[Stage Direction]
EXTERN An AFFAIRS
First and second reports of the standing committee on external affairs-Mr. Bradette.

[Stage Direction]
Mr. L. 0. BREITHAUPT (Waterloo North) presented the first report of the standing committee on railways, canals and telegraph lines, and moved that the report be concurred in.
Mr. CHURCH:: I should like to ask the
chairman of this committee whether it is the custom to consider in secret a bill which has been sent to the committee after second reading, as was done this morning in con* sidering an important railway bill? What is the policy of the committee in regard to procedure?


Mr. BREITHAUPT:: The committee does not meet in private. There was a quorum this morning of the twenty members as required by law, and all discussion was perfectly in order.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.


Hon. PAUL MARTIN (Minister of National Health and Welfare):: Mr. Speaker,
I wish to bring to the attention of the house a matter concerning the privileges of the house. Last night the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bracken) made a speech to the nation, in which among other things he used these words, as reported in the morning press:
Mr. Bracken said nearly everyone agreed that old age pension payments should be increased. Yet the government refused to do this in open parliament and sought power by order in council so it could decide behind parliament's back what increase-if any-was to be made.


An hon. MEMBER:: That is right.


Paul Joseph James Martin: Mr. Speaker, that statement is absolutely untrue. In the speech from the throne, as I said yesterday, and as the hon. gentleman I am sure upon reflection will note, the government made known its intention to introduce, not by orders in council but by a bill in open parliament, amendments to the Old Age Pensions Act.


An hon. MEMBER:: When?


Paul Joseph James Martin: 
Mr. MACKENZIE:: During this session.


Paul Joseph James Martin: That statement was repeated twice by the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King), twice by the Minister of Justice (Mr. Ilsley) and yesterday afternoon by myself,-


An hon. MEMBER:: Where is the bill?


Paul Joseph James Martin: -seven hours before the hon. gentleman spoke.


An hon. MEMBER:: Where is the bill?


Paul Joseph James Martin: So that, Mr. Speaker,-


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: If you stop your
delaying tactics you will get it sooner.


Paul Joseph James Martin: So that there can be no
question that the remarks of the leader of the opposition last night were not in accordance with the facts, which he knew very well, and which were related to him only yesterday afternoon.
The government has stated repeatedly its intention to introduce at this session the amendments which were referred to yesterday. I ask the hon. gentleman to note that, and to make a correction in the house at this time.


Mr. BRACKEN:: I have no correction to make.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Withdraw.


John Bracken: We have been here now for two or three months-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


John Bracken: -and there is no old age pensions bill before us.


Mr. GARDINER:: Putting out Tory propaganda.


Paul Joseph James Martin: My hon. friend-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Mr. SPEAKER:: I think hon. members will admit that I cannot permit a debate at this time.



MB. ABBOTT-STATEMENT OF LEADER OF THE OPPOSITION AS TO TAXES ON BREAD

Hon. DOUGLAS ABBOTT (Minister of Finance):: I rise also on a question of privilege. In the report of the same speech-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


James Horace King: Order. Is the minister rising on a question of privilege?


Douglas Charles Abbott: Yes, Mr. Speaker. In the same report the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bracken) is referred to as follows:
Mr. Bracken was critical also of taxation policy, restrictions on Canadian exports, rates of old age pension payments and controls.
(Mr. Martin.]
"Everything in Canada," he said, "was loaded down with indirect taxes. A loaf of bread, for instance, carried thirty-six tax levies, making up about one-third of its price. That was an example of the source of the high cost of living."
That too is completely inaccurate. A loaf of bread is heavily subsidized.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


James Horace King: Order. The hon. minister rose on a question of privilege and I would ask hon. members to allow him to state his question of privilege.


Douglas Charles Abbott: My question of privilege is this: I am the minister of the crown specially responsible for the imposition of taxes and the administration of subsidies. I say that if there is any article of commerce in Canada which is not taxed, it is bread; on the contrary, the main content of bread, wheat flour, is probably the most heavily subsidized of any commodity at the present time.


Mr. COLDWELL:: Mr. Speaker, may I ask you to consider this point: Is it proper to raise questions of privilege on speeches made outside this house?


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: On the point of order may I say that it is perfectly proper as long as the statement made outside reflects upon the accuracy of a declaration by a minister of the crown with reference to policy expressed in this house.



FISHERIES


Hon. H. F. G. BRIDGES (Minister of Fisheries):: Yesterday the hon. member for
Queens-Lunenburg (Mr. Winters) asked me a certain question relating to the possibility of shipping Canadian crews on United States fishing vessels on the Atlantic coast and I promised I would give a statement today.
The shipping of Canadian crews to American fishing vessels on the Atlantic coast is governed by an act of parliament, the Customs and Fisheries Protection Act. Section 10 of that act provides for the forfeiture of every foreign fishing vessel which has entered Canadian territorial waters for any purpose not permitted by treaty or by any law of Great Britain or of Canada. So far as United States fishing vessels are concerned there is a law of Canada, namely, an order in council under the authority of section 3 of the Customs and Fisheries Protection Act, chapter 43, R.S.C., under which a licence may be issued to a United States fishing vessel enabling it to

Canadair Limited
enter any port on the Atlantic coast of Canada for the purpose of purchasing bait, ice, seines, lines and all other supplies and outfits. The present order in council, P.C. 3955, September 24, 1946, does not permit the shipping of crews on foreign vessels.
Since the United States vessel in question the Gertrude de Costa is now in the port of Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, with bait and ice on board, the governor in council, under section 3 of the Customs and Fisheries Protection Act, is issuing a licence to this vessel to permit it to ship necessary complement of crew at the port of Lunenburg. While granting a licence in this special case it should be understood that this concession is in no way to be considered as a precedent.



CANADAIR LIMITED


Mr. G. K. FRASER (Peterborough West):: In a return tabled in my name yesterday by the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply in connection with Canadair Limited the balance sheet asked for on page 1758 of Hansard was not included. This balance sheet is also mentioned in one of the letters tabled as being attached thereto, but the balance sheet was not attached. Will the minister see that this balance sheet is tabled tomorrow?


Right Hon. C. D. HOWE (Minister of Reconstruction and Supply):: I looked over the documents briefly and I thought the balance sheet was attached. If it was not, I shall certainly see that it is supplied.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I would refer the hon. member for Peterborough West (Mr. Fraser) to page 299 of Votes and Proceedings of Monday last, the second paragraph; also to a return to an order of the house of March 26, 1947, for a copy of balance sheet of the Canadair Limited, as mentioned in section C, page 1542, Hansard of March 20, 1947. In other words the balance sheet was tabled last Monday.



QUESTION PASSED AS ORDER FOR RETURN


Mr. MERRITT:: 1.	How many houses constructed under the Veterans' Land Act small holdings project have been found to contain (a) defective workmanship- (b) defective materials; (c) a combination of (a) and (b), and (d) unsatisfactory drainage?
2.	How many contracts or arrangements have been entered into for repairs and/or redramage of the defective houses or properties?
3.	In how many cases have the repairs or redrainage been undertaken by (a) the original contractor; (b) other contractors?
4.	In how many cases have the repairs or redrainage been undertaken (a) at the expense of the contractor; (b) at the expense of the taxpayer; (c) at the joint expense of the contractor and taxpayers?
5.	(a) In how many cases has the veteran been required to bear any part of the cost of repairs; (b) in how many cases in which the original contractor is being employed to do the repairs, or redrainage, and the cost thereof is being borne by the taxpayers, is any profit, management fee or allowance over cost being made to such contractor?
6.	If there are any cases in which the cost of repairs or redrainage is not being charged to the contractor, what is the reason for failure so to do?
7.	In how many accepted cases of bad workmanship, materials or drainage have the necessary repairs or redrainage not yet been arranged or contracted for?
8.	(a) What is the total estimated cost of repairs and redrainage necessary to date; (b) what is the division of such cost between the veteran, the taxpayers and the contractors concerned?
9.	(a) How many inspectors or other officers employed by the Department of Veterans Affairs for the purpose have passed or approved work, materials or land subsequently found to be below standard; (b) how many such persons are still in the employ of the department; (c) how many such persons have been discharged for cause; (d) if any such persons are still in the employ of the department, why have their ser- . vices been retained?
10.	(a) Are any prosecutions or actions for damages pending against any persons for bad workmanship, for the supplying of bad materials or for breach of contract in respect of any of these houses or projects; (b) if the answer to (a) is yes, how many prosecutions or actions are pending, and in what locality or' localities are such proceedings being brought?



POSTAL SERVICE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. W. CHESTER S. McLURE (Queens):
I should like to direct a question to the Postmaster General having to do with the changes that have been made in the postal service of Canada. Why was Prince Edward Island ignored and not granted a district postal director at Charlottetown as was done in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia?
Hon. ERNEST BERTRAND (Postmaster General):: I will take this question as a notice.
Inquiries of the Ministry



RATES ON PARCELS TO BRITIAN

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day.:
Mr. D. G. ROSS (St. Paul's):: I should like to ask the Postmaster General a question, of which I have sent him notice. Why is it that a parcel of goods destined for Great Britain, the value of which is $2.09, costs 110.20? How are those charges broken up as between Canada and Great Britain?


Ernest Bertrand: It would be impossible for me to answer the hon. gentleman's question without knowing the contents of the parcel. I might say that on a twenty pound gift parcel, which is the maximum allowed for such a parcel, the rate to England is $2.50, made up as follows: England gets a credit of 51 cents on each of these parcels which the British postal authorities deliver anywhere in England. We have to pay them that 51 cents. The shipping companies charge us $1.50 per two cubic feet, which is about the space of a gift parcel of 20 pounds, takes up. Those two charges amount to $2.01, leaving 49 cents remuneration to the Canadian Post Office for picking up the parcel anywhere in Canada-Vancouver if necessary -and delivering it to the shipping companies. We are losing money on every such parcel.


Douglas Gooderham Ross: If I may ask a supplementary question, I happen to know that this parcel was shipped by air, and the value of the goods was $2.09.


James Horace King: Order. The question
seems to be pretty long, and as I see no urgency in it I would suggest that it be put on the order paper.


Thomas Langton Church: Will the Postmaster General give consideration to allowing these food parcels to be sent to Britain free of postage, the necessary amount to cover the postage to be provided for in an item in the main estimates?


Ernest Bertrand: I am sorry I have to say that the answer is in the negative.



LABOUR CONDITIONS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. A. L. SMITH (Calgary West):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to ask a question of either .the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply or the Minister of Labour. It is this: In connection with the strike in Nova Scotia, in view of the fact that this government has been spending $8,000,000 a year by way of coal subsidies, and in view of the fact that the men say the management is wrong and the management say the men are wrong, will 
the government not consider appointing a board of mining men to go down there and find out who is wrong and what is causing the small production of coal per man in that area?


Hon. HUMPHREY MITCHELL (Minister of Labour):: First of all I want to welcome my hon. friend back to this house. I am glad to see his smiling face once more.


Arthur Leroy Smith: The hon. member for Halifax (Mr. Isnor) welcomed my going away. I am glad the minister welcomes me back.


Humphrey Mitchell: Frankly I do not think it is necessary to accept my hon. friend's suggestion. A royal commission on coal recently handed down a report which covers the situation in a broad and adequate way.


Arthur Leroy Smith: What did they say? Which way are they?


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Read the report.


Arthur Leroy Smith: I have read it, and what have they found on this question, I ask you?


EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Gordon Knapman Fraser: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Secretary of State for External Affairs. Has the Russian government given the Canadian government an official reason why it will not give the wife of George Power, former private secretary to the Canadian Ambassador to Russia, a visa or permission to leave Russia to join her husband?
Right Hon. L. S. ST. LAURENT (Secretary of State for External Affairs):	My
impression is that we have received no official answer. The matter has been under discussion and I will have the file looked into. When I saw it only a few days ago the matter then was still under discussion. There had been no official answer.



EMERGENCY POWERS


[Stage Direction]
'	REGULATIONS
The house resumed from Wednesday, April 16, consideration in committee of Bill No. 104, to provide for the continuation of certain orders and regulations of the governor in council for a limited period during the national

Emergency Powers
emergency arising out of the war-Mr. Ilsley -Mr. Macdonald (Brantford City) in the chair.
On section 1-Short title.
The CHAIRMAN:: When the committee rose last night it was considering clause 1- short title. Shall the clause carry?


Mr. KNOWLES:: Mr. Chairman, just a sentence or two to add to what I was saying yesterday on clause 1, which reads:
This act may be cited as the Continuation of Transitional Measures Act, 1947.
The inference from the title is that the measure before us is one to enable a continuation of certain policies that have been in effect. Our whole quarrel with the government, which we have been trying to state on behalf of the Canadian people, is that they are not continuing for a sufficiently long enough period the policies in relation to the cost of living which the Canadian people want continued.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 2-Orders and regulations continued in force.
William Ross Macdonald: Do I understand that this clause is to stand?


Mr. SINCLAIR (Vancouver North):: In asking that this clause stand, the minister said there might be some amendments after the schedule had been adopted. But on the actual clause itself, aside from any amendments to the schedule, I should like to make a few comments and also to move an amendment in regard to ministerial control over these control powers. I have not wasted any of the time of the house in speaking on controls because the people I represent are completely in favour of the present policy. I have received a large number of communications from both the working people and white collar people that I represent, and without exception they have advocated the continuation of these controls over the essentials of life, therefore I say I am for these controls, but for controls in which there is the essence of parliamentary control.
The member for Kootenay West last week spoke very well in answer to some of the arguments that had been put up by the Progressive Conservative party who had called these controls tyranny and despotism. He said that they could not be considered tyranny or despotism so long as in the end the government had to return to parliament, as the government is doing now, for power to continue the controls. Charges of bureaucracy have been made by the opposition, and civil servants who
have done a difficult job exceedingly well have been loosely slandered by such charges. Some of these men in public office may have got swelled heads and found a little authority too much for them to handle. But in the life of this great dominion do we not find similar characters in every field? You find them here in the House of Commons. For example, we have all seen men who because they happen to be sitting on the front benches opposite think they have the privileges and prerogatives of ministers of the crown. Therefore I see no reason why this whole programme should be scathingly denounced as bureaucracy because of a few failings of officials administering them.
There is, however, I think a great difference between the attitude of the Liberal party to these controls and the attitude of our friends of the C.C.F. party. The charge is made that we are one on this. I think that charge is wrong, because the very essential of controls by this government, as pointed out by the Secretary of State for External Affairs in his apt quotation of Professor Lower, is that there should be in the end parliamentary control and responsibility by the ministers to the people who are sent here to represent them.
I may be wrong in this, and if I am wrong I shall accept immediate correction by the C.C.F. My feeling is that if they were in power they would be quite content to set up these super planning boards and experts of the type of Professor Laski and leave them to do the job remote from any parliamentary control.


Mr. COLD  WELL@: No.


James Sinclair: I am going to accept that correction and I am also going to explain why I made this apparent error. As hon. members know, at times I am labelled as being almost too close to the C.C.F. party. Whenever a member of that party speaks I move down near them so that I can catch every word in order to understand what he is driving at. As British Columbia members know, I am in considerable sympathy with many of their objectives. I do the same thing when any member of the Social Credit party is speaking. Being a keen student I have, however, been bewildered at times by some of the things said by apparently responsible people of the C.C.F. party.
Last week the members of the C.C.F. party in British Columbia held a convention in Vancouver. I read in the Vancouver Sun a
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report of that convention, and I found the following on the front page of the issue of Friday, April 11:
First task of a C.C.F. administration would be the swift removal of the major sources of wealth production from private hands. This was the declaration today of Colin Cameron, provincial president of the C.C.F. in his report prepared for delivery to the party's annual convention in Hotel Vancouver.
"It must be made clear," Mr. Cameron continued, "that our whole programme of social services and economic extension rests on that first bold revolutionary bid."
This is not a misquotation, because it is taken from a prepared report which he turned over to the press beforehand. I understand that.


Major James William Coldwell: Head it all.


James Sinclair: We have heard so much of that in British Columbia; I have heard so much of it that I understand it. Then we heard the excellent speech made in the house yesterday afternoon by the hon. member for Moose Jaw. I heard the excellent speech made here by the hon. member for Swift Current, and how far apart they are from the speech of Mr. Cameron! Yesterday afternoon the hon. member for Swift Current said, as reported at page 2109 of Hansard.
We do believe in private enterprise, and we do not believe in the little private enterpriser being controlled by the freebooting monopoly enterprisers who control and own so much in this country.
The hon. member said: "We do believe in private enterprise", as did the hon. member for Moose Jaw. I also listened to the hon. member for Halifax, and these two speeches by the members for Halifax and Moose Jaw could have been made by the same man. The hon, member for Yorkton charged that all business men were Jesse Jameses, a lovely phrase which he cribbed from the hon. member for Cape Breton South. I could not tell the difference between the speech of the hon. member for Halifax and the hon. member for Moose Jaw, both good business men; for when the member for Moose Jaw spoke to the people of Saskatchewan, according to the Regina Leader-Post, he was for private enterprise. His speech was carried last Friday in the Regina Leader-Post in one column, and slam-bang against it was an account of Colin Cameron's revolutionary speech at Vancouver. If I made a little mistake in listening to everything that hon. members of the C.C.F. party-said about planners they must forgive me for this confusion. Colin Cameron is the provincial president of the C.C.F. party in British

Columbia, and was formerly a member of the legislature. In a kindly way I am going to make a suggestion, because as I listened to the Social Credit party's most excellent suggestion the other night-I sat close to them and I think the members of the Social Credit party will do me the justice of saying that I listened to them-


Stanley Howard Knowles: I rise to a point of order.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Take your medicine.


William Ross Macdonald: Order.


Stanley Howard Knowles: I rise to a point of order. I deliberately waited until the hon. member had finished with the C.C.F., so that he would not say I was interrupting him on that-


James Sinclair: I have not finished. I was going to give good advice to the C.C.F. party.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Chairman, my point of order is this. I have no objection to the hon. member talking about us; we enjoyed it, but yesterday you interrupted me on section 1 because I began to talk about the Progressive Conservatives. We are now on section 2, and I submit it has nothing to do with the matter that the hon. member is discussing.


William Ross Macdonald: Order. Section 2 is a wide one; it refers to all the orders in council; whereas section 1 referred only to the title.


James Sinclair: Thank you very much. This is my first speech on controls. Second, the C.C.F. quickly rose to my bait by saying that I was wrong. I was explaining why I was wrong. I was wrong because I was misinformed by their several attitudes. I wish to say that I hope the attitude they may take in the future will not mislead us who are seekers after truth and who are confused when one responsible man of the C.C.F. party says one thing and another says another thing about the same thing.
A few nights ago the hon. member for Lethbridge was speaking. I was down in that corner trying to find out all I could about the Social Credit philosophy, and at times I find it diificult, although he is a lucid and clear speaker. He was challenged by the hon, member for Cape Breton South; and in return he said: "I challenge any member of the C.CJ'. party or any other party to say whether any responsible members of this group", speaking of his own group, had advocated such and such a course. The hon. member for Cape Breton South wanted to know who were the responsible and who were the irresponsible members of that group so that we would know who are the prophets and teachers of the true

Emergency Powers
gospel, and who were the prophets teaching heresy. I would suggest to the C.C.F. and the Social Credit parties that henceforth in the Parliamentary Guide they put a little asterisk before the names of those who are responsible and who speak with responsibility, and leave the asterisk off those who are irresponsible-


Mr. IRVINE:: May I ask the hon. member
a question?


James Sinclair: Yes.


William Irvine: Would it not take a fairsized revolution to give us free private enterprise in this country?


James Sinclair: The hon. member had best direct his question to the hon. member for Swift Current who is sitting behind him, because he said he believes in it. Let him read it again.


William Irvine: He knows it is not here.


James Sinclair: He says he believes in it. Ask him for a full explanation of it, since he has such a deep and implicit belief in it.


Mr. BENTLEY:: I shall be glad to give it some time.


James Sinclair: However, I turn to the C.C.F. bible, to know whether to believe Colin Cameron, the president of the C.C.F. in British Columbia, or those C.C.F. gentlemen who speak as I do in the house, the hon. member for Swift Current and the hon. member for Moose Jaw. I turn to "Make This Your Canada". There are no asterisks in it; therefore I take it it is responsible so far as the C.C.F. party is concerned. At the end of the Regina manifesto we find the following:
_ No C.C.F. government will rest content until it has eradicated capitalism.
Tie that in with private enterprise and with the speeches made in the House of Commons by the two members to whom I have referred. In the House of Commons, members of the C.C.F. party say they believe in private enterprise. They are in the same class as the hon. member for Stanstead who can vote both ways.
I apologize for being so wrong in misunderstanding the C.C.F. position, but let me get back to section 2 of the bill. I believe positively in parliamentary control, in responsibility of the ministers not only for acts committed in their department but for acts committed by any agency of the crown under them. In the consolidation of the orders in council there are some orders in council which have explicit definitions of the powers and 83166-136
responsibilities of the ministers, those of the Minister of Finance and those of the Minister of Fisheries for example. In other orders in council the powers of the ministers-I put it kindly-are but implicit; and there is no mention at all of the powers of the minister in a few of the orders. I say that somewhere we as a parliament, the court of last resort in this country, must have a man who is responsible for acts by these various boards and bureaux. The fact that it appears in some of the orders in council in the schedule is not sufficient; it should appear right in the bill itself.


Douglas Gooderham Ross: Which bill?


James Sinclair: Bill 104. I have known the hon. member for Lake Centre for a long time. I admire and respect him greatly. He made an impassioned speech yesterday and mentioned the denial of the right of individuals to appeal to the courts of the land against rulings of the various boards. I was swayed by that. I listened to him attentively and I can see why he has made such great success at the bar, because if you put twelve Saskatchewan farmers in the box and let the hon. member for Lake Centre at them he will win his case. The difference between parliament and a jury box is that the next morning we can read Hansard. I read Hansard, and when I read his remarks to the effect that we are tyrants who have removed that last liberty, the right of appeal to the highest court of the land, I thought of some reading that I did last winter with regard to the early days of workmen's compensation in my province. That legislation was introduced by a Liberal government and bitterly opposed by the Tories, especially by lawyers and insurance companies. Oh, the lawyers waxed indignant about that removal from the poor, humble injured working man of the precious right to appeal from a dictatorial workmen's compensation board in respect of unjust awards. How they bled for the workingman 1 Well, workmen's compensation has rolled on all these years, and the workmen of British Columbia have been well protected and have saved many needless legal fees. There is ministerial responsibility to the act because the minister of labour in the provincial legislature is held responsible for any injustice which may have been done by the workmen's compensation board.
The same can be said of the Canadian pension board, again described as a body from which there is no appeal to the courts of the land. But who is the man that must carry the responsibility in this House of Commons, the greatest and highest court of appeal, for seeing that justice is done in all the rulings of

Emergency Powers

the board? Who is that man but the Minister of Veterans Affairs? For that reason I say that we are not denying to those who may feel that they are unfairly dealt with by the boards the right to appeal to the highest court in the land, just so long as it is clearly understood by the people that here in parliament there is one man responsible for each of these boards, one man who must justify before a gathering of his peers the actions of the board.
The second reason concerns the public outlook. There is an old saying-I need hardly repeat it, though it is important-that not only must justice be done but it must be known that justice is done; and certainly if it is known by an amendment written into the bill, known to the people of Canada, that these are not bureaucrats surrounded with absolute power but still servants of the people, that there is still one man, in this house, of the servants of the people, who must answer for the actions of the board, then the people can be assured that justice will be done.
The third reason comes closer perhaps to members of parliament. There is, I will not say a tendency but at least a temptation, for some ministers, when you go to them-not in the House of Commons but in their offices- and protest against actions of boards, to say, "Oh, well, the boards have been set up to run their own affairs, and we cannot do anything". To remove that temptation from ministers I would like to see clearly in the bill an amendment stating that the minister shall not only have control but shall be responsible. With that in mind I therefore move, seconded by the hon. member for Comox-Alberni (Mr. Gibson), the following amendment to section 2, a new subsection 2(1):
Wherever the word minister is used in the schedule to this act, the rights, powers, duties, liabilities and functions of that minister shall extend and apply to such boards, and other public bodies, officers, subjects, services and properties of the crown as may be designated or assigned to the minister by the governor in council over which the minister shall have the control, regulation, management and supervision.
The wording of that, as you will realize, is not my own. It is taken directly from the powers of the minister in the most recent departmental act, that of reconstruction and supply.


