MILITARY SERVICE ACT REPEAL

[Stage Direction]
Mr. JAMES S. WOODSWORTH (Winnipeg Centre) moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 18, to repeal the Military Service Act.
Motion agreed to and Bill read the first time.

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister):: Before the Orders of the Day are called I would like to put my hon. friend the ex-Minister of Finance (Sir Henry Drayton) right respecting a matter
that was referred to yesterday. In the course of my remarks I mentioned that the Auditor General's report had been laid in full on the table of the House on one of the early days of the session. My right hon. friend stated that he thought I was incorrect in that statement.


Sir HENRY DRAYTON:: I thought the fourth volume was not down.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: He said the
fourth volume was the most important. I desire to let him know that the entire report is contained in three volumes. Last year the fourth volume contained the war expenditures separately. This year they have been included in the last of the three volumes.



JUDGES' ACT AMENDMENT


Sir LOMER GOUIN (Minister of Justice) moved:: That it is expedient that an additional Judge of the Court of Appeal for the Province of Saskatchewan be appointed at an annual salary of nine thousand dollars.
He said: His Excellency the Governor General has been informed of the subject matter of this resolution and commends it to the consideration of the House.
Motion agreed to and the House went into Committee on the Resolution, Mr. Gordon in the Chair.


Mr. MEIGHEN:: Before this resolution is adopted, we ought to have some information under several heads. We should know, first of all, what the present composition of the Court of Appeal of Saskatchewan is in point of numbers, the composition of the Court of King's Bench, and secondly what reasons there are for the conclusion that an additional judge of the Court of Appeal is necessary. Are there any arrears of business? Has there been a demand from the people of the province, or what is the real purpose of the addition to the Court of Appeal? We should know, as well, how the number of judges in the Court of Appeal in that province compares with the number on the Court of Appeal of provinces of corresponding size. Our chief concern is to ascertain whether there is any real need for an additional judge. Under our constitution, of course, we all know, the province itself constitutes courts, and declares the number to compose the court so constituted. The Dominion Government, on the other hand, makes the appointment and

Judges' Act
the Dominion treasury pays the salaries and all expenses. Under that procedure which the British North America Act lays down, there is always a temptation on the part of the provinces not to exercise the utmost care to avoid, in the first place, overconstituting the courts and in the next place, over-composing them. We ought to be very careful in this and in every case, to see that the province, inasmuch as it is in no way responsible for the extra expense involved, is animated only by a desire to have the number of judges which is absolutely essential, and no greater number, to constitute the court.


Lomer Gouin: In answer to the right hon. leader of the Opposition (Mr. Meighen) I may say that the Court of Ap* peal of Saskatchewan now consists of four judges, one chief justice and three puisne judges. As to the necessity of adding to the number of judges we find it in the legislation which was passed by the province of Saskatchewan. As it was said, and rightly said by the right hon. gentleman, the courts primarily are created by the provinces under section 92 of the British North America Act. The judges are appointed by the federal authorities. It has been the rule, I understand, in the Department of Justice, to always supplement the legislation which was adopted by the provincial government. Sometimes it would take six months and sometimes it would take three or four years, but always the appointments which were asked by the local governments were made by the federal government. In this case a statute was passed at the last session of the legislature of Saskatchewan adding another judge to the Court of Appeal for that province. We have received the statute, and we propose the present bill to carry out the purpose of that legislation. The right hon. gentleman says that we should make sure that there is real necessity for the increase in the number of judges. I am not certain that we should go that far, unless we are of opinion that the provinces are negligent in the administration of justice. Unless we have good ground to suspect their motives in legislating as they do, I do not see that we should insist on a special report on such questions. At any rate, in this case we have that statute. It was sent to our department, and we ask the House now to supplement that statute. If my right hon. friend desires further information that I do not possess now, and insists on an adjournment of the consideration of this resolution, I would be
willing to try to give him all the information he desires.


Arthur Meighen: It is not quite correct to say that vacancies that exist by reason of provincial legislation are filled merely automatically or as a matter of course by this parliament. I remember well when I was Acting Minister of Justice declining to fill such in the province of Ontario and effecting an arrangement with the Attorney General of that province, that, in the event of vacancies in county courts being created or caused by death, those vacancies would be filled by appointment of junior judges out of other counties where there was not only a senior but a junior judge and insufficient work for the two. In that way a very considerable saving was made. I am afraid, though, the Government now in office has not followed up that good precedent. I can recall cases even now in which to meet political exigencies, they have filled vacancies from the outside, instead of filling them by appointment of junior judges who are virtually out of work in different counties of the province, which would mean a saving to the country of several thousand dollars. It is with the idea of saving, and nothing else, that I ask in this case whether inquiry has been made to ascertain if there is real need; Whether the demand comes because of the need of an extra judge, or for some other reason.


Lomer Gouin: I must say that I was told by the Attorney General of Saskatchewan that there is need of such an appointment. As to the position my hon. friend takes with respect to Ontario, it is quite different in this respect: in that instance there was no discussion between the Attorney General and the Minister of Justice, or between the provincial government and the federal government. Both agreed that there were too many judges and that no more should be appointed, but in this case we have a request from the provincial government that an additional judge be appointed for the Court of Appeal. Unless we are to say to the Saskatchewan government that we cannot accept their representation as to the need for such judge we have to make the appointment.


Arthur Meighen: The hon. gentleman is mistaken in regard to Ontario. No request at all came from the Attorney General of Ontario to the effect that a stay be made in the appointment of judges. The action was taken wholly at Ottawa, by the Justice Department,-by myself
Judges' Act

when I was acting Minister of Justice. The Attorney General of Ontario had acquiesced in the movement on the part of members of the Bar for the increase of salaries. I refused to consider the matter of increases, until I obtained his acquiescence in the policy of appointing no more members of the Bench and of providing, by legislation in Ontario, to fit in with our policy that new appointments would not be made, but that junior judges would be appointed to fill vacancies, and the position of junior judge in the county from which such a judge was appointed would be done away with.


Lomer Gouin: And he agreed.


Arthur Meighen: But the initiative was taken here. I ask now merely whether a similar initiative has been taken in this case by the Attorney General's Department.


Lomer Gouin: If we were merely asked to fill a vacancy in Saskatchewan or any other province, we would probably act in a similar manner; but, in this instance, we have a statute passed by the Saskatchewan legislature providing for the appointment of an additional judge for a court in that province, and we are now implementing that legislation. I do not see how we can refuse to do so.


Mr. CRERAR:: How many judges constitute the Court of Appeal in Alberta, and how many the Court of Appeal in Manitoba?


Lomer Gouin: There are five judges in Alberta and five also in Manitoba.


Mr. BAXTER:: It is very easy for the provinces to put forward requests of this character, and of course, it is easy to say that these judges are required. I do not assume, merely because the request is made, that the additional judge is not required; neither do I take the request coming from a provincial government as being absolutely conclusive proof of the necessity. Very often in the provinces another element enters into the matter. One province sees a larger number of judges in another province, and the tendency is to say: "Why should we not have as many highly paid officials receiving pay from the Dominion Government as some other province? It will cost us nothing." We have, in the city of Ottawa, a court which, I think, I can fairly describe as being absolutely overburdened with work. I think there is no harder-working court in the British Empire than the Supreme Court of Canada; their work is almost monumental. I should like, 
before making up my mind in regard to the matter now before us, to compare the number of cases passing before the Supreme Court of Saskatchewan in a single year with the number of cases that are dealt with by the Supreme Court at Ottawa. I should like to form some personal judgment regarding the matter, and perhaps other hon. members would like to do the same. It is a matter of no importance to this Government whether another judgeship is created or not; the question is whether there is a real need on the part of the people to have an additional judge to expedite the business. I should therefore be very glad if the minister would allow this matter to stand for a few days.


Mr. CARROLL:: Does the hon. member
think there should be three, five or seven judges in preference to two, four or six respectively, so that there would be a majority decision in all cases?


John Babington Macaulay Baxter: That is exactly my
opinion. An odd number in the Court of Appeal is most desirable, and I cannot understand why the Court of Appeal in Saskatchewan ever came to be constituted with four judges. I would suggest that there is another way of getting around the difficulty. It would be easy, I should think, for the province of Saskatchewan to pass legislation for the reduction of the Court of Appeal to three judges, who could do the work just as efficiently as four judges, because they must all sit together, and the other appellate judge could go on circuit or be used in whatever other way judges are used. A matter pf rearrangement would not involve any more expense to the Dominion. The real question is to find out whether there is work which is not being efficiently done for lack of another judge, and until that fact is established, I do not think any member can be in favour of the appointment being made. But the moment that fact is established, I would be very much surprised if any member of this Chamber would withhold his assent.


Mr. VIEN:: It seems to me that we
should not object to nominate judges when the provincial authorities have created the positions. Under the British North America Act, the creation and the organization of tribunals are vested with provincial legislatures, and it seems to me that when in the opinion of a provincial legislature the organization of a tribunal is fixed along certain lines, it would be a little improper tp discuss the motives which might have prompted that legislature in its enactment.

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My hon. friend (Mr. Baxter) stated that in many cases the provinces were prompted to a certain extent to create a position for a high official by the fact that his salary was paid out of the federal exchequer. I do not think it is fair to cast upon the legislative authorities of the provinces, which have so shaped their judicial organisations, such an imputation. The British North America Act having left it to the provincial legislatures to organize their tribunals, it seems to me that the only fair way to deal with the question is to appoint a judge when there is a vacancy on the provincial bench. The suggestion made by my hon. friend does not appear to be the proper way of dealing with the matter.


Mr. JOHNSON (Moosejaw) :: Some
months ago, before even the position was created by the Saskatchewan Government, this matter was drawn to my attention by some members of the legal profession in the city of Regina. I believe it was advanced as an argument by the Chief Judge of the Court of Appeal of Saskatchewan that the work was in arrears; that they could not possibly keep up with it; that there was an absolute necessity for the appointment of another judge to the Court of Appeal, this argument was put up to me, and I believe it was pretty well accepted in Saskatchewan some time before the position was created by the legislature of that province.


Mr. MACDONALD (Pictou) :: I question very much whether it can be urged with any degree of soundness that, as a matter of constitutional right, we in this Parliament can refuse to carry out the necessary implementing legislation providing for the appointment of judges by the federal authorities. The constitution of provincial courts is a matter entirely within the realm of provincial legislation. Under section 92 of the British North America Act we have no power whatever to interfere with any legislation that a provincial legislature may pass by way of rearrangement of or addition to the number of judges whom they require for the purpose of administering justice in their province. One might stop and consider for a moment what the result would be if the federal Parliament refused to act upon the authority that is vested in it of providing judges in any province in the Dominion, after a local legislature, having regard to their local necessities and conditions, had decided that the court should be constituted in a certain way, I am quite sure that never since Confederation has it been urged seriously that this Parliament or the federal government could refuse to pass this implementing legislation. It is not for us to say whether or not the provincial legislatures should have their courts constituted in this way or in that way, or should have three, four or five judges. That, under the Act of Confederation, has been left entirely to the discretion of the people of the several provinces speaking through their respective lgislatures.


John Babington Macaulay Baxter: It is a little difficult to tell, simply by looking at the index, how many cases are reported, because cases are often duplicated; but I think I am perfectly safe in saying that not more than 120 cases a year are reported in each of these volumes. Each volume covers a year, and the cases are not all cases of appeal. Some are decisions of judges of first instance, but I do not think that many of those are included in the reports, at least so far as I can tell from a hasty glance at the volumes. Now, as there are not more than 120 decisions in a year, I should have great doubt-
'An hon. MEMBER: That is, 120 reported.


John Babington Macaulay Baxter: Reported, yes. The custom in all reports-I do not blame the bench or the bar, but I do blame the organizations that publish the reports-is to report everything whether it is reportable or not.


Thomas Vien: Who is judge of the necessity for additional judges for any provincial court?


John Babington Macaulay Baxter: I would say that the
hon. gentleman (Mr. Vien) himself is one of the judges, and his mind seems to be pretty well made up on the subject. I think that we are all here judges as to whether or not this country needs to pay $9,000 a year for further judicial services. The provincial legislatures can ask, and they very frequently do ask, without very much reason for doing (so, to increase expenditures, and I know of cases where there has been an extension of the provincial bench without any business to justify it. I do not know whether or not that is the case in Saskatchewan, but looking at these two volumes of reports I am strongly inclined to think that there is no need for a further appointment.


Mr. LAPOINTE:: By the British North America Act the organization of tribunals is left entirely to the provinces. There is no appeal from the decision of the provinces to this Parliament or to the federal
Judges' Act

Government; all we have to do is to implement their legislation by appointing judges in accordance with the organization of the courts by the legislatures. I think it is a bad tendency on the part of the central power to intervene in a matter that is left by the constitution to the provinces themselves. It is a dangerous tendency that has prevailed of late and it is high time it should be stopped.


Mr. McCONICA:: I think it was quite well understood throughout the province of Saskatchewan that there would be a request for an additional Judge of Appeal for the bench in that province, no matter what party was returned to power as a result of the last election. The Estimates show that in Manitoba there are five judges in the Court of Appeal, in Alberta five, and in Saskatchewan four. I was formerly connected with the courts of Saskatchewan, and I am well advised that the Court of Appeal in that province is crowded. I am not sure that they are despatching the work as expeditiously as some other courts are doing, although I am perfectly sure that they think they are. I suggest to hon. gentlemen that if this Parliament could arrogate to itself the right to say that Saskatchewan shall not have this judge, then it would have the same right to stop the wheels of justice altogether in that province or in any other province. If we can refuse this request we can refuse to implement any other action which any province, under the constitution, has the right to take in matters relating to the administration of justice. I certainly think that the province should have the additional judge.	,


Arthur Meighen: I desire only to comment on the remarks of the hon. member for Pic-tou (Mr. Macdonald), followed by the Minister of Marine (Mr. Lapointe). They suggest that it would be an invasion of constitutional right on the part of this Parliament to exercise any restraint whatever, or even to bring decision Unto play, in deciding whether to acquiesce in the request of any province. I cannot agree with that view at all. If the original intention of the British North American Act was that the request of a province is always to be met by the appointment by the Government of Canada of someone to fill a vacancy then there would have been no requirement in the Act for legislation on the part of this Parliament. All that the British North America Act would have said would have been this: "The Governor in Council shall

fill any vacancy created by the province." To have taken that position evidently seemed to the Fathers of Confederation scarcely a right thing to do, and the act was so framed as to require federal legislation. I do not say that such legislation is specifically demanded by the terms of the act, but the act is so framed that legislation, as a matter of fact, is needed1; otherwise, why have we legislation now?


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: To get the money.


Arthur Meighen: Certainly, but the act could have said that the necessary expenditure would be a charge on the Treasury, requiring no specific legislation in this Parliament for each vacancy. It would have been a serious thing to put it within the power of any province, without any restraint whatever, or even an opportunity on the part of the federal Parliament to exercise consideration of the matter, to write a cheque on the Dominion Treasui-y for just whatever number of judges that province thought it needed. That, I repeat, would have been a serious thing. We have confidence in the provinces, it is true; but the system of balance is such that they exercise their consideration first, and we here have restraint upon their request. I admit that we should not exercise any restraint upon the province without very considerable reason. We should have more than the ordinary weight of reason in our favour before interfering with the desire of the government and legislature of a province in this matter, and for myself, I would attach a great deal of weight to representations made by members from that province as to whether or not there is need for an additional judge in Saskatchewan. I thought that Alberta had four.


Lomer Gouin: Four puisne judges and a Chief Justice.


Arthur Meighen: If there are five in Alberta and Manitoba, I should think there would be equal reason for five in Saskatchewan, but there would be more litigation in Manitoba than in Saskatchewan, notwithstanding that Saskatchewan has a larger population. Manitoba is an older province with a larger city, and would probably have more litigation. Prima facie also, there would be more litigation in Saskatchewan than in Alberta. All I wanted was to make sure that the minister had convinced himself that there was need for this additional judge. If he says he has, then I accept his opinion.

Soldiers' Bonus
Sir LOME It GOUIN: I am convinced that there is.


Arthur Meighen: A while ago the minister said that he had not inquired.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: The leader of the Opposition (Mr. Meighen) argues that because the appointing power rests with the federal government, therefore, there must be some consideration given by the federal authorities as to the wisdom of action which has been exclusively committed to the provincial legislature by the Constitution.


Arthur Meighen: Not committed to them exclusively.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: Exclusively, to the extent that under section 92 of the British North America Act the organization of the courts is committed entirely to the legislature of each province. I submit that the only reason why the appointing power was vested in the Dominion Parliament was the theory that the Governor General was the sole representative of His Majesty in Canada. Down to the time of the decision in the Maritime Bank Case the theory obtained that His Majesty was not present in regard to provincial legislation, and that consequently there was no power vested in the Lieutenant-Governor to make judicial appointments as the direct representative of His Majesty. Since then that theory has been held to be bad law, and to-day the right of the provinces to deal with matters entirely within their jurisdiction is unquestioned, and I think it is rather too late in the day for us to say that we have any reviewing power in such matters.
Resolution reported and concurred in.
Sir LOMER GOUIN thereupon moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 19, to amend the Judges' Act, founded on the Resolution.


