enter into industries. I have always suspected that Toryism was favourable to big interests; the hon. member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) has gone so far as to state it but, after all, I think he is adhering strictly to the scriptural phrase: 'Unto him that hath, shall be given, and from him that hath not, shall be taken away even that which he hath.' That is what happens to me on the plains. I am a small man in the farming industry and the big capitalist goes to British Columbia. I fail to derive much consolation from the statement that it is necessary to help this big fellow, especially when the money to help him is taken from me, the smaller man. The minister has referred to Sydney being built up under bounties. I have' doubts in my mind whether, if you had continued on the free trade lines with which Canada commenced, if it had been possible to continue reciprocity, the trade done from the coasts with the United States would mot have compelled the building of industries, as free trade has forced the building of all industries to an extent unparalleled in the world, in the British Isles. The fact is that having bled the maritime provinces white by a hostile tariff, the bounties^ became necessary to infuse some little strength and life into the places we had previously destroyed by another form of protection. My hon. friend mentions dumping, the danger of businesses being slaughtered in this country. That has always been the difficulty with which I have had the most trouble in reasoning and thinking upon this subject. Still the case of Great Britain comes to my assistance. Chamberlain made a great deal of the dumping argument when he set out on his protectionism in Great Britain. He mentioned one case, the case of a large number of steel bars which were brought from Germany to Furness, and made a

great cry about them being dumped at a smaller figure than they could be produced in Great Britain. Sir Hugh Bell, one of the greatest ironmasters in the north of England, a Unionist tree trader, said that Mr. Chamberlain did not follow the history of his steel billets sufficiently far. If he had followed the history of these steel billets he would have learned that at Barrow they were bought by a ship-building firm and used in building ships under a contract which had been taken in competition with the world, and those ships afterwards went to Germany. It was a contract to build German ships, so they bought the dumped steel bars, a great misfortune according to Mr. Chamberlain, built them into ships and sold them in the form of ships back to Germany with a handsome profit. That is the way the Britisher trades, that is how he beats the world. That is all I want my hon. friends opposite to do, to imitate the ordinary British pluck. Canada can do things, I have met as good men in Canada as anywhere. I expect to die among them, and I want to be of all the assistance to them I can by any advice I can give them from the history of other lands. If we have the courage of real free trade convictions I do not think that we need fear any competition. The United States could not kill my beef. That is my answer. I produce the best beef, and I defy their competition. I produce the best butter, and I defy their competition. Why cannot the inhabitants of British Columbia who produce lead have the same kind of manhood as the farmer in Alberta? My hon. friend says that Alberta is going to be helped by these industries. He gave me some of those arguments with a smile which made me doubt whether his incursion into politics was not producing a certain ability to argue along lines, of the truth of which he was not convinced. I am perfectly sure that the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Foster) does that kind of thing. He has laid well to heart the doctrine that milk must be given to babes, and, representing the constituency of North Toronto, he gives economic truth, as he knows it, in doses fitted to the constituency which he represents. I would be sorry to see the hon. the Minister of Finance fall into that habit. Does he really think there is anything in the argument that Alberta should support the lead bounties because the farmer in that province is going to get a market in British Columbia? Stripped of its dressing, what does it mean? Is it not a case of coming to me and saying, if you will only give some money to the hon. member for Kootenay (Mr. Green), he will buy some of your beef. That is what it amounts to, but that would not be a profitable way of doing business in Alberta. He proposes to take money from the consumer
and to give it to the lead producer, or to some other kind of producer, and he says, that will be good for you, because, the money he gets he will spend with you. I do not think there is much in that. Now I think I have dealt with the points raised by my hon. friend the Minister of Finance. I am obliged to him for giving attention to the economic side of this question. I do not know that I would have broken silence this morning, but I was here for two hours on Friday night, when a large number of lawyers wasted time, as I thought, talking upon a clause on which I kept silence, and I feel I am doing my duty much more effectively in recalling to my hon. friend the principles of that political economy, of which I know he was a student in his youth, but which he seems in danger of forgetting.


Mr. W. B. NORTHRUP (East Hastings):: I was rather surprised that the hon. member for Red Deer (Mr. Clark) should practically adopt the idea which was in the mind of the hon. member for Moosejaw (Mr. Knowles) when he asked a question a few moments ago. The question of the hon. member for Moosejaw was, if you do something, by way of a bounty, to assist British Columbia, assuming British Columbia is to be assisted, how is it going to help Saskatchewan? The hon. member for Red Deer apparently adopts that as a reasonable proposition. Let us see what it means. In the first place it eliminates the idea of patriotism. It means that we must at once abandon the idea of the unity of a great prosperous Canada. I think that that part of the country from which these hon. members come, is very materially assisted. I have in mind the immense amounts of money which have been spent on improving transportation in that part of the country, and also the immense amounts oi money spent on elevators, and now steps are being taken to assist them in getting better prices for their grain. If the idea in the minds of these hon. gentlemen is correct, an hon. member from Prince Edward Island is bound to oppose every dollar spent upon the improvement of transportation in the Northwest or in assisting the farmers of the Northwest to get better prices for their grain, because the man from Prince Edward Island would not be immediately benefited by the improved transportation in the West or by the higher price for grain. If these hon. gentlemen would pause for a moment they would see that they were arguing from a wrong basis, and were eliminating the idea of patriotism. I am surpised to find the hon. member for Red Deer appearing as a champion of capital. He has no record for the labouring classes. He refers to the success of Great Britain in manufacturing. To a certain extent, he is right, but everyone knows that Great Britain became the greatest manufacturing country in the

world under the stiffest form of protection the world has ever known.


Michael Clark: I must ask
leave of my hon. friend to say that everyone does not know that. No one can know it who knows the history of manufacturing in Great Britain. I cannot concede that.


William Barton Northrup: I accept the hon.
gentleman's statement, and I shall say that everyone except the hon. member for Red Deer is well aware that Great Britain became a great manufacturing country under the greatest protective tariff the world has ever seen. I might go a step further, since he has challenged one, and say that the policy introduced in Great Britain under the name of free trade was the most deliberately protective tariff ever introduced in any country. It was introduced by the manufacturers, and it was passed by the dominant class. It is well lmown that it was introduced by the manufacturers for two reasons, first to get food from abroad cheaper for their employees so that they would require to pay them less wages, and secondly, by destroying the agricultural strength of Great Britain, they had in view that the people from the country would be driven into the overcrowded cities, and would thus cause a demand for work greater than the supply, which again would have the effect of reducing wages. I might remind my hon. friend from Red Deer that those so-called free traders Cobden and Bright were no friends of the workingman. When Lord Ashley, afterwards the Earl of Shaftesbury, introduced legislation to help the poor girls who with straps round their waists crawled on their knees in the mines, he received no assistance from Bright and Cobden. When they and their followers wished to increase the products of the manufacturers, to the detriment of the labouring classes, they adopted the policy known as free trade. He who reads the statistics must admit that they are to be congratulated on the success of their policy, from their standpoint. I had occasion to go over the rates of wages paid in Great Britain, and to my surprise, they ranged to from 9/3 to 33/11 a week, the average wage paid to the best mechanics in England being 33/11 a week, and that with a period of unemployment running from ten to twenty and even thirty per cent. It must also be remembered that while that was the average rate of wage, there were mechanics, particularly good men, getting a higher rate, which would reduce the average wage paid to others. So that while my hon. friend speaks of the success of free trade, as shown, by the position of Great Britain as a manufacturing country, he must not forget that the reason why it is able to compete with other lands is that the labouring men Mr. NORTHRUP.
in Great Britain are paid so much less than the men in those other countries.


Michael Clark: They are better paid than the workers in Lawrence, Mass., according to President Woodrow Wilson.


William Barton Northrup: Possibly there may be isolated cases in a country with a population of 90,000,000, and where the strike occurred the wages might be lower, though I doubt very much if there ever was a time when the wages there were lower than they are in Great Britain, where the average is 33/11, with unemployment during the year averaging ten, twenty and even thirty per cent. When my hon. friend defends the capitalists in manufacturing Great Britain, he forgets that the present Liberal Government in the old country has been compelled to entirely change the course of politics in Great Britain by the measures which it deems necessary to meet the exigencies and necessities of the labouring population. At the present time, everybody knows-it is admitted on both sides- that the state of the rural population of Great Britain is simply deplorable.


Michael Clark: No.


William Barton Northrup: My hon. friend dissents from that. I wonder if there is anything I could say to which he would assent. He contradicts me when I say that the condition of the rural population of Great Britain is simply deplorable. I accept the hon. gentleman's statement as being sincerely made, but it shows the estimate which he has of the rural population and of the labouring classes in Great Britain when he considers that the state they are in at the present time is not a deplorable condition.


Michael Clark: I am sorry to interrupt my hon. friend (Mr. North-rup) but I venture to think he cannot produce from any public man on any side of politics in Great Britain, a statement that the condition of the rural population of Great Britain is dep^rable.


William Barton Northrup: If I had fifteen minutes to look up the utterances of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, I would show my hon. friend that the present intention of the Chancellor of the Exchequer is to follow up his idea of a commission to investigate this question by legislation which will probably be the principal plank of the platform of the Liberal party at the next election in Great Britain, in order to improve the condition of the labouring classes, and one of the factors of that legislation is to be a minimum wage.


Wilfrid Laurier: That will be
against the idea of the feudal system.


The CHAIRMAN:: I fear the discussion
has gone far afield.


William Erskine Knowles: The hon. member for
West Hastings, no doubt inadvertently, misrepresented what I said.
At one o'clock, House took recess.
At three o'clock, House resumed and again went into Committee.


William Barton Northrup: When you left the
Chair, I was making a few observations on this resolution to grant aid to the lead industry of British Columbia, and I presume you will agree that on its face it seems rather an extraordinary proposition that this House should grant aid to any industry in this country. Therefore, one may analyse the conditions to see on what grounds such a grant can be defended. All admit that similar grants have been made to other industries, but that only takes us one step further on the question as to on what grounds a grant such as this can be justified. It brings us at once to the root of the question as to whether or not un der any circumstances such a grant is allowable, and that again brings us to the vexed question which has been so often discussed with regard to fiscal policy: so-called free trade and protection. I support this resolution because it is, I believe, a practical commonsense carrying-out of the protective policy; that policy which I believe history will show to have been a success in the past. And although my hon. friend from Red Deer differed from me when I described the protective policy which had made England, as being one of the most rigid protective policies in the world, when he comes to look into the evidence and study the law and the history of the case, he will be inclined to agree with me that a tariff such as they had in England a few centuries ago, where the first breach of it was punished with a fine, and the second breach punished by mutilation, and the third breach punishable by death, was a pretty rigid protective policy. And, Sir, that was the policy of England.


Michael Clark: My hon.
friend, I am sure, does not wish to misrepresent me. I never thought of denying that, Britain had a protective policy, but what I did differ from my hon. friend in was as to the effect of that policy, and my study of the figures, which has been fairly careful, has led me to dispute the position that the effect of that policy was to build up Britain's manufactures.


William Barton Northrup: Without stopping to
discuss whether the effect of the protective policy was to build up England's manufacturers-it did not build up Ireland'3
manufacturers owing to the difference be tween these two countries in the application of the law-it will be admitted by all that England did have a protective policy and that simultaneously with her possessing that protective policy she became the 'manufacturing country of the world, and that when that policy was changed in Eng land it was* changed by those who were protectionists out and out, for no more rabid protectionists ever lived than Richard Cobden and John Bright. They introduced the protective policy in England under the name of free trade; a protective policy that in a sense we never had in this country, where we applied protection to all trades and all classes of the community, but a limited protection to manufacturers alone, and which was the most successful form of protection the world has ever known so far as manufacturers are concerned. And, if the experience of England were to be a guide for us in Canada, and if I were look ing only to the manufacturing industries, possibly I would agree with my hon. friend from Red Deer. But let us look at the effect of free trade in Great Britain to-day. I take the following statement of facts from the Mail Year Book of 1912 referring to British wages in 1911, and this statement contains the number of men in each industry and the average weekly wages paid:
Wages of workmen, exclusive of lads and boys working full time:
Per week.
182,000	men in textile trades earn.. 23s. 6d. 411,211	"	clothing "	.. 30s.	2d.1.200.000	"	- building and woodworking	
32s.	..1.100.000	"	metal engineeringand ship-building.. 33s.	lid.268,438	"	public utilities, gas,water works, &c... 28s.	Id.621,311	"	railway workers.. .. 25s.	.,956,185	"	agricultural labourers, including all allowances, from 9s.	2d.
to
20s. 9d.
The period of non-employment runs from 10 to 20 a,nd even 30 per cent.
The result of free trade, as a doctrine to be invoked in opposition to this resolution, is that in the greatest manufacturing country in the world; in the richest country in the world; in a country where the manufacturers are overflowing with wealth, the labouring classes of the highest rank earn only thirty-three shillings and eleven pence per week on an average. Under these cir-iumstances, is it surprising that Mr. Snowden, representing the labouring classes, moved in the Imperial House of Coni mons on the the 3rd of March last, an amendment to the Speech from the Throne:
Expressing regret that in view of the existing industrial and social conditions of lal-ge masses of the people arising from a de

so fond of referring as the typical exponent of the advantages of free trade, the people are paying from $350,000,000 or $360,000,000 a year in taxes or duties on what they eat, drink and smoke, it hardly seems fair to talk about free trade in England. I venture to say that there is no place on the face of the earth, except in darkest Africa or in the remotest sections of Asia, in which true and genuine free trade in its full application is known or practiced.


William Erskine Knowles: It has been my firm conviction for years that one of the main desires and purposes of the protected interests has been to becloud the thought and befuddle the thinker, and I think my hon. friend (Mr. Northrup), in the dissertation he has given us, has lived up to that principle. I spent two hours thinking what he said and meant, and then I had Only a rough guess as to what he was really driving at. Now that he has talked for twenty minutes more, I am hopelessly in the dark to know what his argument is. Possibly' the Minister of Finance, having sojourned with two schools of thought, Liberal and Conservative, may be able to take the true sense of the arguments of the hon. member for East Hastings and classify and divide them in some way so as to make head or tail of them. About the only clear thing I understood him to state was that there was no such thing as protection.


William Barton Northrup: The hon. member
certainly did not.


William Erskine Knowles: That no such thing was in order in this House.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I thought he said he
was in favour of a reduction of the tariff.


William Erskine Knowles: I understood him to say that any talk about high protection in this House was out of order as much as it would be to talk in Gaelic or in German.


William Barton Northrup: I certainly did say
that.


William Erskine Knowles: Even then I did not know why he said that. Tariff has been talked in this House probably before any of us were members of the House and why the hon. member should state it was out of order to talk about protection because only English and French can be spoken in this House-


William Barton Northrup: The hon. member is unintentionally misrepresenting me. I did not say it was out of order to talk about this question, but I said that to speak of high protection is not good English.


William Erskine Knowles: I will have to withdraw that then and to say that I have not the faintest idea of what he intends to convey. He did not even go so far as to tell Mr. NORTHRUP.
us what adequate protection was. I presume he will classify that as being something that is out of order.


William Barton Northrup: That would he protection, that is good English.


William Erskine Knowles: I think protection is
out of order anywhere and should not be tolerated. My hon. friend prefaced his remarks by misrepresenting me inadvertently. I think he made that the occasion for rising to speak. He stated that by asking a question of the Finance Minister as to how it was any monetary advantage to the province of Saskatchewan that there should be an industry like this in British Columbia, I was giving another manifestation of my lack of patriotism and of loyalty. Let me remind you that I distinctly said: What monetary advantage in addition to the gratification which comes to all of us through our natural pride in seeing our brother Canadians prosperous in British Columbia. After my having it put on those broad lines it was not the most magnanimous or graceful thing for the hon. member to speak of lack of loyalty because I had asked a question.
The minister said it would be an advantage to Saskatchewan; and, knowing the great tendency of hon. gentlemen opposite to impugn our loyalty and patriotism, I was careful to say that I recognized the advantage due our fellow-Canadians as a great benefit; but even after that he could not miss the chance to gather the flag about him and give us a biff in the eye about lack of patriotism. I have always found from what little reading or observation I have been able to employ that the only way you are ever going to get a patriotic and loyal people in Canada is, as in any other country, by using all the people fairly and making them a contented people. Then you will have a loyal people and I think that a policy such as he advocates, that takes away from one class, the ordinary, common people, their right to trade where they like in the open markets of the world, is not calculated to bring about the existence of a contented or loyal people on the prairie* of the Dominion of Canada. My hon friend has given us some remarkbable instances from the economic history of Great Britain. If I came anywhere within following dis tance of him-and I admit that I lost him in the haze many times-his reasoning comes to this, that the manufacturer in Great Britain established himself and developed his industry so successfully under protection in the early part of the nineteenth century that he was getting on too well and he put on the brake of free trade for fear he would get too rich.


William Barton Northrup: I certainly said nothing of the! kind.


William Erskine Knowles: 
William Barton Northrup: They never had free trade; they have not got it yet.


William Erskine Knowles: The hon. member will
have to enlighten us; he will have to make a new dictionary, glossary and everything. If they have not free trade in Great Britain, I am entirely at sea. I understand they have free trade in Great Britain. The ground taken by my hon. friend was that free trade was rotten in Great Britain and he proved inductively that that was so. Now he doubles on his tracks and says they have mot got free trade in Great Britain. If they have not got free trade there, then I curse the protection which brought about those conditions in Great Britain.


William Barton Northrup: I am glad you admit them, at all events.


William Erskine Knowles: I am giving my time and attention to developing the good things in this country and I am not spending my time in digging up information unfavourable to Great Britain and spreading it on * Hansard.' If my understanding of it is correct, my hon. friend's argument, when sifted, comes to this and it turns entirely against himself, that Great Britain has prospered in an unexampled degree under free trade, whereas, under protection, she was practically stagnant. He talked about the wages given there. As my hon. friend from Red Deer pointed out, President Woodrow Wilson, time and again in the late elections, made the statement, which was never contradicted, that the wool workers in Lawrence, Massachusetts, were working for one dollar a day, certainly for wages lower than they had in Great Britain.


Mr. BENNETT (Calgary):: That is why they struck.


William Erskine Knowles: Did my hon. friend from East Hastings (Mr. Northrup) tell ns what wages they got in Great Britain under protection ? If he compared the wages paid under protection in Great Britain with those paid under free trade, he would find that the former were starvation wages. Perhaps the working classes in Great Britain do not get enough to-day. The social conditions in Great Britain are not ideal. They arise from the most unfortunate and unjust class system of centralizing all the wealth. Protection is going to bring the same class system in our

country, the centralization of immense fortunes. The poverty in Great Britain, to which my hon. friend referred, is due to the class system of centralizing wealth and the holding of land in the hands of a few, and is not due to conditions of the tariff. The argument of my hon. friend goes to show that in so far as we may take any lesson from the history of Great Britain, it is that the sooner we develop along lines leading to the goal of free trade, towards the conditions which have made Great Britain prosperous and great in the world, the better it will be for us, and the longer we hold back, the more firmly will be established the bullying hold of the interests which lie so close to the Government that to-day occupies the treasury benches. My hon. friend from Bast Hastings said that it the people of Saskatchewan take the view that they should not abide by a tariff, we might as well give up Confederation. We do not take that stand at all. Let me state my position once and for all on the tariff. Within certain limits, we are ready to encourage the establishment of industries in Canada,-perhaps we cannot do anything else, because we are a small proportion-but it must be distinctly understood that we are prepared to do so voluntarily, and that no man in Toronto or in the Kootenays, has a right to make us pay for his maintenance. When our friends say that they have a right to put their hands in our pockets and take our money we protest. If we are asked to reason together, and to consent to a certain amount of protection, we are ready to reason with those men, but they have no right to come and say: I am making so much money out of my business, but it - is not enough, and we want to get a bounty, and we will put our hands in your pockets and make you give it to us. When the lead producers come to us and say you must give us two or three million dollars, to help us, you must pay us a better price for lumber, and you must be not only a market for us but a mark, we protest. The other day the hon. member from Peterborough (Mr. Burnham) asked me whether it was not the case that the farmers on the prairies were prosperous, as if the fact that they were prosperous, was any reason why the lumbermen in British Columbia, or the men who make implements in Toronto or in any other part of Canada, have a right to take away our prosperity. It is the assumption on the part of those men that they have a right to take our money from us that makes our blood boil. We are gratified to see our fellow Canadians prosperous. To us it is a source of pride that we are building up a nation in Canada, but when our manufacturing friends come to the lobbies of this House, and endeavour to hold up Parliament, say-Mr. KNOWLES.
ing, we have had our graft and rake-offs and now we want you to help us more by putting your hands in your pockets, and if you do not, we will use the bludgeon, then we rebel.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I should like to ask my hon. friend why he did not make this speech in 1908?


William Erskine Knowles: I made stronger
speeches than this along that line.


Richard Bedford Bennett: They are not in 'Hansard.' I do not remember seeing any speech of yours against this bounty.


William Erskine Knowles: I do not know whether I was in the House or not. But I am not opposing the bounty very strongly.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


William Erskine Knowles: There need not be any oh's about it. The protected interests deal in befuddling arguments, Dut I have said in this House, and I could refer to my hon. friend to my very words, that I think protection an abomination, that I think it is a matter of trusts and combines and that it is a cause of loss in every country. I have said before in Parliament, and I say still, that I can best serve my constituency by supporting the party that makes for the lowering of the tariff. As between the two parties, I have no hesitation in giving my undivided support to the party that makes for the lowering of the tariff, and if my hon. friend will read what I have said in the past about the tariff, he will find that it was a good deal stronger than what I am saying to-day.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I have noticed that you always voted right.


Frank Oliver: The argument that has been made in favour of the resolution is based upon the assertion that the resolution is merely a continuation of the policy of the previous Government. It is true that the resolution proposes to dispose of a certain balance of an appropriation made by the previous Government for a specific purpose, but I want to point out that the conditions which existed when the late Government made the appropriation and provided for a bounty on lead, do not exist to-day, and, therefore, the reasons which existed then for the provision do not exist to-day. The argument that the present resolution is a continuation of the former policy is not well founded. I am aware that the strongest attack that our friends on the Government benches can make against the Opposition is that their policy is the same, and it is that form of attack to which I most strongly object. The bounty on lead was given at the time and under conditions as described by my hon. friend from Kootenay. The bounty

was justified by those conditions;-I will not put it that way, I will say that the bounty may have been justified by those conditions; it is immaterial whether the position is taken that it was or that it may have been justified. The conditions which the bounty was provided to meet having passed away, I maintain that the mere fact that the appropriation was not exhausted is no reason why my hon. friends on the Government benches should propose the continuance of the bounty.


Robert Francis Green: Why does the hon. gentleman say that the conditions have changed and that the reason for granting the bounty has now passed away?


Frank Oliver: I am taking what my
hon. friend himself told the House, that when the bounty was granted the lead mining industry had practically ceased because of the low prices. The bounty was given and the lead mining industry was kept on its feet until an era of higher prices followed. The fact that the prices have been higher is proven absolutely and unquestionably by the further fact that the bounty was not exhausted, for if the prices had remained as they were when the bounty was voted, that bounty would have been exhausted long ago. The bounty was intended to carry the lead industry over a difficult situation, existing at that period. My hon. friend told the House in so many words-and he is thoroughly familiar with the facts and very frankly stated them to the House-that the bounty was granted for the purpose of carrying the lead mining industry over a difficult period. Having achieved its purpose and the period of difficulty having terminated, my hon. friend must take the responsibility of, as he says, continuing the bounty, but as a matter of fact of re-establishing the bounty and establishing it under the conditions of to-day which do not call for it. Only the amount of $600,000 is involved, and it is an amount, which, so to speak, has already been set aside for this purpose. But the argument that my hon. friend has made, and that has been taken up by all those who have spoken on the other side of the House, and has been to some extent, I may say, admitted on this side, is that he is merely continuing the policy of the late Liberal Government. It is that argument I want to protest against most emphatically; he is not continuing the policy of the late Liberal Government, he is taking upon himself to hand out, if the occasion shall arise-it may be that the occasion will not arise-the sum of $600,000 to the lead industry of Kootenay should the prices of lead go down. Remember, it was not merely because the prices of lead were down that the bounty was voted in the first place, it was to keep the lead industry from going out. it
was to keep it from sinking through the floor, under especially difficult circumstances. It was not a mere matter of taking so much money from the treasury of the Dominion of Canada and handing it over to the men who are mining the lead, which is my hon. friend's proposition of to-day.


William Thomas White: 
Richard Bedford Bennett: Although it
may not be spent.


Frank Oliver: That is exactly the point I want to argue, to a finish here and new, if I may be permitted. I am taking what my hon. friend from Kootenay says. I was a member of the House when the late bounty was given and am very familiar with the arguments in its behalf. I met the gentlemen from British Columbia who came here and argued in its favour. So, I am not speaking at random when I say that the bounty was given specifically to tide the lead industry over a diflieult period. It was not given for the purpose of bonusing lead mining in the Dominion of Canada as a permanent policy. Never was such an idea entertained, never was such a demand made on behalf of the lead mining industry, and if it had been made I am satisfied it would never have been conceded. I repeat, the request was made for the purpose of carrying the lead industry over a difficult period of its existence, and was not made for the purpose of establishing a policy of bonusing lead mining in Canada.


John Hampden Burnham: Does the hon. gentleman subscribe to the theory that these industries should be helped over just such trying periods?


Frank Oliver: I am inclined to think
that there are occasions when help may te given to an enterprise or industry in Canada with profit to the community. But I am not arguing against that; it 'eems to me that it is a fair proposition. Difficult circumstances may arise, and a particular industry may be of such importance

that it will warrant special assistance being given for a period to help it over a difficult time; but if it is said that this, that or the other industry is to get assistance out of the public treasury permanently in order to keep it alive, then I say, with my hon. friend from Moosejaw, that that industry has no claim upon the people of Canada to be kept alive, and it is cheaper for Canada, and better, for Canada, that it should go out of existence.
I have been trying to establish the point that is at issue between the two sides of the House, the difference between the policy of the late Government and the policy of the present Government in regard to this trifle of $600,000 to the lead industry. The question of bounties will come up; the question of protection will come up. I want to go on record here, at this particular time, and under these particular circumstances, as holding a certain, definite position. When the Government come forward with further proposals for the continuation of protection, either by bounty or duty, they will not be able to argue that, because we did it, they are entitled to it. What was done in the case of the lead bounty was done under special circumstances, these special circumstances have passed and the reason does not exist today. The Government are taking the responsibility of pursuing a policy of simply handing out of the public treasury money for the purpose of maintaining the profits of an established industry. If the lead industry of British Columbia, after having existed for a matter of fifteen years, is not now able to stand on its own feet, then it is not in a class that is entitled to special assistance and had better drop. My opinion is that the lead industry has arrived at a position when it can stand on its own feet, on its own merits, just the same as the production of wheat on the prairies has to stand on its own feet, and if it cannot, let the people who are mining lead take exactly the same advice as is given so freely to the people who are raising wheat who are told, if wheat raising is not profitable, to go into mixed farming. I suggest to the lead miner that he mine gold instead of lead.


