Mr. ROBERT FORKE (Brandon):

Mr. Speaker, I desire to lay on the table of the House some correspondence between the Prime Minister and myself, asked for yesterday by the hon. member for Muskoka-Ontario (Mr. McGibbon).

Mr. J. F. WHITE (London):

Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the government whether, next Wednesday being Ash Wednesday, the House will adjourn?

Hon. J. A. ROBB (Acting Leader of the House):

Mr. Speaker, we hope the Address

will be disposed of before next Wednesday. If not, we shall follow the usual custom, I imagine-that is, adjourn.

ALBERTA COAI^-TRANSPORTATION

On the Orders of the Day:

Mr. E. J. GARLAND (Bow River):

Mr. Speaker, I desire to direct the attention of the government, through the Minister of the Interior (Mr. Stewart), to the serious fuel situation in Ontario, as set forth in a letter to me from the United Farmers Co-operative Company Limited. This organization, as the minister knows, is working in conjunction with the Canadian Manufacturers' Association and other bodies in an effort to solve the acute coal situation in Ontario. The company object to the fact that only another 25,000 tons of coal is to be moved, and they say:

This in our estimation would be a calamity. There is an emergency throughout Ontario to be met im-

Alberta Coal

mediately on the fuel situation. During the past two weeks we have been in communication by long distance telephone to points throughout all parts of the province, and have made it our business to inquire of our people as to the fuel situation in their district, and we find that coal at almost every point is very scarce.

We find that coal dealers who have been counting on receiving supplies of coke and Pocohontas coal are disappointed in this. Deliveries of this have not come forward as expected. Coke, as we all know, is practically off the market at the present time, and will likely be very scarce until spring. Deliveries of Poco-hontas Coal are slow, and unless an adequate tonnage of Alberta coal is secured for immediate delivery, the situation will create hardship in many localities.

I bring this to the attention of the government in the hope that the minister will be able to assure the House that every possible effort will be made in accordance with the proper procedure to induce the railway companies to consider the hauling of this coal.

Hon. CHARLES STEWART (West Edmonton, Minister of the Interior):

Mr. Speaker,

may I point out for the benefit of the House that each province has a fuel commissioner? In the cas9 of Ontario, this official is Mr. Ellis. He is directly in touch, so far as I know, with every district of his province, and is well aware of the local requirements. He has power to direct coal shipments to any point he deems desirable and to take such other measures as he sees fit to relieve any fuel shortage. The federal government is always glad to co-operate in relieving any emergency, but Mr. Ellis and the coal operators of Alberta have been dealing directly with Sir Henry Thornton and his board of management. As my hon. friend is aware, there is no movement of this coal over the Canadian Pacific railway; it is all confined to the Canadian National railways. I want it to be distinctly understood that Sir Henry Thornton announced specifically that he was hauling this coal at seven dollars a ton as an emergency measure. I have no doubt that so long as the emergency exists he will continue to bring in Alberta coal.

Mr. M. C. SENN (Haldimand):

Mr. Speaker, I understand that the Cayuga tribe of Indians, which is a branch of the Six Nations confederacy, has been awarded a considerable sum of money by the United States government in settlement of certain longstanding claims against that country. Will the minister inform the House if the members of this tribe residing in the reservation near Brantford are to rfiare in the award? Also, is the department looking after their interests?

Hon. CHARLES STEWART (West Edmonton, Superintendent General of Indian Affairs):

Mr. Speaker, I cannot give my hon. friend at the moment all the information necessary to answer his question, but I will 'secure it for him to-morrow.

Mr. THOMAS CANTLEY (Pictou):

Mr. Speaker, when at six o'clock yesterday I moved the adjournment of the debate I was discussing railway construction in the several provinces from 1907 to 1920, and the increased railway mileage then built. During this period the increase in railway mileage constructed in Saskatchewan was 4,200; Ontario, 3,363; Alberta, 3,181; British Columbia, 2,639; Quebec, 1,425; Manitoba, 1,329; New Brunswick, 310; Nova Scotia, 109; Prince Edward Island, 12.

