Right and left
To the Editor:
Neil Danroth (March 28) poses an important question which deserves clarification. No doubt, with forum writers it may be improper to stick a ‘right’ or ‘left’ label on the content of a single letter. A person supporting the NDP could still rave and rant against the Wheat Board and supporters of this Board could well be found in the other political parties.
However, the picture becomes much clearer when and where politicians enter the fray. We all remember cowboy Charlie Mayer who stripped oats from the Wheat Board when he was the Minister for Agriculture. Almost all Alberta’s agricultural ministers have been contemptuous of the wheat board and of orderly marketing.
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Kochia has become a significant problem for Prairie farmers
As you travel through southern Saskatchewan and Alberta, particularly in areas challenged by dry growing conditions, the magnitude of the kochia problem is easy to see.
The sectional Manitoba minister curtailed market protection for hog farmers and the spokespersons for the farm sector in the Reform party have not one good word to say for market protection of any kind. In contrast, NDP spokespersons have consistently endorsed market protection for farmers including the wheat board and other marketing boards. The Liberals are sitting somewhere on the fence in between these two extreme positions. They are watching which way the wind blows in order to take action on a contentious issue at the most opportune moment.
Indeed, democracy runs by politics and the ballot box, so it is foolhardy to ignore these political overtones. We get just one real voice every four years. To get the most from that voice, one has to keep informed on politics.
Only political deception and ignorant voters can make democracy unworkable!
-Ernest J. Weser,
Laird, Sask.
Small towns
To the Editor:
It’s Palm Sunday, a time to meditate, reflect and give thanks for all the free wonders we have in our little community.
The harsh cold winter is tossing off its heavy snowy coat to make way for the beautiful sights, sounds and smells of a glorious spring.
But there is a dark cloud hovering overhead that suggests to me, unless together we all stop and smell the roses, we may not have our vibrant little community as we knew it.
Firstly, perhaps it was the demise of our service station that served our farming community for machinery, parts, fuel, etc. that kept our farmers shopping at home.
Today when farmer “Willie” has need for repairs and has to drive many miles to the larger centres, “Wilma”, farmer Willie’s wife, goes along for the ride and shops for supplies of groceries in those glitzy mega super stores.
Now, where does that leave what we, a short time ago, thought of as our own little supermarket with groceries, mini drugstore, meat market, fresh produce etc.?
Nowhere, that’s where. Common sense dictates we cannot keep the doors of our community open if we keep on treating our businesses like a glorified drop-in centre for mere necessities when it isn’t convenient to drive off to that mega store. Try it, you may enjoy meeting your neighbors and having a chat while you get your supplies. We all must try harder or soon our happy little main street will just be part of the road going from A to B.
-Georgena Lesyk,
Birsay, Sask.
Costly ABC
To the Editor:
The Alberta Barley Commission (ABC) has launched a law suit challenging the validity of the existence of the Canadian Wheat Board under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. As of July 31, 1995, $260,000 had been spent in that court case by the ABC. The Chairman of the ABC stated in Red Deer at the annual convention in November 1995 that (he) will spend “whatever it takes to bring the Charter challenge to conclusion.”
Of the $1.1 million collected by the checkoff on all barley sales in 1994, $476,000 went for research.
In 1995 of the $1.44 million collected, $742,000 went to research. As of July 31, 1995 the Commission had an accumulated surplus of $1.96 million. It could be quite a prolonged, expensive process if carried to its conclusion.
The action of the ABC means of course, that the Canadian Wheat Board personnel will have to spend probably at least as much or more money on legal fees defending its right to exist. This will mean that the Board Commissioners will have less time and effort to spend on selling grain on behalf of the producers.
All the barley and wheat producers who sell grain through the CWB will ultimately have to pay these costs (loss of time and effort and court costs). The net result will be lower returns to the producers.
– Stan Bell,
Carstairs, Alta.