Mr. ILSLEY:: I should like to compliment the hon. member on his contribution to the debate and would ask that his suggestion stand for consideration by the officers of my department and by the government. I would

point out that in one of the orders in the schedule at page 23, is found a clause which reads:
In the exercise of its powers conferred by these regulations or otherwise, the board shall be responsible to the minister and, whenever any directions are given by the minister, all action taken by the board shall be in accordance with such directions.
Generally speaking when I was Minister of Finance I tried to see that clauses of that kind were inserted in the orders which set up the boards that operated under my jurisdiction, and I am in accord with the general principle of my hon. friend's observations. I should point out, however, that the language of his amendment may be too sweeping, and it is for that reason that I should like to have the proposal stand. There is a class of organization which should not, I submit, be subject to the direction of the minister and that is any organization which is in the nature of a court. For instance, in some bf these orders courts of rental appeal and the like are set up. These probably should not be subject to the direction of the minister; they should have independent jurisdiction. The same may be true of certain organizations connected with labour relations It may be they should not be subject to interference by the minister. But with regard to organizations of the type of the wartime prices and trade board, it is perfectly proper that they should be subject to direction from the minister, and that probably is recognized by the clause which I have read, which appears in the wartime prices regulations.
With regard to this section, I suggest that at some stage it should be allowed to stand. I do not think the section can be passed, either with or without this amendment, at the present time, but should stand until we get through the schedule, as I explained yesterday. If however hon. members have any suggestions to make as to the proposal itself, this may be as good a time as any to make them. If they are made now it will give the government an opportunity to consider them before we return to the section.


Mr. MacINNIS:: I have no suggestions at the moment with regard to the section, but I do wish to reply to some of the remarks made by the member for Vancouver North (Mr. Sinclair). First may I say that I have admired the independent stand that he has taken in this house on numerous occasions, although perhaps there is a reason for that show of independence. He did not, however, deal fairly in this case with the quotation he gave from the Canadian Press report of Mr. Cameron's speech. He read a sentence and

Emergency Powers
stopped there, whereas the sentence he read was only a part, really only half of what Mr. Cameron said.


James Sinclair: It was the end of a paragraph.


Angus MacInnis: It was not the end of a paragraph either.


James Sinclair: In the Vancouver Sun it was the end of the paragraph.


Angus MacInnis: I have it, and it is the same Canadian Press article.


James Sinclair: Mine was in the Vancouver Sun, Friday, April 11, front page, not by the Canadian Press but by the Vancouver Sun, and the remarks ended at the end of the paragraph. I am not here to read the entire speech. A paragraph is one coherent thought.


An hon. MEMBER:: Whose paragraph?


James Sinclair: The paragraph in the press release that was given by Mr. Cameron.


Angus MacInnis: The Vancouver Sun is not above distorting news any more than any other capitalist paper in Canada.


James Sinclair: The old cry of the C.C.F., "We were misquoted".


Angus MacInnis: It is not a misquotation, but the hon. gentlemen did not finish the quotation. Let me read it.


James Sinclair: Give us the whole speech.


Angus MacInnis: Yes. I will give you what is in the press, and I will not stop just where you stopped for your own convenience to make your own case.


Mr. TUCKER:: What paper is it?


Angus MacInnis: The Leader-Post, Regina, Saskatchewan, April 12, 1947-a good Liberal paper.


Walter Adam Tucker: It is a good paper.


Angus MacInnis: It is a good paper of the kind.


Arthur Leroy Smith: Who said so?


Angus MacInnis: Let me quote it.
"Our whole programme of social services and economic extension rests on that first bold revolutionary bid," he said. "If we present effectively the case for sane and intelligent revolutionary progress through use of democratic procedure and institutions, we can hope in Can-83166- 136i
ada to lay foundations of that free classless society which is the goal of all socialist aspirations.
Through our democratic institutions. The C.C.F. has never at any time gone beyond the use of democratic institutions, or as is the phrase they use in Great Britain, revolution by consent. If there is confusion in C.C.F. speeches, the same confusion results from listening to speeches from the other side of the house. For instance, the Minister of Justice in presenting this bill made the statement that the policy of the government was to get back as quickly as possible to a free economy. The Minister of Reconstruction and Supply said that the policy of -the government was to get back as quickly as possible to a free economy. But let us get the opinion of the hon. member for Spadina (Mr. Croll) on a free economy. He does not think a great deal of a free economy; indeed he does not think it is anything worth while getting back to.


James Sinclair: He is not a minister.


Angus MacInnis: Perhaps the reason he is not a minister is that he holds these ideas. The reason that the hon. member for Vancouver North (Mr. Sinclair) is not closer to the ministerial seats is because he holds similar ideas. The front benches are not very keen on ideas.
On page 2056 of Hansard we find the hon.
member for Spadina saying:
During the war the government used successfully the device of controls to divert the tremendous output of industry to the interests of the state-which at that time was the fullest prosecution of the war. Now in these critical and emergent years of peace we must take the same forces and use them, but not, as some political thinkers would suggest, to bring industry back to normal.
The political thinkers he possibly had in mind were the Minister of Justice and the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply, who wish to get back as quickly as possible to a free economy. The hon. member for Spadina continues:
To my mind that is a label only, and one which hides a _ multitude of iniquities. As we saw in the thirties, in the titanic struggle of economic forces, the small man was crushed.
That is, under a free economy in Canada prior to the war the small man was crushed.


An hon. MEMBER:: Oh, oh.


Angus MacInnis: All right; I am quoting the hon. member for Spadina.
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James Sinclair: We do not know whether they are your words or his.


An hon. MEMBER:: The lawyers would starve to death.


Angus MacInnis: No lawyer will ever starve to death under capitalism. There are too many crooks to defend. The hon. member for Spadina said further:
After all, it is not the function of either the landlord or the millowner to run his business for the benefit of the public. The true function, as they see it, is to produce profits; and it would be naive for us to assume otherwise, or to ask them to run their business in an altruistic manner. The good business man is not operating for the sake of charity; and if scarcity presents him with an opportunity, he takes advantage of it.
That is the system under which we are living, where the need of one individual is used to the advantage of another. That is what the C.C.F. wants to get away from.
Then on page 2057 the hon. member for Spadina has this to say-and I should like to know how many on that side of the house agree with him. I should like to see the hon. member for Vancouver North get up and take issue with him in this matter. I quote:
Many of these people reason that Hitler and Mussolini imposed a controlled economy on their countries and that all kinds of evils followed as a natural result-loss of liberty, persecution, regimentation, mass murder and war. They are convinced that if we hold on to the few controls that remain we shall be selling the freedom of this country down the river-quite overlooking the fact that Britain, probably the most largely controlled English speaking country in the world today, is also the one in which the flame of freedom burns the brightest. Only persons who have little faith in democracy should live in fear of democratic controls. People have come to take for granted the exercise of economic controls which prior to the war they would have called totalitarian. We must not forget that the little people of this country do not merely accept controls; they actually want them, and they do not want to go back to the days of false booms and real depressions.


James Sinclair: I will answer. The hon. member invited my comments.


Angus MacInnis: No, I did not invite them but I have no objection to the hon. member making them at the proper time.


An hon. MEMBER:: Oh, let us get on with the work.


Angus MacInnis: Let my hon. friends be fair in this matter. Yesterday when the discussion began, the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) started a discussion something like this on section 1, but was ruled out of order by the Chairman. I am not now

disagreeing with the Chairman's ruling, but my impression was that if there was any section in the bill on which there could be general discussion, it was on section 1, the title. But this section deals with this specific point, and the hon. member for Vancouver North was allowed to proceed. My hon. friends did not object. They were enjoying it very much.


An hon. MEMBER:: Because he moved an amendment.


Angus MacInnis: I know the hon. member moved an amendment, but what he said in moving the amendment was not related to what he said in the first part of his speech.


James Sinclair: The hon. member's party were very kind to me. They said "explain", and I explained.


Angus MacInnis: No, the party did not say anything of the kind. The purpose was to create a false impression of what was said by a member of the C.C.F., and we are not going to allow the hon. member to get away with that sort of thing.


William Ross Macdonald: Order. I might say to the hon. member for Vancouver East that I was asked for a ruling with regard to section 2. I made a ruling that in my opinion it allowed very wide latitude-it deals with all the orders in council-and I did not see how I could rule the hon. member out of order. I thought I was right and still think I was right.


Thomas Langton Church: I rise to speak on section 2. I have not taken up much time in connection with this bill, and I speak now because I must be at a meeting of the committee on railways at four o'clock.
I wish to refer to two or three principles in connection with controls. I wish to speak about three items which, if continued in new form will afford no relief so far as I see. The other day I referred to what has been done in the United States regarding production. That was the key to the solution of control and decontrol in that great country. Sooner or later we in Canada would have to follow suit, in view of the fact that our economy is closely interlocked with that of the United States. In the United States figures show that they are now having their greatest volume of production in all their history of all classes of goods. The result has been that that production has had a great deal to do with maintaining and aiding consumer goods business, and in some instances in lowering prices. This has been the effect, either directly or indirectly, of their decontrol policy.

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This whole matter gets back very largely to the law of supply and demand, the principle which applied long before the war and which made the United States the great country it is. In some respects let me say that the public holds relief in this respect in its own hands. It need not buy manufactured goods offered in the stores at higher prices if it does not want to. That is shown in the large departmental stores throughout the country today. Clothing for men and women is being offered at fabulous prices-and in this I include men's ties, shirts and all sorts of things. The same applies to women's clothes. Some of these articles will not be bought at higher prices, and in many instances the result has been that the goods have remained on the counters, with few if any people buying them.
The Minister of Finance dealt with two or three controls the other day. I believe some reference was made by him to re-control where necessary. It was pointed out by me that in the coming winter it may be necessary to give some relief in order to make fuel available. This winter we still have snow in April, and when the warmer weather does come we shall have had about nine months of winter weather, when some fuel must be provided. The minister said that they might find it necessary to reestablish, if urgent and necessary, some forms of control.
Then I think something further should be done in connection with milk, because any neglect in this respect might have a severe effect on the health of our younger population. I should hope that next winter the minister might see fit to reestablish some system of a moderate milk subsidy for the winter months at least.
In connection with section 2 of the bill I should like to see some amendment in respect of the orders and regulations affecting houses. The present system of controls has retarded the building of houses, so that no one now wants to invest in real estate. In the city from which I come, sixty-five per cent of the people used to own their own homes. Many have lost them to the mortgagees. Some of the owners have had undesirable tenants under this system of controls, tenants who have misused the properties and left them in such a rack and ruin state that insurance companies would not pay a dollar in the event of fire. I know of one instance where the mortgagee wanted to foreclose. He asked for a further payment of principal because of the way undesirable tenants ruined his investment.
I do not favour a form of control under which an owner cannot get into his own house, even after years of waiting; it is nothing
but state confiscation. Where the tenant had no lease he could be put out. The rental regulations are ridiculous and have worked great hardships on returned soldiers who have not been able to get into their own houses on which they had spent their gratuities and credits.
I suggest that the minister should have some form of federal inspection. I know that in my city the offices are filled with rental administrators. They have had to move to a larger building at 32 Adelaide street. It may be that only five or ten per cent of these undesirable cases would require further investigation by federal authority. Why could not a check be made on undesirable tenants so that the landlord would have a little encouragement and a chance to put them out, and would be prepared to invest more money in real estate?
How can this be administered from Ottawa? I say it should be turned over to the provinces and municipalities for rent control regulation, if necessary. The municipalities regulate the building of houses and have control of fire and building by-laws. Why should the dominion attempt to operate a system like this, away down here in Otta-wa, and discourage the building of houses for all time to come?
I do urge upon the government that some further regulation be applied to housing along the lines I have suggested, and that they be made to apply to those undesirable tenants who came in, destroyed property, ruined it to the point where it has to be rebuilt from the ground up by a landlord who may lose it. Why should this be allowed? It is nothing but confiscation.
As I have said, only five or ten per cent of the tenants could be considered as undesirable. Inspection could be made of them under civic by-law. If the federal power cannot do it, then let the property inspector, the building inspector or the fire chief visit these places and take note of the inflammable material which has been collected.
Why should not the municipal and city police continue this process of housing control, if there is to be any control? It would be far better to put an end to control altogether, and apply the system I have suggested.


William Irvine: I want to be sure I am
in order, and so I refer to the section under discussion; it is section 2, having to do with orders and regulations continued in force.
I rise to make a few brief comments, and to make reference to the speech of the hon. member for Vancouver North (Mr. Sinclair). I know he has been well answered already, but there are one or two further comments
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in that connection which I feel ought to be made. The hon. member began by referring to the view expressed by some that there was no difference between the C.C.F. and the Liberal party in the matter of controls. But he proceeded to dissociate himself from that idea, and to show that there is a difference. He said his understanding was that the C.C.F. party would deliberately appoint bodies to take charge of public functions, which bodies would have no contact with governmental control through representation in parliament.
Of course the hon. member knew we would deny that immediately. Then he proceeded to quote. In the first place, let me say to him he may find there are many people in the ranks of the C.C.F. who are no more proud of being associated with the Liberal party than he is of being associated with us. I would point out further to him that the quotation he made had nothing whatever to do with the principle of control. Neither of the gentlemen he quoted was making any reference to controls or to the appointment of bodies to carry out certain important functions, or to the mechanism by which democratic control might be mainatined. Neither was discussing that.
I suggest the reason for the first quotation, that from the presidential address of Mr. Cameron in Vancouver, was that Mr. Cameron had used the word "revolution." That is the reason it was used.
I believe that perhaps the best thing any man or woman in the house can contribute to the public life of Canada is a point of view, whether that point of view be individually expressed or be expressed as the view of an organized body. Because I believe that I do not desire to have the views I hold either misrepresented or distorted. I want my views to be considered for what they are and not have somebody's distortion of them.
The word "revolution" is a perfectly good word and I do not propose to give it up just because somebody misinterprets it. If it stands for blood and horror to my hon. friends on the government side of the house or in any part of the house, then they do not understand their English, that is all. If I had the time I could give the committee numerous examples of revolutionaries in art, science, religion and, in fact, in every walk of human life. I could show how Watt himself, the man who discovered the power which originated the industrial revolution, was a revolutionist in industry. There have been revolutionists in music and in art. Jesus Christ was a revolutionist in religion and of course they crucified him. I

have no doubt that the Liberal party would crucify him today if he came back, and maybe a lot on this side would help them.
Revolution means a fundamental change in human 'affairs, and that is all it means. We happen to stand for revolution by the consent of the people through our democratic institutions.


An hon. MEMBER:: You will never get it.


William Irvine: My hon. friend says we will never get it. He is a real revolutionist of the bloody sort, but I am revolutionist of the democratic kind. If we do not get it in that way, I do not want it and lam not interested in it. I am interested in the revolution that is brought iabout witih the consent of the Canadian people at the ballot box and without any of the misrepresentation that we had this afternoon.
There is no contradiction between the man who believes in free private enterprise and the man who believes in the necessity for a great revolutionary change in this country's way of doing business and in this country's way of life. As I suggested in my question to my hon. friend a moment ago, there could be no greater revolution possible in this country than the one that would leave every individual free to express his own being and his own personality and to do the kind of work he wants to do and to make his contribution to society. That would be revolution. There are few individuals that have any such freedom today.
To believe in that is to have a very idealistic concept indeed. As the hon. member for Swift Current said, an ideal of that sort is pretty much like the ideal of those who hope to get to heaven. It' is an ideal but it is far from being the fact in Canadian life today. So thus goes the argument of my hon. friend. I do not know why he brought' it up. He may have had some idea in his own mind. I do not think he inteded to misrepresent the viewpoint of this group, but I conclude by saying: Let those in this house oppose the C.C.F. all they want to, provided that they oppose us for what we really are, for what we stand for. I resent being opposed because of something in which I never believed or advocated.


James Lorimer Ilsley: May I suggest that the section stand and that we go on to another section.


Douglas Gooderham Ross: I have something to say.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Louder.

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Douglas Gooderham Ross: I will speak a little louder. After listening to the hon. member for Vancouver North, I begin to wonder why he is not sitting on the front benches. I have a few notes here somewhere and I will try to find them.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Carried.


Douglas Gooderham Ross: That is all right, I will get them in a minute. From the way the hon. member for Vancouver North talked I thought he would probably be in the cabinet tomorrow. I am not so sure that he would not be a better man in the cabinet than a whole lot of our friends who are sitting on the front benches over there right now.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Start anywhere.


Douglas Gooderham Ross: You are going to get something in a minute that is worth while. This government is not so good that it can laugh a't everything. I think a lot of the fellows over there really do not know where they are going. There are a lot of others on that side, on the back benches, who have more in them than those on the front benches, and there are a lot on this side who have more in them than those who are on the front benches.
I asked for a return last year giving the number of people in the employ of the government of Canada. That is very important, is it not?-the people who are in our employ. I just want to tell those fellows who are sitting on the government benches that there are too many people trying to look after too few in this country right now. You just cannot get away from that. We have to get down to brass tacks; and I am going to give a few figures.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh. oh.


Douglas Gooderham Ross: You fellows over there can laugh if you want to. A member of the cabinet the other day referred to the amount of income tax he had to pay. Let us get down to something here; let us get busy and get something done. Let us have on the front benches more fellows like that bright young boy in the back seat over there, who is not as incompetent and inept as many of the leading lights on the front benches, who are probably there for political purposes and for nothing else. I have some good friends-


William Ross Macdonald: Order.


Douglas Gooderham Ross: Why?


William Ross Macdonald: I ruled that we would allow wide latitude in the discussion of section 2, but it must be discussion with respect
to the bill under consideration and with respect to the orders in council which are set forth in the schedule. I do not think it allows discussion of the income tax or some other legislation.


Douglas Gooderham Ross: I bow to your ruling and I will keep as close as I can to the text of my sermon. A lot of people have talked about this bill as being the bill of fifty-seven varieties, copying Heinz. It is not that at all; it is Canada's greatest fruit salad. Without exception, it is the silliest, the most foolish bill that has ever been brought into this House of Commons. If you want me to quote my authority, it is my friend the hon. member for Quebec South (Mr. Power). If anybody knows anything about bills, he does.
I have a few figures to put on Hansard, and I think they will surprise hon. members. I wonder if each individual minister would like to know the increased numbers on the payroll of bis department today. I have a return here showing what a great increase there has been in the number of government employees, and while on the subject of returns I put this to the committee:	Can we get a
return that is reliable brought down in this House of Commons? This affects the whole people of Canada and it affects everything that is in this bill. I had a return brought down last year to show the number of people in the employ of Canada and how much we are paying them; and what do you think, Mr. Chairman? - four departments, employing 8,600 people, were left out of that return! On March 31, 1946, we had in round figures 155,000 persons in the employ of the government of Canada. The return was short by about 7,000 employees, but what is 7,000 or 10,000 to an administration so incompetent and inept as I see sitting in front of me at the present time? It makes no difference to them at all. But I am Scotch and a lot of other fellows in this country are Scotch and they like to bite a nickel a couple of times before they spend it.
On March 31, 1946, we had 155,000 employees of the Dominion of Canada. On December 31, 1946, we had 174,000 employees, and instead of paying them $229,000,000 a year, as we did in 1946, we paid them $317,544,045.85-and don't forget the cents. I am bringing this up because I believe there are many people on the other side of the house with more brains than those sitting on the front benches.
So far as these controls are concerned this consolidation, Canada's fruit salad-for that is what it is-is all nonsense. Of course there has to be a certain measure of proper control. But why was not this consolidation printed
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in French for the benefit of the French members? I should be very sore if I spoke good French and a copy of it were not available in French. How can the government expect to keep down the cost of living when it increases the number of its employees to the point where we are now paying them 8317,000,000 a year? It is the same old story; the higher she rises the harder she falls.


James Lorimer Ilsley: Mr. Chairman, may I suggest again that this section stand. It is necessary that it stand anyway until we finish the schedule. I do not think we shall make very much progress if we make general speeches in perpetuity on this section.


Mr. FULTON:: If the section is to stand, may I suggest that we be allowed to consider the schedule before we consider the other sections of the bill?


James Lorimer Ilsley: Why?


Edmund Davie Fulton: Because there may be comments on other sections which would be influenced by the schedule. In any event it would assist us. There are amendments to make to the schedule. Many members have amendments to suggest, and if we knew where we stood with regard to the schedule it might speed up discussion on the remaining sections of the bill.


James Lorimer Ilsley: If that is the wish of the committee it is satisfactory to me. I thought we should go through the other sections first, but if anyone thinks there is any advantage in dealing with the schedule first, perhaps they should express themselves.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Any of us who have done any preparation had in mind that we would be proceeding with the other sections first before dealing with the schedule, as the minister indicated last night.


James Lorimer Ilsley: That is right. I stated explicitly last night the order which would be followed, that we would take section 1, let section 2 stand, and then take sections 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8. I think we might as well do it in that way.


Mr. FLEMING:: Would the minister not consider the suggestion put forward by the hon. member for Kamloops? It is true that the schedule is more directly related to section 2 than to the later sections, but in these later sections there are provisions which may require amendment in the light of amendments that may be made to the schedule. I would urge on the minister that the reasons why it

is more convenient to consider the schedule before dealing finally with section 2 apply in greater or less degree to the other sections. I think we would have a more orderly consideration of the whole measure if the minister would permit the committee to proceed with the schedule next, because what is done with respect to that will affect not only section 2 but the other provisions of the bill.


James Lorimer Ilsley: It is a matter of indifference to me. I am prepared to meet the wishes of the committee. I do not know just what my hon. friend has in mind though. I do not see any way in which the other sections would be affected by what is done with the schedule itself. I can see how section 2 would be. I would really prefer to take it up in the order announced. Perhaps the only member who objects to what the hon. member for Kamloops suggests is the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre.


Stanley Howard Knowles: I am also making objection on behalf of other members who are not here but are attending committees at this moment. It was specifically stated last night that we would consider the other sections before the schedule. Many members who are interested in the first orders in the schedule are not able to be here at this time. I would be in the position of having to ask for certain orders to stand for their convenience.


James Lorimer Ilsley: I think we had better take the sections. There has been no suggestion as to how they could be affected by any changes in the order.


Edmund Davie Fulton: I can give the minister one now. Section 7 provides that the act shall expire on the 31st day of December, 1947. I am not going to anticipate it, but some of us have misgivings as to whether some of them should not expire sooner. We may be suggesting an amendment to this section if these orders in council are to remain in their present form in the schedule. If they are amended a great deal or perhaps dropped in the schedule that question will not arise. Therefore it would be a much more orderly method of procedure to consider first whether we shall-


James Lorimer Ilsley: If there is application to let section 7 stand let us take it up when we come to it. Let us deal with section 3 now.


William Ross Macdonald: Section 2 and the amendment stands.
Section stands.

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On section 3-Employment of necessary persons.


