Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier
Liberal
Mr. E. R. E. CHEVRIER (Ottawa):
I
wish to direct to the Prime Minister a question based on two press items that have appeared in the Ottawa Citizen. I shall read only what I consider relevant to the question I shall submit, and if in doing so I fail to place the question in its proper light I shall be glad to read the extracts fully. First of all I refer to the Ottawa Evening Citizen of Tuesday, July 14. On the front page there appears the following:
Replying to a query by The Citizen this afternoon, however, Mr. Bennett said: "I do not at the moment propose a further interim supply bill."
This is taken by some to mean that the
salaries may have to wait until departmental estimates are approved by the house.
That is the first quotation. The next one appears in the morning Citizen of July 15:
In view of his statement to The Citizen early yesterday afternoon that he did not, at the moment, propose a further interim supply bill, The Citizen again approached the Prime Minister on the matter in the evening.
"Does it mean that the civil servants will have to wait for their salaries until the main departmental estimates are passed by the house"? Mr. Bennett was asked.
"Well, you see, I had expected that the main estimates would have been passed by parliament in the regular way before this date, without a further interim supply bill being necessary, hut four or five days' delay doesn't mean so very much."
"You think the estimates will be passed in that time"?
"Oh, I didn't say that; but I don't forget things like salaries," the Prime Minister concluded. "I will have to consider what will be done in view of the situation now existing."
In the light of these two quotations may I ask the right hon. gentleman whether civil servants throughout Canada will be paid today? If not, why not, and if not, when will they be paid?