The Progressive Conservative party will use its diminished parliamentary voice to press the Liberal government to increase farm aid, says the party’s former agriculture critic.
Nova Scotia MP Gerald Keddy said members of the fifth-place, 12-member PC caucus will have their hands full trying to keep up with issues in the new Parliament when it gathers early next year.
But he said agriculture definitely will be one of the priority items.
“We had the most comprehensive agricultural policy in the campaign and (leader Joe) Clark showed that he was familiar with the file and cared about it,” Keddy said in an interview after the Conservatives held their first post-election caucus meeting.
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“This will be one of our top issues for certain.”
Keddy, a Christmas tree farmer and businessperson from Nova Scotia’s south shore, was named agriculture critic for the Tories late in the last Parliament when Brandon-Souris MP Rick Borotsik was promoted to finance critic.
Keddy said last week he expects Borotsik to be renamed agriculture critic in the new Parliament.
“Of course, we’ll all have three or four responsibilities,” he said. “It is going to be busy.”
Keddy said the Liberal government agriculture policy has been a disaster. But the policy failure isn’t confined to agriculture.
“I also have been natural resources critic and their record of neglect extends to fishery and forestry as well,” he said. “They seem to think that in the future, everybody is going to be sitting working at a computer. They don’t seem to understand the importance of resources as the basis of our economy. They have no vision of how the resource economy fits into the general economy.”
The second-term Tory joined other opposition critics in suggesting that the new Liberal cabinet should contain a new agriculture minister.
“I think Lyle Vanclief has a good heart but I don’t think he has the status in cabinet to get what is needed. Nobody likes subsidies but as long as other countries are doing it, our government has to pitch in to help farmers. If it is not prepared to do that, farmers should be told so they can get on with their lives.”
