House of Commons Hansard #23 of the 37th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was farmers.

Topics

Questions Passed as Orders for ReturnsRoutine Proceedings

3:50 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Bakopanos)

Is that agreed?

Questions Passed as Orders for ReturnsRoutine Proceedings

3:50 p.m.

Some hon. members

Agreed.

Question No. 1Routine Proceedings

November 6th, 2002 / 3:50 p.m.

Liberal

Guy St-Julien Liberal Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik, QC

With regard to the Social Services Minokin in Val-d'Or, can the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs or any other department indicate, for each year from 1997 to 2002 inclusively, the amount of the funds, grants and/or contributions awarded for the delivery of programs and services to the members of the Abitibiwinni (Pikogan), Lac Simon and Kitcisakik communities, and specifically: ( a ) how much was the administrative budget in each year; ( b ) how much of those funds were earmarked for travel outside Quebec and Canada; and ( c ) what were the terms and conditions of these agreements, for each year?

Return tabled.

Question No. 5Routine Proceedings

3:50 p.m.

Canadian Alliance

John Williams Canadian Alliance St. Albert, AB

With regard to the Court Challenges Program operated by the government: ( a ) which individuals, groups and/or organizations received funding under the program in fiscal years 1999-2000, 2000-2001 and 2001-2002; ( b ) how many individuals or Full-Time Equivalents (FTEs) work in the Department of Canadian Heritage or any other department on the program; ( c ) how much is spent each year by the government on the administration of the program; ( d ) who (name, city or town of residence and company or organization each individual is affiliated with) currently determines who receives funding under the program; ( e ) which individuals or which company is currently conducting the review of the Court Challenges Program; ( f ) how much has been budgeted for the review; and ( g ) how much has been spent on the review?

Return tabled.

Question No. 5Routine Proceedings

3:55 p.m.

Liberal

Geoff Regan Liberal Halifax West, NS

Madam Speaker, I ask that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.

Question No. 5Routine Proceedings

3:55 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Bakopanos)

Is it agreed?

Question No. 5Routine Proceedings

3:55 p.m.

Some hon. members

Agreed.

Motions for PapersRoutine Proceedings

3:55 p.m.

Halifax West Nova Scotia

Liberal

Geoff Regan LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons

Madam Speaker, I ask that all Notices of Motions for the Production of Papers be allowed to stand.

Motions for PapersRoutine Proceedings

3:55 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)

Is that agreed?

Motions for PapersRoutine Proceedings

3:55 p.m.

Some hon. members

Agreed.

Motions for PapersRoutine Proceedings

3:55 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)

I wish to inform the House that, because of the ministerial statement, government orders will be extended by 25 minutes.

Motions for PapersRoutine Proceedings

3:55 p.m.

Progressive Conservative

Loyola Hearn Progressive Conservative St. John's West, NL

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order.

A few moments ago the government House leader accepted the request for unanimous consent from one of our members to withdraw a motion but in the meantime gave a lecture that this was not the way we do it, that the offices should be notified.

I have been notified that the government House leader's office was notified that this was going to be done, as were other members who have indicated that was the case.

Motions for PapersRoutine Proceedings

3:55 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)

I thank the hon. member for informing the House, but I think that is an issue that should have been taken up with the government House leader at that appropriate meeting.

SupplyGovernment Orders

3:55 p.m.

Calgary Southwest Alberta

Canadian Alliance

Stephen Harper Canadian AllianceLeader of the Opposition

moved:

That, in the opinion of this House, all Canadians are to be treated equally and fairly, and since Prairie wheat and barley producers are discriminated against solely because of their location and occupation, this House call on the government to take immediate action to end this discrimination and give Prairie farmers the same marketing choices that are available in the rest of Canada.

Madam Speaker, we will be splitting our time.

In the course of the business of the House, hon. members are required to debate and take positions on a great variety of issues. While all of them are important in their own right, some of them carry much more significance reflecting the kind of nation that Canada is.

