The Canadian Wheat Board is taking the Canadian Transportation Agency to court.
The Federal Court of Canada last week granted the board leave to appeal a Sept. 25 decision by the CTA.
In that ruling, the agency found that Canadian National Railway failed to provide adequate service to four grain shippers in 2007-08.
However, it rejected similar claims by the CWB and another shipper.
In its brief asking for the right to appeal, the board said the CTA failed to consider relevant evidence and didn’t conduct a thorough investigation of the board’s complaint.
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The CTA said in its Sept. 25 ruling that it didn’t have enough information to consider CN’s grain-hauling performance during an eight-week period in February and March of 2008, when the board said CN’s performance was at its worst.
The board says the CTA failed to live up to its statutory responsibility to gather all the relevant information it needs to make a decision.
“The agency’s investigation into the complaint was flawed and incomplete as a result.”
The board says if the agency had considered all the available information it would have determined that CN was in breach of its service obligations.
The board now has 60 days to file its appeal with the Federal Court.
The CTA ruled that CN failed to provide adequate service to North East Terminal, North West Terminal, Paterson Grain and Parrish and Heimbecker. It rejected complaints from the CWB and Providence Grain Group.
The agency also set out a number of performance benchmarks for CN, but they apply only to the four shippers that won the complaint.
