[Stage Direction]
Hon. HUGH GUTHRIE (Minister of Justice) moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 84, to amend the Inquiries Act.
Mr. CASGRAIN:: Explain.


Mr. GUTHRIE:: This is merely to extend the operation of the Inquiries Act to international commissions that may desire to take evidence in Canada subject to the control of the governor in council.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.



SILVER COVERAGE

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. THOMAS REID (New Westminster):: I would like to direct a question to the Minister of Finance. In view of the fact that under the agreement entered into regarding silver at the last economic conference; that Canada has agreed to purchase 1,671,802 ounces annually for four years and that every

Privilege-Mr. Gott
indication would seem to be that the price of silver is on the rise, will the Minister of Finance say whether Canada has purchased her portion agreed to?


Hon. E. N. RHODES (Minister of Finance) :: I understand that a similar question was put to the Prime Minister the other day.
I can, however, say to my hon. friend that the purchase of silver in conformity with the London agreement will be carried out strictly in conformity with the terms of that agreement.


Mr. E. J. YOUNG (Weyburn):: Is there in the estimates an item providing for that expenditure?


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: My hon. friend knows full well there is no such item in the estimates.


Edward James Young: I am disappointed.


Right Hon. R. B. BENNETT (Prime Minister):: The agreement was not ratified until after the estimates had been submitted.



PRIVILEGE-MR. GOTT

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. ECCLES J. GOTT (South Essex): On a question of privilege, the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River (Mr. Heenan) as reported in Hansard at page 3275 had this to say on the orders of the day:
Hon. Peter Heenan (Kenora-Rainy River): Mr. Speaker, during my absence from the house on April 24 the hon. member for South Essex (Mr. Gott) made a statement which will be found on page 2513 of Hansard. In referring to myself he said:
In the month of March of that year-
That is, 1930-
-he drew $520 sessional indemnity.
I said $620, not $520. He continued:
I have waited for nearly three weeks to try to catch the hon. member in his seat, but I have not been successful. I had hoped to make a correction while the hon. member was present, but I do not think the matter should go any further. I just want to say that that statement is not true.
I have no desire to do an injustice to any hon. member. If that statement is not true, I wish the hon. member had given the correct figures, because his total personal expenses for 1929, exclusive of his sessional indemnity and ministerial salary, were $9,291. His total personal expenses from 1926 to the end of his term in office were $16,691.

[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Wednesday, May 23, consideration in committee of Bill No. 4, respecting the Bureau for Translations -Mr. Cahan-Mr. Bury in the chair.
On section 3-Bureau for translations.
Mr. VENIOT:: When the committee rose on Wednesday afternoon I was discussing clause 3 of the bill. I wish to direct some further remarks in connection with it in addition to those I have already laid before the committee. As I want to be quite correct in the statements I shall make, and as I intend to offer some suggestions in an attempt to better conditions in the printing bureau in regard to the translation of debates, I shall speak somewhat closely to the notes that I have made. It has not been my practice to read my speeches but I consider this question so important that any suggestions or criticisms I may make should be along definite lines, distinctly understood, and having a basis of correctness.
With that object in view I wish to draw the attention of the committee to the fact that when this bill was up for second reading I stated that the minister could solve the difficulties he had encountered without the introduction of a bill of this kind. At that time I made my suggestions, suggestions which I considered constructive. Those suggestions are to be found in the speech I delivered on March 6 as reported in Hansard at pages 1242-3. I shall read those suggestions again, or rather repeat them. I said it was not fair to criticize a measure unless one was prepared to submit something constructive, and I suggested the following:
Let me, sir, offer some suggestions. First, have it arranged that each department shall have departmental reports ready before the fall of the year and handed to the translators before the English text of the report is printed. At present what do we find? Departmental reports in English are handed to the translators in many cases only after the English edition has come from the printing bureau. This suggests one way of avoiding the tardiness that has worked itself into the printing of the reports. Matters should be so arranged that these reports shall be given to the French translators as soon as the English version is complete, or, better still, as twenty, thirty or forty pages of the copy are completed and certified by the proper authorities, those pages should be handed over to the French translators. It would then be found that the French version would be ready to go to the printer within two or three days after the English version is ready.
Then I went further and said:
It has become an almost universal practice among ministers of the crown-I am not going to include myself in this category; for when I was in the government these reports were ready in time-to delay sending to the printers until the fall of the year the reports for the year ending the previous March 31st. If the minister would issue an order that these reports must be ready soon after parliament prorogued, say the last part of July or the
Translations Bureau

early part of August, there would be no further cause for complaints about tardiness in the printing of those reports.
Further on I made a third suggestion: Do not pass documents to persons outside the service for translation, and fourth: do not allow young bilingual clerks and typists to handle the translation of any documents.
Then fifth:
With reference to the debates of the commons, see that a typewritten copy of the English transcript is handed to the Commons staff of translators just as soon as the English reporters can furnish it, and have the French translators begin translating when they receive that typewritten copy. Instead of doing that, what happens?
And then I go on to explain what happens.
Now, Mr. Chairman, I find that an order in council was passed, I think on May 21st, and laid on the table here last Wednesday. When I was speaking on Wednesday I did not know that that order in council referred to this matter, I learned it the next day in reading the press. Reading that order in council carefully I find that two or three of the most important suggestions made by me on that occasion are included in the document. I am going to read the order in council. It is not necessary to encumber Hansard with the whole of it but, I shall take that part that refers to the point I wish to make. After certain vhereases it says:
That in order to maintain the efficient operation of the printing bureau and to reduce its costs to a satisfactory basis, it is necessary to insure that the supply of printer's copy for printing all departmental reports and' documents shall be balanced uniformly throughout the fiscal year;
That, as the printing bureau is subject to extraordinary demands during the session of parliament for printing and binding the debates and proceedings of the Senate and House of Commons, it is essential for the economic operation of the printing bureau that the printer's copy of all departmental reports to parliament, usually known as "blue books," should be made available to the king's printer, in both English and French, as early as possible after the close of each fiscal year;
That the Secretary of State is reliably informed that the federal government of the United^ States peremptorily insist that the printer's copy for all reports of the several departments of that government shall be available for the printer within three months after the close of their fiscal year; and
That the adoption and strict enforcement of a similar regulation by the government would provide continuous work for the printing bureau uniformly from month to month throughout the fiscal year, and thereby afford constant and continuous employment for the employees of the printing bureau, curtail the excessive cost of overtime night work during the session of parliament, considerably reduce the general expenses of operation of the 
printing bureau, and' enable this department of government to provide an adequate and more satisfactory service at considerably less expense;
Therefore His Excellency the Governor General in Council, on the recommendation of the Secretary of State, is pleased to order and it is hereby ordered that it shall be the express duty of the deputy heads of all departments of government to insist that the printer's copy of all departmental reports, complete in revised typewritten form, in either the English or the French language, shall be delivered to the king's printer on or before the first day of July in each and every year;
Now, Mr. Chairman, right here I shall-


The CHAIRMAN (Mr. Bury):: The hon. gentleman has spoken for forty minutes.


Peter John Veniot: No, Mr. Chairman, I have
spoken little more than five minutes.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: I call the
hon. member's attention to the fact that he spoke half an hour on Wednesday.


Peter John Veniot: I ceased then. In committee of the whole I think I can discuss an item more than once.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: The hon. gentleman has a right to speak again. The whole question is whether his speech this afternoon is a continuation of his speech on Wednesday. If it is not, then the position is that any other hon. member of the committee to-day could have risen to speak the moment the committee wms called to order. But the hon. member rose as of right to continue his interrupted speech.


Mr. CHEVRIER:: Mr. Chairman-


Mr. CAHAN:: Before the hon. gentleman
continues I wish to state that when he made his suggestions-


Peter John Veniot: I do not think this is in
order; I have the floor.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: The question at present is whether the hon. member is correct in his view that the rules of committee permit a speaker whose speech had been interrupted by the rising of the committee from its previous sitting, when he resumes his speech at the next sitting in committee, to consider that he is recommencing another forty minute period.


Mr. BOUCHARD:: It is a new speech.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: I think
that is a matter which the committee ought to settle.


Peter John Veniot: I am not resuming; on
Wednesday I finished what I had to say then.

Translations Bureau


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: Rule 58 provides that the standing orders of the house shall be observed by the committee of the whole so far as may be applicable. In my opinion, though I am prepared to hear members of the committee on the point, a member who has spoken in committee one day has no right to resume bis speech in committee the next day, and to consider that he is commencing a new speech.


Mr. POULIOT:: Will you please give me
the rule and the paragraph?


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: Rule 58,
paragraph 1, page 157 of Beauchesne:
The standing orders of the house shall be observed in the committees of the whole house so far as may be applicable-


Jean-François Pouliot: But it continues:
-except the standing orders as to the seconding of motions and limiting the number of times of speaking.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: That has
nothing to do with it. We are not limiting the number of times of speaking at all. This is a simple question as to whether a member of the committee has a right, after having spoken for say thirty minutes on the previous day, to take up another forty minutes when the committee resumes the following day.


Jean-François Pouliot: Then you establish a new
jurisprudence.


Peter John Veniot: I did not adjourn the
debate on Wednesday. If I had adjourned the debate I think the ruling would be quite right.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: The answer to that argument, I think, is that it is not necessary to adjourn the debate; the debate adjourns itself at six o'clock.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Rule 58, which you have just invoked, reads:
The standing orders of the house shall be observed in the committees of the whole house so far as may be applicable

It is well understood that there are a number of rules observed in committee that do not prevail when the house is sitting as a house. In the house no hon. member has a right to put a question to another hon. member except by consent. When the committee is sitting the same rules that prevail in the house apply to a certain extent, but while in the house no questions are allowed, in committee of the whole frequent questions may be asked and answered, so this must be taken mutatis mutandis. 'Under those circumstances I submit that the forty minute
rule of the house cannot apply to the sittings of the committee of the whole. It might be said that the moment the hon. member is interrupted in committee of the whole, immediately his forty minutes is completed and then he can begin all over again. I stood up, and the Secretary of State stood up and interrupted the hon. member.


Hugh Guthrie: Would not that be the
best way to settle it? He has been interrupted; let him go on.


Jean-François Pouliot: Speaking to the point of order-


Hugh Guthrie: It has been withdrawn.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: With the consent of the committee the hon. gentleman may continue, but this is a question that ought to be settled.


Jean-François Pouliot: If the committee has to settle it I should like to speak to the point of order for a moment.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: There is no need to debate it now; the hon. member has the consent of the committee to go on.


Jean-François Pouliot: You have said that the point ought to be decided, and I want it to be decided now. Rule 37 states that no hon. member shall speak for more than forty minutes during the course of any debate. That rule applies in the house but it does not apply when we are in committee of the whole, because rule 58 states that the rules of the house shall be observed in committee except the rule limiting the number of times of speaking. We are not debating now; we are discussing. In the house we debate; here we discuss, and the Minister of Justice understands that difference very well.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: I cannot follow the hon. member's argument, but with the consent of the committee the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Veniot) may proceed.


Peter John Veniot: Thank you. I was referring to the order in council and the provision contained therein with regard to the printing of departmental reports. I find that this order in council contains my first suggestion in full, and that it also includes suggestions two and five in substance. Suggestions three and four, which referred to giving translations to clerks and sending translations outside are not referred to in the order in council, and I can understand why it was not necessary to do so; those matters can be arranged by the different
Translations Bureau

departments without the authority of an order in council.
The part of the order in council which refers to the method to be adopted in reference to the translation of departmental reports could be applied with equal force to the production and translation of parliamentary debates, both of this chamber and of the Senate. At page 979 of Hansard for February 27 of this year, in giving reasons for the introduction of this bill the Secretary of State said:
-I was informed, as the minister responsible for the administration of the Department of Public Printing and Stationery, that the publications of French translations of public documents were frequently so long delayed as to impair, if not to destroy, their usefulness to the government and to the public.
This statement could leave but one impression, that the delay was due to the translators. When I spoke previously I pointed out how and why this delay was caused. I now find that the Secretary of State must have convinced himself that I was right; he must have looked more fully into the matter, if I am to judge from the order in council that I have just read. This order in council now places responsibility for the delay where it properly belongs, on the various departments of the government and not on the translators. The responsibility for this delay now having been placed on the proper shoulders I hope the Secretary of State will not continue to blame the translation staff.
According to the hon. gentleman, however, we have still another evil; that is, the too great cost for changes that have to be made in type after the translation has been handed to the printer. I have gone into this matter already and have attempted to show that this extra expense cannot be attributed to faulty translation in such large measure as the Secretary of State suggests. If there are errors attributable to faulty translation-and no doubt there is some faulty translation-it cannot be helped in the ordinary course of events. Such faulty translation must exist, to some extent, but there is a remedy for it. All the hon. gentleman has to do is add to the present order in council another suggestion I intend to make, and I want the Secretary of State to give very careful consideration to it. All he has to do is to add to the present order in council the provision that instructions be issued to each department to the effect that no translation shall be sent to the printer until such translation has been revised by the person responsible for the correct translation. This

revision is to be done when the translation has been typewritten, and not after it has been put into type. If this is done, the galley proofs will come back to the translation branch of each department, and be returned practically as a clean sheet. Then the government would further avoid the necessity of furnishing to the translators a loose-page proof. The latter, in itself, will save considerable delay as well as considerable extra cost. That is not being done to-day and the system should be changed in order to bring about the procedure which I am now suggesting. All the Secretary of State has to do is to add the instructions to the present order in council, or have placed in the order in council instructions to the effect of those I have just stated.
But there still remains the author's changes. If, after the galley proof has been submitted to him, the author has made no changes in the English version, there will be no changes made in the French translation. But if the author's changes have to be made, then one may definitely know what those changes are, and what the cost has been in making them. The minister could then quite easily distinguish the charges to be made for errors by authors or errors in translation which, evidently, according to the evidence given before the committee of investigation they are not now in a position to do. I claim that they should now be able to do so. I claim, further, that it is at the present time an easy matter to do so. If it is not done and has not been done in the past, it is because the work of the printing bureau has been carried on in a loose manner. Of course, I am not blaming this government any more than any other government for that condition.
I wish further to point out how unfair some of the criticism made by the Secretary of State has been. Before doing so however, let me say that if in the first two or three years in which he was in charge of the department he had obtained the passage of the order in council tabled last Wednesday, he would not be confronted with the worries which now assail him, and under that order in council, which I claim is the keynote to a solution of the difficulty, we would have a system established. I state that under it there could be established a system which, with the additions I have indicated, would give satisfaction to all concerned, and thereby avoid the necessity of introducing this bill.
On May 9, I find that Mr. F. G. Bronskill gave evidence before the civil service committee, and it is indicated in the evidence that he is the accountant of the printing bureau.

Translations Bureau
In answer to a question by Mr. Chevrier touching upon the question of errors in translation he said-


Mr. DUPRE:: At what page?


Peter John Veniot: I have not the page, but
I copied the evidence exactly as it appears in the official report. Mr. Bronskill's reply was:
Well, I do not know quite why you refer to translation. So far as we are concerned, it is an author's alteration, that is a change in the proof made by the author. The cost of that for the year 1933-34 is given at $58,000.
Then, in reply to some other questions he said, in substance:
It would be very difficult to tell how much of that money is due to translations,-to French corrections or English corrections.
Then he was asked the following question:
And therefore, it is all put together?
-referring to the $58,000-and the reply by the witness was "Yes." Then comes the following question:
Without knowing exactly what amount is due to the corrections of the French groups and the corrections of the English groups?
A. That is correct, sir.
In the face of such answers from the accountant of the printing bureau surely the Secretary of State cannot blame hon. members for casting very grave doubts on his statements made at- various times and places as to the very heavy cost brought about by changes in type due to faulty translations. I feel the Secretary of State must have been led astray by someone in whom he had great faith, because I do not believe that he would wittingly, himself, commit such an error in regard to the cost of translations. Apparently the official merely guessed, and gave the minister the result of such guess work. Now that they have been driven to separate the cost of errors by authors and errors by translators they cannot do so, and the minister has been left to bear the brunt of the criticism. Is it not time that the minister disciplined the printing bureau? He must now know that the-


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Mr. Bronskill is not under
my jurisdiction as Secretary of State, as the minister having charge of the printing bureau.


Peter John Veniot: He is the accountant of it.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: He is an accountant in the
Department of Finance. I do not know whether he has been there three months or six months.


Peter John Veniot: He is in the printing bureau.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: He may be there now, but I do not know how long he has been there, He is not under my supervision.


Jean-François Pouliot: He is an able man.


Peter John Veniot: Before the committee, as one of his qualifications he stated he was the accountant of the printing bureau. Is it not time that the minister disciplined the staff of the printing bureau-not only Mr. Bronskill but the whole staff? The witness before the committee said he could not distinguish the difference in cost between the corrected French translations and authors' errors. I think it is time that this gentleman was told it is his duty to do that, and that if he does not do it someone else may be obtained who will do it. I would advise the minister to apply his knowledge of organization to the accounting branch as well as to the directing branch of the printing bureau.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I have no control over it,


Peter John Veniot: No control over the printing bureau?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Over the accounting.


Peter John Veniot: I said direction, as well as accounting.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I have no control over the accounting.


Peter John Veniot: But I have added to the word "accounting" the word "directing."


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I have it, and I have ex-, ercised it.


Jean-François Pouliot: It shows the absurdity of centralization.


Peter John Veniot: Following the question of the unfairness which I claim has characterized the criticisms by the Secretary of State on this matter of faulty translations let me come to another point in connection with which I believe he did not do justice to himself or to the matter under consideration. I refer to the evidence given by the Secretary of State before a certain committee. I find Mr. Cahan saying, "I can show you instances of French translation of Senate work that did not come out until a year after the meeting was held." The minister seems to be obsessed by French translations; it seems to be his bete noire. But he does not say a word about delays in printing English versions.
Then an hon. senator took up the cudgels apparently for the translator or for the cost of translation. What do we find? The senator said, "Until this year we did not
Translations Bureau

have much cause for complaint in respect to the French translation of Senate proceedings, but this year the government cut off our money for translation, and we have no translation."


Jean-François Pouliot: Hear, hear.


Peter John Veniot: In reply to that Mr. Cahan said, "I did not know that."


Jean-François Pouliot: Hear, hear.


Peter John Veniot: I am surprised to find an astute minister, such as the Secretary of State, giving such a reply. Some discussion then took place as to the difference in cost between having documents printed by the printing bureau and by outside printers, and what do we find? Senator Sharpe said:
Senate translation in French costs for 85 copies $4,519 on the average but that work can be done outside for $2,760.
I want those figures to be noted, and also what follows:
Hon. Mr. Cahan: I have no doubt it could be done for that if clean proofs were handed in. But look at the way the proofs come to us. Here are specimens.
Mr. Sharpe: Surely clean proofs would not be responsible for so much difference in cost.
Senator Sharpe was quite right. Clean proofs could not account for one-quarter of the difference in cost referred to by him.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I will show you the difference in a few moments.


Peter John Veniot: I hope the minister will
bring along a little better evidence than what has so far been produced because he has not yet convinced the members on this side of the house, nor has the committee been convinced I am sure from the evidence already produced before the investigating committee, that there was any necessity for this bill.
Then we have the statement of the bon. the Secretary of State at page 982 of Hansard of February 27 of this year. He said:
Now it was ascertained by one of the committee under the control of the treasury-
I want this to be noted:
-that the setting up in type of these corrections made in the text after it had been set up in type and sent for revision-not all French, but a great deal of it, some of it being in English-over a series of years, in wages in respect of the resetting of that type after it had been first set up in the printer's text, varied in cost from $75,000 to $80,000 a year.
Yet, Mr. Chairman, in the face of that statement I have just quoted we have been unable to ascertain what was the cost of the
[Mr. Veniot.J
corrections of the French text as distinct and separate from the rest. Apparently the committee under the control of the treasury had ascertained that in detail or no such statement could have been made by the Secretary of State. Why has not the report of that committee been brought before the civil service committee of this house so that it would be in possession of the facts? It is no answer to say that the civil service committee had the opportunity of asking for that report. It is no answer to say: You could have examined the witnesses, because the names of the members of that committee 'have been completely hidden from this house. We do not know who the members of it were, or who was. the person who made the report to the governor in council.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: The names are on the records of this house.


