i “Aleveg ments TH Right Hon. c. D. Howe, Minister of trade and com- en and defense production, for * an article three weeks ago .eekend (October 3). The eo 1s important because it ee both the chill fear of im- “ng crisis that grips the St. ae Sovernment and its de- ith awe so far, to persist i € Policies that are bring- tise the crisis regardless of ile. Cost to the Canadian peo- es article was presented Deets et of the economic pros- 10 yegrc 2248 through the next in 5 It was entitled “Can- “sente 1963.” In his opening ~ wc&; Howe asked his read- erg: & 10. What will Canada be like Years from now?” p reight from that he proceed: his pnamact the attention of - the ers completely away from ~~ WUestion, Instead of examin- St. Lone evidence that ‘ a Tent’s policies are rush- Bvamp nt into an economic cerning M Presented facts con- though What is now the past as Ot Can they were a guarantee caret eS future. In fact, he : ip retted the attention “ders away from the ; Sip duestion that his article was sed to be a study of. puting the past seven years Production Tot Howe, Canada’s Percent a Was increased by 24 ard of ie Teal values, the stand- a Whole 28 for the country as 1 dere Tose “by an average of ade eens Canada’s export Dep ree Teased by $1,100 million a and More than a fifth of Wag re national production Tent. ; In capital equip- Canadian nVestors’ claims upon 163 Percent ection increased by Howe ; tradiot;, enored the glaring con- that Coney eressed in the fact only half sePtion has increased Th View ee fast as production. Ment ee the fact that “invest- that oo doubled during the gre od, it is quite clear that the ANS majority of Canadians, e hee and farmers, receiv- ‘the ; onetably less than. half duets fase in the flow of pro- . The : inequity oe Side of that glaring boast nae revealed in Howe’s Crags More than a fifth of oo Production was Ueers : stead of the pro- “chag} Deine increased pur thei _ OWer Proportionate to creased Production of Purchasing power : e tal — down so that the capi- for which they Profits could be Nn faster, : 0 Pro meteased eye” Thste y Ueg ate of Suaranteeing contin- heart . Perity, that is the very ability © fundamental inevit- Capitalist crisis, OWe i hiaie. those aapesn t even acknowledge off hee Instead he “brushes ; anaes With his own Not. _°Stimate that, “This is “COntemp edinary ues Fees Bre * assiirance that Chee that Canada will continue ‘ €xpand,” th 4 s Midst of his effort to Tosy Picture, and his 0 2 upon facts refer- € re ; Cts Which fent past instead of Teng, 0 dicate the present dever, We betrays his fear that anal, ‘scredit his YSis” before very monte h impelled by a pre- ieets o at danger he inter. : anes a to his readers to noe. that: he world is oe to suit Canadians. Bs and downs in gen- «i rounds for confi- RE Nee ae “S bre ‘er, VitK * dio: srt This cartoon by the Canadian artist, Avrom, was first published in 1952. Howe looks ahead . --with misgivings eral business and in particular industries are wellnigh inevit- able.” The underlying reasons for that “hedge” are evident. Howe knows better than do the great majority of Canadians, that, to- day, the dominant trend in Can- ada’s economy is towards crisis. The mass layoffs in the farm implement industry, the automo- bile industry, the textile industry, the lumber industry, etc., are not the isolated temporary “ups and downs” that he pretends, they are elements of a general situa- tion. The most evident factor in this situation at the moment is the shutting off of the British market for several of Canada’s staple products. Wheat, lumber, fish, pork products, fruit, tobaccd, automobiles and trucks, etc., all used to be exported in very large volume to the markets of .the British Commonwealth and other parts of the far-flung area which foreign trade accounts are paid with British pounds. Today Britain and other parts of the sterling area are buying those things elsewhere — from countries which will accept pay- ment in British pounds. They would prefer to import most of those things from Canada’ but the . St. Laurent government, as part of its deliberate subordination of Canada to the United States, In- sists upon payment in dollars— which most of the countries of the sterling area are short of. The loss of the great markets of the sterling area is the direct cause of the crisis now confront- ing prairie farmers, B.C. loggers and fishermen, etc., and it is due to the U.S.-dictated policies of the St. Laurent government. Howe omitted to acknowledge those facts but his fear of them showed through in spite of him- self, He knows that the diffi- culties now evident only in cer- tain industries all stem from basic contradictions and will spread very soon unless the fed- eral government: changes its foreign trade policy. —By TIM BUCK Howe is not in favor of a change. He doesn’t want Cana- dian products sold for pounds sterling. He wants to press fur- ther and ever more systematic- ally. the drive to transform Can- ada into the raw-material hinter-_ land of the U.S. knows ‘that the changes oe into our national oe omy by the government of whic he is such an influential member are bringing our country to econ- omic crisis and depression. ecisely because he is so fear- ck the gathering warnings of economic crisis, Howe tries to free the government from respon- sibility. He