[Stage Direction]
Mr. G. W. McPHEE (Yorkton-for Mr. Moore) moved that the first report of the standing committee on banking and commerce be concurred in.
Motion agreed to.

Mr. A. W. NEILL (Comox-Alberni):: I wish
to present a petition, signed by W. W. R. Mitchell, president of the Associated Boards of Trade of Vancouver Island, and 9.595 others, all citizens of British Columbia. The prayer of their petition is that this honourable 51052-40f
house may be pleased to order the abolition of fish trap licences in the waters of British Columbia.



CANADIAN WHEAT BOARD

Hon. W. D. EULER (Minister of Trade and Commerce):: I wish to lay on the table the report of the Canadian wheat board for the crop year 1936-37. The report has been printed and will be available for the members within a day of two.



LEAGUE OF NATIONS

[Stage Direction]
Britain's foreign policy-Canada's responsibilities AS MEMBER OF THE LEAGUE
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. S. WOODSWORTH (Winnipeg North Centre):: Before the orders of the day are proceeded with I should like to direct a question to the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King). In view of recent occurrences indicating a change in Britain's foreign policy, will the Prime Minister make a statement at an early day on the government's attitude to Canada's responsibilities as a member of the League of Nations?


Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister):: I might answer my hon. friend's question at once. The attitude of Canada towards the League of Nations remains precisely as set forth by myself in this House of Commons at the last session of parliament.



QUESTIONS

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

Mr. COLDWELL:: 1.	What was the amount of loans placed by the Canadian Farm Loan Board in northern Saskatchewan?
2.	What individual or firm acted as solicitor in the Prince Albert and adjacent area?
3.	How much money, if any, was paid to the firm of Davis and Davis, barristers and solicitors, Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, in solicitors' fees for said board?
4.	Who are the partners in or members of the firm of Davis and Davis, Prince Albert, Saskatchewan?


Mr. DUNNING:: The following reply is furnished by the Canadian farm loan board, with respect to questions 1 to 3:
1.	As the loan records of the board are kept on a provincial unit basis only, the information asked for is not now available.
Questions

2.	The services of J. G. Deifenbaker, Prince Albert, in the period September to November, 1935, and C. S. Davis, Prince Albert, in the period November, 1935 to May, 1937, were utilized. None at present.
3.	None. The board has paid to J. G. Deifenbaker, Prince Albert, the sum of S12.75 and to C. S. Davis, Prince Albert, the sum of $207.00, on account of legal services rendered the board.
4.	C. S. Davis is sole partner of the firm of Davis and Davis.


FEDERAL INCOME TAX-QUESTION OF SHARING WITH MUNICIPALITIES
Mr. CHURCH:: Is it the government's intention to grant a share of federal income tax to the municipalities where it is collected as a subvention for services rendered the government in the way of exempt property, by giving the municipalities a share of this federal collection in the same way as provincial authority shares income tax?


Charles Avery Dunning: This question relates to a matter of policy and it is not usual for the government to make statements on matters of policy in giving replies to questions.


ST. LAWRENCE RIVER DREDGING FLEET
Mr. POOLE:: 1.	Was the government dredging fleet of the St. Lawrence river ever kept idle while work was being done by the General Dredging Company ?
2.	How many vessels, dredges, boats, tugs, etc., have been sold by the government to the General Dredging Company since 1922?
3.	What was the price obtained on any sale made?
4.	What sales were made without tenders being called, and what were the prices?


Mr. HOWE:: 1.	The number of dredges employed by the contractors and by the department on the St. Lawrence work has varied from time to time, and it has happened that work has been done by contractors' dredges when departmental dredges were not fully employed, This has been due in part to the urgency of the work of providing a deeper and wider ship channel from Montreal, and also to the fact that contractors' dredges were able to do more work with the money available than could be accomplished by departmental dredges.
2.	The following units of the dredging fleet, St. Lawrence ship channel, were sold to General Dredging Contractors, Limited, together with Sorel shipyard, on July 22, 1937:-
Dredge No. 3 (at south channel) (scrap), dredge No. 4 (at south channel), dredges Nos. 5 8, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16. 17, dredge No. 18
unfinished), Churchill No. 1.

Tugs:-Deschaillons, Becancour, Lake St. Pierre, Varennes (scrap), Contrecceur (scrap), Iberville (at south channel) (scrap).
Coal barge No. 6, hopper barges Nos. 1, 3,
4.	and 5 (all at Quebec), rockbreaker No. 1, steel sand dumping scow No. 22 (at south channel).
Steel dumping scow No. 23; Nos. 24, 25, 26 (at south channel); No. 27; No. 28 (at south channel); No. 29; Nos. 30 and 31 (at south channel); No. 32.
Steel sand dumping scow No. 33; wood dumping scow No. 34 (scrap); wood dumping scow No. 35 (scrap); steel dumping scows Nos. 36 and 37 (at south channel); No. 38; No. 39 (at south channel); Nos. 40 and 41.
Winch scow No. 1, 11-Barrel floats, 3- small wood flat scows, fire scow No. 1, fire scow No. 2.
Also the following surplus marine equipment, Montreal harbour:-
Tug "Aberdeen", tug "David Sneath", dipper dredge "John Kennedy", dipper dredge No. 5; floating derricks Nos. 1, 4 and 8; launch "Messenger"; dumper scows Nos. 36, 37 and 38; flat scow No. 2 (equipped with hand derrick); hull of old concrete mixer; flat scow "A6"; flat scow No. 22; flat scow No. 31 (equipped with steam derrick); flat scow No. 55 (equipped as floating sawmill); flat scows Nos 50, 51, 52, 58, 59, 61; 3 derrick floats.
3.	The lump sum consideration for the entire transfer of the shipyard property, and appurtenances thereto was $1,708,544.
4.	Sale was by negotiation.


SHORT MEASURE IN GASOLINE SALES
Mr. BERTRAND (Prescott):: 1.	Has the Department of Trade and Commerce through its branch of weights and measures, or otherwise, been made aware of short measure in sales of gasoline, wholesale or retail?
2.	If so, how many complaints from each province: (a) from wholesale sales; (b) from retail sales?


Mr. EULER:: 
RASPBERRY PULP IMPORTATIONS
Mr. LENNARD:: How much raspberry pulp was imported into Canada for the twelve months ending December 31, 1937?


William Daum Euler: Raspberry pulp is not separately recorded in Canadian import statistics.

Questions
629.



REID HILL DISTRICT, ALTA., MAIL CONTRACT

Mr. HANSELL:: 1.	What persons tendered on contracts for carrying mail throughout the Reid Hill district adjacent to Vulcan, Alberta, on or about the first part of January, 1938?
2.	What was the amount of each tender?
3.	Who obtained the contract?
4.	When did he, or will he, commence his duties ?


William Daum Euler: The tenders submitted for
the conveyance of mail over a proposed rural mail route from Vulcan, which were opened in the Post Office department on January 28, 1938, are still under consideration,-the awarding of a contract being suspended until the result of a canvass for boxes is known.
Information concerning the tenders will be available as soon as contract is awarded and executed.
Canada's war debt


Mr. ISNOR:: 1.	What is the total outstanding war debt (in dollars and cents) of the Dominion of Canada.
2.	Is this amount now being carried on the balance sheet of the public accounts?
3.	If so, under what heading?
4.	Is there at present a special war tax?
5.	If so, what is the total revenue from such source?
6.	Is said war tax being used to liquidate war debt?
7.	If not, to what fund is it being credited?
8.	What was the total amount received from war tax during the fiscal year of 1937?


Mr. DUNNING:: 1.	It is impossible to determine with accuracy what portion of the outstanding debt of Canada is "war debt." All loans issued during the war have been refunded one or more times; in some cases portions of maturing issues were paid off and in other cases refunding issues were increased to provide funds for other purposes. War expenditures were charged when made to the consolidated revenue fund, likewise other expenditures attributable to the war, such as war pensions, treatment and after-care of returned soldiers, soldier settlement, interest on and administration of public debt, etc. All revenue received by the government goes into a common fund, the consolidated revenue fund, and all expenditures are made therefrom. It is impossible, therefore, except by the use of highly hypothetical assumptions, to calculate the proportion of the present total net debt of Canada which may be attributed, directly or indirectly, to the war.
In the public accounts for the year ended March 31. 1937. a table is given (see page
51) showing war and demobilization expenditures (including adjustment of war claims) year by year since 1915. and totalling $1,695,958.569.66 as at March 31, 1935. This total, however, does not include any expenditures for war pensions, treatment and after-care of returned soldiers, soldier settlement, interest on war debt, or other indirect or consequential expenditures arising out of the war.
2	and 3. Answered by No. 1.
4.	Income tax is collected under a statute entitled "The Income War Tax Act." Various excise taxes, the tax on bank note circulation and the tax on net premium income of insurance companies other than life, are collected under a statute entitled "The Special War Revenue Act."
5.	In the fiscal year ended March 31, 1937, the amount collected under the Income War Tax Act totalled $102,365,241.75. and under the Special War Revenue Act to $154,457,679.76.
6 and 7. All government receipts are credited to the consolidated revenue fund from which all government disbursements are made.
8. Answered by No. 5.



TORONTO MUNICIPAL AIRPORT

Mr. GRAYDON:: 1.	What proportions of the cost of the new Toronto municipal airport at Malton, Ontario, will be borne by the dominion government, provincial government, and the municipal corporation of the city of Toronto?
2.	When will the said airport be opened for aerial traffic ?
3.	What is the estimated total contribution of the dominion government towards the construction and completion of said airport?


Mr. HOWE:: 1 and 3. An agreement has been entered into between the Department of Transport and the city of Toronto for assistance in the development of the Malton and Island airports, which are now being constructed by the city authorities. This agreement calls for contributions as follows:
Fiscal year 1937-38	 $100,000
"	"	1938-39	
250,000"	" 1939-40	
100,000
The municipal authorities have advised the department that the province of Ontario is contributing similar amounts and that the proportion of the total cost of the two developments will be approximately:
Dominion government	 24 per cent
Provincial government.. .. 24 per cent City of Toronto	 52 per cent
Questions

2.	The officers in charge of construction for the city of Toronto notified the Department of Transport that though construction will not be completed it will be sufficiently advanced to permit of its use by high-speed aircraft not later than July 1, 1938.



MONTREAL HARBOUR BRIDGE

Mr. WALSH:: 1.	At what figure is tlie Jacques Cartier (harbour) bridge now carried on the books of the government?
2.	What loss, if any, has been sustained by the port of Montreal for the year ending December 1, 1937?
3.	What loss, if any, has been sustained by the port of Montreal during the seasons of 1933, 1931, 1935, 1936?
4.	What savings, if any, have been effected by putting the harbour of Montreal under the National Harbours Board?
5.	What increase in revenue will accrue to the port of Montreal if advertised increase in rates is put into effect (based on the volume of traffic handled in 1937)?


Clarence Decatur Howe: The following information is furnished by the National Harbours Board:
1.	Capital cost of Jacques Cartier bridge
is not carried on the books of the government except as an indirect liability in respect *of guaranteed bonds outstanding.	It is
carried on the books of Jacques Cartier bridge at a capital cost of $18,649,077.80. Operation, maintenance and carrying charge [DOT]of the bridge are covered by a set of accounts which are separate and distinct from those kept in respect of general harbour operations at Montreal, and the deficits of the bridge are provided for by annual votes of parliament.
2.	Net income deficit, 1937, $1,066,514.60, exclusive of Jacques Cartier bridge.
3.	Net income deficit (exclusive of Jacques
Cartier bridge):	1933, $1.407,916.21;	1934,$1,787,795.57;	1935,	$1,467,889.78;	1936,



DELEGATION ON FAR EASTERN SITUATION AND REELECTION OF SPAIN TO COUNCIL

Mr. COLDWELL:: 1.	Did Canada's League of Nations delegation at Geneva vote on October 6, 1937, on the report of the drafting committee of the League of Nations, recommending that signatories of the Nine Power Treaty be invited to meet to examine the far eastern situation?
2.	What instruction or advice was given to the Canadian delegation by the government of Canada or the Department of External Affairs on or about September 20, 1937, regarding the question of the reelection of Spain to a seat on the council of the League of Nations?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Hon. members will see that this question is really two questions, and both involve matters on which there has been a good deal of misunderstanding, but neither question is so framed that an answer limited to the point raised would be of much assistance in making the situation clear. I therefore propose to answer the question orally and in the form of a statement on the questions referred to.
The first question refers to press reports last October to the effect that the Canadian delegation in the league assembly had abstained from voting on the resolution regarding the Sino-Japanese war, and to the effect further that this was due to failure on the part of the Canadian government to send instructions promptly.
The Sino-Japanese conflict was referred by the assembly to a committee termed the far eastern advisory committee, on which Canada was represented. Some phases of the question were referred by this committee to a subcommittee on which Canada was not represented, and this subcommittee finally

Questions
set up a drafting committee. The drafting committee reached agreement on the text of a report on the afternoon of October 5. An attempt was made to rush the report through the three remaining stages that same day, regardless of the consideration that a large number of members of the assembly were not represented on the sub-committee or on the committee itself. After adoption by the subcommittee it was referred to the full committee. The senior Canadian representative quite properly refrained from voting, giving his reasons as follows:
This is the first time I have seen the two reports under discussion. I notice that they contain conclusions of great importance. I have no instructions from my government, to which I would at least like to communicate the conclusions with a view to obtaining their approval as soon as possible. Therefore, in the circumstances, I am bound to suspend my adhesion to these reports until such time as I have received these instructions. I hope they will be available before the matter is discussed by the assembly, when I hope that I shall be able to support the reports.
Later in the same evening, at eight-thirty, the report was sent on to the assembly, and it was proposed to proceed immediately with the discussion and voting. The delegates of Norway and the Union of South Africa protested that they had had no time to study the report and resolution or communicate with their governments. It was agreed to adjourn to the following afternoon.
The Canadian delegation at once cabled the resolution and their own views. That telegram was received and decoded at ten o'clock in the morning and delivered to me personally at once. The procedure adopted left no opportunity for consulting my colleagues, as it was then three p.m. in Geneva, but I concluded, in view of previous discussions and the tenor of the resolution, that no material question would arise, and therefore directed that a cable be sent in reply authorizing the Canadian delegation to support the resolution. This cable was dispatched in an hour and a quarter after the cable from Geneva had been received and decoded in the department. I brought the question before my colleagues at the first opportunity. When the reports and the resolution based on them came before the assembly that afternoon the Canadian delegation gave its support. No formal vote was taken. The procedure adopted was a negative one, which seems to be growing in use at Geneva, of considering all delegations present as supporting, unless voting contrary or declaring that they abstain. Two of the delegations present, Poland and Siam, abstained. It will thus be seen that there was no delay whatever at Ottawa, and that the Canadian
delegation at Geneva was entirely justified in declining to vote on a resolution on a matter of first importance without having had adequate opportunity to consult the Canadian government. No other course would be possible if the work of the league is to be taken seriously and if members at a distance from Europe are to take a considered and responsible part in its deliberations.
The second query has to do with the voting on a question of lesser importance, namely, the election of members of the council.
Members of the house will recall that in addition to the permanent or great power members of the council, now reduced to Great Britain, France and Russia, and also Italy, which has announced its resignation, it is the practice to elect temporary members, usually for a three year term. Certain countries have developed claims in the past ten years to semipermanent seats. Before any temporary member which is retiring can be considered fol reelection the rules provide that it must obtain from' the assembly a declaration of re-eligibility by a two-thirds vote. If successful it may then be a candidate for reelection. On the present occasion Spain and Turkey failed to secure the necessary majority for reeligibility. The countries elected in place of Chile, Spain and Turkey were Belgium, Iran (formerly Persia) and Peru.
As to Canadian instructions, none were given on this occasion and none have been given for some years past. The full list of candidates is not known until the assembly is in session. I may add that information on every phase of the assembly agenda, to the extent of some hundred pages, was furnished the members of the delegation, and some points of special importance were discussed in council before the Canadian delegation left.
Following the vote the Geneva correspondent of an English paper telegraphed that the empire delegates had split on the question of Spanish re-eligibility; Canada, the Irish Free State, India and Egypt voting against Spain's re-eligibility, and the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand for it. This irresponsible statement was relayed to Canada by two Canadian correspondents in London, and in due course various editorials and resolutions appeared criticizing the alleged stand. Not one of the critics appeared to have stopped to consider whether the report could have any foundation, or what the league procedure was in such voting. The fact is that under article 2 of the rules adopted by the assembly for the election of non-permanent members it is provided:
The assembly shall pronounce separately by secret ballot upon each request for re-eligibility.
Questions

I need only say that the correspondent who sent out this story had no information or facts whatever to base the story upon. It was an irresponsible cable, based upon guess or gossip. The Canadian delegation did not give any statement as to its vote.
I am not aware that any responsible country has ever made a statement as to how its delegation voted on a question which the league assembly had expressly provided should be balloted upon in secret. The secrecy imposed upon such balloting is a league regulation, not a Canadian decision. To break this rule because a Geneva correspondent sends out reports on subjects of which he has no knowledge would simply encourage the circulation of guesswork in the hope of provoking a denial or confirmation. For this reason, at the time the dispatches appeared, I felt it desirable and necessary to refrain from indicating how the Canadian delegation voted. I intimated, however, at the time that 1 thought it might be possible, in the event of the matter being brought up in parliament, to give to parliament the information sought. As the question has been asked, and a refusal to give the information requested might only lead to renewed controversy and misrepresentation of Canada's position, I have decided to inform the house what in fact was the action taken by the Canadian delegation in this case. I am not sure that in so doing I am justified under the league regulations. I hope however that my so doing may serve to emphasize the necessity for avoiding reckless news stories and unconsidered comment on questions which easily arouse acrimony and friction, and also do something to prevent similar incidents in future.
The Canadian delegation voted for the reeligibility of Spain. The reasons why the Canadian delegation voted for the re-eligibility of Spain are very concisely set forth in a letter which I received from Senator Dandu-rand shortly after the vote was recorded. It is dated Brussels, November 10, 1937, and is as follows:
The Right Hon. The Prime Minister,
Secretary of State for External Affairs, Ottawa, Ontario.
My Hear Prime Minister,
I have taken cognizance of the debate which has taken place in the Canadian press over the attitude of the Canadian delegation in relation to the request of Spain to be again allowed to present its candidature for a seat in the council of the league. The query repeatedly made to you bore on the vote which Canada gave on that question. You answered quite properly that the vote had been taken by secret ballot and that the public was not made aware of the way in which the various nations had recorded their will.
IMr. Mackenzie King.]
I may say that to this date I am unaware as to the individual action of the members of the league. I do not know how Great Britain voted, nor the other members of the commonwealth, although I met them daily.
Since you stated publicly that you would give that information to parliament, if it were asked and if you were allowed to by the rules governing the assembly of the league of nations, I have no hesitation whatever in informing you that the Canadian delegation voted in favour of the re-eligibility of Spain, for the following reasons:
1.	When Spain expressed in 1926 its intention of withdrawing from the League of Nations, if the assembly did not allow her a permanent seat in the council, it was suggested that an opportunity would be afforded of obtaining election to a non-permanent seat, with the right of re-eligibility on a two-thirds vote. Two years later, in 1928, the same procedure was proposed again. In order to secure the collaboration of Spain in the work of the league, a resolution to that effect was carried in the assembly by a vote of 44 to 5. Canada supported the resolution.
2.	Because the Canadian delegation did not feel that the calamity of war in Spain could justify the members of the league to inflict upon this unhappy country the further humiliation of the loss of its seat in the council;
3.	Because the Canadian delegation had solely Spain in mind, without asking themselves what government would represent her, to-day or to-morrow, in the assembly and in the council;
4.	Because the Canadian delegation could not take sides for one faction or the other, as Canada had faithfully followed the policy of non-intervention in the affairs of Spain.
The sole duty of the Canadian delegation was to think of Spain as an entity, without interfering in its domestic quarrels.
Yours very faithfully,
R. Dandurand.



LANSDO WNE, ONT., POSTMASTERSHIP

Mr. STEWART:: 1.	Was the postmaster at Lansdowne relieved of duties within the last year?
2.	If so, what were the reasons for his dismissal ?
3.	Upon whose recommendations was the appointment of the present postmaster made?


Mr. EULER:: 1.	Yes.
2.	The postmaster tendered his resignation.
3.	Canadian Legion and D. E. Lewis.



LANSDOWNE, ONT., RURAL MAIL ROUTES

Mr. STEWART:: 1.	What are the names and addresses and the amount of tenders of the parties who tendered for current mail service on each of the following rural mail routes,-1, 2 and 4 Lansdowne, Ontario?
2.	What is the name and address of the contractor for each of said routes?

Questions as Orders for Returns
3.	Was the contract awarded to the lowest tenderer in each case?
4.	If this course was not adopted, why was the contract not awarded to the lowest tenderer
in each case?


Mr. EULER:: 1.	Route No. 1-
Stanley Beseau, Lansdowne	S700
Harry Hunt, Lansdowne R.R. 1.... 720
Route No. 2-[DOT]
Wm. Edward Funnell, Lansdowne

 500
B. J. Middleton, Lansdowne	 580
Mark A. Fodey, Lansdowne	 600
Jas. Henry Moxley, Lansdowne...	625
Ford Gray, Lansdowne	 650
W. A. Slack, Lansdowne	 750
Route No. 4-
Benedict Fodey, Lansdowne	 790
Orville Clark Grier, Lansdowne.	888
2.	Route No. 1-
Contract	awarded	to	Stanley	Beseau,
Lansdowne.
Route No. 2-
Contract	awarded	to	Mark A.	Fodey,
Lansdowne.
Route No. 4-
Contract	awarded	to	Benedict	Fodey,
Lansdowne.
3	and 4. No-In the case of route No. 2, the tender of W. E. Funnell was passed over for the reason that he already held the contract for Lansdowne rural route No. 3 at the rate of $625 per annum.
B. J. Middleton's tender for route No. 2 was passed over following the receipt of an adverse report.



QUESTIONS PASSED AS ORDERS FOR RETURNS


Mr. BRUNELLE:: 1.	What is the total number of employees of the civil service commission including the commissioners ?
2.	What is the total amount paid in salaries?
3.	What is:	(a) the number of permanent
employees of said commission and total amount of their salaries; (b) the number of temporary employees and total amount of their salaries; (c) the salary of the commissioners and length of their term of office?


