Mr. Speaker, today is a sad day in the history of the federal Parliament. We knew that the successive federal agriculture ministers in recent years were all irresponsible. We also knew that they were incompetent. Now we know that they are also cowardly.
This is momentous day at the UPA convention. Having been the UPA's chief economist for seven years, I would say this is a first; never before has a federal agriculture minister backed away from his responsibilities. This minister is failing to take responsibilities which are his to take. If the mad cow crisis is continuing and nothing has been done in 18 months, it is the responsibility of the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food.
We are faced with a destabilized agricultural sector. This is the worst income crisis farm producers in Quebec, and even across Canada, have had to go through in 25 years. The negotiations with the Americans to reopen borders to cattle and cull have gone nowhere. Farm producers have not been supported appropriately by the federal government. Hundreds of millions of dollars were announced left and right, but the producers who testified this week said they received barely $90 million. Without Quebec City's assistance, they would have received compensation for approximately 20% of their losses, as compared to the current 50%. The crisis would be even worse than it is.
The federal government must get involved. It is not by shirking its responsibilities, as the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food is doing, that it will resolve the situation. In all the years I have been involved in agriculture, I have never seen anything like it. Looking back at what was done in the past 10 years, we can see that this government is the one responsible for the current crisis. Not just the Americans. This government is also responsible, because it did not take its responsibilities or took steps in the past which are wrong by today's standards.
I will give an example. The current Minister of Finance was responsible for the Canadian Dairy Commission a few years ago. He cut the dairy subsidy that was paid to Quebec and Canadian farmers. At the time, they were given $6.03 a hectolitre of milk, which provided Quebec dairy producers with $120 million a year. This subsidy was cut. Today, $120 million would not have solved all the problems stemming from cull that the dairy producers are facing, but at least it would have helped. The Minister of Finance had said he would raise prices accordingly to compensate for the losses, but he never did. This means that the farmers are already missing $120 million because of this government.
Today it is the same thing. We are asking for a Canada-wide floor price for cull. Do not forget that although the producers are receiving roughly 20% of what they were getting a year and a half ago, before the mad cow crisis, it is still possible to set a floor price. Furthermore, Ms. Gauthier, the minister of the department of agriculture, fisheries and food, has said so. She has asked the federal minister—who has done nothing with this request—to set a floor price.
Today, the packers have doubled their profits. Consumers were not aware that producers were getting paid less. Consumers are paying the same prices if not more than they did 18 months ago for beef from the supermarket. The packers are the ones pocketing the profits, particularly a cull cattle plant in the Drummondville region. It has doubled its profits and continues to siphon off what producers should be receiving as fair and equitable prices.
In the meantime, the Minister of Agriculture is shirking his responsibilities and not adequately responding to the demand to set a floor price. Dairy producers are going under.
Worse still, yesterday, ten Bloc Quebecois members went to Quebec City to support Quebec producers at the UPA convention. We talked with them. I know that some of them were happy a few years ago. They loved their jobs. They put their hearts and souls, as we know, into their jobs, working 120 hours a week to run their farms. Today, they are suffering and in distress. It is not surprising that, in the agricultural industry, the suicide rate is two times higher than that of the general public.
While producers are in distress, the minister is using the false pretext of a motion introduced by the Bloc Quebecois to say that he has to stay in the House all day, that he has no choice and that it is the Bloc's fault if he is unable to attend the UPA convention. People should not be treated like idiots. When there is a debate on an opposition motion, the minister can make a speech, but then it is his parliamentary secretary who takes over. This morning, the minister could have—I even suggested it to him—taken a plane and been in Quebec City in less than an hour to meet with the producers, if he had something to offer them. But what did he offer them? Nothing.
The mad cow crisis has dragged on for 18 months, the producers are all going under, and the minister is shirking his responsibilities and acting like a coward.
There is still time for him to go there if he has something to announce.The reason he is hiding out here is that he has not one penny to offer them. Nor is he offering an agreement to establish a cross-Canada floor price.
The mad cow crisis was set off by one mad cow in Alberta. I remember what the minister's predecessor said, when asked if animal health should be regionalized so that if there was one cow in Alberta it would not affect the Quebec market. He told us, “We are all Canadians. There is a mad cow in Alberta and everyone has to pay for it.” What pathetic reasoning.
It was that pathetic reasoning which led to the current crisis. The federal government did not live up to its responsibilities. Today the minister is sitting there, with a look of blissful contentment, while in Quebec City, the producers are protesting loudly and expressing their anger with the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food. I have never seen anything like it; I can tell you. I have been following the situation in the agricultural sector since 1982—I even started here in Ottawa at Agriculture Canada—and I have never seen a situation like this.
Agricultural producers are being attacked on all sides, not only by the Americans but by their own government. And the minister sits there looking contented. It does not make sense.
There is still time for him to go and meet with the producers and give them some good news. I do not think he will. And why? Because the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food has no power in the cabinet. He has not tried to help the producers in any way. He is thinking; he has plans. To use my leader's word from this morning, he is “chicken”.
He is afraid to go and tell the farmers of Quebec that he has nothing to give them and that all he does is make plans. He is afraid to go and tell them that he has paid out $360 million, when they have only received $90 million. They are all declaring bankruptcy—at least, half of them are.
When I left the UPA in 1991, there were 14,000 dairy producers in Quebec. This year, the figure is around 8,000. How many will be left next year? This has been dragging on for 18 months. We have been presented with policies that are not even applicable to the Quebec agricultural sector, to the reality of dairy production. They have set the percentage of cull that can be compensated at 16%, when the actual figure is 25%. That is the percentage of a herd that is replaced every year. So why set the figure at 16%? Because Ottawa knows best.
The dairy subsidy is cut because of the need to be in line with international agreements. How dumb we can be sometimes. While farm subsidies were being halved here, the Americans were doubling theirs and the Europeans raising theirs by 75%, and here we were acting like good little boys and girls, slashing our subsidies in order to comply with WTO international agreements.
There is not one blessed country in the world, with the exception of Canada, that is respecting those agreements. In the meantime, do hon. members know where our Quebec and Canadian producers' competition is coming from? From those who are getting the US and European subsidies. Then we have our American competitors blocking the borders any time they have an excuse to do so.
This makes no sense. I appeal again to the minister. If he has an ounce of pride and courage left, I appeal to him to announce to the agricultural producers of Quebec and Canada that he is going to help them, going to cover the losses they have sustained over the past 18 months, all the equity they have had to absorb, the savings built up over years of work that have now been lost.
Whole farm families are being uprooted. This is unacceptable and it is also unacceptable to see the minister so comfortably ensconced in his seat in the House of Commons while the farmers are struggling to keep their heads above water. This is irresponsible. He is incompetent, and a coward to boot.