Environment Committee on Oct. 29th, 2014

[Paul Calandra, Conservative, Oak Ridges—Markham, ON]

Yes, I don't disagree with you.

Here's another quote. The member for Scarborough—Guildwood suggested that in the last round of questions we're making this up; everybody supports farmers, and we shouldn't worry. The member of Scarborough Southwest said this in his speech:

Nothing will ever be accomplished in Rouge Park without buy-in from the Friends of the Rouge Watershed. They are the ones who have been there on the ground. They are the volunteers who have cared for and loved that park for 40 years. They are not going to let it be torn apart... They are the people who are invested in that park already and have been for generations.

You hear that it's essential that we have the Friends of the Rouge Watershed. The Markham committee...I have a tape here, and I'm not going to play it because it'll take too much time.

When you hear those kinds of statements and when you see members of Parliament presenting petitions on behalf of Jim Robb to save the Rouge watershed, talking about this ecological corridor, are you filled with confidence that you're going to be allowed to continue farming in perpetuity unless this legislation is passed?

[Mike Whittamore]

The answer is no, I do not feel any confidence.

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

We will move to Mr. McKay for seven minutes.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Thank you both for coming.

I'm looking forward to asking Jim Robb where he stores his horns.

I've known Jim for years, and there's a certain resplendent irony here, Mr. Whittamore, because without Mr. Robb and all his colleagues over the last 30 years—including Ms. Browes, Mr. Lee, and so on; a huge panoply of people and none of us are here—the pressure on any government to sell your land and everybody else's would be enormous. You are locked in this dance of the dialectic, which is somewhat interesting to observe from afar.

To my mind, the issue is how to address the concerns of the farmers inside a park because operating a farm inside a park is, by definition, going to be different. Ms. Schultz, can you see any objection to longer-term leases for the farmers?

[Caroline Schultz]

No.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

No, of course not.

Anything that's really said: water management and tile drainage; when we had a farm we drained our place, and it's a costly exercise and you'd better know that you own it and you want to get it back over a number of years. I don't see any objection to that. Pest management; sometimes there is a contradiction between renaturalization pest management and what farmers need. Again, I don't know if that's a huge reason not to address it.

I guess where I'm going here is to address the concerns of both of you, so both of you get the protection you think you need

. I was just reading clause 6, and if I'm a farmer I'm thinking that maybe that's not as sufficient protection as I would think I would like. It says, “The Minister must, in the management of the Park, take into consideration the protection of its natural ecosystems”—that may or may not be farms—“cultural landscapes”—I don't know; is a cultural landscape that standard auto wrecker down the street from you? I don't think that would qualify—“maintenance of its native wildlife and of the health of those ecosystems”. Other than clause 4, which talks about “vibrant farming community”, I don't see that the minister has to take into consideration the issue of operating farms.

The question becomes how to draft a clause that addresses both of your concerns. Are there any thoughts from either one of you?

[Caroline Schultz]

My immediate comment is that there are many good examples where those of us who are on my side of the equation, which is environmental protection, conservation, and the farming community, have worked very effectively and collaboratively together to come up with solutions. In our own organization, we work very closely with the farming community on a number of initiatives in Ontario. We work with the Ontario Federation of Agriculture, the Christian Farmers, the National Farmers Union, the cattlemen, the cattle producers, and others, particularly around species at risk conservation, but also on other issues.

I do not believe this is an issue that cannot be resolved to the satisfaction of both entities and achieve what we believe, from my perspective, that this park should be achieving in terms of ecological integrity. I don't think the two are mutually exclusive.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Mr. Whittamore, what's your reaction?

[Mike Whittamore]

I didn't spend a lot of time on Bill C-40. Where I spent my time was in that draft management plan, and I compared it to what Jim and other people would like added, which is the 1994 plan and the 2001 plan. What I see in this new draft management plan is an equal weighting of agriculture, culture, and nature that did not exist in the other documents for the last 20 years. Agriculture in the other documents was an afterthought, and I watched it south of Steeles Avenue. I had a neighbour, Bert Patterson. He gave up his lease. That farm was supposed to go to a young farmer, somebody who wanted to start out. That farm was reforested in two years, just like that.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

I know exactly where you're talking about, the farm that you're talking about. The issue though is that at this point, all the minister needs to do is take it into consideration. Taking something into consideration is not a plan. It's sort of like a hope or a wish. You could readily imagine aggressive environmental ministers, or ministers who are less aggressive, driving a bulldozer through that clause. That would be the only thing left, because management plans come and go. My concern is as much for the folks, for want of a better term, south of Steeles Avenue, as it is for the folks north of Steeles Avenue.

To me, there seems to be a mutual interest to draft a clause which gives some measure of ecological and farming integrity to the point where both parties seem to be reasonably satisfied.

Are there comments? Mr. Whittamore.

[Mike Whittamore]

I acknowledge your point about driving the bulldozer through it; however, I've read the recommendations of what Friends of the Rouge Watershed want in amendments, and the amendments they want go back to what was there before. You can probably put a bulldozer through it, but let's just suppose in the future we have a minister who wants to take it the other way. Do you honestly believe that once they've reforested seven, eight, or ten thousand acres of land that he's going to say, “Well, now we're going to pull out all those trees back and go back?”

We can only go one way, right?

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Well, not necessarily; we could go either way.

[Mike Whittamore]

Well, we can save the farmland and keep farming it, but once you've planted trees, for somebody to actually stand up and say, let's rip all those trees out, and we'll go back to farming, that is just not going to happen.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

I don't disagree.

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

Thank you, Mr. McKay.

Ms. Sitsabaiesan please, for five minutes.

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

I want to echo a little bit of what Mr. McKay said, that over the last 35 years there have been a lot of activists and volunteers, including Friends of the Rouge, who have protected a lot of that land from development. I'm grateful to them, but now we're at a different stage.

My question is for Mr. Whittamore. What do you think is the biggest threat to the class 1 farmland that is in Markham and has been farmed over the years? What is the biggest threat?

[Mike Whittamore]

In the park study area...?

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Yes.

[Mike Whittamore]

The biggest threat would be if we endorsed and followed the Rouge north management plan, and then we apply that same type of thinking about ecological integrity to the whole thing, because...

Listen, we're the feedstock. We're the feedstock to reach ecological integrity. It's raw farmland. That's what gets reforested. That's what has the wetlands.

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Reforestation or ecological restoration is what you think is the biggest threat to farmland.

[Mike Whittamore]

Yes.

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Okay.

Ms. Schultz, I'm going to ask you a similar question that follows from his answer. Do you believe that ecological restoration is the real threat to farmers in the Rouge park?

[Caroline Schultz]

I don't think it should be a threat to farmers in the park. I think that there is ecological—it depends what you mean by ecological restoration, because that's a pretty broad term.

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Reforestation of the existing farmland....

[Caroline Schultz]

Well, planting trees is one element of ecological restoration. It all depends on what ecosystem you're restoring. I think it's really important that we're looking at increasing ecological functionality, including farmlands, which can be accommodated, because it happens all the time. Farmers are some of the best stewards of the land and provide some of the best habitats.