Jean-Guy Chrétien

[Canadian Wheat Board Act, February 17th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, if I may, I would like to give a brief historical overview of the Canadian Wheat Board.

First of all, we must remember the good old days, or perhaps the bad old days, of the famous 1929 depression. In the mid-1930s, when the western grain producers were breaking their backs to raise crops they could sell for only a pittance, the government of the day created a board to organize sales of western grain.

At that time, membership in the Canadian Wheat Board was optional. There was no monopoly. Only around the middle of the second world war, or near the end, in 1943, did the Canadian Wheat Board become a monopoly.

Since then, the Canadian Wheat Board has undergone only slight changes. More than two years ago now, we in this House began to look at a certain bill, Bill C-72, which died on the Order Paper because the government decided to call an early election. Hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars were spent on examining Bill C-72, and then the House had to start all over again with the Minister of Natural Resources, who in the former Parliament was responsible for the Wheat Board in his capacity as Minister of Agriculture.

He now wears another hat, but the Prime Minister has also given him the additional responsibility for the Canadian Wheat Board, thus taking it away from the new Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food. And why? I will leave that up to your imagination.

The Minister of Natural Resources, who is responsible for the Canadian Wheat Board, revived Bill C-72, this time calling it C-4. It is a wide-ranging bill, since it affects three western provinces in their entirety, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta, as well as part of British Columbia.

It is very important, and because of its importance, they are setting a time limit. This is not the end of a session, and the government's legislative menu is quite slim. We have nothing to sink our teeth into. We had Bill C-4, which was reasonably important, and then bang, down comes the guillotine. Third reading starts at 10 a.m. and voting is at 5:30 p.m.

Bill C-4 will change the Canadian Wheat Board from a conventional crown corporation into a private group. However the government is keeping its foot in the door, because it can democratically elect ten members to the board of directors, which, with the help of the governor in council, can make five appointments, including, most importantly, that of the president, whom it can also dismiss.

I criticize these appointments day in and day out in this House. They become a sort of cancer when the time comes to make these prestigious and weighty appointments. Patronage appointments will be made. And when you know the government's system in Parliament, you can predict who is going to be appointed president of the Canadian Wheat Board. It will no doubt be a Liberal, who will be well paid and a good friend of the Minister of Natural Resources.

It will also serve to free up a riding, as in the case of the riding of Beauce, or to compensate various members from Nova Scotia who were defeated in the last election and give them something to put in their mouth and on their toast in the morning. They will be appointed to the office of the Minister of Natural Resources or the Boston office. We need only think of André Ouellet, who used to be here, or David Berger, who of course became Canada's ambassador to Israel.

If it is a private business, if the Canadian Wheat Board is an independent company, why impose a president, who will essentially be running the entire Canadian Wheat Board? Worse yet, because it will no longer be a crown corporation, it will escape the scrutiny of our good auditor general, Denis Desautels, who makes all of government shake when he tables his report, because, with his extremely well-structured team, he can examine this type of corporation and its operation to determine if it is truly efficient and whether it puts the producers or certain patronage recipients first.

Instead, Deloitte & Touche will have the huge responsibility of auditing the books of the Canadian Wheat Board. Did this same accounting firm not make a substantial contribution to the coffers of the Liberal Party of Canada in the last general election? Do you recall? Perhaps someone could check on Deloitte & Touche.

This government takes good care of those who show their gratitude. In the interest of transparency, we in the Bloc Quebecois would like to see Denis Desautels, the Auditor General of Canada, and his team audit the books of the Canadian Wheat Board.

The figures are well-known, but let me remind you that, in 1998-99, total sales will exceed $7 billion. Even a one-thousandth of one percent error would represent a significant amount of money. If the goal is to work in the interest of grain producers, we should have no hesitation in ensuring that its administration is as transparent as possible.

