Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak on third reading of Bill C-50, legislation that will produce a voluntary producer levy or check off program for plant breeding research.
I have a number of comments to make today, some of which are based on the bill before us, some of which are based on the debate that we had yesterday in this Chamber specific to report stage of the bill and as well some comments about the Canadian Wheat Board which I believe is central to this debate and is crucial to the future of agriculture in this country.
First I would like to address the specifics of the bill which are before us for third reading today. Essentially, as we have heard in this Chamber already, the federal government has launched an agriculture initiative, depending on how we want to look at it, either as a tax grab from farmers or an opportunity for farmers to participate financially in the development of new grains research.
The new legislation proposed here sets out what is called a voluntary producer levy or check off program to support plant breeding research programs for wheat and barley.
As the minister of agriculture indicated in the Chamber during his comments at second reading, if passed the legislation would call for the first collection of this levy to take place in January 1995.
The idea of the check off is not a new one. It is already in practise for beef and hog producers and as a concept has been endorsed by many of western Canada's grain organizations. This is however the first time that a check off has been applied across the board for wheat and barley production.
According to the minister of agriculture there is general agreement for this idea among producers. The agreement is on principle more than it is on practice. While this bill sets out a particular practice we as members of Parliament are called upon to examine how that practice will be implemented and what it means rather than on the general principle.
Here is how the bill is supposed to work. Western producers of wheat and barley will pay levies of 20 cents per tonne of wheat and 40 cents per tonne of barley delivered during the crop year. The first levies will be deducted from the Canadian Wheat Board final payments beginning with those for the 1993-94 crop year. Those final payments in the ordinary course of events for 1993-94 would be made in January 1995.
Based on projected deliveries the check off is expected to bring in, according to the minister of agriculture, an estimated $4.7 million for additional research. That research would be co-ordinated by the Western Grains Research Foundation, a
federally chartered public organization that has been co-ordinating research in this field for the past 10 years.
Under the terms of the new legislation the foundation would be accountable to producers by having to report annually to all prairie permit book holders, by giving an accounting of the money received and how it has been used to accomplish its research goals.
The new program is not intended to duplicate or replace current check off programs already in place in some provinces and, as has been mentioned numerous times in the Chamber over the last two days, certain Alberta grain producers will be exempt from the levy.
I think it is worth repeating what was said yesterday. The check off in Alberta is somewhat different than the check off being proposed nationally. If one were to compare the reasons for bringing in the legislation as it is today and apply it to the implementation of the goods and services tax from a few years ago, the implication would be that any province with a pre-existing tax would be exempt from the GST and those that had no pre-existing tax would be levied the GST.
In that case if the same principle were applied in 1990 as the one that is being applied here on the check off in 1994 only the province of Alberta would be subjected to this federal levy and the other provinces would be provided with an exemption. It is an interesting scenario to say the least.
The program as proposed in Bill C-50 is also voluntary so that producers who choose not to participate may opt out if that is their preference. Any producer wanting to opt out may do so on an annual basis simply by putting that request in writing.
In introducing the legislation the agriculture minister says he expects 90 per cent of western grain farmers to participate in the program but he gives us no indication at all on how he has calculated that figure.
There has been as fair amount of criticism in the House over the last couple of days about the program. For those who have reviewed its components and have not liked what they have seen in the specifics of the bill, the arguments focus somewhat on the fact that plant breeding research in Canada has always been publicly funded. The new legislation simply gives the federal government an opportunity to withdraw from providing adequate funding, perhaps some time in the future, because they will say the producers themselves are being taxed through the levy for the necessary funding.
Of course the minister of agriculture in his opening remarks denied that this would happen but there is certainly no protection in the existing funding in the legislation to guarantee the federal government's commitment to publicly funded research. Therefore, without that type of legislative guarantee it is difficult to accept the word of the minister.
At the same time if farmers opt out in numbers greater than the 10 per cent the minister has already calculated the financing pool will be diminished. Actually it will be uncertain from year to year because the financing pool will have to be calculated only on the amount of money that is collected and if farmers can opt out on an annual basis it will be difficult to calculate the entire financing pool on an ongoing basis.
Therefore the research institutions commissioned to do the research will not know from year to year what level of funding they will be able to receive. There is also the unfairness that some producers will pay for the support of research and want to contribute to it but all producers will benefit from that research whether or not they paid into it in the first place.
This alludes to the exemption provided to certain Alberta producers who will get the benefit from the research even though they do not pay into it.
The other argument is on the accountability of the process. It is acknowledged that the foundation must report on how it is spending the money for research but if producers disagree for any reason there is no mechanism in place for them to appeal those spending decisions and it is always after the horse has left the barn, after the door has been closed. You can only comment, perhaps publicly, and not direct or influence the way those decisions will be made. Therefore true accountability does not exist.
As the member for Mackenzie mentioned a few moments ago there is an important concept here that every member of the House and all producers in Canada must keep in mind and that is the principle of research into grains production is an important public policy matter and as such we should do whatever we can to ensure that there is as much public funding and public accountability in the process as possible.
Yesterday I indicated during report stage debate in what became in a sense a conversation with the minister of agriculture that the importance of the Canadian Wheat Board has never been more in question among Canadians. We are hearing in the news a considerable amount of discussion about the future of agriculture and the future of the Canadian Wheat Board because a number of producers in Canada, particularly producers near the American border, have been expressing discontent with the marketing practices of the Canadian Wheat Board.