I use the term “reflecting Canada” rather than “defining Canada” because I believe that what defines a free society is not necessarily established by law. Those things are part of our nature, our history and our values. They cannot be legislated into being and they cannot be debated into existence. They first must exist in our hearts, then in society and then, finally, in the laws of our nation.

One of this country's most positive attributes is its sense of fairness; that we intrinsically believe that all people should be treated with respect, with justice and with dignity. I say as Canadians we believe that sometimes almost to a fault.

There is no part of this nation where Canadians believe that others are not entitled to the same rights, the same opportunities, the same dreams and the same freedoms. We insist on fairness for all.

However, while the House cannot create such attributes, it can destroy them. The laws that are passed in this place either protect our inherent rights and freedoms and those of others or they erode them. They either strengthen them or diminish them. While some legislation has little impact on these things, other policies go to the heart of what we believe, and still others violate these norms. One of the latter is the legislation which results in our courts sending farmers in one part of the country to jail for activities which are considered normal commercial practices in other parts of the country. I am referring to the monopoly of the Canadian Wheat Board.

Quite frankly, I know of no other single policy in our nation today that does more violence to the fundamental rights and freedoms of Canadians than that one. It singles out a particular group of people, the grain farmers, in a particular region, the Prairies, and strips those involved of commercial opportunities that no other Canadian businessperson would dream of being deprived of.

Having done so, it then attempts to convince other Canadians that the stripping of such rights is perfectly acceptable and can be rightfully imposed on others any time one can demonstrate some claim to public opinion or academic expertise. In doing so, these claims and these policies erode the very foundation of democracy from which they purport to drive their authority.

I must admit that for many years I, like most Canadians, did not appreciate the impact this law was having on real people in some parts of our country. I was born and raised in Ontario. Although my grandparents were mixed farmers in Ontario and although my father did business in western Canada, I was unfamiliar with the Canadian Wheat Board, at least its origins, its purpose and the impact it has.

All that changed during my term as a Reform member of Parliament and, more specifically, my years as president of the National Citizens Coalition. During that time I travelled around the Prairies and met hundreds of smart, entrepreneurial, hardworking farm families who were struggling to save, to expand and to diversify their industry. In the face of often difficult markets, they were finding lucrative markets outside our borders, yet prevented by law from exploiting those opportunities by an archaic, collectivist federal monopoly. Some of them, out of desperation and determination, took their grain across the border. They simply wanted to be treated like every other Canadian citizen expects and deserves to be treated.

For those who are not familiar with the monopoly of the Wheat Board, allow me to explain what it means.

Everywhere in the country except the prairie region Canadian grain farmers are encouraged to sell what they grow. The prairie farmers who grow wheat and barley and want to export it or sell it for human consumption must let the Canadian Wheat Board sell it. Unless they go through a bureaucratic and expensive process to buy back their own wheat, prairie farmers are not allowed to sell their own grain.

In spite of the fact that the Canadian Wheat Board Act is a federal law which technically applies to all of Canada, the prairie region is singled out for different treatment. While farmers in Quebec, Ontario, the Atlantic provinces and most of British Columbia can freely market their grain, prairie farmers cannot. The result of this are the following inequities.

If people farm in Ontario, they can sell their wheat through the Ontario Wheat Board or on the open market. However if people farm on the Prairies they can go to jail if they try to sell their wheat on the open market.

If people farm in Nova Scotia, they can sell their wheat directly to a mill. However if people farm on the Prairies they can go to jail if they try to sell their wheat to a mill.

If people farm in Quebec, they can obtain export licences at no cost, but if people farm on the Prairies, the cost of export licences takes the profit out of any sale beyond the Wheat Board.

If people farm anywhere else in the prairie region export licences are routinely granted, but if people farm on the Prairies export licences are routinely denied.

The arguments for retaining this monopoly are varied and complex, but at the end of the day they all have one thing in common. They are just an excuse for denying basic freedoms.

