Mr. J. E. ARMSTRONG (East Lambton):

Mr. Speaker, before the order of motions is disposed of, I beg to move:

That the resolution of the House carried on Tuesday, April 13, concurring in the first report of the seilect standing committee on Agriculture, be rescinded.

My reason for asking that this resolution be rescinded is simply that the report does not contain a correct copy of the proceedings be-

Agriculture Committee

fore that committee. First I will read the resolution as presented to the House:

Mr. Kay, from the select standing committee on Agriculture and Colonization, presented the first report of the said committee, which is as follows:-

Your committee recommends that it be authorized to have its proceedings and such evidence as may be taken, printed from day to day for the use of .the members of the committee and of the House, and that rule 74 as relating thereto be suspended.

Now what actually occurred in that committee I shall show by reading to the House from the proceedings of the committee as they appear on the records of the clerk of the committee, Mr. A. A. Fraser. Here is a copy of the motion taken from the proceedings of the committee on Agriculture and Colonization at its meeting on April 14, 1926:

On motion of Mr. Armstrong, seconded by Mr. Letellier, the chairman was instructed to report to the House recommending that the committee be authorized to have its proceedings and evidence printed from day to day, and also' to have printed such addresses by government officials as may be presented and as it selects.

That, Mr. Speaker, is a very different statement from that which appears in the report that was accepted by this House. I need hardly say that we have had two meetings of that committee. The Deputy Minister of Agriculture attended the first meeting of the committee and spoke for about two hours, giving an address that should receive the widest possible publicity. At the next meeting of the committee, Mr. Archibald, director of experimental farms, gave a most excellent address, covering a period of nearly two hours, in which he dealt with matters pertaining to the different experimental farms and illustration stations throughout the country. Surely copies of these addresses should be available not only to the members of this House but for general distribution as well. That is my reason for asking that the resolution be rescinded and represented in the form in which it passed the committee.

W. F. KAY (Brome-Missisquoi): I think that my hon. friend the member for East Lambton has followed the wrong procedure in the motion which he has presented to-day. Had he done me the ordinary courtesy of speaking to me privately and telling me his troubles I think the matter could have been arranged most satisfactorily. However, I will make a statement of the circumstances touching this matter.

The motion which my hon. friend made in the committee on Agriculture and Colonization was not presented in writing as it should have been. The hon gentleman moved a motion at the end of our meeting

and the clerk of the committee took it down. I think the report which I presented to the House contains the gist of that motion which was a very short one. The motion, as far as I remember its tenor, was that I should be instructed to make a report to the House requesting that the committee should be empowered to have its proceedings printed from day to day for the use of members. The report presented to the House was drafted by the chief clerk of committees and he thought, after consulting with me as to what my hon. friend desired, that it would cover the hon. gentleman's idea. As chairman of the committee, my desire is to present a report which shall embody the substance of any motion which is passed by the committee. The report in question was presented on the 9th April and concurred in on the 13 th. It gives the committee power to decide what number of copies of the addresses made before it shall be printed. That is, the committee can decide at the end of a meeting whether it wants 500, or 1,000 or 10,000 copies printed. There is no limit contained in the recommendation. I think the hon. member for East Lambton, in the few words he uttered at the last meeting of the committee, stated that 10,000 copies should be printed. Another member suggested 100,000 copies, and a third very enthusiastic member suggested that the number of copies printed should be a million. There is no question but that the addresses delivered before the committee so far have been very interesting and very instructive to members of the committee and the House alike. One was an address by Dr. Grisdale, describing in brief form the work of the Department of Agriculture, and the other was an address by Mr. E. S. Archibald dealing with the activities of the experimental farm system. Now, I submit to the House that while these addresses are very valuable to the members of the committee, they are not such as should be printed and distributed throughout the country to the extent of 100,000 or a million copies. The Department of Agriculture issues a number of concise and illustrative pamphlets which in reality contain all the information to be found in these addresses. I am not sure from what my hon. friend from East Lambton has said to-day what he really wishes to be done. He has moved that the report of the committee which was concurred in be rescinded. I submit that he can achieve the result which he desires by making a motion at the next meeting of the committee that 10,000, or 100,000 or 1,000,000 copies be printed. That could be done and would be in perfect conformity with the report in which

Agriculture Committee

the House has concurred. I may say that since the report was adopted by the House the committee on Agriculture has met once and my hon. friend made no motion on that occasion. I submit that the proper procedure for him to have followed was to have made a motion at the last meeting of the committee-

Mr. ARMSTRONG (Lambton):

1 did.

Mr. KAY:

-asking for the printing of whatever number of copies he desired. I submit that the motion presented by my hon. friend be not accepted, and that at the next meeting of the committee on Agriculture the hon. member should make such suggestion as he sees fit.

Mr. ARMSTRONG (Lambton):

I have no desire-

Mr. SPEAKER:

Order. If other hon. members wish to speak now is the appropriate time because the hon. member for East Lamb-ton will close the debate.

Hon. ERlNEST LAPOINTE (Minister of Justice): I have no advice to give as to the

advisability of printing what the hon. member for East Lambton desires. But I really believe that it is difficult for those of us who are not members of the committee on Agriculture to decide to-day whether the report as concurred in by the House was or was not in conformity with the motion of my hon. friend. The hon. gentleman says it was not; the chairman of the committee says it was. As it is very easy to adjust this matter by the hon. member for East Lambton moving a further motion in the committee for the printing of the additional matter he wishes to have printed, I would suggest that this motion be referred back to the committee on Agriculture and Colonization so that the committee can settle the matter itself.

Sir GEORGE PERLEY (Argenteuil):

I

happen to be a member of the committee on Agriculture and Colonization although I was not present when the report in question was agreed to. But it must be remembered that the statement made by the hon. member for East Lambton rvas that the report of the committee brought before the House is not in accordance with -the motion passed in the committee itself. That is something which ought to be carefully investigated. Whether there should be additional copies printed or not is beside the question at -the moment. I quite agree with the Minister of Justice, if my hon. friend from East Lambton will agree, that this matter should be taken up again in the committee-

Sir HENRY DRAYTON:

Refer it back

to committee.

Sir GEORGE PERLEY:

- that the motion be referred back to the committee, and then the hon. gentleman can see that the report to the House is in accordance with the motion as it passed the committee.

Mr. ARMSTRONG (Lambton):

I do not intend to delay the House at all, I merely wish to say that the report as presented to the House is entirely different from that which the clerk of the committee handed to me as a correct copy of what he -has on his books.

Mr. KAY:

Did you write out a notice

to the committee?

Mr. ARMSTRONG (Lambton):

I did not write out a notice to present to the committee, but at the last meeting of the committee I rose at the close of the address made by Mr. Archibald and moved that 10,000 copies of that address be printed. The chairman called attention to the fact-and he knows it well- that such a number of copies could not be *printed; that we could have only one copy for each member of the committee and one copy for each member of the House. He *will not deny that, but to-day he is willing to allow this matter to be referred back to the committee for consideration. I am perfectly satisfied that that should be done, but I do not like to hear the Chairman rise in this House and misquote me. At the last meeting of the committee I certainly moved that 10,000 copies be printed, and he gave the committee to understand that that number of copies could not be printed.

Mr. KAY:

With the consent of the House-

Order, order.

Dispense.

Mr. SPEAKER:

Is it the pleasure of the House that the hon. member shall have leave to withdraw his motion.

Sir HENRY DRAYTON:

Refer it to the

committee.