Mr. Speaker, it costs a farmer out in our country about $4,800 to dig a water dugout for his cattle. Normally he could apply for and receive one-third of that, or $1,600, from the government through the PFRA, but like the drought that money has dried up.
While the government said it had no money, it found $4 million and handed it out to NGOs to attend a racist conference in Durban. How did Canada benefit from our own taxpayers' dollars? We got insulted by being labelled racists.
That $4 million would have supported the construction of 2,500 dugouts in the parched regions of Canada. The government has stopped the flow of money in the heart of cattle country, where the water supply is imperative.
The government will not help to ensure that we have enough water for next year, yet it seems that it has found money to fund its own grandiose schemes in conferences with questionable benefits to Canadians.