Mr. R. L. BORDEN (Halifax).

If I may be permitted, I would like to asic my right lion, friend (Rt. Hon. Sir Wilfrid Laurier) to co-operate with you Mr. Speaker, in maintaining better order during this forenoon. I do not think it is in keeping with Ike decorum of this House that when an lion, gentleman on either side is speaking, six or seven others should be carrying on conversation almost at the top of their voices, as lias been the case for some minutes past. I think that my right lion, friend, and you, Sir, in particular, must see to it that there is a little better order kept in the House, i refer at this moment particularly to hou. gentlemen on the other side of the House, although, as I said on a previous occasion, I have noticed the same thing on this side, and I deprecate it as much here as there. But during the last fifteen minutes when my hon. friend from Lincoln and Niagara (Mr. Lancaster) was speaking, I noticed at least half a dozen gentlemen carrying on conversation in tones almost as loud as those of my hon. friend in addressing the House. I do not think we should conduct the business of the House in that way. Some restraint should be put upon lion, gentlemen; and I, for my part am prepared to support you, Mr. Speaker, to the utmost of my power, so far as this side of the House is concerned, in putting a stop to this undesirable condition of things. I trust the right hon. gentleman (Rf. Hon. Sir Wilfrid Laurier) will support you with regard to the other side.

I am afraid the sinning is not all on one side

Mr. BORDEN (Halifax).

I have said so.

And my bon. friend (Mr. Borden, Halifax) acknowledges Mr. LANCASTER.

it. I have no hesitation in saying that, for my part. I shall be glad to co-operate with him, and with you, Mr. Speaker, in preserving order. I suppose that if we maintain order we shall reach prorogation all the sooner-and it ought to be sufficient inducement for us all to beliave. If my hon. friend (Mr. Borden, Halifax) says that he will take care of his own side. I will try to take care of ours : and you, Mr. Speaker, will take care of both.

Mr. BORDEN (Halifax).

I do not know that I said I would take care of my own side ; I do not know that they require much care. But I said that I would endeavour to support you, Mr. Speaker, so far as my own side is concerned, and that is what I suppose you would desire.

Mr. SPEAKER, For my part I will do my best to maintain order.

Mr. RICHARD BLAIN (Peel).

Before the third reading of this Bill is carried. I wish to occupy the attention of the House for a very short time to move an amendment, which applies to section 8, it is as follows ;

That all the words after the word * that ' to the end of the question be left out. and the following be substituted therefor : ' the Bill be referred back to a Committee of the Whole House with power to amend section 8 by adding thereto the following words :-

'Provided, however, that the surveys and plans, showing the most favourable route and the best practicable grades and curvatures that can be obtained, together with an estimate of the cost based thereon, shall be first submitted to the parliament for approval.'

It seems to me that this is an amendment that should meet the approval of both sides of the House. When this Bill was first introduced by the Prime Minister, tlie leader of the opposition challenged the government to state within ten million dollars what the cost of this work would be. I listened with great attention to the whole debate, lasting many weeks, and I have not heard any member of the government attempt to answer or to solve that question. I am quite sure that the people of Canada will regret very much that the parliament of Canada propose to expend in the neighbourhood of one hundred or one hundred and twenty million dollars without first laying upon the Table of the House some closer estimate of what this work is going to cost, and some estimate of its length, within a few miles, and the character of the country it is to traverse.

During this discussion a large number of petitions have been presented to the House coming from every section of Canada, coming from the farmers of this country, who ask that, following ordinary business principles. the government should lay upon the Table some estimate of the cost. Surely,

there must be some duty resting upon the government in respect to the expenditure of the people's money. It is all very well to say that we have prosperous times now, it is all very well for the Finance Minister to say that we have a flowing treasury-that is ail very acceptable, and is appreciated by the people of Canada. But notwithstanding that, Mr. Speaker, the people of this country expect that their money should be expended in a business-like manner, and with that in view they have spoken out in very loud tones, I think, judging from the large number of petitions that have been presented1 from day to day, signed by hundreds and hundreds of electors belonging to both sides of politics. I think it is proper that a copy of these petitions should be placed upon the [DOT] Hansard,' and I propose, with the kind indulgence of the House, to read it. It deals with the subject of the resolution which I have moved, because it asks for an estimate of the cost of this proposed railway.

To the Honourable

The Senate and House of Commons of Canada, In Parliament assembled.

The petition of the undersigned electors of the Dominion of Canada humbly showeth :

1. That a wise and prudent solution of the great question of transportation is of the utmost importance as regards the future of this Dominion.

