EDMONTON – The federal government’s refusal to end the Canadian Wheat Board’s marketing monopoly flies in the face of Ottawa’s general free market strategy, Alberta agriculture minister Ed Stelmach complained last week.
He warned the Senate agriculture committee the federal Liberal determination to keep the monopoly endangers national unity.
“The failure of Ottawa to appreciate the magnitude of the discontent on this issue in rural Alberta will strain our federal-provincial relations,” he said. “… do not validate the cynicism towards Ottawa in the minds of a large segment of rural Alberta.”
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As he appeared before senators holding prairie-wide hearings on proposed CWB changes, the Alberta minister said the consistent message from the federal government has been the need to promote market solutions, freer trade and an end to impediments to investment, job creation and exports.
“At the same time, Ottawa imposes a CWB marketing monopoly which regulates what varieties are produced, how they are marketed, at what price and to whom in the fashion of a command economy in a specific area of Canada only,” said Stelmach.He called it inconsistent and discriminatory.
Reference to regional alienation was a common theme through six days of hearings as opponents argued the Liberals, with little western representation, were imposing an unpopular policy on western farmers.
Some saw a broader alliance of oppressors.
“This has nothing to do with what farmers want and everything to do with what the federal Liberals and the pools want,” complained Greg Rockafellow, president of the Western Barley Growers Association.
Others noted the Liberal majority is centred in Ontario and even as these MPs were insisting on a monopoly for western farmers, their own Ontario wheat-growing constituents were deciding to allow an opt-out from the Ontario Wheat Board export monopoly.
When criticism turned to the clause that would allow farmers to vote new grains under the CWB monopoly, many noted the provision had been championed in the House of Commons by Prince Edward Island Liberal Wayne Easter.
“The perception is it’s someone from the Maritimes imposing something on Western Canada we did not ask for,” Stelmach told senators in Edmonton.
The next day in Winnipeg, Manitoba ag minister Harry Enns picked up the theme.
“A member from Prince Edward Island should not make any decisions about what happens to prairie grain producers,” he said.
Enns quickly came under attack from senator Eugene Whelan for his comment.
Whelan said he was “shocked” that a veteran politician like Enns would belittle an MP because of where he lives. MPs are elected to deal with general public policy and not just local issues, he lectured.
About face
Enns quickly retreated.
“You properly correct me,” said the Manitoba minister. “I meant no disrespect to any member of Parliament. But it is understandable that a member from that part of Canada would not be sensitive (to the ramifications of inclusion for Manitoba).”
Later, National Farmers Union Manitoba director Fred Tait said the inclusion idea came from Western Canada and NFU members who testified during Commons committee hearings last year.
“This was not Wayne Easter’s idea,” he said. “It came from Manitoba here.”
