Group backs down from quota challenge

Tuesday, April 27, 2010

by SUSAN MANN

The Ontario Quota Rights Organization has quietly dropped its appeal to have Dairy Farmers of Ontario’s current quota policies declared null and void.

Their Ottawa-area lawyer Don Good says the group didn’t have the resources to continue with the appeal. “It costs a lot money to run an appeal like that. You have to hire expert witnesses.”

Ontario Quota Rights appealed the current quota policies to the Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs Appeal Tribunal last summer before Dairy Farmers was slated to introduce them. The policies include a price cap of $25,000 a kilogram for quota, the introduction of non-saleable quota, a new entrant quota assistance program and a reduction in the over-production credits to 10 days from 20 days as of Feb. 1. Once the Quota Rights’ appeal began an automatic stay on the new policies came into effect and Dairy Farmers couldn’t implement them on Aug. 1, 2009 as planned.

The Tribunal partially lifted the stay so Dairy Farmers could implement the new policies for all producers except the 41 active members of Ontario Quota Rights. At the time of the appeal’s launch, Ontario Quota Rights had 41 active and 34 former dairy farmer members. Since then three withdrew and three others obtained permission to participate on the quota exchange.

“No other producers (of the Ontario Quota Rights group) made enquires about running their own exchange, which would have been difficult at best,” says George MacNaughton, production division director for Dairy Farmers.

MacNaughton adds that the stay on Quota Rights farmers is no longer in effect because they dropped the appeal.

Good says he hasn’t heard formally from the group yet but he expects it will also drop its appeal to the Ontario Superior Court of Justice for judicial review of an earlier tribunal decision. The group had asked the tribunal to rescind previous Dairy Farmers quota policies in effect from November 2006 to July 2009, including one concerning transfer assessments. The tribunal denied the request late last year.

The discouraging outcome of an Ontario Appeal Court ruling on a separate case is the reason why the group might consider dropping the appeal, he says. The case involved three former dairy farmers who sold their quota in 2007 and sought exemptions to the transfer assessments.

The tribunal had granted the farmers (Bill Denby, Keith and Ron Jarvis and Dale McFeeters) exemptions but the Ontario Superior Court of Justice overturned that decision. The farmers requested permission to appeal the court’s decision. Earlier this month the Ontario Court of Appeal denied their request.

Good says the Appeal Court’s decision to deny leave to appeal means the Superior Court’s ruling is now binding.  “Since it (the court’s decision) has now been confirmed, there’s no basis for our judicial review.” BF