Wait a minute. We took that study and gave it to the industry and said, “You decide which parts of this you want to harmonize with the U.S., our major trading partner in red meats, which parts you want to change, and how we involve food safety at the border”. They are in the process of giving us some tremendous response on that.
The first thing we found is there is not a smoking gun when it comes to differences. Certainly, we do things differently than the U.S. but it is a different system. We have a little thing called sovereignty here, but we are more than willing to harmonize our systems back and forth across the border.
We found a couple of instances, mostly on the export and importation of live animals and genetics, where our regulatory regime might be a little bit prohibitive. We are addressing that and we will adjust it.
The CFIA has been under a cost recovery moratorium for a number of years and it is capped at 15% recovery. We are actually at 11% cost recovery with the CFIA and if we have to go to zero, we will, in order facilitate that trade. We will take a look at it. That work is ongoing and is ready to go. The member said it has to be done this month. We are already way past that. While he fiddled, we got out there and did the job.
These political rants that I constantly hear might be crowd pleasers but the unfortunate part is, we keep track of where the member is because we always go in and gain a lot of votes afterwards. The crowds that he draws are very small and disgruntled groups, usually the same folks.
I was at a meeting last night with 250 producers sitting in a room. We had a great meal together that farmers produced on the ground. It was a fantastic meal of beef and pork, and all the trimmings that go with it. I had a great dialogue with them for about an hour, taking questions from the floor. They are pleased with the role of this government.
Whether we are talking supply management or producers in beef and pork, and the grains and oilseeds sector, they are happy with what this government is doing, because they are involved. They are helping us to develop the new programs. We did not arbitrarily go out and hammer on them and say, “This is what you get”. We went out and said, “How can we best serve you?”
We did that with the livestock sector. As they plummeted down into this crisis, we went to them and said, “How do we best serve you?” They came back and said, “Let us look at some practical solutions. Let us make sure this is not countervailable and that it gives us the liquidity to carry forward”.
The member for Malpeque says we cannot borrow our way out of trouble, but then he lists his own recommendations where he talks about loans. It is pretty shortsighted. He has a pretty short memory. We did that. We took a loan and we created it into a situation where it gives them the liquidity. We took second chair when it came to security, keeping the financial institutions on line.
We have created a cash flow situation that will see them through this downward cycle and if we have to adjust, we will do more. They know that. We are in discussions with the livestock sector constantly as to what is happening and how it is working.
Band-aid solutions will not solve the problem. Ad hoc programs that the Liberals were famous for announcing but never really delivering only really reinforce the status quo. With their programming over the years, all they did was mass market signals. They did not allow the market to adjust. The Liberals have maintained a certain rigid focus. They wanted them farming the mailbox but we do not.
We want them drawing their moneys from the marketplace. That is why we are seeing differences in the money out there from the government. The money is still there, but we have not had to deliver it because grains and oilseeds are finally getting their return out of the marketplace.
That is a wonderful thing. That gives us the freedom to move over and help the livestock sector in a more fulsome way and we have done that. We have made unprecedented amounts of money available to them. I do have the power and I have done that. The member said that we should not claw back the money. We made those changes. We did not just think about it or talk about it or rant about it. We did it.
As the minister I have the power, in conjunction with the finance minister, to absolve people of their repayments for up to a year where they are looking at just paying the interest. We can even take that away and give them time to get back on their feet. We did it. The Liberals did not even have that in their plan.
We are making changes to the farm improvement loan so that more people can qualify. We have changed the disaster component under the Agricultural Marketing Products Act. Where it used to be capped at $25,000, it has now been changed to $400,000, with the first $100,000 interest free. That is tremendous liquidity. That provides a tremendous opportunity for the sector to move ahead, and it is. The market is going to drive it. Producers are adapting to it. We are starting to see some light at the end of the tunnel.
The member went on and on about a number of different things that really are not pertinent to this. It was more of a political rant. I am happy to have a debate any time those members want to go to the polls.
The member brought up the issue of Gencor. While we do feel for the company, it is alive and well in certain other sectors. It is a big multinational company. We certainly feel for the people who have lost their jobs and the producers who do not have access to it.
The good news is that this government rebuilt the trade situation in the U.S., and rule 2 is in place which means live animals and animals over 30 months can cross over the border. Cull animals, and cows and bulls have seen unprecedented value, more than ever seen since BSE. That is what drove Gencor out of business.
The member opposite talked also about the SRM removal and the feed ban and so on. Guess when that started? That happened on the Liberal watch. The industry asked for those types of things to get the border back open. We are now looking at every issue listed under SRM and removing them as we get agreement with our import nations.
We have since made some tremendous moves on getting some of those SRMs out of the system. We have taken away a lot of the regulatory costs on the feed ban. We are looking at on farm mixed feed, which is regulated by the time it gets there, so why would we do it again?
We are listening to producers. We are getting the job done. The opposition cannot seem to get it through its head that we are doing the right things and producers are accepting that.
The member for Malpeque talked about CAIS and how bad it was. He said it did not do this or it did not do that. Guess whose program that was? It was a Liberal program. In 2006 we campaigned on getting rid of it. We have done that because it did not serve producers in any way, shape or form.