Donald Methuen Fleming: On section 3, with respect, it seems to me that the time has arrived when some steps should be taken to have the civil service commission deal with the employees and staffs of the various boards operating under the authority of the orders enumerated in the schedule. Although there has previously been some discussion on some phases of this matter, there has been no comprehensive statement of the reason why it has been necessary over a lengthy period of time, in some cases going back to 1939 and in other cases to 1941, to have a body of employees outside the scope of the civil service commission in their manner of appointment, in their remuneration and in other provisions which are dealt with on a different basis from that of the civil service. I do not know what the minister is going to say with respect to the temporary features of the bill, but it seems to me that, if some demobilization is in contemplation with respect to the staffs, the time has come when a statement should be made by the ministry as to its intention with respect to the continuation outside the scope of the civil service of staffs of government boards.


James Lorimer Ilsley: The staffs of these boards were selected by the boards themselves, subject to the approval of the governor in council, because that seemed the only way in which they could be staffed. I remember the fall of 1941 when price ceilings were imposed and when it was thought it might be necessary to staff the wartime prices and trade board with some thousands of employees. About that time Mr. Gordon was appointed chairman of the board; he surrounded himself with some trusted associates, and they in turn got together a staff for the board as best they could. They had to move with great rapidity; they had to be in a position to give assurance to the people whom they took on. Many of these were taken on without remuneration, some of them with remuneration and so on. If the selection of these officials had been made by the civil service commission it would have been found that the rules established for the manning of the permanent service of Canada would have been entirely inappropriate. Therefore, after careful discussion, it was decided that the only practicable way of dealing with the matter was by authorizing the appointment of officials and staffs by the board itself, sublet to the approval of the governor in
council. The same thing was done in several other departments. I am satisfied that that wag the proper method to pursue.
At the present time, to try to bring the remaining employees of the wartime prices and trade board under the civil service commission, to have them selected by the civil service commission, appointed pursuant to the provisions of the Civil Service Act, would, in my opinion, be a most unwise thing to do. There would be a great deal of wasted effort, a great deal of confusion, and all unnecessary because it is anticipated that the staff of an organization such as the wartime prices and trade board will from now on be diminishing; perhaps in a few months from now it will be diminishing fairly rapidly. The system under which we are now operating should be allowed to run its course instead of a new system being instituted at this time in a late stage of the board's existence. The same question came up with regard to employees of the wheat board where the same arguments did not apply, but I think the house was convinced after a while that it was desirable that the employees of the wheat board be selected in accordance with the present system instead of by the civil service commission. But there is a much stronger reason why they should be continued under the present system in the case of the wartime prices and trade board and similar organizations, and it is this: these organizations before too long will be passing out of existence.


Mr. BROOKS:: Does the minister expect that there will be an additional large number of employees taken on?


James Lorimer Ilsley: There is some turnover. Some go and some are taken on to replace those who leave, but there has been considerable reduction in the number of employees of the wartime prices and trade board.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: Is there any soldiers
preference at the present time in taking on new employees?


James Lorimer Ilsley: The rules of the soldiers preference are observed. Whether there is any law under which they have to be observed I do not know.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 4-Orders and regulations may be revoked.
Stanley Howard Knowles: This section reads:
The governor in council may revoke in whole or in part any order or regulation continued in force by or mads under this act.



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There is no doubt that this provision is necessary in certain instances. It will be required particularly where orders in council continued by this "bill are, in turn, replaced by legislation. In such a circumstance it will be necessary to revoke the existing orders m council; and there may be other instances where power such as this would also be necessary. But I rise to attempt once again to do what the minister referred to last night, namely, to try in some way to persuade the government that the country would like the administration to put the brakes on its programme of decontrol, particularly with respect to prices. That case has been made effectively by a number of hon. members who have spoken. Particular reference has already been made to the remarks made the other day by the hon. member for Spadina. I feel strongly that the government should pay attention to what the people across the country are thinking in connection with this matter.
I recognize that there is a difference of philosophy and point of view between us and the government with respect to the long-range question but may I for the moment argue on the basis of the government's own terms? I have in mind certain promises that were made in the speech from the throne in the first session after the war was over, namely, that price control would be kept in effect as long as it was necessary, and also the remarks made by the Minister of Reconstruction and Supply in the white paper which he tabled in the spring of 1945 before the war was over, when he made it clear that the most difficult period would be after the war was over; that it was during that period that controls on our economy needed to be maintained in order to effect, a proper transition from war to peace.
I am arguing now not on our basis but on the government's own terms, and my contention is that on the basis of their own premises, and even accepting their idea that in due course they have to get out of this field, nevertheless they have gone too fast. I would suggest that, if the government is able to ignore some of the things we are saying on this side, it ought to pay attention to the hon. member for Spadina and the round dozen Liberals who have been referred to as supporting the viewpoint he has expressed. As an attempt to let the government know of the desire of the country for the brakes to be put on its too rapid decontrol, I will move an amendment and then say a few words about it. I move:
That section 4 be amended by adding thereto the following words:
"Provided, however, that none of the orders listed in the schedule to this act under the section headed wartime prices and trade board may be revoked without the consent of parliament."
I would point out immediately to the member for Vancouver North, who seems to find amusement in this-


James Sinclair: I am getting no amusement at all out of it. It is a serious matter.


Stanley Howard Knowles: I am glad to hear my hon. friend make that comment and I hope he will support the amendment. May I point out that it does not refer to board orders and regulations made by the wartime prices and trade board and associated boards; it refers only to the actual orders in council listed in the schedule that is appended to the bill. There are about nine of them, I believe, under the general heading "wartime prices and trade board," and the effect of this amendment would be to deny the government the power, without getting the consent of parliament, to toss the wartime prices and trade board completely out of existence. My fear is that that is what is likely to happen before many months.
The other day the Minister of Finance, in reply to remarks made by the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar, made the suggestion that if industrialists -were not wise in this matter of prices the government might have to consider the reimposition of certain price controls. I suggest that if the process of gradually getting rid of the wartime prices and trade board continues much longer the government will not be in a position to reimpose any price controls. They will not have the staff.
I realize that even if this amendment carries, and even if by the terms of the amendment the government is prohibited from revoking certain orders in council altogether, they can still whittle them away, and the board itself can whittle away price controls under board orders and regulations. But at least it would indicate to the government the feeling of a section of the house at any rate- and I hope we have that round dozen of Liberals with us-the desire that they go a little more slowly in the matter of price decontrol.
That is my reason for moving this amendment, and I submit that those in the house who have had so much to say about keeping control over these matters in the hands of parliament will also want to support the
CMr. Knowles.]

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amendment because of its insistence that in this respect the government shall not act without the consent of parliament.


The DEPUTY CHAIRMAN:: Is the committee ready for the question?


James Lorimer Ilsley: I suppose, Mr. Chairman, the hon. member means the orders and regulations of the governor in council. His remarks indicated that was what he meant.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Precisely, because, if I may call the attention of the minister once more to the wording of the amendment, it is "none of the orders listed in the schedule to this act under the section headed wartime prices and trade board." That makes it quite clearly refer to orders in council 8528, 9029, 9870, 7475, 5518, 6497, 34/4433. 3122 and 328.


James Lorimer Ilsley: 
Mr. NICHOLSON:: Supporting the amendment moved by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre, may I say that during the Easter recess the people in my constituency *who spoke to me were greatly concerned about the rising cost of living and the possibility of finding themselves with their dollar buying a great deal less as the months go by. Again and again people said to me, "Why is it that, now that the war is over and our people are home, we have to accept a situation where we have less milk, less butter, less foodstuffs?" Unless the minister and the government give some guarantee that the wartime prices and trade board will continue for at least another year, there will be no way of preventing the cost of living from rising a good deal higher. People are naturally concerned when, after parliament takes a recess, those wTho live in rented quarters find that their rents have gone up without members of parliament having had an opportunity to have all the evidence placed before them. We were asked by our people, "Are the landlords in the position where they face bankruptcy unless they have such increases?" 83166-1371
We have to say frankly that the matter has not had full and frank discussion in parliament. I think the amendment moved by my deskmate places the matter in the hands of parliament. If an emergency should arise later in the year and the administration felt that our reconversion programme was being handicapped because of the operations of the wartime prices and trade board, it would be an easy matter to call parliament together, outline the problem and ask for permission to do, through parliament, what it is proposed to do by order in council. I feel that those on this side of the house who have spoken about the supremacy of parliament will want to support this amendment, and that would give a great deal of confidence to the people, who have no way of protecting themselves as their dollar buys less from day to day and week to week.


Angus MacInnis: I cannot see the difficulty envisioned by the Minister of Justice in this matter. The amendment provides that the orders in council under the heading "wartime prices and trade board" shall not be revoked except by parliament. The purpose of these orders in council was to provide that prices should not rise beyond a certain level or get out of hand. If there is no pressure for the raising of prices, no emergency can exist and the orders themselves provide for keeping prices stable. Therefore I cannot see that the minister, if he accepts this amendment, is accepting anything which might result in a dangerous situation. It is perfectly democratic. The leader of this government has told this house time without number, that parliament will decide. We are merely asking that, in this important matter which affects the lives of so many of the people of Canada, parliament should decide.


William Henry Golding: Is the committee ready for the question?


Stanley Howard Knowles: May I ask the minister one other question which, I admit, may be fairly pointed; but, after all, we are supposed to get down to brass tacks in this chamber. The minister said that he understood the amendment and recognized it as desirable from my point of view. I appreciate the interest he shows and the attention he pays to some of the efforts that we make. Does he not also realize that it is desirable, from the viewpoint of the majority of the Canadian people, at the present time to continue the policy of pr>ce control at least for a longer period than seems to be envisioned by the government? Is he not aware, for example, of the Gallup poll on this matter and of the concern of housewives, consumers, workers, farmers,
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pensioners and others across the country, that the excellent job the government did during the war years be continued for a further period?


James Lorimer Ilsley: I think the public does not want to see prices go up. I agree with that. I myself do not want to see prices go up. I must say when I hear some of the speeches warning against the rapidity of decontrol-


Stanley Howard Knowles: Headlong decontrol is the phrase.


James Lorimer Ilsley: Well, against headlong decontrol, I can understand clearly that type of speech. After all, for a great many years I threw myself into trying to keep prices from going up, and I naturally look at that side of it. On the other hand, it must be borne in mind that it becomes more difficult every day to keep in force an effective price control system. I am not talking now about the constitutional objections, but the time will come some time when it will not be within the power of this parliament or any agency of this parliament-that is, the constitutional power-to control prices, because we shall be in the field of property and civil rights, in which field we do not belong.


Angus MacInnis: If we have the constitutional right for controls now to pass this bill, the constitutional validity shall maintain as long as the act remains. Is that not correct?


Paul Joseph James Martin: Not necessarily.


Angus MacInnis: Oh, yes.


James Lorimer Ilsley: As long as the emergency arising out of the war exists.


Paul Joseph James Martin: That is it.


James Lorimer Ilsley: I should think there might come a time when an order in council under this act would not be valid.


Angus MacInnis: We are assuming that it will be valid for the period mentioned in this act.


James Lorimer Ilsley: I think so.


Angus MacInnis: That is all the time
covered by this amendment. If it is valid now and during the life of this act, it will be valid as long as this amendment remains in effect.


James Lorimer Ilsley: I went off on a tangent. It was an aside. I said I was not then talking about constitutional validity, and then I proceeded to talk about it, foolishly. What I was saying was that it becomes harder and harder every day to maintain an effective price control system in Canada. I want my hon.

friends in the C.C.F. to understand that. Some of them have not had executive or business experience. I do not say this unkindly at all, but some of them have not had that experience. The thing here is that a high type of executive experience and ability is required to operate a price control system. We had a great many able people on the staff of the wartime prices and trade board during the war years. Now a great number of those people have gone home. It must be borne in mind that they are pounded by the opposition every day in this house for being bureaucrats, and so on.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Do not pay any attention to that.


James Lorimer Ilsley: They are subjected to that tirade of abuse in this house. Many people do not enjoy that. They get tired of it after a while; they say, "Why should I have to take that sort of thing?" and they go home. They also feel that the war emergency is passing and that they must go back and make provision for their own futures. For one reason and another we are losing and keep losing our good men all the time. That makes it very difficult to do these things. If you have a badly enforced price control system; if you have a system that you simply cannot enforce because the patriotic urge of the people is not as great as it was, because the selfishness of a good many people is a little more assertive than it is in time of war, there comes a time when it is better to have no control at all, apart altogether from the constitutional objection. Then of course, as conditions of supply and demand change, as scarcities disappear, it may be apparent that prices will move to higher levels and stay there for quite a while, if not indefinitely. Then a stage is arrived at when the dominion government should get out of price control. It may possibly be that w^e are decontrolling too rapidly. The Progressive Conservatives accuse us of decontrolling too slowly and urge us to be more rapid about it. The C.C.F. say that we are decontrolling too rapidly and that we should be slower about it. We are in a difficult position. Of course we cannot suit opposition parties. There is no use in trying to do that. We should be foolish to try it. We are taking a middle course, what we think is the sensible course; and we can discount quite a lot of what is said by opposition parties, I suppose, as being said for political purposes. Nevertheless, I think the original idea of this bill was the correct one, and that was to maintain the power to control in the agencies that are set up, and to continue it for a time and to leave it with the government to revoke these orders when the time comes

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that they think these orders should be revoked. It would alter our plans very much if we froze a control system on the country for a year; and I do not think we should do so at the present time.


Mr. BURTON:: I do not rise to take issue with the Minister of Justice as to the constitutionality of the procedure, 'because I realize I am not learned in that respect. I believe, however, that the remarks made by my colleague, the hon. member for Vancouver East, have covered the subject fully. He has pointed out that if it is constitutional for us to have these controls at the present time, then surely under the measure before us it would be all right to have them for the remainder of the year or until parliament is called to attend another session.
Nor do I rise at this time to take part in the debate in answer to the remark of the right hon. gentleman to the effect that some of us in this group do not have the so-called necessary business experience properly to realize what is involved. I would say to him, however, that while some of us may not have had the opportunity to sit in control of big business, nevertheless we have all had the experience of running our own business. And let me say that if we had not paid more attention to the running of our own business than have some people I know of, then we would not have got very far with it.


James Lorimer Ilsley: With regard to my reference to business experience, I never ran a business, myself; and I do not think I am reflecting adversely on any person when I say he has not had business experience. Indeed I believe some of the best people in the country are those who have not had business experience. But what I have said is that one requires business experience in this kind of thing, and a lot of it.


Joseph William Burton: Possibly on this occasion the right hon. gentleman and I are on an equal footing. The right hon. gentleman need not take a back seat to anyone, when it comes to a matter of applying common sense. I believe that during wartime, while he was in charge of an important department of government, he rendered a distinct service to the nation. Yet he did not have what some people would call the necessary business experience.
However, as I said, I did not rise to give advice which some people believe can come properly only from certain people. But I would say to the right hon. gentleman that when at times we speak emphatically, we are endeavouring to convey to him and to his colleagues the voice of the people back home,
and we believe that is something which requires more attention than it sometimes receives. When the right hon. gentleman suggested that during the course of debate some may at times be influenced by political reasons, let me point out to him that in this instance, if he does not heed with alarm the voice of the people with respect to the situation which is developing-and not gradually; but rapidly-in this country, then there will be more people who will have to pay attention to their political fences. Otherwise it will be bad for them. And let me say it will not happen to those in this part of the house. In my view this question has split right across party lines of every party in the house, with the exception of the C.C.E. This group has consistently pointed out to the government that the people are alarmed by the development of this situation.
However, when I rose it was my intention to state to the minister that I have been amazed to note his hesitancy-and I could have used a stronger word-in connection with the amendment offered, and to note that without very much consideration he was not prepared to accept the amendment offered by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre. As was pointed out by the hon. member, the adoption of the amendment would not prevent the wartime prices and trade board from easing off or, as he put it, from chiseling off some of the controls. Nevertheless the people of the country would be assured that the entire system of controls would not be done away with at least until parliament had been consulted in another session.
The minister appears before the committee with a bill which has within it more than fifty orders in council which, as he has said-and we all know-were in operation during past years. He says the time has now come when he wishes no longer to carry on these rules and regulations by orders in council, but wants to do it by statutory means.
I submit to him that the parliament which puts the stamp of approval on the bill should be the only body properly qualified to take that stamp of approval away. 1 submit that the amendment is a perfectly good one and is worthy of the minister's consideration, on that aspect alone. If we do place our stamp of approval on the bill, then surely no order in council should have the effect of wiping out a statute.


Mrs. STRUM:: Mr. Chairman, this is a matter deserving of serious consideration by all members in the house. I believe what the minister has said is true, that the members of the wartime prices and trade board are weary.
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However I do not think they have ever taken seriously criticism such as that which has been registered by the Tories. I do not think anyone takes it seriously. Sometimes I think not only are they something out of this world, but they are something out of this century. They are living in the world of a hundred years ago.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: You are out of your head.


Gladys Grace Mae Strum: There have been some on the government's side of the house who apparently have been awake in the past fifty years, and who have realized that at least to some extent we have to protect the consumer. That right has been given under the National Emergency Transitional Powers Act.
In spite of what my hon. friends say, we should consider the needs of the consumer. I believe the government's policy is based on the assumption that if we institute decontrol as consumer goods become more plentiful, prices will automatically adjust themselves. Since we began the process of decontrol we have not received enough literature on the subject to know just what the situation is. However, in the United States, where they have had a longer time in which to test the process of decontrol, they have found that this is not true. I would refer hon. members to Time magazine of April 7, and particularly to the page dealing with business and finance, to show what their experience has been. On page 43, under "Prices", there is a paragraph entitled, "Highest climb", which reads:
The magazine Mill dc Factory polled business men, found that forty-four per cent thought prices were too high. But only fifteen per cent expected to reduce them by summer. In a nationwide survey, the Wall Street Journal found that virtually no one is going to reduce them now.
Everybody wants the other fellow to reduce them but the individual manufacturer is not going to do anything about his own profits.
Profits in many industries were so fat, despite slackening sales, that few were being scared into price cutting.
And the last paragraph reads:
But out of fear, or the reluctance of most business men to charge less than the traffic would bear, there seemed to be small hope of general price reductions until a drastic drop in buying power forced them. Everyone was content to let George do it. And the longer prices remained unreasonably high, the farther-and faster-they would fall when the inevitable drop came.
I think that is a fairly good summary of the experience *mder decontrol in the United States. Here is another quotable quote from

the issue of April 14. This article refers to Quebec in our own country. This reads:
In a special dispatch from Quebec the Times talked about the "enormous profits" Canadian paper companies were making, showed that net profits of New York's International Paper Company had risen 270 per cent since 1943, that profits of another company had risen 500 per cent. But the price of newsprint was boosted again last fortnight.
Greatly perturbed by all this, Macy's president, Jack Straus warned in full-page ads last week: "Unless prices were lowered, we believe that a business recession is probable." But Macy's itself made no broad price cuts in cost of living items. Ironically, retailers and manufacturers were clinging to high profits as a hedge against the recession which they feared high prices would bring.
Are we to sit here and allow the manufacturers to drag us into a depression because we do not like to go to the trouble of controlling prices? Are we going to permit this thing to go on until consumer resistance and the lack of purchasing power bring on strikes and another depression? Sometimes when I read the opinions of some of our economists I think it is time that we started a new school of economics. They regard what they call the law of supply and demand as being something like the law of gravity, something over which they have no control. In this issue of Time someone has charted business booms and depressions, and to me it just looks like the records of smallpox which we used to consider were an act of God and that we could do nothing to prevent that disease. We used to think that all we could do was to record the death rate. Then some revolutionary in the field of medicine decided that we should not just record the death rate, that we should do something about the matter. If this parliament sits here like a bunch of nitwits and does nothing, then they are crazy.


Stanley Howard Knowles: I think we all appreciate the point made by the minister about the difficulties of administering price control. We know he spoke with pretty deep feeling on the matter because he was responsible for it all during the war. Revolutionaries have been referred to several times this afternoon; I suggest that the Minister of Justice during the time he was Minister of Finance was something uf a revolutionary in this field, and he did an awfully good job. However, we do not want him to be responsible now for a counterrevolution.
The thing we would like the government to do is to weigh one set of difficulties against another. Yes, the administration of price control is difficult, but one must consider the difficulties that the consumers face with rising prices; one must consider the difficulties that

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the old age pensioners are facing today. I am glad to see the Minister of National Health and Welfare in his seat. I was saying that one has to consider the difficulties that old age pensioners face.


Paul Joseph James Martin: May I point out to the hon. gentleman with great respect, and I am sure that he will agree, that there is no one in this house who does not share great concern for that problem. He has no monopoly in this matter.


Stanley Howard Knowles: I agree thoroughly that every member in this house shares that concern. What some of us are anxious for is to have that concern translated into the passing of amendments to the Old Age Pensions Act, so that the old people of Canada will get whatever increases are to be given to them.


Paul Joseph James Martin: May I point out to the hon. gentleman that if he and others will facilitate the passage of this bill we can do that very thing.


Stanley Howard Knowles: The government cannot claim that as a reason for not putting the old age pension legislation on the order paper right away. We have been told that priorities had to be established and that we had to get on with this omnibus bill first. However, there was placed in Votes and Proceedings of yesterday a notice of motion which will appear on the order paper tomorrow to provide pension legislation with respect to senior appointees in the diplomatic service. We contend that if that can be done for a selected group, it can be done for the old people of Canada. I am calling on the Minister of National Health and Welfare to try to get the legislation, which he says is prepared and which he has in his pocket, placed on the order paper as soon as possible.


Paul Joseph James Martin: The old age pension legislation will be introduced in this house before that particular legislation. Just as soon as we are given an opportunity to deal with amendments to the Old Age Pensions Act, we will do so.


Stanley Howard Knowles: There is nothing to stop you-


William Henry Golding: I suggest to hon. members that we should deal with the matter now before the committee.


Stanley Howard Knowles: I just want to say to the minister that there is nothing to prevent him giving notice before six o'clock tonight, and we could have his old age pensions amendments on the order paper tomorrow.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Are you running the government?


Stanley Howard Knowles: I am telling you what the people of Canada want. The minister raised the question of difficulties and some people are going to be faced with some real difficulties before long. What I am asking the minister and the government to do is to weigh the comparative difficulty of administering price controls and the difficulty faced by the housewife, the worker, the consumer and the pensioner because of rising prices. We now have a rumour that there is to be an increase of ten or fifteen cents in the price of butter. Those are the two kinds of difficulties to be weighed against each other, and we contend that it is the government's responsibility to lessen the difficulties of the Canadian people in this regard.
The minister said that the government found itself in a difficult position because of the difference between the views expressed by the Tories and by the C.C.F. It was pointed out that the Tories are saying that controls should go off quickly and that we wanted them continued.


James Lorimer Ilsley: I did not say that that created any difficulty for us.


Stanley Howard Knowles: The minister said that the government was being hammered by both sides.


James Lorimer Ilsley: That is right; so we are.


Stanley Howard Knowles: If the minister has any doubt as to which view expressed over here indicates the feeling of the Canadian people, I suggest that he pay attention to the remarks of the only members on his side of the house, on the back benches, who have really discussed this issue. I see the hon. member for Fraser Valley sitting there. He has told us what the women in his constituency want. The hon. member for Spadina made a tremendously effective speech the other day in which he asked the government to halt its policy of headlong decontrol and to consider the welfare of the people of Canada, and I suggest that the few Liberals who have spoken specifically on price control have expressed the views of the Canadian people generally. The minister himself the other day, in speaking about the Tories, pointed out that they had moderated their views on price control since they had been home at Easter.


James Lorimer Ilsley: I do not know what they think now, to tell the truth.


