[Stage Direction]
Mr. C. E. BOTHWELL (Swift Current) presented the first report of the special committee on electoral matters, and moved that the report be concurred in.
Motion agreed to.


[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 43, for the relief of Stefano Guilio Luciano Roncari-Mr. Walsh.


[Stage Direction]
on st. Patrick's day
On the orders of the day:
Mr. ROBERT FAIR (Battle River):: Has the government considered adjourning at six o'clock this evening in order that Irish members of the house and their friends may celebrate St. Patrick's day?


Right Hon. ERNEST LAPOINTE (Minister of Justice):: We will all celebrate this great day by doing some more work to hasten the business of the session.



NATIONAL DEFENCE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. DANIEL McIVOR (Fort William):: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of National Defence (Mr. Mackenzie) with the view that the estimates of his department might be cut down. As Mr. De Valera has now decided to fight alongside of Great Britain, do we low need to spend as much on national defence?


Hon. IAN MACKENZIE (Minister of National Defence):: I greatly appreciate that splendid Hibernian contribution to national defence.

Canada-United States Trade Agreement



FOREIGN POLICY


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. T. L. CHURCH (Broadview):: Will the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) be in a position at the first of the week to give the house any information on the foreign situation, in view of its great importance to the people of Canada?


Ernest Lapointe: The government will take notice of the question of my hon. friend, and I have no doubt the Prime Minister will satisfy his legitimate curiosity.



PENITENTIARIES


[Stage Direction]
Right Hon. ERNEST LAPOINTE (Minister of Justice) moved the second reading of and concurrence in amendments made by the senate to Bill No. 34, an act respecting penitentiaries.
He said:	The senate have approved this
bill, adding two amendments. The first is to section 5, by adding a subsection 2 reading:
(2) Nothing in this act shall be deemed to extend or apply to the exercise of the royal prerogative of mercy, or to the remission service of the Department of Justice, or to alter or affect or to authorize any altering or affecting of that direct control of that service by the minister which now exists.
I have no objection to accepting the amendment, which however I did not think necessary. It has never been the intention in any way by this bill to affect the present situation in regard to the prerogative of mercy. I took the trouble to say that anything along that line will have to be considered and be the subject of further legislation if it is deemed advisable.
The second amendment is to section 11, which gives to the commission the power to appoint the guards, trade instructors and subordinate officers. The senate have added these words: "upon the recommendation of the warden." By the old statute those guards were appointed by the superintendent upon the recommendation of the warden. My purpose was rather to give full control to the commission, but the senate have thought fit to add the words "upon the recommendation of the warden , and I am quite willing to accept the amendment.
Motion agreed to; amendments read the second time and concurred in.


[Stage Direction]
The house in committee of ways and means, Mr. Sanderson in the chair.
Mr. DUNNING:: Mr. Chairman, some time ago I tabled an explanatory tabular statement of the tariff changes, of which I think every hon. member has a copy. If hon. gentlemen will now turn to page 21 of that statement they will find printed opposite each item the answers to a number of questions which I feel sure they otherwise would ask. This information is printed for the purpose of expediting the consideration of each item. I have, of course, further information in connection with each item; but as far as comparative rates are concerned, they are fully set out in the tabular statement commencing on page 21 with respect to schedule 1. I believe we are now on the second item; one item was carried.
Customs tariff-7. Meats, fresh, n.o.p.: ex (a) Edible offal of beef and veal, 4 cents per pound;
ex (c) Pork, li cents per pound.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-9. Poultry and game, n.o.p., 15 per cent.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-10. Meats, prepared or preserved, other than canned:
(a)	Bacon, hams, shoulders and other pork, 1| cents per pound;
(b)	N.o.p., 3 cents per pound.
Mr. THOMPSON:: I notice this item provides for meats, prepared or preserved, other than canned. I have always felt it a great mistake that we did not have some protection against canned meats. We are paying li cents per pound to get our cattle into the United States while our quota lasts, and it lasted only three weeks during the first quarter of the year. After the quota is filled we must pay 3 cents per pound or practically $30 per head, while at the same time we admit free from the United States and the Argentine between eight and ten million pounds of meat each year, which is the equivalent of about thirty thousand cattle. In other words these countries are sending practically thirty thousand head of cattle into Canada annually free of duty while we must pay from li cents to 3 cents per pound on the cattle we ship to the United States. I have always thought it was very unfair that we did not have some protection against the importation of canned meats from countries which impose such high duties on our live stock.

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Canada-United States Trade Agreement


Charles Avery Dunning: My hon. friend's remarks do not pertain strictly to this item, which deals with bacon, hams, shoulders and other pork, prepared or preserved, other than canned. In connection with that class of commodity the balance of trade is very much in our favour, and the object of the item now under consideration is merely a binding that Canada will not, during the continuance of the treaty, increase the rate against the United States. Perhaps the committee would be interested in 'the figures of our imports from the United States. Last year the total was less than S300,000, while our exports to the United States were 8551,000 in connection with the same items.


Thomas Alfred Thompson: Could the minister
give us the imports from the Argentine, which enjoys the same privileges we extend to the United States?


Charles Avery Dunning: I have not the figures
before me, but my officer tells me there would be no imports from the Argentine under this item, which has to do with pork and pork products.


Mr. HYNDMAN:: Would the minister
give us the corresponding United States duties in connection with the items we have considered so far?


Charles Avery Dunning: The United States tariff item does not exactly correspond with the one now under discussion; there is a slight variation in the content of the item, but broadly speaking it is similar. Prior to the first agreement their rate against us was 3i cents per pound. Under the new agreement the rate will be 2 cents per pound.


Alonzo Bowen Hyndman: And on the three preceding items?


Charles Avery Dunning: Under item 6, before
the 1938 agreement the rate was 2 cents per pound; under the 1938 agreement the rate is one cent. Under item 7, before the new agreement the rate was 6 cents; under the new agreement it is 3 cents. The United States tariff is 6 cents per pound. There is no change in that tariff on item 9 in the new agreement.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-16. Eggs in the shell: 5 cents per dozen.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-42. Salt, in bulk, n.o.p.:
4 cents per 100 pounds.
Item agreed to.

Customs tariff-45. Milk foods, n.o.p.: prepared cereal foods, in packages not exceeding twenty-five pounds weight each: 25 per cent.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-46. Prepared cereal foods, n.o.p.: 15 per cent.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-ex 47. Lima beans, dried: one cent per pound.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-ex 47. Soya beans, n.o.p.: free.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-52. Barley, n.o.p.: 15 cents per bushel.
Mr. PERLEY:: I think we are giving the United States a little advantage under this item. There is a reduction of 7% cents a bushel on barley coming into Canada, whereas, under the corresponding item, 722, in the United States tariff, a reduction of five cents only is given us. When we consider the value of barley for feeding purposes, I think we have given a little greater concession than we have received. The United States imported last year something like $11,000,000 worth, from which it appears that there is a good market there for our barley. We went a little too far in reducing our duty as compared with theirs.


Charles Avery Dunning: In negotiating the treaty we had in mind, as regards this item, the points made by my hon. friend. Of course, the fact is that we have never imported as much as a thousand bushels from the United States in any of the last three years. In 1936 we imported 231 bushels; in 1937, 251 bushels; and in 1938, 417 bushels. The United States on the other hand imported from us in 1936, 1,806,000 bushels; in 1937, 13,300,000 bushels; and in 1938, 2,871,000 bushels. As pointed out by the hon. member, the rates under the new agreement will foe matched; that is to say, the rate is 15 cents a bushel on barley going to the United States and 15 cents on barley coming from that country. On the whole, having regard to the history of the trade, the five cent reduction on our barley going into United States means very much more to our farm population than the reduction to 15 cents on United States barley entering Canada.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-55. Indian corn, n.o.p.: 10 cents per bushel.
Ernest Edward Perley: I have a more serious complaint in regard to this item. The duty

Canada-United States Trade Agreement
is reduced from 20 cents to 10 cents. Will the
minister give amounts of importations of Indian com, particularly from the United States, and other countries as well?


Charles Avery Dunning: The imports from the United States in each of the last three years have been:
Bushels
1936		 35,000
1937		 32,000
1938		 189,000
Curiously enough our exports to the United States in the same years were:
Bushels
1935-	36	
40,0001936-	37	
127,0001937-	38	
304,000
In other words, in 1938 we exported to the United States approximately double the quantity we received in that year. The conditions vary from year to year owing largely to the size of the crop in South Africa. It was necessary a few years ago, in the interests of Canadian users of corn, to ask the government of South Africa to agree for a time to the dropping of their preference in order that the great body of users of corn in Canada might be able to get it at a reasonable price, for the reason that South Africa was in that year unable to supply corn. This solution, not merely under this item but in connection with other com items, follows negotiations with South Africa and represents a fitting together of the interests of South Africa and of Canadian users of corn in relation to the duty on United States corn, about as effectively as I think can be done.


Ernest Edward Perley: What was the duty on corn going into the United States?


Charles Avery Dunning: Twenty-five cents a bushel, with a special rate from Cuba only of ten cents, which does not concern us.


Ernest Edward Perley: This is an important item. I am pleased to note that the exports of com from Canada have been increasing; it is evidence of the fact that we can produce corn in Canada as well as they can in the United States. That has been demonstrated on our experimental farms. Anything that would replace our barley

and corn has been doing this to a certain extent for feed purposes-is detrimental. On a former occasion, as hon. members who were in the house from 1930 to 1935 will recall, the then member for Souris. Mr. Willis, placed on the record in detail the experiments that had been carried on in Canada in connection with the feeding value of corn and barley. He showed the experiments that had -been done at Indian 71492-126i
Head and other demonstration stations, proving conclusively that barley, and particularly a mixture of barley, wheat and oats, had a great food value and compared very favourably with corn. The point I wish to make is that if we can produce corn in Canada, as no doubt we can, in the light of the figures given by the minister, and knowing what we can do in regard to barley, we should be careful to see that the Canadian market is not lost to the Canadian producer, for either barley or corn. In view of the rate which the minister has given of 25 cents a bushel going into the United States, and considering our reduction from 20 cents to 10 cent! a bushel, I think the exchange is rathe! unfair. The United States -producer has the advantage over the Canadian.


Mr. MARTIN:: I would not want to let this item pass, particularly in view of some of the observations of the hon. member fol Qu'Appelle (Mr. Perley), who I see has done vicarious duty to-day.


Ernest Edward Perley: What was that?


Paul Joseph James Martin: I said I would not want to
let the item pass in view of the observations of the hon. gentleman, who has vicariously done his duty to-day in a very admirable manner. This item, involving a reduction of the tariff on corn from 20 cents to 10 cents, should be considered in the light of other provisions in the treaty which will be discussed later, where the duty is increased from zero to 10 cents on corn for starch and distillation purposes. Of course the hon. member for Qu'Appelle knows that this matter is of donsiderable importance to southwestern Ontario, which produces eighty-five per cent of the corn produced in Canada. The ten cents that is now provided for in the treaty, together with the imposition of a tariff on corn which up to now has not existed, should satisfy the worry and concern of my hon. friend. . That there is no doubt as to the capabilities of the corn growers of southwestern Ontario to produce all that is necessary for the corn consumptive needs of this country. It has been done in the past arid it can easily be done again. I should like to ask the Minister of Finance one question. The ten cent imposition on com for distillation and starch purposes-it does not come under this item-will apply only to non-empire importations?


Charles Avery Dunning: Correct.


Paul Joseph James Martin: Has any request been made by South Africa to have its exports included in the ten per cent imposition on corn for distillation and starch purposes?
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Mr. DEACHMAN:: Mr. Chairman, I should like to suggest to the hon. member for Qu'Appelle (Mr. Perley) that he make some concession, however slight it may be, to the intelligence of the farmers of Ontario. If they want to feed barley, they will feed it. If they want to sell it to the United States, they will sell it. If they want to buy com for feed purposes, let them buy it. I think we can trust to their decision in the matter without any advice from the hon. member for Qu'Appelle or even from the Minister of Finance (Mr. Dunning) or the Minister of National Revenue (Mr. Ilsley). I should like to see a more generous latitude allowed in connection with some of these things. Although the farmer may not conform to some of our ideas, when it comes to running his own farm under the conditions which exist he is, to use a familiar phrase, master of his own fate. He will decide these questions just as intelligently himself as when he receives the advice of members of parliament, who may be here in this chamber regardless of whether or not they are farmers. The only thing we need to do for the farmer is to give him freedom. The only thing which he needs is the thing which we deny him. The more generous measure of freedom he gets, the better and happier he will be. The greater measure of freedom that is given him, the less trouble this government will have in connection with unemployment, loss of revenue on the national railroad and other problems which we are trying to solve by getting in the way of the only thing that will solve them, the wisdom and common sense of the producers of the Dominion of Canada.


Thomas Alfred Thompson: I do not think that legislation to permit the importation of corn for feed purposes will benefit the farmers of this country, neither do I think it is wise or in their interests to lower the duty from 20 cents to 10 cents per bushel. I have been in the live stock business and I know that there is no feed that will make a fine quality of bacon more rapidly than wheat, barley and oats. Such bacon is much superior to corn fed bacon. Our great difficulty has been to sell our wheat. In 1932 we obtained from Great Britain a quota of 180,000,000 pounds of bacon, which we have never been able to fill. If the farmers of the west would mix their wheat, barley and oats together and produce more of the bacon the British market is wanting, they would be able to use a considerable portion of their wheat. I do not think it is in the interests of our farmers to encourage the importation of corn for feed purposes.


Ernest Edward Perley: The hon. member for Huron North (Mr. Deachman) appeals to hon. members to use their intelligence with respect to this matter. I may say that I was thinking somewhat of the tastes of the animals we produce in western Canada, those good steers which the farmers in his district go out west to buy to bring down here to feed. These animals have a taste for western barley, and when farmers go out west to get these cattle, I think it would be advisable that they bring back a carload or so of barley to feed. These cattle prefer western barley even to Ontario corn.


Mr. REID:: I suppose it would be very difficult to make changes in the tariff to suit every province, but I think I speak for the other British Columbia members when I say that this reduction in the tariff on corn is welcomed in British Columbia by the dairymen and poultrymen. I do not know how many times I have had to rise in my place to contradict the hon. member for Qu'Appelle (Mr. Perley) when he has spoken about barley for feed. He quoted Mr. Willis, but he is no authority, especially on poultry. He need not come out to British Columbia to preach feeding barley to poultry. There are two reasons why that is not feasible. First, the freight rate from Manitoba to British Columbia is too high. Second, barley is not as palatable poultry feed as is corn. If you throw down corn and barley to poultry, the barley is the last grain they will pick up. Any poultryman who knows his business at all would never substitute barley for corn. I am pleased that the tariff is being changed to equalize the importations of all varieties of corn. It was a sore point to people in British Columbia that corn for distillation or starch purposes should enter free when corn for poultry feed was charged a duty. It is unfortunate that one small section of Ontario should attempt to be a guide for the rest of this country, even if they do beat us out as far as numbers are concerned. Coming from British Columbia, I welcome this reduction in the tariff.


Mr. STEVENS:: It would be most unfortunate if the observations of my hon. friend should go without correction. He probably is not aware that the appreciation which he has just expressed of the reduction in the tariff has been directed to a tariff which does not affect the poultry feeders of British Columbia It is chiefly South African corn that comes into British Columbia. This has been so ever since the Ottawa agreements, which the hon. member condemned so much. The corn which

Canada-United States Trade Agreement
is fed in Ontario does not go to British Columbia, and I do not think it ever did to any extent.


Paul Joseph James Martin: It should.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Not necessarily. As everyone knows, there is a market for it here. The corn used out our way which the chickens have been relishing so much is imported from South Africa. Some corn is brought in from the Argentine and a small quantity from Manchuria.


Mr. ILSLEY:: Quite a lot from the Argentine.


Charles Avery Dunning: Quite a lot from the United States.


Henry Herbert Stevens: South Africa is the chief source of supply for corn for British Columbia.


Thomas Reid: There have been years when the United States had not enough corn to supply our requirements. Those who are in the business of manufacturing poultry feeds tell me that the Argentine corn is a much better corn for making cracked corn and corn meal than is South African corn. I want to contradict the hon. member with regard to price. Before I left to attend the session, corn in British Columbia was selling at around $3S per ton, as compared with $21 for wheat. Upon making inquiry I was told that this price was due to the long haul for corn coming from South Africa. The Cloverdale Cooperative Association, who handle the greater part of the business in my district, inform me that corn from the United States can be brought into British Columbia more cheaply than corn from any other point.


Mr. HAYHURST:: I was going to suggest to the hon. member that if we had a good road from Alberta to the Fraser valley, Alberta wheat could be taken down the Fraser valley much more cheaply than you can import corn, and the hens would pick up our wheat in preference to corn any' time. But the main thing is to get means of transportation in our own country. The hon. member for New Westminster is always advocating a reduction in freight rates, but if we had a good road there, they would carry the grain by truck.


Thomas Reid: Then we would get cheaper
freight rates.


Charles Avery Dunning: I dislike to hold up my own items, but the economic argument that has been made is so fallacious that I cannot forbear referring to it. No one will seriously suggest that wheat in bulk can be taken on the long haul from Alberta to the Fraser
valley cheaper by truck than it can be hauled over the railroads. That is completely wide of the mark.


William Hayhurst: A great many garage men in southern Alberta would like that road built to-day, and then they would deliver the wheat at Chilliwack and other internal points in British Columbia cheaper than the railroads are doing it now.


Mr. CLARK (Essex) :: Mr. Chairman, I
should like to put on Hansard a copy of a resolution sent to me by the president of the Essex county farm bureau.


Paul Joseph James Martin: What is his name?


William George Clark: John Lickman,
and a good Conservative, too. I received the following letter from him dated at Essex, April 8, 1938:
The enclosed resolution was unanimously passed at a meeting of corn growers and dealers held in Essex Wednesday night.
Copies have been forwarded to Hon. W. D. Euler, Hon. J. G. Gardiner, Hon. Chas. Dunning,, and Hon. J. L. llsley.
I would very much appreciate your assistance in order that the resolution may be given full consideration by the government.
The resolution reads as follows:
Whereas the present tariff structure between Canada, United States, and the British Empire is about to be adjusted, and whereas it is understood that the United States is making strong representations to have United States corn given free entry into Canada;
And whereas the present tariff of twenty cents a bushel against corn from all sources except South Africa is acknowledged to be a very high protection considering the size of the industry to be protected, and the comparative size of the corn consuming industry;
And whereas the cereal and corn starch industries enjoy the privilege of duty free corn as raw material and at the same time a very high protection on their finished product;
And whereas a considerable percentage of the total volume of corn imported free of duty by these industries is sold as offal for feed in a protected market, thus giving those industries a very unfair advantage;
And whereas the present situation with a tariff operative only when the Union of South Africa has no corn for export, has not been satisfactory in that the situation is very unstable and has made market conditions difficult to predict;
And whereas this uncertain situation has a disturbing effect on all grain markets throughout Canada;
And whereas if United States corn were given entirely free entry, a very valuable market in eastern Canada for western Canadian feed grain would be largely lost to cheap American corn, in years when United States has a large crop;
And whereas the distilling industry is known to be very profitable and could well afford to pay a slightly larger duty on the corn they have to import;
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Canada-United States Trade Agreement
Therefore be it resolved that the government be asked to place a stable duty of 10 cents a bushel against all corn entering Canada for all purposes and from all sources.
That is signed by the president of the Essex county farm bureau, a representative of the elevator association. I might add that the Essex county farm bureau is a representative organization, non-political, and one of the members of that organization, at the last Conservative convention held in Kingsville a short time ago, was a proposed Conservative candidate to contest the next federal election.


Mr. BARBER:: I am pleased to note that some hon. gentlemen opposite are still advocating protection. Referring to the corn question, I am sure the poultry-raisers in the Fraser valley appreciate anything that is done to decrease the cost of feed, but looking over this agreement I think they will decide any reductions made are not sufficient to compensate them for the reduction in the duty from 10 to 5 cents a dozen on eggs coming from the south.


Charles Avery Dunning: I do not know anything about the political complexion of the gentleman who prepared the resolution presented by the hon. member for Essex South, and I care nothing about it. But it is quite evident that the association gave a very broad-gauge study to the corn question, and that is all to their credit because that is the corn-producing section of Canada. The reasoning they have expressed was the reasoning which guided the government in reaching the conclusion it did on corn.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-56. Oats, 8 cents per bushel.
Mr. TUSTIN:: Would the minister tell us what is the duty on oats coming in from the United States, and also give the imports and exports? .


Charles Avery Dunning: Under the new agreement the rate is 8 cents per bushel, formerly 16 cents.


Mr. MOORE:: What does the 8 cent rate represent ad valorem?


Charles Avery Dunning: In 1936-37 the intermediate Canadian rate of nine cents a bushel was equivalent to 32 per cent on imports from the United States, and in 1937-38, it was equivalent to 26 per cent. The fluctuation in the price of the article from year to year changes, of course, the ad valorem incidence. That was under a nine cent rate; the new rate is eight cents.


William Henry Moore: What would be the ad valorem rate at to-day's price?


Charles Avery Dunning: I could not say; I do not know what to-day's price is.


Ernest Edward Perley: Thirteen cents.


Mr. DONNELLY:: What are the imports and exports of oats as between Canada and the United States?


Charles Avery Dunning: From the United States, and here again drought conditions have caused fluctuations in various years, we imported in 1936, 941,000 bushels; in 1937, 341,000 bushels; in 1938, 8,359,000 bushels. We exported to the United States in 1936, 787,000 bushels; 1937, 287,000 bushels; 1938, 526,000 bushels.


William Henry Moore: I am told that the ad valorem rate on oats is well over 50 per cent.


Charles Avery Dunning: At the present time?


Mr. ROSS (Moose Jaw):: Suppose it is; it is not of very much use to the farmer in Canada at any time, and it would be to the advantage of the farmer in Canada if you cut the duty off altogether, both ways.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-57. Oatmeal and rolled oats, 50 cents per 100 pounds.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-63. Rice, cleaned, when in packages weighing two pounds, each, or less, the weight of such packages to be included in the weight for duty, 70 cents per 100 pounds.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-71a. Timothy seed, one cent per pound.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-ex 73. Broom corn seed, when in packages weighing more than one pound each, free.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-74. Seeds, as hereunder, when in packages weighing more than one pound each:
(i)	Parsley and parsnip, 2 cents per pound;
(ii)	Beet, not including sugar beet, 3 cents per pound;
(iii)	Mangel and turnip, 4 cents per pound.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-75. Seeds, as hereunder, when in packages weighing more than one pound each:
(i)	Radish, leek, lettuce, carrot, borecole or kale, 3 cents per pound;
(ii)	Cabbage and cucumber, 5 cents per pound.
Item agreed to.