Mr. SPEAKER:

Order. Might I suggest that hon. members should not carry on too many conversations? I have to strain my ears to understand what the hon. gentleman is saying.

Mr. CANTLEY:

These figures, Sir, show

that the percentage increase in railway mileage within each of the provinces for the same period was as follows:

Alberta, 238; Saskatchewan, 208; British Columbia, 155; Ontario, 57; Manitoba, 43; Quebec, 40; New Brunswick, 21; Nova Scotia, 8; Prince Edward Island,

ih-

Then consider the amount of Dominion aid given to each of the provinces by way of subsidies, construction of the National Transcontinental railway, the purchase of the Canadian Northern railway, the practical assumption of the liabilities of the Grand Trunk Pacific railway and the aid given to the Canadian Pacific Railway. These payments or contributions by provinces are as follows-* and I am giving the figures in round millions:

Ontario, 288; Quebec, 158; British Columbia, 167; Manitoba, 138; Alberta, 128; Saskatchewan, 163; New Brunswick, 28; Nova Scotia, 21; Prince Edward

Island, 8.

For canal construction and enlargement from 1867 to 1925, the capital expenditure in round figures was 225 millions, of which about 20 millions was spent prior to confederation

The Address-Mr. Cantley

To the balance of, say, 200 millions, expended since 1867, is to be added the estimated approximate cost of completing the Welland ship canal, about 54 millions, and this in addition to about 61 millions already expended! on this new work up to the end of the last fiscal year; or, a grand total since 1867 of 280 millions, when the Welland ship canal work now in progress is completed. Of this great sum about $650,000, or less than three-eighths of one per cent was spent on the half mile St. Peter's canal in Cape Breton.

Now Scotia has nearly twenty per cent of the whole population of Ontario, and more than twenty-five per cent of the rural population of that province, but Ontario received nearly $1,400 for every dollar Nova Scotia received by way of railway expenditure, and up to the clos'e of 1923 more than $150 for every dollar expended in Nova Scotia by the federal government on canals. Nova Scotia in 1920 had twenty-four per cent more population than Alberta, while that province received as milway aid from the Dominion more than six times as much as Nova Scotia. Saskatchewan, with practically the same population got 163 odd millions, against 21 millions for Nova Scotia, or nearly eight times as much. British Columbia fared even better, for while the population of Nova Scotia was twenty per cent greater, she got but slightly over one-eighth as much Dominion railway expenditure. Manitoba received nearly seven times as much as Nova Scotia, and Quebec more than seven times as much. We have not forgotten that a few miles of privately-owned branch lines were taken over in Nova Scotia, and several such railways in New Brunswick, but at much below the cost of construction, and in ail the expenditure did not amount to five per cent of that spent in any one of the western provinces.

The province of Nova Scotia gave in land grants to Nova Scotia railways now comprised in the Canadian National Railways,

160,000 acres. The province's proportion of the lands given in grants to other railways, also now merged in the Canadian National system, aggregate 1,770,000 acres. As a partner in confederation Nova. Scotia bad, and by right still has, a substantial interest in these lands and in the benefit derived from this or other such exploitation, though made chiefly in the prairie provinces for railway development there.

Quebec, Ontario and Manitoba were all allowed to extend their boundaries into the territories abutting on these provinces, and so added immense areas-some of great mineral value-to their respective domains. No such advantages came to Nova Scotia, and no com-

pensation has yet been made to Nova Scotia for those portions of the territory so alienated from the Dominion and given to these other provinces. Nova Scotia's interests as one of the four original partners who acquired and paid for these lands is being ignored. I repeat, Sir, Nova Scotia as one of the original partners in confederation has contributed! in proportion to her population to all the national expenditure of the Dominion, and should have realized a proportionate advantage with the other provinces. Neither in railway mileage, railway expenditure, canal construction, nor the free traffic thereon, has she received back a proportion more than, trifling. No share of the prairie public domain has been given her or any compensation for her proportion given to other provinces.