Stanley Howard Knowles: In other words, he gave them credit for recognizing where public opinion stands on this matter. All that we
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in this group and the member for Fraser Valley, the member for Spadina, the member for Vancouver North and others are asking is that the government also recognize to some extent the opinion of the people of this country. This amendment is not at all revolutionary. I am not very proud of it because it does not go very far, but it seems to go as far as we can in a legislative way. It merely prevents the government from revoking and tossing out of the window the whole price control machinery without getting the consent of parliament.


Mr. CRUICKSHANK:: Is the hon. member anxious for this amendment to go through?


Stanley Howard Knowles: Yes, and I am glad to know you support it.


George Alexander Cruickshank: Then stop talking.


Stanley Howard Knowles: If my hon. friend will vote for it I will sit down and not say another word this afternoon.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: The Minister of Justice did not press the constitutional question, but I gathered that he had in mind the problem of public opinion. I realize that we could not maintain the wartime prices and trade board indefinitely in Canada if public opinion were against it. If we had had a corrupt administration of the wartime prices and trade board during the war it would not be feasible to advocating such controls now, but the minister deserves a good deal of credit for maintaining the high standards that did exist throughout this country during the war in preventing black markets and runaway prices. At the moment the minister is, I think, misjudging public opinion. He mentioned, when speaking earlier in the debate, that if we had not had the wartime prices and trade board during the war we would not have had an equitable system of distribution. One of the Tory members questioned that. Since he comes from the city of Toronto he may be able to look after his constituents in that area; but, coming from a rural constituency as I do, I realize the problems we would have been up against with no control over distribution. My people are up against a problem of distribution now. At Easter I was in a home where there are twin girls for whom the doctor had prescribed com syrup as part of a formula. But now that controls have been lifted from corn syrup, the people there are not able to get corn syrup.


An hon. MEMBER:: There are carloads of it available.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: They did not have any corn syrup when I was there. I am talking

of a rural riding, not of metropolitan Toronto where you may have friends in the business of manufacturing corn syrup. During the war there wrere storekeepers in frontier towns who were not able to get overalls and, if it had not been for the operation of the wartime prices and trade board or some similar organization, it would not have been possible to maintain the supply of these necessities. I am satisfied that the minister will have no fundamental problem in finding the necessary public support to continue the wartime prices and trade board for the duration of this act, provided that in an emergency parliament can be assembled and taken into his confidence and provision be made to rescind this portion of the act.


James Lorimer Ilsley: Mr. Chairman, I am willing to give consideration to the amendment and not press for a vote rejecting it this afternoon. I do not think we will accept it but I want to see just how serious its effects would be; so I will ask that the amendment stands. I want to thank hon. gentlemen for their tributes to the wartime prices and trade board.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: And to yourself.


James Lorimer Ilsley: Thank you.
Amendment (Mr. Knowles) stands.


Mr. HAZEN:: Section 2 provides for orderly decontrol. It says:
. . . the orders and regulations of the governor in council specified in the schedule to this act shall . . . continue and be in force.
But when we turn to section 4 we find:
The governor in council may revoke in whole or in part any order or regulation continued in force by or made under this act.
Is it proposed to make any orders in council under this act?


James Lorimer Ilsley: Under section 3, yes.


Douglas King Hazen: Which are the words in section 3 that give power to make orders in council?


James Lorimer Ilsley: They are these:
The governor in council may appoint such persons in connection with the administration of any order or regulation . . .


Douglas King Hazen: That is done by order in council?


James Lorimer Ilsley: Yes.
Section stands.
On section 5-Publication of orders.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Under the terms of this section will all orders and regulations made, for instance, by the wartime prices and trade board under the terms of the basic order in council be published in the Canada Gazette?

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James Lorimer Ilsley: No; the orders of the governor in council. The hon. member wants to know whether the orders of the board must be published?


Stanley Howard Knowles: Yes.


James Lorimer Ilsley: No; they do not have to be published in the Canada Gazette.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Section 6 agreed to.
. Section 7 stands.
Section 8 agreed to.
On the schedule:
Edmund Davie Fulton: Will the minister elaborate on how he intends to deal with the schedule? Does he intend to have each item called or may we call them as we wish?


James Lorimer Ilsley: I think the only thing to do is to call each item in order. If a minister cannot be present for his orders I may ask that we postpone consideration of those orders to meet his convenience and that of the committee. Otherwise we should take them in their order. Therefore I would suggest that we take P.C. 5424 as the first one.


William Henry Golding: We shall deal with P.C. 5424. Shall P.C. 5424 carry?
P.C. 5424 agreed to.
On P.C. 6759.


George Alexander Cruickshank: I should like to ask a question on this schedule. I have not taken much time so far but I am going to take a little time now. I am all for controlling prices. I do not think the C.C.F., with all the imaginary powers they have, believe that the farmers are getting enough now. There has been a report in the press that the price of butter is to go up. I am all for controlling the price of butter, but at the same time I am not in favour of the subsidy being taken off on May 1. I want some assurance from the minister that that is not to be the fact, provided that the controls are kept on butter. Neither this parliament nor anybody else was consulted when the Massey-Harris people increased their prices twelve per cent. Therefore parliament is entitled to know whether the price of butter is to be held at the ridiculous figure of forty-three or forty-five cents and whether the subsidy is to be continued. So far as I am concerned, this bill will not go through in two months until we know that.


James Garfield Gardiner: The first two orders in council which are dealt with in the bill do touch agriculture, and were based on the
recommendation of myself as Minister of Agriculture. They have to do with the subsidies which are paid on agricultural products. Some of these subsidies which are paid on products such as butter and others which are sold from time to time to ships that come into our ports, 'and which go out as ships stores, are collected by the person who supplies the commodities to those who are to utilize them. That is done for the purpose of making certain that the subsidies which are paid on those products are not provided by the treasury. In some cases it corresponds with the subsidies paid by the British, for example, on cheese. The British now pay the subsidy on cheese but we pay the subsidy on the milk which entered into the cheese. The British agreed to pay the subsidy on cheese which goes to Britain, but the Canadian government pays the subsidy on the cheese which is consumed in Canada. It was thought advisable to collect a subsidy on any commodities which were sold to ships which were supplied in Canadian ports from those who provided the commodity to the ships. These orders in council are to deal only with comparatively small quantities of the total product which is sold.
With regard to the question asked by the hon. member for Fraser Valley, I would say that I hope he will not insist on carrying into effect the last remark which he made. I am sure he will not when I explain. As I said yesterday, the announcement with regard to what is to be done about butter, cheese and other dairy products will be made before May 1. I am sorry I cannot be any more specific than that. It may be made within the next week or some time shortly, certainly before May 1. My understanding is that it will be made to apply as of May 1. The advisory committee which is composed of representatives from each of the departments of agriculture of the nine provinces and seven representatives from the federation of agriculture is meeting in Ottawa at the present time. They met yesterday, the day before, and they are meeting today. They are making recommendations as to what they think these price levels ought to be. I am sorry that I am not able to go farther than I did yesterday. I know I have the support of all members of the government in what I am about to say now. Whatever that price level is, it will be a price level which covers the present price plus any subsidy. It is not definitely decided that there will be no subsidy whatsoever; but there is a possibility that it will be a price alone and not a subsidy plus a price. But if it is a price alone it will be sufficient to cover the subsidy and the present floor price. I am
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speaking of the different dairy products. I hope that the hon. member will not insist upon having anything more definite than that while this legislation is before the house. The recommendations have not yet been finally made by the advisory committee which represents agriculture right across Canada.
We shall give consideration to these recommendations and make our decision vrithin the next few days and announce it in the house.
Mr. CRUICKSHANIv: If I am correct in my interpretation, the minister said that the price to be set ultimately will be equal to the present rate plus the subsidy. Is that correct?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes, it will be the same or-


George Alexander Cruickshank: It will not be less?


James Garfield Gardiner: It will not be less.


George Alexander Cruickshank: So far as I am concerned, the minister is running agriculture and I am asking for an assurance, no matter who these boards are, that it will not be less. I do not want it to work the same way as it worked with poultry. About three weeks ago the poultrymen of British Columbia took a trimming. When the new rates were set, the Massey-Harris people immediately put up the price of wheat and mash. I do not know any better way of describing them than by calling them "Massey-Harris" people. The price went up immediately and the poultry-men took a trimming. We are not maintaining the price to the consumer when we take the ceiling off. So far as the poultrymen are concerned, the Department of Agriculture should have known that and should have protected the poultrymen from these dealers who increased their prices to the extent that every poultryman in British Columbia producing eggs had to produce them at a cost of from two to four and a half cents more than-


James Garfield Gardiner: May I ask a question? Is the hon. member speaking of wheat or of all coarse grains?


George Alexander Cruickshank: Coarse grains, laying mash and growing mash. If my memory is correct the price of oats went up $2 a ton; the price of wheat, $1 a ton, and the price of laying and growing mash, $2 a ton immediately when the announcement was made in the house and no increase was given to the producers' contracts with England. The only increase which was permitted was that the ceiling was lifted on eggs. In 1945 eggs reached the ceiling price in only two weeks; in 1946 eggs reached the ceiling price in only

four weeks, which was something like forty cents a dozen. There was absolutely no material benefit to the farmers.


James Garfield Gardiner: I am not in a position either to verify or to deny the statement which has just been made, but I am in a position to say that no dealer in feed anywhere in Canada had any justification, from anything that was done here, to increase the price of grain other than the increase which was made possible because of what was done on wheat at the time when we did make a change in relation to the cost of wheat that was entering into consumption in this country. The position is that oats and barley, which are the two grains that were dealt with, are sold until August 1 at the old ceiling price. There is no increase whatsoever in the price to the feeder of barley and oats until August 1. If someone, on the basis of a report which has gone out, has taken it for granted that there was an increase all around and therefore did increase his price we shall have to look into it and see that it is corrected. The present position is that there is a drawback of twenty-five cents on barley and of ten cents on oats, which makes it unnecessary for anyone to raise the price of the feed to the feeders until August 1. From August 1 on, there is an increase in the price of grain.


Mr. WRIGHT:: According to the information given me by the department, that is hardly correct. They reformed me that the price of coarse grains had gone up approximately 3J cents a bushel to the miller or producer of feeds for poultry and the dairy industry in Canada, and that the increase of that amount in the manufacturer's price to the consumer was justified. That would not amount to very much. I do not know personally how much they did increase their price to the consumer; but, according to the hon. member for Fraser Valley, it was apparently more than that. That was the information which the minister's department gave me with regard to the increased cost of feed to the manufacturers.


James Garfield Gardiner: There is an increase of thirty cents on wheat that enters into feed. On the other grains there is not supposed to be an increase.


Gladys Grace Mae Strum: I spent my Easter holiday rambling around Ontario and I should like to talk about the Ontario farmers for a moment. I find that what the hon. member for Fraser Valley said is true not only of British Columbia but of Ontario. I found the farmers in Ontario cancelling orders for baby chicks, and they told me that the hatcheries were gassing baby chicks because of cancelled orders as a

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result of increases in feed prices. I have no way of knowing whether the dealers know about the minister's ruling, but private enterprise is going ahead and raising the cost of feed all over Ontario. That is what the men on the farms tell me. Anyway, this is a serious matter because it will be reflected in the egg contracts with Great Britain. If we put the egg producer out of business, and if the cost of feed is sneaked up by the dealer and we pay no attention to it, we know what the resuit will be. If the hon. member for "Vancouver North has anything to say about double-talk, I can assure him that others than tire C.C.F. indulge in double-talk. Here we have a dual system of control, namely, price control on long-term contracts, price control of wheat, beef, pork, cheese and eggs, ami at the same time decontrol of all costs that go into production. This double-talk will be reflected in the farmers not being able to deliver eggs, cheese and meat, and it will result in a very bad condition and all kinds of dislocation.
V. ou cannot control the price which the farmer receives and then decontrol all costs, and yet that is the sort of double dealing the government is carrying on at the moment. Whether it intends to or not, that is the effect.
Not only should we review the whole question of subsidies, but we should go over all the subsidies and pay particular attention to those that have to do with production and the health of the nation. I do not care whether it comes under agriculture or public health, the subsidies that have to deal with the whole field of milk need overhauling. We should begin to reimpose these subsidies. Whether it is done in the name of public health or under agriculture I do not care, but the health of the Canadian people demands that we keep milk plentiful and reasonably cheap.


Mr. HERRIDGE:: I should like to support the contention of the hon. member for Fraser Valley. We do not raise as many chicks in the district I come from but they lay more eggs per bird. I am getting letters from dozens of poultrymen and they tell me that the prices of the things that go into production have been raised, as the hon. member for Fraser Valley says. Only a few days ago I received a letter from one man informing me that an order for 2,000 baby chicks had been cancelled because he cannot produce eggs at the present price. It is something the minister should investigate immediately. May I ask whether the advisory committee and the officials of the department have given consideration to the price of eggs?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes. I spent an hour with them this morning, and we talked about egg prices.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: I am glad to hear that.


James Garfield Gardiner: I want to say a word or two now with regard to the remarks of the hon. member for Qu'Appelle. There is no double dealing or misunderstanding on the question of feed costs for chickens. One of the ingredients of feed for chickens is wheat, and a month or so ago we had a discussion in which everyone acknowledged that the price of feed for chickens had gone up because thirty cents a bushel had been added to wheat costs as a result of the action we took in order to change a condition, which everyone had previously criticized, of allowing wheat to be supplied at cost to the consumers over Canada at 774 cents for certain purposes. It was acknowledged by everyone that, as a consequence of that change, the cost of feed into which wheat entered for chickens and live stock of all kinds would go up by thirty cents.
There has been no double-talk about that at all. Everyone understood that, and two or three members in this house raised considerable criticism of it. We had discussions of the question and finally agreed that certain things should be done. One thing that was done was the very thing it is now suggested ought to be done, if we are to do it for others. We took the ceiling price off eggs. There is no control now on the height to which eggs can rise in Canada. They can go to any price. It is true they have not gone up much, probably not at all, but this is the season of the year in which they do not go up. They may go up later in the season; I am not in a position to say whether they will. At any rate, there is no ceiling on them. There is a ceiling on the grain that is fed. How long we are going to maintain that may be another question, but at the moment there is a ceiling. There has been no misunderstanding about that and some people have said that they will quit raising chickens because of that increase.
On the other question, I do not think this is the time at which we can discuss it and get anywhere by discussion. When the proposals are being made to change the position in relation to the whole situation we can discuss it, but this has to do with only one question:	Are we to collect subsidies
from the agencies that supply the farm commodity to those who are supplied, or ships and others, or are we to take it out of the treasury and pay it? Our practice has been to collect it.


Edmund Davie Fulton: Are any conversations going on now to increase the price under the contract,
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which would apparently have the greatest effect of all in assisting the poultry grower and egg producer? It seems that the domestic market is either flooded or else cannot stand a rise, and the greatest help that could be given the producer would be to increase prices under the contract. That is what those who have corresponded with me have intimated, and I am wondering whether such discussions have proceeded and whether any indication can be given as to whether a result can be expected soon, and what that result will be.


James Garfield Gardiner: Discussions are proceeding continuously, but with a little more pressure being put on to get decisions at the present time than at other times, because we are considering the raising of, and have already raised, the price of grain being fed. Discussions are going on daily, and we hope that by the time we reach the point where we can make an announcement we shall be able to say something about that. At the moment we are not in a position to make that statement. I do not know whether the letters that have been mentioned are the same as those that I have received. I have at present at least a dozen on my desk, which were written either in the same place or by the same person. They are not written in the same hand, but there must have been instructions because they are all along the same line, though they come from different places. However they were based on understandings that are not correct. These misunderstandings have been cleared away since and I do not think the same kind of letter will come from now on. Most of those I have received are dated around the end of March or the beginning of this month. They have not been coming within the last day or two.


Mr. REID:: Whatever policy the government adopts, it should be announced as soon as possible.
I listened with a great deal of interest to the hon. member for Qu'Appelle. The situation as outlined in Ontario is exactly similar to that in British Columbia. The poultrymen in British Columbia are doing away with their flocks. They tell me that they do not know what is going to happen. Many of them are cutting down their flocks. That might not mean much to some people, but to those who have built up flocks and put their money into the business, it is serious indeed. When wheat went up to $10 a ton it meant a drop of three cents a dozen in eggs to the poultryman, and he has no redress. As pointed out by the hon. member for Fraser Valley, the ceiling was not worth anything at all to the poultryman. Eggs did not go up. I would ask the minister

to give every consideration to having the policy announced quickly in order that the industry may not any longer be left in doubt as to what the government's intentions are, and subsidies maintained.


Gladys Grace Mae Strum: What proportion of the whole egg output is exported and how much is consumed in Canada? What percentage does our export contract represent?


Thomas Reid: About fifteen per cent.


George Alexander Cruickshank: Might I answer that? Apparently the Minister of Agriculture has not the figures here. Fraser Valley produced over 600,000 cases of eggs.


James Garfield Gardiner: That is not all Canada.


George Alexander Cruickshank: Eighty-five per
cent of the total production in British Columbia comes from Fraser Valley, including New Westminster riding. We shipped 173,887 cases to Britain in 1946, out of a total of 1,895,834 cases, or nine per cent. I have the exact figures.


Mr. ROWE:: Will the minister tell the committee how much we fell down last year on our egg contract with Britain?


James Garfield Gardiner: I think we had better leave this all over, if we are to have it after six o'clock, until I bring down my speech too. I should like to suggest to those who are going to make speeches that they get in contact with the officials of the poultry association and find out just what they really think about this question of eggs, because they have much greater fears than I have about increasing the production of eggs in Canada. Hon. members had better consult with them before making speeches, because I shall have to make one here indicating what they tell me.


George Alexander Cruickshank: I can speak for Fraser Valley, which elected me twice running by a big majority.


Thomas John Bentley: I am not particularly familiar with eggs, but the hon. member for New Westminster mentioned that the increase of thirty cents a bushel in the price of wheat caused a corresponding drop of three cents a dozen, I think he said, in eggs. I presume that is a correct statement.


James Garfield Gardiner: An increase in the cost of production.


Thomas John Bentley: There would be a corresponding drop in the revenue. That is a correct statement?


George Alexander Cruickshank: Yes, approximately.
At six o'clock the committee took recess.

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After Recess
The committee resumed at eight o'clock.


James Garfield Gardiner: Mr. Chairman, there is just one remark I should like to make before the discussion proceeds, and it is to make reference to the statement made by the hon. member for Fraser Valley with regard to the price of feed.
The announcement made with regard to oats and barley, which I have checked since the discussion which took place before recess, did make this change in the price levels, that the new price levels are not the ceiling prices but the floor prices. There is a floor price guaranteed on barley of ninety cents and a floor price guaranteed on oats of 614 cents, basis No. 1 feed. The old guarantee was on the basis of No. 3 CW barley and No. 2 CW oats.
The result of that is that the new ceiling, which can be three cents higher than the floor on barley, and 34 cents on oats, is brought about by the fact that the basis now is No. 1 feed barley and the variation between No. 1 feed and No. 3 CW is about three cents, and on oats about 34 cents. So that there could be an increase, and there actually is an increase as a result of what is happening on the market. All the feed barley is selling at the ceiling. All grades of barley are selling at ninety-three cents, and they are entering into the production of the new feed mix, which would mean that if there were nothing else but the barley entering into the increase in price there might be an increase of about $1.20. There may be some other costs along the way which would be increased by the same percentage.
On oats there was an increase from a ceiling of 614 cents to a ceiling of possibly sixty-five cents. That allows for some increase on any oats that are in. The increase I referred to with regard to wheat applies. So that there could be an increase of somewhere between $1.20 and probably the $2 that was mentioned. We would have to know what the entire mix is before being able to estimate what that increase might be. That is due to the fact that the basis is now No. 1 feed instead of No. 2 CW, which allows a margin of three cents, or a margin of between ninety and ninety-three cents, within which the trade can carry on, and buy and sell barley. So that there is a possibility of an increase there.
I wanted to give that explanation before the discussion continued.


George Alexander Cruickshank: First of all, I wish to make very clear where I got my information from. It came from last year's president of the Pacific Coast Poultry Producers' Association. And just so that there may be no misunderstanding, I want to state the names of the officers this year. As I said before, eighty-five per cent of the eggs produced in British Columbia are produced in the ridings of New Westminster and Fraser Valley.
This year's president is J. 0. Bowles. The past president was Gordon Billingsley. The vice-president is Francis Parker, and the secretary is Mr. Headey. I want to have those names on record, just to show that the figures came from responsible people, people who represent eighty-five per cent of the poultry producers of British Columbia. That is an important point.
Another point I wish to make clear to my hon. friends from Saskatchewan particularly is that the people of Fraser Valley are in no way objecting to an increase in the price of grain. That is perfectly clear. But what we do object to is an increase in the cost of feed to our farmers. However we do not object to the people in Saskatchewan getting more.
Second, and most important, the people of Fraser Valley are not opposed to controls. I made myself clear on that the other day. The only action of the government so far to which we object is that they have taken controls off too rapidly, and have taken them off some things from which they should not have taken them. I believe that before we are through, if we are to prevent inflation we shall put back many of the controls we have taken off. I believe the people I represent are in favour of that. I have had absolutely no objection from anyone in my riding to the fact that we have had controls; but I have had a lot of objections from a few prominent individuals-and they do not bother me much, because they know they are well represented-to any controls being taken off. I want that point made clear.
When I came first to the House of Commons I told the people of my riding that I was not going to be a back-bencher. And in this connection I pay my respects to the new member. When I first arrived in the House of Commons, I returned after the session to my people and said I was not a back-bencher. I had the seat that the hon. member now occupies, and I told them I might as well have been in a chicken-house in Chilliwack, because I could neither hear nor see from my seat. I hope the hon. member will be moved up to a better seat before long. It is no good down there, I can assure him.
I shall quote some figures, to show the minister's department that if they would come to the proper source for information they would get correct figures, and have them available. In 1946, in the province of British
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An hon. MEMBER:: Is that the C.P.R.?


George Alexander Cruickshank: I am not allowed to refer to them, but I imagine they will get their increase. We were told about the ceiling having been taken off eggs, but in 1944 eggs only reached the ceiling in British Columbia for two weeks. In 1945 they were high for a few weeks, but the highest price paid was forty-one cents. In 1946 the ceiling was 44J cents, but the highest reached was forty-one cents. I think any farmer here will admit there has been no particular value in taking off the ceiling.
This is only the chance I shall have, so that I am going to cover a few other things I represent a dairying district as well as a poultry producing district. This is the only opportunity that the dairy producers will have to put their case before the house. Again I want to give the authority for the figures I am using. They came from Dean Clement, who is known, I think, even to the federal Department of Agriculture. He is one of the best known dairymen from a technical point of view in the entire Dominion of Canada; he is the dean of agriculture in the university of British Columbia. He made a survey at the request of the provincial government. I am not claiming any particular value for that government at the present time and we may change that set-up shortly.
He found that it cost 58-7 cents last year to produce a pound of butter fat, with nothing allowed for labour. The reason I want these figures on the record is that if the subsidies are taken off and ceiling prices are set, or floor prices as referred to tonight, they may be of value. According to Dean Clement, to receive $100 a month, with $60 cash going to the farmer, it would require 72-22 cents a pound for butter fat. If you are including wages, then the $60 cash that the farmer takes out of it for himself would require 94-61 cents a pound for butter fat. I should like to know how these officials here arrived at the ceiling price they put on butter when we have these cost figures to surmount in British Columbia. I know nothing about costs in Ontario and I am not particularly interested, but surely there are enough farmer members who are sufficiently interested to speak for Ontario.

