Mr. Benidickon:

Who wants what?

Mr. Broome:

Quebec; that is what you are saying.

Mr. Benidickson:

No. I say that here we have legislation for the needy, the most needy people in our land; those who are without assets and without jobs at 65 years of age and before they get the old age security pension automatically. I refer to the people who are disabled, those people who are unfortunately blind, those who are unemployed, and I say that federally we must have a standard that is applied from coast to coast.

Mr. Broome:

Do you not believe that standard applies to blind people right across

Supply-Health and Welfare Canada? Are you saying that blind people in Ontario are not treated as well as blind people in Quebec?

Mr. Benidickson:

I am saying that these figures indicates that going through the crucible-

Mr. Broome:

The which?

Mr. Benidickson:

The crucible-

Mr. Broome:

What is that?

Mr. Benidickson:

-of administrative provincial screening-I think the hon. member knows what that means-and considering the attention that must be given administratively under the government of Premier Frost of Ontario, it would appear there is less likelihood of an applicant for old age assistance, a disabled person or a blind person getting as kind or as careful attention as he would get if he happened to reside in the province of Quebec and made his application in that province. The figures bear that out.

Mr. Broome:

Would the hon. member permit a question? Would he mind telling the committee when the hon. member for Essex East will be back?

Not today.

Mr. Benidickson:

That is completely irrelevant. Mr. Chairman, I think I have provided a good summary of what the statistics tell us when we look at page 81 of the white paper attached to the budget of the Minister of Finance presented on Tuesday, June 20.

Mr. Horner (Acadia):

Five more minutes to go.

Mr. Benidickson:

I think that I have made a very serious indictment-

Mr. Broome:

You have talked it out.

Mr. Benidickson:

-as to the examination in Ontario of these applications, in kindness and consideration, with regard to what the federal laws provide when I recite-

Mr. Broome:

The crucible.

Mr. Benidickson:

-the final expenditure figures in all these welfare categories comparing Quebec with the province of Ontario. In his opening statement the minister did refer to the fact that, perhaps for the first time, the old age assistance fund was coming into balance. It is true, Mr. Chairman, that it did come into balance this session, but it came into balance only because of a financial trick typical of the Minister of Finance.

I raised this matter a year ago. Until the budget last year never before has a minister of finance of this country refrained from taking into his budgetary expenditures the deficit

[Br. Broome.]

in the old age security account. This Minister of Finance did not do that a year ago.

Mr. Hodgson:

We are on the estimates of the Department of National Health and Welfare.

Mr. Benidickson:

And as a result of doing that, $28 million was put out of the budget for 1960-61. That was, of course, to achieve his objective of having a $12 million surplus last year when the minister presented his accounts. If one looks at the report of the Department of National Health and Welfare and the old age security fund, one finds that this deficit to which I referred a year ago, which I complained about a year ago, has not been recovered in the budget accounts of 1960-61.