I recently spoke with the president of the Canadian Federation of Agriculture. He mentioned an article that appeared in Western Producer, which revealed that Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada's planned spending for 2012-2013 would be significantly less than what it spent in the fiscal year ending March 31. It was just under $2 billion, which is 45% less than what it spent in the fiscal year ending March 31, around $3.5 billion. One of the reasons was agristability.
I thought of a comparable situation—then I read the article, and La Terre de chez nous also mentioned the decrease in spending—in terms of employment insurance. Everyone pays into the EI program, but not everyone is entitled to collect EI benefits.
As far as agristability goes, I see that many people contribute to it, but a lot of them will not be able to access it at the end of the day. This will save the government a lot of money, but you will end up being the ones who suffer.
Of course, we will see what ends up being the main message we hear from people during our tour, but our key recommendations will probably include changes to this program.