David Anderson

[Agriculture, May 5th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, farmers are well aware of the government's commitment to them, especially the member for Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound who has been very vocal in his support of the farm community.

We put forward $755 million right after we were elected. We promised $500 million and we have tripled that. The farm community is very happy to have that. We are coming forward with a biofuels initiative to give farmers a chance to be part of the processing and development sector. We want to do research and development.

We look forward to working with farmers to bring them the success that they have not had in the past because of--

[Agriculture, April 24th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, it is too bad the member did not have that passion when he was on this side of the House.

The government has already delivered $500 million to the farm community. There is another $255 million coming from that first program. Another $500 million has been committed in the budgetary process. We will look after our farmers.

[Agriculture, April 24th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I am surprised that the Liberals have the gall to stand up and even ask this question. They left the farmers completely without farm programs that worked. They left them with no biofuels program. They left them with virtually no income on their farms.

The Prime Minister and the Minister of Agriculture have addressed this problem. They have met with producers across the country. Two weeks ago they met with many of the same people who are asking for the meeting right now. The Prime Minister has made it clear that these issues will be dealt with in the budgetary process.

[Agriculture, April 24th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, as I just said, we have acted in the interests of the Canadian farm community. We have delivered three-quarters of a billion dollars. Of that, $470 million has already gone out. We continue to move on the agricultural community. We are committing another $500 million through the budgetary process this year. We will work to protect our farmers and work with them to make them successful in this country.

[Agriculture, April 24th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, this government is reacting to meet the needs of Canadian farmers. We have already moved. We made a campaign promise to get out $755 million to our farm community. That money is going out. We have a further commitment in our budgetary process to put $2.5 billion over the next five years into the farm community.

Farmers have suffered under 13 years of failed Liberal farm programs and we intend to correct that.

[Agriculture and Agri-Food, April 24th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, the minister has offered to do something. He has offered to sit down with the processors and the producers in order to come to a resolution of this problem. He intends to do that.

[Agriculture and Agri-Food, April 24th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, the government has been dealing with this issue. The agriculture minister has offered to sit down with both the producers and the processors to come to a resolution of the issue. He looks forward to working with the industry to do that.

[Agriculture, April 6th, 2006]

Mr. Chair, that is a difficult question to answer and it is not one that I take lightly. We find ourselves, those of us who live in agricultural communities, understanding this desperate situation.

The government has been given a responsibility. We feel that we have begun to meet that by bringing out the $755 million as soon as we possibly could. We have committed other money to the budget. We are talking about other options as well. We want to put in place a long term plan. We want to help people in the short term and keep them going until we can get a long term plan to change the direction of agriculture in this country, so farmers have a chance to survive, to do well and be proud of the fact that they produce the food that this country eats.

[Agriculture, April 6th, 2006]

Mr. Chair, as far as I understand, the money was an ad hoc payment and if my understanding of the budgeting process is accurate, I believe that would have been found in the supplementaries that went to grains and oilseeds producers. It was determined that they were the ones who needed that help.

The Prime Minister and the Minister of Agriculture spoke about our commitment to agriculture. I am proud to stand as the parliamentary secretary representing agriculture across Canada. I look forward to working with my colleague from Lotbinière—Chutes-de-la-Chaudière on agriculture and I look forward to working together with the rest of the caucus here, because this is important to us.

Most of us come from agricultural ridings. We have a majority of farmers in our ridings. It is important to us that we protect and look after our farmers, but at the same time, we need to come up with some longer term planning that has been lacking over the last while that will give our farmers long term success, so they are not going from hand to mouth year after year. Farmers would like to make their living. They do not want to be coming back to the government.

Virtually everyone with whom I spoke told me they did not want to have to come back to the government, but right now they are forced to do so. They asked if I could change the system, so it will work for them so that they can make money from the marketplace and be proud again of what they do.

[Agriculture, April 6th, 2006]

Mr. Chair, when the hon. member is discussing agriculture, he reminds me of a steer attempting to breed. There is a lot of noise but it is pretty well useless.

He stood across here earlier and said the reason they were giving out ad hoc money was because the programs were a complete failure. I would like to talk about the Canadian Wheat Board. He knows as well as I do that western Canadians love nothing better than having someone from 3,500 miles away tell them what is good for them. Our farmers need some choice. They need some opportunity.

The dual system works in a number of places. One of them is Ontario, where the system has actually been gaining ground and gaining market share. The second one is the system that has been set up in Australia over the last few years, although it has run into a little trouble in the last few months; it has been set up in a system that is different from ours. It gives farmers the opportunity, both domestically and in export markets, to be able to do something with their own grain.