Robert Francis Green: The hon. member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) says very frankly that the bounty was given to the lead industry at a particular time when it was necessary, at least from the point of view of hon. gentlemen opposite, himself included, under certain conditions that then existed. He had said nothing to show that the conditions are materially different now. I claim that while the lead industry has undoubtedly benefited during the payment of this bounty, at the same time, it has not yet reached a position, in which it is able to stand upon its own merits.
As to the question of the low price of Mr. OLIVER.
lead, the hon. member for Edmonton must know that the lead market has not been at all steady, that it has had its ups and downs and it is simply to balance and steady the market that the bounty is given. If the hon. gentleman could assure this committee and the lead producers that the present price of lead will be maintained for the next five years, possibly there would be no need for this bounty being renewed, but we may be in the position, a month, or two months, or six months from now, of seeing the price of lead go down to where it was before and where it will be necessary, if the lead industry is going to exist at all, to pay this bounty.
There can be no question that the conditions of the lead market and of lead mining are such that the continuance of this bounty is essential. It is true that ten years ago the production of lead had almost ceased in British Columbia. To-day the production has reached a fair amount. But the men who have been in the lead producing business are only now commencing to get upon their feet, are only beginning to be in the position that we as Canadians want to have them in of being able to produce lead and to dispose of it in the world's markets. It must not be forgotten that the duties on lead and lead products coming into Canada are very low. I think that the duty on pig lead is fifteen per cent which, under the preferential tariff, is reduced to about ten per cent. That will hardly keep our own market for our own lead producers as against the mines of Spain, Mexico and countries where, labour and supplies being much cheaper, lead can be produced at a much lower rate. With the lead import duties so low and the cost of labour and provisions so high in Canada, the Government are pursuing the proper policy in extending this lead bounty. It matters not whether it was introduced by the former Government or this Government; I am not at all bothered about that, nor do I think that my hon. friend the Minister of Finance is worried, whether he shall take the responsibility of it or not. I am quite sure that he is ready to do so because the conditions are such that it is necessary to have the bounty extended for a further term.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Mr. Chairman, I well remember the occasion when the law granting a bounty upon lead was enacted by this Parliament. Prior to 1903 many petitions were circulated throughout the province of Alberta. I remember signing one of those petitions, because I believed it was necessary for the reasons which have been given by the hon. member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver). If I am not mistaken all the agricultural organizations in southern Alberta signed that memorial which was presented to the Government

then in power. That memorial recited that if the lead industry were placed upon a sound and permanent basis it would secure for the farmers of southern Alberta a market for their products. After the bounty was given and after the industry was placed upon a sound basis there were three refrigerator cars per week carrying the products from the dairies and farms of Alberta into the Kootenay, while to-day that number has increased to one per day. I might inform my hon. friend from Red Deer (Mr. Clark) that the town of Olds increased the quantity of butter and farm products that it shipped into the Kootenay very greatly by reason of the market which was created by .the construction of the smelter that was mentioned by my hon. friend from Kootenay (Mr. Green) which gives employment to a large number of men.
That was the principle upon which that bounty, amounting to a sum of $2,500,000, was granted. I am bound to say that by reason of the increase in the number of workmen employed in the British Columbia camps and smelting industries, we have a much greater demand for the agricultural products of the Lethbridge and southern Alberta districts and extending as far north as Lacombe. As a matter of fact, the demand goes as far north as Lacombe, it has spread to Stettler on the one branch and it has again spread to different points along the Alberta Irrigation and Railway Company's line. These products are,now being largely consumed at the points where smelters have been constructed and are being operated by reason of this bounty. There is an illustration of the benefits of protection given to a particular industry extending beyond the people to whom it was directly given. There is a case where protection has given a stimulus to the agricultural interests of southern Alberta. T recall the fact that the farmers of southern Alberta could not find a ready market for their products in British Columbia until such time as the Crow's Nest Pass railway was built. The hon. member for Edmonton will remember the stimulus that was given to the development of agriculture in Alberta when that was built. When that was accomplished the question of the development of a market for the farmers of Alberta had to be considered and at that time the smelting industry had almost failed. The farmers were badly in need of the market which would be afforded by the smelting industry and, when petitions were signed, not by manufacturers, I would have the hon. member for Moosejaw (Mr. Knowles) understand, not signed by those gentlemen whom he speaks of, but signed by the farmers, the 'ranchers and the producers of the western plains, and when the late Government yielded to those petitions and gave that bounty on lead, it gave an added stimulus to agricultural development 322
in southern Alberta and afforded a ready and profitable market to the farmers there for their agricultural and dairy products. These are the facts in relation to that particular thing of which I have a personal knowledge. When the late Government gave a bonus or bounty to that industry, they provided that if the price of lead were at a certain figure it should not require any assistance, but if by reason of market conditions the world over the price of lead fell to a certain figure, then the bounty came automatically into effect. Five years went by and the two and a half million dollars were not expended, in 1908 the bounty was again renewed, and here we are again at the end of another five years. The Minister of Finance does not propose to grant the bounty in any event; he says: I propose to continue the principle that was inaugurated by the Liberals when in office, and it is a sound principle, that if by reason of conditions that are not local, but world-wide, the price of lead falls to a figure that would cause the industry to languish in the southern part of British Columbia; by this bounty I will stimulate that industry to the point of providing that lead shall have a certain price in the markets of the world, so that the industry may be maintained, giving employment to hundreds, nay thousands, of workmen throughout Kootenay, and thus the farmers of Alberta who are the ultimate beneficiaries, who produce the butter, the eggs, the meat, which supply the men in these smelters, and the oats which feed the horses, snail have a market, and in order that Canadians may in the end get the benefit of every dollar that is expended. It may well be that if after five years that industry does not languish, not one dollar of this money will be paid out. If on the other hand owing to changed economic conditions or the operation of the dumping propensities on the part of manufacturers in other parts of the world, the market for lead goes down below a certain figure, then this $600,000 would be available to assist that industry to be maintained on a profitable basis, and the people who profit most by it are not the lead manufacturers themselves, but the thousands of people who will be indirectly benefited. That is the reason I support this resolution.


Frank Oliver: When my hon. friend from Calgary (Mr. Bennett) sticks to the realm of imagination he is much better than when he dips into facts. As to the amount of butter and eggs supplied the Kootenay from Alberta, there was a time when there were few people in Alberta and many in the Kootenay, and then the Kootenay market amounted to a great deal to Alberta. But now-a-days there are many people in Alberta and fewer in the Kootenay, and the



market of the Kootenay is not of much value in that respect. My hon. friend has allowed his imagination to get mixed up with his facts.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Is it not a fact that a refrigerator goes each day into the Kootenay on the line of the Canadian Pacific railway?


Frank Oliver: I cannot say.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Well, I can, and that is the difference.


Frank Oliver: My hon. friend kqpws there are fewer people to-day in the Kootenay than last year, and fewer last year than the year before.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The men from the
Kootenay do not say so.


Frank Oliver: Nevertheless it is a fact. The number of people in the Kootenay 1 venture to say is no greater to-day than it was ten years ago when the smelter bounty was first given. There has been no increase in the population in the Kootenay which would bring about such a market for the farmers of Alberta as my hon. friend has suggested. The suggestion is absurd beyond words. The bounty was given for the benefit of the lead-mining industry, as everybody will admit, and in so far as it had an effect on that industry, it was desirable from the standpoint of the people of Alberta; but when my hon. friend rests his support of this proposal on the market, that the people of Alberta to-day find in the Kootenay because of the lead bounty, I can only say that he is drawing on his imagination. I suppose my hon. friend knows that the city of Calgary which he represents does not get from the surrounding country its own supplies of the articles that he says Alberta exports to Kootenay. The country around there does not produce sufficient of these articles to supply itself and yet the hon. gentleman says that he supports the lead bonus because it provides a market for the farmers of Alberta to which to export these products. The hon. gentleman should not take up the time of the House in talking such nonsense. His theory is fine, but the trouble about it is that it has no relation to the facts.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The only difference is that I say I know the facts, and the hon. gentleman says he does not know anythipg about them.


Frank Oliver: My hon. friend mentioned the price of oats, but does he know that three months ago oats in Alberta were cheaper than they were when this lead bounty was first given?


Richard Bedford Bennett: 
Frank Oliver: And yet my hon. friend
exhorts us to vote for this bounty because of the market it gives to the people of Alberta for their farm products, including oats.


Richard Bedford Bennett: What has that got to
do with it?


Frank Oliver: It has everything to do
with it. If the farmers of Alberta are not getting as good a market to-day after ten years of lead bounty, as they did before the lead bounty was put on, whatever the good will may have been the results are not to the benefit of the Alberta farmers. My hon. friend is off the track when he asks us to vote for this lead bounty in order to give a market to the farmers of Alberta.


Mr. FOSTER (Kings):: Is the bounty on lead the only thing that affects the price of oats in Alberta?


Frank Oliver: Certainly not.


Arthur de Witt Foster: Then how do you apply your argument?


Frank Oliver: I am not applying any
argument; I am showing how ridiculous the application of the argument of the hon. member for Calgary is.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I said that the market was increased to the extent of the hundreds of men who were employed in these smelters.


Frank Oliver: There are no more men in Kootenay to-day than the day the lead bounty was first put on and they do not eat any more. Therefore there is no advantage to the Alberta farmers in the line my hon. friend has suggested.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I stated that the population at the smelters had increased.


Frank Oliver: Oh, yes.


Richard Bedford Bennett: And they are not producers of farm products, and therefore they have to rely on other people; among others, the farmers living in Alberta.


Frank Oliver: In the first place, the
farmers in southern Alberta, in the vicinity in which the hon. gentleman lives, have not any butter or eggs to send to Kootenay; they do not produce enough for the local wants.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Well, they are doing
it.


Frank Oliver: In the next place, so far as wheat and flour are concerned, we are raising so much wheat in Alberta that the market of Kootenay, if it was not there at all, would make no difference. And, so far as oats are concerned the price of oats is lower to-day than before the lead bounty was put on. I am dealing now with the state

of facts which the hon. member (Mr. Bennett) said induced him to support this bounty on lead. His theories were all right, but the facts were not there to support them. The general question of protection and free trade does not enter into the consideration of this lead bounty. We are brought back to the fact that the bounty on lead was given to help the lead industry to overcome a difficult period. It answered the purpose for which it was given and it is being renewed and re-established to-day by the present Government under conditions which did not exist when, it was first given; if such conditions had existed, it would never have been given. The hon. member for Kootenay (Mr. Green) says: But the lead industry may be less prosperous later on; the price of lead may go down, and this sum of money should be in reserve to be paid out in case that should happen. I would say to the lead industry, and to the wheat industry, the cotton industry or any other industry: When you have had a fair chance to establish your business; when you have had the assistance of the people of Canada for a period of ten years to establish your business and to get on your feet, you must expect to carry your losses in the lean years out of your profits in the fat years, and you must not expect to play with the country a game of heads I win tails you lose. The people engaged in the lead industry have had their opportunity, and if they are unable to carry the fluctuations of the market to-day it is because the industry is not a good one and it is not worth while keeping it up.


Michael Clark: I must apologize for troubling the committee again on this subject; but I should just like to say a word with regard to the argument which the hon. member'for Calgary (Mr. Bennett) has advanced with very great moderation and very great preciseness. As my hon. friend from Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) has pointed out, for the most part the market of Alberta is found in Calgary itself, but I may add that Calgary has grown, as a result of the independent and self-supporting agricultural enterprise of the province of Alberta, without the aid of protection at all; and that is the first answer I would make to my hon. friend from Calgary. While we in Alberta are very grateful and glad to avail ourselves of any market there is in British Columbia, it would be a mistake to attribute the prosperity of southern Alberta-and here I differ slightly from my hon. friend from Edmonton, because southern Alberta does export considerable agricultural produce to British Columbia-entirely to the lead, lumber and coal mining industries. These industries give us part of our market, but
this is where the argument of my hon. friend from Calgary halts. In accordance with the principles of justice and logic, if the people engaged in the lead enterprises in British Columbia are justified in coming to Alberta and saying to the farmers: We are giving you a market for your ag icultural products, tnerefore give us a bonus to help us to produce lead; clearly the farmers of Alberta would be equally justified in going to the lead people of British Columbia and saying: We are buying your lead products in Alberta, therefore give us a bonus on the production of beef and cattle. That is where the injustice is felt by the people of the plains and the whole of the consumers of Canada. I wish tc say that in reply to my hon. fiiend, and it is an argument that I am sure no hon. gentleman on tiie other side of the House can successfully meet.


Hon. MARTIN BURRELL:: That is precisely the attitude that has been taken by the farmers and a great many of the people .or many years in my part of the country and all through the province of British Columbia. The farmers of Alberta have a protection; there is a protective tariff on wheat, oats and beef. In a great many districts of British Columbia the people could have bought those products from the State of Washington cheaper than they could from the people of Alberta; yet I have rarely heard, the British Columbian farmers raise a voice against that condition, because they recognize the immense value to our province of keeping up interprovincial trade, even if they could not trade quite as economically with our own people, and of assisting in the endeavour to build up a united Canada. I think that position is absolutely fair.


Michael Clark: I do not think the farmers of the plains consider that protection is of any service to them whatsoever, and I think they are better students of economic principles than the farmers Of British Columbia if the views of the latter are such as my hon. friend represents them to be. A protective tariff cannot be of any service in the production of a commodity, a large surplus of which is produced in any country, because the surplus going abroad, the price is regulated by the price in the-foreign market. I think that is an economic principle which no one has ever been able to overturn. I do not think the farmers of the plains get any benefit from protection; at any rate they do not believe they do, and they were very ready to part with that benefit, so far as the provinces of Saskatchewan and Alberta were concerned, if I read aright the opinion of the people as shown by their votes in the general election of 1911. Again I would warn my hon. friend the Minister of Finance against giving too ready an ear to these
10191

infant industries, because my own study of this particular kind of industry that is always seeking protection is that it never reaches the period of adult life; it either remains an infant or it passes into decrepitude and old age. Hon. gentlemen opposite cannot talk of infant industries in Britain, but they represent the industries of that country as declining. That is always the cry of the protectionist; he is the emblem of human feebleness. He says: We have not grown up, and if you say: You are old enough to have grown up, he says: We have grown past adult life and are now in decrepitude and old age. I was much interested in reading a speech delivered in the United States House of Representatives not long ago, in the course of which the speaker gave one or two amusing illustrations with which I would like to deal for a moment, as I want to put my hon. friend on his guard against these healthy infants, who will be coming to him from time to time for assistance. The speaker said that these infant industries in the United States reminded him of the man who had an invalid and very cantankerous wife, and he prayed the Lord that he would restore her or do something with her. He also quoted a very familiar verse, but he altered the last line, and it is a common saying in the United States now:
Mary had a little lamb,
Its fleece was white as snow,
It followed her to Pittsburgh,
And look at the darned thing now.
We have our little lambs in Canada as well and they will follow my hon. friend to Toronto, but I do not want to see the darned things.


Mr BURNHAM:: I wish to explain, as I said that I was going to move an amendment, and that the reason why I am not going to do so is that the hon. member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) has since made a speech in which he has said that he is in favour of giving bounties at any rate at a certain stage of the game. As this makes any amendment I intended to move hopeless of support, I have given up the idea.
Resolution reported, read the first and the second time, and concurred in.
Mr. WHITE thereupon moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 213, respecting the payment of bounties on lead contained in lead-bearing ores mined in Canada.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, and Bill read the first time.	.

[Stage Direction]
On motion of Hon. W. T. White (Minister of Finance) for Committee of Supply:
Mr. CLARK (Red Deer1'
Mr. WILLIAM CHISHOLM (Antigonish) moved in amendment:
That the Speaker do not now leave the Chair, but that it be resolved:-
That the Minister of Public Works caused the following letter to be sent to Senator Girroir during the late contest in the electoral division of Antigonish for the election of a member to the legislative assembly of Nova Scotia, viz.:-
Office of the Minister of Public Works Canada.
December 28, 1912.
My Dear Sir,-Your letter of the 24th inst., addressed to the Minister of Public Works received, and, in accordance with your request, I am inclosing you herewith a list of the items which have been placed in the supplementary estimates for Antigonish county for 1913-14,
Yours sincerely,
George Buskard, Minister's Secretary.
To F. L. Girroir, Esq.,
Barrister,	.
Antigonish, N.S.
List of amounts for Antigonish county, N.S., noted for estimates, 11)13-11.
Main Estimates.
Arisaig-To complete extension to
wharf	 * * [DOT]$ 3,000
Bayfield harbour-Repairs to wharf and
breakwater	 2,000
Blue Rocks-Repairs to breakwater ..	1,200
Breen's Pond-Construction of breakwater	 1.40<*
Harbour au Boucher-Repairs to wharf 1,000 Malignant Cove-Repairs to breakwater	sot
Supplementary Estimates.
Cribbin's Point-Wharf and dredging.. 15,600 Delorey's Beach-Breakwater repairs
and extension	  14,700
Malignant Cove-Extension of piers and
dredging	 4,000
Me Arras " Brook-Extension	of boat
landing	    L700
McNair's Cove-Extension of wharf.. .. 5,500 Ogden's Pond-Sand groin and extension of pier	;[DOT] -[DOT]	2'80,)
South Lake, Lakeville-Extension of
channel pier	
Auld's Cove-Protected channel	15,000
Tracadie-Harbour improvements	 27,000
Harbour au Boucher-Warehouse .. ..	1,200
Breen's Pond-Extension of breakwater	14,500
Georgeville-New- wharf	 90,000
That in causing the said letter to be sent to Senator Girroir, as above stated, the Minister of Public Works was guilty of an attempt unduly to influence the electors of the said electoral division and violated his duty ais a member of the Privy Council of Canada, as well as the rights and privileges of this House.
He said: Mr. Speaker, the motion I have the honour to make, may on its face appear to be of a partisan character. But, whilst a cursory reading of it might indicate that this is an attempt to strike at a political opponent, the matter I propose to

bring before the House is of serious importance and should receive the most careful consideration of all hon. members of this House -whether they sit on your right or on your left. It is a matter which affects the rights and privileges of the members of this House, a matter which is also calculated to reflect upon the honour of a member of the Privy Council of Canada, and of the Cabinet. It is a matter too which concerns the people, which concerns the whole people of Canada, for purity of elections and the free and independent expression of public opinion at the polls is a matter which not only every member of this House but every citizen of the country should guard most jealously. The case to which I call attention is not only an invasion of the rights and privileges of this House, not only shows conduct on the part of a Cabinet minister that is entirely at variance with parliamentary practice, but it goes further and, hard as the term may seem to be, it would indicate a violation of his oath of office on the part of a Privy Councillor. In addition to that it strikes at the ballot box and the purity of elections. You will remember that when the present Prime Minister of Canada issued his manifesto to the electorate, one of his strongest appeals was on the ground of purity in elections. I am not going to quote from that manifesto or give the argument he used on that occasion ; suffice it to say that we all recognize that in a country like this corruption and all attempts made to prevent the free and intelligent exercise of the franchise such as were made in the recent election in the county of Anti-gonish must be a matter of regret to all. This is a rather unpleasant duty I have to perform, but I feel it incumbent on me because the constituency I have the honour to represent has received undue prominence in connection with the circumstances which I shall relate. The county of Antigonish has hitherto had the reputation of being one of the purest and most incorruptible in Canada. We have always boasted of the fact that the people of that county tried to exercise the franchise independently and conscientiously and according to their lights. For the first time in the history of Antigonish county, so far as I know the attempt has been made to buy up the electors in platoons. It is proper that I should on this occasion resent the insult cast upon the people of Antigonish, Conservative and Liberal, by the attempt of the Minister of Public Works to bribe the electors e* that county in platoons as he and his minions sought to do in that election. I	should very much	preferthat	the task	of bringing	these
matters to the attention of the House were imposed on someone else. But, for the reason I have already given, I
consider it my duty to bring the matter to the attention of the House and in doing so I feel that I shall have the endorsation not only of the Liberals of Antigonish county, but of the Conservatives as well, for if there is one thing that we down there pride ourselves on it is that as far as elections are concerned, we have never been amenable to the corrupt practices used in some parts of the country, particularly where the Minister of Public Works has been operating in the conduct of elections. Antigonish is neither corrupt nor corruptible. It is true that perhaps in sections of that county as in other places there are men who may be influenced by promises such as were made by Senator Girroir representing, as he said, the Government on this occasion. But let me say that these men, one and all, would spurn a direct bribe or money offered for their votes. It is, after all, a comparatively small matter who represents the constitu ency, but it is a matter of the greatest im portance that the purity, honesty and inde pendence of the electorate be maintained and its good reputation preserved. Therefore, it is my duty to ventilate these matters before the House.
May I explain the conditions which led to the by-election of the 16th of January, 1913? A vacancy occurred in the local legislature by the appointment to the Senate of Senator Girroir, then a member of the Legislative Assembly of Nova Scotia, representing the constituency which I have the honour to represent. While we in Antigonish county are proud of his appointment and appreciate the fact that he comes from Antigonish county, the honour is not an honour to that county in particular. It so happened that there was a vacancy in the French Acadian representation in the Senate from Nova Scotia owing to the death of the late Senator Comeau, and as Senator Girroir possessed all the qualifications necessary for the position of senator, being a good representative of the French Aca-dians in that province, than whom there are no more intelligent, industrious, thrifty and upright people in Canada, we were proud to see his appointment to represent that large body who were well worthy of the representation they received. Whilst the French Acadians may well be proud of their representative, they owe no particular gratitude to this Government for the appointment made on this occasion, as they had a right to have one of their members appointed to the Senate owing to the precedent established by the late Liberal Administration.
If any particular credit is to be given for the appointment of a French Acadian representative in the red chamber, it is due to the late Laurier Government that for the first time the province of Nova Scotia recognized that body in the appointment of the late lamented Senator Comeau.
The vacancy caused by the death of
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Senator Comeau was filled by the appointment of Mr. Girroir and the local election came on. The Conservative party seemed to attach a great deal of importance to the issue in that constituency. Perhaps it was due to the fact that the naval question was then an issue, and in Antigonish there is only one opinion on that question; the electors are dead opposed to the policy of the present Government. On that account I suppose the Government felt it necessary to put forward some herculean effort in order that they might hold their own in that constituency. Be it noted that the county was represented in the Legislature by a Liberal and a Conservative. The Conservative candidate who went into the general election in June, 1911, was elected by a majority of two hundred and twenty-nine. In the by-eleotion of January the 16th the Conservative candidate was elected by two hundred and ninety-eight. The Conservative candidate in 1913 got fifty-five more votes than the Conservative candidate in 1911, while the Liberal got fourteen votes less in 1913 than in 1911. Thus -the result did not amount to very much so far as any political gain or advantage went. The election was held on the 16th day of January. On the 9th day of January, one week before the election, there ap peared in the local paper the item to which I shall presently refer. There is only one paper published in the constituency, a weekly religious, Catholic organ, non-partisan in politics. It is a paper very highly .respected by all classes of people and it is exceedingly careful in -the publication of news. It is not of the sensational type, it has none of the yellow journal qualities that we see in many other papers. When a news item appears in that paper it is taken as correct. There appeared in that paper what, to ninety-nine per cent of the people would appear to be a news item, but which was in reality an advertisement. It was a letter purporting to come from the office of the Minister of Public Works. The letter as it appeared in the Casket of January 9th, 1913, read:
Office of the Minister of Public Works of Canada.
Senator Girroir:
Ottawa December 28, 1912.
My Dear Sir,-Your letter of the 24th instant addressed to the Minister of Public Works received, and, in accordance with your request, I am enclosing you herewith a list of the items which have been placed in the supplementary estimates for Antigonish county for 1913-14.
Yours sincerely,
(Sgd.) George Buskard,
Minister's Secretary.
To E. L. Girroir, Esq.,
Barrister, Antigonish, N.S.
Mr. CHISHOLM (Antigonish).
That letter when received in the constituency caused a great deal of -comment. It stated distinctly that the secretary was enclosing herewith a list of the items placed in the supplementary estimates for Antigonish for 1913-14, and it stated that the letter was sent to Senator Girroir in accordance with his request. I have not Senator Girroir's letter to the Minister of Public Works, but there can be no question about the contents of that letter, for the letter which the minister's secretary writes on December 28 says distinctly that it is in accordance with the request of Senator Girroir that he is furnishing a list of the items which have been placed in the supplementary estimates fo-r Antigonish county for the years 1913-14. There is no suggestion that this is a list of items to which the senator had called attention on various occasions or of items noted for consideration on the preparation of the estimates, supplementary or main. Mark you, -Mir. Speaker, at that time neither the main nor the supplementary estimates had been prepared, although the letter would suggest otherwise. The tmain estimates were not brought down for nearly two months after that -and -the supplementary estimates are not down yet; but still the secretary of the minister, on the eve of an election, writes this letter to one of his henchmen, in which he states that he is sending a list of the items which have been placed in the supplementary estimates for that county. I have read the letter. The enclosure as it appeared in the Gasket was as follows:-
Main Estimates.
Arisaig-Complete extension to wharf.. $3,000 Bayfield-Repair to wharf breakwater.. 2,500 Blue Rock-Repairs to breakwater.. .. 8,200 Breen's Pond-Construction of breakwater	  M|}0
Harbour au Boucher-Repairs to whart 1,000 Malignant Cove-Repairs to breakwater 800 Supplementary Estimates.
Cribbons Point-Wharf' and dredging... 15,000 Delorey's Beach-Breakwater repairs
and extensions	14,700
Malignant Cove-Extension of piers
and dredging	 4,000
McArra's Brook-Extension of boat
landing	1,700
McNair's Cove-Extension to wharf .. 5,500 Ogdens Pond-Sand grain and extension of pier	 2,800
South Lakevale-Extension of channel
pier	  [DOT][DOT]	3,000
Auld's Cove-Protected channel	15,000
Tracadie Harbour-Improvements.. .. 27,000 Harbour au Boucher

