Senator Rob Black gets around. Appointed in 2018, he’s earned a reputation for his diligent commitment to agriculture issues and ensuring they get their fair share of attention in the upper house of Canada’s parliament.
Black was on hand this week at the Ontario Federation of Agriculture AGM at Toronto where he kicked off the proceedings with an update on a host of agriculture legislation working its way through the Senate. In true Black fashion, he had a boots-on-the-ground story to share with delegates, noting how he had just flown in from Edmonton where he was visiting a horse farm to get a better perspective on issues surrounding Bill C-355, legislation that would prohibit export by air of horses for slaughter.
“Over the last day and a half, I traveled to Edmonton to a horse farm. 99 horses were loaded onto trucks and we followed them to the airport. They were offloaded into crates, three per crate. They were not crammed in there or pushed in there. They had lots of room in those crates,” says Black. The horses and their crates were then loaded onto a Korean airliner and flown to Japan, he noted.
A whirlwind of meetings and travel keeps Black constantly on his toes and on the move. It’s a commitment that has won him the respect of farmers and agriculture stakeholders across the country. No longer is agriculture rarely discussed in the senate — it’s debated weekly, almost daily, in the chamber — and Black is typically engaged in the conversation.
“I have talked to horse farmers who have horses that are sold live to Japan. And I’ve also talked to folks on the other side of the of the bill, [including] Animal Justice, to hear their comments. I think it’s important to know all sides of the issue before I can better stand up in the Senate chamber and talk about the issue,” says Black. Story continues after the interview.
Black has certainly worn out some shoes standing in the Senate chamber in his commitment to shine a spotlight on agriculture and spearhead discussion on farming legislation before the chamber. He’s led the effort to shepherd Bill C-234 — the attempt to remove federal carbon tax from natural gas and propane used on farms — through the Senate in the face of ongoing Liberal government efforts to amend and delay the legislation. He admits his hopes for the legislation are waning with it stalled in the House of Commons and an election looming.
But there’s plenty of other work to be done. In this interview, recorded after he concluded his remarks at the OFA meeting, Black notes that the Senate currently has a stack of agriculture-related legislation and issues before it for debate. This includes proposed health of animals biosecurity legislation (Bill C-275); amendments to bankruptcy and insolvency rules to protect fruit and vegetable sellers (Bill C-280); legislation to protect Canada’s supply management policy (Bill C-282); and the horse slaughter rules.
Black is also busy plotting the next steps for the Senate’s soil health and risk report he helped champion — Critical Ground: why soil is essential to Canada’s economic, environmental, human and social health. In 2025, he also intends to engage stakeholders on land use planning and food security in what promises to be another busy year.
Related: The time is now for a national soil strategy
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