I can recall that, last spring, my colleague from the riding next to mine, the hon. member for Richmond—Arthabaska, pointed a finger at the Prime Minister and the Minister of Natural Resources, as well as the Minister of Human Resources Development, because a bagman would show up two weeks after the minister to collect. He can be named, since we have immunity here. It was Mr. Corbeil, if memory serves, who trailed around after the minister and collected funds.

In the interests of transparency, we should not be afraid to have the books examined closely by qualified individuals, who will do the job for less than Deloitte & Touche. Finally, on this same topic, since it is no longer an ordinary crown corporation, the good old Access to Information Act will put a stop to any further questions. Grain producers will not be entitled to find out about hidden defects, about resolutions or decisions that have been taken on their behalf, but that the information commissioner cannot investigate for them.

Transparency is all but non-existent in Bill C-4.

That reminds me of when western Canada was given an advantage—my colleague, the member for Lévis reminded me of this just a few minutes ago—in the form of the well known Western Grain Transportation Act, commonly known as the Crow rate. Every year, it was costing us close to $1 billion in direct subsidies for grain transportation.

Obviously, some people turned this Western Grain Transportation Act to their personal advantage, and were no longer paying a red cent. They even made money by having boxcars go to Thunder Bay and return to Vancouver with the same wheat.

Because the government was abolishing a privilege that was apparently their permanent due, western grain producers were given almost $3 billion free of provincial and federal taxes. As my colleague, the member for Lévis, reminded me, some producers used this $3 billion to diversify their production. Instead of paying to ship their grain, they decided to keep it for local use.

They could not turn to dairy, poultry, chicken or egg production, because of the quota system. What was left that did not have a quota? Pork.

Two things happened. In Brandon, a gigantic slaughterhouse that could handle over 35,000 hogs a week is being built. Multiply 35,000 by 52 and you have quite a year. That is one thing.

The second is that the price of pork has gone way down. Our pork producers in Quebec are losing money daily, as we speak.

[Division No. 72, February 12th, 1998]

moved:

Motion No. 46

That Bill C-4 be amended by adding before line 1 and the heading “Agricultural Marketing Program Act” on page 22 the following:

“Access to Information Act

30.1 Schedule I to the Access to Information Act is amended by adding the following in alphabetical order under the heading “Other Government Institutions”:

Canadian Wheat Board Canadian Wheat Board”

[Division No. 72, February 12th, 1998]

Or Mrs. Y, of course.

The problem is with the position of chairperson.

I will conclude by discussing another motion, moved by the hon. member for Prince-George—Peace River, who is making a very interesting suggestion.

The bill currently provides that the already existing advisory committee may—it may, but all this is not clear—continue to exist. Motion No. 48 moved by the Reform Party member proposes to clearly state that the existing advisory committee will be dissolved.

The board will have 15 directors, compared to the three members currently sitting on the advisory committee. We agree with the Reform Party that having a board with 10 elected and five appointed directors would be enough. This is not to say we necessarily approve of the number 10 for elected directors. Personally, I would have proposed that all members be direct representatives of grain producers, and that they be elected through a general vote.

If the chairperson does not do a proper job, he will be let go at the end of his mandate, as was the case with the Conservative Party, in 1993, when only two board members were kept.

Mr. Speaker, I would like you, as Speaker of the House, to ask the Prime Minister, the Minister of Agriculture or, rather, the Minister responsible for the Canadian Wheat Board, namely the Minister of Natural Resources, to take a close look at the many motions before us. These motions do not seek to weaken Bill C-4, but to improve it. After all, this legislation deals with sales of between $6 and $7 billion.

[Division No. 72, February 12th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I rise with considerable interest to speak to Group No. 6. The aim of these amendments for the most part is to improve Bill C-4, which, we must admit, is a step in the right direction toward improving the Canadian Wheat Board.

When the Canadian Wheat Board was set up, its underlying principles were valid. At that time, we were in a period of full economic crisis, and grain producers were working hard for next to nothing. The wheat board was founded then, when it was needed. The effect of this was to raise prices and stabilize incomes, which were then very, very low. Times were tough.

