Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister):

I beg to move, seconded by Mr. Fielding:

That on Wednesday the fifteenth day of March instant and subsequent Wednesdays to the end of the session, the House will meet at three o'clock in the afternoon.

I may say in regard to this motion, Mr. Speaker, that during the sessions of the previous Parliament the House assembled at two o'clock on Wednesdays instead of three. Experience, however, went to show that meeting an hour earlier on one day of the week resulted in a good deal of confusion, inconvenience and embarrassment, and I think it will probably better serve the convenience of all members if we assemble at the same hour on Wednesday as on other days of the week.

Mr. MEIGHEN:

This is a variation of a long standing rule of the House, but by way of trial I offer no objection to it at the present time.

Hon. T. A. CRERAR (Marquette):

Before the Orders of the Day are called I should like to ask my hon. friend the

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Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Robb) if any report has been made to the Government by the Royal Grain Inquiry Commission appointed by the late Government, known in Western Canada as the Hyndman Commission, and if so, whether such report will be made available to the House. I should like also to ask whether the Government has a copy of the evidence taken, and if it is the intention to submit such evidence to the House.

Hon. J. A. ROBB:

(Minister of Trade and Commerce) There is a voluminous amount of correspondence in the department, but no definite report. The expense of printing this evidence would be' considerable. I see no objection to supplying it to my hon. friend if he so desires, and if the House decides to bear the expense of printing it there will be no objection to that being done.

Mr. MEIGHEN:

May I ask the minister if it is the intention of the Government to continue the work of the commission?

Mr. ROBB:

Well, the Wheat Board have apparently discontinued their own work. They have run out of supplies.

Mr. MEIGHEN:

The Wheat Board?

Mr. ROBB:

The Grain Commission.

Hon. T. A. CRERAR (Marquette) :

Mr. Speaker, my first words this afternoon shall be words of congratulation to you, Sir, upon your elevation to the position of First Commoner of the land. The office of Speaker in the greatest deliberative assembly of the nation is one of much responsibility. I think the House has been happy in its choice, Sir, and I have no douht that hon. members will give you every assistance in the maintenance of that order and decorum which are necessary for the proper conduct of the public business.

It is appropriate also that I join with the right hon. the leader of the Opposition (Mr. Meighen) and the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) in the words which they have uttered with regard to the appointment of His Excellency Lord Byng to be

Governor General of Canada. A good many of us have pleasant recollections of the late Governor General, the Duke of Devonshire. I have no doubt that the present Governor General will soon gain from the whole of the Canadian people that esteem and respect that he gained so rapidly among the Canadian soldiers when he was their chief at the front.

I wish also-and I feel a particular pride in doing so-to say a word of welcome on the part of my fellow Progressive members here to the new lady member of this House. I think it is particularly fitting, Mr. Speaker, that the first lady member elected to the House of Commons, marking a distinct step in progress, should be elected as a member of the Progressive Party. We have recently given the women of Canada the franchise. I am a thorough believer in that reform; I believe that the women of Canada can make a great contribution to the public life of the country, and I have no doubt that our new member will make a valuable contribution to the work of the House.

I wish also to say a word of felicitation, not only because it is customary but because I think it can be sincerely offered upon the present occasion, to the mover (Mr. McMurray) and to the seconder (Mr. Mer-cier) of the motion we are considering. It is not a light ordeal for a new member to speak from his place in this House for the first time; I recall my own experience in that connection. But I know I am well within the judgment of the whole House when I say that the hon. member for North Winnipeg discharged his duty yesterday very well indeed. Unfortunately for me I do not speak the graceful language of my hon. friends from Quebec and I was therefore unable to follow in actual text the address given by my hon. friend who seconded the motion. But I am bound to say that of the many admirable speeches that I have listened to in the French language none has impressed me more than the speech I heard from my hon. friend yesterday.

