Farmers ‘phased out’

Clamp vise on dairy farms

By B. F.

The squeeze being put on the
grain-growing farmers on the
Prairies is being duplicated in
the case of the dairy farmers
mainly of central Canada. Agri-
culture is being brought under
the multinational corporation

control and whole areas of farm- -
ing, together with large num- .
are being

bers of farmers,
“phased out”, =

The economic domination of
the U.S.-based multinational cor-
poration over. all basic industry
has already been effected. Agri-
culture is now being tied in.

In 1969 the Pearson Govern-
ment had passed the Canadian
Dairy Commission Act, which
incorporates the entire dairy in-
dustry of Canada under the Gov-
ernor-in-Council. The Act estab-
lishes a Commission of three,
appointed for pleasure (or until
they are aged 70) by the Gov-
ernor-in-Council.

The Commision may “pur-
chase any dairy product and
package, process, store, ship, in-

sure, import, export, or sell, or -

otherwise dispose of any dairy
product purchased by it.” It may
also “make payments’ for the
benefit of producers of milk’ and
cream for the purpose of stabil-
izing the price of those pro-
ducts.”

The funds for payment of
commisioners’ salaries, travell-
ing expenses and administra-
tion will come from Parliament,
but the expenditures considered
by the Minister as directly attri-
butable to actions of the- com-
mission to stabilize the price of

_any> dairy product will come
from the Consolidated Revenue
Fund account recording the
moneys received by the commis-
sion from license fees, levies
and charges and from loans
made by the Minister of Finance,
up to $100 million.

The Governor-in-Council dic-
tates quotas, agencies, issue of
licences, fees, etc. form of book-
keeping, etc., and may seize and
dispose of products marketted
illegally.

Under the Act the agencies
of the Commission ~ may in
agreement with provincial gov-
ernments take over and exer-
cise powers and functions for-
merly carried on by the Pro-
vince. -

‘Modernize’ Farming

Following the passage of this
Act a real drive got under way.
for modernization of dairy farm-
ing, for the increasing of “effi-
ciency”, “quality”, etc., to raise
“competitiveness” of the pro-
duct.

Reaction of the dairy farmers
of Canada was immediate, and
nation-wide, although the main
concern was felt among the
dairy farmers of Ontario and
Quebec.

By May 1967 over 20,000
angry farmers from Ontario and
-Quebec were demonstrating on
Parliament Hill, complaining

that their call for a national

conference on. agriculture had
‘not been met, that their demand
for a new dairy policy was ig-
nored, that they had been de-
nied an independent committee

to develop long-term agricultu-

ral policy for Eastern Canada.

This was just the beginning
of the dairy farmers’ battle,
which still rages.

Elimination Measures
In 1969 came the federal

policy of limitation of acreage.

5,000 farmers meet in Regina

ment wheat policy.

in wheat farming which can
eliminate the wheat farmer as
an independent producer; and
on March 17, 1970 Bill C-197,
An Act to Establish the’ Natio-
nal Farm Products Marketing
Council, and to .authorize the
establishment of national mar-
keting agencies for farm pro-
ducts was introduced into the
House at Ottawa. It. passed
second reading in. May.

Bill C-197 applies to any farm
product that is not a regulated
product.

Incorporate Farming

Bill C-197 would in effect in-—

corporate agricultural products
and marketing under the Gov-

ernor-in-council which appoints ©

the national farm products mar-
keting council of from 3 to 9
persons to hold office during
pleasure, and whose members
when absent are replaceable by
Goyernor-in-Council appointees.
The object of this council is to
advise the Minister of Agricul-
ture on the establishment and
operation of agencies “with a
view to maintaining and pro-
moting an efficient and competi-
tive agricultural industry.”

