ST. JOHN’S, Nfld. – Federal and provincial agriculture ministers have given themselves a Sept. 30 deadline for completing the details of a new national farm income safety net scheme.
And federal agriculture minister Ralph Goodale has warned that if a national agreement is not reached by then, Ottawa will act alone.
“If it just proves at the end of the day not to be possible to bring everybody happily along to the same conclusion, then we may have to look at a different configuration,” he said.
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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
It could be a configuration that has Ottawa acting without provincial support to fund a new national “whole farm” insurance plan cost-shared by the federal government and farmers.
Ottawa and the provinces would continue to fund crop insurance. It would be up to the provinces to decide what companion programs they want to fund on their own.
“This is not my preferred option but we cannot allow this to drag on forever,” he said.
After two days of federal-provincial ministerial negotiations that failed to resolve outstanding safety net disputes, Goodale decided he’d had enough.
Disagreements remain over how much flexibility provinces will have, what national standards will apply and what trigger point should be used to unlock payments.
Alberta continues to lead the charge for provincial flexibility, few national standards and a minimal safety net.
The ministers claimed some success in narrowing the gap last week but conceded that four major issues of contention remain. Last week’s meeting was supposed to be used to put the finishing touches to an agreement-in-principle reached last December in Toronto.
“We need to bring this issue to some reasonable degree of closure promptly,” Goodale told a news conference, flanked by provincial agriculture ministers.
Hold onto national standards
“There is a vital farm community in this country that has been waiting for the decision-making process for some months now and we can’t allow the discussion to go on forever. We have to bring it to a close Sept. 30.”
He held out the prospect of another ministerial meeting before then for one last push to settle the differences.
He also insisted there is a limit to how much he will allow national standards to be weakened in pursuit of a deal.
Provincial ministers at the news conference declined an invitation to comment on the deadline and the threat.
Canadian Federation of Agriculture president Jack Wilkinson offered Goodale an uneasy endorsement for his tougher stand.
“I am pleased he has moved to put a deadline on this,” Wilkinson said from his northern Ontario farm. “We have been pressuring him from the CFA not to cave in to the provincial demands, not to let them blackmail us to lower standards.”
But the CFA president said there is a risk.
A joint federal-farmer program would not be as well funded as a federal-provincial-farmer plan.