CANADIAN LIFE INSURANCE COMPANIES
Mr. POOLE:: 1.	How many life insurance companies are there in Canada?
2.	How many are operating under federal charter?
3.	How many are operating under provincial charter?
4.	How many are international companies?
5.	How many policies have been dropped since 1929, in each company?
6.	How much money was lost by the previous policy holders?
7.	What profits were made by each of the companies ?
8.	How many executive officers are there in each of these companies?
9.	What salary is paid to each of these executive officers?


CANADIAN FARM LOAN BOARD-LOANS BY PROVINCES
Mr. REID:: 1.	What was the amount of loans placed by the Canadian farm loan board in the various provinces of the dominion during the calendar year 1937?
2.	How many applications for loans were made during 1937 in the province of British Columbia, and how many of these were granted in the said year?


Charles Avery Dunning: Return tabled herewith.


CANADIAN NATIONAL RAILWAYS-MILEAGE OWNED AND CONSTRUCTED SINCE 1925
Mr. LALONDE:: 1.	How many miles of railway does the Canadian National own in each of the provinces of the dominion?
2.	Since 1925, inclusive, how many miles of railway have been constructed in each of the provinces of the dominion by the Canadian National Railways, or by companies it controls, and what was the cost of each line?


COLONEL J. L. REGAN
Mr. BETTS:: 1.	Was Colonel J. L. Regan retired from the Canadian permanent force?
2.	Was he granted a militia service pension; and, if so, hoiv much?
3.	Why was he retired and pensioned?
4.	Was the pension computed upon the rates of pay and allowances which he drew as an officer of the overseas militia force of Canada or upon his rates of pay and allowances as an officer of the permanent active militia?
5.	Was the said Regan at any time since November 1, 1935, in the employment of or in any way connected with the service of the Department of National Revenue?
6.	Is he now in such employment; and, if so, what are his duties, and what remuneration does he receive?


PENSIONS APPEAL COURT
Mr. MacNEIL:: 1. How many appeals were pending consideration by the pensions appeal court as at December 31, 1936, in the following categories: (a) appeals by the crown from the quorum pensions commission; (b) appeals of applicants from quorum pensions commission; (c) other categories ?
Motions for Papers

2.	How many appeals were filed with the appeal court during 1937 as follows: (a) appeals of the crown from the quorum pensions commission; (b) appeals of applicants from the quorum pensions commission; (c) other categories?
3.	How many appeals were heard by the appeal court during 1937, as follows: (a) appeals of the crown from the quorum pensions commission; (b) appeals of applicants from the quorum pensions commission; (c) other categories?
4.	How many appeals were allowed in 1937, as follows: (a) appeals of the crown from the quorum pensions commission; (b) appeals of applicants from the quorum pensions commission; (c) other categories?
5.	How many appeals were disallowed in 1937, as follows: (a) appeals of the crown from the quorum pensions commission; (b) appeals of applicants from the quorum pensions commission; (c) other categories?
6.	How many appeals were referred by the
appeal court to the pensions commission in 1937:	(a) appeals of the crown from the
quorum pensions commission; (b) appeals of applicants from the quorum pensions commission; (c) other categories?
7.	How many appeals were awaiting consideration by the appeal court as at December 31, 1937: (a) appeals of crown from quorum pensions commission; (b) appeals of applicants from quorum pensions commission; (c) other categories ?



MOTIONS FOR PAPERS


Mr. MASSEY (for Mr. Brooks):: For a copy of all letters, correspondence and other documents of any kind, in the possession of the department, dated within the past three years, relating to the mail service between Riverport and North La Have, in the province of Nova Scotia.



NEW ROSS CROSS-FORTIES, N.S., MAIL ROUTE

Denton Massey: For a copy of all letters, telegrams, correspondence and other documents in the possession of the department, dated within the past two years, relating to the rural mail route between New Ross Cross and Forties, New Ross, in the province of Nova Scotia.



BRIDGEWATER, N.S., POSTMASTERSHIP

Denton Massey: For a copy of all letters, corespondenee, telegrams and other documents, including therein the civil service examination reference, and generally, all documents of any kind and description, relating to the dismissal of E. W. Walker, postmaster at Bridgewater, Nova Scotia, in the year 1937, and the appointment of his successor.



STE. GENEVIEVE DE BATISCAN, QUE., POSTMASTERSHIP

Mr. BRUNELLE:: For a copy of all letters, telegrams and other documents in the possession of the Post Office Department, dated from October 6, 1936, to date, with respect to a charge of political partisanship made by Willie St-Arneault against postmaster J. A. Bouchard of Ste. Genevieve de Batiscan, county of Champlain, and also relating to the investigation which followed, and its results.
Motion withdrawn.



RELIEF ADMINISTRATION-FEED, FODDER AND FOOD PURCHASES

Mr. PERLEY:: For a return showing, the names, addresses, occupation or business of persons or firms employed in connection with relief administration, as agents, commission merchants or otherwise, in the purchasing of feed and fodder in the province of Manitoba and in the state of Minnesota, and the amounts paid to each such person or firm.


George Halsey Perley: For a return showing,-
1.	The quantities of cheese, beans, fish, fruit, vegetables, hay, fodder, feed and seed grains and other products, purchased directly or indirectly and shipped by the government into Saskatchewan, Alberta and Manitoba for relief purposes, between the first of July, 1937, and the present date.
2.	The names, addresses, occupations or business of persons, firms and corporations from whom such goods were purchased, with the quantities and value of such purchases from each person, persons, firm or corporation, showing prices paid and the points of delivery to the government and points of distribution in the said provinces.
3.	The total purchase price of such material.
4.	The amount paid for freight on each class of goods.
5.	The total cost of storage and handling at points of shipment.
6.	The total cost of handling and storage at destination.
7.	Cost of reshipment, including handling and freight from first destination in Saskatchewan to final destination.
8.	Names, addresses and amounts paid to all persons engaged in: (a) dividing up and reparcelling each class of said goods; (b) distributing such goods; (c) warehousing.
9.	Total amount paid for demurrage, and to whom.
10.	The final points of shipment from which such goods were distributed.
11.	The area described by municipalities or otherwise, within which such goods were distributed.
12.	If such goods were distributed to those on relief only, or to the population in general.

Motions for Papers
13.	The total cost of such shipment.
14.	From what vote this money was paid.
15.	The amount obtained by governor geueral's warrants for the purpose of providing for the costs of this distribution.
16.	What amount of each class of such goods was produced in Saskatchewan in the year 1937.
17.	What amount of each class of such goods was imported into Saskatchewan from other provinces of the dominion, and from outside Canada, in the year 1937.
18.	The part the government played in the distribution of free goods contributed by persons, firms and corporations, to Saskatchewan, and the quantities of such goods handled or distributed by the government or any official thereof.
19.	The points in Saskatchewan where final *distribution of such contributed goods was made.
20.	The instructions given officials of the dominion government in Saskatchewan with respect to the distribution of: (a) goods purchased and supplied by the dominion government; (b) goods supplied by voluntary contribution.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I imagine the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner) would like to have a look at this motion, and in the circumstances perhaps my hon. friend would not object to it standing for a few *days.


George Halsey Perley: That is quite all right.
Motion stands.



XLE AU HERON BIRD SANCTUARY

Mr. WERMENLINGER:: For a copy of all papers, telegrams, petitions, and all other documents in the possession of the government, Department of Mines and Resources, concerning an order in council passed *on Wednesday, the 22nd day of September, 1937, establishing a bird sanctuary under the Migratory Birds Convention Act, chapter 130, R.S. 1927, to be known as "He au Heron" bird sanctuary in the area including that portion of the St. Lawrence river from Victoria bridge to the westerly intake of the Montreal Light, Heat and Power plant, which lies approximately *opposite the easterly limit of the Caughnawaga Indian reserve, and covering the area where hunters, fishermen and boat owners who live in Verdun, Point St. Charles, Laprairie, St. Lambert, Cote Ste. Catherine and La Tortiie are prohibited at all times, within the said sanctuary, to exercise the above-named sporting recreations.



NIAGARA RIVER BRIDGES

Mr. ESLING (for Mr. Church):: For a copy of all telegrams, correspondence and other documents exchanged between the government of Ontario, or any other persons, and the dominion government, with respect to .the construction or reconstruction of new
bridges across the Niagara river, between the years 1923 and 1930, or in reference to the observation bridge that was destroyed, and the removal of same as a menace to navigation.



NATIONAL REVENUE-REFUNDS OF TAXES

Denton Massey: For a return showing, all refunds, rebates or remissions, on account of direct or indirect taxation of any kind, made by the Department of National Revenue since November 1, 1935, and in each case the amount involved, the person to whom such amount was paid, and the agent acting on his behalf.


Mr. ILSLEY:: Mr. Speaker, I would prefer not to have the house pass this motion, at least not to-day. There are some very obvious objections to the motion, one of which is the time and expense that would be involved in preparing such a return. If the motion does pass this house I will ask that it be amended so as to cover a period of two or three years before November 1, 1935, as well as the two or three years after that date, but while I am getting the information as to the time and expense involved perhaps this motion might be permitted to stand.
Motion stands.



PUBLICATION &quot;EMPROS&quot;

Mr. MacNEIL:: For a copy of all correspondence, instructions and recommendations, relating to action by the Department of National Revenue in refusing importation into Canada of the publication " Empros."



INDIAN &quot;POTLATCH&quot;

Mr. COLD WELL:: For a copy of all papers, communications and other documents received by, or sent from, the Department of Indian Affairs from or to any person or persons in connection with the custom known as "potlatch" among the Pacific coast Indians during the years 1935, 1936 and 1937.



SALE OF SOREL SHIPYARDS AND ST. LAWRENCE DREDGING FLEET

Mr. PELLETIER:: For a copy of all letters, documents, telegrams, correspondence, agreements of sale or negotiated agreements and other legal documents, in the possession of the government concerning the sale of the Sorel shipyards and the St. Lawrence dredging fleet to the General Dredging Contractors Limited.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Mr. Speaker, this duplicates a return ordered for the hon. member for Quebec West and South (Mr. Parent) a few days ago. However, both orders can be complied with by the one return.
Drought Area-Mr. Coldwell



WESTERN DROUGHT AREA


Mr. M. J. COLDWELL (Rosetown-Biggar) moved:: That, in the opinion of this house, the government should place before parliament at an early date plans, or proposals, for a comprehensive and authoritative survey of water conservation, irrigation possibilities, and other feasible projects for the permanent rehabilitation of the drought stricken area of western Canada and its people.
He said: Mr. Speaker, may I first remark that the resolution asks not for the actual undertaking of large scale irrigation projects, but for the consideration of the appointment of an authoritative committee to look into the feasibility of such projects in western Canada.
From time to time in this parliament conditions in western Canada have been outlined, and if further proof were needed of the extent of the disaster which has befallen not only the western provinces but the entire dominion, it could, I think, be found in the submission of the Saskatchewan government to the Rowell commission. Two or three years ago it was quite usual for some public men to pass off conditions somewhat lightly by saying that one or two good crops would meet the situation. I do not think anyone familiar with conditions existing there to-day would contend that one or two crops would meet that situation.
During the past summer the Minister of Labour (Mr. Rogers) and the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner) drove over the major portion of the drought area. I drove over it at that time, and again this fall. The picture of devastation one saw was almost indescribable. If one enters Saskatchewan at the southern boundary, from the United States, or at the eastern boundary from the Manitoba border, and drives right across into southern Alberta; thence north to a point just east of Edmonton, thence in a southeasterly direction to about where the main line of the Canadian Pacific railway crosses the Manitoba border, and thence through southwestern Manitoba, he gets an idea of the appalling condition and the huge territory affected by the drought-mile after mile of burnt up vegetation in the summer; mile after mile of black Russian thistle in the fall, a picture which in my opinion is comparable only to that presented by one of the great deserts to be found elsewhere in North America, Indeed, driving over the desert

last summer in the state of Washington, where the Grande Coulee irrigation project was being carried out, I could imagine myself in Saskatchewan, except that the vegetation was sage-brush instead of Russian thistle.
Because of this condition, in recent years there has been a disposition to look into the records, and to inquire if this great western country in past days has been subject to periodic droughts. I have read the reports, as no doubt have other hon. members, of the explorers who crossed the great plains during the middle of the last century, and I have noticed particularly the records left by Captain Palliser and Mr. Hind. These records indicate that in those days there had been prolonged and disastrous dry periods.
For example, at page 11 of his report, Captain Palliser says this:
After leaving the eastern limit of the country that is within the influence of the mountains the south Saskatchewan flows in a deep and narrow valley through a region of arid plains devoid of timber or pasture of good quality. Even on the alluvial points in the bottom of the valley, trees and shrubs only occur in a few isolated patches. The steep and lofty sides of the valley are composed of calcareous marls and clays that are baked into a compact mass under the heat of the parching sun. The sage and the cactus abound, and the whole scanty vegetation bespeaks an arid climate, but at the elbow the same arid description of the country was met with, and it seems certain that this prevails throughout the entire distance.
Then, at page 51 of the same report Palliser speaks of his arrival at Fort Qu'Appelle on September 13, 1858. On September 14, he started towards Moose Jaw creek, and in that connection makes this statement:
Our roads during the early part of to-day was mostly through a country moderately well wooded, over good land, well suited to agricultural purposes where there were also lakes and hay producing swamps, but towards evening, we began to observe symptoms that showed us we were again near the line of desert country, or northern extension of the North American arid basin.
Again, at page 52 of the report, September 15, 1858, he makes this statement:
Our course was due west and, as far as the eye can reach nothing but desolate plains met the views; at noon we reached a small creek called "the creek before the creek where the bones lie"; here we found water and some little grass, also a few willows and cherry bushes, but no wood fit for fuel. In the evening, reached the creek where the bones lie-
Probably that is where Regina now stands.

where we found water and very little grass; a few willows also grew here, but no wood fit for fuel.

Drought Area-Mr. Coldwell
Then, farther down on the page he adds:
We reached the Moose Jaw creek where there was wood and water. Here our Indian, Nichiwa, advised us to bring wood for five nights along in our carts, and told us it was the last we should see between this and the elbow of the south Saskatchewan.
They camped several days later on Thunder Mountain creek, and again his comment of the neighborhood is made in these words at page 54:
The grass in this arid soil, always so scanty, was now actually swept away by the buffalo, who, assisted by the locusts, had left the country as bare as if it has been overrun by fire; even at the edge of Sage creek, we could obtain very little grass for our horses.
I need not quote more from Palliser's report, except to say that from the Elbow north he reports a wooded country, in his opinion well suited to agriculture. The description of the southern area is a description of what is now known as the drought area.
Another traveller, whose narrative is to be found in the parliamentary library, is Henry Youle Hind, M.A., F.R.G.S. He, too, explored the country in 1858, but took a more southerly route in Manitoba, and along the Souris river. At page 297 of volume I, Mr. Hind speaks of the grasshoppers, which usually accompany drought. He says:
Upon one occasion the whole heavens towards the south, east and west, appeared to radiate a soft grey-tinted light with a quivering motion, and the day being calm, the hum produced by the vibration of so many millions of wings was quite indescribable. The aspect of the heavens during the greatest flight we observed, was singularly striking. It produced a feeling of uneasiness, amazement, and awe in our minds, as if some terrible, unforeseen calamity were about to happen.
That was on July 2, 1858. Then, at page 338 he speaks of the difficulty of obtaining wood, and regrets that they carried none with them. He says:
No tree or shrub or even willow twig could be seen in any direction from our camp on the morning of the 25th.
He adds that they went supperless to bed and the customary breakfast of tea and buffalo meat was impossible. This, may I add, was the day after they left Moose Jaw forks. This description of the country before the white settler came would indicate that drought conditions were not unknown in the days when the prairie was covered with thick sod and prairie wool and when the subsoil moisture had not been depleted by the raising of heavy cereal crops. Then came years of settlement which, with intermittent but short dry periods, were years of fairly satisfactory rainfall. Because of this, the dangers ahead were not recognized
by governments or by those interested in the settling of western land.
It should be noted, however, that shortly before the provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan were formed in 1905 the then premier of the Northwest Territories, Sir Frederick Haul-tain, who, I am glad to say, is still living, proposed that one province should be formed between the Manitoba boundary and the mountains. He wanted the new province to own and control its own lands and natural resources, and he particularly desired provincial control of southwestern Saskatchewan and southeastern Alberta. Sir Frederick desired to control these lands partly because he wished to retain them as ranching and grazing country. He did not consider them to be suitable for settlement, but a reading of the records would indicate that to a large extent those who wanted to open up these lands for settlement argued that it was the selfish interest of the ranchers that governed Sir Frederick's policy. There are members of this house, particularly the right hon. leader of the opposition (Mr. Bennett) and the hon. member for Melville (Mr. Motherwell), who will remember this controversy quite well.
At all events two provinces were formed and a new premier was designated for Saskatchewan by the federal Liberal government of the day. In the ensuing provincial general election Sir Frederick Haultain and his provincial rights party were defeated. Old timers in that part of Saskatchewan and Alberta continued to declare that the new settlers and homesteaders who came into that country to break the land would one day be faced with drought and be ruined. History seems to have vindicated their predictions to a regrettable degree. This dominion parliament must take the responsibility for the opening up of this territory for farming operations and, therefore, the rehabilitation of the area should also be a federal responsibility.
The cause of drought in western Canada is not hard to find. As someone said in this house during the debate on the address, it is primarily due to lack of moisture. I draw particular attention to that statement-a lack of moisture, not a lack of rain. In the days when the prairie plains were simply the haunts of Indians and grazing lands for herds of buffalo, the land was covered with short grass which made no great demand upon the stored up moisture in the subsoil. When the snow melted in the spring or when rail fell upon the natural covering, it slowly percolated through the tiny openings in the grass and down into the subsoil where it found storage space. This storage was assisted by the thick sod which from year to year formed and grew thicker,
63S
Drought Area-Mr. Coldwell

thus holding the winter snow and minimizing surface evaporation. When the pioneer settlers took over this unbroken land they found beneath it a rich store of subsoil moisture that had accumulated in this way throughout the ages.
What water ran off at that time ran into depressions to form little sloughs, lakes or marshes, and these together formed a watershed from which through seepage and capillary action the level of the subsoil moisture was kept fairly constant just beneath the prairie sod, except in those periods of prevailing drought such as Palliser indicated in his journal. The destruction of this natural earth covering by the settler's plough and the sowing of crops, together with thick growths of weeds, made greater demands on the stored up moisture than the scanty precipitation could replace in a single year. Even in years of normal rainfall, in many areas the moisture was being used up at a greater rate than it could be replaced. Our western farmers have been accused of using the moisture and the chemical content of the soil at too great a rate, but I believe that as a class the farmers do not desire to deplete their soil which, if I may so put it, is their constant capital. However, what choice have they when long periods of high production at low prices failed to enable them to meet their obligations and the fixed charges of taxes, interest, and so on?
The very tilling of the soil has helped also to make the restoration of moisture more difficult. Soil deficient in vegetable matter sheds water quickly, particularly when it is a clay soil. When raindrops fall upon the fine prairie mulch they make a film which chokes for a time the pores of the soil and the result is the water runs off rapidly. Subsequent hot sunshine bakes the clay surface and cements it. I have studied some very interesting statistics gathered by the department of agriculture in the United States dealing with the loss of moisture through the growing of crops and by the formation of this surface film. In its natural state the prairie sod has millions of tiny openings made by little roots, sometimes made by insects and worms, and the water tends to percolate to the subsoil. But with the breaking of the sod, that was ended to a degree. Previously when the raindrops fell on the natural covering they were broken up and they percolated slowly into the subsoil beneath which they formed a reservoir of moisture for future growth.
I would emphasize that to-day that covering is gone, and the wind swept plains unfortunately are with us. All this would seem to [Mr. Coldwell.)
indicate that if the west is blessed again with a wet year or even with several successive wet years the restoration of subsoil moisture will not be sufficient to withstand the inevitable dry years that will follow. Because of this in my opinion we must consider ways and means of watering the land and filling the empty sloughs and lakes in the drought region and thus restore the table level of subsoil moisture of which in these days we hear so much. Moreover the drought region is extending. This is to be expected, because the intense heat of the dry land dries up land adjacent to it, and the desert tends to extend. Wind erosion follows and dust and the blowing topsoil cause still greater disaster.
There are those who say that irrigation is not feasible because there is a lack of water. But wheat is a semi-arid plant which requires a minimum of moisture provided it receives that moisture at the right time. In several of the recent so-called dry years the annual precipitation has been sufficient to ensure a crop of wheat, but the crop failed because the moisture did not fall at the right time; the subsoil moisture was lacking to carry the crop along. Hence it is not a question of large quantities of water, but of being able to deliver at the right time to the growing crops the comparatively small amount of water often required. For this purpose I believe there is sufficient water in the rivers and streams of western Canada.
A friend of mine last summer, when the days were hot. stood near Saskatchewan landing and watched the south Saskatchewan, incidentally lower than usual, roll by. He told me that the river was in flood-not a great flood such as we have known in the past, but comparatively in flood-at a much higher level than normal last year, and flowing at about eight miles per hour in a channel one-quarter of a mile wide. He estimated that if the water were diverted it would cover many sections of land one foot deep within twenty-four hours.


Mr. STIRLING:: What month was that?


