Dr. Bennettasked the Minister of Works if he will give an indication as to what progress has been made during the past year in eliminating the unnecessary waste of steel in the construction of buildings in this country by the substitution of reinforced concrete wherever possible; and what plans he has for giving further encouragement to such substitution.
§ Mr. MolsonI have no means of estimating the extent to which reinforced concrete may have been preferred to steel for the construction of buildings during the past year, but I have no reason to believe that designers generally are not aware of the advantages of reinforced concrete in many circumstances. I believe that the best encouragement I can give is 139W by example. In the past twelve months, out of 251 buildings designed at the headquarters of my Department, 163 have been in reinforced concrete and 15 in joint construction.