For example, the Liberal government claims that the CWB can obtain a better price for farmers' wheat because of its monopoly position. Yet the fact is the CWB has no monopoly in the context of the world market.

Canada grows only 5% of the world's wheat and holds only 18% of the world wheat export market. This means that for every CWB agent out there peddling a bushel of wheat the competitors are lined up with four times as much to sell. That is some monopoly.

On the basis of data the Wheat Board keeps secret, the Liberal government also claims that it has done studies which prove the CWB obtains better prices for farmers. However it never considered all the costs.

Costs it does not factor into the study are such things as the lost opportunity costs for farmers who want to add value; the costs of failing to develop niche markets; the costs of inefficiencies in a bureaucratic grain handling and transportation system; the costs of endless commissions, studies, panels and hearings on this issue; or, finally, the exorbitant costs paid by many farmers to fight for the basic economic right to sell their own property.

If the Wheat Board were really to have this superior performance in wheat markets it would not be afraid to show all of that data to western farmers, which it has never done.

The next argument the government puts forward is the claim that if farmers had to compete against each other for markets it would drive the price of wheat down. This is simply silly. What other business people are being told by the federal government that the more buyers they have for their products the more the price drops?

Multiple buyers push the price up as grain buyers compete with one another to secure supply for their sales commitments. If farmers were to have a choice about who they sold their products to, they would always choose the one offering the higher price. Those would be our farmers, perhaps not the Liberals' farmers. This would force grain buyers to compete against each other or see the business go elsewhere.

Finally, we are told farmers want the monopoly. This is an interesting argument. What is the evidence of this? Was there a vote in 1943 when the monopoly was first established? No. Did farmers vote when the government decided to bring in this wartime monopoly to keep wheat prices low? No. Was there a vote in 1949 when it was again decided to keep the monopoly around even though the war was over? No.

Was there a vote when the government decided to give wheat to Great Britain at half its commercial value in the 1950s? No. Was there a vote when government never repaid farmers for these losses? No. Was there a vote in the mid-1950s when the government decided to renew the CWB monopoly again? No. Was there a vote five years later when it happened yet again? No.

Was there ever a vote? Yes, there was a vote. The current Wheat Board minister had a vote in 1997. He gave prairie farmers two options. Would farmers like to leave the monopoly exactly as it is or should he destroy the Canadian Wheat Board for everyone?

There was no option of a dual market. There was no mention of a voluntary system. There was no chance for individual choice. There was no opportunity to have a system like Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia or the west slopes of British Columbia. There was only the rigged plebiscite that frustrated farmers and solved nothing. It was followed by this farcical system of elections that the government likes to point to where it still has effective control of the Wheat Board. It controls one-third of the board which is directly controlled by the minister. These elections, frankly, would not pass a UN monitoring system.

Perhaps someone should tell the government that there are many farmers who are not interested in electing a director to a corporation they do not want to do business with. We believe that people should be treated equally and fairly. If farmers want to market through the Wheat Board, let them do so.

Voluntary cooperatives are a cherished part of this nation's history and frankly, with competition the Canadian Wheat Board would do a lot better job of serving the farmer. However for farmers who want to take their business somewhere else, they should have the freedom to do so. Such freedoms are the basic right of all Canadians and are the responsibility of the House to protect. Western Canada and prairie farmers should have the same rights as any other Canadian when it comes to these freedoms.

SupplyGovernment Orders

4:05 p.m.

Mississauga South Ontario

Liberal

Paul Szabo LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Public Works and Government Services

Madam Speaker, in his speech the member referred to the Wheat Board cost per bushel which he characterized as being exorbitant. I am not sure if the member is aware, but the audited financial statement for the Canadian Wheat Board indicated that the cost was approximately 5¢ a bushel.

If the member characterized the Wheat Board cost as being exorbitant then he must know compared to what. Could he advise the House what those costs are compared to someone like Cargill's or ADM's?

SupplyGovernment Orders

4:05 p.m.