While the bill is a step in the right direction, it could be a big step. It is a little step, because the three to five members on the previous board of directors were political appointments. When the Liberals were in government, they appointed their friends with very little regard, as we know, for the quality of their work. When we changed vehicles, from red to blue, the friends of the Conservatives were appointed. Here too, the appointments were very dubious.

This morning I drew a parallel with Senator Thompson who, a few years ago, was an excellent Liberal, but today is the shame of his party. They want to kick him out of the Senate as they did out of the Liberal caucus. Since he was appointed to age 75, they are stuck with their choice. That is what the Constitution says.

The bill is, then, a small step in the right direction, but it could be a medium step or a giant step. The opposition parties have brought in several motions, highly constructive suggestions for the most part.

My party, the Bloc Quebecois, for which I am the spokesperson on agricultural matters, proposed Motion No. 46, which would require the Canadian Wheat Board to give access to information. Those mainly responsible for the existence of this Canadian Wheat Board, the producers, could thus, using the very founding principles of the Access to Information Commission, verify whether the Board was being administered very well, well, badly or very badly.

I would remind the House that, year in and year out, wheat sales hover around the $6 billion mark, and are coming up to $7 billion. I have just been doing the math, for the fun of it. If, for example, the board makes a one one-hundredth of one percent error—one-hundredth of a percentage point is very little, one-hundredth of a penny is so little compared to a dollar, and we do not even bother to bend over to pick up a penny—that still represents a $600,000 error. That is significant. If the error is one one-thousandth, that represents $60,000.

The ten directors elected by the producers and the five appointed by the governor in council will, presumably, be highly competent of course. The CEO, who will be the only full time person, the one who will obviously call the tune for the Canadian Wheat Board, will be appointed by the Liberal Party. Let us face it, they are the ones in power today. So the CEO will certainly be a good Liberal, let me tell you, and will draw a nice comfortable salary, needless to say. If this president or CEO is out by a fraction as small as 1%, huge sums would be involved.

In the interests of transparency, we in the Bloc Quebecois are suggesting that grain producers or anyone, I or my neighbours in the riding, should be able to request an audit in order to have this board release documents.

I would remind you that, in Group No. 5, we learned that the auditor general would not have the opportunity or the right to go and audit the books and find out how well or badly the Canadian Wheat Board was being run. Sometimes I honestly wonder whether the Liberal government headed by the member for Saint-Maurice does not have some things it is trying to hide from grain producers. It is a question I ask myself, and I hope that a member of the government party will give me an answer after I have finished.

The trust of grain producers must be restored at all costs. This is essential. It is terrible the number of telephone calls, letters and faxes my office has received from western farmers, from western groups working tirelessly for the defence of grain producers. Unfortunately, as soon as it looks like farmers are going to get any control, the government hesitates, although farmers themselves are the ones who know how it should be run.

As an example—I am digressing briefly—there will be 15 members on the board of directors. In that sense, it is an improvement. Before, there were three, four or five at most, and they were all partisan appointments. People were told “We are sending you there”.

For example, if a prime minister wanted to get rid of a member of Parliament, he would appoint him to the Canadian Wheat Board, where that person would get a good salary and nice perks. A byelection would follow, and some friend of the prime minister would get elected and get a cabinet post or some other big job. It would now be a good thing to change things, restore the producers' trust.

This is a step in the right direction, since 10 of the 15 directors will be elected by farmers, who will vote by region. For example, grain producers in the Peace River area will vote for Mr. Y, who will become their representative. If he does not do a good job, he will be replaced the next time.

[Division No. 72, February 12th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, here we are after a vote to gag the opposition as we consider Bill C-4. The government has used its majority to gag us.

However, we in the Bloc Quebecois will use the time we have left to point out the failings of the bill, as has been our practice since our arrival in this House, put forward constructive amendments and hope that the government majority will agree.

