This Wheat Board thing is starting to get noticed

[AdamSmith]

This was in the Jaksoville Florida Times Union, as well as NewsDay NY

Tories refuse to commit to farmer vote on future of wheat board

OTTAWA ((AP) - Prime Minister Stephen Harper says the Canadian Wheat Board must "respect the opinions of all western farmers, not just those who agree with it" - even as his government hedges on holding a farm plebiscite to determine the grain monopoly's future.

The Conservatives are pressing ahead with an election promise to make participation in the wheat board voluntary, a change that many believe would fundamentally undermine the world's biggest wheat marketer.

The proposal has the combined majority opposition in the House of Commons up in arms.

Agriculture critics from the Liberals, NDP and Bloc Quebecois held a joint news conference Tuesday to denounce recent government moves as "unprecedented, unethical and undemocratic."

The opposition MPs want the Commons agriculture committee to hold emergency hearings next week to hear from wheat board advocates who they say are being muzzled.

Agriculture Minister Chuck Strahl issued a statement Tuesday, defending the decision to remove 36 per cent of the 44,578 producers on the preliminary board voters list because they made no deliveries in the past two years.

"It is my belief that this decision will result in a more equitable election process that empowers western grain farmers," said Strahl.

Speaking with reporters, Strahl refused to commit to a plebiscite before any board move to a voluntary basis. Western wheat farmers have been compelled by law since 1943 to sell only through the board.

[Ron]

what the ffff hell does the bloq have to do with the CWB. Oh yeah, it helps keep feed prices down in the Homeland of central canada

[mustardman]

Ron the reason the Bloc is concerned has to do with supply management. They are afraid the conservatives, after ending the wheat board, would then move on to end the supply managed area (milk and eggs] even though this is the only sector in agriculture that consistently makes any money. The conservatives -when in opposition- wanted to move WTO talks ahead by giving this sector away. They wouldn't try this with a minority but with a majority ????

[TOM4CWB]

Mustardman;

THe Conservative Party of Canada voted on this matter at the national convention in 2005.

Supply Management is safe and secure by a vote of Conservative Delegates themselves. I have never heard PM Harper ever express a desire to override his own Conservative COnsitution and Party.

He is simply carrying out election promises they said they would deal with.

Media SPIN... slow news days... and Left wing Communism... at it's screeching pitch

Next thing we will hear is that they need the CWB to keep grain prices DOWN... to feed poor CDN consumers that pay too much for their Beer and Bread!

[mustardman]

TOM4CWB, The cosnservatives might have voted by delegates to keep supply managed system in place, but the motive was suspect, they want votes in Quebec. don't forget that quaint little group called Canadian Citizens Coalition - headed by Mr. Harper- they were against the CWB and against supply management. Nothing has changed.
He's smart enough politically to know that he could end the CWB without losing many votes as long as the liberals are leaderless, however the Quebec situtation is far different, they need Quebec, if they didn't the Canadian Citizens Coalition 's mandate
would be steaming Right ahead.

[TOM4CWB]

I like your Logic Mustardman!

You seem to forget the Conservatives have a MINORITY... and need Quebec seats to get a majority in the next general election.

THis is pure fear mongering...

nothing else.


The two issues are unconnected...

other than Supply Mangement wanting the power of the CWB to keep feed prices DOWN.

[agstar77]

Latest polls show Reform/cons in dead heat with Liberals. So you don't think Quebec will play in their decisions? They have also lost support in the West. This may force them to put on hold any controversial measures.

[Braveheart]

I don't believe that supply management has much if anything to do with the Bloc asking hard questions about CWB reform. Quebec is a fairly socialist province/culture. Co-operatives, marketing boards, and gov't support for agriculture are all big issues in QC.

Anytime I presented to the Agriculture Committee in Ottawa, the Bloc, more than the Liberal members, were the ones that thought farmers would/should benefit from a single desk marketer.

One has to wonder though why a party existing only in QC and not accountable in any way to western farmers has any right to decide our future. The election of the Harper gov't when they ran openly on their CWB positon should have sent the message to the Bloc to just go with the flow.

[AdamSmith]

Judging by Prime Minister Harper's response to Wayne Easter's call for a plebicite today in Question Period.

(God, I've got to get a life)

I wouldn't be expecting one anytime soon.