Peter John Veniot: But that report was never submitted to the civil service committee.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: The names of that committee were reported to the house.


Peter John Veniot: They are members of the council, are they not?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: They were not.


Peter John Veniot: I do not see their names on the records of this house. I would like to see them.	.


Mr. CIIEVRIER:: The minister time and again has said that that was a privileged report.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Quite so. The hon. member was asking about the names of the committee.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: What is the use of handing out names if you cannot discuss the report of that committee?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: He said he could not get the names and I said they were on the records of this house.


Peter John Veniot: I hope the hon. gentleman will produce them. Why is the report of that committee not now before the committee of the whole house for our consideration? Why keep it back from this committee? It should be produced and laid on the table so that this committee would have the opportunity of looking into it and seeing how and when and where the committee based their charges of extra cost against translation and against authors' corrections. We have a right to ask for that, Mr. Chairman, and the minister should produce that report so that we may judge whether this bill is the remedy for all

Translations Bureau
the difficulties that have been specified by him. We should know what the reasons were for the introduction of a bill such as this.
Now I wish to touch upon the work of the printing bureau as done by unilingual and bilingual operators. As I understand it-I may be astray but I think I am correct-when the departmental reports in English are sent to the printer the whole staff of operators, unilingual and bilingual, are put to work upon them, and in that way the English edition can be rapidly got out because the whole staff is working on it. But when the French translation from that English edition is sent to the printing bureau for putting into type the employees who do that work are bilingual employees, only, not unilingual and bilingual as in the case of the English edition, and that is the reason for the accentuated delay in the issuing of the French editions of these reports.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Is the hon. gentleman speaking of bilingual compositors or translators?


Peter John Veniot: I am talking of linotype operators and compositors. I say that the French translation of the English version is handed to the bilingual operators to be set in type and they have to rush that work through notwithstanding that they were able to devote all the time that was required to carry on the unilingual typesetting and linotype operation of the English version.
But, Mr. Chairman, if my proposition is accepted and the two versions are submitted simultaneously in English and in French-by simultaneously I do not mean to say that the English and French versions should be ready at the same time, but the French translation of the English version could be submitted fifteen or twenty pages at a time, and then you would have the operators in the bureau continuously employed and the minister would not be beset by the problems confronting him to-day in trying to keep the whole staff regularly employed. Further, he would be in a position to do away with all this rush work and would be able to have a timely regulation of the work carried on at the printing bureau. That is impossible under the present system. He must change that system in order to do it. The change I suggest would result in a saving to the government and in the work being done efficiently.
I come now to the question of the cost of corrections. I have studied this matter very carefully. I do not wish to repeat what I said on Wednesday and go into this whole 74726-212
question again, but when I was speaking on that day I was not speaking in any boastful way as some hon. members opposite sought to imply. I have the experience which enables me to deal with questions of this kind, especially as to cost, and I think I can direct the minister to a proposition which would enable him to ascertain definitely where the cost lies and how the matter should be treated in the future if he wishes to avoid these extra costs.
First of all I claim that we have a right to know, and if the printing bureau cannot give this information they are not worthy of holding the positions they hold, and as well it would be interesting for this committee to know the definite cost of corrections in faulty French translation which have to be made after setting the copy up in type. We should also be informed as to the exact and definite cost of making authors' corrections in type and putting the material in proper shape in English and in French. Let me direct the attention of the committee to the fact that the law bills submitted to the House of Commons and to the Senate contain more author's corrections in English than in French. There are no corrections in French unless the author of the English text is forced to correct. To correct what? The faulty construction of the bill which he has prepared for the government. The committees of this house are authors because changes are made and bills are brought back to be reprinted. Everything which pertains to these changes must be eliminated from the original bill and the changes correctly inserted. In this way the changes in English are the sole basis of the extra cost of changes which must be made in the French text.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: That is far from the case.


Peter John Veniot: That is not far from being so. The only extra cost which can be attributed to the French text is the revision of faulty translation which has been discovered. I admit that there has been some faulty translation but the printing bureau should be in position to distinguish between the cost of faulty translation and the cost of corrections in French due to author's errors and changes made by the committee of the whole house and other committees. I am convinced that the costs of theise changes in legislation and so forth will amount to at least fifty per cent of the $58,000. I challenge the Secretary of State to produce to this committee one account which will disprove the statement I am going to make. I challenge him to produce an itemized and detailed statement of the cost of corrections because of faulty trans-

Translations Bureau

lation. If that is done I know he will find that that which can he properly charged to faulty translation will not amount to ten per cent of the $58,000. I make that statement without fear of contradiction.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: The hon. member has spoken for forty minutes.


Mr. YENIOT:: At least ten minutes of my time has been used up in the discussion of points of order and so forth. It will take me only about three minutes to complete what I have to say and then I will speak no further on this bill. You will be saving time by allowing me three or four minutes.
I have dealt with the extra cost entailed by authors' corrections and corrections in faulty translation, I have made suggestions which were considered to be sufficiently of a constructive nature to warrant inclusion in the order in council, I have submitted further constructive suggestions to-day which I am sure would be effective if applied, but I have still a further suggestion to make. In view of the strong opposition to this bill as expressed in the house and in the press, in view of the fact that several heads of departments such as the acting Deputy Postmaster General, the assistant director of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the chief of translation of debates have not approved of the changes contemplated, in view of the fact that the order in council which has just been passed will, if put strictly into effect, meet the major difficulties with which the minister is faced, would it not be well for him not to force this bill through but take one year in which to work out the suggestions contained in the order in council? In that time a fair trial could be had and if the suggestions contained in the order in council did not prove effective, then this measure could be put into effect.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Due I suppose to his experience in the printing business, the hon. member has made some suggestions which are more or less valuable. I only regret that he did not use his experience for the benefit of my predecessor in office as then I would not have been overwhelmed with the difficulties which I now face.


Peter John Veniot: The question never arose.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: With respect to the suggestions which he made in the house on March 6, 1034, I made the following statement which appears at the top of page 1242 of Hansard:
I fully agree with what the hon. member has said so far.


Peter John Veniot: Why did you not put them into effect?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: They have been embodied in an order in council but the provisions of the order in council are inadequate to overcome the difficulties with which I have been confronted. If the hon. gentleman thinks that I have not given attention to the printing bureau then he is very much mistaken.


Peter John Veniot: I did not wish to leave that impression.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: The mere cost of printing, binding and lithographic work plus the cost of paper for the year ended March 31, 1930, amounted to $2,482,851.95. For the last year for which accounts have been made, that is the year ended March 31, 1933, these operating costs of the printing bureau amounted to $1,709,494.49. That is, a reduction in the operating costs of the printing bureau of $773,357.46 had been effected.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: How much of that was wages?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: A great part was wages but I am dealing with the operating expenses of the printing bureau and have shown that in three years they were reduced by $773,357.46.


Jean-François Pouliot: If you decided to print nothing, there would be no costs.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: With regard to the purchases by the stationery department for the various departments of government and for this House of Commons, great care has been taken. No order for $500 or over has been made without competition, and in many cases of which I have known where the amount was less, the same holds true. All competitive bids have been submitted to the governor in council and approved by order in council. The expenses of this department for the year ended March 31, 1930, were $1,435,414.39, while for the year ended March 31, 1933, they amounted to $1,001,833.30. The reduction in the operating expenses of the stationery branch during a period of three years amounted to $433,581.09 additional.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: How much in the way
of wages is included in that?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I am not talking about
wages; I am talking first about the management of the printing bureau. Therefore, on those two branches, first the operation of the printing plant, and, second, the stationery branch, there has been a reduction by the year, comparing those years, of $1,216,938.55, and that reduction has not been made with-

Translations Bureau
out considerable attention and careful supervision. The hon. gentleman has challenged me to produce a single case which shows excessive cost of corrections in the French text of translation after those translations have been sent out as being the final printer's proof to the printing bureau.


Peter John Veniot: I know the hon. gentleman does not wish to lead the committee astray.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: No. He said: Give me one case, and I am giving it.


Peter John Veniot: No, I did not. I did not
say one case of faulty translation. I admit there were faulty translations.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: The hon. member said:
Give me a case in which the cost was excessive. He said that it would not be over five or ten per cent.


Peter John Veniot: The minister must not put words into my mouth.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: If I am not correct, I will
be glad to be corrected.


Peter John Veniot: I asked him to give me
one case showing the distinction between the cost of faulty translation and of authors' corrections.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I am giving it.


Peter John Veniot: The minister is not giving
it.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: 
Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Will the minister say
why I did not get those figures in the committee?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I suppose the hon. member did not ask for them. I was not a member of the committee.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: The record is complete and replete with my demands for it.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I did not know the hon.
member asked for it.
Translations Bureau


Joseph Georges Bouchard: The minister knows he is dealing with an exceptional case.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I am dealing with this case. It may be exceptional in some respects, but it is not so very exceptional. I will deal with it fairly. Those are the facts that were put up to me. If the hon. gentleman had sat in my office and been told month after month except in cases where I have been abroad on public business, as to the excessive cost of these corrections in translations, photographically placed before me when I complained of the excessive costs of the bureau-


Joseph Georges Bouchard: The minister knows
these are exceptional and he knows why. He knows the translator was overworked.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I showed the house many
photographs exhibiting translators' corrections.


Peter John Veniot: The minister showed no
photographs of the English corrections.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: There are no corrections in the English edition that I have seen as bad as that.


Peter John Veniot: They are bad enough in
some cases.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: The minister is right
in saying those that he has seen; but the English ones were not shown to him.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: They were not shown to me to demonstrate the cost of French corrections.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: There was a happy
selection.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: They were shown to me
because it was repeated to me from time to time that the cost in the printing bureau was higher than the same printing could be done in places outside the printing bureau.


Jean-François Pouliot: Then the minister was not fully informed.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: There is no printing establishment in Canada that can do its work more economically than we are capable of doing ours in the printing bureau.
Let me revert. The other items in the details of cost of printing are as follows:
Press work	$102	40Binding	
71	85Paper	
15	16
This makes a total cost of $4,915.46.
Of that entire cost almost one-half, namely $2,250.83 was due to the actual cash paid out in the re-setting in type of page after page. And more than that, the hand work which is shown in composition includes the work after 
the linotype corrections are made and the metal form comes from the linotype machine. There is certain handwork in picking out the incorrect type from the old galley of type and putting in the new. And part of that hand work, costing $888.66 is due, not to the linotype, but to picking out the old type * and putting in the new after the linotype corrections have been made. That is a very long and continuous operation, in view of the quantity and extent of the changes made.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: But might I ask-I think the minister will be fair-


Mr. BOWMAN:: Let the minister go on.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I want to be fair to him on this occasion, although in his estimation I may not have been as fair as he would like on other occasions. He submits this particular case, he knows I am aware of it-


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Please allow me to finish.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Does the minister submit this as a fair sample of what is done usually?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: It may have been an unusual case in this respect, but you see the same thing time and time again with regard to those French translations.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: If the minister is not fair on this occasion I will cease to be fair to him.


Jean-François Pouliot: You cannot cease to be fair.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: The hon. member does not know anything about the operation of the printing bureau except what he is told by interested parties.
If the copy received from the French translators in the first instance had been correct we would have saved at least $200 on the handwork and $2,250 in resetting translators' alterations, making a total saving of $2,250 on this whole job. If this extra cost of alterations in the printed text could have been avoided the entire cost of the French Hansard for the Senate debates would have been reduced from $4,915 to $2,465.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: And the minister knows how it could have been done.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Certainly, it could have been done if we had had charge of the translation.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: Order. I must ask hon. members not to interrupt the minister without his consent.

Translations Bureau


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Let the minister be fair.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I am stating absolute facts. I do not wonder the hon. gentleman does not relish them after some of the statements we have heard in this house.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Well, it is not because-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: If the minister wants to go into this case I shall go into it with him.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I am simply replying to a challenge made from the other side of the house.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Watch where the chips fall.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I am not particular about chips. If this house or this government think I am not administering my department efficiently they are welcome to my portfolio on any day of any week. I have given to that department the very best of my experience in business life; I have given it my wholehearted attention night and day since I have been there.


Jean-François Pouliot: The minister is just as fair as bad weather.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: In this case the cost suggested is the estimate of an outside printer, who made his estimate having a revised and bound copy of the French Hansard before him, basing it on the actual cost of composition without corrections. They estimate the actual cost of doing it in a first class establishment in Canada, without their profit, as $2,760. If it had not been for this faulty translation which had to be corrected, the cost of the printing bureau would have been $2,465. Now I wish to go further.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: That is far enough.


James Langstaff Bowman: Plenty, I would say.


Joseph Georges Bouchard: That is just one case.


Mr. BARRETTE:: One at a time.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Take the English edition of the Senate debates, in order that you may have a fair comparison. The unrevised English edition of the Senate debates for the same session, of which 1,015 copies were printed and issued daily, cost as follows:
Composition:
Hand work	$ 684 07
Linotype	
1,058	91Monotype	
50	77Author's alterations	
1	23

Press work	
211	36Binding	
91	33Paper	
132	43

But for the revision of the Senate Hansard in English, members of the Senate who speak in English-and they all speak in English- were allowed to make such corrections as in the House of Commons members are allowed to make for the revised edition. For the final revised edition all these forms have to be reset in another way for printing, and the cost was:
Composition:
Hand work	$ 449 64
Linotype	
56	10Monotype	
2	45Author's alterations	
694	41$	1,202	60Press work	
146	39Binding	
171	49Paper	58 01

That is the total cost in respect of the entire revised edition of 362 copies printed and bound for distribution. So if you take the cost in the Senate of issuing the English Hansard from day to day to the extent of 1,015 copies, including the entire cost of the revisions, the reprinting and the binding of the English edition for the permanent bound edition of 362 copies, the total cost of both was only $3,808.59. Therefore you find that although there were only 85 copies of the French edition, which was the one and final edition, both the English editions, the daily and the revised and bound edition cost only $3,808.59 compared with $4,915.46 for the single French edition.


Joseph Georges Bouchard: Will the minister allow me a question?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Certainly.


Joseph Georges Bouchard: Would the minister
look at the other end of the question, not only from the printer's point of view but also from the writer's point of view, and see what it costs for the staff for the English edition and the staff for the French edition.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Staff where?


Joseph Georges Bouchard: I mean the staff of translators, editor and proofreaders.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I am trying by this bill to procure efficient translations, and I hope it will go through.
Translations Bureau


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I hope not.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I think it should receive the unanimous approval of this house. When a minister of the crown is made responsible for translations he will have the opportunity of seeing whether the translators do their work with efficiency and competency.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: It is apparent that they do now.
Mr. OA.HAN: Therefore I say that this extra cost of the French edition of the Hansard, with respect to which as a member of the government I was summoned to give evidence before that committee of the Senate to which reference has been made, was due solely to the inefficient work of the French translators of the Senate in preparing their copy for the printer.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: How many translators are there in the Senate?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I have no more knowledge than the hon. gentleman has.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I have knowledge.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: I must ask hon. gentlemen to keep their seats and not interrupt without the consent of the minister.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Then may I ask the minister to say how many French translators there are in the Senate, if he knows who was responsible for the translation with which he has just dealt, and where that gentleman is to-day?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I can only say that the name on the printed text for corrections is given, but more than that I do not know.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: The minister dare not say who the gentleman was who did that work.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Does the hon. gentleman wish me to give the name? I know what the French proof discloses-


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: The minister is on very thin ice at the moment.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I am not on thin ice; for more than three score years I have learned to walk on thin ice or thick, and I find that if one relies on a truthful statement of the facts it carries him over thin as well as thick ice. That is my reply to the challenge that has been made. I dislike to name officials-


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Then be fair.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I will leave it to the house to decide. Time and again hon. gentlemen opposite have referred to the incorrect and
fMr. Cuhnn.1
inefficient translations from English into French of the speech of His Excellency the Governor General at the opening of this session of parliament. Before this house I have not done otherwise than assume the responsibility on behalf of the government as being responsible for that translation. I should like to say now, however, that despite the insinuations of hon. gentlemen that this translation was made somewhere outside by some incompetent translator-


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: It was a good thing it was done outside.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: -I say that translation was made by one of the chief translators of the House of Commons, and every bit of condemnation which hon. gentlemen opposite have heaped upon that translation is so much criticism in condemnation of one of the heads of the commons translating branch, which is under the control of the House of Commons and not of the government. Now if you insist upon having the name I am prepared to give it. Every bit of condemnation that I have accepted and for which I have assumed responsibility as the member of the government responsible for the administration of the Department of the Secretary of State. I have borne rather than reveal to this house how incompetent, in the opinion of hon. gentlemen opposite!, is one of its chief translators, though he had two or three associates and a total staff of ten to consult with in making that translation.
There is nothing covert or concealed in this bill. We have done everything we can to place the printing bureau on a satisfactory and unprecedentedly efficient basis, and we are carrying out that purpose. Hon. gentlemen opposite must know that for the first time in many years a member of the French-Canadian race has been placed in charge of that bureau, and I must say that he has cooperated in every way to carry out the reforms I have suggested. But I cannot complete those reforms so long as translations are in the hands of appointees over whom the government of this country has absolutely no control. Therefore the time has come when, if the government is to assume the responsibility of producing French and English versions of departmental reports and other governmental documents on time, to satisfy the demands of hon. gentlemen opposite, to satisfy the demands of the whole body of the French-reading public in Canada, to satisfy the demands of those departments which do business with foreign countries where the language is French, I say it is absolutely

Translations Bureau
necessary that the government should assume the responsibility of organizing this translation bureau as a part of the civil service of the country, so that those there employed shall be placed under ordinary civil service regulations and have, as such civil servants, all the advantages and privileges that accrue to the civil service of this country. That is my sole desire. I have no desire at all to criticize. Hon. gentlemen have done that to the greatest extent; in criticizing the translation of the speech from the throne they have criticized the men who are now doing the translation work for this House of Commons.
May I say, Mr. Chairman, I have not regretted that, with regard to some of these officials, I have shielded them as long as I could. The provocation offered by hon. gentlemen opposite has continued to the point where to shield them from such criticism is no longer possible. But when this translation bureau is organized under this proposed act those men who are employed in this service will have the full advantages of occupying positions already recognized in the civil service, and an honest and efficient effort, impartial to the extreme, will be made to that end by the civil service commission and by the superintendent to be appointed by the civil service commission, under such direction as it may be necessary for the minister to give. There will be no fear and no favour. Men who are competent will receive their just advancement and be maintained in their positions, but we will expect that when translations come from the new bureau in fair copy for those employed in composition at the printing bureau, this copy will have been so revised by the chiefs of the bureau as to render unnecessary these large unnecessary expenses now incurred, which are not only an expense to government but a still greater expense to the administration of the printing bureau, because until those faults, if I may call them that, are remedied and overcome it is absolutely impossible to maintain an efficient administration of the printing bureau or of the translating staff.