Major James William Coldwell: That was in July. I
do not know how correct that estimate is, but I do know that vast quantities of water are flowing through the parched lands both from the North and South Saskatchewan rivers to the Arctic seas without being utilized in any way whatever. I have endeavoured to discuss these matters with engineers and others who have looked into the problem;
I have gone carefully over the contour maps of the dried-out area, and as a layman I would say that wide-scale irrigation seems to present

Drought Area-Mr. Coldwell
no insuperable difficulties, either physical or financial, on the northern side of the Mis-souri-Coteau divide. True, some damming might be required, but the height of the land over which the water would have to flow from, let us say, the South Saskatchewan, near River-hurst. down to the Moose Jaw area, across the Regina plains and down to the Souris at Weyburn, presents no formidable difficulties in these days of scientific engineering.
I have read that someone has suggested that any necessary pumping might be done by windmills; for the wind blows almost continually across the great plains. When I remember that windmills have been in operation for centuries in Holland, pumping water over dykes and out into the sea, I see no reason why equally cheap power should not be pumped from dammed rivers of western Canada over such heights of land as may be necessary to water at least a large part of these great plains. Electric power might be generated and utilized partly for this purpose. The valleys of both the Saskatchewan rivers lie between great banks and there are several places where dams could be conveniently located and power generated if desired. If it were necessary to divert some water from the North to the South Saskatchewan river, and to supplement the latter, irrigating the intervening county as it flowed, I believe that could be done.
Many people conceive of such channels being long straight cuts across the prairies, through hills and valleys; but that is not at all necessary. There are depressions running north and south and east and west which could form the basis for channels to be cut, and these could wind across the countryside following the line of least resistance and the most inexpensive engineering practice. The Kindersley, Rosetown and Biggar territories might be benefited in this way.
I have been told by engineers that dams placed at intervals on the South Saskatchewan, south of Saskatoon, to the point at which the Red Deer joins the South Saskatchewan in Alberta, would impound sufficient water to give moisture to the whole of central and south eastern Saskatchewan. I do not know. But that is something we should, as a parliament, find out. The little sloughs and large lakes now dry could be filled, and the table level of subsoil moisture raised again to its old level, while in many years an inch or two of water on the parched land at the rizht time would ensure a bountiful return for the labour expended.
Schemes like these should be investigated. I want to say quite frankly that as a layman I am not in a position to say whether such
schemes are feasible or not, and I therefore deprecate definite statements made by other laymen that irrigation is an impossibility in western Canada. I have heard persons who.
I am quite sure, know no more about this subject than I do, make the definite statement that all these schemes are quite impracticable. I am willing to admit that personally I do not know, but with the knowledge that I have I am persuaded that it is worth investigating. There are those who hold that a scheme of large-scale irrigation would involve an expenditure of $400,000,000. Personally that would not frighten me when I remember that we have spent more than $100,000,000 in recent years in agricultural relief, and have nothing to show for it, to say nothing of the enormous losses due to crop failures. But I am persuaded that for one-tenth of that $400,000,000 expenditure which some people have suggested would be necessary, lams could be built along the Smith Saskatchewan that would irrigate several million acres of good agricultural land. The larger scheme could, if necessary, be completed over a long period of years. When I see the puny efforts being made in western Canada, and contrast them with the great projects I have seen in the United States or read about in India or Africa, I realize that we should investigate thoroughly the possibilities of irrigation in our own country.
Last summer I went down into the United States and visited several of the great projects there. I went to the Fort Peck dam in the state of Montana, which is not, primarily, of course, an irrigation project but rather a flood control and power project, with irrigation as incidental to them both. There I saw an earth dam which will rise 240 feet above the river bed, the length of its main section across the river valley being
9.000	feet. The dam will contain approximately 105,000,000 cubic yards of earth,
1.600.000	cubic yards of rock, and 4,000,000 cubic yards of gravel. The great reservoir to be created by this dam across the Missouri river will store over 19,000,000 acre-feet of water. It will have a maximum surface area of 245,000 acres, and will be 180 miles long, with a maximum width of 16 miles. This will be one of the great new projects of North America. It will cost $100,000,000 and give employment to thousands of men who otherwise would be unemployed. Even the damming of either of the Saskatchewan rivers would be a relatively small affair compared to this.


Charles Avery Dunning: How much land will it irrigate?
Drought Area-Mr. Coldwell


Major James William Coldwell: I said that it is primarily not an irrigation project, but it will irrigate, as time goes by, large sections of a country which is much more difficult to irrigate than our prairie country. As the minister probably knows, it is situated in a hilly, semi-mountainous country, somewhat like our foothills, and the project is not primarily an irrigation project. It illustrates how vast quantities of water may be stored.


Charles Avery Dunning: But there is plenty of prairie down below.


Major James William Coldwell: Yes, and that would be irrigated. I saw the American projects around Malta, Montana, and drove from the arid prairie into a veritable garden of Eden, as did the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner) and the Minister of Labour (Mr. Rogers) just a few days before I arrived there. I then drove on across the mountains and saw another project in the state of Washington, where a desert looking very like our prairie will be watered by the Grande Coulee development from the Columbia river. There they are going to irrigate several millions of acres of desert country. These are giant undertakings, and from an examination of contour maps on both sides of the line I am convinced that irrigation projects on the great Canadian plains are relatively small when compared to these.
There are those who criticize such proposals on the ground of expense, but the alternatives are too terrible to face. Either we shall have to keep thousands of people on almost continuous relief or remove them from the lands they now occupy. Railways have been built to open up these territories and to serve communities established along the way. Men and women have built their homes there and unless we can rehabilitate this great area they face utter ruin. Schools and churches, with the usual business necessities, have been established and will have to be abandoned. The effect upon the economic structure of all Canada will eventually be profound, for eastern industry has as much interest in this rehabilitation as have the people who live there to-day. Rehabilitation of the country would not only rescue the people from poverty, misery and relief but would make available lands upon which thousands of our young people might establish homes, and might live, under proper conditions, in comparative security.
I am suggesting then that an investigation be made to see if any of these projects are feasible and that large scale irrigation if feasible should be undertaken as a national

plan and as a national responsibility. There are those, as I have said, who will lift their hands in horror at the proposed expenditures; some will call them handouts to the west. But in days gone by much larger handouts of these very lands were made by the federal government to powerful interests and corporations whose headquarters were located in our eastern cities. What a wonderful gift it was. The inalienable right in perpetuity to this land was given to corporations who, without regard to surface or soil analyses, turned them over to hardy pioneers whose efforts turned them into farms, but whose obligations caused them to deplete the rich reserves of moisture and chemicals that nature had stored through bygone years.
In recent years great irrigation schemes have been brought to successful conclusion in other parts of the British empire. British engineers have watered deserts in Africa and India; in the province of Sind in India the Lloyd barrage is one of the wonders of the world. When that scheme to utilize the river Indus is fully developed it will water 7,500,000 acres and bring security in a land where the desert has made life uncertain and caused suffering to many millions. Of the great projects in the Sudan and in northern Africa I do not propose to say anything at the moment, because I have not the time; but in North America, in India and in Africa, American and British engineers have, after careful surveys, watered the deserts there, giving economic security and crop certainty not only to those who till the soil, but to millions who depend on the products of that toil for their subsistence.
My resolution does not ask the government to undertake any such projects, but to obtain an authoritative survey in order that we may know whether such a scheme for western Canada is scientifically feasible and economically sound. My suggestion now is that such a committee should consist, not of departmental officials whose ideas have perhaps been moulded to some extent by the political environment in which they find themselves, but rather of authorities such as engineers who have been connected with one or other of the great projects to which I have alluded. If it were possible, an engineer in charge of the Indus development, an engineer who has had charge of the Sudan development, an American engineer connected with one of the great projects in the United States, and a Canadian engineer of outstanding ability in this direction, or any two or three of them, would make a commission whose authority and standing could not be questioned. My objection to what has been

Drought Area-Mr. Bothwell
said throughout the country regarding irrigation, both for and against, is that it is being said by laymen, men often filled perhaps with political prejudice and not equipped to give authoritative judgment upon matters of this description.
I have not dealt with the power which could be developed by large-scale irrigation schemes, but in my opinion that would electrify the whole of the Canadian northwest, bringing new comfort and power to the people who live there in this age of electricity. Moreover, in mixed farming areas, it would enable farmers to refrigerate their dairy and meat products and do much to improve the standards of Canadian farm produce on the markets of the world. For these and other reasons, which will no doubt be brought out by other speakers, I urge the adoption of the resolution.
I believe that the time has come when we have to consider this problem of the rehabilitation of western agriculture on a much larger scale than anything we have thought of doing up to the present time. I do not want to emphasize the misery and want and difficulties that face the people; I do not want to emphasize the hopelessness for the children who now live there, the difficulties in schools and the condition of teachers, all of which are due to the long periods of economic disaster and crop failure in that country. But I believe that we shall not be doing our duty if we simply say that these proposals are not feasible or if we say that the rain will fall again and the crops will grow. The history of the western country shows clearly that throughout the years that have gone by there have been from time to time long dry periods as well as wet ones, and if we have a wet period coming now we are sure it will be followed by a period without sufficient moisture. We must face that fact. I am not asking the house to authorize any particular irrigation scheme, but rather to obtain the very best advice that it is possible to get wherever we may find it, anywhere in the world, in order that we may know whether large scale irrigation is feasible or not.


Mr. C. E. BOTHWELL (Swift Current):: I am sure the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell) will pardon me if I do not specifically follow him in his remarks. I am quite in sympathy with the tone of the resolution, but I am afraid that before I get through the house will judge that I am not able to go quite as far as the hon. member did. Nor do I entirely follow some of the arguments he has made. It is perhaps fortunate that to-day this same subject is under
discussion in the legislature of Saskatchewan. On Thursday last a resolution was introduced by Mr. Stork to which an amendment was proposed by the provincial Minister of Public Works when the subject came up for discussion. The amendment rather appealed to me in the moderation of its terms. The amendment was:
That this assembly expresses its gratitude for the appropriations made by the federal government in its general rehabilitation program and for the works begun and constructed in Saskatchewan for the conservation and utilization of water for irrigation and stock watering purposes; and further
This assembly would respectfully request that sufficient moneys be provided from year to year so that detailed surveys of all watersheds not yet fully investigated be carried on with a view to facilitating the construction of all necessary projects found to be economically feasible, and also that the whole federal program be so extended and enlarged as to include the entire province.


Mr. DOUGLAS (Weyburn):: Would the hon. member also read the motion?


Charles Edward Bothwell: The motion was as
follows:
That this assembly respectfully request the federal government to set aside an appropriation of at least $50,000,000 this year, to be used in investigation and completion of feasible water conservation, irrigation and other projects, directed towards the permanent rehabilitation of the drought area of this province.
This question of conservation of moisture in the prairie provinces and the rehabilitation of the farmers there perhaps goes back to the time mentioned by the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar. The Palliser report and reports of the early surveyors in the prairie regions did express doubts as to whether, on account of the lack of rainfall, the great central plains region would be suitable for agricultural purposes. Back in 1901, in the territory which is now comprised within the boundaries of Saskatchewan, we had only about 100,000 people. Since that time, through continued years of sufficient moisture to grow crops, the influx of settlers became very great, until at the present time we have 930,000 odd in that area of Saskatchewan. From the early settlement down to 1929 the people who settled there were able to make a good living. They found the soil productive, and they were able to build roads, bridges, schools, government and municipal buildings, and all that sort of thing; and the debt of the province up to 1929 was more than represented by physical assets in the province. Since 1929, on account of the drought, the country has not been the finest place in the world to

Drought Area-Mr. Bothwell

live in, and the debts of individuals, municipalities and governments have mounted up tremendously.
By 1934 the dominion government realized that the taking of steps to rehabilitate that area had become a federal responsibility, and an act was later passed by the federal government under the leadership of the present leader of the opposition (Mr. Bennett) known as the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act. Moneys were appropriated under that act and an organization set up to see what should be done to rehabilitate the area. That work has been carried on ever since, more money being expended each year, under three heads -reclamation, conservation and rehabilitation. We believe that the experience gained in the expenditure of that money has taught those who are interested in the projects on the ground, as well as people generally throughout the dominion, that the work that is being done is well worth while, and we all hope to see the complete rehabilitation of that whole area.
I might say in passing that I think the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act had the support of every hon. member in the house, no matter what his political affiliations. The intention was that some form of organization should be set up under which we would be able by some means to reclaim lands that were drifting and blowing away; also that we should find a way to conserve the rainfall and prevent its being carried off in spring freshets. Farmers or settlers in areas that have suffered severely from drought conditions and whom the organization could not see means of rehabilitating in the area in which they were located could be moved to other lands where they would have a chance of making good. In connection with the work of this rehabilitation board the first major step that had to be considered was what had been achieved in the past by the methods followed. In that connection I think I should go back to the work done through the dominion experimental farm at Indian Head many years ago. There they developed the idea of summer fallow for the purpose of conserving moisture. The next step in the rehabilitation plan was the development of marquis wheat, practically eliminating, as it did, the frost hazard in those areas and moving a considerable distance north the limit of territory upon which wheat could be grown. Marquis wheat has now become the standard of quality in hard spring wheats throughout the world.
The next step came in Alberta, by the introduction of strip farming and trash covering of the soil for the purpose of conserving

moisture. The objectives of the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act may now be outlined as follows:
1.	Establishing of dominion experiment substations which are essentially outposts of the dominion experimental farms, set up under the rehabilitation program.
2.	Organizing of agricultural improvement associations where individual farmers and ranchers organize for community activity, including establishing of strip farming and trash cover crop methods to control soil drifting, regrassing work and tree planting.
3.	Reclamation stations established for the purpose of reclaiming land for agricultural use or of reestablishing a suitable grass cover on land which has been severely damaged by drought and soil drifting and has become a public menace.
4.	Grass development for the purpose of determining improved methods of establishing grass on land subject to soil drifting.
5.	Tree planting, including free distribution of trees and large scale demonstrations of field shelter belts.
6.	Establishing of a fully equipped soils laboratory at Swift Current experimental station for the purpose of continuing investigations of soil moisture and soil drifting in the drought area.
7.	Continuation of soil survey and soil classification in the drought area in cooperation with the provincial departments.
8.	Large scale soil moisture conservation projects, including contouring, terracing and furrowing to determine the value of such work.
9.	Agricultural economic survey throughout the drought area.
10.	Financial assistance in reestablishing settlers now on sub-marginal lands and reseeding of these lands for community pasture purposes.
11.	Assistance in developing a sheep and cattle policy in connection with sub-marginal lands developed for community pasture purposes.
12.	Engineering and financial assistance to individuals and communities in building dug-outs, stoekwatering dams and irrigation schemes where feasible.
These are the objectives of the prairie farm rehabilitation board, and for the past few years they have been working along these lines. It is quite true, as the hon. member who preceded me has said, no person who has not seen the drifting areas of western Canada can appreciate just what they are like. Last August I circled through a stretch of territory where scarcely a green thing of any description was to be seen; with soil drifting, rolling all the time, even though scarcely any wind was noticeable. The experimental farm at Swift Current, with the assistance and perhaps under the direction of the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation board, experimented on about ten thousand acres of land scattered throughout that area in half sections. They used different methods in different places to find how they could control

Drought Area-Mr. Bolhwell
this soil drifting, and they believe they have found a method of doing so. There is a large area, however, that has to be looked after. It extends perhaps from some place east of Swift Current to about Bassano in Alberta, south to the United States border, and north of the South Saskatchewan river as far as Lloydminster. Throughout all that area work has been done with the assistance of the experimental farms. One day last August, when driving along there were times that I could scarcely see the radiator of the car. I had to creep along the side of the road in case some other car might come out of the dust storm. Finally I came to a half-section of land just south of the railway track at Fox Valley where work had been done with the help of the dominion experimental farm. I thought the storm had gone down, that it was all over, but after I got past that half section of land I found the situation just as bad as ever.
There they had listed the west side of the land with a new machine called a lister, which throws up a heavy furrow. They had run this lister one trip across the half section, north and south, every eight rods. They found that they were able to stop this drifting by doing that-not necessarily every eight rods but possibly every twenty rods, depending upon the type of soil in which they were working. In discussing the matter with the superintendent of the experimental farm at Swift Current I was informed-and I presume it will be in his report to the department- that the territory comprised within the area I mentioned will have to be farmed in a way somewhat similar to that I have indicated, by using a lister or some machine that will do similar work. A cultivator properly equipped may and will do just as satisfactory work, and in the trenches dug by these machines they are able to conserve whatever moisture there may be.
In addition they believe that by a system of terracing throughout that area, with machines such as I have described, they will be able to conserve a considerable portion of the normal run-off water in the spring and also the rain that falls during the storms, of which we have a few even in the driest part of the area. In addition, under the 'Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act they are encouraging farmers to put in dugouts, small irrigation projects and stock watering dams. According to my information, up to January 15 of this year over eleven thousand applications had been received from the three prairie provinces in connection with these small projects. Over half of this number, or over 7,100, were from Saskatchewan; 1,800 were from Manitoba and less than 2,500 were from Alberta. Over 820 of the applications received have been cancelled, rejected or dropped, leaving over 10,500 active applications, in addition to hundreds of letters that are receiving attention. Of these applications approximately 5,500 have been authorized or approved for construction, and of these nearly 4,300 have been completed or reported completed.
That is not going to solve the whole difficulty in that country, but the prairie farm rehabilitation board and the officials of the experimental farms have encouraged the farmers to form agricultural improvement associations in various parts of the province. To-day something over one hundred of those agricultural improvement associations have been formed. The object of that is to get the farmers who are interested in a particular district together so that they can discuss their difficulties and in unison work out some Dlan whereby not only the individual but also the whole community will be assisted. It is believed that more can be accomplished by getting the people on the land to work together to assist themselves than can be done by any widespread government expenditure of money.
In addition to the conservation of moisture in dams, dugouts and small irrigation projects, the terracing of land, the use of the lister and that sort of thing, they have worked out a scheme whereby the lands that are not properly arable will be taken out of cultivation. In the province of Saskatchewan we have, I think, about 30,000,000 acres of broken land. In 1936 there was something over
22.000.	000 acres actually seeded, and an area about one-third that size would be in summer fallow, which would bring the total to around
30.000.	000 acres. It is authoritatively stated that large scale irrigation projects in that province cannot take care of more than
1,500,000	acres.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: I am very much interested in what my hon. friend is saying. Would he state his authority for that figure?


Charles Edward Bothwell: My authority is the engineers in Regina who are interested in the work. It has been so stated by the chairman of the board and also by the Hon. Mr. Spence, who I believe is the liaison officer between the board and the federal government. Then, I have personally discussed the matter with engineers, particularly Mr. McGavin of the water rights branch in Regina, and Mr. Russell, chief engineer on the rehabilitation program. Although a complete survey of all possible projects has not yet been made, nevertheless

Drought Area-Mr. Bothwell
I believe these gentlemen are pretty well satisfied that large-scheme irrigation projects in Saskatchewan are not possible, because they estimate that the total amount of water obtainable there is only about 11,000,000 acre feet, and about a third of that will be lost in the process of irrigation.


Mr. MacNICOL:: Can the hon. member tell us the flow in cubic second feet of the South Saskatchewan river?


Charles Edward Bothwell: No, I am not able to answer the hon. member's question, without making a search. I have the information, though. Then, in Saskatchewan the condition is different from that in Alberta, due to the fact that the land to be irrigated is higher than the water which would be used in irrigation, and the water would accordingly have to be lifted, In Alberta there is the possibility of tapping streams without the necessity of an expensive system of dams, ^ and that water could be carried down to irrigate the lower lands.
While I am not opposed to irrigation projects, and while I believe that some projects are feasible-for instance, the one from River-hurst mentioned by the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar-may I point out that, as I understand the term, and from the hon. member's description of the size of the Fort Peck dam, no large scale irrigation projects are contemplated. A project may be feasible around Herbert, and there may be the possibility of another one near Vanguard, within territory with which I am familiar.
Some of these irrigation projects may be feasible, and possibly should be constructed. But we are still not taking care of all the area. In addition to that, a considerable amount of land within the area should not be used for agricultural purposes-that is, should not be used for farming purposes. At the present time there is a plan to have areas which should not have been broken thrown back into community pastures in an endeavour to have such lands covered with grass and made them capable of producing crops for the sustenance of range stock.
Real success has been achieved along these lines in the experiments carried out at the Scott experimental station within the last four or five years. That station particularly has been experimenting with different kinds of grasses, and they find that the crested wheat grass is possibly a solution to the difficulty of getting those lands covered with grass and putting them in a condition where they can produce feed for stock which may run there.
I was much surprised to find the extent to which crested wheat grass may .be the salvation

of the province. Tests have been made in the past five years at the Scott station with respect to both cattle and sheep. In 1937 an attempt was made through the use of cattle to determine the relative amount of pasture obtained from grasses. The pasture fields compared were native pasture, brome, western rye and crested wheat grass. In this series the crested wheat grass was sown on the higher land to give it a more rigid test. The animals were rotated on the fields. The fields were fenced separately, and the pastures were not overgrazed. The native grass gave ten cow days per acre; western rye mixed with alfalfa gave forty; brome gave forty-nine, and crested wheat grass gave fifty-eight. To state this in another way, the relative amount of pasture from these fields was, with crested wheat grass equalling 100 per cent, brome 84 per cent, western rye with alfalfa 69 per cent, and native pasture 17 per cent.
In connection with sheep the difference in the third year was still greater. The statement is made that when western rye was practically all dead and gave no pasture, brome provided 38 per cent of the pasture and crested wheat grass gave 62 per cent. Averaging the three years, crested wheat grass provided about half the pasture on the three fields in question, brome provided slightly over one-third, and western rye provided approximately one-fifth.
These are the views of the superintendent of the dominion experimental station at Scott, Saskatchewan. In his statement he says that crested wheat grass must possess a powerful root system, and goes on to say:
After three years the sod from these grasses was ploughed. Western rye appeared not much better than a good grain stubble, brome looked much better, but crested wheat matched the best prairie sod.
Then, later on he says:
Another institution has collected information which further illustrates the comparative sod forming value of these three _ grasses. The pounds per acre of root fibre in the top six inches of soil from these grasses which had been down for three years was found to be 1,795 pounds for western rye grass, 3,783 for brome grass and 5,079 for crested wheat grass. Furthermore, excavation of these root systems showed western rye roots penetrated the soil to a depth of sixty-four inches, brome sixty-five inches and crested wheat grass ninety-six inches.
It is believed by the superintendent at the Scott station that crested wheat grass, together with the conservation of moisture through the methods I have briefly described, will save a great part of the affected area. Then, by the small irrigation projects many farmers can instal on their farms they will be able to

Drought Area-Mr. Quelch
grow from ten to twenty acres of alfalfa, which would tide them over in years of severe drought.
With these various methods it is believed that a continuation of the work now carried on under the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act would be more than justified. No tremendous expenditure of money would be required, although we will have to spend more than has been spent in any previous year. Much of the initiatory work has been done, and if we are to rehabilitate the area these projects will have to be carried out.
To illustrate what has happened I obtained from the experimental farm photographs of areas on which they have worked. About forty miles south of Swift Current, near Cadillac, there was drifting soil to such a degree that most people believed recovery impossible. They did not think it could ever be put back into grass. If one were to see pictures of the drifting soil, of buildings half covered with silted soil, and sand a foot deep on the land, and then look at pictures of the same piece of land with a crop of spring rye growing on it in the spring of 1937, he would be amazed. I quote from the descriptive matter in connection with one of these pictures having to do with the Cadillac reclamation area:
Sufficient cover has been obtained to sow grass seed on the stubble. Rainfall during 1937 was practically nil. The methods practised enabled the growing of this crop.
Then there is a picture of a crop of spring rye which comes up to a man's knees. That was grown on a piece of land that had had a foot of moving silt on it. Down near Mort-lach there is another area where the same condition of drifting soil existed. This area has been recovered. One field had been abandoned and had nothing but Russian thistle, tumbling mustard and prairie sage growing on it. A picture is shown of a stand of crested wheat grass on the same field. The caption under the photograph reads:
Seed was drilled in among the weed cover without any cultivation in April, 1936. Seedlings same up in spring of 1936 but appeared to die off during the hot, dry summer that followed. In 1937 the plants revived, made a good growth and produced seed.
These are actual photographs taken on the ground, and they show just what can be done. These experiments were carried on by the experimental farm under the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act and they have demonstrated clearly just what is possible in the way of recovery and reclamation. The conservation of moisture by methods found feasible up to the present time, the saving of all run-off
water in the spring instead of allowing it to run away as it has been doing, proper methods of cultivation in order to stop drifting, the establishment of stock watering dams and small irrigation projects, and the taking out of cultivation of the lighter soils which, as is now known, should never have been broken up, have all been demonstrated. We believe that with a continuation of the work that has been done under the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act and with possibly a greater expenditure of money from year .to year than has been expended in the past, we shall be able to save all of the area referred to by the previous speaker, and which I have described as extending throughout a tremendous part of that prairie country. Later on in the session, when the estimates are being considered, I hope we will have an opportunity of considering the extension of this program which has been found so feasible for the west.


