Mr. Deputy Speaker:

I will hear the point of order.

Mr. Murphy (Lambton West):

The hon.

member has been government whip for the last 11 years and he must know that you cannot raise a point of order when a member is speaking. An hon. member cannot raise a point of order when I have the floor. I continue:

And to put the cap on an already revolting situation, have Canadians stopped to consider that the future of this country's natural gas at this moment is being determined . . . not in Ottawa, which is nominally the capital of Canada . . . but in Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States of America?

It is hard to believe that a nation and a people with any pride would tolerate such a demeaning state of affairs as this.

That comes from the people in the heart of the oil industry. of this country. Here is another one a little later, on Saturday, May 5:

Stop the Pipe-line Negotiations Now That is what my leader and our speakers have been saying for some time. The Trans-Canada Pipe Line Company defaulted and have been in default for some considerable time. It is time, as our leader has said emphatically, that this whole mess should be referred to a standing committee. Certainly no one could find fault with that except those who are themselves captives to Trans-Canada. I shall not refer to anything more in that particular editorial.

Mr. MacDougall:

That is enough.

Mr. Murphy (Lambton West):

I hear the Liberal members say "That is enough," but it takes a lot to satisfy some people, and I shall give them some more. This is from the Calgary Herald of May 8.

Mr. Richardson:

I rise on a point of order.

Is it a Tory newspaper?

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Mr. Deputy Speaker:

I understand the hon. gentleman is rising on a point of order. I must hear the point of order.

Mr. Richardson:

On a point of order. May I refer to citation 306 in the second edition of Beauchesne?

Read it.

Mr. Deputy Speaker:

I know the citation.

Mr. Murphy (Lamblon West):

The Deputy Speaker is quite well acquainted with the rules.

Mr. MacDougall:

That is the first constructive thing you have said in the whole speech.

Mr. Murphy (Lambton West):

That is good. I am glad we have satisfied the hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard. It is so rare that we do so. The Calgary Herald of May 8 says:

Is This "The Dominion of Howe"?

Of course, we have referred to the Dominion of Canada and the British commonwealth of nations in the one breath, but is this the dominion of Howe? it says:

Canadians can scarcely be blamed for wondering if the Right Hon. C. D. Howe regards the building of the east-west natural gas pipe line, and the exploitation of Alberta's natural gas, as purely personal projects of the Right Hon. C. D. Howe.

In view of this being the pet project of the minister, I think that editorial is also well worth reading, because no one else has had an opportunity to present the facts before parliament for a case for an alternative to the Trans-Canada pipe line. Apparently they were warned off with the big stick. Let there be no mistake about that. The people of this country certainly have that impression, from what the minister himself has said and from the attitude of the government. I think it is very important that we have material of this sort from that particular area. It means more than my speaking or anyone else's speaking, and certainly means more than the various attitudes that have been held by the Minister of Trade and Commerce. It is only last January when he spoke in Toronto-and how contradictory can a man be?-and said the following:

A subsidy for the line is not desirable, since gas in central Ontario and elsewhere will compete as a fuel with coal and oil. Is it desirable for governments to subsidize one fuel against competing fuels and one set of producers against another?

I think not.

Now we have a project which is neither beast nor bird, which is partly public and partly private. We must not overlook the importance and the necessity of getting a fair distribution of the natural resources across our country. I think members of this house would be well advised to recall what

Do you think he will?

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Mr. Murphy (Lamblon West):

-and give us his views on this important subject, I hope in the meantime he will have considered what has been said by both sides. He is a great corporation lawyer. There is no question about that. I know he will probably feel as though he should say something. I think the people down in my part of the country for whom I speak would like to know the Prime Minister's attitude with regard to this mess and whether he is going to allow it to go through.

We do not like closure, Mr. Speaker. We in our party make no apology to any government nor to any person for the attitude we have taken. I have no hesitation in saying that we have in the house today two members-and as I said a short time ago we might not continue to have one of them for a time

namely the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) and the hon. member for Kamloops (Mr. Fulton), who have made an exceptional contribution not only to this parliament but to their ridings.

Oh, oh.

Mr. Murphy (Lamblon West):

I make no apology for saying that because X am expressing the opinion which the press of this country expressed and which the people of this country will express when they get the opportunity to do so at the next election. Mr. Speaker, I am saying that we as Canadians should not provide a luscious melon to satisfy the hungry taste buds of foreign investors. I hope the time has come when the Prime Minister and others in the government will not be the Charley McCarthys of the big interests on the other side.

