Gerry Ritz

[Agricultural Growth Act, June 4th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, Conservatives have campaigned for years on certain aspects of moving the agenda forward for the Canadian people. We make no apologies for using the tools available to us in this House and in the Senate to make sure that Canadians have that in the most expeditious way we can.

[Agricultural Growth Act, June 4th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I welcome the input from the House leader on the other side. He should recognize that there have been 22 years of debate on this issue. This is UPOV '91. It is based on 1991 and moving forward. Right now Canada operates under UPOV '78, which is certainly antiquated and outdated from today's standpoint in agriculture. We have been 22 years getting to this point. A lot of the opinions are exactly the same as they were 22 years ago. There is only one small splinter farm group that is against moving forward on this. Other than that, hearings the agricultural committees had when I sat in opposition, when I sat as chair of the committee, moving toward this day, all talked about the innovation required to move forward in Canada's agricultural sector to get under that umbrella of UPOV '91.

We are only one of two developed countries in the world that have not embraced this. The other one is Norway. Of course, its seed system is quite a bit different from ours.

It is time Canada got up to speed. It is time we moved this forward in an expeditious way.

The member opposite said that we are not standing up to take our fair share. What we are doing is allotting the opposition all the time, because its members constantly complain that they do not have enough time to speak, so here we go.

[Agriculture, May 29th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, it very interesting that the member for Malpeque pulled himself from agricultural files several years ago because the agricultural industries out there did not recognize his brilliance. That continues today.

The question he asked is well in hand. I continue to work with my colleagues at CBSA and finance to find resolution on this file. Chicken farmers are well served by our government. They continue to tell us this, even when they were lobbying here last week.

[Agriculture and Agri-Food, May 28th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, we have a very positive record working with farmers of all calibre across this great country, including the supply-managed sector. We continue to work with them on people who cheat at the border, cheese compositional standards, pizza kits, milk protein concentrates, and of course now we are working on spent fowl, issues that the Liberals never attacked when they were in government.

[International Trade, May 13th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I am not sure anyone is entitled to compensation. We have not actually finalized the deal through this House of Commons, so I am not sure what the member is talking about.

Those consultations continue with dairy farmers and cheese producers across Canada. We look forward to the positive results of that trade agreement.

[Fair Rail for Grain Farmers Act, May 1st, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, when the agency is assessing these claims, it would be assessing what is spelled out in the contracts that have been defined between the railways and the shipper of whatever commodity it happens to be. The great people at the CTA have the economic skills and the ability to do exactly that. The Minister of Transport has the right people in place to make those adjudications should they be desired and needed.

We are hopeful that the railways, with this extra tool in the kit of the shippers, will not have to take advantage of that adjudication. However, should they do it, the CTA is more than capable of handling that.

[Fair Rail for Grain Farmers Act, May 1st, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the NDP and the member for Welland, who sat on the committee at times, for the great work that they did in moving this forward as expeditiously as we have. We need to take it from the red zone and past the goal post. I am looking forward to that today.

With respect to his specific point on the number of cars and the amount of grain moved, the railways are within the target that was set for them. I do not have a corridor-by-corridor breakdown in front of me, but the vast majority of the grain is moving to Vancouver where the ships are sitting. Grain is moving to Thunder Bay. As I understand it, there are four boats in store at Thunder Bay right now and another 10 to 15 coming up through the canals and the lakes now to take advantage of what is in store at Thunder Bay. The overabundance of boats that were in Vancouver are being loaded and moved out as expeditiously as can be done. Also, a small amount of grain is starting to move into the southern corridors.

Part of this legislation would give Mark Hemmes of Quorum Corporation the oversight capacity and far more powers to give us that breakdown week-by-week, corridor-by-corridor. He was never able to give us the corridor specificity going south or east of Thunder Bay. We will now have that captured with the regulations under this legislation.

[Fair Rail for Grain Farmers Act, May 1st, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, the gist of what the member for Malpeque has spoke about, and I agree with most of what he said, is the basis price. This is the price that the grain companies would offer a farmer on that day, at that time and in that place. This is reflective of their inability to move that grain to market. It was a market signal to say “If we're going to buy your grain, we're going to buy it so cheaply. We can afford to store it”.

The good news is less than 1% of Canada's record production in western Canada last year was sold at that lower basis price. Those are actual numbers from the Grain Commission. This is good news in that farmers were not forced or pinched to sell at that level, but we need to see more transparency in those numbers.

There are some holes in the way that is projected now so that farmers are not necessarily right up to speed, should they so desire it. They are all very much technically inclined, and they will know at a moment's notice the price being offered. They need to know what the export price is and what they are being offered in their own community.

They now have the ability to move that grain much farther than they did under the old single desk system under the Wheat Board. They are not confined to a permit book that forced them to sell to one particular point of entry. They can actually put it on their truck and take it where they need to now. That has given us some competition to keep that price where it should be.

We are seeking ways, through regulatory packages attached to this legislation, that will give that transparency to farmers on a day-to-day basis.

