(Resource News International) — While not ruling out other options to remove the Canadian Wheat Board’s single-desk marketing powers for Prairie barley, the federal government for now is focused on a court appeal toward that end.
The government is focusing its attention on an appeal of a decision by a Federal Court judge, which cancelled a cabinet order
that was to remove the monopoly powers of the CWB on barley marketing, said a spokesman for
Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz.
The appeal is expected to be heard in February 2008, said Ritz’s press secretary Patrick
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Ritz was seen pursuing the appeal given that the
Conservative government received a mandate for marketing freedom
from 62 per cent of Prairie barley farmers in
a plebiscite this spring, McCloskey said.
“All options remain on the table, including legislation,”
Ritz said in a forwarded e-mail from McCloskey.
The government had announced on June 11 that it made
regulatory amendments that removed barley from the control of the
CWB effective August 1, 2007.
Supporters of the CWB, however, had successfully argued in court that the 1998
amendments to the Canadian Wheat Board Act set out a clear
process by which barley can only be removed from the single desk
through a vote in Parliament — not by regulatory means, as the federal
The government’s lawyer had argued that the CWB’s monopoly can be stripped without a parliamentary
vote because it is only reversing a regulatory move, not changing
legislation. The government has filed an appeal of the decision against it.
Industry sources have indicated that while the government is following through on the appeal, legislation was being drafted which will allow open marketing of barley.
McCloskey declined comment on this speculation.
