Mr. Speaker, when I came into the House today I did not intend to speak on this particular matter. However it is an important bill and I feel compelled to stand and rebut some of the things my colleagues across the way are saying.
I would first point out to my hon. friend that Canada Post is a monopoly. That is its biggest competitive advantage. I do not think any of the competitors of Canada Post are going to be able to succeed in somehow imperilling the ability of Canada Post to get by when it is a monopoly. In fact the hon. member said it would reduce service. Well I point out that we have no service today. We have a postal strike and that is because there is a monopoly in Canada Post. I thought it was important to point that out.
I want to speak to Bill C-216 from the perspective of a westerner. I note that one of the things Bill C-216 would do would be to open up the Canadian Wheat Board to an access to information request. I cannot say how important that is to western producers today.
As members and many Canadians across the country know, right now in western Canada there is great dissatisfaction with the Canadian Wheat Board on a number of fronts. One of the ones that is most important is that producers in the west do not know for sure that they are getting the best possible price for their grain. Yesterday when I was in my hometown I saw a bumper sticker on a truck which read “We want the Canadian Wheat Board to be subject to access to information requests”. That is very reasonable.
What we need to point out here is that farmers who grow their own wheat do not have the ability ultimately to find out how much the wheat board is selling that grain for, whether or not it is getting the best possible price. It is impossible for them to determine that. I would argue that when we are talking about hundreds of millions of dollars, when we are talking about the livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of people, they should as a basic right know what is going on with their grain and what is happening in terms of the price they are getting for it.
I strongly support this legislation, Bill C-216. I urge all members to consider supporting it. It does after all bring accountability to crown corporations at a time when, I would argue, unfortunately politicians are held in fairly low regard partially because it seems as if we try to protect our own interests.
One way to ensure that we do not do that is to open all the crown corporations up to access to information legislation so that Canadians can scrutinize these things. The auditor general can scrutinize them. Right now he does not have the ability to do that in some cases. Then we could ensure that money that is being spent on behalf of Canadians is being spent wisely and in their interests.