And I don't think he's too worried about losing any seats over the cwb file. He knows his constituants and he knows what they want.

It's great to see the PM taking the lead here. Chuck Strahl stood up to respond to Easter, but quickly sat down when he saw the Prime Minister rise.

[TOM4CWB]

Adam...

It is scarry isn't it!

But I did get a bunch of non-CWB wheat placed... some beans... glad I didn't need a single desk to talk to... the CWB phone lines have been too busy lately to talk to those folks!

[agstar77]

But where do you find time to listen to question period and why ?

[TOM4CWB]

Agstar77;

Question Period is now part of marketing information... as the CWB's future performance is being determined.

Good people are spending valuble time trying to fix an organisation that is suicidal. I hope the CWB management snap out of this depression soon.

Otherwise PM Harper will have no choice but to take more drastic action.

[agstar77]

Like kicking people out of his caucus that show integrity. That kind of drastic. Mr. Harper should take some humility pills and remember he has a minority government which means a majority of Canadians don't agree with his policy.

[TOM4CWB]

Agstar77;

Obviously this has been a long time (many months) in the making... and a decision not easily reached.

A minority government doesn't easily give up a seat... unless there is a real issue that caused the problem.

P.M. Harper is willing to make the hard decisions... by principal... not for convenience but by conscience

[AdamSmith]

Today's (oct19) National Post has a wonderful editorial about the cwb, as well as a Column by John Iverson about the cwb and Quebec.

Here they are.

#1
Free the farmers National Post
Published: Thursday, October 19, 2006
In just the last month, the Conservative government has removed 16,000 Prairie farmers from the voters' list for ongoing elections to the Canadian Wheat Board board of directors, and moved to stop the wheat board from fighting publicly to keep its monopoly over Western wheat and barley sales. These actions have provoked opposition politicians and collectivist farm groups to charge Ottawa with running roughshod over democracy and attempting to silence those with whom it disagrees. Jack Layton, the NDP leader, accused the government of "gagging" the wheat board, and "interfering with the democratic process in a very serious way."

In fact, both moves were taken to ensure that active grain farmers of all persuasions -- both for and against the grain monopoly -- have their views respected in the current elections.

The former Liberal government changed the wheat board in the 1990s to make it appear as though grain producers were in charge, instead of bureaucrats. At the same time, though, they strengthened the monopoly, gave up very little government control and made it difficult for future directors to loosen the board's grip. For instance, the Liberals created a 15-member board to run the organization, then ensured they kept five seats for patronage appointees. They always appointed only directors who favoured retention of the monopoly. That way, even if producers, who select the other 10 directors in regional votes, managed to elect six or seven free-market representatives, the three or four pro-monopoly directors elected by farmers could join with the five government directors to protect the monopoly.

Thus, the wheat board has the appearance of being democratic, when it really isn't. Recently, Adrian Measner, the board's chief executive officer, accused the Tories of failing to "accept that this organization has been turned over to farmers." The truth is, the board is structured in such a way that only pro-monopoly farmers have much influence.

Another method used by monopoly supporters has been to keep retired farmers on the voters' list long after they have harvested their last crop. Younger farmers are more likely to favour market choice than older ones. So supporters of ending the monopoly have argued for years that permitting farmers to vote in directors' elections years after they have ceased to farm is distorting the selection of directors. Prior to the government's move in late September to delist inactive producers, a full 34% of eligible electors in the current campaign had made no wheat sales in the last two years -- almost 10% had made no sales in nearly a decade.

By also ordering the board to cease its public advocacy of its own monopoly powers, the Conservatives are simply ensuring that the board represent all farmers. Tuesday in the House of Commons, Stephen Harper, the prime minister, responding to angry accusations from the opposition, said that so long as Western farmers have no option but to sell their grain to the wheat board, the board has an obligation to represent all farmers, those who oppose the monopoly as much as those who like it.

Last month, when first asked by Agriculture Minister Chuck Strahl to cease its propaganda campaign to retain its control of Prairie grains, the board refused, saying it was "not an agent of government"; the government could not tell it how to allocate its funds.

But if the board is not a government agency, why does it permit the government to appoint five of its directors and rely on the government to enforce its monopoly? The board was granted its monopoly in 1943 to ensure "orderly marketing" of Western grain on Ottawa's behalf. Without its connection to Ottawa, it has no reason to exist.