The Canadian Wheat Board, it will be remembered, will have sales of between $6 billion and $7 billion annually. This is not peanuts. We in the Bloc have a very constructive proposal, Motion No. 20, and I would like to take a few minutes to read it. I would invite you, Mr. Speaker, to pay careful attention, because this is important. It is vitally important as a moral issue and to give grain producers confidence in the Canadian Wheat Board.

You already know that the Board, although its prime objective is praiseworthy, has lost a lot of credibility among the main stakeholders, the grain producers.

Motion No. 20 reads as follows:

That Bill C-4, in Clause 4, be amended by adding after line 37 on page 7 the following:

“(4) Notwithstanding subsection (2), a department within the meaning of the Financial Administration Act includes the Board for the purposes of the Auditor General Act”.

What does that mean exactly? It means, currently and once Bill C-4 on the Canada Wheat Board is passed, the books will be audited once a year to see whether the people appointed by the government, primarily the president, are working for the benefit of producers or for their own benefit.

The company of Deloitte and Touche will do the audit. I will not ask how much that means a year for this firm, which is a willing contributor to the Liberal Party campaign fund.

In the interests of transparency, we in the Bloc Quebecois are proposing not only that the auditor general be the one to audit transactions, but that he also be allowed to audit the Canadian Wheat Board's operations. The accounting firm will audit only the statement of income and outgo. You know how it works. An accounting firm prepares the following sort of letter: “On the basis of the figures supplied to us, we have audited a few invoices and everything seems to be in order”.

There is always this traditional phrase relieving the private auditor of all responsibility in the event of fraud. Whereas the credibility of Denis Desautels, who plays an extremely important role, is above all suspicion and he could also, as I was saying earlier, audit the Canadian Wheat Board's operations.

Let us take the sales figure of $7 billion. A mere 1% adds up to hundreds of thousands of dollars. Funds could be misappropriated.

Obviously, the president and the four other individuals appointed by the Liberal Party could be above all suspicion, but the absence of suspicion could later turn into slight doubts.

Take Senator Andrew Thompson, for example. He was a good Liberal who headed up the Ontario Liberal Party. He was appointed to the Senate by a Liberal government. Today, he has fallen from favour. But the Constitution tells us he was appointed until age 75. We are stuck with him. That was a Liberal appointment.

We are proposing that appointments be examined and approved by the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food, something the government party is unfortunately rejecting as well.

For the good of grain producers, I am asking the Liberal majority to seriously consider and approve—this is nothing to be ashamed of—the Bloc Quebecois' proposal, which seeks to give more transparency to the Canadian Wheat Board. If the idea has to come from the Liberal Party, then let us remove my name and put the name of a Liberal member on the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food. I can certainly live with that. As you know, the Canadian Wheat Board provides excellent services and is a necessary corporation. Still, only 60% of farmers are willing to rely on it. This is not normal.

I will use the rest of my time to look at Motion No. 21, moved by the Conservative member from Manitoba. The hon. member proposes to add a heading, but I am almost certain that Liberals will vote against it. Let me give an idea of how narrow-minded the Liberals are when it comes to helping farmers. This motion makes sense. I cannot see why the Liberals will reject it. It reads, in part:

1. The Corporation is incorporated with the object of marketing grain grown in Canada in the best interests of farmers—

The motion states that the corporation works in the best interests of farmers. Does this not make sense? Is the CWB's raison d'être not to maximize grain producers' returns? Its role is to help and support our grain producers, not make them poorer.

Based on what Liberal members on the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food said, the Liberals will vote against Motion No. 21, moved by the hon. member for Brandon—Souris. Again, all this is not very transparent.

Let me go back to the financial interests that the Liberal Party may have in passing Bill C-4. Given the refusal to have the books of the Canadian Wheat Board audited by a private accounting firm, and given the refusal to let Denis Desautels, the auditor general, take a look, we are justifiably concerned about the transparency of the Canadian Wheat Board.

Let us not forget that 15 directors will sit on the CWB's board of directors, 10 of whom will be elected by the producers themselves.

