Lyle Vanclief

[Agriculture, September 22nd, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I will repeat again, there are hundreds of millions of dollars that the federal government has available for the provinces. Some provinces have not even agreed to put their 40% with that, so their industry should be asking those provinces why they are not there to support them.

As well, last Friday I announced the payment to the farmers of the second $600 million transitional fund. That will be there to help producers and that will go to all farmers across Canada whether they sign the implementation agreement or not.

[Agriculture, September 18th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, as the Prime Minister and all of us are informed, we know that the opening of the border to meat as far as we have at the present time by Mexico and the United States is a precedent. It has never happened before in this type of situation to accept product from a BSE country.

I met again last week with the secretary of the United States and the secretary of Mexico. They both promised me that they would expedite the process in order to move live animals into their respective countries. I am confident that they will do that. When that happens that will apply to all ruminants at that time.

[Agriculture, September 18th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, the single issue that has closed that border was unfortunately the fact that we had one single animal. It is a health issue and that is what we have to deal with. We are going by the guidelines of the Office International des Épizooties. They are following those guidelines. They have even moved past those to recognize the system that we have and the quality of beef we have in Canada. For that initial movement we are very thankful and we look forward to further opening of the border.

[Agriculture, September 18th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I remind the hon. member he should be thanking this government and thanking the United States for opening their border to the extent that they have. It is the first time in history that any non-BSE country has accepted beef products from a country that has BSE. They have opened it for boneless beef and they are expediting the process, as the secretary of agriculture in the United States said to the press yesterday, in order to move forward to allow the movement of live cattle under 30 months going direct to slaughter. Now they are expediting that process.

[Agriculture, September 17th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I want to point to out to the hon. member, to the House and to all Canadians that because of the efforts of everybody, of governments, individual Canadians and organizations and our food chains, grocery stores and retailers in Canada, in the first two or three weeks after the one animal was found, we only slaughtered about 23,000 to 25,000 animals a week in Canada. In the last week in August we moved that up to 73,000 animals a week, which is more than we were slaughtering before the situation occurred back in May.

That is the approach that we will continue to take to find markets and uses for the good Canadian beef that has been recognized by all Canadians and that is being recognized by our customers in the world.

[Agriculture, September 17th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, some time ago, even before the BSE situation, I put in place a beef round table. It has participants from the industry, from the processors and from the consumers. They have been meeting on a regular basis and have spent considerable time with provincial, federal and industry people recently, talking about the ways which we can develop to use this good meat in a beneficial way. We will be working with the industry to do that.

In the meantime, again I say, let us move the money that we have there in order to assist our producers until we further assess all this and develop the programs and products in order to use this good quality meat.

[Agriculture, September 17th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the hon. member is saying that $300 million on top of the other support that is there for Canadian farmers is a small amount of money.

Certainly we know they would like more. There are hundreds of millions of dollars more that the government wants to move to Canadian farmers but we must have the legal authority to do so.

I have had the signing authority since April to do that for the provinces and for the producers in the provinces. Let us use that money up. We have partially opened the borders to Canada and Mexico and some other countries. Their borders are closed and they are the ones that need to open them. We have shown them the science and they are reacting.

[Agriculture, September 17th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I do not know where the Liberal Party was nor where we will be. We told that group yesterday that we would meet with them, the rural caucus and myself, this afternoon. We will meet with representatives later this afternoon. We have done that all along and we will continue.

As far as opening the border, the hon. member should recognize what our industry has done, what our food inspection agency has done and what members on all sides of the House have done. They have pointed out to the United States, and Canadians have said, that Canadian beef is safe. It is the first time in history that any non-BSE country has opened up to a product from a BSE country. I guess they forgot that.

[Agriculture, September 17th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, we have spent $560 million between the federal government and the provincial governments since June. There are hundreds of millions of dollars available in the programs that we have for the farmers. That money can flow to the farmers in interim payments as soon as the signatures are there to allow it to flow.

The United States, Mexico and other countries have recognized the food safety system that we have in Canada. These countries have begun to open their borders. The United States is expediting the process to open its border to live cattle under 30 months of age. We will continue working with all those countries.

[Agriculture, September 17th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I wish to thank Canadians and all the members in the House for supporting the beef industry this summer. We know the situation that has been created in the beef industry.

I also want to say and point out to the hon. member that it was only a very few weeks after the situation that the government came forward with over $300 million. There are hundreds of millions of dollars more available to producers. Let us use that up and then we will see what more money we need after that. That is the goal that I have. Unfortunately, there has to be agreements to allow that to flow. We will do that.

Meanwhile we will continue to work on opening the borders more than they are open at the present time.