Plans by the House of Commons agriculture committee to travel Canada this autumn for hearings on the future policy requirements of agriculture are on hold because there is no travel budget, says committee chair Charles Hubbard.
The committee requested more than $300,000 to allow MPs to hold hearings across the country.
The Commons liaison committee, which controls the budget for MP travel, said it would fund travel for hearings in Ontario and Quebec, but not in the West or Atlantic provinces.
On Nov. 1, Hubbard told the committee that was not good enough. Until there was a firm commitment to fund broader travels, the hearings should be postponed.
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Other members agreed.
“The liaison committee is short of money,” said the chair.
If sufficient money was not made available to allow adequate planning and a national scope, then the committee should delay, Hubbard argued. “We don’t want to do it poorly.”
He suggested arrangements be “put on hold until we get some better answers.”
Canadian Alliance agriculture critic Howard Hilstrom said it would be unimaginable for MPs to tour central Canada and ignore southern Alberta and western Saskatchewan where the effects of the drought have been the most pronounced.
Under a tentative schedule drawn up when the funding request was made, the committee hoped to hold hearings in Eastern Canada in mid-November, in Atlantic Canada in late November and in the West Dec. 3-7.
The committee promised prairie agriculture ministers last spring it would hold hearings after harvest to hear farmer stories directly.