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These farms are based on an average value of S21,269; the average value per acre being $179 and ranging from $215 to S143. The average cost of producing a pound of butter fat on these farms was 58-79 cents, with nothing for the farmer. The minister gave me assurance a little while ago that the new price was going to look after the farmer. That was my understanding of what he said. He said it would be not less than it was before, but that is still one-third short of being high enough for the farmers of Fraser Valley.
I am going to pass on because I want to cover berries. Everything goes into the production cost in Fraser Valley. I have just come back from that district. The Minister of Reconstruction and Supply is not in his seat at the moment but I hope his parliamentary assistant can tell us something about these tons and tons and carloads of nails that are going to British Columbia. I made it a point to go to every store in my riding. One store had a full keg of something that would be very handy for putting on shiplap to repair an old building, a keg of three and a half inch spikes. Another store had some boot nails-I have one here-at sixty cents a pound, which could be used to repair a building. Another rather big store had some copper nails two and a half inches in size at sixty cents a pound. I have never seen copper nails before. If you weigh them you find that it comes to exactly one-half cent per nail. That may be all right for the farmers in Ontario where you have all the millionaires and where they do not care about the cost of producing farm products. The Ontario federation of agriculture did not make any complaint anyway. Maybe they can afford to pay sixty cents a pound for nails to repair a coop, but we cannot afford to pay it in Fraser Valley or in any other part of British Columbia.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: We cannot even get copper nails in Ontario.


George Alexander Cruickshank: I forgot that the hon. member's speciality in Peterborough was nails or I would have left this matter to him.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: I am glad the hon. member has backed me up in my statement.


George Alexander Cruickshank: I will back you up? The hon. member for Qu'Appelle paid me a little compliment this afternoon. I will put it another way. I will be glad to have the hon. member cooperate with me in any
way possible. I do not know what you need nails for in Peterborough anyway with all the manufacturers you have there.
I want to deal now with berries. I come from a wonderful riding. I am very proud of the riding I represent. We produce about half the berries that are used in the entire Dominion of Canada.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: It is the berries.


George Alexander Cruickshank: I just want to give certain figures of the berries we produced last year. I am naturally modest about Fraser Valley and I hesitate to mention it at any time, but last year we produced 4,863,683 pounds of strawberries and 11,475,428 pounds of raspberries.


Edmund Davie Fulton: That is your major product -raspberries!


George Alexander Cruickshank: I knew if I waited long enough Kamloops would ask for it and he will get it in a minute. In the meantime I have other more important matters to speak of. I wish to point out to the prairie farmers that we were able to ship only 90,000 crates of strawberries last year to the prairie provinces, our great market. We want to ship there at a fair price, but unfortunately last year we could ship only 90,000 crates. I will come to Kamloops in a minute. I am no socialist by any manner or means; I am a capitalist. Two other fellows and I own a farm; they own the most part and I own the rest. I do not believe in socialism; I believe in free enterprise. I agree with the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar when he said that this government and no other government dare take off these controls, but they are taking them off bit by bit and we see the profits that are being made as quoted by the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar yesterday and as quoted in the Star today. The United States is admitting that they cannot control prices at the present time.


Percy Ellis Wright: That is under the free enterprise you believe in.


George Alexander Cruickshank: We can improve free enterprise but never socialism. I have been trying to improve the hon. member for Kamloops but have not succeeded yet; you cannot improve the impossible. I will tell you why we shipped only 90,000 crates to the prairies last year. I was successful in moving the adjournment of the house to discuss the shortage of containers. One of these downtrodden lumber operators in British Columbia could not pay fifteen cents an hour wage

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increase, but they can make a profit in their business in spite of strikes. One gentleman who did not know one end of a board from another came from Toronto and took over a sawmill with watered stock that showed a profit of over $400,000 in a few months. In my opinion, that same group of operators from Toronto, headed by this notorious brewer who has now moved into British Columbia's lumber business, are doing everything they can to prevent us from getting crates this year by fomenting trouble with the honest loggers in British Columbia. If something is not done about the matter, I shall be moving more adjournments of the house and I hope to have the support of my hon. friends opposite.
The Minister of Agriculture has given me one assurance. I do not want to put words into his mouth, but I understood him to say that when the subsidy is taken off butter the price will not be less than it is now. I should like him to repeat that. That is correct?
I want these controls to be more effective. I want some controls to be restored. I do not think you can ask the dairy producers to go on producing forever at present prices when you permit other industries to make the profits which have been quoted in this house and never denied, and when you permit the lumbermen of my own province of ' British Columbia to amass fortunes they have never had before. It will be pretty poor pickings for Cruickshank with the lumbermen at the next election, but that is all right with me. When they can make these profits our dairymen are not going to be satisfied with the present price of butter in British Columbia.
I turn to the Minister of Veterans Affairs, then next to the Minister of Labour, and I shall finish off with the hon. member for Kamloops. I did not take part in the debate on the address, but I believe that every member for British Columbia is dissatisfied with the deal made so far as veterans homes are concerned. I find that the minister's own officials have given him two different lists of figures. One sets out that it costs $169.50 to heat a house till the plaster is dry in a home in the sunny Fraser valley, and then a week iater the minister brings down a return saying that it costs $28.05. It is time that we put to work in the Department of Veterans Affairs some unemployed who can add and substract. The veterans of Fraser Valley are not asking for homes for nothing, but they are asking for a fair deal, and when any official at Ottawa tells me that it costs $184.95 to drain a veteran's home in the Chilliwack district I
liMr. Cruickshank.]
say that he does not know what he is talking about-$184.95 to drain an acre and a half of land in the Chilliwack district. This is in order, Mr. Chairman, because it all comes under these fifty-seven varieties.
I am not satisfied with the deal the Minister of Labour has given in the Tashme camp for Japs. If the truth were known it would make us blush.


Humphrey Mitchell: Let us have the blushing.


George Alexander Cruickshank: You give me the facts and figures and you will do the blushing, or bring the figures before the public accounts committee and you will find who will do the blushing. I am a little bitter about Tashme when a farm, which never made a profit of $500 a year, in twenty years gets $500 a month rental over a period of years and can get waterworks and all the buildings when hospitals and schools cannot get these things and, in addition, get a cash settlement. I would ask the government to have inquiries made about Tashme camp.
So far as my riding is concerned, we will support this government's efforts to maintain controls 100 per cent and, if necessary, restore some of the controls that have been taken off, which we believe should not have been taken off. We believe that it is in the best interests of our district and of Canada as a whole that controls be maintained. I believe that everyone in British Columbia has that opinion. I have never heard one request that controls be removed other than from Toronto and Kamloops. Kamloops is not a bad town to get out of.
In closing, Mr. Chairman, I shall support the C.C.F. amendment. I believe it is the fairest one to date in connection with controls, unless the government brings down something better.


Humphrey Mitchell: In reply to my hon. friend's remarks about Tashme camp, let me say that it is all very well for one who has no responsibility as an administrator to bandy these things about, but if my hon. friend has anything he has a duty to perform. Let him bring the facts before the public accounts committee and he will not need to worry about the labour department coming out in the clear. It is the easiest thing in the world to make statements of the kind he has made. If he thinks there is anything wrong let him bring the matter before the public accounts committee and let us get the truth.


George Alexander Cruickshank: Nobody should
know better than the present minister how easy it is to get up and bandy something around without any responsibility.

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William Ross Macdonald: Before the discussion continues, may I remind the committee that we are dealing with order in council 6759. This afternoon there was considerable discussion on eggs, the cost of producing eggs and the return the farmer received for producing them, but upon reading order in council 6759 I find no mention of eggs. If hon. members will look at the second and third preambles they will see that they read as follows:
And whereas the subsidy in respect of creamery butter, cheddar cheese, concentrated whole milk products, white beans and yellow eye beans is now being paid through the Department of Agriculture;
And whereas it is deemed necessary or advisable for the security, defence, peace, order and welfare of Canada to provide for the repayment of subsidy involved in such goods . . .
That is to say, the goods mentioned in the second preamble. It will be noticed that section 2 of the regulations reads as follows:
(b) "subsidized goods" means creamery butter, cheddar cheese, concentrated whole milk products, white beans or yellow eye beans, or such other goods as may be designated by order of the Deputy Minister ot Agriculture by notice in Canadian war orders and regulations.
I mention these things to remind hon. members that this order in council does not refer to eggs in. any way; it refers only to the subsidy on dairy products and certain beans, which subsidy must be repaid to the government when these goods are exported. I do not wish to curtail discussion, but I believe that the committee would like to deal with the contents of the order in council and not have too wide discussion.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: In connection with eggs, I should like to quote two or three sentences from a letter which I have received. I think I am in order because some of these people also produce milk and butter, and depend very much on the price of eggs-


William Ross Macdonald: I do not think it would be fair to interrupt the hon. member for Kootenay West at this time; but would it be agreeable to the committee that, afer he makes his statement in regard to eggs, we discuss the contents of the present order in council?


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: For the information of the committee, I shall quote from a letter written by Mr. Godfredsen, president of the Kootenay Cooperative Poultry Association, and dated March 18, 1947. He is one of the largest poultrymen in the district and is a responsible and practical man. He writes as follows:
Dear Mr. Herridge
I am very much surprised of the announcement over the radio that the ceiling price was taken of eggs, if that is to compensate the
poultry farmer for the increase in feed price, it is absolutely inadequate as we can only get ceiling price three month of year.
Toward the end of his letter he says:
Coming back to feed prices wheat is eleven dollars more a ton and laying mash is five dollars more a ton and it was announced over the radio that barley and oats would go up too if that is the case laying mash will be still higher.
In addition to that, I have a letter from Mr. Charles E. Tutt, secretary of the same association, who is a poultryman and a responsible person. In this letter he says:
We heartily endorse a greater return to the Canadian wheat producers, but we strongly resent the fact that a rise in the price of feed wheat directly discriminates againat the poultry-men.
In his letter he mentions the fact that at the present time there is a surplus of eggs which cannot be sold, on the local market. These are No. 1 eggs and they were sold to the Swift Canadian Company at Nelson for twenty-three cents a dozen. He also mentions that the cost of feed and so forth nullifies the floor price which has been placed under eggs in the British contract. I urge the minister to have this situation investigated.


Percy Ellis Wright: What subsidies are now being paid on goods classified as subsidized goods, namely, creamery butter, cheddar cheese, concentrated whole milk products, white and yellow beans? How many of these subsidies have the government already announced will be withdrawn, and on what dates will they be withdrawn?


James Garfield Gardiner: As I said before recess, the government has under consideration the whole matter of returns on dairy products which is largely the items covered in the order in council that we are now discussing. There are smaller items such as beans which enter into it, but most of it is dairy products. The position with regard to these is pretty generally understood in the committee. We did pay and are still paying a ten-cent subsidy on butter fat; we are also paying a subsidy of thirty cents on milk which enters into cheese, and we are paying a subsidy on milk which enters into the production of canned milk of different kinds.
The question which is now under consideration is as to whether these subsidies should be taken into the price. If they are they will probably be taken into the price very shortly, within a few days time. This particular order in council gives the government authority to deal only with subsidies on exports such as ships' supplies, until that time is reached. In other words, we are spending a lot of time in
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talking about something that may last for only ten days. After that, it will be necessary to have the order because of these other items, provided that subsidies on dairy products are done away with and the whole matter is put into the price. It will probably be only a short time until the announcement is made. I have said on two or three occasion that any changes which do take place will take place on May 1. The whole matter is under consideration. The matter that has been discussed during the greater part of the time that we have had these orders before the committee is the question of increased cost of feed. That question is being fully considered by the advisory committee which is now sitting, and it will be fully considered by the government when the recommendations are made by that committee to the government. In other words, the government will not reach a decision on what should be done with regard to butter, cheese, milk and even eggs, which do not come under this at all, without having before them all the implications of the increases in feed costs. They will also have under consideration all the implications of the increases which have already been made since there was any previous increase in the cost of grain, increases which have already been made in the returns for farm products, and within a few days time with regard to almost everything that is covered by this order in council an announcement will be made which will probably do away with the greater part of the necessity for it.
I would suggest that I think we can discuss most of the questions which are being asked better when my estimates are before the house, which, may be coming up on Friday evening and the following Friday evening as usual. At least by the second Friday evening we shall probably have all the facts in front of us and we shall be able to discuss the matter to much better advantage then than we can now.


William Earl Rowe: From what the minister says one could almost draw the inference that subsidies are to disappear. AVould the committee be right in understanding that?


James Garfield Gardiner: Well, I have come as close to saying that as I could. I rather think so.


William Earl Rowe: Probably a hint is as good as a nod to a blind farmer. Will the minister give consideration to lifting the ceiling price also on dairy products and on bacon products? I was interested in what the hon. member for Qu'Appelle said this afternoon, indicating that there is something wrong. The planned economy which those to the left would like 
and the planned economy which we have had on the right has caused confusion such as agriculture has never known before in this country.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: On that side of the house.


William Earl Rowe: The minister is not a farmer.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I was on a farm.


William Earl Rowe: Yes, but the minister left it pretty early. Had, he stayed there he would have realized the position the farmers are in today.


James Garfield Gardiner: They are in the best position they ever were.


William Earl Rowe: Why is it you are falling down on the egg contract to Britain; why on the cheese contract; why on the butter contract? Why have you fallen down on the bacon contract, and why have you made the most nonsensical wheat contract the world has ever known? So that agriculture has not a great deal of confidence and does not know where we are going.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Did you vote for it?


William Earl Rowe: No, I did not.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: You were not in the house.


William Earl Rowe: Surely the time has come, in view of the political confusion that has been caused by this type of state panic, when the minister should give some consideration to removing the ceilings, and admit that, so far as agriculture is concerned, they have been a deterrent. I say to the ex-minister of finance as well that, so far as the wartime prices and trade board and fixed prices are concerned, the farmer has been the guinea pig in the whole picture. He has been the guinea pig of this new economic experiment. My hon. friends may laugh, but let them go up and down the side lines of the dominion and the people will tell them, and more vociferously than I am doing, and not in parliamentary language either.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I have seen ten times as much of the dominion and of every province as my hon. friend has seen. I have been through every province. He lives in Toronto and Ontario only. Let him go and see the great west.


William Earl Rowe: I have been west too, but if my hon. friend has gone all over the map in the short time that he has done I can understand why he has seen so little of the country.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: You have a localized viewpoint; that is all.

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William Earl Rowe: I remember when members of the present cabinet were on this side. They did not see as much of the back concessions as they thought they did.


James Garfield Gardiner: What did the farmer get then?


William Earl Rowe: He got a fairer share of the world market than you have given him. He got a fairer share of it than you are giving him now. It is all very well to talk about 1930 and 1931, but I have sat here longer than the Minister of Agriculture and I say to him that no one can tell me that the farmer did not get a fairer share of world markets than he gets today.


An hon. MEMBER:: At what prices?


William Earl Rowe: If the hon. gentleman expects to be big enough to run all the industries of Canada he should know more than he does.


Stanley Howard Knowles: You should know more about it.


William Earl Rowe: I do, and I know this-


Stanley Howard Knowles: Nothing whatever.


Arthur Leroy Smith: Bring on the cheering section when you can't take it.


William Earl Rowe: I am not disturbed by little Chicago over here, or over there either.


Mr. GRANT:: When the hon. gentleman was in power they were not getting any prices at all.


William Earl Rowe: What did you sell your products at?


Thomas Vincent Grant: Starvation prices; that is all.


William Earl Rowe: That is the most antiquated sort of defence that anyone can put up. I am not going to go back-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


William Earl Rowe: There are those, especially to my right, who would like to suggest that the depression came about because the Conservative party came into power at a time when we faced the greatest crisis in the history of the world. If my hon. friend the leader of the C.C.F. party has made a study of the situation; if he is big enough to take over all the industries of Canada, he ought to know more about what caused the depression in 1929 than he appears to know.
I say to my hon. friends from western Canada, and to some on my own side too perhaps-


Thomas Vincent Grant: Perhaps?


William Earl Rowe: -what caused the depression in 1929 was-


An hon. MEMBER:: Bennett.


William Earl Rowe: The hon. member says "Bennett."


An hon. MEMBER:: 


William Earl Rowe: Well, "R. B." was a great fellow, but the Right Hon. Mr. Bennett was not in power from 1921 to 1930.


Thomas Vincent Grant: We had good times then.


William Earl Rowe: You had good times, but more Canadians left this country than were brought in or were born in Canada, and the natural increase was lost. We lost a million people during those years, people who found better employment and a better opportunity in foreign countries than they could find at home.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Why did he leave Canada?


William Earl Rowe: I beg your pardon?


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Why did R. B. leave it?


Arthur Leroy Smith: He was sick of you.


William Earl Rowe: I do not know, Mr. Chairman, but knowing what happened between 1921 and 1930, I presume the people who went away thought that some day again they would have to endure another Liberal government. In any event, Mr. Bennett has been accepted with good grace in another country and I do not think he is any discredit to Canada. He is a distinguished citizen where he is.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: No one ever suggested otherwise.


Mr.   CHAIRMAN@: Order.


William Earl Rowe: My right hon. friend is a distinguished man, but I say to him I have no apologies to offer for Mr. Bennett.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Neither have I. I am a great friend of his.	.


William Earl Rowe: He never recognized it very much, but I suppose you are. I can only say that, so far as agriculture in Canada is concerned, never in the history of this dominion has it been in the confusion it is in at the present time.


An hon. MEMBER:: Oh, oh.


William Earl Rowe: My hon. friend always says more sitting down than he can say standing up. He is always chiming in.


Thomas Vincent Grant: The farmers were never so well off as they are today.

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William Earl Rowe: My hon. friends may twit and make these empty gibes-


Thomas Vincent Grant: No gibe at all.


William Earl Rowe: -but history will prove what I say to those who, running, may read. Those who run may read, but my hon. friend perhaps would rather sit than either run or read. May I say this to the committee, Mr. Chairman, and you need not take my word for it. The Minister of Agriculture and the right hon. gentleman who is leading the house have no doubt read the records of the Geneva conference on world economic affairs, and they no doubt know-it is now common history which every student of economics understands-that in this dominion the greatest contributing factor to the depression of 1929 was a clumsy effort to plan agriculture. I remember stepping out into the corridor on one occasion when I stated that Canada should have a balanced economy in which we would pay more attention to mixed farming instead of putting all our eggs in one basket-one wheat basket. I remember that at that time my hon. friends from the province of Quebec who were on the opposite side of the house used to refer to the fact that we were listening to nothing but wheat; and finally, as I remember well, one gentleman said to me, "You don't understand. We have the wheat market of the world in the palm of our hands. We are the bread-basket of the world and we can dictate prices."


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


William Earl Rowe: I can quite understand why my hon. friend does not understand this. He does not listen long enough to learn anything.


An hon. MEMBER:: What was the price of wheat then?


William Earl Rowe: If you do not know that much, why enter into this discussion at all? We know that during 1925 and 1926 Italy and Czechoslovakia, France and Germany, every country in the world, all raised their tariffs, yes, higher than the price of our wheat. W'hy? Because, as reported at the world conference, they were fearful of the wheat pools of western Canada fixing a price and demanding that price, and were afraid of the monopoly. We have seen the results. We sold wheat at thirty-five cents a bushel.
The world did not suffer a depression because Bennett was elected in Canada and wheat was forty cents. The world did not say, "Because of that, we will put 29,000,000 men out of jobs". Anyone who talks that sort of thing is just talking stupid political nonsense. That worked all right for an election or two, but it is not according to the facts and the records

of history. Let us look the facts square in the face. The Minister of Agriculture knows now what the facts are. He says to my hon. friends to the left, "Leave your amendment; we are not sure whether we will adopt it or reject it. It may be all right. Let us look it over". The minister is the same as he has been for the last four years; he does not know whether he is going or coming.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: You are certainly
going; that is one sure thing.


William Earl Rowe: The Minister of Agriculture cannot tell me tonight why we have seen the greatest reduction in dairy' production that we have had in the last twenty-five years.


James Garfield Gardiner: I can tell you what the reduction is, but you will not believe me.


William Earl Rowe: I can tell you what it is and why7. I asked you this afternoon but you would not tell me. We have reduced our bacon production. You have not told the country that before your party came into power we sent more bacon to Britain than you sent this yrear. You have not told the people that. You have not told them that you made a contract with Britain for 350.000,000 pounds three years ago and fell down by 100,000,000 pounds, and revised the contract and made another for tw?o hundred and fifty-and by the signs of the times and the brood sows that are going to market you have not filled that.
The handwriting is on the wall, Mr. Chairman. The farmers of Canada today have lost confidence in the present government. They do not know what to sow. They are waiting for the Natural Products Marketing Act. They have read the Wheat Board Act. They do not know whether the Minister of Agriculture will tell them what they have to sow, where they are going to sell, how much they are going to get for their product, but they do know that they pay about three times as much today for a binder as they paid in the last great war which my hon. friends hark back to with regard to high prices. They know they pay about twice as much for farm labour as they paid then and that they get about half as much for their wheat. As to price ceilings, the hon. member for Qu'Appelle said this afternoon that she believes they will be good things for all. But even a kindergarten class knows they are no good on one side unless they are operative on the other side. Personally I do not think they are any good on either side. I hope I do not embarrass the cabinet ministers, because I understand there has been division on this in the last five years. I do not believe that a farmer like the

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Minister of Agriculture could sit in a cabinet like this without having embarrassed the ex-minister of finance; and I do not believe any old Scotch Presbyterian free economist like him could sit there and not feel that the whole show was being put out of commission. We have carried controls to the limit. We have carried controls to the point of detriment to our supply of products overseas. We have carried controls to the point that the peoples in Europe, hungry for food, are deprived of wheat which would have been produced in Canada. My right hon. friend tonight says. "What about the price of feeds to produce this bacon and meat products? Where does the feed come from?"


James Garfield Gardiner: Off the farm.


William Earl Rowe: Yes, off the farm. I hope that some day in the cabinet you will tell the rest of your colleagues, the new found economists, why it is that for Britain, that we feel we want to help, the farmers of Canada are asked to send their wheat over at S200 million less than they can get at the world price for a year, and yet you make the British pay more for lumber than the people of Canada have to pay. Do you think it is fair for the farmers of Canada to lose $200 million on their product which they are exporting overseas and yet at the same time tell the lumbermen of British Columbia that they can charge the Britisher what they want to, even if he needs a house as badly as he needs bread. What type of economy is this?
We are not surprised at the hon. member for Qu'Appelle, in view of the fact that she is a member of the fairer sex. I think she is more sympathetic than any member of the cabinet when she says it is a planned economy, but it is only half-planned. It is a mixture, and so it is. It must be a mixture when the western farmer and wheat producer of Canada surrenders $200 million a year, but the lumberman of British Columbia can charge $123 a thousand for rough lumber for Britain.


George Alexander Cruickshank: How much do you get for pulp in Ontario?


Mr. BRADETTE:: Tell us about the price of lumber.


William Earl Rowe: What is that?


George Alexander Cruickshank: How much do you get for pulp in Ontario?


Arthur Leroy Smith: Oh, you are usually fair.


William Earl Rowe: We get as much and more for pulp than you would take to produce it.


George Alexander Cruickshank: You raised it $8 a ton.


William Earl Rowe: Yes; and freight rates rose $3 a ton, and we raised wages in Montreal last week $3 a ton. May I inform you-and I think you are a great defender of the British Columbia lumberman; I have no brief for them-that if you want to talk about the pulp and paper industry, we in the pulp and paper industry have no apologies to make, despite the snipes that have been coming from various sides of this house.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: You have been doing very well.


William Earl Rowe: Yes; just as well as under your management.


Major James William Coldwell: Apparently a whole lot better.