Mr. MacINNIS:: As one of the members of the civil service committee to which this bill was referred, after it had received second reading, I think it would be in order for me to say a few words, not because my remarks may have any effect in reducing the opposition to the bill, but because I believe some other hon. members will agree with me in what I am about to say.
First of all I should like to touch upon the statement made on Wednesday by the hon. member for Temiscouata (Mr. Pouliot) when he stated that he had been abused by the chairman of the committee. I do not believe that was a fair statement to make. I had the honour to serve on the same committee in 1932 which differed only in the fact that in the present year the hon. member for Temiscouata sat in place of the hon. member for South Battleford (Mr. Vallance). So far as I am concerned this year the chairman could not have been more fair than he was. I wish to make this statement because I believe that in matters of general principle I agree more with the hon. senior member for Ottawa (Mr. Chevrier) and the hon. member for Temiscouata than I do with the hon. member for West York (Mr. Lawson) who acted as chairman of the committee. I wish to state, however, that I could not wish to sit on a committee headed by a chairman more fair than the hon. member for West York has been.
Part of the report of the committee which sat in 1932 read as follows:
Item Ho. 12:	To promote economy and
efficiency in engineering and mapping services or any other services which can he centralized, your committee recommends to the civil service commission that a careful study be made of such government services with a view to amalgamations thereof.
It appears to me that this bill has been brought down in conformity with the recommendations made by the 1932 committee.


James Langstaff Bowman: Unanimous recommendation.


Angus MacInnis: Yes. And I believe that all hon. members should accept a bill such as the one now before them in the spirit in which it is brought before the house. That is, we should not bring in racial or language considerations any more than we should do so if it were a question of amalgamation and coordination of the various engineering services of the government. We would not ask whether an engineer were French speaking or English speaking; all we would require would be that he must be efficient, and we would govern ourselves accordingly. I believe that hon. members on this side of the house who sat on the committee would do well to consider the matter from this point of view.


Joseph Georges Bouchard: We do.


Angus MacInnis: I am very doubtful. However, I shall accept my hon. friend's statement as one of fact. Since this bill has come
Translations Bureau

before the house I have talked to quite a number of translators, and I am satisfied that their only objection to the bill is that it may interfere with their tenure of employment or might interfere in some way with the remuneration they now receive or with their position in the government service.


Mr. GAGNON:: With their vacations.


Angus MacInnis: I do not see that that need necessarily be the case. I have enough faith in the generosity and fairness of the Secretary of State to believe that he will see to it that if after the bureau of translations is put into working form certain translators are not required, some other positions will be found for them without any loss of remuneration or any loss of the considerations attached to their service. I believe that this position, which I have described, can be read from their evidence.
The senior member for Ottawa read some of the evidence given before the committee; I shall proceed to read some more and go a little farther on some of the points he raised. I turn to the evidence of Mr. Gerin, chief of the debates translation branch of the House of Commons. The chairman of the committee asked the following question:
Then, Mr. Gerin, may I take it this way, you are giving me the objections which you see to the establishment of a bureau, and, may I take it that you see three objections or possible objections, one, the interference with the hours and conditions of work now established for the translators; two, possible interference with salaries; and three, possible interference by the new superintendent in the method or means adopted for accomplishing of translations.
A. Yes.
The hon. member for Ottawa did not read the next question, which is as follows-


Maurice Dupré: Will the hon. member give the page?


Angus MacInnis: Page 38. The next question is this:
Would that summarize the situation?
A. Well, I suppose it would, yes. I don't see anything else.
That in my opinion is the crux of the whole matter. Surely that should not be sufficient to hold up a measure which has for its purpose efficiency in the organization of government work. I am in favour of the bill-


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: It looks like it.


Angus MacInnis: -because I am in favour of efficiency and order in the government service. Neither the government nor the

country nor, most of all, the employees, have anything to gain from lack of efficiency in any government service. I feel quite satisfied that it would pay the government and the country to pay those people for whom they have not sufficient work to keep away from the service altogether so as not to demoralize others who are working. For these reasons I am in favour of the bill; I trust that we may organize a bureau and that the civil servants now in the translation services will not be hurt in any way by the organization which will take place.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: The hon. member who has just taken his seat has expressed some of the sentiments I feel with regard to the civil service. Taken as a whole, it is a competent body. The hon. member has said that this bill will tend to increase efficiency in the translation services. The hon. member, who sat on the committee, has always been fair. I believe I must say that he was one of the most assiduous and impartial members, and I pay him that tribute. I think he must admit, however, that there is not one tittle of evidence in the record to show that this system will by any means conceivable or inconceivable improve the present situation. If the hon. member is fair he must admit that the whole of the evidence is against the contention he has put forward, namely that the bill if put into effect would increase the efficiency of the translation services. Further, there is not a particle of evidence before the committee that the translations to-day are not of the highest standard. There is not one solitary, single complaint in the whole of the evidence to show that the standard of translation from French into English or from English into French-but particularly from French into English-is not of the highest order. There is not one complaint about the translators of the House of Commons. There is not one particular complaint about the translators, whoever they may be, in the other chamber, and I do not think it is fair simply to say that if this bill goes into effect it will increase the efficiency of the service. I say to the hon. gentleman who has just taken his seat, just as I said to the minister the other day, that this is simply a smoke screen, a pure piece of camouflage. So evident is that, that I take it from the lips of the hon. Secretary of State himself when he said that this bill must go through and will go through.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: If the government can put it through. It is a government measure.

Translations Bureau


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Oh yes. It is the most wonderful example of Toryism that this bill shall go through and must go through with the benign complacency of those who sit to your right, Mr. Chairman.


Mr. GOBEIL:: Will the hon. gentleman allow me a question?


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Certainly.


Samuel Gobeil: Will you tell the committee what you mean by camouflage. Camouflage for what?


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I am not here to give my hon. friend lessons in English. The dictionary is there. If my hon. friend wants a lesson in politics I will be quite ready to give it to him.


Samuel Gobeil: Substantiate your statement.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: The dictionary is there.


Samuel Gobeil: As usual.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I am not here to teach my hon. friend his letters. I say, Mr. Chairman, that here we have the evidence that this bill must go through. The Secretary of State has said it and he has repeated that the government stands or falls by this bill.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Efficient administration is impossible without it.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Will the hon. gentleman say how many times since confederation a bill has gone to a committee of this house and has been studied at seven or eight or twelve meetings, and after six out of eight witnesses have testified against the worthiness of the bill, it has come back to the house without any amendment, although amendments have been repeatedly proposed? Will the hon. gentle^-man say how often that has occurred? It has not occurred in this case even after the pious wishes expressed by outstanding members from the province of Quebec sitting on the other side of the house that this bill might come back from the committee in an unrecognizable form. Yet it has not. And now those same gentlemen sitting behind the minister will complacently and benignly help to put the bill through.
I want to be fair to the minister. He has a knack with his stubbornness and his one-track mind of starting off on what he thinks is the main line and then running off into sidings. Then when he gets to the bumper he gets sort of worried when he gets it right between the eyes. I did not start him off into the siding. But now he realizes, and particularly do those who sit behind him, the position in which this
bill places them. Unfortunately the minister is determined that this bill will have to go through. I want to be fair to the hon. gentleman, although he has been far from fair. I do not mean to say he did it intentionally, but sometimes he opens the throttle a little too wide and gives himself a little too much speed and oversteps himself.


Maurice Dupré: What is not fair is for the hon. member to say that the Secretary of State is not fair. The hon. member knows just as well as anybody else that there is no man more fair than the Secretary of State, and the hon. member should not say anything to the contrary.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: What is fair and what is not fair is a matter of appreciation, and it would be well for the hon. Solicitor General, for whom I have a very friendly feeling, that he should mind his own business. The Secretary of State can well look after himself. Let me remind the hon. gentleman that he is not on the pampas now but in the House of Commons. The hon. gentleman says that the first gun speaks the loudest. There are no gay caballeros around this chamber and we are not going to be intimidated by any talk of that kind.


Maurice Dupré: Oh.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: If the Solicitor General wants to say anything, let him stand up and make a speech, but let him not interrupt me like that.	.


Samuel Gobeil: Small stuff.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: It fits the subject.


Maurice Dupré: My hon. friend knows that time and again he has interrupted.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: The hon. gentleman
never opens his mouth except he puts his foot in it.


Maurice Dupré: The hon. gentleman is indeed very fair.
'Mr. CHEVRIER:	The Secretary of State
has said that the English edition of the Hansard in the Senate runs to 1,115 copies' and that the cost is $3,808.59. I think those are the figures he gave, and that the French edition, of which he said there were only eighty-five or a hundred copies, cost $4,915.46. Now when the Secretary of State boasted in the Senate that he was an old printer, he must have known that you can print one hundred copies for a certain price and that when you order five hundred copies you can get it at a relatively lower price, and five
Translations Bureau

thousand copies at a relatively lower price still. When he compared eighty-five copies with 1,115 copies, he was not fair in that regard. This includes the cost of translation.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: The costs were the total
costs and not the relative costs. The statement I made is absolutely correct and cannot be controverted.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: The hon. gentleman is
wonderful on the comeback but he always starts wrong. He has always something up his sleeve. He never makes a cleanout statement to start with. He has not been fair again when he talks about this thing that happened in the French translation. That is not fair. The hon. gentleman knows that there is nobody who wants to go into that less than I do. I do not want to go into this special and particular case. He knows why he does not want to go into it and why I do not want to go into it, and he is not fair. He is neither fair in his comparison nor fair to the individual.


James Langstaff Bowman: You be fair. Give us
the facts. Let us have the facts.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I will accept that. Will the Secretary of State appoint a special committee or someone-not the hon. member for Compton (Mr. Gobeil); he would not understand anything-but I will take the hon. member for South Essex (Mr. Gott) or any other hon. member on the other side of the house except the member for Compton. There is a certain expression in legal phraseology that rhymes somewhat with Compton -non compos mentis.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I think you should call the hon. member to order, Mr. Chairman.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: I cannot hear half the time because so many members are interrupting.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: His suggestion that a member is insane is not quite a proper statement. It is a breach of the privileges of this house.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I would be the last
one to do that. I said the name reminded me* of something. I did not apply the expression to him.


Hugh Guthrie: You implied it very distinctly.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: If the Secretary of State in answer to the challenge of the hon. member for Dauphin (Mr. Bowman) will appoint anyone on that side of the house except the hon. member for Compton to investigate-


Samuel Gobeil: He would not act on your
suggestion anyhow.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Les confitures sont assez bonnes pour vous.


Samuel Gobeil: Elies sont trop bonnes pour vous.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: If the hon. Secretary
of State would appoint anyone to investigate this particular piece of translation that happened in the Senate, and it was investigated as the hon. member for Dauphin would do it, I would be perfectly satisfied to let him look into it and place the responsibility where it should be placed, so that we could have an end to these insinuations and innuendoes all over the place. If the hon. member for Dauphin goes into that and places the responsibility for the translation of these French debates I would be satisfied.


James Langstaff Bowman: Unfortunately we do not
know to whom the hon. member is referring. If he would tell us what the facts are perhaps we would know more about it.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I will make it plainer.
The Secretary of State referred to a certain piece of translation in the Senate debates, The hon. member for Dauphin can read my answer in to-morrow's Hansard and he will then know that I am not misquoting the hon. gentleman. The hon. member will have an opportunity to see that I am not misquoting. Then the hon. member may be appointed but I would be most sorry because any one who has placed upon his shoulders this responsibility may find that the party in question may be some one who in later days has received recognition at the hands of those who sit to the right of the Speaker. I think it was very small potatoes on the part of the Secretary of State to bring up that matter in the way in which he did. That is just why I told him that if he continued in that strain, I would not care where the chips fell. I did not mean that I was going to say anything against the character of the minister but I said that if he wanted to know where the responsibility lay, let him go just one step further.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Whom is the hon. gentleman charging with being responsible?


Hugh Guthrie: What is he driving at?


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: The minister said something about this order in council. It was discussed in committee as to whether or not it was possible to achieve this thing without this bill. I think it was clearly established

Translations Bureau
at page 82 of the evidence that it was not absolutely necessary to have a bill of this kind in order to achieve simultaneous translations and to have the reports printed and tabled at the same time. At one point in his evidence before the Senate committee, the minister said:
We could balance the work as between summer and winter if the government and parliament would take certain measures to ensure that all blue book printing, departmental printing and the translation of these public documents were done early after the close of the year on March 31. They all relate to a year that ends on March 31. I can see no reason why nine-tenths of that work, most of which is done in English, could not be prepared by June or July.
What is the use of this bill? The minister goes on:
-hut in any event I can see no reason why the returns should' not be prepared in most instances early in April and put into typewritten form.
There is no particular reason for this bill. Then he goes on:
If that were'done the printing bureau could be kept busily employed during the summer, when it could work efficiently. Under such a plan the bulk of the printing would be done in November or December, and all the blue books would, in compliance with the law, be laid upon the table of the house in the first few days of the session.
Then the Hon. Mr. Griesbach asked:
That seems reasonable. Why has this not been done?
Hon. Mr. Cahan: Well, obviously no one person has the power to have it done. But the government, having control of the various departments, could by order in council direct that the work be done in that way.
Hon. Mr. Murphy: And- that of course would entail the cooperation of all the ministers at the head of the various departments?
Hon. Mr. Cahan: Yes, Senator. You know how it is, it necessitates the cooperation of fifteen or sixteen ministers.
Hon. Mr. Murphy:	I had to get it on
several occasions. It was accomplished but not on the first venture.
The minister loves that word "cooperation." It is a sacred word with him, provided the cooperation is such that everybody cooperates with him. He never endeavours, he will not and does not endeavour to cooperate with anyone in any particular. At that time this was done by order in council. It has been done by order in council and it was shown .in the committee that there was no necessity for this infamous bill. Yet the minister says that it must be put through.
I want to refer to just one more subject on this particular section. There is no doubt that the minister has effected reductions in the printing bureau, but I do not think that
demonstrates any great wisdom. Any one could reduce costs by putting 158 people on the street. But I know what the minister is going to say. He has said it already four or five different times, and if he said it seven or eight times he would use the same words. He will tell us of what he did between Christmas and New Year's day. He uses that as a sort of flame of charity, he uses it to ask for help or coordination. It is perfectly true that the minister has brought about these reductions, but this is what he said before the committee:
We have, as I shall point out in a moment, reduced the staff very, very materially.
Anybody could do that. Then later on:
We have reduced the staff very, very considerably. Up to the close of the last fiscal year we have reduced the staff by 158.
And then in answer to the Hon. Mr. Sharpe, he said:
-and other notices are outstanding for further reductions.
Then he goes on:
Those reductions included the retirement of a very considerable number of persons.
Then further on:
Taking the period from March 31, 1933, to October 17. 1933. the reduction of staff effected a saving of $118,382. The saving effected by the reduction of working hours was $56,530. In addition, I undertook to lay off employees in the operating department, which effected a saving of $85,477.
I submit that under these conditions it is with very poor grace that the Secretary of State says that all these reductions have been achieved when something like $260,000 or $270,000 of the reduction refers to wages and the reduction in staff of 158.


Jean-François Pouliot: The Secretary of State (Mr. Cahan) has told me that he is ready to answer questions, and I have one to put to him. However, before putting this question I should like to make a preliminary reference. On July 6, 1931, a question came up concerning the right of a minister to change an official letter into a confidential letter. Referring to the delay which had occurred in the tabling of certain documents I said:
I have no objection to delay provided no official letters are marked private in the meantime.
The Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) then answered.
I think the language of my hon. friend might be described, as I heard an hon. gentleman say a moment ago, as an outrage. Notice must be taken of that language at once.
Translations Bureau

Then the Prime Minister continues after a short dialogue.
Mr. Bennett: That is such a reflection on the honour of members of the government that I must ask Your Honour to direct the hon. gentleman to withdraw it unreservedly.
Mr. Pouliot: Mr. Speaker

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member would be well advised to withdraw that remark, and I ask him to do so. I did not catch what he said; he was interrupting when I went on to the next order of business and I called him to order. The remark is certainly an insinuation that the Minister of Marine marks letters "private and confidential" when they are asked to be produced, and no such insinuation can be allowed to go unchallenged.
Again:
Mr. Speaker: I would ask the hon. member to withdraw that implication.
Again:
Mr. Speaker: I must ask the hon. member to withdraw the insinuation.
Mr. Pouliot: There is no insinuation in that, Mr. Speaker.
Some hon. Members: Withdraw.
Mr. Speaker: The words were open to_ that interpretation and to no other. I must insist that the hon. gentleman withdraw the insinuation.
Further:
Mr. Pouliot: I did not make any reflection in regard to the past; I said what I wanted for the future.
Mr. Cahan: Withdraw.
Mr. Pouliot: I do not wish to be disagreeable to any hon. member-
Some hon. Members: Withdraw.
Mr. Pouliot: Is it a crime to mark a letter "personal"-
Mr. Speaker: That is neither here nor there. My request is that the hon. member withdraw the insinuation, that the Minister of Marine marks letters "private and confidential" after they have been asked for by way of a return to the house. It is a most unfair insinuation to make.
Then I withdrew. I had to withdraw twice because I said that I hoped the Minister of Marine would not mark as confidential official letters that he had received.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: What has this to do with the bureau for translations?


Jean-François Pouliot: I wanted to put the preliminary before my argument.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: What
bearing has what the hon. member is now saying on the bill to establish a bureau for translations?


Jean-François Pouliot: Here we have arrived at
full speed at the junction. I have been patient to-day; I might have argued on a point of order. Yesterday the Secretary of State rose to a point of order arguing that I should not quote letters that in accordance
fMr. Pouliot.]
with the authorization of the special committee I had seen in the office of the civil service commission. That point of order has not been decided by the chairman.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: The point of order was decided; it was decided on Wednesday that the hon. member had no right to refer to those files in this discussion in committee. The hon. member will have to confine himself to clause 3 of the bill.


Jean-François Pouliot: Then, Mr. Chairman, will
you please tell me at what page of Hansard of Wednesday you gave a ruling on the point of order raised by the Secretary of State?


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: I gave a
ruling on Wednesday that that particular file could not be used in the discussion on this bill. .


Jean-François Pouliot: No, sir.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: I hold I
did.


Jean-François Pouliot: Then I appeal, sir, to the Speaker, I move, seconded by the senior member for Ottawa (Mr. Chevrier), that the committee rise and report to the Speaker.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: The hon.
member is forgetting that the chairman is not now ruling on a point of order. He is stating a fact that within his own knowledge took place on Wednesday. The hon. member has no right of appeal from what the chairman has just said. He has a right of appeal from any ruling made by the chairman on a point of order. This is not a ruling on a point of order.


Jean-François Pouliot: I maintain that the ruling you gave on Wednesday was on the point of order raised by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth). Afterwards the Secretary of State raised another point of order which has not yet been decided by the chair. Now I ask you, sir, either to give your ruling on the point of order raised by the Secretary of State or to give me an opportunity to submit the whole matter to the Speaker.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: I make a statement of fact that on Wednesday the question of the right of the hon. member to refer to that particular file was discussed in the committee and I made a ruling that it could not be referred to. That is a statement of fact which I make now; I am not going to make another ruling on the same point to-day.


Mr. TURNBULL:: May I point out the
ruling is reported in Hansard at page 3332, where the chairman said:

Translations Bureau


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: If the hon.
member has dealt with the method by which he came to know the subject matter of the files, I am prepared to give my ruling. It is this: That whatever may be said as to the power or right of the committee to requisition those files, I hold that the mere fact the committee said they had no objection to one of their number seeking to get inspection of the files, does not make those files official records of the committee and does not make the information that he privately got from the files official records of the committee. Therefore I hold that references to the files are out of order.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: There was more than that, if I may say so. The senior member for Ottawa (Mr. Chevrier) agreed with the ruling but requested leave himself to restate the point for ruling in a different form from that in which the hon. member for Temiscouata had stated it and I refused to allow him to restate the point of order.


Jean-François Pouliot: Therefore, as it is useless, I shall not insist any more on that except to say that this bill is a dream baby.
As I do not wish to be disturbed while making an argument which may last a few minutes-


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Will the hon. member
kindly excuse me? I have received a longdistance telephone call.


Jean-François Pouliot: Certainly. I shall wait
until the hon. gentleman returns, to ask him the question.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: The hon. member will find
sufficient to say.