Those agencies ‘‘may purchase
any farm product, wherever
grown or produced that is of the
same kind as the regulated pro-
duct in relation to which it may
exercise its powers and package,
process, store, ship, export or
sell or otherwise dispose of any
such product purchased by it”
and it ‘may implement a mar-
keting plan which the Governor-
in-Council proclaims. :

Squeeze Farmers Out

Once passed, Bill C-197 will

complete the incorporation of

all Canadian agricultural pro-
duction and marketing in a fe-

New tractor

LENINGRAD — An electro-
hydraulic system for automatic
driving of the wheeled tractor
has been developed here. The
driver will no longer have to
watch the tractor move and to

steer it. The system takes over. °

The watching device, mounted
onthe nose, moves along the
edge of the furrow. As soon as
the tractor starts deviating from
the course, the support of the
devise, by inclining to one side,
signals the hydraulic steering
system which returns: the ma-
chine to the set course. At the
end of the furrow, an automatic
device turns back the tractor.
Tests have shown that the
automatic drive is reliable in
operation and ensures _high-
quality ploughing. No refitting
of parts is required to mount it.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, JULY 17, 1970—Page.4

to protest the Trudeau Govern-

derally controlled national sys-
tem. The independent farmer
vanishes; tens of thousands of
“inefficient” farms are forced
out of existence, either through
forced ‘sale or forced retirement,
and ex-farmers ‘swell the ranks
of the urban and rural unem-
ployed. The proletarianized farm
population finds itself the crea-
ture of a monopoly-capitalist
corporate state.

This persepective brought the
dairy farmers into action from
Ontario and Quebec, more than
half of them from Quebec

‘where 63% of the farms get
more 50% of their revenue from
milk, and the national policy on

- marketing of dairy products is
vital.

By W. STEWART

A provincial tax strike which
originated amongst the farmers
in Essex and Lambton Counties
has now extended to cover the
entire province of Ontario and
faces the Robarts Government

with one of the biggest crises of .

its term of office:
Launched by the Ontario. Fe-

deration of Agriculture and join-.

‘ed by the National Farmers
Union, the strike called on all
farmers to withhold education
taxes this fall and is designed to
force the provincial government
to pay 100% of education costs.
At present 49% of education
costs, on a province wide basis,
are charged against real estate,
In cities like Toronto and Ha-
milton a much higher percent-
age, somewhere between 70 and
75% is charged against local
real estate.

Malcolm Davidson, executive
member of the OFA, has ex-
pressed the hope that all: rural
and urban ratepayers’ organiza-
tions across Ontario will join in
support of the campaign, which
has already seen thousands of
farmers signing petitions pledg-
ing to withhold their taxes.

With a provincial election ru-
mored for 1971, possibly in the
spring, the issue is dynamite for
the Tories who draw most of
their electoral
rural areas. |

NDP Ontario Leader Donald
MacDonald has urged urban
support for the tax strike and
the entire issue shapes up into
a hot potato which will have the
Robarts strategists heading for
the political drafting boards.

The farmers’ action culmin-
ates a decade of. frustrating
struggles for meaningful tax re-
form in Ontario which has seen

Prairie CP Conference ;

virtual unanimity among elected

strength from.

Monopolies in saddle |

EDMONTON—Meeting here in
special conference last week,
the representatives of the Com-
munist Party organizations in

“the three Prairie provinces con-

demned the Report of the Fe-
deral Task Force on Agriculture
as “the handbook of the big
monopoly interests for the pur-
pose of expanding and deepen-
ing monopoly control over agri-
culture.”

A press statement, signed by
Alberta provincial leader W. A.

‘Toumi, Saskatchewan leader F.

J. Schofield, and Manitoba lead-
er W. C. Ross, said:

“While the Report has not
been debated or approved by

Parliament, sections of it are al--

ready active policy of the

Trudeau Government, such as.

LIFT for example. The Report
spells out, in cold - blooded
terms, the long-term plan of
monopoly capitalism to fully in-
tegrate. Canadian agriculture
with that of the United States
which, if successful, will ruth-
lessly drive another million peo-
ple off the land and destroy
much of the job-creating poten-
tial of agriculture for Canadian
workers.

