Thank you.
Good morning, and thank you for the invitation to be here today.
The Alliance of Canadian Wine Consumers, better known as FreeMyGrapes, is a grassroots volunteer organization. Our goal is to make it legal to buy and ship Canadian wine across provincial borders for personal use. Today, I'll provide you with a brief update of what has happened since Bill C-311, the amendment to the IILA , was passed last year, as well as what else still needs to be done.
First, a big thank you to your colleague Dan Albas, the MP for Okanagan—Coquihalla. We are very proud to have been associated with Dan in the unanimous support he was able to garner from Parliament and from Senate. And unanimous support these days on the Hill is almost an oxymoron. We do appreciate all the efforts from both sides, from all the parties, in support of Bill C-311.
Why do we want interprovincial wine shipments? Let's start with the reality that there is overwhelming support from Canadians for this notion. In 2012, Harris/Decima research showed that, nationally, 78% of people said that these interprovincial barriers are unreasonable.
This is largely a North American problem. Imagine telling somebody in Paris they couldn't order a case of wine from Burgundy. If you told Italians they couldn't order their own product and that they could indeed incur a fine of up to $100,000 and jail time for ordering Italian wine, they would look at you as if you had grown a second head. This is the reality in Canada. It's largely going away in the United States. Today, 40 U.S. states are open, with Montana coming on board last week.
Our wineries can ship to 90% of the U.S. market, and small wineries that make up only 5% of U.S. production have been able to garner 50% of the direct-to-consumer market. This is an example where you would think that Canadian governments would want to support Canadian small businesses, especially small rural businesses, and when they had the overwhelming support of Canadians to do so, they would be able to move forward.
You may have some witnesses who will come in and say that provinces can't do this because it's unaffordable. We look at the U.S. numbers and respond that's nonsense. In the U.S., less than 1% of U.S.-produced wine is shipped across state lines. It is indeed a very affordable measure.
Bill C-311 passed on June 28 last year, almost a year ago. What has happened? Manitoba, a province with very little wine production, immediately said its borders were open. Kudos to Manitoba. Within two weeks, B.C. announced its borders were also open, and it continues to be the most forward-looking. It has in fact named a wine envoy, whose job it is to go to the other provinces and try to get them to open up their borders for B.C. wine.
Nova Scotia passed enabling legislation on December 6, and the minister's comments on this legislation are very encouraging, but the officials in the liquor boards prior to the minister's comments were not very encouraging. So we need to wait and see what the regulation actually says, but Nova Scotia is marked as hopeful.
Recent changes that allow one case of wine per trip on your person—so it has to physically accompany you—have been enabled in P.E.I. and Saskatchewan. If you live in P.E.I., you probably make it out to B.C. once or twice in your lifetime, on average. It's probably during the summer when you're not about to put a case of wine in your trunk and drive it across Saskatchewan in the heat of the summer. So this little measure that has been passed is not something that we see as progress at all.
Both provinces have also said they're not going to do any more, although neither one has come up with any answer to the question about how in the world they're going to enforce it.
Unfortunately, Alberta gets the booby prize. According to reports by outside counsel, Alberta law clearly states it is legal to ship into the province. Section 89 of their law says that “an adult may import from another province liquor for the adult's personal use or consumption”. It can't get more clear than that, but the Alberta government's position is that “import” means only on your person. So in free-enterprise, free-trade Alberta, we face a huge disappointment, and more work is needed there.
The Ontario law is actually silent on the importation or possession of wine from another province, but the LCBO's position is that you can only bring in one case on your person per trip.
There was a private member's bill by MPP Rob Milligan in 2012, but we lost that when the legislature was prorogued. He has that said he's going to reintroduce the bill, but unfortunately this Ontario government has a very poor record on opposition bills ever even making it to committee, never mind into law.
So while Ontario is clearly benefiting by shipping their wine to other provinces, they haven't opened their borders. To say that's ridiculous is an understatement.
In Quebec a petition was recently tabled in the legislature with over 3,000 signatures supporting people's ability to buy wine across provincial borders. Quebec has yet to respond to this petition, but the government has tabled enabling legislation, which if they wished, could include regulation that would allow reasonable quantities of wine to be shipped directly from a winery to Quebeckers. Unfortunately, we've been told that the intent of this legislation and the regulation that's currently being written is only to allow it on your person. So there's a real opportunity for movement in Quebec, but the effort needs to be considerable and quick.
So clearly the job is not done, although Canadians truly believed that with the passage of Bill C-311, the work was done. A significant number of them are ordering wine across provincial borders, and wineries—because it's now a possession issue and no longer a shipment issue—are largely willing to ship across provincial borders. The reality is that it's not legal and that there is a significant risk to anybody who does so.
We will continue to make our efforts, but we need some help with this huge loophole that is being used by too many provinces.
First, on behalf of the thousands, and thousands, and thousands of Canadian wine-lovers, we encourage you to continue Parliament's good work in tearing down these obsolete, ineffective, Prohibition-era, job-killing, interprovincial wine barriers.
Second, every time you see one of your provincial counterparts—and I really do encourage this for those members who come from Alberta—ask them to respond to the desire of 82% of Canadians who believe that we should be able to access wine through online purchasing. It is bizarre when you think about it that if you're an Albertan, you can go into B.C., literally load up a tractor-trailer full of wine, get in the passenger seat, drive across the Alberta border, and as long as it's for your personal consumption, that's perfectly legal. But if you order one bottle of wine and have it delivered to your home, you've broken the law.
Third, we encourage you to use all possible vehicles to promote this issue. There is a Conservative meeting happening actually on June 28, the one-year anniversary of the passage of Bill C-311. We encourage you to make sure it is filled with Canadian wine from outside the province, and that you make this public. We encourage you to find all federal-provincial opportunities to drive home the message that it is time to free our grapes. It is only together, by working in concert with consumers, the industry, and parliamentarians, that we'll finish the job.
Thank you.