William Earl Rowe: If you could run them all together better than we can run them separately, you are a better wizard than you have ever indicated here in Ottawa. I will say this, in any event, for the benefit of my hon. friend from British Columbia because he is a free enterpriser-and I say it for the benefit of the leader of the C.C.F. party because he interrupted me: the great pulp and paper industry of Canada has been the greatest stabilizer, as the ex-minister of finance knows, of any industry in Canada. Half of that industry has been in bankruptcy for the last fifteen years. No industry in Canada pays its employees as high wages, and no industry in Canada has paid its shareholders less dividends. Those are facts which are irrefutable, and I challenge anyone to rise in the house tonight and say they are not right.


George Alexander Cruickshank: Watered stock.


William Earl Rowe: Watered stock, you say. I could tell you about some of your companies but I might get too personal if I did. But those are the facts and they are undeniable; and today we are paying to labour the highest base rate paid by any industry in Canada. It is true that some will say, "You have had an increase in your commodity." So we have. Where is this venture capital to come from? \\ here is the capital to come from with which you are to take over all these industries? Will you get it for less than two per cent? The pulp and paper industry in Canada in the last fifteen years have not paid an average of two per cent on the venture capital which made it possible in Canada. I challenge my friends to say where they are going to get the money to take over all this industry at any less. Let us throw the cards down and see where we come in this new economy of
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yours. Do you think you can run them all better than anybody runs them separately?


Major James William Coldwell: Address the chair.


William Earl Rowe: I apologize to you, Mr. Chairman. I would much rather address you than address my hon. friend. I think you are both very fine, but if I were going to trust my estate to either, I would entrust it to you, Mr. Chairman.
I urge upon the Minister of Agriculture, and urge it upon him before it is too late-


Thomas Vincent Grant: What did you do under
Bennett?


William Ross Macdonald: Order.


William Earl Rowe: I do not know what my hon. friend said. However, if you think you are contributing something to the debate, then you serve a purpose.


Thomas Vincent Grant: I am sure you are not,
anyway.


William Earl Rowe: I cannot tell what my hon.
friend's interruptions are. If he would make them audible and make them clear, I might be able to deal with them, but I do not know what he said. I know he is saying something and I think he understands it probably as well as the rest of the house does.
In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, following what the hon. member for Qu'Appelle said, I am not supporting her theory that we should have a planned economy, but I support her to this extent:	If you are going to have a
half planned economy you must have it all. You on the left and you on the right had better get together. You have a half planned economy now.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: You have got none.


William Earl Rowe: You have a bureaucracy built up on a planned economy. You do not want to go out and say you will leave it to the law of supply and demand. But I ask you now, do you think them is any other way of establishing agricultural production in Canada unless you give an incentive to the farmers?


James Garfield Gardiner: I am going to talk
after you are through. Go right on.


William Earl Rowe: I know pretty well what
the Minister of Agriculture will say, too. I realize that he will tell us about the low prices in 1932. I realize that he will tell about the Tory reactionaries. I know about the line he will take. If I gave it, he would be glib enough to find another one, probably, in another speech; so I am not going to relate it all. But I know very well that at least fifteen times I have heard the Minister
of Agriculture tell about the low prices in 1932 and what the farmers went through. That is an old, tottering and dusty argument.


James Garfield Gardiner: You don't like to hear
about it, do you?


William Earl Rowe: I don't like to hear about it from a man who is a right honourable, who should know better, and does know better. I don't like him to use it for political purposes, when he knows it is not true. And after some years of activities we expect people to stick to the truth of things. You can't stand up tonight and tell us that the prices we received in, 1932 were due to the fact that it happened we changed governments in Canada in 1930.


James Garfield Gardiner: You have a bad conscience.


William Earl Rowe: No, but I have to recall the type of argument you have put up for the last ten years in this house.


James Garfield Gardiner: You really think it is true.


William Earl Rowe: I know it is not true, just as you know it is not true. Will you tell me if that is not true-[DOT]


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Chair, chair.


William Earl Rowe: Mr. Chairman, Lam reminded that you are in the chair.
I say to the right hon. gentleman: When you rise tonight will you tell us why it was that when your party came into power in 1921-and, that is history-we had more live stock production, and sold more live stock products to Great Britain than we did grain? Will you tell us why it was that we were eating more bacon at that time than we are today. Will you tell us why it was that when you went out of power in 1930, before the Right Hon. Mr. Bennett and his party took office, we were importing New Zealand butter and Danish bacon? My hon. friend knows it. I have heard him use it in the house. We were eating Danish bacon in Canada; we were eating New Zealand butter in Canada in 1930 than we were exporting from Canada. We were importing more live stock production into Canada. But in 1921, about thirty years ago, we were selling, at those lower prices, $77 million worth of live stock products more than we are buying.
What happened in those years? The Danish farmers were taking grain from western Canada, feeding hogs and sending bacon back to sell in the butcher shops at Regina. Eighteen thousand head of cattle were impor-

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ted in tin cans in 1930. We were eating canned beef in 1930, beef canned in the Argentine.
True, during the war, the bacon people had some exports; but it is rapidly falling off again. It has fallen from 350,000,000 pounds two or three years ago to 250,000,000 pounds now. And if you keep the price ceilings on those things we have to sell and take the price ceilings off those things we have to buy, then I shudder to think how much more we shall be falling down in, our supplying of the British market. And if we cannot supply it in a time of stress and strain, then we have no right to claim it in a time of peace and prosperity.
I urge the minister and ask him to urge the government to let go of these bureaucratic controls. You cannot control them all unless you are going to do it with machine-guns. The farmers are paying today double the amount in wages they were paying back in 1921-and I know whereof I speak. We are selling our wheat and losing hundreds of millions of dollars a year on your fixed ceiling price. And your exports of other products are falling down. Even the British people are laughing at the mess you have made of Canadian agriculture.
I leave it to you: If you do not listen tonight to what I have said' you will hear from the farmers in the next election.


James Garfield Gardiner: Mr. Speaker, when we opened the discussion this evening on two orders in council which have been in effect for some four years, and which will probably be in effect for some few weeks more at the most, I did not expect that for the third or fourth time during this session we were to have a full-dress debate on agriculture. Nor did I expect that it would carry on into all the activities of the government, or of all governments we have had during the century. But we have just listened to a speech which covers all that.
My hon. friend has just been making statements which are not borne out by the facts. He has tried to leave the impression that in years gone by there was at some time higher production and that there have been higher exports of products than we have had recently As a matter of fact we still have high production and exports. But I just wish to leave a few figures with him and with the committee in order to indicate how far from the facts he really is.
In 1930, a year which was spoken of, the production of cheese in Canada was 119,000,000 pounds. The production of cheese in 1942 was
208,000.000 pounds; in 1943 it was 167,000,000
pounds; in 1944 it was 182,000.000 pounds, and in 1945 it was 189,000,000 pounds. In 1946 it is true that it was down, as compared with these last few years, to 148,000,000 pounds. But that is still much higher than 119,000,000 pounds.
But that is not the most important figure. When we talk about parties going out of power, another party has gone out of power since that. That was the party led by the Right Hon. R. B. Bennett, which went out of power in 1935. The production of cheese in that year was 101,000,000 pounds. And from the time they came into office in 1930, when it was quite low-119,000,000 pounds-it still went on down. It went down during all the time they were in office, until it reached
101.000.	000 pounds.


An hon. MEMBER:: He kept it up well in those hard times.


James Garfield Gardiner: As a matter of fact, hard times do not have so much effect upon production of food as is suggested by my hon. friend. But what happened immediately after-


William Earl Rowe: Will the hon. member permit a question? He did not interrupt me, but I know he does not wish to be unfair and to mislead the committee.


James Garfield Gardiner: I will not mislead the committee either.


William Earl Rowe: And you are certainly not going to mislead me because I know what took place very well.


William Ross Macdonald: Order.


William Earl Rowe: The minister says he wishes to show the difference. I never mentioned one figure about production in 1930. Go back to 1921, and see if what I said was not true. You are dealing with a different set of figures entirely. At least let the committee know that my integrity in these matters is as good as yours.


James Garfield Gardiner: We imported 1,788,000 pounds, produced 119,000,000 pounds and exported 80,000,000 pounds in that year. That was in 1930.


William Earl Rowe: Certainly.


James Garfield Gardiner: And the domestic disappearance, if you wish to have all the figures, amounted to 37,000,000 pounds.
Now, coming back to 1934, which was the lowest year-and 1935 was about the same. There was 100,000,000 pounds in 1934 and
101.000.	000 pounds in 1935. The government changed in that year, in the fall of 1935. In
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1936 the production went up to 120,000,000 pounds; in 1937 it went up to 131,000,000 pounds; and by 1940, the first year of the war, it was up to 146,000,000 pounds. It went on up, under the present government, and under the agricultural policy that has been spoken about, to 206,000,000 pounds, which is the highest production of cheese in the present century.
Now, one might go on and deal with other products which have been spoken about. Let us take concentrated milk products. In 1932 it was 110,000,000 pounds. In 1935, the year the government of Mr. Bennett went out, it was 105,000,000 pounds. It was down. It had been down much lower in the intervening period, but it was down 5,000,000 pounds that year. It went up next year to 109,000,000 pounds; the next year to 137,000,000 pounds; next year to 157,000,000 pounds; the next year to 166,000,000 pounds; the next year to
193,000,000 pounds; the next- year to 236,000,000 pounds. To save reading a lot of figures, by 1946 it had got up to 302,000,000 pounds. There has not been any reduction in production over a period in connection with that.
The same kind of figures could be produced with regard to other items. Let us look at eggs for a moment. In 1930 our production was 250,000,000, but by 1935 the preceding government had succeeded in getting it down to 244,000,000. Since this government has been in, it has gone up from the first year of the war when it was 250,000,000 to 1945 when we got it up to 393,900,000. It has dropped down slightly in 1946.


William Earl Rowe: What are you paying in subsidies?


James Garfield Gardiner: The hon. member wants to know what we are paying in subsidies. I have heard nothing from the other side of the house but the suggestion that we ought to get rid of all these controls and special considerations we have in connection with these matters and let trade take its free course. That is a rather peculiar policy to hear from my hon. friends on the other side; nevertheless it is the kind of policy which has been spoken of. What was the position taken by our hon. friends back in 1929 when they were contesting an election back and forth across this country? It was that there was protection in every other country in the world. They said that they had protection in Germany, in France and in Italy; they said that there was no unemployment in those countries, that the only countries where there was unemployment were countries like Britain, Canada and other countries which followed the same policy as this country. They 
said, "Put us in power and we will blast our way into the markets of the world". They were blasting for five years, and by the end of that time they had created the situation indicated by these figures, not only with regard to agriculture but with regard to every other industry in the Dominion of Canada.
Now my hon. friend comes back and says that we have been in power for some time and that there is a certain situation existing with regard to agriculture. What is the situation? In 1946, in spite of the fact that production of hogs is down; in spite of the fact that production is down on some dairy products; in spite of the fact that production is down slightly on eggs as compared with the previous year, the highest net return the farmers of this country ever received was received in 1946. That means only one thing. If the production was down, then the return per unit must be very high as compared with the previous year. There is only one year in the history of this country when even the gross income from farm operations was higher than 1946, 'and that was in 1944.
The products which were sold in 1944 and which brought about the high gross income of that year were not products produced in 1944. One of the products which brought about a greater increase in gross farm cash returns in 1944 than any other was grain, and that grain which was sold in 1944 in such great quantities was not all grown in 1944. That grain was grown in 1942 and the years preceding, and in 1943. It was stored in our elevators and sold in 1944 and thus brought a considerable amount of cash into the pockets of the farmers of this country.
In spite of that, the cash income in 1944 was $1,849 million, whereas in 1946 the gross cash income was only $90 million less in spite of the fact that we were selling only the production of the year 1946 in the main. The net income of our farmers was the highest, whereas the gross income was only $90 million less than it was in the highest sales year that agriculture ever had in this country. We have increased the price of grain. My hon. friend wants to know why it was done. If he looks at the record he will find that there are only three provinces that had a lower gross return in 1946 as compared with 1944, and those were Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta.
Why were those provinces down in gross return while the other provinces were not? The reason is obvious. Year by year we have been increasing the returns that can be obtained from every farm production that can be produced by the feeding of grain, but we have not increased the prices of feed grain

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since 1943 until this year. This year, in justice to the farmers who have been growing the feed that is being fed to live stock in surplus all over the Dominion of Canada, we have suggested that the prices ought to go up. If that increase does result in a slight increase per ton in the cost of the feed that is being fed to live stock, it will be found by the end of the first year for which statistics are available that it did not do anything more than give justice to the people who produce the grain that is being fed in surplus elsewhere.
What I want to suggest with regard to that is this:	The discussions which we have
had tonight clearly indicate that there are some men v'ho claim to be farmers but who have not followed the records in relation to % agricultural production, more particularly in relation to agricultural returns. There has been a constant upward levelling of prices over the returns from those products which are produced from the feeding of grain. There has not been a comparable increase in the price of grain itself to those farmers who grow the grain and who sell it to those who are going to feed it. The reason for the announcement that has been made is partly to adjust that situation. When it is adjusted, when we get our returns, if we have anything like an average crop year in 1947 it will be found once more that the three prairie provinces which produce grain occupy a position in relation to both gross and net returns from farms in Canada which is comparable to that in the other provinces. The government has nothing more in mind to produce from the results of its policies than that result.
To come back to the position of the farmer, there is not a farmer from one end of Canada to the other but will say that his position is better under this government at the present time than it has ever been under any other government in the dominion. When I have said that I am not saying that the farmer has yet got all that is coming to him. That is the reason why we are saying tonight that we are not going to lower the return the farmer will receive as of the 1st of May or the first of any other month throughout the coming year. We have said to this house that we are going to establish prices for dairy products which will put the farmer in at least as good a position after the first of May as he had before the first of May.
This necessitates taking under consideration any increases that have been made in grain prices; it necessitates taking into consideration at the same time the fact that we have already increased the financial position of agriculture in all the provinces that produce live stock products as related to the provinces 83166-138
that produce grain. Not only have we done that as relating to the provinces that produce live stock to be fed grain, we have done that as relating to the provinces that produce grain in so far as they feed their grain to live stock.
Our province of Saskatchewan is not entirely a grain producing area. If one draws a line from the southeast corner of our province to Lloydminster he will find that the line runs about twenty miles north of Regina and twenty miles south of Saskatoon. It will be found that the area north of that line is a live stock producing area, just as important a live stock producing area as can be found anywhere in Canada. The hon. member for Melfort knows this. As was said earlier in this house during a debate, when he came back from the first war he made a trip across our country and searched for an area in which to establish farming operations. He chose the Melfort district in the northeastern part of Saskatchewan. If he has not very good judgment in his politics he certainly had good judgment in his choice of a farming area. He has a good farm in that area and he has done very well. He is in the centre of the live stock producing area of our province. I want to say again that that area is just as much a mixed farming area, a live stock producing area and a dairy producing area as any section of the Dominion of Canada. It can stand comparison with any other part of Canada both with regard to production and with regard to net returns.
The southwestern part of the province is a grain-growing area, and we can sit in this house and belittle the discussions that have taken place on wheat, as I have heard them belittled by the previous speaker; but, after we have belittled them as much as we can, we come back to the fact that there is no other product produced in Canada that is-shipped out in quantities to bring in as much outside money into Canada as wheat. Since that is the case, a considerable part of the business of this country is dependent upon the production of that area. It is not a wheat growing area by accident. It is the only product they can produce there to advantage and remain there and maintain their families on a reasonable standard of living. In other words, it is a natural grain growing area, not only for wheat but other grains. It is not an accident that they are producing grain there. They were able to go into that section of the country, stick a plough into the land and plough a whole quarter-section the first year and the second year have it under crop. Of course people who would go into an area of that kind would start growing grain.

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The other sections went into mixed farming for the same reason that Ontario went into mixed farming. The northeastern part of the province was covered by trees, much of it not by trees big enough to call forests. We call them scrub, scrub poplar, scrub willow and trees of different kinds which had to be cleared. People who go into an area of that kind would naturally go in for mixed farming, because they are not able to make enough money in any other way on the small acreage they have to maintain them while clearing. They went into mixed farming and they remained in mixed farming. But neither the farmers in that section nor the farmers in the remainder of Canada could produce anything like the live stock they are producing today were it not for the fact that farmers did go into the grain growing area and did produce and ship large quantities of grain, the surpasses which made production possible. So I would say to any member of this house, farmer or no farmer, who lives in eastern Canada, that he is not doing credit to 'himself or to the farmers in his area when he decries the discussion of grain or wheat on the floor of this house; for it is a product which brings more wealth into this country than any other product, a product which makes it possible for live stock to be fed on farms right across Canada in the quantities in which is fed, a product which makes it possible for every province, except the three provinces that grow the grain, to have a higher gross income from farming last year that they ever had in any other year in their history.
Having said that, I come back to the chief criticism made by the 'hon. member who just took his seat. His chief criticism is that our production was down in 1946 as compared with 1944. I have given a partial explanation, 'namely that much that was sold in 1944 was not produced that year. But there is another thing I should like to say. My hon. friend speaks of what has been going on, the lack of planning, the lack of organization, the lack of leadership to the farmers of this country. I listened to that kind of speech during the first four years I was here prior to the war, and yet farm production went up and up year after year in spite of the fact that my hon. friend was making the same kind of speech that he did tonight. Then the war came. You can go back and check the record in the debates of this house, and you will find that every year he predicted that our production would go down and down. Yet from 1939 to 1944 it soared from one height to another, until it reached a record height in 1944 which probably no other farm group in Canada
(Mr. Gardiner.]
under any kind of organization or leadership will be able to match over a long period of
years.


Arthur Leroy Smith: There was a war.


James Garfield Gardiner: I am not speaking now of the prices they obtained for their crop but of their production.


Mr. HACKETT:: There was a demand for it.


James Garfield Gardiner: My hon. friend said there was a demand. All I will say is that we made a much better job in getting that demand when half the world was shut out from us than my hon. friend and his government did in the five years they were in power when the whole world was open to them to blast their way into. The situation from 1939 to 1944 was that we had only one market where we could market our products to advantage, and that market was the British isles. My hon. friend has been saying tonight: Yes, we are willing that the United Kingdom should be fed. But, Mr. Chairman, fortunately those who are administering affairs in the United Kingdom know a great deal more about agriculture in this country than the hon. member himself does, and because they do they are not misled by the kind of argument he was making a few moments ago, when he said that a few years ago we were selling 700,000,000 pounds of bacon to Britain.


William Earl Rowe: Mr. Chairman, I rise to a question of privilege.


James Garfield Gardiner: The only reason you did not say it was because you could not remember the figures.


William Earl Rowe: The minister may be the crown prince of Saskatchewan, but he is not going to bull-doze me in the House of Commons. He may do that in the little country schoolhouse, but I say that he has never heard me in twenty-five years state that we ever sold
700,000,000 pounds of bacon to Britain, and he knows that I know we never did. That was just a straight political statement of his, or it indicated senility or a misunderstanding of the facts. The minister cannot put that over. The minister knows better than anyone else; everyone in his department knows, and the leader of the C.C.F. party knows that I never at any time made the statement that we ever sold Britain 700,000,000 pounds of bacon, because I know we never had that much to sell. But in 1921 we sold 255,000,000 pounds. That is the statement I made.


James Garfield Gardiner: My hon. friend has not been listening very closely. I did not give

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credit to the party of which he is a member for every having sold 700,000,000 pounds of bacon to anybody.


William Earl Rowe: You said I said that.


James Garfield Gardiner: I said we sold 700,000,000 pounds, and the actual figure here is 717,000,000 pounds.


William Earl Rowe: In what year did1 you sell
717.000.	000 pounds?


James Garfield Gardiner: I will give you the whole record. In 1944-


Mr. HARKNESS:: What is the minister quoting from?


James Garfield Gardiner: From the official records of the statistics bureau of the dominion government.


William Earl Rowe: How much are you selling them this year?


James Garfield Gardiner: We shall get around to that in a minute. I am making this speech, and not you.


William Earl Rowe: You are making your own, but do not make mine.


William Ross Macdonald: Order.


James Garfield Gardiner: In 1944 we sold
717.000.	000 pounds of bacon to Britain. And after that experience we had sold or fed the enormous amounts of feed grain which were produced in 1942 and the amount we added to it in 1943 and also what we had grown in 1944. By the end of July, 1945, we had only one month's feed stored in the Dominion of Canada on our farms and elsewhere, with a new crop coming up. In these circumstances this government was wise enough to know that it was absolutely impossible for the farmers of this country to feed 717,000,000 pounds of bacon to go to Britain any time again until we had gone through the first three or four years of another war, or preparation for it, which would compel us to keep our grain stored in our bins year after year until we could open up a way for it into the natural markets of the world on the European continent. Therefore we began to plan for that. What did we do? We signed a contract with Britain not to deliver 600,000,000 pounds as we did the preceding year, when we actually delivered 717,000,000 pounds, but
450.000.	000 pounds a year. For the reason that we knew there were men in this country like the hon. member who has just spoken who would go out and say that was an indication that we wanted the farmers to decrease the production, we made a two-year contract for 900,000,000 pounds over the two years in
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order that we might have two years in which to make the shift. True to form, my hon. friends in this house and all through this country went out and said that the government of this country is deliberately cutting down on supplies of bacon to Great Britain. My hon. friends said that we could never build it up. We did build it up from the unreasonably low levels at which it was in 1935 to the enormous quantity of 717,000,000 pounds sent in 1944. Then, when we reduce it to a figure that they never dreamed of being able to reach in their day, 450,000,000 pounds, they thought that was a ridiculous thing to do. Now, when they find that there is not enough feed in Canada with which to feed the live stock we now have they are still trying to maintain that somebody somehow could have been able to feed more hogs and more cattle in Canada. The only way in which we can feed hogs and cattle is to produce grain with which to feed them. Every bushel of feed grain that we have in this country is being fed in this year, which is an indication that we could not have produced more.
My hon. friend tries to lead us to believe that that reduction is due to some kind of policy which the present government has been following; but when anybody suggests that the reductions that came about from 1929 when they were going to blast their way into the markets of the world down to 1932 had anything to do with the Conservative policy in the country they say it is all bosh. I am prepared to accept his suggestion that the fact that we had a Conservative government here then was not the only reason for our bad times, provided that he will just say that the fact that our farmers have such good times now is partly because we have a Liberal government. I am quite sure that whether he will say that or not-


William Earl Rowe: You hit a war, too.


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes, we had a war. We had a war before when my hon. friend's friends were in power. When that war ended what happened?


William Earl Rowe: We had higher prices than we have today.


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes, you had higher prices for a few days. Wheat 'sold at S3.05 for one day, and during that time the government sold some millions of bushels of wheat and wheat went down like a rock and never came back.


William Earl Rowe: Yes-
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James Garfield Gardiner: I know, because I was selling wheat then off my own farm.


William Earl Rowe: So was I.


James Garfield Gardiner: And it kept on going down, and we had a new government in power-


William Earl Rowe: It went up, did it?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes, wheat went up and kept on going up, until from 1926 to 1929 we had the best conditions in this country that agriculture had ever experienced prior to that time and the best conditions we have ever had since until the last four years. Both of these good financial conditions for the farmer were created, not under a Conservative government not under these ideas that we have listened to for the last two months, but under the policies that were put into effect by this government.
My hon. friend says that his hon. friends to the left of him are talking socialism. I quite agree that they believe in socialism, but more than half the time they are talking liberalism. The only way in which a government can really benefit the people of this country, no matter what they talk in order to get elected, is to put truly Liberal policies into effect while they are in office. When they do that the position of agriculture improves. Unfortunately for other parties in this country the only party that has ever done that is the Liberal party. Our position has always been improved under Liberalism.
I do not know whether this is going to develop into an old-time political campaign. It has been going on now for some months. I have sat here for two months, and during the greater part of that time I have been reprimanded both in the house and outside of it when I rose on a point of order in order to try to keep things in order. I have now come to the conclusion that the best thing I could do is to make a few political speeches myself, and that probably in making them we shall finally convince hon. members opposite of what I think is the truth. They are standing here day after day making speeches for no other purpose than to get free propaganda before the people of this country. I would suggest to my hon. friends that if they really do want an election, if they really do want to get political propaganda out to the country, just get together against the policies that this government is putting into effect, make a clear statement of their position in relation to them, say why they are opposing it and vote that way; if as they think they can find some support from this side of the house they may

get an election, and they will probably find out what the people really think about these matters. But may I say this to them-


William Earl Rowe: Call one in Halifax now.


