Madam Speaker, I will now congratulate the first speaker from the Bloc, the member for Frontenac, on being appointed critic for agriculture and agri-food as we could not make comments after his first comments in the House today.
I also want to comment on some of the concerns that the Bloc has raised. One is the statement made by the Bloc inadvertently that the wheat board buys Canadian wheat and barley. The wheat board does not buy Canadian wheat and barley. The wheat board
sells Canadian wheat and barley on behalf of producers in western Canada. It does not buy the product at all.
Regarding the other concern of some overlap or concern about spending taxpayers' dollars, one really tremendous thing about this amendment to the act which I want to clarify for them is that this will cost Canadian taxpayers absolutely nothing.
The cost of administration within the wheat board and in the research foundation will both be subtracted from the fees collected voluntarily from the producers.