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MEMO
FROM
MATHER

“Carterpillar Government” is the way Mrs. Grace Mac-.

Innis, M.P. (Vancouver Kingsway) describes the Pearson
Cabinet ... “Its many feet head in different directions.”

BARRY MATHER IS M.P. FOR
NEW WESTMINSTER, B.C.

Swords vs. Plowshares: NDP M.P.’s keep pressing for more
Canadian aid to developing countries. And well they may
when the joint incomes of the poorer lands, (with two-thirds
of the world’s population), is one-tenth that of people in the
industrialized nations. Meanwhile U.S.A. and U.S.S.R. be-
tween them spend $120 billion a year on arms while two bil-
lion people need tractors, chemical fertilizers and agricultural
aids which would cost less than 10% of the arms outlay.

* * *
How Crazy Can We Get? “Let’s declare ourselves the
Viet Nam war winner and stop shooting”. . . Vermont Senator

George Aiken. Another plan — if there were enough religious
holidays having some obligation for observance between Pro-
testants, Buddists, Confucians, Catholics, a cease-fire could

last longer than a few hours. .
% % *

QUOTE: “The American Nation is becoming a bland
society with the ‘bland leading the bland.’” Sidney Lens,
Chicago Business Service official.

* * *

Cost of Credit: — is something into which NDP M.P.’s
have been delving. By the way, the length of time it takes
Canadians to pay their debts has been increasing, to the worry
of those concerned with the financial stability of the economy.
At the end of 1966 Consumer Credit in Canada, excluding
real estate and business loans, totalled approximately eight
billion dollars. The cost averaged 20% — or the cash cost at
over 1% billion dollars a year, close to the cost of defence.
In Canada it takes nine billion dollars a year to buy 7% billion
dollars worth of goods. Does this stimulate production and
employment?

* * *

Government Debt — Speaking of debt, Canada adds to
her Federal Debt at the rate of approximately $2 million a
week.

% * *

Who Owns Canada? .. . Out of our 20 million population
oximately 1,000 Canadian residents control the director-
in the major corporations of Canada... . 28% of director-
ships in dominant corporations are in the hands of just 90
people. ... Interlocking directorships have reached the point
where directors of nine chartered banks hold 297 of the direc-
torship in the leading corporations, with the directors of 10 life
insurance companies holding 188. On the other hand — nine
out of 10 Canadians own no stock at all.

Strike Time: Time lost in 1966 strikes and lockouts in
Canada represented just one-third of one percent of the work-

ing time of non-farm employees . . .

*

$3,000 A Minute: Vast, highly questionable Canadian ex-
penditures on Defence will go up $115 million this fiscal year
_. This brings them to just short of $1,700,000,000 a year, or

close to the total of all that personal income tax you're pay-

ing . -. OF about $442 million a day. i

te Quote — “Politicians have continued the extra-
of wartime into peacetime.” Socrates (50 B.C.).

THE WESTERN CANADIAN LUMBER WORKER |

11

LABOUR MINISTER SCORED
OVER CRITICAL HOUSING SHORTAGE |

OTTAWA — If the speech
delivered by New Democrat
M.P. Reid Scott in the House
of Commons doesn’t move the
federal government to take
more effective action on hous-
ing, it is very doubtful that
any words will.

Speaking in the Throne de-
bate May 18, the Danforth
member of parliament told
the government that there are
few modern industrialized
countries in the world where
people are as badly off for
housing as they are in this
country.

Calling for the removal of
federal labor minister John
Nicholson from his responsi-
bilities for housing, Mr. Scott
placed on record nine facts
which he hoped would impel
the government to action:

e 100,000 Canadians are liv-
ing in absolutely appalling
conditions.

© 20 percent of all our dwell-
ings have primitive bathing
facilities and toilet facilities.

© One out of every three Ca-
nadian homes is in bad con-
dition.

© We have a shortage of half
a million houses just to
catch up with the backlog
of the last war.

e Half a million Canadians
are living in substandard
homes.

© The Economic Council says
we need a minimum of 170,-
000 homes a year every
year from now until 1970,
and 200,000 from that point
on. We have never come
close to achieving that tar-
get.

e Because of the housing
shortage rents are going up
20 percent each year: and
more and more of our peo-
ple are being gouged.

e Canadian consumers spend
more of their income per
annum on housing than
consumers in any other in-
dustrialized country in
North America or western
Europe.

e A world survey shows us
sixteenth among the coun-
tries of the industrialized
world in terms of what we
have to spend for housing.
“In my own city of Toronto

we are in need of a minimum

of 40,000 new homes a year,

and we are building 21,000.”
Housing in Toronto which

sold for $19,000 in 1964 was

selling for about $30,000 last
year, he told the House.
Mr. Scott attacked the
housing minister for mouth-
ing statistics about what’s be-
ing done when 85 percent of
the people cannot afford the
homes anyway: He also criti-
cized the minister for brush-
ing off the problem as a pro-

vincial and municipal respon-
sibility.

“Housing is something
which affects every Canadian
from coast to coast and every
Canadian in every age group
... Yet the government sits
here in Ottawa and takes the
position that this is not a re-
sponsibility of the federal
government.”

The government ought to
admit that we are in a hous-
ing crisis and that “it will
take the ingenuity and talents
of the people in the House of
Commons, in our provinces
and our municipalities for as
long as we can foresee in
order to come to grips with
this particular problem.”

The NDP MP. called for a
complete new housing act.
The present one is out of. date, ©
he said, since it requires in-
comes of over $8,000 to come
under its provisions. ‘Social-
ism for the rich, deprival for
the poor,” he called it.

He also called for advanced
construction methods, a new
housing fund and new poli-
cies for public housing and
urban renewal, government
participation in land assembly
and land development, re-
moval of some of the tax bur-
den from homes and to cap
it all, a fulltime minister of
housing and urban develop-
ment.

1 GOTTA WAIT FER A LOAD OF LOGS TA PASS... RELAX AN’ ENJOY TH’ VIEW!

Pe ee