There are five others, including the president, who, to all intents and purposes—and we might as well be honest about it—will run the board of directors. He will run the Canadian Wheat Board. This very important person will be appointed by the governor in council and there will be no way to have the auditor general audit his books. That is unacceptable.

I launch an appeal, in closing. I appeal to my colleagues opposite to work for the benefit of farmers and not for their own personal benefit.

[Final Offer Arbitration In Respect Of West Coast Ports Operations Act, February 10th, 1998]

Madam Speaker, on November 24, 1997, I asked the Hon. Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food if he intended to protect Canadian dairy farmers against the import of increasing amounts of the cream and sugar mixture commonly known as butter oil.

At the time, the secretary of state for Agriculture and Agri-Food stood up to thank me, of course, for my question and say he was doing his best. That was on November 24, one month before Christmas.

Today, nearly two months after Christmas, many weeks have gone by and it is clear that butter oil imports to Canada are doubling every year. To preserve our so-called supply-managed industries, that is to say dairy, eggs and poultry, when the WTO agreements, formerly known as GATT, were signed in December 1993, tariffs were set so high that they would discourage any country from exporting supply-managed items to Canada, including dairy products.

A number of exporters affiliated with Unilever met with Revenue Canada senior officials to discuss the tariff schedule and numbers. With the blessing of Revenue Canada, they were told: “Put in only 49% butter, melt it, add 51% sugar, and you will pay a 7% entry tariff instead of 284%”.

That is how things are done under this Liberal government and our farmers, our dairy producers, have seen their milk quotas drop by 3% last year. That is a 3% decrease in net profits.

Very recently, the Dairy Farmers of Canada held their annual convention in Vancouver, where the minister took the trouble to meet with them at the end of their meeting. The poor guy said he was disappointed by the position taken by the Dairy Farmers of Canada, and he asked the revenue department to set up some kind of tribunal, a so-called advisory tribunal, to review the tariff on butter oil. What a disgrace.

In one, two or three years from now, this advisory body will probably submit its report to the revenue department, which will review it under the leadership of the revenue minister, but without too much pressure from the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food. We will end up with another agreement we will have to sign since, in 1999, in 18 months' time, we will have to embark upon a new negotiation process to renew this WTA agreement.

I have always been told that, in law, one cannot do indirectly what one cannot do directly. Dairy products were subject to a quota—

[Canadian Wheat Board Act, February 9th, 1998]

moved:

Motion No. 20

That Bill C-4, in Clause 4, be amended by adding after line 37 on page 7 the following:

“(4) Notwithstanding subsection (2), a department within the meaning of the Financial Administration Act includes the Board for the purposes of the Auditor General Act.”

[Canadian Wheat Board Act, February 9th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I hope my time will not cut short off because of this sort of nonsense. You seem to be nodding your approval, and I thank you.

I was therefore saying that the Liberal Party has discovered another ploy, which is to liberate certain relatively safe ridings for friends that could take over. Incumbents are appointed to prestigious positions that are usually paid more than an MP, and this frees up the seat.

I wanted to make a prediction. The president of the future Canadian Wheat Board will be a Liberal. This Liberal is sitting across from us now, and probably does not know the first thing about the Canadian Wheat Board. We will pay for many years so that he can find out, and just as he is starting to get the idea, he will leave to collect his gold plated pension. He will then have two hefty pensions.

The Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food, on which it is my great pleasure to sit with several of my colleagues whom I see in the House now, is a committee that I believe takes its work very seriously. It astonishes me that certain members opposite, who sit on the committee with me, do not wish to take on an additional, collective responsibility and voice their opinion on the future president of the Canadian Wheat Board.

For how many hours and weeks did the standing committee examine this problem? The entire committee trooped out west. We visited the four provinces. No one in the House, I am speaking about members, is more familiar with the problems of farmers and the Canadian Wheat Board than the 12 members now sitting on the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food. I am offering my colleague, the member for Bourassa, an unparalleled opportunity to feel like his party, his prime minister, is giving him an additional responsibility. But he is not interested.