Mr. VICTOR QUELCH (Acadia):: Mr. Speaker, generally speaking I find myself in agreement with the objects of this motion and therefore I shall support it. I would direct attention to the fact that the federal government have incurred a certain amount of responsibility for the conditions that exist to-day in the drought areas, because they were in charge of the natural resources of these provinces when the lands were thrown open for settlement in spite of warnings issued by prominent engineers and government surveyors that they were too dry for settlement. To-day we are reaping the tragic consequences of the policy carried out at that time. The hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell) has covered thoroughly this particular aspect of the matter, and I shall not take up the time of the house to go over the ground again.
Last fall I received a number of articles from England written by Mr. A. G. Street, a farmer journalist who some twenty years ago had resided for three years in Manitoba. Last summer he returned to Canada and made a tour of the west. He has been criticized severely for the gloomy and tragic picture he paints of the drought area, but, in my opinion it is no more gloomy or tragic than the actual conditions that exist in many parts of this area. Mr. Street referred to the methods of farming which had been followed in these areas in past years, and his comments in this connection have also been criticized. While I realize that some of his arguments may not have been well founded, as a farmer who has resided for some thirty years on the edge of the drought area I know that our methods have been at fault. This fact was
Drought Area-Mr. Quelch

Prior to 1921 there was a good deal of interest in and discussion of a large-scale irrigation project, and in 1922 a preliminary survey was made of what is called the North Saskatchewan project. It is generally known as the William Pearce project. The proposal was to divert water from the North Saskatchewan to the Clearwater and the Red Deer rivers, then take it down to Sullivan lake, where a storage reservoir of some million-acre feet would be formed; then carry it by the Eyehill creek and Sounding creek into Tramping lake in Saskatchewan. Below Sullivan lake approximately 470,000 acres would be irrigated and one million acres in Saskatchewan. Under the total project about
1.500.000	acres would have been irrigated and the total cost would have been 8105,000,000. The cost, however, of carrying water from Sullivan lake to Tramping lake would have been excessive owing to the very sandy nature of the soil through which the water would have to be carried. It would have run the cost to about $70 an acre to irrigate the land in Saskatchewan, and for that reason the scheme has been generally condemned. On the other hand there is for Alberta a modified scheme known as the Sullivan lake project, which is believed to be thoroughly sound. Under this project the water would be diverted from Clearwater river and carried down Stauffer creek into the Red Deer river; then a dam fifty feet high would be placed below the mouth of Raven river and the water would be carried, by a canal 146 miles long, to Sullivan lake where 437,000 acres would be irrigated.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Do the notes from which the hon. gentleman is reading give the number of cubic second feet that would be taken out of any of those rivers?


Victor Quelch: This is a survey that was made by the engineering department and it has been declared absolutely sound. The article is about five pages long and gives a complete description of the engineering features and the sizes of the various reservoirs. I shall be glad to pass it on to the hon. gentleman and he will get full information from it. It is a matter of engineering technique which I should not care to go into now. The areas irrigated below Sullivan lake would be 73,190 acres between Sullivan lake and Hanna; in the Berry creek area, 304,930 acres, and in the Monitor area, 49,240 acres. The total cost would be approximately $23,000,000. In addition to that, another
142.000	acres could be irrigated on the west side of the Red Deer river along Ghost Pine,

Knee Hill and Three Hills, bringing the total cost to $27,000,000; and the total amount irrigated would be 580,000 acres.
The Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner), speaking in Alberta, said that the Sullivan lake project would cost $28,000,000; but at the time he must have been confusing the two projects, because according to the reclamation surveys-and that is the only record there is-the cost of the Sullivan lake project only would be $23,000,000 while the Sullivan lake project, plus the irrigation scheme on the west side of the Red Deer, would be $27,000,000.
I have discussed this project with the officials of the Department of Agriculture in Alberta, and they say that it is desirable. I have discussed it with the head of the water resources department, Mr. Charlesworth, and he tells me that from the engineering point of view the scheme is absolutely sound. That being so, what would appear to be the main objections? Well, once again we seem to have the same old bugbear; we have arrived at the same dead end that we have reached whenever we have discussed anything else of a progressive nature-the question of money: Where is the money to come from to finance a scheme of this kind?
We must remember that the existence of the drought area is not a local responsibility; it is recognized to-day as a national problem and a national responsibility, and as such it might well be financed under the proclaimed Liberal policy of currency and credit in terms of public need. The project should be carried out as a national responsibility without placing a capital charge against the irrigated land. If we were to try to recover the total cost of such a project by making it a charge against the land it would be absolutely impossible for the farmer to make a living and at the same time pay that charge, and no doubt that is the reason why many irrigation projects in the province have had their difficulties. They have failed owing to the high capitalization of the schemes.
This project is especially desirable in view of the fact that practically all the land which would be irrigated is already owned by the government under the special areas board, and therefore they would be in a position to divide the land into small economic units so that the farmer would have enough irrigated land to make it possible for him to grow feed and seed and to sustain his family.
I would imagine that in Saskatchewan it would be possible to put in similar projects in the area that might be classified as a permanent drought area, and we in this comer

Drought Area-Mr. Donnelly
shall be only too glad to support the motion in the hope that this government may find ways and means of carrying out progressive measures of the kind I have described.


Mr. T. F. DONNELLY (Wood Mountain):: I find myself in accord with much that has been said this afternoon regarding the condition of the people in the dried out area of western Canada. I have listened with a great deal of interest to the discussion of the drought in western Canada and what can be done to bring about an improvement in conditions there.
The present state of affairs in western Canada is serious; it is one of the biggest problems facing the dominion to-day. The Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner) last year told us that the dried out area in the west represented one-fourth of all the land occupied in Canada, and one-fifth of all improved farm land in Canada. In other words the drought area covers about 18,000,000 acres of improved land and 35,000,000 acres of occupied land in western Canada. It is important to the lives of about one million people in Canada. In my opinion it is a greater problem than even the railway problem. The question what we are to do with this great drought area we have in western Canada is the big problem we have to solve.
In 1934 in the house I advised the then Conservative government to make a survey of drought conditions in that part of the country and to determine for themselves what they would do. One of two conclusions could be reached, either that it was possible to farm this land, or that it was not possible to do so. If it is not possible to farm the land then it is necessary to help the people to move out, and if it is possible for the people to live in that part of the country and to farm it, then they should be given instructions in the proper methods of farming that land, and shown how to cultivate the land so as to make a living in that district. That seemed to be the conclusion. Shortly after that the Conservative government put through a rehabilitation act and work was begun towards a survey of this country in an endeavour to rehabilitate some of our people there. I agree with much that has been said with regard to the condition in that part of the country, but I do not agree with the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell) when he tells us what the cause of the condition there is.


Charles Avery Dunning: Hear, hear.


Thomas F. Donnelly: I beg your pardon?


Charles Avery Dunning: I said, "Hear, hear."


Thomas F. Donnelly: I have been farming for more than thirty years and I think I know something about agriculture. If you tell me that when you cultivate the land you prevent the water from soaking into it, that the water runs off, and that it soaks better into sod land than into cultivated land, then I must find serious fault with such a theory. I cannot agree with it at all. Any man who has farmed knows that after a rainfall, when you go and look at the sod you may find the water has soaked two or three inches into it, whereas if you cross the road and look at the cultivated land you will find that the water has soaked down eight or ten inches. That is the reason why our sloughs and dams and reservoirs have dried up; the water has soaked down into the cultivated land and has not been running off as it did when the sod was there. There is no doubt of that. We have been farming in order to conserve moisture, to allow the moisture to go down into the land and stay there as subsoil moisture. That is the object of summer fallow, deep ploughing. I disagree with the statement that the condition there was caused by cultivating the land and letting the water run away.
Since this rehabilitation act was passed the purpose has been to teach the farmers, to show them how they may ensure a crop in the dried out area, how they may seed their land and farm it in such a way that even in the drought area they may be assured of some crop, some return for their efforts. With this object one of the first things the government did in Saskatchewan was to make a soil survey. It was absolutely necessary to know what the land was. In the early days when the land was first taken up the price of wheat was good and people were anxious to get land; the land was offered free and people rushed in and took up any land they found available with the idea of cropping it for a few years, getting a few good crops and then perhaps getting out. Much land was taken up and farmed which never should have been taken, sub-marginal land. Now we find much of that land has been abandoned. This soil survey has been completed in Saskatchewan and at present an economic or agricultural survey is being made to discover the condition of the different farmers. That is being done in order to find out what should be done in the different districts. This survey has already been completed in some of the worst districts, but the whole province has not yet been covered. On a lot of this sub-marginal land the taxes have not been paid; the land has gone back to the municipalities and they
Drought Area-Mr. Donnelly

have turned it over to the provincial government and the provincial government in turn to the federal government. They are fencing that land and, as the hon. member for Swift Current (Mr. Bothwell) said, trying to get it into grass again. In Saskatchewan at present a great deal of land has been fenced and about twelve pasture areas, amounting to about 225,000 acres have been established. In Alberta some 595,000 acres have been fenced and pastured. Some buildings have also been built, dugouts, dams, reservoirs and corrals constructed, and up to date methods of cultivation adopted to produce proper pasture, with the idea of creating community pastures where the people, with the direction and assistance of the government, can raise better stock. We are helping the people to stock these pastures with better stock. This ia being done both in Saskatchewan and in Alberta. Besides that, I understand it is the intention of the government to set aside a certain amount of these pastures as reserves, so that in dry years it will not be necessary to ship a lot of cattle out to Manitoba and districts in northern Saskatchewan, but it will be possible to keep them right there in these pastures which have not been pastured down. These are some of the things that are being done with these sub-marginal lands.
Then we come to soil drifting. For years most of us did not know what soil drifting was. I have been farming in western Canada for some thirty years, and for probably twenty-five years of that time we did not know what soil drifting meant. It is only in the last few dry years that it has become a problem. I believe that when we have rain again, as we hope we shall in the near future, we shall not be troubled with soil drifting. In order to combat and prevent soil drifting certain steps have been taken. One method is strip farming. If your farm is, say, half a mile long, you cultivate strips twelve to fifteen rods wide and put in a crop; on the next twelve to fifteen rods you will not have any crop but will let it stay in stubble, and so on alternately. This will prevent the soil from drifting. There is no doubt this has a certain beneficial effect. If you have a whole section in summer fallow, once it begins to drift at one end the drifting will spread over the whole field.
Besides strip farming we also sow grass seed in order to get back to grass. To help in this the government have started experimental substations, to the number of something like forty-seven, demonstrating the way to farm in order to prevent drifting. Also we have organized throughout western Canada what are known as agricultural improvement

associations, of which we have some eighty-five. In these associations the people meet together to talk over their difficulties; they agree to follow the directions of the men from the experimental farms and substations as to the best way to farm the land. Also men from these substations are going out and sowing grass seed on the rough land, and broadcasting or sowing it with seeders on prepared land. They are sowing it with and without cover crops, with the idea of determining which is the best way to get the land back into grass. So far they are not sure which is the better way, but they make certain recommendations. The membership in these agricultural improvement associations numbers about 11,000 or 12,000 farmers, and to these farmers a certain amount of grass seed is given free for experimental work. During 1935-36 the government gave out, of crested wheat grass, something like 86,000 pounds; brome grass, 25,000 pounds; western rye grass,
8,000	pounds; sweet clover, 35,000 pounds; alfalfa, 7,000 pounds; alsike clover, 500 pounds; timothy, 1,000 pounds; reed canary grass, 500 pounds; cereal grains, 386,000 pounds, making in all 550,000 pounds of grass seed that they have given out freely to these people to sow.
In addition, certain areas have been taken over entirely by the substations in order to try to bring them back under cultivation. This is done where land has started to drift, continues to drift and has been forsaken and is drifting over good land in the immediate neighbourhood. Last year I had an opportunity of going out and seeing several of these areas and watching the work done, and I feel sure that much of this land will be brought back again in the near future and sown to grass.
Another thing being done relates to trees. Some of our theorists claim that trees bring rain, other people say that rain brings trees. Where we have trees we have rain, they say; others say that where you have rain you have trees. In the United States they are experimenting with tree planting. They are planting trees in rows six rods wide every mile for one hundred miles; that will be, as it were, one hundred patches six rods wide and a mile apart, extending from the Canadian boundary to the gulf of Mexico. I do not know if that will determine the question whether or not trees bring moisture; it is hard to say what will be the result over an area of that size; but if these trees grow, in the next forty or fifty years some of the people living then will be able to come to some conclusion on that point. I have often thought that if we on the plains had moisture we would have

Drought Area-Mr. Donnelly
trees; that it is the moisture which brings the trees and not the trees which bring the moisture.


Charles Avery Dunning: Where we have more
moisture in the west we have more trees.


Thomas F. Donnelly: That is so. But there is just this I want to say with regard to that matter. Under our tree planting policy in the past, especially on the bald prairies, the short grass country, we have tried to concentrate on putting trees around a man's house. That may be a laudable idea but it has many faults. The place where the trees should be planted is the lowest land belonging to a farm. Invariably a man builds his house on the highest piece of land he has. Then, when he plants trees around his house he plants them on the highest piece of land he has. I believe that is the worst place to grow trees. In the late winter or early spring, as soon as the warm weather begins, you have a chinook; the snow melts; the roots of the trees are more or less exposed, and the sap goes up the trees. Probably the next day a frost comes along and the trees are split open and killed. On the other hand if the trees were planted at the lowest point on a man's farm they would gather snow around them; it would not melt off so quickly; the trees would not be subject to chinooks and to having the sap rise too soon, and then they would not be frost killed, as they have been in the past.
I also believe that we have been getting the wrong kind of trees. We do not want trees with roots which spread out on the ground; we want trees which have tap roots, so that the sap will not rise so soon, and they will not be winter killed as they have been in the past. I am not referring to the park section. I know there you can plant poplars, Manitoba maples and so on, and do well with them. I am referring to the dried out area, the bald prairie. In that section of the country we want trees with tap roots, and we want to concentrate on planting those trees at the lowest points of the farms, in order that enough snow may be collected to furnish sufficient moisture to produce a garden, thus enabling a man to raise his own vegetables more than has been the case in the past.
I want to refer more particularly to water conservation and matters of that kind, rather than to trees. The water we have to conserve, or the water we have in the province of Saskatchewan, is from three principal sources. First, we have the ground water, which comes to us by means of springs or wells. On the farm we may have a spring, an artesian well. We have some shallow wells
and we also have some deep wells which go down 125, 200 or 250 feet. In some districts there is some irrigation by means of ground water, but not a very great deal. The next source is our rivers, or water that comes from the mountains, and in the latter case the water is almost continuous. We have our rivers, the South Saskatchewan, the North Saskatchewan and so on. Last of all, we have what we call our surface water, the run-off from the snow or rain, and in many districts that is the only moisture we have. That is practically the case in the district I represent.
With regard to my constituency I may say that practically speaking nine-tenths of the run-off goes into natural reservoirs, while the remaining one-tenth goes across the line into the United States. For example, we have Johnstone lake, Twelve Mile lake, Lake of the Rivers, Fife lake, Willow Bunch lake and others. These lakes have no outlets, or at least their outlets have not been in operation for the last twenty-five years. For all that, however, at the present time these lakes are absolutely dry. Where is our water for irrigation to come from? If you are going to have irrigation the first thing you must have is water. Where are you going to get that water? I have gone about from place to place in my constituency and told the people, "If you can show me any place where we can put in a dam I shall have an engineer come and look it over." Last year and the year before I travelled for about a month and a half, inspecting these various dams and reservoirs in Saskatchewan, and I know whereof I speak. We have had engineers in there to inspect these different locations, but our water is so slow in flowing and our channels are so deep that it is impossible to get the water out of them in order to do any irrigating. If you are going to do any at all, it is a pumping proposition. You must have pumps in order to get the water up so that you may use it.
As far as the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar is concerned, I welcome an investigation into this matter if it will do anything to help us irrigate our farms and be assured of crops, but in connection with many places in that area I do not know how it is going to help in any shape or form. We have, however, small dugouts, small dams and small irrigation projects. These are small works, but so far as I am concerned in western Canada these are really the big things. These small things are what we should concentrate on, because in my opinion if Saskatchewan is depending for its future upon the land it is going to irrigate, then that province is just about through. We are expecting moisture
Drought Area-Mr. Donnelly

and better farming conditions to return. Small dams, small reservoirs and dugouts will be of some advantage to the people living on the farms when the moisture returns and when, as in the past, we have a reasonable amount of rain. But if we get rain, as we hope to in the future, and as we have had it in the past, our irrigation projects will not be of much use to us, although at the present time we may think they would be.
It has always been found, in every country, that when there are trying conditions the people yell for irrigation. All of them want irrigation. But the moment the dry time passes and moisture returns they forget about the irrigation project; the country must look after that project and keep it in shape. I am satisfied that the government should go slowly in the matter. Do not rush into it and spend a lot of money. Do not say, "We will spend millions; we will have it all fixed up. Our people will then be all right." We know it will not be so. I do not believe that would be the result.
One hon. member referred to a project in the United States. In the states bordering on western Canada I believe there are thirty-one of those projects, and they cost about $193,000,000.


Charles Avery Dunning: Is that in Montana?


Thomas F. Donnelly: Yes, and Idaho and Washington. Some of those projects are in preferred districts. There are irrigation projects in the state of Washington where they grow fruit, beets and things of that kind. Those are crops which yield high prices. It is not a question of growing grain. On irrigated land one might have six crops of alfalfa, one of beets, one of wheat, one of oats and one of barley. I believe the rotation is something like that. Those irrigation projects in the United States serve about 2,000,000 acres.


Charles Avery Dunning: The whole bunch of them?


Thomas F. Donnelly: Yes, all of them.


Grote Stirling: All the way to California?


Thomas F. Donnelly: No, just in the states bordering on western Canada.


Grote Stirling: Only in Montana?


Thomas F. Donnelly: No; there are some in Montana, some in Idaho, some in Washington and some in Oregon. May I repeat that they irrigate about 2,000,000 acres, but on those projects an amount of $157,000,000 is still owing. The people in those states were supposed to pay back the amount in ten

years. They have cut off a certain amount from year to year; they have now reached the point where they find that the people are not able to pay, and there is a grave doubt whether they will ever pay. It has been found that the settlers could not establish themselves and also meet the payment charges.
The projects in the United States involved a long and difficult task. People over there say that not only is it a long and difficult task, but they add that it is a very hard matter to take a man from dry farming, place him on irrigated land and teach him how to irrigate it. It is said that the man who is brought from the dry farm to the irrigated farm is more liable to pray for rain than to pay for irrigation. That has been the experience across the boundary line in connection with some of their projects.
Reference has been made to the Fort Peck dam. That was a wonderful undertaking w'hich took place just across the line from my constituency. That undertaking cost about $250,000,000.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: No; $105,000,-
000.


Thomas F. Donnelly: Well, I was told it was about $250,000,000.


Charles Avery Dunning: It is not finished yet.


Thomas F. Donnelly: As a matter of fact, it is not an irrigation project at all. They irrigate a little, but not very much. The idea behind the project is to control the flood waters running into the Mississippi. It is to hold back the waters of the Missouri river.


Charles Avery Dunning: Will it irrigate 500,000 acres?


Thomas F. Donnelly: No, it will not; the land is not there to irrigate.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: The hon. member did not refer to it as an irrigation project.


Mr. McLEAN (Melfort):: Yes, he did.