Canadian Alliance

Stephen Harper Canadian Alliance Calgary Southwest, AB

Madam Speaker, I am not sure exactly what costs the member was referring to in that question. He misses the point that it is not my decision whether those are the appropriate costs farmers want to have any more than it is his decision. That is a decision to be made by people in the industry who understand the option and who have the options available to them. That is the point. It is not up to us here.

SupplyGovernment Orders

4:05 p.m.

NDP

Dick Proctor NDP Palliser, SK

Madam Speaker, the Alliance leader's panacea for this seems to be to have a dual market. Justice Muldoon in Alberta, a number of years ago, threw out that notion saying that a dual market would simply be a transition to an open market. We have seen that this year with the Ontario Wheat Board. Why does the leader of the Alliance think that a dual market will work for more than about 30 days?

SupplyGovernment Orders

4:05 p.m.

Canadian Alliance

Stephen Harper Canadian Alliance Calgary Southwest, AB

Madam Speaker, I am unclear why the hon. member of the NDP would think that marketing choice would not work here as it does in so many other industries in this country.

If the NDP got away from this single desk, socialistic philosophy and instead got back to its roots, listened to western farmers and listened to the options that western farmers want to deal with the difficult situation that their industry faces, it might find once again that it would have western farmers interested in voting for it.

The reason why this party has gradually lost favour in rural areas of western Canada is because it simply is not open to the views of farmers on these issues and keeps raising these completely unrealistic scenarios that somehow all options would collapse if farmers had a choice.

I think what would happen is that the Wheat Board would be forced to modernize itself and deal more openly, fairly and efficiently with its customers. We would see not only marketing choice, but a strengthened cooperative, which is in the interests of the industry.

SupplyGovernment Orders

4:10 p.m.

Canadian Alliance

Howard Hilstrom Canadian Alliance Selkirk—Interlake, MB

Madam Speaker, oats were removed from the Canadian Wheat Board monopoly in the early 1990s. Since that time Canada has become the largest exporter of oats for human consumption in the world. I am proud to say that one of the plants is in Portage la Prairie in my home province.

Does the member agree that if we leave it up to marketers and individual farmers to market innovatively, that greater wealth for this country can be produced?

SupplyGovernment Orders

4:10 p.m.

Canadian Alliance

Stephen Harper Canadian Alliance Calgary Southwest, AB

Madam Speaker, it has been clear in my travels in recent years that most of the growth in the western grain industry has been in grains not covered by the Wheat Board monopoly. It is not just oats, but the growth of the lentil industry and the organic industry, within the grain industry that have been seeking to stay outside the Wheat Board monopoly.

We believe there is a clear majority opinion for a dual market, but there is debate among farmers about whether certain grains should stay within the Wheat Board monopoly. One of the fascinating things is that once the grain is outside of it, nobody ever demands that it be put in the Wheat Board monopoly, because as the hon. member says, that is where all the growth is.

SupplyGovernment Orders

4:10 p.m.

Progressive Conservative

Rick Borotsik Progressive Conservative Brandon—Souris, MB

Madam Speaker, did the hon. member, in replying to the member from the New Democratic Party, indicate this is all about votes, not about the producers themselves or the free market system? Did I hear him say that the New Democratic Party would get more votes in western Canada if it would change its tune?

SupplyGovernment Orders

4:10 p.m.

Canadian Alliance

Stephen Harper Canadian Alliance Calgary Southwest, AB

Madam Speaker, our party was founded on the notion that we would get more votes if we listened to people. That is a healthy thing. I would say to the hon. member for Brandon--Souris that I understand his party has essentially the same position as ours, that it favours dual marketing on Wheat Board issues. The member should work with us to change the law and change the government rather than aligning himself with the NDP.

SupplyGovernment Orders

4:10 p.m.

Canadian Alliance

David Anderson Canadian Alliance Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK

Madam Speaker, I appreciated the speech made by the leader of our party. As an Ontarian and a person who has not been a farmer, he has come to understand the situation very well.

