CWB Reform; What do YOU Need?

[melvill]

I wasn't talking about farmers as 'disgruntled customers'. Was talking about disgruntled customers of public companies (and public and private broadcasters). Although visioning the CWB as a customer of farmers is an interesting idea when thinking about the CWB debate. Maybe we haven't been thinking in those terms even though farmers have, in a sense, been buying CWB services for many years.

I'd assume that you would consider yourself a 'disgruntled cwb customer'. Correct?

[chaffmeister]

Parsley:

Which would you prefer:
Avis Grey, Kenny Ritter, etc telling Steve Harper and Chuck Strahl “the way it is”, or someone else?

Poison? Perhaps.
Lesser of two evils? Perhaps.

- Avis Grey lobbying the govt on behalf of the CWB: $100,000 per yr
- The CWB handling export licensing: $millions over the years
- The Federal government seeing clearly for the first time what the CWB has been doing to the Western Canadian economy: priceless.

[chaffmeister]

Another option would be to bring back the Auditor General and allow her to do a THOROUGH forensic audit.

Do you think she would give the answers the CWB wants you to hear?

[TOM4CWB]

DO we agree with Chaff?

Step ONE.

Back the Auditor General and allow her to do a THOROUGH forensic audit.


How many in favour, how many against?

[parsley]

Do you want to concentrate on CWB reform, or moving forward towards a free grain movement environment? charliep called it transition, not a Board overhaul.

Should transition discussions be about how players not dealing with the Board can adapt and function?

It seems as if we are leaning towards trying how to make the Board better in the new environment.

Board supporters have every confidence in how the CWB does business now, so why plan on how to improve the CWB, during a post-monopoly time?

Isn’t the issue at hand,moving forward to how do farmers and grain companies and transportation companies best deal with this new environment that can actually bypass the CWB?

[TOM4CWB]

Parsley;

I believe it would be prudent to draw a line in the sand... before Conservatives (BC)... and after David (AD)!

This way we could attribute responsibility to the appropriate leadership... no cross transfer of liabilities across the line.

Does this make sense?

[parsley]

melville,

The CWB is not the farmers' customer.
I am not the CWB's customer, either.

The CWB acts as a national compulsory licensing agency for the Government of Canada. Similarly, Elections Canada is the regulatory body for voting. I would not describe either licensing applicants or voters as customers.

As a regional Government marketing agency, the CWB's customers are Russia, and Poland and China etc.

But better permit books, and transparency and another layer of bureaucracy has been at the top of the Board's 'To do' list since 1947, right?

1.I thought for sure you'd ask, melville.... what are the malting companies new contracts with individual farmers going to look like?

1.(a) Shouldn't farmers be designing them?

2.How do Customs facilitate truckloads of grain with regards to terrorism?

3.What about price discovery for grain bypassing the Board.

There are 1,156,751 more questions to ask.

I'm not disgruntled. Yet.
Parsley

[parsley]

TOM 4CWB

No drawing crosses in the sand,(Nobody wants to deal with Hedy Fry),I agree with no cross transferring liabilities, (you don't know what's in the books), and absolutely no cross-dressing.

Parsley

[TOM4CWB]

Parsley;

I thought you were going to draw and quarter me there for a moment!

Back to Basics:

What are our standards to make our decisions?

May I be so bold as to suggest some?

The Golden Rule, in practical terms:

Do not infringe upon the Rights, Freedoms or Property of others, and;


Keep all contracts willingly, knowingly and intentionally;

* That for every wrong there is a remedy,

* The end does not justify the means,

* Fundamental principals cannot be set aside to meet the demands of convenience or to prevent apparent hardship in a particular case,

* Ignorance of the law is no excuse for breaking the law,

* Two wrongs do not make a right, and

* One can enlarge the rights of the people, however they cannot be taken away without their informed consent.


Any objections to using these as the standards?

[Incognito]

Good Card Commercial Chaff!!!!

[sawfly]

do the audit and see for yourself whats inside. if you dont find any weapons of mass destruction. then what.
if you do find we have been makeing 50 cents a bushell more than the open market do you still axe the single desk. ( i know the answer to that )

if we go that way , to lower domestic,prices (which might be great for the economy) We had better have some amercian style farm supports in place.
The changes to the board are going to have a lot less impact on farmers than the farm support package, They should go hand in hand.
Are we going to give away a WTO bargining chip and get nothing in return ,( probably too late for that now any way)
IT seems strange that THE USA is bargining away( subsides that they havent even used yet) for actual canadian programs.

and what kind of idiot Liberal OR conservative agreed to this subsidy cap thing in the first place.

[chaffmeister]

Sawfly:

If the CWB has been making 50 cents per bushel more than the open market – would you axe the CWB? I honestly can’t tell from your posting. (Not sure how you benchmark or measure that one anyway…)

I have said it before and I’ll say it again – if it’s proven that the CWB provides a net benefit, I would not argue against it.

When I talk about the impact of the CWB on the economy, I’m not talking about prices that are too high. Because of the way the CWB buys grain from farmers, farmers are forced to grow and sell other crops to generate cash flow. Because these crops – like canola and peas – are then sold off the combine, prices and driven much lower than they would be if wheat was also a cash crop. These low prices to farmers and system inefficiencies due to congestion etc are the cost to the economy I am talking about.

In addition, there are other factors concerning the CWB’s activities that cost the farmer money – too many to go into right now. So if we’re talking about the CWB “making 50 cents per bushel more”, I hope these items would be factored in.