Madam Speaker, it has been an interesting morning. I would like to announce that my colleague from Yorkton—Melville will split the time with me.
I heard the question asked today why are farmers against ten elected directors. I will tell members exactly why they are against it. They have had over a dozen elected advisory board members and they have never represented the farmers who elected them, to work for them and to try and promote things that make the board more transparent and accountable to farmers.
They would not even come out and support the board when the courts ruled that it had no mandate to act on behalf of farmers but rather on government.
What has happened recently is that it is not just the farmers who do not want the board anymore, the people working for the board are concerned that their jobs are going down the road if the board does not become transparent and accountable.
I got a document from the wheat board last weekend showing how much management deadwood is on that board. Out of 454 employees, there are 130 some with management titles. I can list them, every single one, if members want to know. There are 131 management people who are probably eligible for a huge pension and a severance package. If the hon. member for Malpeque wants to look in the book and turn to compensation, it says there is $21.991 million in wages. Out of that there is another $5.139 million in benefits, like EI, pension, group insurance and medical; 24.5% per cent are benefits out of a $21 million wage package.
That is better than being a Liberal MP. They should start running to be elected to the wheat board. That is where the big bucks are. The farmers starve but the wheat board lives pretty well. That is why farmers are getting disgusted. That is why they are going to change the system. It will not take a government to change it. They will do it themselves. Farmers have done it before and they will do it again.
Why are farmers so dead set against a marketing system that did work for them? Because of the secrecy and suspicion in it. Nobody trusts the wheat board anymore. Why do they not trust it? In 1994 when we had the fusarium wheat in southern Manitoba, the wheat board said we could not sell that wheat because there was no market. The farmers could dump it, burn it, do anything they wanted.
David Sawatzky found a market for it. He exported I do not know how many millions of dollars worth. What did he get for it? Wheat that was worthless. He got thrown in jail. What did he do? He went to the law books and he started studying law. He won the case. The government was not happy with that so it appealed it. He beat it again. That is why farmers are upset. That is why farmers are going to beat this lousy system. That is corrupt.
I hope I am not getting too loud because I do get excited. Mr. Speaker's nerves are a little better, so I can start going ahead. Mr. Speaker, you can turn your ear this way because the Liberal government's hearing is kind of bad, but the Speaker sometimes does hear things that he should not. We will forgive you for that.
That is one example. I want to point out another example. Andy McMechan was another one of those farmers who trucked over a couple of million bushels of fusarium rotten wheat. What did they do to him? The minister changed the Customs Act as soon as Sawatzky was declared innocent.