A Conservative MP says Saskatchewan’s NDP leader is at odds with his party’s position on the Canadian Wheat Board.
The NDP is on the record as supporting the wheat board’s single desk powers and insisting that farmers be allowed to vote on any changes to those powers.
However, David Anderson, an MP from southwestern Saskatchewan and parliamentary secretary for the board, said he met with provincial NDP leader Dwaine Lingenfelter numerous times during Lingenfelter’s stint in the private sector.
“He was one of the strongest proponents of free choice in the marketing of western Canadian grain,” Anderson said in a statement issued June 16.
“I had several conversations with him regarding this issue and there was no indication that he wanted anything other than marketing freedom.”
However, Lingenfelter said it shouldn’t matter what he thinks.
“We have been saying since day one that farmers should make the decision about the Canadian Wheat Board,” he said. “And if they decide they want to keep it, they should be allowed to keep it, and if they decide they want to get rid of it, they should be allowed to.”
Lingenfelter said federal agriculture minister Gerry Ritz’s position is not logical that farmers voted Conservative and therefore want to get rid of the board.
“What I’m hearing from farmers here at farm progress (show) is, ‘look, we voted Conservative but we voted to get rid of the gun registry, we voted for other reasons but we want to keep the wheat board and we would like to have a vote on that topic.’ “
He said that if the government is so confident it knows what farmers want, then a vote should be held to confirm it.
As for his personal feelings, Lingenfelter said he has used the board his entire farming career.
“We have invested a fair bit of money in a producer car loading operation at Admiral and that operation … depends on the Canadian Wheat Board allocating cars, so that’s where I’m at on it.”
The Saskatchewan Party government has said it won’t get involved in the debate about the board’s future.
The party position is to support marketing choice, but it intends to stay out of what it calls a federal issue.