Canada-United, States Trade Agreement
Customs tariff-76. Seeds, as hereunder, when in packages weighing more than one pound each:
(i)	Tomato and pepper, 10 cents per pound;
(ii)	Cauliflower, 15 cents per pound;
(iii)	Onion, 20 cents per pound.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-76a. Root, garden and other seeds, n.o.p., when in packages weighing more than one pound each, 5 cents per pound.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-76b. Seeds, viz: Field, root, garden and other seeds, when in packages weighing one pound each, or less, 25 per cent.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-79b. Flowers and foliage, natural, cut, whether in designs or bouquets or not, n.o.p., 25 per cent.
Mr. GRAYDON:: Before this item carries perhaps I should make a brief observation with regard to the reduction, in the tariff on that old familiar item in which the hon. member for Ontario (Mr. Moore) used to take a keen interest, namely, cut flowers. I dealt with this at some length in the debate on the resolution, and I have no desire to hold up the committee, but I should like to point out that a reduction in the duty from 40 per cent to 25 per cent, a difference of 15 per cent, will make, I firmly believe, a considerable difference so far as the prosperity of the cut flower growers is concerned. True, the disposition of the growers to await the results of the workings of the agreement is a reasonable one, and is, I think, the only sensible view to take.


Charles Avery Dunning: I have found them very
reasonable.


Gordon Graydon: However, as representing the constituency in Canada where cut flower growing is perhaps most prevalent, I feel I should not let this opportunity pass without protesting against the reduction of 15 per cent in the duty. The reduction under the budget of 1930 left the duty at 40 per cent. Of course a countervailing provision with regard to the United States tariff was incorporated at that time. In the agreement of 1936 the duty was taken off entirely, but it was put on again in the budget of the same year. It is noteworthy that the budget of 1936 raised the duty again to 40 per cent. I should like to say this to the minister, not by way of carping criticism but as a suggestion: In 1930 and in 1936, the same government and the same minister decided that it was necessary to have a duty of 40 per cent. I submit that nothing has happened
in the meantime to improve the industry to such a degree that the reduction now proposed should be put into effect.


Charles Avery Dunning: May I say at once that
whatever decision I may have made nine or ten years ago on a particular item, particularly one so difficult as this, and which brought me a lot of good-humoured chaffing from hon. members opposite, not only in the house but during the subsequent election, I do appreciate the importance of this industry. After all, the industry produced last year two million dollars' worth of goods. It is, within limits, a legitimate industry. There are certain limits beyond which in a climate such as this it is obviously not economical, but within the limits in which it is now being operated by Canadians who are interested in it I believe it to be worth while, as I did then.
Last year our total importations from the United States were of the value of $152,000, while our total production was, as I said, approximately $2,000,000; and we exported to the United States $21,000 worth. That was against a duty entering the United States of 40 per cent. Under the new treaty the rate is 25 per cent each way, and I am frankly hoping, although one cannot be certain in connection with such a product, that the tremendously larger size of the United States market and its proximity to a considerable part of our industry will enable our growers to profit through the reduction in the United States rate at least as greatly and I hope more so than the United States grower will profit by the reduction of our rate to 25 per cent. After all there is a tremendous market in the United States immediately adjacent to our border, and our industry is close to the border. It is true that the facilities for producing this class of goods are much greater in the United States than they are here, and it is a very difficult matter upon which to arrive at definite and positive conclusions. As my hon. friend points out, the industry is anxiously awaiting the working out of the new rate of 25 per cent each way.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-82. ex (e) Nut trees, ipelud-ing grafted stock, and buds and scions for grafting nut trees, free.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-83. Potatoes, as hereunder defined:
(a) In their natural state:
August 1 to June 14. inclusive, free. June 15 to July 31, inclusive, 37J cents per 100 pounds.
(c) Sweet potatoes and yams, in their natural state, free.
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Henry Herbert Stevens: It is a good day to discuss potatoes.


Mr. STIRLING:: Mr. Chairman, this is
an item which I am afraid will fall rather heavily on production in British Columbia. I understand that the production of that province is in the neighbourhood of 40,000 tons, of which rather more than half is consumed in the coast markets, and the . balance, with the exception of some 100 or 1:50 cars which find their way eastward across the mountains, is consumed in British Columbia, a market in which our growers have received a reasonable price consequent upon a tariff of $15 a ton on potatoes coming in from the south. Now they appear to think that the inroads which will be made by potatoes from the south will be very considerable. Federal assistance in various forms which is given to producers in the south has so far had the tendency, in almost all the commodities to which it applies, to increase the acreage, and California potatoes, for instance, are at the top of their peak. There will definitely be a tendency for these potatoes to come into the British Columbia and Alberta and Saskatchewan markets, which of course will not be an assistance to the British Columbia producers.
There have been a great many resolutions on the subject, and I am not going to bother the minister at this time with sheets of them. I know representations have been made by the British Columbia coast marketing board to the Minister of National Defence, and representations no doubt were made by him to the government. But in this regard I want to put two short resolutions on Hansard. One is from the British Columbia coast vegetable marketing board:
Whereas the time limit for potatoes entering Canada on payment of duty is from June 15 to July 31 of each year;
And whereas this time limit will be of no value to the growers of early potatoes in the coast area of British Columbia;
Be it therefore resolved that recommendations be made that this time limit shall be from the 25th dav of May to the 15th day of July in each year.
They want the period drawn forward. In British Columbia there are what might almost be called two early crops. The period mentioned in the agreement is rather too late for the first and too early for the second, and the producers consider that they will be in grave difficulty consequent on the long free period. All through tl>eir resolutions and statements one finds the idea that in their opinion this should have been looked upon as a matter in which the countervailing principle should be adopted.

The second resolution I want to read is as follows:
"Whereas the Canada-United States treaty signed at Washington on November 17, 1938, appears very detrimental to the potato growers of British Columbia;
And whereas potatoes being shipped into Canada are duty free except for the period from June 15 to July 31 while potatoes from Canada entering the United States must pay duty of from $7.50 to $12 a ton;
And whereas this discriminates very unfairly against British Columbia growers;
Therefore be it resolved that the executive of this association protest most vigorously against this discrimination and request that arrangements between the two countries should be reciprocal, and if no protection can be given the duty should be countervailing; and further demand that regulations regarding grading and freedom from disease be strictly enforced on all importations.
So that the growers of potatoes in British Columbia are afraid that this is going to be a serious blow to them, and they do not see that the government of Canada has made any provision whatsoever to take care of dumping, which they look upon as almost inevitable.
They further draw attention to the fact that the United Kingdom, in its arrangements with the United States, has taken precautions should such a difficulty arise. Here I should like to read a quotation from the journal of the ministry of agriculture of the United Kingdom, of December, 1938:
A comprehensive trade agreement between the United States and the United Kingdom was signed on November 17, 1938. The surrender of advantages at present enjoyed by agriculture in the United Kingdom is not of a very serious nature. Among the general provisions of the agreement there are clauses that enable action to be taken to impose additional duties if any scheduled products are dumped or are subsidized upon exportation, and there are other clauses which provide freedom of action for the institution of quantitative regulation of or other measures operating under government authority which are designed to control production, market supply, quality or price of the domestic article.
Can the minister give any hope to these growers that in the event of dumping, since the duty has been entirely removed with the exception of a period of six weeks when in their opinion it will not help them, there is anything the Canadian government can do to relieve the situation?


Charles Avery Dunning: The ordinary dumping provisions of the Canadian customs law will of course apply in the case of any dumping from anywhere. I am not aware of there being anything in the British law which protects the grower there with respect to dumping, or in the United States either for that matter.

Canada-United. States Trade Agreement
The potato question generally illustrates what a difficult country Canada is to govern. In the maritimes, particularly in Prince Edward Island and I think in New Brunswick, potatoes are one of the principal money crops. The production of potatoes for export is a means of livelihood for a very large proportion of the people of those two provinces, not to speak of parts of Nova Scotia and certain sections of Ontario and Quebec. In working out this very difficult matter, and trying to get the maximum advantage for those who must export, we endeavoured to see to it that the productive months in Canada should be safeguarded to the utmost extent. I have before me a careful review of the imports of potatoes into Canada from the United States during the last eight years. During that period the average of the imports would be in the neighbourhood of 160,000 hundredweight annually. An average of 78 per cent of the potatoes imported came in during the months of June and July, running as high in some years as 87 per cent of the total. My hon. friend can assure the people for whom he speaks that their concern in this matter was in the minds of those who were negotiating for Canada and in the mind of the government; every effort was made to reduce to the minimum the danger to them without surrendering the tremendous advantage to the potato growers, who rely on potatoes as their chief source of livelihood, of getting a larger market in the United States for their product.


William George Clark: Knowing that the hon. member for Yale (Mr. Stirling) is always fair in any of his representations, let me point out that there is one thing that he did not mention. I believe that the new regulation prohibiting the import of No. 2 potatoes will greatly help his district as well as other early potato-growing districts. I understand that approximately seventy per cent of our imports were No. 2 potatoes, so that this new regulation, one might say, will give an added protection, although not appearing in the tariff, of 50 cents a hundredweight.


Grote Stirling: I did refer to that in the second resolution that I read.


Mr. NEILL:: I must support the hon. member for Yale (Mr. Stirling) in his remarks. I have had numbers of resolutions similar to those to which he has alluded; the spirit of them is practically the same. The growers in British Columbia fear that they will suffer owing to the conditions mentioned by the hon. member for Yale. In addition to the production mentioned from California there is a very fertile belt in the state of Washington, I think, the Yakima valley. There they can
grow potatoes in abundance under very favourable conditions; they can put them on a truck and run them into the Vancouver market at minimum expense, and it pays them to dump their potatoes at almost any price in order to maintain their home market where they make the great bulk of their sales. The hon. member for Essex South (Mr. Clark) referred to the fact that now the potatoes imported will have to be above No. 2 grade. But that is only a question of running them over a sieve before they are sacked, a very simple matter-I do not think that will prevent the influx.
The potato growers I represent have asked for a countervailing duty or else the operation of the dumping clause. I fully appreciate the remarks of the Minister of Finance when he says that this is a hard country to govern, and conditions which may be very favourable and desirable for those in the eastern part of Canada work unfavourably to us in the west.
I suppose it is a matter of the greatest good to the greatest number.
I have heard the argument put forward in response to the objections of our potato growers that we are getting great benefit from the increased sale of seed potatoes to the United States. That again is a matter which concerns the east; for us in the west our sales to the United States of seed potatoes are comparatively unimportant. We do not get any great advantage from that. I thought at one time I read something in the treaty of a provision that under certain conditions, possibly at the end of a year, if it were found that any particular item worked unfairly to any particular section of the public, the minister could initiate negotiations with the other country to attempt to make an adjustment. I hope there is something of the kind, although perhaps it is more for cases in which it is found that the arrangement works too favourably to some other third country rather than directly against our interests.
I do hope the minister will explore every possible avenue along those lines, because I am afraid this is going to affect our potato industry pretty seriously. Possibly that will not be the case this year, because there is a shortage in the United States; but in years to come, with this opportunity of bringing their surplus to Vancouver, I am pretty certain there will be a very heavy importation.


Mr. TAYLOR (Nanaimo):: Mr. Chairman, I align myself with the hon. member for Yale and the hon. member for Comox-Alberni in what they have said about the British Columbia situation.
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Charles Avery Dunning: That makes a formidable triumvirate.


James Samuel Taylor: I have also
received many requests and resolutions, which lead me to ask how the minister arrived at these dates, and whether they are in any sense movable.


Charles Avery Dunning: No.


James Samuel Taylor: Then were they arrived at after due consideration of the situation in the west as well as in the east? Obviously to fix one date to cover both east and west would be scarcely fair. I think you will find that the seasons in the west are warmer than they are in the east; and if a rigid date is set to cover the whole country it is bound to work against the western provinces beyond a certain meridian line. I believe that is worth considering and taking into account when these questions are being discussed.


Charles Avery Dunning: It w'as considered.


Mr. ROSS (St. Paul's):: There is a fairly large reduction under this item. On the one hand potatoes coming in during a certain period are on the free list, while from June 15 to July 31 the duty is 37| cents per hundred pounds.
When these treaties were negotiated it was stated all over the country that they were designed to further world appeasement, and most of the people understood that we had to do everything that was done; we had to reduce all these duties, we had to take off the excise tax and we had to make these further treaties with the other thirty-eight countries involved in order that Great Britain might be able to consummate its treaty with the United States. Speaking in the house on the resolution I said: In his statements the Prime Minister has said that we have gone no farther in making these sweeping reductions in our tariffs and in making the sacrifice of our preference in the British market than has been absolutely necessary to bring about the consummation of the treaties-
That was in the evening. Continuing on the following day I said:
But what hon. members of this house and the people of Canada should know before they can properly judge the merits or demerits of the new treaty is just what sacrifices we were asked to make or it was necessary for us to make.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order; we heard that before.


The CHAIRMAN:: I want to remind the hon. member that we are on the item of potatoes.


Douglas Gooderham Ross: I will come to that in a moment; I am going to ask a ques-
tion about it, but I must lead up to it. The Prime Minister replied as follows:
Before my friend continues may I relieve his mind at once by saying that all concessions that were granted were requested and were necessary in order to enable the agreement between the United Kingdom and the United States to be concluded. But with respect to concessions made, there were as far as we were concerned compensations effected in the agreements which we have either with the United Kingdom or with the United States.
The question I wish to ask on this item is simply this: Were we requested by the government of Great Britain to make this reduction? Were we requested to put potatoes on the free list for a certain length of time, or were we requested to make any change at all?


Charles Avery Dunning: No, Mr. Chairman; this
item had nothing whatever to do with Great Britain. The negotiations with respect to potatoes were carried on in what we believed to be the interests of Canada, and I am quite sure that the interests of Canada will be well served by the arrangements which have been made both ways; that is, considering the concessions we get in the United States market for our products and this comparatively minor concession which was given to them in order to make possible what was very much more important and valuable to us.


Douglas Gooderham Ross: Then this reduction was not requested by Great Britain?


Charles Avery Dunning: No. That had nothing
at all to do with it.


Douglas Gooderham Ross: Therefore the
reduction on this particular item had nothing to do with the making of these treaties from the point of view of world appeasement. That is my point.


Charles Avery Dunning: I would not accept that
statement, Mr. Chairman. I am inclined to think that any mutual lowering of duties does have its weight in promoting goodwill.


Mr. LENNARD:: Notwithstanding the
argument of the hon. member for Essex South, I say this reduction will seriously affect the potato growers of Ontario. The reduction in duty which will apply from June 15 to July 31 in itself will affect the growers of central Ontario, because it means that these potatoes from the southern states-and from the northern states as well, because they are several weeks earlier than we are-will be brought in prior to June 15 in sucli quantities that the market will be practically glutted, so that potatoes will sell at such low prices that our growers will not get the profit they should receive.	.

Canada-United States Trade Agreement


William George Clark: The hon. member
for Wentworth forgets that at that time of the year new potatoes do not keep for any length of time. I am sure that by the time the earliest potatoes in western Ontario are ready for the market the United States potatoes will be gone.


Charles Avery Dunning: Perhaps my hon. friend
from Wentworth did not hear the information I gave a few moments ago, when I said that in dealing with this matter we very carefully worked out the monthly importations into *Canada over a period of years. We found that over a period of eight years an average of 78 per cent of the total importations came in during the two months which are covered by the duty I have mentioned. Indeed in some years the proportion went as high as 87 per cent, and it never dropped below 70 per cent. So it does not look as though there could be very much interference with the marketing of early potatoes produced in Canada.


Frank Exton Lennard: My point was that a
specified date when the duty will apply will mean that an effort will be made to increase importations just prior to that date. While I am on the subject I should like to direct the attention of the hon. member for Essex South to a question which I asked in this house several weeks ago, and which was ruled out of order. I stated that it had been brought to my attention that Texas beets, cabbages and carrots-I am not on the item now, but I might as well mention this in passing-


Charles Avery Dunning: We will come to cabbages, carrots, beets and so on in a moment.


Frederick George Sanderson: I would ask the hon.
member to wait until we get to the appropriate item.


Frank Exton Lennard: My point is that subsidized shipments of United States vegetables are being carried at a cheaper rate than our vegetables shipped from corresponding Canadian points.


Frederick George Sanderson: The hon. member is out of order. He will have full opportunity to discuss that question under item 87.


Alonzo Bowen Hyndman: What is the United
States duty against us?


Charles Avery Dunning: It depends on the quality and the time.. From March to November inclusive it is 37| cents. Formerly it was 75 cents. From the first of December to the last day of the following February it is 60 cents per one hundred pounds.


Mr. BROOKS:: Under the regulations are grade 1 potatoes the only ones allowed to come from the United States into Canada?


Charles Avery Dunning: The Minister of Agriculture is not here, but that is my understanding.
Mr. O'NEILL: The potato growers of British Columbia definitely fear that they will be injured by this agreement. I have received numerous resolutions from them to that effect. When will there be an opportunity to review this treaty and to straighten out any injustices that may appear from time to time as the agreement operates? To-day the potato growers fear this agreement, but they may find after it is in operation that they are not so badly injured as they now think they will be. If they do find however that their interests are affected to a greater extent than they had feared, will there be an opportunity to review the treaty?


Charles Avery Dunning: The treaty lasts for three years. Under its provisions there are certain bases set out for mutual consideration. The reason mentioned by the hon. member is not one that is included in the treaty. I would say to him however that our relations with the United States are very friendly and we have reason to believe that fair consideration would be given any representations we might make as to any grave injustice. We on our part would have to be prepared to give similar consideration to any representations made by them on the ground of serious injustice to any classes of their people. I do not therefore expect that there are likely to be approaches of that kind made by either country. I sincerely trust that my hon. friend will find that the people are not as adversely affected as they at present fear they may be. That has always been my experience in matters of this kind; there is a great deal more fear prior to the event than is subsequently justified.


Grote Stirling: In these negotiations, was notice taken of the regional application of the dates?


Charles Avery Dunning: Yes, but it is virtually impossible to work it out. Succeeding governments have tried to work it out, with very little success.


Mr. LOCKHART:: This is about the first item in connection with which we might ask the minister to make a brief statement indicating why the reduced limits and the seasonal limits were placed on a number of items which will follow one after another. The in-season periods have been reduced and set
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dates established. Can the minister give any general indication as to why that was found necessary? It more or less affects the next fifteen or twenty items. He might make a statement with regard to the in-season periods and the set limitations of time.


Charles Avery Dunning: The considerations vary of course with the items. They do necessarily. An effort was made to see to it that the period of flush production of our own industry should be injured as little as possible, while at the same time making available to Canadian consumers of the commodity, in other than flush seasons of Canadian production, vegetables at reasonable prices. Perhaps however I had better discuss them as I come to them, because that is an old and fruitful subject of discussion in this house. As I say, succeeding governments have endeavoured to meet it in various ways. As hon. members who tease me occasionally know, I have made several efforts to meet this situation, with more or less success; and the principle now applied has worked rather more successfully than any other that has been applied. There will always be a demand for enlargement of the period from some producers somewhere, and there will always be a demand from consumers for the reduction of that period in order that they may be able to buy the vegetables as cheaply as possible. What has been worked out represents the best compromise between these various interests which it has been possible to arrange. However, I will deal with each one separately as we come to it.


Harry James Barber: Perhaps the minister would tell us now how this period of forty-five days was arrived at, taking into consideration the different parts of Canada?


Charles Avery Dunning: I gave information with respect to imports into Canada. Unfortunately it is not possible to find out accurately over a period what quantities of potatoes come in at a particular port of entry destined for consumption within a particular area. We had of necessity to take account of total importations, and as I pointed out, when we found that seventy-eight per cent of the total importations over a period of eight years came in during the months of June and July, it was obvious that that was the period that required to be attended to. Does my hon. friend follow me?


Harry James Barber: Yes, but there is a point to be noted there. The trouble with the in-season period, and particularly wit h potatoes, a commodity that can be stored, is ! :nt there 
should be a protective period prior to the actual date, because hundreds of tons can be stored.


Charles Avery Dunning: Not very well. I am
advised that that is not so as regards early potatoes.


Harry James Barber: They can be stored for three or four weeks. With cold storage they can be stored a much longer time.


Charles Avery Dunning: It costs money.
Mr, BARBER: The question is, why was this not made ninety days instead of forty-five. Who would object?


Charles Avery Dunning: There were other parties to these negotiations. We were not making the whole agreement.


Harry James Barber: But apparently we did not
get very much.


Charles Avery Dunning: My hon. friend is not stating the fact.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-84. Onions, in their natural
state:
(a) Onion sets and shallots, 30 per cent;
*(b) Onions, n.o.p., 30 per cent, (J cent per pound).
Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: Why was there no
change in this item?


Charles Avery Dunning: I am not clear as to the question. I can usually answer intelligently as to why there is a change, but I find it difficult to say why there is no change.


Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: On all other items there has been a definite change, different reductions on different items.


Charles Avery Dunning: Now I understand the question.


Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: It would appear that this item remains the same, and I was just wondering why.


Charles Avery Dunning: My hon. friend will find many items in the schedule where no change takes place. They are here because we undertook that there should be no increase during the period of the treaty.


Mr. MARSHALL:: Is there not a change with respect to the half cent per pound?


Charles Avery Dunning: There is no change at all on onions.


James Alexander Marshall: I thought it was three-quarters of a cent per pound previously.


Charles Avery Dunning: There is no change.


Mr. McLEAN (Melfort):: There will be a change in the 3 per cent tax.

Canada-United States Trade Agreement


Charles Avery Dunning: Yes, my hon. friend is right; there is a decrease from three-fifths of a cent to one-half cent.


James Alexander Marshall: Is it not a reduction from three-quarters of a cent to one-half?


Charles Avery Dunning: No, from three-fifths of a cent to one-half cent.