Jean-François Pouliot: I wish to make an argument that this bill is most uncalled for. What I desire to state to the committee is in accordance with the exhibits filed in committee and with the evidence given by Mr. Bland of the civil service commission. I wonder, Mr. Chairman, at this point, be. cause I do not wish to be disturbed when I am speaking on that, whether I shall be in order to discuss those matters?


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: The hon.
member may discuss any matter that is relevant to clause 3 of the bill. If he goes into what is irrelevant to clause 3 of the bill, I shall call him to order.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: And to the amendment
that has been moved?


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: Yes, and
to the amendment.


Jean-François Pouliot: There are several lines of
arguments that may be taken with regard to this bill bub the first point is to see how the translation business is going on at present,
how the translation is done. If the members of the committee will look at the back of report No. 5, page 156, they will see a list of 45 units. In some of those there are no official translators. Is that because no translations are made there? No sir. The reason is obvious-I would ask that the Clerk of the House do not disturb the chairman of the committee while I am addressing the committee, he is mumbling loudly and he disturbs me. There are 45 units. What I was saying when I was disturbed by the mumbling of the Clerk of the House is this, that there is a distinction to be made between translators de facto and the people who are called translators in the estimates. In all departments apparently there is some translation done, but some of it is done by people who are not officially called translators. For instance we have the biological board, which comes under the Minister of Marine, with no translators. Apparently the work is done by the translators of the Marine department. The Canadian pension commission, no translators, but the work is done by the translators of the department. For the Canadian radio broadcasting commission there is no report about translations made. That work is probably done by Mr. Maher who is the bilingual commissioner or Mr. Landry, the bilingual secretary of the board. The chief electoral officer is Mr, Castonguay. There is no translator there; the work is done by Mr. Castonguay who is bilingual and his bilingual staff. In the civil service commission Mr. Potvin is bilingual and he must have some bilingual assistants. Extra work is done outside, and the lack of supervision is due to the fact that t'he translator of the civil service commission was superannuated and has not been replaced. Then the exchequer court is a special case. One of the judges is bilingual and the other is English-speaking, therefore there is no necessity for having an official translator. The work is done by the staff, and the judgments, as you know, Mr. Chairman, because you are a distinguished member of the bar, are printed in the language in which they are given, either French or English. External Affairs, one translator. Farm loan board, no translator. The Department of Finance has no translator except one who is engaged on the railway work; it is curious that a translator who does some work on account of the Department of Railways and Canals does not come under the jurisdiction of my genial friend the hon. Minister of Railways and Canals (Mr. Manion), but of his colleague the Minister of Finance (Mr. Rhodes). This is wrong
33G8
Translations Bureau

and should be remedied. For the government contracts' supervision committee there is no translator. For the Governor General's secretary's office the translation is done by the staff. Department of Insurance, no translator. International joint commission, apparently no translator. Department of Justice, translations in the official languages are made by Mr. Fontaine, one of the officials of the department, an able bilingual gentleman, and the foreign correspondence is done by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Library of parliament is like the exchequer court; one of the librarians is bilingual and they have a bilingual staff, therefore there is no necessity of having translators there. In the national research council the work is done by the staff. The pension appeal court work is done by the Department of Pensions, they have no translator. :In the Department of Public Printing and Stationery the work is done by the staff. The Solicitor General is bilingual, he has a bilingual staff and does not need a special translator. For the supreme court the situation is the same as that in connection with the library and the exchequer court. Mr. Justice Rinfret and Mr. Justice Cannon are bilingual and they have a bilingual staff, therefore there is no necessity for translators. The tariff board has no translators but the work is done by the Post Office Department.
In those 19 units the work is supposed to be done within the staff, there are no translators. In the other units there are some translators. This gives a general summary of the situation. According to the answers which have been sent by every branch there are no translators in the library of parliament, where there are two librarians, one being bilingual, and no translator in the government contracts supervision committee. There are some self-sustaining departments with regard to translation; by that I mean departments which do not send translation outside. One of them is the archives, where excellent work is being done by two translators. Then in the department of the auditor general, who is also bilingual, they have one translator, and the work is done there. For the superintendent of bankruptcy the work is done by the staff, none sent outside. In the Department of Fisheries they have one translator who does the whole work including the annual report. For the Governor General's secretary's office the work is done by the assistant secretary. Indian Affairs has one translator, they do all the work within the department. The Department of Marine have one translator, they do all the work within the department. For the national research council the

work is done by the staff, none sent outside. The Department of National Revenue and customs and excise has three translators, no work sent outside. Public printing translation is done by officers of the department, no work sent outside. The Privy Council have one translator, no work sent outside. Public Works department has three translators, no work sent outside. Soldiers' settlement board work is done by a bilingual member of the staff. Trade and Commerce and bureau of statistics, all work is done in the department, except for a few pages of the blue book last year, but this is an exception. When I asked the Department of the Secretary of State to tell the committee if all the translation was done within the department the answer was, "No information on file respecting translation done by another department and outside the government service." In the patent and copyright office they had also one translator. It means, sir, that in all those branches the work of translation is so organized that all the work is done within the branch.
Let us see which departments have to depend on other departments for the translation of foreign correspondence. From September, 1931, to date the Department of Agriculture sent ninety-two foreign letters to the Department of the Secretary of State. The Department of Labour sent three 'letters during the same period, though the Secretary of State's department say there were six. From the Department of Mines one hundred and eight pages of text were sent to the Department of the Secretary of State, but there is nothing in the report of that department about it. The Department of National Defence sent seven letters, and they sent ten pages outside to be translated. In 1932 the income tax branch had eighteen forms and forty-two pages translated by government translators, and in 1933 they had twenty-two forms and forty-one pages translated by outside translators. It is wrong for the Department of National Defence and for the income tax branch to send their work outside the service; that work is most confidential, and the translation should be done within the service. Occasionally the pension commission sent foreign matter to the translators of the Department of the Secretary of State and the Post Office Department. In 1932-33 the Department of Pensions and National Health sent one hundred and fifteen foreign letters to the Post Office Department.
Therefore, Mr. Chairman, in addition to what I have already said, we have the departments of agriculture, labour, mines, national defence, pensions and national health and the

Translations Bureau
income tax branch and pension commission having their translation in both languages done within each of these departments, and only a small amount of foreign work is sent outside the service. As a consequence those units are also self-sustaining. Then, with regard to the Department of External Affairs, in the last two years that department sent twenty-4our foreign letters to the Department of the Secretary of State and forty-seven pages to the House of Commons. That is a very small amount. In the Department of the Interior the head translator had to deal with ten thousand items in two years, and he sent two hundred letters and ten articles to the Department of the Secretary of State, though that department gives the amount as fifty-five letters and certificates and four hundred and twelve pages of technical matter. In 1932 that Department sent one hundred and forty-one pages and in 1933 they sent one hundred and thirty-two pages to the blue book branch of House of Commons, in addition to ten or fifteen legal documents to the law branch of the House of Commons. Formerly there were many translators in the Department of the Interior; there was no reason why all should have been dismissed with the exception of only one. In his evidence Mr. Bland said that in this department there would be enough work for two translators, so one man from the blue book branch should be sent to the Department of the Interior to assist the translator already there. That is the first department of all those I have mentioned that is not self-sustaining, and that is so because there are fewer translators engaged in the work. It is very easy to remedy that condition. One must be fair; the translator in that department must be given some assistance.
It seems unfair that some translation work done for the Department of the Interior should be charged to the House of Commons. There is no reason why we should pay for the work done for that department. The estimates of the Department of the Interior show a reduction, but on the other hand there is a proportionate increase in the estimates for the House of Commons. This is absurd; the work should be charged to the department for which the work is done.
Now let us consider the work done by the blue book branch of the House of Commons for the civil service commission. The reports of 1932 and 1933 were translated by that branch. This is wrong. The translator of the civil service commission was superannuated, and the position has not been filled. Mr. Bland told the committee that there would be
enough work to give employment to one translator within the civil service commission, translating the official reports and revising the corrections. Why is that not done? Those publications of the civil service commission, advertisements of vacant positions and so on, should be done very carefully. They go all over the country, and they should be well done. It is necessary that they should be revised, and in addition there is no reason why the civil service commission should send its work to the House of Commons. If some money is to be voted for the civil service commission I have no objection, provided that it is charged to the civil service commission and not to the House of Commons. The audit board should see to that, because it is a discrepancy in accounting. The money should be charged to the department for which it is expended, and I take this opportunity of directing the attention of the government to that point.
Then there is the Department of Finance, whose translation work is done in a very stupid way. Some of it is done by the Post Office Department and some by the blue book branch of the House of Commons. There was a Mr. Lorans who was a translator in the Department of Finance; he died, but the position has not been filled. According to the evidence given by the deputy Minister of Finance, in 1932 there were 246 pages and 925 pieces and in 1933, 348 pages and 1,100 pieces, plus forty references of the tariff board, sent from the Department of Finance and the tariff board to the House of Commons and the Post Office Department for translation. This is absurd; the Minister of Finance should have his own translator, and the work of that department should be done by a man who is familiar with that work.
Then let us take the report of the Post Office Department. According to the deputy minister they have translated 1,300 pieces from the Department of Finance and 900 pages from the tariff board per annum during the last two years. Do you see, sir, the absurdity of refusing to replace the dead translator, and sending some of those translations to the department headed by the Postmaster General and other work to the House of Commons? The Minister of Finance should have the guts to have some estimates for translating services in his own department. It would be possible for a translator to look after tariff board translations and translations for the Department of Finance. The superintendent of insurance also is under the jurisdiction of the Minister of Finance. The farm loan board also comes under his jurisdiction. Do hon.
Translations Bureau

members not think that there would be enough work in these branches I have indicated to employ the services of one translator, and to justify the Minister of Finance bringing forward an estimate for a salary equal to that received by the dead translator who has not been replaced? In that way the work would be done within the department. The work could be done by a translator of the blue book branch who by order in council and according to law could be transferred. Not in 1932, but in 1933 the Department of Immigration sent only ten pages to the blue book branch. Therefore we must conclude that this department is self-sustaining, so far as translation is concerned.
Then there is the board of railway commissioners. In 1931 a report of 131 printed pages was sent to the House of Commons, and in
1932	the house received a report of 72 printed pages from the board. In 1932 the Department of Railways and Canals sent a report of 212 pages to the House of Commons and in
1933	sent a report of 92 pages. While the Minister of Railways formerly had two translators in his department he has now only one.


Mr. MANION:: They never translated blue books. They are translators for correspondence, and that sort of thing, 'but not for blue books.


Jean-François Pouliot: Even if they did not translate reports, I say it is a bad practice, because the reports of the Department of Railways and Canals should be translated within his department, as the reports and publications of the Department of Finance and other departments are translated within those departments. I should like to see my hon. friend come to the house with a supplementary estimate providing for the salary of one of the translators in the blue book branch, so that that amount might be charged to his department. I should be glad to vote the amount, and in my opinion it would be more proper to have the translator in his own department than to have a messenger going hither and thither from the west block to the house carrying work to be translated outside the department.


Robert James Manion: May I suggest to the hon. member that if we did that we would have to hire, the year round, a translator to do only one job which would take a matter of two or three weeks, at the most.


Jean-François Pouliot: Before that there were two translators who seemed to have enough work to do.


Robert James Manion: They did not; that is why we let one go.


Jean-François Pouliot: There were two translators on the board of railway commissioners and two translators in the Department of Railways and Canals.


Robert James Manion: I have nothing to do with the board of railway commissioners. They are an independent body, and with the exception of putting their report before the house I have nothing to do with them.


Jean-François Pouliot: But at the same time, as to a certain extent they come under the jurisdiction of the Minister of Railways-


Robert James Manion: No, not at all.


Jean-François Pouliot: Well, even if they do not come under his jurisdiction, I say that the kind of translation done by the board is about the same kind as is done in the Department of Railways and Canals. I think the minister would admit that. In my view it would be normal to have one translator added to the one now operating in the Department of Railways and Canals in order that that department may have two and in order that the translations may be made by persons who have real knowledge of the railway business and are familiar with railway terms. That work could be done much better, much more quickly and with better results. Anyway, I have submitted my request and if as a result the minister brings an estimate before the house indicating compliance with my suggestion, I shall be very glad.
Fifty pages were sent to the House of Commons blue book branch in 1932 by the Department of Trade and Commerce, statistics branch. That is an exception, because as a rule they do their own work. Only an occasional translation is done for them by the blue book branch. In connection with the Department of Justice, in the year 1932-33 three reports of the superintendent of penitentiaries were sent to the House of Commons. Letters in foreign languages from convicts are sent to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and are not translated in the east block. Most of these departments, with the exception of the Department of Finance, the Department of Railways and Canals and the board of railway commissioners, are self-sustaining so far as translation services are concerned.
The following units are self-sustaining: Agriculture, Archives, Auditor General, Superintendent of Bankruptcy, Fisheries, Governor General's Secretaries, Indian affairs, Marine, National Research Council, National Reve-

Translations Bureau
nue, customs and excise, public printing, Privy Council, Public Works, Soldier Settlement Board, Trade and Commerce, Agriculture, Labour, National Defence, Income Tax, pension commissioners, Pensions and National Health, External Affairs, Immigration, statistics branch of the Department of Trade and Commerce, with the exception of the superintendent of penitentiaries, the Department of Justice, etc.
The civil service commission is not selfsufficient. The others which are not self-sustaining are the Department of the Interior, where the number of translators has been too much reduced; the Department of Finance, where the dead translator has not been replaced; the Department of Railways and Canals, and the board of railway commissioners, where the number of translators has been reduced.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: The hon. member has spoken forty minutes.


Joseph Georges Bouchard: Mr. Chairman, I do not intend to speak at length in this discussion, because I believe I have already stated my views with regard to this bill. To anyone who may express surprise at our opposition may I say, first, that we do not know exactly how the bill would operate. I do not see any ground for such a bill either in Canada or outside of Canada, and I believe the Secretary of State (Mr. Cahan) would have been much wiser had he given us his reasons for introducing the measure.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: I might remind the hon. gentleman that that was settled on the second reading. It is now a matter of the contents of clause 3.


Joseph Georges Bouchard: I will come to that.


Peter John Veniot: He has the right to go on.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: He has not.


Peter John Veniot: It was granted on Wednesday.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: If the committee granted the right to a general discussion on the short title clause, such concession certainly does not apply to every clause of the bill.


Joseph Georges Bouchard: Clause 3 provides that there shall be a bureau under the minister to be called the bureau for translations, and it is to that clause I am speaking. I usually do not abuse my right to speak in this house, and I am surprised, Mr. Chairman, that you interrupted me when I was just making a few preliminary remarks on this bill.
As I was saying, I do not see any ground for the centralization of the translation services. Here in Canada if you will look back over the past, you will not find in the record anything in favour of this measure. Look over the rest of the world, more particularly at the experience in Switzerland and Belgium, and you will find that centralization has not produced the effect in those countries that was expected of it, and now they are returning, more particularly in Switzerland, to the system of decentralization.
This bill seems to have been born in the dark like a mushroom, and to my taste it has not even the flavour of a mushroom. When we ask for reasons the minister gets up and speaks, as he. did on two previous occasions, of the printing necessities, as if translation were to be subordinated to printing. That, as we say in French, is "mettre la charrue devant les boeufs,"-to put the cart before the horse; for translation, which after all is a form of writing, and not an easy form, perhaps indeed the most difficult of all, cannot be subordinated to the printing bureau. I do not see why the minister insists upon the necessities of the printing bureau. He went on to give examples. I have always thought a great deal of the fairness of the minister and I was surprised this afternoon when he referred to a very exceptional case where a man who was overworked and had the assistance of some temporary employee without any experience in that particular work turned out to the printing bureau under very difficult ^ conditions a translation which I must admit was not in proper form. But that was very exceptional. It was a case in the Senate, moreover, where we have no jurisdiction, and we have not all the data to deal with it. It does not give us a real picture of the translation services in general, and I am surprised that the minister resorted to that kind of example. When we were pressing him for the author of the translation of the last speech from the throne we were turned down and the minister said that he was shielding someone. I happen to know this man myself. I think very highly of him, and it is not his fault if there were perhaps sixty mistakes in the translation of the speech from the throne. He was perhaps overworked. But it does show one thing; it is an argument against the centralization of translation. How can you expect a man, even a chief translator, to be a master in all kinds of translation? A translator who is working on penitentiary documents will be able to translate such docu-

Translations Bureau

merits very well, and a translator from the Department of Railways can be expected to translate well a report of the Department of Railways, and so on. But the very fact that this speech from the throne is the worst piece of translation that one can witness does not indicate that the translator himself is a poor translator. On the contrary, it indicates that centralization is very unwholesome. Referring again to the speech from the throne, the minister said that he wished to shield the author of this piece of translation, and in order to confute mv hon. friend from Temis-couata and myself, he quoted a letter signed by a pen name. Then in almost the same breath he read another letter, but only in part. Well, Mr. Chairman, when the opposition is asking for information I think we are entitled to get all the information the minister has, and if he had given all the information that was in his possession or had taken the trouble to inform the committee as to the nature and purport of this bill in its working out, perhaps the opposition would not have been so great. But we know nothing whatever about it. We do not know how it will work. We are asked to make the change without being given the facts.
I admit frankly, as I have admitted previously, that a little more coordination is necessary in the different translation offices. So much is that the case that the translators themselves of their own initiative some time ago formed a society called the Technological Institute, where they discuss questions concerning their occupation. That body might be strengthened, or the chief translator in each of the departments might be united in a sort of federation comprising all the departments, with a view to bringing about a further improvement, in translation.
But I resent more than anything else the argument which the minister used and the comparison he made between the translation system and an accounting system. The minister who introduced this bill was unable to have a proper translation made in his own department, and any time that he resorted to the gratuitous services of a friend he never came back with the best piece of work, as has- been demonstrated. The minister now comes and says that he wants to organize the translators in all departments. We do not know if he intends to bring all these translators into one office where one translator will be doing one job and then a few hours afterwards be asked to do another job. I should like to impress upon this committee the impossibility of any man translating the work

of any department unless he is closely related to the activities of that department. New words come up every day and he must be able to follow the technique of the department. In Switzerland instead of looking for mere translators they look for expert scholars and men of great technical ability. These men are part of their department, promotions are open to them and they know just what are the necessities of their department. That is the only way in which there can be good translation. W'e do not know if there is to be a bureau in which all translators will be coordinated or if there is to be just a bureau comprising them all.
There is another point upon which I should like to touch for a few minutes. It has been a long established tradition that the translators of th.e Senate and the House of Commons should be segregated and receive special treatment. They are responsible for their work to the Speakers and to the two houses. Does any hon. member who makes a speech feel it is fair that the translation of that speech should be in the hands of the government? Is it fair that the government should take the responsibility of translating my speech? Is it fair that the translation of my speech should be in the hands of my opponents? The translators of the House of Commons live side by side, so to speak, with the members. They know not only the different idioms used but they know the idiosyncrasies of the different members. If I have' any complaints to make, I make them to the Speaker, and I take full responsibility for the translation of my own speeches. Otherwise I am in the hands of the government. Many hon. members who spoke gave us some hope that a special branch would be established for the parliamentary translators but now we have this bill without the slightest intimation that this is to be done. We should like the minister to be more precise. We should like him to take into consideration the suggestions made from this side of the house and the recommendations made by his colleagues, such as the Solicitor General (Mr. Dupre), the Minister of Marine (Mr. Duranleau), the hon. member for Dorchester (Mr. Gagnon) and others. If he had listened to those suggestions and amended the bill accordingly, he would not be witnessing the strong but sincere opposition we are making to-day.
At six o'clock the Speaker resumed the chair and the house took recess.

