Gerry Ritz has a clear message to farmers demanding fast action at the Canadian Wheat Board: be patient, change will come Aug. 1, 2012.
“We wanted to send a signal as soon as we can to make sure they understand that’s the way it’s going to happen,” Ritz said shortly after he was sworn in as federal agriculture minister.
“There’s frustration out there, I understand that. I talk to farmers that are still sitting on 80 percent of last year’s crop. Rail cars are backed up to the mountains again, ships are sitting in the water on the West Coast we’re paying demurrage on.”
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However, Ritz said frustrated farmers should not think the problems can be fixed with the stroke of a pen abolishing the wheat board monopoly. It is more complicated.
“There’s a lot of mess out there that needs to be cleaned up,” he said. “It’s going to take awhile.”
Grain Growers of Canada executive director Richard Phillips said he understands why Ritz quickly announced the end date, as GGC had been urging.
“There are people calling the minister’s office to say on Aug. 2. I’m going to start running the border and I dare you to challenge it,” Phillips said.
Ritz said such action would be “unfortunate.”
Phillips went further, saying it would be illegal as long as the CWB Act is in force. The lobby group is advocating an orderly transition.
“Grain Growers of Canada would be very firm on that and we’ve told the minister’s office,” he said. “If you break the law, you should be charged and prosecuted.”
It would be a sticky situation for the Conservative government if supporters of one of its key policies began to flout the law.
The government opposes the CWB monopoly and yet promotes a law-and- order agenda that calls for criminals to pay the price.