Gordon Graydon: Having in mind the fact that onions appear to 'be the only vegetable where no change has been made with respect to the ad valorem duty-


Charles Avery Dunning: Is an onion a vegetable? Let us settle that first.


Gordon Graydon: Having in mind also that we have a famous onion grower in the county of Elgin in western Ontario, would it be reasonable to suggest that perhaps the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) is extending his policy of appeasement from international matters to domestic affairs?


William George Clark: I hope the hon. member for Peel (Mr. Graydon) does not discount the fact that a lot of onions are grown in my constituency, and possibly I would have some representations to make.


Mr. McGREGOR:: I realize that this trade agreement has been agreed to, and that although we may talk here for days and weeks, it will make no difference. I submit that the growers of vegetables as a whole have suffered more than any other class of the people, and I believe that statement will be borne out by what happens in the near future. Roughly speaking, the duties on vegetables have been reduced from 30 per cent in 1935 to 10 per cent at the present time. I believe it would save a lot of questions if the minister would place on the record the imports and exports of the different items from No. 83 to No. 96 inclusive, as well as the rates of duty that apply on these commodities entering the United States.


Charles Avery Dunning: I shall do that as we reach each item, if it is the wish of the committee.
. Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-ex 85. *Mushrooms, fresh, 10 per cent; (2 cents per lb.).


Douglas Gooderham Ross: This item is
reduced to 10 per cent. I should like to know if the reduced rate is to apply to France. The mushroom growers are having a little difficulty at present because of the depreciated franc, and this would seem to be an added reduction in the duty.


Charles Avery Dunning: If France can ship fresh mushrooms to Canada, she will benefit under this item.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
' Customs tariff-87. Vegetables, fresh, in their natural state:
*(a) Asparagus, 10 per cent; (4 cents per pound: 10 weeks).
Gordon Graydon: Under this item we will be discussing various vegetables. I dealt with this item when speaking to the resolution and I have no intention of repeating my remarks at this time. However, I should like to make this serious suggestion to the minister. One of the complaints, among others, of the vegetable growers of Ontario is that there is likely to be a conflict between the early and late growers of vegetables. No doubt the minister is well versed on this matter, because I believe he has received representations from many sources. Would it be possible to split the periods during which the added values are to be applied? Could these periods be split so that protection would be given, not only to the early grower but to the late grower as well, and avoid any conflict or confusion in the industry? I consider this a constructive suggestion; I believe it would alleviate some of the conditions which now affect this industry.


Charles Avery Dunning: My hon. friend will have noticed that the split period is introduced here for the first time in connection with some of these commodities. I can state frankly that this is experimental. We felt that experience had demonstrated that with respect to certain storage items the split period would be more beneficial to the home grower. This principle has not been applied to any of the non-storage items. While the treaty is settled and we cannot say that this or that can be done after it is passed, I am quite prepared to watch things this year with the idea of discussing with the United States the splitting of other periods if experience demonstrates the wisdom of so doing. I should not like to be arbitrary about this. I once came to this house with a plan in connection with fruits and vegetables and the hon. member for Kootenay East (Mr. Stevens) and others who were here at that time will remember that it seemed a grand scheme until it got before the house. Subsequently I was compelled to do what no minister of finance likes to do, that is, to ask the house to accept an amendment of my own proposals. Ministers of finance have to do that sometimes, but they do not enjoy it. I think I can say that the new scheme I proposed did not work out any better than the previous one was expected to.


Grote Stirling: It surely did.


Charles Avery Dunning: I am glad to have that much support, at any rate, because, as my hon. friend knows, I was the subject of a lot of abuse. From that time in 1930, when I
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endeavoured to deal with the problem in that manner, until to-day, the governments which have been in office have I believe made fair efforts to work this out-I may disagree with them as far as some of the rates are concerned -and I believe we more closely approached the interests of the growers with every step we took. But I do suggest that we must go very carefully. As I said to the hon. member for Peel, if the benefits of the split periods now applied to some commodities become apparently beneficial to others we will consider it one of the things that we should talk about, at any rate, to the United States. I shall be very glad to watch things and do everything possible to avoid harmful results.


Gordon Graydon: In other words, the door is not definitely closed so far as further negotiations are concerned?


Charles Avery Dunning: So far as the treaty is concerned, yes, the door is closed. This is a treaty and we cannot say that we are going to change this or change that. However, this is one of the matters which I think lends itself to possible future negotiation. It would not constitute a change in the rate or in the period; it would merely be a question of the desirability of splitting the period. It is something which might be done on occasion with possible advantage to both countries.


Mr. WOOD:: It is refreshing to hear the minister make such an excellent defence of this treaty and state his intention to apply the tariff in a practical way. I happen to come from a constituency where there is a considerable amount of vegetable growing. When the hon. member for Peel (Mr. Graydon), the hon. member for Wentworth (Mr. Lennard) complain of many of these tariff items it is no doubt because many of their vegetable growers are producing on land that at one time was valued at several thousand dollars an acre. But the advent of the motor truck has pushed the growing of vegetables back into the more remote districts, so that vegetables are grown to-day on land that is worth only fifty dollars an acre. I remember hearing an old sage make the remark that there was no land under the sun that was used for growing food that was worth more than fifty dollars an acre. When you attempt to make the growing of fruits and vegetables profitable on land of such high value as it is in the fruit-growing sections of the constituency of the hon. member for Wentworth, you are trying to do something that is fundamentally unsound. It is asking the tariff to make corrections that are impossible. There are certain fundamental facts and laws of

nature that cannot be corrected by tariffs, and I sometimes think that vegetable growers,, particularly those producing on very expensive land, expect too much.
I believe a review of the production of vegetables would show that the production in Ontario is very much larger than it was a few years ago, and that is largely due to the fact that more vegetables are grown in the remote districts where it is more economical to produce. That is the reason for the difficulties of many of the organized vegetable growers,-the competition they have to meet from the more remote districts. In the community in which I live the land is excellent. It lies in the valley of the Grand river and the soil is very fertile. Our farmers are good farmers. They keep a lot of cattle, so that no difficulty is found in increasing the fertility of ten acres of land. On that ten acres of land they will possibly grow more vegetables than all the gardeners around the city of Brantford, where the land is inferior and they have not the ordinary manure to make the land as productive as a farmer can who has a stable full of cattle.
I think some hon. gentlemen opposite are expecting the tariff to do the impossible. They are trying to hold up the value of the land in Wentworth and grow food on it, but if they are going to have a tariff to protect food grown on that high-valued land., it will mean an increased cost to the consumer.


William George Clark: I disagree somewhat with my hon. friend from Brant (Mr. Wood). In the first place the tariff as applied to vegetables is not added to the cost of the vegetables. The tariff is to prevent dumping; it is for protection only.


John Gordon Ross: Where? Speak for yourself.


William George Clark: It is in Ontario. Now that these items are under discussion, I should like to express my appreciation of the excellent timing which the Minister of National Revenue, with the assistance of the Minister of Agriculture, did in the application of the seasonal duties. A protection of a thousand per cent would not help if it were not timed correctly. Proper timing is essential in the application of these duties. I think the hon. member for Peel will agree with me up to that point.


Gordon Graydon: He will, up to that point.


William George Clark: The Minister of National Revenue is to be complimented on the wonderful job he has done in the past three years.

Canada-United. States Trade Agreement


Gordon Graydon: I am directly opposed to the argument of the hon. member for Brant (Mr. Wood). In many instances we do agree, but in this particular instance we are somewhat apart. First of all he entirely disregards climatic conditions. There are certain parts of Ontario particularly, close to large bodies of water, where the temperature and the climatic conditions are more adapted to the growing of fruits and vegetables than other parts, and when he makes a statement that we are in the more valuable parts, as he puts it, of Ontario, are vainly attempting to compete in the growing of vegetables, he is entirely away from the point. If his argument were sound it would apply equally to our milk business, and to other branches of farming. I am sure the hon. member for Brant would be the last to suggest that the county of Peel should turn to some other enterprise than farming; for when he wants to purchase a good Holstein cow he comes to the county of Peel, and has done so more than once. That is perhaps the best recommendation a man can give; for actions speak louder than words.
Supporting the hon. member for Essex South (Mr. Clark) I would say that too many people have the idea that a high tariff on vegetables at certain periods of the year raises the price to the consumer. Nothing could be further from the fact. All you have to do is to go into the fruit and vegetable markets of this country to find out what a low price our fruit and vegetable men are getting for their products at all seasons of the year. The tariff is merely for the purpose of protecting our market so that our people can sell at all. It is to stop the dumping of surplus United States products on our markets which would compete unfairly with our own production. If those who object to these tariffs would only study the situation, they would find that the tariff on fruits and vegetables has not raised prices in any way whatsoever to the consumer in Canada.


John Gordon Ross: In reply to the hon. member for Peel (Mr. Graydon) like many other members of the house he sets the boundaries of Canada within a very small distance of King and Yonge streets. Anybody who says that the tariff on fruits and vegetables does not raise the price is wrong. There may be sections of Canada where the tariff does not make a great difference because of heavy production-


Mr. SPENCE:: Do you call ten per cent a high tariff on vegetables? Would that make any real difference in the price?


John Gordon Ross: When you add the cost of bringing the vegetables into my
part of the country it does make a difference. I am not thinking of one particular section of the dominion only; but when a member stands up and says that the tariff does not <aise the price to the consumer, I say he is ivrong, because in many parts of Canada it does raise the price to the consumer, and very substantially in the part from which I come.


Charles Avery Dunning: Mr. Chairman, I know
this is the seventeenth of March, but after all, the item we are on is asparagus. Now that both views have been so eloquently expressed I wonder if we might just deal with the subject of the item.


David Spence: We had better take them all together.


Charles Avery Dunning: I would willingly take them together, but one of the hon. members opposite asked that I would put on Hansard in connection with each of them the imports for last year. Perhaps I may be permitted to do so now with respect to asparagus. Giving round figures, $96,000 worth of asparagus was imported last year.


Mr. LANDERYOU:: How much did the unemployed eat?


David Spence: I must say that I endorse what the hon. member for Peel has said. I also endorse what the hon. member for York East (Mr. McGregor) has said, that this is law to-day, it is passed, and we are losing a lot of time discussing it. I do not see how we can remedy it, but anyone knows that ten per cent on a very cheap commodity bought in the United States does not raise the price here at all. We used to have a duty of 30 per cent, but even that was insignificant and did not give much protection, particularly to vegetable growers. They are the hardest hit of the lot. They have got practically nothing for the last three or four years; they are pushed around every place.


John Gordon Ross: My hon. friend must admit it is not ten per cent part of the time.


David Spence: For ten weeks the duty is put on a certain commodity, say asparagus. Is that what it means? It is a seasonal tariff?


Charles Avery Dunning: Yes.


David Spence: Reference has been made to fruits or vegetables coming in at different times in different parts of the country. Take Leamington, for instance, around Windsor, and in that district, the vegetables come in practically two weeks sooner than they do elsewhere. It is a pity that there cannot be some kind of zoning system for applying this seasonal tariff, because the provision will be
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Canada-United, States Trade Agreement
practically of no use to the people of the district in which the hon. member for York East lives. It may give some protection to the people in the Niagara peninsula, about half what they should get, because in Windsor and vicinity the stuff comes in sooner. A great deal depends upon the time you put on your seasonal tariff. However, I cannot see how you can help the growers at all. You have the law; the conditions are laid down, including the number of weeks in which the seasonal tariff can apply, and you cannot extend that period. But perhaps you can change the dates so as to make the provision more suitable to the different areas affected, having in mind the fact in some parts this stuff comes in earlier than in others. But somebody is going to suffer no matter how you adjust a thing of this kind. The only hope is for the Minister of Finance to have the biggest heart possible to help these poor devils, because the vegetable people will absolutely starve this year. They have been in that position for three years.


Frederick George Sanderson: Carried?


David Spence: What is carried? What is the idea?


Frank Exton Lennard: To prevent repetition and not unnecessarily take up the time of the committee I would just say that I disagree absolutely with the hon. member for Brant (Mr. Wood) and agree with the hon. member for Peel (Mr. Graydon). That is that. I should like, however, on item 87 to repeat that it has been brought to my attention that fresh vegetables from Texas are being subsidized by the United States railways. The United States railway rate on fresh vegetables from Texas has been established on a package weight basis of 34 pounds, although the actual weight is around 60 pounds. That means that the Canadian National Railways is carrying these products from Chicago to Toronto and Montreal on the United States rate. In other words, our nationally-owned railway is carrying Texas products at a rate three-fourths less than the rate on Canadian products from Windsor to Montreal, and it really means that through this set-up the Canadian National Railways is subsidizing Texas products. That alone is a very serious handicap to our growers, and if it is allowed to continue it means that this duty signifies nothing at all.


Charles Avery Dunning: I am pleased that the
hon. member for Wentworth has put that last point on Hansard, because it will enable an examination of it to be made. I need not tell my hon. friend that usually there are two sides to a question, and also that his

information may not be complete. We shall be very glad to make a note of the point and to look into it.


George Ernest Wood: The hon. member for Wentworth (Mr. Lennard) and the hon. member for Peel (Mr. Graydon) seemed inclined to read into my remarks a lack of sympathy with these seasonal tariffs. I do not think anything they said has exploded my contention that the opposition has always come from that particular district which contains the owners of this high-priced land. I know the constituency from which the hon. member for Wentworth comes. It would be discourteous on my part to mention the name of any man, but I will just mention one example. The hon. member for Wentworth has in his riding a man who grew last year 35 acres of early potatoes, had them all harvested and marketed on the 25th of June, and then went for a tour down through the southern states and had a mighty good time on the proceeds of his sales; and he made some money as well. I am not objecting to that; it is quite all right, but this particular man came to me and objected very strongly because of certain importations of pears and other commodities. It often happens that most of the objection comes from those who may be the least deserving, people who are living on land valued at two or three thousand dollars an acre. The same consideration applies in the constituency of the hon. member for Peel; there are many people in his riding who are in exactly the same position. I want to correct any intimation which may appear on Hansard that I am opposed to seasonal tariffs. By no means. I am interested in a practicable and sensible solution of the question of the administration of this arrangement. But very often we are inclined to see difficulties elsewhere when the fault is our own. When we get into any trouble we analyse everybody but ourselves. We say that the economic system, or the government, or something else is wrong, instead of attempting to analyse our difficulties and trying to solve them. Perhaps that is our greatest trouble.


Charles Avery Dunning: Can we now carry
asparagus?


Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: I gather in a general
way that these in-season periods have been established to the best of the ability of the minister? The periods are established and cannot be changed, except possibly by a consideration of splitting a little later on; but the dates are definitely set?


Charles Avery Dunning: Yes. My hon. friend
is wrong in only one particular. Duration

Canada-United States Trade Agreement
is established in the treaty,-not dates; the duration of the period in which the special provisions apply as set in the treaty, but not specific dates.


Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: Seasonal changes might be taken care of?


Charles Avery Dunning: Exactly. That is part of the point of my answer to the hon. member for Peel, that there is that much possible flexibility.


Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: That is applicable all down the line?


Charles Avery Dunning: Yes.


Robert Henry McGregor: Do I understand that the minister will put on Hansard the corresponding United States duty for all the items?


Charles Avery Dunning: The United States duty on asparagus is 50 per cent ad valorem; no fixed value. The arrangement of our duty involves during the period in which it applies a very much higher duty than the United States duty. During the remainder of the year the Canadian duty against the United States product is much lower than the United States duty.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-87. Vegetables, fresh, in their natural state:
*(b) beans, green, 10 per cent; (1J cents per pound: 14 weeks.)
Charles Avery Dunning: Importations, $282,000; United States duty, 3J cents a pound.


Grote Stirling: The minister expressed gratification just now that the hon. member had placed on record certain references to payments by the United States federal authorities in assistance to producers. May I add to that a short quotation from the Northwest Daily Produce News of Seattle, dated July 20, 1938.
During the ten months' period from July, 1937, to May, 1938, surplus farm products purchased by the government equalled 29,900 cars, the cost of which was $21,287,000 and in addition freight was paid to the extent of $5,438,000, it has been announced by the agricultural adjustment administration.


Charles Avery Dunning: Is that for export, or for transport within the United States?


Grote Stirling: I understand that they divide their states into two categories, those which they look upon as their normal market for the growing states, and others that are not the normal market. But I cannot tell the minister whether these figures include assistance to exports or not. But here are some of the purchases:
Products were purchased in forty-five states. Distribution was made to an average of more than 2,000,000 needy families a month through state welfare agencies. The largest amounts bought during the ten-month period were: rice,
70.550.000	pounds; dry peas and beans, 59,000,000 pounds; dried prunes, 45,100.000 pounds; fresh apples, 5,600,000 bushels; dried apples,
14.450.000	pounds; oranges and grapefruit,
1.720.000	boxes; cabbage, 10,170,000 pounds; cottonseed oil, 9,780,000 pounds; butter, 8.320,000 pounds; eggs, 8.100,000 dozen; fluid milk,
8.100.000	quarts; dry skim milk, 8,650,000 pounds.
This gives an indication of the assistance that the federal authorities are giving to the producers of these different commodities, the result of which already has been increased production, against which we are fighting. As the minister knows, this whole matter is one to which I have had to pay very close attention over the years. He referred to his efforts in 1930 to please the people whom I represent, and others. Unfortunately, having arrived at a compromise, he has departed from that compromise in the 1938 agreement, for which those whom I represent are sincerely sorry. The Liberal government has accepted in principle the application of values for duty, and as I said in my speech on the second reading, those whom I represent regret that those periods have been cut down.
Does the government intend to continue to use the zoning method of application? Hitherto the country has been divided into three zones-I think I am right?


Charles Avery Dunning: Yes.


Grote Stirling: The reference the minister made just now to zoning within a province would merely be a modification, if that were possible?


Charles Avery Dunning: I do not think it is possible.


Grote Stirling: Perhaps not in the opinion of the government. But I wanted to get an assurance from the minister that zoning is still a part of the probable plan.


Charles Avery Dunning: Oh, yes.


Grote Stirling: He has dealt already with the other point I meant to refer to, namely, the splitting of other periods.


Mr. McNIVEN:: Will the minister indicate the area of the zones to which reference has just been made?


James Lorimer Ilsley: There are three-the maritime provinces being one, Ontario and Quebec another, and the rest of Canada the third.


John Gordon Ross: Would the minister consider splitting the third?
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Canada-United. States Trade Agreement


James Lorimer Ilsley: Consideration has been given to it a great many times, but so far we cannot see our way clear to do it.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-87. Vegetables, fresh, in their natural state:
(c)	brussels sprouts, 10 per cent.
Charles Avery Dunning: Imports are not separately recorded. The United States duty is 50 per cent.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-87. Vegetables, fresh, in their natural state:
*(d) cabbage, 10 per cent; (| cent per pound: 26 weeks).
Charles Avery Dunning: Imports, S358,000; United States duty, 14 cents a pound.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-87.	Vegetables, fresh, in
their natural state:
*(e) carrots, 10 per cent; (§ cent per pound: 26 weeks).
Charles Avery Dunning: Imports, 8356,000; United States duty, 25 per cent.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-87.	Vegetables, fresh, in
their natural state:
* beets, n.o.p., 10 per cent; (1 cent per pound: 26 weeks).
Charles Avery Dunning: Imports, $55,000; United States duty, 10 per cent.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
George James Tustin: Are there any exports of these vegetables?


Charles Avery Dunning: Yes, I can give the exports. Our total exports of all these alphabetically listed items last year was $38,000; the year before, $13,000. They are not separately recorded.
Customs tariff-87. Vegetables, fresh, in their natural state:
*(f) cauliflower, 10 per cent; (1J cents per pound: 20 weeks).


Charles Avery Dunning: Imports, $147,000; United States duty, 25 per cent.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-87. Vegetables, fresh, in their natural state:
eggplant, free.
Mr. NEEDHAM:: Was there a seasonal tariff on eggplant?


Charles Avery Dunning: No, and there is not now.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
{Mr. J. G. Ross.]
Customs tariff-87. Vegetables, fresh, in their natural state:
*(g) celery, 10 per cent; (f cent per pound: 26 weeks).
Charles Avery Dunning: Imports, $518,000; United States duty, one cent per pound from April to July; two cents a pound for the rest of the year.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-87. Vegetables, fresh, in their natural state:
*(h) cucumbers, 10 per cent; (2 cents per pound: 20 weeks).
Charles Avery Dunning: Imports, $65,000; United States dut.v, three cents a pound.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-87. Vegetables, fresh, in their natural state:
*(i) lettuce, 10 per cent; ($ cent per pound: 18 weeks).
Grote Stirling: This is thought by my people to be a very substantial cut indeed. The period has been shortened from 146 days to 126. They look upon that as a very serious obstacle to overcome.


Charles Avery Dunning: Canadian imports of
lettuce, $828,000; United States duty, two cents a pound.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-87. Vegetables, fresh, in their natural state:
(j) parsley, 10 per cent.
Charles Avery Dunning: Imports of parsley are not separately recorded.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-87. Vegetables, fresh, in their natural state:
*(k) peas, green, 10 per cent; (2 cents per pound: 12 weeks).
Charles Avery Dunning: Imports, SI 17,000; United States duty, July 1 to September 30, two cents a pound; remainder of the year, 3%o cents a pound.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-87. Vegetables, fresh, in their natural state:
(l)	rhubarb, 10 per cent; (1 cent per pound).
Charles Avery Dunning: Rhubarb is not separately recorded in our statistics.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-87. Vegetables, fresh, in their natural state:
(m)	spinach, 10 per cent.
Charles Avery Dunning: Imports $164,000; United States duty, 50 per cent.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.

Canada-United, States Trade Agreement
Customs tariff-87. Vegetables, fresh, in their natural state:
(n)	tomatoes, 10 per cent; but not less than 1J cents per pound.
William George Clark: I believe the greater part of our imports of tomatoes does not come from the republic immediately to our south, and I would suggest to the Minister of Einance that it would be in the interests of our growers to place a higher duty against that country from which most of our imports *come.


Charles Avery Dunning: I believe some other hon. members wanted to offer a few prayers in this regard.


Mr. MAYILEW:: 1 do not know whether
it is because to-day is March 17 that we seem to be against the government, but this is a serious matter to the people adjacent to my district who have a large investment in hothouses and equipment for the growing of tomatoes under glass. They cannot compete with tomatoes grown outside at that time of year. The growers are very much disturbed about this matter; in fact they feel that their industry will be completely wiped out if they do not get some further protection. I should like the minister to take that point under advisement.