Translations Bureau
After Recess



PRIVATE BILL


[Stage Direction]
The house in committee on Bill No. 28, to incorporate Ancient Foresters' Mutual Life Insurance Company-Mr. Bell (Hamilton)- Mr. Bury in the chair.
Sections 1 to 11 inclusive agreed to.
On section 12-All assets of fund (e) vested in company, subject to mortgages or liens.
Mr. NEILL:: Apparently this company has existed for a long period as a fraternal society. I would like to ask the hon. member in charge of the bill whether any provision is made for taking care of liabilities incurred under its fraternal operations. Has it received the approval of the insurance department and has it gone through the private bills committee?


Mr. STIRLING:: I am afraid I cannot
answer the hon. member's question in detail other than to say that it was before the banking committee and was passed there without amendment. It has the approval of Mr. Finlayson, superintendent of insurance. The main purpose of the bill is the changing of a fraternal insurance company into a straight line company.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I made inquiries along the line of those of the hon. gentleman, as to whether the superintendent of insurance had approved, and the bill will stand for third reading until the next sitting so that it may be quite clear that he has. I am informed that he has, as the hon. member has said.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Sections 13 to 19 inclusive agreed to.
Bill reported.

[Stage Direction]
The house resumed consideration in committee of Bill No. 4, respecting the bureau for translations-Mr. Gahan-Mr. Bury in the chair.
Jean-François Pouliot: Mr. Chairman, shortly
before the committee rose, when you told me I had spoken forty minutes I was just outlining the self-sustaining departments in accordance with the reports which have been
74726-213J
sent by each deputy to the civil service committee, and before which Mr. Bland of the civil service commission was examined. There is one department which has been left aside, which is self-sustaining in regard to translation, and which does some work for other departments, namely the Post Office Department. It does work for other departments, including the Department of Finance, although it sends some foreign letters to the department of the Secretary of State. Therefore all departments of this government are selfsustaining except the following: In the civil service commission, where a .translator and chief examiner have been superannuated and not replaced-in that department there is no one to revise the proofs of the publications or revise the translation after it is made. In the finance department the same thing; there was a translator, Mr. Lorans, who died and has not been replaced, and now part of the work of the Department of Finance and of the boards under the jurisdiction of that ministry is done either by the Post Office Department or the blue book branch. Therefore, sir, the only way to remedy what is wrong in the producing of translations in the Department of Finance is to replace the translator who died. That new translator could do the translation work for the finance department, the farm loan board, the insurance department and also the tariff board. There would be plenty of work for him.
In the Department of the Interior there were six or eight translators before, and there is only one at present. The work he has to do is the work of two good men. According ito the report of the acting deputy minister he had to deal in the last two years with ten thousand items. He had so much to do that he had to send some of his work to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and to the blue book branch. Therefore the Department of the Interior would be selfsustaining with regard to translation if one translator were put with the translator in charge there at present to assist him in his work. If that were done there would be no necessity for a central bureau. The Department of Justice is apparently self-sustaining except for the penitentiary branch which sends its reports to the blue book branch for translation. It seems to me there is enough work in the Department of Justice to employ one translator, who would be in charge of the reports of the superintendent of penitentiaries and so on. In the railway board there were two translators, but one of them is dead so that there is only one left. In the Department of Railways and Canals there were two
Translations Bureau

before, and there is only one left. So of those four translators there are only two left. Some work in that department is sent to the blue book branch also. Would it not be wise to have another translator in the department who would do the work without its being sent to the blue book branch? That department would then have three translators instead of two, and the whole work of the Department of Railways and Canals and of the railway board, which is the same with regard to translation, would be done satisfactorily under the jurisdiction of the minister.
In the Royal Canadian Mounted Police there is a curious situation, according to the evidence of Mr. Darling, who appeared before the committee. The translator, Mr. Arnoni, has not passed the civil service examination but is kept there because he knows the common language, not the elegant, classical language which is required of the translators, but he speaks the language of the common people, and it has been stated in the evidence that this is what is wanted for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. They just want the ordinary, common language for the use of that branch. But there is much work which is sent to the Department of the Secretary of State. For instance from September, 1931, to January, 1933, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police sent to the Department of the Secretary of State 23 Danish letters, 45 Dutch, 114 German, 324 Italian, 24 Norwegian, 1 Portugese, 10 Spanish, and 18 Swedish, a total of 559 letters. In the year 1933 they sent 2 Danish, 70 Dutch, 2 Flemish, 235 German, 292 Italian, 34 Norwegian, 27 Swedish, a total of 662. Therefore although there is some foreign translation done in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police it is not a self-sustaining department with regard to foreign translation.
If we consider all the outside units of the service we see that to remedy any complaint, not which has been made but which might be made with regard to translation, the only thing to do would be to transfer one translator from the blue book branch to the civil service commission, one to the finance departs ment, where both translators have not been replaced; one to the Department of the Interior, or to give a chance to the translators of the Department of the Interior who were supposed to have the preference by virtue of an order in council which was passed at the time, and who are now without work, one of them; one to the Justice department, and another one to the Department of Railways and Canals. It means that the whole question might be settled by fMr. Pouliot.]
taking five translators from the blue book branch and sending them to five different departments to fill the vacancies that have been created through the death or superannuation of the translators formerly there, who have not been replaced. This is a very simple suggestion I am offering to the Secretary of State. I know that my remarks this afternoon were very dull; I do not pretend anything to the contrary, but this question must be decided in accordance with facts. There is a relative truth in everything, and my colleague the senior member for Ottawa (Mr. Chevrier) and myself have tried to discover that truth. So I take the liberty of offering this suggestion piping hot to the Secretary of State.
Now there is something else. The only departments that are not self-sustaining are the civil service commission, the Department of Finance and the boards under that department, the Department of the Interior, the Department of Justice with regard to penitentiaries, the board of railway commissioners and the Department of Railways and Canals. That is all. I wonder if the Secretary of State intends to change the entire system of translation because the government has not seen fit to replace translators who have died or been superannuated, in consequence of which some departments have preferred to send their work to the blue book branch here. This seems rather absurd. In addition there are the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Department of the Secretary of State. In that department the routine work of translation in French and English is done by the ordinary staff; the only translator in the department apparently is proficient in foreign languages but is not familiar with French. This is why the hon. gentleman had to go outside his department for the translation of the speech from the throne.
In my opinion, Mr. Chairman, it was wrong to have that translation made by anyone on the House of Commons staff; it was a mistake for the Secretary of State to ask the clerk of the house to look after that translation, for this reason: This is a constitutional matter; before the speech from the throne is delivered by His Excellency it is not a parliamentary paper. It is a document which belongs to the government, and which is supposed to be kept secret until it is read by His Excellency. Therefore it was most discourteous to His Excellency to have that speech read by a civil servant of the House of Commons before it was read by His Excellency. I regret that this happened. I know what is coming, from the smile of my hon. friend the Secretary of State-

Translations Bureau


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: No doubt the Secretary of
State should be confined to the tower for that.


Jean-François Pouliot: The Secretary of State
may say it has been done before. I admit that, but previously it was done for $25, because the gentleman who did the work wanted that amount for doing it. This is the kind of petty graft of which I complain. Before the $25 was asked for and paid the speech from the throne was translated by the clerk of the privy council. It is a document that belongs td the privy council, and it might be properly translated by that gentleman, who has a fair knowledge of both languages. That is how it should be done. I do not say this in an offensive way to the genial Secretary of State, but I should like him to observe the old constitutional custom that the government shall keep the speech from the throne secret-I mean within the council -until it is delivered by His Excellency. There has been a good deal of criticism with regard to that faulty translation, for which the hon. gentleman cannot blame any translator of the blue book branch, because that work was delivered to him by the clerk of the House of Commons, who was responsible for it. If there had been even one mistake in that translation it should have been corrected before it was handed out.
There is one other thing which I regret very sincerely. The hon. gentleman is sufficiently familiar with the French language to know that there are even constitutional mistakes in that speech; he knows very well that it is not His Excellency who summons parliament. So I regret very much, as a member of this house, that the government has taken full responsibility for that translation, which is erroneous. I am sure that in his own heart my hon. friend regrets having done so. How can the government come here with a scheme for a bureau of translations when they took responsibility for the seventy-five mistakes that we find in the two pages of the French translation of the speech from the throne? Let us say that to the electors of St. Lawnence-St. George, the electors of Ottawa, the electors of Riviere du Loup or those of any other constituency; one should ask, "How can the government bring in a piece of legislation to preserve the rights of the French language in Canada while they take full responsibility for seventy-five mistakes in the two pages of the French translation of the speech from the throne? Where is the logic in that? It is most extraordinary. I cannot conceive how an eminent lawyer and statesman like the Secretary of State can accept such a responsibility, not only on behalf of himself but also
on behalf of his colleagues in the cabinet, both English and French speaking. I am sure the hon. gentleman will reconsider his statement in that connection. Surely the government will drop that responsibility some day, but until it is done may I say how deeply I feel what he has said. There may be a clerical error, or two clerical errors, or three clerical errors, but those errors could be corrected. Who can take the responsibility for an error without being exposed as an ignoramus? The hon. gentleman is not an ignoramus; he is a most learned man. Why is he so stubborn about this matter? Why does he not drop all responsibility? He knows very well that in all the questions I have put with regard to the correspondence which passed previous to the drafting of the bill I have been as courteous and as respectful as one could be. He knows that, and he cannot deny it. I need not go over those facts; I need only say that I have too much esteem and respect for him to do anything which would not be proper in the circumstances. I have' been just as fair as anyone could be, and there are things I would never have done if the hon. gentleman had not said to me, "I have no objection, personally, to your doing this." He knows that.
I am through with this part of the discussion. I should now like to show to the minister that the trouble with the translation business comes from the fact that the translators who have died or who have been superannuated have not been replaced, and that this has happened in only a small number of departments. For that reason it would be very easy to mend those stockings

yes, very easy. I turn now to a body like the Senate, an independent body-a body so independent of the House of Commons that only yesterday Mr. Chairman refused to let me read a statement which the Secretary of State had made before hon. senators. It is a body entirely separate and distinct from the House of Commons, and it has its translation of Senate debates made in the House of Commons by the parliamentary translating staff who are paid by the House of Commons. Where are we going? We have seen the near amalgamation of railways, the centralization of banks, the centralization of translators, the centralization of farming-everything in this country will be centralized. Why? There is no reason for it. Things worked well before; the Secretary of State had no complaint about the way translations were made. When we were discussing this point before the committee and I was asking some questions about the qualifications of certain witnesses, the chairman told
Translations Bureau

me that we were not to study the quality of translations but that we were to consider only their production.
I come now to the famous order in council to which reference has been made by the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Veniot) and by the senior member for Ottawa (Mr. Chevrier). If I am wrong the minister will correct me when I state that the purpose of the order in council is to have the work ready on the first of July, three months after the expiration of the fiscal year, and to have all translations sent to the printing bureau right away. This is the text of this recent order in council.
Therefore His Excellency the Governor General in Council on the recommendation of the Secretary of State is pleased to order and it is hereby ordered that it shall be the express duty of the deputy heads of all departments of government to insist that a printer's copy of all departmental reports, complete in revised typewritten form in either the English or the French language shall be delivered to the king's printer on or before July I, and in each and every year.
And that if this order is not complied with in respect of any annual departmental report the deputy head of that department shall communicate in writing to the Secretary of State for Canada the reasons for such delay and its probable extent so that the work of the printing bureau may be adjusted accordingly.
August	
September	
October	
November	
December	
January	
That is not so bad-and these are only the annual reports of the departments. These figures indicate that after the session there were the following' pages printed: In June, 1,275; in July, 2,315; in August, 2,597; in September, 1,782; in October, 1,629; in November, 2,629; in December, 1,401, and in January of 1934, 1,348. If all the work is delivered on or before July 1, there will be no work afterwards for the printers.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: The hon. member is in error in one respect. A great deal of that was for departmental reports for the year previous.


Jean-François Pouliot: I wonder if the Secretary of State has read the evidence of the king's printer. I am sure he has not read Mr. Patenaude's evidence before the committee.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: 
Jean-François Pouliot: Well, that is pretty hard on the king's printer, because he was in the printing bureau when the hon. member was practising law in Montreal.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: The king's printer was in the printing bureau, but in an entirely different capacity, namely that of controller of purchases.


Jean-François Pouliot: I do not wish to be unpleasant to my hon. friend the Secretary of State, and what he now says I receive in a very cool way. I must say, however, that I am more impressed by his intelligence than by his learning in printing. I think his intelligence is much greater than his knowledge of printing. I do not say that to offend him. It is simply my sincere belief.
1 There might have been delays in the delivery of translations, but it is very easy to have that remedied. I think the hon. gentleman is fair enough to concede-I am sure

Translations Bureau
he will-that the departments in which there is the least trouble about translation are as a rule the departments in which the high offh cials, the deputy or his assistant, are bilingual ; that in those departments the work of translation is much better and much more quickly *done than in departments where the high officials are unfamiliar with both languages. *That was frankly admitted by Mr. Bland in *his evidence. If the hon. gentleman will read *the evidence he will see that Mr. Bland time [DOT]and time again admitted that in the departments where the high officials are bilingual *there is no trouble about translation, and if *there is any delay in the delivery of reports *it comes from the fact also of the centralization of annual reports in the blue book branch. That is a great mistake.
Now I offer another suggestion to the Secretary of State.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Does it have reference to this bill?


Jean-François Pouliot: The first one had reference to this bill, I think. If the hon. gentleman does not appreciate the work that my friend from Ottawa and myself have done it might be just as well to stop the argument right away and leave him with the whole responsibility, if he is .going to adopt the attitude that was taken the other day by my hon. friend from Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth) who said that he did not want any reply. I hope the Secretary of State does not assume that he is infallible. If he does, it is a great mistake. When a great man admits that he can be mistaken he is all the greater for that.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I am anxious to see the hon. gentleman improve in stature immediately by admitting that on his own behalf. I have seen no evidence of any suggestion that his judgment was fallible.


Jean-François Pouliot: Well, Mr. Chairman, I wonder if I have to start again what I have been saying since a quarter past eight o'clock. My hon. friend has received some suggestions. They may be worthy or unworthy. I do not pretend to be infallible but I have offered the suggestion that some of the translators be transferred from the bluebook branch to departments where translators have not been replaced. That is one suggestion that I believe was quite pertinent, and I have offered it to the hon. gentleman with great pleasure.
There is another suggestion that I wish to make. Why does he not amend the printing
bureau act by placing one man under the jurisdiction of the king's printer, whose duty it shall be to see that the reports, not only annual reports but the whole translation business, is divided up and delivered at such times that the printing bureau can work all the time?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: That is just what we are taking authority to do by this bill.


Jean-François Pouliot: No, no. The aim of this
bill is to synchronize the translations, which is absurd; it cannot work. But what is necessary is to give assistance to the king's printer who has charge of the printing for all the departments. Instead of passing an order in council like the one to which reference has been made, why does not the Secretary of State amend the printing bureau act in order that the king's printer shall have an assistant who will regulate the delivery of translations? That could very easily be done.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Under the Public Printing and Stationery Act the king's printer can have all the assistance he requires. There is no difficulty; he has all the assistance he requires.


Jean-François Pouliot: Then what is the necessity for this bill?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: To provide for the translation. He is not a translator.


Jean-François Pouliot: Is it to improve the
quality of translation?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: That is possibly one phase
of it, but only one phase.


Jean-François Pouliot: Leaving that aside for the moment, I will ask the hon. gentleman one question. Is not the only purpose of this bill the regulating of the delivery of translations?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: N ot only in regard to the
regulation of delivery but the improvement of the translation services generally, putting them under a responsible minister of the crown whose duty will be to answer to the government and to parliament in respect of those services. At the present time there is no control over a large body of these translators.


Jean-François Pouliot: Will the translators stay
where they are now or will they all be put together in one bureau?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: They may be members of one bureau, and yet different members may occupy different rooms in this building or
Translations Bureau

some other building where some of them may be located. At the present time, the treasury department has what you might call an accounting branch of that department buit its employees are not only to be found in one building but in several buildings.


Jean-François Pouliot: There is a great difference between accounting and translating.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: The hon. gentleman has said that they are different sciences.


Jean-François Pouliot: I have not said it yet.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Oh yes, I have heard it several times. I heard it four or five times when we were discussing the second reading.


Jean-François Pouliot: I did not speak on the second reading.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: The hon. member has spoken forty minutes.


Joseph Georges Bouchard: As this bill is liable to change the status of the parliamentary translators, will the minister see that the same guarantees are made as were given previously under section 62 of the Civil Service Act?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: What is that section?


Joseph Georges Bouchard: It reads:
Nothing in this act shall be held to curtail the privileges enjoyed by the officers, clerks and employees of the Senate, House of Commons or Library of Parliament with respect to rank and precedent, attendance, office hours, or leave of absence, or with respect to engaging in such employment during parliamentary recess as may entitle them to receive extra salary or remuneration.
I have in my hand a list of the civil servants who enjoy parliamentary privileges. In the Senate there is the committee and the general branch, as well as the debates. In the House of Commons we have the law branch, the journals branch, the parliamentary papers branch, the private legislation branch, the debates branch, the members' stenographers branch and so on. I shall not read all the list but I ask the minister if the translators are to be the only ones to be deprived of the privileges which have been enjoyed so far? Are other branches, such as the debates reporters and so on, to be left with these privileges?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: The employees now employed in the translation service will come under the Civil Service Act and be amenable to that act throughout the year, subject to
such holidays as may be recommended by the civil service commission in view of any

special or onerous services which they may have to render while parliament is in session. The other branches are not the subject matter of this bill but in order to bring about the effective performance of services by the branches referred to by the hon. gentleman some provision may be made with regard to them. This bill deals with translators and I cannot promise what other changes may be suggested by the government at some future date.


Jean-François Pouliot: Mr. Chairman, can the exhibits which were filed with the committee be read in this debate?


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: Nothing can be read that is not relevant.


Jean-François Pouliot: I mean the exhibits which were tabled in the civil service committee when this bill was before it, referring particularly to those filed by the king's printer?


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: Nothing can be read that is not relevant to clause 3.


Jean-François Pouliot: The exhibits must have been relevant.
The CHAIRMAN OMr. Bury):	Not
necessarily. Some may be relevant to one clause, some to another and some to no clause.


Jean-François Pouliot: This is in connection with the bureau of translations. I just want to read the following letter:
Auditor General
Ottawa, October 2, 1930.
Hear Sir:
Salary Increase to Mr. Sherwood,
Chief Accountant
I am in receipt of your letter of the 29th ult. in which you state in reference to my letter of the 26th ult. regarding increase of Mr. Sherwood's salary as Chief Accountant, House of Commons, to $4,000 approved by the Internal Economy Commission, that the decisions of the Commission are not subjects of reference to the Treasury Board.
Obviously you have misinterpreted the last paragraph of my letter of September 26th last respecting ,a^ reference to the Treasury Board.
I had no intention of conveying to you that I would be obliged to refer the decision of the Board of Internal Economy in the case of the salary increase to Mr. Sherwood to the Treasury Board.
The reference to the Treasury Board which I mentioned was, as I pointed out, to be made under Section 41 of Sub-section 2 of the Consolidated Revenue and Audit Act in which the Auditor General is directed to report to the Treasury Board any case in which a subaccountant has expended money out of the proceeds of any accountable credit beyond the amount for which there is legislative authority.

