Canada: Land is for Oil or Land is for Food??

[Oscar]

ARNEY: Canada sure has its priorities right!! Oil over food.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: iamjema . <iamjema@gmail.com>
Date: Sun, Feb 23, 2014 at 7:10 PM
Subject: Fwd: Canada sure has its priorities right !! Oil over food.

[ This was sent to the entire Harper Administration Caucus. ]

To all members of the Harper Government caucus:

I wrote to both Minister Fast and Minster Ritz concerning the plight of the Canadian Prairie farmers and their inability to ship their grains to market.

I am attaching those letters below in case you were not on the distribution list and here is something I received to day, which, if I was a CPC member from the prairie provinces, would make me sick to think what I had done to my constituents who believed and trusted in both my party and I.

There is a very real possibility that the only grain from last years' bumper crop to be shipped to market will move through the small provincial wheat boards and the emasculated Canadian Wheat Board. The rest will probably just rot where it now sits.

The cost to our prairie economy is far larger than just the farms that go broke to be purchased at rock bottom prices by the corporate farming sector, but also on the local towns and villages that depend upon the local farmers for their survival.

Here is what I received:


----- Forwarded Message -----
From: "norm" . . .?
Subject: Interesting discussion in Sask

Yesterday I had lunch with a fairly well to do farmer in southern Sask.

He farms a bit over 6 square miles of land and until the last two years or so a Harper supporter. He is angry. Since last Sept he has been able to move a total of two truckloads of grain even though he has 20 times that much sitting in storage.

The issue? In his town there are more oil cars parked on the railway siding than grain cars ( none). He says Harper's killing of the wheat board took away any muscle farmers had to get reasonable rail service from CN or CP. There is no large organization to push for better service and timely delivery.

As a result hundreds of thousands of tons of grain sit there with no way to get to market.

A large number of locomotives have been sent south for the winter to move US oil and in Canada containers and oil are getting priority shipping.

In the case of the guy I spoke with he has grain sitting in fields stored in long plastic silage bags because there isn't room left in his grain bins.

He is slowly growing broke even though he has a wealth of product and it is not a product that has no demand - it is a product being choked by a corporatocracy that is restricting shipment of one product in favor of another.

The fear is that before long the individual farmer will be out of business and factory farmers of the corporate world will control that food supply even further than they already do.

- - - - -

I hardly think I need to say anymore.

Jeremy Arney
CAP member and past candidate for SGI
#6, 2931 Craigowan Rd
Victoria BC V9B 1N1
250-216-5400


Cc: "Mulcair, Thomas" <thomas.mulcair@parl.gc.ca>, "Trudeau, Justin" <justin.trudeau@parl.gc.ca>, May Elizabeth <Elizabeth.May@parl.gc.ca>, News CBC <yournews@cbc.ca>, ctv <news@ctv.ca>, CPAC <comments@cpac.ca>, Toronto Star <city@thestar.ca>, The Ottawa Citizen <letters@ottawacitizen.com>, Globe & Mail <letters@globeandmail.ca>, "The Tyee.ca" <editor@thetyee.ca>, Revelstoke Times Review <editor@revelstoketimesreview.com>, The Calgary Sun <cal-letters@calgarysun.com>, "Redford, Alison" <calgary.elbow@assembly.ab.ca>, "Wall, Ed" <premier@gov.sk.ca>, Vancouver Province <provletters@theprovince.com>, "Selinger, Greg" <premier@leg.gov.mb.ca>

= = = =

ARNEY'S LETTER Gerry Ritz on Grain of Feb. 13, 2014

- - - QP 13th Feb…Ritz on grain[Expand]

[Table of Contents]

Ms. Linda Duncan (Edmonton—Strathcona, NDP):

Mr. Speaker, grain farmers have not seen a bottleneck like this since the 1970s, contrary to what the minister is saying.

Grain is vital to Canada's economy. We must have an efficient, reliable grain-transport system. The current law is not protecting the interests of our producers. We need better rail service laws, with enforceable performance standards, accountability, and penalties. Will the Minister of Transport finally agree to meet with the producers and establish the long-awaited regulations on performance?

[Expand]

[Table of Contents]

Hon. Gerry Ritz (Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food, CPC):

Mr. Speaker, we have been doing just that as a government. The Minister of Transport and I continue to meet with the grain farmers and oilseed producers across western Canada, who are the most affected by this.

We continue to work with the grain companies and the railways to work through the holistic situation that needs to be put in play to ensure that everybody has access to good rail freight. The cold weather cannot last forever. This global warming has to stop sometime, and when it does break, trains will get back to the length they need to be, and there will be more grain moved to port authorities and moved off to countries around the world.