2. That your petitioners are of opinion that it would be unwise and imprudent to take definite action until the government and parliament are fully possessed of the information essential to a proper decision of that question.

3. That the country is not possessed of such information ; that the government has appointed a commission to investigate and report upon the whole subject of transportation. .

i. That, a project of such magnitude should not be undertaken without the most complete and accurate surveys, under the direction and control of engineers of standing and repute.

5. That such surveys should be in the hands of the government and of parliament before the credit of the Dominion is committed to an enterprise which involves enormous obligations.

6. That those obligations cannot properly be estimated before such surveys shall have been made.

7. That, however, the most competent men are of the opinion that the cost of the projected line between Winnipeg and Moncton will reach the enormous amount of upwards of $120,000,000.

8. That no evidence has been adduced so far during the long discussion that has taken place to establish that such a large expenditure of public money will cheapen the freight rates for the products of the west, or establish more satisfactory communication between the different parts of the Dominion.

9. That, on the contrary, it is greatly to be feared that by pledging the credit of the conn-try to such a vast extent, the government will make it impossible to carry ont works better calculated to meet the transportation needs of the country.

10. That the government, parliament and taxpayers should have an opportunity to learn the results of the investigation of the said commission ; and to examine the evidence upon which such results were arrived at.

Your petitioners, therefore, humbly pray that the said Bill now before parliament may not now become law ; but that its further consideration by the government and by parliament shall be deferred until such full and accurate information shall have been obtained and laid before parliament.

That is a copy of the petitions that are being presented to this House by the hundreds within the last few weeks. Some little effort lias been made on the other side of the House to cast reflection upon the genuineness of the signatures to some of these petitions. I may remind our lion, friends opposite that from every section, almost from every county, have come petitions from the farmers who have put tlieir names to these documents, making the reasonable request that before their money is expended the government should apply to this enterprise the same business principles that any private company would apply to its own business.

I have no hesitation in saying that the electors who signed these petitions are responsible citizens-we have seen them coming from the great metropolis of Montreal this morning signed by 5,000 electors of that great city-surely these deserve some consideration by the government.

We are asked" to construct this road without proper estimates. The right hon. first minister has laid upon the Table a Blue-book, that has been occasionally re^ ferred to in this discussion. I do not propose to make any extended reference to it, only to read one short paragraph in respect to the timber. It has been frequently alleged in this House by hon. gentlemen opposite that this road ought to be constructed through the northern part of the provinces of Quebec and Ontario for the purpose of developing timber limits and the timber resources of those regions. Here is a paragraph from the report of Sir. Ogilvie, D.L.S., 1891, addressed to the Minister of the Interior, in which he makes this statement :

II the timber on all the other rivers flowing into the bay is no more important than that I saw on the Abitibi, I would hesitate as to the timber resources of that district being valuable; for though it is all thickly wooded, only a small percentage of it (along the river at least) is large enough for merchantable lumber.

So you see that this gentleman says that the timber limits of that section of the provinces of Quebec and Ontario to which reference is made in this Blue-book, are not so valuable -as tlie members of the government would lead us to believe. Now, in so far as the transportation of wheat is concerned, I wish to give one short quotation from a speech of the First Minister when discussing the transportation question last session. On page 958 of the 1 Hansard ' of 1902, I find he made this statement;

But, unfortunately, there is a rugged section along the shores of Lake Superior which hardly admits of wheat being commercially carried through.

When the First Minister was discussing the transportation question in the last session of parliament, with all this information in the hands of the government-because doubtless there is no information of more recent date than that they possessed last session-with all the information at his disposal with all the knowledge the right hon. gentleman has been able to obtain as First Minister for the purpose of solving the great transportation question during all the time he has been in public life, during the seven years he has been Prime Minister of this country, I say with all this information, the right hon. gentleman stood up in this House last session and said that the carriage of wheat from the west would be a failure as a commercial enterprise. I do not quite understand what change has come over the hon. gentleman's views. Surely the rocks that were there last year are there still ; this rugged country that he referred to last session is still as rugged as ever. The hon. gentleman has not given us any information more recent than that. And yet the First Minister is prepared to say now that a road can be constructed through that country that would be of commercial value.- It does look as if some unknown person had stepped in to the counsels of the government and demanded a speedy solution of this question in the interest of the Grand Trunk Railway. I do not quite understand what the right hon. gentleman means. We are expected as a Canadian parliament to 'conduct our business in a businesslike manner. The government of Canada, by reason of owning and operating the Intercolonial Railway has the advantage of knowing something about the cost of railway construction, inasmuch as it has expended an enormous sum ranging from seventy-five million upwards upon government roads in this country.

