Agriculture committee  In being around for a good period of time, sitting on a couple of previous entities of grain companies that merged as they grew up, and sitting as a director of the Canadian Wheat Board at one time, I think we've rationalized our elevator system to make things more efficient. In the case of Ian and me, we have made our farms more efficient by getting larger trucks and stuff like that.

Agriculture committee  It's great. As far as investing into infrastructure goes, I know Ian's probably increasing his investment in his farm every year, and as a producer I'm trying to increase my investment in my farm to make my farm better. It's just a good business decision for CN and CP to do that.

Agriculture committee  I'm the primary transporter. I own my own trucks, so I'm the driver. If I can't drive it myself, I hire a neighbour to drive for me. I'm the primary person. As Ian and I are on our combines in the fall, we're already planning our production cycle for the following year. You know by your averages what you're going to produce, so you work that production into future contracts—

Agriculture committee  In a word, no. I didn't see much in the letters they presented. We need to have this bill passed so we can actually have some teeth, and so we as farmers, Ian and I, can do a financial plan for our farms so that if there's an issue because we couldn't move in December, then hopefully we can see....

Agriculture committee  Any tool that farmers can use to alleviate a situation is great. APP programming is one of the tools we can use. Is doubling the funding...? You have to understand that if you double the amount a farmer.... As Mr. White said in the previous sessions, there's an expense to any line of credit you get.

Agriculture committee  We need the bill passed.

Agriculture committee  Not to the degree that we would like it to be, no. The government does facilitate some collection of data through Quorum Corporation, and as part of the Ag Transport Coalition we get that data from them, but it's not as distinct as you're suggesting.

Agriculture committee  Yes, it's reactive.

Agriculture committee  If I can say so, we're past the point of severe weather, or what they call severe weather. Severe weather is the biggest red herring I've ever seen in my lifetime, but we're past that point. We have longer sunshine days now, longer days, and they're getting warmer. Yes, there could be an issue with washouts or something once the snow does melt, but when Minister Ritz at that time put the order in council in, it was in the spring too, and grain handling actually got better.

Agriculture committee  It may come from the industry side that you're getting mixed messages, but I think if you look at.... I'm not sure who you're thinking of on the industry side. The grain growers sit on the crop logistics working group, whose mandate Minister MacAulayrenewed last summer, and that whole committee fully agrees on the proposed amendments that we have put forward.

Agriculture committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair, senators, and MPs, for allowing me to come and provide some comments to you today. Across the Prairies, farmers are once again suffering the impacts of poor rail service. Unfortunately, this is not a unique experience. We dealt with it four years ago, and that's why I am here today: to ask the committee to back the systemic solutions that can fix rail transportation for the long term.

Transport committee  I guess this goes back to Ms. Block's comment too. If we have a contract in place—this is between the shipper and the grain company, or to the end-user or the customer—and the grain company has the guarantee it wants that it will get the product to export position and that there is a reciprocal penalty in place if it doesn't, that hopefully will filter through to better service, if a few of these incidents happen.

Transport committee  I agree with those comments. We're very happy with a lot of the intent of the bill. We're just asking for some minor amendments to it. As mentioned, we need to see this go through now. We're into week six or seven as far as the crop year goes and as far as the shipping calendar goes.

Transport committee  I'm not sure about negotiating contracts, but I'm just thinking now that the Agriculture Transportation Coalition does a weekly roundup of what cars have been available to the grain companies on certain train runs. Right now, both railroads are sitting at the low nineties. Right now they have a pretty good rating as far as supplying cars on time to certain facilities is concerned.

Transport committee  Going back to your previous question on capacity, when you look at the U.S. marketplace, both CN and CP do have rail lines into the U.S., but with this loss, as Ms. Block mentioned about the 160-kilometre interswitching, we're missing opportunities right now to get grain in there because we were relying on those two railroads instead of doing the interswitch at BNSF.