Warehouse.. ..	1,200
Breen's Pond-Extension to breakwater	14,500
Georgeville-New wharf	 90,000
There will also be placed in the general rate for dredging amounts for Lakevale and Bayfield, and an amount for repair for old wharf at Georgeville, will be placed in es-

timates when exact amount of damage is ascertained.
Thus read the letter and enclosure which purported to come from the Minister of Public Works, and which was inserted in the Antigonish Casket of January 9. It is a weekly paper, as I have said, and there was no other issue until election day. It happens to be published on Thursday, and the election was on the following Thursday, the 16th, so that there was no opportunity of contradicting those estimates in the paper which disseminated them throughout the county. I had seen the original letter a few evenings before the date on which the estimates appeared in the Antigonish Casket, and I was amazed to find that it was signed by Mr. Buskard, secretary of the Minister of Public Works. I thought perhaps it was intended to be used secretly in the campaign at the suggestion of the Minister of Public Works, for we know that he prides himself on the fact that he knows how to win elections. I thought that perhaps this was one of the methods which he intended to be used in te dark, but I did not think that 'the letter and the enclosure would be made public. To my amazement, however, they did appear in the Casket newspaper just as I have read them. When I read the letter in the Casket, notwithstanding the fact that it purported to be signed by Mr. BuskaTd, I had some doubts as to its authenticity, and when I came to Ottawa I made inquiries of the minister, and put a question on the Order Paper. I quoted the letter as it appeared in the Casket, and put the following question :
2.	Did the Minister of Public Works or his secretary send, or authorize to be sent, to Senator Girroir, of Antigonish, N.S., the said
letter and inclosure?
3.	If not, did the minister or his secretary send, or authorize to be sent, any letter to Senator Girroir in the month of December last, respecting the estimates, or proposed expenditure for Antigonish ?
4.	If so, what was such letter and enclosure ?
You would suppose Mr. Speaker that a categorical answer would be given to these questions. There was nothing ambiguous about the language; they were plain simple questions. But what answer did the minister give? He replied as follows:
Mr. R gers: The Minister of Public Works had no knowledge whatever respecting the matter referred to. Senator Girroir, who from time to time had interested himself in making requests that certain work at different points should be carried on during the coming year, asked to be supplied with a memorandum of the applications which he had so named, in answer to which request the following is a correct copy of the memorandum sent:
You will observe, Mr. Speaker, that the Minister of Public Works evaded the questions that were put to him. He said he had no knowledge whatever respecting the matter referred to, and in the next breath he turned around and said that the Senator had been inquiring about certain works which he wished to be carried on at various points during the coming year, and that he had asked to be supplied with a memorandum. But you will observe that the letter sent by the secretary of the minister is not consistent with any suggestion of that kind. It is as clear and explicit as it could be and states:
I am enclosing you herewith a list of the items which have been placed in the supplementary estimates.
He does not say that he is sending a list of items to which his attention had been called by Senator Girroir. The very idea that such a list was necessary is absurd. Senator Girroir's memory is not so short that he required a list of the items from the minister. Senator Girroir had those things as pat in his memory as I have had them all along. I had written to the Department of Public Works sending a list of the various items which required attention, and I could recite them without any difficulty, morning, noon and night, and Senator Girroir could do the same. Therefore, whilst under the rules of debate we have to accept the statement of the Minister of Public Works, I leave it to the House to say whether the answers he gave to my questions were honest and frank, or consistent with the truth in any shape or form. Let me direct your attention again, Mr. Speaker, to his answer. He says that the Senator had asked to be supplied with a memorandum of the applications for appropriations which the latter had made, and that in answer to that request the memorandum had been sent. Let me call your attention to the list which the minister says was sent to Senator Girroir, and let me ask you, Mr. Speaker, and the House, to institute a comparison between the list or enclosure sent to the senator, according to the minister, and the list which was published in the Casket. On page 2440 of 'Hansard,' January 29, 1913, it is stated that the list sent to the senator was as follows:
List of amounts for Antigonish county, Nova Scotia, noted for estimates, 1913-11. Main Estimates.
Then followed the items just as they apeared in the Casket with one exception: ' Blue Bock, $8,200,' as it appeared in the newspaper instead of $1,200, as it appears in the minister's answer. You will observe, Mr. Speaker, that in the letter which appeared in the Casket on the eve of the elec-
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tion there was no heading such as is found in the memorandum which the minister brought down. Any reader of the Casket would come to the conclusion that the min ister was sending Senator Girroir a list of the items which had been placed in the estimates, and not a list which had been merely noted for the main -or supplementary estimates. Let me again remind you of the fact that at that time the main estimates had not been prepared. A few days before he House rose for Christmas recess I took occasion to go to the Public Works Department to call their attention to some works which were of pressing need, and while I was there I was told that the estimates had not yet been prepared but that they would be considered during the holidays. When this letter was read by Senator Girroir at a joint meeting at which we were both present, about the 6th or 7th January, I took occasion to call attention to the fact that the estimates had not yet been prepared and that the letter of Mr. Buskard, if it were genuine, contained statements that were absolutely untrue. The answer that was made to that was that the letter came from the Department of Public Works and it was there to speak for itself. Let me emphazize the fact that there is a difference between the memorandum which was isent to Senator Girroir according to the minister and the same as it appeared in the Antigonish Casket. In the first place the letter in the Antigonish Casket does not state that the list is a list of items noted for the estimates for 1913-14. The head note after enclosure or memorandum is absent. In the letter which appeared in the Antigonish Casket it is stated, in addition to what is contained in the memorandum as-brought- down by the minister that:
There will also be placed in the general vote for dredging amounts for Lakevale and Bayfield; and an amount for repair of old wharf
at Georgeville will be placed in estimates when exact amount of damage is ascertained.
In the memorandum which was brought down by the minister that language is not found. The publication in the Casket -contained a suppression of the head note and an addition at the end of the enclosure sent the senator. When I read the reply of the minister to my question I was very much surprised. I could not understand how it was that such statements could have been made publicly by -Senator Girroir during the election campaign, and that such a letter should be found in the Casket. I found, as I have said, that there was a variation as between the memorandum which the minister says he sent to Senator Girroir and the letter which Senator Girroir had published. I would like to direct the attention of the House to the definition of Mr. CHISHOLM (Antigonish).
forgery as found in the Criminal Code, section 422:
Forgery is the making of a false document knowing it to be false, with the intention that it shall in any way be used or acted upon as genuine, to the prejudice of anyone whether within Canada or not, or that some person should he induced, by the belief that it is genuine, to do or refrain from doing anything, whether within Canada or not.
2.	Making a false document includes altering a genuine document in any material part, and making any material addition to it, &c.
3.	Forgery is complete as soon as the document is made with such knowledge and intent as aforesaid, but though the offender may not have intended that any particular person should use or act upon it as genuine, &c.
While I do not say that the alteration of the letter which came from the hon. Minister of Public Works by the elimination of the heading from it, namely, ' List of items for Antigonish county noted for estimates, 1913-14/ and whilst I do not say that the addition of the words to the enclosure referred to in the letter as it appeared in the Casket, and which were not found in the letter sent by the Minister of Public Works to Senator Girroir, according to the statement of the Minister of Public Works, constitute a forgery, yet I say it comes pretty near to it and there can be no denying the fact that the senator, by the alteration of the original letter and the addition made to it, published a garbled document for the purpose of influencing the electors. If the enclosure had been published as the Minister of Public Works says he supplied it to the senator, it would not have had the same effect because the electorate would have seen that it was only a list of items that had been noted for the estimates for Antigonish county. But these words were left out so that the people were led to believe that the senator had authority to pledge the minister that these works would be provided for. When the minister gave his answer on the 29th January, he rather evaded the question that was put to him, as I have already pointed out. He did not give a straight -categorical answer to the question. On that occasion I tried to get the minister to answer -the question fully. I said:
The question as to whether the minister or his secretary sent or authorized to he sent the letter referred to has been evaded.
The minister replied:
The Minister of Public Works did not authorize or send any such letter. I understand that the words ' or his secretary ' appear in the question, but I did not know they had any hearing upon the matter.
He said that he did not know that the words ' or his secretary ' had any bearing
MAT? 19, 1913
upon the matter. He was not frank in making that statement. The question that was asked was:
Did the Minister of Public Works or his secretary send, or authorize to be sent, to Senator Girroir, of Antigonish, N.S., the said letter and enclosure?
The letter is signed by his secretary. Surely, it would have occurred to the minister that the question as to whether his secretary sent that letter would have an important bearing on the matter. It looks very much like the old case of where a man's conscience is not at ease he is apt to say and do things that under other circumstances he would not say or do. He evaded that question and he sought to create the impression that he was not responsible for the letter.
I followed the thing up a little further. On February 3, I referred to the same letter as it had appeared in the Antigonish Casket and which gave a list of the items. I asked the following question:
Did the secretary of the Minister of Public Works send, or authorize to send, to Senator Girroir, of Antigonish, N.S., the 9aid letter and enclosure?
You will remember that when I asked the question on January 29, the minister evaded it to a certain extent. On February 3, he stated that:
The following letter and memorandum were sent by the secretary of the Minister of Public Works.
The letter and memorandum are given at page 2691 of ' Hansard.' They are set out in the resolution which I have submitted for the consideration of the House. What has the minister to say for himself in connection with the publication of estimates in advance of their submission to this House? It was a violation of the rights and privileges of this House to publish estimates in advance and I could quote authority for that statement from May and other writers on parliamentary procedure. I do not propose to quote authorities in detail, but I would refer the House to page 74 of May, where there will be found the following:
It is declared to be a breach of privilege for a member, or any other person, to publish the evidence taken before a select committee, until it has been reported to the House;
In 1911 a statement purporting to represent proposals contained in confidential papers referred to the select committee on the civil-list with a report of the proceedings of the committee was published in a newspaper.
This was deemed to be a breach of privilege. Then, at page 416, it is stated that:
No member, or any other person, may ublish any portion of the evidence taken y or documents presented to select committees, which have not been reported to the House; and this rule extends equally to the
report of a committee before it has been presented to the House.
I shall not weary the House by quoting authorities to the effect that in so far as these estimates are concerned, it is the right and privilege of the House to first receive the estimates before they are submitted to the public. The letter which purported to have been sent by the minister through his secretary contained statements that were absolutely false because the estimates were not prepared at the date the letter was sent. The main estimates were not prepared then and the supplementary estimates have not been prepared yet. In addition to that, the minister, through his secretary, in _ sending that letter which was false on its face, violated his duty, and he was guilty of improper conduct, both as a minister and a privy councillor, in giving out information of that kind. I go so far as to say that the minister had no right to disclose what had been noted in the supplementary estimates in this manner. If I want to find what items there are for Antigonish county in the supplementary estimates and I ask the engineer in the department. I am politely told that inlormation cannot be given. We have had numerous incidents in this House of hon. gentlemen inquiring whether certain works were provided for in the supplementary estimates, and the invariable answer was given that the estimates had not yet been brought down. The Prime Minister himself a few days ago stated that it was not proper that information of that kind should be given until it was imparted to Parliament in the regular way. The effect of the answers to the question put to the minister, as found in ' Hansard ' of February 3, 1913, and January 29, 1913, is to place Senator Girroir in the position of having garbled the letter sent to him. While I know Senator Girroir to be an extreme partisan, and one who is prepared to fight the game to a finish, I do not believe he would be guilty of what inspirit if not in letter would appear to be forgery, and take the risk of the penalty prescribed for that offence. I took the precaution of ascertaining who sent that letter to the Casket newspaper, and I ascertained it was Senator Girroir who brought the letter of the minister with the enclosure to the newspaper office, which published both in good faith. Ninety-nine out of one hundred people would believe this was a matter of news. It was published however as an advertisement and paid for at so much per inch. The Casket newspaper was imposed upon most shamefully.
Arthur de Witt Foster: How?


Mr. CHISHOLM:: In that the Casket
newspaper is non-partisan. It is very Con-

servative-I use the word not in a political sense-in its management; it virtually vouches for its items of news and this letter appeared in the Casket in such type and in such a position that ninety-nine per cent of the people who read it would suppose it was a news item, while, as a matter of fact, it was an advertisement. The people who read it as a news item in the Casket would be disposed to say it must be so, and that these items were provided for in the estimates for Antigonish county or the Casket would not publish it. You could not get an advertisement into the Casket merely for money. The Casket would not publish the letter if it were known to be untrue.


John Hampden Burnham: You say the Casket
was imposed upon?


William Chisholm: Yes, the Casket was imposed upon.


John Hampden Burnham: It was the Casket that imposed on its readers. You know perfectly well, and everybody knows who has ever been connected with a newspaper, that when an advertisement is published in the news columns the letters ' advt ' are printed under it.


William Chisholm: Not necessarily.


John Hampden Burnham: Yes, necessarily.


William Chisholm: Maybe they do not
run the newspapers down there as my hon. friend would wish to have them run. The fact remains that the Casket was imposed upon and the Casket's readers were in turn unintentionally imposed upon by the Casket.


Arthur de Witt Foster: Will you allow me a question?


William Chisholm: I would rather not; but go on.


Arthur de Witt Foster: I did not catch the point the hon. gentleman made. Where does he contend that forgery took place? Was it after the letter left Senator Girroir and went to the Casket office or before it arrived in Antigonish at all?


William Chisholm: I did not say there
was forgery in law; I said there was something akin to forgery and I Tead the definition of forgery. In the letter which the Senator had published in the Antigonish Casket, a list of items was given as I have read them here, without any head note, and in the letter which the minister states he sent to Senator Girroir there was this head note:
List of amounts for Antigonish county, Nova Scotia, noted for estimates 1913-14.
The letter which the minister sent to the senator would put an entirely different colour on the whole correspondence, from the letter as it appeared in the newspaper.
Mr. CHISHOLM (Antigonish).


Arthur de Witt Foster: Will you state on your responsibility as a member of this House that you did not see the letter sent to Senator Girroir in which the words were plainly set out as the minister stated?


William Chisholm: My hon. friend puts a straight question and I give a straight answer. I did see that letter and I saw that these words were there and I commented upon them, and I directed the attention of the audience to the fact that this letter was simply a list of items which had been noted and not a list of items which had been placed in the estimates. To this the Senator replied: there is the letter and the letter says expressly, I am enclosing you herewith a list of the items which have been placed in the supplementary estimates for Antigonish county for 1913-14; and the senator addressing the audience said:	All the ingenuity of my
learned friend cannot get away from the fact that here is a letter signed by the minister's secretary in which it is expressly stated that these items have been placed in the supplementary estimates. That was the argument of Senator Girroir, and that is why whe.n I returned to the House after the holidays I put the question to the minister, setting forth the letter as it appeared in the Casket to ascertain juste what had been sent to the senator. I confess I was exceedingly surprised when I read in the Casket that this heading was omitted. I was also equally surprised to find that there was added to the letter which appeared in the Casket the words:
There will also be placed in the general vote for the dredging amounts for Lakevale and Bayfield, and an amount for repair for old wharf at Georgeville, will be placed in estimates when exact amount of damage is ascertained.
That was the letter which the senator published in the newspaper. I direct attention to the fact that the minister says he did not send that letter. I suppose his answer will be that his secretary sent it. Every hon. gentleman in this House knows that a large percentage of the letters whith the minister sends to hon. gentlemen are signed by his private secretary, and let. me say that this letter purports to have been written with the authority of the minister. This was not a letter which was addressed to the secretary of the minister and to which he replied; it was a letter which had been addressed to the minister himself for the letter reads:
Your letter of the 24th instant addressed to the Minister of Public Works received, and in accordance with your request, I am enclosing you herewith a list of the items which Have been placed in the supplementary estimates for Antigonish county for 1913-14.
The secretary purports to speak for the minister; in his capacity as secretary he

answers a letter addressed to his minister, and that answer binds the minister. It would be impossible properly to conduct the business of any department of the Government unless the secretary to the head of the department were responsible to the minister for his actions. In the oath of office taken by every private secretary, which hon. gentlemen of this House can find in the Civil Service Act, the secretary swears that he will properly conduct himself in the position to which he is appointed. It will not lie in the mouth of the minister, therefore, to say that he did not write the letter, and that it was written by his secretary without his authority. If the secretary had no authority for writing the letter, why does he still occupy his position? Why was he not instantly dismissed from office? Every hon. gentleman knows that any private secretary who flagrantly violated the rules of his office would not hold his position for an hour. The very fact that the minister has retained the services of his secretary shows that he assumes responsibility for what the secretary wrote. If that is the case, the minister, through his secretary, wrote a letter which was false, and which gave information which was entirely at variance with the facts. I have said that a minister of the Crown is not at liberty to disclose what takes place in Council, or to publish in advance any estimates which he has under consideration. Let me quote from Dodd on Dignities, Privileges and Precedence, page 26. Speaking of the Cabinet Council, the writer says:
As they are more immediately responsible for the conduct of public affairs, their deliberations are always considered confidential and kept secret, even from their colleagues who are less exalted in office.
Their deliberations have to be kept secret from their colleagues, and neither the hon. the Minister of Public Works nor any other minister of the Crown is at liberty to leave the Council Chamber and tell any one of his supporters that any particular item is to be provided for in the estimates when they are brought down. In Thom's Book of the Court, page 230, it is stated that:
The duty of a Privy Councillor appears from the oath which he takes on his admission to the office to be:
1.	To advise the King according to the best of his cunning and discretion.
2.	To advise the King's honour, and the good of the public, without partiality, through affection, love, need, doubt or dread.
3.	To keep the King's Counsel secret.
4.	To avoid corruption.
5.	To help and strengthen what shall be resolved in the Council.
6.	To withstand all persons who would attempt the contrary.
7.	To observe, keep and do all that a good and true Counsellor ought to , do to his Sovereign Lord.
The Cabinet is a committee of the Privy Council.
These are the duties of a Privy Councillor, and, as hon. gentlemen know, the Cabinet is only a committee of the Privy Council. Let me read to you the oath taken by a Privy Councillor when he assumes office:
You	do solemnly
promise and swear that you will serve His Majesty truly and faithfully in the place of His Council in this His Majesty's Dominion of Canada, you will keep close and secret all such matters as shall be treated, debated and resolved on in Privy Council, without publishing or disclosing the same or any part thereof, by word, writing, or any otherwise to any person out of the same Council, but to such only as be of the Council, and yet of any matter so propounded, treated and debated in any such Privy Council, shall touch any particular person, sworn of the same council upon any such matter as shall in any wise concern his loyalty and fidelity to the King's Majesty, you will in no wise open the same to him, but keep it secret, as you would from any person, until the King's Majesty's pleasure be known in that behalf. You will in all things to be moved, treated and debated in any such Privy Council, faithfully, honestly and truly declare your mind and opinion to the honour and benefit of the King's Majesty, and the good of his subjects without partiality or exception of persons, in no wise forebearing so to do from any manner of respect, favour, love, meed, displeasure, or dread of any person or persons whatsoever. In general you will be vigilant, diligent and circumspect in all your doings touching the King's Majesty's affairs; All which matters and things you will faithfully observe and keep, as a good councillor ought to do to the utmost of your power, will and discretion. So help you God.
It is evident that the statement in the minister's letter is false, for on February 19 of this year the supplementary estimates had not been considered. On that day, after quoting the letter to Senator Girroir and the enclosures, I asked the minister -the following questions:
Have the items mentioned under the head-, ing supplementary estimates, or any of them, been placed in the supplementary estimates for Antigonish county, for 1913-14, as stated in said letter? If not, is it the intention of the Government to place these items in the supplementary estimates this year?
The Minister of Public Works made the following answer:
The supplementary estimates have not yet been considered.
Some hon. gentlemen on this side of the House about three weeks ago asked further questions with regard to the supplementary estimates, and the minister replied that they had not been considered, so that the minister could not have been in a position to give any information with regard to them even at that late date, although through his secretary, he said in

his letter to Senator Girroir live months ago that he was enclosing a list of the items which had been placed in the supplementary estimates for Antigonish county. As far as the main estimates were concerned, if these items had been considered in council, before he wrote the senator, I submit that the Minister of Public Works should not have given out that information. I shall not comment further upon the oath of office taken by the minister and the necessity for absolute secrecy in that regard. The minister will doubtless try to place the responsibility upon his secretary, as he has done on other occasions. We had such an experience in connection with the Donaldson case; a steal was perpetrated upon this country and the minister attempted to place the blame upon his secretary. Certain correspondence that was brought down contained the initials ' G. B.'-George Buskard -and the minister endeavoured to escape responsibility by placing the blame upon his secretary. I think, however, that such an argument will not go very far with the people.
The works referred to are necessary in the county of Antigonish, and it was perfectly proper that they should have been provided for. Provision should now be made for these works in the estimates for the present year if justice and fair play be meted out to the county of Antigonish If some of these items had appeared in the estimates the year before last as they should, they would not bulk so large on the present occasion. The greater portion of these items were provided for by the late Administration, but the present Government cut them out of the estimates they brought down, and refused to do anything for the country until the local by-election was held. It is quite true that these items amount to a large sum in bulk even without taking into consideration the dredging and other repairs referred to in that letter. These supplementary estimates alone amount to $195,000- $16 for every man, woman and child in the county, or $81 for every vote polled in the election. It is true these sums bulk large. But, as I have pointed out, if those had been voted and expended last year or the year before as they should have been, the vote would not have bulked so large in the estimates of this year. But that is not the question; you should not consider what it amounts to for each individual, what you should consider is:	Are these works
necessary and proper? I submit that these works should be built. Let me ask the minister then, that when the estimates are brought down every one of these items will be found there and that the money will be spent. It is right and proper that the money should be voted and spent. He Mr. CHISHOLM (Antigonish).
owes that to the people; he owes it to himself; he owes it to the reputation of Senator Girroir. It is true that the Conservatives workers in that county had to drink a cup of humiliation that was filled to the brim. If the Minister of Public Works wishes to give an antidote to the political poison these people had to drink, he will see to it that all those items are provided for in the estimates.
Now, I come to another question of that election, which at first blush may not seem directly relevant to the motion, but as I proceed you will see that it is pertinent. It involves the conduct of the Prime Minister in seeking to influence the electors on that occasion. The Minister of Public Works is not the only guilty party. I claim that the Prime Minister and the Minister of Railways lent themselves to a scheme to mislead and deceive the farmers of Antigonish county for the purpose of unfairly influencing that election. Last year, weather conditions were so unfavourable that there was a considerable shortage of hay in that constituency. In some sections the crop was not more than one-third of the average. The year before also the hay crop had been light. On the 4th of September, the Farmers' Association of Antigonish county, after due consideration, passed a resolution memorialising the Government for free transportation of hay over the Intercolonial railway. I shall not dwell on the facts that justify their action, nor refer to precedents that could be invoked in support of their request. Suffice it to say that they were encouraged in this matter by Senator Girroir, who volunteered to lend them his assistance and led them to hope that they would secure what they desired. Finding that nothing was done, or that nothing seemed to have been done by the senator in this regard when the House met, at the request of some of the members of the association, I called on the Minister of Railways and Canals to ascertain whether or not free transportation would be provided. I was informed that the Railway Department knew nothing at all about the matter. In the ordinary course one would suspect that the request made would be submitted to the officers of the department for investigation. I was surprised that they had heard nothing about it, so I hied myself to the Minister of Agriculture, who informed me that he had received such a petition which he forwarded to the Minister of Railways and in a general way he discussed the matter. I called on the Minister of Railways, and he informed me he did not see how the Intercolonial railway could give free transportation. He very kindly discussed the subject from

his point of view, but held out no hope of free transportation. I called his attention to the fact that the farmers of Antigonish desired to know at as early a day as possible what the position o'f the Minister of Railways was in this matter as they would have to make other arrangement if the request they had made of him was not granted. H.e told me that in a day or two he would give his decision, and that in the meantime he would need to consult the Prime Minister. The day or two passed, and other days passed, and I received no reply; so on the 26th of November, I put questions on the Order Paper as follows:
1.	Is it the intention of the Railway Depart-1 meat to allow free transportation of hay over) the Intercolonial railway from the province^ of Quebec to the eastern counties of Nova' Scotia, or any of them?
2.	What relief, if any, in the matter ofl freight rates on hay to be carried over the Intercolonial railway for the farmers of the eastern counties of Nova Scotia is proposed?
That question ought to have been very easily answered; the Minister of Railways ought to have been able to state what the position of the department was. But every time that question was called until after the by-election in Antigonish the Prime Minister rose in his place and said 'stand'. And on the 12th of December he told me: The matter is under consideration. Now, I want to say that the Prime Minister was not candid, he was not honest in making such -a statement, because, as a matter of fact, the Minister of Railways had decided as early as the 14th of October that free transportation should not be granted. I have here the papers brought down on the 8th o!f March pursuant to an order of this House on my motion for:
A copy of all petitions, resolutions, letters, telegrams and the correspondence, relating to free or reduced transportation of hay over the Intercolonial railway for the farmers of Antigonish county.
In this connection, let me say that while this return purports t-o cover all the papers and correspondence on this subject, I cannot find a line from Antigonish, I cannot find the resolution of the Farmers' Association or any letter or telegram or any intimation of any kind made to any of the departments of this Government on the pant of the farmers of Antigonish county. I find representation from Cape Breton, from Inverness, from Richmond and from Gysiborough but .not from Antigonish. Reverting to what I was about to say, I find here the following letter from Mr. Thos. Gallant, of Inverness, who has the patronage for Inverness county:
Inverness, N.S., Oct. 9, 1912. Hon. Frank Cochrane,
Minister of Railways,
Ottawa, Canada.
Dear Sir,-The shortage of the hay crop in this county places the farmers in a very precarious condition. It will be necessary for them to import a very considerable quantity of hay. I would recommend that this hay be transported over the Intercolonial railway free of charge. This would be a great help to the farmers of this county, and I would respectfully ask for your favourable consideration of this matter.
Yours sincerely,
Thos. Gallant.
And what do you suppose was the answer? It was as follows:
19th Oct., 1912.
Dear Sir,-I have yours of October 9 asking that the Intercolonial railway should transport hay free for the farmers along the line whose hay crop has failed. While I sympathize with the farmers, I do not see how the Intercolonial railway can he expected to do this.
Yours very truly,
F. Cochrane.
Thomas Gallant, Esq.,
Inverness, N.S.
There is no mistaking that answer. The Minister of Railways was frank, honest and aboveboard and told the people he could not see his way to grant the free transportation. I find also the following letter:
_	November 9, 1912.
Dear Sirs,-I have yours of November 7, and in reply may say that it is not intended to carry hay via Intercolonial railway free of charge from Quebec to Nova Scotia. This could only he done by a grant which would cover freight charges, as the road must pay its fixed charges.
Yours truly,
F. Cochrane.
Messrs. S. R. Griffin & Sons,
Goldboro,
Guysborough county, N.S.
The request was for the carriage of hay into Nova Scotia, and not for the carriage of hay from some particular section of that province. The Prime Minister refused to answer the question that was put to him although his Minister of Railways had decided long before that that there would be no free transportation. Why did he suppress the information that I had a right to obtain from him? I had a perfect right to ask those questions on behalf of mv constituents and to receive an answer. Was it for the purpose of influencing the election there that the Government maintained such golden silence. There could be no other reason. What would you think of a Prime Minister of this country, the leader of a great party, who would stoop so low as to take advantage of the farmers of Antigonish or any other county in the

province of Nova Scotia in order, forsooth, that he might win a by-election. The situation might have been very serious to the farmers of eastern Nova Scotia. Suppose the price of hay had gone up in December, that it had risen from week to week and from month to month, and the farmers had had to pay 25 per cent or 50 per cent or 75 per cent more for the hay in the middle of the winter than they had to pay in the fall or the early part of the season. In that case the farmers would have suffered. It is true that the price did not go up but for that no thanks are due to the minister or to any of his colleagues or to this Government. I say that it was the lowest of petty, picayune politics on the part of the Primt Minister, to use such a trivial matter to influence the electors.
Let me refer to the minister's statement at page 1786 of the unrevised ' Hansard,' made a few days after the election in Antigonish. The hon. member for Richmond county asked a question about free transportation of hay over the Intercolonial, and then the Minister of Railways replied. He had no difficulty about speaking after the election. He and the Premier were as mute as oysters until after the day of the by-election, but immediately after it the minister said, in reply to the question of the hon. member for Richmond:
I have taken the attitude all along that if anything is done in that respect it should be done by special vote not by Order in Council.
You have heard that the minister states: I have taken the attitude all along. He had not come to this conclusion recently, he had taken that attitude from the very inception of the request that there should be no free transportation. Why did not the Minister of Railways frankly state that on the 26th of November? This question ot the free transportation of hay was used in the by-election for all it was worth. There was not a Conservative speaker from one end of the county to the other who did not picture the benevolence, the generosity of this Government in going to give the farmers free transportation. There was not a district in the county in which the appeal was not made that the farmers should show their appreciation of what the Conservative party at Ottawa was doing for them in the matter of free transportation of hay. They should therefore vote for the Conservative candidate.


