The federal government may have issued a firm “no” to requests for disaster aid to compensate prairie farmers for flood damage but, in Ottawa, that does not mean the controversy has ended.
Political pressure continues for a change in the rules of the natural disaster aid program or more flexibility in interpretation of existing rules.
In early May, defence minister Art Eggleton will be called before the House of Commons agriculture committee to justify his interpretation of compensation rules under the Disaster Financial Assistance Arrangements act.
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federal government proposed several months ago to increase the compensation rate from 80 to 90 per cent and double the maximum payment from $3 million to $6 million
He will be asked by both government and opposition MPs to find a way to help.
Meanwhile, agriculture minister Lyle Vanclief has revealed that he disagrees with his cabinet colleague and has written to ask that farmer losses be covered in the 1999 flood areas of southwestern Manitoba and southeastern Saskatchewan.
“Unfortunately, we were not successful with that argument,” the agriculture minister told a recent Commons committee meeting. “I have not given up yet.”
And later, a senior Agriculture Canada policy official said the government recognizes there is a gap in government support and is trying to fix it.
The agriculture department operates income loss protection programs and crop insurance, Doug Hedley told the agriculture committee last week.
The defence minister is responsible for the DFAA which compensates for loss of property, infrastructure and assets suffered in a natural disaster.
But neither covers losses suffered when the rains last spring turned a large area of the southern Prairies into a lake – fertilizer was washed away, millions of acres of land went unseeded and weeds became a problem in the fallow land.
“I admit that we have looked at the two programs and we need to ensure they fit better together,” said Hedley. “We continue to talk to (the) defence (department) to see how these gaps can be filled. We have no answers yet.”
Election issue
While affected farmers wait for compensation, it has become a highly political issue in the year before an expected election.
All political parties have a stake in it.
In Parliament, the two MPs pressing most consistently for federal help are Conservative Rick Borotsik, who represents the affected Manitoba area, and Canadian Alliance MP Roy Bailey, who speaks for the farmers across the border in Saskatchewan.
The main New Democratic Party player is Manitoba agriculture minister Rosann Wowchuk, who has accused the federal Liberals of insensitivity.
And the Liberals are sensitive to the charge of being insensitive to Manitoba. They uneasily recall the 1997 election when the Red River Valley was under water, the Liberals decided not to postpone the early election call and the prime minister flew to Manitoba to have his photograph taken tossing a sandbag.
Voters punished the Liberals, taking away six of the 12 seats they had won in 1993.