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

[Stage Direction]
Mr. ARTHURS' MOTION ON SOLDIERS'
.	BONUS PLEDGE
On the motion of Hon. W. S. Fielding that the Speaker do now leave the Chair for the House to resolve itself into Committee of Supply:
['Hear, hear.\nProgress reported.\nOn motion of Mr. Mackenzie King, the House adjourned at 11.05 p.m.\nWednesday, March 29, 1922']
Mr. JAMES ARTHURS (Parry Sound):: Mr. Speaker, before you leave the Chair, I desire to call the attention of the House for a few minutes to a matter which arose yesterday afternoon while the House was
in Committee of Supply and the Estimates of the Minister of Soldiers' Civil Re-establishment (Mr. Beland) were under discussion.
A few days ago we heard from the leader of the Government that we should pay little attention to political documents, especially those issued during an election. We did not believe then, Sir-I do not think any hon. member believed-that this remark also applied to the platform of a great party. Before an election each party issues a platform, and the difference between the respective platforms constitutes the issue before the people in that election. And not only that, but the party issuing the platform is of course pledged to substantiate its provisions by legislation if returned to power.
In 1919 the Liberal party held a great convention in this city, and a platform was then adopted which was the basis of their appeal to the country during the recent election. We have already had from the Government side a repudiation of many of the tariff planks of that platform, and the remaining planks are being carefully held in abeyance for the express purpose of securing a few votes from my hon. friends to my immediate left. But the most glaring case of repudiation occurred yesterday. In that platform, as enunciated in 1919, we find the following resolution:
Resolved that this convention declares that the adoption of a system of cash grants to the soldiers and the dependents of those who have fallen is the most satisfactory and effective means of civil re-establishment-such grants to be in addition to the present gratuity and to any pension for disability resulting from service.
Yesterday the Prime Minister, and also the minister in charge of the estimates of this department, both declared that they not only do not intend to fulfil this pledge, but so far as the Prime Minister is concerned, he declared that he never had any intention of doing so. I believe that the majority of those who attended that convention in 1919 were honest men and went home firmly convinced that the Liberal party had pledged itself to implement by legislation every plank in that platform. According to the Liberal handbook this pledge was made in the most solemn manner. The men who attended that convention went back to the country and used every plank of that platform during the last election, and it is idle for the Prime Minister or anybody else to say that they did not use the particular plank to which I am now drawing the attention of the

Soldiers' Bonus
House. This was a solemn promise to the returned soldiers that the Liberal party, it they got back to power, would grant cash bonuses, and it was used in every constituency where there was a returned soldier. It was used by the followers of my hon. friend, the leader of the Government, in his presence, and he himself, in spite of what he said yesterday, did pledge himself to carry out this resolution, because he said that he endorsed every plank in the platform of 1919.
The attitude of the late government and of the party to which I belonged was well known. We were opposed to the granting of $2,000, or any similar bonus, indiscriminately to returned soldiers. We did not believe that that was the proper policy to adopt. But our friends opposite, by this plank in their platform, succeeded in getting thousands of votes, evidently under misapprehension and in spite of the fact that the present Prime Minister knew that his party would never implement that promise. While the Conservative party was opposed to any cash grant of this nature, it was not opposed to doing everything possible for the returned soldier. I have had the honour to be on the Soldiers' Civil Re-establishment Committee for the last four or five years, and I have personal knowledge that the then government had no strings on that committee, that the members of that committee were perfectly free to take any course they chose. That committee, by their recommendations, and the late government by implementing those recommendations by legislation, have done a great deal for the returned soldier. It is not necessary at this time to go into details, but we know and, as Canadians, are proud, no matter whether we are on one side or the other, that Canada has paid the most liberal scale of pensions of any country that was engaged in the war. The late government directed its efforts toward bettering the condition of widows and orphans who had lost their bread winners during the war, and of men who returned from overseas unable to pursue their ordinary vocations through illness or wounds. But as I have said, we were faced throughout the country with this pledge made by the Liberal party under the conditions to which I have referred.
The leader of the Government, speaking of this matter yesterday, defended his position by saying that a course advisable at one moment may not be the best at another time. Assuredly this has a

familiar sound to me; it is right in line with the general policy of hon. gentlemen opposite. They had not only a policy for Canada, but a policy for each province. And in the provinces you found the present leader of the Government supporting in one county a man who was a free trader, in another county a man who was a protectionist, and in another county a man who had no idea of tariff matters at all. In fact, that procedure was carried so far that the policy advocated in one polling subdivision was different from that advocated in another, and so on right along the line.
The leader of the Government says that conditions have changed; that at present we have a large debt, incurred through the railway situation. But he has forgotten to tell the people of Canada that during the last election-not in 1919, but in October, 1921,-a handbook was issued and placed in the hands of Liberal speakers throughout Canada bearing on its face the portrait of the present leader of the Government and subscribed to by him, in which his pledge to the returned soldier was reiterated and renewed; nor has it ever been repudiated by the hon. gentleman or any one on his side.
The minister in charge of this matter took a somewhat different stand; he declared that he had reason to suppose that the returned soldier would not accept $2,000. Now, Mr. Speaker, if you took a vote of the members of this House, or, say, of the members of the press gallery, on the question of whether they would accept a cash bonus of $2,000, I am sure they would all vote affirmatively; and I have not the slightest doubt that the returned soldier would do exactly the same thing. It is quite true that certain soldier organizations have passed resolutions advising against any request for a cash gratuity of $2,000. It is quite true that they have moderated their demands; but it is foolish to say for one moment that these men are repudiating a cash grant of any kind.
I have brought this matter to the attention of the House for the purpose of setting forth one of the reasons why hon. gentlemen of the Liberal party are sitting on the other side of the House. I beg to move, seconded by Mr. Stevens:
That all the words after the word "that" be struck out and the following be substituted therefor:	.
The Liberal Party assembled in convention in August, 1919, adopted the following resolution:

Soldiers' Bonus
"Resolved that this Convention declares that the adoption of a system of cash grants to the soldiers and dependents of those who have fallen is the most' satisfactory and effective means of civil re-establishment-such grants to he in addition to the present gratuity and to any pension for disability resulting from service.'*
That the policy embodied in such resolution so adopted was continuously thereafter held before the people of Canada, and in an official handbook issued in October, 1921, by the Liberal Party under the authority of its leader Hon W. L. Mackenzie King, the said resolution was quoted and reaffirmed, and the promise and the pledge embodied therein declared to be the policy of the Liberal Party.
That candidates contesting on behalf of the Liberal Party in the late election used widely such promise and pledge as the means of securing support.
That the Liberal Party having been returned to power, the refusal now by the leader of the Government and by the Minister of Soldiers' Civil Re-establishment to fulfil such promise and pledge constitutes a repudiation of a solemn obligation and a disregard of political honour.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Mr. Speaker, the custom of this House has been to extend to the leader of the Government the courtesy of permitting him to see, before the moment it is handed to you, Mr. Speaker, any amendment or resolution which is likely to be moved by a member of the House. Neither my right hon. friend the leader of the Opposition (Mr. Meighen) nor the hon. member (Mr. Arthurs) who has just spoken has given me slightest intimation that any resolution of the kind was to be submitted this afternoon.


Arthur Meighen: May I be permitted to say, Mr. Speaker, that I am very sorry if my hon. friend did not receive a copy of the resolution. I instructed my secretary at one o'clock to send a copy, and I dictated an accompanying letter. I sent it also to the leader of the Agrarian party (Mr. Crerar.)


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Shame.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Arthur Meighen: If my hon. friend has not received it, I am quite prepared to let the debate adjourn.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: There is no necessity for the debate being adjourned.


Arthur Meighen: It was quite unintentional on my part.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I would simply like the House to know that the first intimation I had of this resolution was as I heard it read a moment ago.
Now, Mr. Speaker, may I just read to the House the resolution of the Liberal Convention of 1919 and see exactly what it states? First of all, it is a resolution on Soldier's Civil Re-establishment. It reads:
Whereas, it is considered that the guiding principle for a permanent settlement of the problem of civil re-establishment should be equitable treatment to soldiers in all avocations, having regard to the length and nature of service,
Resolved that this convention declares that the adoption of a system of cash grants to the soldiers and dependents of those who have fallen is the most satisfactory and effective means of civil re-establishment-such grants to be in addition to the present gratuity and to any pension for disability resulting from service.
That resolution is not a pledge on the part of the Liberal party to give cash grants indiscriminately to all returned men. As I read it, and as the Liberal convention understood it, the resolution was a declaration that in the opinion of the Convention that was the most effective means at that time of dealing with the question of re-establishment. The resolution relates, as I have pointed out, to the matter of re-establishment, not to the granting of an indiscriminate bonus to every soldier who was overseas, simply as a recognition of his services.	[DOT]
What the convention believed, and I think rightly believed, was that if the government would adopt the policy with the returned soldiers of giving to them a cash grant of a certain amount, and allowing them to re-establish themselves with the aid of that money, that would be the most effective way of bringing about their reestablishment. It was felt that the government was proceeding under a policy of more or less obliging returned men to act in accordance with the wishes and under instructions of officers of the government, not trusting them to make use of sums of money, according to their own light, which would enable them with regard to what might seem to them to be the most effective way having regard to their interests and circumstances, to work out their own salvation, so to speak, in the matter of re-establishment. I think that if that point is perfectly clear, hon. members will see there has not been any attempt on the part of hon. members on this side of the House or of their supporters, in any way to repudiate any statement that appears in this platform in regard to the re-establishment of the returned soldiers.

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I said yesterday, and I will repeat it now, because I believe it to be absolutely true, that what may have been the wise course to take at that time, when men were returning from overseas and seeking to return to their regular vocations, would not necessarily be wise or the proper course to take some years later, particularly after Parliament had met and after the House of Commons on two occasions, had discussed the whole question, in Special Committee, and had decided upon certain measures of re-establishment, and when the government were taking action in accordance with views which were unanimously concurred in by Parliament. Let me repeat, this statement in the Liberal platform is not a pledge of cash grants to all returned men. It cannot be so construed. It is a statement of what in the opinion of that convention at that time would have been the most effective way of dealing with re-establisment.
May I say this further? Hon. gentlemen opposite are given to use of extravagant language in criticising their opponents. They have on repeated occasions resorted to the use of terms which I think are a little stronger than is necessary, even for the political purposes they have in view. May I read the last clause of this amendment?
That the Liberal party having been returned to power, the refusal now by the leader of the Government and by the Minister of Soldiers Civil R'e-establishment to fulfil such promise and pledge constitutes a repudiation of a solemn obligation and a disregard of political honour.
I submit, Mr. Speaker, that hon. members of the House of Commons, regardless of whether their references are to their political opponents or not, should be careful in imputing motives of political dishonour. I think hon. members on this side of the House are just as true custodians of honour as any hon. gentlemen opposite, 4 p.m. and I would ask the House, when voting upon this amendment, to consider that aspect of the question.
It seems to me, the point of material importance at the present time, is the attitude taken with respect to this question of cash grants by myself and others associated with me in the recent election campaign. I notice that this amendment is directed primarily against myself as the leader of the party, and for that reason it is proper I think that I should refer somewhat to my own attitude on this particular question.
Yesterday my hon. friend from Fort William and Rainy River (Mr. Manion)

read to this House an extract from a speech made by Colonel Thompson, who was with me in our Canadian West during the course of the political campaign. My hon. friend said that the extract which he read, while it did not amount to a pledge, carried an implication to the effect that I was standing, because I was with Colonel Thompson at the time, in favour of a cash grant to the returned soldiers. As Colonel Thompson is not at present a member of this House and was therefore unable to speak for himself,
I was about to rise and reply to my hon. friend when you, Mr. Speaker, as Chairman of the Committee, ruled the whole discussion out of order, and I permitted the incident to pass. My recollection is clear as to what took place at that meeting, and if my hon. friend will consult with those who were present at that gathering, or will read the full reports of it, he will find that Colonel Thompson said that while returned men might very well feel that their services were worth $2,000, the Liberal party did not propose to measure their services in terms of money, and was not standing for cash grants. That was the position he took.


Mr. MANION:: The paper could not have quoted him correctly.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: My hon.
friend was ready enough to bring into this House a paper which had a partial reference to what was said at that meeting. He was careful to say that what he read did not constitute a pledge, but he did say that it carried a certain inference. Now I was present on that platform and I heard Colonel Thompson say to that audience that the Liberal party was not proposing any cash grants to the returned men. Not only did he say that on that platform, but he said it on a dozen other platforms on which he spoke when he and I were travelling together, and I submit that if we on this side of the House are to be judged in respect to our attitude toward the returned soldiers, we should be judged by what was said on the public platform as to what our attitude towards the returned men would be if we were returned to power, and not by any inference which hon. gentlemen may draw in regard to what may or may not have been said at a political meeting, or, indeed, by any misrepresentation of the purpose and spirit of resolutions passed at a general convention.
I think, Mr. Speaker, I may well leave the matter there. What I have said' to different audiences, what I have said to

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every deputation of returned men whom I have had the privilege of addressing, has been this: That I regarded the old House of Commons as not being representative of the will of the people, that I felt the returned men could not expect to receive from a parliament that was not truly representative the treatment which they had a right to expect from a parliament that was truly representative, and that when the election was over and the new House of Commons had been formed, one of the first steps I would take would be to refer the whole question of the treatment of returned men to a committee of this House which would be truly representative of all shades of opinion in the country; that I would ask the committee to deal with the questions that came before them, and that the Government would be guided in its action in the light of the report made. That was the pledge I made during the campaign, and that pledge has already been fulfilled. My hon. friend the Minister of Soldiers' Civil Re-establishment (Mr. Belaud) has already given notice of the establishment of that committee, and as soon as its members have an opportunity of meeting there will be placed before them the whole position in regard to the returned men. There is no reason why the committee should not consider, if it so wishes, the question of cash grants. As far as I am concerned, the broader they make the whole of their inquiry, the better.
The point that is of concern at this moment is this: This amendment is an attack upon the honour of myself and my colleagues as to our attitude towards the returned men. I am quite prepared, Mr. Speaker, to leave to the House, to hon. members who have heard the discussions throughout the election campaign whether in any particular, as the leader of the Liberal party, I made a pledge of cash grants to the returned soldiers generally, irrespective altogether of their need or their desire or their wish for such. I say again that the resolution of. the Liberal Convention was an expression of opinion as to what seemed wisest and best at that [particular time. I think in that respect the resolution was sound. In regard to the position taken during the general election, I have nqthing to retract, and I am only too happy to leave it to this House to express its view as to the political honour of the gentlemen who sit on this side, by asking hon. members to reject this amendment.


Hon. H. H. STEVENS (Vancouver Centre) :: The resolution which has been placed in your hands deals with a principle somewhat broader than the very narrow and limited scope ascribed to it by the Prime Minister in his appeal to the House to reject this resolution. The object of this resolution is to meet the oft-repeated repudiation, by the Prime Minister in particular, and by others around him, of solemn pledges publicly given and written in the documents of the Liberal party to the people of Canada prior to the last election. It is, Sir, to bring before the House this point: v.hether or not a party-or a group, if you choose to use a more modern term-can go before the people of Canada, offering a written document stating their policy and their views upon important questions, which are bound to come before Parliament, asking the public to support them on that platform, and, after having received the support of the people and having secured the power to implement those pledges, can coolly tell the country that these pledges are light and frivolous matters, not to be taken too seriously, but, may be repudiated absolutely by those who made them. That is the principle which we call into judgment before the House to-day. We are asking the House co say whether or not they stand by an old practice of parliamentary procedure in the British Empire, namely, that groups of individuals, known in the past as parties, go before the country, issue their platform and appeal for support on a general policy, not on details of government; and if they do that, then they are bound, when they are returned to power, to implement those pledges by legislation. That is the affect of the responsibility we assume. Why, Mr. Speaker, while you were not in the House during the whole of last parliament, I think you were here long enough to remember that my hon. friend himself, the leader of the Government, and many around him, wanted my right hon. leader (Mr. Meighen) to resign and go to the country. Why? Because, forsooth, he had fulfilled the pledges he and the party had given. They said that we had discharged our mandate, that we -had completed the pledges and promises we had given, and, therefore, we had no right to sit here any longer. But now we have the same hon. gentlemen coming into office and absolutely repudiating pledges. He says it is not a pledge. He says he made no promise of this kind as he went about the country. I asked him yesterday, and I ask him today, is this document an official document of the Liberal party or is it not? I hold