Mr. DAVIDSON:: Will the hon. member, on his responsibility as a member of this House, say that the statement was ever made in that county that the Government would provide free transportation of hay?


William Chisholm: Well, well, well, I am surprised that my hon. friend should ask Mr. CHISHOLM (Antigonish).
such a question. Shall I have to read the requests that were made-


Avard Longley Davidson: Answer the question.


William Chisholm: Certainly. The request in Antigonish was for free transportation over the Intercolonial. That was the resolution passed on the 4th of September.


Avard Longley Davidson: But we want the promise of the Government, the statement made by Government supporters. I am quite prepared to admit that the request was made.


William Chisholm: I think I shall be able to convince my hon. friend that he has not even that loop-hole of escape. If he thinks that possibly by some hair splitting distinction, by juggling with words, he can put that construction on it I am quite content that he should do it, but I say on my responsibility that the farmers of' Antigonish and the people of Antigonish understood the proposition before the Government to be free transportation over the Intercolonial for their hay, as was granted in 1904.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I think the hon. member is quibbling between Government and Intercolonial. See if that is what is bothering him.


William Chisholm: Possibly, but the people of Antigonish understood it.


Avard Longley Davidson: No.


William Chisholm: I heard it and before I have finished I shall produce the evidence. Let me read the advertisement which appeared in the Casket of January 9, two days before the election.
Arrangements have been made for fjree transportation of hay into this county for farmers only. Persons desiring hay can leave their orders with C. Edgar Whidden from whom full information can be obtained. The following persons have been appointed a committee to oversee the matter:
A. D. Chisholm.
P. S. Floyd.
Dan. D. McDonald.
This appeared in the Antigonish Casket on January 9.


Avard Longley Davidson: Absolutely true.


William Chisholm: iviy hon. friend has a happy faculty of finding rest when he is in an uncomfortable position. What was the request of the farmers? It was free transportation of hay over the Intercolonial by the Intercolonial. They never expected that Senator Girroir or the Conservative organization or the boodle fund of the Tory party, if they have such a thing, were to be appealed to for the purpose of paying for the transportation of the hay of the farmers in the county of Antigonish, they would pay for the transportation of their

own hay rather than nave somebody else pay it; but they felt as they were large contributors to the exchequer of the Intercolonial, as the Intercolonial was reaping a large profit and benefit from them and through them, that they were not ashamed to' ask the Intercolonial to help them out on this particular occasion and carry their hay free. They did not ask the Conservative party of Canada or the Conservative organization of Antigonish or anybody else to pay for the transportation of their hay. This letter appeared in the Casket of January 9. People were surprised. This man Floyd was a Liberal, a very respectable man in the county of Antigonish, one of the most respectable citizens of the county. I shall not say anything about the other gentlemen, they are both very strong Conservatives.


Avard Longley Davidson: Did he vote Liberal
last year?


William Chisholm: I do not know, I am not supposed to know how he voted. I would call the attention of my hon. friend to the fact that there is not very much room for jubilation and glorification over the victory in Antigonish when you come to consider the base, despicable and ignoble methods resorted to. There is little comfort for the Conservatives in the fact that the Liberal candidate had only fourteen votes less than he had in the general election a year and a half or two years before and the Conservative candidate had fifty-five votes more. Considering the Herculean efforts they made to win that constituency, they have not very much to glory over. I was going to refer to those gentlemen who signed this notice respecting the free transportation of hay. Mr. Floyd was approached and asked what the arrangement was, and he at once said: I know nothing at all about any arrangement for the free transportation of hay; I have not heard of any such arrangement with the Intercolonial railway or with anybody else; the first time I knew about it was when I read it in the Casket. So he repudiated it at once. The Secretary of the Farmers' Association sent a telegram to Mr. Tiffin, the traffic manager of the Intercolonial railway:
To E. Tiffin,
Antigonish, Jan. 11, 1913,
Traffic Manager, Intercolonial railway. Moncton.
Wire collect what arrangements made regarding transportation of hay for this county. Rush.
Alexander McDonald, Secretary Farmers' Association.
That same evening came the reply:
To Alexander McDonald,
Secretary Farmers' Association, Antigonish.
Your wire this date. I am not aware of any
special arrangements in regard to transportation of hay for Antigonish county.
E. Tiffin,
The Conservatives had the notice in the paper, and the farmers were led to believe that there was to be free transportation. The traffic manager was wired, and he replied that he was not aware of any such arrangement. But that did not stop the Conservatives. They said: Oh, Tiffin does not know anything about it; he is not the man who has to do with this thing. Sc they issued a circular immediately to the electors of Antigonish in which they said:
: The Halifax Morning Chronicle also is being freely circulated with farther sensational statements about hay, &c. Mr. Whidden has been authorized and is now taking orders for free hay, and some of it has been already ordered and is on the way to Antigonish. The following telegram has been received by Mr. Whidden from one of the largest hay dealers in the Maritime provinces:
Amherst, N.S., January 13, 1913.
C. Edgar Whidden,
Consignment of hay to you going forward at once. Any other orders will be promptly attended to. You get hay free of freight charges for farmers only.
(Sgd.) Edgar Fillmore.


Avard Longley Davidson: Was that dispatch not correct?


William Chisholm: Does my hon. friend say it was correct?


Avard Longley Davidson: Yes.


William Chisholm: Well, I will quote the Minister to prove that it was not correct, that it was absolutely untrue. My hon. friend should not jump before he reaches the stile. What I have read was what was sent out on January 14, and the election was on the 16th. The electors were told they were going to 'get free hay.' Now, let me deal with the question asked by my hon. friend. On page 3271 of 'Hansard' of February 13, 1913, he will find that I asked the following question:
1.	Referring to a telegram purporting to have been received by one C. Edgar Whidden from one of the hay dealers in Amherst, Cumberland county, during the recent by-election for the provincial legislature in Antigonish county, as follows:-
Amherst, N.S., January 13, 1913.
C. Edgar Whidden,
Antigonish.
Consignment of hay to you going forward at once, any other orders will be promptly attended to. You get hay free of freight charges for farmers only.
(Sgd.) Edgar Fillmore.
2.	Was any arrangement made by the Department of Railways, or any of its officials, for free carriage of hay over the Intercolonial railway from Amherst to Antigonish, as stated in said telegram?
3.	Has there been free or reduced transportation for carrying hay over any part of the

Intercolonial, or any reduction or rebate made to shippers or purchasers of hay for Antigonish county since the beginning of the present year?
Mr. Cochrane answered 'no' to each of those questions; there was no free transportation, no reduction, no rebate. One would suppose that with that record before them, the Conservative party would be thoroughly abashed in Antigonish county, and they would cease from referring to this matter any further. But, like my hon. friends opposite who have been interrupting me, they did not seem to grasp the humiliation in which the minister and the government were placed by their desperate efforts to win the constituency. _ After the elections were over, Senator Girroir wrote in the Casket of February 6, 1913, as follows:
Notwithstanding any rumours or assertions to the contrary, arrangements have been made for the importation of hay into this county from Amherst and vicinity, and the delivery of same to Antigonish farmers at the price for which it is purchased there. The farmer gets his hay for the price at which it is sold in the open market at Amherst or vicinity, and neither directly nor indirectly pays any freight or other charges on same from that district. We have asked the following leading citizens to make a thorough investigation into the whole matter, and publish a report of their findings in the Casket, and they have consented to do so:
A. D. Chisholm, merchant.
George Taylor, Esq., farmer.
Dan D. McDonald, merchant.
James H. Stewart, merchant.
H. H. Crearar, Esq., farmer.
I will give any person who will furnish satisfactory evidence to disprove the above statement the sum of two hundred dollars.
I do not know to what statement he refers, whether it is to the statement that hay can be bought at Amherst at market prices, or that those people had been appointed a committee. Then he proceeded:
Farmers should order their hay at once as this privilege cannot he held open later than March 15th inst. Advices are to the effect that at present there is a heavy demand from Newfoundland and other places, which is liable to cause an advance in price in the very near future.	.
E. Lavin Giro)*-.
Antigonish, N.S., February 5, 1913.
So far as the gentlemen who constituted the committee are concerned, I may point out that they were not appointed by the Farmers' Association. We have no knowledge of who appointed them. I may also point out that they are all Conservatives with one exception, and the exception is a gentleman whose name I was surprised to find in the list, for he has always home a reputation for integrity, fail dealing, and honour in all his business relations. I am surprised to find that he had any finger in such a scheme as this, and that he should Mr. CHISHOLM (Antigonish!
so far forget himself as to lend his name to such a deception of the public. There was an alleged investigation, and the report of those Conservatives who constituted uie body of white-washers was that they could not find where freight had been charged. Let me call your attention, Mr. Speaker, to the fact that on March 3 I moved:
For a statement of all amounts collected by the Intercolonial railway for freight on hay carried from Amherst and other stations on the Intercolonial, county of Cumberland, to Antigonish, N.S., and consigned to C. Edgar Whidden or C. B. Whidden & Son, in the month of January last and Februarv instant, and by whom such freight was paid; also a copy of all way bills and bills of lading for the same.-Mr. Chisholm (Antigonish).
The papers were brought down and among them a letter from Mr. Pottinger, as follows:
In reply I beg to advise that we have no record of any carloads of hay carried from Amherst and other stations on the Intercolonial railway in the county of Cumberland to Amherst, N.S., and consigned to Edgar Whidden or C. B. Whidden & iSon in the months of January ajjd February.
According to the return that was brought down on March 27, there was no hay sent to C. B. Whidden or C. Edgar Whidden; yet, the telegram of Edward Fillmore to C. Edgar Whidden. is that he is sending hay and there are no freight charges upon it. Yet, this whitewashing committee, that looked into the books of the Messrs. Whidden, cannot find where a single cent has been charged the farmers for hay. Let us dispose of this thing once and for all. The statement of the Prime Minister is on 'Hansard'to the effect that there was no free transportation, the statement of the Minister of Railways and Canals is there that there was no free transportation of hay over any portion of the Intercolonial railway since the 1st January, 1912, and that there was no rebate or remission of any kind so far as freight rates are concerned. The fact is that the farmers were purchasing their hay from Amherst and other sections, they were paying freight upon it and they were able to get it at as cheap a figure, within fifty cents a ton, as the price at which it wa3 sold through the Conservative party. And the hay got through the Conservative Committee was very inferior. This whole free hay arrangement was a scheme to deceive and mislead the people. It is the old st-ory that, following corruption you will find deception, dishonesty and untruthfulness. When the Minister of Public Works started the thing in the beginning of the campaign by publishing these fake estimates and by seeking to bribe the electors in platoons it was followed by his friends with deception.

dishonesty and untruthfulness and since that time they have floundered until now there is none so poor as to do them reverence in Antigonish county. I would like to direct the attention of the House to the way in which the Minister of Railways and Canals is building railways for Antigonish county.
At six o'clock, House took recess.
After Recess.
House resumed at eight o'clock.


William Chisholm: Before six o'clock I
was referring to the way in which the Conservative party sought to use the question of free transportation of hay over the Intercolonial in order to influence the election that took place. I pointed out that according to the statement of the Minister of Railways in this House there was no free transportation of hay over the Intercolonial railway. Let me refer to the answer made by the Minister of Railways on the 20th of January, 1913, ('Hansard' page 1786) to a question put by my hon. friend from Richmond (Mr. Kyte). Remember this was a few days after the by-election took place in Antigonish:
Mr. Kyte: I desire to ask a question of the hon. the Minister of Railways and Canals. I beg to read the following telegram, which I received on Saturday:
Arichat, N.S., 17th Jan., 1913. f 6. W. Kyte, M.P.,
Ottawa, Ont.
Council directs me to wire to know if free transportation hay Intercolonial railway has been granted.
D. H. Campbell,
Municipal Clerk.
It is desired to know if any arrangement has been made for free transportation of hay on the Intercolonial railway.
Mr. Cochrane:	I have taken the attitude
all along that if anything is done in that respect, it should be done by a special vote, and not by the Intercolonial.
The reason I labour this is to meet the remark made by the hon. member for Annapolis (Mr. Davidson) which would convey the impression that free transportation had been granted on the Intercolonial. To set the matter at rest so far as the farmers of Antigonish county are concerned,
I state that they had to pay for the hay they imported. Let me quote the statement made by the Prime Minister on the 10th of February, 1913-'Hansard' page 3123:
Mi'. Borden:	Before moving the adjournment of the House I wish to give some information to my hon. friend from Antigonish who made inquiry a few days ago with regard to representations to the Government from certain eastern counties of Nova Scotia as to providing free transportation of hay on the Intercolonial railway. The Government have had under consideration representations received from the counties of Antigonish and Guysborough and from the Island of Cape


REVISED
[Stage Direction]
Breton, with regard to the shortage of hay in that district and the advisability of granting free transportation over the Intercolonial railway. It seemed better that any necessary aid should be given not by free transportation but by a money grant so that there would be no discrimination in such cases between portions of Canada served by the Intercolonial railway and those served by other railways. The Government being desirous of doing anything that could reasonably be undertaken for the purpose of aiding the farmers of the district above mentioned made very careful inquiry through the Department of Agriculture and otherwise into the conditions in eastern Nova Scotia and Cape Breton. The result of that inquiry has not established conditions which would justify a special grant. In some counties there was undoubtedly a regrettable shortage in the hay crop, but unless a definite policy of special aid in all cases of crop shortage is to be entered upon there seems no justification for acceding to the requests that have been made for Government assistance in this instance. According to the reports made to the Government the conditions are not nearly so severe and the shortage is not nearly so great as in 1904 and the reports made to the Government indicate that there is a considerable surplus above requirements in the -western part of the provinces ind in New Brunswick.
There is no question in the mind of the Prime Minister as to what the farmers of the eastern section of Nova Scotia and the farmers of Antigonish wanted, namely, free transportation of hay on the Intercolonial. Let me direct attention to the fact that in 1904 when there was a scarcity of hay in eastern Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, hay was carried free of freight charge from the province of Quebec. I also direct attention to the fact that the Prime Minister in making this statement on the 10th of February, 1913, knew that the Minister of Railways had as early as October 12, and even earlier, stated that there should be no free transportation. Let me further call attention to the fact that the Prime Minister kept back this information until the election was over. I stated before six o'clock that on the 15th December in answer to a question of mine as to whether there was, or would be, free transportation or not on the Intercolonial, the minister stated that the matter was under consideration. I should have stated it was on the 12th December, and not on the 15th of December, that the answer was given. The Prime Minister knew, and every member of his Government knew, that they had no intention of allowing free transportation of hay, and what I complain of is the deception that was practiced on the people of eastern Nova Scotia. That is not the worst feature of it. The worst feature of it is found in the fact that certain ministers, not only one but several, should be guilty of such deception and dishonesty. What will the people of

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the country think of our public men; what confidence can they have in our public men when ministers of the Crown will descend to such small tactics for the purpose of furthering their ends. My hon. friend from Annapolis intimated that the people of Antigonish received their hay free of transportation charges. I read a letter from Senator Girroir in which he offers to bet a sum of money that his statements were correct in that regard. He refers also to a certain committee that was appointed, but as to who had the appointment of that committee we are in the dark. Certainly the Farmers' Association did not appoint that committee, and so far as I can see there are no Liberals on it. In order that you may see the desperation of these men, let me quote the report of that committee, composed of the henchmen of Senator Girroir:
Report on Free Transportation of Hay.
We, the undersigned, duly app inted to ascertain whether the hay for farmers, which has been and is now being imported into this county from Amherst and vicinity by C. Edgar Whidden has been and is being imported free of freight charges to farmers of Antigonish county, beg to report as follows:
1. That we have examined all books, vouchers, letters, telegrams, invoices, bills of lading and quotations in the hands of the said C. Edgar Whidden relating to the importation of the said hay, and have ourselves obtained quotations from dealers, and find that all hay so far imported by Mr. Whidden has been sold to farmers at the selling price of said hay in the open market at Amherst and vicinty; and that no freight charges from Amherst and vicinity have either directly or indirectly been charged the farmers on said hay. We further state, that this hay is being bought at the lowest market price at Amherst and vicinity, and is sold to farmers at this price. Farmers not only receive this hay free of freight charges, but pay no commission or charges of any kind for the ordering, handling or distributing of said hay.
We further undertake to see that all hay so imported up to the 15th of March next shall be sold to farmers under the same conditions as above set forth.
Dated at Antigonish, N.S., the 17th day of February, 1913.
J. G. Taylor,
A. D. Chisholm,
D. D. MacDonald,
J. H. Stewart,
H. H. Crerar.
I do not know whether the gentlemen whose names are appended to this report signed it or not, but I do know that after the other notice regarding free transportation arrangements was published in the Casket, the week before the election, with the name of P. S. Floyd, a respectable and prominent citizen of Antigonish, a Liberal, he repudiated it as soon as he had an opportunity of doing so, and stated that he Mr. CHISHOLM (Antigonish).
had not authorized his name to be put to the document. I do not know whether the signatures of these gentlemen, purporting to be genuine, are genuine or not, but in view of the falsification of documents and the liberties taken with the names of citizens of the town and county in connection with this matter, I would not be surprised if some day or other these men would repudiate this report. According to the information that was brought down to this House a few days ago by the Minister of Railways, there was no hay shipped to C. Edgar Whidden. According to the committee's report, there was, but no freight was paid. It is certain, however, that the farmers of the county of Antigonish paid the freight on hay. The Minister of Railways more than once said that there was no free transportation, rebate, or remission of any kind so far as freight was concerned. The farmers have had to pay the freight cn this hay and the attempt of Senator Girroir, his henchmen and the committee which had been appointed by him, to bolster up this weak case of theirs is absolutely futile. There is no question of the fret that the hay that was imported by these people was hay of an inferior quality; in fact it was so bad that a good deal of it was sent back. I would infer from a remark made by the hon. member for Annapolis (Mr. Davidson) that he contends that the farmers of Antigonish county did not pay this freight. I desire to say that the freight was paid by them indirectly. It is true that they did not put their hands in their pockets when they were purchasing the hay and pay the freight upon it. Likely the freight was prepaid; or if not, the hay sent was of a very inferior quality, and the farmers were paying for a third quality when they thought they were getting a better quality. Those who purchased hay outside of the nominee of Senator Girroir and the Tory party, paid freight on it and got it at practically the same price, better hay, than was received through the nominee of the Tories on that occasion.
I wish to refer to another canvass that was made on that occasion, and that is with respect to railway facilities. I had occasion to ask the Minister of Railways during the- session whether he had received any report with regard to the proposed line of railway between Antigonish and Country Harbour, and he replied that he had not. The minister promised me a year ago last February that a survey of that line would be made, but that promise, I regret to say, has not been fulfilled. During the election campaign a man who pretended to have authority for making the statement, appealed to the people to support the Conservative candidate because they had the

assurance that this line of railway would be constructed. Among the numerous campaign documents that were issued was one from which the following is an extract [DOT]
About a year ago, Hon. F. Cochrane, Minister of Railways, on his first visit to Nova Scotia, invited representations and information with respect to proposed railways in the province. Shortly afterwards, I placed myself in communication with the department, and * have had considerable correspondence with him during the past ten months, on the question of branch line from Cape George to Country Harbour, instead of the Sunnybrae route through Pictou county.
I moved for all the correspondence in connection with that matter, and although I have made inquiries from the Department of Railways I can find no correspondence of this nature on the public files. The writer of this document goes on to say that two eminent engineers made a cursory examination of the road. If a report was made by those engineers, I would ask the Minister of Railways, if he were here, why that report is not available. He goes on to say further:
Some there are, who say this promised survey is just now only for election purposes. I can safely assure them, knowing what I do, that it is not, and knowing Hon. Mr. Cochrane as I now do, from lengthy correspondence, I am fully convinced that he is one of the last public men in Canada, who would stoop to any sinister purposes. He is not a man of promises, but if he makes any, he fulfills it.
I would like to know why this lengthy correspondence is not on file.
As early as February 22 last, in a letter to me, which I now hold, he wrote:
I can assure you that the railway interests of the district you refer to, will not be lost sight of.
In a letter dated April 11th last, he wrote:-
I hope to be able to look into the railway situation in Nova Scotia some time during the month of May.
Where is that correspondence? If this man has been corresponding with the minister and has put him in possession of such information as he has alleged, why does that correspondence not appear on the public file, and why do not hon. gentlemen of this House have access to it? I rather think that if such correspondence ever existed it was consigned to the waste-basket, where the minister probably thought it deserved to be plaoed. There are some references to this document which would seem to indicate that the writer was the first person to call the attention of the Government to the necessity for this railway. Let me, however, call your attention to the fact that on more that one occasion -in fact during every session of Parliament since I first had the honour of occupying a seat in this House-I called the
323i
attention of the Government to the necessity for the construction of this road, and I had a promise from the minister that a survey would be made long before the gentleman who wrote this document had made his alleged appeals to the minister.
The object of my amendment is to call the attention of the House and the country to some of t/he political methods, some of the extraordinary actions of the Minister of Public works, which, unless checked, are fraught with great danger to the country. Taking it all in all, there is a sense of political decency, honour and honesty throughout Canada. Here and there occasionally, acts are done, political warfare carried on in an improper and reprehensible manner. But the heart of the people as a whole to-day is sound. It was not always thus. It is not many years since Canadians had to blush for the corruption in this country and the misdeeds in high places. So disgraceful had these things become that the English press, irrespective of party, referred to them as Canada's shame, and a certain respected and honoured clergyman in Canada, one of the leading Canadians of his time, exclaimed in the bitterness of his soul, ' as well defend Sodom as to try to defend these acts of political corruption.' I desire to refer to some of the comments of the English press in this connection. The London Times, speaking of the corruption of these days:
George Henry Bradbury: What is the date?