Gordon Graydon: May I ask if there is
a serious influx of Mexican tomatoes into Canada at the present time?


Charles Avery Dunning: Last year our imports
from Mexico were greater than our imports from the United States. That is what the hon. member for Essex South was referring to, and I have had requests, which the hon. member just now supported, that a difference should be created between the general and intermediate tariffs in respect to tomatoes. I may tell my hon. friends that this is under [DOT]consideration at the present time.


Gordon Graydon: There is nothing in the
present trade agreement to prevent the government from increasing the tariff against these Mexican tomatoes, is there?


Charles Avery Dunning: Not as long as Mexico
is under the general tariff.


Frank Exton Lennard: I would also in a word
urge the minister to give serious consideration to this matter, because it means so much not only to the growers of hothouse tomatoes but also to those who grow stake tomatoes, which come in several weeks before the field crops.


Charles Avery Dunning: For once the hon. member for Wentworth was second to the hon. member for Essex South. I shall bear in mind that support from Wentworth.


James Samuel Taylor: The hon.
member for Victoria (Mr. Mayhew) has pleaded my case in regard to tomatoes, but I want to assure the minister that it is a very serious matter in my constituency. The growers there not only have to compete against Mexico, the Imperial valley and other hot places; I understand now they have to compete against tomatoes grown by the soil-free method, which is assuming very considerable proportions in certain parts of California.


Charles Avery Dunning: I should point out that
the ad valorem equivalent last year on Mexican tomatoes was 72 per cent.


Grote Stirling: Just one word with
regard to the seriousness of this situation in my constituency. For the moment I am dealing with it not so much in regard to the grower as in regard to the labour employed. It is going to be a very serious question where there is a very large acreage in tomatoes. I am not speaking only of the early tomatoes;
I am speaking of the main crop. We are fearful that the labour which hitherto has found a livelihood for a short time in the summer and fall, which enabled it to provide for winter sustenance, will be seriously affected.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-87. Vegetables, fresh, in their natural state:
(o)	watercress, 10 per cent; whitloof or endive, free; peppers, green, 10 per cent; radishes. 10 per cent; artichokes, horseradish and okra, free.
Charles Avery Dunning: Watercress is not separately recorded.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-87. Vegetables, fresh, in their natural state:
(p)	n.o.p.. 10 per cent.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-89. Vegetables, prepared, in airtight cans or other airtight containers, the weight of the containers to be included in the weight for duty:
(a) beans, baked or otherwise prepared, 1J cents per pound.
George James Tustin: What is the duty on canned goods entering the United States? What was it before the 1935 agreement, what was it under the last agreement, and what is it now.


Charles Avery Dunning: That is with respect to canned beans?


George James Tustin: If the minister so desires he might give the information in regard to beans now.
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Canada-TJnited States Trade Agreement


Charles Avery Dunning: It varies with different
commodities.


George James Tustin: If the minister desires to give the information under the individual items it will be all right; or he can put them all together.


Charles Avery Dunning: In regard to canned beans our imports last year were valued at $18,000, practically all from the United States. The United States rate is 3 cents per pound.


Donald Alexander McNiven: Has the minister the rate prior to 1935?


Charles Avery Dunning: It has not been changed.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-89. Vegetables, prepared, in airtight cans or other airtight containers, the weight of the containers to be included in the weight for duty:
ex (b) corn, 1J cents per pound.
George James Tustin: I should like the same information in regard to this item.


Charles Avery Dunning: Perhaps I should explain why that rate was not changed, because it applies to a number of other items. The principle on which the United States works in negotiating trade agreements is called the doctrine of the principal source of supply. No commodity is included in an agreement with Canada of which Canada is not the principal source of supply. It is a very logical principle to adopt, having regard to the legislation under which the United States operates with respect to trade agreement matters. For instance, in connection with canned beans, if they gave a concession to Canada, which is not the principal supplier, that concession under the most favoured nation arrangement would go automatically to whatever nation was the principal supplier, and would thus prejudice the United States in possible negotiations with that nation. I may say that while we have no such legal restriction so far as Canada is concerned we do endeavour to keep the same principle in mind when we are negotiating. It would be absurd to give a concession to one country which was a small supplier of a commodity in a trade agreement in which reciprocal advantages were exchanged. It would mean giving a minor advantage to that country and a major advantage to some third country which in the nature of things was the principal supplier of the commodity in question.


George James Tustin: Will the minister give the countervailing duties on these items going into the United States?


Charles Avery Dunning: I will give them on each of these items.


George James Tustin: And the exports?


Charles Avery Dunning: Our imports of canned com last year were valued at $2,700. The exports are not separately recorded. The United States tariff on corn prepared or preserved is 35 per cent.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-89. Vegetables, prepared, in airtight cans or other airtight containers, the weight of the containers to be included in the weight for duty:
(c)	peas, 1J cents per pound.
Charles Avery Dunning: The imports from the United States of canned peas amounted last year to $1,800, an increase from the previous year, when they were only $200. The United States tariff on peas prepared or preserved is two cents per pound.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-89. Vegetables, prepared, in
airtight cans or other airtight containers,-the weight of the containers to be included in the weight for duty:
(d)	n.o.p., 20 per cent.
Charles Avery Dunning: Under this item the imports last year were $16,400, almost wholly from the United States. The United States duty varies. It is an n.o.p. item and usually, on most of the items which would fall within this limit, 35 per cent ad valorem.


George James Tustin: I must protest against the reduction on canned goods in this agreement. In 1935 when there was a duty of three cents per pound on canned goods coming into the country the importations from the United States were $723,378. Under the last agreement, when it was reduced to two cents, there were in 1938 imports amounting to $1,493,377. In the face of the great increase in importations of canned goods the government have now seen fit to produce the tariff to one and a half cents per pound. Surely they must be aware of the full warehouses. I do not wish to take up the time of the committee but I must protest on behalf of the producers who are in this business. If anything can be done it should certainly be done for this line of industry.


Charles Avery Dunning: I am quite sure that the figures my hon. friend gave are not those that are applicable to canned vegetables. I gave separately the importations of each of the commodities comprised within this group, and I am sure they would not total the figure he gave. I can only assume that he has included, in the figure he gave, all varieties of canned goods, whether vegetables, fruits; meats or others. I say that for purposes of a correct record.

Canada-United. States Trade Agreement


George James Tustin: The figures I have were given me a few days ago by the bureau of statistics, and the figures I quote are for canned vegetables. I have the figures for canned fruits and meats, but they are not added to the figures I have just given.


Charles Avery Dunning: There must be something wrong, because the source of our figures is also the Dominion Bureau of Statistics. I gave the figures separately and the hon. member gave the aggregate figures respecting importations of canned vegetables. Mine do not total anywhere near his.


George James Tustin: I got my figures from the bureau of statistics, and if they are not to be relied on, then-


Charles Avery Dunning: I have the answer now. I gave figures dealing with these canned vegetables particularly, which are within the purview of this agreement. The figures given by my hon. friend have reference to canned vegetables that are not affected at all by the agreement. So that probably his complaint will be minimized to that extent.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-90. Vegetables, prepared or preserved:
(a) dried, desiccated or dehydrated, including vegetable flour, n.o.p., 22 j per cent;
(e)	vegetable extracts or juices, liquid mustards, soy and vegetable sauces of all kinds, 27J per cent.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-92. Fruits, fresh, in their natural state:
* (a) apricots, March to December, inclusive, 10 per cent; (li cent per pound).
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-92. Fruits, fresh, in their natural state:
*(b) cherries, 10 per cent; (3 cents per pound: 7 weeks).
Harry James Barber: As has already been said, I do not think there is much use in spending a great deal of time on these items. It is quite apparent the government, by this agreement has dealt another blow to the fruit industry of British Columbia, On cherries the in-season protection has been reduced from 81 to 43-8 cents per case and the in-season period reduced from 8 to 7 weeks. That is not the worst part of it. I represent a district in which we produce an enormous quantity of cherries and our problem at one time was to get the people of Vancouver to buy Canadian cherries. They were paying 20 or 25 cents a pound for United States cherries through brokers. We put on a cherry carnival on the
first of July each year. This date coincides with the production season. We sold cherries to Vancouver people at 8 and 9 cents a pound and they were as good cherries as those that are imported. We have built up that business until we sold as high as 40 tons on that day.


Charles Avery Dunning: Excellent.


Harry James Barber: People coming from Vancouver by motor car to attend that carnival bought our cherries by the pound or crate. Last year however the season was a little early and on the first of July we did not have the buyers. The reason was that between the middle of June and the first of July, 17 cars of cherries were dumped from across the line on the Vancouver market. That is one complaint. It is not the application of the dumping duty or the regulations as regards time, but that simply meant that producers in my district lost tons of cherries. They rotted in the gardens simply because an enormous quantity of cherries had previously come in. We did object to the 17 cars that came in because they came in at a time that should have been included in the in-season period.


Charles Avery Dunning: The dates can be adjusted.


Harry James Barber: There should be some way of keeping track of the different seasons. Some seasons are earlier than others. Can the minister give us the imports?


Charles Avery Dunning: As my hon. friend will recognize, the great difficulty is as between different parts of Canada and also as between different seasons in the same part of Canada. In British Columbia they went on last year on the 14th of June. That would appear from my hon. friend's statement to have been early enough. However, it should be taken up with the Minister of National Revenue.


Harry James Barber: It was after the 12th of June that 17 cars came in. They rolled them in ahead of our date. And we had earl-y cherries before that. Perhaps the minister will give the imports.


Charles Avery Dunning: The imports of cherries last year from the United States totalled 8110,000.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-92. Fruits, fresh, in their natural state:
(c) cranberries, 10 per cent, but not less than 1J cents per pound.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-92. Fruits, fresh, in their natural state:
* (d) peaches. May to November, inclusive, 10 per cent; (1? cents per pound: 9 weeks).
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Canada-United States Trade Agreement
Charles Avery Dunning: The imports of peaches amounted to $248,000.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-92. Fruits, fresh, in their natural state:
* (e) pears, May to January, inclusive, 10 per cent; (1 cent per pound: 15 weeks).
Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: What were the imports
of pears?


Charles Avery Dunning: The imports last year of fresh pears from the United States were $477,000.


Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: A great deal was heard about the deliberations that took place in connection with the negotiation of this treaty. Changes have been made in connection with commodities in which there are large importations, and I should like to know what method was taken to ascertain the views of the growers of these particular commodities. Was any effort made to ascertain the view of the Canadian producer before the treaty was actually signed?


Charles Avery Dunning: In general, there is not an item affected by this agreement which was not the subject of a brief to the government, to myself usually, from associations of the classes of producers interested. With regard to pears and other similar products, we were briefed fully by the Canadian Horticultural Council. Into the docket in my office bearing the number of each of these various items go all the representations made during the year from anyone anywhere. We have been in constant touch and communication with those vitally interested in the production of the commodity with which we were dealing. That is the system, I must compliment Canadian producers of all kinds upon the effective manner in which they briefed us in connection with the commodities in which they were interested.


Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: That is the point I wanted to bring out. I wanted an expression from the minister as to whether they had dealt fully with the situation and given him all the available information.


Charles Avery Dunning: I have no doubt of that at all.


Mr BARBER:: I take it that the 10 per cent is to apply from May to November, and the item will be free the rest of the time?


Charles Avery Dunning: My hon. friend is correct. Nothing could be done with respect to the rest of the year because of bound margins under the British and other dominion agreements.
fMr. Dunning.]


Grote Stirling: During the other months the British preference rate would apply?


Charles Avery Dunning: There are fixed margins in connection with other dominions.


Donald Alexander McNiven: Does the same apply to peaches?


Charles Avery Dunning: Yes.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-92. Fruits, fresh, in their natural state:
(f) plums and prunes, May to November,. 10 per cent; (plums: 1 cent per lb.: 10 weeks); (prunes: 1 cent per lb.: 8 weeks).
Harry James Barber: I have the same complaint to make with regard to the application on prunes. We grow hundreds of tons of prunes in the particular part of the country from which I come, and we have considerable difficulty in having the application made in time. Could the minister tell me what time this application was made last year on prunes?'


James Lorimer Ilsley: August 19.


Harry James Barber: They tried to get it about. August 10.


James Lorimer Ilsley: Representations are always made by the fruit growing interests to put it on at an early date, and representations come from the importing interests to defer putting it on. It is a very difficult matter to adjust.


Harry James Barber: Here is what happens with regard to prunes. One canner comes along and tries to beat down the growers to a half cent per pound for their fruit. He tells them that if they do not take it he will buy imported prunes. He will load up with 40 or 50 tons of prunes the day before the protection comes on and leaves the growers in an unfortunate position.


James Lorimer Ilsley: It was done earlier last year than the previous year.


Harry James Barber: The season was a great
deal earlier.


Donald Alexander McNiven: What were the importations of plums and prunes?


Charles Avery Dunning: The importations last year of plums and prunes were $262,000.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-92. Fruits, fresh, in their natural state:
*(g) strawberries, 10 per cent; (If cents per lb.: 6 weeks).
* raspberries and loganberries, 10 per cent;
(2 cents per lb.: 6 weeks).
Harry James Barber: The in-season is reduced' from eight to six weeks, while the protection,

Canada-United. States Trade Agreement
has been reduced by over fifty per cent since 1935. This is a large industry. From one point in the district which I have the honour to represent they shipped 145 cars of fresh strawberries to the prairies. The prairie members did not pay any more for strawberries owing to the protection given, because they never even got a price equal to the protection. There was sufficient Canadian competition, there was sufficient British Columbia competition to keep the price down. Although the growers sold more fruit last year, their profits were a great deal less than in any other year. A few years ago a carload of strawberries arrived in Ottawa from my district. United States strawberries had been selling for from 20 to 25 cents per box, but two days before this car arrived in Ottawa the United States berries were reduced to 10 cents a box. The British Columbia berries sold for 15 cents a box right alongside the United States berries. If these Canadian berries had not been in transit the price of the United States berries would have been held up for another week or two. When people say that protection increases the price, they should study these things a little more closely.


Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: There has been a reduction of 33$ per cent in the in-season period. Is there any reason why this period should have been so drastically reduced to six weeks?


Charles Avery Dunning: Just a matter of negotiation. We were doing the best we could.


Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: In other words, we gave them an exceptionally nice slice of the melon. The strawberry growers are going to be seriously affected through having only a six weeks in-season.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-92. Fruits, fresh, in their natural state:
(h)	berries, edible, n.o.p., 10 per cent.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-92. Fruits, fresh, in their natural state:
(i)	quinces, and nectarines, June to February, inclusive, 10 per cent.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-93. *Apples, fresh, in their natural state, 15 per cent; (| cent per pound).
Mr. RICKARD:: Is there any time limit on apples?


Charles Avery Dunning: No time limit.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-94. Grapes, fresh, in their natural state, the weight of the packages to be included in the weight for duty, July to January, inclusive, one cent per pound.
Grote Stirling: There had been a considerable growth of acreage in grapes, and of varying varieties, in the southern part of British Columbia. Why has the duty been cut 33$ per cent?


Charles Avery Dunning: Do you mean the period?


Grote Stirling: The duty. There is no period left.


Charles Avery Dunning: It is a thorny subject. Our wineries use imported grapes as well as Canadian grapes. Last year the grapes imported amounted to $976,000; our own production was about $1,100,000. The ad valorem equivalent duty on grapes last year was 46 per cent.


Grote Stirling: Is the minister able to divide that $976,000 of imports geographically? Does he know that most of it came into Ontario and Quebec, and just where it came in?


Charles Avery Dunning: There are no figures as to provincial distribution, but undoubtedly, from the nature of the industry, it came principally into Ontario and Quebec.


Thomas Langton Church: With reference to items 93 and 94, does the minister think it is fair to the producer of these fruits in Ontario to reduce the duties? Around the city of Toronto for many years there were many market gardeners engaged in this work, but now it does not pay them to till the land for apples and grapes. You might just as well ask the people of the United States to buy these fruits from South Africa instead ol buying from their own domestic producers in California and Florida. I think it is too baa to destroy such a large industry around Toronto. They had the St. Lawrence market and other markets where these people came in with their produce every Saturday. You might just as well put these fruits on the free list and have complete free trade.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-95. Canteloupes and musl melons, 10 per cent; (1$ cents per lb.: 8 weeks).
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-95a. Melons, n.o.p., 2 cents each.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-96. Fruits, fresh, in their
natural state, n.o.p., 10 per cent.
Item agreed to.
2014	COMMONS
Canada-United States Trade Agreement
Customs tariff-ex 96. Avocados or alligator pears, free.
Provided, that, as regards such of those articles dutiable under tariff items 84, ex 85, 87, 92, 93 and 95, as are marked with an asterisk in this schedule, Canada reserves the right to fix the value for duty at a figure exceeding the invoice value by not more than the amount set forth in the parentheses following the descriptions of the several articles;
The values so fixed shall not be maintained in force in any twelve months ending March 31 for a period in excess of the number of weeks set forth in the parentheses following the descriptions of the several articles; provided, however, as regards articles dutiable under subitems (d) and (e) of tariff item 87, the number of weeks during which the value so fixed may be maintained in force may be divided into not more than two separate periods, the combined duration of which shall not exceed the number of weeks set forth in the parentheses following the descriptions of the articles;
Provided further, that Canada reserves the right, after consultation with the United States of America, to substitute, in whole or in part, for the system of protection of these fruits and vegetables by means of advances in values for duty purposes, a system of specific duties which shall not be more burdensome on imports from the United States of America than that provided for in this agreement.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-99a. Plums or prunes, dried, unpitted, when in packages weighing two pounds each, or less, the weight of such packages to be included in the weight for duty, 1 cent per pound.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-99b. Fruits, dried, desiccated, evaporated or dehydrated, n.o.p., 15 per cent.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-99d. Dates, dried, unpitted, in bulk, i cent per pound.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-99f. Figs, dried, when in packages -weighing two pounds each, or less, the weight of such packages to be included in the weight for duty, i cent per pound.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-99g. Apricots, nectarines, pears and peaches, dried, desiccated, evaporated or dehydrated, 221 per cent.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-100a. Grapefruit, n.o.p., 1 cent per pound.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-101. Oranges, n.o.p.: December to April, inclusive, free; May to November, inclusive, 35 cents per cubic foot.
Provided that Canada reserves the right to substitute for the above item the following:
Customs tariff-101. Oranges, n.o.p.: January to July, inclusive, free; August to December, inclusive, 35 cents per cubic foot.
Grote Stirling: Which of these two items is to be made use of?


Charles Avery Dunning: That is a very difficult
question to answer.


Grote Stirling: Why difficult? Because
the information has not reached the minister yet?


Charles Avery Dunning: No, but because one
wants to defer a decision until as close as possible to the time the duty shall become effective. We left ourselves as free as possible in the matter in order to decide it in the best interests of our own country.


John Gordon Ross: Before we pass
this item I should like to make a few remarks on it.
Oranges is one of the items under the British empire agreement which was changed in duty to the great detriment of the Canadian people. We have heard hon. members from the other side of the house lauding the British empire agreement for the great good it did Canada, but here is one place where the consumer was again sacrificed in true Tory fashion to help certain of the industrialists in Canada.


Charles Avery Dunning: This is a reduction in
duty.


John Gordon Ross: Yes, but it has
not been reduced anywhere near to where it should have been. The British empire agreement bound the duty so that it could not be changed. That is the trouble. Many other items were similarly bound, but this one item will show what the British empire agreement did for the Canadian people. The British empire agreement placed a duty of 35 cents a cubic foot on the importation of oranges. Prior to that we were importing into Canada from 2,500,000 to 3,000,000 boxes of oranges a year. But in order to sell automobile chassis, sawn lumber, newsprint and box shooks to Australia and South Africa, a bound rate of 35 cents a cubic foot was put on oranges by the former administration, and oranges from the British empire were made free. A similar thing happened with respect to the corn rate, of which we were speaking earlier this afternoon. A rate of 20 cents a bushel was put on corn to help South Africa.
Now what happened was this. First, Japan protested vigorously against the imposition of this duty of 35 cents per cubic foot. So the big stick trader from the Conservative party at that time, Mr. R. B. Bennett, backed up to count the cost to the Canadian industrialist. He found out that Japan had threatened to boycott Canadian manufactured goods or

Canada-United States Trade Agreement
place a much higher tariff on them. Although the dictionary said that a Japanese orange was an orange, although the trade always called the Japanese orange an orange, an order in council was passed at that time, saying that a loose-skinned mandarin or tangerine was not an orange and therefore could enter Canada free. But other oranges, the same tangerines and mandarins from the United States, were still subject to the same duty of 35 cents per cubic foot.
After that duty of 35 cents per cubic foot became effective, the consumption of oranges went down in Canada to about 2,000,000 cases, a drop of about 500,000 cases. During the same period, and under the same economic conditions, the consumption of oranges in the United States went up by 7J per cent, while our consumption dropped 12 per cent. Average importations of oranges from British empire countries into Canada during the time of the British empire agreement amounted to only 115,000 boxes. The Canadian consumer, on all the oranges that he purchased, paid $1,350,000 more on account of that 35 cents per cubic foot.


Gordon Graydon: No.


John Gordon Ross: He paid
$1,350,000 more.


Gordon Graydon: The hon. member cannot prove that.


George James Tustin: The price was not increased.


John Gordon Ross: Of course the
price was increased. Oranges sold into Canada are sold from the * United States at exactly the same price as is paid by the United States buyer, but the Canadian buyer has to pay a tariff charge which is 35 cents per cubic foot.


Mr. BROWN:: That is not necessarily so.


John Gordon Ross: But it is so in this case. What did that mean? It simply meant that in order to protect oranges from certain parts of the British empire, of which ionly 115,000 cases were shipped to this country, the consumers paid an additional $1,350,000, or at the rate of $12 cash per box over and above the price of the oranges which were bought from the British empire.


Gordon Graydon: Oh, no.


John Gordon Ross: My hon. friend says no. In 1935, after this government came into power-


Mr. MacNICOL:: Everything went to
pieces.


