In the House of Commons, debate had just started on government proposals to reform the Canadian Wheat Board.
Reform leader Preston Manning was taking his seat, having just issued a ringing call for defeat of the legislation.
Bloc QuŽbecois MP Jean-Guy ChrŽtien was rising to offer a separatist’s views about the CWB. Suddenly, a distinctive voice drifted across the aisle from government benches.
“Now, we’ll hear something sensible,” said the heckler with the down-east accent and a love of doing battle with Reformers over “agiculture” policy, as he curiously pronounces it.
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Prince Edward Island Liberal and former National Farmers Union president Wayne Easter was having fun.
Who could begrudge him a little fun? For the sophomore MP, this has been an unsettling political season.
To start with, he barely won re-election in his own seat. He had expected an easier election, given his record of hard work.
Voters judged the Liberal government rather than their MP.
The lack of voter appreciation for his efforts made him a bit bitter. Soon, spirits rose. He received a telephone call alerting him that a cabinet appointment was coming.
He made a trip to Ottawa for a round of appointments, including one with the ethics commissioner vetting his background. Then, the day before the cabinet was unveiled, Easter received a call from the Prime Minister’s Office.
The cabinet appointment was off, probably the victim of successful lobbying on behalf of fellow Islander Lawrence MacAuley for re-appointment.
The consolation prize was to be appointment as a parliamentary secretary, considered a possible stepping stone to future elevation to cabinet.
Easter hoped for agriculture, where he could play more of a role in the policy area he loves. Instead, he was given fisheries, a no-win assignment in these days of scarce cod and salmon wars.
He makes no secret of his disappointment at what looks like a forced exile from the centre of the agriculture debate in the new Parliament. Yet Easter’s influence remains very much front and centre in the current CWB debate, even though he is somewhat removed.
The “inclusion” clause which has attracted much opposition was inserted in the bill largely because of Easter’s work in the last Parliament.
It would allow farmer plebiscites on whether to add grains to wheat board jurisdiction, as well as to subtract grains. Reform, the Conservatives and interests like the Winnipeg Commodity Exchange and the Western Canadian Wheat Growers, have attacked the clause.
Easter recalls how he had to overcome reluctance inside the Agriculture Canada bureaucracy and Goodale’s office in order to have the clause included last spring.
“It is a matter of balance,” he said. “Without it, this bill would be a one-way ticket to weakening the board. This at least makes strengthening it an option.”
If it remains intact in the legislation, it will be Easter’s political legacy to the board he has defended during close to two decades of farm and electoral politics.