William Chisholm: This was previous to 1896, before the cleaning up the country got after the Liberal party came into power. I mention this to show hon. gentlemen that we seem to be reverting back to a similar condition of affairs, and, unless there is a change from the conditions connected with the Macdonald, Richelieu and Antigonish elections, we will be back again to the shameful and disgraceful conditions that existed when the English press commented in such denunciatory terms of the state of public and political life in Canada. The London Times said:
Here in the Mother Country there can be
only one feeling, that of deep regret for the wrong done to the fair fame of the eldest of her daughters.	\
The London Graphic said:
It is no longer possible to doubt that corruption in its worst form is rampant in a large portion of the Canadian civil service.
This is from the London Telegraph:
Enough unfortunately is already known in1 England to make it clear that only the most resolute and drastic purification can redeem' public life in Canada from the taint of corruption, the like of which we have not seen in our own country for hundreds of years.
The Graphic Despatch had this to say:

Even Tammany Hall smells sweet and clean in comparison witli the huge stink pot of the Conservative Government.
In Sir Richard Cartwright's memoirs there is a black chapter on Canadian shame, where this matter is fully discussed and commented upon. Making due allowance for the intensity of that distinguished statesman's feelings and his extremely keen sense of honour, every fair-minded man, Conservative as well as Liberal, has to admit with sorrow and regret that what Sir Richard Cartwright wrote was, alas, too true. He was in a position to know; he was a contemporary of the events narrated. His memoirs were not to be published until after death; he had no interest in exaggerating, or minimizing the facts; his statements were in the nature of dying declarations, and they have not been controverted in any material respect. It is with shame and regret, I say, we recognize the truth of the facts of Canadian history, as pictured by him. But there is a brighter side. The exposure of the iniquities perpetrated in the days of Sir John A. Macdonald aroused the public conscience and since then a better and healthier state of public sentiment has been created. Sir Mackenzie Bowell was an honest man; Sir John Thomson had a high sense of public duty and was a man of honour, and honesty. Sir Wilfrid Laurier gave the country an honest administration, and the present Prime Minister of Canada was expected to govern the country honestly. The present Prime Minister had a reputation for honesty and integrity in private life and he was regarded, when he took the reins of office, as a man of high political ideas, with a due sense of political rectitude, who could be depended on to give effect to these, ideas in the administration of public affairs. Unfortunately at the very outset of his career he proved somewhat of a disappointment to the best element of his party and the country generally, when he formed the unholy alliance with the extreme wing, the supposedly disloyal element in our country-the Nationalists of Quebec. In the formation of his Government the people were surprised to find him surrounding himself with the Nationalists from Quebec and another extreme element from the province of Ontario, whose counterpart in the old country, in Ulster, Ireland, openly threatened the Crown but a few months ago. But it is not these conflicting elements, this heterogeneous combination of which I desre to speak. Great as was the surprise of the country at the unholy alliance, there was greater surprise when the present Minister of Public Works and the Minister of Railways were called by the Prime Minister to be among the advisers of the Governor General. What
Mr. CHISHOLM (Antigonish!
qualifications did these men possess that they should be selected over the heads of better men in the ranks of the Conservative party? Everybody will admit that these men in point of ability and intellectual force and attainments were much inferior to members who sit on the other side of the House, whom I might mention. But the stalwarts who fought the battles of their party when they were in Opposition, were passed over, and these outsiders were given the preference. Why was this, people wondered. The explanation of it all is that the Minister of Public Works is skilled in election methods, he has said so himself, he declared that he was a master at winning elections. There is such a thing as Skill in the management of elections that will be the undoing of the party in whose favour such methods are employed, and I venture to predict that the day is not far distant when the Prime Minister will find that such methods as have been adopted by the Minister of Public Works in Macdonald, Richelieu and Antigonish will bring a sad and sorry day for the Conservative party and will be the wreck and ruin of that party in the not distant future.
I regret that I have had to take up so much of the time of the House but I think I have shown you conclusively that the Minister of Public Works, in sending that letter, was guilty of a breach of the privileges of this House. I say that no minister should be permitted to divulge the estimates in advance, to make public a document of a secret character such as this before it is submitted to Parliament. I submit that in doing so he violated the rights and privileges of this House. His conduct in writing that letter, by his secretary, and stating that there were certain estimates for Antigonish county when, as a matter of fact, the main estimates had not been prepared and the supplementary had not been under consideration, was, besides being untrue, a breach of faith 'towards his colleagues and a violation of his o'ath as a privy councillor. I have read that oath, I have quoted to you what the authorities say on the duties of a privy councillor. There is no doubt that a cabinet minister is not permitted to disclose what has taken place in council. In giving any information about what was contained in the estimates, or would be, he was guilty of a breach of faith towards his colleagues and violating his duty as a privy councillor. His conduct in offering to the electors of Antigonish public works if they delivered the goods is conduct that will pieet with the disapproval of every man in this House and out of it. At the very inception of this whole matter there was an unlawful bargain made between the

Prime Minister of Canada and the appointee to the Senate whose elevation caused the vacancy in the legislature that brought on the election. It is no secret that Senator Girroir could not have got his appointment as a Senator had there not been given to the Prime Minister an assurance that the county of Antigonish would return a supporter of the Opposition in the local Legislature. I say that a contract of that kind is corrupt and dishonest and should meet with the disapproval of every right thinking man in this House and outside of it.


Hon. ROBERT ROGERS (Minister of Public Works):: If the hon. gentleman is
entitled to nothing else, he is at least entitled to congratulation upon his own patience with himself. For months this House has been threatened with the attack which has just been made by the hon. member for Antigonish (Mr. Chisholm). We have listened, as we were bound to listen, for upwards of two hours to-day to my hon. friend, and as far as I can judge the only thing that he has been able to accomplish is to reflect upon the honour, the honesty and the intelligence of the electors of the county who have done him the honour of sending him to this Parliament to represent them. He accuses me of having caused a letter to be written which he claims to have had the effect of purchasing, almost holus bolus, his honest electors in Antigonish in a by-election a few months ago.


William Chisholm: I said no such thing.
I said there was an attempt but I distinctly stated that the people of Antigonish could not be bought.


Robert Rogers: I can assure my hon.
friend in the first place that he is very much mistaken. I have a great deal too much confidence in the honour and in the honesty and in the intelligence of the citizens of that constituency to venture to believe or to think that either a letter from myself or any action upon my part or upon the part of any other individual in this Dominion of Canada would have the effect of purchasing any individual within the borders of that intelligent constituency of Antigonish. In the second place, let me say to my hon. friend that the letter, which he accuses me of having had distributed in this constituency was, I understand, written upon the 28th day of December, when I was in the city of Winnipeg, endeavouring to enjoy my Christmas holidays. I had no knowledge of any kind or description that any such letter had been written, and no knowledge so far as requests from Senator Girroir or any other person were concerned, that a by-election was taking place in the county represented by my hon. friend.
Now let me explain and make clear to the House what did happen. For some time
previous, Senator Girroir had been taking an interest in the welfare of the constituency in which he lived. He had appealed to the officers of the Department of Public Works, he had appealed to my predecessor in office and had pointed out to him the necessity that, in his opinion, existed for the expenditure of a certain amount of public money in the public interest in that particular locality. He had succeeded in persuading my predecessor in office and the officers of the department that his requests were, at all events, entitled to serious consideration, and to this extent, Mr. Speaker, he succeeded in having placed in that department certain items to be noted for consideration when the estimates came up. In view of the several requests which he had made in this form, it appears that he addressed to myself a letter, which arrived at the department at a time when I was in the city of Winnipeg, and it was answered by my secretary. In the light of the knowledge which my secretary had of the circumstances, of the fact that Senator Girroir had been interesting himself in securing, if he possibly could, necessary public works in that particular locality and that Senator Girroir had full knowledge of the manner in which those estimates were considered and provided for from time to time-in view of these circumstances Mr. Speaker, I claim that my secretary was quite justified in writing the letter which he addressed to Senator Girroir. But he was careful to attach to that letter a statement of the amount that Senator Girroir had asked to be placed in the estimates for the carrying on of necessary public works in the constituency, for he headed his statement in the following words:
List of Amounts ifor Antigonish county, Nova Scotia, noted for the estimates of 1913-14.
That is apparently all that my hon. friend has to complain of. It is true, Sir, that he undertakes to complain that a certain mutilation of this statement took place in a certain newspaper in the constituency which he represents. But, Mr. Speaker, I am at a loss to know now whether or not my hon. friend from Antigonish accuses the editor of that newspaper in his constituency of being the individual guilty of the mutilation of that statement. In that respect he has not made himself clear to this House, and I am sure he will not make his statement clear to the editor of that newspaper. I do not know whether I am to understand from his remarks this afternoon that he objects to the items which Senator Girroir was successful in having noted for consideration in the supplementary estimates that are to be brought down to this House at a later date.


William Chisholm: I said distinctly that
I approved of them.

1G22S


Robert Rogers: I did not understand my hon. friend to make it clear whether or not he desires this expenditure of public money in the constituency which he represents. Let me say to my hon. friend that it was only on Saturday last that, as Minister of Public Works, I had the time and opportunity to give any consideration to the items which were noted for the supplementary estimates in respect to the constituency of Antigonish, and if may hon. friend would take the responsibility, in line with his arguments to-day, of saying that he does not want this money spent in that locality, he might influence me in my recommendation to this House with respect to what Senator Girroir suggested should be expended in the public interest in this particular locality.


William Chisholm: I stated distinctly
that you owed it to yourself, to the Government, and to the reputation of Senator Girroir that you should have those items in the supplementary ' estimates. They would form an antidote to the poison which was contained in the cup. of humilitation that the Tories of Antigonish had to drink when that letter was published.


Robert Rogers: I am glad to get a definite statement, at all events, from my hon. friend in respect to his desire that some money, at least, should be spent in his particular constituency. I do not know, however, that his arguments and his misrepresentation of the actual facts will assist him in getting for his constituency the full benefit that the public necessities of that portion of the Dominion deserve. I want to say to my hon. friend in a word, because I do not propose to occupy more than a minute or two of the time of this House in replying to the rambling statement which he undertook to make this afternoon, that when the next election takes place in that constituency in my opinion it will not be necessary for the Prime Minister, or the Minister of Railways, or myself, to write any letter, or to give any consideration to the freight upon hay, or to anything else in that locali-ity, for all that will be necessary will be for the Conservative candidate, whoever he may be, to -take the speech delivered by my hon. friend this afternoon and place it in the hands of every intelligent elector in that constituency. They will find in that speech a reflection upon their honour and upon their honesty by the man whom they sent to this Parliament as their trusted representative. And I believe that speech will be sufficient to assure the election of a Conservative candidate, who will follow in the footsteps of Senator Girroir and come down to this Parliament seized of his responsibilities, seized of his duties to the constituency, and will present as best he can their claims for the carrying on of certain public works Mr. CHISHOLM (Antigonish).
in that constituency in a manner that will be creditable to the Government and satisfactory to the electors. My hon. friend who has gone very wide of the amendment which he has proposed and has undertaken to deal with certain conditions with respect to the freight upon hay as dealt with by the Minister of Railways and Canals. He goes to the length of accusing the Prime Minister of being guilty of dishonesty in this matter in order that it might affect the result of a byj-election in Nova Scotia. I think, Sir, that the argument of the hon. gentleman is so ridiculous, if argument he did make, that it needs no answer from me. I am free to confess that after having listened to him as attentively as I could, I do not know now whether he was complaining that the farmers of Antigonish county were successful in getting hay at free rates over the Intercolonial railway. The remarks of my hon. friend were so mixed and disconnected that I am at a loss to know now what was his complaint in this regard as against the Prime Minister and the Minister of Railways. I am convinced that neither the Prime Minister nor the Minister of Railways made any statement in connection with the matter that was pot in keeping with the dignity of their position, with the dignity and the rules of this Parliament, and in accordance with their duty as representatives of the people of Canada. I am surprised that my hon. friend should have occupied the time of the House in presenting here "the very simple matter which he has presented and which has already been answered in this Parliament, I am sure to the satisfaction of every hon. member. The facts are as I have stated: That the letter which my hon. friend complains of was simply written to Senator Girroir, who had undertaken to have placed in the estimates, if he possibly could, certain items which he desired to have considered in connection with the expenditure of certain public money in the public interest in that particular constituency. And in doing so, Senator Girroir, in my opinion, was fulfilling a service to that constituency and to that locality, and deserved well of the people there. And we have here to-day the spectacle of the man who was elected as the representative of that constituency coming forward in his own simple form and endeavouring to reflect upon the honour and upon the honesty of those who entrusted him with their confidence and sent him to this Parliament to look after their best interests and to see that their constituency should receive its full share of public money in order that it might have the same measure of prosperity in the development of its industrial life that should come to every constituency within the

borders of this Dominion of Canada. I will only add that I am satisfied that when the speech of my hon. friend is read by his constituents it will meet the same fate as the amendment in this Parliament, that of being turned down by every intelligent hearer who gives consideration to the simple and very disconnected manner in which he has ventured to occupy the time of this House for over two hours.


Mr. D. D. McKENZIE (North Cape Breton and Victoria):: The hon. member for
Antigonish (Mr. Chisnolm) in my opinion has made out a very strong case against the Minister of Public Works, and, so far as I can understand the answer of the minister, it is an absolutely undefended case. I see opposite me quite a number of able advocates, men who are accustomed to defending cases in the courts, particularly in the criminal courts- as this is to some extent a quasi-criminal charge, and I submit to them that I do speak it truly when I say that if this case were before a judge and jury in view of the evidence that was put forward by the hon. member for Antigonish and of the answer or statement of the minister himself, the judge would have to tell the jury that the case was not defended at all and that there was nothing left for them to do but to give a verdict of guilty upon the facts as represented to them. The form and substance of the statement of the Minister of Public Works is that in any county in Canada in which there is an election pending it is perfectly open to any minister of the Crown, months. and months before the estimates are prepared and long before they are sanctioned by the Governor General, to make copies of them and send them broadcast throughout the constituency to tell the electors that this is what the county is going to get, this is what we are going to do for you, and this is what we are going to do for you particularly if you vote for our candidate. That is the case presented as a defence by a gentleman of the experience and standing in this country of this minister of the Crown. I submit to any minister of the Crown here that this offer of money to be expended in the constituency in a particular way so that it will go into the pockets of the people, is as much bribery in the eyes of the law, just as corrupt as if the_ minister had gone from house to house giving the money into ..the people's hands. I ask the Minister of Public Works as a man of experience in the affairs of the world, particularly of experience as he boasts himself in the winning of elections, what was this letter published for? That is what we ask. What did Senator Girroir ask the letter for? And I ask, why was not Senator Girroir's letter produced? If this is an open-minded honest statement made to the public, why are we
not given a knowledge of the communication that Senator Girroir sent to the minister? That would be illuminating, I am sure, and we would know whether things really are as they are attempted to be made appear in this connection. That letter is suppressed. There may be nothing in it, but so far it has not been given to the public. The minister says that this letter was published in good faith. We are not in ignorance of wliat took place around this House and around the office of the minister before Parliament rose at Christmas, when he went off on his joyous trip to Winnipeg. He knows that the Opposition in the local legislature of Nova Scotia was here, he knows that every local member supporting the Opposition was here, he knows that they called upon him one by one, or together, and put to him the great necessity of carrying this by-election in Antigonish at all costs.


Robert Rogers: The hon. gentleman is
entirely in error. I do not recollect any non. gentleman mentioning the by-election that took place.


William Chisholm: They saw Buskard.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: They saw this Gilpin
Homer, who was in his office, and, if my hon. friend read Scott's Lay of the Last Minstrel, he will find out who this Gilpin Horner was. He was a man who could be blamed for everything. If they did not see the minister


John Hampden Burnham: That is a romance.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: If I am romancing, I have only to go for happy fellowship across the way. That is the condition of things. Before the election the whole outfit of the Opposition came up here, got the sinews of war in shape and the way it was arranged with the minister was that Senator Girroir was to go home to Nova Scotia and there write a letter.


Robert Rogers: I absolutely deny that
statement.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: Gilpin Homer again;
blame him for it. If you charge the hon. Minister of Public Works with a'violation of any of the Ten Commandments, he will get up and say: I absolutely deny it from start to finish. But there is such a thing as exhausting these denials. They are getting very stale now.


Robert Rogers: They are not as stale as your charges.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: This is a synchronism, ft is a well known fact to many hon. mem->ers of this House that no action can be. and never was, taken on the estimates until they have finally passed and the House pro-

rogues. Instructions then go to the officers of the Government in different parts of tne country to put into execution the votes that are passed. That is the course which tiie minister should have taken when he received that letter, or that it is the course that should have been taken by his secretary. If his secretary wanted to act in a straight, honest and above-board fashion, he would have written a letter acknowledging the receipt of the letter which had come to him and he should have told Senator Girroir that the minister was out of the city, that he was away on his Christmas holidays, that he would be back in due time and that he would lay the senator's letter before him. That is what an honest business-like above-board officer would have done with Senator Girroir's letter. But it was found that this would not do, that there was haste necessary, that the business would not wait, that there was a by-eleotion to be run in Antigonish and that to give the information when the minister came back would not answer the purpose of their friends in that county. Therefore, this letter went out, a letter which had no business to go out.
Will the Minister dare to say that there is any justification for any minister under the Crown to give any information of this character? The only message that comes into this House, when we are all standing up solemnly, and with bared heads, is the message which we receive from the representative of the King transmitting the Estimates. It is on such an occasion as this that this act of solemnity is performed. But we have a minister of the Crown who cares nothing about these solemnities, who cares nothing about the dignity which hitherto has surrounded occasions of this kind but who will write a letter and place in that letter the estimates which are to he and send them broadcast for the purpose of corrupting the people of this country. An attempt has been made to throw back, in reference to my hon. friend from Antigonish, that he is casting a reflection upon his people because, forsooth, this effort has been made. Is that any reflection upon the good people of Antigonish? On the contrary, the Minister of Public Works did not understand the kind of people they were. Is it any credit to him that the bait was not swallowed in the county of Antigonish? He did everything he could and he now tries to frighten the hon. member for Antigonish by saying that:	When the next election comes on
we will publish your speech and -tell the people that you thought they could be bought. My hon. friend from Antigonish said nothing'of the kind. He is not the man who thought they could be bought, but the men who thought they could be bought were the minister and his Senator who went and placed this bait before them.
Mr. McKEINZIE
If, I repeat, there is one thing more than another that should be respected in this country, it is the judgment that people are to give through the medium of the ballot box. Men should go to the ballot box unprejudiced and willing to pass judgment upon the record of the party that is on trial. 1 submit that no action of this Government was on trial in the Antigonish election, that the Minister of Public Works had no business to interfere in that election, neither was the Government on trial, but the conduct of another -government altogether apart from this Government was placed before the people, and they were called upon to pass judgment upon it. The electors of Antigonish were the jurors who were to pass judgment upon the conduct of the Government of the province of Nova Scotia and what think you, Sir, of this Government, and what think you of a Minister of Public Works who would be willing to stuff the pockets of the jury with his money in order that they might -bring in a false verdict? That is the position in which he stands and that is the position in which those behind him stand who sneer and laugh at the idea that there was anything wrong in going to the people of Antigonish with something like $200,000 of money and saying to them: vote for O'Brien and you will get this money, but if you do not vote for O'Brien, if you dare to open your mouths against this conduct of promising this money, I will see to it that you will not get it. That is giving us a fair sample of what we were talking about in this House for some weeks -the use to which the Road Act is to be put by the hon. the Minister of Railways and Canals (Mr. Cochrane), and the use that the agricultural subsidy Act is to be put by the hon. the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Burrell). When a man in any province expresses an honest, fearless opinion he will be told: You are not going to allow this money to be spent in your province, you do not want the money, and therefore you must shut your mouth and say nothing.


Martin Burrell: Mr. Speaker, I rise to
a point of order. My hon. friend is using language that he is absolutely unjustified in using. He has stated that the use that I will make of the money voted for the promotion of agriculture will be that I will withhold it unless -certain things are done in a constituency. I submit, Mr. Speaker, that that is an offensive expression.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: I did not say anything of the kind. T said we had a fair sample, in a speech of the hon. the Minister of Public Works to-night, of what would happen if a man from any county or province would dare to express an independent opinion about the expenditure in his county or province. He would be threatened that he

would be demolished by the people of that county or province if he dared to do so.


Mr. SPEAKER:: The hon. member is
giving a very plain illustration, but I am not sure that the point of order is well taken; I think the language used by the hon. member can properly be used.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: I rather think it is
more or less beneath the dignity of a member of the Canadian House of Lords, that he should go around looking after affairs of this kind or trying to corrupt the electors in any part of the Dominion. We are told that the functions of a senator should be higher than that of a party hack; we are led to believe a senator is on a high plane where he is to hold evenly the balance between different opinions in this House and carry out what may be regarded as best for the country generally. But I find that Senator Girror does not regard himself in that light. I have nere a manifesto, a manifesto mind you, issued by that gentleman on the 20th December, 1912, asking the support of the people of Antigonish for his candidate in this provincial election. Among other things he says:
A vote for John S. O'Brien will be an expression of confidence in the Government of the day at Ottawa.
By what circumlocution can a vote one way or the other upon the conduct of the Murray Government in Nova Scotia be a vote of confidence or non-confidence in the Ottawa Government ? He says further:
A vote for Mr. O'Brien will strengthen my hand in my endeavor on your behalf.
Well, the meaning of that is: If you vote for Mr. O'Brien, you will get $3,000 for Arisaig; if you vote for Mr. O'Brien, you will get $2,500 for Bayfield; if you vote for Mr. O'Brien, you will get $8,200 for Blue Rock; if you vote for Mr. O'Brien, you will get $1,400 for Breen's Pond; if you vote for Mr. O'Brien, you will get $1,000 for Harbour au Boucher; if you vote for Mr. O'Brien you will get $800 for Malignant Cove; if you vote for Mr. O'Brien you will get $15,000 for Crib-bons Point; if you vote for Mr. O'Brien you will get $14,700 for Delorey's Beach; if you vote for	Mr.	O'Brien	you will get	another $4,000	for	Malignant Cove; if	youvote for Mr. O'Brien you will get $1,700 for McArra's Brook; if you vote for Mr. O'Brien you will get $5,500 for McNair's Cove; if you vote for Mr. O'Brien you will get $2,800 for Ogdens Pond; if you vote for Mr. O'Brien	you	will get	$3,000 for SouthLakevale; if	you	vote for	Mr. O'Brien	you
will get $15,000 for Auld's Cove; if you vote for Mr. O'Brien you will get $27,000 for Tracadie Harbour; if you vote for Mr. O'Brien you will get $1,200 for Harbour-au Boucher; if you vote for Mr. O'Brien you
will get another $14,500 for Breen's Pond; if you vote for Mr. O'Brien you will get $90,000 for a new wharf at Georgeville. And then, to wind up, if you vote for Mr. O'Brien there will also be placed in the general vote for dredging, amounts for Lakevale and Bayfield and an amount to repair the old wharf at Georgeville. Georgeville is a country place where there is not much shipping and true there is an old wharf there, but if you vote for O'Brien we will repair the old wharf and build a new wharf at a cost $90,000 so that you may be able to distinguish the difference between the two. The practice generally is to vote a lump sum for each province for dredging, but in this case the minister through his agent told the people of Antigonish that the usual practice was to be departed from and that there was to be a special vote for dredging in that county. You will see, therefore, what was meant by Senator Girroir' when he wrote this letter on the 27th of December, which was sent to every elector in the county. I would haVe no fault to find if these estimates eame out in the-proper way, but I characterize it as robbery of the darkest and most high-handed character in a political sense to publish these estimates at that time. The minister tells us now that he had not considered them; they certainly were not before council at the time, and possibly some of them have not gone before Council yet. I understand that matters of this kind first go before the department, whence they are sent to the Minister of Finance, who puts them down, and finally they get to council where they are carved further and until they are laid on the table of the House nobody can tell what money it is intended to expend. That is the proper way; that is the way it ought to be; that is the way it used to be both under Conservatives and Liberals until a new chapter has been introduced into the political history of this country by a minister who wants to win elections no matter what it may cost. It is the Minister of Elections and not the Minister of Public Works who has charge of this now, and as minister of winning elections he is not to be circumscribed. Trivialities are not to interfere with him in the slightest, and this false information could go to the country to enable him to win an election whether it is right or wrong. I submit, Mr. Speaker, there is no justification for conduct of this kind, and I put the question again: what was the purpose of this announcement in the midst of an election; why was there not decency enough to wait until the election was over? If the secretary wanted an excuse he had a very good one in the fact that his minister was away, and he could say that he had no authority from the minister to make this publication. But the

whole thing was arranged, and the minister does not say for one moment that his secretary was not justified in carrying out the course that was laid down for him, possibly before the minister left Ottawa. I believe the minister said he did not do it although I am not perfectly clear whether he said there was no communication between himself and his clerk in regard to the matter before he left. If he said so, I am, of course, bound to accept his assertion, but I do submit that it is extraordinary conduct on the part of- any clerk to take the responsibility of making such a radical departure from constitutional usage in respect to the expenditure of moneys, one of the most important functions of the Government. The fact that he has done this and that he still holds his position, and, apparently, the confidence of the minister, is sufficient to show "that he did what the minister wanted him to do, and that in the course which he took he had the full concurrence of the head of the department.
So far as the question of free freight is concerned, the minister undertakes to justify and defend the course taken by those of his party who were interested. I cannot understand how anyone can put any construction upon the actions of certain individuals in that regard but bribery of the darkest kind. The people of Antigonish are, perhaps, incapable of being bribed, but evidently the Tory party did not understand it in that way. They were told by Mr. Girroir in his manifesto:	Every vote for
Mr. O'Brien helps me in my endeavours on your behalf. He was endeavouring to get free hay and free freight; in the public press he offered to bet two hundred dollars that he would prove something which nobody could understand. In the midst of an election, what does an offer of free hay and free freight mean? Hon. gentlemen of this House who are familiar with the conducting of elections know that the offer of money or of any valuable consideration is a violation of the Election Act and an indictable offence. To offer a man free freight and free hay is not an offer of money, but certainly it is the offer of a valuable consideration. The senator, as representing the Conservative party in the county of Antigonish, offered a valuable consideration in the shape of a promise of free freight, and, at other times, free hay. The Minister of Public Works stood in his place to-night and said that that was absolutely correct; there was nothing wrong about that. He fully approved of the conduct of the senator in doing that; it was just exactly what he had a right to do.


Robert Rogers: I said nothing of the
kind. The hon. gentleman is absolutely mistaken; he is entirely misquoting me.
Mr. McKEflNTZIE.
Mr. McKEiNZIE: Perhaps my knowledge of the English language is too limited to permit me to understand the remarks of the hon. minister. The Scripture says: ' He that is not with me is against me.' My hon. friend has a wide knowledge of the Scripture, I am sure, and he will realize that he comes within that category as far as the circumstances connected with this matter are concerned. Certainly he was not against Senator Girroir in the language used by that gentleman and the canvass made by him with regard to free freight and free bay. The hon. minister defended the Minister of Railways and the First Minister for any part they may have taken in the matter, saying, as I understood him, that there was nothing in their actions with which anybody could find fault; and he even went so far as to say that the member for Antigonish (Mr. Chisholm) was deserving of rebuke for having brought the matter up at all. On the one hand in the midst of an election, the people were being offered free hay and free freight, and on the other hand they were being solicited for their votes; it is quite unnecessary to ask hon. gentleman whether or not that was a proper line of conduct, especially at such a time. Every hon. gentleman knows that any decision obtained from an elector after his having been offered a bribe of this kind would not be the expression of a straightforward and unbiased opinion. His opinions might not have been entirely overcome by the offering of this inducement, but the attempt was bad, whether there was fruit from it or not.
The hon. minister says that the letter which appears in the Casket was mutilated, twisted and practically forged from the time it left the hands of his secretary until it was published in that newspaper in the town of Antigonish. I submit to the minister that the letter was not mutilated by the Casket. The Casket is a paper of the very highest reputation in the province of Nova Scotia for truthfulness, integrity and honesty. It is a religious or church paper, and really takes no part in polities. What purpose would the editor of the Casket have in mutilating this letter? The Casket did not take any part in the election; this letter appeared in its columns simply because it was paid for as an advertisement. I ask any hon. gentleman who has had experience in .the weighing of evidence to consider the probability of this letter having been mutilated. The minister says it was changed in such a way as to make it more favourable to those who would benefit by its publication in the county of Antigonish.


