ONTARIO. 



683 



tween the House of Commons and the Senate, 

 the point of difference shall be decided by a ma- 

 jority of the members of the two houses present 

 and voting in a joint meeting. Further, that it 

 is the opinion of this House that the British 

 North America act should be so amended as to 

 provide that the appointment of Senators should 

 be for a limited term of years, and not for life 

 as at present." 



The House adjourned after one of the heaviest 

 sessions in provincial history, on April 3, with 

 the following review of its work from the Lieu- 

 tenant Governor: 



"I cordially approve of the measures adopted 

 for supplementing the revenues of the province. 

 By the act last year which required the manu- 

 facture of saw logs in Canada, it was inevitable 

 that the receipts from the Crown Lands Depart- 

 ment would be impaired, and when to the proba- 

 ble loss of revenue is added the expenditure aris- 

 ing from the increase of population and the grow- 

 ing needs of the people, the public interests re- 

 quired that provision should be made for all 

 necessary expenditure and for the maintenance 

 of the financial standing of the province. I am 

 glad you have been able to effect this by a mod- 

 erate tax upon the accumulation of capital and 

 by a reasonable increase in the duties upon dis- 

 tillers', brewers', and liquor licenses. I assent 

 with much pleasure to the act respecting aid to 

 certain railways. In order, however, that the 

 resources of the northerly and westerly parts of 

 Ontario may be opened for further settlement, 

 the further extensi9n of our railway systems to 

 those sections becomes necessary. Within two 

 or three years access will probably be obtained 

 by railway to the agricultural lands in the Rainy 

 river district and the mineral and timber lands 

 lying between Rainy lake and Port Arthur. And 

 through part of the railroad systems projected it 

 is intended to place the capital of the province 

 in direct communication with the tide waters of 

 Hudson's Bay. 



" The acts respecting public schools, the amend- 

 ments to the election laws, the further improve- 

 ment of our mining industries, for the protection 

 of our fisheries, and for the better administration 

 of the game laws, meet with my hearty ap- 

 proval." 



The game protection bill settled a question 

 that had been debated for years. It permits the 

 shooting of deer in the water. It also enables 

 persons and corporations engaged in the cold- 

 storage business to keep game in cold storage dur- 

 ing the close season upon taking out a license, 

 and hotels, clubs, and restaurants to supply game 

 to their customers at meals, also upon taking out 

 a license. Carriers and other persons are prohib- 

 ited from transporting wild deer, deers' heads, 

 deers' skins, or any venison unless there is at- 

 tached to each deer, deer's head, deer's skin, or 

 venison one of the coupons belonging to the hunt- 

 ing license of the person shipping the articles. 



By the mines act a bonus of 50 cents a ton is 

 every year to be paid out of the iron mining fund 

 on all pig metal smelted at the blast furnaces in 

 the province from foreign ores with charcoal or 

 peat made in Ontario. But to obtain the bonus 

 the following yearly proportions of Ontario ores 

 must also be s'melted: In the first period of two 

 years not less than 20 per cent, of the foreign 

 ores; after two years not less than 40 per cent.; 

 after four years not less than 60 per cent.; after 

 six years not less than 80 per cent.; after eight 

 years not less than 100 per cent. The bonus per 

 ton on the pig metal produced from Ontario 

 ores is to be $1. No more than $25,000 will be 



paid out in any one year for these bonuses. The 

 bill also rearranges the price and rental of mining 

 lands. 



Subsidies were granted to railroads as follow: 

 Ontario, Hudson Bay and Western, 240 miles 

 $2,000 a mile; James Bay, 175 miles, $2,000 a 

 mile; Haliburton, Whitney and Mattawa, 30 

 miles, $3,000 a mile; Ontario and Rainy River, 

 $1,000 a mile for 205 miles and $4,000 a mile for 

 the remaining 75 miles; Central Ontario, 21 miles, 

 $3,000 a mile; Central Counties Railway, 14 miles, 

 $2,000 a mile; and Ontario, Belmont and North- 

 ern, 7 miles, $3,200 a mile. The total amount of 

 these subsidies is $1,538,400. 



The succession duties bill provides more ef- 

 fective means for recovery of succession duties 

 where any property which previous to the death 

 of the person whose estate is subject to duty has 

 been conveyed or transferred to some other per- 

 son is declared liable to duty. 



The following railways incorporated: The 

 Worthington and Onaping Railway, the Thunder 

 Bay, Nipigon and St. Joe, the Nipigon Railway 

 Company, the Nickel Range Railway, the North 

 Lanark Railway, the Haliburton, Whitney and 

 Mattawa, the Hamilton and Caledonia Railway, 

 the Thessalon and Grand Portage Railway, the 

 Bruce Mines and Algoma Railway, the Algoma 

 Central Railway. 



Politics in 1899 were very warmly discussed in 

 Ontario. In the constituency of West Elgin evi- 

 dences were produced of undoubted corruption in 

 the preceding general election, and the Liberal 

 (Government) member -was unseated and subse- 

 quently defeated. In three other by-elections 

 two seats were held by the Government and one 

 went Conservative. But the Government major- 

 ity in the Legislature* was very small. On Oct. 

 18 the Hon. A. S. Hardy, Premier of the province 

 for three years, resigned, and accepted a sinecure 

 appointment under the Crown. On Oct. 21 the 

 new Ministry was sworn in, with the Hon. G. W. 

 Ross, who had acted for many years as Minister 

 of Education, as Premier. His Ministry was 

 much the same as the old one except that certain 

 offices changed hands and that Messrs. J. R. Strat- 

 ton and F. R. Latchford came in as new members. 

 It was made up as follows: Premier and Provin- 

 cial Treasurer, Hon. G. W. Ross; Attorney-Gen- 

 eral, Hon. J. M. Gibson; Minister of Education, 

 Hon. Richard Harcourt; Minister of Agriculture, 

 Hon. John Dryden; Commissioner of Crown 

 Lands, Hon. E. J. Davis; Provincial Secretary, 

 Hon. J. R. Stratton; Minister of Public Works, 

 Hon. F. R. Latchford; ministers without port- 

 folio, Hon. Messrs. J. T. Garrow and William 

 Harty. 



Finances. Mr. Harcourt made his budget 

 speech on Feb. 10, and had to deal with a deficit 

 which seemed to depend in amount upon the ques- 

 tion whether the Government or the Opposition 

 were handling the figures. The principal receipts 

 for 1898 showed a decrease of $500,000 over the 

 preceding year, and were as follow: Interest on 

 capital held and debts due by the Dominion, 

 $272,414; interest on investments, $31,646; Crown 

 lands, $42,602; rent, $63,944; woods and forests, 

 $981,186; licenses, $276,761; law stamps, $57,283; 

 Education Department, $59,573; succession* duty, 

 $206,185; casual revenue, $116,568; public insti- 

 tutions, $94,113. Only in two cases was there an 

 increase of revenue. In the one case it amounted 

 to $60,000, this being derived from interest pay- 

 able by the Dominion, and in the other, $3,057, 

 was caused by an augmentation in the revenue of 

 the Education Department. On the other hand, 

 the net decrease amounted to $507,955. The larg- 



