Mr. Speaker, last Friday I asked the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food a question and he responded by declaring that my comments were absolutely false.
I represent my constituents in this House. My constituents call me with their problems and I raise their concerns in the House. When the minister accuses me of making false statements, he is calling my constituents liars. The minister should pay more attention to what farmers are saying about his programs than what his bureaucrats are telling him.
Last Friday I asked the minister “The disaster application forms are 40 pages long and accountants are charging farmers between $500 and $1,000 to fill them out. Why is the minister giving western grain producers more bills to pay instead of the disaster assistance they desperately need?”
My constituents are telling me that the AIDA application forms are not even available in printed form yet. I checked the Internet, found the application forms and counted the pages for myself. There are 50 pages, not 40.
I checked with a few accountants in Saskatchewan and asked them how much it was going to cost farmers to have the accountants fill out these AIDA applications. One accounting firm in Regina that does thousands of returns for farmers said the charges for filling out an AIDA application would be about the same as filling out an application for the Alberta farm disaster program. That is $500 to $1,000. Is the minister saying that his AIDA application is simpler than Alberta's?
The minister said “It is so simple. Just transfer information from one form to another”. The minister's statement is an absolute falsehood.
Here is what accountants who do thousands of returns for western grain farmers are saying. The information a farmer needs is more than just his tax return and his NISA forms. Accounting firms told me that grain tickets or permit books are needed as well as their crop insurance records and documentation to prove their level of inventory.
Producers who are not a part of NISA will have another eight pages of forms to fill out. Accountants say producers cannot use the cash basis but need to determine what their inventories were on January 1, 1998 and then again on December 31, 1998. Accountants say getting the accurate records to comply with the accrual method on the AIDA forms is going to be quite a struggle. The form asks not only how much wheat a producer has, but what grade and protein content it is.
Even when the AIDA forms are filled out, there is no way of knowing if that is how much compensation the farmer will receive. These forms are directly tied to NISA. The farmers' NISA numbers might not reflect the same numbers that the bureaucrats have.
Also the timeframe given to complete these AIDA applications in Saskatchewan is June 15. That is too short. Accountants say it will be a struggle to get all of their producers' forms filled out by that deadline.
Farmers are getting into seeding season and it is going to be extremely tough to get farmers off the tractor and into the accountant's office. In Ontario and Alberta, farmers have until July 31 to fill out their applications. Why is the federal government putting such a strict deadline on the forms coming from Saskatchewan and Manitoba?
One accountant said that these forms are extremely complicated and that it looks like a make work project for the bureaucrats in Ottawa. The whole package could have been much simpler.
Farmers are telling me that when they see the forms, they get extremely frustrated. Many wonder if it is worth taking the time to fill out the AIDA application. They feel they will not be entitled to anything anyway because of the way the program is structured.
The AIDA program does not take into account any bills or outstanding lines of credit that a farmer may have. As a result, the AIDA form is not an accurate representation of a farmer's financial situation. This final point is very key.
My final question is why did the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food create a make work project for bureaucrats and accountants instead of a simple cost effective system that the farmers were asking for.