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in my hand the handbook of the Liberal party. Yesterday I invited the hon. gentleman to repudiate it, and he said, no, he would not repudiate it, nor will not repudiate it to-day. This document, Sir, contains, in its opening pages, the platform of the Liberal party. Is that platform a meaningless document? Or is it a document issued to the people of Canada upon which they are invited to support that party? I have here the platform, for the sake of comparison, of my hon. friends of the Progressive party. Will these hon. gentlemen say that in issuing their platform to the people of Canada they did not consider they are now bound in honour- that is what the resolution refers to-to support that platform to the limit of their ability? Every one of them who has spoken so far has given expression to that principle. As far as we are concerned, we stand exactly on that same principle. This platform of the Liberal party is issued with the imprimatur of the Prime Minister himself, issued by authority of the committee he had guiding him-he will remember that he told us the other day that he had adopted the course of being guided. I invite the attention of my hon. friend to this. I notice he is not giving me very much attention, but I would like him to do so. He said a moment ago that this pledge, which he chose to call a pledge, was all very well in 1919, under the conditions existing then. But, why, Mr. Speaker, did they reissue this pledge again in 1921? Why did the hon. gentleman offer it to the people of Canada during that three months up to December 6, 1921? If it was only intended for August, 1919, why did he issue it again last fall? If -what he told us is sincerely true, that it was a pledge under the conditions obtaining in 1919, then exactly the same thing applies to every statement in this platform. I have them here. Let me give hon. members the headings. There are resolutions on finance, tariff, reciprocity, agriculture, labour, conservation of physical standards, soldiers' civil re-establishment, railways, national unity, Canadian autonomy, control of natural resources, elections, and so forth. Are all these resolutions just to be considered as they happened to apply in August, 1919, or do the principles contained in these resolutions guide my hon. friend in his leadership of his party today? That is the question that is before the House. Here is what my hon. friend says in this document preceding all these 
resolutions. Referring to the convention as a large and representative convention comprising 1,800 delegates, he says:
The interest of the delegates in the policy of the party was evinced by a mass of resolutions from which those adopted were carefully selected by a representative committee. They express the idea of a great body of delegates of-
Of what?
-the aims of the Liberal party.
That is set forth in this document. He himself says, as leader of the party, that these resolutions, the ones I referred to and others, were carefully selected and issued to the public as the aims and the platform of the Liberal party, not as something to guide the party in 1919, but for the guidance of the party in October, November, and up to December 6, 1921, for the winning of votes for the party. If thjs resolution is to be treated as my hon. friend desires to treat it to-day, I say to my hon. friends to my left, who have been very courteous to him in anticipation of a fair deal on the tariff question, that they can expect exactly the same answer from him in regard to the resolution on the tariff. My hon. friend the Minister of Labour (Mr. Murdock), when he meets his fellow workmen in Toronto, will be able to say to them, in the words of the Prime Minister, when he is called upon to state why he did not bring in the eight-hour-day, as pledged in his resolution on labour, "Oh, that resolution was for August, 1919, and not for the present time." Either the argument made by the Prime Minister a moment ago in regard to this pledge is meaningless and a mere subterfuge, or the same language must be applied to every resolution in this platform; that
is,	that the resolution, the pledge, the plank in their platform, whatever you like to term
it,	is merely convenient to stand upon for the time being, and for the purpose of influencing the public, but was never intended to be implemented by legislation. That is the position.
My hon. friend made to-day, and has made on several occasions, quite a display over the promise that he gave to the returned men to the effect that he intended to refer this matter to a committee of this House, and that this committee would deal with it. In this same interesting book, the same piece of Liberal literature, I find pages devoted to this question. I draw the attention of the Minister of Health and of Soldiers' Civil Re-establishment (Mr. MARCH 28, 1922
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Beland) to this, because yesterday, when he was discussing this question, he took a a very strong stand. He said that personally, he had never supported the cash gratuity. That is correct, I think. He said that, as regards himself and those who were associated with him, the committee on Soldiers' Civil Re-establishment was a committee free from embarrassment and unanimous in its decisions. He does not contradict me, and I think I am stating the case correctly. But all the way through this literature, my hon. friends say that the only reason why Parliament did not give to the soldiers what they were demanding was-what? It was because the hand of the Government was over the committee and controlling it. That hand is now removed. My hon. friend knows that, and he and his friends take a great deal of satisfaction out of that fact. Let him and let his minister go before this committee, which is freed from this sinister influence which he says was exerted, and allow that committee to do what he says it was prevented from doing by the former government, That is what we ask him. My hon. friend knows perfectly well, and we know, that in making this pledge-we call it a pledge, and if it is not a pledge, his whole platform from end to end is meaningless, because there is nothing more clear in any of the resolutions than this-he had no intention of implementing it. If my hon. friend was sincere at all in making this pledge, he would implement it, but we know perfectly well that he has no intention of doing so. Indeed, we know, and we knew in the last parliament that such a pledge as this could not be implemented without serious difficulties in this country, and that is what made it so difficult for those of us who were supporting the late government, to make good in the last election, because of the conviction carried to the minds of many people by speeches and utterances of my hon. friend and his followers on such subjects as this. The people were told that it was possible to do things which my hon. friend and his followers knew it was not possible to do. We are calling upon him now to do one of two things, either to implement that pledge by legislation providing for cash gratuities, or to admit that his statement and the statements of his party were unfair to us, that they misled the soldiers in regard to the course which my hon. friend intended to pursue. Either one or the other is what we are asking; and in 28i
the absence of that,-and last night we were led to believe that we could expect neither-then we say this: This resolution having been passed, this is a repudiation of-a solemn obligation and a disregard of public honour. It is that principle that we are bringing to the attention of the House; it is that principle that we are asking the House to pass upon on this occasion.
We believe that in this country public utterances and platforms issued by responsible leaders of a party should have a meaning. We believe our system of government cannot be sustained unless there be some regard for the pledges of a party when it is offering itself and its programme to the people. What position will this country be in if a party can go before the people of Canada offering to them a programme, and then after attaining its objective, can coolly tell the people: "It is not our desire to discharge that pledge"? That is the position in which the hon. gentleman finds himself to-day, and that is the reason why we move this resolution and invite the House to support it.


Mr. JOHN MORRISON (Weyburn):: Mr. Speaker, this matter of the promises made by the present Government during the late election campaign in connection with giving a cash gratuity to the returned men, has been sprung upon us, and we have not had much opportunity to prepare evidence to the contrary. During the campaign, I was not out of my constituency, but I want to contribute my little bit of evidence as to what went on in Weyburn constituency. At only two of my meetings was this matter mentioned, and at one of those meetings I was asked, when on the platform, what my attitude was towards granting this cash gratuity. I had really not considered the matter very much, and I replied that I was not in favour of it. A returned soldier was helping me at the meeting that night, and I asked him what the boys would think of my reply. He said: "You are perfectly right, Mr. Morrison; the boys are not expecting it today; they were at one time, but that is not an issue with them any more." I do not know what promises were made in other constituencies; I can speak only for what occurred in mine. The chief issue there was not what we were going to do towards rewarding the returned soldiers;-it was the record of the hon. member for Marquette (Mr. Crerar) in managing the business of the United Grain Growers. That was the chief issue and practically
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the only one. His record in this House was not touched on; the issue was the private business that he was conducting. The campaign in this regard was carried on very unfairly, and the issue was instigated by my hon. friends to my right. Those hon. gentlemen are finding very much fault with campaign matters, but to me their attitude looks like the pot calling the kettle black. They did their best; they did not regard all the finer rules of the game; they did everything to gain; and they lost. I think it would become them better if they would not say anything about breaking the rules of the game.


Mr. WILLIAM IRVINE (East Calgary) :: Mr. Speaker, in this amendment there is involved a policy which makes it necessary for me to make a few remarks upon it. I believe in the policy of the returned soldiers as it has been laid down by then-organization, and I have been pledged, both by the organization which I represent, organizer labour, and by the organized soldiers, to support such a policy. I regret, however, to see that this question should have been so involved with censure of the Government, and judging from the sentiments which have already been expressed by the Opposition, I should say that they are more interested in getting a censure of the Government than in getting a bonus for the returned soldier. I personally find it very difficult to believe in the absolute sincerity of the hon. member who has moved the amendment. I hate to be a party to any imputation of false or biased motives on the part of the Opposition, but nevertheless I think that if they are absolutely sincere in this matter they should bring in a resolution or bill, as they please, dealing with the question specifically and not involving the Government or any individual in censure. I agree with the position as set forth by the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King). I do not see how the political honour of the Government is involved in this matter at all, and while I am in sympathy with, that which is alluded to in the resolution, in so far as the soldiers' bonus is concerned, at the same time I do not feel -that it ought to be tangled up with any censure of the Government. I think that this is a case of using what would be more or less a popular issue for the purpose of getting a vote of censure passed on the Government. I am sure that if the hon. gentleman who is responsible for the resolution will bring in another one on the specific question which is before us, he will find a great deal of 
support in this wing, whereas I doubt very much whether he will find any sympathy for his motion as it stands. I cannot vote on this question because I do not want to vote against the bonus, and I do not want to vote for a censure of the Government.


Mr. W. C. GOOD (Brant) :: As an onlooker and a new member, I must say that this discussion, while illuminating and interesting, has not so far been edifying; and I agree with the member (Mr. Irvine) who has just sat down that it would be very much -better if we could dissociate the specific issue under consideration from the question of censure of the Government. There is another question related to this one which occurs to me, and which was brought up some days ago in the House and that is as to what would result it this group, to which I belong more or less independently, should vote against some Government measure. Now, I think it would be unfortunate that anyone in this House, not wanting to censure or to oust the Government, should be compelled by some custom, which I think surely is now obsolete, to vote contrary to his own conscience and opinion. And this is a case in point. If the Government could be convicted, on the present occasion, of dishonour and duplicity in this matter, and we in this section of the House should desire to censure them, I should hope very much that such a vote would not be carried too far; and I should be glad if some amendment to the constitutional rules could be effected which would leave greater freedom to an individual to vote according to his own conscience and his own opinions. I think that such freedom is necessary. I simply say, in conclusion, that so far as I am concerned it will be practically impossible for me to sit in judgment on this squabble between the two old parties. I do not feel that I can vote at all.


Arthur Meighen: I desire first of all to say a word with regard to the objection taken by the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) on the ground that the courtesy of sending him a copy of the resolution had not been observed. I have made inquiry and find that my instructions, given at one o'clock, were carried out, and that within a few minutes of one o'clock a copy of the resolution and a notification that it would be moved in amendment to Supply was delivered at his office, a similar copy having been delivered to the office of the leader of the Progressive party (Mr. MARCH 28, 1922
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Crerar) who, being present, received it. The Prime Minister not being present apparently did not receive his copy.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I am sure my right hon. friend would like me to have the facts correctly stated. As he has just said, his instructions were to leave the resolution at my office.


Arthur Meighen: To be delivered to you.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: As the right hon. member knows, I have an office in the House of Commons and one also in the departmental block, where I am obliged to be when dealing with business that appertains to the affairs of the Government. The leader of the Opposition knows that Council meets between two and three o'clock, and at that hour my place of business is in the East Block. The copy which my right hon. friend sent was taken to my office here, which I did not reach until three o'clock. My secretary sent it to me during the course of the debate with a message that it was found on the table, but evidently not delivered to any member of the staff.


Arthur Meighen: I do not dispute the facts as stated by my hon. friend; I merely state that my instructions were to deliver the resolution to him. It was taken to his office here, and I only add that when similar notices were given me while I was Prime Minister they were delivered also to my office in this building, inasmuch as they had reference to House of Commons matters. Hereafter such notices will be delivered to the hon. gentleman at his office in the East Block. I am not finding fault with the Prime Minister at all. I want to make it clear that not only had I no intention of being discourteous to him, but I took the natural steps to notify him of the intention to move this resolution.
Now, what is before the House this afternoon is something which, if I am able at all to estimate the importance of matters that come before Parliament for consideration, is not of cursory or secondary, but of primary and first importance for the decision of hon. members. One hon. gentleman describes the debate as a squabble between one side and the other. Well, everything that comes up for debate in Parliament may be so described, but the question to which hon. gentlemen's minds should be addressed is this: What is the proper thing in the interests of Canada to do? What is the proper decision to give regarding the question propounded in the
amendment that has been moved? It is a question of good faith of political parties; it is a question of the good faith of the House. That is what we have to consider. There is no question before us as to whether there should be a further gratuity to the soldiers of the country. If that were the question before Parliament I would vote in the negative. Is my sincerity doubted, or the sincerity of hon. members who sit around me? By whom is the question of sincerity raised? When we were in office were we or were we not frank with the returned soldiers? We told them definitely, once we had gone the extent we thought the country could go in the matter of cash gratuities, that we could go no further, and we took the penalty of certain hostility among them because of that candour. I put the course we pursued before hon. gentlemen to my left and hon. gentlemen in front of me, before both Oppositions, if you may call them such, en face et de cote, and I ask them whether that is evidence of sincerity or not. We are deciding in this debate, by our votes on this question, whether or not parties are to be held to their pledges. If this resolution is defeated, he who votes against it votes that he is not a supporter of the principle that a party in power is bound by the pledges by which it attained that power.
Now, what was the pledge? Let us inquire dispassionately what it was, and let us inquire, as to the value of the Prims Minister's explanation of the effect of his party's commitment in the terms stated in their platform as transcribed into the resolution. It was this:
Resolved that this Convention declares that the adoption of a system of cash grants to the soldiers and dependents of those who have fallen is the most satisfactory and effective means of civil re-establishment-such grants to be in addition to the present gratuity and to any pension for disability resulting from service.
What is the Prime Minister's statement to-day? He says: There is not embedded in that any promise or pledge whatever. Not embedded there any promise to the five hundred thousand returned men that the Liberal party was committed to give them a further cash grant in addition to the then existing gratuity and pension! Well, all I want to say is this: that if what the hon. leader of the Government says is the only effect of this resolution, then the Liberal party stands under an indictment greater than that levelled against them in the resolution now before

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the House. Could any returned soldier in receipt of his gratuity and of his pension, having fought, as large numbers of them did, if not the majority, for a further recognition in cash, in the form of a general addition to the grant, could any returned soldier reading that, not come to the conclusion that the Liberal party favoured that for which he had fought? Can the hon. gentleman conceive that any one would come to any other conclusion? "Resolved that this convention declares that the adoption of a system of cash grants to the soldiers and dependents of those who have fallen is the most satisfactory and effective means of civil re-establishment- such grants to be in addition to the present gratuity and to any pension for disability resulting from service." Would not any returned soldier reading this at once think that the Liberal party is in favour of cash grants in addition to the present gratuity? Could any scheme to deceive and mislead the soldiers be more plainly devised than that resolution, if it means what the hon. gentleman says? If it falls short of a promise to the men of a cash grant in ease the party passing that resolution is returned to power, then the indictment of deceit is as bad at [DOT] least as the indictment of repudiation.
That is the resolution. " Oh," says the Prime Minister, " I went through the campaign and I did not promise any cash grants at all." Indeed, Colonel Thompson, who was with him, though he is reported to have made such a promise, actually said he was not in favour of cash grants. He said precisely opposite to what he is reported to have said. Well, are we concerned with Colonel Thompson? Was Colonel Thompson empowered to amend the resolutions of the Liberal party in convention assembled? I doubt, in fact I would question, were I a follower, the right of even the leader of a party to amend those resolutions, to take in his pocket the commission of his party and at his will alter it, whatever the circumstances might be. Colonel Thompson had no such right.
But the leader of the Government says, " I made no promise; I never stood on any platform and promised cash grants." Why, he did not need to do so. He had an official proclamation issued by a committee of which he was the chairman, more than a month before the campaign was launched, and he had commissioned every speaker for the Liberal party to make that promise

under his authority. So he could well afford to be silent while he placed in the hands of every speaker who stood on the platform in his support a document with his photograph on the outside, issued by a committee of which he is declared to be the chairman, that declaration appearing on the frontispiece. That document contains this statement:
That the platform as adopted and quoted below expresses the idea of the great body of delegates of the aims of the Liberal party.
And in that document he quotes the fol lowing, just as it is set out in the resolution before the Chair:
Resolved that this Convention declares, that the adoption of a system of cash grants to the soldiers and dependents of those who have fallen is the most satisfactory and effective means of civil re-establishment-such grants to be in addition to the present gratuity and to any pension for disability resulting from service.
With that in the pocket of every candidate, with that authority to go and repeat the promise embedded in that resolution, what would be the need of the Prime Minister and leader of the party to refer to the subject at all? Nay, more, on platform after platform, men -commissioned by himself, commissioned in writing to say sb, proclaimed this to he the policy of the party, to be its promise and its pledge. And in -my hands now I hold the proclamations, as quoted yesterday, that those candidates issued to the returned soldiers among their electorate promising that this was going to be done. I wonder if even the hon. member for the city of Ottawa, right in the -city where we stand now, will say that he did not utilize that -plank of the Liberal party? Yea, he utilized that platform in this city in association with the Prime Minister himself, and sought to obtain votes on the strength of the pledge contained in the document which I hold in my hand.
That is the condition of affairs that existed in the last campaign. It is not the conduct of elections that we are concerned with. The hon. Prime Minister says, "Oh, you did not do everything that was right." The Government in office in the last Parliament-and I appeal to the hon. leader of the Progressive party (Mr. Crerar) to say if what I speak is right or not-that Government in office, whether it was politically advantageous or whether it was. not, set about to implement by legislation, and did one by one implement by legislation the pledges that it made to the people before being returned to office. Did any member

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of the late government stand in his place and say, "Oh, those resolutions were very good in the months of September and October, 1917, but now we are in power, and they don't apply once you get in power if it is two months later." Did any one hear that position taken? No. We set about the fulfilment of our promises, and we took the consequences of that fulfilment-and I want to say that those consequences were not always advantageous to us, and no one knows that better than the 'leader of the Progressive party. One lby one we put those pledges into effect, one by one we fulfilled the contract which we made with the people-a contract which the people accepted when they put us in power, and expected us to carry out.
We were told yesterday: "Oh, the Great War Veterans at their last convention opposed the granting of cash bonuses. I do not know what could be advanced more false, more shadowy, more tricky than the argument that the policy of a great party is subject to alteration by the resolution of some organization in the country. But as a matter of fact there was no such resolution passed by the Great War Veterans. In 1920 they passed a resolution after the convention of 1919, to which I have referred, in which they affirmed themselves definitely in favour of cash grants and pledged themselves to secure such grants if they could. In the face of the position taken by the Great War Veterans the Government of the day declined their request, and said to them: We believe we have gone as far in the general cash grants as is in the interests of the country, and we think that anything further should be in the way of enabling the soldier to help himself through re-training, seeking out various ways in which specially disabled men may be helped in the struggle for life to overcome to some extent the handicaps they labor under as the result of their war service. That was the answer we made to those men. We took the responsibility and the discredit for the straight denial of that request. In the 1921 meeting no resolution was passed changing the position taken by the Great War Veterans in 1920. They passed a general resolution with regard to re-establishment, but took no special position one way or the other on the matter of cash grants. I examined their records in order to make certain of that. But I feel like apologizing, Mr. Speaker, for referring to the action of any association, however respected, however honourable, however worthy of deference its opinion
may be; because I never knew a political party to be in a position of such desperation that it had to seek a loophole of escape from its own solemn pledges, from its own declared policy, by pleading the action and the opinion of some association other than that political party itself. Does the Great War Veterans' Association sit in appeal over Liberal policy? Are they a court of appeal empowered to amend, modify, strike out or enlarge any part of the Liberal platform? Well, possibly they could improve on it; I do not doubt they could. But I would not want to be the leader of the party that submitted to the jurisdiction of any court of appeal in relation to the policy that it puts before the people, save alone the court of appeal of the people themselves. The people accepted the pledge of the Liberal party, accepted the pledge of the Prime Minister, made two years and a half before the election, reaffirmed more than once in the meantime, and reaffirmed last of all in the most solemn way in the handbook of his party which he placed, in the hands of all his speakers throughout the length and breadth of Canada with the authorization to make those . pledges, to state those intimations, to declare that policy. That is the position the hon. gentleman is in to-day.
Now, is it a matter of no concern how we decide this resolution? I do not know that I am particularly concerned as to how others vote than myself. It is a vote of confidence in the Government; I seek no camouflaged position in that regard. If any hon. gentleman wants to say that this Government is to be open and free to repudiate the position it took prior to the contest; to repudiate its solemn pledge and policy and still enjoy the confidence of the House, then it is the right of that hon. gentleman so to vote. If there is anything of more conseqence to that hon. gentleman than the good faith of political pledges, than the good faith of political parties, than the honour of a political party in carrying out its solemn pledge, then the hon. gentleman is the judge of what is more important to him. But if this House is now to give a verdict of acquittal; if this House is now to declare that the platform of 1919 is a "scrap of paper," that it may be accepted as already annulled, abandoned and forgotten, then the consequences of that position must be faced. That platform contains other principles; it contains other policies than those we are discussing to-day. No matter what course the Government takes on any subject em-
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bodied in that document, on any subject referred to by them in this House through session after session, since and during the campaign, they can never take a position of more direct and defiant repudiation than they took yesterday in relation to this subject. If they are to be acquitted for so doing, then the hon. member of this House who seeks to hold them to their pledges, who seeks to hold them to their avowed policies, will already have cut the ground from under his feet, because he has acquitted them of the very same charge of which he seeks later to hold them guilty. I, for one, will not put myself in that position. I purpose to hold them to their whole chapter of pledges. I purpose to make solid my ground by my vote upon this resolution and through it to declare that I have not lost faith in the political honour of our country. I purpose by my vote here to say-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Arthur Meighen: "Oh, oh," say hon. gentlemen; I presume those are the hon. gentlemen who have lost faith, and they have good reason for doing so. I have a recollection of sitting through four sessions of this House when hon. gentlemen who now say "oh" were sitting opposite to me. Though they opposed us in many matters of policy; though they made very many charges against us, they sat through four sessions and never once declared that we had failed in fidelity to the pledges we made by which we obtained office.