When many other people find out the facts about the Canadian Wheat Board they begin to change their minds as well. That includes Liberal backbenchers who have approached me over the last year to talk about the issue. They have said to me that this cannot be the way it really is. After the situation is explained to them, they cannot believe it. This goes beyond a partisan issue. I would suggest that is why a Liberal dominated agriculture committee approved the agriculture committee standing report last spring which called for a voluntary marketing option. It called for a short term free market option for farmers.

The committee travelled across Canada and listened to farmers, especially farmers in western Canada and their comments about the Wheat Board. I will give credit to the chairman of our committee because he was willing to listen. He said to us, “The farmers have told us that they would like to see this option and we are willing to support it”. There were other Liberal members travelling with the committee, such as the member for Lambton--Kent--Middlesex, the member for Dufferin--Peel--Wellington--Grey and the member for Huron--Bruce. They all supported the recommendations made by the committee.

It looks to me like we are going to have some interference with that report. There are rumours that when it comes back to the agriculture committee, we will see some interference from the government. Given the history of the minister responsible for the Wheat Board and also the Solicitor General, we expect to see their fingers somewhere in that pie.

I have a greater concern that there will be some interference with the way things are run. This concern comes from an article in the Western Producer . Barry Wilson interviewed the minister responsible for the Wheat Board and he wrote:

Goodale said last week that farmers don't have to go to jail to protest the Canadian Wheat Board monopoly. They simply have to convince a majority of Canadian Wheat Board permit holders that they want marketing freedom and presto, the monopoly is gone.

One would think that would be the end of it, but I am afraid there are some qualifiers with regard to that. I would like to read them into the record. Later the minister was asked directly, if Wheat Board elections returned a majority of farmer directors calling for an end to the monopoly, would he change the legislation? His answer was, “If that is the democratic will of farmers, obviously the government would have to respond to it, yes”.

That response is not necessarily freedom for farmers because, and I quote from the article again:

Then came the qualifiers. A recommendation from the Canadian Wheat Board [not farmers] to end the monopoly would trigger a government organized vote among permit holders.

We have already seen one of those. I quote again:

A majority vote against the monopoly would be persuasive [the minister tells us] in the campaign to convince the government to amend the legislation.-

One would expect that a majority vote would make the decision, but no, it would be persuasive.

This is a tremendous concern for us. We are debating this issue today and already the minister is apparently telling us that it does not matter what farmers want, it does not matter what the vote decision would be, it would only be persuasive to the government. The article goes on to say:

“But a majority vote in favour of change would not necessarily be accepted by the government as the voice of farmers”, Goodale said. “There is a technical question about how big the vote would have to be”. He said the government would have to decide if the turnout and the margin of victory were large enough to be sure that an end to the CWB monopoly is really what farmers want”.

I have to ask, what do farmers have to do to get the government's attention and to get change? There is a long history here.

I have farmed for 25 years and have watched as people around me have battled this issue for decades. Many of them have spent most of their lives trying to bring about changes to the Canadian Wheat Board. As I was growing up, farmers were told that they needed the Wheat Board, that they were not capable of doing their own business. I know for a fact that is not true.

In the early 1990s we went through a fall when there was a lot of frozen wheat throughout a good part of the Prairies. Farmers began to wonder what they could do with their wheat.

Farmers in my area actually went down to Great Falls, Montana and talked to one of the grain companies and made a deal as to what they could get for their wheat. The company was cooperative. Unfortunately, as part of the buyback program, farmers had to tell the Canadian Wheat Board whom they were selling their wheat to, which they did. They got a call from the grain company saying it did not need their wheat and would not deal with them. The company said it had as much wheat as it wanted. It named a price which was between 50¢ and 80¢ a bushel less than the farmers had negotiated.

That began to open up people's minds. New crops were introduced in our area. People saw they were capable of marketing their own product.

It is interesting to note that in the early runs when farmers decided to take their wheat across the border, the minister said there was nothing that the Wheat Board could do. As it began to pick up momentum, it changed its mind and began to charge the farmers under the Canadian Wheat Board Act.