Thomas F. Donnelly: The engineers from the Fort Peck dam who come into our district all agree that in Canada we are going along the right line. They advise against large developments or extensive irrigation projects. We have moved slowly in these matters, and in future it may be necessary for us to continue that procedure. They advise us to go slowly in matters of this kind.
I would hope that in the future we shall have rain and shall not have to irrigate. With respect to the small dugouts, dams and small irrigation projects, may I say that at present we have an officer known as the agricultural supervisor. A man may send in his application to build a dam or dugout, and the supervisor will drive around to see

Drought Area-Mr. Donnelly
the location of the farm. If a dugout has been suggested the supervisor will advise the farmer that the dugout should be about 150 feet long, about sixty feet wide and at least ten feet deep. The officer marks out the planned work, and in turn the farmer goes ahead and does the digging. When he has dug it out, and the drainage from half a section, a section or two sections runs into it, it will probably be filled with water, and he will have a supply sufficient for his stock and his household requirements. He finds this a great help in watering his stock, and in the general care of his farm. If the water is about ten feet deep it will last throughout the year, and he is assured of a good water supply.
I have seen some of these dugouts which have been built by communities. These have been about 250 feet long, about 150 feet wide and about fifteen to twenty feet deep, and are projects well worth while. The government began by paying these people about three cents, and raised the rate to four and a half cents a yard. Last year the rate was raised to eight cents a yard. The farmer, with the use of his horses, cannot work for less than twelve cents a yard, so it would appear that he does not get paid for all his work. If the work is done with a drag-line or done by machinery, the farmer may be able to do the work for eight cents a yard. He may be able to get by at that rate. Then, as soon as the farmer has the dugout he must put a fence around it and must plant trees, in order to draw moisture and to hold the snow, so that the dam, dugout or reservoir may be filled.
Then, there are dams. In connection with these the agricultural expert comes along, looks the ground over and gives his decision. In addition, in Saskatchewan there is an engineer checking on the water rights. A survey is made, and the farmer is advised to go ahead. In turn the farmer proceeds to put in the dam, and ripraps it with stone. He gets a certain price for his stone, and a certain price for constructing the dam. The dam is beneficial in the same way. In many cases, with a small dam the farmer is able to irrigate half an acre, an acre or two or three acres and to raise some alfalfa and garden products. These dams are of great benefit to the people in the dried out areas. There are thousands of these dams; more and more people are building them. The people in western Canada are getting dam conscious.


Charles Avery Dunning: D-a-m?


Thomas F. Donnelly: We believe these dams would be a great help in carrying them through dry seasons. There are also stock watering
dams to be used by communities. For stock watering dams in large communities grants as high as $250 are allowed, and eight cents a yard paid. Two, three or four neighbours can go in together to build these and they may also obtain the assistance of the municipality.
In western Canada there are something like twenty larger projects being considered, all of which have to a certain extent to do with irrigation. For example, the ones at Val Marie, Coderre and Eastend are mainly for irrigation purposes. The main object of most of these irrigation projects is to provide forty or fifty acres to each farmer for grass or alfalfa. The pastures for stock will be up on the high lands and it is expected that in the dry years they will be able to raise enough feed and fodder for their stock.
I should like to give some of the reasons why certain of the larger projects have not been continued. I have before me a collection of the opinions of certain experts with regard to these matters. One man has suggested the possibility of irrigating from the Saskatchewan river. That may be possible, but I should like to quote what Mr. Charlesworth, one of the engineers, has to say. I quote:
The time may come when the construction of more of these larger projects may be desirable but for the present, however, with experience to date, it would seem doubtful whether the expenditure of a large amount of public funds would be wise and certainly not before some assurance was forthcoming that markets for irrigated products are available.


Grote Stirling: What is the date of that?


Thomas F. Donnelly: This is the summary of the reports, and it is dated January 25, 1938. This is what Mr. Fairfield, superintendent of the experimental farm at Lethbridge, has to say:
Western Canada can well spend more time in digesting the raw irrigated lands still available that are in or adjacent to the existing irrigation projects before it embarks on any very large new projects.
I understand that in Alberta there is somewhere in the neighbourhood of a million acres of raw irrigated land, and that only half of that has been taken up. In other words, there is something like 500,000 acres of land still to be taken up.


Charles Avery Dunning: There is more than that vacant in the irrigation districts.


Thomas F. Donnelly: That is what Mr. Fairfield says. I could quote also from the opinion of Mr. Griffin of the Canadian Pacific railway, but my time is about up. I think the government would be well advised for the time being to pursue the policy it has been pursuing of conserving all run-off moisture
Drought Area-Mr. Massey

and of carrying out small irrigation projects where necessary. If we have a long period without any rain at all, it will then be time enough to go into the larger irrigation projects.


Denton Massey: Mr. Speaker, the burden of the resolution before the house for consideration at the moment touches particularly a part of this dominion and some hon. members may feel that a matter of this kind is peculiarly sectional and therefore to be discussed only by those who come from that part of the country affected. So far those who have spoken have come from western Canada, that part of the dominion which has been primarily affected by the conditions which inspire the resolution introduced by the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell). On the other hand, I feel it is important in connection with a matter which touches a section of the country as vitally as does this touch western Canada, that every hon. member should place on record his full recognition of responsibility. There is no section of Canada which is not a part of Canada. We are here as Canadians and, perforce, if we discharge our duties as we should, we should take a keen interest in those matters which may directly affect only a part of the country but which indirectly affect all parts.
As one who lives in Ontario I rise to speak on this resolution, not in specific terms or with any idea of discussing irrigation but in an attempt to convey to the house the fact that, after all, there are those of us who live in the eastern part of Canada who are vitally concerned with western Canada. For western Canada is as much a part of us as is our own province. One has heard it said repeatedly by those who come from the west that the east understands little about the west. Those of us who live in the east have heard it said altogether too often that we do not understand very much about the west and perhaps do not take enough interest in that part of our country. When such a great section of this dominion faces the problem which Saskatchewan faces at this time, it is incumbent upon us to give to that problem our best as Canadians. Our fellow Canadians are being impinged by circumstances at the moment beyond their control.
In the eighteenth century there lived a great American philosopher who was also a statesman and an erudite gentleman. I refer to Benjamin Franklin, of whom the fourteenth edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica has this to say:
Other men may have been greater, but very few have been more human.

He left for us many philosophical gems in which to delight, but perhaps no statement of his is more sententious than this aphorism:
We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all bang separately.
There has been no sentence uttered in recent years that sounds a graver warning to us in Canada than do those words given to the world by Benjamin Franklin 160 years ago.
I am a firm believer in the rights of groups, whether they be minorities or majorities. I have the deepest and utmost respect for all considered opinions of men, and I firmly believe, as did the fathers of confederation, that local institutions and local laws of all the various provinces should be guaranteed. I am not parochial in outlook or narrow in viewpoint, and whereas I reside in one province I respect the rights of all provinces, just as I respect as a Canadian the rights of all the other dominions and the colonies of the British Commonwealth of Nations. I am not intolerant, and I dislike intensely bigotry and prejudice. I have at the same time a high regard for broad-mindedness and openmindedness. In other words, I am a firm believer in the spirit that motivated and made possible the Dominion of Canada. I am, you see, Mr. Speaker, a thorough Canadian in spirit as well as in name.
What has it meant and what does it mean to "hang together" in Canada? On Monday, February 6, 1865, the then attorney general, Sir John A. Macdonald, moved in the House of Commons a resolution which reads as follows:
That an humble address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that she may be graciously pleased to cause a measure to be submitted to the imperial parliament, for the purpose of uniting the colonies of Canada, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Prince Edward Island, in one government, with provisions based on certain resolutions which were adopted at a conference of delegates from the said colonies, held at the city of Quebec, on October 10, 1864.
As an ultimate result of this resolution the Dominion of Canada was born on July 1, 1867. Subsequently, what are now the provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia, became part of the dominion, so that to-day there is in the northern part of the north American continent a great British dominion stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific, from the 49th parallel of latitude to the wastes of the arctic.
We are indeed a vast country geographically, though a small country numerically. Our population is concentrated in what is essentially a long, narrow strip of territory,

Drought Area-Mr. Massey
extending from coast to coast, along an international border across which lies one of the great nations of the world. We are British, and throughout Canada proclaim our allegiance, along with hundreds of millions of others throughout the world, to the one who is the quick and living centre of the spirit of empire, the personification of the nobility and tradition that belong to those who call themselves British, and we unitedly honour the crown.
We are a complex nation, not homogeneous in any sense of the word. Native within our borders are those of two great races, and we speak two languages.
We have also absorbed into our midst those who have come to our shores from all over Europe and from other continents as well, new Canadians, who in the main have adopted well and sincerely the customs, manners and modes of Canada. We are engaged in a wide diversity of activities. We are farmers, fishermen, miners, lumbermen, mechanics, and we practise all the trades. We have customs which vary widely across our dominion, stretching as it does across a whole continent, 3,500 miles in width.
The habitant of Quebec and the farmer of Ontario are as different in character and characteristics as the Devonshire yeoman and the Highland Scot. The ranchman in the west and the dairyman in the east have personalities as unlike as their occupations. Even the fisherman of British Columbia is a different sort of fellow from the fisherman of the maritimes, while the professional men of the eastern cities are in many ways unlike the professional men in the western cities. But in spite of all our differences in race, in customs, in religion, in habits and in personal and individual characteristics, in spite of the sectional divisions into which this country may so readily be divided, we are a Dominion of Canada, bom in 1867, and we have grown rapidly through the last seventy years to our present position of importance as a nation of the world.
Our growth has been as romantic as it has been steady, a growth possible only as a result of the fact that through those seventy years we have all "hung together."
As we look back through the years to 1867 we come to the instrument which was designed to give to us to-day the dominion in which we live-the British North America Act. Here was an act designed and brought into being by men of all shades of political opinion, an act in the designing and passing of which such notorious political enemies as George Brown and Sir John A. Macdonald joined forces, and hand in hand hurdled what seemed at first to be almost insuperable difficulties on the way to their common goal.
In their efforts they were supported fully, whole-heartedly and sincerely by many eminent Canadians, prominent among whom was Sir George Etienne Cartier. Have we justified the faith reposed in us by the fathers of confederation? As Canadians we may well be proud in many ways of the accomplishments of this nation. Under the handicap of g1 eat space, under the difficulties of extremes of climate, under the hazards and hardships that beset the path of the pioneer, under the menace of possible incipient and unconscious domination by a mighty nation to the south of us, we have progressed to our present degree of national importance and to the point where we are held in international respect. To-day we are eleven millions of people, actively engaged in agriculture, industry and commerce. At first, in our earlier days, we were an agrarian country, bending our full efforts toward the development of our agriculture and agricultural products. In this century we have added the pursuits of industry and commerce, until to-day we are fifth among the trading nations of the world. Not only are our agricultural and manufactured products widely accepted everywhere, but we are now one of the most important factors in both precious and base metals in the world's metal market.
I have taken the time of the house this afternoon, Mr. Speaker-and the house has listened most patiently-to discuss what I have discussed because it seems to me, as I said at the beginning of my remarks,' it is incumbent upon all hon. members, so important is the resolution introduced by the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar, to bend our full and united efforts towards finding a solution for this problem. We are challenged by what has been presented in this chamber to-day to realize anew that we are not east and west or nine separate and independent provinces, to forget our sectional differences, to attempt to overcome misunderstandings' and to make a combined and united effort towards the development of a Dominion of Canada that shall be a dominion in fact as well as in name.
At six o clock the house took recess
After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock.


Mr. C. R. EVANS (Maple Creek):: When the house rose at six o'clock we were debating the resolution of the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell) with reference to rehabilitation of the drought area. I wish to continue for a short time the discussion of that resolution.

Drought Area-Mr. Evans
Coming from the southwest corner of Saskatchewan, from a constituency which has suffered severely from drought at different periods over the past thirty years, I believe that we who live in that southwest part and in the drought area have first hand knowledge of the difficulties and problems experienced by our settlers who settled in that district during the early part of the present century. I wish to speak particularly of the southwest portion of the province and to discuss the way in which the farm rehabilitation act applies to us in that district.
Our part of the province is in the plains area about which we have heard so much and we are peculiarly situated there owing to the fact that we are in a semi-arid district. We find that in our district and in the southeast corner of Alberta the situation is particularly adapted to the development of irrigation projects. Our part of the province was settled from about 1907 to about 1914 and in 1910 we had a severe drought in that area. Again in 1914 there was a very severe drought and a total crop failure.
The dominion government of that day, recognizing the severity of the drought of 1914, came to the assistance of the settlers in that area, particularly in southwestern Saskatchewan and southeastern Alberta, and furnished them with food, fuel, seed grain, and feed and fodder for their live stock. I bring this to the attention of the house for the reason that our district was then in the early stages of settlement, and the governments of that period should have realized that it was unsuited for the growing of cereals and the development of agriculture along that line. Prior to 1910 there had settled in that district many people who came in during the 90's-people who had developed the live stock industry-and when the government of Canada decided upon settlement in that area we destroyed the best ranching country in the world, with the result that we have developed a country which is not adapted to either farming or ranching.
We believe that the responsibility for conditions which now prevail in southwestern Saskatchewan rests at the door of this parliament. As late as 1918 we had petitions signed by settlers throughout the southwest asking the Department of the Interior at Ottawa to cancel leases and open up lease land for settlement. To-day the people who settled on these lands are not able to carry on because they settled on sub-marginal lands that were not fit for cultvation. This brings us to the present climax. We have come

through seven years of drought in southwestern Saskatchewan. We are trying to overcome in two or three years what has developed during the past thirty years, which is an impossibility. Many of our people are impatient because of the slow movement of the government in the endeavour to overcome conditions that have developed over thirty years.
As I have said, the southwest part of Saskatchewan and the southeast part of Alberta are adapted to irrigation, for these reasons. Down through the centre of the plains area there is a row of hills known as the Cypress hills, which are partly wooded. These hills are dotted here and there with small lakes and numerous springs which are sources of many streams. The streams running on the north and south slopes of the Cypress hills can easily be developed to irrigate land in small or large quantities as the case may be, but we have an opportunity to irrigate land only in the river valleys. There have been developed over past years in southwestern Saskatchewan many small irrigation projects, some of them dating back to 1892. These projects were developed at that early date on Maple creek, Bear creek and Battle creek, and are still in operation. Many tons of fodder have been cut off the lands irrigated by these private projects.
Since 1935, when the rehabilitation program came into force, there has been developed in southwestern Saskatchewan an irrigation scheme. To-day the hon. member for Wood Mountain (Mr. Donnelly) referred to some of these projects. We find that the irrigation projects are being developed in Saskatchewan as rapidly as possible, and while the rehabilitation program is in its third year it is still to some extent in the formative stage and new measures are being undertaken as conditions warrant. The water development program is progressing more rapidly and we are establishing reservoirs of surplus water for stock watering and irrigation purposes. In many districts we are developing large irrigation projects. Take, for instance, the development of the Frenchman river. This river takes almost the entire run-off on the south slope of the Cypress hills. There have been developed so far- in the Frenchman river valley an irrigation project at Yal Marie and one at Eastend. Last year the Yal Marie project had under cultivation about 1,200 acres, and from some of this land there was produced thirty bushels of No. 1 wheat to the acre. On the rest of it we grew fodder and some garden truck. The Eastend project had some crop on it -last year, but it is not quite

Drought Area-Mr. Evans
as well developed as Val Marie. This year we have ready for cultivation on the Val Marie project some 4,000 acres.
The Val Marie and Eastend projects have to be supported by a fresh reservoir that is being developed at Cypress lake, which is the head of Frenchman river. This project is now under development, and when fully developed it will irrigate between 30,000 and
40,000	acres along the Frenchman river valley. We know from experience, from the crops grown and the development at Val Marie; that the soil and climatic conditions are suitable for irrigation farming, and all we need is the full development of the water supply. Further development at Eastend will enable us to irrigate between 6,000 and 7,000 acres. When the Cypress lake reservoir is fully developed it will also furnish additional water to continue irrigation in the Battle creek area of another 6,000 to 8,000 acres of land. In addition to the development of this south run-off of the Cypress hills we have under development the Downey lake project. This is on the north slope of the Cypress hills, and is located about twelve miles southwest of Maple creek. This project when completed, and supplemented by other smaller creeks and dams, will make it possible to irrigate another 6,000 to 8,000 acres along the Maple creek valley and its tributaries. Many other creeks on the north run-off of the Cypress hills are being surveyed and we expect will be developed during the coming summer.
One other outstanding development for which engineers have completed their surveys and supplemented their report is located about forty miles southeast of Swift Current, near the town of Vanguard, and is known as the Vanguard project. This when fully developed has the possibility of irrigating between 15,000 and 16,000 acres of some of the best land in Saskatchewan. We expect that this project may be developed this coming season. The development of this project will solve the feed problem of a large portion of southern and central Saskatchewan. Irrigation goes hand in hand with live stock, so we have in southwestern Saskatchewan the development of irrigation projects to supply winter feed for our live stock.
In addition to these major projects many small schemes have been developed by individual farmers, where it has been made possible to store run-off water which will be used to irrigate from five to twenty acres and in some instances up to eighty or one hundred acres on a farm. This is the best form of assistance, reestablishing and rehabilitating the farmer on his own land.
We have also in southwestern Saskatchewan the problem of sub-marginal lands. This was dealt with to some extent this afternoon by the hon. member for Wood Mountain, but I should like to say a few words concerning it. In the early years of this century during the rush for land in the great west, large areas of sub-marginal land were settled on. These lands to-day are not fit for growing cereals. The areas range in size from a few sections to blocks of thousands of acres. Owing to the type of soil and the lack of precipitation the people who settled on these lands have failed. Many of them failed even before the general drought that we are now experiencing.
The problem of what to do with this land confronts us. It has been decided to withdraw this land from cultivation and turn it into community pastures, assisting the settlers on these lands to reestablish themselves on better land as close to the pasture area as possible, where the development of a pasture will enable them to rehabilitate themselves. The development of community pastures in these areas will return the land to live stock production as a range area. This land is fenced and cross-fenced with suitable stock fences, the crossfences dividing the pasture into breeding reserves and main pastures. As these areas have for the most part been cultivated we find the land in various stages of grass; part of it has the natural prairie grass; the rest may be bare ground or drifting sand. It is therefore necessary to get the grass cover started as soon as possible. The pastures are operated under definite rules, particular attention being paid to prevent overgrazing. These grazing areas will be used for producing the best grades of beef cattle, using the best sires. By this method we hope to produce a uniform animal suitable for the eastern and overseas market. Sixteen of these pastures, varying in size from 6,000 to 25,000 acres, were completed in 1937.
This afternoon the hon. member for Swift Current (Mr. Bothwell) outlined the policy of the agricultural improvement associations. I should like to say a few words concerning them as we have a number of these associations established in the constituency which I have the honour to represent, and they are accomplishing a great deal of good work. Their object is to encourage farmers in a community to cooperate in the solution of their own problems arising from drought and soil drifting, by the general adoption of such policies as strip farming, cover crops and cultural methods best suited to local conditions. These associations are supervised from the

Drought Area-Mr. Evans

experimental farm in the district. Free distribution of suitable drought resisting grass seed is made to members of the associations. In the past sweet clover, alfalfa, brome grass and crested wheat grass have been distributed to members. The seed so distributed is tp be used for seed production purposes, allowing each member to increase his own seed and also gain experience in producing seeded forage crops. Crested wheat grass has been most in demand through the drought areas, and has given promising results. Such organizations as these are necessary to assist the experimental farms in keeping contact with the farmers and to aid in the distribution of seed.
In conclusion I would say that we are advancing in the rehabilitation of the drought areas slowly but surely, keeping in view permanency in policy and getting full value for the money expended. We find that the development of the smaller irrigation projects is most satisfactory. I visited some of those projects that we heard about this afternoon down in Montana. I found that the project developed at Malta was a series of small irrigation projects taking the water out of one stream. I believe that the policy we are following in Saskatchewan in developing the small individual irrigation project is the thing which will reestablish and rehabilitate the drought area in that province.


John Ritchie MacNicol: First I wish to place myself behind whatever sound means the government decides upon to rehabilitate the province of Saskatchewan. I have heard the cost mentioned here this afternoon, and while cost is always of importance, still I say whatever means the government decide are necessary to rehabilitate Saskatchewan should, irrespective of the cost, be supported unanimously by this country. The country cannot exist without Saskatchewan.
Now I am going to touch on another phase of this subject that has not been dealt with by any of the previous speakers. In a way I hesitate to do so, because, search as I might, on the one hand I have not found engineers to agree as to the real cause of the trouble, and on the other I have not found engineers to agree on the real source or origin of the moisture required for Saskatchewan. Some say one thing; some say another; but before entering upon that phase of what I have to say I should like to pass a word or two of comment on the remarks of one or two previous speakers. First, I refer to some remarks made by the hon. member for Wood Mountain (Mr. Donnelly). I thought he gave an exhaustive and clear explanation of what he

had in mind, and in the course of his remarks he asked a question in reference to something that had been said earlier by, I believe, the hon. member for Acadia (Mr. Quelch), in reference to the diversion of water from the North and South Saskatchewan rivers. At that time I believe I asked what was the cubic feet flow per second of water on either or both of these rivers, and the hon. member for Wood Mountain asked where the water was going to come from.
. That is a problem, Mr. Speaker. If the two Saskatchewan rivers are diverted, it will mean, of course, that the water from them will be lost as far as the rivers are concerned. The water might do splendid work in irrigation projects, but it would not return to the river. I thought it might be worth while just to say something about the flow per second of these two rivers. They vary very widely in their maximum and minimum. The mean average flow of the united Saskatchewan at The Pas, throughout the year 1934-35, October to September, was 22,700 cubic feet per second. The maximum flow was 55,700 cubic feet per second; but the minimum flow, with the water at its lowest point, was down to 3,960 cubic feet per second. The North Saskatchewan at Edmonton ranges from a maximum of 46,300 cubic feet per second to an average of 8,290 cubic feet per second and as low as 460 cubic feet per second as a minimum. So the question asked by the hon. member for Wood Mountain was a pertinent one, in my judgment, inasmuch as the diversions that were mentioned as being required for the irrigation of Saskatchewan were as follows:	The hon.
member for Acadia said that from the North Saskatchewan there should be a diversion of 6.800 cubic second feet; from the Clearwater river, 1,180 cubic feet per second; and from the Red Deer river, which I believe is a tributary of the South Saskatchewan, 2,275 cubic feet per second.
As I said a moment ago, the question asked by the hon. member for Wood Mountain was quite pertinent, for the total diversion flow that would be required, according to the bulletin entitled Reclamation Service, which was quoted by the hon. member for Acadia, would be over 10,000 cubic feet per second. So if there were a sustained diversion from the North and South Saskatchewan of anything like that number of cubic second feet, it would necessitate some measures to store up the water at the headwaters of those two rivers, as has been done in the state of Arizona irrigation projects. Large reservoirs would have to be built so that the flow could be maintained in all the seasons for which the water would be required.