Thomas Vien: Will the right hon. gentleman permit me a correction? Does he not remember when we criticized his government for having repealed Orders in Council passed during the election of 1917 exempting farmers' sons from the application of the law? The repeal of those Orders in Council right after the election we interpreted as lack of good faith toward the farmers' sons.


Arthur Meighen: The Government in office, in the spring of 1918, at a time when the war was at its worst, repealed Orders in Council-or, rather, enacted Orders in Council,-which took away the exemption of farmers' sons between the ages of twenty and twenty-three. That is quite true.


Thomas Vien: After the election.


Arthur Meighen: Certainly, after the election.


Thomas Vien: Not before?
[Mr. Meighon.J


Arthur Meighen: No, the Orders in
Council were not in effect then. We removed these exemptions by special Orders in Council, and we did it in obedience to the pledges we made to the people of this country in pursuance of the fact that the throwing of the whole force of the country behind the war effort was the first mandate of the government.


Thomas Vien: Will the right hon. gentleman allow me to make this correction? The Order in Council exempting the farmers' sons was enacted right before the election and repealed right after.


Arthur Meighen: 
Mr. BELAND:: If my right hon. friend will allow me, I do not believe I made such a statement. May I repeat what I said yesterday?


Arthur Meighen: Certainly.


Henri Sévérin Béland: I said that the veterans' organizations in Canada had declared themselves opposed to a cash bonus. That is the statement I made to the House.


Arthur Meighen: I will read what the hon. gentleman said. After having declared that the veterans were opposed to the bonus, which by the way the veterans have never declared-I have their resolution here-my hon. friend said:
If my hon. friend wants to Know what my attitude would be on the subject, it could not be
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any different from the one taken by the returned men themselves, and that is not to grant the cash bonus.


Henri Sévérin Béland: Exactly.


Arthur Meighen: Well, what did I say? I stated that the hon. gentleman had stated his attitude to be-and I assume he spoke for the Government-not to grant any more cash bonuses.


Henri Sévérin Béland: The difference between the right hon. gentleman and myself is that he wants to impose his own will, whereas I want to respect the will of the Veterans.


Arthur Meighen: I will leave the hon. gentleman's retort to answer itself. The point he rose to interrupt me upon was that I had misinterpreted his words. I have read his words, and they are precisely what I said. He announced as Minister of Soldiers' Civil ^Re-establishment his opposition to further cash grants, and the Prime Minister in his statement did the same thing. If, however, in the face of this debate, if in view of the position they are in to-day, the Government wants to lecant or modify its position, there should be ample opportunity to do so. If they are taking the stand, no further cash grants, let them say so. If they want to change from their attitude of yesterday, let them make the change. If they do not intend to change, if they are against further cash grants, then why by interruptions lead any hon. gentleman to any doubt upon the question. They stated yesterday they were opposed to further cash grants. There can be no doubt at all about that. Those are the words of the Minister of Soldiers' Civil Re-establishment, who.presides over the department affected. Those are the words reiterated by the Prime Minister himself, and even in to-day's debate is there any hon. gentleman who would not take it, after the Prime Minister's speech, that his Government had definitely decided against further cash grants to soldiers as intimated in the resolution of the Convention of 1919? No. Of the repudiation there is no doubt. Of the making of the pledge there is no doubt. Of its reiteration there is no doubt. Of the authority of the Prime Minister for both the making and the reiteration there is no doubt. Of the repudiation we have had confirmation by one after the other in the debate yesterday. Now, is this Parliament to decide that the making of the pledge followed by its repudiation-the first step in relation to their platform since they came into power- is to go without the rebuke of this Parliament? Shall this House by its vote declare 
that that sort of conduct meets with its approval? This resolution is an opportunity for hon. gentlemen to say that it does not, and I shall vigorously support the resolution.


Hon. W. S. FIELDING (Minister of Finance) :: Mr. Speaker: down in my old home town some years ago a worthy aider-man won undying fame by a single sentence. He had been present at a discussion occupying considerable time, at which speeches had been made very much like the one to which we have just listened by the right hon. leader of the Opposition (Mr. Meighen), and at last he said, "Mr. Chairman, I move that we quit nonsense and proceed to business." We have business to do in this Parliament, hut my right hon. friend and his supporters seem to think that some good end will be served by interrupting business with the motion that has been made to-day, and I pay it a very excellent compliment when I speak of it as nothing worse than nonsense. Does my right hon. friend think any good purpose is to be served by constantly reviving the campaign issues? Does he think he can stand examination on these tests himself?


Arthur Meighen: Hear, hear.


William Stevens Fielding: I venture to say that if any one takes anything like the pains he has taken to look over the work and the speeches preceding the election, he will find cases where my right hon. friend has made statements which have not been followed by results.


Arthur Meighen: I invite the hon. gentleman to pursue the inquiry.


William Stevens Fielding: My right hon. friend makes a serious denial. I will remind him of an incident in this House that most people will remember. The right hon. gentleman gave what was equivalent to a pledge that there would be no dissolution of Parliament until there had been a redistribution.


Arthur Meighen: I invite the hon. gentleman to quote my words, and he will find that he is not correct.


William Stevens Fielding: I did not expect this "nonsense," and, therefore, I have not the quotation, but if this debate goes on, or perhaps a similar debate, I will produce the passage, and I will show what the hon. gentleman said in this House, at the opening of last session, during the debate on the Address, when he was asked to dissolve the

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House, and when it was argued that the government did not represent the people. The Montreal Gazette at that time endorsed the position of the right hon. gentleman and declared that it would he an outrage to dissolve Parliament until the West had obtained its representation. The hon. gentleman told us very truly that the West was going to be entitled to so many more members, and he said "If we were to dissolve the House on any issue in advance of that time we would be doing a great injustice to the western provinces." He has done that injustice. He has perpetrated what the Montreal Gazette declared would be an outrage by the dissolution of Parliament. We are going to have a period now of five years during which the western provinces are going to be denied proper representation. My hon. friend has asked for an instance, and I give it to him now. With further investigation, we might give him other instances. Soon after my right hon. friend became Prime Minister he went out west and in Calgary made his declaration in regard to the tariff policy, saying that the country had a right to know what tariff they were going to have, and declaring that before Parliament was dissolved they would have before them a tariff revision in black and white.


Arthur Meighen: Better get the speech and quote it.


William Stevens Fielding: Does the hon. gentleman deny it?


Arthur Meighen: He is not correctly quoting what I said.


Ernest Lapointe: It was in the Speech from the Throne.


William Stevens Fielding: The Speech from the Throne promised tariff revision. So far as that is concerned, the hon. gentleman monkeyed with the tariff question for years. They had Sir Thomas White telling the House that the tariff revision was overdue and that it ought to come that year, but it did not come, and then another year passed, and it did not come. Then they had the Tariff Commission which wandered all over the country. They made a solemn declaration in the Speech from the Throne that during that session they would bring down tariff revision. Is that statement true, or do I invent it?


Arthur Meighen: If the hon gentleman invites an answer, I will give it. The words he quotes were not used. What was stated was that a tariff revision would
be brought down in due course. The interposition of the American situation on the tariff question was good and sufficient reason for postponing it.


William Stevens Fielding: The right hon. gentleman not only put in the Speech from the Throne that statement, but instructed the then member for Prince Edward Island, Mr. Mclsaac, in moving the address, to declare that the tariff revision was imperative. It was said, "Now is the day of tariff revision." Was that true? With that promise in the Speech from the Throne they let the session go by, and dissolved Parliament without a tariff revision at all. What right has the right hon. gentleman to talk of the honour of Parliament in the way he does, after these two instances I have given? My hon. friend did these two things, and I have no doubt if we would make an investigation we would find many more. Again I say, he cannot afford to challenge discussion along these lines. The question whether that resolution with regard to the soldiers' bonus at the convention of 1919 was or was not a wise one,
I am not going to discuss, but this I do say, that it was not an issue in the recent election. If it were correct that it was an issue affecting the elections recently held, there would be some ground for the hon. gentleman's complaint, but we all know that, whatever may have been said at that convention, at the time the election came on that question had ceased to be an issue in this country. I had the pleasure of taking some part in the election. I spoke at a number of meetings. I never mentioned the soldiers' bonus, and never heard it mentioned. My opponent never mentioned it. It never was an issue at all. So that I say, Mr. Speaker, that there is no reason in the world why that should be treated as an issue affecting the election.
My right hon. friend talks of the appeals to the people on which we won the election. He cannot talk on any appeal on which be won his election. Whenever he appealed he was met from ocean to ocean, to a degree tnat was never experienced before in the history of Canada, by a repudiation of his Government. The soldiers' bonus was not an issue in the election, so far as any knowledge of mine goes. I never spoke of it, and my opponent never spoke of it. I spoke at many meetings in many parts of the country, I never heard it mentioned. I was never asked a question about it. It may have been an issue in former times. The country accepted the judgment of the

Soldiers' Bonus
committee of the House, presided over by that excellent member, Mr. Cronyn, as a settlement of the soldier bonus question. Before that committee the door was opened to consider any matters that might arise in connection with soldiers. But when he says that was an issue at the last election, and that on that issue we came back to power, I tell my hon. friend he is entirely mistaken.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I do not propose to detain the House for any length of time in a discussion of this matter which has been pretty vigorously threshed out by my hon. friends on both sides of the House. The crux of the amendment moved by my right hon. friend is that it levels the charge of insincerity and of disregard to the niceties of political honour against the Government and my hon. friends who sit opposite. That is a very serious accusation to level, and if I were convinced that it had substantial foundation. I would have no hesitation in supporting the amendment of my right hon. friend. But, Mr. Speaker, I am not so convinced, and I will very briefly give the House my reasons. I do not now propose to enter into any discussion as to whether the resolution dealing with this matter passed at the Liberal convention, 1919, was passed in good faith or not. I have no reason to believe that it was passed other than in good faith, and for the reason that every one in this House and out of it knows that at that particular moment, in the midsummer of 1919, our soldiers were being demobilized, they were being returned from Europe and there was a feeling throughout the whole Dominion, from the Atlantic to the Pacific, that everything we could do for the returned men who fought so gloriously overseas was only what Canada should do for them. That was the atmosphere at that time. But if I say to the Government, " Because you had a resolution approving the principle of a soldiers' bonus at your convention in 1919, you must disregard all that has taken place since then and implement that resolution," then I am going a little too far. That is the position I take in this connection, and let me very briefly state my reasons. The Liberal party then in Opposition in this House might be, and probably were, perfectly consistent at that time. But if public opinion throughout Canada has changed upon that question in the last three years since June, 1919, and if other things have intervened, then, in

my judgment, the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) and my hon. friends opposite are not acting dishonourably in stating that the time has passed for the giving of a bonus to the returned soldiers. That is the position I take.
What are the reasons? We have our financial situation for one thing. I speak so much about it, I am afraid I make myself wearisome sometimes upon the point; but I think anyone who studies the financial position of Canada is aware that it is one of the gravest things facing this country. We know that the finances of Canada will not, at the present time, stand a vast contribution by way of a soldier's bonus. We recognize that fact; we recognize also the fact that three years ago a definite policy was followed by the government of the day, in my judgment a wise policy, a policy endorsed by Parliament at that time, for giving assistance to returned soldiers, and already a sum amounting to almost a hundred million dollars has been spent in the soldiers' land settlement scheme. My right hon. friend (Mr. Meighen) brought in the soldiers' land settlement scheme; I supported him at that time, and I think yet that, while th6 scheme may have had defects in its operation, it was soundly conceived. I am quite willing to admit that my right hon. friend, and the then government of which he was the head, endeavoured to administer that scheme in the best interest of the returned soldiers of this country. For these considerations, I cannot agree with my right hon. friend and the mover and the seconder of this resolution, that because the present Government, in view of changed circumstances, cannot come forward and provide a cash bonus for the soldiers, it is acting in bad faith or dishonestly. I am anxious, as I am sure all other hon. members are, that good faith in matters of public policy should be observed. I must, however, confess that 1 am afraid there is possibly a little bit more behind the moving of this amendment than the mere vindication of political honour in this House, and I am led to that conclusion by a statement made by the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens) who spoke to the resolution. In that statement, my hon. friend said to the Government: "You should either implement the plank in your platform, or state that you took an unfair advantage of us in the election." That is placing the reasons for a consideration of this question upon altogether too low a level

Soldiers' Bonus
and, consequently, I cannot agree with my right hon. friend and his supporters in the amendment which they have moved. The amendment, as the leader of the Opposition has stated, is a direct vote of confidence in the Government-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Want of confidence.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Yes, I would scarcely expect my right hon. friend to move a motion of confidence in the Government. It is a direct motion of want of confidence in the Government. What does that mean if we look at the situation fairly? If we carry the thing to its logical conclusion, it means that if this motion carries, this Government is out and we shall have another election. I do not think my hon. friends to my right for a moment expected or desired that this would be carried to that conclusion, and for that reason I shall oppose the amendment of the hon. member for Parry Sound (Mr. Arthurs.)
A good deal has been said in the debate about the conduct of the election. I trust that in this House we shall soon get away from an examination of what happened prior to December 6. I could tell you, Mr. Speaker, in all confidence, and I will state it here for the full information of the House, that if I and my hon. friends around me desired to pursue that line, we could bring a very emphatic indictment against not only my right hon. friend who leads the Opposition (Mr. Meighen), but some of my hon. friends on the other side of the House. Possibly in the course of the election I may have said something; for in the heat of elections, we sometimes get beyond the bounds of political proprieties or what should.be the political proprieties. But I cannot see that much good will come to this House from continuing these discussions.
As I have already stated, this Parliament has very serious business to do. Let us get down to the consideration of that business. When my hon. friends opposite are not pursuing a course that I conceive to be in the best interest of the country, then I stand here to tell them so, and to oppose them in that course. That is the angle from which I approach my duties in this House; and because the amendment moved by the hon. member for Parry Sound (Mr. Arthurs) approaches it from another angle, I cannot support him, and I shall oppose it.


Robert James Manion: Mr. Speaker, when this debate started this afternoon, I had no intention of taking part in it, and I would not do so now but for the fact that the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) brought in a statement which I made yesterday evening regarding what Colonel Thompson h'ad said at Port Arthur. I was not, of course, present at the meeting of the Prime Minister; I think I was out in some section of my constituency or somebody else's at that time. But at any rate Colonel Thompson is quoted exactly as I quoted him yesterday evening, and I did the courtesy to the Prime Minister of sending him the paper in which the quotation was given. I might point out that this paper is not a political paper; it takes an absolutely independent stand. It did not support me in the election, so that I am quoting from a paper which is not a supporter of mine. If I wished to go on quoting-and I shall not take up any time in quoting anything- I could give a quotation from a speech of my hon. friend which might embarrass him severely in this House. As is reported in the Port Arthur press, he took the stand in that city that the government of Mr. Meighen at that time was committing the unpardonable crime of appointing its friends to the Senate. That was one of the statements quoted in connection with his speech, but I do not wish to deal with that. The hon. gentleman who leads the Government stated, in the speech which he made this afternoon, that this pledge of the Liberal party was wiped out because of the actions of the Great War Veterans Then I ask, as has been asked before: Why do they include it in their platform in October, 1921? Their platform was sent out at the beginning of the election, and it would have been the easiest thing in the world to delete that part of it since my hon. friend says now that they had no intention of carrying it out. As a matter of fact, I hold in my hand what has been handed to me by an hon. member from Vancouver, namely, a statement put out in the press by three Liberals who ran for Vancouver, absolutely pledging themselves to a cash gratuity. There is no doubt they based that pledge on the platform of the Liberal party. The Prime Minister also said that in 1919-I think I am quoting him correctly; I hope he will correct me if I am not-when that resolution was passed at the convention, they favoured cash grants, but they have changed their opinion since. We were giving cash grants at that time to soldiers returning from overseas. Every soldier, who served over-
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seas and who returned, received from the government that was in power at that time, a cash grant running anywhere, I think, from three hundred to six hundred dollars. So that we were giving cash grants; and unless that resolution meant a further cash grant it could mean nothing at all. I presume now that it might well be said to have meant nothing. My hon. friend from East Calgary (Mr. Irvine), I think, said that this was a camouflage motion, and that it really was not intended to get a bonus for the soldiers. I admit that very frankly. The party in this corner of the House, which were in power from 1917 to 1921, again and again refused to consider cash grants for soldiers. I made myself unpopular amongst some of the returned men by openly declaring my opposition to the principle. This resolution has nothing to do with any request for a grant, and so far as I am personally concerned I do not believe that the thing is possible. I think it is a financial impossibility to give $2,000 to each of the returned men. The only thing the resolution does is to condemn the putting into a platform, for political purposes, of a promise which the party that makes it has no intention of carrying out. The resolution condemns such unscrupulous tactics; it declares that pledges which are not intended to be implemented should not be exploited for election purposes. In other words, it is a condemnation of the breaking of faith with the people of the country after a party has been elected on a pledge which it has used during an election campaign. My hon. friend the Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding) is quoted as having said at one time, in a jocular way, that platforms were made to get in on but not to stand on, and it seems that that piece of pleasantry has become an established political principle. The hon. member for Marquette (Mr. Crerar) said a moment ago that he did not favour the resolution because it sought something that was not possible. Let me repeat once more that the resolution does not demand that the Government should give a cash bonus to the soldiers. It is a resolution condemning the principle, or rather the lack of principle, of advocating platforms in the country before election and refusing to carry them out afterwards. Now, my right hon. friend (Mr. Meighen) has been accused of having broken his pledges. Let me say that I got elected on a platform put forward by Sir Robert Borden in 1917, and that we carried out every one of the twelve planks of which it was composed.