It is proper that I should make some reference to the speeches of my right hon. friend who leads the Opposition (Mr. Meighen) and my hon. friend the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King). If the speeches we had yesterday from our hon. friends, Mr. Speaker, are an indication of what we shall have throughout the whole session and this Parliament, I can well believe that we are in for some interesting times. I should like to have seen a little more discussion of the really serious prob-

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lems that are facing this country. The business of this Parliament is very serious, and I hope I am not giving any offence to my hon. friends when I offer them this advice, that it would be well in the future to give more consideration to the great problems that are facing us in this country.

My hon. friend who leads the Opposition (Mr. Meighen) had a good deal to say as to the character of the campaign carried on in some parts of Canada by my hon. friends on the Government side. Well, I had some experience myself of the character of the campaign carried on in some parts of the country by my hon. friends on the other side of the House, and I dare say that my right hon. friend the leader of the Opposition had a similar experience, but I must say that he was living perilously near a glass house when he was making those charges. I am among those who believe that the election campaigns of this country, whether federal or provincial, should be conducted as far as possible upon the basis of a clear and honest discussion of the issues before the people. I conceive that only in such a way can the best government be secured. I have no patience with the character of the campaign that was carried on by some of my hon. friends on the Government side in the province of Quebec, both in respect to the question of conscription and the question of the tariff. As far as Western Canada was concerned, and Eastern Canada too, very largely, on what basis was the campaign against the Progressive party and the Progressive candidates carried on? On a basis of utter and gross misrepresentation. As far as Western Canada was concerned, the record of the Government and the question of the tariff were discussed very little. I discovered in the election contest recently closed that I had become a most dangerous character in this Dominion, and if some of the things that I heard were said about me and about some of my associates sitting behind me, in the last election campaign in Western Canada were true, I certainly should not be occupying a seat in this House of Commons to-day. I say again, let us endeavour to free our minds of these things, for there are great and vital issues before this country at the present time. Let us concentrate our attention upon these issues and endeavour to seek a solution for our problems; along the line of what will be in the best interests of our country. On no other line can I conceive that we can discharge our duties to our constituents as we should.

We have had a change of government, and we shall wait with interest to see what benefits that change of government will bring to this country. That brings me to a matter that was referred to by my right hon. friend the leader of the Opposition and by my hon. friend the Prime Minister. I refer to the question of the negotiations that were entered into, or were supposed to be entered into, between the Government and myself and one or two members representing the Progressive party elected in the last campaign. My hon. friend the Prime Minister, I think, was animated by a sincere desire to do what was in the best interests of this country, but when he states that he made it quite clear in any proposals or suggestions he made, that this ministry was only to be a Liberal ministry I must say that I did not so understand it. When these proposals were first made they were discussed or suggested on the basis of policy and on the basis of the personnel of the Government; and that, to my mind, is the essential thing. I am not much concerned with what government is in power in this country so long as the country gets the legislation and the administration it should have. I have had a great many differences of opinion with my right hon. friend the leader of the Opposition, who was very kind in his references yesterday -or at all events in the inference that might be drawn from his references to his hon. friends who sit on his left; but notwithstanding the strong differences of opinion I have had with my right hon. friend I would be prepared to co-operate with him or with anyone else at the present time to secure for this country the administration and the legislation that it needs. But such co-operation would be upon definite lines of principle, upon definite lines of policy, and upon no other lines. I submitted the suggestions that had been conveyed to me to my supporters, as it was my duty to do. Those suggestions were considered and there were further discussions, but nothing came of those discussions, and we are here to-day sitting in this House as an independent party standing for the principles that we believe in and prepared to further those principles by every honest and legitimate means within our power.