Crow acres
To the Editor:
In regards to the Crow transition payment I’m wondering how much thought went into deciding the eligibility of who receives what?
In southern Alberta alone, I’m guessing there is probably 100,000 acres of barley grown on irrigated land, grown for silage only and fed to cattle. None of this is harvested, so none is shipped by rail but because barley is an eligible crop and listed in their permit books they will receive a payment. How many hundreds and hundreds of acres of pedigreed seed and contract crops are grown which never see a rail line. A lot of these crops are also grown on irrigated land which qualifies for a payment of $30-$40 per acre. There are also thousands of acres of barley grown for feed which never move by rail.
One option would have been to set up a separate fund of the transition payment (collecting interest) and every six months or so get a printout from the CWB of who shipped and how much. For non-board grains and producer cars (if the CWB doesn’t have this information) I’m sure the elevator companies could supply it.
Another option would have been for anyone who ships grain by rail to submit claims with substantiating documents. This way the fund would have gone to the producers who are using the rail lines. Wasn’t this the intent – compensating the ones who ship grain by rail – who have the increased costs?
I’m sure the fund would have lasted a number of years and would have benefited the producers who rightfully deserved it.
– Howard Dunn,
Turin, Alta.
Selling fleet
To the Editor:
In regard to Mr. D.K. Loewen’s letter April 4, explaining SEO policy on selling our federal hopper car fleet to the railways, it seems to me that most of the people with the power to influence the outcome of the final decision have forgotten why the government owns these hopper cars in the first place.
If my memory serves me, the reason is because at the time they were purchased, the two railways said that they couldn’t afford to make such a huge capital outlay for the purpose of replacing the old boxcar fleet, and the taxpayers would have to foot the bill. What is to stop the railways from purchasing the hoppers at a price of $100 million, which the farmers are expected to pay for at approximately $1 per tonne freight rate increase, using the fleet for its 15 year life, and then asking the taxpayers to do the same thing again?
If safeguards are not put in place to assure this does not happen, I would have to favor the option of a farmer-owned fleet. If we have to pay for them anyway at the rate of $1 per tonne shipped, we might as well pay a little extra for the maintenance and capital replacement costs, and have some control over the use and allocation of the cars.
If the SEO report’s $100 million price tag is accepted by the federal government, I do not see why there should be any difference in asking price from the railways or the farmers. I too hate to see any more bureaucracy put in place to administer the fleet, but it seems to me that given the record of the railways we had better consider our options very carefully.
– Edward Feil,
Golden Prairie, Sask.
Check history
To the Editor:
In the April 4 issue, Darryl Toews displays the same ignorance of history that he accuses Jim Pallister of. What Mr. Toews fails to recognize is that the struggle for civil rights by American blacks was inextricably and fundamentally tied to economic freedoms.
The civil rights movement grew out of blacks’ frustration with their lack of economic power. Unjust laws kept them out of universities, limited their employment opportunities and relegated them to the lowest level of society. What the blacks knew was that without economic freedom there can be no personal freedom. One only has to look at communist countries such as China and North Korea to see the truth of this.
Laws that limit a worker’s mobility, that place restrictions on a producer’s right to sell his or her production, also limit personal freedoms. Worse, they benefit a small privileged group like grain companies, railways, union bosses of grain handling unions and “de masses” in Winnipeg.
When the slaves were freed after the Civil War they were fearful of the future, wondering, as Mr. Toews does, who would look after them. After a long struggle that goes on still, they found that the answer is no one but themselves.
– Greg McIntyre,
Darcy, Sask.
Study effects
To the Editor:
I am writing in response to a letter written by Roman Wowchuk, MLA of Winnipeg, in which he uses the results of the CWB study by doctors Furtan, Kraft and Tyrchniewicz as a good reason to maintain the current system.
One aspect of this study that has been given very little attention is the impact on prices of grain that has occurred since the results have been released publicly. Let us assume that the results of the study are accurate. I would venture to say that by publicly boasting that Canadian farmers receive on average $13.50 more per tonne than farmers selling under the open market for equivalent grain, that buyers would want part of that $13.50 back.