John Gordon Ross: -they made a trade treaty with the United States and they
allowed four months' free entry of oranges into Canada. In the year 1936, when that treaty was initiated, there were imported into Canada from the United States more oranges, of course, during the four month period, January, February, March and April. Here is what actually took place in connection with the price of oranges in Canada. On the Montreal market, for size 252, which is the most popular size of orange purchased there, the price during the four months when the duty was off averaged 23} cents a dozen retail to the consumer. But during the other eight months of the same year, while the tariff of 35 cents per cubic foot was on, the price for the same size was 33 cents per dozen oranges. That applied all through the eight months period.


Wilbert Franklin (Frank) Rickard: What did the apple
growers get for their apples during that time?


Henry Herbert Stevens: Surely the hon. member must know that the flush period of production in California, where most of the oranges come from, is from the middle of December until April.


John Gordon Ross: My hon. friend is entirely wrong.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I am not.


John Gordon Ross: There are two kinds of oranges grown in California, the navel orange and the Valencia. The navel orange starts to become ripe and is shipped in November and on through to January.


Henry Herbert Stevens: No.


John Gordon Ross: I am telling my hon. friend the facts. The Valencia orange starts to ripen in April, and is picked from April through to July.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Surely, but it is much smaller in quantity.


John Gordon Ross: No, not much smaller. The large amount of fruit grown in the United States in these months is grown to-day in Florida and Texas, and a great deal of the fruit which is received in this part of Canada comes from those states.
The actual facts in connection with the price of oranges at that time are as I have given them to the committee. In other words it has cost us practically ten cents a dozen more for oranges while the duty period is on than when it is off. We still have this provision in the treaty. We cannot escape it because we cannot get certain parts of the empire to let go of the bound rate which was put in the 1932 agreement. This applies not only to oranges but also to many other fruits

2016	COMMONS
Canada-United States Trade Agreement
in our trade schedules. As a matter of fact, when this government first came into office there were some 200 bound rates. There are now around 90, and it is to the credit of the government that changes have been made to that extent. This government does not bind a rate against decrease; it binds only against increase. My hon. friend's party bound only against decreases.


Ernest Edward Perley: We put more items on the free list than your government did all the time it has been in office.


John Gordon Ross: My hon. friend is entirely wrong.


Ernest Edward Perley: Well, look at the record.


Charles Avery Dunning: I see we are starting a discussion here which will probably continue, and I am desirous of reporting progress before six o'clock.


John Gordon Ross: I will allow the item to go now.


John Ritchie MacNicol: We on this side will try to help the minister.


Charles Avery Dunning: I think everyone has been trying to help me this afternoon, and I appreciate it. I want to congratulate the committee on a good afternoon's work.


Mr. COLDWELL:: The item of oranges is standing, is it not?


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: It has not been passed.
Item stands.
Progress reported.
At six o'clock the house took recess.
After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock. PRIVATE BILLS


SECOND HEADINGS
[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 41, for the relief of Edythe Marjorie Burke Atkinson-Mr. Heaps.
Bill No. 42, for the relief of Marie Louise Rosetti Di Rosa-Mr. Macdonald (Brantford City).

[Stage Direction]
Mr. T. L. CHURCH (Broadview) moved the second reading of Bill No. 11, respecting balloting on questions of great national importance.
Ernest Lapointe: Explain.


Thomas Langton Church: In moving the second reading of this bill, as to-day is the anniversary of a great saint and a great man, and a notable day to a great many people of the Irish race in this country, I wish to compliment you, Mr. Speaker, as the representative of another great people, the people of the glorious land of France, towards which the eyes of the whole civilized world were turned during the great war, who suffered pain, sacrifices, sorrow, anguish and great privations and the story of whose endurance, bravery, and glorious service to humanity will live in the annals of patriotism forever. The people of Ireland were a downtrodden people for a great many years. I wish to pay tribute to you, sir, for your conduct of the public business in the interests of the people of Canada.
In moving the second reading of this bill let me say that it does not in any sense involve the expenditure of money, because it is only enabling and permissive legislation. It gives power to the governor in council if he sees fit to refer any matter of national importance to the people. This house, and parliamentary institutions generally in this country, have not been treated fairly by some of the press as far as reporting the proceedings of parliament is concerned. I should like to take a couple of minutes to answer some of the criticism which has been directed against this house from outside. As far as the notice or reports given by some of the press to the proceedings here is concerned we might just as well turn the key in the door and hold the sittings in secret or in private. The press has a duty to the public, which with three or four exceptions it is not carrying out,-to give to the people the plain facts of what is being done in this house.
The ballot proposed has been the rule in the municipalities for many years. I see the respected and honoured Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) here to-night. I think he is a taxpayer in the city of Quebec.


Ernest Lapointe: But we are not a municipality.


Thomas Langton Church: The taxes he pays on a piece of real estate may be a rent in itself. The object of this bill is to apply the law which has been the rule in the municipalities since confederation and in the provinces to federal affairs, so that we shall have government of the people by the people and for the people and let the people rule so that they will have something to say about the disposition of their own property. This pro-

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vision for a referendum was found to be in the public interest and of great benefit; it was found to prevent waste and to check overgovernment and overtaxation. It has been in operation extensively in the provinces for years. As the explanatory note says, it is enabling legislation similar to that for many years in vogue in democratic countries. It is found to be in the public interest and most useful, permitting the submission of important domestic national questions to the wisdom and judgment of the electors. The provinces have used it extensively for years through the municipalities, thus providing an opportunity for giving the public a voice in government policies. It will create a prerogative of checks and balances and make for government "of the people, by the people, and for the people." It is only enabling legislation to enable the governor in council to submit to a vote any question of national importance.
Last year I wrote a letter to the special committee on electoral matters. The following is from the record of the committee's proceedings, May 4, 1938:


Frederick George Sanderson: Gentlemen, I have a letter which I would like to read to you so that you may think the matter over and dispose of it at a later date. This letter is from Mr. T. L. Church, M.P., and is addressed to the chairman and gentlemen of this committee.
I thought I would simply acknowledge receipt of the letter and read it to the committee and we can discuss it at a later date.
Mr. Pelletier: Would it be possible to have a copy of the letter?


Frederick George Sanderson: It is simply a matter of
adding a clause in the elections act whereby we can submit a referendum to the people on certain questions. The letter does not describe the matter in any clearer form than the bare statement.
Mr. McIntosh: Does he mean that a referendum would be held at the same time as the voting?


Frederick George Sanderson: To make provision for that to be done.
Mr. Taylor:	It is impossible to have a
referendum under the present act?


Frederick George Sanderson: There is no provision in the act now.
(At this point the committee proceeded to other business. There is no record of the letter having been read.)
You, Mr. Speaker, have been a municipal ratepayer for many years and will realize that a provision for referendum on matters affecting the liberty of the subject and the control and disposition of property is a wise thing. For example, the city of Toronto has a splendid patriotic press, all good papers; they do a great deal for the city and country. I do not wish to criticize in any way the press, far from it; I have on other occasions 71492-1271
in my newspaper bill paid tribute to the press and what it does for the people of the country in peace and war alike. But I recall an occasion in Toronto when five of the six daily Toronto newspapers advocated very strongly the purchase by the people at $32,000,000 of an old electric railway and electric light company's franchise and physical assets which was reported by the investigator to be worth $6,000,000. Had it not been for the voice of one newspaper, the Telegram, and one or two men in the Toronto city hall- I am not saying who they were-the people of Toronto forever would have had to pay carfare at a cost of two tickets for a quarter on the streets of the city. A referendum should have been held on the proposal that the municipalities should buy and control this light and power and transportation, and some of the papers supported the purchase and nearly pulled it oil over the people's heads. But an amendment to the municipal act was sent to the legislature by the city, when my hon. friend, the member for Park-dale was in the city council, providing that no franchise to any light, power or transportation company should be granted by law over the streets of municipalities in the province of Ontario without a vote of the ratepayers That amendment to the Municipal Act, which I moved, passed the legislature and is commonly called the Beck act. If that policy is good for municipalities and provinces, it is good federally. It would have been good in connection with the launching of three transcontinental railways. Some of the old newspapers were responsible for the present railway situation and bungle in this country; they said " Cox could not wait." Had the people then had a voice in that, I doubt if the railway situation in Canada would be what it is to-day. I am not criticizing the newspapers, but in the early days of this century they created-at least most of them did-this folly. There is political wisdom even in what I said the other night that you can never answer a newspaper, because it always has the last word.
The principle of this bill is to trust the people, and let them have a more important place in domestic government. What has become of the old clear-cut doctrine of representation by population, a principle recognized before confederation and a splendid doctrine that did credit to Liberalism. It was a good principle, because it gave the people a voice. I would not have a referendum on questions of defence or war or foreign affairs, that would be a great mistake. The government of the day must take the responsibility in an emergency, as Sir Robert Borden did
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in August 1914, and the country backed him up. The enemy might be in the country and take possession before you could open the ballot boxes. If a referendum was held, they would sail up the St. Lawrence and destroy our leading cities in eastern Canada. I would hold referendums on great domestic problems such as I have described and on over-government and over-taxation. I think the people know more about our railways than some of the members of this house. It does not indicate great wisdom when we see three or four transcontinental, double track railways, with all their branch lines as condemned by the Drayton-Acworth and Duff reports. If that proposition had been submitted to the people in 1905 and 1909 I doubt if we would have had a second or third transcontinental railway in this country; nor, I believe, would we have had the over-government and waste from which >ve have suffered in the past. In the Drayton-Acworth report it was stated that Canada, with a population of 10 millions, had a railway mileage equal to that of Germany with a population of 67 millions, and of France and England, with populations of 46 and 47 millions. With Canada's 42,000 miles of single track it is now too late to hold a referendum.
A further point is that a referendum would be a check on hasty legislation. It would ensure that vital and important measures dealing with domestic affairs could not be passed by parliament against the wishes of a majority of the electors. A referendum is the most effective way of making the voice of the people effective. In the second place the compulsory referendum would be the greatest possible safeguard against sudden tampering with the constitution. It would be used principally in regard to questions of constitutional change, so would not involve serious changes in the routine of government.
The representative system has completely broken down. British statesmen, though professing to serve their constituents and the will of the people, are becoming more and more independent and out of touch with them, except at elections. They can hardly object to becoming more subject to popular control. Under the referendum it is not necessary for a ministry to resign when one of its schemes is rejected. Thus able men may remain in office even though one of their proposals may be rejected. The heart of the whole policy is often contained in some single resolution or law; and if the doctrine of the mandate has any place in democratic theory, it is applicable on these pivotal occasions. The electors would have to vote for measures and principles, not for men, and this they are perfectly competent to do. At

present they are asked to decide between two or three complicated policies which touch every foreign and domestic interest of the state, without a chance to exercise a critical selection between the good points and the bad. Surely they can decide on the advantages or disadvantages of a single legislative proposal. The merits of voting for men, not measures, are disproved by the steady degeneration in the type of candidates elected. The public think they have a good man when they may not. The reason why voting is so small in many referenda is that considerations of party and personal passion and prejudice are absent. Those who do not vote presumably are indifferent to what may happen, so those who are concerned are rightly allowed to decide.
Then, Mr. Speaker, this would be politically educational, and would free people of the habit of thinking in terms of parties. Measures would then be considered from the point of view of the community rather than of the interests of parties, creeds, sects and classes. The House of Commons would still deal with unimportant measures and would have to draw -up each measure to be referred, settle all the details connected with it and finally present the best result that could be obtained. The adoption of the referendum plan would lessen the evils of the party system, because the certainty that party support meant party victory would vanish. A partial or trial application of the referendum system might be made. It would put more vigour into political life and would give the electorate the feeling that they really controlled their destiny. In some of the states of the union and in Switzerland it has been tried with great success. Far from being an un-English institution, it originated in England in the seventeenth century. Its position in the United States is that of substitute for the veto, which is a cardinal feature of English constitutional theory. The royal veto is now a mere survival, but the need for a sovereign veto remains. No fewer than 1,600 instances are known in America, and undoubtedly if the system had been a failure it would have been dropped. It is an ordinary part of trade union constitutions in England, and has worked well. That is, strikes are nearly always subject to it, and in those cases where it is not used the strikes very often fail because of the discord that follows lack of agreement about the policy to be adopted. In addition it keeps the legislature and individual members in touch with opinion in the country during the interval between one general election and the next.
It is not my desire to criticize the newspaper or splendid public activities of that great

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and most popular young Canadian, Mr. Mc-Cullagh, or of that other patriot and gentleman who was a great pioneer and who is a very much beloved citizen, Mr. Wright, both of whom are old and admired friends of mine. As I see it these two gentlemen have done a great public service, in one sense, in that they have reawakened and reconsecrated public opinion to paying more attention to the way we are governed and the need of modern reforms. After all is said and done, while the fathers of confederation are greatly respected it must not be forgotten that mistakes were made, and it is the duty of parliament to endeavour to remedy those mistakes, and to bring the conduct of public business up to date.
Our whole system of government seems to be upside down. As I see it one of the cardinal principles of our constitution is that the courts shall be subservient to the legislature. To-day the working man is at the mercy of arbitrary social conditions which are quite beyond Iris control. A century ago we reformed the franchise to secure the liberty of trade and commerce and industry. Later that reform was extended for the benefit of the mercantile industrial classes as against a landed family compact, and still later it was extended to wage earners and women, in order to enlist the aid of the women toward the betterment of social conditions. Our governments have done the best they could, faced with that comedy of errors called the British North America Act, a relic of the ox cart days. We are told that we have to suffer all the economic evils of to-day because of the British North America Act; because certain wise men, whose vision did not extend to the conditions of to-day, unloaded the provincial system upon us as opposed to the federal system which they have in England. Many things we enjoy to-day were unheard of in 1867. Then there were no joint stock companies, no telephones, no power development, no air lines, no radios, no old age pensions, no social insurance, no eight-hour day; nor had they the benefit of many of the great discoveries that have been made in science, physics and biology. Are we to assume that these men who lived in the past left us adequate machinery to deal with the problems these new discoveries have brought us? The authors of the British North America Act did not play bridge or squash or badminton, or go to rugby or pro hockey games, but they left us this relic, the British North America Act. As a result the unemployed have to suffer, and we cannot solve the simplest economic and social questions.
What I should like to see result from this referendum system is a restoration of government of the people, by the people and for the people. The British North America Act is blamed for our failure to solve our most pressing problems, but the constitutional parliamentary, cabinet and law reform problems are the most pressing of all. It is responsible for the failure of any effort on the part of the dominion, the provinces and the municipalities to solve the difficulties with which we are faced while the people suffer untold hardship, misery and want.
In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, may I say that we in this house are even blamed for our present canal system. I saw an article to that effect in the press this morning. The Rideau canal was financed and built by the British government as a back door to lake Ontario to aid the inadequate defences shown in the war of 1812. The newspapers make a great many statements that are not correct. They published garbled accounts of the debate that took place here just a week ago to-night with regard to constitutional and cabinet reform and the statute of Westminster. I suggest that some of our editors should publish what actually happens in this house and give the people the truth and facts; because we might as well be meeting in secret for all that is said about us by some of the newspapers with regard to our proceedings. And what is going on here under the constitution? In the old days our newspapers published an account of the proceedings of our democratic bodies in federal, provincial and municipal affairs. In the last two cases they still do, but not as to the proceedings here. For example, from what source do some papers principally derive their news concerning Great Britain? Do we get it from Britain direct or from Mr. Chamberlain: I venture to say that a large part of the information that we read with regard to the old land-in some papers there are many notable exceptions-does not come from England but through the papers of the United States. Many of the articles you read in the morning papers in this country have already appeared in some of the newspapers of Cleveland, New York and Washington, in United States press chains instead of direct from London.
Those who criticize the party system do so not without some cause. It has some defects, I admit. It sometimes leads members to forget the basis and functions for which political parties were formed two hundred years ago, for the greatness of the country and the welfare of its people. But when you criticize its faults, do not also forget its virtues and what it has done in the old land and in the empire for good government and for government of the people by the people
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and for the people. It has given the mother of parliaments the good government it has had and its modern reforms for the benefit of the masses and of the suffering millions and the free parliamentary institutions under which we live to-day, which guarantee us liberty of the press, a free pulpit, liberty of the universities and freedom in the legislatures. Surely that is something we should all be proud of. Parliamentary government may not be as efficient as we should all like to see it, but I urge upon the Minister of Justice, who is respected by the Irish as by all classes, to answer the criticisms that we have heard from within and without. The best way in which those criticisms can be answered is for us to bring about certain reforms that are badly needed. From within, let us reform our parliamentary system, our constitutional system, our cabinet system, our electoral system, and let us have the necessary law reform so as to bring all those departments of our administration up to date, making it more efficient in order to give more expeditious redress for the evils of the capitalist system- a good system if it will clean its house of errors-and allowing us to organize that system so that the workers may share in its benefits. That is so far as criticism from within is concerned. As regards criticism from without, we shall still be where we were in 1812; we shall still be completely dependent upon the motherland for our defence.
I do not wish to criticize the press, because I realize that it, too, has its burdens to bear in a day like this, and must be run from the commercial aspect. In fact, in connection with the newspaper bill I paid my tribute to the press. There are only two agencies whereby the people can be kept informed of our parliamentary institutions; one is the press and the other the radio. Unfortunately however people are too ready to jump to conclusions from what they read and hear over the radio. They have heard that nothing is done " on the hill nothing is done by the House of Commons and the Senate. I suggest that the press should give all the facts. This is the forty-seventh day of the session, but I have not read in one morning paper-and I read them all-an adequate or impartial account of what is going on here. The press owe it to the public to give full information of the proceedings of parliament, because they have a franchise of goodwill from the public. I repeat, I am not criticizing the press. There are two evening papers in Toronto and one morning paper and I fully appreciate the good work they all do. But after all, you cannot answer a newspaper, and they do not give all the facts to the public. What I say with respect to the press here is applicable to

the press of the old land, since the demise of the Morning Post; and in the United States there is the same trouble. The present president has almost no press supporting him.
In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, I move the second reading of the bill. I should like to see it go to the elections committee because there is the great principle of good government involved in it. I am sure it would serve many admirable purposes. It would prevent many abuses, it would be useful to the dominion as it has been to the municipalities, and to the provinces, and it would be in the interests of good government to make some answer to the criticisms that have been levelled against this house and against our parliamentary institutions. Either the Minister of Justice or the Secretary of State should, I submit, consider the question of enlarging the powers of the committee on elections in order to give them an opportunity to study the matters involved in the bill and to take into consideration the question of referendum, which has been so advantageous to the taxpayers in the provinces and in the municipalities; and also other election methods regarding the use of billboards and the radio, with a view to bringing about needed reforms in the interests of the people.


Hon. FERNAND RINFRET (Secretary of State):: Mr. Speaker, the purpose of the bill is to place upon the statute book certain provisions whereby the government may take a referendum on any question of importance. May I point out in the first place that this bill will not establish a right. The government may at any time order such a referendum, provided it is authorized by an act of parliament; and this has been done before, at least in one instance to which I shall refer in a moment.
Let me say at once that so far as I am concerned I am in favour of the principle of the bill. I am in favour of having on the statute book some provisions by means of which the government may in exceptional circumstances have a referendum or take the votes of electors, properly qualified, on questions of importance. I do not however agree with the mover of the bill that some of the questions to which he has referred should have been submitted to the electors. In the first place, the government should take its responsibility wherever an emergency or a question of importance is concerned involving the general administration of the affairs of the country. In such circumstances, I submit that the government should assume its responsibility, bring down its policy to the house, and let hon. members, duly elected and properly qualified to do so, discuss that

Elections-Special Ballot
policy; and members of parliament should also assume their responsibilities in the matter. In other words, I am not carried away by the modern idea that the government is concerned only with minor matters and that as soon as any question of importance arises it should consult the people and have a referendum on any question that occurs in the ordinary course of administration. I admit that there might be exceptional circumstances in which it would seem advisable to consult the people by means of a referendum, and to that extent I agree with the bill; and instead of leaving it to the last moment it might be advisable to have on the statutes electoral machinery whereby that end would be attained.
I have looked into the political history of the country to find instances of a referendum having been held, and I can find only one occasion on which a dominion-wide plebiscite was resorted to. That was in 1898 when the Laurier government held a referendum on the question of prohibition. The government had a bill adopted by the house during the session of 1898. It was assented to on June 13, the title being "An Act Respecting the Prohibition of the Importation, Manufacture and Sale of Intoxicating Liquors." I have in my hand a copy of that bill. The act became obsolete after the referendum, or the plebiscite as it was called, and consequently it does not appear in the revised statutes of 1927. It not only authorized the government to hold that plebiscite, but it also provided the electoral machinery by means of which that could be done. Section 3 stipulated the question to be submitted, which was as follows:
Are you in favour of the passing of an act prohibiting the importation, manufacture or sale of spirits, wine, ale, beer, cider and all other alcoholic liquors for use as beverages?
Section 4 provided for the proclamation of polling day and section 5 set out those who might vote. Section 6 reads as follows:
For the purpose of submitting the question to the electors, obtaining an answer thereto, and ascertaining the result of the vote, the same proceedings, as nearly as may be, shall be had as in the case of a general dominion election, and the Dominion Elections Act and the North-west Territories Representation Act, and their amendments, and the Franchise Act, 1898, shall, subject to the provisions of this act, and of any regulations, orders or instructions made or given by the governor in council thereunder, apply, mutatis mutandis, to the conduct of such proceedings, and with respect to the powers to be exercised, and the duties to be performed by, and the rights, obligations, liabilities, qualifications and disqualifications of, judges, officers, electors, and all other persons, and with respect to offences and the penalties which may be incurred.
Perhaps I may be pardoned for placing these questions on Hansard, but this is an act which cannot be found readily to-day outside of the library. I thought that hon. members would like to know how the plebiscite was taken at that time. The legislation provided for the taking of the vote, how the ballots should be marked, and the returns made. Hon. members will remember that although that plebiscite gave a majority in favour of prohibition, it disclosed a great divergence of opinion throughout the country, and the government hesitated to act according to the results. Perhaps I might pause here to draw the attention of hon. members to the fact that even this way of legislating is not always the best, nor is it necessarily productive of good results. What the government did was to place the Canada Temperance Act upon the statute books at a later day, which act is still on our statutes. It provided for local referendums, if I may use that term, leaving it to each territory to decide whether they wanted to come under the act Although this act is still on our statute book, it is in force in only three parts of the country, in Manitoulin Island, in the province of Ontario; Thetford Mines in Quebec and in Lisgar and Marquette in Manitoba. I am informed that some two hundred local elections have been held since the act went into force. Certain parts of the country expressed a desire to come under the act, and later on asked that it be allowed to withdraw from its operation.
This bill proposes to enable the government to proclaim the taking of a vote or referendum on certain questions. That right is already in existence and has been exercised by a former government, which passed legislation, as I have indicated, to permit balloting on a particular question. Never to my knowledge has there been a general disposition given to a government, as is proposed to be given by this bill; there has always been in contemplation a special question upon which a referendum was to be held. I do not think this bill is sweeping enough in its provisions. It is limited in its scope by sections 4 and 5. Section 4 states that the holding of a poll and the taking of a vote under this act shall be on the day fixed for the holding of a general election. That means that this bill could not be applied in an emergency or in respect to .any question of national importance which might arise during the course of a parliament. Apparently it is meant to apply to questions upon which parliament would not care or dare to take an attitude, something which the members would rather have referred to the electorate at the same time as a general election is held. Then section 5 states:
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The provisions of the Dominion Elections Act, 1938, and regulations made thereunder in so far as applicable, shall apply to the taking of the vote and making returns in respect thereto.
If the provisions of the Dominion Elections Act are to apply, it would mean that seven weeks must elapse between the instituting of a referendum and the taking of a vote. I do not think I am far astray when I say that if a referendum is needed, it would be in a time of emergency and not at some fixed date every four or five years when a general election is held. Then seven weeks must intervene between the time a plebiscite is announced and the ballot is taken. I think that part of the bill might well be reconsidered. It should be redrafted and studied by the special committee on electoral matters. I suggest that that committee should consider ways of permitting the government to hold a referendum, not on a fixed date when a general election is to be held, but at any time when it might be thought necessary and advisable so to do. The committee should also try to reduce the time between the proclamation of a plebiscite and the polling date.
Under our present electoral laws the voting lists are prepared on the eve of an election. There are no standing lists kept here in Ottawa, and perhaps that is one difficulty to be faced. A period of seven weeks may be necessary in connection with a general election when every precaution must be taken, but it might be possible to shorten that period in the case of a referendum. If the referendum provided for by this bill is not to be merely a means of having certain questions decided directly by the people outside of parliament; if it is intended that this type of referendum shall be a means of reaching the people in a time of emergency, it is essential that the bill to provide the machinery by which a ballot may be taken should not be limited in its provisions as to the duration of time or the date upon which a ballot shall be taken. Therefore, Mr. Speaker, I am quite willing as far as I am concerned, to support the bill on its second reading, but if the bill is read a second time I shall move its reference to the special committee.


