Mr. EULER:

Perhaps some hon. members will be disappointed when I say I have no intention whatsoever of discussing the amalgamation of railways. It has been so definitely stated on many occasions by the minister that the government will adhere to its resolution, "amalgamation never, competition ever," and as it has also been stated as a policy of the Liberal party that they will endeavour to continue the Canadian National Railways as a separate organization, I am not at all disposed to quarrel with either party or to enter into any controversy at this time.

May I say this, however; in his first radio speech the Prime Minister said that the solution of the railway problem is precedent to the return of prosperity. In other words, we cannot have prosperity until the railways question, whatever that question may be, has been settled. Now, the Prime Minister has promised prosperity, and if he was sincere in bis promise then it certainly becomes his duty to enunciate some policy looking to the settlement of the railway problem. Yet in addressing the board of trade of the city of Toronto, after discussing for ten or fifteen minutes the difficulties in which the Canadian

National Railways found themselves, he is reported to have said, "But this is not Bennett's problem; it is your problem. What are you going to do about it?" I wish merely to point out the inconsistency of bringing in reform policies which are to have the effect of bringing back prosperity, and yet doing nothing to settle a question which the Prime Minister himself has said must be settled before we can have prosperity. The hon. member for South Perth in his very eloquent plea-

Hear, hear.

Mr. EULER:

I sympathize with him. The hon. member made reference to statements made by the president of the Canadian Pacific Railway company which, he said, reflect upon the Canadian National Railways. With that statement I have a good deal of sympathy. May I suggest that the object which the hon. member for South Perth seeks to attain, that of preventing this gentleman from the Canadian Pacific Railway from making derogatory statements about the Canadian National Railways, might be attained if the Minister of Railways gently conveyed to that gentleman the suggestion that unless he stops he will not receive any more guarantees of $60,000,000.

In connection with the suggestion made that Mr. Fullerton, chairman of the board of trustees of the Canadian National Railways, should not enter into a controversy with Mr. Beatty respecting amalgamation-

Mr. MANION:

It was Mr. Fullerton's own

suggestion.

Mr. EULER:

The minister made the statement, or I believe the inference was, that I congratulated Mr. Fullerton on his statement as to the inadvisability of debating with Mr. Beatty the question of amalgamation. In order to keep the record straight I should like to say that Mr. Fullerton made quite a long statement, covering five or six pages of the report of the committee, in which he dealt with many questions in addition to that of amalgamation,

Mr. MANION:

That is quite correct.

Mr. EULER:

I congratulated him upon

the general tenor of his statement, and I finished with this, which I think will remove any misconception there may be in the minds of hon. members of the committee to the effect that I supported the statement that the chairman of the board should have nothing to say whatsoever in connection with any wrongful statement by the press, the Canadian Pacific Railway or any other body.

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At that time I said the following:

I would like to add that while I agree with the chairman that he need not get into any public controversy with the other railway, nevertheless whenever anything does issue from that other railway, if it does, which seriously prejudices in the minds of the public the interests of the Canadian National Railways, then, in my mind it becomes the duty of the chairman of the board to combat and contradict such statement.

Mr. MANiLON: I agree entirely with

that.

Mr. EULER:

I make the quotation merely to remove any misconception which may have 'been created by what was said by the minister.

Now, a word with regard to the proposed vote of S15,000,000 towards purchasing equipment for the two railway companies, $8,000,000 of which is to go to the Canadian National Railways and $7,000,000 to the Canadian Pacific Railway. 'Certainly I would not be heard advocating anything which would interfere with the giving of employment or relief to unemployed people. If it is really necessary to construct equipment in our own shops I hope the hon. member from Stratford will receive a good deal of the business, or in other words that a large part of it may go to that city. I rose to say that if the equipment is required I have nothing to say with regard to the assistance which might be given to the Canadian National Railways, although at the moment I am not speaking with regard to the privately owned road. I think there is a decided difference between helping ourselves and helping somebody else. At the moment however I shall not discuss that point.

Just five days ago-I believe it was last Wednesday-the president of the Canadian National Railways appeared in committee and said, "We do not need any equipment; we have sufficient equipment for all our traffic requirements." That was the very definite and unqualified statement he made. He did say however that although they had plenty of cars and plenty of equipment for all general purposes there were periods of peak loads when the equipment was not Sufficient. "Then," h.e said, "We do as other railways do; we follow the very logical course of borrowing from the other roads. We exchange; we get cars from other roads when we need them, and they do the same when they find themselves in a similar position." My point is this: If the Canadian

National Railways do not need this equipment it ought not to be purchased.

Mr. MANION:

They do not have to take it if they do not wish to.

Mr. EULER:

May I refer to what the minister has just now said: If there is one

thing for which the late government was criticized day in and d'ay out by the Minister of Railways and Canals and his colleagues- more particularly by the minister-it was the statement that the late government had spent millions of dollars in what they described as unnecessary expenditures on the Canadian National Railways. That was the criticism which was heard on many occasions. In view of that fact it does not lie in the mouth of the Minister of Railways and Canals or any member of the government to say that we ought to buy, or even to suggest that we should spend $8,000,000 for equipment which is not needed and which will only add to the burden which the Canadian National Railways already have to bear. That is the point I wish to make. They do not ask for it.

Mr. MAMON:

That is not so. They

did propose buying it if we would give them one-third, and we made this proposal. So that they did ask for it, in a sense.