Mr. GRAHAM:: Including Sir Robert
Borden.


Robert James Manion: Sir Robert Borden carried himself out, because he happened to be so unfortunate as to fall ill; and I would say in regard to the laughter which I hear on the other side that I have yet to see in this House, on either side, a man for whom I have greater respect than I have for Sir Robert Borden. I saw him in this House during the better part of four years, and I have-and I believe my hon. friends on the other side have-the highest respect for the attitude which that right hon. gentleman took on all questions. I have said it in private, and I say .it in public now, since the Minister of Militia (Mr. Graham) has seen fit to interject the remark he has made, and his friends sneeringly approve it, that I have never seen Sir Robert Borden in the House of Commons, on any question that was discussed, taking what I considered to be a narrow or bigoted stand; and I think that is a tribute which can be paid with pride to any man who has sat in Parliament as long as the right hon. Sir Robert Borden did.
The Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding) dismisses this resolution as so much nonsense. He points out that my right hon. leader promised that there should be redistribution before an election and that he did not carry out that promise. Well, the Minister of Finance and his colleagues are in power now, and I do not notice any remarks about redistribution in the Speech from the Throne this year, although they have an opportunity of doing what they think we should have done. It has also been said that the bonus question was not an issue in the election. I grant that in many cases it was not; but it was made an issue by the platform of the Liberal party, and it was used by those members I have quoted and by some of the supporters of the men whom I opposed on public platforms. It was made an issue by the party-opposite in various parts of the Dominion during the election and was used as a means of securing the soldier's vote. If the present Government had wished to be fair in regard to this question they would have deleted the pledge from their platform when they put that platform before the people. Now, Sir, I do not wish to take up more time.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Mr. RINFRET:: Let us get down to business.

Soldiers' Bonus


Robert James Manion: My last remark seems
to please some hon. gentlemen. Well, I am glad to be able to please them to that extent at any rate, although some of them during the last four years were not so very considerate of the time of the House or so anxious to help expedite matters. Let me point out again that the resolution does not advocate a bonus for soldiers, but condemns the making of promises by political parties who afterwards refuse to carry them out. I do not believe in that type of political warfare and I shall vote for the resolution.


Mr. E. J. SEXSMITH (Lennox and Addington) :: I want to ask two questions, Mr. Speaker: Are we to understand from the mover of the resolution that there shall be given a cash grant to the returned soldiers?


James Arthurs: No.


Edward James Sexsmith: Or does the hon. member imply that there has been an absolute refusal to assist the soldiers, and that the Government does not intend to give any further help to them?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: No.


Edward James Sexsmith: Then we have lost three hours and a half.


Mr. DONALD SUTHERLAND (South Oxford) :: In view of the wording of the resolution I am somewhat surprised at the question asked by the last speaker (Mr. Sex-smith). The resolution is clear and definite. It is a condemnation of the principle of giving pledges, before an election, which a party has no intention of carrying out. As I listened to the various speeches I could not help thinking of an inscription on the walls of another chamber in this building, "The spirit of the printed word". 1 also recalled an address delivered in this Chamber a year ago in the debate on the address by the present Prime Minister, (Mr. Mackenzie King), and I am going to quote a few words from his remarks. What I am about to read was his carefully prepared peroration which he read to this House. He said:
What is it, Mr. Speaker, that works havoc in human lives, that destroys the noblest of friendships, that blights all that is most sacred in our human relations? It is the loss of confidence that comes through disillusionment, through the broken pledges, the shattered ideals, the lost visions, the vanished faith. Cruel, indeed, it is when that breach in confidence comes between man and man, between friend and friend, between race and race, between nation and nation; but when it comes between a people and its Government, there is no saying what injury it may ultimately work.
What we need to-day is to seek to restore to the people faith in our parliamentary institutions, through conceding their right of control over the Parliament of the country. We know that there are rights under the law; that there are powers under the constitution; these we are prepared to concede to the limit. But is there no such thing in our national economy as public morality? Is there nothing binding in conscience and in honour between those who rule a people and those who have permitted them to rule?
There are the words of the present leader of the Government on that occasion, and yet to-day he attaches no importance to the promise that was made a part of his platform, which was re-affirmed, and, as has been pointed out, circulated throughout the Dominion in the handbook of the Liberal party during the election of 1921.
I know that in my constituency twenty-four pamphlets were circulated by the Liberal party, being placed in the mail boxes throughout the rural districts after dark presumably so no one might know who was doing it. And this was one of the pledges made to the people, which the people had a right to believe would be carried out by those who were appealing for their support.
I was a little surprised at the statement' made by the hon. Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding) this afternoon. "Why," he said, "this stuff is all nonsense. We are just wasting time. Why do you pay any attention to things embodied in .platforms, election addresses and promises?" It seems to me that I heard the hon. minister make a similar statement some time ago. He was quite frank and candid. This was before the election. Speaking in this House on May 18, 1920, he said:
Now, responsibility generally sobers men.
Yes, responsibility sobers men, and he is evidently sober now. The hon. gentleman who leads the Government is also evidently sober to-day. I suppose that would imply that they were not sober when these statements were made to the people. What else did he say on that occasion?
I think myself that we will find that we are all prone in framing platforms to put things perhaps a little more strongly than is wise and we all find when we come to the responsibilities of office that we may have to modify our views.
He said we may have to modify our views. I am not going to take up the time of the House in quoting from the Liberal platform, but I do want to call attention to something else. The hon. Minister of Finance has stated that the leader of the official Opposition (Mr. Meighen) did not keep the pledges and promises
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which he made to the people, and he referred to the revising of the tariff and other matters. What happened in regard to them? Just about a year ago, on February 15, 1921, we find that the present Prime Minister moved a resolution in this House in amendment to the Address in the following words:
We respectfully submit to Your Excellency that Your Excellency's present advisers do not possess the confidence of this House or of the country, and that their retention of office constitutes a usurpation of the powers of popular government.
This is all he had to say on the matter: We are not going to discuss tariff, redistribution or anything of that kind; the Government has no right to legislate, and its retention of office is a usurpation of power. The right hon. leader of the Opposition, who was then Prime Minister, went to the people, and he had to deal with the promises and platforms made by the then leader of the Opposition, now Prime Minister of this country, who to-day asks hon. members assembled here, the representatives of the people of Canada, to attach no importance to promises and pledges that were made while his party was in opposition. Has our public life become so degraded that this is the lesson we are to teach the youth of our country? Is this the ideal we are to set in public life-that we are to repudiate promises made to the electors of Canada. I say it is an insult to any hon. member to ask him to disregard the pledges and promises which he made to his electorate.
Now, Sir, this is not a new policy which has been developed by the Liberal party. Eleven days after the armistice was signed, in fact the ink was scarcely dry on the signatures, when an organization meeting of the Liberals of Western Ontario was held in the city of London which was addressed by the leader of the Liberal party of that day (Sir Wilfrid Laurier). Reference was made to this matter at that time, and a resolution was passed that our soldiers' claims would be one of the first things that the Liberal party would deal with if returned to power. When I came into the House last night and heard the Prime Minister and the Minister of Soldiers Civil Re-establishment (Mr. Beland) repudiate these promises, stating, "We do not intend to do anything with them," I immediately recalled the statements that were made upon that occasion. I hold in my hand the London Advertiser of November 20th 1918, the official organ of

the Liberal party in Western Ontario, then as it is now. Two things featured the speeches then made. One was referred to by the hon. member for Lotbiniere (Mr. Vien) relative to promises which had been made to the farmers of Canada regarding exemption from militia service. It was taken up by Sir Wilfrid Laurier on that occasion and he condemned the Government of the day for having violated its promises, and I am going to read from the official organ of the Liberal party exactly what he did say. Here it is:
Delegations of farmers came to Ottawa, thousands of them, to ask the Government to be as good as its word. They were told no, it could not be done, and the reason the Government gave was that the military situation was serious. The military situation at that time, that is about the month of May, was certainly very serious, but sir, are we to believe that the men who introduced that policy, who told us that it was absolutely necessary that we should have this compulsory recruiting, that it should be universal-are we to believe that when they made that promise, are we to suppose that they believed that this war could be fought without reverses? Did not they know last fall that we were to have a last offensive of the German armies in France ; did not they think it was possible that these armies might suffer reverses of their own; and that when they gave that promise they might meet with a situation such as this? If they did, then sir, there is only one of two things, they made the promise to the farmers in ignorance or they made it in bad faith. I know what their motive was.
This matter has been referred to so often in this House that I am afraid hon. members opposite have not followed the course of the war with any degree of care. It is very easy to look backward and see where you have made mistakes and where you might have done better; but when we are subject to censure by hon. members opposite, in view of what has happened and it is on record, I say that it ill becomes any hon. member to your right, Sir, to taunt the Government of that day with having put in force the law which was then enacted. If hon. members will refer to the report of General Allenby, Commander-in-Chief of the Egyptian Expeditionary Forces, to the War Office, issued from his general headquarters on September 18th, 1918, they will find that he states how his army had been depleted by reason of the situation which had developed on the Western Front, and he points out that in the first week of April 1918 the 52nd Division had been withdrawn and hurried to the Western Front, that in tfie second week of that month the 74th Division had also been withdrawn and hurried to the same destination. Those

Soldiers' Bonus
withdrawals were followed by nine yeomanry regiments, five and a half siege batteries, ten British battalions, and five machine gun companies. In May fourteen battalions of British infantry were withdrawn, and he had to fall back until his depleted forces were made up by fresh recruits front India. I mention this to show the desperate situation on the western front at that time, and the need for men to justify the cancellation of exemption from military service at that time. It was not until after troops had been sent him to take the place of those that had been removed to the western front that he achieved the victory which was the deciding factor in bringing the war to an end. Now, this is a matter which has apparently escaped the observation of some hon. gentlemen opposite; yet they readily point to the cancellation of the farmers' exemptions as a justification for the attitude of this Government and of the Liberal party to repudiating one of the pledges contained in their platform.
This resolution has been referred to by a number of speakers in the party to my left as one that should not be taken very seriously. It struck me that they were very anxious to find some excuse for not supporting a vote of censure upon the Government with regard to its attitude on this question. The one who considers himself the alpha and omega of the Farmers' movement in Ontario, the hon. member for Brant (Mr. Good) says that the discussion has not been very edifying. Well, I do not think that he added very much by the remarks which he himself made. I followed him closely; I believe it is the first time he has spoken in this House. He has written most voluminously in regard to the movement of the Farmers' party in Ontario, but when his constituents and the people of Ontario read Hansard to-morrow I fear they will not be very much edified by his contribution to the debate. Other hon. members to my left have made some observations. But I want to point out that a violation of pledge of this kind recalls to one's mind the justification of the allied countries for taking the action they did in August, 1914-the repudiation of a solemn obligation by Germany, an obligation which they characterized as a "scrap of paper." Many sacrifices were made in that war; millions of lives were laid down for a principle; yet in this Parliament to-day we are
calmly asked by the Prime Minister and his supporters to attach no importance to pre-election promises. Conditions, they say, have changed since they adopted that plank in their platform. But have they overlooked the fact that the policy in question was reaffirmed by them during the recent election campaign with a view to getting the support of the soldier electors? If they knew they were not going to put it into effect, then they deliberately set about to deceive the very men who made such tremendous sacrifices that we might be permitted to assemble here in Parliament this atfernoon.
Mr. JOHN L. BROWN (Lisgar) : The hon. member who has just sat down (Mr. Sutherland) has seen fit to criticise the remarks made by those who sit in the Progressive group. I have been brought up to believe that we should be able to give a reason for the faith that is in us, and it is incumbent upon me to be able to give a reason why I shall vote as I intend to do upon this resolution.
I am not very greatly concerned In coming to the defence of the Government in this matter. I am not greatly concerned in what may have been their attitude before the election and how it squares with the position they take now, any more than I am with the attitude taken by the official Opposition, either before the election or at the present time. To what extent this question was an issue in the election I am not prepared to say. I was In a happy and unique position in my constituency: there was no one prepared officially to endorse either the hon. gentlemen now sitting opposite or the then government. Opposed to me was a gentleman who repudiated the Union government and its successor, the National what-do-you-call-it- the big name-and all its works, as well as the right hon. leader of the Opposition. But this question was not an issue In the constituency of Lisgar. As has been pointed out, the only issue raised in that country

and we could not get any discussion of public and really important questions at all -had to do with the question of the United Grain Growers. It is worth noting that in that section of the country, where that particular question was best understood- and we did understand it-the electors spoke in no uncertain terms. Hon. gentlemen on the Government benches will take note of that, just as well as hon. gentlemen of the official Opposition.

Soldiers' Bonus

The list of pairs as furnished by the Chief Whips, is as follows:
Power,
McMurray,
Hunt,
LaSamme,
Jacobs,
Cannon,
Pelletier,
Putnam,
Messrs.
Mewburn,
Ryckman,
Guthrie,
Bristol,
Church,
Maclean (York), Be Sueur,
Jones ,


Mr. MEWBURN:: I was paired with the hon. member for Quebec South (Mr. Power). Had I voted, I would have voted for the amendment.	[DOT]


Mr. RYCKMAN:: I was paired with the hon. member for North Winnipeg (Mr. McMurray). Had I voted, I would have voted for the amendment.
Motion (Mr. Fielding) agreed to and the House went into Committee of Supply, Mr. Gordon in the Chair.
At six o'clock the Speaker resumed the Chair and the House took recess.
After Recess
The House resumed at eight o'clock.



[Stage Direction]
. SECOND READINGS Bill No. 9, respecting the Canada Trust Company.-Mr. White.
Bill No. 10, to incorporate Canadian General Insurance Company.-Mr. Lanctot.
Bill No. 11, respecting La Compagnie du Chemin de Fer de Colonisation du Nord - Mr. Lafortune.
Bill No. 13, respecting the Montreal Central Terminal Company.-Mr. Ethier.
. SUPPLY
The House in Committee of Supply, Mr. Gordon in the Chair:
Civil Government-Justice-salaries and contingencies, $235,517.50.
Hon.   S@: There are a few changes in the Estimates. There is an increase of $9,785 as follows:
One inspector of penitentiaries, new
position	 $2,820
One senior clerk stenographer for minister's office	 1,320
One clerk stenographer for the peniten- '
tiary branch	 900
One clerk stenographer for the department	 960
_. . . . $6,060 statutory increases for 46 officers.. ..	3,725

The decreases are as follows:
Saving by superannuation of Miss Armstrong ($2,100) replaced by
Mr. Pearson ($1440)	$ 960 00
Say ing by vacant clerkships, reverting to minimum of class	 417 50
Over estimated last year	'	995 00
Total decreases	$2,372 50
Net increase	 $7,412 50
I must say that this is more apparent than real, because we have to deduct from this the salary of Mr. Archibald, Parole Officer, who was receiving $3,600. There is another amount of $600 which was paid to Mr. Ahearn, one of the secretaries of the Minister of Justice. Mr. Ahearn is now in the department, but he is no longer acting as a secretary. These two deductions would represent a decrease of $4,200, so that the net increase, counting statutory increases, would be $3,212.50.
I have the following to report from the Accountant. The apparent increase of $7,500 is caused partly by a transfer of the vote of $2,000 heretofore voted under "Administration of Justice" for expenses of the purchasing agent's office, and $5,500 to raise the vote, because, for a number of years, it has been too small for the increased requirements of the department, and supplementary votes have been neces-
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sary. The amount last year was $32,900, and we are now asking for $32,500.


Arthur Meighen: I am sorry I could not follow the reasoning of the minister. The attempts at economy in this case, and it is not singular, have resulted in a substantial increase in disbursements. The explanation, as I understood it, was that there are certain statutory increases which account for the estimate. That is clear; but it accounts for only a small part of the salaries themselves. Of course, these increases do not account at all for contingencies. The minister says that the difference, some $7,000, is more apparent than real, because there is a saving of $3,600, in that the parole officer, Mr. Archibald, does not appear on the list. It would seem to me that the result of that would be that had Mr. Archibald not died there would have been an increase of $3,600.


Lomer Gouin: Mr. Archibald's salary is included in the Estimates, which were prepared before he died. We do not, however, intend to replace him by the appointment of a new man; his place will be taken by one of the officials of the department. We are therefore saving $3,600 in his salary, and $600 on Mr. Ahearn's salary, br $4,200 in all.


Arthur Meighen: I understand the minister to say that these salaries are included in the Estimates. Why not strike them out? Mr. Archibald has been dead about a month.


Lomer Gouin: We do not intend to make a new appointment; we will not spend the money.


Arthur Meighen: Mr. Ahearn, I understand, is in the Clemency Branch?


Lomer Gouin: Yes.


Arthur Meighen: Will he be continued there?


Lomer Gouin: Yes.


Arthur Meighen: So that he will draw his salary?