In a typical year of marketing 20 to 25 million tonnes of wheat, this represents a potential loss of $337.5 million to Canadian farmers. Now let us assume that the results of this study are inaccurate. This is a double whammy of world buyers perceiving that CWB prices are $13.50 higher than competitive grain (as espoused by the study) and the fact that the price does not have a “smart marketing” bonus but probably is selling at par or less than equivalent grain from other sources. Here the cost to the Canadian farmer could be staggering.
The conception and release of this study in my mind is one of the best reasons for doing away with the CWB. Why would an organization that says the net return to the farmer is their primary focus release a document that could detrimentally affect this net return is beyond belief.
Indeed a more cynical version would be that the release of this study had one major purpose: to protect Commissioners’ prestigious positions and salaries. I am appalled by the cavalier attitude of the CWB hierarchy in jeopardizing ordinary farmers livelihood and have no hesitation in calling for the resignation of each and every commissioner on the board today.
– Duane Filkowski,
Coalhurst, Alta.
Job losses
To the Editor:
A letter I wrote to The Western Producer recently pointed out that the seemingly top priority of big industry and governments is to get as many workers off the job and onto welfare as soon as possible.
Now along comes stock markets with an action which proves beyond any possible doubt that this trend is absolutely correct. There was apparently an increase in the number of people working in North America, so the stock markets took a tumble. This means that we cannot afford to have people working.
The stock markets work on the things that reflect the most dangerous or the most beneficial events taking place in the country. More people working, according to this reaction of a drop in the stock markets, means that more people working is the worst thing that could happen.
Any normal Grade five student would know that to have prosperity there must be large scale employment, but it appears that this logical rule has changed to where there must be complete unemployment to make things work.
Just don’t ask me why this is supposed to work because I do not know. It is not logical that anything can possibly work that way, and those in control know it too, but they are so determined to rid the country of organized labor and a reasonable chance for everybody to have a job with reasonable pay that they are more than willing to totally destroy everything, including the country, in order to accomplish this greedy end, when a reasonable and logical answer is so plain to see.
We are spending billions of dollars in foreign countries trying the impossible and losing some of our people doing it. Foreign aid is grossly mismanaged, and far too lavishly handed out. And our grossly overpaid people in Ottawa have no idea of how to control and spend taxpayers’ money, so billions more is wasted there too, including the huge pensions that they claim when they have been in office for only a few years.
The rest of us have to work a full lifetime to get only a skimpy little portion of their greedy allowance which they don’t even earn. Then they have perks galore on top of that. Just where is all of this money supposed to come from?
Harris in Ontario demonstrating his destructive line of individualism is proof positive of what these reactionary style of governments will do.
– Grant Bunce,
Pritchard, B.C.
Not naive
To the Editor:
I was quite upset, if not insulted, at G. Ferguson’s March 21 Letter to the Editor. Mr. Ferguson accuses the third generation farmer of being, and I quote, “naive”, because he or she no longer supports the Wheat Board.
This person obviously has a serious problem. Is there anything wrong with a farmer wanting a better price for his grain? Is it a crime to try and establish a marketing system with the U.S.?
What is all this paranoia that exists with older farmers? We’re talking wheat and barley here, not cocaine, nitroglycerin or nuclear weapons. We’ve been buying U.S. built cars, trucks, tractors and combines for 100 years. Would it be that unjust to want to trade wheat or barley in exchange?
The best thing that could ever happen to the four western provinces is that we become an American state. How else will we ever get out of these insane rates of taxation and archaic import-export laws that are only there to serve the power hungry of Quebec and Ontario?
$1 per gallon fuel, no sales tax on pickups and cars and $8 wheat looks to me like a good enough reason to start looking for new neighbors in the south!
– John J. Hamon,
Gravelbourg, Sask.