There has been some speculation in the press, and, I dare say, also in the House, as to what attitude the Progressive party would take in this House. Well, Sir, the attitude of the Progressive party is easily

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and simply stated. We are here, not to oppose for the sake of opposing; we are here prepared to give the Government every assistance in carrying on the government of this country, when it gives the country the policies that we believe it should have. I say that we are prepared to do that, but we are equally prepared to oppose the Government and to criticise it when we think the Government is doing wrong or not adopting the policies that we think this country should have. That, to my mind, frankly and clearly states our position. My own hope, and I am bound to say that the words of my hon. friend the Prime Minister give some ground for that hope, is that the policy pursued by the Government in respect of the great vital questions before the country, to which later I shall make some allusion, will be such as to command our support. If their course is shaped in that direction so that we can support them, we shall do so, but if it is not, our duty then will lie in another direction.

I am among those also who believe that the Government should have a reasonable time to carry out its policies and to frame its programme. I quite realize the difficulties of the present situation, that a government coming into office only a few months before a session is called has not had the opportunity to familiarize itself with all the questions of public administration, and perhaps not the opportunity to make a full inquiry as to the lines of public policy that should be followed, and we are therefore prepared to give the Government every reasonable time to shape its course and decide upon its line of action.

I desire to speak, and I shall not detain the House at any great length, upon the subjects dealt with in the Speech from the Throne. It was a good speech as such speeches go. My right hon. friend the leader of the Opposition was on rather poor ground yesterday when he criticised the tariff plank in the Speech, because I recall that a year ago we expected from the Speech delivered at that time, that definite tariff proposals would be laid before Parliament. There is one thing that strikes me, Sir, in respect of the recent Speech and it is that there are in it no decided statements of Government policy excepting perhaps on one or two particulars. There is the suggestion that several branches of defence in Canada should be co-ordinated or joined together under one minister. I think that is a step in the right direction, and I would commend to the

Prime Minister and to the other members of the Government that that course might very well be followed in respect to other departments of the public service. I sometimes think that this country is over-governed. I know that in the United States, with a population of 108 or 110 millions of people, the cost of the Federal Government is relatively much lighter than it is in the Dominion of Canada; and I trust that when the Minister of Militia brings down his estimates he will carry the good work further and pare those estimates as closely as he can. One of the criticisms I had to offer of the late Government was the fact that it did not practise economy as it should be practised having in view the conditions and the circumstances of the country, and I trust that we shall not be obliged to level the same criticism at the members of the present Government when its estimates are placed before the House.

The Speech refers to the existing worldwide depression. Well, we are all pretty well familiar with that. I think we have all, as a matter of fact, pretty much experienced it in our own pockets.

Sir HENRY DRAYTON:

Hear, hear.

Mr. CRERAR:

I am glad to hear that

note of aproval from my hon. friend the ex-Finance Minister because I think perhaps he had a very active experience during his tenure of office of this condition of affairs.

There is also a paragraph in the Speech from the Throne, and to my mind a very important one, dealing with the condition of agriculture in the Dominion. There is [DOT] no doubt, Sir, that the condition of agriculture throughout Canada to-day is very serious indeed. The Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Motherwell) is, I am sure well aware of that fact. After all when we survey this whole Dominion from one end to the other, when we take account of the great manufacturing establishments that we have built up, may we not properly ask upon what does the real prosperity of this Dominion rest? It rests upon our agriculture; and if the farmers of this* country are not prosperous, if agriculture is not thriving, then there is only one inevitable consequence-the business of the country languishes and dies. What is the situation to-day? I venture to say that a great majority of the farmers of Western Canada, that portion of the Dominion with which I am more intimately acquainted, conducted their business last year at a loss. I believe it is true of other portions of the

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Dominion. And what is the result? The result is that our factories are closed, there is unemployment in our cities, and there is lack of business for our railways. At a previous session I gave figures to the House showing the value of our agricultural exports in comparison with the total of our exports from Canada; and without any question of doubt whatever an examination of the facts in all their particulars shows conclusively that agriculture is the greatest industry of this Dominion, and that upon its success more than upon anything else depends the success of all the other industries and business activities of Canada.

