Winnipeg MP gets ag position

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Published: August 7, 1997

Winnipeg Liberal MP John Harvard figures he will be a prairie point man for Ontario-based agriculture minister Lyle Vanclief.

The former CBC reporter and nine-year House of Commons veteran has been appointed parliamentary secretary to the agriculture minister.

“I want to be the eyes and ears for the minister, especially here in the West,” Harvard said. “He can’t be everywhere at once and agriculture is a sprawling portfolio. I hope I can keep an eye on some files for him.”

In a way, it is a return home for the MP.

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In the early 1990s while in opposition, he was the Liberal grains and Canadian Wheat Board spokesperson. He led Liberal criticism of the Conservative government’s 1993 decision to take barley marketing away from the board monopoly.

Harvard said he returns to the agriculture file as a committed supporter of the wheat board marketing monopoly.

“I am a supporter of the wheat board and always will be,” he said. “I do not believe you can have a dual market, as Reform wants, and not destroy the board.”

Still, the MP said he recognizes that agriculture issues change.

“I remember as a reporter when Lloyd Axworthy was transport minister and was talking about the Crow Benefit, I was doing stories about how people thought it would bring life to an end if the Crow went,” he said. “Well, it has gone and that has led to some good things for the industry, including value- added in Manitoba.”

However, Harvard said he cannot imagine the wheat board in the same light, as a part of farm policy theology that eventually will be discarded.

Hope for the future

He said in his attempts to re-establish contacts in the agriculture sector and to become familiar with the issues, he has found one major change since the early 1990s.

“I would say farmers are more optimistic now,” he said. “The economy is working but I also think we have ended some uncertainty by putting some issues behind us.”

Harvard’s new job will give him a seat on the House of Commons agriculture committee, a role representing the agriculture minister at meetings and sometimes answering for him in the Commons when the minister is absent. It also means an extra $10,500 in parliamentary pay.

Meanwhile, as Harvard moves back into the agricultural debate, another prominent Liberal MP is moving out.

Wayne Easter, former National Farmers Union president and Prince Edward Island MP, has been appointed parliamentary secretary to the minister of fisheries. It will remove Easter as a prominent member of the agriculture committee, moving him to the fisheries committee.

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