Time for the Commons ag committee to stop 'playing with fluff'

Saturday, November 3, 2012

Instead of endless meetings on such ethereal topics as the food supply chain or a national food strategy, Parliament's key agricultural committee needs to start dealing with the bread and butter issues that affect farmers where they live

by BARRY WILSON

Watching Parliament through the lens of mainstream media is to imagine that national politics revolves around the drama of daily Question Period and subsequent Parliament Hill mob scenes that set the political agenda.

What minister misspoke herself today? Is Justin Trudeau really the new Messiah? How dare you say that? Blah blah blah.

Sometimes agricultural industry issues figure in mainstream debate (think listeria or E. coli or Walkerton), but normally, in the thrust of parliamentary business, agriculture fits somewhere between free trade with Estonia and a new announcement of infrastructure funding for Nanaimo.

In mid-September, federal and provincial agriculture ministers agreed to a five-year farm policy framework that will eviscerate farm support spending during the next five years. The $2 billion development barely caused a ripple in House of Commons debate and got almost no mainstream coverage.

However, watching Parliament through the lens of agriculture is a far different experience.

There is an unending array of agriculture issues that catch the attention of the 100 or so MPs who represent rural areas, even if they are under the general radar screen.

That brings us to the House of Commons agriculture committee, the focal point for public agricultural discussion on the Hill. It is where the policy heavy lifting should take place.

But, in recent months, the agriculture committee has taken itself out of the game, spending seemingly endless meetings hearing witnesses on such ethereal topics as the food supply chain or a sometime-in-the-future national food strategy.

Meanwhile, the bread and butter issues that affect farmers where they live, such as how are the programs working, what will be the impact of the planned $2 billion in reduced farm support spending over the next five years, or is the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) doing its job well, have rarely been the focus recently.

"We have literally been playing with fluff since this Parliament started last year," New Democrat agriculture critic Malcolm Allen laments. "It is now time to have a hard look at the impacts of policy changes and what is happening to CFIA that seems to have no direction and a host of other issues that have real impact on farmers."

Allen is right. And there is a window for the committee to do just that. Mercifully, the meandering supply chain hearings have ended, and in early October committee members began considering a report to put the issue to bed. Now, with a new chair – Brandon-Souris Conservative Merv Tweed, who replaces Ontario cattle producer Larry Miller – and a relatively open agenda, the committee has a chance to sink its teeth into some issues that are current and, omigod, newsworthy.

There is no lack of issues. The committee also might consider becoming a bit more efficient, some might say brutal, in building a fence around its hearings.

In recent years, the committee has launched hearings on a topic and then extended the hearings to accommodate almost anyone with an interest in appearing. Whether the topic was the potential of biotechnology, Growing Forward 2 in the abstract, or supply chain issues, key messages were delivered early and then weeks were spent repeating them from different groups.

There is a thin line between inclusiveness and repetitiveness. The agriculture committee, as the main forum for the industry in the federal political system, should be, could be, more timely in its analysis of industry issues and recommendations for action.

Here's hoping. BF

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