Oh my, my Mr Ritz what were you smoking before you attended QP this day? First you accused Pat Martin of being confused between railroads and grain companies and then you make this statement which simply boggles the mind that you could utter such nonsense when you are paid so much money to serve Canadians in a ministerial capacity:

“The cold weather cannot last forever. This global warming has to stop sometime, and when it does break, trains will get back to the length they need to be…”

Through your destruction of the Canadian Wheat Board, I would say that you and the PM and all the prairie CPC MPs have very succeeded in destroying the family farms as we have known them for generations, and have opened the door for the giant corporate seed and storage companies like Pioneer, Cargill and Monsanto to take over these farms at fire sale prices. We can be sure that they at least will have the resources to arrange rail cars to get their grain to market.

Meanwhile maybe you should consult with Aglukkaq for advise on climate change, no better yet maybe Meagan Leslie or John MacKay or Elizabeth May, I am sure they know a lot more than Aglukkaq.

Jeremy Arney
#6, 2931 Craigowan Rd, Victoria BC V9B 1N1
TEL: 250-216-5400

- - - - - -

ARNEY'S LETTER TO Minister FAST on Trade . . .

Oral Questions 11th February 2014, quoted from Hansard.


Mr. Don Davies (Vancouver Kingsway, NDP):

Mr. Speaker, under the government, Canada's export performance has been in long-term decline and it continues to suffer.

December figures reveal an even worse trade deficit than expected, now $1.7 billion, enough to knock a full point off our GDP in the fourth quarter, and we have just passed two years of monthly merchandise trade deficits.

Can the minister explain why his trade policies are failing to reverse these troubling numbers?

[Expand]

[Table of Contents]

Hon. Ed Fast (Minister of International Trade, CPC):

Mr. Speaker, nothing could be further from the truth. We are talking about cherry-picking statistics.

In fact, this past year, Canada's exports went up by 3.2%, almost $15 billion, and our trade deficit dropped by almost $3 billion. What is more, our government's low-tax pro-trade plan has created somewhere in the order of 1.1 million new jobs for Canadians.

That is a job creation record we are very proud of. We will not apologize for that.

[Expand]

[Table of Contents]

Mr. Don Davies (Vancouver Kingsway, NDP):

Mr. Speaker, the minister should apologize for a $62-billion current account deficit in this country.

According to the Bank of Canada, poor export performance is a major driver of our slow economic growth, and this means Conservative policies are costing us good, middle-class jobs.

Canadians want a trade policy that gets value-added exports moving again; so when will the minister admit what years of weak export growth have made obvious? His ideological trade strategy is simply not working.

[Expand]

[Table of Contents]

Hon. Ed Fast (Minister of International Trade, CPC):

Mr. Speaker, it is pretty rich for the NDP to talk about trade.

This is the party that has opposed virtually every trade agreement this government has ever signed. Let me articulate what those are: Chile, Peru, Honduras, Colombia, Liechtenstein, the United States, Mexico.

New Democrats are fundamentally opposed to trade. They do not like trade. They do not understand trade. They have absolutely no credibility on trade.


Well Mr Fast,

Firstly you accuse Mr Davies of lying in his first question, then in answer to the follow up question you make this asinine statement:

“New Democrats are fundamentally opposed to trade. They do not like trade. They do not understand trade. They have absolutely no credibility on trade.”

Mr Fast, under your administration’s watch you have managed to completely reverse the trade balance in Canada from a surplus of $26 billion in 2006 to a deficit of $62 billion in 2013. No wonder the NDP are opposed to everything you have done, because they want trade that will actually benefit Canadians not cost them a fortune in lost income and of course lost jobs. Nor do they like the ability you have given to international corporations in all those countries you listed and of course EU and China to sue the hell out of us for lost profits if we don’t capitulate to their slightest whim. Of all the 13/14 so called trade deals your government has signed how many were actually trade deals as opposed to handouts to those countries to turn a blind eye on our mining or
banking corporations operating in defiance the laws of those countries? Or put more simply, just for you, how many actual new export permits were issued for those countries and how many actual jobs in Canada by
Canadians were created by those permits?

Have you also considered how much trade we are losing now and stand to lose altogether with our inability to export grains this year? You and your wonderful administration got rid of the grain farmers best friend in the
Canadian Wheat Board; promised the farmers more money because they could sell where they wanted for the price they wanted, but unlike the Wheat board you made absolutely no provisions for the grains to move. Silos are full, boats are sitting off Vancouver charging demurrage which will have to be paid for by the farmers, the prices are dropping fast and the railroads are moving your beloved toxic tar instead of grain. Meanwhile the farmers are no longer paid when they deliver their grains to the elevators and have no money and cannot expect any until their grains arrive eventually at some distant destination, and who can be sure they will be paid then?