In closing, I wish to raise a final point. The Canadian Wheat Board has traditionally reported to the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food.

I do not know what is going on. When the Prime Minister shuffled his cabinet after the election, he put the former Minister of Agriculture in Natural Resources. No problem with that. But he did not see fit to leave the responsibility for the Canadian Wheat Board with our Minister of Agriculture. Why not? Too heavy a task? Incompetence? I am asking you the question, Mr. Speaker. I would like an answer from my colleagues over there, or better yet, from the Minister of Natural Resources.

Why has he grabbed on to this position, this role of directing the Canadian Wheat Board within the Department of Natural Resources? They do not seem to go together. We have a good Minister of Agriculture, who does the very best he can. Why not give him all the tools he needs? He is going to work for the Western producers, the grain producers, but when it comes time to talk about a very important tool, the Canadian Wheat Commission, he will say "For that, you need to see my colleague, the Minister of Natural Resources".

I await that response, Mr. Speaker, and I would invite you to ask the party in power to support this motion on Bill C-4, which I consider a highly constructive motion.

[Canadian Wheat Board Act, February 9th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I taught for 27 years and in every class there was always one student who tried to disrupt the classroom. In this group of Liberals, we have the hon. member for Bourassa, whose behaviour is not that of a regular student but rather of an undisciplined one.

I invite you, Mr. Speaker, to draw on your authority and expel him if he continues to distract the members opposite. This House is no circus.

[Canadian Wheat Board Act, February 9th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, it is with great interest that I rise to speak to Bill C-4, an act to amend the Canadian Wheat Board Act in depth.

Naturally, the aim of the bill is to try to revitalize—and I say “try” to revitalize advisedly—the former Canadian Wheat Board, which was in my opinion a dictatorship where three, four, up to five patronage appointments could be made to the board of directors, paying fairly well it seems, since there was often someone knocking at the door of the agriculture department to take the job, which was not particularly high profile, but was well paid.

I said that they were trying to revitalize since, of the 15 directors, 10, two thirds of the positions, will be filled through a vote by the producers themselves. If there is someone interested in the operation of the Canadian Wheat Board, it is not the fellows from Prince Edward Island nor the farmers from Quebec, but western grain producers. They will have the authority, with the aid of a pencil, to appoint directors, and when the directors no longer prove satisfactory, they can put them out—the ten of them that is.

However, the government in its great wisdom has decided to keep five positions for itself. Four appointments will be made through the governor in council, but the other, the most prestigious, the lucrative one, the position of power, that of president, will be filled by appointment too.

The Bloc Quebecois has a very constructive suggestion for the Liberal government, and I would like to take a few seconds here to read it to you. It is Motion No. 6.

We are proposing that the president be appointed following consultation of the committee of the House of Commons that normally considers matters relating to agriculture. What exactly does this mean?

We have, here in the House of Commons, the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food, chaired of course by a Liberal. There are eight Liberal MPs and six opposition members on this committee. Obviously, they control it. They could swallow us right up—eight against six, and add to that the chair who, like the supreme court, usually leans the same way, in the direction of the Liberals. Right now, they run it. I respect their right to do so.

I predict that the position of president will become a great Liberal patronage appointment. Earlier, while waiting to speak, I quickly cast about in my memory for the key appointments of members sitting in the House since I have been here to well paid, prestigious, unelected positions.

The names that came to mind were the former member for Ottawa—Vanier, Jean-Robert Gauthier, because I am allowed to say his name, who is now sitting as a senator in the other House, and David Berger, the former member from Montreal West, who gave up his spot, a safe Liberal riding, to one of our current good ministers. He was appointed ambassador to Israel.

This is known as a tactic to liberate ridings. Just recently, a little before the election—the promise was made before the election, but it was not made public until after, so as to keep voters happy—it was my good friend, the member for Beauce, Gilles Bernier, an independent—remember him? He sat not far from us.