WEYBURN, Sask. – Removing barley from the Canadian Wheat Board’s monopoly is proving more difficult than some farmers think it should be.
Frustrated at the politics involved and the time it is taking, farmers who favour marketing choice met here last week to plan a course of action.
Charlie Mayer, the Conservative agriculture minister responsible for taking oats out of the board in 1989, also tried to implement a continental barley market in 1993. That move, which would have allowed private barley trade in North America for a six-year trial period, was challenged in court by the then three prairie wheat pools and the government lost.
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“The mistake I made was first of all listening to (Department of) Justice orders and secondly not doing the whole thing,” Mayer told the meeting, referring to completely removing barley from the board’s jurisdiction. “If I’d have done the whole thing it would have been over.”
He was able to remove oats through order-in-council because that’s how the crop had been added to the board’s mandate in the 1950s.
He said he also did it quietly.
“What I did is basically got agreement from, without naming names, half a dozen cabinet ministers, went out and made the announcement and did the legislation afterwards by order-in-council,” he told the meeting. “The problem now is that (former Liberal agriculture minister Ralph) Goodale amended the act and tightened it up.”
Mayer choked up as he talked about farmers being jailed for trying to sell their grain on their own.
“This is not an issue about whether I get $40 a bushel for my wheat or I get 40 cents. It’s my decision,” he said. “It’s my right to do what I want with my product.”
He noted that no one is asking for oats to go back under the board.
Mayer suggested that farmers who want to get others on their side should talk about the monopoly and how they are treated compared to other farmers in Canada.
“If we protest and block highways without letting people know why we’re doing it, all we do is get them mad at us,” he said. “We’ve got to let them know that we are being subjected to a monopoly that nobody else in this country puts up with, especially the farmers of Ontario.”
Jim Pallister of Portage la Prairie, Man., encouraged those at the meeting to keep fighting.
“Look how far we’ve come. We’ve got the government of Canada on our side.”
