Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Minister, you and I have been farmers for probably 20 years; we've been on this Hill for over 10 years. We both know that you can spin a pretty picture up here on the Hill about life down on the farm, but at the end of the day down on the farm, you have to pay the fertilizer and feed bills.
Last spring our committee travelled across this country about the future of agriculture. We've seen some bright spots, but it was mostly only in supply management. The other sectors are losing their equity at an alarming rate.
We've heard some testimony. I'll give you a couple of examples from across the country. Mr. David Machial from British Columbia said:
First of all, our current AgriStability...programs are not a solution.... It provides a little money, but it's not enough. And the way AgriStability is set up, if you have two or three bad years in a row, that's it, you're done.
That's from British Columbia.
Then we go to Saskatchewan, where we have Ryan Thompson, who said:
The current business risk management programs don't work for beef producers.
My final example is from William Van Tassel in Quebec. He said:
However, when crises persist--like the one the beef producers and pork producers have been going through and the one that hit the grain production sector a few years ago--this program no longer works.
Minister, your government has been at this place for five years. My simple question is, with five years in government, how come you couldn't come up with a better program that could help farmers, especially the non-supply management farmers?