Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak on the private member's motion of the member for Moose Jaw-Lake Centre on jurisdictional responsibilities in agriculture. The motion encourages a complete rethinking of the role and scope of governmental involvement in the agricultural industry.
Like most farmers everywhere in Canada I believe agricultural support is not always delivered in a way that is beneficial to farmers. Taxpayers are consumers. Some of the activities performed by both federal and provincial governments are duplicated, counterproductive or even working at cross purposes. It is high time a thorough overhaul of the system was done.
Within my province of Alberta many federal programs and provincial programs are in place. Therefore the case for consolidation is clear. What started out as a way of helping farmers through the rough times has grown into a top heavy bureaucracy that needs to be pared. As a result of the growth of the department there is now one agricultural bureaucrat for every 14 farmers, which ratio is unsustainable in the long term. We owe it to both farmers and the public service to design a stable and sustainable system.
The overlap and duplication in the system make clear the case for consolidation. There are two forces pushing on the farm industry providing the impetus for making changes now. They are trade agreements with our international partners and the country's fiscal situation. However the most important reason for making the kinds of reforms the motion proposes is that farmers will receive better service from the government. It will cost less and we will all be far better off as a result.
It is important to remember that the well-being of the farming community is at the heart of why we have agricultural support programs. They are not make work programs for public servants or regional development initiatives or even ways of competing with trading partners. It is vital we keep the welfare of the farm and the farm family at the centre of our focus.
The recent trade agreements we have entered into with other nations, such as NAFTA, GATT and the World Trade Organization, have created a set of international subsidy and transportation rules to which we are a signatory. It has become clear to us that many of our current programs will have to be altered dramatically to comply with international trade rules. Being as we have to change our programs anyway to fit the new world trading system, it makes sense to take this opportunity to overhaul our approach to agriculture.
Another reason for systemic reform as I mentioned earlier is that our national finances are in a mess. We all know that. The cost of administering these programs, hundreds of them from coast to coast, is unsustainable even in the short term.
Farmers are not seeing any benefit from much of the moneys spent by the ministry of agriculture because far too much of it is spent on administration. Taxpayers are growing weary of paying more and more for less and less. The time for revolt is coming close. We hear about it in the papers every day: a tax revolt here or a tax revolt in Toronto. All across Ontario, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Alberta, everywhere, we are hearing about tax revolts.
If we can reduce the number of program overlaps with the provinces, bring better service to farmers and save taxpayers' money, that is sufficient reason to carry out an industry wide review. There is considerable evidence that government intervention and programs designed from the top down are very often not in the best interest of farmers.
Those of us who have been in the industry for a while will remember the LIFT program from the early seventies. This was a program designed by the minister of the day to deal with low grain prices caused by a glut of grain. Farmers were given financial incentives to leave land out of production in an attempt
to firm up demand for the product. Demand did rise dramatically because right about that time the Soviets, among others, began buying vast amounts of grain on the international market. The price of grain rose dramatically.
Unfortunately most of the farmers could not take advantage of the higher prices because they had been encouraged by the government to take the land out of production. They lost the revenue. Most grain farmers ended up worse off financially as a direct result of government intervention. Farmers were told to stop growing grain. As soon as that happened, the price of the grain went up. Taxpayers paid farmers to stop producing and they could have made more money if they produced and sold it on the world market.
This is a typical situation of government intervention at the wrong time, in the wrong place, in the wrong way, that totally distorts the whole market. We end up being much worse off because of it.
Another of the great government flip-flops in agricultural policy has been the GRIP. This has been a dud from the word go. The initiative that spawned GRIP was the growing together exercise, as it was billed by the then minister of agriculture Mazankowski "a great consultation with farmers that would discover their needs and develop programs to deal with them".
When introducing the GRIP program to the prairie pools, the minister referred to it as an unprecedented exercise in partnership. He said that people on the prairies want the government to consult with them before making major decisions.
The motion put forward by the member for Moose Jaw-Lake Centre is admirable, should be given every consideration and should be supported.