The time to free Western wheat and barley growers from the board's yoke has come. Ontario grain producers are no longer required to sell their crops only to that province's wheat board. The Canadian Wheat Board is an anachronistic hangover of an era when government mistakenly believed that economic engineering would replace the free market. That idea is dead and the board should follow it to the graveyard of failed ideological experiments.

#2
Bread and butter issues plague Tories
Plan to end Wheat Board monopoly won't extend to dairy price support

The federal Conservative government plans to give wheat farmers a chance to opt out of the Canadian Wheat Board's purchasing monopoly -- something many of them have been demanding for years.

For the Bloc Quebecois, the Prairies are a far-off land of which they know little and care less. For this reason, a Bloc press release on the future of the Canadian Wheat Board -- in English, no less -- caught our attention.

It turns out to have very little to do with the government's plan to end the Wheat Board's purchasing monopoly and everything to do with trying to undermine the Conservatives' already fragile support base in Quebec.

"By banning the Canadian Wheat Board from advocating its continued existence as the monopoly seller of Western Canadian wheat and barley, this government has turned its back on transparency, which it claims is a top priority," said the party's agriculture critic, Andre Bellavance, before getting to his real point. "This attitude is unacceptable and leads us to fear the worst for supply management."

The linkage of the Wheat Board and supply management -- the monopoly of production quotas and price support for dairy and poultry production -- was picked up by Bill Graham, the leader of the Opposition. In Question Period, he accused the Prime Minister of not giving a darn for farmers. "Why is the Prime Minister continuing to attack the agricultural community?" he asked.

But anyone who thought for a second that the Conservative government's desire to introduce market principles to the Wheat Board might extend to the 300% tariffs that keep consumer prices high for dairy and poultry products is clearly ignorant of the crude electoral politics at play here.

To link the two is "ludicrous," according to Conrad Bellehumeur, director of communications for Agriculture Minister Chuck Strahl. "We have defended supply management every step of the way."

The Tories, to be sure, are not blowing up the Wheat Board against the will of the farmers. Instead, wheat growers are being given an opportunity to vote on whether they wish to leave the monopoly -- as many have been demanding for years.

The same demand does not exist among the Eastern dairy farmers who benefit greatly from the protection they receive. They support the system and could be expected to fiercely oppose any threat to it.

There are three reasons why the two are different for the Tories: location, location, location. There are 15,500 dairy farms in Canada, 7,500 of which are in Quebec, while Ontario has 5,000. This powerful lobby receives $2-billion a year in price subsidies from Canadian consumers every year, who end up paying higher prices for dairy products than they would if the market was deregulated.

The restaurant industry, fed up with annual markups in dairy prices, has created a Web site (www.gotmilked.ca) that details some of the more flagrant abuses by dairy producers. For example, Canadian dairy prices for consumers have risen 49% since 1994, even though the cost to produce milk has fallen 4.5%. The site has a nifty Cowculator, which compares the price of Canadian butter and skim milk powder to a basket of other countries. Needless to say, Canadian consumers are getting hosed, paying one-third more than U.S. consumers for a kilogram of butter. Most damning, it claims the average net worth of dairy producers is $1.7-million, 12 times the median net worth of the average Canadian family.

Theresa Beaulieu of the Dairy Farmers of Canada made a valiant stab at defending the indefensible, stating that there are lots of people in the value chain taking a slice of the action, not just farmers. "You can't blame farmers for it all," she said.

To be fair to the Conservatives, they have consistently stood four-square in favour of supply management. They know that tinkering with the system would likely sink their hopes in the rural parts of Quebec and Ontario where they are strongest.

So, while still maintaining their commitment to work toward more liberalized global trade and helping developing countries out of poverty by reducing agricultural subsidies, they can be expected to stand by all attempts to reform supply management.

As Ottawa-based trade consultant Peter Clark put it in a recent speech: "We hear a lot about the good intentions to make international agricultural trade truly free from distortions. [But] that is not backed up by actions by the wealthier World Trade Organization members. They talk the talk but don't walk the walk, and the crippling and devastation of farmers around the world -- 96% of them in developing countries -- is dismissed as collateral damage."

jivison@nationalpost.com