Transport committee  I'll give a brief response because I know Ian wants to add to this.

Transport committee  This is where we're at today. The railways enjoy this much power; shippers enjoy this much power. The legislation we're looking for with the amendments we propose would bring it up to somewhere in there.

Transport committee  If I may, since January—and I just talked to my members yesterday about this, because I wanted the most current information on service levels—service has been very poor on both roads since January. We haven't seen service this poor, particularly from CN, in three years. Overall,

Transport committee  It just changed, and they say it's the cold weather.

Transport committee  We say cold weather happens every winter.

Transport committee  Yes.

Transport committee  Are you asking me?

Transport committee  Well, different people will give you different responses, depending on where they sit. Concerning point number one, about better defining “adequate” and “suitable”, doing that helps to ensure that the service pie grows, and I think it's one that everybody here feels is an impor

Transport committee  Can I add a little bit to that? The way we've proposed the amendment, you would have to submit to the agency for arbitration terms governing whether or not a service failure has occurred and the manner in which damages are to be assessed. So you're submitting to the agency for a

Transport committee  I can address that. That press release was issued on the day the bill was released. When we went through the arbitration process on that day, we were under the impression that we'd be able to take penalties and liquidated damages to the arbitrator. Since then, we've found out t

Transport committee  I have a written answer. I'm just going to make sure I covered it here:[The] Canadian Grain Commission arbitrates disputes between grain companies and producers. Commodity exchanges arbitrate disputes between commodity dealers. Canadian grain merchants and their international cus

Transport committee  No, we're saying that liquidated damages would be payable to the shipper.

Transport committee  Not really. Let me just make sure I'm communicating it properly. Say, we're negotiating with a railway. We're going to arbitration because we can't reach an agreement. So the railway is going to have their position on the various elements of the service level agreement. The ship

Transport committee  Right. So the arbitrator's going to come up with a mechanism that's something in between what the railways and the shippers want for establishment of liquidated damages.

Transport committee  That would become the terms of the contract between the shipper and the railway. If there's a breach or if the shipper claims there's a breach, then they would go to the agency and ask that an arbitrator establish that and establish liquidated damages.