Drought Area-Mr. MacNicol
Another hon. gentleman said something to the effect that it was not lack of moisture in Saskatchewan which was causing the trouble. If it is not a lack of moisture, then it must be a lack of rain. From time to time we have seen in the press the hopes of the people of Saskatchewan, and I might say of the whole world, for the prosperity of the world depends to a large extent upon the production of wheat. The Saskatchewan newspapers, during the wheat growing season, keep reporting, " If we only have rain, such and such will take place." I made a rather extended survey into what I would call the origin of the rainfall for Saskatchewan, but I have been unable to come to any definite conclusions as to the original source of the moisture which formed the clouds above that province. I remember reading the opinion of a former prominent official of this government, I believe in the meteorological service, a celebrated man and engineer. His impression, in which I found concurrence in Washington, was that the moisture which makes rainfall over Saskatchewan originates in the gulf of Mexico. Lately engineers have said that is not so. Others have said that the origin of that moisture is the Pacific ocean; that currents of air come over the Rocky mountains and meet other currents of air over Saskatchewan, and that thereby rain is formed. The engineer, to whom I referred a moment ago, held the opinion-which was shared by many others-that the warm currents of air coming from the gulf of Mexico up the Mississippi and Missouri valleys met colder currents of air over Saskatchewan, coming from the Arctic ocean and Hudson bay, and formed the rain which falls there. I have heard others say that the origin is Hudson bay.
The point I make, Mr. Speaker, is that apparently there is no definite engineering opinion as to the origin of the rainfall which Saskatchewan should and did have. For a long time I have been pursuing studies in connection with rainfall, precipitation and the water production of the St. Lawrence watershed. During the course of my investigations I have asked engineers if part of the rainfall that should and did fall in the province of Saskatchewan by any chance might originate in the great lakes watershed. There again I found there was no one who had a definite opinion. I venture an opinion-which may be entirely wrong, because every other man who has made a study of this seemingly has a different origin for the rainfall of Saskatchewan-that part of it might still be from the great lakes watershed just as well as from the gulf of Mexico, the Arctic ocean, Hudson
5X952-42J
bay or the Pacific ocean. It might be that all these might be sources of that rainfall. If the government wishes to make an investigation as to where the origin of moisture is for the supply of Saskatchewan, I assume it will have to send up some balloons capable of ascertaining the currents in the air in the upper stratosphere, and determine what can be done.
Whether or not the St. Lawrence watershed has supplied moisture to Saskatchewan is something which no one may tell. I know that on the earth's surface the current of air is eastward, but where is it when it is five thousand feet hivh in the air? No one can tell where the moisture originates; but if any part of it was from the watershed of the great lakes I am wondering whether the fact that over ten billion tons of water a year are taken out of the St. Lawrence watershed and poured into the Mississippi watershed could have anything whatever to do with the alteration in the amount of moisture, or could have any effect on the moisture which is said formerly to have come from the gulf of Mexico and part of which may have come from the watershed of the great lakes.
That suggestion may sound a little farfetched, and perhaps it is a long way from the subject of irrigation. However we do know that irrigation is one way of providing moisture, and that rainfall is the real and proper source of moisture. Apparently for a number of years past Saskatchewan has not had its proper share of rainfall, and I should think any body of engineers appointed by the government should endeavour to find out what has happened to the origin of the rainfall which formerly fell in Saskatchewan.
We know that in the St. Lawrence watershed there has been a gradual reduction in rainfall. Later on that fact may have a serious effect, so far as agriculture in Ontario and adjacent states is concerned. I find that at page 43 of John R. Freeman's book, which deals with the regulation of the great lakes, he states that the Canadian meteorological office has said that over a period of fifty years the reduction in rainfall in Ontario has been 2-3 inches, and that the equivalent weighted average reduction for the whole watershed is three inches. That is a colossal reduction. We know that to-day Saskatchewan is suffering from a lack of water, but it may be that in the course of time, unless some measures are taken to return the waters to their proper levels in their watersheds, the eastern provinces may be in a similar difficulty.
A committee sitting in Washington is now considering a measure to alter the judgment
Drought Area-Mr. MacNicol

of the United States Supreme Court handed down in 1930, in which the court directed that the diversion at Chicago should not exceed 1,500 second feet. The bill before the house asked that commencing in 1939 the provision for 1,500 second feet be changed to 5,000. In the proceedings before the committee one of the congressmen, Francis D. Culkin, quoted from a speech he made on January 18, 1934, in which he said:
It is no secret that most of this water has been used by Chicago in generating electricity for commercial purposes. God intended this water to flow east through the great lakes.
Its diversion was a larceny, pure and simple, and was destructive of every shore-front locality along the basin of the great lakes.
Worse than that, it has been one of the causes-there are several major causes-of the reduction equivalent to three inches in rainfall over the entire St. Lawrence watershed area. Whether or not that had any effect on the lack of rainfall in Saskatchewan, I cannot say.
Certainly it is true that water finds its own level, and I suppose clouds, in their flight through the air, are partly affected by the water on the surface. I would say that this whole interference with nature which has been going on for so many years has had a much greater effect throughout Canada and the United States with respect to the amount of rainfall and drought than any person knows. The time has come to make a serious investigation.
Whatever investigation the government may determine to make-and I believe it should make one, in addition to what it is now doing- it should deal with the problem of diversion from the great lakes. I believe the hon. member for Swift Current (Mr. Bothwell) and the hon. member for Wood Mountain (Mr. Donnelly) reported that the work which has been done in the west has been beneficial. If the storage of water is beneficial in the west, it would be equally beneficial to make an endeavour to return the great lakes of the east to their former natural water levels.
In Washington a few days ago, in connection with this very matter, namely the gradual lowering of the water level of the great lakes, there was a suggestion to build control works across the Niagara river, in order to raise the level of lake Erie, and control works at the outlet of lake Huron, on the St. Clair river, in order to raise the water levels of lakes Huron and Michigan, which are really one lake. This latter is a lake area of 45.000 square miles which is to-day three feet plus, lower than the average level of those
[Mr MacNicol.]
lakes for the forty year period between 1860 and 1900. That is a very serious loss of water to the central portion of this continent.
By such works it is possible that the water levels could be returned to their former point, but it would take a long time to do this. If it were returned, evaporation would be greater and, if evaporation on the great lakes has anything whatever to do with rainfall beyond the great lakes watershed, or if it has anything to do with the rainfall east or west of that watershed, no doubt the increased level would be beneficial to the areas adjacent thereto.
May I point out that in this part of the country we are threatened with further diversions of water from northern Ontario, a matter which may or may not affect the rainfall. I take the same stand as that taken by the congressman a few days ago, when he quoted his own speech of 1934, in which he said that God intended the water to flow in one direction. In my judgment man has not any business to divert a large volume of water from one watershed to another.
In the west the diversion of the waters of the two Saskatchewan rivers would not be a diversion from one watershed to another. If there is any possible way of diverting the water of either the North Saskatchewan or the South Saskatchewan rivers for irrigation to benefit the people of Saskatchewan, I for one would support it. However, in view of what I have heard to the effect that the water level is away below the ground level, it would appear that dams, windmills or something of the kind would be necessary to elevate the water. That is not the old system of irrigation which has been handed down from the earliest days.
Egypt diverts water from the Nile north of the first cataract Between that point and the sea is a distance of some five to six hundred miles, and for all that distance the adjacent land is almost level. The river flows quite gently and all they have to do is to tap the water and let it run all over the land. It would be quite a task to pump water up as high as has been suggested by the hon. member for Wood Mountain. It would be much easier if the water could be allowed just to run down hill.
Some hon. member mentioned Holland. I investigated the irrigation projects in that country this summer.


Charles Avery Dunning: Irrigation projects in
Holland?


John Ritchie MacNicol: It may surprise the
minister to know that they have such projects.

Drought Area-Mr. Rowe (Athabaska)
I investigated 200 square miles of that country. The rivers running from southeast to Rotterdam flow above the land level, but they explained to me that where the subsidiary canals run alongside the main canals they have pumping outfits. Sometimes the water is pumped from the land and on other days it may be pumped back, depending upon the amount of evaporation. Whether or not this actually happens, I cannot say, but that is how it was explained to me. I can see that where you are able to have the water run down hill, your irrigation problems would be much easier to solve than if you have to pump it up.
I rose merely to say that is a too tremendous problem for Saskatchewan to tackle alone. That province has suffered tremendously during the last few years, far beyond wwhat any province should be called upon to suffer. I know in the judgment of the government, this is a national problem. The services of the best engineers, both in and out of Canada, should be obtained and then parliament should consider what is necessary in order that a sincere effort may be made to rehabilitate that great province. When I was home on Saturday I attended a meeting, the report of which will come out later. I shall not say just what meeting it was, but mention was made of the large number of people returning from Saskatchewan to Ontario. I know that some relations of mine who have been farming in Saskatchewan for twenty-five years and have helped to build up that country have had to return to Ontario after losing all they had. While it is no disgrace for anyone to lose all he has after going through six or seven years of depression, the fact is that these people are back here and will have to be taken care of. In that way this matter becomes an Ontario problem. I shall close with the suggestion that the government obtain the best advice possible, which I believe it will do, and then set out to do all that can be done to rehabilitate Saskatchewan. In that I am sure they will have the support of all parties in the house.


Mr. P. J. ROWE (Athabaska):: Mr. Speaker, the resolution now under discussion reads as follows:
That, in the opinion of this house, the government should place before parliament at an early date plans, or proposals, for a comprehensive and authoritative survey of water conservation, irrigation possibilities, and other feasible projects for the permanent rehabilitation of the drought stricken area of western Canada and its people.
First, I wish to congratulate the mover of the resolution upon having brought this matter
before parliament. I think the remarks made to-day and the diversified opinions expressed only tend to emphasize the necessity for a survey of this problem being made by technically competent experts so that the people of Canada will know once and for all the attainable possibilities of irrigation in western Canada. Western Canada is one of the world's greatest grain growing areas, but recurring drought periods have brought ruin to a multitude of farmers and those dependent upon them. If it is possible to restore this world's granary to its former potential productivity, and it is within the power of parliament to bring about this result, it automatically becomes the unescapable legal and moral duty of parliament to bring about that result.
To a layman-and I am speaking as such- all the factors favourable to the accomplishment of such a purpose appear to be present. There can be no doubt as to the fertility and crop producing qualities of the soil of western Canada. During the recent drought years I had occasion to revisit sections of the prairie country which had been known to me personally in the early days to be capable of producing large crops. I had seen heavy yields in the plain country around Regina and I was shocked when I went there a few years later to discover that those areas had reverted to veritable deserts.
To a layman it appears that nowhere on this planet has nature been so lavish in the provision of abundant water supplies as on the eastern slopes of the Rocky mountains. Springing from great glaciers and melting snows high up among the peaks and valleys of the Rockies there are innumerable streams and great rivers like the Oldman, the Bow, the Red Deer, the North Saskatchewan and the Athabaska. It so happens that rising temperatures and the early summer melting of mountain snows bring down to the plains vast volumes of water just when the growing crops are most in need of moisture. Writing in the Regina Daily Star of January 22, 1938, Mr. H. H. Cleugh, a gentleman who has made a study of this question, suggests that these rivers should be dammed at a sufficient level above the plains to permit of gravity flow. This is a phase of the matter which has not been touched upon extensively during this debate. In view of the fact that Mr. Cleugh appears to have made a study of this matter, I think it is advisable to place upon Hansard one or two of the statements he has made in the Regina Daily Star.
He states that this water could be carried by gravity to the plains surrounding Regina.
662	COMMONS
Drought Area-Mr. Rowe (Athabaska)
Then he suggests tapping the Bow river at Glenbow, which is 1,500 feet above the city of Regina. As that point is 500 miles away, this would mean a fall of three feet to the mile. He stated also that the Saskatchewan people lost over $120,000,000 in 1937 through seed and labour thrown away on crops which failed because of the drought. Mr. Cleugh believes that for less than that amount pipe lines could have been built and sufficient water brought down to turn southern Saskatchewan into a swamp in two years. I am going to quote from his article as he includes in it some of the figures referred to a moment ago by the hon. member for Davenport (Mr. MacNicol).
I have looked into this very carefully and find in June the amount passing Medicine Hat is
26.000	cubic second feet. Now here is power and also a lot of water for irrigation if a suitable dam site can be found and a pumping station established but I have little hope of pumps.
But that is not all and pumping is not in it compared to the natural law of gravity. The Bow river can be harnessed at Glenbow above Calgary and have 1,500 feet fall to Regina and
10.000	cubic second feet of water can be harnessed in a pipe line with an average fall of three feet to a mile, through the 500 miles of distance; 500 to 600 cubic second feet can be delivered through one pipe line and there is enough water to fill 20 pipes of a 12-foot diameter intake; enough water can be had to make Saskatchewan a swamp in two years if the water is held there.
A 12-foot intake with a fall like that would irrigate one inch deep over 60,000 acres a week and there is enough water running to waste at that point to irrigate about three acres one inch deep every second. Then there are the Maeleod, the north Saskatchewan and Red Deer rivers high enough above Saskatoon, Regina and Broadview to deliver another 12,000 cubic second feet by gravity alone at a terrific speed. In other words in four rivers you have enough water to irrigate one inch deep, six acres every second, or 21 million acres one inch deep in 40 days and in the Bow river alone enough water to irrigate 21 million acres in 90 days, and all that volume will run down without pumping to where it is needed.
Saskatchewan undoubtedly has the water necessary for irrigation and lots of it, but let us suppose for a few moments we irrigated not 21 million acres but 10 million acres every 15 days and instead of 10 bushels to the acre we got 40 bushels, would we not save time, labour and machinery?
Instead of growing wheat only we could grow corn, sorghum, millet, sugar beets, winter rye, sunflowers and alfalfa for siloes, turning out hogs instead of just wheat. Let us farm and no longer be a band of destructive pirates. Make burning straw piles a crime, and burning over prairie or stubble field, bluff and slough, a penalty of not less than five years of hard labour or a $5,000 fine. Burning the prairie especially in the fall has burned the humus which acted the same as a sponge in holding the precipitation. Not only that but the grass roots in the humus covered the ground from
fMr. P. J. Rowe.]
wind, and there were no dust storms until the land became pulverized and the straw and stubble burned and no humus left and no fibre to break the wind or hold the soil together.
All of that sounds to a mere layman very alluring indeed. I do not know whether it is correct or not; but I suggest there is a way to find out, without costing the government very much, and that is to have an authoritative survey made so that all these differences of opinion and arguments pro and con which we have been hearing can be finally cleared up. If Mr. Cleugh is right and we can irrigate southern Saskatchewan and southern Alberta from the South Saskatchewan and Bow rivers, immediately we think of possibilities in central and northern Alberta and Saskatchewan by using the waters of the Red Deer river and the North Saskatchewan river.
There are also the possibilities of generating electric power. That is one point which has not been touched upon. The hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell) in the terms of his resolution suggests " other feasible projects," and I submit the prospect of generating electric power might well be investigated very carefully. In that connection, Mr. Speaker, there is the suggestion that auxiliary power could be generated by steam. We have unlimited quantities of coal in Alberta, over eighty-seven per cent of the coal in Canada, and if the minimum flow of these rivers in the winter time was such that there was not sufficient water power to generate the electricity required, we could switch to steam. I am referring to the possibilities of generating electricity because, after all, if it is possible to bring electric power and electric appliances into domestic use on the prairies, the farmers of western Canada have a right to have them.
How is such a project to be paid for? I am quite aware that we cannot introduce in the house resolutions which involve the expenditure of money, and I want to make it quite clear that I am only trying to suggest something constructive in the event of a survey being made. We have to envisage or forecast the possible means of paying for such a project if the government decides to undertake it.
The other day the Minister of Finance (Mr. Dunning) laid on the table the latest returns of the Canadian chartered banks. The total savings reported were 81,580,000,000, held by 4,084,752 people; but, notice, 3,770,000 of these people have an average of only $120 in their savings accounts, while the other 314,740 have 81,127,500,000 in their savings accounts. I notice further that 536 persons have in their savings accounts an average of $287,500 each. It is safe to say that there

Drought Area-Mr. Rowe (Athabaska)
are not many western farmers, or fishermen, or workers in the last class. If we recall the many references which have been made to the brief submitted by the present Minister of Labour (Mr. Rogers) to the royal commission that sat in the maritime provinces, the three prairie provinces in 1931 were forced to pay in increased living costs because of the tariff something like $56,000,000. That was due to the tariff protection enjoyed by eastern manufacturers. It would be interesting to discover if there is any connection between that $56,000,000 of increased living costs and the average of $287,500 held by 536 people in eastern savings accounts, and to ascertain where they got that money. I suppose if their wages were equal to the wages of farmers and office boys, $350 a year as suggested by the hon. member for Huron North (Mr. Deachman) it would take them about eight hundred years to earn that amount, and about eight thousand years to save it, because you cannot lay by very much in the way of savings out of $350 a year.
I have this suggestion to make. While the Minister of Labour does not, I think, agree with the tariff protection idea, he said that if we abolished the tariff, confederation would be endangered. The inference I drew from that was that the western producers are expected to submit to a levy of $56,000,000 every year in order that confederation may live. That is quite a sacrifice to ask them to make. I suggest that no institution, confederation or anything else, can exist very long on a shaky foundation of that kind, and that the greatest danger to confederation to-day is just these very injustices that one group in this country imposes upon another.
One way to correct that, I think, would be this: I am assuming that such an irrigation and electrification scheme would cost $400,000,000. Suppose the dominion government were to offer a bond issue of $400,000,000 at two per cent payable serially in ten years; the annual amount required to retire the principal would be $40,000,000 and the annual interest would be $8,000,000. This $48,000,000 would still be $8,000,000 short of the annual tribute exacted by eastern protected manufacturers against the three prairie provinces. How would it be, to compensate the west in part for the wrongs they have suffered, if the entire amount of such bond issue were recovered through an excess profits tax? I believe that nothing less than a tangible act of this kind, with a complete rearrangement for the future, can heal the wounds which have already been inflicted, and strengthen again ties which at this moment are perilously near the breaking point.
I have no doubt that such a loan would be quickly taken up, as it would earn more than the one and a half per cent which the banks now pay to these people, and with the Dominion of Canada behind it the security would be unquestioned. I need hardly add that I am making this suggestion merely as an interim measure, because I am confident that in ten years from now the interest system will have been discovered to be one of the principal stumbling blocks in the path of social progress, and will either have been replaced by a more scientific and equitable one, or be just about ready for the scrap heap, and this, too, without placing in jeopardy the security of any person.
It occurs to me that there are eight points which might be gained by this proposal. May I outline them:
(1)	It would make available an abundant and never-failing water supply to the farmers of the prairie plains, thereby bringing to them permanent security.
(2)	It would make possible diversified farming, where, in addition to wheat, sorghum, millet, sugar beets, winter rye, sunflowers, and corn could be grown, and this would make possible hog and chicken raising as well as a vastly greater volume of dairy products, rendering the prairies self-sustaining in all these commodities, with a large export surplus.
(3)	A public work of this magnitude would provide for the unemployed in western Canada.
(4)	It would make available electric light and power for industrial and domestic appliances, adding greatly to the comfort and convenience of the homes of Canadian western farmers, workers and fishermen.
(5)	It would not add to the cost of living of the workers, farmers or fishermen in either eastern or western Canada.
(6)	It would effectively level out and check the effect of falling prices in the approaching depression, by increasing work, permanent assets and purchasing power.
(7)	It would strengthen confederation and alleviate one of the principal causes of strained relationships between the east and the west at the present time.
(8)	It would focus the attention of the Canadian people on a project into which we could direct our energies, now being wasted in the perpetuation of a stupid, archaic competitive system which, unless we check its mad, chaotic course, will soon lead the world into war. And another world war would mean the suicide of civilization.
May I for a moment examine the economic consequences of an irrigation and electrification plan such as I have proposed. One of the
664	COMMONS
Drought Area-Mr. Rowe (Athabaska)
anomalies of our present system is that a universally good crop is a calamity, and when the children in our great cities cry for bread we say, "No, you can't have any, because we've got too much." In the United States to-day, after years of earnest but futile endeavour, they have reached the tragic stage where there are more than 12,000,000 unemployed, and the proposed crop restriction and curtailment plans of the government will inevitably aggravate the heart-breaking and impossible prices of food and clothing, prices under which an ill-clad, under-paid and undernourished working class must falter and fall.
The world wheat conference which met in London last month warned the wheat growers of the world that there was imminent danger of an over-supply of wheat, and that this would mean a disastrous fall in price. I have no doubt that some of my hon. friends who pride themselves on being practical and realistic will oppose this plan on the ground that we must keep things scarce in order to keep up the price. Well, ,if that is being realistic I must define a realist as one who insists upon repeating the errors of his ancestors. Then it may be opportune to ask, Who really is the farmers' friend? The government or the sawfly? The government spends a great deal of money in laboratory research trying to find ways of combating the rust, the boll-weevil, the corn-borer and the saw-fly; but, after all, are these humble parasites not really carrying out the policy of the government by restricting production?
I am ready to agree that the establishment of an adequate irrigation system in the prairie provinces would increase the volume of wheat, coarse grains, live stock and dairy products for sale on world markets, but it would at the same time guarantee an unfailing food supply for the hundreds of millions of people in India and China who are constantly on the edge of starvation and never know what it means to eat more than once each day. This, of course, means that we must change our system from one of production for profit to one of production for use.
The present competitive system, in its efforts to keep things scarce in order to keep up the price, results in the astonishing spectacle of individuals, groups and nations actually competing with one another, for things which may be had in abundance without competition. This false scarcity philosophy results in striving, hate, tariffs to keep things scarce, jealousy, envy and murder, finally culminating in mankind's worst collective social crime, war, where the internationally

recognized vice of private murder, if multiplied sufficiently until it becomes mass murder and mutual extermination, is elevated to the honour and glory of a virtue.
May I say in closing, Mr. Speaker, that all those things which exalt and embellish our civilized life-art, science, philosophy and religion-had their roots in those ancient civilizations and empires which were cradled in the valleys of the Nile, the Euphrates, the Indus and the Hwang-ho, whose life-giving streams have flowed eternally down from the snow-covered ranges of Africa and Asia. They built their pyramids, conduits, palaces and temples with human hands, unassisted by nature. All too often their sumptuous palaces were built by slaves to gratify the vanity and ambition of thieves and robbers, otherwise known as kings and emperors, and the backs that bore the burdens also bore the marks of the slave-drivers lash. We, in this enlightened age, also have slaves at our command, but not the degredation and humiliation of human slavery. We have countless thousands of wild horses, rushing down the gorges of our mighty mountain rivers, ready to be tamed and harnessed in the service of humanity. Shall we use them? These ancient peoples sometimes spent years or generations in building their public works, but they had more intelligence than we moderns because they did not shackle succeeding generations with debt and interest. When these public works were created they were paid for.
It should be clear by every process of logic and by the proof of historic fact that the wealth of a nation, the character of its people, the quality and permanence of its institutions are all dependent upon a sound and sufficient agricultural foundation. Not armies or navies, or commerce, or diversity of manufacture, or anything other than the farm is the anchor which hold through the storms of time that sweep all else away.


