Strahl scores hat trick with dairy announcements - Opinion

IN THE early going, the crowd of dairy farmers was quiet, almost surly, expecting the worst and looking like they were ready to chuck Strahl overboard for a more supply management-supportive minister and maybe government.

The federal agriculture minister at one point even jokingly pleaded for applause after an “I support supply management” line drew nothing but pregnant silence.

They were skeptical, remembering less-than-supportive words from trade minister David Emerson and needing evidence of this support.

Ten minutes later they were on their feet applauding Chuck Strahl. Dairy Farmers of Canada president Jacques Laforge, smiling like a kid in a dairy commercial, was pumping the hand of Christian Paradis, recently appointed agriculture secretary of state with the job of making nice with Canada’s francophone and supply management farmers.

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Strahl had done the unthinkable, the unexpected. He announced the government would bow to dairy farmer demands that a new tariff be created to protect them from unregulated imports of dairy displacing milk protein concentrates.

There would be a price to pay, including possible compensation to such exporters as New Zealand and criticism that a free trade-supporting Conservative government should not be moving to more protectionism.

Strahl made clear it was a price the Conservatives would pay, since imports were costing dairy farmers more than $100 million a year. “It’s not a matter of degree. It’s a matter of survival.”

He also said Ottawa will develop rules that set out how much domestic dairy product must be used in Canadian-made cheese, a decision interpreted as a Conservative tilt toward producers over processors.

“Mr. Strahl made a commitment yesterday I never thought he would make,” Laforge told delegates the next morning. “It was a hell of a struggle, it did not come easy for him. I hope everyone in the industry recognizes that and holds him in high esteem.”

For Conservative political planners, that was the equivalent of a hockey hat trick.

Strahl’s performance helped dispel suspicions that Conservatives, offspring of the anti-supply management Reform party, don’t support the system of protection and regulation – suspicions reinforced by candid comments from trade minister Emerson in December.

It reinforced the impression of the Conservatives as decisive and pro-farmer (unless you support the Canadian Wheat Board monopoly) and probably weakened the credibility of the argument that if they dismantle the CWB monopoly, Conservatives will turn their sights on marketing board monopolies.

And it gives the Conservatives some powerful election ammunition, particularly in rural Quebec, Ontario and Atlantic Canada where Bloc Québecois and Liberal opponents like to suggest the Conservatives have a “hidden agenda” to dismantle supply management to the benefit of their agri-business friends.

Last week, Laforge said Strahl’s actions, supported by Emerson, prove one thing.

“There should be no doubt in producers’ minds about this government’s support for supply management,” he said.

Expect to see that quote in some Conservative election advertisements aimed at rural ridings.