Protesters rally at provincial border
Bobby Vienneau and Josie Gautreau set off early Monday morning in their tractors for the Nova Scotia border.
“He’d have gotten here a lot faster if he didn’t wait for me – my tractor’s slow,” said Gautreau, who runs a llama farm outside Shediac, N.B.
Their tractors joined hundreds of other vehicles, many of which were agricultural machines, at the Axe the Tax protest along the east and west lanes of the Transcanada Highway where it crosses the border,
“It’s not just the carbon tax,” said Vienneau.
“It’s everything. Farmers have to buy everything at a high price and sell everything at a fair price. So we can’t even break even.”
Vienneau took issue with the federal government’s claims that farmers and fishermen get an exemption from the carbon tax. He said despite having 350 head of cattle, his farm is considered too small to qualify for the exemption.
“We’re farmers, contractors, woodsmen, small-business people,” said Larry Mccrea, himself a retired farmer from outside Sussex.
“They say we all get a rebate, and we do. But for farmers, we have to pay its cost on feed, fertilizer, fuel itself, parts, labour.”
Krista Chisholm, who runs Maritime Agricultural Services, said federal government policies have made it increasingly hard for anyone in her industry to do business.
With diesel at around $1.86 a litre, it costs them more than $2,000 to fill their tractor trailer – something they have to do every two days.
“Five years ago, it was 98 cents a litre,” said Chisholm.
“I get up every morning and wonder am I going to make any money today or am I going to give it all to the government.”
On the other side of the highway, Tyson Mcewan
stood beside a flatbed truck done up as an Axe-the-tax float.
Mcewan runs a fleet of tow trucks out of Havre Boucher, Antigonish County.
“I have to buy a lot of fuel,” said Mcewan.
“I have to pass that cost onto my customers. People just can’t afford it anymore.”
Cars honked and people waved as the sun lowered on the Tantramar Marsh Monday evening.
Many protesters planned to stay the night and continue their protest into Tuesday.
But not Gautreau. “I’ve got animals to feed,” she said.