Mr. R. E. FINN (Halifax):: I had not intended to make any remarks in reference to the resolution before the house had it not been for the speech of the hon. member for Greenwood (Mr. Massey). He carried us back to the days of confederation, 1867, and he divided Canada into east and west with the dividing line at the western end of the great province of Ontario. While sitting here I thought of the words, "Lest we forget." I do not know of any occasion on which they are more apt or should be recalled with more seriousness or deeper human sympathy than

Drought Area-Mr. Finn
on this very day, because conditions in the world art such that we need to stop and think, "Lest we forget."
Just thirty-eight years ago to-day I sailed from Halifax on the steamship Milwaukee for South Africa and the Boer war. Arriving at Table bay twenty-eight days out from Halifax we went on board the tender to go ashore, along with Colonel Evans, Major Williams, Lieutenant Van Straubenze, who was a soldier and a man and who was killed in the great war, 1914-1918, and a clergyman from Lunenburg who was chaplain to the First and Second Canadian Mounted Rifles, a minister of the Methodist church who did very much for the boys on board that ship from the day she left the port of Halifax until we were at Ellfontein, sixteen miles northwest of Pretoria. As I was standing on the deck of the tender going ashore a gentleman who held the rank of colonel came up to me. He saw "Canada" on my shoulder and said, "I see you are from Canada." I said, "Yes, sir, I am." He said, "I am Colonel Doctor Conan Doyle." I said, "I have read some of your books." He said, "I am here with the Doctor Langham hospital corps, trying to look after the convalescents who come down from the front."
We went through that great country of Cape Colony up to the Orange river where the bridge had been blown up; that great iron structure looked like a lot of snakes. It was a Canadian who built across that river a transportation bridge over which men and ammunition might be taken into the Orange Free State. That engineer was Colonel Girouard, son of Hon. Mr. Justice Girouard of the Supreme Court of Canada. When the mules were passing over, kicking up like the very old Harry, at least I felt happy to know that the way was made safe, not for democracy, but for us to cross without falling into the water. After crossing the river where President Steyn was fighting up to his middle in the water, we went on to Bloemfontein, and just outside Bloemfontein I met a fellow Haligonian, Captain Harry Stair, who came up and spoke to me. The chaplain of whom I spoke was the Reverend Mr. Lane from Lunenburg. I pay him this tribute, because he was as broad as the sky above us on a clear night, and the work he did had an uplifting and inspiring influence on every man aboard that ship from Captain Webster down to the humblest sailor and the humblest individual going to the war, which was myself.
From there we went into the Transvaal, among the mighty mountains where we did
not know at what moment we were going to receive that reward which comes to a soldier or a war correspondent. We arrived at Johannesburg, where doors were barred and windows shuttered; from there we went on to Pretoria, and met Lord Roberts and Lord Kitchener, both now deceased, and saw the home of Oom Paul Kruger, a sentry with fixed bayonets outside, and Mrs. Kruger and some Boers sitting on the verandah. Oom Paul had gone by fast train, blowing the bridges behind him, to Delagoa bay, where he took a ship for Holland, where my good friend (Mr. MacNieol) was last summer, where he found that there were waters flowing and something else that flowed, I am not sure what they call it but I think it is Holland gin.
But, Mr. Speaker, to be serious, I speak of February 21, 1900, because at that time England and the empire were fighting the Boers. To-day some say, "Well, has not England been an aggressor?" I say in that respect, "No." Why? Because on the subjugation of that country it was handed back to them. To-day it is one mighty confederation, and the very men, General Hertzog, Smuts and other generals, who would have shot Queen Victoria on sight, have become the leaders of that confederation and sit in the councils of the empire in London at the imperial conferences of this commonwealth of nations. These changes, Mr. Speaker, are of a kind that make one wonder why conditions are as they are to-day in reference to matters of national and international concern, with which I do not propose to deal for one moment. But I say, "Lest we forget."
Let me say that I am in hearty accord with the aspirations of hon. gentlemen in this house who come from the provinces of Saskatchewan and Alberta. They have had their drought seasons; influences have been brought to bear that have made their country not so happy to live in as the older provinces which entered into confederation in 1867. I am not an engineer; therefore I am not in a position to deal with the question of irrigation or its cost or the portions of the country where it is necessary. But I do say this, that I believe this government is sympathetic to the interests of those provinces which were carved out by the late great leader of the Liberal party, Sir Wilfrid Laurier, and it will see to it that as far as it can and as far as the treasury will provide, those conditions will be ameliorated, so that the present hardships may be forgotten and happiness may reign again among our people in the west.
That brings me, sir, to the little province of Nova Scotia, that rock-ribbed province
Drought Area-Mr. Finn

which gave to Canada that magnificent maritime frontage on the east without which Canada could not have been a nation. I tell you, Mr. Speaker, and hon. gentlemen who sit in the house for the first time, that we were taken into confederation-I was not born then-against our will. To-day we are satisfied to be a part of this great Canada of ours, extending from Halifax to Vancouver; but we are most desirous, yea, insistent, that the promises and pledges which were given to us, not by word of mouth but by statute shall be carried out, perhaps not to the letter, because we are not after our pound of flesh, but we are after that which will bring the prosperity that should be ours as the eastern gateway of this young country.
The British North America Act of 1867 provided in section 145 for the construction of the Intercolonial railway from the city of Halifax to a point on the St. Lawrence river. That railway was built at a cost of millions of dollars, which was contributed by England. That railway was constructed to our disadvantage. Why? Because the British government insisted that it be built so far away from the American border so that if there was another war between England and the United States our line of communication could not be cut. So the road was built down around the bay of Chaleur, and on to Moncton and through to Halifax, making the line about two hundred miles longer than it should have been if it had been built as the Canadian Pacific railway was, though not through the state of Maine, as is the Canadian Pacific, from Megantic and then on through the province of New Brunswick to Saint John. We were sufferers because of that, and the disadvantages were such and the rail haul was so great that the opportunity was given the Canadian Pacific to construct a shorter line. As Sir Charles Tupper said, he bought a summer place at St. Andrews, New Brunswick, because he could come down from Montreal to St. Andrews in twelve hours, whereas it would take him about sixty hours to get there by road, because the Intercolonial railway was not completed to the city of Halifax. Those were the conditions, and it took many years to have the government realize that those conditions could no longer continue; that we should carry Canadian goods over Canadian railways and out through Canadian ports, on both the Atlantic and the Pacific.
Then in 1903 there was placed upon the statute books of Canada the Transcontinental Railway Act which assured to the people of Canada, east, west and in the centre, a line of railway coming through from Vancouver to Edmundston and from Edmundston down

to Moncton as a common centre for Halifax and Saint John, reducing our mileage by about 150 miles. Under that contract, sir, it was provided that the Grand Trunk should operate that line of railway; that they should build piers; that they should build or charter ships and that they should carry every bit of freight, unless specifically routed otherwise, through Canadian ports.


Thomas Miller Bell: Mr. Speaker, I should like to know just what bearing this has on an irrigation problem.


Robert Emmett Finn: It has not very much to do with irrigation in the west, but it has to do with living in the east. You want water in the west; we want business in the east. That is the answer to my hon. friend, and when he has an opportunity to express his views he will not find me taking any exception to what he says. I look to the chair; if the ruling is that I am out of order I shall respect that ruling, and I thank the hon. gentleman for giving a hint which no doubt will be taken.


The ACTING DEPUTY SPEAKER:: I
hesitated to interrupt the hon. member, who is an old member of the house, but I really cannot see any connection between what happened in South Africa in 1900 or what happened in Nova Scotia during the time of confederation and the resolution before the chair, which has to do with the feasibility of irrigating the drought stricken area of Saskatchewan and Alberta.


Robert Emmett Finn: Well, sir, I bow to your ruling, but this afternoon when the Speaker himself was in the chair, the hon. member for Greenwood (Mr. Massey) dealt with the very matters to which I am referring, and nobody called him to order. Perhaps it is because he is a " big '' fellow and I am a little fellow that I am called down and he was allowed to stand up.
In closing, let me say that if this is not pregnant to the matter under consideration, later there will be an opportunity to deal with it. Then it will be in wholesome form, well nourished and well developed, and I hope that the ears of every hon. member will be open. I shall be within the rules of the house on that occasion. Therefore, Mr. Speaker, I accept your ruling and offer my apologies if I have transgressed. I offer apologies too for my hon. friend the good member for Greenwood, because he cannot speak a second time.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Mr. Speaker, I am sure the preceding speaker will pardon me if I do not endeavour to follow him in what he has said.

Drought Area-Mr. Douglas (Weyburn)


Robert Emmett Finn: I thought you must have got your inspiration from your right.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: The discussion this afternoon and evening has been both interesting and instructive, and as seconder of the motion I should like to spend only a few moments in dealing with some of the objections that have been raised by some of those who have spoken to this motion. I think those objections may be classified, roughly, under two headings: First, the objection of those who point out that there is now being carried on under the prairie farm rehabilitation administration all the work necessary and, second, the objection of those who feel that irrigation and water conservation are not feasible.
I want to deal with those two objections, and first with reference to the matter of the prairie farm rehabilitation administration. The hon. member for Swift Current (Mr. Bothwell) -and I need not repeat what he said-outlined ten objectives of the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act. I draw the attention of the house to the fact that those ten objectives have to do with such things as substations for experimental farms, farm improvement associations, reclamation stations and soil survey, all of which are for the purpose of gathering data and securing information.
The prairie farm rehabilitation administration has done excellent work in mapping out the general course that a program of rehabilitation ought to take, but it has not had sufficient funds at any time to put on, on a large scale, the program necessary to meet the problem of drought in the prairie provinces. In the discussion which took place last year on the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act, along with other members from the west I commended what had been done under that administration. But I submit that the figures given this afternoon by the hon. member for Swift Current show that the prairie farm rehabilitation administration is, more or less, dealing in a "penny ante" way with the question of drought. The figures in connection with dug-outs would seem to indicate this contention. There have been 11,000 applications, 5,500 of which have been approved and only 4,300 completed. The hon. member for Swift Current said-and I take this to be pretty well the general attitude of the government-"It is better to get people to assist themselves than to have large scale expenditures by the government." I took his words down, but he may correct me if in any way I have misquoted him. I believe that would seem to describe the prairie farm rehabilitation program. It is an attitude whereby the people are asked to assist themselves to meet a problem of drought. I would point out, however, that when you
ask the people in a drought area to assist themselves you are asking them to try to lift themselves by tugging at their own shoelaces. You ask a man to put in a dugout or a dam for eight cents a cubic yard when, as the hon. member for Wood Mountain (Mr. Donnelly) pointed out, it takes at least twelve cents, if not more. It means that he must have horses -and a lot of farmers have no horses. It means extra feed for those horses, because they have to work. If they use farm machinery it means fuel consumption. The same is true of planting grass seed. The fact that the farmers have not horses or feed for horses, and that they have not fuel for their tractors makes it impossible to carry out many of the excellent schemes suggested in the rehabilitation program.
The prairie farm rehabilitation administration has done excellent work. It has surveyed the field, and as a result of its work I think we shall not make mistakes which would have been made, had they not done the preparatory work. But I feel that -the resolution calls for a thorough investigation of the feasibility of water conservation, irrigation and other means of combating drought, and that those matters ought to be considered thoroughly by a competent body.
I come now to the second objection, namely that such a scheme is not feasible. I am not a civil engineer, nor was any hon. member who spoke this afternoon. The hon. member for Swift Current said it had been authoritatively stated that irrigation in Saskatchewan was not feasible. For proof, he quoted Mr. John Val-lance the head of the prairie farm rehabilitation administration, and the liaison officer Hon. George Spence, but may I point out that neither of these gentlemen is a civil engineer.
I suppose it would be possible for hon. members on both sides of the house to quote engineers, both pro and con, and still not get anywhere. The motion does suggest, however, that we as laymen shall neither sneer at the projects nor become eulogistic about them, but that we should endeavour to secure the best possible professional advice as to the feasibility of water conservation on the prairies.
With that in mind I should like to deal with my impression of the feasibility of these projects. I am thinking now of what is being carried on just across the international boundary between the United States and the Canadian drought area. In the last two years I have made it my business to make frequent trips into the area south of the border. I have gone into North Dakota, South Dakota and Montana, and have studied what the
668	COMMONS
Drought Area-Mr. Douglas (Weybum)
Americans are doing under their rehabilitation plan. I am cognizant of the fact that they are spending sums of money out of all proportion to the sums we are in a position to spend. Their population is much more dense, and the government has been willing to put large sums of money at the disposal of their engineers. But when one talks about the feasibility of what is being done there one can only speak of what he has seen of what is actually being done. Sometimes I have spent a week at a time with some of their engineers, visiting their different projects, receiving explanations of what they are doing and going into the homes of their people. The engineers explain that they are working on two principles, the first of which is that the drought is a recurring problem. They say that there have been droughts in the past, and that it is reasonable to expect that there will be droughts in the future. They say, further, that now during a period of drought, is the time when it is easiest to persuade governments and people concerned to look into the question of recurring drought.
To that end they are now setting up the necessary means whereby, when the moisture does return, they will be able to conserve it against the needs of future drought periods which they know are bound to come. The second principle on which they are working is one which was not mentioned this afternoon, namely, that the problem cannot be attacked on one front. It must be attacked on a number of fronts. They say quite frankly that there are large areas where irrigation is not feasible. There are some areas in which one procedure will solve the problem, and there are others where that same procedure is not a solution.
With that in mind I wish to outline the three main lines of approach which they have used. The first has to do with water conservation itself. In that connection they have spent money in putting in dams to hold bodies of water in rivers and creeks, and to prevent run-offs. By this means they have succeeded in having creeks backed up into gullies and sloughs, and have succeeded in holding bodies of water in the little hills of northern Montana and in supplying water-holes for the stock. A number of large dams have been built. Some of the engineers state frankly that if they were doing this work over again they would not build some of the very large dams on which huge sums of money have been spent. For instance, they say Fort Peck dam, which is a flood control project rather than an irrigation dam, has cost well over $100,000,000. They state they

would have been further ahead if they had built a number of smaller dams. More would have been accomplished with a smaller expenditure of money. But they are learning from the mistakes they have made.
The result is that they are conserving bodies of water. For instance, the engineers estimate that the Fort Peck dam will create a lake with a shore line of 1,600 miles and a body of water which will have an effect on climatic conditions. It will be possible for ranchers to water their stock. It will cause creeks to back up and fill the gullies. They have also gone in for small, individual dams, of which large numbers have been built. This has not been done on the basis of trying "to assist the farmer to assist himself." They have put out gangs of men on a daily wage basis. A gang would be moved on to a farm to build a dam and then move on to another farm, to build another. They have done the same thing in connection with building dugouts. They use drag-line dredges. I saw many cases where they had moved on to a farm and put in a dug-out in a day and a half. Then another gang would come along and plant trees around it, and then move on to the next farm. In the minds of many people water conservation means irrigation and irrigation only. In my opinion, the problem of water conservation is, if anything, more important than the question of irrigation.
The second method they have used is to irrigate. Wherever feasible they have irrigated the land. The hon. member for Maple Creek (Mr. Evans) and others have mentioned the project around Malta, Montana. I went around the Malta country with Superintendent Lantz and saw where they had taken land that was considered hopeless, paid the farmer $3 an acre for it and then proceeded to irrigate it. Under their housing scheme model homes were built with running water and electric lights. The land was cut up into small farms of from sixty to 120 acres and rented out on a thirty to forty years amortization basis.
Of course the best proof of any pudding is in the eating. I went to the home of a man by the name of Karl Blount, just outside Malta. He had been two years on a sixty-five acre farm and he showed me his books. His sugar beet crop alone had netted him $3,000 that year. His wheat had averaged over forty bushels to the acre. He had corn seven feet high and he thought it would run about sixty bushels to the acre. He had taken off several crops of alfalfa and had more feed than he could use. He claimed he had made more money in both the years he had been on that small farm than he had made

Drought Area-Mr. Douglas (Weyburn)
in any year he had been, on his old farm consisting of one section of land. Of course this is not feasible everywhere, but they are doing it wherever possible.
In other places they have combined dry farming and irrigated farming. They have irrigated a strip of land which has been broken up into plots of up to twenty acres, each with a new house. The farmer grows his feed for his stock and his garden stuff for his family on this irrigated plot, and .then back from the irrigated strip he has his huge dry area where he puts in his wheat crop. If his wheat crop should prove a failure he has a guarantee of his garden stuff and feed for his stock. They are trying to meet the problem in the different localities in different ways, depending upon the topography of the country and the economic conditions under which the people live.
I think when we pooh-pooh the idea of irrigation, we perhaps do so too quickly. A famous engineer went through western Canada last year and his reports of conditions were published in the press. One of his statements was that an irrigation project at Riverhurst, Saskatchewan, bringing water down from Moose Jaw to the Weyburn and Souris river would irrigate 7,000,000 acres of the drought lands of southern Saskatchewan at a cost of between 820,000,000 and 825,000,000. I am not in a position to say that that is a correct estimate as I am not a civil engineer like the hon. member for Yale (Mr. Stirling) and one or two others.


Malcolm McLean: Who was the engineer?


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Mr. R. O. Sweezey. He travelled through western Canada and his reports were published in the Regina Leader-Post, the Winnipeg Free Press and other western newspapers.


Mr. McNIVEN:: What was the cost of his program?


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: He had a number of other projects, but he estimated the cost of the Riverhurst project as between $20,000,000 and $25,000,000.


Donald Alexander McNiven: What was the $400,000,000
project?


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: The Bow river project to irrigate Alberta and Saskatchewan. I do not intend to go into that, but that was the one.
The third method used in the United States rehabilitation plan was that used in the areas where water conservation and irrigation were not so feasible, and where supplies of water were not available. In those areas they went
in for an extensive program of soil drifting prevention. Some hon. members have referred already to the manner in which they tackled this problem by planting crested wheat grass, brome grass and in some cases, soya beans, and also by strip farming. Of course this meant the expenditure of money. I went into one farm just a few miles out of the town of Plentywood, Montana. The soil on this farm had been reduced almost to black sand. The government inspector approved the farmer putting it into crested wheat grass. He put in 300 acres of this, for which the government paid him $7 an acre or a total of $2,100. This meant two things for that man. He was able to finance his operations this year without going on relief and, second, he was rehabilitating his farm.
All though the drought area the United States government has been paying farmers $3 an acre to put in summer fallow in fifteen rod strips. This makes it possible for a farmer to buy feed and carry out some of the suggestions we are always making in circulars, but which we never tell the farmer how to implement.
Before I sit down I should like to say that if such a program of water conservation, of irrigation and of soil erosion prevention could be undertaken, especially during these periods of drought, it would have a twofold beneficial effect. First of all, it would put us in a position to meet the next drought more intelligently and more successfully than we have met the present one. I cannot understand the attitude of some hon. members who keep pooh-poohing the whole idea of trying to deal with this problem from the scientific angle. If the medical men of this country were to inform us that we were to be subjected to the ravages of a certain disease at regular periods, we would organize all the resources of medical science to meet that condition. But when we know perfectly well that periods of drought will come which will upset our economy and cause our people to suffer privation and hardship, we simply sit back and say, "Well some day it will rain." But some day it will stop raining again and unless we are prepared to use the intelligence that we have to meet such a contingency we shall go through these years of suffering again and our children shall go through them after us.
The second beneficial effect would be that money would be spent on wages rather than on relief. The farmers and the unemployed in the small towns and villages could be paid wages. Both in and out of the house we hear mention made of the racketeering that goes on in relief. We hear of the fellow who has
670	COMMONS
Drought Area-Mr. Douglas (Weyburn)
a little tea dollar radio to which he dares to listen. There may be some racketeering, but I believe it is quite small. In my opinion the great mass of Canadian people who are compelled to take government assistance would far rather work for anything they get. I believe we could give them work by setting them to the task of building these dams and dugouts.
Late one night I was going to New Glasgow, Montana, with a number of friends in my car. Not being sure of the road, we stopped to inquire of a farmer just how we could get to New Glasgow. After directing us, he found out that we came from Canada and we stopped to chat. We asked him if he had any crop and he told us he had none at all. We then asked him how he lived, and he told us he had these sheep. One of the gentlemen with me said, "You cannot live on the products of a few sheep." He replied, "Oh, I work on the government WPA." We then asked how much it netted him. "Well," he said, "it varies. We get ten days a month, and some months I get more. My cheque last month was $98.80." The gentleman with me asked, "Is that charged up against your property?" He looked as though we had come from another sphere. "No," he said, "that is wages; I work for it."
There are thousands upon thousands of farmers in the drought area to-day who would like to say, "It is wages; I work for it." And such could be done, Mr. Speaker. We talk to-day about spending money for many other purposes which in my opinion would not give us as great a return in terms of human happiness and future prosperity as spending our money to conserve water against future periods of drought.