This creates a huge problem for them in trying to plan this year’s crop with no cash in their bank accounts with which to buy seed. For your colleague Ritz to say that he is studying this along with his suggestion that trains will start running again when climate change ends (QP 13th Feb 2014) is just what the farmers want rather than action to get their grain to market! How you have betrayed them and attacked yet another export trade product!

I do understand that the PM and the Minister for agriculture are both trying very hard to get rid of the family farms across the Canadian Prairies and replace them with corporate farms under Pioneer, Cargill or Monsanto etc., which will have the clout to arrange for all the rail cars they want when they want them, and it seems they hit upon the perfect plan to accomplish this with the destruction of the Canadian Wheat Board.

How are you going to lie your way out of this one with the prairie farmers in the election next year? You really can’t blame this on the NDP or Liberals, as you usually do when things go wrong even after all this time, so you will have to wear this one and it looks good on you.

Jeremy Arney
CAP member and past candidate for SGI
#6, 2931 Craigowan Rd
Victoria BC V9B 1N1
250-216-5400

[Oscar]

Kelowna chapter hosts fired defender of agricultural land

[ http://canadians.org/blog/kelowna-chapt ... tural-land ]

March 30, 2016 - 7:16 am

The Council of Canadians Kelowna chapter will be hosting a public forum featuring Richard Bullock on April 1.

Chapter activist Karen Abramsen notes, “Bullock is a Kelowna agriculturist with significant knowledge of orchard and agri-tourism operations. Mr. Bullock has extensive experience in international consulting including the production and processing of agricultural crops.”

In May 2015, the Globe and Mail reported, "Richard Bullock, the outspoken chair of B.C.’s Agricultural Land Commission [an independent tribunal that is responsible for preserving agricultural land], says he was fired in a brief phone call shortly before the government issued a statement saying he’d been replaced. Mr. Bullock had been in the job for five years and his term wasn’t due to expire until November. ...Mr. Bullock said he had no regrets about speaking out in defence of the commission, as he did frequently over the past year while the government pursued controversial policy changes that many critics saw as a strategy to strip the commission of much of its powers."

NDP agriculture critic Lana Popham has commented, "By firing him the B.C. Liberals are continuing their war on B.C.’s agricultural land. Bullock is a true champion for agriculture, who is respected by all sectors of the agriculture industry for his expertise and fair-mindedness. ...By replacing B.C.’s agricultural watchdog with someone with no background in agriculture, the B.C. Liberals are making it clear that their attack on the Agricultural Land Reserve has only just begun."

A CBC article explains, "The Agricultural Land Commission, formerly known as the Agricultural Land Reserve, was created by the NDP in the early 70s to protect B.C.'s farmland from industrial and urban development." And the Agricultural Land Commission website notes, "The Agricultural Land Reserve is a provincial land-use zone where agriculture is the priority use. The Agricultural Land Reserve comprises just 5% of BC’s total land base and is the area with the greatest agricultural capacity. As a finite and valuable resource, the province has decided to protect this land."

In July, after he was fired, Bullock stated, "There's going to be huge pressure put on those lands particularly in the northeast with LNG and oil being such a dominant force within our government today."

Bullock has also been speaking out against the Site C dam on Treaty 8 territory in northeastern British Columbia. Last month, Vice News reported, "Former Agricultural Land Commission chairman Richard Bullock said it would be a 'tragedy' and 'probably a sin against humanity' to flood the Peace River Valley. ...Once built, BC Hydro's Site C dam will flood an estimated 13,600 acres of fertile farmland, old growth forest, fish habitat, First Nations territory and archaeological sites to replace a portion of the Peace River with a 50-mile long reservoir."

A recent letter to the editor in the Alaska Highway News noted, "Last summer, the Liberal government bypassed the Agricultural Land Commission and removed almost 4,000 hectares of the Peace River valley from the Agricultural Land Reserve in a hastily-called cabinet meeting. Soon after, the chairman of the Agricultural Land Commission, Richard Bullock, was fired and replaced by a tire store manager, Frank Leonard."

The Council of Canadians believes in the protection of farmland. As noted in the Leap Manifesto, "We must develop a more localized and ecologically-based agricultural system to reduce reliance on fossil fuels, absorb shocks in the global supply – and produce healthier and more affordable food for everyone."

The Kelowna chapter event takes place this Friday at 7 p.m. at the East Kelowna Community Hall, 2704 East Kelowna Rd.

All are welcome and admission is by donation.

Tags: chapters
[ http://canadians.org/tags/chapters ]


Brent Patterson's blog
Political Director of the Council of Canadians
[ http://canadians.org/blogs/brent-patterson ]