I think it is important during this debate about amendments to the Canadian Wheat Board Act that we do keep in mind how important the Canadian Wheat Board is and the role that this Chamber and the minister of agriculture must play in providing some support for the Canadian Wheat Board, the organization that we as producers and as members of Parliament have created in order to assist in the sale of all Canadian wheat and barley. Perhaps, as I suggested yesterday, we should as well be
considering changes that would allow for marketing of oats and canola and perhaps even some other grains in Canada.
Yesterday the minister of agriculture responded to one of my concerns by saying that he did not want to engage in a broader debate about the Canadian Wheat Board. Then he qualified his statement by saying, and I quote from Hansard of yesterday at page 7579, pertaining to a broader discussion about the wheat board:
The fact that I do not happen to mention some of those other things should not be taken as any kind of disinterest in the subject matter. I am simply holding my fire.
He is simply holding his fire. I wonder how long he intends to do that. How long does the minister intend to remain silent about his personal commitment and the commitment of this government to the Canadian Wheat Board?
I say that because just the other day the Canadian Wheat Board in an unusual statement came forward to defend itself in the face of some of the attacks. I quote the information officer of the Canadian Wheat Board, Miss Deanna Allen: "The board is under personal attack. If others are rallying farmers to rethink what they have, then let them think on accurate information".
The Canadian Wheat Board is arguing that those who are calling for dual marketing in Canada are doing so not with accurate information. If the minister of agriculture has information like the Canadian Wheat Board has which can add to the debate, I think it is very important that the minister not hold his fire in this regard but rather engage in the debate and bring forward not only the information but the opinions that are needed to support the strong Canadian Wheat Board in its work.
I will quote from the Canadian Wheat Board's defence of its activities in its releases from last week. Mr. Richard Klassen is the board commissioner with the Canadian Wheat Board. Mr. Klassen says in response to the U.S. market:
"The U.S. is a premium market. It is one of the few premium priced markets left in the world. It offers a high return because it is unaffected by the price discounting subsidies imposed by the U.S. and the European Union. U.S. customers are also usually willing to pay a premium for Canadian wheat because of its high quality".
The down side is that market is not large enough to accept all of the 24 million tonnes of wheat and barley that western Canadian farmers want to export. The board as a result must sell into other markets that do not offer as high a return. The prices from these sales are what lower the overall return to farmers.
"The question is really who should receive the commercial premium often available in the U.S. Should these premiums go to individual farmers or grain companies who access the U.S. directly, or should those premiums be shared among all grain growers in western Canada?".
The answer is through the Canadian Wheat Board all western Canadian farmers benefit from the premium market, whether it is in the United States this year and next year or whether it is in Japan or China or Europe or Saudi Arabia in the future.
I also want to indicate that I found the comments of the minister of agriculture the other day quoted in the Regina Leader-Post of October 27. The headline on the newspaper article was Goodale is determined''. The agriculture minister saidCanada has a historic right to duty free access into Europe for a million tonnes of high quality wheat and almost a million tonnes of barley''.
The minister of agriculture is wanting to have a stronger Canadian presence in Europe and is willing to fight for it. That market in Europe will not be accessible without a strong Canadian Wheat Board. If the minister of agriculture is anxious to fight for Canadian markets in Europe, he should be willing to fight for the Canadian marketing arm that gives us that access here in Canada.
Those concerns of mine are shared by numerous constituents of mine, all of my constituents who have phoned me recently. One of my constituents was fortunate enough to be at a meeting organized by the National Farmers' Union in the United States just a couple of weeks ago, Mr. John Clair from Radisson, Saskatchewan, also a member of the Canadian Wheat Board advisory committee; a committee that I would strongly advise the government take a look at and see if it cannot turn that into more of a board of directors than an advisory committee so that the elected wishes of the producers are more influential in the decision making of the Canadian Wheat Board.
Mr. John Clair was at a meeting in the United States, a meeting that involved a number of farmers in Glendive, Montana. Mr. Clair says that he is more convinced than ever after that meeting that the Canadian Wheat Board should be left intact and keep its export monopoly.
Quoting Mr. John Clair recently in an issue of the Western Producer from October 20, Mr. Clair says: They''-meaning the Americans-said if there was a dual marketing situation in Canada, they would push to have the border closed immediately''.
In other words, if Canadian farmers are given the opportunity by the Canadian government to just cross the border unimpeded with every truck load of grain that they can, the Americans as they have on so many other trade issues would immediately retaliate and close the border to all Canadian grain.
That means any premium market that was accessible by the Canadian Wheat Board or any farmer immediately closed and there would be no access to those premium dollars to any Canadian farmer whether we can sell into that market or not.
Mr. Clair also mentioned that the people he talked to looked at the dual marketing supporters in Canada as quite naive about their circumstances and even our own. Again I quote Mr. Clair: "They seem to assume it is just a great big pit we can drop wheat into". In other words, the American market is just there for all the wheat that we can put into it.
Mr. Clair says in a tremendous year, we can sell maybe 10 per cent of our crop to the United States. That means 90 per cent has to go some place else. There is nothing more true than that statement.
I remind the minister of agriculture and the government that in the agriculture supplement to the red book they made a very strong commitment to the financial security of Canadian farm families, a commitment that extends to the value of the Canadian Wheat Board.
Basically the comment from the red book is that Canada's agri-food industry needs policies and programs such as supply management, the Canadian Wheat Board and stabilization to minimize the impact of market price fluctuations.
On this day I call on the minister of agriculture and the government to, as they have with everything else in this place, stick to the commitment of the red book and maintain policies such as the Canadian Wheat Board to minimize the impact of marketplace price fluctuations on Canadian farmers.