Interestingly enough, on May 16, 1996, the first farmers, and David Sawatsky was one of them, were found innocent. Mr. Sawatsky should have been able to walk out of the court and continue on his way and to move his wheat where he wanted to move it. What did the government do?

That same day the minister changed the customs regulations to ensure that all other farmers who were charged would be convicted. He rewrote the legislation, the Wheat Board minister who presently sits here and is supposed to be representing western Canadian interests. He wonders why his party is out of touch with western Canada. He has made those comments himself. He is not part of the solution. He is actually part of the problem. Not only that, the government rewrote the legislation to lock in the repression. Our position has been consistently that people have the right to do their own business.

The example of Mr. Sawatsky was not the first nor was it the last example of repression by the government. Andy McMechan who is a farmer from Manitoba grew 20,000 bushels of a specialty waxy barley. The Wheat Board told him it had no market and it would only market it as a lower grade of barley and pay him about $3 a bushel. The U.S. market told him he could get $6 a bushel, so he started moving his wheat down to the United States.

The Canadian Wheat Board, customs, justice and the RCMP all got involved. The gentleman spent 155 days in jail because of what the government was trying to do to him, which was trying to break him. There were multiple strip searches. He was thrown into cells with people who threatened him. How is a regular citizen supposed to survive that?

Last Thursday I was in Lethbridge. Premier Klein came to address the rally. Almost 1,000 supporters were there. I would say it was a historic day in the struggle for freedom.

I said that we had come to support a group of people who are holding to their convictions over comfort, to their commitment over convenience, and to their faith over fear. One of the things that really bothered me, and I think it was the most frustrating moment of the day, was watching the families say goodbye to their fathers.

The rally was on one side of the street in a parking lot. When the time came that the rally was over, people lined up on both sides of where the farmers were walking. They walked through the group of people. Their wives were with them. Their teenage daughters were crying and their little kids, who did not understand what was going on, were crying. There is a picture in most of the national papers of one little nine-year old girl who did not even understand except that her dad was being locked up for trying to sell his grain.

For most of the weekend I was really angry. I am usually a pretty controlled person but it just made my blood boil to see normal, hardworking people run that far afoul of the government that they were being locked up. Several of them are still there today.

They are not standing alone because there is tremendous support for the farmers. Their families were there, their parents and their wives. Their neighbours were there. One of the farmers' wives approached me and said, “We thank you for what you are doing in trying to help our husbands out”. Other farmers were there.

Consistently surveys have shown that there is strong support for marketing choice. The Canadian Federation of Independent Business has done surveys which show there is 75% to 80% support for change. The Canadian Wheat Board surveys, which it will not release but which were leaked, show over 60% support for marketing choice. Our mail-outs show up to 80% support for marketing choice. The Edmonton Journal did a survey just the other day which showed over 90% for marketing choice.

The farmers just want choice. They want out of jail and they want to be able to market and do their own business.

For those who would like to support these farmers I would like to point out that a fund has been set up to support them. The mailing address is: Box 68, Cremona, Alberta, T0M 0R0.

I suggest that the real culprit is actually here. The minister responsible for the Canadian Wheat Board has served his party's interests consistently over the years against the interests of his constituents and against the interests of western Canadians.

In conclusion, we often hear there are only a few countries in the world that jail their farmers for selling their own wheat. That is not true. There actually is only one. That one is Canada. Even China now allows its farmers to sell their own wheat on the Chinese domestic market. So the freedoms we dream of and the freedoms that so many others in Canada have, farmers all around the world already have. We are here today to help work toward giving prairie farmers those same opportunities.

Therefore, today I would like to seek the unanimous consent of the House to make this opposition motion votable and that it not be considered as part of the total allotment of votable supply day motions.

SupplyGovernment Orders

4:20 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)

The House has heard the terms of the proposal. Is there consent?

SupplyGovernment Orders

4:20 p.m.

Some hon. members

Agreed.