Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to speak on Bill C-50 and the amendments. In particular, I would like to address my comments to amendments Nos. 4 and 5. First I would like to go back a little bit and share with the House my history of involvement with a check off program in the riding I am pleased to represent.
One position I held prior to being elected to this exalted place was with an organization called the B.C. Grain Producers Association. I was a founding member of the organization. I was the first vice-president when it was first formed and subsequently became president of that organization. Over the years, as any struggling organization does, we had to try and sell memberships and raise money to keep the organization running. We had a number of ongoing projects.
One we always wanted to get involved in was in the area of varietal trials and research at local levels. There were always problems with the government operated research farms in areas that did not necessarily conduct research applicable to the Peace River region of British Columbia. We wanted to carry that
research one step further by conducting trials in our area on a field scale.
Over a number of years we came up with a plan to lobby the provincial government to allow the B.C. Grain Producers Association to enact a check off that would automatically come off producers' cheques at the time their product was delivered to the elevators. This check off is now in place and has been for a number of years. It is working quite well, I might add.
I would like to address some concerns that have been raised by my colleague from Vegreville and other members. One real strength of the operation of the check off in the B.C. Peace has been that it is local and is administered at a local level. In other words, the farmers have the option of electing councillors to a regional council that oversees how the money is spent. The problem my colleague from Vegreville mentioned was that once you go beyond that and have a bureaucracy in some distant place administering the money, there is concern with the local producers that they lose control of how that money is spent and whether they get the best bang for the buck, so to speak.
Local producers supported the check off because they could visibly see how their money was being spent. As we moved forward and were able to purchase specialized equipment for plots to expand different varieties of wheat, barley, canola and other grains, we could readily drive by the fields in our area and see how different varieties were producing in comparison to one another. That was a real benefit to the producers.
Subsequently we found that there were very few people who opted out at the end of the year because the check off was and is fully refundable. However, what we found, because it was a local organization, was that at our annual meetings we could certainly do a good selling job to the local producers of what they were getting for their investment. Subsequently we found that very few wanted their money back out of the check off pooling fund.
I am certainly in support of the fact that this check off is totally refundable, as is the one in B.C. However, I am very concerned about the process. I think that is addressed in amendment No. 4 put forward by my colleague and the amount of the extra paperwork. In other words, make it as easy as possible for farmers to opt out of it because after all if it is not easy for them to get their money out they will view this as just another form of taxation, just another expense for them. They have to be convinced to see it as an investment in their future.
All of us in the agricultural industry certainly understand that we have to have and have to find the funds in these days of increasing problems with the government funds being available for research and development. We have to find them elsewhere. Producers are willing to do that as long as they can see the results. To do that we certainly want to pass amendment No. 4 which would allow that there would be as little paperwork as possible to allow the producers to opt out should they decide they are not getting the best investment for their dollar.
The other thing I would like to briefly touch on is the amendment as put forward by the hon. member for Mackenzie in allowing certain groups that already have a check off in place an exemption from it. We had concerns when we were holding meetings in our area of the B.C. Peace region trying to convince producers to come on board and support this thing. We actually had to pass a referendum of the producers before the B.C. government would pass the legislation to allow that check off. They insisted, and rightly so, that the producers supported the concept. To do that the B.C. Grain Producers Association had to go out and hold meetings and actually convince the farmers of the necessity of this and that it would certainly be worthwhile over the long haul.
We did that but one of the real concerns that was expressed to us time and time again was if we vote in favour of this what is to prevent next time another check off by the Canadian Wheat Board or the prairie wheat growers and the list could go on and on. That was the major concern that they voted for with the understanding that there would be no further check offs.
I am quite insistent that we should oppose amendment No. 5 put forward by the member for Mackenzie because it does allow those areas that already have an existing check off the option of trying to get the exemption and not having a double check off put in place.
With that bit of history with my involvement with the check off I thank you very much for the time, Mr. Speaker.