OTTAWA — The new agriculture committee of the House of Commons will be meeting for the first time this week, almost certainly with Ontario Liberal MP Bob Speller as chair.
And if one new government MP has his way, the committee will quickly become a forum for asking some tough questions about how government policy is working.
“I want to find out why the decisions that were taken were taken at the GATT talks; why we are renegotiating with the Americans some of the tariffs we were told were secure; whether agriculture policy in the past few years has been doing what it is supposed to do down on the farm,” P.E.I. Liberal Wayne Easter said in an interview last week.
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“I will be expecting some answers from bureaucrats.”
Easter was candidate
Easter is one of several MPs sometimes mentioned as a potential committee chair, but government sources last week said Speller has been “anointed” by the prime minister’s office. Still, he will have to convince a majority of the 15 members to vote for him when the committee first meets.
Speller is a five-year Commons veteran from the Haldiman-Norfolk riding of Ontario’s Niagara region. He said last week he expects to be chair “but you never know how a vote will go.”
He said he would like to see the committee be aggressive in investigating issues independent of the government agenda, although it also is the main parliamentary forum for studying agricultural legislation, analyzing Agriculture Canada spending plans and questioning the minister and his officials.
Previous experience
Speller will be one of just four MPs on the committee with previous Commons committee experience. The others are Liberals Jerry Pickard (Essex-Kent), Mark Assad (Gatineau) and Lyle Vanclief, parliamentary secretary to agriculture minister Ralph Goodale.
Reform Party committee members are Leon Benoit (Vegreville), Jake Hoeppner (Lisgar-Marquette) and Allan Kerpan (Moose Jaw-Lake Centre).
Bloc QuŽbecois members are Jean-Paul Marchand (QuŽbec East), Jean Leroux (Shefford) and Bernard Deshaies (Abitibi).
Other Liberal members are: Murray Calder from a rural riding northwest of Toronto; Bernie Collins (Souris-Moose Mountain, Sask.); Harold Culbert from New Brunswick; and Paul Steckle from Huron County, Ont.