“At the present. time Cana-
dian agriculture creates many
hundreds of thousands of jobs
and, in terms of both the goods
used by agriculture and the ma-
nufacturing and retailing of
farm products, represents 42%
of Canada’s Gross National Pro-

civic Officials, ratepayers’
groups, farmers, the NDP and
the Communist Party that real
estate could not and should not
form the base for education
financing. oa

The monotonous answer of
the provincial government, re-
pealed as late as at the Ontario
Association of Mayors and
Reeves held in Windsor last
May, has been that there’s only
so much money to go around
and if it doesn’t come from real
estate it will have to come from
other taxes levied against the
same sources.

Drastic increases in education
costs and the impact of provin-
cial government reassessment
policies over the past few years
have driven farmers and house-
holder to the point of despara-
tion and what is now shaping
up is an active confrontation
where the people’s muscle is be-
ing placed behind their repeated
appeals for new tax policies.

The labor movement, ratepay-
ers groups and tax reform move-
ments should very carefully
consider the request of the On-
tario farmers for a massive tax
strike beginning this fall and
continuing until the Govern-
ment removes the education tax
from real estate. Certainly the
time for talking is past and the
time for action is here. Resolu-
tions have served the purpose
of defining the issue and pre-
paring the way but a new stage
in the struggle is indicated by
the bold action of the farmers.

Farm officials point out that
the 1% per month penalty le-
vied by the municipalities for
failure to pay taxes on date
could be largely offset by de-
positing tax money in the bank

_farm lands sold, leasing i

duct. Thus the implementati
of the’ Report, which the 7M
deau Administration is hell-
on doing, will create even a
unemployment, and further ol f
er the standards of life for 2
farmers and all Canadian WOM —
ing people.

Phe. Communist Party .
Canada calls upon all farmers :
work for broad, united action
by farmers and workers for 4.
ternative policies which Oe
fully ‘develop our tremendon”
agricultural potential in the
terests of all Canadians. 5
“Such a program deman ie
new policies to open UP es! al
for wheat and other agricul.
products—policies which bf
with the present Cold War,
tinentalist aims now follow? 7
Ottawa — and for democra’
tax reform; for protection
the farmers from the price
squeeze, for a moratorium It .
farm debts, and for a Sa
million dollar program of ea
development and’ reconstruct?
to raise the standard of life

4

Com

ee
our rural areas to at least equ’

that of the industrial workite
class. in

“The Communist Party Ore
ference also agreed to call a
federal-provincial co - operatld”
to nationalize all land in Cana”,
by government purchie®
permanent ownership t back
to the farmer now farming it
to his family if they remain
farmers.”

or investing it in a safe security
which would bring betwee? a
and 9%, taking care of betwe
half and three-quarters of 7
penalty. For the municipalit!

"and the Provincial Governmé

the loss of revenue would Pr
cipitate a crisis which wo! a
require some immediate actiOl’

The Ontario farmers are Pf Cs
posing that the monies for fin:
ancing the total cost of edu
tion be drawn from income ly
corporation taxes. Unfortunaté
this seems to open the door |
the introduction of a provincl#”
income tax system which
Robarts Government has if
leading up to for some time. he
however, it is meant that VA
monies should come from Fed
ral income tax sources throué
education grants to the Ld
vince, that of course would
acceptable. : ae

Otherwise it weakens a
case of the farmers and a
workers to suggest that takife
the tax off real estate and levy
ing it in another way on
same people who pay it no
homeowners and renters, WOU
provide any meaningful solutl®
to the problem.

pee®

all

The major focus has to be on.

wealth _ producing property;
through a capital gains taX%
recasting of existing taxation —”
achieve higher yields from ©
tractive and wealth product
property, and civic taxes aim

at those who use the facilities ©

the cities and towns for the P¥
pose of accumulating wealth.
The Communist Party
carefully worked out propo
for solving the Ontario W
crisis. These proposals are 10)
advanced again as part of e
public discussion which ™
bound to: take on new dime?
sions in the new tax struggle

nas
als