It has been expended, not by private enterprise, but by the government themselves. The government of this country, year after year, have been expending vast sums in the purchasing of cars, and of steel rails, and of locomotives, and of railway ties, indeed, in the purchase of everything that enters into railway construction, ahd the government, therefore, should have been able to lay before the people of this country a fair estimate of the cost before they would) undertake such a gigantic work, notwithstanding the government has this advantage, they are now In the railway business themselves, notwithstanding that they have been equipping the Intercolonial Railway by taking down the old bridges and replacing them with newer and up-to-date bridges,) notwithstanding that they have told the people of this country that they have practically equipped anew the Intercolonial Railway by the construction of better roadbed, by the purchase of better freight cars and better passenger cars-notwithstanding all this, the people of this country are asked to pay this enormous amount of money

Mr. BLAIN.

without the Railway Department coming forward and laying upon the Table of tbe House a statement of what, in their opinion, would be a proper estimate of the cost of this road. Further than this, It would not be an unreasonable request for the people of Canada to ask some leading railway man, either in this country, in the United States or in England, some man who has a reputation as a x-ailway expert, who has constructed railways in this country, like Sir William Van Horne, to give an opinion upon the cost of the building of that, road before we are asked to vote the money. As it is, we are asked to do so, without haying the opinion of any great railway man in this country excepting that of the hon. member for North Norfolk (Mr. Charlton), and I noticed the other day that the right hon. the First Minister rather shoved him aside and did not put quite so high an estimate on him as a railway expert as when be introduced the Bill.

Hon. Mr. ROSS (Victoria, N.S.).

Has the hon. gentleman read Sir Sandford Fleming's report ?

Mr. BLAIN.

I may say to the hon. gentleman of many years, that I have read Sir Sandford Fleming's report, and! that it has1 been read in this House over and over again in the absence of my hon. friend during this discussion. Sir Sandford Fleming's report, in so far as it refers to the province of New Brunswick, and that gentleman states that the northern part of the province of New Brunswick, where this government propose to construct the road, is a very rough country, so rough that he would not recommend the government of earlier days to construct the Intercolonial Railway there. That is what he said in the report which is in the possession of this House at the present time.

Just one word in conclusion in respect to the country through which this railway is to pass in the province of Ontario andi in the province of Quebec. My hon. friend the Minister of Justice (Hon. Mr. Fitzpatrick) made a statement in this House the other day that there was a very large area of good land in the northern part of the province of Ontario amounting to millions of acres. If that statement be correct, and perhaps it is correct, then I say that the people of this country would expect the government to tell them $vitliin twenty or thirty or fifty miles, through what part of that country this railroad will he constructed. Why do they not tell this to the people of Quebec and of Ontario and of New Brunswick, because the electors in these three great provinces are interested in this matter, as they will have to pay some portion of tbe taxes of tills country like all other citizens-and they are not complaining on that point-but they do expect that the government will lay before the people of this country data sufficiently accurate to enable them to judge within 100 miles where this rail-

way will be constructed in these provinces. Is that an unreasonable request ? I do not think it is, and I do not wonder that as the people come to understand this matter, information which the newspapers with their splendid facilities and enterprise, are circulating throughout the country, that we are heseiged day after day with petitions from the electors saying something must be done by this government to furnish informa-i tion before they pledge the people of this country to an expenditure of at least one hundred millions of dollars.

I move the resolution which I read, seconded by Mr. McGowan, and I would earnestly hope-although perhaps it would be too much to say_I expect-that the government will lay before parliament such information as will enable the electorate of this country to vote intelligently when they are asked to authorize the expenditure of so many millions of dollars.

Mr. A. E. KEMP (East Toronto).

I desire to say one word in reference to this resolution, which appears to me to be one of the most reasonable that has been placed before the House in connection with this transcontinental railway project. The resolution asks that the information obtained by the government from time to time in regard to the surveys and estimates of cost shall be placed before this House. It is evident that this railway cannot be built before the House meets again; the surveys and the reports of the engineers cannot be completed before that time. Is it not, therefore, as reasonable a proposition as ever was made in this House that the information thus obtained should be placed before the House before we pass final judgment ? The government, perhaps, might not then be disposed to adhere to what they j had stated in regard to building a first-class railway, with one-half or four-tenth per cent grades' through this country in order to carry the products of the west to the seaboard in a more economical way than by the existing routes. This country, under such circumstances, would not be under any ob-*igatiou to the Grand Trunk Pacific, because parliament would have an opportunity to say whether the road shall be constructed or not. The only reports that have been placed before this House are reports of geologists, who were not instructed to investigate the regions through which^ they travelled for the purpose of building a modern railway, and I submit that then report is of no value when it comes to building a modern up-to-date railway. We have absolutely no information before the House from first-class competent engineers as to the suitability of that country for the building of a railway for the purpose foi which this is being built. I would not have spoken on this resolution, but I wisnea to ask the Prime Minister a question. I read to him the other day a report from