John Hampden Burnham: If there had been a
Liberal on that newspaper who wanted to put a Conservative in a hole, he would have been glad to drop a line out of the letter. That would be quite likely to happen.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: When it comes to the matter of dealing with Tories getting in or out of holes,-I shall not take issue with my hon. friend. It was in the interests of Senator Girroir and the Tory party that these moneys were being placed in the estimates, should be published and circulated. The heading that was on the list showed that these amounts were noted for the estimates; it did not say they were to be placed in the estimates. That did not mean anything at all; the minister might not put them in the estimates, but when the heading was changed to indicate that the amounts were to be placed in the estimates, it was a different proposition altogether. If anyone were to go to the electors with this letter, and say:	The
minister tells me that he will consider the amounts I submitted to him; he has taken a note of them; that is one thing. But when he goes to the electors and says:	Here is a letter
from the minister in which he says that he puts these amounts in the estimates, that is a different proposition.
Mr. ROGER6:	That is the same question I asked the hon. member for Antigonish but I got no answer.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: Now,	whose interest
was it to change that letter? Every body will say it was the interest of those who were using 't as a political engine in the county of Antigonish to change it. That reputable paper the Casket, which was earning money publishing it at so much a word or so much a line, why should they change it? I ask hon. gentlemen on the other side who committed this mutilation, this criminal, rascally mutilation, which the Minister of Public Works says took place between the time the letter left his possession and the time it appeared in that reputable paper the Casket?


Robert Rogers: I did not say the paper was mutilated; I was taking the word of my hon. friend from Antigonish. I knew nothing about it and asked him who he thought was doing this thing.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: Putting the best construction upon his words the minister says that if the letter reads as it appears in the Casket, that is not the way it left his hands. If the change was made in it, it was mutilation, it was rascally, criminal mutilation. And I submit that it was not the Casket or anybody about it that made this mutilation. It is stated here
to-day and cannot be contradicted, that the Casket received that letter from Senator Girroir. Perhaps Senator Girroir was imposed upon. Perhaps he has a secretary, a typewriter in his office who could be blamed for this change. Then we should be thrown back upon some other Gilpin Horner, upon whom the blame could be thrown, and Senator Girroir could get out of his responsibility for this mutilation. But I submit that the fact is that the mutilation took place, and this letter, this kindly note sent by the minister to his friend Senator Girroir, simply reminding him, giving him a note of the things he handed in. Did anybody ever hear of anything more absurd? Senator Girroir was here while the House was sitting, he was back and forth compiling all these statements. He made a note of it. At least he writes:	I forgot
what I have been talking about, and would be obliged if you would send a statement of the things I spoke about. Is that ordinary common sense that would appeal to any person? Senator Girroir was back in Antigonish county. It is not a large county. All these expenditures are within a small circle. The hon. member for Antigonish told us that these expenditures represented over $80 for every vote cast in that election and $16 for every person in the county. That is most extraordinary. I do not say that such may not be necessary. If this is the pace the minister has set for himself, if he is to do the same for the maritime provinces, then even big as his surplus is, I think he will find that he has undertaken more than he can perform. If there is no justification for these expenditures then the blame is thrown upon Senator Girroir, and we have no opportunity of explanation from him. Every part of this case goes to show that this is simply a huge Tory corruption fund and system of trickery with the view of the winning of elections. The country had better look out for the Minister of Public Works, the Minister of Railways and possibly the Prime Minister. If these gentlemen are now prepared to go to this length in a by-election which does not affect their stability in this House no matter what way it goes, I ask the country to look out for tornadoes when their seats are in jeopardy, and the result of an election will be to turn them out or keep them in office. That is the time when we can look out for the breach of every rule, for setting aside all the amenities of public life. And if the people of this country are capable of being corrupted, these attempts are to be made to break them away from honest rule and the proper exercise of the franchise which will make this Parliament not the true voice of the people but the voice of the moneybags, and of the cor-

rupting influence of the minister whose particular business it is to win elections regardless of the means by which they are won.
Mr. A. DE WITT FOSTER (Kings, N.S.: It is not often I ask the indulgence of this House, and I can assure hon. members that I do not intend to weary them by any extended remarks. I am very glad, as, the youngest member of Parliament, to say that I listened and do listen always with great pleasure to the remarks of hon. gentlemen opposite. Apart from venturing to ask a question now and then with a view solely to get information and without the idea of being discourteous to any hon. gentleman, I have respected as I have said the time and feelings of the members of this House. I have listened to the hon. member North Cape Breton and Victoria (Mr. McKenzie) when I think, if I may be permitted to say so, he has done far more justice to the debate than he has done this evening. I may even go further and say that his speech to-night is perhaps the poorest, in my judgment, he has ever attempted in this House. I am sure he will pardon me if I do not follow him in the various ramblings of his speech. But, at the outset he spoke of this case as being one, which had it been brought before any court the judge would have pronounced as proven at once. I submit to any fair-minded member of this House that had the judge been any other than judge D. D. McKenzie, now the member for North Cape Breton, that judge would immedately have dismissed the action.


Mr. BEATTIE:: With costs.


Arthur de Witt Foster: Yes, with costs. On every occasion when a point of law is in question in this House, the hon. member for North Cape Breton seems to be obsessed with a desire to give the House and country in detail his definition of what the law really is. If it was a question of constitutional law or international law upon which we might expect such able men as Sir Allen Aylesworth of the late Parliament or the present leader of this House, to give an opinion that would be a weighty opinion before the Privy Council, we find the hon. member for North Cape Breton plunging head first into the question and giving his version to the House and country as being absolutely final in every detail. It has become somewhat wearisome, but I suppose that is one of the least objectionable features that this House has to put up with from the hon. gentleman until the next general election. The hon. gentleman next came to the point of the denial of the Minister of Public Works and said that the denials of that hon. gentleman were getting rather stale. I suppose
Mr. MoKENZIE.
he would deny that he owed his first seat in this Parliament to the fact that by a technicality in law he stole the election from John McCormick. I suppose he would deny the statement that at his next election some one hundred and ten fishery guardians whom he had succeeded in appointing worked day and night to secure his election.
Mr. MoKENZIE:	I am not aware that
my conduct in any election is before the House.


Arthur de Witt Foster: He denies it in another
fashion. On each and every occasion when a matter has been placed before this House, even on sworn testimony, submitted before a court of law, which proved the case, submitted by the hon. member for Annapolis, we find the same member from North Cape Breton denying the whole thing. I suppose he will deny that again? He does not deny that, because I could refer him to the evidence.
Mr. MoKENZIE: I take it that this is your defence of the minister.


Arthur de Witt Foster: I am coming to the defence of the minister. I want to give the member for Cape Breton a little pen picture of himself. He reads a homily upon the virtue and the great morality he possesses, the wonderful purity characteristics he has in running elections; and yet we find in his own constituency in the last election, according to the evidence submitted to the House, two hundred dollars was paid for rum and liquor in order to ensure him his seat in this House. Yet he seems obsessed with the idea of purity, of absence of corruption and attributes all corruption to hon. gentlemen on this side. I might bring the rascality a little nearer home and I will tell him that the very man responsible for having paid that money was his own law partner. It is nice to have a Gilpin Horner handy so that you can lay the blame on him. He talks about bribery in elections, about it being bribery to publish a card in the riding, wherein certain things are promised. In the card of the hon. member fo.r Pictou (Mr. Macdonald) in the last election, what do you find ? He recited every appropriation that had been granted in his county while he represented it, upwards of $1,000,000, and his friends urged the people both in private and public canvass: Elect him and when the Government is returned he will be taken into the Cabinet, he will be one of the ministers and he can get you all sorts of things. Bribery at election? Promising to constituencies certain things? If the hon. gentleman is so fond of purity he had better purify a lew on his side. Charity begins at home, let him commence there. He talks about expenditure of public money. I have not under my

hand at the moment, but I will get for the House at a later time, the name of a certain gentleman in the riding of North Cape Breton who was under some little difficulty in regard to trading with Montreal and other ports by virtue of the fact that freight rates were not as low to him as to his competitors on either side. So we find the late Government building a wharf eighty or one hundred feet long in order that this man's store might be served and the rate equalized as between him and the other points.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: We are entitled to the name of the gentleman so favoured.


Arthur de Witt Foster: I said I would be delighted to give the name later. He does not deny that.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: I certainly do; there
was never such a thing in the world and I challenge the member to produce any such evidence. He has not got it.


Arthur de Witt Foster: I told him he would deny
it. The fact remains that the wharf is there.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: The hon. member
should accept the denial.


Arthur de Witt Foster: Yes, I accept it. Then
there is the question of the manifesto which was issued by Senator Girroir. Where was that copy prepared and by whom? I am not sure that this House is entitled to accept the mere statement that that was prepared by Senator Girroir.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: It bears his signature.


Arthur de Witt Foster: It may bear his signature and yet there have been occasions in Nova Scotia where signatures have been attached to documents without necessarily showing that the man had signed them.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: The minister will not deny that he signed this.


Arthur de Witt Foster: He spoke of a bet in the paper but he did not tell the House to what bet he referred. I would ask if he referred to the offer of a reward of $200 referred to by the hon. member for Antigonish.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: I saw the letter in the Casket offering the reward or making the bet, that was what I had reference to, the senator s letter in the Casket.


Arthur de Witt Foster: As a member of Parliament and an ex-judge, perhaps the hon. member will say whether he considers that an offer of a reward and a bet are one and the same thing.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: It calls it a bet, that he will bet is what he says.


Arthur de Witt Foster: I must again leave the
hon. gentleman to his construction of English. The hon. member stated that the Minister of Public Works said that the Casket had mutilated the letter. I submit that the Minister of Public Works did not say anything of the kind, he said absolutely nothing to the effect that the editor of the Casket had mutilated that letter in any respect, and the hon. member for North Cape Breton knew when he uttered those words to the House that the Minister of Public Works had not made such a statement.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: I made no such statement. The minister said that the letter was mutilated when it appeared in the Casket, and he did not say who did it. There are only two parties-


Arthur de Witt Foster: I said that the minister had said absolutely nothing of the sort. He did not say that the letter was mutilated when it appeared in the Casket, he said he did not know anything about it; all he knew about it was the letter that left his secretary's office and the letter that was produced here in this House were correct. On that point let me say that the hon. member for Antigonish made a great fuss in this House. In loud words and insinuating language he dwelt upon the point that the letter was multi-lated when it appeared in the Casket. Even the hon. member for Antigonish would not go so far as to charge Senator Girroir with the mutilation of that letter. The hon. member for North Cape Breton (Mr.^ McKenzie) when he came to deal with it said there was absolute proof that Senator Girroir delivered the letter to the Antigonish Casket. Where is his proof of that statement? As a matter of fact the hon. member for Antigonish himself saw the letter before it went to the Antigonish Casket and he saw the word ' noted ' at the top. He admitted it here to-day. He knew there was no misrepresentation whatever and the fact that the word 'placed' appeared in the paper instead of the word 'noted' might have been due to a typographical error. The hon. Senator would never think of doing anything like that and there is not a scintilla of evidence to show he did. The hon. member for Antigonish has to correct statements in the press now and again but in de 1-ing with a subject of this sort, it would never occur to him to be fair. His partisanship must express itself, even to the extent of casting insinuation and slurs upon an hon member of the Senate. The hon. member for Antigonish was very careful this afternoon not to say where the mutilation began, but inadvertently I think he made it clear that the mutilation, if such there was, took place in the office of the Casket. I think that is the plain conclusion to be drawn from the hon. gentleman's argument. No doubt he did not wish the country to get that impression, and I think a careful perusal

of his language will show that that is the only fair conclusion from his argument. The hon. member for North Cape Breton says that the senator should have relied upon his memory in regard to the transaction, that as a member of the Senate he went to the minister now and again and discussed the matter with the minister, and that when he went back to his constituency he should have remembered the details and not have asked for a statement in regard to the various works under consideration. Let me go over the facts of the case. Previous to the election we had the hon. member for Antigon-ish going over to the Department of Public Works and endeavouring to find out if any representations had been made in the interests of the county which he represents. How do I know that? That statement was made by the Hon. John Corbett, a member of the Nova Scotia legislature, at a particular place in the county of Antigonish, and afterwards repeated by my hon. friend for Antigonish himself. My hon. friend was not satisfied with that. Before going down to his county he started out to see if he could find whether Senator Girroir had neglected the county which my hon. friend is supposed to represent, and whose interests he is supposed to guard above those of any other community. He went [DOT] down to the county and one of the forms of canvass which he undertook was that the Conservative party would not spend a single dollar in the county of Antigonish, no matter how great the necessity for public works might be, and that they did not care anything about the interests of the county. That was the line of canvass of my hon. friend, and that was the statement made by the Hon. John Corbett at a place called Lenwood in the store of John McCoe, and in the presence of a number of electors Mr. Corbett made the further statement that Mr. Chisholm had made a search of the records in the department. Who ever heard of an hon. member of this House going to one of the departments and searching the records to see whether anything was there which affected his own county or whether or not a member of the Senate had attended to his business? Mr. Corbett stated that the hon. member for Antigonish had made a search of the records at Christmas, before going home, and that not a single dollar was in the estimates, and that statement was corroborated a short time later at a joint meeting at Lakevale, attended by Senator Girroir, the hon. member for Antigonish, and the late lamented Liberal organizer for the county of Digby, Mr. Wall. That was the preconceived line of campaign of my hon. friend, and when Senator Girroir arrived in the county he found the story broadcast over the constituency. What was more natural than
Mr. FOOTiEOR (Kings, N.S.).
that he should proceed to show the people that their member of Parliament had not been giving to his duties the attention required of him, and that he should seek to aid his memory, but not that it needed refreshing, to dispel the disgraceful, lying, deceitful story that had been spread throughout the county by the hon. member. That was the reason why the senator acted as he did and I submit to this House that it was a cogent and sufficient reason, and that there was no corruption or deception attached to the transaction. It was done in the plain ordinary course of protecting himself and the interests of truth and justice, and in order that he should have something tangible to show that he had been making representations in the public interest and on behalf of the people of Antigonish.
At this point let me refer to the fact that in that election it was openly stated that the Conservative Government would not spend a dollar in that or any other county. A plan had been formed to force them to the country this session, and the story was circulated that the Liberal party would soon occupy the treasury benches and be in a position to spend any money that was in the estimates. The plan was hatched as everybody knows by ex-Cabinet ministers, and was diligently circulated throughout the county. Men were betting hundreds of dollars that the Opposition were going to force the Government to the country, and that they were masters of the situation. When the election of Hochelaga was allowed to go by default, so far as the Opposition were concerned, dust was cast in the eyes of the people of this country to make them believe that the Opposition were waiting with an unbiased mind to look into the Government's proposition, and that they would deal with it absolutely on its merits, whereas a year ago the real scheme was hatched to oppose it" in whatever form it might be submitted to the House. The hon. member for Antigonish may take what consolation he can from such statements as were made at that particular time. He says that no main estimates and no supplementary estimates were made up at the time of the election, and therefore that those items could not possibly have been in the estimates. The people of Antigonish are an intelligent class of people, as is evidenced by the fact that they reversed their former decision when the light of truth was presented to them, and elected a member of the Opposition in the province of Nova Scotia, an Opposition wThich gave to a moribund government the greatest overhauling any government ever had since the days of Sir George Boss in the province of Ontario. As the hon. minister has stated, the items were simply in the department for his consideration at a later stage. I wish to refer to that particular point, and to show this House and the country that,

in my judgment there is now a different modus operandi in respect of public works from what existed under the regime of the late Government. As I understand it, today a member of Parliament submits a proposition with regard to a certain work-we will say it comes under the purview of the Public Works Department. There is an engineer in that department, a man who is trained and responsible to the Government which appoints him. That engineer makes a report on his responsibility and then the matter is considered. Under the late Administration, I state from my place in this House, that I believe there were engineers in the province of Nova Scotia who were commanded to do certain things regardless of whether or not these things were in the public interest. Let me cite one illustration. The Canning Supply Company, of Canning, in the county of Kings, N.S., composed of the Liberal henchmen of my predecessor, bought a certain piece of property on the North mountain. They wished to timber that property. In order that they might facilitate the handling of their logs to a mill in a particular creek, they applied to the Dominion Government for $1,000 for a wharf on the side of the creek. There was $1,000 granted by the late Government to be expended in building the bed for a wharf, or what was supposed to be a wharf, on the east side of the creek. There was no public road leading down to it, there were no residents living near it, the onlv approach to it was by a log road across the pasture, and yet that $1,000 was expended for the benefit of the Canning Supply Company to enable it to put its mill down and to take its logs from that particular creek.


Richard Bedford Bennett: How
wide was the creek?


Arthur de Witt Foster: It was not wide enough
for some of these hon. gentlemen to drown themselves if they had fallen in. I could give other illustrations of the same kind, and yet hon. gentlemen talk about corruption and purity as if all the purity existed on their own side of the House and all the corruption on this side. The hon. member for Antigonish went back to the days of 1896 and referred to what the London Times had said. When he was asked by an hon. member on this side of the House to give the date of the London Times he could not give it, and did not give it, and I doubt whether he knows now what it was. Talk about corruption previous to 1896! It would have been far more to the point if he had referred to the one hundred scandals from 1896 down to 1911. But he was strenuously silent upon that point.
As I was saying, the Government refers
the matter to the engineer, the engineer looks into it, the engineer lays his report before the minister, the minister considers it, he takes the matter before council and council decides upon the merits of the case. In certain cases, at least in the one which I have mentioned, that does not appear to have been done by the late Administration. Therefore it is easy to comprehend that the hon. member for Antigonish would not know what was being done in Antigonish because the old regime was over. He no longer was in a position to command a certain official to go to this place and to do this and that regardless of what he considered to be in the public interest. He is a little out of touch with the new order of things under this present honest Administration. I come to one other point and that is the charge which was made against the Minister and to which the minister's answer, has, I think, been most effective. How could he possibly have known the contents of a letter when, at the time it was written, he was 2,000 miles away? That seems to be so absolutely plain that it does not need any further word from me.
Some reference was made to hay in the county of Antigonish. I do not understand, and I do not think the House clearly understood, as to whether or not the hon. member for Antigonish was in favour of the farmers of that county receiving free transportation of hay over the Intercolonial railway. He did not make that point clear. If he had presented a grievance here from the farmers of Antigonish, saying that they were dissatisfied in any respect with the attitude of the Government, or with what the Government did in regard to the matter, his case would have been somewhat stronger, but I venture to say that he cannot find in his own riding any person who is seriously complaining against the action of the Government or the action of any person with regard to the transportation of hay. Several other rambling remarks were made by the hon. gentleman to which I shall not allude. I was surprised, however, when I asked him from what he was reading. I expected him to tell the House' that he was reading from the memoirs or autobiography of the late, lamented Sir Richard Cartwright, than whom no abler man ever sat upon the Opposition side of the House, in my humble judgment. I was surprised to find he was reading from some extended remarks of his own. I am sure that the House would have been interested to a far greater extent if he had given it a list of subscribers to the Fielding fund. He might possibly have conveyed to us far more information upon the Fielding fund than his speech has done.


Mr. WILSON (Laval):: What about the electric automobile presented the other day?


Richard Bedford Bennett: It was
not presented by contractors, and the subscribers are not ashamed to let their names be known.


Charles Avila Wilson: If the cap fits you, put it on your head.


Arthur de Witt Foster: If the hon. gentleman had asked me that question loudly enough, so that I could have heard him, and so that I might be asssured he was not ashamed to ask me, I would have told him that out of the spirit of loyalty which we have for the man who leads the affairs of this Dominion, than whom no abler man has ever sat in the Prime Minister's chair, and as a unanimous expression of our feeling of regard and appreciation for the excellent service rendered to this country by the right hon. Prime Minister, the members of this House presented him with that particular manifestation of their appreciation; and I have no hesitation in telling the hon. member for Laval (Mr. Wilson) that we are quite willing that he should publish that fact in his constituency or anywhere in the Dominion of Canada if he wants to. In conclusion, I may say that in my humble judgment the scurrilous, deceptive and scandalous charge brought in the motion of the hon. member for Antigon-ish has been completely met by the minister and therefore any humble words of mine are superfluous. I wish to go on record as being absolutely in favour of and pleased with the administration of the Government of which I happen lto be a humble supporter.


Mr. J. H. SINCLAIR (Guysborough):: My hon. friend from Kings, N.S. (Mr. Foster), has been entertaining us for the last half hour, but he has not, in my humble opinion, touched at all upon the question which is now before the House. He started out with a tirade against the hon. member for North Cape Breton (Mr. McKenzie) accusing him of a great many crimes and misdemeanours, political and otherwise. He criticised him in regard to his legal knowledge, and told him that he was imposing his opinion on legal questions on the members of this House. I must protest against that statement, because everybody knows that my hon. friend from North Cape Breton has never done anything of the kind. In any opinion he has given with a view to assist us in deciding the great questions that come before us, he has dealt with them honestly and modestlv, and he is not in any way to be accused of imposing his opinion upon the members of this House. I do not think it comes with very good grace from my Mr. FOSTER (Kings, N.S).
hon. friend from Kings to make this accusation and to tell the House that my hon. friend owes his seat to the votes of fishery guardians and people of that class.


Arthur de Witt Foster: It is true; can
he deny it?


John Howard Sinclair: Certainly; it has been denied in the House over and over again, and it has been proven to be untrue and 1 am surprised that my hon. friend should mention it again. My hon. friend from Kings is said to owe his own seat to a carload of potatoes. The tradition in Nova Scotia is that he would not be in this House to-night if it were not for a carload oE potatoes brought in from the United States to the county of Kings in order to frighten the farmers of that county against voting for reciprocity.


Arthur de Witt Foster: Brought in by whom?
M. SINCLAIR: I am not concerned as to who imported the potatoes. I do not think there is any question about the fact, because it is well known to be true.


Arthur de Witt Foster: The fact that a carload of potatoes came to my riding is true, but the insinuation that they were brought in by me or the party that supported me is absolutely untrue. The fact is that they were imported by a Liberal dealer.


John Howard Sinclair: If my hon. friend will ask for a committee of this House to investigate that question-


Arthur de Witt Foster: Ask yourself.


John Howard Sinclair: If we secure a committee I think we will be able to submit proof that the carload of potatoes was brought to the county of Kings for the purpose of assisting his election and that it was so used and that he would not have a seat in this House to-day if it were not for that carload of potatoes.


Arthur de Witt Foster: I ask the hon. gentleman to withdraw that statement.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Arthur de Witt Foster: I rise to a question of
privilege.


John Howard Sinclair: If the hon. gentleman has a point of order to make, I will take my seat.


Arthur de Witt Foster: I want to say-


John Howard Sinclair: Will the hon. member say that the canvass was not made in his county, that the county would be flooded with potatoes from the United States if the people voted for reciprocity?


Arthur de Witt Foster: I will say that to my humble knowledge no such statement was ever made, and no such canvass was ever

made that the county would be flooded with potatoes from the United States, because it would be a foolish thing to say.


Mr. HENDERSON:: Potatoes are not a bad thing to flood the county with.


John Howard Sinclair: My hon. friend (Mr. Foster), will not say that in the County of King's where the facts are well known.


Arthur de Witt Foster: I will say it anywhere.


John Howard Sinclair: The charges of my hon. friend from Antigonish were scarcely touched upon at all in the long rambling speech we have had from the hon. member for Kings (Mr. Foster). He dealt with everything from a sawmill on the North Mountain to the fishery guardians of North Cape Breton, but he did not attempt to justify this Government for their conduct in regard to the question of free hay on the Intercolonial or to justify the position of the Minister of Public Works in making promises to the county of Antigonish for the purpose of influencing the votes of the people. The charge of my hon. friend from Antigonish is a specific charge and it is a serious one, in which two ministers of the Crown are involved. The Minister of Public Works is charged with making corrupt promises to the people of that county with regard to the local election on the 16 th of January last. What reply does the Minister of Public Works make to that charge? He tells us that he is of the opinion that the hon. member for Antigonish will lose votes cn this question when he again appeals to his electors. The Minister of Public Works attempts to give another answer, and that is that he was in Winnipeg at the time the letter was written. Are we to be asked to believe that because, the Minister of Public Works was out of town he was not responsible for what is going on in his office? Is that the position the hon. gentleman takes with regard to the conduct of business in his department?


Robert Rogers: I hope my hon. friend
did not misunderstand me; I took the full -responsibility for everything.


John Howard Sinclair: Why did the hon. gentleman mention the fact that he whs in Winnipeg?


Robert Rogers: I wanted to correct a
mis-statement on the part of the hon. gentleman from Antigonish.


