Minister Ritz on the CWB Interview on Legal Challenge

[agstar77]

Actually it was the governments own handpicked committee that said it would not work.

[Burbert]

Go for it CWB! Did the Cracker and
Harpo et al, believe that the CWB would
roll over fer the politicos and give
themselves up? The CWB has a very, very
strong position and the Courts have
upheld the rule of law in the past.
If'n I was a CWB elected director, I'd
fight fer my job too! Good fer Mr.
Oberg! Down with the gestapo tactics of
Mr. RITZ.... After all this is Comedia
and we have the rule of law in this
great nation. Not the rule of the
Jungle...

[parsley]

Wrangling with the chuckchucks takes away time
that could be well spent on writing a letter to the
Saskatchewan minister of agriculture He needs
a fistful of letters from from choice farmers to
read from at meetings. Highwayman write one
will you and get four of your buds to do the
same. Works for you?Pars

[agstar77]

Gee, Ritz is real interested in the bottom line since there was no cost benefit to this legislation. The Pools might still be around if they had not adopted go big or go home.

[charliep]

So you think the pools would have survived their poor financial situation of the early 1990's with the small capacity wood elevator system? Where would the money have come from to upgrade elevators - cooperative members?

I will stick my neck and suggest staying on the course you suggest would have seen bankrupt cooperatives and more US based companies versus Canadian companies that can compete anywhere in the world.

Change doesn't come easy but sometimes it needs to happen. But I am treating the current as a business issue and not a political one.

[agstar77]

They spent money on ill advised concrete coffins, instead of more cost effective structures. They called in so called outside experts that screwed us over royally.

[charliep]

What you call concrete coffins I would call pretty good profit financed to a significant amount by the wheat and barley handled on behalf of the CWB with guaranteed margin/minimal risk. In your terminology, what makes them concrete coffins is policies which put the wrong grain (read not moving/stored) in their facilities and reduces handle from 10 times turn over to something far less.

[malta]

Agstar
You asked where are the Prairie Pools.
The answer is that the directors of the Pools (some of who now run the CWB) chose to live in the past. For years they refused to modernize and to compete, They took the attitude that "We are the Pool, people will deal with us" As the next generation took over the farms the younger farmers went to the companies that earned the business. The CWB has spent the past 30 years telling us we must do business with them rather than showing us "heres what we've done to deserve your business". Losing the Pools due to the poor management was a loss, losing the CWB will not be.

[Kodiak]

Agster,

I think you’re asking for something you won’t or can’t do yourself. Can you point me to a credible cost/benefit analysis that shows the single desk is a net benefit to my farm or the western grain industry as a whole? And given the nature of the debate, I'm sure you'll agree with me that to be credible, it should be current, independent, and peer reviewed. I’m pretty sure there isn’t one out there. I watch this stuff pretty closely so would have seen it is there is one. But maybe I missed it.

In the absence of compelling and demonstrable proof the single desk provides significant benefit, there is no reason for the CWB single desk to enjoy widespread support, as is evidenced by its own polling and surveying.

The loss of ability to manage and control your farm comes at a cost. There can be no debate about that. So to be of any value at all, the benefit the single desk delivers must be substantially more than the costs of loss of control. Otherwise, the trade-off is just not worth it.

So Agster, show me your supporting cost/benefit analysis. The burden of proof lies with single desk supporters like yourself, not the other way around.

[highwayman]

Chuckchuck or Korneychuck or upchuck, whatever your name is, you seem to believe that by deflecting and diverting to the supply management issue that your weak arguments for retention of the single desk will carry more weight. Sadly mistaken. Show me where I have ever expressed support for supply management at any time.The governments current position with SM is one I do not support. The CWB restricts my business in multiple ways every single day. At this point in time I choose to fight the battle closest to me personally. Supply management will have its day in the spotlight I'm sure. If you believe that personal property rights are bull shit then you are truly lost in your ideological fairyland. Where does your sense of entitlement end chucky? With your neighbors tractor, his land, his family?
Parsley my letters to my MP have long since been written and mailed as well as numerous phone calls. But it wont stop there. If it is war they want, it is war they will have. This LUNACY has to end and it will start with Oberg and the crazy 8.

[Jfreedom]

Just a thought if you live near one of the band of
8. There will be land for sale because they will be
held accountable personally.I have been on
plenty of boards in my day and if you knowingly
go against the law or directed policy directors
liability insurance is withdrawn by the company.
Chuck Strahl made it clear in his ministers order
not to spend producers money on self promotion
and preservation. It was appealed to federal
court of Canada and upheld . These clowns have
just bet the farm on this issue. The same policy
usually prevents a director from using in house
legal council so that will be at their personal
expense this little bought of ideology could cost
some of them there farm. There's a new spelling
for stupid in the dictionary it's Oberg

[freewheat]

To those that think a voluntary board
won't work. Excellent! They have had
their chance. I sincerely hope a
voluntary board won't work either. We do
not need a voluntary board for my oats,
canola, peas, flax, canary, etc. I just
depend on evil multi-nationals who
continually screw me. Yet I keep going
back for more...

Why won't you just die, board. Utterly,
completely. DIE!

[sumdumguy]

There is no place for the present board of
directors in the new organization. They have
proven to be inflexible and therefore
unemployable.

[gregpet]

chuck, you never answered why it was consitent for
the former CWB to control the sale of wheat and
barley over farmers only in the designated area and
not the rest of Canada? So get off your supply
management already and answer the question.