The parliamentary committee studying legislation to dismantle the Canadian Wheat Board monopoly will have just three sessions this week to hear witnesses with limited scope to testify and then approve it.
The Conservative majority on the special legislative committee to review Bill C-18 pushed through a motion during a closed meeting yesterday that forces conclusion of the study on Thursday after three marathon late-night sessions.
The legislation will be sent back to the House of Commons Nov. 14 by the committee for report and third reading stages, presumably limited to a few days of consideration before it is sent to the Senate for final approval.
Limited committee study is a key part of the Conservative government’s aggressive timetable to get the CWB bill through Parliament and into law by mid-December.
It would end the CWB monopoly on wheat and barley sales on July 31, 2012.
At committee, opposition MPs will be limited in their ability to debate amendments. Witnesses will be told to talk about the technicalities of C-18 rather than the debate about whether it is good legislation.
CWB directors will be on the witness list Nov. 2 during a long evening session but collectively will be limited to a 10 minutes presentation before questions. Agriculture minister Gerry Ritz will also appear that night.
Conservative MPs want to call as witnesses one or both of the CWB directors who resigned over the board’s decision to fight government plans.
New Democrat CWB critic Pat Martin, who was at the off-the-record planning meeting yesterday, said today that Conservative tactics to limit debate and force a controversial bill through with little debate or scrutiny sets “a new low bar for cutting off democratic debate in Parliament, and unfortunately, a precedent.”
Queen’s University political studies professor emeritus and parliamentary expert Ned Franks agreed that the use of debate-limiting tactics by the Conservatives is unprecedented.
“This government looks at Parliament as a roadblock that they can drive a tank over, so they are using tanks,” he said.