The cost of transportation on the Intercolonial railway has been- doubled, and in many important oases more than doubled, thus virtually cancelling the only commercial consideration promised at confederation. Our basic products are practically dftty free today, and1 we are left not only without protection, but the canal system, to the building of which we have contributed our share, supplies free transportation not only to Quebec, Ontario and the central western provinces, but also to our foreign competitors, who pushed three million tons of soft coal and a considerable tonnage of iron and steel through these waterways into Canada during the season 1923-4.

These Unfavourable conditions, Mr. Speaker, which make it impossible for Nova Scotia to do any volume of profitable business with her sister provinces west of the ancient city of Quebec, are as depressing as they are powerful in effect. Appreciation of the situation is reflected in the building programme of the Dominion for the past year, which in the Contractors Journal is forecast at eighty million dollars. Of this amount it is said that five-eighiths, or thirty millions, will be spent in Ontario, and but one million in the three Maritime provinces. In other words, it is expected that the Maritimes, with a population of one-fifth of that of Ontario, will thus spend on new construction this year only one-fiftieth of the amount to be spent in Ontario. I ask: Why?

A few days ago before I left home to come to Ottawa I saw eighteen expert artisans leave New Glasgow for the United States. These artisans, some of the best mechanics we have in this country, followed nearly three thousand others, most of them equally expert, who have left either New Glasgow or within a radius of five miles of that town within the last two years. Why did they leave? Why were we not able to provide employment in

The Address-Mr. Cantley

this country for those skilled artisans? Why is it necessary for them to leave the Maritime provinces and go to Detroit, Boston, and other points in the United States to get employment? Mr. Speaker, we used to talk some years ago, and I have heard a good deal of that talk myself sitting in the gallery here in past years, about remittance men, but I want to tell the House that we have to-day a large number of remittance men, not in Canada, but in the United States- Canadians who have been forced to go over there, and who, after paying for their board and living expenses, are remitting from week to week and month to month what they can save to maintain their families in Nova Scotia and the other Maritime provinces.

Any serious attempt to investigate the two questions to which I have referred will bring to light the realization of a deep-seated and widespread situation where, due to unfair territorial treatment, tariff inequalities and disappointing traffic conditions, the natural development of the Maritime resources is restricted and the opportunities for employment similarly affected.

I have made little or no reference to the question of protection for our Maritime industries. During each of the months of June and July last there was imported into this country from the United States about

55,000 tons of steel; I do not know what the total tonnage imported in August, September and October was, but for the month of November last we imported into this country from the United States 68,000 tons of steel, seven-eighths of which could have been produced equally well in Canada. Only a few days before I left home, I was in Stellarton, three miles distant from the town of New Glasgow where I live, and there the Public Works department are building a post office. In the construction of that building some structural steel is being used, and what did I find? I looked at the steel and I found rolled into it the name of the Carnegie Steel Company of the United States. The same material could have been bought and was in store at the works at New Glasgow, within four miles of where that building was being erected. There was in store at the works at New Glasgow 6,000 tons of it, 560 different sections of various shapes and sizes, all available for that work. Why was that not used? Why do we bring in, why are we allowed to bring in, American material for use in the construction of public buildings when within four miles of that construction there is ample material available for the purpose, when Canadian steel is stored and

remains uncalled for and unsold so near that construction? That is a condition of affairs, Mr. Speaker, which is not creditable to this country, and it is a condition of affairs that bears hardly upon the province from which I come. During recent years between

600,000 and 700,000 tons of foreign steel has annually come into the Dominion of Canada, and I repeat, 90' per cent of that steel could have been and should have been manufactured within the Dominion of Canada. I do not intend to delay the House much longer in dealing with this phase, but I expect to refer to this question of protection for our iron and steel and coal industries at some later date.

Mr. MacLEAN (Prince):

Would the hon. member tell us what is the difference between the American price and the Canadian price for that structural steel? Could it be bought cheaper in the United States?