Mr. EULER:

I shall not question the

minister's words, but it is difficult to reconcile that statement with the statement made in committee that equipment is not needed.

At six o'clock the committee took recess.

After Recess

The committee resumed at eight o'clock.

Mr. CANTLEY:

Mr. Chairman, I was interested in the statement made this afternoon by the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Veniot) in connection with the financial history of the Intercolonial railway both before and after its inclusion in the Canadian National Railway system'. I think this statement is well worthy of being recorded in the journals of this house. I was also interested in the remarks of the hon. member for Quebec South (Mr. Power). I always enjoy the hon. gentleman's speeches, whether they be in earnest or otherwise, but in my judgment the speech he made to-day was purely partisan propaganda and rather unworthy of him. Both the hon. member for Quebec South and the hon. member for South Perth (Mr. Sanderson) took full advantage of the lack of relative responsibility which attaches to hon. members of the opposition. I would direct the attention of both hon. members to the statement which appeared this morning in the press with regard to the quantity of rolling stock, originally costing about $27,587,106, most of which will never again be put in

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service. This statement is attributed to the general manager of the Canadian National Railways. It is stated that from Sydney to Vancouver there are distributed some

16,000 to 20,000 cars which will never again see service. There are- a number of derelict locomotives which are useless and should be scrapped. Many of the locomotives in service to-day are expensive to operate because of the low boiler pressure under which they work.

While I do not claim that all the equipment referred to should be replaced at once, much of it must foe renewed if the Canadian National system is to maintain the service which it is exacted to give. The hon. member for South Perth was quite within his rights in acting as champion of the shop employees of the Canadian National Railways, but I would point out that none of these shops are in a position or ever were in a position to build locomotives or rolling stock in competition with the private shops. These shops are located in Nova Scotia, Quebec and Ontario, and with their private initiative they are able to produce rolling stock at a lower cost than can the ill equipped shops of the Canadian National and the Canadian Pacific. This has been proven time and time again. It is my well considered opinion that tihe equipment program now being presented by the minister is entirely inadequate. In the interests of the country I think it should be doubled, because this is the time to bore with a really big auger.

Mr. HOWDEN:

Mr. Chairman, I should

like to say a word or two on behalf of the citizens of the town of Transcona. When the Grand Trunk Pacific and the National Transcontinental railways were built a location some six miles from Winnipeg was chosen as the nucleus of their operations and the site of their shops. The largest and the most up to date railroad shops in the Dominion of Canada were built at this location. When running at full capacity these shops employ some 7,000 men but to-day only some 1,700 are employed. Many hundreds of men came to Transcona, bought property and built homes for themselves. As the hon, member for South Perth (Mr. Sanderson) indicated this afternoon, only a very small percentage of shop employees are employed at the present time, and these men are working only three days a week. I understand that the government intends to spend some $8,000,000 for replacements of one kind and another for the Canadian National Railways. I have been told that I can say without hesitation that there is not an item

of rolling stock which the shops at Transcona cannot produce. These shops have turned out pullman cars and have assembled engines, while it is the regular everyday task to build a freight car. In the early days of the history of the Canadian National Railways many men were prompted to go to Transcona. They built homes and cast in their lot with that town, but many of them have lost everything they had. I take this opportunity of appealing to the minister to ask that as large a proportion as possible of this money be spent upon equipment to be built at Transcona. I am not asking that these shops foe given priority over any other Canadian National shops, but I do ask that in the expenditure of this money these employees who have lost their all should receive serious consideration.

Mr. ELLIOTT:

Mr. Chairman, it is not

my intention to deal with matters connected with the Canadian National Railways, as these have already been dealt with in detail, but I should like to refer to the resolution itself. If this resolution contemplates a bill along the lines of the public works construction bill of last year, it will meet with strenuous objection on the part of members of this house. I do not know whether the minister would feel like giving us any information as to whether the bill will be drafted along the lines of the bill of last year. If he does, I should like to have some information in connection with the lump sum feature, then with regard to the power to put in other new buildings, and the inviting of tenders instead of having tenders by public advertisement.. These are some of the features in regard to which the minister might give me some information, which might have the effect of curtailing the remarks I desire to make. Is it intended to follow last year's action in these respects?

Mr. STEWART (Leeds):

I thought I intimated in my address when opening the discussion on this resolution that in a general way the terms of the bill were similar to those of the Public Works Construction Act of last year. The total amount involved is approximately $18,000,000 outside of the amount which would be provided for the railway guarantees and which would probably be $1,050,000-

Mr. ELLIOTT:

I have the amounts.

Mr. STEWART (Leeds):

-and, in addition, the $30,000,000 which we propose to spend under the former act, which would make a total of about $50,000,000 this year. The bill itself will disclose its provisions, and

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possibly when my hon. friend reads it he will find that his alarm may not be warranted, I am not prepared to discuss in detail the provisions of the bill until it is brought down, but again I assure my hon. friend that it is substantially the same as last year's, with a much shorter schedule.

Mr. ELLIOTT:

If it is substantially the same as last year's, I must say that it will not be very satisfactory in many respects. First of all, the amount is a large one. The minister has said -that it is practically $50,000,000.

Mr. STEWART (Leeds):

Not in this bill. What is unexpended under the act of last year, together with this one, representing $18,000,000, gives that total.