Mr. Speaker, I reiterate the statements made by my hon. colleague from Vegreville. He made a very good speech on what this change to the grain commission act really is. I will add a few comments.
As members of the standing committee on agriculture know very well, I am not a big friend of the Canadian Grain Commission. I was very close to the issue when Grandin wheat was smuggled into the country and put the reputation of our milling wheat at stake. The way the grain commission acted on the issue was really appalling. Not only did it not try to keep the grain out of the country but it more or less showed the smugglers, as I call them, how to get around the rules and regulations to bring it in and fill their pockets with wheat that was really not suited for our area.
It makes me wonder: I see a bill like this one that says deregulation and then I see it is probably open to loopholes whereby small players could be put out of business in a very short time.
When I look at small elevator companies with no terminals, I wonder how they will be able to compete with a very low tariff in the country. When grain is shipped to the terminals of larger
players they can be hammered with the tariffs and put out of business. That is not fair. The grain commission was put in place to see that everyone was treated equally, small players or big players.
Why would large grain companies be worried about exporting grain if their terminal charges were so high they actually made more money by keeping it there than moving it once or twice during the year? It is a deterrent to exporting grain outside the country.
We have small players in the grain industry like small seed cleaning plants. They are really the entrepreneurs in the special crops industry. They were the people who put at risk the bit of capital they had by experimenting with lentils and with peas. These small players are going to be licensed and regulated to a point where they cannot exist. I received a call from a small seed plant owner one day who said: "Jake, to enforce the new regulations in the act it will cost me $20,000 extra for doing my books". A chartered accountant will now do his books which were always done by him and his family.
The accounting and the bonding are putting these small players out of business. Every farmer knows the reputation of the seed plants in their areas. They have been in business for years and have never defrauded anyone of a single dime. They are now going to be put out of business. That is wrong.
Another thing that is wrong is that grain commissioners are paid by farmers; 90 per cent of their wages are from farm receipts. However what input do they have in who the commissioners are? This is a point in our democracy that must be changed. When a player pays he should also have the right to know whom he is paying.
Clause 4 of the bill also bothers me. It would permit the Canadian Grain Commission rather than the governor in council to fix allowances paid to members of grain standards committees and grain appeal tribunals, removing the set of rules as far as payment is concerned one step further from the House. Before it was the governor in council and farmers who had some input. Now it is to be removed from the governor in council and given to commissioners to set wages for grain weighing tribunals or grading standards people.
This is not very effective nor what farmers want. I do not think it saves the taxpayer money. I would equate that to putting the fox into the chicken coop instead of outside the door. It is dangerous and should not be allowed to happen.
Clause 21 of the bill really bothers me. Under the clause process elevators, unlike primary elevators, would no longer have to perform weighovers to determine whether there is an overage or a shortage, a discrepancy between the amount a grain elevator has in store and the amount it really paid for. This is to recognize that process elevators are not required to account for grain delivered by producers.
Why should process elevators be treated any different from primary elevators? These are the elevators that are processing the special crops. These are the process elevators that really turn over the dollars, where the big bucks are. Very little overage or a shortage can increase their profit margins and it is all coming out of the pockets of farmers. It will open the door to more corruption and more lost revenue for farmers. If we want a bill that is fair to everyone, it should be on a basis where primary and processing elevators are treated exactly the same.
My colleague touched on another item I do not like. Public carriers will only be able to transport grain in the west, not into the east or vice versa. It is another regulation that will hinder value added processing companies.
Just this week a small miller in Manitoba tried to export to another province. He will be able to do so under this act into Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and B.C. However he cannot go into Ontario and compete with the bigger processors or the millers. The country should be shared by everyone. We have agreed to the establishment of the World Trade Organization but we do not have free trade in our own country.
There is so much to be said about the government that we could probably talk all day long. One of these days in the House, especially when we are not debating this bill, I will mention to hon. members what the old red combine did to my farming operation. We could probably debate a few matters outside this bill.
When I commented in the standing committee that there should be a revamping of the Canadian Grain Commission I was not very far off. Farmers will very much support that idea, just like they supported the idea that the Grain Transportation Agency should be done away with.
It amazes me that we can debate bills in the House and agree in committee 100 per cent, Liberals, Bloc and Reform, but legislation does not get passed. I would suggest very strongly to the House that if we want the farming industry to stay in business we will have to start making real deregulation, not superficial.
As far as I am concerned the bill is giving the grain handling system the chance to increase its revenue without considering what it will cost farmers. We will not have the free movement of grain we should have. The bill will give us competition, but the competition will be limited. The amount of tariff that can be charged will be set by larger players with no regulation. That really bothers me. We have to start realizing that the primary producer should be protected by bills like this one, not the major players, the processors or the grain handling system.
My colleague did a very good job on the other issue that is wrong with the bill. I wholeheartedly suggest to members across the way that if western Canada does not get a few fair shakes in some of these bills, maybe we will start seeing more grain moving to the south, which will be detrimental to the country.
I am a Canadian. I like rules and regulations that benefit Canadians, but my children and my neighbours' children who are farming need to survive and have a profit. If we do not start drawing up bills to protect the farming industry, we are in big trouble.
With that I will close my remarks and turn the debate over to someone else.