one of the Toronto newspapers that the Grand Trunk Railway themselves were making surveys between Winnipeg and the Que-< bee boundary. The right hon. gentleman will remember the contents of the article to which I am now referrng. I asked, why did not the government make the surveys for this government road, instead of the Grand Trunk Pacific, and also asked why it was that the information obtained by these surveyors was given to the press before it was submitted to this House. I think the Prime Minister would have replied to me the other day were it not that the chairman called ' carried,' and the resolution was hurried through. Surely^ the Prime Minister can give the information to the House now.

What is the question ?

Mr. KEMP.

The question was in reference to the surveys. I will again read what was said by the Toronto ' News ' ;

The Grand Trunk has been exploring the country. Its officials to-day are in possession of their own surveyors' reports. These reports cover the country from Winnipeg to Lake Abitibi. These reports state that from Winnipeg to the eastern border of New Ontario a grade of four-tenths of one per cent-about twenty-one feet to the mile-is perfectly practicable. The standard of the best wheat-carrying railways of the United States can be attained. . ,

More than that, the fall of almost every grade is to the east. This is an immense advantage, for it means that the road will practically run down hill from Winnipeg for the thousand mile stretch in eastern Manitoba and New Ontario.

This is a splendid start. For the first thousand miles at least the trains will roll down a continuous gentle slope. Extraordinary economy of operation should he practicable. The limit to the size of the trains will be the number of cars which a single crew can handle, rather than the hauling power of the engine. We must insist on equally good grades all the way through Quebec. It may prove the case that the height of land in Quebec will make an up hill grade necessary. The ideal road, would he down hill every foot of the way from prairie to ocean. The ideal seems to be assured for one thousand of the fourteen hundred miles.

I wish to know why the Grand Trunk are making these surveys, and if they are going to be accepted by the government ?

The hon. gentleman asks me, if it is true that the Grand Trunk Pacific are making surveys ?

Mr. KEMP.

On the government line ?

Between Lake Abitibi apd Winnipeg. The hon. gentleman also asks, if the government will avail of these surveys. I understand that the Grand Trunk have been making surveys since last fall ; that they started when they first thought of this Grand Trunk Pacific scheme. I do not know for a fact whe-

tlier they have done so or not. It is impossible to say what the government will do with regard to these surveys. The only thing I can say is, that we shall have surveys of our own when the commission is appointed, and these surveys in proper time will be laid before the House.

It. EMMERSON (Westmoreland). I would be very sorry indeed to take up the time of the House in prolonging this discussion, but there has been some reference made to the petitions presented, asking that there should be delay, because there is little knowledge of the section of the province of New Brunswick, through which this road is to run. I do not think that there is very much significance to be attached to these petitions, but there is this significance : That

while they have been very carefully prepared. I have no doubt, by lion, members opposite and printed and sent throughout the country and signed in their respective constituencies it is quite apparent-at all events judging of the signatures with which I am familiar-that they are signed by friends of lion, gentlemen opposite almost exclusively. There is one very strange thin? in connection with the contents of these petitions, and that is, that though they have been prepared with so much care by lion, gentlemen opposite and circulated by their political agents, there is no reference in these petitions to the alternative proposition of the leader of the opposition.

Mr. SPROULE.

The alternative proposition is not about to become law, and there is no reason to petition for or against it.

Mr. EMMERSON.

This fact proves, that the great body of the Conservatives, in my province at any rate, are no more in sympathy with the alternative proposition of the leader of the opposition, than are some of the hon. gentlemen's own friends in this House, who have devoted the whole time during this debate to speaking of the government proposition, and have hardly raised a murmur in favour of the proposal of my hon. friend (Mr. Borden). The hon. gentleman (Mr. Blain) who moved this amendment, has stated that there is little known of that part of New Brunswick through which this road will run. The fact that he stated that it was going to run in the northern part of the province, shows that he is ignorant of the geography of New Brunswick. I have in my hand a pamphlet issued by the board of trade of the town of Woodstock, which is situated in the county of Carleton, represented by my hon. friend opposite (Mr. Hale), and this road will run almost entirely through that rich and flourishing county. Just wliat portion of the county it will run through, I have no doubt will be determined by the engineers, but in order to show the resources of that county, I will read an extract from the circular to which I refer. Here is a statement of the yield of crops in Carleton county, in ^)02 :