Mr. Rene N. Julras (Provencher):

Mr. Speaker, I rise at this stage particularly to deal with the speeches made by three Winnipeg representatives in this house. Coming as I do from Manitoba I feel strongly that all three of them completely misrepresented the feeling of the people in the city of Winnipeg. I think it is quite clear to everybody that there is no place in Canada where the feeling on this subject is clearer than it is in the city of Winnipeg. The people there certainly do not feel that this is the time to take a second look or that this is the time to postpone the matter any further.

The premier of the province of Manitoba himself made representation to the board of transport commissioners and emphasized that point clearly. A little later the legislature of the province debated this matter and again this point was made clear not only by the Liberal members of the legislature but by all parties represented in the legislature.

Furthermore, the people as a whole in the province are very much concerned about the immediate implementation of this scheme because the company has negotiated probably a bigger purchase contract in the city of Winnipeg and surrounding area than in any other part of Canada.

So far as the province of Manitoba and the city of Winnipeg are concerned, the matter that concerns them now is to have this pipe line built at the earliest possible time. Generally speaking, they are very pleased with the situation and are grateful to the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Howe) and to this government for having found a solution with respect to the early implementation of this proposition.

I can understand the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) and the hon. member for Winnipeg North (Mr. Stewart), who belong to the C.C.F. party and who choose to ignore the practical realities of any schemes. There is no likelihood of their party having the responsibility for putting any of these policies into operation in this country for many years. Hence over the years they have delved into the realm of fancy when it comes to great socialist theories. But when it comes to the hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre (Mr. Churchill), I must say that he is not so easily excused because he belongs to the official opposition. He belongs to one of the old parties of this country, and I regret that he did not show any more sense of responsibility than he did in the speech that he made to this house. But if the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre can be excused to a degree he is a socialist, I am at a loss to understand his stand on the procedure at the resolution stage.

All hon. members know that this hon. member was one of the first, and the one who put more effort than anybody in this house, in an attempt to prevent the second resolution from being dealt with by the house. He used his experience and his knowledge of the rules of the house to prevent the second resolution from being dealt with, and delayed proceedings for a considerable time. Now, what does the second resolution mean? I am going to refer now directly to the bill before us, part II of Bill No. 298. This second section, with which the hon. member tried to prevent us from dealing, embodies practically the same principle as was contained in the original resolution. It also deals with the same amount of money as was contained in the original resolution. There is no new money involved in this second part of the bill, but it does make it possible for roughly half of the money which was to be provided

for the construction in Ontario to be used for the same purpose in the western provinces in order to expedite the construction of the pipe line. There is no subsidy involved in this second part.

Some hon. members from both parties have referred to this as a subsidy to western Canada. There is absolutely no subsidy involved. All that is involved is that the government allows the company to use up to $80 million for the construction of the western pipe line. There are only two things that can happen. Either the company puts in the pipe line and brings gas to Winnipeg, in which event the loan is repaid to the government at a rate of 5 per cent interest and it does not cost the taxpayers any money at all, or the company defaults and the government takes over the pipe line and also the security. In the first case the government might realize a small profit on this enterprise, and in the second place we end up with a pipe line at certainly no cost to the taxpayers. In this particular scheme Canada is in the very fortunate position that she cannot lose either way. The taxpayers of Canada have nothing to lose and the people of western Canada are assured of the pipe line going into the ground and reaching the city of Winnipeg this fall. In view of all this it is very difficult to understand why the three representatives of the city of Winnipeg are putting forth so much effort to try to prevent this from being done. Irrespective of what happens, under the present arrangement we are assured of a pipe line to Manitoba this fall. Furthermore, the pipe line goes into the ground irrespective of what is decided in Washington by the federal power commission.

Now, this second part of the bill is highly commendable and most desirable, particularly from the point of view of the western provinces. I was very much surprised to hear one of the front benchers of the Conservative party refer, in a speech on May 18, to what I take to be the attitude of the Tory party in this house. In his concluding remarks on page 4074 of Hansard for May 18, 1956, he said: -

Do you have to build this line now? Let us have another look at it;-

This is typical of the attitude taken so far.

-let us do something for the economy of all parts of Canada rather than for the small privileged section of two or three provinces.

Here is the attitude of the Conservative party when it comes to the western provinces, a small privileged section. When the hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre, who represents a constituency in Winnipeg, applauds that statement in the house, when 67509-262}

Northern Ontario Pipe Line Corporation he asks what is the big hurry, let us wait and delay and delay, then I am surprised.

It used to be that the Conservatives in the official opposition blamed their inefficiency and their abortive policies on the huge majority of the government. Now, they have a new line. They are turning their wrath on the United States investors in this country. They are trying to blame their difficulties on the United States investors in this country.

Mr. Fleming:

How silly can you get?

Mr. Jutras:

Just read your own speech.