SASKATOON – Larry Maguire has broken his losing streak.
When the Elgin, Man., farmer was elected president of the Western Canadian Wheat Growers Association, it marked a change in his recent electoral fortunes.
In the federal election in October 1993, Maguire finished third running as a Progressive Conservative in the riding of Brandon-Souris.
The bad news continued last month, when he lost his bid for a third term on the Canadian Wheat Board’s producer advisory committee.
But that didn’t deter Maguire from seeking the presidency of the wheat growers, at their recent convention in Lake Louise, Alta.
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“The writing was on the wall in the other two I was running in,” he said with a laugh last week.
Not so in Lake Louise, where Maguire, vice-president for the last three years, was elected by the association’s 14-member board of directors. There were no other candidates.
He said his experience in a wide variety of farm groups, including Manitoba Pool Elevators, Keystone Agricultural Producers, the Canada Grains Council and the advisory committee, stand him in good stead.
“I think I have a good understanding of farmers’ needs from all these different perspectives,” he said.
Maguire doesn’t think his history as a Tory candidate will make it difficult for him to deal with the Liberal government.
“I guess some people have looked at my politics when I was running federally and said ‘well you should be able to get along with the Conservatives better than the Liberals’, ” he said. “But we have people of all political stripes in the wheat growers so I don’t see any problems in dealing with (federal agricultural minister Ralph) Goodale at all.”
No full endorsement
Even though he ran under the Tory banner, he added, he wasn’t necessarily endorsing all the policies of the previous government.
“I was running on changing the way things were done as much as anything else,” he said.
The association’s 6,000 members want deregulation and a lower-cost system, with the saving passed on to farmers as much as possible, even if it cuts into the profits of grains handlers or railways.
Maguire said he will continue to press for changes to the Canadian Wheat Board based on the association’s policy document published last November. It calls for a voluntary pooling system, whereby farmers would be allowed to opt out of the board marketing system.
He emphasized the association wants the board to change but not disappear: “We want choice but we don’t want to take choice away from anybody else.”
Another priority is to improve the knowledge and understanding of the Canadian grain marketing system and farm support programs among U.S. farmers. He said Canada must not get too far ahead of the U.S. in dismantling farm supports.