Lomer Gouin: Yes, but not the extra $600.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Interior: Salaries, $1,462,770 ; Contingencies, $115,000.
Hon. CHARLES STEWART (Argen-teuil, Minister of the Interior) :: The sum of $1,353,922.50 was voted for the fiscal year 1921-22 for salaries of

the permanent staff at Ottawa, and it is estimated that it will require $1,462,770 for the service during the fiscal year 1922-23, an increase of $108,847. As shown in the schedule, the permanent inside service consists of 832 employes, an increase of ten over the fiscal year 1921-22. Statutory increases under the Civil Service Act have been provided for in every instance, and the balance of the increase shown is due to the application of the classification. The increase in the number of employees is accounted for as follows: Number of positions in 1921-22, estimated, were 822, less position of superintendent accountant, deleted. Then there was a transfer from the Commission of Conservation by Order in Council No. 2550, of the 20th of July, 1921, of eight persons. The following employees, namely, economic adviser, hydro-electrical engineer, outside agent, librarian, principal map draughtsman, four senior clerk stenographers, and a messenger clerk, account for the difference between the 822 estimated for and the 832 employed in the department.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I do not know that this explanation quite covers the matter. Take the assistant office engineers, for example. They are fairly highly paid employees and they have increased from 15 to 31, or over 100 per cent. There are undoubtedly reductions in some other instances, but what is the reason for this increase?


Charles A. Stewart: These increases were dated back to April, 1919, and they were not classified until this year.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I am not asking as to the salaries; the minister has given some explanation regarding them. I am speaking as to the number of the office engineers, which has increased from 15 to 31.


Charles A. Stewart: There are no increases, but there have been changes made by the classification of the Civil Service Commission, and these changes account for the difference.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I have no
doubt my hon. friend has given a good deal of thought to the Estimates. I suppose I am right in that?


Charles A. Stewart: I suppose so.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Well, does
he consider that the Estimates as pro-

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duced are a proper exemplification of the platform of economy?


Charles A. Stewart: As I am informed, this is a matter over which I have no control.


Henry Lumley Drayton: No control
over your employees?


Charles A. Stewart: I have been in charge of the department for a short time, but I do not appear to have control over the number of employees, or the classification; my hon. friend appears to have provided for that.


Arthur Meighen: If the hon. minister
thinks or believes that he has no control over the number of his employees, then with all my respect for him personally, I really think he should resign and let some one else take his place who will have control.


Mr. JACOBS:: Are you looking for it?


Arthur Meighen: When I was head of that department I controlled the number of employees.


Charles A. Stewart: When I liave been in charge for a time I will try to control the employees too.


Arthur Meighen: I am very glad of that promise of improvement, but I do not want the House to get the impression-at least, it will not be my fault if it does-that any minister does not absolutely control the number of officers in his department; that is to say, unless he fails to get the approval of Council, he can reduce the number to any extent he deems advisable, and the responsibility is his; he cannot shift it on to anybody else.


Charles A. Stewart: I am not seeking to evade responsibility for control of the department. I quite understand, even from my short tenure of office, that one has the authority to carry on with a lesser number of civil servants than he may find in his department; but I think my hon. friend will agree with me that it is advisable to be well-informed and to go slowly before starting to make changes. I have said that I think the department is very well organized; I still think so; but perhaps after mature consideration I may find places where more economy may ba exercised.


Henry Lumley Drayton: My	hon.
friend is quite right in connection with the classification. There is no doubt that former temporary emloyees have been
drafted into the service, and very properly so, under the rules of the Civil Service Commission. For example, there is an apparent saving under the heading of Clerical Assistance from $40,000 to $25,000. That saving, as it is taken up, accounts in part for the increase in my hon. friend's vote, because those temporaries are made permanent and therefore added to the list. I am quite well aware of that. But take travelling expenses and sundries; that cannot be blamed on the Civil Service Commission. There is an increase of 30 percent. Why that increase?


Charles A. Stewart: I admit that personally I have not interfered with the services of any one of the departments over which I have control. I think it will be generally agreed that with eight hundred or nine hundred employees, while one is trying to get acquainted with them, there is not very much time to examine very closely as to where certain services might be dispensed with. This again is accounted for by a change. Travelling expenses and sundries, $32,000, shows an increase of $10,000 over 1921-22. It is estimated that $22,000 will be required to meet expenses of the permanent Inside Service officials at Ottawa who may be travelling on Government business, and an amount of $10,000 will be necessary to cover the expenditure connected with telegrams, postage, subscriptions to newspapers, express charges, cab hire, washing towels, and for other small items relating to the Inside Service of the department at Ottawa. The amount estimated for 1921-22 for travelling expenses was $12,000, but, on account of additions to the permanent Inside staff through blanketing-in Orders in Council or Section 79 of the Dominion Lands Act, it will be necessary to increase the item in order to meet the requirements of this service. The expenditure from 1st April, 1921, to 31st December, 1921, was $17,036.78. I am advised that the $10,000 is very largely charged from other services and is drawn by the very same civil servants who may be travelling. Those expenses will now be all taken out of this particular vote. There is therefore no real increase in this vote, it being in the nature of a transfer.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Is the total expense for the past year $17,300?


Charles A. Stewart: No, the total expense from April 1st, 1921, to December 31, 1921, nine months, was $17,036.78.
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Henry Lumley Drayton: Then why are you endeavouring to increase the vote for nine months? The old vote would just about cover that.


John Babington Macaulay Baxter: I notice at the foot of page 78, dealing with senior file clerks, that the number is increased from twelve to twenty-nine. I thought at first that possibly some junior grades were moved up, but looking at the top of page 79 I find that even this year there are twenty-three, or a reduction of only two on the number last year. That would mean seven less in the junior grades, but there is an increase of seventeen in the senior grades. There is one other item on page 79, clerk stenographers, increased from 96 to 111, while the juniors have been reduced by ten. It may be that' these two items together make up 30 per cent or 40 per cent of the entire increase in the department, and that the Civil Service Commission is responsible, although it would hardly seem to me to be so on a cursory inspection. On the other hand, it may be that the pruning knife which was applied to most of the departments by the late government-and which, very naturally, was very much resented- having been dropped, the economies which resulted are now being made up for by a constant expansion. I do not know whether the hon. minister can answer the question off hand. I do not ask to hold up the passing of the vote because of that, but I should like to know, and possibly the House might be interested too, in his explanation before all the Estimates are passed.


Charles A. Stewart: A large proportion of the $10,000 item, practically all of it I am informed, is taken from the vote for other purposes in the interests of which these men were travelling. They are now grouped together, have become civil servants and can no longer procure money from that vote; therefore you find the item of $12,000 added to the travelling expenses for the purpose of covering those items. In answer to the hon. member for St. John, I thought I made it very clear that there is no increase, except to the extent of the eight who joined the service and were transferred from the Conservation Commission staff to that of the Department of the Interior. On the other hand, the items as changed simply represent, so far as my information goes, the changes made by the Civil Service Commission with respect to classification, and that I take it is fixed. I have not attempted

to interfere with it, assuming that the Civil Service Commission have control.


Mr. MacKELVIE:: What are the functions and duties of the Publicity Agent for whom $2,400 is provided on page 77? There are two or three other new items in the same group.


Charles A. Stewart: I am informed that the publicity agent advertises the parks and playgrounds over which the department has control, and takes steps to induce tourists and other interested persons to visit them.


Arthur Meighen: For the encouragement of the minister and to inspire in him hopes for the future, I want to say this: it is difficult in a large department such as the Interior to avoid increases, particularly in the face of the statutory increases of civil servants. This year I find that his increases amount to approximately $108,000. In the year of which I was reminded by the hon. member for George Etienne Cartier (Mr. Jacobs), when I was Minister of the Interior-and I know the previous reductions were the same-notwithstanding the obstacles, notwithstanding that the work of the department very considerably expanded, we took care of all statutory increases and of all the actual work and effected an actual reduction of $6,200.


Mr. CHAPLIN:: What is the explanation of the increased amount asked for printing and stationery?	Members of the
House are literally flooded with stationery and printed matter from nearly every department; it seems to me that a good deal of it could be lopped off. It looks like a case where we should have a decrease rather than an increase, particularly in times like these.
Mr. STEWART	(Argenteuil) : The
money is needed to pay for books of various descriptions,-index books; land patent record books, etc., file backs, special paper for patents, printed forms, purchase of typewriters and stationery required for the general use of the Inside Service at Ottawa. There are 250 typewriters constantly in use in the Inside Service, the cost of repairs and supplies in connection with which amount to a very large figure each year. The expenditure under the head of printing and stationery during the past three years has been as follows: fiscal year 1919-20, $58,603.64; 1920-21, $70,367,.16; 1921-22, $77,000. The amount estimated for 1922-23 is $13,000 more than the

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amount of the estimated expenditure for 1921-22, but as strict economy is being practised it is thought that $58,000 will be sufficient to cover this service.


Henry Lumley Drayton: But still, why the increase? We were using typewriteri before. Prices are going down; paper is a good deal cheaper than it was. I may say that in order to effect a saving, the Department of the Secretary of State went through the old war departments and got hold of all available typewriters, and the departments were asked not to purchase any new ones. Is my hon. friend putting this large increase into the purchase of typewriters?


Charles A. Stewart: No, I
did not say so. That is simply one of the items.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Then why the
increase?


Mr. SPEAKMAN:: I was going to ask
the question about printing and stationery which the minister has just answered. We find ourselves at a loss in criticising any of these Estimates, because as soon as we speak about them we find that everything is covered by the reclassification. This reclassification is like charity; it covers a - multitude of sins. Of what avail are our criticisms of these Estimates if every time we ask, why these increases, there is a tendency to hide behind the Civil Service Commission or the reclassification; and because of that we cannot go into the details. I realize that the heads of these departments are new men and cannot be expected to be familiar with all the details. At the same time, they are responsible for their departments, and we want to impress upon them that the country expects of them anci will demand of them, classification or no classification, a reduction of these Estimates commensurate with the reduction in the cost of living and the price of supplies, due regard being had also to the country's diminishing income.


Charles A. Stewart: In the
general vote of the department as a whole we are able to show a considerable saving. I hope no one would intimate that I have been endeavouring to hide behind the Civil Service Commission in connection with this matter; that was not my thought. So far as Civil Service salaries are concerned I must confess that we appear to have very little control,-I may say frankly, none at all. My hon. friends have pointed out that we have control so far as the reduction
of the service is concerned; that is quite true. I think my predecessor in office was managing the department very well; I have every confidence in his ability to do that. It may be that further savings could be effected, but after some years' experience with civil servants I do not know that you can get along by reducing your staffs all at once. I am not prepared to say at this juncture whether or not further reductions can be made, but I do say that if savings can be made in any quarter, I am determined to make them. This vote is asked largely on the representations of the officials of the department. It is stated that the money is needed; if it is not needed it will not be spent.


Henry Herbert Stevens: There is a new appointment here: Economic Adviser, $4,200. Is this new Economic Adviser appointed to assist in the expenditure of the additional $100,000, or is he to assist the minister in reducing the expenditure? It seems rather a peculiar thing to appoint an economic adviser and then ask for an increase of $100,000.


Charles A. Stewart: I trust
my hon. friend does not assume that I am thoroughly familiar with the titles of all the different officers in this huge department. I do not pretend to be able to give the information, and I Would not try. This official came over from the Conservation Commission. I do not know why he has this particular title. Indeed, I may say I have sometimes wondered at the multiplicity of titles in the Civil Service.


Robert James Manion: We voted against titles some time ago in the House.


Charles A. Stewart: It does not seem to have reduced them in the Civil Service.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I was very glad a moment ago to hear the declaration from the minister that he proposed to practise as rigid economy as possible in the administration of his department. I commend that attitude, and trust that it will be fully appreciated and practised by the Government as a whole.
Since yesterday I have taken the trouble of getting a little information in respect to the increasing cost of civil government in this country, and to my mind it is quite alarming in view of the circumstances in which this country finds itself financially. I find, for instance, that in 1903 the total vote for civil government in Canada was
Supply

Interior

in round figures $1,404,000; that is twenty years ago. In 1913, ten years later, it had increased to $5,372,000, and between 1913 and 1923 the cost of civil government has grown to over $11,000,000, or an increase of almost 100 per cent in the last ten years. That, to my mind, is a subject of very serious importance to this House. Parliament votes the money and naturally we are reluctant to cut down the Estimates that a minister asks for. I know that that is the attitude with which I approach the matter myself. I am anxious to see the public services carried on efficiently and effectively, but the time has come, I think, when we must frankly face the situation.
In respect to the department over which my hon. friend has supervision, I find that the increase has been equally great. In 1903 the total expenditure for civil government in the Department of the Interior, including salaries and contingencies was roughly $135,000; that is twenty years ago. In 1913 it had grown to $1,025,000. Now at that time the Department of Immigration was also in the Interior Department. Consequently, the figures I have just given include the expenditure for immigration purposes, as well as the conduct of the business of the Department of the Interior. At the present time the minister is asking for a vote of $1,462,770 for salaries, and $115,000 for contingencies, or a total of $1,577,770 for civil government in this department alone. That is an increase in the last ten years for civil government alone of $575,000 in the Interior Department, and if we include the vote for the Department of Immigration, which amounts to almost $275,000, we find that the cost of administering these services has increased by almost $1,000,000 in the last ten years. This does not take into account the cost of running the department outside Ottawa. It is simply the cost of civil government, the overhead cost of managing the machine, and I submit to the House and the Government that it is costing too much to run the business of this country. I am not criticising the Government for a moment; I am not disposed to criticise the government that preceded this one, for I had twenty-two months' experience in a government and I know how difficult it is to keep down expenditure, but I do say in all seriousness that the time has come in this country when there should be a thorough examination and revision not only of the cost of civil government, but of administering the whole government machinery outside of the head offices at Ot-CMr. Crsrar.l
*tawa, to see wherein economies may be effected. ' We cannot tax the people of Canada at the rate of $450,000,000 or $500,000,000 a year, and expect the country to prosper, and if I may offer this suggestion, I think the Government would be well advised-and in this I am confident that they would have the whole-hearted support of the Canadian people-to set about seriously to consider where the cost of running the machinery may be cut down not only in the city of Ottawa but throughout the whole Dominion.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Perhaps in view of the remarks of the hon. member for Marquette, and in View of the minister's own declaration that he finds >his department exceedingly well run, he will now consent at least to say that extravagance shall stop or that it is not going on in his department, and will reduce this vote to the amount asked for last year. If we are to practise economy, this is the time to start.
I cannot add anything very much to what has been so ably said by the hon. member for Marquette nor indeed to the very frank admission of the minister himself, that he finds his department well run. Surely in this year of contraction and further deflation, there ought not to be an increase in the cost of administration, but rather economy, and I would suggest that the minister seriously consider cutting down this vote.


Charles A. Stewart: I think no one knows better than the hon. gentleman who has just sat down that we have no control over the statutory increase. That is a matter for the Civil Service Commission. I should be very glad to run the department for the same amount as last 1 ear if the Civil Service Commission would permit me to pay the same salaries.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Will the minister consent to cutting down the vote to what it was last year except for the statutory increases?


Charles A. Stewart: That
would mean that I should forego the increase of $10,000.


Henri Sévérin Béland: May I remind my hon. friend (Sir Henry Drayton) that legislation was passed by Parliament last session doing away entirely with the Conservation Commission, and the contention of the government then was that a large part of the work carried on by that commission would be diverted to the Department of

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the Interior. I think that would account for a large portion of this increase.


Arthur Meighen: The contention was not that. The contention was that the work was already being done by the Department of Interior and that there was mere duplication in the Conservation Commission. That was why we adopted the economy of abolishing the commission. It appears, according to the minister, and I have no doubt he is right, that eight clerks were tansferred from the Conservation Commission to the Interior Department, but those should have taken the place of men who dropped out by death, superannuation or resignation. I do not see any need of increasing the number of employees in the Interior Department at all. Even though eight were transferred, there would be many more than that, even since the minister took office, who could drop out by retirement, death or superannuation, so there should not be an increase in the number. Furthermore, with reclassification and a better arrangement of the work it was hoped, and there is no reason why it should not take place, that there would be more work done by the individual man, permitting of a reduction, not by dismissals, but by the natural contraction that would take place through death, retirement and superannuation. It is that, the minister, I think, has failed to take account of.


Charles A. Stewart: Let me read the items that go to make up the 8108,847.50:
Transferred from the fCommission
of Conservation (10)	$19,902 50
Transferred from Board of Pension
Commissioners (1)	 3,360 00
I do not know at the moment, but I presume the Government who passed the Order in Council did know for what purpose those ten individuals were transferred to the Department of the Interior, because they passed the Order in Council in July and transferred ten people.
The next item is Board of Pension Commissioners (1) $3,360, statutory increases make up $52,737.50, increases due to reclassification $55,418.50, less appointments at minimum to fill vacancies $22,571. And I am told that where retirement or superannuation takes place the office is filled at the minimum salary, and not at the maximum, so that what my hon. friend has just been pointing out does take place, but the position has been filled at the minimum salary, which requires $22,571, making up $108,847.50. That, I claim, is uncontrollable, unless the argument is used that the staff of the department be reduced, and I stated three or four times that I have not gone into that matter. I frankly confess that. But let me tell the hon. gentleman from Marquette (Mr. Crerar) that I will go into it. I think it would be presumptuous on the part of any one who has been in a department of this size for a period of a few months or six weeks to say he knows all about it, and that he would know which services could be dispensed with and which were absolutely required. I have absolute confidence in the ability of my predecessor to run the department, and I presume he required all the service I found there when I took office. I agree most thoroughly with the hon. gentleman from Marquette. I know that in the provincial government of the provinces during the period of the war, and undoubtedly in this Government, it was found incumbent upon the members of the Government to increase the payments to the staff, and they have been increased very materially. Not only was it found incumbent to increase them, but it was found incumbent to pay bonuses, and the cost of civil government has increased enormously. There is no doubt that, in conjunction with other services in Canada, the cost of government will have to come down, and that will be part of the business of this Government.


James Dew Chaplin: I notice on page 79
there is an item under the head of Research Astronomers. There are two of them at $3,060. These positions are apparently entirely new, and there was evidently no classification of last year. The item amounts to over $6,000, and right next to this item is the item of Astronomical Computors. I would like to know why there should be an increase occasioned by these appointments. Surely the Civil Service Commission are not responsible for that.


Mr. KNOX:: What effect would it have on this vote if the natural resources were turned over to the Prairie provinces?


