The government’s determination to appoint the new Canadian Wheat Board president has the critics suggesting there is something fishy about the way the Liberal government goes about making such appointments.
For them, fishy is spelled p-o-l-i-t-i-c-s.
Just as the House of Commons agriculture committee was starting to study legislation to reform the CWB last month, the government announced the $90,000-per-year appointment of former Manitoba Liberal MP Ron Fewchuk as president of the Winnipeg-based Freshwater Fish Marketing Board.
The appointment raised the hackles of prairie freshwater fish industry representatives and 16-year veteran general manager Thomas Dunn. It also became a rallying cry for opponents of a government appointed CWB president.
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“The story reinforces the importance of having the president selected and accountable to the board of directors,” United Grain Growers president Ted Allen said in October when he appeared on Parliament Hill to argue against the government proposals.
Reform and Progressive Conservative MPs took up the issue.
Alberta Reformer MP Leon Benoit said it will be an added cost to the prairie inland fishing industry because Fewchuk does not have the expertise to run the board so Dunn has been retained as executive vice-president.
“This is an extra cost imposed on those producers of $100,000 plus, because this patronage appointment won’t provide any extra benefit to the commission but it will provide a cost,” said Benoit.
Liberal can be competent
Manitoba Tory Rick Borotsik raised the issue later in the Commons and received the usual government argument that just because he is Liberal does not mean the appointee is incompetent.
“I do not subscribe to the theory that members of Parliament come to this House with no abilities or qualities and when they leave this House have no abilities or qualities,” said fisheries minister David Anderson.
Borotsik raised it again in the Commons in early November, wondering if Fewchuk’s appointment might be a precedent for the CWB president.
“It makes me very nervous because, quite frankly, there were a number of defeated Liberal members in the last election,” said the rookie MP.
“I am wondering which one of those will be appointed CEO of the Canadian Wheat Board.”
Liberal MP Wayne Easter, responding for the government as parliamentary secretary to the fisheries minister, accused Borotsik of attacking Fewchuk’s reputation for political gain.
He said the former outfitter was well qualified for the job.
Meanwhile, another one-term Liberal who did not run in the last election received his patronage reward last week.
Timmins, Ont. lawyer Peter Thalheimer was appointed to the Canadian International Trade Tribunal, which hears disputes about unfair dumping of products ranging from steel pipes to pasta into Canada.