Hon. T. A. CRERAR (Minister of Mines and Resources):: Mr. Speaker, the discussion this afternoon and evening on this interesting subject has covered a very wide range. It has gone all the way from the Orange Free State to the great American desert, and from the head waters of the Athabaska to the watershed of the St. Lawrence river. That, I suppose, may be taken as an evidence of the importance of the subject and of the general interest it arouses.
If this problem could be solved by theoretical discussions, then I think the speaker who preceded me (Mr. Douglas) could make a useful contribution to its solution. But, Mr. Speaker, it is a practical problem, a very practical problem, and it must be so regarded.
The mover of the resolution (Mr. Cold-well) states in its terms that there should be "a comprehensive and authoritative survey of water conservation, irrigation possibilities,
[Mr. Douglas.)
and other feasible projects" looking to a permanent rehabilitation of the drought-stricken area. In that respect it is interesting to review what has been done in the way of meeting the proposals contained in the resolution. My hon. friend in his opening remarks quoted from Palliser's report and from the reports of one or two others as to the conditions which they found almost a century ago when they made their first journey across the prairies. There is no doubt that a very large part of Saskatchewan and Alberta is subject to recurring drought. That has been known for many years.
I would agree also with the criticism which has been made in the discussion this afternoon that it was a mistake to open up all of that country for wheat growing or cereal production. Without question large areas of it should have been reserved for ranching, for which, generally speaking, it was naturally well adapted.
The possibilities of drought received early attention. I can recall, because I have lived in western Canada for a good many years, that the popular conception in the nineties, of last century, was that the great part of southern Saskatchewan was not adapted for grain growing and never would be. That is the view which was held at that time, and it was the view, I think, which was held originally by those who had to do with the building of the first transcontinental railway, because the first survey of that railway, on the engineering reports available, placed the line a great deal further north than the location where the Canadian Pacific railway was finally constructed.
As I have said, droughts have recurred frequently. If we study the rainfall in western Canada we find that, taking Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta, probably the heaviest annual rainfall is in the Red river valley, where it amounts to about twenty-one inches per annum. The rainfall gradually lessens as you move westward until in the western part of Saskatchewan and the eastern part of Alberta-I am speaking of their more southern parts, what is now referred to as the drought area-the rainfall runs from twelve to thirteen inches, and in an exceptional year to probably fourteen or fifteen inches. Now, if the rainfall is well distributed and comes at the right time, you get crops; if it is not well distributed as to season, then you have a certain amount of drought, and consequent failure of crops. That was all recognized a great many years ago, when as far back as 1894 the first Irrigation Act was passed by the federal parliament relating to the drought

Drought Area-Mr. Crerar
areas of what was then the Northwest Territories. Under that act the ownership and control of the water available in western Canada was reserved for public control, and those rights, I understand, passed to the provinces when the natural resources were transferred some seven or eight years ago.


Mr. BENNETT:: No, the water rights did not.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I always bow with great respect to my right hon. friend's opinion, but I think they have the control of the water.


Richard Bedford Bennett: There was a dispute about the matter, and I think finally counsel arrived at the conclusion they had been wrong in advising as they did. If you look at the act approved by the imperial parliament, transferring the resources, you will see that it did not mention waters. It had been thought that the word "lands" was broad enough to cover it, but in view of the fact that the restrictions are as they are, I think the opinion of counsel is that the waters have not passed.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I know there is that difference of opinion, and it is probable that legislation will be before parliament this year to clarify that point. The law officers in certain of the provinces hold that the waters were not included; others held that they were; but at any rate the intention was to include them, and I mention that for a reason I shall give presently.
Following the setting up of the prairie provinces, more effective steps were taken to ascertain the volume of water and the annual flow. There were finally set up in Saskatchewan and Alberta several hundred stations by which the flow of water in each of the streams could be scientifically measured. That work was carried on until the transfer of the natural resources, and all that, data is available in the old files of the Department of the Interior at Ottawa, and I believe also in the records transferred to the provinces.


Richard Bedford Bennett: And in the report of the Minister of the Interior in some cases.


Charles Avery Dunning: From year to year.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Yes, in part.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: So all the data as to the volume of water and rate of flow in these streams is to-day available in the department here or in the provincial departments having to do with the matter.
There are three sources of supply for water for the agriculturists in western Canada, or, shall we say, in the drought area. There is first the subsurface water; that is the water
which is secured from digging or drilling wells, and the like. The information on that was fragmentary and incomplete. In 1935 my right hon. friend the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bennett), when he was in charge of the administration of this country- and I think this was one of the really good things he did-appropriated a very considerable sum of money to have a survey made. As a result, under the geological department of the mines branch, a survey was made of all the municipalities from the international boundary in Saskatchewan as far north as township 33. That was almost two hundred miles. That information has been plotted by the geologists and is available to any farmer in the municipalities surveyed who wishes to obtain it. It gives useful data on the water possibilities, and that data is being taken advantage of to-day in the rehabilitation program which is being carried out in those provinces as far as water supplies are concerned.
The next source of water is the ordinary spring freshet. The snow or rain falls over the vast prairies and eventually the water runs off.
The next source is that which comes from the eastern slope of the Rocky mountains or the foothills of the Rockies. There we find the origin of the great rivers of western Canada. A number of these rivers come down in the province of Alberta almost from the international boundary right to the northern section and they find their way into the two forks of the great Saskatchewan river. Some of these waters are international. That is to say, we have a stream rising in the United States, flowing into Canada and finding its way ultimately into the Saskatchewan. We have other cases where a stream rises in Canada and flows into the United States. We have one case where the river rises in the United States and flows approximately one hundred miles in Alberta, finding its way back again into the United States. So far as these streams are concerned, their use is regulated by international treaty, and Canada cannot *take more water from them than she is by treaty entitled to take.
As a result of the conditions obtaining in these western provinces some irrigation projects have been undertaken, but before discussing that phase of the subject perhaps I had better complete the point I was making. These streams have all been measured. Information regarding the total volume of water, the average over a great many years, is available, and consequently with that information in hand it is quite a practicable matter to estimate the extent of land that
Drought Area-Mr. Crerar

could be irrigated by means of the water which can be made use of. In that respect the information asked for by my hon. friend in his resolution is, I submit, available for all practical purposes.
In consequence of the drought conditions in some of these areas irrigation projects have been undertaken and I would refer to these very briefly for a moment or two. There is one project known as the Alberta Railways Irrigation Company. That was southeast of Lethbridge and was designed to irrigate 130,000 acres.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That is the oldest one.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Yes, my right hon. friend is quite correct; that is the first project of this kind undertaken. The capital cost in that case was about S20 an acre. The next one is a project which was undertaken a great many years ago by the Canadian Pacific Railway about fifty miles east of Calgary. That was designed to irrigate 220,000 acres and cost about $5,000,000.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The intake was at Calgary from the Bow river.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Yes. Then further east
still, in the Brooks district, another irrigation area was set up which was designed to irrigate 400,000 acres at a cost of $11,000,000. My right hon. friend's residence in Alberta will have furnished him with more information than I possess, but I can recall the complaints which were made many years ago by farmers in the Brooks district about the irrigation facilities provided for them and the prices they had to pay for the water they used.


Richard Bedford Bennett: It was too expensive,
they said.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: It was too expensive, and as a result of that I am correct in saying that the final solution of that scheme was the transference of the whole works to a cooperative group of farmers in the Brooks district. It is now managed and controlled by them. So far as the Canadian Pacific Railway is concerned, I think it made a very considerable contribution to the welfare of the farmers of that district.


Richard Bedford Bennett: They gave the works
in the eastern section to the farmers, together with a sum of money to enable them to make the works operative.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Yes. There was another
undertaking started west of Medicine Hat.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I would not say too
much about that.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: This one, from information I have, had rather unfortunate results.


Richard Bedford Bennett: It had a bad start.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Perhaps it had a bad
start, but at any rate it had a bad ending.


Richard Bedford Bennett: It is not ended yet;
there was a lot of money in it last year.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: There was a company that acquired 500,000 acres. They commenced as far back as 1909, and according to information supplied to me, they have spent $15,000,000. The amount of land that is being irrigated at the present time is 35,000 acres. All this indicates, therefore, that it is necessary to examine with some care before we rush into vast expenditures for purposes of irrigation.
In addition to those I have mentioned, there are a number of smaller undertakings that have been developed, such as the Lethbridge Northern, a small area at Taber, and altogether some half dozen or more. These were small projects that were started more or less on a local basis and financed with some outside assistance.


Richard Bedford Bennett: In the case of the Lethbridge Northern the province guaranteed the bonds.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Yes; in the case of the Lethbridge Northern the province guaranteed the bonds. Some of these have done very well. It bears out the view that where you select your area carefully, where your water can be put on at a reasonable cost, where there are farmers who will take the trouble to learn how to handle an irrigation project, you can attain a very considerable measure of success. Probably the most successful of these is the one adjacent to Lethbridge. There, as a result of irrigation, they are engaged in a type of quite intensive farming, producing sugar beet and alfalfa, and unquestionably they are getting good results.
During the years I have mentioned other projects were surveyed by the dominion government when it had charge of the lands in western Canada. Preliminary surveys were completed on these. There was one known as the Lethbridge Southeastern. There were in that 315,000 acres and the estimated cost- I would direct the attention of the house to these figures particularly-was over $40 an acre.
There were several others, including finally one known as the North Saskatchewan project. That project contemplates the diversion of the waters of the North Saskatchewan river somewhere west of Prince Albert, bringing them down over the countryside of which

Drought Area-Mr. Crerar
the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Coldwell) spoke this afternoon, to irrigate the lands lying beyond. They hoped in that scheme to embrace some 1,410,000 acres but the cost would be about $75 an acre. There is no question that engineering science could solve the problem of irrigation. As an engineering question it is not an impossible thing I suppose to take the waters of lake Superior and put them on the prairies of Saskatchewan. But it has to be regarded also from the practical point of view. I ask the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar or any other hon. member, Is it a practical thing to burden land with $75 capital cost an acre to put water on it and the management expense, on top of that, and then expect farmers to carry it?


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Does the minister cite that figure of $75 an acre as a general figure?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: No; this is just in that particular case. The figures run from $35 to $75 an acre. That gives a general picture of these projects. In the surveys made by the water powers branch at that time-and they were very complete surveys-they estimated that if all the water were utilized, probably 7,000,000 acres at the outside might be irrigated. Understand, that is all the water coming from the mountains. But that again is an impossibility. These small projects, where you can get the water on the land cheaply, are practicable propositions; but on the scale spoken of by the hon, member for Rosetown-Biggar this afternoon, taking the water, say of the South Saskatchewan river and pushing that water down, let. us say to Estevan, that, I think, is a wholly impossible proposition. In the first place the banks of the Saskatchewan river are from 100 to 300 feet high, practically all the way from Medicine Hat on. The water would have to be lifted that height from the river before the diversion over the land began. In the second place there are important cities along that river. Lethbridge gets its water supply from a tributary of the Saskatchewan river, and the town of Medicine Hat, with a population of 10,000 or 12,000 people, gets its water supply from the Saskatchewan river. Saskatoon, farther down, with a population of 45,000, gets its whole water supply from the Saskatchewan river, and my information is that they have no other source to depend upon than that. Consequently, if the waters of the river were lifted and sent over the prairies as far as Estevan, you would have the problem of the water supply for these towns and cities.
There is also another aspect of the matter which might bring about complications. The
*51952-43
South Saskatchewan is an interprovincial river. It is an important tributary of lake Winnipeg! If we could conceive it possible to divert all the waters of that river west of Prince Albert, Manitoba would be at once interested, because that would have an important effect on lake levels in Manitoba and on works which would be affected thereby. I need not say what effect it would have on areas lying east of Prince Albert.
I think the facts I have given are sufficient to indicate certain conclusions: First, that there is to-day a complete body of information available along the lines suggested in the resolution of the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar. In the second place extensive surveys have been made as to the possibility of utilizing the water available for irrigation in Saskatchewan and Alberta. May I say in passing that these reports indicate that of the acreage which could possibly be benefited by irrigation over ninety per cent is in Alberta. So that if we look for relief in undertaking vast and costly schemes of irrigation on the prairies I am afraid we are doomed to disappointment. That, however, does not mean that in certain localities' irrigation projects cannot be undertaken, but such projects must be on a modest scale such as those being undertaken to-day, which are situated almost entirely in Alberta.
I may then be asked the question, How are you going to deal with this problem? I do not think it can be dealt with in any other way than that which is being followed to-day. We may not have reached perfection by any means in the work carried on under the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act. But, as I have already stated, under the initiative of my right hon. friend opposite, that survey was undertaken of all the municipalities in southern Saskatchewan. The results of that survey are available. Also under the prairie farm rehabilitation scheme dams are being built to conserve the water as the snow melts in the spring and hold it. That scheme can be extended at but a fraction of the cost which would be involved in diverting the Saskatchewan river to the prairies of Saskatchewan, if that were a physical possibility. With these go the suggestions made by the hon. member for Swift Current (Mr. Bothwell) who made,
I thought, a very practical speech to-day, as well as did the hon. member for Wood Mountain (Mr. Donnelly) in relation to this whole problem. There is no doubt that improved methods of farming can be found that will be of benefit to the agriculturists in these drought stricken areas. We know that progress is being made. There is hardly any limitation to what science can do. Crested wheat grass,



Drought Area-Mr. Crerar	_____
a plant which is very strongly drought resistant, has been mentioned this afternoon. With improved knowledge and the application of that knowledge to agricultural practice in these provinces, along with the work being done under the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation^ Act, will be found the best road to the alleviation of the unfortunate conditions of recent years.
One point more and I am finished. I have lived in western Canada practically all my life. It has been my good fortune to be pretty well acquainted with our vast prairie country. There are not many parts of it that I have not visited at one time or another. I know its possibilities. It is true that in the last several years it has been sorely stricken. On top of the misfortune of drought, there was, owing to general world conditions, a time of low prices which further aggravated the situation as far as our farmers were concerned. But I still have faith in western Canada. In 1928, only ten years ago, the wheat fields of the prairie provinces contributed 540,000,000 bushels of wheat to the grain production of Canada, and of that amount over 300,000,000 bushels came from Saskatchewan.
I am convinced that those days will return and that western Canada once more will come into its own. I regret to see the picture painted in the dark, gloomy colours my hon. friends sometimes use in the house. We want to look at facts fairly and squarely, but there is nothing to be gained by giving the impression to the whole of Canada, and indeed to the whole world, that unless we spent hundreds of millions of dollars in irrigation projects, the country is gone and will never come back. I do not believe that. I think it will come back. What is needed to-day is a sane, sensible, practical method of going at the difficulty, and I believe that is what the government is doing in the projects whicn it is carrying on so well under the present Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner).


Malcolm McLean: 
Richard Bedford Bennett: Preliminary surveys.


Malcolm McLean: Preliminary, but a great deal of advanced surveying was done.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That work was described in the report as preliminary.


Malcolm McLean: Yes; I read those words myself and I thank the right hon. leader of the opposition for emphasizing them.

For two or three years prior to that time other surveying parties were making pie-liminary and final surveys in the territory that later was within the constituency of Melfort. They were trying to see how water could be taken off the land so that it could be prepared for cultivation. I am sorry the results in that connection were not so happy, but much surveying work that will be useful in the future was done in the northeastern part of Saskatchewan. The dominion government spent a lot of money on surveys in those days, and I think some attention should be paid to the results. This is what the report has to say about one of the projects:
The lands comprising this project consist of all lands suitable for irrigation within a tract of 20,000,000 acres, its boundaries extending from a point near Coronation south of the Red Deer river near Duchess, and eastward as far as the South Saskatchewan river near Outlook and Saskatoon. Some investigations have been made to include lands to the south of the South Saskatchewan river adjoining the Empress branch of the Canadian Pacific railway, and also lands to the west of the Red Deer river along Kneehill, Threehills and Ghostpine creeks.
The estimate of the irrigable areas in the various tracts is 1,410,980 acres. I shall not deal with the areas in Alberta as I am not familiar enough with them to comment thereon. However, I should like to give the estimate of the irrigable areas in different tracts in Saskatchewan. They are as follows:
Acres
Kindersley tracts	 105,630
Elrose tracts	 80,610
Rosetown tract	 436,275
Saskatoon tract	 302,645
The report continues:
In addition to the above, it is estimated that approximately 135,000 acres to the south of the South Saskatchewan river can be irrigated by crossing the river in section 2, township 24, range 24, west of the 4th meridian, and there would be a considerable area of irrigable lands along Kneehill, Threehills, and Ghostpine creeks. As a result of last season's surveys an area of about 46,592 acres in the Kerrobert tracts previously included in the project has been cut out on account of expense, and other large areas in the tracts have been eliminated for the same reason.
The report shows that 1,410,980 acres were possible of irrigation out of a total of 20,000,000 acres with water to be taken from the North Saskatchewan river. The description of the Rosetown tract reads as follows:
This tract includes the largest concentrated area of irrigable land in the project. The topographical and soil conditions vary greatly, but generally the lands are from smooth to gently rolling, and the soil generally a light clay loam. Throughout the southern portion in the vicinity of Elrose and Rosetown, from

Drought Area-Mr. McLean (Meljort)
townships 25 to 30, ranges 11 to 15, the conditions for irrigation are excellent. The surface is smooth but with sufficient slope, and the soil is a light clay loam. Good drainage is provided by numerous creeks and water courses running to the northeast, and except in places along the creeks there is very little indication of alkali. To the north of township 30 the lands are generally a little more rolling, becoming distinctly rolling toward the western limit where the Bear hills commence. This area is drained by Eagle Hill creek and its various branches. To the west of Eagle Hill creek there is good slope, but to the east some of the lands are flatter and may require drainage. There are quite a number of sand ridges, which makes classification difficult, the most notable of which is in the vicinity of the town of Harris on the Canadian National railway between Rosetown and Saskatoon. This ridge is very rough and consists of almost pure sand. It is covered with foliage of various kinds, and a lake situated in these hills has become quite a summer resort. To the extreme north the soil is heavier and the surface more rolling, becoming distinctly rolling toward the northwest limit.
That is part of that 1,400,000 acres. The report goes on to show how the water could be distributed, and then comes a significant passage dealing with the water taken from the North Saskatchewan:
The absorption losses are unusually high, amounting to 53*6 per cent of the gross supply. This estimate of losses is based on 6 second-feet per million square feet of wetted area, except in natural channels of Stauffer creek, Raven river, and Sounding and Eyehill creeks, where losses of one-half this amount have been assumed. The losses in Tramping and Sullivan lakes, over and above the run-off to those lakes, have been taken as equivalent to a depth of 3 feet over the total full supply areas. No losses have been allowed for, in transporting *water through the channel of the Red Deer river between the mouth of the Raven river and intake in section 4, township 38, range 25. It is estimated that the run-off particularly from the Blindman river will more than balance the absorption losses. An allowance has been made for riparian rights in Red Deer river of 100 second-feet, and in Clearwater river of 50 second-feet.
In estimating the requirements a net duty of 18 inches on 80 per cent of the irrigable area has been assumed and the methods of monthly distribution are as follows: May, 2 inches; June, 6 inches; July, 6 inches; August, 2 inches; September, 2 inches.
It is considered impractical to operate canals from the rivers before the beginning of May and after the end of October, and in preparing the tables an open-water season of six months has been used. Allowing for absorption losses at 53*6 per cent of the gross supply the requirement for 1,410,980 acres is 3,648,157 acre-feet, which is equivalent to a continuous flow during the open-water season of 10,015 second-feet. For the purpose of regulating this flow to provide for peak load requirements the following storage is required.
Then is set out the tremendous amount oi storage that would be required. The report goes on to say:
From the following estimates it -will be seen, that it is not feasible at present to irrigate the whole 1,410,980 acres, the estimated cost being $74.84 per irrigable acre. The estimated cost to irrigate 427,360 acres is $55 per acre, which is also high.
The lowest figure they quote under any scheme is $48.50 an acre. Now under those conditions, to ask the government at this time to go ahead and irrigate that land would not, I think, be reasonable. The evidence is there to show how much water it would take, and the cost, and I would point out, if fifty-three per cent of the 10,000 cubic feet per second was totally lost in absorption charges, it would affect very, very seriously the rivers further east and north, flowing through the provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba, and even in Alberta itself. I do not know how Edmonton, for example, with a large and growing population, or Calgary, with its large population, or cities like Saskatoon, Lethbridge, Prince Albert, Medicine Hat and other places which depend upon the river for their water, would find themselves situated if 10,000 cubic feet per second were diverted from the upper waters of the North Saskatchewan alone. It is certainly something that must be gone into very carefully before steps are taken to spend money on such a large irrigating project. The smaller works in southern Saskatchewan on the Frenchman's river, where something like
40.000	acres is going to be available for irrigation, if distributed according to the plans which the people of the district are putting into being, would result in eighty acre subdivisions which would be suitable for raising alfalfa and other forms of fodder. When you take into account the higher bench lands, and the dry lands used for grazing purposes, together with the lands down in the valley that can be irrigated from water from Frenchman's river, the irrigation of that tract of
40.000	acres would add a very great deal to the possibilities of that part of the country.
Several speakers have spoken of dugouts, and I know they are exceedingly valuable in northeastern Saskatchewan, and have been for ten years or more. They have been using dugouts, for example, to hold water from the spring run-off, and were it not for that factor many of my neighbours and many people in the constituency I have the honour to represent, would not have had any water
680	COMMONS
Drought Area-Mr. McLean (Meljort)
for their farm requirements last year. Even up there they were hauling water quite a considerable distance. One contractor near where I live has put in one hundred dugouts a year, and when my hon. friend speaks of high class engineering necessary to dig a dugout and that it takes a day and a half to do so, I might tell him that a man thoroughly familiar with the business and equipped with the proper machinery can put in a dugout in eleven hours. But these dugouts of which f. speak have been put in at the expense of the farmers themselves, and some of them are beginning to think that if there is to be a great deal of assistance given in building dams and dugouts and other means of conserving water elsewhere, then some assistance should be given in northern Saskatchewan and Manitoba because they feel that with the low prices they have received, with the high cost of operation and development, and with the high cost of replacements, some assistance should be given them if it is to be given elsewhere.
Valuable as this resolution might prove to be if it succeeded in inducing the government to do something that had never been done before, it is not of very great value, I think, in view of conditions as we know them as far back as sixteen or twenty years ago. But I plead with you, Mr. Speaker, and every member of the house, to give serious thought to preserving the timber on the eastern slope of the Rocky mountains, because if that goes, the control of the water goes too, and then there will be no wild life, no hunting or fishing, no possible source of water for irrigation or any other purpose, and the great cities that have been built on the rivers will find themselves in a most difficult situation. The timber of north and northeastern Saskatchewan, and Manitoba, and probably of Alberta as well, will also be in danger, and the new fur farms which have been developed in northern Saskatchewan and northwest Manitoba will also be in danger because it is no good putting in dams to hold back water if the water does not exist. But, Mr. Speaker, I am satisfied that moisture is going to come again from the clouds; that the rain will fall and the sun will shine, and the grass and wheat grow in western Canada, and no man is doing his country a service who weakens confidence in its resources of soil and climate and in the likelihood of Providence again favouring us with rainfall and sunshine in due season, which I myself am satisfied we shall have in the future.


[Stage Direction]
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.

Tuesday, February 22, 1938