John Howard Sinclair: There was no mis-statement. It the minister is to take full responsibility for the corrupt letter written to the electors of Antigonish, he had no reason to tell the members of this House that he was in Winnipeg at the time his secretary wrote it. The issue in Antigonish was not a
Dominion issue; it was a local and provincial issue. Senator Girroir, who immediately prior to that time was a member of the provincial legislature, was elevated to the Senate, and his seat in the legislature was to be filled at this election. The Conservative party in place of fighting out that election on provincial issues, imported Dominion issues and promised free hay and public works as an inducement to the people to vote for the Conservative candidate. They were not able to attack the Government of Nova Scotia on its record; the record of the Government of Nova Scotia was not capable of being attacked. The Liberal Government of that province has held power for thirty years without a single serious accusation of any kind being brought against it. After such a long period of power, gentlemen on the other side, when that local election took place, had to resort to the means which have been described here to-night, rather than fight the election out on provincial issues as they ought to have done. On the question of free hay the charge against the Government is very plain. Why did they not announce to the' members of this House when asked to do so that they did not intend to give free transportation of hay to the electors of Antigonish. The election campaign in the county of Antigonish began, I think, some time in November, and on the 2Gth of November, 1912, the member for Antigonish asked these questions in the House:
1.	Is it the intention of the Railway Department to allow free transportation of hay over the Intercolonial railway from the province of Quebec to the eastern counties of Nova Scotia or any of them.
2.	What relief, if any, in the matter of freight rates on hay to be carried over the Intercolonial railway for the farmers of the eastern counties of Nova Scotia is proposed.
He received no reply to these pertinent questions. Why were these questions not answered? Why did they stand on the Order Paper day after day and week after week? I cannot say just now how often they were called, but they must have been called many times, and every time they were called the Prime Minister answered, ' stands.' The Minister of Public Works did not attempt to explain this. The reason is obvious. The Government was aware a contest was going on in Antigonish, and that the Conservative party in the county were using the promise to the electors: that if they would vote for the Conservative candidate they would get free transportation of hay on the Intercolonial, if the Prime Minister and the Minister of Railways had given the straight and honest answer that they ought to have given, saying that they did not intend to grant this request, the Committee in Antigonish would not have been able to deceive the



electors as they did with regard to this question. It is a circumstantial case and the evidence is so clear that it would be decided against them by any fair-minded, jury. As late as December 15th the Prime Minister said that the matter was under consideration, but we find out when all the papers are brought down that the matter was not under consideration, but was decided prior to that date. It- has been shown that the Minister of Railways prior to December 15th decided that no free transportation of hay would be given; but the Prime Minister, on the 15th of December, knowing that an election was in progress in Antigonish-for I presume he reads the newspapers in Nova Scotia-knowing that advertisements were being placed in the newspapers in the county of Antigonish calling for the farmers to apply for this free transportation of hay, instead of honestly answering the question that the Government did not intend to give this free transportation, said that the matter was under consideration. Then the Christmas holidays came, and the House adjourned. We come back after the holidays, and even then my hon. friend from Antigonish could get no reply to his question. It was not until after the 16th of January, when the election was over, and the Government found that there would be no further object in concealing their decision, that they brought down to the House the statement that they were to have no free transportation of hay. It has been pointed out that the Conservative committee in . Antigonish issued a notice and published it in the newspapers in that town, in which they use the following language:
Arrangements have heen made for free transportation of hay into this county for farmers only. Persons desiring hay can leave their orders with C. Edgar Whidden from whom full information can he obtained.
The following persons have heen appointed a committee to oversee the matter.
A. D. Chisholm,
P. S. Floyd,
Dan. D. McDonald.
My hon. friend from Annapolis has hinted, but has not plainly stated, that the money to pay for the freight came from some other quarter; that it did not come from the Department of Railways and Canals, but from some other mysterious fund of the Tory party in the county of Antigonish. Will my hon. friend be good enough to tell us if that, is the ease ?


Avard Longley Davidson: I said nothing of the kind. I asked the hon. gentleman if he would state that a promise was made in that campaign that the Government would supply free hay, and I think that by his silence he has admitted that no such promise was ever made.
Mr. SINCLAIR.


John Howard Sinclair: Of course my hon.
friend knows very well that it is admitted that the promise was made not by the Government, but by the Conservative party in the county of Antigonish. _ Here js the positive and distinct promise, which I have just read to him:
Arrangements have been made for the free transportation of hay into this county for farmers only.
This was put forward by the Conservative party in the county of Antigonish. How could an arrangement for the free transportation of hay be made except over the Intercolonial railway, which is the only means of transportation that we have in eastern Nova Scotia during the winter months ?


Avard Longley Davidson: The hon. member will have to keep guessing in regard to that. The question under consideration is whether or not the Government made any of these promises.


John Howard Sinclair: Surely my hon. friend does not think I am guessing, in the face of the positive language of the notices placed by the Conservative committee in the newspapers, calling upon the farmers to apply for the hay which was to be transported free into the county of Antigonish ? I quite fail to understand my hon. friend. It was said that arrangements had been made; such arrangements could only have been made with the Minister of Railways. It turns out, however, that arrangements were not made with the Minister of Railways, but my hon. friend the senator went so far as to appoint a committee to investigate the matter and to ascertain whether or not he was telling the truth, and he promised to pay two hundred dolr lars if it could be shown that he was not telling the truth. After hearing the evidence and examining the books of a merchant, tlhat self-constituted appear to have made a written 'statement that the story was true and that the farmers were getting free transportation of hay. In view of the fact that the minister has given us his answer and that they did not get the free transportation of hay, what are we to think of the conduct of the leaders of the Tory party in the county of Antigonish ? What are we to think of the men who stand up in this House and make boisterous speeches in defence of such conduct ?
I pointed out that the charge against this Government is, in the first place, that from December 26th to January 16th, they were silent when they ought to have spoken with regard to this matter of hay. They refused to give any reply to the questions asked, and in the meantime the Tory party in the county of Antigonish were falsely putting this matter forward to deceive the electors. The hon. Minister of Publio

Works has not attempted to make any reply to this charge made against his Government. He does not seem to realize that the people of this country will look upon this as a very serious charge. Regarding the second charge, here is the letter from the minister's secretary, for which he admits he is responsible:
Office of the 'Minister of Public Works of Canada,
December 28, 1912.
My Dear Sir,-
Your letter of the 21th instant addressed to the Minister of Public Works received, and, in accordance with your request, I am inclosing you herewith a list of the items which have been placed in the supplementary estimates for Antigonish county for 1913-14.
Yours sincerely,
(Sgd.) George Buskard, Minister's Secretary.
T. E. L. Girroir, Esq.,
Barrister,
Antigonish, iN.S.
These items aggregate $204,900. My bon. friend the Minister of Public Works said that the letter had not been mutilated. If not, we must take it as it stands, and it says that these items have been placed in the supplementary estimates. There was some discussion as to whether any changes had been made in the letter, but I understood the Minister of Public Works to say a few moments ago that he did not say that any changes had been made. As I say, therefore, we must take the letter as it stands, and as it was placed upon ' Hansard ' by the hon. minister himself. The Minister of Public Works produces this letter to this House and this letter makes the positive statement that these items are in the supplementary estimates for this year. That is a very positive statement, but it turns out to -be untrue-these items were not placed in the estimates at that time. We have it admitted now that the statement is not true, that the supplementary estimates were not prepared at the time that letter was written. The Minister of Public Works has withdrawn his contention that he was in Winnipeg at the time and that that made a difference. I think it was Sam. Weller, in Pickwick Papers, who said that if you were in legal trouble at any time and were afraid of the evidence should resort to an alibi. I thought the minister was going to try to get off on a defence of that kind, but he has accepted the responsibility and the members of the House and the people of the country will hold him responsible for what his secretary did. He told us tonight that his secretary was justified in sending this statement to the electors of Antigonish on the eve of that election. He knew the purpose for which that statement was sent, he knew that it could not be sent for any but a corrupt purpose,
324J
to influence the electors. I do not wish to-be understood as opposing these grants. I have no doubt these public works are necessary, I have no special knowledge on that subject. I am not opposing these appropriations. But I am opposed to a minister of the Crown on the eve of an election sending a letter of this kind into any county, for the purpose of influencing that election. There are a number of questions that may be asked in this connection, some of which were asked by my hon. friend from Antigonish. What about the etiquette of a minister of the Crown in matters of this kind? What about the respect he owes to His Royal Highness in making known estimates before he has been asked to bring them down? What about his oath of office? The hon. member for Antigonish has read the oath of office to the House in which the minister has sworn that he would keep such matters secret and yet this hon. gentleman allows his secretary to disclose them, to violate that oath, and he still retains that secretary in his office and does not even reprimand him but comes to this House and defends what he did, and tells us that his secretary did the proper thing in sending the letter for the purpose for which it was sent. I do not think the Minister of Public Works realizes the position he is in or the seriousness of the crime he has committed. I took occasion to look up May's Parliamentary Practice in regard to this matter, and I found this doctrine laid down that any hon. gentleman can verify for himself. A resolution was passed in the House of Commons of England on the 20th December, 1779-over one hundred years ago-adopting the principle that a minister of the Crown must not use his position of minister in charge of the funds of the people for the purpose of winning elections, he must not seek to corrupt the electors by making promises to them prior to the election. That resolution was as follows:
Resolved that it is highly criminal in any minister or ministers or other servants under the Crown of Great Britain directly or indirectly to use the power of office in election of representations to serve in Parliament.
That is a very positive statement, and it is regarded as the law in England, and I have no doubt it is the law of Canada also. The Minister of Public Works does not seem to realize that he has done something which is described in May's Parliamentary Practise as ' highly criminal ' and was so declared by the Parliament of Great Britain more than a hundred years ago. If the Conservative party are to retain their selfrespect, they must change their tactics, they must either reform their Minister of Public Works or replace him. The people of Canada are taking note of these matters, and I have no doubt that what the Minister

of Public Works has done will reflect upon this Government and will be resented by the people of Canada. The Government may, of course, win a few votes by such tactics in the county of Antigonish temporarily, but for each one they gain by these means they will lose in ten other places. This is not a solitary instance; soon after he took office the Prime Minister sent a telegram to the people of Prince Edward Island which has never been properly explained and on which the election in Prince Edward Island was run. Everybody remembers the telegram to which I refer. The facts were brought out later and the Prime Minister had to admit that he had sent it. Here is the telegram.
A. A. McLean, M.P.,
Charlottetown.
In reply to representations of Nicholson and yourself during the past two months, I beg to inform you that the Government has decided to undertake the establishment of a Government ferry service between the island and the main land. This will involve the changing from narrow to standard gauge on the Island railway. This improved service will do away with the three short hauls, and it is hoped will result in a great advants
The Charlottetown Guardian published this telegram and made the statement that no more important message has come to the people of Prince Edward Island since Confederation. You will notice that that message came on the 26th of December, 1911, and about a week or ten days later the local election was to come off. Does any one 'believe that that message would have been sent to Prince Edward Island on that occasion if there had not been a local election in view? Will the minister of Militia (Mr. Hughes), who I see is in his place, say that in his opinion that message would have been sent if a local election had not been due at that time? He knows that it was sent for the sole purpose of affecting the local election, which was a very unbecoming and improper thing for the Prime Minister to do. How can we criticise his Minister of Public Works, who has the reputation for doing things of that kind when the Prime Minister himself leads the way in violating the principles that he laid down and insisted on for fifteen years when in Opposition? The hon. gentleman promised us pure elections. In every manifesto he issued to the people of this country during the fifteen years he was in opposition, he never failed to introduce the paragraph on pure elections. Yet his first act in regard to elections after assuming office was to send that telegram to the people of Prince Edward Island, and it was on that telegram that the local government of Prince Edward Island was defeated and the Matheson Government came into power. Then we had the outrages Mr. SINCLAIR.
in Macdonald; coming later, we bad the criminal practices in Hochelaga! We had the corrupt promises in the county of Richelieu. What are we to expect? It was no surprise to us that this manceuveringj took place in Antigonish, no surprise that they refused to answer the question as to the free transportation of hay. We knew that the Tories in Antigonish were using it for election purposes. We know that the Government were concealing the fact to enable the Tory party to use it for political purposes. We also know and everybody in Canada knows that the announcement of the expenditure of $204,900 in the county of Antigonish, as far back as last December, -was made solely for the purpose of influencing the election in Antigonish. That was the only purpose for which that information could be given and the Minister of Public Works has not attempted to justify himself in regard to this matter. He will have to give some better explanation than he has done up to date if he asks us to believe that he is innocent in the use that he has made of his position in endeavouring to corrupt the people of Antigonish by election promises. During all the years the Prime Minister was in opposition he promised honest 'elections. How has he performed this promise? Is it honest to do these things? Is it honest as was done in Manitoba to conspire with the electors of a province, to issue blank warrants in order to intimidate the voters of a province or a county? Is it honest for a minister of the Crown, when charged in this House with intimidation to meet the charge with a counter statement that a certain man was a nephew of Captain Sullivan when he was not a nephew of Captain Sullivan? Is it honest to imprison innocent men to prevent them assisting the opposite party at an election?


Robert Rogers: I do not know that this has anything to do with the motion of the hon. member for Antigonish, but if my hon. friend is going to discuss outside questions, then I claim the right of replying to the hon. gentleman because he is making statements that are absolutely untrue.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: In a debate of this nature when a motion is made for the Speaker to leave the Chair for the House to go into Committee of Supply, usually great latitude is given to those who speak; it is not the usual practice to confine them very closely to the question before the House.


John Howard Sinclair: I was asking my hon. friend a question which he has done me the honour to answer but I appeal to the record of the House to settle the question as to who is correct. Will he say that these transactions in the county of Antigonish were honest and were carrying out the policy laid down by his leader during the

time he was in opposition. Is it honest to endeavour to influence the public in order to secure votes by saying that a certain expenditure has been agreed on when it was not agreed upon? It has been admitted here to-night that while the statement was positively made by the minister in the county of Antigonish that these expenditures of public moneys had been provided for in the estimates they had not been placed in the estimates at that time. The leader of the Government made these promises of purity when he was in opposition. He has not carried them out when in power. I have pointed out to you that disreputable practises have been carried on in Macdonald, and Hochelaga, and Richelieu, and in Prince Edward Island, and in Antigoni'sh.


Richard Bedford Bennett: And in Alberta.


John Howard Sinclair: I have pointed out that all these things are a disgrace to the Conservative party, and the Minister of Public Works will have to make some stronger defence than he has made to-night if he expects a jury of his countrymen to acquit him of his conduct in Antigonish.
Proposed amendment (Mr. Chisholm) negatived on division.



SUPPLY.

[Stage Direction]
House in Committee of Supply. (Mr. Deputy Speaker in the Chair.)
Arte, Agriculture and Statistics-Patent Record, $20,000.
George Perry Graham: Will the minister tell
us something about the work of this branch? I have had some experience of it, and it has been quite satisfactory to me. They have in connection with this branch, what is called the Trade Mark branch?


Martin Burrell: That is really a separate branch.


George Perry Graham: I see there is an increase of three thousand dollars. Will the minister explain that?


Martin Burrell: The increase is due to the extra expense in printing and publishing the Patent Record. The amount voted for the printing of the Patent Record is payable to the Department of Public Printing and Stationery. Twelve hundred copies are published each month, and the expense varies according to the number of patents issued and to the length of the claims. The increase is owing to the increased wages and cost of paper; that is practically what it amounts to.


George Perry Graham: Who gets that paper?


Martin Burrell: Every member of Parliament, every senator, and I believe nearly
all the leading newspapers and the principal libraries throughout the country. Of course that does not cover the entire cost. As my hon. friend knows the patent office is a revenue producing branch. It costs about $90,000 to run it, and brings in from $110,000 to $120,000. The revenue for the past year was, I think, about $110,000.
Experimental farms, $250,000.


Mr. KYTE:: Have any additional farms
been established during the past two years?


Martin Burrell: This item is for the
older organized farms, and covers the central farm here, which takes about $110,000 of the amount, and also such branch farms as Nappan, N.S.; Cap Rouge, in Quebec; Brandon, in Manitoba; Indian Head, in Saskatchewan; Rosthern, in Saskatchewan; Lacombe, Alberta; Lethbridge, Alberta; and Agassiz, in British Columbia.
Mr.LEMIEUX: My hon. friend has just mentioned the experimental farm at Cap Rouge in Quebec. I understand it is under the management of Mr. Gustav Langelier, and that it is very well kept, and has rendered very valuable service to the farmers in the district. Some time ago I noticed a question on the Order Paper asking how many lectures the manager of the farm had given during the winter, but I forget what answer the minister gave. I am informed that, although Mr. Langelier may not have given lectures last year, his management of the farm has been quite an education to the people in the district. I would like to know from the minister if he confirms that opinion which is based on information I have received. I have known Mr. Langelier for many years. He is quite a progressive farmer and his farm is visited by many people, including foreigners. Has the minister visited the farm?


Martin Burrell: I have not had an opportunity to visit the farm. As my hon. friend knows it is difficult to get round all the farms, especially when we have sessions of this length. But I understand that the Cap Rouge farm has done good work, and, so far as I know, the present superintendent has contributed quite a lot to the development of farming.


George William Kyte: Will the minister give us some idea of the revenue that is derived from these experimental farms? I presume there is some revenue.


Martin Burrell: I might be able to give my hon. friend some figures, but I would remind him that the experimental farms are not meant to be revenue producers, and would not be understood as such by any one who has studied experimental work.


George William Kyte: But some revenue is derived.
1G25J


Martin Burrell: Yes, but I cannot give my hon. friend the particulars just now. I could get them for him, however.


George William Kyte: I have the farm at Nappan in mind at present.


Martin Burrell: I can give my hon. friend the general expenditures in connection with the Nappan farm. The general expenditure for 1913-14 is $13,470.


George Perry Graham: If the hon. minister
will look at page C-22 of the Auditor General's Report he will find something to help him out. There the expenditure for Nappan farm is given as $13,660.65, less proceeds of sales of cattle $4,750.47, leaving $8,910.18. I am glad to have the minister make the statement about the experimental farms not being intended as revenue producers, because he will probably remember the attacks made years ago in the province of Ontario because the Guelph Experimental Farm did not make a profit. The men who pretend to be the friends of the farmers used to make that statement at every election. Everybody knows that this kind of institution, especially when an agricultural college is connected with it, is no more intended to pay a dividend than is, say, Ottawa University. The farm is for experiment, and not for the purpose of selling so many bushels of potatoes at a certain price. It is intended to save the farmers time in making experiments, so that the farmers save the money that the experimental farms cost the country. I am glad to hear the Minister of Agriculture make that statement, and I hope we shall never hear it used again. The experimental farms are not meant for profit any more than are the institutions which educate msn as doctors, lawyers, or ministers. These institutions are the high schools for the farmers and ought to be so treated. Every dollar that the farmers are enabled to add to their income is the return which we get from these institutions and the money expended upon them is an investment that pays better than any other investment the Government make on behalf of the people. In years gone by it has been a fight to have these institutions maintained, not that people did not believe they were right, but because they were told at election times that the money was squandered. I am very glad to hear the Minister of Agriculture give expression to the view which he has enunciated to-night upon this question so that it will not in future be expected that the farmers high schools are to pay a revenue as distinct from all the other institutions which exist for the education of men in other walks of life.


Hugh Boulton Morphy: The calf with a cough.


George Perry Graham: Yes, the calf with a
-cough in Ontario was a strong factor for Mr. KYTE.
some years. I have heard my hon. friend from Simcoe (Mr. Bennett) discuss it time and again.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The man from whom it was bought.


George Perry Graham: Then, the prize bull was another issue, and a good deal was also said about some wagons that were bought. But the education of the people and the education of public men has advanced somewhat since then so that we now vie with each other in seeing how much public money we can devote wisely to the education of the farmers' sons and to impress upon the farmers' sons the fact that they are engaged in a calling that is the equal of any other. I am glad to be able to have this chance to support the wise expenditure of money in this direction. Will my hon. friend the Minister of Agriculture tell me about the work that is being done at the Central experimental farm at Ottawa? I think it is well that the people should know about this institution that belongs to the farmers of Canada.


Martin Burrell: As my hon. friend and most hon. gentlemen know, there is a very large amount of experimental work being carried on here in connection with animal husbandry, field husbandry and horticultural work. A lot of valuable work is being done in connection with cereals, as represented by different strains of grain, crossing and hybridizing, under Mr. Charles Saunders. An immensely valuable work is being done in agricultural chemistry and I think that I may say now that Canada can congratulate itself that it is not second to any part of this continent in this particular line of work. It is being carried on under the able supervision of Mr. Shutt who has been with the experimental farm since 1887. We undertook a lot of new work about a year ago by putting a specialist in charge of the experimental work in connection with forage plants, such as clovers and alfalfas. We are doing a lot of experimental work at the farms, at the different stations, and in the laboratories in connection with botanical study and plant pathology. There is also a lot of work being done along entomological lines in connection with the destruction of the worst pests that afflict the agricultural industry, particularly in fighting such pests as the brown tail moth. All this work is in charge of Dr. Hewitt, the entomologist, a gentleman possessing very excellent qualifications. Then, we have tried to bring about a little further development in connection with the poultry work this year because the poultrymen had come to the conclusion that their particular branch had been neglected. We have secured the services of a gentleman whom I believed from my inquiries amongst the poultrymen themselves to be one of the best poultry experts in the

country, Mr. Elford. We have created a special position for him as head of the department, keeping our old friend, Mr. Gilbert, who has been connected with that branch of the work for more than a quarter of a century, to assist him. We are placing a new building there and bringing the equipment generally up-to-date so as to give this important branch of the live stock industry every encouragement. I have not referred especially to the cattle and field experimental work. We have there about 140 head of cattle, comprising the leading breeds and with both cattle and horses we are doing a lot of experimental work in connection with feeding, fattening and everything that may be of assistance to a man . in raising live stock. I can give my hon. friend the' items of expenditure under each of these heads amounting in all to about $113,000. I can only say to him that I cordially extend to him, as to the other members of this House, an invitation to visit the farm at any'date that they may mention to me and I .shall be very glad to arrange for luncheon. We might perhaps be able to go out to the farm before the session closes.


Mr. MACLEAN (Halifax):: I would like to have from the minister a very brief statement as to the work done by the Department at the experimental farm at Nappan, Nova Scotia. In that province we have a very excellent agricultural college situated at Truro, a few miles from Nap-pan. I have frequently thought that there is an unnecessary duplication of work and possibly unnecessary expenditure owing to the duplication. If the minister has visited the Nappan farm I would like him to give his view as to whether it would not be possible to have a fusing of the work now carried on by the Dominion and provincial Governments.


Martin Burrell: I do not like to make
any definite statement offhand in reply to my hon. friend. I am not at all sure that it would be well to fuse the work of the provincial institution and the Dominion experimental farm. Although it is true that the question has been mooted once or twice as to the possibility of moving the farm so that the farm would be in connection with the institution at Truro, I think there are a good many things to be said for and against a proposition of that kind and I would want to think it over very carefully. At the present time I see no reason why we should move the farm which is serving a very useful purpose. I have not yet had an opportunity of visiting Nappan. I had hoped to last summer when I was on my way back from Prince Edward Island, but I was called back
sooner than I expected and could not go. We are extending the work at Nappan.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: Could the
minister give an idea of the work done there?


Martin Burrell: It is work similar to that carried on at the different stations- experiments in feeding, horticulture, 'live stock and the raising of various field crops. The system of these experimental farms is all correlated to the work at the central farms. For instance, Mr. Macoun, the Dominion horticulturist, not only does the work in connection with the central farm but he plans out the work for the branch farms and visits and assists the superintendents of the branch farms in carrying out a certain line of work. By a .systematized line of experiments carried on in different localities we get very much more fuller data than if we were simply to allow the superintendent of a branch farm to carry out his own work in isolation at home without any relation to the work at the central farm.


Mr. PROULX:: Is it true, as stated recently in the newspapers, that the experimental farm people have discovered a composition which will exterminate the caterpillar plague?


Martin Burrell: My hon. friend is a
lawyer and has not made_a close study of entymology, else he would have discounted that statement in the newspapers. Caterpillars can be killed by any stomach poison and the poison mentioned in the article referred to was hellebore which was effectively used when I first started fighting various bugs thirty years ago.


Edmond Proulx: Has the department circulated a pamphlet telling the farmers how to exterminate the caterpillar?


Martin Burrell: Oh, yes, I shall be glad to send my hon. friend a copy.


Hugh Boulton Morphy: My complaint against
this appropriation is that it is not nearly large enough. The province of Ontario is growing rapidly and extending its borders northward for hundreds of miles, bringing in virgin soil, and I submit that in the very near future there should be established an experimental farm in the North which would bring near to the people the teaching as to how to cultivate this new soil under the new conditions. I would point out that in the province of Ontario the only experimental farm under the federal Government is that situated here at Ottawa, between the boundaries of Ontario and Quebec. The next submission I have to make should appeal to the Minister of Agriculture, and it is that there should be established an experimental station in

southwestern Ontario which is possibly the finest fruit-growing country in the world, not even excluding British Columbia. There is, of course, the model farm at Guelph to which something will come under the Agricultural Aid Bill, and the Guelph farm attracts thousands of people every year who usually adopt the principle of going on an excursion in the morning and returning home at night, which, of of course, is altogether insufficient to enable them to learn much of the work that is being done there. For example, people who go from the district of Leamington in Essex to Guelph and return on the same day, cannot devote much time to study of the work on the farm. It does seem to me that the province of Ontario is not properly served in this respect, and I call the attention of the minister to it in the hope that he will -take into consideration the needs of the northern portion of Ontario as well as the southwestern portion of old Ontario, and establish centres for teaching and demonstration in these districts. Ontario is bearing a great deal of the burden of taxation in this Dominion; it is doing so ungrudgingly and without boasting, and it deserves some little attention from this Government,


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: How does
it do that more than any other province?


Hugh Boulton Morphy: I am not making this
statement in a boastful spirit, but it is a statement susceptible of proof.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: It is an absurd statement. I do not blame the hon. gentleman for making it because it has been made time and again by men on both sides of politics.


Hugh Boulton Morphy: 1 thank the hon. gentleman for his bluntness, and I do not know that I need make any answer further than to repeat that the Province of Ontario, by the fact of its greater population and the greater burdens it has been bearing on its own account, is contributing largely to the development of this Dominion, as compared with the province which my hon. friend (Mr. Maclean) represents, which is merely a flea-bite by comparison with Ontario, and he knows it. Ontario has been the milch cow for this great Dominion of Canada in supplying improvements and extension of railways in the West, of which we hear so much in this House. The hon. gentleman has prompted me to say that the great province of Ontario has borne burdens, greater than have ever been borne by the provinces by the sea, or by the provinces in the prairie country. If, on some future occasion the hon. member desires to take up this question with me, I will have the Mr. MORPHY.
figures at hand to prove my statement. My plea is to the Minister of Agriculture for further consideration for the province of Ontario in this matter, and I am sorry to find there is a gentleman on the other side, so zealous in his advocacy of his own province, for which I give him credit, that he is jealous of the statements made by me on behalf of the province of Ontario.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: The statement that a greater proportion of taxation of this country is borne by Ontario than by any other province, has been frequently made, not only by hon. gentlemen within the Conservative party, but by prominent men within the Liberal party. I regard that statement as too absurd for contradiction, and it never should be made in this Parliament without at least being contradicted. The statement has also been made by men in both political parties that the province of British Columbia pays more than the province of Ontario to the Dominion treasury, and that statement is equally absurd as the other. However, this is not the time to discuss that question.


