03) LABOUR-FARMER UNITY NEEDED TO SAVE WHEAT BOARD
The Communist Party is urging a broad and strong fight to defeat the dictatorial Conservative Party plan to demolish the Canadian Wheat Board. Thousands of farmers turned out at meetings across the prairie provinces during August, most expressing their opposition to the Harper government's drive to gut the CWB by 2012.
In an Aug. 14 statement, the Party's Central Executive said that "Strong Labour‑Farmer unity is needed now to save the family farm, to protect Canadian food sovereignty and to help end the domination of the global grain trade by the handful of corporations now responsible for mass famine and death throughout the world.
"Destroying the Canadian Wheat Board as a single‑desk seller of wheat and barley will be a fatal blow to thousands of family farms in Western Canada. It will accelerate the growth of mega‑corporate farms at the expense of smaller farms.
"Most importantly, the main beneficiaries are the handful of corporations which now dominate the global grain trade. Removing the democratically‑run CWB from the global grain trade will be an added incentive for global grain corporations to act as a monopoly‑cartel with price‑setting and hoarding of stocks.
"These corporations put profit ahead of the starving and malnourished millions. Cereal grain consumer prices are at a record high this year, matching those of 2008/09 when the top five grain corporations made a combined $266 billion profit, a year with food hunger riots in 26 countries.
"The main fight now is to save the Canadian Wheat Board. But should the Harper Conservatives value their corporate accomplices more than millions of newly roused and informed voters in Western Canada, we will support efforts to establish provincial marketing boards in provinces such as Manitoba that support democracy for farmers.
"The Communist Party welcomes the petition launched by the Manitoba government defending the Canadian Wheat Board. The government should state it is ready to replace the CWB at the provincial level should the Conservatives succeed in carrying through their threat. It is not enough to point an accurate finger of blame if you have the power to make real change.
"In this hour of need for the family farm and global food security, the labour movement must step forward. Since the defeat of Farmer‑Labour governments in Canada in the 1920s, the family farm has been under constant attack by the growing monopoly corporate price‑cost squeeze and government policies such as ending the Crow Rate transportation subsidy.
"As a Party that has been part of the struggle for 90 years, we say the need for labour‑farmer unity has never been greater.
"If you are a doctor or a lawyer or any other professional, governments mainly leave it up to you and your colleagues to figure out what happens in your industry. Not so with farmers. That is because an enormous amount of money made from agriculture ends up in the pockets of the big corporations.
"Farmers are working people, many with jobs off the farm. Sometimes these jobs are unionized. Since commercial farming started in Western Canada, farmers have been the target of corporate plundering, at times sparking strong resistance by farmers.
"After the First World War the Progressive and other farmer political parties won power across Western Canada and in Ontario. These governments were supported by Labour politicians and became genuine Farmer‑Labour governments which enacted measures that still protect farmers and Labour today.
"Such unity today will bring similar needed advances. This is the time to return to a strategy that worked in the past. It is the only strategy that has ever worked!
"The labour movement knows what it would be like if the federal government ripped up every collective agreement in Canada on the grounds that workers need to market their skills to a wider variety of employers. Many labour bodies have passed resolutions of support for the CWB and single‑desk selling.
"This is a strong basis for unity in the fight for the Canadian Wheat Board.
"The enormous fraud and rigging by the Conservative government in past Wheat Board related votes should never be repeated. This is a government that betrays its agenda by dropping smaller farmers from the voter rolls. It is a government that is moving to `One Corporation ‑ One Vote' at home and `One Tank, One Vote' abroad.
"We support the idea of `One farmer ‑ One Vote' and votes for those who work the soil. Why should farm corporations be on a voter roll? We do not allow corporations the vote in other elections. All who work the soil should be able to vote on marketing issues."
(The above article is from the September 1-15, 2011, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $30/year, or $15 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $45 US per year; other overseas readers - $45 US or $50 CDN per year. Send to People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 706 Clark Drive, Vancouver, BC, V5L 3J1.)