REGINA – Saskatchewan Wheat Pool is sticking with its pay-the-railway stance.
President Leroy Larsen said the company will talk to Ottawa about transportation reform, but isn’t ready to throw in the towel on the method-of-payment issue.
Delegates to the pool’s annual meeting went behind closed doors to thrash out their transportation policy after being told by agriculture minister Ralph Goodale that the status quo is not acceptable and the issue is how, not whether, to pay the $560-million Crow subsidy to farmers.
Ottawa has asked farm and grain industry organizations for advice on how to pay it to farmers.
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Delegates were presented with a resolution saying the company should get involved in discussions on changes to the Western Grain Transportation Act. (A similar policy was recently adopted by Manitoba Pool Elevators.)
But the resolution finally passed by 84 percent of the 134 delegates bore little resemblance to that original motion. It said the pool should “protect producer interests in any changes to the WGTA.”
Another resolution, to develop an alternative proposal to pay the Crow Benefit to producers, was tabled. A third, supporting a producer payment, had not been voted on by press time.
Pool president Leroy Larsen told reporters the pool’s longstanding position that the Crow be paid to the railways is still on the books and that’s what the company will continue to advocate.
Asked if the pool plans to take part in discussions initiated by Ottawa on how to pay the Crow Benefit to producers, Larsen said:
“I think we do, but we’ll also be asking the question of how much money is on the table, and what are we talking about here with regard to the producer share, and how are they going to get that money.
“(Delegates) were asking that we pose those kind of questions because producers have a right to know the other side of the equation as well.”
Delegate John Clair of Radisson, a strong pay-the-railway supporter, said he’s satisfied the resolution doesn’t weaken the pool’s existing policy stance.
He said there was clear direction from the delegates to pool leaders to participate in discussions but only in order to tell Ottawa to keep paying the money to railways and to get more details from the government about the future of the transportation subsidy.
Larsen said one of the pool’s arguments will be that if the government intends to cut the Crow payment substantially, there is no point in changing the method of payment.