James Garfield Gardiner: We who sit on this side know hon. members on this side well enough to know that they believe in Liberal policies. They believe in liberalism. They know that there is no other party in this country which would ever give them Liberalism in this country except the Liberal party. They are going to keep this party in power for some considerable time in spite of the talk of my hon. friends. I would suggest to them that, instead of putting on full-dress debates on the matter of paying subsidies for two or three weeks on a small quantity of butter and cheese that is put on boats when they come into port, we get down to discussing what is before us and continue to do that for a while.


Edmund Davie Fulton: One of your own members started it.


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes, but I tried to stop him, and I am trying to stop everybody now. Let us get down to discussing what is before the committee and put these items through. Someone has been saying that they want to know what we are going to do about old age pensions. They want to know what we are going to do about other important matters. We have been trying to tell the house for two months that, just as soon as this bill is put through, it will know all about what we are going to do about these matters. The bills will be brought down and placed before the house and we shall have an opportunity of discussing them. If everybody is interested in these matters, then let us get on with this bill; pass it, get it through the house, get it out of the way, go on with the administration of it. Then we shall bring down the legislation which everybody seems to be worrying about and have it discussed, and let us get home some time this summer.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: I am sure that the Minister of Agriculture does not need any assistance in meeting the hon. member for Dufferin-Simcoe. In view of the fact that hon. members on this side of the house directed a good deal of heat in this direction, to keep the record straight a word should be said about the so-called wonderful days which existed when these hon. members sat over on the other side of the house. I was living in a part of Canada that took seriously the propaganda of a well-known Canadian who promised that he would blast his way into the markets of the world; that he would cure unemployment or perish in the attempt. That constituency

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elected a supporter of that well-known Canadian and he became a member of the cabinet, but the blasting did not seem to click and the unemployment situation grew worse. Our young men left home to go east to look for work, and everywhere the situation was the same-no men wanted. The farmers took their butter to town, and I remember farmers taking that product home again, unable to sell it at ten cents a pound. One farmer brought thirty dozen eggs to town one day and received ninety cents-three cents a dozen, in the good old days when the Tories were in office. I am sure the farmers in all parts of Canada have sufficiently vivid memories to recall those days and they certainly do not want a repetition of those incidents.


An hon. MEMBER:: A Labour government was in office in Britain at the same time.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: Not very long. They never had a majority. The Minister of Agriculture said, quite correctly, that the Canadian farmers during the war period were in a more favourable position than ever before; they were in that favourable position when all our markets were gone with the exception of the British market, and for a very large portion of the war we were supplying agriculutral products to Great Britain, as part of the mutual aid programme, which meant in reality that Canadian farmers were enjoying prosperity, while they were participating in giving agricultural products away. I want to make it clear that we were in complete agreement with the government policy that made agricultural products available in Great Britain. Indeed, I am not very proud of the fact that some Canadians have come through the war in such a favourable financial position. While we made substantial gifts in inan-power and materials, when we consider the position which other countries of the world are in, we cannot take a great deal of satisfaction in the financial position of Canadians in many walks of life at the present time.
The situation is still unsatisfactory. I have in my hand the Canadian agricultural programme for 1947, which is published under the authority of the Minister of Agriculture. It refers to the fourteen agricultural conferences which were convened here during the war. At the last meeting the deputy minister of agriculture gave a report of a conference lie had recently attended at Copenhagen and mentioned that the world grain deficit was given as 8,000,000 tons, while there was a potential shortage of rice of about 6,000,000 pounds. Fats and oils were fifteen per cent below the pre-war average, and meat production dropped
in the war to seventy per cent of pre-war levels in Europe and sixty per cent in the United Kingdom.
I find in this report that, while we reached enviable heights in the field of dairy production, hogs and cattle, during the war, our production is now falling off. On page 21, I find that the hog production in 1946 had dropped to 4,350,000 as compared with 5,861.000 for the previous year. It indicates that the government wants an increase of nineteen per cent in 1947 over the 1946 production, and the statistics for the past two years would indicate that we are not likely to reach this objective.
I mentioned before the dinner recess that I visited my constituency in the Easter recess. I was told at several points that hog production is decreasing rapidly and that the farmers in that part of the country are not likely to go into hog production again. They say they are not getting a satisfactory deal.


James Garfield Gardiner: May I be permitted an interruption? On that point I must admit that I was taken away by some of the interruptions we had from something I was going to say and should have said. What I started to say at one stage of my remarks was that the figures which appear in our contracts are fully understood by the British and have been all the way through ever since we made the reduction to 450,000,000 pounds. We have discussed the matter with them and have also discussed the question whether we should reduce the figure to what we expect to be able to supply, or hold it at what we are trying to get the farmer to produce, and we have written into the contract what we have been trying to get the farmers to produce. It is necessary for me to make that statement because, if the matter is looked at from any other point of view, one gets a mistaken idea.
The British knew, for example, last year that, while we wrote 125.000.000 pounds of cheese into the contract they did not expect to get 100,000,000 pounds. They knew that beforehand.


John Thomas Hackett: The British house did not know it.


James Garfield Gardiner: Their officials know it, and they can use their judgment whether they tell householders. But the objective put before them was that. If we had said to the farmers, "All that the British want is 100000,000 pounds," they might not have tried to produce 140,000,000 or 150,000,000 pounds. They might slip down, fearing that they would not have a market. So we put up the figure, and we said that in that way we would try to encourage the farmers to come up to the

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standard the British desired. But the British always knew whether we were coming up to it or falling down, and they knew it weeks in advance.


Alexander Malcolm Nicholson: During the war years, with over three-quarters of a million of the youngest and strongest men in the armed services and with a similar group producing armaments, Canadians did increase production of hogs, beef and milk. Now that the war is over, we are no longer engaged in the manufacture of munitions and our service personnel are back home. There must, therefore, be something radically wrong with the Canadian economy when the production of milk, butter and eggs declines. It is a reflection on our Canadian set-up that we cannot get our Canadian youth to take on the job of milking cows, feeding pigs and making butter. I think the only thing wrong is that the young people of Canada feel that those engaged in agriculture are not getting a fair share of the national income.
I agree with what the minister said earlier, that Canadian farmers are in a better position today than before. I think the debt position of the farmer in 1947 is better than it was at the end of the last war. But I was in British Columbia the other day at the C.C.F. convention, and when the agricultural policy was discussed I was amazed to hear delegate after delegate, as he rose, say, "I spent the first twenty, or thirty or forty years of my life on a farm and here I am now in Vancouver. I am not going to go back to the farm and I do not want my children to live on the farm". In Ontario the same situation prevails, certainly in that part of the province where I lived, in Bruce county. Very few-young people plan on taking over the family farm and continuing the production of agricultural commodities.
I submit that the minister has now sufficient evidence to know that the policy of getting rid of controls and subsidies will not enable Canada to meet her commitments to the hungry people of the world, with the very serious deficit of grain products, of meat products, of fats. I think we should be following the policy in agriculture which the minister of reconstruction followed during the war. He was not held up by lack of gold or lack of foreign markets. His programme was carried out on the theory that whatever is physically possible somehow or another must be made financially possible. I submit that the minister will not be able to supply adequate stocks of butter for Canada and abroad by leaving it to free enterprise or to supply and demand.

The farmers are the victims of huge monopolies which control the price of everything the farmer buys, and which in the past have controlled the price of things the farmers sold. Some of my hon. friends who sit to my right were here when the Stevens mass buying commission investigated price spreads, the operation of the tobacco industry, the canning industry and the packing industry. All down the line it was the same story. I remember that when you bought a can of peas or com you actually got about three-quarters of a cent's worth of vegetables, about three-quarters of a cent's worth of labour, and the rest went for the tin can which was thrown out, and profits that made huge fortunes for a very small group of people who operated on a monopolistic basis.
I submit that if Canada is to fulfil her commitments to feed the hungry people in the world the minister must use the weapons that he has to tax these corporations which the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar mentioned the other day and see that subsidies, if necessary, are paid to producers so that we shall maintain our production and supply the home and foreign markets. I think the minister should make some statement before we take his advice and go on, as to his opinion regarding the possibilities of Canadian children being able to have enough milk to drink in the next few years if you leave it to the law of supply and demand, to see that they get enough wages in the pay cheques so that they can buy milk at the greatly increased price. If the minister has the statistics, I think he would be able to tell us that our local consumption of milk is going down markedly in the cities and towns across the country. Again there is something seriously wrong when our own children have to consume less milk in 1947 than they did in 1945 when the enemy threatened our commerce and our people were risking their lives all over the country. Before we leave this item, I should like the minister to give some indication that the consumer in Canada will be able to maintain his consumption of dairy products, meat and pork products on a level similar to that- which prevailed during the war.


Arthur Leroy Smith: Mr. Chairman, I intend to occupy but a very small portion of your time and to be as speedy as usual I do that in order to answer some of the things said by the Minister of Agriculture, and I take what he said in reverse order. The last thing that he said was that we on this side of the house were using this opportunity to put propaganda before the people of Canada. We may have some who are capable of doing

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that, but since this is the first time that I have risen in this debate, either on the resolution, second reading or now in committee, I think I might be forgiven any such dastardly charge as trying to be political, particularly in view of the fact that the minister himself has made three political speeches on this very measure.


James Garfield Gardiner: And I am going to keep right on as long as you make them.


Arthur Leroy Smith: I give you my word that no one else can compare with the minister. He will keep on longer than anyone else; even though he does not say anything, he can still keep on going.
The next point he raised was this. He said my friends to my left, the state socialists, were talking liberalism.


James Garfield Gardiner: Half the time.


Arthur Leroy Smith: You did not say half the time.


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes, I did.


Arthur Leroy Smith: I will accept that.


William Ross Macdonald: Order.


Stanley Howard Knowles: The better half.


John Thomas Hackett: He meant that they talk in their sleep.


James Garfield Gardiner: About half the time.


Arthur Leroy Smith: I wish the Minister of Agriculture would make up his mind as to what he did say and I will accept it, whatever it is.


James Garfield Gardiner: About half the time.


Arthur Leroy Smith: That about half the time the hon. gentlemen to my left were preaching liberalism. You know, Mr. Chairman, words change. There is a simple word called "planning", and I shall have something to say about that, too. A few years ago it was a very respeotable word until it was grabbed completely by my hon. friends to my left. They seemed to think they had made a great discovery in grasping that old word and altering its meaning.
Mr. TOWNLEY-SMITH: You should talk about grabbing any word.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Yes, what about the word, "progressive"?


William Ross Macdonald: Order.


Arthur Leroy Smith: May I say that I shall answer both of you and all of you. One man mentioned "grafting", and if you mean what I think you did I will take you
on now or any other time. With respect to the word "progressive", I will take that on before I have finished. It does seem to me that the thing has become a bit threadbare and my hon. friends either need a new needle or a new record, because all they are doing is playing the old one again and again and it has become very scratchy.
So I come back to what I started to say, with the kindly interjections and help of my hon. friends over here, and that was that the minister said they were speaking liberalism- I am using his last explanation of what he said -about half the time. Let me accept that, if I know the meaning of the word liberalism. But I know another word a great deal better, and the minister and his government are not talking but are preaching socialism more than half the time, and they are acting it and practising it.
The next note I made with respect to what he said was on the position of the farmer today under this government, and he spoke of a levelling up of prices. I know about the farmer in the area in which I was born, where my grandparents farmed at a place called Foxley, twelve miles north of Regina where I spent all my boyhood holidays. I am certainly a blue-blooded fellow. My father was a tinsmith; he progressed and became a hardware merchant. My mother was a schoolteacher. I do know a little about the history of the country which these young fellows over here have now claimed to discover and all that sort of thing. It was there long before they knew about it. It was Assiniboia then. It is now the province of Saskatchewan. What I have in mind is this. All through the minister's speech he said "we" did this, "we" did that. I got lost in the millions. The most things I ever saw together-and I know nothing of dollars-was in a round-up where there were 30,000 head of cattle. To me that is a tremendous number of things. It is the most I ever saw in one place, but I have not been to a football match in England, for example, so that is the farthest I can go. But what struck me as amusing and with a little bit of resentment, was that the Minister of Agriculture through this war took full credit for what the farmers in this country did; and in my judgment the farmers did it in spite of the Minister of Agriculture.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Once he even told them to grow less wheat.


James Garfield Gardiner: And they did.


Arthur Leroy Smith: Yes; I am not going to take the time to point out all his mistakes. The only thing I am capable
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of doing at the moment is not to go into detail but to throw a blanket of obscurity over him because I think he would be much happier in that position.
The next thing he dealt with was the levelling of prices, and then he also carried on with respect to something said by the hon. member for Melfort. I am sorry I have forgotten what he did say about the hon. member for Melfort, so I am going to leave that.


James Garfield Gardiner: They were all nice things.


Arthur Leroy Smith: There is one thing I like about that. When one begins to court a girl he calls her nice things. I think it is infinitely better than that; the marriage is almost consummated between you and these people over here. So we are really making progress.


James Garfield Gardiner: He really used to be a Tory, and you used to be a Liberal. You had better get together.


Arthur Leroy Smith: Well, there is one thing I can say to the Minister of Agriculture. At least the minds of the hon. member for Melfort and myself are active. We change. We are not dead, as the minister is, because he has never been anything but a propagandizing Grit.


James Garfield Gardiner: But you just got through
accusing me of being a socialist.


Arthur Leroy Smith: Then I am going to accept that, entirely. In my judgment you should be sitting over here; that is where you belong. Your speech in Regina and your speech in Vancouver put you over here. But there are some delightful people around you, many of whom do not like you. But I cannot help that. There is nothing I can really do about it.
I want to go back a little. I have been here only-well, this is my third session. There is a man by the name of Bennett. We are not and have not been personal friends. But if it were not for this man Bennett people opposite and people to my immediate left would be absolutely naked in their arguments in ninety-nine per cent of the subjects which come up in this House of Commons. There is not any doubt about that. They all say, "We hit it in 1930, at the top of the depression." I am a little afraid we might hit it again, if some of these comments are right, and under rather similar circumstances. If so, we probably shall not last much longer than the Bennett government lasted at that time.
I want to say a word or two about this man. What did he do?


An hon. MEMBER:: Nothing.


Arthur Leroy Smith: Where did he stand in the world economy? I was in Ottawa in 1932, and I was very well paid for it. At that time I was acting in the Beauharnois inquiry before the senate committee. I do not hear any cheers from the opposite side of the house when I mention the Beauharnois inquiry, either. But I was here, and I had quite a time of it. Really it was my banner year. At that time we did not have the income tax that the minister over there is collecting.


Mr. McCANN:: It may be retroactive.


Arthur Leroy Smith: That is tin only thing the income tax people have failed to do-to make it retroactive from the cradle to the grave. There is no doubt about that.


James Joseph McCann: Keep your eye on Calgary.


Arthur Leroy Smith: I wish I could hear better. What did the minister say?


William Ross Macdonald: I might say that there should not be so many interruptions.


Arthur Leroy Smith: Mr. Chairman, I thank you very much, but I do not object to the interruptions. The only thing I was suggesting was that when the minister interrupts he should throw his chewing gum away so that I can hear him properly.


James Joseph McCann: Perhaps if you would clean out your ears it would do just as well.


Arthur Leroy Smith: I have an appointment with a physician tomorrow to blow out the right one; but my left one is still pretty good.


James Joseph McCann: Well, blow the whole thing off while you are at it, so that you will do a good job.


William Ross Macdonald: Order, I do not want to interrupt, except when the balance is even. But I do think hon. members should address the chair.


Arthur Leroy Smith: I agree with that. The only reason the minister will not have his ears blown out is that the few brains he has now will go with it.


James Joseph McCann: That is just where you would lose out, because there would be nothing to go with it.


Stanley Howard Knowles: What is the score now?


James Joseph McCann: Come again. We will beat you every time.


William Ross Macdonald: May I act in the capacity of referee and say that the balance is now even?

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James Joseph McCann: Stick to agriculture.


Arthur Leroy Smith: Mr. Chairman, I could not hear, but I gathered the result of your ruling was that I still have the floor.


Stanley Howard Knowles: And the score is 3 to 0 for Montreal.


Arthur Leroy Smith: I am going to take care of this, in a much broader sense. There is no question that between 1929 and 1939 we had a depression. The expression "the terrible thirties" is one which, in my judgment, was wisely used, and I admit that frankly.
But what was the situation at that time in this House of Commons among right honourable and honourable members opposite-and I use those words in the same collation? We have been speaking of a man named Bennett, who is now a viscount. Someone asked a minute ago: Why did he leave this country? I think that came from over here to my left. Let us be fair about it. Let me say to hon. members on my immediate left, who believe in 'socialism, that I think they have an arguable position. I have never denied that. They have an economic theory under which they believe we can economically and socially better the position of our people. I accept that from them. I am sure the suggestion is made in all honesty; I have no doubt about that at all. So surely we can have our bits of difference with respect to economic and social theories without going back and saying that so-and-so did this in eighteen slixty-slix, or eighteen seventj'-six or eighteen eighty-six.


An hon. MEMBER:: Eighteen slixty-slix?


Arthur Leroy Smith: The Minister of Agriculture does not know that I do that deliberately. That used to make a hit in the schoolhouse.
Is there anyone here who will deny that that was the first world-wide depression this world ever knew?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes, I deny it. We went through one in the early nineties which was just as bad.


Arthur Leroy Smith: World-wide?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes, world-wide.


Arthur Leroy Smith: I am sorry, but you must have read about that a lot later. You were not born at that time.


James Garfield Gardiner: I went through it, like a lot of other people.


Arthur Leroy Smith: I repeat what I said, and I have support to my left, 83166-139
although the Minister of Agriculture has a different view and a different memory.


James Garfield Gardiner: You are more socialist than I am; that is all.


Arthur Leroy Smith: I think I am. And may I put it to you this way, that I am more honestly socialistic in my thought and in my heart than you will ever be. But you are a politician first and a socialist after.


James Garfield Gardiner: I did not say "socialistic"; I said "socialist"; there is quite a difference.


Stanley Howard Knowles: He complimented you on your intelligence.


Arthur Leroy Smith: Well, I suppose there is a great difference between a noun and an adjective; but I always thought that socialist and socialistic persons were rather the same thing. However I appreciate the distinction the minister makes. What he means is this, by using the word "socialistic", that he loves all human kind, particularly if the3r are Grits. That is about it.


James Garfield Gardiner: They are really better then.


Arthur Leroy Smith: That is about his socialistic position.
So I return again, Mr. Chairman, with respect to you and with your kindly permission, to this so-called depression. The depression then was a political one. It arose because every country in the world went completely nationalistic. It arose because countries like Great Britain, France, Italy and all the rest, after the first war decided that never again would they, if they could avoid it, be placed in a position where they had to import the greater [DOT] proportion of their food. That is what happened at that time. And so we had bad prices for farm products and so on.
I am not an economist and, in fact, I do not recognize anybody any more under that name except the Minister of Labour. I do not think those people really exist or are entitled to that appellation. What happened was that we all put up tariff barriers and walls and endeavoured to live within ourselves. The result was that world trade languished and almost died. Then we came to 1932, I think it was. I remember that expression which everybody now thinks was so funny, about blasting our way into the markets of the world. But I think hon. members will remember one thing about it; it won an election in any event and it is entitled to that much credit. The Ottawa

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agreements were formed at that time and those are the Ottawa agreements having regard to this commonwealth.
As you know, Mr. Chairman, they were coming in here and taking out our gold, and this man Bennett had the courage to stop it on his own order and do more to save the economy of this country than any man sitting over there at the present time.


An hon. MEMBER:: Pretty wide powers.


Arthur Leroy Smith: He took
the power and it was confirmed later. Let us be frank. I do not think I can be accused of going very far from the truth even though perhaps it may hurt me, or perhaps "hurt" is the wrong word to use. These things flow like water from a duck's back, although there ire no duck shooters here.
I close by saying I appreciate very much the fact that the Minister of Agriculture had a terrible loss during the war; I am not overlooking that in what I am going to say. I close with this: In the figures which he gave tonight covering from 1939 until the present day he did not give credit to the fact that we were at war, with respect to either production or prices. It is easy to say that we produced more then. We did. He asked the farmers to do it and they did it. Production of similar products was stopped in half the countries of the world.
I do not think we in this House of Commons can get any straight line. There is bound to be a complexity on one side and a complexity on the other side. As I said when I spoke first in this house, times have changed so much. I like the expression used the other day by the hon. member for New Westminster. He said that there were many who did not recognize that we had had a war which blew our country to pieces, that the lid had been blown off our economic life. I go with him in that. This is a time of changing economies. I have not any doubt of that whatever. I close by just saying: It seems to me to be bad business and bad faith to break with all the good that is in our past and try to have a new broom which will sweep clean, as the expression is. When you have done that there is nothing more to sweep. You will not have a broom left to sweep with.


William Ross Macdonald: May I again remind
the committee that we are dealing with order in council P.C. 6759, which relates to the repayment of subsidy (agricultural products) regulations. That order in council states:
(b) "subsidized goods" means creamery butter, eheddar cheese, concentrated whole milk products, white beans or yellow eye beans, or
fMr. A. L. Smith.]
such other goods as may be designated by order of the deputy minister of agriculture by notice in Canadian War Orders and Regulations.
We have discussed a great many things tonight, such as eggs, lumber and pulpwood. I cannot see where lumber and pulpwood would come within the definition of dairy products. Possibly eggs might, because I have often read that hens are milk fed, but I do not see how lumber could come within that category. It occurred to me that it is time now, after this wide discussion, to consider this order in council. I do not want to curtail the debate because I think it was with unanimous consent that the general discussion has taken place, but I submit that it is now time that we should deal with the order in council.


Mr. QUELCH:: Mr. Chairman, you have suggested that we have been going around a large circle, but the circle has not been completed. I hope you will let me complete it.


William Ross Macdonald: I think the hon. mem-is correct. No member of the Social Credit group has taken part in the debate tonight. Would it meet with the wishes of all members of the committee that, after he completes his speech, we shall then deal with the order in council?