George William Kyte: Were I to adopt the figurative language of the hon. member for Perth when he said that Nova Scotia was only a flea-bite to Ontario, I might remark that it is a flea-bite that feeds a good many Ontario fleas. Ontario is to be congratulated upon the trade which it gets from Nova Scotia; Ontario sends its goods to Nova Scotia, and it takes from Nova Scotia no return except in hard cash. So far as the advantage of trade is concerned, it is altogether in favour of the province of Ontario.


George Perry Graham: We buy our unshrinkables in Nova Scotia.


Mr. STANFIELD:: And you get good
value.


Richard Bedford Bennett: It has been
announced that the Conservation Commission intended establishing a number of experimental farms in the West, and if that be so I would suggest that the work should in some sense be under the control of the Department of Agriculture, because to be effective the same work carried on by different departments should be co-related. I would direct the attention of the Minister of Agriculture to the fact that there are large numbers of Galician settlers in northern Alberta who came in twelve or fifteen years ago and who have become excellent farmers. I would suggest that one of the best things this Government could do would be to establish an experimental farm in that district. I was among these people twelve or fifteen years ago and

since then I had not seen their farms until recently and I must certainly say that they have made great progress in agriculture. They are willing and anxious to learn and while I am not making any special claim for northern Alberta as against any other part of Canada, I think we could well afford to have an experimental farm established there, because of the benefits that would accrue not only to Alberta but to the whole Dominion, from the teaching of scientific agriculture to these people.


Mr. CLEMENTS:: The Minister of Agriculture knows full well my views on agriculture, so far as the northern part of British Columbia is concerned. On behalf of the province of British Columbia, in the northern portion of which we have not all the transportation facilities that are needed, I desire to say that there is no province in this Dominion which is more deserving of an experimental farm. Every hon. member in this House knows that there are in the northern portion of the province of British Columbia hundreds of thousands of acres of the best agricultural land in Canada, and that many thousands of acres of this land are unknown and unexploited. Every member of this House is desirous that the great immigration coming into Canada day by day shall be well taken care of, and when the Panama canal is opened and the stream of traffic goes through the province of British Columbia, the people of that province will be asked to provide for the great flood of immigration which must come into it by the Pacific coast. Speaking not only for the constituency which I have the honour to represent, but for the entire province of British Columbia, I would suggest to the Minister of Agriculture, who represents in this House a portion of that great province, that there is no part of this Dominion more deserving of substantial aid from the Department of Agriculture than the northern portion of the province of British Columbia.


Mr. BUCHANAN:: The experimental
farm at Lethbridge has proved to be of great value to the farmers. It has been said that we cannot grow fruit on th(e prairies, but at the experimental farm at Lethbridge, they are growing nearly all the small fruits with great success. Trees have also been successfully grown, and, speaking generaly, the farm has been of marked value to the people in that part of the country. I would suggest to the minister that in order to encourage mixed farming in southern Alberta, he should attempt to place some live stock on the farm at Lethbridge, especially in view of the fact that on the irrigated land the people are growing several varieties of hay. Experiments
have been made by some of the farmers in feeding hay to the stock, and they have found alfalfa to be especially valuable. If tests were made by the Government at the experimental farm it would be a help to the farmers in that regard. I think it is the custom to place live stock on some of the Dominion experimental farms, and I would suggest to the minister that he should do this at Lethbridge.
I would also like to direct the attention of the minister to the matter oi the pest known as the cut-worm, which has destroyed very many thousands of acres of crops in southern Alberta during the last few years. I can commend the Department of Agriculture, under the present minister, for having sent an expert to that part of the_ country to investigate the matter, but I find that where the investigators found cut-worms, they have recommended a treatment which is rather expensive, and some of the homesteaders who have lost crops during the last two or three years byreason of the operations of this pest are not in a position to go to the expense of using this treatment. Would it not be possible to provide this treatment, which I understand is composed of bran and paris green, to the homesteaders? It is rather expensive in its application, and if the Government could either provide the treatment or advance to the homesteaders the money for its purchase, in order to enable them to rid themselves of this pest, I am sure that their action would be greatly appreciated. I am sure that the hon. minister knows the difficulty experienced by the farmers in this regard, and that many valuable crops have been destroyed in the past few years by reason of this pest.


Mr. THOMPSON (Yukon):: I should like to draw the attention of the hon. minister to the matter of placing an experimental station somewhere within the confines of the Yukon territory, in the Yukon river valley. We have had civilization in that territory for about twenty-five years and we have been able to raise many of the things which we use on our table and feed to our stock. But wages in that part of the country are very high, and farming, and other branches of science and agriculture has not developed to any very great extent. If we could obtain some assistance from the Government, either in the way of the establishment of a small experimental station or the payment of a subsidy, as it were, to those who farm as a matter of business, conditional upon their making reports to the Department of Agriculture, we would be able to gather some definite information with regard to agricultural conditions in the Yukon territory, and to have before us the actual facts as to what the territotry can produce. At the present time we raise

hay, oaita and some barley. Wheat will ripen there, but it is not grown as a commercial product. There are many kinds of indigenous grasses of a succulent character growing in the territory. During the winter which has just passed, over one hundred head of horses lived out in the south-eastern portion of the Yukon territory, without shelter and with no food other than that which they got by pawing through the suow and eating what they found underneath. I think that is a condition which cannot be duplicated anywhere in Eastern 'Canada. The snow of that district is very light; its depth is not very great, and the horses find no difficulty whatever in finding their way to the bottom, eating the grass, and coming out in the spring in fairly good condition. If these conditions were taken into consideration by the department, I have no doubt that considerable development would take place. The United States Government have been a little in advance of us in that regard. They have had an experimental station in the Tanana valley for some four or five years, and the results which the Department of Agriculture of the United States have secured in exploiting the soils of that valley have been surprising. I can assure the hon. minister that if he feels that he can make a small grant for the purpose of encouraging agriculture in the Yukon territory, he will be casting bread upon the waters that will return to him, I have no doubt, bringing many benefits with it.


Mr. H. BOULAY (Rimouski) :: (Mr. Chairman, while we are discussing this item about experimental farms, the House will allow me to say a few words in behalf of the county of Rimouski which I have the honour to represent. That county is essentially a farming district, and that part of the province seems to me to have been almost ignored for a certain number of years, as far as the establishment of experimental farms is concerned.
I have looked into the matter last year, and I have written the Conservation Commission-which is entrusted with establishing small experimental farms-asking if something could not be done for the county of Rimouski, and I had an answer from the secretary to the effect that there were five experimental farms in the province of Quebec, already. I think that if additional farms are established in the future, that part of the province which includes a territory of 300 miles and comprises the counties of Rimouski, Matane, Bonaventure and Gaspe should not be overlooked. Rimouski alone has a farming population of 54,000 souls.
I think the Government should do something to help us, by establishing an experimental farm in that district. I pray the Mr. THOMPSON (Yukon!
hon. Minister of Agriculture to take note of my remarks, and if he does not understand them in French, I hope he will read them after they have been translated into English.
On the 13th of February last, I received from Mr. White a letter acknowledging receipt of one of my letters and containing this statement:
Sir. I have the honour to acknowledge receipt of yours of the 11th instant, addressed to Hon. Mr. Sifton, respecting the establishment of an illustration farm in the Gaspe peninsula.
In reply, I have to say that we have only established five illustration farms in the province of Quebec, and, in view of the large expenditure on agriculture proposed to be made by the Federal Department of Agriculture, it is not likely that we will establish any additional illustration farm.
Yours faithfully,
James White,
Secretary.
H. Boulay, Esq., M.P.
House of Commons,
Ottawa.
The meaning of this seems to be that nothing will be done, this year at least. I hope that, next year, those counties will be given some consideration and that something will be done for us. There are five experimental farms in the other parts of the province, it is true, but the district we represent should not be forgotten. The farmers in that part of the country are just as worthy of help as those who live elsewhere in the country, and perhaps more so, because the conditions of the climate are more unfavourable than in other parts where the climate is better adapted to farming.


Mr. ROBB:: I may say at once that I
do not rise for the purpose of asking for an experimental farm in my district. I live in a district where every farm is an experimental farm-a model farm. I rose mainly to remind my hon. friend from North Perth (Mr. Morphy), who boasts of Ontario and of Ontario farmers, that in the provincial contest last year by an Ontario journal, for the best farm combined with the best farmer and the best stock, the first prize was awarded to the province of Quebec, to a farm in the county of Chateauguay. I would also remind him that the dairy commissioner of the Dominion of Canada, in a speech made to the Ontario dairymen in January last made the statement that sixty-five per cent of the production of butter of all Canada was made in the province of Quebec. I merely wish to remind my hon. friend that though he comes from a fine province, a province we are all proud of, that province is not the only pebble on the beach.


Mr. BUREAU:: I hope the minister will not take exception to my professional call-

ing if I ask a question. Is there any training carried on at the experimental farm subsidized by the Government? Can a man go there and learn what is to be done, and then go back to the farm and put in practice what he has seen?


Martin Burrell: The educational side
has not been taken up by the federal Government, but by the provinces. We train our own men to some extent, but as a matter of fact we draw from educational institutions experts to carry on experimental work.


Mr BUREAU:: I am in favour of experimental farms, but I wish to know 'how the result of this experimental work is distributed among the masses of the people. Must a man apply to the farm to get information, or, is there an established system of diffusing this knowledge?


Martin Burrell: There is a very strongly established system, as the. hon. gentleman will see by the items when we come to them. We are spending large sums of money on our publications and we have a branch which is engaged in the distribution of these publications to an enormous extent all over the country. These publications are used very widely and very profitably. In addition, we send out men on lecture work and assist in other ways.


Jacques Bureau: Is there an established
practical education? Do the lecturers go around to other farms making practical demonstration of their experiments?


Martin Burrell: Wherever a province
is carrying on, for instance, institute work to agricultural associations, we are always glad to place our officials at their service, and do as a matter of fact, place practically all our experimental farm officials at their disposal for work in that way. But it is not strictly our work.


Jacques Bureau: How does McDonald College, for instance, work in with the experimental farm? Is there any interchange of their experiments? I understood the minister to show a difference in these farms. But is there any relation between them?


Martin Burrell: There is no formal relation between an institution like the McDonald College and our own farm, except such there is between all institutions that carry on scientific and experimental work.


Jacques Bureau: There is no affiliation or any definite relation of that kind?


Martin Burrell: No, there is no affiliation.


Mr. RAINVILLE:: The question raised by the hon. member for Three Rivers (Mr. Bureau) is a very important one, especially
for the province of Quebec. The publication and lecture work have not done what, they should have done. I think .that if purely demonstration farms were established where the farmers could go and learn by seeing, it would do a lot of good in our province and, I am sure, in the other provinces as well. If that could be established by agreement between the federal Government and the provinces I think it would greatly improve the practice of agriculture. So far as I know, in my own county, which is quite an agricultural county, it will be well received. It is a thing I am asked for every time I have the opportunity of seeing them.


George Perry Graham: In Ontario graduates of Guelph Agricultural College are appointed to districts throughout the province, and so each county or group of counties gets the benefit of the work of the farm through the experience of a graduate.


Jacques Bureau: What does he do?


Mr. SEVIGNY:: Does he lecture?


Mr. MURPHY:: He does more than lecture. He gives demonstrations, as for instance in tile draining.


George Perry Graham: He gives the benefit of
his information and his studies of practical farming made at the Guelph establishment. A few years ago they sent out practical demonstrators in spraying. In that way information is brought close to the people. But I would suggest the danger of overlapping. You cannot get too much of this information, but there is no use in having it doubled up. One difficulty is that education under the consideration was left to the provinces and the federal authority does not like to encroach on the prerogative of the province, nor does the province wish them to, I suppose. It may be difficult to draw the line between the two. I am inclined to think that the action of the federal Government in voting money and working with the province may help out to some extent. In reference to what my hon. friend from North Perth (Mr. Morphy) has said, I may say that there is an experimental farm or model farm as it may be called at Dryden, under provincial jurisdiction.


Hugh Boulton Morphy: There is one at Monteith, but very limited.


George Perry Graham: I do not know the details but I suppose that farm could be enlarged and its usefullness extended. The hon. gentleman is right in what he has said about that north country. It is estimated that in that country there is from 16,000,000 to 20,000,000 acres of land as good as any in Ontario-what is known as the clay belt, a strip of land through that coun-

try	that will	surprise anybodywho	thinks that that	region is
not capable of raising crops of any kind.
I am inclined to think that a real, live experimental station in that country will do a great deal because while the mining industry there is now of great importance, mining will not last forever; you can only take out one crop whereas in agriculture you can take a crop every year, so long as you pay back a part of what you take from the land. Our attention ought to be devoted to the more permanent development of agriculture in that new country when we know that we have 15,000,000 to 20,000,000 acres of good land there. I wish to ask for some practical information about the destruction of mustard. I know that a great deal is being done at the experimental farms here and at Guelph and we have had a great many experiments and potions and advice as to the destruction of mustard. In going through Ontario I have come to the conclusion that there are many counties where enough land is wasted in the growth of mustard and other weeds to supply the whole people with flour if the weeds were destroyed. Has any method been devised by which these particular weeds, mustard and daisy can be destroyed?


Mr. EDWARDS:: There has been as far as mustard is concerned. We have in the county of Frontenac a district representative of the Ontario college at Guelph appointed by agreement between the county and the Ontario Government in connection with our county high school. The county pay a small part of the salary but the Ontario Government pay the major part. He is available at all times and to every person in the county to demonstrate how best to destroy weeds and to lay plans for draining any man's farm; he makes the plans and estimates the cost, for which no charge is made. Last year in Frontenac he demonstrated on a farm overrun with mustard showing just what it was possible to do. He sprayed the weed with Bordeaux mixture and it appeared that if the weed is sprayed with this mixture at certain times the mustard can be practically eradicated. On the question of experimental farms, the hon. member from Yukon has asked for an experimental station of some kind in that country. British Columbia has asked for one in the northern part of that province and different members have expressed the desire for experimental farms or stations in their constituencies or their parts of the country. We are altogether too slow in this country in establishing experimental farms and stations. Two or three years ago I called attention to what other countries are doing and if you will allow me I shall Mr. GRAHAM
quote a few figures which I gave in this House on April 18 last. The number of experimental farms and stations in different countries is as follows: France, seventy-one; Germany, eighty; Austria, sixty-one; United States, sixty; Russia, one hundred and two; Sweden, twenty-six; Norway, twelve; Italy, two; Belgium, fifteen; Japan, fifteen. We know the very small number we have in this country. If the Canadian farmer is going to maintain his position and successfully compete with those of other countries, every possible advantage and encouragement must be given to him. This is a very large country and while the experimental farms at Guelph and at Ottawa serve a useful purpose, you have only to go seventy-five to a hundred miles from either of these farms to find physical conditions entirely different from those existing at those points. I am prepared to back up any movement which will increase the number of experimental farms. I think we might have experimental stations controlled from the central farms at Ottawa and Guelph. Why should there not be a number of stations throughout the Northwest gathering information there from Lethbridge and the other experimental farms of that country? Why should we not have a number of farm stations in British Columbia dealing with a number of different climatic conditions in various parts of that province, sending expert men to the central school or to the central experimental farm for the province, and giving instructions on the conditions of the soil and on what is best to be done under certain climatic conditions? Think of one experimental farm for the province of British Columbia, a province which is larger than the German Empire, or think of one or even two for the province of Ontario, which is considerably larger than France, which has 71. How can our farmers expect to know all there is .to know about the soil under those conditions. It is utterly impossible. There is no profession which requires a keener intellect or a better brain than that of the professional farmer. There is no profession in which there is more to learn, and I believe that the people in the country districts are eager to get the information. If it were placed before them they would avail themselves of it. We cannot give that information by simply having an experimental farm here and there, scattered over districts of such extent. We should create a number of branch stations under the control of the central authority, and distribute the information through that central point, which is better fitted to gather such information, scientifically and otherwise, than the branch stations.


Mr. ARTHURS:: I would like to add a
word or two in favour of the idea suggested

by the hon. member for Chambly-Var-cheres (Mr. Rainville) as regards demonstration farms. The hon. member for South Renfrew has spoken of the experimental farm at Monteith, which is the only one in northern Ontario. I happen to know something about the circumstances there. That farm is placed on a piece of ground not composed of the ordinary soil of that country. It is placed on high land entirely different from the rest of the 16,000,000 or 20,000,000 acres of farm land in northern Ontario, and that is true of almost every experimental farm in Canada. As has been pointed out by my hon. friend from Frontenac (Mr. Edwards), these farms are situated, one in each province. Probably if the conditions were exactly the_ same throughout the province the experimental farm might give good results. But a better plan would be to have demonstration farms in various parts of the provinces. Northern Ontario embraces some 20,000,000 or 30,000,000 acres of the best farm land in Canada, and at present we have no means of instructing the farmers with respect to the conditions in that part of the country. The cheapest and most effective system would be for the Government or for the various provinces, to take hold of certain farms having different conditions, and put practical men upon these farms to demonstrate to the farmers exactly what should be done under different conditions and on a variety of soil.
Mr. OLIVER. My hon. friend from Calgary (Mr. Bennett) mentioned that the Conservation Commission was establishing experimental stations. To what extent is the establishment of experimental agricultural stations carried on by the Conservation Commission?	.


Martin Burrell: There has been a little confusion in the past as between the work of the department and the work of the Conservation Commission. As a matter of fact, the commission are not establishing what can be called in any sense experimental farms. What the Conservation Commission does-and I may say that I have no control over their operations, apart from being the intermediary between Parliament and the commission- they undertake to collect a lot of valuable data in regard to the farming conditions in various sections of Canada. They have carried on valuable work, for example, in connection with the subject of weeds. They take a number of farms and find out what are the worst weeds on those farms, what progress they make, and how far the weed area extends. In addition, they undertook last year to establish what have been called illustration stations. In various localities they have been collecting data. They select one of the men whose farms have been taken for the work, and, acting under instructions, he carries on certain lines of work similar to that of demonstration farm work. They supply him with the proper seed, or see that he gets it, and he carries out the instructions of the officers so that his work forms an object lesson to the farmers in that district as to whether or not it is profitable to carry on certain lines of approved work. They are hardly experimental farms, they are more in the nature of demonstration farms. They have established I think about twenty-seven of these stations, and I think the idea is to carry on about three more, and to continue the work for two or three years. I may frankly say that when it comes to practical work, work of an executive kind, my own feeling is that it more properly belongs to the department, than to the Conservation Commission. I do not think there is any desire on the part of the Conservation Commission to develop that work on a larger scale. Although it is true, as the hon. member for south Renfrew (Mr. Graham) has said that there is some overlapping, the country is so big and the field so immense, that the overlapping along certain lines is scarcely felt. The hon. members who have mentioned the subject of demonstration farms perhaps do not realize the administrative difficulties connected with carrying on a large number of experimental farms proper. I cordially agree with every word uttered by the hon. members who have spoken as to the desirability of increasing the amount of demonstrative work in this country, but I think that a lot of that demonstrative work could be more properly done by the various provinces. In British Columbia, Ontario, and, I think, Alberta, they are carrying on a number of these demonstrative stations, taking the results of our work that has been approved at the experimental farms, rejecting the many experiments that do not pay, and taking the sound ones, and applying them to demonstrate that they are along scientific lines and might be made commercially profitable. I think that such work belongs more strictly to the provinces, but I would welcome any scheme under which we could work co-operatively. With such a tremendous field we could not help doing good. I may say it was the intention when the subsidy in the agricultural Bill was proposed, that a certain amount of educational work along that line should be undertaken by the provinces.


Frank Oliver: I think it is desirable
from the point of view of,the Government and from the point of view of Parliament, that there should not be a duplication of work or overlapping by two branches of the service. I think that what my hon friend has suggested that different fields might be occupied, by the Dominion and the provinces working in co-operation, is a very good one. It seems strange that the Conservation Commission should be establishing illustration stations. I think there is

another vote in the estimates of the Agricultural Department for much the same thing. I should think it would be wise to concentrate the effort under one branch of, that service; either let the Conservation Commission take charge of the illustration stations so far as the Dominion Government is concerned or the Department of Agriculture. I never understood that the Conservation Commission was charged with administrative responsibility. I always supposed that it was advisory, educative and for the purpose of collecting information. But, if the Government decides to vest it with administrative authority, it would be well to have it understood. I would understand that the experimental farms established by the Dominion Government were primarily for the purpose of experiment, for what might be called the creative purpose of experimenting with a view to securing actual improvement in stock, fruit and grains, and that their educative work was secondary, which educative work might very well be carried on by subsidiary illustration stations or farms. The primary purpose of the experimental farms, whose support we are voting now, is original action in the improvement of the very foundation of agriculture.
lecturers. That is good too, but I think they might very well carry that feature of their work on more strongly so that whatever they achieve in the way of discovery on their principal farms, the agricultural population may get the benefit of it more rapidly and more generally than they do at the present time. I just wish to ask the minister a question. We have agreed that the farms, whose support we are voting, are for the purpose of experimenting and finding out a few things with regard to the different branches of agriculture. Would my hon. friend be good enough to say what particular features are worthy of mention that have been achieved by these farms in recent years, what discoveries in the way of grains or in the way of dealing with pests or weeds, what discoveries in the way of the maintenance or improvement in productiveness of different forms of live stock have been made ? If there is anything that is particularly striking I would be glad if the minister would take the opportunity of placing it before the committee.


Mr. SMITH (South Ontario):: As a
practical farmer I have been very much interested in the discussion that has taken place this evening. The hon. member for South Renfrew (Mr. Graham) has asked


Mr BURRELL:: My hon. friend is right.


Frank Oliver: At the same time it must be clear that the mere improvement by the experimental farm is not enough. It is necessary that the improvement, when successfully achieved, shall be demonstrated so that the public at large may get the benefit of it. The achievement of the experimental farm, assuming it to have made an achievement, is good, but it is not good enough. The fact of that achievement must reach the public at large in order that substantial benefit may result. If I may criticise, 1 would think that perhaps, if the experimental farms have in any way fallen short in the past, it has been in this, that there has not been sufficient attention paid to the bringing to the notice of the agricultural population generally the results of the successful experiments on these farms. My hon. friend has spoken of the bulletins that have been issued. They are valuable and useful, there is no doubt, but I think it will be within the knowledge of every member present that after all the printed message does not secure interest or action on the part of the person who reads it as does actual sight or sound, either of actual work in progress on the land, or by demonstration by some person who has seen and who knows. What the Government have done so far is good. They have started in a line of spreading demonstration farms either directly or through the Conservation Commission, and they have sent out
a question as to how mustard can be eradicated. I may say that I do not think that this is the most dangerous weed we have. I do not know that it lessens the production of a crop very much, if at all. Whilst I do not often agree with the hon. member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver), I may sav that' I feel a good deal of sympathy with him in the position which he has taken that the experiments at our experimental farms are all right, but they want to go one step farther. That has been touched upon by the hon. member for Edmonton. My idea is that where we have an experimental farm there should be in connection with it 150 or 200 acres where we would be able to demonstrate to the farmers that that farm can be made to pay.


Martin Burrell: Of course, my hon.
friend (Mr. Oliver) quite understands that even to attempt a short resume of what has been done upon the farm would involve an account of a good many years work. If I were to give one little illustration that would almost justify the establishment of the farm in itself, I would mention the results which have followed the production of the Marquis wheat.


Frank Oliver: I had that in mind when I asked the question.


Martin Burrell: There are a large number of other results in connection with cereals, fruits and live stock. I think that
M. OLIViER.

my hon. friend will agree with me that the work carried on has been abundantly justified by the economic results which have been achieved. It must be assumed by 'hon. gentlemen here that the results of this work have not reached the people simply because our bulletins are not always ready or because we are not demonstrating them in a popular way throughout the country. It must be remembered that good results may be achieved in an indirect way because every worker in agriculture, every man connected with the Guelph or any other institution, every institute worker is more or less familiar with our work and takes good care to acquaint himself first hand with the results of our experiments. He becomes a missionary and an instrument in bringing our work before the people of the country and it is therefore scarcely correct to say that our work is not educative because it foes through only limited channels.


Frank Oliver: I do not wish to minimize the advantage of what is done, hut I think it well to carry it through. I agree with what my hon. friend from the Yukon (Mr. Thompson) says as to the desirability of experimental effort in that region. I have visited the Yukon and the fact that the conditions are difficult .is all the more reason why the Government should enter upon even considerable expense to demonstrate how far its possibilities extend. The same holds good in regard to all the .newer sections of the Dominion. I do not suggest that the Government should scatter experimental farms all over our unoccupied territory but they would be profitable in the Yukon, northern British Columbia, northern Alberta, northern Saskatchewan, northern Manitoba and northern Ontario.


Martin Burrell: We are making tests of that kind in a small way in the Peace
river territory, at Athabasca Landing, and at Grouard and Beaver Lodge, Alberta. The suggestion as to the Yukon is well worthy of consideration.


Frank Oliver: Expenditure might well
be incurred to insure that what is done at these stations should be done under the responsibility of the Government. The hon. member for Calgary has suggested _ there might be an experimental farm in northern Alberta amongst our mutual friends who hail from the eastern part of Austria. I do not know there is any particular reason why a farm should be located among these people. They are above everything else farmers and according to their lights know more about farming than most of us do. The natural conditions in the Edmonton country differ materially from those in central or southern Alberta and I wish to put on record my view that there should be a full-fledged experimental farm located some place in the Edmonton district.


Mr. DOUGLAS:: Is there any provision made for .stations along the line of the Grand Trunk Pacific?


Martin Burrell: We have not yet done anything in the northern country. It is asking for work of this kind and the whole matter has to be considered.


George Perry Graham: There will be some considerable discussion on the item for exhibitions, but we might pass it and let the minister give explanations later on any item.


Martin Burrell: That would be satisfactory.
Progress reported.
On motion of Mr. Rogers, House adjourned at 12.18 a.m. Tuesday.