I am writing to express the profound consternation all farmers have with CN Rail’s announcement of the delisting, or closing, of numerous producer car loading sites in Western Canada.
Producer car loading sites are an absolute necessity if farmers are going to be able to exercise their hard-fought right to load rail cars themselves. If they do not have a large number of widely dispersed and accessible loading sites, their right is effectively extinguished. If a farmer does not have access to a loading site within a reasonable distance from his farm, he cannot get the grain to a railway car in the short time frame the railways require for loading.
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Bill C-202 wound up pitting farmer against farmer for political reasons at a time when an unwritten law of Canadian politics remains very much in effect anyway.
The right to a producer car is of overarching importance. It allows a farmer to order a car and have it spotted (at the railways’ convenience) for him to load. It guarantees a farmer access to rail service.CNis saying that because
farmers have rarely used these points, the onus should be on farmers to bring CN a proposal that guarantees a suitable amount of grain cars will be shipped.
By taking this stance, CN is usurping the historic right of