Victor Quelch: I am not going to speak at any length, but there are one or two things that have been said to which I should like to refer. The Minister of Agriculture has emphasized the fact that agriculture is better off today than it was before the war, and I agree with him. On the other hand, that it not saying very much, because agriculture was in a state of bankruptcy when the war came. As the minister said; the condition of agriculture could still be very much better than it is now. You have only to refer to the fact that agriculturists make up thirty per cent of the population, but today they receive only nineteen per cent of the national income. We still have a long way to go.
At the start of the war, farmers as a whole were heavily in debt; their buildings were depreciated and their machinery was mostly worn out. During the war, it was practically impossible to replace their machinery and now that they are trying to buy machinery they find- that prices have gone up considerably. We all know that the cost of building materials is very high at the present time.
During the 1930's we were constantly being told that we would have to be willing to produce at world prices, that we could not expect to get special prices in Canada. Shortly after the war started, when prices began to rise ceilings were placed upon the prices of agri-

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cultural products. We were forced to receive world market prices before the war when world prices were low, but during the war when world prices went up we had to take lower prices. After a while the ceilings were raised slightly, but just at that time the income tax was increased greatly and the farmers were compelled to pay heavy taxes upon the repayment of their debts which had been incurred prior to the war. The result was that their debt charges were increased anywhere from thirty to forty per cent, and that places agriculture under a serious disability today.
I would say that what agriculture needs today from the government more than anything else is a declaration of policy to the effect that in the future the government will do all in their power to see that agriculture receives parity prices. When I refer to parity prices I am not talking about the wrishy-washy prices to which some hon. members refer; I am referring to prices that will return to the farmer his fair share of the national income, so that the income of the farmer will bear the same relationship to the national income as farm population bears to the national population.
The situation referred to this evening by the hon. member for Fraser Valley can be dealt with in only one way, by subsidy. I think that is the greatest mistake the government have made in their decontrol policy. They started off by taking off the subsidies, and then they took off the price controls. They should have left on the price controls and subsidies and then, taken off the price controls before the subsidies were taken away, instead of reversing the procedure as they have done. As a result, the cost of living for the people has gone up. I suggest to the minister that it is still not too late to reverse the policy and reimpose subsidies where they are found to be necessary, in order to maintain the purchasing power of the people.
I have been very much puzzled by the attitude of the Progressive Conservative party which emphasizes the need for the removal of all controls. If the party are sincere in that stand, when they suggest that all controls should be lifted they should also advocate that all tariffs be taken off because tariffs are controls. We all know, for example, that the seasonal tariff on fruits is a direct control. 1 quite agree that there are certain industries in this country which could not carry on without some form of protection. If any industry can show the government that it cannot continue without a tariff, let that industry apply for a subsidy and, if it is shown that the industry cannot produce in competition with imported goods, a subsidy could be paid. If that were 83166-139,}
done we would find that our eastern manufacturers would in future be a little more sympathetic toward subsidizing agriculture in western Canada. The eastern manufacturers have always been subsidized in the past by the tariff. We have heard a lot about the spoonfeeding of western Canada, 'but the manufacturers in the east have been spoon-fed right along.


An hon. MEMBER:: By the shovelful.


Victor Quelch: Yes, by the shovelful. I know it will be said that a policy of that kind would cost a lot of money. I remember that this question of money was quite a serious one in this house before the war, but never once during the whole war were we told that we could not do this or could not do that because we had not the money. We produced the money, and by the shovelful, as someone remarked just now. But now wp are hearing the same old cry: it will cost too much to do this or to do that.
The hon. member for Stanstead the other day seemed to deplore the fact that our money had been diluted in relation to certain securities. I do not know just what he meant, but apparently he thought we were still on a gold basis. We are not on a gold basis, and have not been since the start of the war. After all, what is the value of money? It depends upon one thing alone, and that is its purchasing power. Personally I am far more interested in maintaining the purchasing power of the people than I am in maintaining the purchasing power of the dollar. The hon. member for Stanstead thought the value of the dollar had gone down too low. Would he suggest that we should reduce prices of agricultural products to increase the value of money? On what commodities does he think prices should be reduced in order to increase the value of money, because the only way we can increase the value of money is to bring prices down? When the Conservative party was in power in 1930 the dollar had a far greater value than it has today. Then it would buy four bushels of wheat or twelve dozen eggs. Surely the hon. member is not suggesting that we should increase the value of money today to what it was when the Conservatives were in power in the 1930's. I think it is far better to have the purchasing power of the dollar reduced and the purchasing power of the people increased to the point where they can buy what they want. So I would say that the only way in which we can decontrol in an orderly manner is to introduce subsidies in this country in order to maintain the purchasing power of the people at the point where they are able to buy the total production of the country.
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Mr. LOW:: Let him answer that.
P.C. 6759 agreed to.
On P.C. 8541i.


Mr. TIMMINS:: This takes us back to the year 1927. I can see no reason in the world why the veterans preference could not be dealt with now. The Secretary of State told us some little time ago that he was going to bring down a separate bill with respect to the veterans preference. After all, it seems to me that one of the most important things in this country, now that the war is over, is that we should decide definitely and as soon as possible what these preferences amount to, without having to look through eight or ten orders in council and amendments. This particular order in council takes us back to the statutes of 1927, chapter 22, section 29, which deals with the preferences which are to be given in the civil service to the soldiers who served in the first great war. If hon. members will look through the order in council which we are now dealing with and those that follow they will find, as I found this afternoon in checking through them that they simply amount to adding some definitions and making some exceptions. I would ask the minister, is there any reason why this particular matter should not be dealt with now by a bill? Should not a 'bill be brought down now instead of later?


Mr. GIBSON (Hamilton West):: A bill is to be brought down dealing with the veterans preference in the civil service and with other matters connected with the civil service which is not emergency legislation. The extension before us is to protect the veterans preference in case the other bill should not be passed by May 15. The preferences already have the approval of the veterans committee which sat last year; we also have letters from the Army, Navy and Air Force Veterans' Association of Canada in which they recommend that the Dominion of Canada is requested to maintain the preference as it now stands in the statutes of this dominion. So that in passing this legislation today we shall be continuing the veterans preference that already exists, and it will be included in the civil service bill which will be brought down at a later stage of the session.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: The minister says that the veterans committee agreed to leave the veterans preference as it is. Was there not an understanding that a committee would be appointed this year on the Civil Service Act when the question of extending the veterans preference to men of the merchant marine
j Mr. Quelcli.]
and to others would be considered? We understood, at the beginning of the session, that it was the intention of the government to set up a civil service committee, but for some reason nothing was done about it.


Colin William George Gibson: I will
quote from the report of the veterans affairs committee, 1946 volume 2, 23rd report:
Your committee recommends that the present civil service preference for disabled veterans and veterans who served overseas be extended to cover all employment, both temporary and permanent, by dominion government agencies, inclusive of crown companies.
That was the recommendation of the committee of last year, that the present preference be continued.


Harold Aberdeen Watson Timmins: Will the bill be brought down this session without fail?


Colin William George Gibson: Yes; it is in course of preparation at the present time, but there are other matters affecting the civil service commission and the civil service generally to be included in the bill.


Harold Aberdeen Watson Timmins: Does the minister undertake that the bill will be brought down this
session?


Colin William George Gibson: I quite undertake that.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: Is it the intention to set up a committee to study the veterans preference before the bill is brought down, or is the bill being brought down without any further study of extending the veterans preference to the merchant marine and others mentioned in our report last year?


Colin William George Gibson: No. The intention is to bring down a bill to provide the same preference as exists at the present time.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: There will be no
enlargement.


Colin William George Gibson: No.


Mr. PROBE:: On February 4 the Prime Minister intimated that there would be a committee set up to go into the matter of veterans preference in connection with civil service appointments, with the idea, I presume, of examining what preference should be given to veterans of the late war comparable to that given following the first war under sections 29 and 30 of the Civil Service Act, chapter 22 of the revised statutes of Canada. I regret I was not in the house when this item was called, and I may be asking for a repetition of information, because the hon. member for Royal was asking for information

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along that line. Can the minister inform the committee- as to whether or not a special committee on civil service preference is to be set up and at what time that committee is to function?


Colin William George Gibson: There is no present intention to set up a special committee to deal with civil service preference. The matter was considered by the veterans committee last year and the report of the committee was that the present preference should be continued. It had been the intention of the government to continue the preference that already existed. It has been extended from the first war to the veterans of the late war. Certain extensions were made to provide for those who had served on ships that were not ships of war but had been on active service, and for airmen who had been flying over the Pacific and the Atlantic oceans. Beyond those extensions as they exist at the present time, there is no intention of extending the preference farther.


John Oliver Probe: It was not with the purpose necessarily of extending the preference or limiting it for veterans of the late war beyond what is now contemplated in the orders in council. In his statement of February 4, the Prime Minister said, as reported at page 82 of Hansard:
A certain number of the orders which will be specified in the schedule-
Which we are now studying, by the way.
-will be the subject of additional specific bills later in the session. This would apply, for example, in the case of labour relations, which will be covered in a bill to amend the Industrial Disputes Investigation Act, orders regarding old age pensions which will be covered in a later bill to amend the Old Age Pensions Act and orders regarding veterans' preference in the civil service which will remain in the schedule pending examination of this subject by a parliamentary committee with a view to later introduction of legislation.
That is the language of the Prime Minister on February 4. It seems to me that that was a definite statement which was followed on the following day by another reply in answer to a question asked by the hon. member for Royal as follows, as reported at page 130 of Hansard:
Mr. Mackenzie King:	On the matter of the
preference only.
Has the government now decided not to set up this committee?


Walter Adam Tucker: Since I was the chairman of the committee in question, I might be permitted to say a word about this. This matter came up from time to time before the committee. So far as I remember, there was
pretty unanimous feeling that the preference as it then existed should be continued, and we so reported, as has been read by the minister. That was brought to the attention of the minister, and in view of the fact that there were a large number of committees and that hon. members were going to be very busy with other matters which had not been as carefully considered as this had been, the suggestion was made by several members of the house who were veteran members of that committee that a further study of the matter would not and could not carry us any farther than we had gone when we made our recommendation last year. I must say I was under the impression that all the members of the committee felt that they had gone as far as they could go in making that recommendation, and that no good purpose would be served by setting up a further committee on the matter. That is the state of affairs. I doubt very much whether any returned soldier members of the house really feel that a further committee could usefully be set up on this matter.


John Oliver Probe: What did the Prime Minister refer to in the two quotations which I have read to the committee? I feel that there may be representations to enlarge the scope of preference perhaps to cover merchant seamen. I know I have had requests with respect to certain personnel in the women's service who are not covered by veterans' preference at the present time. I think that at least that should be studied by some committee. I am not prepared to say what stand they should take, but I believe that a committee might have served a useful purpose. How would the parliamentary assistant explain the statements made by the Prime Minister? I believe it was the Prime Minister's intention to proceed.
Mr. ST. LAURENT: Before the opening of the session, it was the intention of the government to ask for the setting up of a special committee to study this matter. After the house met, it was found that many committees were to be set up, and it was also found that this would be a very controversial subject. It was thought that it would be in the best interests of the veterans to extend the preference as it existed rather than to reopen the whole matter. There were representations made to the government that the extent of this preference to a certain extent affected its value for individual veterans. There were also representations made that there were many who had wished to go overseas and who had been prevented by those in command of the forces here from getting overseas, and that, if the whole matter were reopened, it would be a very controversial subject because there
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were many cases where strong representations were made to the government that the exclusion of the preference of such and such individuals whose cases were brought to our attention was working an unfair hardship upon them. It was felt that there would not be advantage to the veterans generally to reopen the question and that this extent to which the preference had been granted after the last war had brought about some difficulties, but that on the whole it worked reasonably well and that it was perhaps well at this time to attempt to continue it in that form rather than to break new ground.


Victor Quelch: Is it the intention to bring down legislation to put this into effect?
Mr. ST. LAURENT: Just as soon as the time of parliament can be found to do it. As matters now stand, this emergency legislation requires to be dealt with before May 15. The public is anxious to have the budget announced. The budget is ready to be announced. After the Minister of Finance presents his budget, it is usual to take a certain short adjournment for the debate on the budget. All that time will be utilized. The legislation is ready to be put before the house just as soon as the house can find the proper time for considering it.


Victor Quelch: It will be brought down this session?
Mr. ST. LAURENT: Yes. The legislation dealing with this preference, the legislation dealing with old age pensions and the legislation dealing with labour relations will be brought down this session just as soon as parliament has disposed of these more urgent matters.


William Irvine: Let us get at it.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: I do not wish to labour this point. I agree with the Secretary of State for External Affairs that the matter would have been controversial, and possibly that is the reason the government changed its mind. However, when the matter was discussed by the veterans committee last year, I do not think we came to any definite decision on it. There was an understanding that a committee would be appointed and that the matter of the civil service would be discussed later on, and for that reason the veterans committee did not deal with it conclusively. I would ask the minister this question. If a bill is brought down extending the civil service, will it include men like those of merchant marine and some others. I do not think it is necessary perhaps to have a committee to discuss this matter, but I would ask the minister if there is any 
intention of extending or enlarging the preference, or whether it will be left absolutely as it is at the present time.


Colin William George Gibson: It is intended to bring down a bill granting the same preference to veterans as included in the orders in council which extend the preference to veterans of this war. It is not intended to go farther than the order in council.


Herbert Wilfred Herridge: I support the remarks made by the hon. member for Royal, as a member of the veterans affairs committee of last year. The committee was very busy and rushed. When this question was discussed I am quite sure I am safe in saying that the members of that committee were under the impression that a special committee would be set up this year to deal with veterans affairs, and on that basis the recommendations were passed that were quoted by the hon. member for Rosthern. It is a question that should be referred to a committee. Representations have no doubt been made to the government. It is a question of making a second group for veterans who could not leave Canada, through no fault of their own, and there is the question of merchant seamen. I believe that women who joined the armed forces should receive preference in the government service, and I should like to see the government appoint a committee to study the matter.


Colin William George Gibson: We are discussing the procedure to be adopted when the bill is introduced later on in the session. That is a matter that can be discussed when the bill is introduced, but it need not be discussed now.


Mr. MERRITT:: We are trying to indicate to the minister, that whether or not a committee is set up, we should like him to consider, when he brings down the bill to replace the order in council, the extension of the preference in certain quarters as suggested by the hon. member for Kootenay West. I had occasion recently, when in Vancouver, to speak to a spokesman for the merchant seamen, a student of the university of British Columbia. Although I know the department concerned has already ruled against their being put on all fours with veterans who served in the forces. I was quite unable, after talking to that man, to satisfy myself that the department was right in that decision. I could not find a proper distinction between a man who had served in a convoy, in the Atlantic, or going to Russia, and one who had served in the forces, and I believe there are many members who feel the same way on the subject.

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I would urge the minister to consider a more extended bill than the one here. I am not talking about classifications but about those who would qualify as veterans under the new bill, and merchant seamen and the women's services, and one other class that has been mentioned. They are all classes that will get the support of many members.


Mr. LENNARD:: I might mention the firefighters. I know of several instances where these men served overseas with the overseas fire-fighters and applied for positions with the federal fire-fighting services, and they were denied any right to the position because they had not had service in the armed forces overseas, although they had served with the overseas fire-fighting forces. That is one case where some consideration should be given.


John Oliver Probe: The members in this group are prepared to let these orders in council get through as they now stand, but we still have not had an explanation which appeals to me as adequate, and it looks as if this discussion might be enlarged considerably because there are groups who have made representations for inclusion in the veterans preference. We have not been satisfied by the government as to why the selection of a parliamentary committee has been decided against. I have another quotation from the Minister of Justice. It seems to me that it was a definite undertaking on the part of the government as late as February 10. The Minister of Justice said that veterans preference legislation would be introduced this session, but only after the matter had been fully discussed by a committee of this house. We are prepared to let this go through tonight as it stands, but we have not had an explanation as to why we shall not be able to discuss the matter in committee.


Percy Ellis Wright: May I ask the minister whether the legion or other veterans organizations have made representations to the government to have the matter discussed? There must be other organizations who have made representations asking to be included in the veterans preference, and I should like the minister to give a statement as to what organizations have asked.


Colin William George Gibson: I read a resolution that came in a few days ago dated March 27, 1947, from the army, navy and air force veterans in Canada. Among other resolutions there appears this one:
Whereas the commission on civil service salaries has recommended that veterans' appointment be modified,
Therefore be it resolved that the dominion government be requested to maintain this preference as it now stands in the statutes of this dominion.
That is the latest recommendation we have had.


Percy Ellis Wright: Is that the only resolution with regard to veterans preference? Have any other organizations made representations?


Colin William George Gibson: I would not say whether there have been any recommendations in previous years, but I have not had any within the last six months.


Walter Adam Tucker: The Canadian Legion
suggested that there be a third preference for those who saw service only in Canada, and, as the hon. member will recall, our committee considered these other suggestions and decided that further extension of the preference would whittle down the value of it for those who already had it. After careful consideration, therefore, we made our report and when we considered the final report, as the hon. member will recall, we again considered this matter and decided that we would recommend that the preference as it exists at present be continued. Immediately I heard there was a suggestion that a committee be set up again this session, I pointed out to the government that our committee had considered this matter and made a definite recommendation. I presume it was in the light of that it was thought, since there were so many committees, and since our committee had considered it and recommended the continuation of the existing preference, that perhaps it was not the desire of the members to have a further committee on the subject. I spoke to several members of the veterans committee and they suggested that a further committee would not get us any farther than we got last year. That, I think, may have had some effect on the decision of the government to continue the existing preference, because our committee did consider the matter. I remember very well saying that, unless we had some desire to go farther than the existing preference, it would be taken that that was our final recommendation in the matter, and we so reported in the final report.


Arthur Leroy Smith: I merely want to ask one question with reference to these five orders in council, which I have not examined with the care that perhaps I should have given them. Do they apply only to the civil service, or do they apply to crown companies and other kindred organizations?


Colin William George Gibson: Only to the civil service.
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Arthur Leroy Smith: Is there a veterans preference with respect to these other organizations?


Colin William George Gibson: Not under the Civil Service Act. I do not know whether there is under any other act, I do not think so though.


Arthur Leroy Smith: Do you not think it is worthy of consideration by the proper minister?


Colin William George Gibson: Not when we are amending the Civil Service Act.


Arthur Leroy Smith: It seems to me that would be a very proper place to have it. Perhaps you might include in the Civil Service Act that these other persons are civil servants. In any event, may I make it merely as a suggestion to the proper minister of the government, that it might be worth while considering as to whether-it may be a fact; I am sure I do not know-the preference should not be given to other persons who are civil servants except in name only.


Victor Quelch: I want to admit that we were consulted at the start of the session as to whether or not we wanted a committee set up, but we felt at that time that nothing would be gained by it. As the hon. member for Rosthern has stated I think the reason is that we had representatives from the legion before us last year and they did make a recommendation regarding the second preference; but they were not at all sure whether or not they wanted that preference put into force, because they were afraid it might weaken the first preference. I felt that to have a committee at this time, without any certainty on the part of the legion whether they wanted the second preference put into force, would not get us anywhere. I think, before the government brings down new legislation, they should again consult the members of the former committee and see whether or not there has been any change in that opinion. I may say at this time that we are quite prepared to let these measures go through as they are.


Percy Ellis Wright: Speaking on behalf of this group, may I say that I know of no one in it who was on the veterans affairs committee and who was consulted by the parliamentary assistant in this matter.


Major James William Coldwell: On the contrary, we were asked for names.


Percy Ellis Wright: Yes, we were asked for names of members for the committee. I am
[Mr. C. W. G. Gibson.)
not saying, as far as we are concerned, whether we want the veterans' preference extended or not. But certainly we were given to understand that the committee was to be set up; we were asked for names of members for the committee and turned them in to the official government whip. Certainly there has been some change if the parliamentary assistant is to go around and consult those who he thinks will agree with him and not consult those who were on the committee who he thinks might disagree with him. I do not think that is a fair way of arriving at a conclusion.


Walter Adam Tucker: As a matter of fact, I really did not consult anybody. Several members of the committee came to me and said, "We discussed this last year at great length, and we came to a certain conclusion. What is this idea that we are going to thresh it all over again?" I said, "Well, I will bring it to the attention of the government that we did discuss it last year and that we did make a recommendation in the matter; then, of course, they will decide what they want to do." I was not under any commission to go around and consult people. Several members of the different parties came to me and made these representations to me; then I conveyed them to the government. If I had happened to run into my hon. friend at that time, I would certainly have asked him, because I got representations from practically every party, but perhaps I did not talk to him. They came to me rather than my going to them.


Arthur Leroy Smith: I am sorry to confess my ignorance, but may I ask the parliamentary assistant who has just spoken if there is any statute or order in council giving to veterans the preference in these various subsidiaries of the government, such as these crown companies, the C.B.C. and so on?


James Lorimer Ilsley: No.


Arthur Leroy Smith: I know of none. Will you correct me if I am wrong?


Walter Adam Tucker: I myself do not know of any, and that is one of the reasons why our committee made the recommendation which it did make, namely that the preference be applied to employment in the crown companies under the control of the dominion government and in regard to employment in this house as well as in the civil service; the recommendation was that the preference be applied throughout in regard to all people working for the government of Canada. We made that recommendation in our committee. So far as I know, up to this date I do not think there has been any change in the law in that regard.

Emergency Powers


Frank Exton Lennard: That is all the more reason why this matter should be considered. If the crown companies being operated by this government are not giving any preference to the overseas men, then it is about time they did so.


Douglas Charles Abbott: They are. They always have done.


Frank Exton Lennard: I know of several cases where they did not.


Walter Adam Tucker: I did not say that they were not giving the preference. I said that, as far as I know, by law they were not required to give it; but I am sure that they all do give the preference in that regard.
Mr. SMITH Calgary West): I am sure the hon. member will agree with me that it should be obligatory by law, should it not?


Walter Adam Tucker: That is what we recommended.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: I wish to correct an impression which I think the hon. member for Rosthern is trying to make in the house, namely, that the members of the veterans affairs committee are responsible for this civil service committee being dropped. I think the Secretary of State for External Affairs gave the correct reason, namely, that it was a very controversial subject and that, as far as the members of the committee were concerned, they recognized that fact. It is not because we came to any agreement at all on the civil service. I am satisfied that most members of the veterans affairs committee expected that there would be some extension, though not the extension perhaps that a good many asked for; that is, that those in Canada receive the preference. I do not think there was any great demand in the committee for that. But they did feel that there were certain branches of the service, such as the ones I mentioned before, the merchant seamen and others, which should be included in the civil service. When we were told that there would be amendments to the Civil Service Act and that there a new act would come in, we fully expected that consideration would be given to these different branches of the service. I think the hon. member for Rosthern is trying to impress on the committee that we are responsible for the matter being dropped.


Mr. MUTCH:: I do not think it necessary to come to the defence of the hon. member for Rosthern. I attended as many meetings of the veterans affairs committee last year as anyone else who was a member of it, but I cannot either argue with the remarks of the
last speaker or expand them, because that particular thorny question was considered in camera in that committee last >rear, and I shall not be the first to disclose those proceedings in it. But I am quite sure that I speak for a considerable number of the members of that committee when I differ in this respect only with the hon. member for Royal: I do not think the members of that committee expected that something would be done against their own recommendation. Probably the majority of the members of the committee were of the opinion that this particular problem, presenting the difficulties it did and having before them the diversity of opinion from the organized legion and other sources, were hopeful that the question would have a little time to resolve itself before they would be forced to come to a decision on it.


William Henry Golding: Shall these items carry about the civil service?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Carried.


An hon. MEMBER:: Call it eleven o'clock.


James Lorimer Ilsley: Which ones are carried?


William Henry Golding: I should like to make this appeal to the members of the committee. Practically all the discussion that has been taking place on the item that we called has to do with a bill which is to be brought in and should be dealt with at that time. I would suggest that the members of the committee take this book; then, when we go into committee again they will have it before them and will see exactly what the item deals with. I believe we can save a good deal of time and conduct our business much more efficiently if each member knows exactly what we are dealing with and will try to stick to those items. I make that appeal because I believe that every hon. member wishes to make some progress in getting the business through the house.


John Oliver Probe: Mr. Chairman, it was necessary that we know whether this committee is to be set up before we undertook to go into the details of five orders in council. It was for that reason I believe that most of us spoke as we did.


William Henry Golding: Shall I report progress?


James Lorimer Ilsley: No; it is understood, is it, that the five orders in council headed "Civil Service Commission" are carried?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Yes.


William Henry Golding: Yes.

Inquiries oj the . Ministry
Orders in council P.C. 8541J; P.C. 15/1647; P.C. 16/1647; P.C. 20/6173 and P.C. 30/7500 agreed to.
Progress reported.


[Stage Direction]
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Friday, April 18, 1947