Mr. Speaker, I recall that when those provinces signed on they were told quite clearly by the former agriculture minister that if they did not sign on they would not get any support money for the BSE issue. Farmers were so hurt that the provinces said they had to take what little miserly bit they could get from the federal government.
The member talks about the CAIS program and how happy he is that it has been set up and says that we can it take to the bank. I took mine to the bank the other day, because when we have a $100,000 reference margin, we have to go to the bank and borrow $24,000 so we can make our farmer's deposit in order to qualify for the program. The federal government does not deposit any money into any bank accounts. Why is the government being so hard on the farmer that the farmer has to put his money up front instead of just having a letter of credit from the bank stating that if he makes a claim on the program, the farmer's portion will be there?