A farmer from southwestern Manitoba has gone to jail rather than pay fines for taking grain across the U.S. border without a licence from the Canadian Wheat Board.
Bill Cairns of Tilston, Man. was ordered to spend 60 days in jail after refusing to pay a $2,000 fine in a Brandon courtroom Feb. 10.
Cairns was convicted of the charges in March 1996, along with Andy McMechan. The farmers want the right to sell their wheat and barley to buyers other than the Canadian Wheat Board.
Cairns was originally fined $600. But the crown successfully appealed the sentence, and the fine was raised to $2,000.
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Patricia Cairns, his wife, said she thinks her husband is doing the right thing.
“Myself, I don’t have much faith in the judicial system, so I wasn’t surprised” at the stay in jail, she said.
Local support
Neighbors are helping her with calving and farrowing while her husband is in jail, she said, adding she’s getting a lot of support from people who believe in the same cause.
Rick Strankman, an Alberta farmer who faced similar charges, said he agrees with Cairn’s decision.
Strankman was convicted of exporting grain without a wheat board licence in December in a Lethbridge courtroom. But in his case, the crown asked for and received a conditional stay.
Strankman said he’s getting legal advice about what the stay means to related convictions and fines of $10,000 for not reporting in writing to customs and evading customs.
He has appealed the convictions. But he said depending on what happens, he may consider taking a jail sentence too.
Strankman is helping get like-minded farmers organized for this spring’s “Andy 500” border run, where they will again challenge the laws requiring them to have a wheat board permit.
U.S. cattle group affirms free trade
By Garry Fairbairn
opinion
More than two hundred years ago, English philosopher David Hume clearly saw the folly of the type of narrow-minded protectionism so often displayed by the United States. Hume wrote:
“Nothing is more usual among states which have made some advances in commerce, than to look on the progress of their neighbors with a suspicious eye, to consider all trading states as their rivals, and to suppose that it is impossible for any of them to flourish, but at their expense.
“In opposition to this narrow and malignant opinion, I will venture to assert, that the increase in riches and commerce in any one nation, instead of hurting, commonly promotes the riches and commerce of all its neighbors; and that a state can scarcely carry its trade and industry very far where all the surrounding states are buried in ignorance, sloth, and barbarism.”
Despite the intervening two centuries, many U.S. policymakers and interest-group leaders still have not grasped that concept.
Using everything from health regulations to anti-dumping laws as pretexts, they have sought to hinder Canadian grain, hogs, lumber and other commodities from entering the U.S. market. At times, the attempts at protectionism have been in flagrant violation of free-trade agreements.
Almost invariably, international tribunals have sided with Canada in such disputes, but that embarrassment has not deterred protectionist forces in many sectors.
Given that background, the position of the (U.S.) National Cattlemen’s Beef Association is especially commendable and enlightened. At its recent annual convention, NCBA turned down Montana cattle producers’ call for restrictions on imports of Canadian cattle.
In doing so, they rejected such nonsensical statements as a prediction by one Montana auction-yard owner that the Canadian cattle herd will expand by 700 percent within three years.
Fortunately, an Alberta Cattle Commission representative was there to note that the prediction was about 693 percentage points on the high side.
NCBA representatives also observed that the southward flow of Canadian cattle is largely balanced by meat products moving into Canada from the U.S.
Reaffirming support for free trade, they also declared that producers, not governments, would do better at resolving Canada-U.S. trade issues.
The co-operation shown between cattle producers on both sides of the border has been good for all concerned. It sets an example that politicians and other policymakers would do well to consider.
