New organization dogged by old controversy

Thursday, February 25, 2010

by BETTER FARMING STAFF

Grain Farmers of Ontario, the amalgamation of the corn producers association and the wheat and soybean boards, is only a few weeks old and already tinged by controversy. The wife of a former wheat board director charges her husband has been defamed is threatening legal action.

In an e-mail to Grain Farmers of Ontario dated Feb. 19, Lanark County grower Geraldine Vanderspank says new Grain Farmers chair Don Kenny told her husband John Vanderspank he would never be named to a committee of Grain Farmers because of his “past history” with the Ontario wheat board.

John Vanderspank, who gained a high profile as a result of work with the Ontario Landowners Association, says he had requested that he be named to the new group’s research committee and also to a committee on government affairs.

Don Kenny, the new chair of Grain Farmers, from Ottawa Carleton, says committee members are chosen by the board as part of a “democratic process.” “John didn’t do anything wrong,” Kenny says. “I just said he had some past history when he was with his former board (the Ontario Wheat Producers Marketing Board.)

The wheat board passed a non-confidence motion against then director Vanderspank last May, and banned him from its committees last year, citing violations of board confidentiality agreements.

Geraldine Vanderspank’s letter cited her husband’s concerns last year “about privacy infringement, the lack of return on investment by (lobby consultant) the Daisy Group, the research efforts in eastern Ontario and the research committee’s travel expenses spending.” Vanderspank says.

She says The Daisy Group received as much as $500,000 for lobbying governments in recent years.

Barry Seft, the new CEO of Grain Farmers, says the lobby was funded by the Grain and Oilseeds Committee, with contributions from Ontario grain and soybean groups and their counterparts. He said he didn’t know where the $500,000 number came from. Kenny is the director representing District 13, which includes Vanderspank’s area.

“I was being open and frank with John. I have known him for years,” says Kenny. Kenny was previously a director on the Ontario Corn Producers’ Association.

“I asked (Kenny) about sitting on a committee. He told me I wasn’t welcome because of my past history,” John Vanderspank says. “They want the old boys on the research committee.”

When the research committee met this week, Kenny says he was there to represent growers in district 13, which includes Lanark County. The GFO board has consulted with legal counsel because of the letter from Geraldine Vanderspank, Kenny confirmed. BF