Charles A. Stewart: I am afraid I could not answer that question. I would not like to venture to say what proportion, but I imagine a very large, or a fair, proportion of the Department of the Interior would go over to the provinces. There are the territorial services that will have to be carried on, but just what proportion I am unable to say.
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Andrew Knox: I was merely asking for the purpose of showing that there would be a saving, and that it would be an argument in favour of turning over the natural resources to the provinces.


Mr. GOULD:: The thought has occurred to me that it is possible our Finance Minister (Mr. Fielding) would like to bring down a huge credit balance next year, and on that account he has not been very severe in his criticisms of his ministers when they have presented their budgets to him. The time to practise economy is right now, and surely from all the expressions that have been given on both sides, particularly the Government side, it is apparent the House has indicated its approval of the principle of economy. We are everlastingly talking economy on this side. We believe we should have economy, and yet in every case excuses or reasons are given why each particular department should be sustained in its vote, practically as high as the expenditure of last year. It seems to me the excuse of the Civil Service Commission is offered too frequently. They are charged with the responsibility, but it seems like a man trying to hide behind a woman's skirts a little bit.
If the Government appreciate the position of the taxpayers throughout the country, they will deal with the question of expenditure with determination to bring the administration back to a basis of rigid economy. While it is true that the minister has only a brief acquaintance with his department, he must have had advice; but I fear his advisers have not viewed the situation from the standpoint of the taxpayers. If all these large spending departments are coming before Parliament and asking for the same amounts of money as have been spent in recent years we must simply insist upon the Government putting into practice those principles of economy which have been enunciated on all sides. We must demonstrate by our votes that we are going to put in practice that which we preach. The ministers must accept the principle that economy has to be practised and the principle must be illustrated by the amount of money that Parliament is asked to vote.


Charles A. Stewart: I may say that, so far as the total vote of the department is concerned-and that concerns all our activities, including the Civil Service, and the $108,847.50 increase,-there is a net decrease of $68,482.50 this year. We are not dealing with that matter for
the moment, and it might be unfair to interject it, but the total vote was $7,358,527.50, for 1921-22. This year we are asking for $7,290,045, or a reduction of $68,482.50, and I say that in spite of the increase of $108,847.50 the statutory increases, the memorandum of which I have just given to the committee.


Arthur Meighen: Do the hon. gentleman's figures include civil government?


Charles A. Stewart: I understand so.


Arthur Meighen: I do not think so.


Charles A. Stewart: This is a summary of the whole vote of the Department of the Interior.


Arthur Meighen: Inclusive of civil government?


Charles A. Stewart: Yes.


Arthur Meighen: They never give it
together.


Charles A. Stewart: I have a summary of the figures for the whole department here. I mentioned, in answer to my hon. friend who makes the statement that we must economize, that it was probably unfair to interject the vote of the department into the civil government. A. saving of $68,000 is not a very large eco nomy in an expenditure of $7,000,000 odd, but I just want to show my hon. friend as we will be discussing this later that we are endeavouring to cut down, and we make that saving in spite of the statutory increases amounting to $108,000.


Donald Sutherland: Do the sums
mentioned here include a ibonus, and if so, what amount?


Charles A. Stewart: That will all be provided for if the bonus is continued. I am told the bonus was supplementary last year. The estimates that I am quoting are the estimates for last year, supplemented by a bonus. Whether the bonus will be continued or not is another matter.


James Dew Chaplin: The minister did not
answer my question as to research astronomers.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Civil Government-Labour-salaries and contingencies, $304,255.
Hon. JAMES MURDOCK (Minister of Labour) :: It will be noted that the civil government Estimates for the Department

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of Labour for the fiscal year 1922-23, as prepared, show an increase of $23,400. This increase is explained as follows. Under the present regulations of the Civil Service Commission, it is necessary to provide for payment for positions resulting from promotions or changes in duties, before the positions are actually created by Council. There are in the Estimates now before the Committee a number of such positions, that is, a position specified with a stated salary opposite it, which position has not yet been created or filled, but which it is believed to be necessary to create and fill.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Would it be convenient to give a list of those at this moment?


James Murdock: Let us take the third specified position-Director of Technical Education. Since I have been minister of the department, we have had no Director of Technical Education. That official was taken from the Dominion Government by the Government of British Columbia, and we have not yet filled the position. I do not know just when we shall fill it, but possibly we shall not fill it for the next few months. ;It, however, appears necessary to place in the Estimates an amount to cover the salary for such an official, if it be found that we can get the proper and desirable man to fill the position, and if we think the time opportune to appoint such an official.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: What are the duties of a Director of Technical Education in this department?


James Murdock: The Director of Technical Education has, in co-operation and conjunction with the provincial educational authorities, the duty entrusted to him of maintaining timely supervision of the expenditures of the amounts of money granted by this Government to assist provincial governments in providing for proper technical education in the various provinces. As the hon. gentleman will know, this Government has a specified vote which, this particular year, amounts to $1,100,000, and which is apportioned on a certain basis prescribed by law and on an equal basis as between the provinces, to promote and further technical educational advantages to the youth of the various provinces. Those are, as best I can describe them, the duties of the Director of Technical Education. At the present time we have an Assistant
Director of Technical Education, who is carrying on with the assistance of one or two stenographers, I am not sure just how many.	*


Thomas Alexander Crerar: This, perhaps, affords an illustration of the manner in which these expenditures grow. As we well know, education is a matter entirely within the control of the provinces, and I think it should remain there. I know a good many of my hon. friends opposite agree with me in that view. It is of doubtful wisdom to develop in any branch of the federal government any staff or group of people whose business it is to mix up in the function of education which is particularly a function belonging to the provinces. If the federal authorities desire to assist and promote technical education in the various provinces, that can surely be done without the need of building up a staff of educational experts in our Labour Department. This is an item upon which we could have a little enlightenment.


James Murdock: I am quite sure the hon. member for Marquette will not hold me responsible for the condition that I find in this respect.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Not for a moment.


James Murdock: I am quite sure he will agree with me that, even though his views are absolutely correct and this House should conform thereto, it would be necessary to change an existing law. Under the existing arrangements and the law placed upon the statute book by the government which preceded us, we have a graduated, increasing amount of money provided by the federal government to assist, on a fifty-fifty basis, the various provincial governments in promoting proper technical education amongst the young people of those provinces. If the views of my hon. friend were to prevail, it would, of course, be necessary to eliminate the law now existing, which provides in the present year for a fund of $1,100,000, or $100,000 in excess of the amount provided for in last year's Estimate, and we would, in substance, be saying to the various provincial authorities: No longer will the federal government undertake to uphold the hands of the provinces or to assist them in providing technical education for their young people. I think my hon. friend will agree that to maintain the necessary and timely supervision over that federal expenditure of $1,100,000 during the present year, it is not unreasonable
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that there should be a director of technical education. We have not one now, and there should be such an officer; and we should also have an / assistant director, because there might be something to do in two provinces at the same time. A couple, but not more than a couple, of stenographers are also needed, or approximately a staff of four, to maintain the supervision over the expenditure of this money during the present fiscal year.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I am aware of the legislation by which this assistance was given for technical education, but I do not think that it provides for any Director of Technical Education, or Assistant Director. That was what I was drawing my hon. friend's attention to. As regards his last statement, it is a fact, for instance, that the federal government pays large subsidies to certain provinces in Canada, but because that is done, under the law there is no provision that there should be a staff of experts to supervise, with the provincial authorities, the expenditure of those subsidies.


James Murdock: I regret that I have not with me a copy of the statutes. I had understood that the law specifically provided that there shall be a director.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: If that is so I stand
corrected.


Robert James Manion: In view of the fact that the position which the minister speaks of was marked up against last year, so that it does not x-epresent an increase, why is it that the total number of employees for the coming year is 11 more than in the preceding year? And before the minister answers this question perhaps he will answer another. He has spoken of technical education. Perhaps the House will be interested to know his view as to whether or not the Dominion Government should take part in technical education.


James Murdock: The last question is indeed a fair one and I personally regard it as commendable that the federal government should show a disposition to cooperate, where desired, with the various provincial governments in promoting technical education. My hon. friend (Mr. Manion) asked why the permanent employees show an increase, the respective figures being 106 permanent employees for 1921-22 as compared with 117 for 1922-23. I am glad of the opportunity to answer the question. On the 30th of December I took

charge of the Labour Department and found the following employees therein: In Ottawa, there were fifty-one permanent ladies, and twenty-five temporary; fifteen permanent returned soldiers and seven temporary; other males, twenty-eight permanent and five temporary, or a total of ninety-four permanent and thirty-seven temporary. Outside of Ottawa, at the employment offices in Calgary, Winnipeg, Vancouver and other points, there were three permanent ladies and four temporary, three permanent returned soldiers and one temporary; other males five permanent, or a total of 147 employees instead of the 106 which my hon. friend sees on the Estimates for the closing fiscal year. There were forty-two temporary employees. Perhaps my hon. friend would like to know how long these temporary employees had been working in the Labour Department.


Robert James Manion: Yes, and perhaps the
minister will explain how it is that, in view of the fact, that there is to be a reduction of thirty or forty, he is increasing the estimate on civil government by $24,000.


James Murdock: The proposal is to make twelve of these forty-two temporary employees permanent. Some of the rest have received notice, which so far as I understand will not be revoked, that they are to leave the service on the 31st of this month, or a few weeks later.


Henry Herbert Stevens: There are sixteen who are scattered over the country that are included in the estimate of last year, and my hon. friend is including them in the deduction he is making.


James Murdock: All of the permanent employees of the department outside of Ottawa are included.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Where are they?


Henry Lumley Drayton: What is the number of employees in Ottawa?


James Murdock: There were ninetyfour permanent and thirty-seven temporary when I took charge.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Are the eleven permanent employees outside Ottawa included in this list?


James Murdock: There are four wage investigators for 1922-23 at $11,460. The estimate also provides for a wage investigator who has heretofore been employed in the province of Quebec, and used temporarily on the basis of $15 per day. The

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4C1
proposal now is to provide a permanent salary of $1,980 to begin with, but without the definite assurance that we shall positively fill the position or put that wage investigator on a yearly salary. We do ask, though, to have the provision made so that his services can be utilized on the basis of a yearly salary, instead of on the basis of $15 a day, if it should be found to be a better business arrangement.


Henry Herbert Stevens: That accounts for three permanent employees.


James Murdock: I thought my hon.
friend from Vancouver was asking for certain employees outside Ottawa.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Exactly; there are eight more permanent employees outside Ottawa.


James Murdock: There is a clearance officer who is assistant to the officer at Winnipeg. It is proposed to provide a salary for him on a permanent basis of $1,980.


Henry Herbert Stevens: That is a new appointment.


James Murdock: Making a somewhat lengthy temporary appointment permanent. In the case of a number of these temporary employees the Civil Service Commission have intimated that they would decline to give any further temporary certificates because of the fact that such certificates for the same individuals had been issued on two, three or more occasions, and that they must be placed on a permanent basis.


William Irvine: What is the function of an employment specialist? Is he busy at the present time, and is the increase in his salary due to his increased employment in dealing with unemployment?


James Murdock: This employment
specialist analyzes the returns which come to the Labour department from various parts of the Dominion in regard to the employment situation. He was appointed by the late government, and is classified by the Civil Service Commission as specially qualified to perform the duties and to be regarded as an employment specialist. For fuller information the hon. member might consult the book which is issued by the Civil Service Commission.


William Irvine: Is he a statistician?


James Murdock: He has to deal with statistics, facts and figures, analyze them,
and tabulate them to secure as accurate results as possible.


William Irvine: But those results would be purely statistical?


James Murdock: Largely statistical, I think, and based on comparative estimates in each case with similar figures from other parts of the country.


Mr. HANSON:: While these Estimates are under discussion I desire to call the attention of the minister to a matter which in my opinion, and I believe in the opinion of the House, is of great public importance, namely, the critical situation in the coalmining districts of the maritime provinces, as a result of the strike-on-the-job which is now in progress in portions of Nova Scotia. I observe in the press that the hon. minister has declared himself in very strong terms to Mr. McLachlan, the secretary of the United Mine Workers of America, holding office in that province. I apprehend there will be no other opportunity to discuss this matter, and I think it is due to the country, especially in view of the representations which have been made to hon. members by circular letter, and also in view of the representations which I believe have been made to the hon. minister himself by the mayors of several towns in the districts affected, that we should have a declaration from him as to his policy in connection with this very important matter.


James Murdock: Mr. Chairman, in reply to my hon. friend from York-Sunbury, when a boy I was taught "There is a time and place for everything."


Richard Burpee Hanson: This is the time and the place.


James Murdock: My hon. friend has intimated that he has learned through the press my personal views of the intended strike-on-the-job. He has probably also noticed in the press that to-day a deputation from Nova Scotia waited on certain members of the Cabinet, including the Prime Minister. It is likely that a statement upon the situation as developed at the conference may be forthcoming within the next day or two, and therefore it would be entirely unbecoming for me now to undertake to deal with the matter.


The CHAIRMAN:: Shall the item carry?


Henry Lumley Drayton: I do not think we have got started yet, Mr. Chairman. The hon. Minister of Labour was giving
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us some information, but was interrupted by questions. He started to give us a list of appointments which he said were not filled now and which he had to have in reserve; he had given us one when he was interrupted. I hope now he will be able to go on.


James Murdock: I am very much obliged to my hon. friend from West York for coming to my assistance. I will now proceed. I referred to the third specified position, Director of Technical Education. Now I would ask hon. members to go down to the position specified as Statistician at $2,400 a year.


William Irvine: Mr. Chairman, I should like to put another question or two with regard to this statistician. From my previous question I understand that the employment specialist is largely a statistician. Now we have another statistician in the Department of Labour. A little further down we have Wage Investigators, who I presume are also statisticians. Then a little further down we have Principal Statistical Clerks, who I presume, are statisticians. Then we have Junior Wage Investigators, who, I assume, are also statisticians. Then we have Senior Statistical Clerks and Junior Statistical Clerks. Would it not be possible to co-ordinate these statisticians and dispense with half of them?


James Murdock: My hon. friend evidently thought I was too slow in running down the list, so he proceeded to get ahead of me. If he will bear with me patiently I will endeavour to go over each of these positions and discuss them for his benefit. The position of statistician is not a new one, though we are going to ask the Civil Service Commission to provide definitely for the classification of this employee. The duty of the statistician relates to the comparison of prices, the particulars concerning which you will find in the Labour Gazette. He has to secure accuracy in the comparison of those prices and make a correct estimate of the cost of living from time to time. Then we come to the head clerk. This vote is to place a capable employee in a slightly higher class in order that he may get a thorough line on the work of an efficient officer who is advancing in age, and thus become properly qualified to discharge those duties if necessary. The next position is that of Senior Wage Investigator. The vote is to place on a somewhat higher basis the position held by an officer of the department at Calgary.


Richard Burpee Hanson: The minister was good enough to read me a little lecture a moment ago as to times and places. May I ask him if any of his investigators are in Cape Breton at the present time, and if so who they are, and what progress they are making?


James Murdock: The answer to the first question is, No; therefore there is no necessity of answering the others.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I am very grateful for the information the minister has given me with regard to four out of eleven permanent employees outside of Ottawa who, he says, are included in this list. If he will inform me with respect to the other seven, I shall be obliged.


James Murdock: I must ask the hon. member for Vancouver also to hear with me. I have started to do that several times, but have been tripped before I got through. I will try to get through the whole list. Now, we are asking the House to provide for five wage investigators instead of four.


Henry Herbert Stevens: You have already given that. I am anxious to get information with regard to the others.


Henry Lumley Drayton: The minister has not finished his initial list. If my hon. friend will bear with him, I think it is only fair that he should have a chance to do so.


James Murdock: I started at the beginning of the list and am trying to deal specifically with each of the changes. I was going on to say that the fifth wage investigator is a gentleman in the province of Quebec whom we have been paying on the basis of $15 a day, but for whom we now ask you to provide a stated yearly salary of $1,980 in case it should be found necessary to use his services continuously.


Robert Milton Johnson: What are the duties of these wage investigators, and what control have they over wages paid or received?


James Murdock: These wage investigators are skilled in the comparison of wage rates as paid to various classes of employees. As you know, for many years the Government has had a fair wage policy, and it is necessary quite frequently to investigate what the fair wages in any particular class of employment may be in a certain locality. To illustrate, recently we found it necessary to place two wage investigators in the Niagara Peninsula to ascertain comparative fair wage rates for various classes

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of employees engaged on the Welland Ship Canal. As the hon. member for Vancouver will know, one of these wage investigators undertakes, under the direction of the department, to maintain supervision over comparative fair wage rates in the mining industry on Vancouver Island; and he has been entrusted by employer and employees with the duty of determining from time to time what should be the graduated scale of wages paid in the coal mining industry.


Richard Burpee Hanson: But not in Cape Breton.


Robert Milton Johnson: Have the Fair Wage Investigators anything to do with farm labour? To make clear the purport of my question, I may say that I have had i Considerable to do with this matter in the western territory, particularly in Saskatchewan, and I know that there is a real effort being made in those provinces by the provincial departments of labour to standardize the wages of farm labourers. They have been attempting to do that for two years. I think the first attempt was made in the summer of 1920, but they did not get very far. The officials met again a year later, and made a little more progress, and I happen to know they are attempting another step in advance this year. I should like to know if these Fair Wage Investigators have anything to do with that, and if so, what progress they are making.


James Murdock: Do I understand my
hon. friend to suggest that the Fair Wage Investigators of the federal department of Labour have been undertaking to interfere with the wages paid to farm labourers in Western Canada?


Robert Milton Johnson: That
was not my point. I know that the provincial departments of labour, in co-operation with the employers of labour on the Prairie provinces and with the employees, are attempting to evolve some system of standardizing the wages that will be fair both to the farmers and farm labourers. It may not seem to the committee to be a matter of importance, but there are many thousands engaged every year in seasonal occupations in Western Canada. Does the provincial department co-operate with the federal department? Have representatives of the federal department attended the conferences that have taken place, and if so, what part have they taken in them.


