June 19, 1903 (9th Parliament, 3rd Session)

Mr. TAYLOR.

When did the hon. gentleman (Hon. Mr. Fisher) get new light ? I proved then that this oleomargarine which Hon. Mr. Fisher would not prohibit from coming into Canada was made out of products of dead hogs brought into the Chicago market, and some of which were dead and buried before they started to make oleomargarine out of them. Yet the hon. gentleman at that time was willing to allow oleomargarine made in these Chicago factories to be brought in here and sold, so long as it was sold as oleomargarine, to the poorer classes of this country in competition with our butter. He not only voted against the resolution I then introduced, but he gave it all the opposition he could. Later, the government came down with a proposition in the tariff prohibiting the importation of oleomargarine into Canada. And now, seventeen years afterwards, the hon. gentleman wakes up to the fact that it would be injurious to the dair$ interests of Canada to have oleomargarine made in the country. There is no necessity for this Bill, as oleomargarine is prohibited to-day. The hon. gentleman only introduces it in

order that he may go to the farmers and claim credit for having introduced and passed a Bill prohibiting the importation and manufacture of oleomargarine, butterine, or other substitute for butter. Surely the hon. gentleman does not want to take up the time of the House with a Bill for which there is no necessity, because the laws put .on the statute-book by the Conservative government, who had the true interests of the farmers at heart, amply meet the case. Surely the hon. gentleman does not expect in this way to make amends for the speech which I have quoted, and which was properly understood by the farmers of his county, because they left him at home in the next election after he had made it. It is nothing but a bit of buncombe, this legislation which the hon. gentleman is introducing after seventeen years of opposition to the Bill which I introduced, having the same object.