Thomas Langton Church: My bill will not affect the rights of minorities.


Mr. SPEAKER:: Order.


Harry James Barber: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased that the minister (Mr. Rinfret) accepts the principle of this bill. While I am not prepared to speak on the bill to-night, after hearing from its sponsor I should judge that the government would be

anxious to grasp this opportunity of referring some of Canada's main problems to the people.
I have in mind, for instance, the railway problem. We know perfectly well that the government will not taclde this problem to-day because of the railway vote in this country. Therefore I think it would be a very fine thing if during the next election the government would submit the question to the country and secure from them the voice of the Canadian people. It is a problem that means life or death economically to this dominion, because we are going behind SI,000,000 a week on account of the national railways, and we cannot continue to do that much longer. The government is not prepared to step out and tackle this problem, and I should think it would be a very fine thing to submit it direct to the people of this country. I do not see, therefore, why the government should not accept the principle of this bill and incorporate it in the statutes.


Mr. WOODSWORTH:: Is it the idea of the hon. member that the referendum should take place at the time of the election?


Harry James Barber: I should certainly say so.


Mr. HEAPS:: What would you submit to the electors?


Harry James Barber: That is up to the government.


Ernest Lapointe: Mr. Speaker, I do not like
to throw cold water on the enthusiasm of the supporters of this bill, but while I have no objection to second reading being given [DOT] and the bill being referred to a committee, I am not so cheerful about this method of submitting to the people grave and important, or less important, questions at the same time that they are voting on who shall be the candidates to represent them in parliament and constitute the government of this country for the next four or five years.
The responsibility of the electors on polling day in a federal election, their choice of the candidates who shall be the government of Canada and represent them in parliament, is important and serious enough in itself; and goodness knows there are questions enough arising out of the programs of the various parties which are submitted to the electors without asking them at the same time to vote as is done in municipal elections on still further questions, even one-and it may be one or two or three, because there would be no limit. But who will compare a federal election and the selection of members of parliament with a municipal election? I do not think any member of the house will say

Civil Service Commission-Secretary
that they are at all comparable. To my mind it would simply confuse the electors to have further questions submitted to them on polling day in a general election.
The hon. member for Fraser Valley (Mr. Barber) referred to the railway problem. If there was a referendum on the railway problem at the time of a general election, the question would undoubtedly be discussed and it would only add to the confusion. The people would require the candidates to pronounce themselves on the question which was the subject of the referendum.


Harry James Barber: I think the minister is
perhaps confusing the two things. If at the time of polling there was a separate referendum or ballot, it would not necessarily be confusing to the people as it is now.


Ernest Lapointe: I am
afraid it would. I am not at all opposed to the principle of submitting some questions to the people of Canada, and in spite of the fact that it would perhaps involve a large expenditure I certainly would favour holding any such consultation of the people at some other time than on polling day in a general election. I think the electors have enough to do on polling day in selecting the candidates who shall be their representatives for the next four or five years, and with the multiplication of parties and groups which appears to go on rapidly all the time, I think there will be enough ballots submitted to the electors without adding any further questions of public policy for them to decide.
Motion agreed to and bill read the second time.


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: I move, Mr. Speaker:
That this bill be not referred to the committee of the whole, but that it be referred to the special committee appointed to study and report on matters pertaining to elections and electoral districts in Canada.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.	*

[Stage Direction]
appointment of the secretary to the civil service commission should be made by the government and not by the commission. The position is just as important as that of a commissioner, if not more so. Indeed, it may be said that the secretary is the mainspring of the commission. Moreover, as the government habitually appoints the officers of commissions which it creates, why should it not do likewise in the case of the civil service commission? This position is equivalent, to my mind, to that of a departmental deputy minister, and deputy ministers are appointed by the government.
The secretary of the civil service commission, being the link between the commission and the public, should be acceptable not only to a section of the country but to the entire dominion. It is not a question of making a political appointment, as certain newspapers have suggested, but of making an appointment satisfactory to the Canadian people and not only to the civil service commission. The impression is daily gaining ground that there has arisen in this field what amounts to a bureaucracy, more powerful than the government itself. On the other hand, it is believed in certain quarters that the civil service commission is simply a shield and that members of parliament are responsible for appointments which in reality come under the exclusive jurisdiction of the commission. Such is the case, for example, in the appointment of a customs officer, a lighthouse keeper and a post office caretaker at Matane. Although these three appointments were made by the civil service commission, certain people have sought to spread the impression that they were political appointments for which I was responsible, when in reality I had nothing to do with them. Such is the situation.
In submitting this bill to the consideration of the house, Mr. Speaker, I have but one purpose-to improve conditions in this domain, so that the public interest may be served. I trust it will meet with the approval of the entire house.
appointment of secketary to civil service Mr. T. L. CHURCH (Broadview): The bill commission	of the hon. member is not one which in my
Mr. ARTHUR J. LAPOINTE (Matapedia- opinion should receive the support of this Matane) moved the second reading of Bill house. One of the institutions to which we No. 24, to amend the Civil Service Act. He can look with a great deal of admiration is said:	the British civil service from which pattern
(Translation) Mr. Speaker, on the second ours is formed. When all is said and done, reading of this bill which I have had the	no form of responsible government,	whetherhonour to introduce in the house, I do not	parliamentary or municipal, can go on	withoutintend to make a speech, but simply to offer a	having good and efficient heads of	departfew brief observations.	ments. As one who has had a great deal ofAs I explained when the bill was read for	experience with public servants in	federal,the first time, I am of opinion that the	provincial and municipal affairs, I can	say that
2024	COMMONS
Civil Service Commission-Secretary
fortunately the officials we have in all departments of government at Ottawa are the backbone of the good government we have under modern conditions. As members of parliament we are here to-day and away to-morrow. The backbone of any system of government is found in the permanent public servants and heads of departments, officials who give their lives to this work at small pay. They work hard and give most efficient and honest service.
Years ago parliament created a civil service commission. That commission has been handicapped from lack of a free hand and support. When I was a member sitting on the government side of the house I took the same position as I do now, namely that we should have a proper civil service commission and that they should be absolutely in control to promote honest and efficient government and give value for the taxpayers' money. It is true that in some ways it has permitted the employment of too many officials, but that applies in all departments of government, public and private. In private service the same conditions may apply; but it can be said that our public service in Ottawa is a good service. You, Mr. Speaker, have had a great deal of parliamentary experience; you are a distinguished man in educational and legal and commercial matters. You will agree that, whether in academic, legislative or business affairs, the backbone of the business is an efficient administrative service. How are we to get efficiency if the commission cannot even appoint a secretary? I do not care whether the secretary is black or white, Jew or Gentile, English or French or Irish, as long as he is efficient, because the first thing in connection with the appointment of a secretary is to find out the qualifications of an applicant for the office, whether he has experience, training and capacity; whether he will give value for the taxpayers' money, and all that sort of thing. If we are to interfere with the civil service commission as this bill proposes, on the ground that the commission is appointed by the governor general in council, the commissioners will not have power to do anything but act as office boys through an organization, the governor general in council, which Sir Robert Borden called a political body. If you ask me, the principle of the bill will not conduce to good government, to an efficient public service, or to value for the taxpayers' money.
The bill first says that it is an act to amend the Civil Service Act.
His Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate and the House of Commons of Canada,-
-amends several statutes, including the revised statutes, chapter 22; the statutes of

1929, chapter 38; the statutes of 1932, chapter 40; the statutes of 1938, chapter 7; and here is the fifth amendment since the commission was created:
1. Section three of the Civil Service Act, chapter twenty-two of the revised statutes of Canada, 1927, as amended by subsection two of section thirteen of chapter forty of the statutes of 1932, is further amended by adding, at the end thereof, the following subsection:
"(9) The secretary of the commission shall be appointed by the governor in council.
Under the rules of the house the hon. member must give an explanatory note, and this is the only explanation he gives for a change which, if made, will practically reduce the civil service commission to a lot of office boys. The explanatory note says:
The position of secretary to the civil service commission already exists under the civil service classification. The purpose of this bill is to provide that the appointment of the incumbent thereof shall be made by the governor in council.
If the civil service commission are not competent to choose a secretary, how are they fit to choose clerks, deputy departmental heads, and stenographers, and the experts for the board we were considering last night as well as for some fifteen or twenty other boards under the commission system? I may say to the mover of the bill that if we do not abolish some of these royal and other roving commissions, the royal commission system will abolish the House of Commons. That is what it is coming to, if we do not regulate some of these things and prevent overlapping, and see to it that those whom we appoint have a free hand to administer the system from a business and commercial aspect.
Ernest Lapointe: How about the referendum?


Thomas Langton Church: If this bill passes, from the viewpoint of efficiency of the public service we might just as well abolish the civil service commission altogether if it is not to make an appointment of this kind; and unless we cease to appoint additional royal commissions we might as well abolish the House of Commons, and pronounce "earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust" upon our parliamentary institutions.
As I have said, I know a great many of the officials. Take our learned clerk of the house, the dean of the House of Commons; also the able assistant clerk of the house. We owe a great deal of the efficiency of the house to our clerk: and assistant clerk. The clerk is practically the secretary and manager of the house, although he is called the clerk of the

Prairie Farm Rehabilitation
house. I believe that on a day like the seventeenth of March the Irish should pay tribute to so good an official, although he belongs to another race. Suppose he were appointed, not for efficiency, not because he knows the rules and regulations so ably, and has written such a fine text book on parliamentary and constitutional procedure, which the other day was quoted in the British house; I say, suppose we had allowed the appointment to be made by the governor general in council, I doubt if he would ever have been here.
It is nine o'clock, Mr. Speaker. I thank the rules for that, and I now move the adojurnment of the debate.



PRAIRIE FARM REHABILITATION


[Stage Direction]
Hon. J. G. GARDINER (Minister of Agriculture) moved the second reading of Bill No. 36, to amend the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act.
He said: This bill does not affect the principle of the original act in any way. It is simply to give effect to what we attempted to do in 1937, but it was found that the limitation in the act which would end its activities in 1940 was not removed. It is also proposed now to make legislative provision for what was previously done under a vote of a certain sum of money by this house. It has been suggested by those who are checking the expenditures in connection with this branch that it would be much more satisfactory if the powers which the minister now has under regulations and under the vote itself were put in legislative form. For example power is given to purchase land. That simply means that sometimes where we undertake to build dams we have to purchase land, and have done so ever since this legislation was enacted. On other occasions where we are setting up pastures it has been necessary to purchase certain lands, particularly those associated with buildings which may be used in the establishment of pastures. That is now covered by a section of this bill rather than merely by a vote of the house of a certain sum of money for carrying on that work. The same is true with regard to the purchase of machinery and with regard to agreements with provinces and cities and municipalities.
On the occasion of moving the first reading of this bill I intimated to the hon. member for Weyburn (Mr. Douglas) that before further discussion took place I would attempt to have all the information asked for by the hon. member for Qu'Appelle (Mr. Perley) 71492-128J
laid on the table. That information is not all compiled; I had to send to Regina for some of it, but it will be complete at the beginning of next week and can be just as well discussed when the bill is in committee, probably more properly then than now. If that is not satisfactory to the hon. member it can be discussed fully on the estimates having to do with rehabilitation.
In view of the fact that this bill does not affect the principle of the original act, I suggest that it be permitted to go to the committee where its clauses can be fully discussed.
Ernest Edward Perley: The
minister has stated that it is desired to extend the act so that there will be no termination of the operations under it in 1940; also that power be given to the minister to expend sums voted by this house. I suppose that later on the estimates will include a stated sum to be used for prairie farm rehabilitation.
Prior to 1934-35 there was an unparalleled climatic condition extending over a large area in the southern part of Saskatchewan and part of the other prairie provinces, which brought about distressed conditions in that area. For a number of years there were crop failures, and it looked for a time as though that part of the country might be turning into a desert. The municipalities in that area and the provincial government could not cope with the situation. An appeal was made to the federal government for assistance, which I think all will agree was granted, and the situation was met as far as possible. After careful investigation by the Minister of Agriculture at that time the situation was considered so serious that the federal government offered to assume full responsibility with respect to relief, schools, roads, et cetera, in a certain area, taking it over as a federal area. There was correspondence between the then Prime Minister Right Hon. R. B. Bennett, and the premier of the province, who happened to be the present Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner) with respect to that proposal. I have a copy of the correspondence. But apparently the two governments could not agree and that area was never taken over by the federal authorities.
In 1935 the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act was passed, providing for the setting up of a committee, with the main purpose of reclaiming and rehabilitating the area. Many projects were undertaken, including experiments in control of soil drifting, conservation of water, and other worth while projects: the main object being to reclaim the land and rehabilitate the farmers in the area.
Prairie Farm Rehabilitation

In 1935 there was a change of government. The act however continued. It was amended in some minor respects in 1937, but the government of the day has been carrying on that work. I believe they have been seeding large areas to grass in order to try to get it back to pasture. I agree with the main principle of the bill, and I think the government would be well advised to continue the work. The area involved has in the past made a considerable contribution to our export trade. It has had a wonderful record from the production standpoint, particularly prior to 1930, and I believe that that same area may yet regain the position it held prior to 1930 and be capable of producing as much new wealth as any area of similar size anywhere in the west. Certainly if we have a reasonable rainfall for three or four years in succession we shall soon return to that condition.
In the last two or three years those in charge of prairie farm rehabilitation have set up an organization which in regard to size of staff is out of all proportion to the wrork that they are doing. Salaries and expenses are beyond all reason. If you look at pages 56, 57, 58 and 59 of the auditor general s report you will see the names of the employees of this department, together with their salaries and expenses, and I believe after careful study you will agree that the statement I am making is correct.
This amendment certainly gives the minister wide power. He can undertake almost anything he wishes. As he said a moment ago, he can lease and dispose of land as he sees fit. Section 12, which is a new section, states:
The minister may, for the purposes of the act, purchase or rent whatever machinery or equipment may be required in connection with the development, construction or operation of any project, or scheme, and may sell or otherwise dispose of such equipment upon such terms as he may deem desirable.
All this can be done without the approval of the governor in council, which is required under sections 10 and 11.
The minister stated a moment ago that he proposes to give certain information when the bill is in committee, information for which I asked and in regard to which an order was passed on March 6. This has to do with the number of engineers, supervisors and employees of all kinds engaged under the act. I believe we should have that information, as well as a good deal more that I can think of. We should have all the contracts that have been entered into, all the contracts that have been sublet, as well as the leases of land and equipment that have been entered

into. It will be noted that the bill gives the minister power to lease and rent machinery, land and so on. I think we should have this information in order that we may understand how the work is being carried on. We know that in this area-and I believe this applies to almost all of Saskatchewan

there is not twenty per cent of the horse power that is required properly to carry on farming in the district. As I have previously said in this house, the minister would be well advised to consider assisting the farmers in some way in making the first payments on power equipment. I cannot think of any better way to rehabilitate the farmers and encourage them to stay on the land. That may not be possible under this act, but I suggest that any industrial organization carrying on work of this kind certainly would see to it that salaries and expenses were cut about in half. If the minister could do that, it would be a great saving to the treasury, and perhaps some provision could then be made for the assistance I have suggested.
As I said a moment ago, I approve of many of the projects that have been undertaken, particularly those having to do with water conservation. Just here I suggest to the minister that, since certain rivers and streams have been dammed

I think it is under this act that a dam is being constructed near Saskatoon-the board in Regina will have representations made to it in regard to damming the Qu'Appelle river at certain points, and those representations should be thoroughly investigated. At a point on the Qu'Appelle river near the Crooked Lakes there is a place where a dam could be constructed without great cost which would hold back a considerable body of water, and the same thing could be done at other points with beneficial results. If this were done it would also have the effect of creating breeding grounds for wild fowl and game of the kind, and I know the board in Regina will be requested to make a survey of the Qu'Appelle river in order to see if this cannot be accomplished.
The minister has stated that he will furnish all the information desired when the bill is in committee, which I think is the proper time to ask for it. That leaves me with very little more to say at this stage except this: I am surprised that the minister should be willing to accept the responsibility that will be delegated to him under sections 10, 11 and 12. Under the last section he can do many things, involving large expenditures of money, without the approval of the governor in council. I am also surprised that the Minister of Finance (Mr. Dunning), the watch

Prairie Farm Rehabilitation
dog of the treasury, should agree to allowing any member of the government to have the power that is vested in the Minister of Agriculture by this bill. I am not for a moment imputing any ulterior motive; far from it, but I do not think these provisions can be carried out without arousing a great deal of suspicion. I am afraid the minister is placing himself in a position which may bring about certain charges, perhaps none of which may have any foundation at all. I am a little surprised to see him go this far; I think it is a mistake. However, when the bill is in committee we may obtain more detailed information.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Mr. Speaker, we are considering Bill No. 36, to amend the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act. I was surprised a few moments ago to hear the minister intimate that this is a comparatively unimportant bill, that it does not touch the principle of the act. The other day when the resolution was before the house the minister made a similar statement, and he used this sentence, which he more or less repeats to-day, as indicative of the main purpose of the bill:
Instead of basing our action on order in council, based on regulation, we are asking for legislative authority to do it by order in council.
In the first place, the language used is meaningless; it does not represent at all what the bill does. When I read the bill over I recognized at once that it was a serious departure. I obtained a copy of the original act and the amending act of 1937, and I invite the house to consider exactly what it is doing to-night. In presenting this view I do not wish to imply that I am objecting to the government doing anything that is possible for rehabilitation of the area in the west which was devastated, and assisting in any alleviation of the general farm conditions. What I do want the house to understand, and particularly the Liberal party, is the exent to which in this bill, as in one or two other measures that have already passed, we are departing from the normal democratic parliamentary procedure.
Let us look at the original act which the minister says we are not departing from in principle. It was passed in 1935, and I would ask the house to note that it was what might be termed an emergency measure; it was in recognition of extraordinary conditions in the west, and, very properly, steps were taken to provide for them. For the purpose of my argument, however, I wish to lay it down that it was an emergency measure. One of the main points in the bill was in section 3,
which provided for the setting up of an advisory committee, and I want the house to note the constitution of that committee. I quote:
(2)	One of the members of the committee shall be appointed chairman by the governor in council.
(3)	The committee shall consist of the following:
(a)	one representative of the Manitoba Grain Growing Farmers from the drought and soil drifting areas;
(b)	one representative of the Saskatchewan grain growing farmers from the drought and soil drifting areas;
(c)	one representative of the Alberta grain growing farmers from the drought and soil drifting areas;
(d)	one representative of Saskatchewan livestock farmers from the drought areas;
(e)	one representative of Alberta range farmers from the drought areas;
(f)	one representative of Mortgage Companies of Canada;
(g)	one representative of the Canadian Bankers' Association;
(h)	one representative each from the Canadian Pacific Railway Company and the Canadian National Railways;
(i)	two representatives from the dominion Department of Agriculture; and
(j)	one representative of the government in each of the provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta.
It will be at once recognized that parliament at that time set up that committee as an advisory body, realizing that it was doing an unusual thing in spending money in the way it was; otherwise an appropriation would have been made in the estimates and the whole matter discussed here. But knowing that there was an emergency, and realizing that there was need to expedite expenditure,, they set up this non-partisan, independent committee representing the farmers, the cattle producers, the loan companies and the governments of the west, as a committee advisory to the minister. That stood for two years. Two years ago the minister came to parliament and he had section 3, to which I have referred, repealed. In place of that, the following was done:
The governor in council may establish one or more advisory committees to be known as prairie farm rehabilitation committees. . . .
That is the plural note. The first was a strong representative advisory committee.


Mr. GARDINER:: It is there yet, practically the same one.


Henry Herbert Stevens: If it is, then it is time
parliament looked into it, because the clause that set up that committee has been repealed.


