The federal government’s campaign against the Canadian Wheat Board’s monopoly powers has caused heated political arguments in the capitals of Manitoba and Saskatchewan.
Both provinces’ NDP governments are planning their own plebiscites on the issue if Ottawa attempts to force change without farmer consent.
And both provincial governments have been pressuring their right wing political rivals by introducing motions in the legislature their opponents haven’t wanted to support.
In Winnipeg, resolutions were batted around in the legislature Nov. 20, with the NDP proposing votes on supporting the CWB monopoly and a farmer vote on the issue, while the provincial Liberals called for all three party leaders to travel to Ottawa to fight against unilateral changes to the wheat board.
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After Manitoba premier Gary Doer announced he would put forward a pro-monopoly and a pro-farmer-vote resolution, as well as holding a provincewide farmer vote on the issue, Progressive Conservative leader Hugh McFadyen accused him of grandstanding.
“I don’t know why we’d want to get into a phoney, politically motivated expense to the taxpayers that is totally unnecessary and all about politics and has nothing to do with wheat or sound public policy.”
McFadyen said his party supports a farmer vote on barley, but the federal government has already promised that, and the wheat monopoly is not now in discussion.
To the west, a Nov. 15 debate in the Saskatchewan legislature on farmers’ rights to vote on the future of the CWB’s export monopoly split along party lines, with one exception.
Saskatchewan Party MLA Glen Hart voted with the NDP government to pass a motion calling for a producer plebiscite on the issue.
Hart, who represents Last Mountain-Touchwood, said it wasn’t easy to break ranks with his caucus. The 22 other opposition MLAs in the house voted against the motion, which passed 28-22.
In an interview, Hart said he has consulted with farmers in his constituency north of Regina and found strong feelings on both sides of the debate.
“The vast majority of them tell me they would like to have a say on this issue,” he said.
Saskatchewan Party agriculture critic Bob Bjornerud said his constituents in Melville-Saltcoats are on both sides of the issue as well. But he told the assembly he couldn’t support the motion in part because it contained an incorrect statement about the Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities.
The motion included a reference to a SARM resolution passed last March, which directed the organization to lobby Ottawa to continue its financial support of the government guarantees it provides to the board and the board’s single desk marketing power.
But at the SARM mid-term convention earlier this month, delegates voted to reconsider that resolution because it had caused so much dissension among delegates. They said Ottawa and producers should decide the board’s future.
Provincial agriculture minister Mark Wartman accused the federal government of wanting to “tear the guts out” of the board and allow grain companies to take over.