[Fair Rail for Grain Farmers Act, May 1st, 2014]

moved that the bill be read the third time and passed.

Mr. Speaker, it is indeed a pleasure to report Bill C-30 back to the House.

The bill addresses the immediate needs of Canadian farmers, bulk shippers, and our overall economy. Our government knows our economy needs a supply chain that works today and tomorrow, with the capacity to move what is produced.

I was proud to speak to the benefits of this bill at the agriculture committee last month. I understand the committee had a very extensive series of meetings, including testimony from over 20 stakeholder groups. The committee heard from the entire supply chain from farm to port, and from a wide range of commodity shippers, from wheat to oats to barley, as well as from fertilizer, mining, and timber groups.

I was pleased to see a strong will around the table to work toward industry-led solutions focused on service and private sector responsibilities.

This is a piece of comprehensive legislation, and opposition and government together appreciate the non-partisan work of the committee to date, along with all of the witnesses that came forward. By working together, we were able to strengthen the bill, which, I would like to note, passed through the committee with unanimous support. I thank the committee members for that.

It was extremely unfortunate that the member for Edmonton-St. Albert turned a deaf ear to those farmers and shippers by attempting to deprive them of meaningful service level agreements, or SLAs. His point of order accomplished nothing but delaying the much-needed measures in the bill.

I want to be clear that these parliamentary games, while unfortunate, will not deter our government and the opposition from amending Bill C-30 to include service level agreements with reciprocal penalties. Testimony shows that the majority of stakeholders support the bill and what it sets out to accomplish.

During the committee's consultations, shippers of all commodities applauded this legislation, but they also asked the government to go further. They asked us to put more teeth into service level agreements to bring day-to-day accountability to the railways. Responding to this feedback, my parliamentary secretary introduced an amendment at committee on behalf of the government.

The first part of the amendment would give the Canadian Transportation Agency the authority to

...order the company to compensate any person adversely affected for any expenses that they incurred as a result of the company's failure to fulfill its service obligations...

By “company”, of course, we mean railways.

The amendment allows shippers who enter into service level agreements to be directly compensated for any expenses they incur as a result of the railways' failure to meet those service obligations. This includes compensation if the shipper is out of pocket for costs such as demurrage, contract defaults, or penalties. It goes further than the reciprocal penalties that many in the industry have requested, because it applies to any level of service complaint under the Canada Transportation Act. This is a market-based solution that would help get all bulk commodities moving and continuing to move.

The second part of the amendment reads:

...or, if the company is a party to a confidential contract with a shipper that requires the company to pay an amount of compensation for expenses incurred by the shipper as a result of the company's failure to fulfill its service obligations, order the company to pay that amount to the shipper

This measure is equally important, because it allows compensation to be paid within a commercial contract. It would encourage the shippers and railways to come to the table and set their own terms and agree on SLAs with reciprocal penalties, should they so desire.

The goal is to level the playing field and provide better tools for shippers when railway companies breach their service obligations.

We are working to continue to improve the efficiency, reliability, and predictability of the entire supply chain. I am pleased to say that strengthening SLAs has the support of industry, the provinces, and the opposition, and I thank them all.

Industry groups that support this needed amendment include, but are not limited to, the Inland Terminal Association of Canada, the Barley Council of Canada, the Canadian Canola Growers Association, Cereals Canada, the Mining Association of Canada, the Canadian Fertilizer Institute, and the Freight Management Association of Canada. It covers all of the spectrum.

The importance of the bill cannot be understated. I recently returned from a trade mission to South Korea and Japan, where, alongside Canadian industry, I spoke directly with international buyers of Canadian grains about problems incurred in our immediate past. I assured these buyers that our government was not taking this situation lightly and explained the details of Bill C-30 to directly address their concerns. These buyers were pleased to hear that our government was taking this needed action to ensure Canada's reputation as a reliable grain shipper, and they thanked our government for acting quickly.

Farmers and all shippers need our government to pass the bill, as amended, as expeditiously as possible. Our economy and Canadian jobs are relying on us to act.

Crop yields show every sign of continuing to grow through better technology, higher yielding, more disease-resistant varieties and better agronomic practices.

Shippers of all bulk commodities that rely on rail are growing their businesses exponentially and are demanding increased capacity to get those products to a burgeoning marketplace. That is why we must move forward to strengthen the supply chain now for the next crop year and beyond.

Bill C-30 holds solutions that would benefit the entire supply chain. I urge everyone in the House to work together to pass this important bill, with this needed amendment, as quickly as possible.

[Agriculture and Agri-Food, April 8th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I like the admission that they sometimes listen; that is very helpful.

At the end of the day, of course, we have a balanced piece of legislation moving forward. There are numerous pieces to that, and not just the service level agreements but the information package, which will give us a lot more timely and on-point information from the railways, from the shippers, so we can start to coordinate, corridor by corridor, the specificity that is required to move grain, potash, coal, timber, and all those other commodities that need to be moved as well.

Come this August, when this legislation moves into the next phase, the Minister of Transport and I will sit down with all shippers and work out their surge requirements moving into the next year.