assures the readers of his alleged “analysis” that, i da has “The expansion of Cana not been directed by govern- ments. That statement completely mis- i hn A. sents the truth. Sir Johr . a cianahts “National Policy, Sir Wilfred Laurier’s new Tariff ‘Policy, Sir Robert Borden’s Pro- tectionist Policy, were each de- cisive in directing Canadian de- velopment , along the path that it followed during the years that they operated. Similarly the economic policy imposed upon Canada by the Lib- eral party under the pressure of Louis St. Laurent, C. D. Howe and Douglas Abbott, has been de- cisive in changing the direction of economic development during the past six years. Howe asks the readers of Weekend to believe that develop- ment has not been directed by governments. But he and Fin- ance Minister Abbott had an en- tirely different attitude when they were imposing their changes. Then they emphasized the Bi that they were aiming to direct economic development increas- ingly to the production of Can- adian raw mate States industry. Howe himself. Abbott explained that aim in brash terms when he submitted his plan to the House of Commons (after it had already been put into operation without parlia- mentary approval). Then, in jus- tification of his proposal to re- strict the expansion of manufac- turing industries and speed up the expansion of raw materials production, he said: “Tf we cut down the consump- tion of refrigerators and other articles which contain metal, we can sell, the metal in its original form for dollars... . Instead of using labor in Can- ada to convert the metal into things our own people consume _we shall sell the raw mater- ials.” The governnment’s role in forcing that drastic change up- on Canada’s economic develop- ment was illustrated further by He warned Can- adian manufacturers that if any of them sought to expand their operations beyond what appeared necessary, the government would . not hesitate to encourage increas- ed imports of similar products to eliminate their advantage. Such were the aims of the St. Laurent governmnent, such were the methods by which it ach- ieved them at the expense of Canada and her people. Now, because he and other members of the government are beginning to fear the consequences, Howe wants Canadians to believe that the disastrous change “was not ‘directed by governments.” I challenge Howe—and the St. Laurent government as a whole —to deny the following facts: + Prairie agriculture is fac- ing a profound crisis because there are nine hundred million bushels of wheat. available for sale and virtually no export demand. Every bushel that could be spared could be sold if the federal government would sell it to the nations which need it and would: accept payment in the cur- cency of the countries which buy. The same applies to the lumber industry and the fishing industry on the Pacific Coast and to many other Canadian products. + Canada has tremendous re- serves of rich iron ore, but, be- cause of governmental policy, has to import steel from the U.S.— millions of tons of it. The gov- ernment systematically favors the alienation of entire areas of Can- ada containing rich iron ore de- posits to U.S. ownership or own- ership controlled by U.S. inter- ests, on terms which block the development of a great Cana- dian steel industry. + Canada’s economic develop- -ment, her foreign trade, her for- eign relationships, her control over national defense, her op- portunities for young Canadians, ’ even the supremacy of her par- liament, have all been subordin- ated to United States interests and aims by the St. Laurent goy- ernment. : Howe cannot deny those facts. Because it ignored them, his so- called analysis of Canada’s pros- pects for 1963 is worthless—or worse, deliberately misleading. Canada can have a population of 18 or 19 million people 10 years from now, our national in- come can be up to the equival- ent of $30 to $35 billion dollars per year at present prices, we can all be immeasurably better off— but, only if Canadians insist upon discarding the anti-Canadian poli- cy of the St. Laurent govern- ment and adopt a New National Policy to Put Canada First! es Major Charles Robert Eustace Radclyffe, late of the -First Life Guards and a considerable landowner in Britain, died recently, he evi- dently believed the Old Coun- try was going to the dogs. So what did he advise his heirs? To engage in patriotic a bit! He warned them to get out while the going was good. Here is what he said in his will: , “As there appears to be a rapid increase of Socialism and strong indication of Com- munism in the future, both of which are a menace to all securities, investments and rial for United land ownership, I advise my struggle to stop the rot? Not: Devil take hindmost trustees and my heirs to invest in Canadian securities or land, rather than in similar securi- ties in England, so long as the before-mentioned dangers ex- ist, and if the danger becomes acute I advise my trustees and my heirs to get rid of all trust investments and much of their land in England, and under these conditions I also advise my heirs to seek and make a new home for the family in Canada after making a tour of inspection in that great coun- try.” Every man for himself, Sir, and devil take the hindmost. Hardly seems a_ suitable motto for a Life Guard, though.