Mr. Speaker, six years ago a group of Canadians made a bid for freedom. They were treated as hardened criminals. They were arrested, charged and jailed, handcuffed and shackled. They were strip searched and humiliated. Their families have been harassed and intimidated, and their property confiscated.
For six years they have been dragged through the legal system in an attempt to break them financially and to make an example of them. Four weeks from today this group will be jailed.
These people are regular folks: hard-working, law-abiding, salt of the earth, and good neighbours. The crime for which the government has persecuted them is taking a small amount of wheat across the United States border. The manager of this campaign of intimidation and fear sits in the House, the Minister responsible for the Canadian Wheat Board.
Will he finally listen, do the right thing and give these farmers the same opportunity that the rest of Canada has: the right to sell their own wheat? Or is he actually prepared to jail Canadian farmers for marketing their own wheat? The countdown begins. He has four weeks.