Translations Bureau
The payment to Mr. Sherwood of a salary at the rate of $4,000 a year comes within this statutory direction, as the only legislative authority governing Mr. Sherwood's salary, that I am aware of. is contained in. a recommendation of the Civil Service Commission approved by resolution of the House of Commons May 11, 1928, in which the Compensation rate is given as $2,700, $2,820, $2,940, $3,060 and $3,120.
I presume you will not contend that the Internal Economy Commission has power to override a salary rate so established even in anticipation of a probable revision by the House of Commons favouring the action of the Commission.
I do not conceive it my duty to question the "rights, privileges and immunities of Parliament" and there was no intention or desire to do so in my letter of the 26th ult., but when a clear case of 'the violation of Section 41 of the Consolidated Revenue and Audit Act comes before me I regard it my duty to observe the direction therein provided.
Yours truly,
(Sgd.) Geo. Gonithier,
Auditor General.
A. Beauehesne, Esq.,
Clerk of the House of Commons,
Ottawa.
And the answer is as follows:
House of Commons
Ottawa, October 4, 1930.
Dear Sir:
In reply to your letter of the 2nd instant, I beg to say that subsection 2, section 41 of the Consolidated Revenue and' Audit Act does not apply to payments made by the House of Commons. With the exception of section 35, as I pointed out in my letter of the 29th ultimo, no part of that statute has the remotest application to moneys voted for the expenses of parliament.
We would be quite justified in not allowing you to audit our accounts. The resolution giving you that authority was sessional and not permanent, and it lapsed at prorogation. You are now "permitted" by our Commissioners of Internal Economy to make this audit, but you certainly exceed your rights when you claim that you can report our payments to the Treasury Board which has no jurisdiction over the expenses of parliament.
Your action in following such a course after you have been notified-


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: Might I ask the hon. member from what he is reading?


Jean-François Pouliot: From a letter which was tabled in the committee by the king's printer.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: Dealing with what?


Jean-François Pouliot: Dealing with the rights of the House of Commons with regard to the treasury board.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: That is not relevant to section 3.


Jean-François Pouliot: It is one of the exhibits. Can we not read the exhibits filed by the king's printer? The exhibits filed looked like a haystack.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: All that can be read is something that is relevant to clause 3 of this bill. Otherwise the hon. member could read every exhibit and every piece of evidence that was given.


Jean-François Pouliot: I am not going to do that because it would be most boring to you and to the committee. I have only seven more lines to read and then I will be through. I shall not read any more exhibits which were filed by the king's printer. The letter continues:
Your action in following such a course after you have been notified that the Commissioners of Internal Economy have passed on a certain matter is tantamount to denying their authority and placing them under the authority of the Treasury Board', and you are thereby questioning the rights, privileges and immunities of parliament.
Yours truly,
(Sgd.) Arthur Beauehesne, Clerk of the House of Commons. Geo. Gonthier, Esq.,
Auditor General,
Ottawa, Ontario.
I shall now give the story of this exhibit. It is not mine; it belongs to the committee and I will give it back to the committee. I am sorry the acting chairman is not here this evening. The photostat copies which were filed looked like a haystack; I thought it was August and that a farmer was coming in with a load of hay. When I saw this one I was a little curious and I started to peel the banana. Underneath these two letters-I have read the last one-I found this one which passed between Mr. Georges Gonthier and Mr. Beauehesne. These letters are marked in white.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: Will the hon. member keep to clause 3 of the bill? He is quite out of order.


Jean-François Pouliot: I am not and I shall explain why. There was a waste of money and this is what we complain of. Even in the exhibits which have been filed by the committee we find an extravagant waste of money in typesetting done for nothing because afterwards-
Translations Bureau


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Let me call attention to the fact that apparently those so-called exhibits, so far as I can see from this side of the house, were exhibits of bad translation and of corrections made in the galley proofs of those exhibits, the contents of which have no reference whatever to this or any other matter before the committee.


Jean-François Pouliot: I do not insist on that; I am through with it, but I wanted just to show that even the pure .can make mistakes.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: The hon. member does not need to discuss that under clause 3 of the bill.


Jean-François Pouliot: I am not insisting.


Onésime Gagnon: I rise to a point of order. The hon. gentleman ought not to have read those letters because they do not deal with the subject matter under discussion. Moreover, the hon. gentleman has read a letter supposed to be written by the clerk of the house. I do not know the hon. gentleman's purpose, but surely he has attempted to cast a reflection on the clerk of the house, a gentleman who ought by all means to be kept out of the debate. If, sir, you had understood the French language, what the hon. member read in French, you would have ruled the letter out of order, and I humbly ask you so to rule.


Jean-François Pouliot: What can be done about the past? It is done; we cannot change it. I did not do this, sir, to play a trick on you; I wanted only to show the committee what kind of exhibits we had and why there is a waste of money at the printing bureau; that is all.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: I must ask the hon. member to confine himself exclusively to clause 3.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: As the hon. member for Dorchester (Mr. Gagnon) has said, this quotation which the hon. gentleman has made from the contents of documents which have no relation to the printing bureau and no relation to any subject under discussion should be struck out of the report of this debate. It is becoming intolerable that hour by hour this irrelevant discussion should be proceeding at a cost of more than, a thousand dollars an hour.


Hugh Guthrie: It costs $1,500 an hour to
run this house of assembly.


Mr. STEWART (Lethbridge):: We know it
is costing that much and only nine members of the official opposition are in the chamber at the present time.


Jean-François Pouliot: I say this once and for all to the Secretary of State: I am ready to discuss matters with him but I shall stand for no lectures from him. Moreover, the cat came out of the bag when the hon. member for Dorchester spoke.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: If the hon. member is going to speak further, will he confine himself to clause 3 of the bill, or I must ask him to take his seat.


Jean-François Pouliot: I was saying just a moment ago that the House of Commons and the Senate are two independent bodies. You will admit that, Mr. Chairman.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: That has nothing to do with clause 3 of the bill.


Jean-François Pouliot: Yes it has and I will tell
you why. It has because downstairs we are doing the work of the Senate in regard to translation. I think it has something to do with the bill. It means that someone, I do not know who, has taken the responsibility of putting the bill into force before it is passed. As a member of parliament who has made some study of parliamentary rights and British customs I complain about the infringement on the old traditions; they are completely disregarded.


Maurice Dupré: Will the hon. member permit me a remark? The hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Veniot) said this afternoon, I think, that this order in council could have been passed without any bill at all; therefore there is no infringement.


Jean-François Pouliot: I did not say that. I
wish to correct the hon. gentleman. I did not say that the order in council could have been passed without this bill. I said that if the order in council has been passed when it should have been passed there would have been no necessity for this bill.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Carried.


Jean-François Pouliot: If one more member says
"carried", the discussion will last until Monday or Tuesday.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Carried.


Jean-François Pouliot: That is all right.


Mr. QUINN:: At $25 a minute.


Jean-François Pouliot: It is not a question of
that; it is a question of knowing whether we are to change the whole translation business to give the clerk of the house more superannuation than he otherwise would have, a higher salary than he is now receiving. Is it

Translations Bureau
not true that the whole thing has been started by Arthur Beauche^ne, the clerk of the house, and that he has made the memorandum on which the bill is based in order that he may have a higher salary?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I utterly deny that statement, and the clerk of the house should be protected here instead of being criticized ungenerously and in a discourteous way. He did not originate this bill.
Mr. POULrIOT: Did he not draft a memorandum on which this bill is based and was he not the first to write to the government in February of last year to ask it to investigate the matter?


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: The hon.
member cannot raise that point on this clause. The principle of the bill was adopted by the house on the second reading. These are all matters that have to do with the principle of the bill and while the hon. member may feel very strongly against the principle, it is now- beyond his power to attack it.


Jean-François Pouliot: But we might come to an agreement. If the Secretary of State refuses to pay attention to what I have said so far, may I appeal to him as a lawyer of high standing? It may take me twenty-five minutes, and afterwards I shall have very little to say on the bill. I would like to point out to him some of the statutes concerning the various departments and their constitution. I took the trouble to go through them and if he agrees to give me a last opportunity to appeal to his legal sense and constitutional knowledge, the committee will afterwards have a chance to vote on the amendment.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I suppose I cannot object
if the hon. gentleman wishes to read the revised statutes, but it would perhaps be more interesting to us if he would read the bible or some romance. To read the revised statutes relating to the constitution of some eighteen or twenty departments is altogether irrelevant to the question before the committee.


Jean-François Pouliot: I maintain, sir, that it is
relevant, and I wish to inform the hon. gentleman, even if he refuses to be informed, that in virtue of our laws the only authority in the department is the minister, and the one who comes after him and who has delegated authority by this house is his deputy or the assistant deputy. But they both come under the jurisdiction of the minister, as the hon. gentleman should know.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I am not quite as ignorant of the revised statutes as the hon. gentleman would imply.


Jean-François Pouliot: I am sure the minister
has known them, but he must have forgotten something since he has sponsored this bill. In each department the minister is the head; he has authority in his department and is responsible to the House of Commons. There can be no dual authority; that is absurd, and the hon. gentleman knows it. When we asked Mr. Bland in committee: Suppose translator A is in such a department; the deputy minister of that department rings for him, and at the same time the superintendent of translation rings for him, whom shall he obey? "It is a very embarrassing dilemma." That was his answer; he could not answer that dilemma any more than the hon. gentleman can answer the dilemma I put to him Wednesday with regard to Mr. Potvin of the civil service commission. There will be that conflict of authority in every department if this translation bureau comes into existence.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: I call the hon. member's attention again to the fact that the principle of the bureau of translation has been established by the house, and that he must confine himself to the particulars of clause 3; otherwise I shall have to fall back on standing order 40, section 2, which gives the chairman of the committee power to tell him to take his seat.


Jean-François Pouliot: I am sorry I have not
my hat here, because I would take my hat too.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: There is
an amendment proposed by Mr. Chevrier:
That clause 3 be amended by striking out after the word "service" in line 18 the words "and both houses of the parliament of Canada." And further, by striking out in line 24 the words "debates, bills, acts, proceedings."


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: We cannot accept that
amendment.	-
Amendment negatived on division.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Before the section carries as it stands I want to move another amendment. May I say to the committee that although I have a certain number of amendments it is far from my intention to speak at length on each of them, as apparently they will be defeated as quickly as I can move them. I shall, therefore, make no long speech in presenting them. But may I say in answer to the hon. gentleman who interrupted a moment ago that if on this side of the house there are but nine members
Translations Bureau

of the official opposition and some thirty-three on the other side, on this side it is not quantity but quality.


Maurice Dupré: How modest: First prize for modesty.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Therefore it takes only nine of us to look after thirty-three on the government side. I move now:
That the following be added as subclause 3 to clause 3:
All departmental reports and other documents or statements which it is the duty of any officer or department of the government to lay on the table of the House of Commons shall be issued and printed in the two official languages of the dominion and shall be deposited simultaneously.
The amendment speaks for itself.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: That adds nothing to the
bill. It deals with the publication of departmental reports, not with the question of a translation bureau. We have by order in council provided that these reports shall be prepared, and now we are only waiting to have a bureau created which will see to the translation of them, and be responsible not only for the translation but for the printing.


Jean-François Pouliot: Before the question is
put-


James Langstaff Bowman: On a point of order, surely the proposed amendment is not an amendment to the clause before the committee.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: It is not
an amendment; it is a proposal to add a new subclause, which in my opinion has nothing to do with the bill. The bill is for the setting up of translation machinery, whereas the subclause purports to enact a regulation which will be binding on the department as to the form in which its reports are to be issued. I hold that the amendment is not a proper part of the bill.


Peter John Veniot: That makes no difference;
as long as it is offered I think it is your duty to submit it.


James Langstaff Bowman: Speaking to the question before the committee I submit that the amendment is not in order because it has nothing to do with the bill.


Peter John Veniot: That makes no difference.


James Langstaff Bowman: I ask the chairman to
rule it out of order.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: May we hear from some of the Quebec members on this subject?


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: It has been called to my attention tjjat there is a rule that no new clause can be added to a bill until the whole bill has been passed by the committee.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: This is not a new clause, it is a subclause.


James Langstaff Bowman: Once more, Mr. Chairman-


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I know where the shoe pinches; I can see the opposition.


James Langstaff Bowman: That is the exact purpose of the introduction of the amendment. I submit that the amendment has nothing to do with the bill or the principle of the bill; it is an entirely extraneous matter, and I therefore ask that it be ruled out of order.


Peter John Veniot: What is the number of the regulation on which you are going to rule?


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: It is rule
778 found on page 223 of Beauchesne:
In the commons all the clauses of the bill are considered before any new clauses are brought up and added to the bill.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: But this is not a new
clause; it is a subelause.


Peter John Veniot: Read on.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: But this practice is not rigorously followed and the committee is generally guided by what is most convenient in each particular case.


Jean-François Pouliot: Who is the author who
says that?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Jean-François Pouliot: Speaking to a point of
order, the only book that should be referred to is the standing orders of the House of Commons. In that book by Beauchesne there are quotations from May and English authors which are absolutely irrelevant. I hear a mumbling now; it disturbs me, when I am addressing the chair, to have the clerk of the house mumbling to the chairman. What I have to say is very simple. Beauchesne's book is very deceiving; he quotes English authors as well as Bourinot, and he gives too much importance to May even when May comes in conflict with the regulations of this house. Very often I have noticed that the information given by the clerk of the house is absolutely erroneous.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.

Translations Bureau


Jean-François Pouliot: Is he a saint? Am I committing blasphemy?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I wish to direct your attention, Mr. Chairman, to rule 781, which states:
An amendment must be relevant both to the subject matter of the bill and the clause to which it relates.
Further it states:

it must not be beyond the scope of the bill-
I suggest that this amendment is clearly out of order under that rule.


Jean-François Pouliot: This is not a rule of the house. I know how it is done, with scissors, pepper and glue; that book is only a compendium of clippings. The book itself is out of order.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: If the hon, gentleman will allow me-


Jean-François Pouliot: And the author of it is a
perfect-


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: Paragraph 778, which I read, is from May-


Jean-François Pouliot: That is exactly the point.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: Will the
hon. gentleman restrain himself and keep order?


Jean-François Pouliot: You confirm what I say; it is May, not a Canadian authority or a regulation of the house.


Hugh Guthrie: When the chairman is
delivering his judgment on a point of order hon. members should keep quiet.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: My ruling is that the subclause is not relevant to section 3 or to the bill, which deals with a bureau of translations. Shall section 3 carry?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Carried.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: On division.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: This is quantity against quality.
Section agreed to on division.
On section 4-officers and employees may be transferred.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I want to move-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: This is quality.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I am trying to be as nice as possible. I may be uncouth in my own way, but I can match anyone on the other side if they give me the start. I am a poor starter but a mighty good follower. I now move that section 4 be amended by striking out, immediately after the word
"service" in the third line, the words "including all employees of the Senate and House of Commons of Canada"; and further by striking out immediately after the word "documents" in the sixth line the words "debates, bills, acts, proceedings"; and further, by striking out immediately after the word "correspondence" in the seventh line thereof the words "including the translation into either the English or French language of the debates and proceedings of the Senate and House of Commons." I do this in a last, evidently futile, endeavour to save the remnants that it may be possible to save in this bill of the rights and prerogatives of the House of Commons and the Senate.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: These amendments are
exactly similar in terms to the amendment just rejected by the committee, if I followed the hon. gentleman correctly. Therefore I would simply say that it is the same motion over again and cannot be accepted.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Let the chairman rule.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: That was
my impression when I heard the amendment, that it was simply a repetition of the amendment proposed to section 3, which was rejected.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I do this because I am
in the court of appeal at the present time; I expect that this bill will go to the high tribunal, and I am laying a foundation fot a better judgment.
Amendment negatived on division.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Before the section carries I now move, seconded by the -hon. member for Temiscouata (Mr. Pouliot) that section 4 be amended by -adding at the end of subsection 1 thereof the following:
But nothing in this act shall be held to affect the present status of the translators of debates, acts, bills or proceedings of the Senate or the House of Commons.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: We cannot accept this
amendment, because the object of the bill would be entirely defeated if the amendment were accepted by the committee.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: In my
opinion the fact that the committee has rejected the first amendment-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Vote on it.
Amendment negatived on division.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I have a further amendment to offer to section 4. This is -a matter of legislation-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Go ahead.
Translations Bureau


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: If h on. gentlemen will only listen I t'hink we will get along much faster. Do not let anyone on the other side try to put sand under my sleigh or chains on my wheels, because that will not work. I am not one of those who can be intimidated. I now move that section 4 be further amended, because evidently this has been left in the hands of some expert draftsman who knows all about the various laws and statutes that this bill will prejudicially affect. I move, seconded by the hon. member for Temiscouata, that section 4 be further amended by adding immediately after the last word in subsection 2 thereof the following:
Subject, however, to the provisions of section 50, the Civil Service Act, 1918, and also subject to section 21, the House of Commons Act, chapter 145, R.S.C., 1927, and to section 2 (c) of the Superannuation Act, 1924.
For the enlightenment of those who know nothing about this but who are prepared blindly to vote down the amendment I should like to explain the matter. The Civil Service Act clearly states that no employee shall be transferred from a position in one department or portion of the civil service to a position in another department or portion of the civil service, except upon the request of the respective deputy heads. Section 4 of this bill says that from time to time the minister may designate translators and have them transferred from one branch of the service to another.


Onésime Gagnon: What section is that?


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Section 50 of the Civil Service Act, which is chapter 12 of the statutes of 1918. This section of this bill is also in contravention of section 21 of the House of Commons Act, chapter 145 of the revised statutes of 1927. Section 21 provides:
If any complaint or representation is at any time made to the Speaker for the time being of the misconduct or unfitness-
I point out to the committee that if the superintendent of translations is to be the man in charge of translations, in the last analysis he will be the one who will pass upon the fitness or unfitness of any clerk, and a translator is a clerk.
-of any clerk, officer, messenger or other person attendant on the House of Commons, the Speaker may cause an inquiry to be made into the conduct or fitness of such person.
2. If thereupon it appears to the Speaker that such person-
A translator-
-has been guilty of misconduct, or is unfit to hold his situation, the Speaker may, if such clerk, officer, messenger or other person has 
been appointed by the crown, suspend him and report such suspension to the governor general, and if he has not been appointed by the crown! suspend or remove him.
Now then, if you turn this over to the superintendent appointed under the Civil Service Act you immediately transfer it from under the jurisdiction of Mr. Speaker, and I say that you cannot do it.


Peter John Veniot: Not without amending the act.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: The Civil Service Superannuation Act, 1924, section 2 (c), is as follows:
Civil service" means and includes the several positions in or under any department, branch or portion of the executive government of Canada and, for the purposes of this act, the Senate, House of Commons and library of parliament, but saving all rights and privileges of either house in respect of the control or removal of its officers, clerks and employees;
And so on. I say that this clause of the bill is in absolute violation of three sections of the existing law. If now in this blind and stubborn way this bill has got to pass, at least these sections should be respected, and I move accordingly.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: This bill provides for the creation of a new bureau, and parliament by passing the bill will create a new bureau under the Civil Service Act, to which all relative clauses of the Civil Service Act will apply. That provision is made in the bill. The last phrase in section 4 of the bill reads, "-and such officers and employees shall thereafter be subject to the provisions of the Civil Service Act."


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: But may I point out, with all due deference to the legal knowledge, training, perspicacity and acumen, politically and otherwise, of the minister, that the Civil Service Act has nothing to do with this special provision.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Because we are taking away that special privilege which gives six months' holidays on full pay to certain of the civil servants, a privilege which no others enjoy.


Joseph Georges Bouchard: May I ask the minister why he penalizes only one class of employees in the House of Commons?


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: It is bad enough to penalize one class; I do not wish to have others dragged in.


Joseph Georges Bouchard: The minister is penalizing one class, and seems to be proud of it.
If he counts the hours that the translators spend at their work, t'he days and nights, he

Translations Bureau
would find their holidays are perhaps not more than one month more than the ordinary holidays in the civil service.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: They wild certainly enjoy less exhaustive hours under the regime proposed by this bill.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I suggest that the words "enjoy less exhaustive hours" are not quite right. I do not know anyone who enjoys "exhaustive hours" -"suffers" would seem to be the word.