I am very glad to note in the Speech from the Throne this statement:

It is apparent that adequate markets and marketing facilities and reduced transportation and production costs lie at the root of the problem.

There is no doubt that better methods of tillage, better methods of farming, and better live stock will increase prosperity and the profits of the farmer; but it is equally true, in the largest sense, that the very things stated here are the things that vitally affect the prosperity of agriculture in this Dominion. The paragraph I have quoted makes the declaration that adequate markets are a part of the problem. That is unquestionably true. How a country such as Canada, with half of its people engaged in the business of agriculture, can have too many markets, or too broad markets, for its agricultural products passes my comprehension. I am not at all sure that the visit of the Minister of Finance to Washington recently was well timed. He of course is the best judge of that; but I do want to commend the purpose of my hon. friend in his desire to promote better trade relations with the United States in respect to markets for our agricultural products. I am not so sure as to how far the Minister of Finance has the support of all those who sit behind and around him in this proposal; but if any words of mine will have any influence with my hon. friend I hope he will persevere in that good work and, if possible, secure that market for Canada's products. I do not agree with the view of my right hon,. friend the leader of the Opposition, who yesterday briefly argued that reciprocity would be of no value to the Canadian farmer. How that argument can be made in the face of patent facts I cannot understand. The year before last we exported, if my memory

serves me right, 350,000 head of live stock-over one year old to the United States. When our American friends passed their Fordney Emergency Tariff that market *was shut off, and what was the result?' The result was that the farmers of Canada did not have that market for their live stock, and the value of live stock in the live stock markets of the Dominion went down, and went down steadily. Now ia that a good thing for Canada or is it not? Is it a good thing for this Dominion that the farmers of Canada shall get the highest possible prices for their live stock and for their grain? I conceive that it is, because if the farmer has money in his pocket, he buys goods from the merchant and contributes traffic to the railways. As a result of that operation the whole area of business is extended and enlarged so that the whole country benefits from it-That is the inevitable result, and consequently there is no greater need for this country to-day than that of wider markets.

A reference is also made in the Speech to the need of improved market facilities. I presume that the Government have in mind in that respect the marketing of the wheat of this country. I hope their reference has a wider application even than that. One of the great difficulties in Canada to-day, and one of the causes of the high cost of living, is the expensive system of distribution, not only of farm products, but of the supplies that consumers require. I am a great believer in voluntary co-operation among the people to overcome these difficulties. I recognize that the middleman in some cases, perhaps, has his place, but when a great body of consumers and producers have to support a vast army of middlemen, it is not a healthy condition, and I trust the Government have in mind in this respect the encouragement and the opening up of these avenues of co-operation.

I would like to make a reference particularly to the marketing of our wheat. The conditions in the past year have been very bad. As my hon. friends know, there is a widespread feeling in Western Canada, shared not only by producers, but by many business men as well, that the Canada Wheat Board should be re-established in a temporary way to meet this condition, and I noted with interest the statement of my hon. friend the Prime Minister yesterday that the whole question of marketing wheat is to be referred to the Standing Committee on Agriculture. I

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would suggest that it be done as quickly as possible, so that the whole matter can be thoroughly inquired into. My right hon. friend who leads the Opposition has advanced a proposal that may have some merit in it, the proposal of a voluntary wheat pool under the control of the Government, but I am not convinced that that proposal as a permanent method of marketing grain, or indeed the method of a Government Wheat Board as a permanent method of marketing grain, is the best and soundest method.

I recently had the opportunity of learning that in the United States great progress has been made in the past few years in the development of co-operative pooling organizations, handling fruits, grain and other commodities used and produced by farmers. In the United States, within the past year, the Federal Government has given substantial assistance in the way of financing these pools in their selling operations. That was done through the revival of the War Finance Corporation, which it will be recalled functioned in the United States during the war. This question of how the Government can aid by assistance of this kind is one that might very well engage the attention of the Government. I can tell them now that they will have the opposition of our banking institutions, but our banking institutionsarenotfreighted with all the financial wisdom that this country contains. This questions is one that should receive the consideration of the Government, and it is a field that can be explored, I feel sure, with great profit to the country.

