Kathleen Wynne's gamble - premier as ag minister

Sunday, March 3, 2013

It is not the first time that a provincial premier has taken on the agriculture portfolio. And while Wynne may not get a big windfall like her Saskatchewan predecessor, what does she have to lose?

by BARRY WILSON

Premier Kathleen Wynne's decision to become her own agriculture minister is a powerful symbol of her recognition that a provincial government must be more than a city-based government.

Like the Liberal Party across much of Canada, Ontario Liberals during the past decade have lost most rural ridings. To be appointed agriculture minister has become an almost certain path to electoral defeat.

So Wynne is taking a gamble – a left-wing former Toronto municipal activist with few obvious connections to rural Ontario other than her support of the local food movement and the fact that, like the rest of us, she eats and that, unlike some of us, she seems to know or wants to find out where her food comes from.

Whether her gesture scores any points with rural voters remains to be seen, but what does she have to lose? Besides, there is a Canadian precedent for premier as agriculture minister and it paid dividends – a $1 billion dividend – for farmers.

The scene was not Ontario but Saskatchewan and the year was not 2013 but 1986. And it is one of the great Canadian political tales.

Progressive Conservative premier Grant Devine had won an historic election victory in 1982, routing an entrenched NDP government and winning 55 of 64 seats to form the first provincial Conservative government in more than 50 years.

By 1985, conditions in the PC rural base were going south as grain prices fell in the midst of the European Union – United States export subsidy war. Late that year, Devine became his own agriculture minister to try to fix things. But the 1986 election was not going well and the party risked losing power, so Devine threw a Hail Mary pass toward Ottawa.

Late one night on the campaign trail with a reporter in the next room listening through the paper-thin walls of rural motels, Devine called Prime Minister Brian Mulroney in Ottawa and begged for some federal help to save the election – $1 billion.

Several days later, Mulroney rose in the House of Commons to announce a $1 billion farm aid package.

Devine lost the popular vote but won a comfortable majority with the aid of solid rural support.

Of course these are far different times. Liberal premier Wynne will not be able to dial up Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper and demand help to win an election. Times have changed, programs have changed and federal bailouts are no longer in fashion.

Still, Ontario farmers can rightly expect the political profile of their industry to be raised at Queen's Park when the buck stops on the premier's desk and a new government that understands the need for investment, infrastructure, dependable support programs and regulations that work.

And if Premier/Agriculture Minister Wynne actually finds the time to attend the next federal-provincial agriculture minister's meeting in Halifax next July, her presence certainly wouldn't hurt Ontario's ability to get a hearing on the province's complaints about new Growing Forward 2 farm support and spending programs that take effect April 1.

Premier as agriculture minister may not pay dividends in those vast green spaces between the cities, but what does she have to lose? BF

Barry Wilson is a member of the Parliamentary Press Gallery specializing in agriculture.