A prairie farm group has launched its second lawsuit in a week against the federal government over Canadian Wheat Board election rules.
On Sept. 17, Friends of the CWB filed suit in Federal Court in Winnipeg alleging the government violated the CWB Act when it ordered the board in late July to change rules governing voter eligibility.
One week earlier, the group launched a suit challenging the legality of the federal government’s move to eliminate third party spending limits in director elections.
“We’ve all got a lot better things to do than spend time and money going to court,” said FCWB member Stewart Wells, a farmer from Swift Current, Sask.
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“But sooner or later people have to stand up for democracy or it’s going to disappear.”
On July 23, CWB minister Gerry Ritz sent a letter to the board instructing it to introduce several changes to the voting procedure.
Those changes included:
- Allowing producers without a CWB permit book to obtain a ballot by presenting evidence, such as crop insurance documents or grain receipts, that they grew eligible grain in the current or previous crop year. Previously a statutory declaration was required and that will remain an option.
- Removing from the voters list producers who have a permit book but have not delivered to the CWB in the current or previous crop year, and requiring them to apply for a ballot in the same manner as producers without permit books.
In his letter to the board, Ritz said the changes were required for “the proper conducting and supervision” of the 2008 elections.
He added that he had the right to issue directions to the board, subject to CWB election regulations.
FCWB argues in its application to the court that rules governing voter eligibility are set out in the act, and Ritz cannot change them through a unilateral direction to the board.
It argues that Ritz’s directive would improperly allow people who are not defined as producers in the CWB Act to vote in the election.
Wells said the case is based on a straightforward question.
“The issue is, does the minister have the authority under law to come in and make up whatever rules he wants for the election, when the election procedures are already clearly outlined in the CWB Act?” he said.
The government will present its arguments on the case when it files a statement of defence, which is expected in about a month.
In his July 23 letter to the board, Ritz said some producers found it costly and time-consuming to file a statutory declaration to receive a ballot, hence the alternative described in his directive.
He also argued producers with permit books who hadn’t made deliveries to the board in the previous or current year had not established that they were eligible voters.
The governing Conservatives made a similar change to the voters list in the midst of the 2006 director election. The delivery requirement in that change bumped 16,000 producers off the voters list and required them to file statutory declarations to receive a ballot.
Wells said the government had two years to pass legislation changing voter eligibility rules before the 2008 director elections, but didn’t present a bill to Parliament until June of this year, by which time it was clear it would never be passed.
Instead, it sent the July 23 letter to the board.
Wells added he’s convinced the government believes the changes it has introduced will add to the voters list producers inclined to vote for open market candidates and remove from the list voters more inclined to vote for single desk candidates.
The FCWB suit asks the court to allow its application even though it was filed more than 30 days after the minister’s order, on the grounds that the letter was kept secret and FCWB didn’t learn of its contents until Sept. 15.
It asks the court to declare Ritz’s order unlawful and to hold an expedited hearing on the matter.