There is another suggestion in this declaration, namely that production costs should come down. I sincerely hope that that is a forerunner of the wiping out of the duty on agricultural implements. It is absolutely necessary that production costs come down in this country, and where the wisdom comes in, in increasing the cost of the equipment the farmer uses on his farm passes my comprehension. The world is going through a period of great change. It is a well known fact that before the war, Russia, with its population of

160,000,000 or 170,000,000 people, was one of the greatest competitors of North America in supplying Europe with the wheat for the breadstuffs her people consumed. Russia since the war has been out of that market, but there are signs to-day that the restoration of Russia has commenced, indeed, if it is not well on the way,

and within a few years that great country, which is now so stricken with famine and pestilence, will be supplying the markets of the world with wheat in competition with us. I say to the Prime Minister and to the members of his Government that there is no more important matter that can engage their attention to-day than the question of how these production costs can be brought down, and when they face that consideration they will recognize that one method in which that can be done is by taking the duties off agricultural implements.

My hon. friend the Minister of the Interior (Mr. Stewart) and my hon. friend the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Motherwell) have a very full and complete knowledge of the needs of the people in Western Canada. There are those who have said that if the United States raises a tariff against our wheat and against our live stock, we should raise our tariff against them by way of retaliation. What an absurd policy. In other words, when you find the farmers of Canada shut off from this market, thus placed in the position where they have to carry on their work under greater disabilities, you propose to help them-how? By raising the duties, or increasing the cost of the equipment they have to use. The sensible thing to do under such circumstances is to endeavour to meet that condition by reducing the cost of the things the farmer needs to carry on his operations.

There is one other thought suggested in this paragraph. It is a reference to transportation costs and I judge from what the Speech states that that matter is engaging the attention of the Government. I trust that it will engage their attention, Mr. Speaker, to good purpose. Without question one of the things that is throttling business and industry in this country more than anything else is the excessive freight rates that the country is labouring under. Those increases have been very considerable. I am not going to debate the question now whether those increases were justified or not. In a large measure they were justified, owing to conditions under which the country was labouring at that time, but when you find a condition of affairs where a farmer, for instance, ships his oats from the province of Alberta to Fort William, and finds that almost half the money he realizes on the oats at Fort William has been taken in freight to pay

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the transportation costs, then I say this country cannot prosper under those conditions. Consequently, this question of freight rates is one that should engage the attention of the Government, and if the Government are not competent or able to deal with it, the question should engage the attention of this House.

There are some changes forecasted in the customs tariff. I read that paragraph, Mr. Speaker, with a good deal of care, indeed I will confess that I read it a good many times. It is a very carefully worded paragraph. I hope it forecasts a revision of duties downwards. I cannot conceive for a moment that the Government would think ,of 'revising the tariff upwards.

I hope that will not be done, although when I read the speeches delivered even since the Government was formed by some of its members I have a mental reservation even on that question.

I say that because I have in my hand an extract from the Montreal Gazette of February 3, giving a report of a meeting of the Shoe Manufacturers' Association of Canada at which the Minister of Justice (Sir Lomer Gouin) was present. The Minister of Justice delivered a speech upon that occasion, and I shall read from the report in the Gazette. The Gazette is an old established newspaper. It is veering very close to my hon. friends on the Government side at the present time.

Sir HENRY DRAYTON:

Hear, hear.

Mr. CRERAR:

I believe that the exMinister of Finance has a note of regret in his "Hear, hear." Not only the Montreal Gazette, but the Montreal Star as well, are adopting a very friendly attitude to my hon. friends on the Government side.

Mr. JACOBS:

Loaves and fishes.