Onésime Gagnon: I do not think the hon. member for Kamouraska is quite right. I am in agreement with him when he states that the translators who work under heavy pressure perform a very difficult task, and under those circumstances ought to have their vacations. But I do not think, Mr. Chairman, it is necessary to pass a special amendment to the act, because if the hon. member will read section 62 of the Civil Service Act he will see that civil servants are fully protected so far as their vacations are concerned. This section reads as follows:
Nothing in this act shall he held to curtail the privileges enjoyed by the officers, clerks and employees of the Senate, House of Commons or library of parliament, with respect to rank and precedence, attendance, office hours or leave of absence, or with respect to engaging in such employment during parliamentary recess as may entitle them to receive extra salary or remuneration.
I have just heard the Secretary of State say that under this new bill all the translators who will be under the jurisdiction of the bureau for translations will remain civil servants and thereby will remain under the jurisdiction of the Civil Service Act. Had not the minister said so, I should have certainly agreed that section 62 of the Civil Service Act ought to remain in full application.


Joseph Georges Bouchard: I am glad the hon member understood the minister to give that answer. I put the question an hour ago and I have not yet received an answer.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I simply say that under the Civil Service Act the civil service commission, after examination and investigation, recommends the extent of the holidays or vacations which shall be enjoyed by the civil servants. I stated to the committee that the civil service commission on my recommendation, if I were the minister, would recommend with respect to those employees doing translations during the session that they have ample privileges of vacation following the session, at which times their exhausted energies might be restored.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I quite agree, and
sincerely and honestly I believe I should be prepared to accept the word of the minister that he would make such recommendation. But I am one of those people who believe that words fly but writings remain. The minister may be full of good intentions today, but I would much rather see it in the statute. Further than that, as the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Veniot) has suggested to me, there is a certain place where it is very warm and which they say is paved with good intentions. I am afraid that under this bill that is the way the translators will be going. If this bill comes into effect there will not be a single section of any law behind the civil service-superannuation, House of Commons, or any law respecting civil servants who may be engaged in translation work, which will be respected. Of course the minister will do anything he likes with it. He may just tear it up, from one corner of the book to the other. And as for section 62, to which the hon. member for Kamouraska referred, and in which because of the supposed answer given by the Secretary of State the hon. member for Dorchester found solace-well, that is all piffle. The law to-day is that these people have certain rights and privileges, and the minister states that if this bill goes through they will come under the operation of the Civil Service Act. Undoubtedly they will, but that is not the answer. The hon. member for Dorchester has shed tears on the second reading, and he now gets up and sheds more tears for these poor translators. He wants to do all he can for them, but he says he has no fear now, after what the Secretary of State has said, because they will be under the civil service commission and therefore they will get their holidays. But they will get no -more holidays than the Civil Service Act allows them, and unless the minister changes the law they will be entitled to only three weeks a year.


An hon. MEMBER:: How many do you want?


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: That is the fact, notwithstanding the good intentions of the minister. He cannot lead me to believe that because he expresses these pious wishes he means anything more than what I have said.
Amendment (Mr. Chevrier) negatived.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: The amendment is defeated; shall we carry the section?


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: All in favour of section 4 as it appears-


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Translations Bureau
[Stage Direction]
On section 5-Appointment and duties of superintendent of bureau.
Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: This section cannot carry in its present shape. I move that the following be added afteT the word "translations" in line 21 it refers to the superintendent of the bureau:

who shall he thoroughly conversant with the two official languages of the Dominion of Canada and' who shall be the holder of degrees conferred upon him by one or more Canadian universities.


Mr. FOULIQT:: Before the amendment is
carried may I say, Mr. Chairman, that it does not go far enough because the superintendent of the 'bureau should not only be familiar with the two official languages of this country but should be familiar also with Danish, Dutch, Flemish, German, Italian, Latin, Norwegian, Portugese, Spanish and Swedish. And that is not all. These are the languages that are translated in the office of the Secretary of State. But in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police there are other languages to be translated. There is not only German but Esperanto, a very great language; also Russian, Ukrainian, Polish, Czechoslovakian, Yugoslavian, Bulgarian, Croatian, Yiddish and Hebrew. The Russian language is also translated in the Post Office Department. Therefore, Mr. Chairman, the superintendent of the bureau for translations should not only be thoroughly familiar with the two official languages in this country but be familiar with all these other languages I have mentioned in order to be able to check the work that is done by the translators. Not only that, but he should have several eyes, certainly more than two, perhaps more than a dozen, perhaps even a hundred eyes, in order to compare the translated matter with the text. As you know, Mr. Chairman, the quantity of publications that comes out of the mouth of the bureau e&ch year represents in bulk ten cubic feet. Let us be generous and say nine cubic feet of all sorts of publications.


Mr. MYERS:: What has that got to do
with it? We have listened to enough of that stuff.


Jean-François Pouliot: It shows the absurdity of
the scheme. My hon. friend could not digest nine cubic feet of printed matter; therefore I shall not address my remarks to him but to the other members of the house who will at once see the absurdity of the proposition. Here we have a mass of printed matter so large that my arms are not long enough to show its width or depth in height.
[The Chairman.]


Felix Patrick Quinn: It must be the Hansard of
your speeches.


Jean-François Pouliot: But there is something in my speeches; that is the difference between my hon. friend and me. Here we have this mass of nine cubic feet of printed matter representing tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands of pages. How could one man with only two eyes read all that when we allow him eight hours for sleeping and perhaps two or three hours for eating and walking around a little in the daytime? Even if he works thirteen hours a day no ordinary man with two eyes could read nine cubic feet of printed matter in the time at his disposal.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: The hon. member is not speaking to the clause or the amendment. Both clause and amendment propose that there shall be such a man, and the amendment moved by the senior member for Ottawa proposes that he shall have certain qualifications. The hon. member for Temis-couata is not speaking to either the clause or the amendment; he is speaking to another proposition.


Jean-François Pouliot: On a point of order, on a question of privilege, Mr. Chairman, the first thing proposed by the senior member for Ottawa is that the superintendent shall be fully conversant with both official languages. I say that his amendment does not go far enough because he should also be conversant with all the other languages that I have mentioned. If the chairman will not allow me to show before this amendment is voted on the amount of work which the superintendent will have to do, I shall have to defer my remarks until after the vote. I am making them now in order not to be under the necessity of making them afterwards. I submit, Mr. Chairman, that my remarks are perfectly relevant to the amendment because the superintendent will have to read not only the French text but also the English text and compare them both; and how can a man compare the English and French texts of all the publications that come out for each department on a wide variety of subjects, not only all the annual reports but all the weekly publications and all the monthly publications? It is absurd to expect the superintendent to read this nine cubic feet of printed matter in the French translation, and if he compares the French with the English version it will mean that he will have to read eighteen cubic feet of matter and compare them. How he can do all that is beyond my understanding.

Translations Bureau


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I do not intend to follow the hon. gentleman. It is obvious that the superintendent of the translation bureau must be familiar with both official languages of this country, and so far as I am concerned I can give a guarantee that no man will be appointed to that position who does not have knowledge of both official languages. The civil service commission that appointed any other man would be untrue to its oath of office. The regulations which are to be made hereunder will certainly provide that the superintendent must be bilingual in one sense, but I am not going to follow the hon. gentleman further and guarantee that he will know German, Italian, Swedish, Chinese, Japanese, Yiddish and all the other languages mentioned by the hon. gentleman. The suggestion to that effect is utterly ridiculous and not worthy of the consideration of the committee.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Again we have the promise, the assurance of the minister. Now if the minister is prepared to help out a friend he does not simply say, I will help you some day,, or, I will sign a promissory note. Why not come across with the cold cash? Why not put it in writing? Why not put it in this bill?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Simply because to do so is an insult to the intelligence of this house. We do not put in the printing and stationery act that the superintendent shall know both languages, and yet no civil service commission would dare appoint a superintendent of printing, dealing with the printing of both languages, who did not have a knowledge of both languages which is absolutely necessary. One of the essential qualifications for this position is necessarily a knowledge of both languages.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I would rather be insulted by the written word of the minister than by his courteous promise.


Jean-François Pouliot: I have just one question to ask the Secretary of State.


Mr. COWAN (Long Lake):: Hurry up.


Jean-François Pouliot: I hear the hon. member for Long Lake (Mr. Cowan) telling me to hurry up.


Walter Davy Cowan: I stand with my minister on that.


Jean-François Pouliot: The fact that he is in favour of this bill makes me more fearful about it because we know what his attitude is towards the French speaking people.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Walter Davy Cowan: If the hon. member would stop this horrible burlesque, this circus, and let us get through, things would be better. We are here for business and not for this kind of nonsense.


Jean-François Pouliot: If the hon. member is for the bill, then I am against it. I am not obstructing this bill.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Nol


Jean-François Pouliot: I hear an echo from the other side. Would the Secretary of State be kind enough to inform the committee just what will be the duties of the superintendent? Is he to check the translation work in every department?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I do not think I need answer any such silly question as that. This will be an organization of which the superintendent will be the executive head. He must have a knowledge of both languages and he will have under him employees to carry out the different duties. I am the head of my department but it is not necessary for me to read the thousands of letters which come into the department.


Jean-François Pouliot: I thank the minister for his answer. I see the whole scheme; there will be no change, everything will still be under the control of those who now have control. On top of it all will be a fat job for a man who will put his feet up on his desk and put a big cigar in his mouth. This man will be paid a large salary at the expense of the poor people who have suffered a cut [DOT] of ten per cent. This man who will do nothing will receive a high salary at the expense of all.
Amendment (Mr. Chevrier) negatived.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 5-Appointment and duties of superintendent.
Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I am rather anxious to safeguard the rights and prerogatives of the House of Commons, although other hon. members may not be. I beg to move, seconded by the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Veniot) that the following words "and to the Speakers of both Houses of Parliament with regard to the translation done for the Senate and House of Commons be added after the word "year" in line 26. This section reads:
An officer to be called the superintendent of the bureau for translations shall be appointed under the Civil Service Act, who shall hold

Translations Bureau

office during pleasure, and whose duties shall be to supervise and control the bureau under the direction of the minister, and to report annually to the minister with regard to the work of the bureau during the preceding fiscal year.
With my amendment, he would report also to the House of Commons and to the Senate in connection with the translation pertaining to those houses.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I cannot agree to this amend-men, which is that the superintendent should report to the House of Commons over the head of his minister. It is the duty of the minister to see that these reports are laid on the tables of both houses, and the minister will do that. I will not be a minister in charge of a bureau of my department whence a report is made over my head by a superintendent of the bureau.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: The amendment refers only to the translation work of the House of Commons and the Senate. I think that is fair.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: The minister will report to
parliament regarding the whole work.
Amendment (Mr. Chevrier) negatived.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 6-Regulations.
Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I beg to move that the following be added as subclause (3):
No such regulations with respect to the translators engaged in work required by the Senate or House of Commons shall come in force unless approved of by the Senate and House of Commons.	*
This section reads:
(1)	The minister, with the approval of the governor in council, may make all regulations which are by him deemed necessary or expedient for carrying into effect the provisions of this act.
(2)	Any such regulation so approved by the governor in council in pursuance of this act shall be of the same force and effect as if it had been enacted herein.
Then my amendment would follow as subclause 3. I might point out that by its complacent manner and because of some feeling of friendship, the house is divesting itself of some of its most sacred rights and privileges. Hon. members on the government side are doing this simply to allow this bill to go through holus bolus. I have never before seen such a demonstration of complacency and willingness to be divested of rights and privileges. We on this side have sat true but hon. members opposite have com-

placently agreed to divest themselves of the rights and prerogatives hitherto enjoyed. Because of this complacency and this desire to have this bill go through, the day will come when members of parliament and senators will have no more rights and privileges than the man on the street. I know the answer that will be made, the one which has been made time and again by hon. members opposite. They will say that the men who heat this building are in the Public Works department, that the elevator men are in the Public Works department and that the charwomen are in the Public Works department. That is true, but does that make things any better? It may be very well for this to be done with certain classes of work but when it comes to translation and to looking after the acts of parliament, the debates and the votes and proceedings, we are going one step too far. I say to my compatriots from the province of Quebec: The day will come when they will repent of having voted away some of the rights and privileges enjoyed under section 133 of the British North America Act. That section states that the acts of parliament, the votes and proceedings and the records of this house shall be printed both in English and in French. Hon. members are permitting certain things to be taken away from under the jurisdiction of the Speaker, of the clerk and of every hon. member of this house. Complacently, benignantly and with great accommodation they have allowed these rights to be taken away from this parliament.


Onésime Gagnon: I rise to a point of order. Ever since this afternoon the hon. member has been persistently insulting hon. members from Quebec by stating that they were complacently voting for the ministry.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: There has been no opposition.


Onésime Gagnon: The hon. gentleman added a few minutes ago "purely for political recommendations."


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: No, I said "accommodation."


Onésime Gagnon: Well, that is worse. I submit that those words are unparliamentary because they impute motives of cowardice to the Quebec members on this side, and I ask that the hon. gentleman be requested to withdraw those words.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: If the hon. member
thinks I have imputed cowardice, that is not the meaning of the word I used. I know the

Translations Bureau
English language if he does not, and the word does not mean that. It means exactly what "accommodating" means, and it does not imply any cowardice. If the hon. member thinks that is what I had in mind, then he is wrong because I did not have that in mind at all. "Accommodating" means something else and if he does not know what it means, let him go back to Oxford and learn. As the .poet says of a little learning:
Where shallow draughts intoxicate the brain
But drinking deeply sobers us again.


Onésime Gagnon: The hon. gentleman has more experience than I have about drinking.
Amendment (Mr. Chevrier) negatived.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Section 6 agreed to on division.
On section 7-Oaths.
Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Clause 7 refers to a special oath that the translators must take. Every man or woman who enters the civil service has to take an oath of office. The employee takes an oath of allegiance and it is in force during the time of employment. I say that the oath prescribed in clause 7 is a direct insult to the integrity and the loyalty of the civil servant who enters the service and takes the oath of loyalty. Now he is called upon to take this very special oath. I move that the clause be deleted.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Every civil servant has to take a special oath.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: The minister knows better than that.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: If this clause is struck out, then the governor in council has the right under the law of the land to impose the form of oath and the same form will be imposed over again. But time and time again during this debate it has been suggested that a bureau for translations could not be relied upon to keep secret the official secrets which came into its hands. If I remember correctly the same suggestion was made with regard to the bureau of Public Printing and Stationery. That was one of the first arguments and we have met it by placing in this bill the form of oath to be taken. Those who are in the bureau for translations at least will be under the compunction of their conscience if they allow information to leak out.
Amendment negatived.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Before you reach clause 8, sir, I want to move that the following be added as section 7 (a):
74726-214 J
In the case of officers, clerks and employees, who at the date of transfer to the bureau, were officers, clerks and employees of the civil service of Canada, the salaries to be paid to such officers, clerks and employees so transferred to such bureau, shall be at rates not less than the rates which such officers, clerks and employees were receiving in their former position.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I cannot accept the amendment because these employees enter the civil service and under the Civil Service Act as employees of the bureau for translations at the same salaries as they now have. Adjustments will be made afterwards from time to time.
Amendment negatived.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Before you proceed to
clause 8, which is the clause dealing with the date upon which this legislation shall come into force, you ruled that an amendment that I had moved as subclause 3 of clause 3 was not in order and that I would have to wait until the bill had been considered in order that I might move it.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: I understood that with the consent of the committee it was subsequently put. Every amendment that was brought before the chair has been put and lost.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I agree, provided Hansard shows ithat, but I now want to make it absolutely certain; I do not wish to be prejudiced, but I should like to see it in Hansard to-morrow. My understanding was that your ruling was that my amendment was out of order because it was not a material part of the clause and that I should have to wait until the bill had been disposed of.


James Langstaff Bowman: I think the hon. member is quite right. The clause was ruled out of order.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: It was ruled out of order because it was not brought up at the proper time.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Because it was utterly
irrelevant to the bill.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: For the time being.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: No.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: I now move it, and
the committee can rule it out of order again, because it seems that everything has to be ruled out of order. In order that there may be no mistake about the matter, there is an expression of opinion I want to see in this measure. I now move that there be added as section 7 (a):
That all departmental reports-
Translations Bureau

This would be the amendment which I left with you, sir, some time ago.
-and other documents or statements which it is the duty of any officer or department of the government to lay on the table of the House of Commons shall be issued and printed' in the two official languages of the dominion, and shall be deposited simultaneously.
That is the last amendment I have to submit; it is the last cartridge out of the last trench. But I do that as a last hope of providing a safeguard, of having something in writing that will somewhat ease the feelings and the minds of those who feel t'hait it is much better to be insulted by the written word of the minister than to take his gratuitous promises.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: May I ask the hon. member for his amendment in writing? Every amendment here is endorsed by the clerk "lost on division." My recollection is that every amendment was put.


Hugh Guthrie: Put it again to save time.


James Langstaff Bowman: The amendment just read by the hon. member was ruled out of order.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: Because it did not come at the proper time. Now is the proper time and I submit it again.


Peter John Veniot: Mr. Chairman, I call attention to rale 778 on page 223 of Beauchesne. It was under that you ruled it out.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: No, under rule 781.


Peter John Veniot: I quote 778:
In the commons all the clauses of the bill are considered before any new clauses are brought up and added to the bill.
Under that and under 781 you ruled that the amendment was out of order. I take it that, all the sections having now been disposed of, under 778, the senior member for Ottawa (Mr. Chevrier) can now come with his amendment. Rule 778 gives him the right now to move something additional.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: This subject is already
dealt with in the bill itself, section 3, which reads:
(1) There shall be a bureau ... the duties and function of which shall be to collaborate with and act for all departments of the public service, and both houses of the parliament of Canada and all bureaus, branches, commissions and' agencies created or appointed by act of parliament, or by order of the governor in council, in making and revising all translations from one language into another of all departmental and other reports ...

They shall collaborate and act together. To add to that that I must bring down these reports simultaneously is to impose a condition that sometimes would be very difficult.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: That is exactly the
point. The hon. member for Temiscouata (Mr. Pouliot) has said time and time again that the oat would come out of the bag. There is the cat out of the bag now. The hon. gentleman all through the discussion of this bill has repeatedly said here and elsewhere that the purpose of this bill was to bring down simultaneously French and English documents. Now he crawls from under; now he says he will take no responsibility for doing that. I have got him where I wanted him. That is what I wanted, an admission of this kind. I know this bill means absolutely nothing. I have to pay respect to legislation that emanates from this house; I have to observe it as the law, but this bill will mean nothing more than a dishonoured cheque.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Question.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: Order. May I ask the hon. senior member for Ottawa to come and show me which of these is the particular amendment he now wishes put? It is agreed by the committee that the amendment be submitted now, whether it was submitted and lost before or not.
Amendment (Mr. Chevrier) lost on division.
On section 8-Enforcement of act.


Jean-François Pouliot: May I ask the Secretary
of State when this bill will come into force, and will there be any provision in the estimates in that regard?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: The time of its coming
into force is within the decision of the governor in council. If they act on my recommendation I shall recommend that the bill be brought into force as soon as the preliminary organization can be carried out, probably within a short time after the prorogation of parliament.


Jean-François Pouliot: Now may I ask one last
question, the very last of the Solicitor General? How is this bill a recognition of the French language ?


Maurice Dupré: I have already stated in the debate on second reading what I thought of the bill, and every argument I have heard from the other side has convinced me that the bill is good and necessary.

Supply-Agriculture-Insect Pests


Jean-François Pouliot: Just a word on that-


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: The hon
gentleman is out of order. We are dealing with clause 8.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Bill reported.

[Stage Direction]
The house in committee of supply, Mr. Bury in the chair.
Entomology, including investigations and inspections relating to destructive insects and pests, $350,000.
Thomas Reid: I wonder if the minister has any information regarding the experiment being carried out in the Fraser valley in regard to the health of animals. I understand the department have rented a certain farm and are conducting tests in connection with a number of cows there, and I wonder if the minister has any further information.


