Despite last week’s farm program funding announcement, the government
has more work to do on many agricultural files, says the chair of the
House of Commons agriculture committee.
New Brunswick Liberal MP Charles Hubbard said in a June 21 interview
that he welcomes the federal announcement of funding for a five-year
national program and a two-year, $1.2 billion federal contribution to a
“transition” fund.
His committee recommended a $1.3 billion annual program.
“I know it was difficult for Lyle to get as much as he got,” said
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Hubbard, referring to agriculture minister Lyle Vanclief. “So I think
on the funding front, this is all we’ll see for awhile.”
However, the wide-ranging, all-party House report tabled in Parliament
in mid-June called for much more than federal funding.
It called for a doubling of the farm lifetime capital gains exemption
to $1 million, a federal fund of as much as $1 billion to compensate
for natural disasters and various promises that farmers will be
compensated if they are hurt by federal policies such as
species-at-risk legislation or animal cruelty rules.
“I think there is more work to do on a broad range of issues,” said
Hubbard. “There is a big problem with succession and we need tax
changes to deal with that. We were told there is frustration with the
fact that emergency measures is now with national defence and is not
very sensitive to farm losses.”
Hubbard said the committee is suggesting a change in national and
government attitude to farmers and farming, recognizing that food
production should be a national priority and a matter of national
security.
He pointed to the last recommendation in the committee report: “The
committee recommends that to achieve this national security objective,
the federal government should aggressively pursue a course that ensures
an appropriate monetary return to primary producers.”
The MP said that is a broad objective that all government departments
should keep in mind when making future policy. In recent years, there
has been more of an after-the-fact reaction to the deterioration in the
farm economy.
“I think one of the things we were saying is that changes are needed
and in the past, change has come too slowly,” he said.
“There has been some frustration with that.”