James Garfield Gardiner: We have the power.
Prairie Farm Rehabilitation


Henry Herbert Stevens: Now we have an illustration of exactly what I was going to lead up to a little later, a government within a government. Parliament provided for that advisory committee; the minister repealed the clause appointing the advisory committee; and now he tells us the committee is still functioning. Under what right it is functioning, what its powers are, what its authority is, I do not know. At any rate here is what was done. The section I have read was repealed in 1937 and the governor in council authorized the establishment of advisory committees-whomsoever they liked -not of the kind to which I have referred, but advisory committees. I say therefore that if that first committee provided for in 1935 is still functioning, it has no legislative or statutory right for whatever action it may take. If the Minister of Justice were here I would ask him whether any action of that committee has the sanction of law. The committee being advisoiy, that question might not arise. That is the first point. The second point is this-


Mr. SLAGHT:: Does the hon. gentleman suggest that, the committee being advisory, that question does arise?


Henry Herbert Stevens: I should imagine that no legal difficulty would arise, inasmuch as they are advisory. But the point I am making is this. In the act of 1935 there was a section pi'oviding for a committee. That committee was set up and in 1937 that clause was repealed and another substituted for it. Obviously, for the purpose of orderly governmental procedure, the first committee should certainly be eliminated and replaced by what was authorized under the second act of 1937. If these committees had any legal power, any contractual power, which I do not think they have, but if they had, then the repeal of the clause appointing them would invalidate any act of theirs from a legal standpoint.


Arthur Graeme Slaght: But as they have not, what is it all about?


Henry Herbert Stevens: We might repeal the
clause providing for these numerous committees and set up some other form, but still continue the numerous committees, and there would be nothing but confusion. Let me now state my second point.
The statement of the minister that there was no change in principle is one that I cannot accept. In section 8 in the original act of 1935, we have this:
For the purposes of this act the sum of seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars shall be appropriated and paid out of the con-

solidated revenue fund of Canada during the fiscal year 1935-36 and for each fiscal year for a further period of four years a sum not exceeding one million dollars per annum as may be necessary to continue and extend the work undertaken under this act.
That was the first act. In other words, parliament in that statute provided for the expenditure of a certain sum of money. In the act of 1937 that clause was repealed and the following substituted:
For the purposes of this act the governor in council may from time to time authorize the expenditure in each of the fiscal years 1937-38 to 1939-40, inclusive, of sums not exceeding the amount appropriated by parliament in , each year for such purposes.
I am not particularly objecting to that. All that amounts to is the lifting of the limitation imposed by the previous legislation. It gives the government very much of a free hand. We now have another amendment, but it will be noted that it limits it in the matter of time to 1939-40. Then we have that section repealed, and the following substituted:
For the purposes of this act the governor in council may from time to time authorize the expenditure of sums not exceeding the amount appropriated by parliament in each year for such purposes.
This is another point which I wish to emphasize. The original act was an emergency measure, but we now find the act made into a permanent measure.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Not
necessarily.


Henry Herbert Stevens: As far as any statute can be said to be permanent. Any statute may be repealed, but any statute that is passed without any declared limitation, or any statute which repeals a previous limitation, may be considered as being more or less permanent legislation. I want to emphasize the definite change which has taken place in the principle of the legislation. It means that what was originally an emergency measure now becomes a normal statute, similar to any other statute on the statute books. I submit that what the minister is doing by section 2 is not good parliamentary practice. In other words, it is recognized that parliament may authorize the minister or the government to do something under emergency conditions, which under normal conditions would not be sanctioned. I consider we are evading the principle of parliamentary responsibility.
Before I deal with the second section of the bill, let me refer to what the minister said both the other day and to-day. He stated that this bill was to do by legislation that which had previously been done by regulation. The inference was that we were regularizing

Prairie Farm Rehabilitation
the matter more firmly and on better grounds. But section 7 of the act still applies. This reads:
The governor in council may make such regulations as may be necessary or expedient for the effectual execution and working of this act and the attaimnent of the intention and objects thereof.
In other words, the minister still has all the powers he previously had to act under regulation, plus what he is to be authorized to do by sections 10, 11 and 12, which are new. The minister suggests that he is voluntarily surrendering some right to act by regulation, but he is doing nothing of the kind. All the rights that he previously had to act under regulation are being preserved, and his rights are being extended by the addition of other sections.


James Garfield Gardiner: The first one was allinclusive.


Henry Herbert Stevens: It still is all-inclusive.


James Garfield Gardiner: Including this.


Henry Herbert Stevens: It is inclusive, and these are added.


James Garfield Gardiner: This was included before.


Henry Herbert Stevens: It was all-inclusive and it remains in that position. Then section 9 of the act reads:
The minister shall annually lay before parliament a report of all proceedings under this act for the preceding fiscal year.
There is a matter which I think I should bring to your attention, Mr. Speaker, because in your custody is the proper carrying out of the orders of parliament. It is recognized that where a statute provides for the tabling of an annual report, it must be done. That is not optional, it is compulsory. The minister may have laid the report on the table, but I am advised by the distribution office and the library that there is no such report available. I do not know if a report has been laid on the table since parliament opened; all I say is that the statute says the minister shall annually lay before parliament a report. I have made every reasonable effort to secure it, but as far as I know no report has been tabled. This has a direct bearing on the point raised by the hon. member for Weyburn (Mr. Douglas) and the hon. member for Qu'Appelle (Mr. Perley). If we had this report before us we could intelligently gauge the worthiness of this effort. But we have no such report; it is unobtainable. We are now asked to wait until the bill is in committee in order to get the information.
I am taking no objection to the object of the legislation, but I do take the same objection as I did to the bill to create a film board, and on other occasions. I object to parliament being divested of its control over the expenditure of money. Let me say to my good friends opposite that that is a thoroughly Gladstonian Liberal principle, one which is now accepted in all democratic countries as being perhaps the most sacred right of parliament. I am sorry the Prime Minister is not here to-night, because in theory he preaches that doctrine, and rightly and properly so.
Before I read these new sections, may I say that I do not think they are well drafted. I think they could be put into one section, with three divisions, instead of being left as three separate sections. My reason for suggesting this will be plain when I read the sections.


James Garfield Gardiner: A note has just been sent to me by my deputy that the report was tabled when the house opened.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Then perhaps we should check up on the distribution office and the library of parliament. I sent for the report but I was advised that no such report was available in the distribution office or the library of parliament. I did not know of any other place to inquire.


John Gordon Ross: I think they were distributed; I believe I got one in my mail.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I do not recall seeing any such report. Let us have the report tabled to-night. Let us have it before we go on with the bill.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Page 15 of the votes and proceedings of January 13, 1939, states that the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner) presented to the house the report referred to.


Henry Herbert Stevens: All I am saying is that it is not available.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: It is part of the proceedings of this house.


Henry Herbert Stevens: The laying of a report on the table does not make it a part of the proceedings of the house. It is not printed in votes and proceedings or in any other document, nor has it been printed and distributed. The distribution office tells me that it is not there, and the library tells me the same. It is not available; that is all I have to say.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: On a point
of order, Mr. Speaker, my hon. friend is an old parliamentarian with much experience,
Prairie Farm Rehabilitation

and he will find the report to which he refers was tabled and therefore is in the possession of the house and available to every hon. member.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I am not disputing that. I simply said that I sent to the distribution office and the library and could not get it.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: But the hon. member conveyed the impression that my colleague-


Henry Herbert Stevens: I accept the explanation.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I am
very glad to hear that.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Section 10 provides:
The minister may, subject to section four-
I would ask the house particularly to notice this:
-subject to section four of this act

Section 4 is the section which in the original act provided that the independent nonpartisan committee to which I referred "shall consider and advise the minister as to the best methods" that shall be adopted. This new section 10 is made subject to section 4, or subject to the advice of the advisory committee. It goes on:
-and with the approval of the governor in council enter into agreements with any of the provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan or Alberta or with any city, town or other municipality within any of the said provinces, or with any person, firm, or corporation, with respect to the development, promotion, construction, operation and maintenance of any project or scheme undertaken under and by virtue of this act or which may be deemed necessary or desirable for the conservation of water.


James Garfield Gardiner: Mr. Speaker, if I may be permitted, I have had the return sent down to me here from the office. It is sessional paper 59, dated Friday, January 13, 1939.


Henry Herbert Stevens: That is a return, but that does not constitute a report tabled.


James Garfield Gardiner: It is the sessional paper brought down in connection with the matter and giving a full report of the whole proceedings.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I take the minister's word, but I certainly could not find it.
Proceeding with my discussion of section 10, it will be noted that the minister-it now becomes the minister-may enter into these agreements, which are very broad and extensive, and the minister in his explanation the other day had this to say. Referring to the number of projects he said that the number

"runs into hundreds, and I am not sure that they do not run into thousands." We passed this legislation originally as emergency legislation to deal with the rehabilitation of the drought area, soil drifting, and water conservation. That was the object of parliament at that time. But this has now grown and extended until the minister is to be empowered to enter into agreements with any municipality or any town or any person, firm or corporation, and he has told us that the number of projects already runs into hundreds and possibly thousands. This is certainly entering upon an extremely wide field, and parliament ought at least to give this legislation careful analysis and thought. Good or bad, it merits that.
I have said that section 10 is subject to section 4, and subject to the approval of the governor in council. Let us look at section 11. Here is another added power or authority. It says:
The minister may, for the purposes of the act, and with the approval of the governor in council-
We have eliminated the advisory committee in section 4, and now in this clause it is the minister and the governor in council. And what may he do? He may:
-purchase, lease or otherwise acquire, or sell, lease or otherwise dispose of, any lands or premises which may be required for or included in any project or scheme, upon such terms or conditions as he may deem desirable.


James Garfield Gardiner: Which schemes were passed under clause 10.


Henry Herbert Stevens: All right, but the minister says that the number of projects "runs into hundreds and I am not sure that they do not run into thousands." Those are the minister's words. So now the minister is getting this authority, subject to the approval of council, of course, and I say that if parliament and the government adopt this method of administration of public affairs, obviously the minister has a very free hand. The approval of the governor in council is more or less a matter of form, as is indicated by the extent of the ramifications under the act already.
Then section 12 provides, and here there is no restriction about the governor in council; it is not subject to section 4 or to the advisory committee at all-all that is eliminated:
The minister may, for the purposes of the act, purchase or rent whatever machinery or equipment may be required in connection with the development, construction or operation of any project, or scheme, and may sell or otherwise dispose of such equipment upon such terms as he may deem desirable.

Prairie Farm Rehabilitation
In that clause, at least, we are clothing the minister with a power which I believe cannot be found in any other statute in the revised statutes of Canada concerning any department.


Mr. DUPUIS:: May I ask if it goes any further than the blank cheque legislation under my hon. friend's former government?


Henry Herbert Stevens: That is a fair question, if not intelligent or applicable. I would reply that the blank cheque legislation, so-called, was emergency legislation, just as this originally was. I said at the beginning, but I think my hon. friend was not in the house at the time, that I had no objection to the emergency legislation that was passed, and that I had no objection to this whole program of development and conservation as an emergency proposition. Rut it is now made permanent, as I pointed out a moment ago. All the emergency features are gradually being deleted by the bill.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: No, the emergency is still there.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Then why not leave the legislation in the form in which it was?


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: You could not. The time for the old legislation had expired.


Henry Herbert Stevens: But in numerous cases- as in the legislation respecting repayment for seed, legislation respecting the soldier settlement board, and so on-the acts were extended year after year. The farm loan legislation would have expired some years before it was finally wiped out had it not been extended year after year. There is precedent after precedent for parliament extending the time for operation of an act. The time for this act has not yet expired, because under the existing legislation it runs to the close of the fiscal year 1939-40, which we have not even entered. So there is no urgency in that respect.
I know that opposition members are often charged with saying unkind things to a minister when they criticize his legislation, but I hope the minister will not take my remarks in that way, because there is nothing personal in what I am saying. It is simply a question of principle. I do not care how efficient the minister is or may be; I say it is not good legislation to clothe a minister with the powers with which he is being clothed in this bill and in the form of this legislation. That is the whole point of my remarks. I think it is a dangerous course to pursue. As I said the other day, we are handing over to bureaux and boards and commissions the responsibility
for the expenditure of money over which parliament exercises little control. In this case I looked through the main estimates, and I could not find the item there. The minister will correct me if I am wrong, but I suppose it will come in the supplementary estimates- the minister nods his head-in the form of a lump sum, and will be called a statutory vote. That is the kind of thing we do right along. The estimate will come up and someone will question it; the minister will say, "This is a statutory vote, authorized under the farm rehabilitation act," and being a statutory vote it goes through in a lump sum-a vastly different thing from the ordinary procedure where the estimate comes in and is reviewed and the government is accountable direct to parliament for every dollar of expenditure.
What I have said is not with the purpose of reflecting on the minister, but I think this legislation is highly dangerous. It is a bad precedent. It is not an innovation; yet in a way it is a precedent, and it is an unwise course to pursue. We should have done far better to completely revise this legislation, if the continuance of the drought makes it necessary, and bring the whole business of western farm rehabilitation into permanent form so that parliament could review it from time to time just as it does with any other analogous activity such as the grain board or the board of transport-that is, in the regular way.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: They
have done so, every year since it commenced, and very fully, as the hon. member will see from the records of Hansard.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I would not say so. We are departing from even the emergency legislation. I object to it on these grounds.


Major James William Coldwell: Mr. Speaker, I agree with very
much that has been said. Particularly do I think it is in the interests of this house and of parliament that wide powers of this description should not be given to any one individual minister. I dislike the idea of many commissions, but I believe that in this particular case, where we have to deal with the rehabilitation of a wide area, which is not now an emergency measure, the powers might be vested in a commission; and I say so because I believe the minister himself, whether he be the present minister or if a change occurs following the election, the succeeding minister, will always be subject to the criticism that he is using this act in order to distribute political patronage. Rightly or wrongly, that is said at the present time.
Prairie Farm Rehabilitation


Mr. JOHNSTON (Lake Centre):: Will
the hon. gentleman permit a question?


Major James William Coldwell: Yes.


John Frederick Johnston: Is the
hon. gentleman suggesting that an emergency does not exist to-day in the western provinces?


Major James William Coldwell: What I actually said
was that this is no longer an emergency. An emergency is something which passes quickly and the emergency is done with. In my opinion, we are faced to-day with a condition which necessitates not an emergency policy but one which will have to be continued for a considerable length of time. As the hon. member who interrupted me well knows-


John Frederick Johnston: Because there are emergent conditions.


Major James William Coldwell: As the hon. member
well knows, the area yet to be rehabilitated in western Canada is of tremendous size, and possibly undertakings which we have not yet even considered will have to be instituted before this area is fully rehabilitated. For instance, the irrigation projects which have been undertaken in the last several years have been excellent to a limited extent, but I believe that either the grassing of large areas and their virtual abandonment as arable areas will have to be undertaken, or in the alternative a much larger and wider type of irrigation will have to be undertaken. Therefore I say that this is not, in the sense in which we usually use the term, something which is passing and just a temporary emergency; it lies much deeper than that.
I do not intend to go to-night into any details of this bill. I intend more or less to fall in with the suggestion of the minister and discuss it next week. But I agree with the hon. member for Kootenay East (Mr. Stevens) that this bill ought to be carefully considered by parliament, and that the house should understand thoroughly the wide powers which are being given the minister under the bill.
I know that this problem has been before the house a great deal during the lifetime of the present parliament, and I know that a number of hon. members who are not resident in western Canada have visited the area since they were elected to this house. That, I think, has been all to the good, because there are hon. members from all over Canada who have some understanding of this tremendous problem; and in my opinion the future welfare not only of the area affected but of the entire dominion is involved in the 
question of prairie rehabilitation problem. Unless we can rehabilitate the western plain which has been injured either by drought or by high winds or by soil content depletion or something of that sort, the entire dominion will suffer in time to come.
I would suggest just this, too, that while there may be justifiable criticism of the number of persons employed on this rehabilitation scheme and of the amounts which are expended in inspection and travelling and office salaries and so on, I would not associate myself with the comment-which, although it may have been so understood by some hon. members, was not, I think, so intended- that we are paying too much money to the scientists who are engaged in these projects. As a matter of fact many of the soil chemists and engineers and so on who are doing a magnificent work in connection with these projects are badly underpaid individually.


John Gordon Ross: And overworked.


Major James William Coldwell: And overworked. I should like to see, when the minister presents his estimates, a substantial increase in the remuneration which those efficient officials are receiving.
I do not rise particularly to criticize the projects which have been undertaken. I think they run into hundreds, perhaps, as the minister indicated, into thousands; but of that we shall know more next week. Of the projects which have been undertaken, I believe every one has performed a useful service to the farmer or to the community in which it has been undertaken. I want to see this work carried out and continued; for I believe that not only will rehabilitation have to be undertaken as has been indicated, but much more will have to be done. Possibly we shall have to consider how we may best protect the interests of the people who are on some of this land and resettle them elsewhere. We have only touched the fringe of the problem. I hope too that when we do rehabilitate this region we may find places where we may dispose of the produce that will be grown there.
I do not propose to say more except to emphasize that I believe it is a mistake to confer such wide powers on the minister; it would have been better to adopt another method of supervising and carrying out this work.


Mr. J. H. BLACKMORE (Lethbridge):: Every year I have expressed commendation of the forward-looking steps which the government is taking with respect to prairie farm rehabilitation. I believe the proposals indicated in sections 10, II and 12 of this bill

Prairie Farm Rehabilitation
are all necessary. We in our generation must do the planning which the past generation neglected to do with respect to the Canadian west, and these sections indicate that we are preparing to do that. As to whether or not it is advisable to give all these powers to the minister, I am not prepared to make any pronouncement. The powers must be placed somewhere, the activities performed and the projects undertaken; and if the minister finds the responsibility too much for him, he will I am sure in the course of a year or two bring down legislation to confer these powers upon a commission. I have confidence in the minister to that extent. Once more I commend him for his action looking to greater activity in carrying on prairie farm rehabilitation.
Hon. J. G. GARDINER (Minister of Agriculture) ; I desire to say just a few words in reply to some of the suggestions made. Very careful consideration has been given to the salaries paid to officials, and the wages paid to those employed under this act, since the present government came into office, and I believe before. Before we came into office a staff had been employed under the legislation of 1935, and most of those who were in positions of authority at that time are still in the employ of the government carrying on this work. As the work grew it became necessary of course to employ others, and as the expenditure of money increased it became necessary to employ more and more people in the proper expenditure of the money made available by this house. The salaries for the different positions have been referred to the civil service commission in order that *we might be assured that they have some relationship to those of persons employed in similar work in other departments. In April 1938, I think we brought down for the first time our recommendations for increases in salaries, and those recommendations have been so carefully checked that it was only within the last two or three weeks, or certainly within a month, that they have been authorized by the government through the treasury board. We had the civil service commission make the most careful inquiry into any increases in salary that were made, or increases in payments to officials who were drawing salary; and I believe all the care that could possibly be taken in that connection has been [DOT] taken under the direction of the treasury board.
It was stated a few moments ago by the hon. member for Kootenay East (Mr. Stevens) that very wide powers were given in
section 7 of the original act. That section reads:
The governor in council may make such regulations as may be necessary or expedient for the effectual execution and working of this act and the attainment of the intention and objects thereof.
I cannot conceive of any wider powers being given than were given in that section. It gives to the governor in council power to make regulations, and under those regulations certain powers have been given to the minister. By this legislation council had the right to do what we are now asking parliament to do, namely, to instruct the minister to do certain things, without their having been specifically placed in the legislation at all. There is not a single thing referred to in sections 10 or 11-I am not certain about 12-that was not done under the minister while the previous government was in office; not a single thing can be done under sections 10 and 11 that I have not been doing for the last three years.
At the time the legislation was placed upon the statute book it was thought, as the hon. member for Kootenay East stated, that this might be a temporary measure. But as the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Cold-well) has just pointed out, I think every hon. member is now convinced that the problem of the prairies was not nearly as "temporary" as in 1935 some of us hoped it might be. We have had another four years' experience with it, and everyone who has visited that section of Canada realizes what was stated a few minutes ago by the leader of the Social Credit group (Mr. Blackmore), that if in the early days the government of Canada had taken more care with the settlement of that section of the country, we should not now be required to do so much of what is known as rehabilitation work. But that care not having been taken then, it is now necessary to set apart sums of money, provide for the resettlement of certain sections, and make it possible for people to continue living in areas that were settled without proper preparation for settlement.
I say, then, that the activities that will be carried out under sections 10 and 11 of this bill are exactly the same activities that we are now carrying out under regulations as provided for in section 7 of the original act. But it stands to reason that officials in the departments checking expenditures desire that some more specific statutory authority be given to the minister than merely the power given by the governor in council under regulations made under section 7 of
Prairie Farm Rehabilitation

the old act. - What we are really doing is asking parliament to enact legislation giving us powers that were given previously under section 7.
For the purpose of this act there was set up an advisory committee as provided for in the original act. Two years ago, when this legislation was being amended, section 3 of the amending act provided for the setting up of more than one committee; the minister was given power to set up advisory committees-


Henry Herbert Stevens: And it repealed the other one.