Mr. WEIR (Melfort):: The work is still going on; no definite conclusion has been arrived at. I shall be glad to have the information up to date sent in the form of a letter to the hon. member, because I know he has been especially interested in the matter.


Mr. MOTHERWELL:: Two rather interesting orders in council were tabled here the other day, which indicate that $500,000 in the one instance and $1,500,000 in the other have been loaned to the Saskatchewan government for relief and grasshopper control. The Prime Minister said this had been done several weeks ago, and I think the committee is entitled to an explanation. This matter was brought up last Friday, and the recommendation to council may have been prepared on Saturday. At all events it went through by Monday at the latest, according to a statement in the Regina Leader made by Premier Anderson, which says that $500,000 has been loaned for grasshopper control. That is dated Tuesday; the announcement was made last Monday, so the orders in council with respect to this $2,000,000 must have been passed after the discussion last Friday, though the Prime Minister said that considerable amounts had been granted for the same purpose two weeks ago. I have examined or have had examined every order in council back to January, and I have not found any order in council earmarked for grasshopper control; anything that has been done has occurred since the discussion. I think the Prime Minister owes the committee an explanation.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Half a million dollars
had been expended in connection with grasshoppers long before the discussion took place in this house last Friday. The government of Saskatchewan requested that we make them an advance, and they secured their money from the bank, because at the moment there were other provinces in the same position. So when the order in council was prepared and put through part of the money had been obtained from the banks, and we were paying the money when we were in the most convenient position to do so. There has been an additional loan of $750,000 to Saskatchewan since that time. The truth is, that their revenues have been disappointing, while the revenues of some of the other provinces have been larger than was expected.
So far as the grasshopper matter is concerned, as I said the other evening we had arranged to make a loan. It happened that at the very time we were discussing the matter here a telegram was in transit from the west saying that they now had expended the full half million dollars and asking if it would be convenient for us to forward the money, which we did on the following day. The other sums were for general purposes, some of them for our share of relief for which we were obligated under an agreement made last year. We extended the time for works that were partly completed and continued to pay direct relief on the basis of the agreement of last year for the months of April and May. The Minister of Labour advised all the provinces by telegram that we would continue to make relief payments for April and May on the same terms as provided' by the agreements of 1933.


Mr. STEWART (Edmonton):: These recent orders in councils are for loans, of course?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Yes, except with respect to relief, where we have the obligation under the agreement. The others are loans, as the hon. gentleman says.


Walter Davy Cowan: I think the hon. member for Melville (Mr. Motherwell) must have been sound asleep for the past year or so. Otherwise he would know that we have had a grasshopper plague out in the west and that we have the most complete organization for fighting it that ever existed in the Dominion of Canada. I think this committee should know what is being done. Our farmers have been thoroughly educated during the winter months; winter classes were held all over the province because our agricultural department discovered there were sixteen million acres of land infested with grasshopper eggs. The educational campaign was led by
3392	COMMONS
Supply-Agriculture-Insect Pests
the entomological department of the university of Saskatchewan, with which is associated the entomological branch of the federal government. We have a very intelligent department out there, notwithstanding my hon. friend from Melville, and all our municipalities were thoroughly organized to fight this plague; they have held mutual councils regularly.
Some people call these pests grasshoppers while some call them locusts. I believe locusts is the biblical term, but I never use that term. If anyone has ever faced this plague, as I have faced it, they would know it is something that must be faced in a very heroic manner and I am very glad that this organization of which I speak has been carried on quietly with the assistance of the Minister of Agriculture. There is no doubt about the assistance that has been given by the federal department, nor is there any doubt about what the agriculture department of the province of Saskatchewan has done and is doing to-day. There is no doubt about what the municipalities are doing, so we need not be afraid that we will not do our part, the hon. member for Melville to the contrary notwithstanding. The hon. gentleman can find all the fault 'he wishes; I do not care. We are going to fight this plague, and we will succeed. The best news I have heard from Saskatchewan in five years was the news that recently, in the country from which I come, copious rains have fallen. The five year drought has been broken, and nothing will do more to destroy these grasshoppers than the rains which have fallen in the last few days. I hope my hon. friend from Melville will rejoice with the rest of us that Saskatchewan is at last coming back.


William Richard Motherwell: I have not been closely following .this method of doing business, but I gathered from the Prime Minister that this money had been expended previously. Was that correct?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Our advices were that the money had been expended to the extent of half a million dollars.


William Richard Motherwell: It has been spent in the preparation campaign? The grasshoppers are just hatching now.


Richard Bedford Bennett: No, it had been spent
in providing poison for their destruction.


William Richard Motherwell: This was for the
late winter campaign?


Richard Bedford Bennett: No.


William Richard Motherwell: 
Richard Bedford Bennett: Mr. Chairman, I rise to
a point of order. That remark must be withdrawn. The hon. gentleman said I was stringing this house, and I ask him to withdraw that remark.


William Richard Motherwell: In the face of these figures-


Richard Bedford Bennett: Order; the chair is
speaking.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: The hon.
member-


William Richard Motherwell: The Prime Minister has no right to ask this house to accept his statement, in the face of these orders in council. I will take it back, then. I say he has no right to ask this house-


Richard Bedford Bennett: I wish to have that remark withdrawn.


William Richard Motherwell: I have withdrawn
it, but I am saying now that he has no right to ask this house-


Richard Bedford Bennett: That is just repeating it.


William Richard Motherwell: 
Walter Davy Cowan: I should like to ask the hon. member a question.


William Richard Motherwell: I am not asking the member for Long Lake, because he does not know anything about this matter. I am asking the Prime Minister.


Walter Davy Cowan: All right, go on.


Robert Weir: 
William Richard Motherwell: Last year?


Robert Weir: No, this year; it
was in the winter time, preparatory to this spring's work. There were representatives from the dominion department and from the provincial departments of Saskatchewan and Manitoba. It was agreed to make a united effort against this menace or pest. The United States voted $2,000,000 and undertook to carry on their campaign under federal auspices. Those who have watched the campaign and the effect of preparation for it feel that at a cost of $700,000 in the three prairie provinces the work done under our methods will be more effective or at least as effective as that carried on by the federal government of the United States. That is so, because the fact that they are undertaking the whole responsibility, means that they have to pay for all the work being done. In Canada the method of campaign and division of work is as follows: Officials of the federal department of entomology made a survey last year, and are continuing their survey at the present time. They had all possible information before them as to where outbreaks might be expected, so that municipalities and farmers affected would be equipped to meet it. Entomological officials of the federal department, officials of the experimental farms, and officials of our seed branch, together with officials of the provincial governments met and set up a central committee which undertook an educational campaign throughout the west. Upwards of 1,400 committees were established to take care of the divisions into which the provinces had been divided. The provinces were to supply poison and bait. In that connection they ran into some difficulty because the price of bran rose quickly through the demand for that commodity. It was used in a fifty-fifty ratio with sawdust and with water and poison and was to be broadcast as thinly as possible as bait. As a result of the rise in the price our officials in western Canada
3394	COMMONS
Supply-Agriculture-Insect Pests
undertook a study of some substitute for bran. A substitute was found which was almost as good and whether or not the fact it was found had any direct bearing on the drop in the price of bran I should not like to say definitely, although we feel it had. The fact is that bran dropped considerably in price. That bait has been purchased and distributed, ready for operation in the campaign. The municipalities take the responsibility for the distribution of this bait and the farmers themselves do the work of applying the poisoned bait in their own time. They are responsible on, their own farms. It is believed by those in the best position to judge that this method, with the expenditure we have made, is the most effective method that could be employed, because it puts the responsibility directly on the farmer but involves no cash outlay on his part. If they carry out this plan the way we believe they will, we think it possible to save from the prospective crop fourteen out of the fifteen bushels from the grasshopper menace. We have an example in the vicinity of Lake Carlyle, in Saskatchewan,, where individual farmers who applied this bait, which has to be applied in sunlight, at temperatures varying from 65 to 85 degrees did save their crop almost entirely. They estimated a loss of about one bushel per acre, while farmers adjoining who did not do this work lost practically their whole crop. But we have every hope this year, with the cooperation between the American officials and our own, that it will- be possible absolutely to control the grasshopper menace so long as there is no letting up of activity. But to show the danger we run into in certain parts of the west because of people giving out information that the menace was not as bad as our officials had reported, this year the officials in a certain municipality went out to a certain area where we had reported a severe outbreak as likely, and took the machine with which the soil is shaken to count the eggs, and after a good deal of work on their part reported that the danger had oeen very much overestimated. Our officials vent there to check up, and taking these people with them, showed them, by the proper method of finding out how many eggs there were, that from fifty to one hundred eggs were present per square foot and that we had been very conservative in our estimate. The trouble was that the officials of the municipality who had gone out were so vigorous in making the test that they not only shook out the earth but the eggs as well. Our committees are very wide awake to see that there 
will be no lessening of their energy and no lessening of their appreciation of the difficulty that is in front of them. This bait and the poison had to be bought, and so far as I am aware, and I have been more closely in contact with the situation, than anyone else in the government, every request so far as finances are concerned has been fully met, so that the poisoned bait and everything that goes with it can be purchased.


William Richard Motherwell: I have no fault
to find with that at all. We all know that they started good and early and distributed the poison betimes. But what I pointed out last Friday was also true. It was on the last lap of the hopper fight that the campaign fell down last year, for want of poison, and I drew the attention of the government to the fact that the estimates for entomology were reduced to one-half of what they were in 1931 and that no special grant was in sight in Canada as there was in the United States, where $2,000,000 had been appropriated. I pointed out that we were in danger again of a vastly greater territory being infected this year with grasshopper eggs, and that if we were to run short again of grasshopper poison during the last lap of the campaign the insects would take their flight, and of course, scatter all over the rest of the province.
I have nothing but commendation to give to the minister for starting earlier in the campaign, but what I wanted to know was, where was the money to correspond with the United States grant? The Brime Minister justified the small vote this year on the ground that it would not be needed, that the grasshoppers were receding, and that less money would be required, showing that he did not know the first thing about it. I pointed out that that was a longJbow stretcher of a statement to begin with. I pointed out that they were not receding, that it was the worst and most terrific invasion of grasshoppers that we have ever seen and that more money was required. The Prime Minister went on for 'half an hour or more, answering either myself or the hon. member for South IBattleford (Mr. Vallance) or the hon. member for Willow Bunch (Mr. Donnelly) and pointing out that the money voted, while it was less, was being efficiently administered; that the grasshoppers were disappearing and that we did not need so much money. Then someone must have given him a tip, because he began to say something about something being given, after I had suggested drawing on the vote for

Supply-Agriculture-Insect Pests
peace, order and good government. I suggested, why could we not keep peace and order with the grasshoppers as well as with anything else, but there was no response even to that. Then after a little while the Prime Minister wakened up to the fact that there really were more grasshoppers there than last year and he said they had arranged to make a loan for that purpose to the west. May I ask the minister when the recommendation went to council on which the order in council was based? Of course, a recommendation is always sent to council by some minister before an order in council is passed. Was that recommendation sent by the Minister of Agriculture or the Minister of Labour? The Prime Minister said last Friday that the Minister of Agriculture always attended to such requirements, and naturally ,1 would suppose he would look after it. When was that recommendation sent to council, and by whom? Does the minister know what day the order in council was passed?


Robert Weir: The understanding was this. We received various requests because we are very closely in touch with the committee of the provincial governments with a view to making this campaign thoroughly effective. We have been in touch with them from time to time and have assured them that whatever was necessary to carry out this campaign would ibe given, as it has been in the past in connection with various relief works and other works. They received this money from the banks, the banks having been given the assurance that when the required amount was purchased-and no one could say exactly what that amount was-the money would be forthcoming.
So far as the information last week is concerned, I myself received a telegram from western Canada before the discussion took place in the house at all.
Dealing with another point while I am on my feet, the hon. member asks why this vote is cut in two. He will remember, I am sure, the way it was done when he was Minister of Agriculture. This used to be under a vote for the Destructive Insect and Pest Act and the money divided between the experimental farms branch and the entomological branch, but this year it was felt more advisable, in order that the officials in charge could make their plans ahead, to divide the vote, giving the experimental farm their part and the entomological branch theirs, which is the item under discussion. Not only that, but actually there is a slight increase this year as compared
with last in what was given to the entomological branch. So, instead of a decrease in the vote there has been a slight increase.


William Richard Motherwell: I think I knew most of that except that I did not know the half, 8350,000 was more than the whole, $700,000, and I do not know that yet. My hon. friend forgot to tell me when the recommendation went to council.


Robert Weir: I could not say exactly. I believe it is the finance minister who submits the recommendation in such cases as this.


William Richard Motherwell: There was a meeting of council, apparently. I do. not want to ask my hon. friend what occurred in council, but somebody must have sent a recommendation upon which the order in council was based. I anticipate that it would be the Minister of Finance in the event of a loan being required and made. That would be in his department. But either he or somebody else must have made a recommendation to council. It seems to me we cannot get this information. They do not want us to get close to the matter. There should be a record of the recommendation to council. Every order in council is based on somebody's recommendation, and it should not be a difficult matter to produce it. I do not think, Mr. Chairman, I should be accused of being oversuspicious in the absence of something being given to the committee beyond a nice dissertation on what was done last fall, all of which we knew. I asked a question as to when the recommendation was made to council, when it was signed, who signed it and when the order itself was signed.


Robert Weir: I do not think the hon. member has got the point. An understanding was reached with the government of Saskatchewan that they were to proceed to make every possible preparation to meet this grasshopper menace, and this was made months ago.


William Richard Motherwell: That is quite all right.


Robert Weir: We have been in almost continuous contact with them. As I stated, a telegram came from Regina stating what had been purchased, what their indebtedness was for it and asking that money be sent.
_ Mr. MOTHERWELL: I know that. I think all this money is spent in advance; a loan is obtained from the bank and then

Supply-Agriculture-Insect Pests
recouped afterwards. There is no other way of doing it, but that has nothing to do with the date upon which recommendation was made to council. There should be no difficulty in telling the committee when the recommendation to council was made, when the order was signed and when the governor general signed it. It looks to me as though there must have been some awfully smart work done to have it gazetted before the announcement was made in Regina. The announcement was made on Monday, so they must have worked on Sunday. Why should there be this secrecy? If the minister does not know, the Minister of Labour (Mr. Gordon) should know, or the Prime Minister.


Robert Weir: I am afraid the hon. member is labouring under a delusion. This money was actually spent during the past two or three months.


William Richard Motherwell: I may be getting old but I am not so old that I am labouring under a delusion. I have been sitting around the council tahle too long not to know all about recommendations and orders in council. Sometimes they are put through the same day the recommendation is received, but more frequently it is the next day as the clerk must get them ready. Evidently there was rush after last Friday and I can imagine that they all went through on Saturday or Monday. I do not see why we cannot be given this information.


Robert James Manion: Why is the hon. member opposing the giving of this money to Saskatchewan? He is from Saskatchewan and I do not understand why he should oppose it.


William Richard Motherwell: My hon. friend is not so thick in the head as not to know what I am trying to get at.	[DOT]


Robert James Manion: What is the opposition for?


William Richard Motherwell: I am not objecting to giving money to Saskatchewan because I think they need it all. It happens, I suppose, to be a coincidence, that is all. An election is on at the same time the .grasshoppers are there-they are all hopping around. What I want to know is why this order in council was put out at the exact time it was, and immediately after last Friday's discussion. Was that a coincidence?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I just want to say one word. The item under consideration is one of three hundred thousand odd dollars for entomological work. This has nothing to do with grasshoppers. It has been pointed out 
that, this amount was arrived at in consequence of the vote of the previous year being divided between the experimental farms and the work carried on by the entomologists. The discussion which took place the other evening indicated that this was not to be used for the destruction of grasshoppers. At least, that is what I said, as hon. gentlemen know. It has nothing at all to do with the destruction of the grasshopper. During the discussion the question arose as to whether or not Saskatchewan was properly caring for its farmers by taking the necessary measures to destroy the grasshopper. It is obviously not my duty to follow every item but I knew that we had undertaken to supply Saskatchewan with all the money required for the purpose, whether the sum was large or small. We arranged with them to go ahead with their work and buy their poison. My memory is that the Minister of Agriculture, who lives in Saskatchewan, received a night letter on Saturday morning, which, of course, had been sent before this discussion took place. This night letter indicated that they had now reached half a million dollars of expenditure, not a million and a half dollars. Matters of this kind which do not come under the relief act are recommended by the Minister of Finance. There was no mystery about it. The. recommendation was put through; I signed the order in council, and my memory is that His Excellency approved it on Monday. The order in council was laid on the table of the house. I cannot say with certainty upon what date His Excellency signed it. The million and a half obviously involved a matter which had to do with other things altogether. My memory is that it was one of the provincial ministers, I believe the treasurer, who was down here to discuss the question of advances to be made for this purpose and who sent the telegram to the Minister of Agriculture. This telegram was sent in pursuance to a promise given ffco the treasurer by the Minister of Finance. We sent the money to him. I may say that we have had to send substantial sums to other provinces, and I cannot understand why a heated discussion has taken place on this item. This item is for entomological purposes and has nothing to do with the other question. The other question is between Saskatchewan and the dominion and it has been arranged to the satisfaction of the province. That refers to the manner in whidh the province discharged its duties with respect to the grasshopper plague. If there was any mystery about it, it is hardly likely that it would have indicated, as was clearly done, that this was money which was utilized

Supply-Agriculture-Insect Pests
for that purpose. If there was any mystery about it there would have been no necessity for its being there, as every member of the former government must know. It was done just in the ordinary course, and if it happens to be a coincidence, it is one of those coincidences which sometimes happen. The fact that it happened to be half a million was merely because Saskatchewan had reached a point where they had no further credit. They had spent a million and a half and it was acted on accordingly.


William Richard Motherwell: There is no need to draw upon my right hon. friend's memory for information as to when the order in council was passed. It was laid on the table the day before yesterday and it is on all our files. I knew this money was required in the west and I knew it was required last year, and more of it. What I was referring to was the delay of the government in getting the supplies through when they were needed. My hon. friends jumped right into the breach and it was not twenty-four hours before they got busy with the recommendation to council after the question was raised by myself and others last Friday. The order in council was put through on Monday and tabled on Wednesday. That was pretty smart work, and I want to congratulate them; but I just want to tell them that they cannot put that thing over on me, that they had it arranged months and months ago or even weeks and weeks ago.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The hon. member must withdraw that statement. I said and the minister has said that these arrangements were made with Saskatchewan. Under the rules the hon. member is bound to accept our statement. He says that we cannot put that thing over on him, but I desire that he should live within the rules. His age protects him from many things but not from that.


William Richard Motherwell: Mr. Chairman-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Withdraw.


William Richard Motherwell: -in doing business to the extent of millions-


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: The hon. member must accept the statement of the Prime Minister.


William Richard Motherwell: AH right; we will have it out another day.


Mr. LAPOINTE:: It is eleven o'clock.


Richard Bedford Bennett: It is not eleven o'clock for a point of order.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: Has the hon. member accepted the statement of the Prime Minister?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I say to the hon. gentleman who is an ex-minister of the crown that when he states that we cannot put that over him, we did have arrangements to advance money to the province of Saskatchewan for this and other purposes, this is a statement that is contrary to the rules, and I ask him to accept the statement of the ministry as to what was done and not say that the ministry has stated in the house what was not true with respect to the matter.


William Richard Motherwell: We will accept the right hon. gentleman's statement, but will he not come along on Monday with the documentary evidence of this? Why should we have to take the minister's statement with regard to money when there is a regular business way of dealing with the matter?


Robert Weir: There is just one wrong impression that I wish to correct before we leave this, and that is that the campaign in Saskatchewan last year was in any way curtailed by lack of support from the federal government for supplying bait for fighting the grasshopper menace that year.


William Richard Motherwell: I know they ran short of poisoned bait several times.
Progress reported.


[Stage Direction]
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Monday, May 28, 1934