For Immediate Release:
July 26, 2011
LEAMINGTON – Haldimand-Norfolk MPP Toby Barrett and Chatham-Kent-Essex PC Candidate Rick Nicholls heard red tape is smothering Leamington-area farmers during a meeting today.
Ten farmers met with Barrett and Nicholls at CF Greenhouses, a potted plant operation in Leamington, as part of Barrett’s tour of western Lake Erie to gain input from people prior to this fall’s election. Farmers at the meeting represented greenhouse flower and tomato operations, vegetable processors and cash crop producers.
“What the farmers indicated to myself and Rick Nicholls were issues of red tape have become a red blanket that is suffocating their initiatives,” Barrett said. “Red tape with respect to Permits to Take Water, pesticide regulations, access to natural gas pipelines, issues around nutrient management and wastewater.”
“Like other small businesses, farmers are being overrun by regulations and red tape that are delaying their business initiatives,” Nicholls said.
In Dalton McGuinty’s Ontario, there are an estimated half-million separate regulations that businesses, not for profits, and municipalities must comply with – the worst regulatory burden in Canada. Each of these regulations takes time and money away from growing a business and creating jobs.
Barrett and Nicholls presented the farmers with an alternative that will eliminate job-killing red tape. Tim Hudak and the Ontario PC Party will cut red tape by:
● Appointing a minister responsible for reducing the regulatory burden by 30%.
● Hold the Premier and Cabinet accountable by docking their pay if this important goal is missed.
● Give small businesses a formal, impossible to ignore voice in any new legislation or regulation that affects our economy, with the Small Business Bill of Rights.
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For more information, please contact MPP Toby Barrett at: (416) 325-8404,
(519) 428-0446 or 1-800-903-8629