James Garfield Gardiner: Well, that was the argument used at the time. We went into that very fully and the then leader of the opposition was fearful that we would not reappoint representatives of practically the same institutions. I assured him at that time that while some of the individuals might be changed, and while we might not think it necessary to have some of the institutions mentioned represented on a committee that was being set up for the purposes set out in the bill, to all intents and purposes it would be practically the same committee. I have not the personnel before me at the moment, but an examination of it would indicate that practically every institution represented here is represented in the same manner as before, in some cases by the same persons; or is represented on the committee with a slightly different personnel and slightly different set-up. But we have other committees in advisory capacities as well, and these committees will give advice to the minister from time to time. It will be noted that the new section 10 says:
The minister may, subject to section four of this act-
That is, subject to being advised by one of these committees.
-and with the approval of the governor in council, enter into agreements with any of the provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan or Alberta or with any city, town or other municipality within any of the said provinces, or with any person, firm, or corporation, with respect to the development, promotion, construction, operation and maintenance of any project or scheme undertaken under and by virtue of this act or which may be deemed necessary or desirable for the conservation of water.
In other words the act sets out exactly what we have been doing for the last four years. Each time we acted we had the advice of the Department of Justice as to whether we were within the terms of the legislation then on the statute book; and on 	.
each occasion we were advised that we were. But we feel that when we are asking the house to make this legislation more permanent than it has been in the past, by removing the date, at the same time we should ask parliament to give us specifically the powers we have had by order in council ever since the original act was passed.
Then section 11 states:
The minister may, for the purposes of the act, and with the approval of the governor in council, purchase, lease or otherwise acquire, or sell, lease or otherwise dispose of, any lands or premises which may be required for or included in any project or scheme, upon such terms or conditions as he may deem desirable.
This leads us back to section 10, and thus brings in the provision with regard to recommendations by advisory committees. In other words, we undertake these activities as a result of their advice and recommendations. Then we proceed under the other section by order in council to do the very things we are now doing. We have simply set out in this legislation the powers which previously were given us by order in council.
In regard to the last section there is just the possibility that there may be some room for criticism. I suppose I am really breaking the rules of the house in discussing this bill clause by clause at this time, but I am doing so only because it has been dealt with in that way by other speakers. There may be some reason for asking that the approval of the governor in council should be inserted in section 12 as well, and as far as I am concerned I have no objection to that if it should be the wish of hon. members when this bill is in committee. There are such things as these to be dealt with, however. For instance, we have to buy machinery for levelling land to be used in some irrigation scheme. We have the land levelled; we are finished with the machinery, which may be of a type suitable for use by people who are on that land. We may feel that rather than move that machinery to a point a hundred miles away where we are carrying on some other project, with all the expense in connection with such movement, it would be better to dispose of that machinery to the people who are going to remain on the irrigated land. So it may be found necessary to dispose of that machinery in that way.


Henry Herbert Stevens: It is a dangerous procedure.


James Garfield Gardiner: It may be, but it is something that has to be done if we are not to leave the machinery lying in some fence corner. So the machinery is disposed of and accounted for. The only result if the governor

Supply-Agriculture-Entomology
in council were required to consent to a transaction of the kind would be a little delay, but as far as I am concerned I have no objection to that. That is a matter that can be considered when the bill is under consideration in committee. The hon. member for Moose Jaw (Mr. Ross) says we may have to get an order in council to sell a wheel barrow, and I suppose on some occasions it might get down to that.
I do not desire to go into committee on the bill to-night, because of an undertaking I gave the hon. member for Weyburn (Mr. Douglas), who is not in his seat at the present time, but I would ask that it be given second reading now.
Motion agreed to and bill read the second time.

The house in committee of supply, Mr. Sanderson in the chair.



DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE

[Stage Direction]
Science service-
11. Entomology, $488,511.
Mr. COLD WELL:: What services are included under this item?


James Garfield Gardiner: The different services that
are covered in the records I have here are: field crop insect investigations; fruit insect	investigations;	insecticide	investigations; forest insect investigations; investigations on insects and allied parasites of animals and man; stored product insect investigations; insect taxonomy; parasite investigations, and other investigations and activities.


Leslie Gordon Bell: How many persons are employed in this branch?


James Garfield Gardiner: There are 207 permanent and temporary employees.
Mr.	COLDWELL:	I imagine	the	grasshopper	infestation is	covered by	this	item.Would	the minister	outline what is	being
done this year in that regard; whether any new methods are being used, and what is the anticipated requirement this year? I ask that question because reports from the west seem to indicate that there will be a serious infestation this year.


James Garfield Gardiner: With regard to the first suggestion, that something be said as to what has been done in connection with grasshoppers. I would say this; that, as suggested by the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar, there was a very bad outbreak of grasshoppers in the western section of the prairie
area last year both in Canada and in the United States. Along the southern boundary of Saskatchewn there was a breeding of grasshoppers in very considerable numbers, and crops in the southeastern part of the province were destroyed by grasshoppers very early in the season, before the grain had headed out. Towards the end of July or the early part of August the grasshopper moves from its breeding grounds to new fields, and during that period it moves further north and west with the winds that have carried it into other sections of the province. The grasshoppers destroyed thousands of acres of crop all through central Saskatchewan and some areas of Alberta. They continued to be in outbreak form in the prairies and British Columbia during 1938. The outbreak in the prairies, owing to the peculiar weather conditions, was more intense and destructive than expected, with the result that severe losses took place in Saskatchewan, owing particularly to migrations of insects from the United States. An area of 62,000,000 acres, roughly speaking, was infested in the prairie provinces in varying degree. The grasshoppers attack all cultivated crops. The most important losses are to grain and fodder crops in the prairies and to range grasses in British Columbia.
The insects are controlled mainly by poisoned bran and sawdust bait which is scattered in infested fields. Control campaigns were successful in Manitoba, British Columbia and Alberta and northern parts of the infested areas of Saskatchewan. In southern Saskatchewan serious losses were suffered together with peculiar weather conditions. The crop losses in British Columbia were surprisingly low owing to control work. In Alberta the losses did not exceed three per cent of the field crops and were but a small percentage even in infested areas of Manitoba. The crop destruction in Saskatchewan was severe. The outbreak anticipated in 1939 will cover a greater ac age and will be of greater intensity than that of 1938, but a more thorough organization of control activities in Saskatchewan is expected to reduce greatly the losses from these insects in 1939.


Major James William Coldwell: As regards the abandoned land in southern Saskatchewan, what steps are taken to look after that area as a breeding place for grasshoppers? Following that question, in order to save time, the minister might give an outline of the steps that have been taken in cooperation with the United States authorities, since migrations came largely from the United States last July and August, along our own southern boundary.

Supply-Agriculture-Entomology
Mr. GAiRDINER:	The United States
government have a very large program of control in the states immediately south of the prairie section of the west. The dominion authorities have been in touch with the United States authorities. I know that the Saskatchewan authorities have been in veiy close touch with them, and I presume those of Alberta and Manitoba have been as well. There is the closest working arrangement between the authorities on the two sides of the line.
With regard to the grasshopper outbreak on the Canadian prairies, it is expected to be much worse in 1939 than it was in 1938 owing to a material increase in the area infested in all three provinces. The infested area in 1938 was 62,000,000 acres, and this is estimated to have increased to approximately 97,000,000 in 1939. The increase in general, however, is in area infested rather than in a spectacular increase in intensity of infestation. That probably is the best comment I can make on the question which the hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar has raised. If there is an area of 97,000,000 acres infested, the infestation is not at all confined to the areas that have been abandoned by farmers. As a matter of fact, judging from the experience that I have had personally, I think the infestation is more likely to be around the edges of fields that are in crop, and not very far removed from them, and probably in areas that were in crop last year. Eggs will be found in the soil in those areas in greater numbers, I suggest, than in the abandoned land. The increase is due in large measure to the unusual amount of migration, both domestic and from the states to the south of us, which characterized the outbreak in 1938. The infested territory in Manitoba increased from some 1,800 square miles to a little over 10,000 square miles. That of Saskatchewan increased from 55,000 square miles to 95,000 square miles.
Mr. MaeNICOL: In 1938?


James Garfield Gardiner: That was the increase in infestation this year. The grasshoppers laid eggs over an area to that extent greater than the year before. While the territory involved in the outbreak in Alberta increased from 39,000 to 49,000 square miles, the greater proportion of the infested area is below the severely infested category, and though the severely infested acreage practically doubled during the year, it forms a relatively small proportion of the territory infested. With vigorous control campaigns organized by the provincial governments in each province the loss of crop is expected to be reduced to very small proportions, and

with more effective control of these insects in the United States, the losses due to migrating grasshoppers is expected to be of little consequence. That is the official statement with regard to the matter. The work on the immediate areas is being done by the provinces. The work itself is not being done under the direction of this government, but we are associating all our officials in this particular branch of the department, who are making studies of these problems here and elsewhere, with the activities of the provinces, in order to make the battle against the grasshoppers as effective as possible.


Major James William Coldwell: Have the officials any opinion with regard to the common notion among the farmers that if the soil is wet and the spring is late, the cold tends to destroy the grasshoppers' eggs or larvae and therefore ends the pest? I ask that question because I have heard it stated as a matter of fact that in certain areas where there are many grasshopper eggs there was a good deal of rain, and the farmers feel that there is not much that requires to be done because nature will take care of the situation. I should like to have something on the record with regard to that opinion.


James Garfield Gardiner: I understand that those who have made a study of the problem are pretty well agreed that merely a wet or cold spell does not affect the grasshopper very much. A recurrence of cold spells and then warm spells, that is, rapid changes in weather over a period, does have some effect in reducing the numbers, but a cold wet spell in the spring will not alone affect them very much. The only safe thing to do is to wage battle against them with poison.


Joseph Needham: I realize that the problem of treating grasshoppers is largely a provincial matter, but in the past, as far as I know, there has been difficulty year after year in getting the bait. I was wondering whether this government is close enough in touch with the supplying of bait .and whether it could help. To be short of bait in the early stages means a tremendous loss a few weeks afterwards. That is a serious matter in the part of the country I represent.


James Garfield Gardiner: I understand that all the information has been compiled as to how much poison will be required, what will be required for mixing and feeding it to the grasshoppers, and so on. This information is in the hands of the provincial governments. The task of finding funds to purchase what is required is upon the provinces. I do not know at what stage they are now in their arrangements to secure the necessary supplies in order to carry on the campaign.

Supply-Agriculture-Entomology


Mr. QUELCH:: To what extent has it been found that fall cultivation will reduce the menace? This has been advocated in the past but I have never been able to see much difference between a field that was cultivated and one that was not.


James Garfield Gardiner: I am informed that fall cultivation has a tendency to reduce the grasshopper movement. The turning up of the soil and the exposing of eggs to the weather and all that kind of thing has a tendency to destroy some of them.


Gordon Graydon: What steps were taken by the department to check the army worm movement in Ontario during the past summer?


James Garfield Gardiner: There is the same
activity in connection with the army worm as there is in connection with grasshopper infestation. We give the same service, and the province or the county does the actual work.


William Hayhurst: I notice there is an increase of $6,180 in this item. I should like to know how many more people are employed in the branch.


James Garfield Gardiner: There are statutory
increases for those employed, which probably accounts for a considerable part of the increase. I understand there has been practically no increase in staff.


Leslie Gordon Bell: The importance of this problem should be thoroughly understood. Could the minister give us any information as to the cost last year of endeavouring to control the grasshopper pest, and the extent of the losses sustained by the farmers?


James Garfield Gardiner: We have not complete records as to the particular fight with the grasshopper now being carried on by the provinces, but a similar fight occurred from 1919 to 1923. It cost $1,700,000, and it is estimated that it saved $80,000,000 worth of crop. This will give some idea of what the result would be if there was no battle carried on.


Mr. MacLEAN (Prince):: As an eastern member of parliament it was my privilege to make my first visit to the west this past season. Although I have heard this matter discussed on many occasions, it was the first occasion I had of seeing the destruction which the grasshopper can do. For the first time I saw the tremendous destruction that had been wrought on the wheat crops throughout the west, especially around Regina and in certain other sections of Saskatchewan. This small insect cuts off the head of the wheat just where it buds out; the head falls to the ground, and as there is no way of harvesting it, it is a complete loss.
My observations of the farming operations in western Canada lead me to the conclusion that possibly our friends in the west are trying to cultivate too many acres. If they confined their activities to a smaller acreage they might be able to control the situation much better. From my conversations with farmers I was led to understand that if the poison was put out in time and properly placed, it was quite effective. I consider it is a very worthy work that is being done, but I think the surface has hardly been scratched, having regard to what might be done. We have had to face similar difficulties in the east in connection with the potato beetle. Our potatoes are prohibited from entering the English market because of that pest. However, this has been controlled to such an extent that they are no longer considered a menace. We spray for blight and include in the spray a small amount of poison which controls the beetle situation.
Perhaps I may be permitted to suggest to our friends in the west that there is enough wheat wasted on every farm

this applies especially to those with which I came in contact-to keep two or three families in the east. Many farmers in the west apparently have launched out on an elaborate farming operation. On many of the farms I visited I noticed a lot of discarded machinery which may have cost more than the whole farm was worth. I do not know how this situation can be remedied, but my first impression was that they were endeavouring to farm on too large a scale and were spending too much money in purchasing up to date machinery. They were wasting much of the crop that should have been harvested. Could the minister tell me how many are employed in the entomology branch at Fredericton?


James Garfield Gardiner: From twelve to fifteen.


Ernest Edward Perley: Not long ago the minister tabled his report for the year ended March 31, 1938. On page 85 reference is made to the grasshopper situation, and I should like to quote as follows:
In Saskatchewan and Alberta the prospect is also for less damage than in 1937, although organized control campaign will be required in both provinces,-
That would indicate that it is not expected the damage will be as great in 1938 as it was in 1937. I appreciate that it is very difficult to make any real estimate, but are we to gather from what the minister has stated that the officials of his department believe the infestation will not be any greater this year than it was last year, or that it will cover a wider area?


James Garfield Gardiner: A wider area, yes.

Supply-Agriculture-Entomology


Ernest Edward Perley: Of course, we appreciate the fact that the most effective method of control is poisoning in the early stage after hatching. From the experience we had in our district in August, 1936, I do not think there can be any effective control of an infestation if the attempt at control is left to too late a stage. It all depends on control after the hatching stage. I had an interesting chat with a crop reporter from the United States side, and he informed me, from an investigation he had made of the number of eggs laid in our district, that no matter what the climatic conditions might be in the spring of 1939, we were bound to have an infestation and a hatching that would be very serious if there was no control. It looks as if we were in for another infestation in the spring.


James Garfield Gardiner: I can only say that I
do not think it is possible to forecast exactly what will happen in connection with grasshoppers in any year, but the best information available is that which has been gathered by persons who have been making close studies of grasshoppers over many years. The areas are all mapped out and indicated, and anyone can get the maps and study them for himself and know pretty well what the infestation is in his particular area. In the area in which I farm, which is just north of where the hon. member for Qu'Appelle (Mr. Perley) farms, we had not experienced a grasshopper infestation since I have been in that area prior to last year. The grasshoppers were not hatched in that area; they flew in. They came in during the month of August and started in systematically to destroy the crop, and the thing that astonished me was that they did not work in the same way on any two kinds of crop. They cut the wheat off about eight inches below the head. They cut the stem about half-way through, and the stem fell over and finally broke and fell to the ground. They cut the barley four inches below the head. In the oat crop they took the little tendril that holds the oats, nipping this right off just a few inches below the head. The corn they attacked down near the root. They apparently had their own way of doing everything, and they did it systematically.
While my hon. friend may think you can poison them no matter how thick they are, it is very difficult to do much after a certain stage. I thought they had not got after the grasshoppers in the southern part of my riding as strenuously as they might have done. They had had so many crop failures

that perhaps they thought it was not worth while. I went into Oxbow in the midst of the infestation and the gentleman I saw there was the druggist, who had all the poison he needed in his drug store to fight the grasshoppers, and he undertook to kill the grasshoppers in his garden. He said to me that the only green things left in his garden were the lilies in the middle of the little fish pond in his back yard. He took me around to show me how successful he had been, and you could not put your finger on the ground where there was not a dead grasshopper. The ground was literally covered with them, and there was not a blade of green anywhere. The potato tops were eaten off right down to the stem. Then he showed me the lilies, and the tops were covered with grasshoppers. It is an impossibility to get enough poison to kill them off later in the season once they have flown in, but you can control them by poison in the hatching season; in other words before they reach the flying stage. But if the infestation is really bad, it is impossible to kill them all and you have to try to control the movement of them, by spreading poisoned bait. That experience has been going on ever since people have settled in western Canada, and I would suggest that if we were cultivating less acreage we would have many more grasshoppers to eat up the less acreage.


Major James William Coldwell: There is another popular notion that a certain parasite destroys the grasshopper, as is the case with parasites of other sorts in other countries, and it is suggested that parasites might be introduced in order to destroy the grasshoppers in western Canada. Is there anything substantial in that theory?


James Garfield Gardiner: A parasite has been brought in from the Argentine which the department is working on in the hope that it will assist in reducing grasshopper infestations. This work as yet is in the experimental stage.


Grote Stirling: Is there any danger of introducing the Australian rabbit?


William Hayhurst: Have there been any experiments in poisoning grasshoppers by airplanes?


James Garfield Gardiner: A commercial firm in Lethbridge has tried that. Apparently the poison can be spread very well in this way. Our officers are keeping in touch with the developments.


John Gordon Ross: Having lived in western Canada right in the centre of the

Supply-Agriculture-Experimental Farms
infested area, I should like to commend the officers of the department for the work they have done in association with the provincial departments in endeavouring to help control the grasshoppers in western Canada. A good deal of information is put out every year with regard to the grasshoppers; in every post office and bank you will find maps showing the infested areas, and informing the farmer in the fall of the year what methods of cultivation to adopt to keep down the eggs or to kill the eggs then in the ground. It is not a hopeless proposition. Some of us think that because there is a wide infestation and a great many eggs laid in the ground for next year, it may mean a tremendous loss of crop.
The minister in answer to a question a moment or two ago said that wet or cold weather did not necessarily stop the hatching of the eggs, or kill the grasshopper. However, I think the hon. member for Wood Mountain will bear me out when I say that one part of his constituency last year had about ten inches of rainfall from the first of April to the first of July, and it is a fact that no grasshoppers hatched in that area, and no damage was done by grasshoppers where the rainfall was until they flew in there late in the season. Therefore, if we get in the infested area more than the normal rainfall, it is reasonable to expect that there will be little or no damage done by grasshoppers this year. Back in 1935 we had many grasshoppers in a great many areas, and the ground was badly infested, but we had a fairly heavy rainfall in the spring of the year, and if the crop can get along to a fairly good height before the grasshoppers hatch out, they cannot live in a dense crop when they are young, and they must get out or die. The result is that if the hatching is not too early, and the crop has got to the point where the field is pretty well covered, the infestation is not very dangerous.
The hon. member for Prince (Mr. MacLean) spoke of the tremendous size of the farms in western Canada. As a western farmer when I look at some of the fields down here I sometimes wonder why a man bothers to try to turn his outfit around in the field. We have a different kind of farming altogether. I think the farmer from eastern Canada knows better than anyone else how to handle his business, and by the same token I believe the farmer from western Canada knows better than anyone else how to handle his, and is doing it in the most efficient manner that it can be done.
The hon. member also mentioned the amount of machinery used by the western farmer. We do not waste machinery in
western Canada. We do not rust it out. We handle such a large acreage that we wear it out in very much less time than is the case in the east. After all, the average farmer in eastern Canada uses a binder on, we will say, 25 to 50 acres, whereas the average farmer in western Canada uses his binder on 150 to 250 acres. Therefore a binder which has been used in eastern Canada on the ordinary farm for about sixty years is equivalent to a binder which has been used in western Canada for seven or eight years, and one can easily see that it might be thought that there was waste where there is no waste.
I want to commend the officers of the department. I have heard criticism before in this chamber about the salaries which are paid to a number of men who are employed in different parts of Canada by the Department of Agriculture. We have some of the most efficient men in that department who could possibly be got in this or any other country. I believe that the scale of pay is, on the whole, a good deal lower than it might be. There is a country to the south of us which to my knowledge has offered on different occasions, to some of the scientists working in our Department of Agriculture, a good deal more money than they received from us; yet they are still holding their jobs here on lower salaries than they could get somewhere else. I do not like to hear criticisms of the scientific men in the Department of Agriculture. The strongest criticism I can make of parliament in relation to this department is that ordinarily we do not spend half enough money in trying to do more, through the department, for the farmers.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Experimental farms-
12. Experimental farms administration,
Alonzo Bowen Hyndman: I should like to draw attention to the wages paid to labourers at the central experimental farm. I brought this matter up last year and asked for an increase, and I want to thank the minister. I do not know whether he was instrumental in bringing it about, but they were granted an increase of two cents an hour.
In my opinion there is discrimination between the treatment of the labourers who work in the fields and the barns at the experimental farm in Ottawa, and the carpenters. The labourers are paid around thirty cents an hour, while the carpenters, plumbers, et cetera, get eighty-five cents an hour. Last year the minister claimed that the rate of wage paid to labourers who worked on the farms and in the buildings corresponded to
2040	COMMONS
Supply-Agriculture-Experimental Farms
the wages paid farm labourers out in the country. I do not think that that is a fair comparison, because most of the labourers are farmers' sons and they have to pay their board and lodging when they come in to the city. I feel that they should get the same wage as the other labourers. I understand that at the experimental farm there are about eleven divisions, and in each division there are fourteen labourers, who are paid around thirty cents an hour, about five or six men who are paid $105 a month, three or four lady clerks; and also there are about twelve other men whose salaries run up to $6,000 a year. I do not question the efficiency of the heads of these departments, nor am I asking for a reduction of their salaries. All I am asking is that we give a little increase to these farmers' sons who are working on the fields out there, and in the buildings during the winter.
Another thing I should like to bring to the attention of the minister is that there should be some form of retirement allowance for labourers who have worked at the farm for fifteen to twenty years. I have in mind one man out there who will be sixty-five years of age next November. He has been working at the farm as a labourer for the past twenty-eight years. He started at sixteen cents an hour, receiving an increase of one cent an hour up to a maximum of nineteen cents, and now he is getting thirty-two cents, or possibly for the past year he has been receiving thirty-eight cents. He will be laid off this November. He is a married man with a family and an invalid wife; how is he going to exist for the next five years until he gets an old age pension? There should be some retirement allowance. I believe that some years ago there was a retirement allowance for men such as he, and it seems too bad that after these labourers have put in long service at the farm there is no allowance for them when they reach the age of sixty-five and have to retire.
I ask the minister to consider these two things: first, a more equitable wage for the labourers at the farm-mind you, they are farmers' sons-second, the provision of some retirement allowance for men who have spent many years at the farm and are forced to retire.


James Garfield Gardiner: As it is almost closing
time I will reply in a few words. Last year we raised the pay about two cents an hour, which for the whole service amounted to somewhere in the neighbourhood of $50,000 for the class of labour which has been spoken of. There is a limit to what we can do in that direction without interfering with wages 
in the vicinity of where our farms are. To offer a much greater increase would probably interfere to some extent with the employment of labour on farms in the surrounding area. In a place like Ottawa, where our farms are close to the cities, we are governed largely by union wages for carpenters and others, which makes it necessary to pay a similar wage for work done at the farms.


George James Tustin: There are a couple of
questions I should like to ask.


Frederick George Sanderson: It is eleven o'clock.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Progress reported.
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Monday, March 20, 1939