Mr. Speaker, the illegal rail blockades are still up and are crippling Canada's economy.
Canadian farmers rely on the rail system, and every day these blockades are up it causes five days of backlog to get the rail back to normal. There is a backlog of 20,000 grain cars costing farmers more than $300 million so far. Propane levels are also critically low.
On Friday, the Minister of Agriculture decided to skip the cabinet meeting dealing with the blockades to dine with diplomats in Washington. Why was the minister not in Ottawa dealing with the crisis facing our farmers?