James Murdock: My hon. friend is right to the extent that the Dominion Government
bears one-half of the cost of the employment service, although permitting the provinces to maintain a large control over the manner of conducting that service. If my hon. friend has heard of any Fair Wage Investigators being connected with these matters, it is only in an advisory capacity to the provincial employment service officer, and only for the purpose of seeing that the money of the federal 'Government was spent wisely and well. Our Fair Wage Investigators have no other authority in matters of that kind.


William Irvine: Have the Fair Wage Investigators authority to investigate the wages paid to men in the employment of private companies or are their investigations confined to government works? If these Investigators have authority to investigate the wages paid to labourers by employers generally, how is it that they are not investigating these cases in Nova Scotia at the present time? If they are investigating those cases, what power has the government to put their recommendations into effect? I ask merely to ascertain what are the functions of these officials, and what authority they have in this matter.


James Murdock: No Fair Wage officer of the federal government has any right or authority to interfere in the matter of the wages paid by private concerns. His investigation in that respect resolves itself merely into ascertaining what are the wages paid for the purpose of determining what would be a fair wage on government works in the district.


Mr. WOODSWORTH:: What are the
duties of the Industrial Engineer?


James Murdock: He was at first assistant to the Director of Employment Service, and handled the work of the Department in the absence of his superior.


James Shaver Woodsworth: He is simply an assistant to the director?


James Murdock: He is now used for
general utility purposes in connection with employment and other questions. The next increase we come to is that of Junior Wage Investigator. Last year there was one such officer; this year we are suggesting that there should be two.


John Armstrong MacKelvie: What about the
Senior Wage Investigator?


James Murdock: I thought I had explained that that was the position we were
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proposing for the gentleman at Calgary who has supervision over the entire coal mining industry in British Columbia, off the Island, and in Alberta. He is a very capable official.


Henry Herbert Stevens: What is his name?


James Murdock: Mr. F. E. Harrison.


Mr. CHURCH:: I suppose that the minister, being young in office, has not yet given much thought to economy, for I notice there are increases practically all the way through his sub-departments. I understood from his speeches in Toronto during the election campaign that he would introduce new and better methods for carrying on the work, but he seems to have surrounded himself with a small standing army of officials so that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like him and all his retinue. For example, I notice there is an Editor of Copy at $2,160. What are his duties?
I understood the hon. gentleman took the position in reference to his annual Estimates that he was introducing new methods and creating economy by just advising capital and labour to get together- he said it was a state of mind. This is the most criticized department in the public service all over Canada. Some officials are merely paper officials. I happen to have had some experience as a municipal officer for seventeen years under many governments past and present, and I say in reference to some officials here that their work is more on paper than real when you sum up the effect of it. I found the minister going to Toronto and a report was published of a speech he made at a Methodist church one Sunday night on what he was going to do-he was going to settle the labour problems probably in the same way that he lowered the high cost of living. He told his hearers that he was going to introduce new ways and means to effect economy. I am sorry I have not the article here. It relates to the first page of these Estimates. He was going to do something by compelling "capital and labour" to get together. What he meant and how he was going to do it he never said. What does he need with all these officials? He said you had to consider the state of mind of the people. Whatever he meant by that I do not know. We find now that he has publicity agents, editors, subeditors and an employment specialist. How any people has this latter officer got jobs for? We have several thou-
sand out of employment in the place I come from. Further down he has 148 officials as against 130 last year, although now there is less work. Then he has a senior wage investigator, publicity clerk, editor and junior wage investigator. I suppose they will check up the editor. Then further down he has statistical clerks, a number of them, and clerk stenographers, probably to check up the statistical clerks; junior statistical clerks to check up some other set of clerks; secretary to executive, and editor of copy. He does not say what kind of editor. Does he hand out copy for the minister? Then there are assistant editors, one at $1,800 and one at $1,440. What are their duties? Do they work eight hours a day, or like the minister 24 hours a day? Then you have a translator $1,410, then editorial assistant at $1,275. You would think you were running a newspaper office instead of a Department of Labour. As a new member of the House I do not want to criticize the minister. He has not had time to look over the department, but this is one of the most extravagant departments of the public service and one full of frills and fads. I would like to say that a little economy would not have a bad effect on the department. If he can do so well in three months wait till you see the minister's estimates next year. If he can present such estimates after he has been in office two or three months what will they be next year, with the list of editors, supervisors, and other members of his retinue? On the next page they go from $108,000 to $192,000, and further on you come to the Labour Branch confidential messengers ; two messenger clerks, probably confidential clerks to check up the other two messengers, and then contingencies, clerical and other assistants, including the minister's assistants. Then we have confidential messenger to the minister. He is not satisfied with the other messenger, but wants to have one of his own. Then you come to the printing and stationery bureau. What about the editor of copy? I think altogether too much copy has been given out by the minister and this department. His business and that of the department is to settle strikes, but I never knew them to settle strikes yet. We had several strikes in Toronto and all the department would do would be to wire or come down to the city and ask the municipal authorities to settle a strike. I think the department is overmanned. I think they

Supply

Labour
could do with less men especially in view of the explanation of the Government that they are practising- economy. Let us start in each department and let us get rid of the frills and fads with which this department is honeycombed. There are more frills in this department than any other department of the public service and I say that without fear of contradiction. I have had a good deal to do with this department. The minister went on to speak of the high cost of living. Let him investigate the price of coal. Soft coal at the Virginia mines is quoted at $1.10 a ton at the mines and hard coal at $6 a ton at the Pennsylvania and other mines. With all these officials why cannot the minister do something to get a reduction in the price of coal? What is he doing to bring down the price of coal? Is he going to bring the producer and consumer together? I am sorry to detain the House so long but I think the House is entitled to more information on each of these items.
The provinces have labour departments and the larger cities have labour and unemployment departments. Is there overlapping? We hear about the people who are out of work in Toronto and other large places. True it is, this Government has had to dole out some money, but they could have done a great deal more if they had reduced expenses by cutting down the number of these useless officials. If they will bring down the cost of civil government they will be doing something towards effecting economy. The question of economy in Estimates is before the United States Congress to-day. They are reducing estimates over there and the municipalities are struggling to reduce estimates. Yet here is the minister coming to the House with a big increase in his Estimates. Although we are told that the relations between capital and labour to-day are happy, the minister's advice is for them to get together. If this is done he should not need these various officials, because if they adopt the principle of getting together it is so much the better for labour and capital and I do not know what he will want the 148 officials for.
I would like some Progressive to go through the Labour Department and see what the officials are doing. Are they settling strikes? I do not wish to criticize them too much. They have done some good work I suppose, but I say these officials are not all necessary and that the Labour Department is often a paper organization
so far as settling strikes go. Then you have the question of the Industrial Disputes Act which does not apply to a public utility, such as water-power, electric railway and electric light companies, operated by the people-and yet you have those officials who are going about the country, spending money and advising these publicly-owned enterprises to appoint boards to settle strikes.
I think if the hon. minister would go slowly in his Estimates when he is just starting, look further into the department and cut out some of the frills and fads it would be better for the House and the country and we would get better results for the money expended and promote the true and best interests of labour.


James Murdock: Mr. Chairman, I am extremely gratified to know that the member from North Toronto (Mr. Church) is here to deal with these questions in his usual way, and I am particularly gratified to note that he appears to be in the same state of mind and body that I have known him tc be for many years in dealing with any such question as the one he has undertaken ta analyze during the last few minutes. I regard it as a special honour for a young minister to have had so much attention paid to him as has been bestowed on me by the hon. member for North Toronto. But in disregard of all the views expressed by my hon. friend, I will undertake to proceed with a consistent and business-like analysis of these Estimates that are being submitted to you, and to show you wherein such increases appear to be necessary on the basis of the amounts that were regarded as necessary by the present Opposition, when it was the government last year. If, as stated by the hon. member for North Toronto (Mr. Church), this Labour department is a paper organization, and unnecessary, as I understood him to intimate, he might surely, for the protection of the reputation of his party, have kept that fact a secret for at least a little while longer, because I want to inform the hon. gentleman, what he was not here to receive a short time ago, namely that when I took hold of this department, there were in it 147 employees, 42 of whom were temporary and we now propose to make twelve of those temporary employees permanent, who will perform largely the same duties as they have been performing, and to discontinue, so far as possible, the services of the other temporary employees. I am sure, too, that the labouring men in Toronto, in whom my

Supply-Labour

hon. friend has expressed, in years gone by under certain conditions, such an earnest interest, will be highly edified, on reading Hansard or the papers, if they take the trouble to quote the hon. gentleman, to learn that his estimate tof the Labour department and its functions during the present and the past government, is that it is useless, of no effect and no good, a paper organization. My experience has been that the labouring men in Toronto and elsewhere have, at times held the view that sufficient consideration has not been given to the aims, claims and rights of labour, and that there should be rather a broadening than a contraction of the efforts of the Labour department. But we, tonight, have had the honour of listening to the advice of the hon. member for North Toronto, who intimates that there is nothing to that department; that it should all be wiped out. I am sure the labouring men of Toronto will be very much edified to hear of the latest stunt of the hon. member for North Toronto.


George Newcombe Gordon: Shall the resolution
carry?


Henry Lumley Drayton: It would
surely never do to check the minister in his statement.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I was just referring to the fact that it would never do to interrupt the minister in order to pass this resolution, and I was called to order.


James Murdock: We then come to the
senior statistical clerks, of whom there were six last year.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Has the minister not missed the Publicity Assistant?


James Murdock: I beg the hon. gentleman's pardon; I have.


Mr. STEWART (Lanark) :: Will the
minister be good enough to tell the com-miteee what are the duties of the publicity agent proper, before we take up the question of his assistant?


James Murdock: The publicity agent, I am told, draws what many hon. members may have seen at times, charts indicating the fluctuations as between supply and demand in the labour market in Canada, for the information of those who are interested in such matters. He also draws such charts and gives such publicity to the charts and to other information as would
[Mr. Murdock.3
appear advisable to assist in equalizing, so far as possible, employment throughout this Dominion.


Mr. BOYS:: Does he draft the political chart too?


James Murdock: I think not.


Mr. McKENZIE:: My hon. friend evidently lost his.


James Murdock: I might say to my hon. friend that, if he was drawing political charts, he would show to-morrow morning a largely rising margin as regards major-' ities. The hon. member for West York (Sir Henry Drayton) asked me about the publicity assistant. I am told that is just a classification which the Civil Service Commission have given to this clerk, classifying and specifying the work and defining the duties.


John Alexander Stewart: Is his work defined as assistant to the publicity agent proper?


James Murdock: I was speaking aboui the publicity agent.


John Alexander Stewart: I thought you were speaking about the publicity assistant?


James Murdock: The hon. member is right.


John Alexander Stewart: The reason I asked the minister the question was that I noted by the Estimates that the publicity agent is apparently a new officer this year. I thought it would be fair to inquire if the work had doubled.


James Murdock: The work has not
changed whatsoever; but the Civil Service Commission have defined the duties, and have classified the position as publicity assistant.


John Alexander Stewart: How was he classified last year?


James Murdock: I am told that the position was classified heretofore as a senior clerk, although the clerk was performing the duties now being performed and which it is proposed shall continue.


John Alexander Stewart: What is his name?


James Murdock: M. K. Roughsedge. The next is an additional senior statistical clerk whom we are asking shall be provided for on a permanent basis. He has been

Supply-Labour
performing the duties during the past fiscal year.


Henry Lumley Drayton: That is a promotion.


James Murdock: It is a promotion on the permanent classification. The next item is for 14 statistical clerks instead of 13, an addition of one, and then the increase in salary for the other clerks. Next is 14 clerk stenographers instead of 11. Two of them have been there during the entire past fiscal year on a temporary basis and on certificate; the third additional clerk is a temporary employee being promoted on a permanent basis. Then we are asking for five office appliance operators instead of four. In this instance we are again asking to have placed on a permanent basis an employee who has been carried throughout the past fiscal year as a temporary employee.


Henry Herbert Stevens: What are the duties of the office appliance operators?


James Murdock: Notwithstanding the length of time which the member for North Toronto (Mr. Church) credits me with having been in the Labour department-almost three months-I have not had the opportunity, which I should like to have and which I hope I shall have, to investigate fully the working of the various branches of the department. I have, however, seen some of the office appliances that are used, and I should be glad indeed if any hon. gentleman would visit the Labour department and inspect the appliances that are used for the purpose of tabulating promptly and accurately certain results that are required from time to time to indicate the unemployment condition throughout Canada as well as many other matters upon which it is desired to secure absolutely accurate and reliable figures that cannot be controverted or disputed.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Are these employees operators of tabulating machines?


James Murdock: Tabulating, mimeographing, multigraphing and some other larger machines. We have in particular in the department one machine which we cannot buy. I understand that we pay a rental of $100 a month for it, that being the only basis on which we can secure it. My predecessor thought that it was worth the money many times over and I have no reason to- dispute his opinion in this regard. In the next item we ask for two additional
30i
junior clerk stenographers, who we feel are needed. These two additional clerk stenographers have been employed during the past year on a temporary basis, and it would appear to be consistent to come into the open and classify them on a permanent basis if they are to continue in the department. And that is what we are asking to do. My hon. friends will agree that that covers the additional increases in the permanent staff of the Labour department. I again call attention to the fact that there are about 30 temporary employees who were there when I came to the department and who are not provided for in these civil government estimates that are being considered. I do not know whether they can all be entirely dispensed with or not, but if they can, I assure hon. members, and especially the hon. member for North Toronto (Mr. Church) that they will be.


Henry Lumley Drayton: What saving does the minister expect to make in getting rid of the thirty employees?


James Murdock: In regard to such of them as we find it possible or necessary, through lack of funds, to dispense with, the saving would, of course, be in their salaries, whatever they might be. Most of them would no doubt be employees with lower grade salaries.


Henry Lumley Drayton: But I understood that my hon. friend was making some real economies in connection with the Outside Service. He is now contemplating dispensing with thirty. I should like to know what salaries these thirty are getting and What saving the minister expects to effect in connection with them. I feal that the minister is perhaps holding back a little bit. He is not quite sure that he can dispense with any of them.


James Murdock: If my hon. friend would like to go over the entire list of forty-two temporary employees I could tell him what they are getting.


Henry Lumley Drayton: 
James Murdock: My hon. friend need not concern himself about being fair to me; the hon. member for North Toronto will look after that.


Thomas Langton Church: Why are there 117 officials as against 106 last year? I see that
Supply-Labour

there are planning clerks, filing clerks, and so forth. What are the duties of these various clerks?


James Murdock: If my hon. friend will clearly state what information he desires I shall try to give it.


Thomas Langton Church: If the minister will give the information it will help him in putting through his estimates. I see there are planning clerks. . What do these men do? Do they plan election campaigns? Then I see there are filing clerks. What are their duties? Do they file the minister's speeches?


James Murdock: Mr. Chairman, my hon. friend from North Toronto reminds me, in spite of myself, of the reply of the thief on the cross. I might call his attention to the fact that we have not yet got to the Estimates which he a moment ago was so interested in inquiring- about; we have only been considering so far the Estimates of the Labour department. But we were not going fast enough for the impatient criticisms of my hon. friend; he must get ahead of the wagon and take up the Printing Bureau Estimates before we come to them, starting in with some of his characteristic criticisms.


Henry Herbert Stevens: We have been treated I think with a very plain and very patient explanation by the minister, Mr. Chairman, but with all due deference to him I must insist on bringing him back to the point where I had him very successfully a while ago. He very kindly gave me the positions of four of the twelve employees I asked him about. Really there are sixteen included in this list. He has not given me the other seven permanent and five temporary employees outside of Ottawa. While referring to that I wish to make another observation. We have in his statement a reduction of thirty employees. If that reduction is real, I wish frankly to congratulate him, because it is a step in the right direction. But with a reduction of thirty employees, which, to use his own expression, he has asserted with characteristic emphasis, we find an increase in the amount asked for of a little over $23,000. I want my hon. friend to get my point, because this is really the value of his economy, if there is any economy in it at all. Thirty less employees. Very good. But surely we do not need $23,000 more to pay for the remaining 117?


James Murdock: I thought I went over the eleven additional positions which we

are making permanent, but which heretofore have been temporary.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Perhaps I have not made myself clear. A few minutes ago my hon. friend told me there were eleven of these employees outside of Ottawa. He explained to me four of them very satisfactorily. Now I should like to have an explanation regarding the balance, and also regarding the increased amount.


James Murdock: My hon. friend must have misunderstood me. We have eleven permanent employees outside of Ottawa and only five temporary employees.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Where are they employed?


James Murdock: One fair wages officer in Vancouver with a temporary stenographer; another fair wages officer at Calgary; another at Toronto, and a stenographer; in Montreal a fair wage investigator, a permanent employee; in Winnipeg we have a superintendent of the western provinces for the employment service, with two statistical clerks and one clerk stenographer.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Are they temporary or permanent?


James Murdock: The clerk stenographer is temporary. There are two temporary junior clerk stenographers. In Halifax we have a clearance officer on a permanent basis, also a clerk stenographer with him on the same basis.


Henry Herbert Stevens: That accounts for
seven permanent and five temporary employees. There are eleven permanent employees in this vote.


James Murdock: One of them is not on a permanent basis but on the basis of $15 a day when required, as I stated; and another is a fair wage officer transferred to the Labour department on February 4, 1921, and on a temporary basis heretofore. Does that give my hon. friend the information that he requires about the eleven?


Henry Herbert Stevens: Yes. I am sorry it has given my hon. friend so much trouble; I had no idea it would do so. Now will he explain the discrepancy in the additional amount for the reduced staff?


James Murdock: Under the present
regulations of the Civil Service Commission it is necessary to provide for payments in respect of positions resulting from promotions or changes in duties before the positions are actually created by Council.

Questions


Henry Lumley Drayton: But you need not create them.


Thomas Langton Church: If the Minister requires 148 officers to solve labour problems of the country, how many would he require to solve the high cost of living problem about which he talked so much during the election and has referred to so often since he became minister?


William Stevens Fielding: If within a little time we might pass this item it would be worth while remaining; otherwise I suggest that we adhere to our wholesome but unwritten rule of adjourning at eleven o'clock.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.
Progress reported.
On motion of Mr. Mackenzie King, the House adjourned at 11.05 p.m.
Wednesday, March 29, 1922