On the motion, Mr. Chair, basically it's a recommendation to the minister.
Until October 31 the Minister of Agriculture originally expressed no intention of allowing any plebiscite among western grain farmers, as provided for under the act. On October 31, the minister relented, to a degree, by informing the committee that he was pleased to announce that there will be a plebiscite on barley that will be held in the new year.
The purpose of this recommendation is to expand on that concession by the minister to include wheat in the plebiscite announced by the minister. As well, at that time the minister said, and I quote:
...we'll announce the exact questions to be on the ballot. Until then, I welcome the input of farmers and this committee and others on what those should be.
--meaning what the question should be. I believe, Mr. Chair, that this motion certainly is within the purview of this committee. Even in the letter that you provided me by the chair of the law and government division of the Library of Parliament, in their paper, “Notes on Some Issues Related to the Canadian Wheat Board”, dated November 7, 2006, it stated:
Framing the question that must be put to a vote under section 47.1 may be interpreted to be part of the voting process. It, therefore, could be argued that the Minister has the right to draft the question or questions to be put to a vote under this section 47.1. In this regard, the Minister can seek advice, or be provided with advice, from a variety of sources.
I know you wanted to rule this out of order. Given that the minister himself had said that he would welcome input from farmers, this committee, and others, and also given the argument by the Library of Parliament paper itself, I think it's appropriate that we provide this advice to the minister via a report to the House. The questions that are raised in here are in fact the proposals that came from the farm community itself on what it would like to see in the ballot question.