As much as some people claim to enjoy the sport of federal politics, I don’t expect even they will have been as excited as they might otherwise be at the way this election campaign has come to pass.
If you’ve somehow been away or asleep all this time — and in either case, you have my congratulations — Prime Minister Mark Carney got approval on March 23 to dissolve the 44th Parliament of Canada and call an election for April 28. Within that tight turnaround, political parties had to get new candidates lined up while incumbents made last-minute decisions on whether to seek re-election. (Among those who decided against running again were Brandon-Souris MP Larry Maguire and Beauce MP Richard Lehoux, both of whom were well-known farmers before entering politics.) For those who remain in the game, signs sprouted in snow-covered front yards before the first shoots of spring had the chance to poke up out of the ground.
Within that time, party leaders and candidates will be doing their level best to get their messages out, but as former prime minister Kim Campbell was infamously quoted to have once said, “an election is no time to discuss serious issues.” Pundits describe that statement as a devastating misstep; she later said she was misquoted, and nine years of accumulated resentment toward Brian Mulroney and a deeply fractured right-of-centre vote split would have crashed down on her anyway in that now-legendary electoral turnover. But unfortunately for all of us — if one interprets her statement the way most of us do — in terms of this election, she would have been absolutely right.
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Successive federal governments have been working to get out of the ad-hoc farm payment business — so whether existing programs fit the bill or not, it’s unsurprising when the feds try to shoehorn problems into one or more of those.
Think about it: as much as we like to think elections are the time to bring the big issues to the fore, most of us only ever see the leaders hustle from brief event to event, from sound bite to sound bite, or knocking on doors with the local candidates in whatever ridings are too close to call. Even the leadership debates, in which discussion of the issues is ostensibly the whole point, are held to tight schedules and quick or superficial answers by both the debate format and the confines of a TV or radio broadcast.
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Making matters far worse is the domination of this federal election cycle by the pronouncements of the one politician who, fortunately for us, isn’t even in the running. U.S. President Donald Trump’s protectionist ramblings, punctuated by incredibly insulting commentary about Canada, are understandably all that anyone is talking about, right now and very possibly for the next four years or more. Within that context, matters such as the well-being of the ag sector are discussed mainly in terms of collateral damage. Even the parties’ agriculture-adjacent announcements — such as on capital gains, AgriStability, export market development, supply management et cetera — are made under pressure of economic threats facing both the export-dependent and supply-managed sectors.
So what are voters to do to make their feelings known? One could, of course, answer the phone when pollsters — or people claiming to be pollsters — start calling, but that doesn’t allow for any nuance in response. We’ve been running a feature on our website this month titled “What do you want to know before voting in Canada’s federal election?” and I do recommend taking part in that if you haven’t already. And I won’t make any predictions about the outcome, but I will make one more suggestion.
If there’s a serious issue affecting your life or your livelihood that hasn’t yet been made clear in any policy document or on the campaign trail with just days to go before the vote — reach out to your candidates. Even if that candidate doesn’t have a whisper of hope in your riding, but their party has a good chance of being able to sway public policy after an election, reach out. Be clear, be thoughtful, be respectful, be patient and be prepared to educate someone who may not have a grasp of the issue. The candidates — and their parties — want to know what matters are top of mind with voters and it’s both our privilege and our responsibility to inform them. Even if this isn’t the time to discuss serious issues, it’s certainly time to make sure the people volunteering for public office know what those issues are.
One other thing
Last month in this space you all got treated to my rant about Canada’s pest management regulatory system and how it seems to have stymied at least one Canadian crop input manufacturer, Vive Crop Protection, whose product roster is largely sold in the U.S. market.
Vive just announced, so I thought you should know, that its one product available in Canada, AZteroid FC 390, has picked up some label expansions for the Canadian market. It’s now registered for control, rather than suppression, of black scurf and stem/stolon canker in potatoes; for in-furrow and banded applications for rhizoctonia control in sugar beets and radishes; and for use in other root crops including carrot, daikon, horseradish, turnip, parsnip, rutabaga and garden beet.
As always, drop me a line with any questions, comments or concerns. We’ll be around to discuss serious issues long after this election is over.
