The Government of Manitoba sought feedback from the public on potential legislative changes to tackle rural crime
Staff Writer
Farms.com
Representatives from Keystone Agricultural Producers (KAP) recently submitted their comments on the Government of Manitoba’s consultation on rural crime, biosecurity and metal theft.
The consultation looked at changes to four pieces of legislation:
- Amendments to the Petty Trespasses Act (PTA)
- Amendments to the Occupiers' Liability Act (OLA)
- Amendments to the Animal Diseases Act (ADA)
- New scrap metal dealer legislation to combat metal theft by bringing transparency and accountability to scrap metal sellers’ transactions
KAP’s submission focused on the first three legislative amendments.
Since 2018, 5 per cent of resolutions passed by members through grassroots democracy relate to rural trespassing and biosecurity, the submission said.
“From our members, we've heard a lot of comments and incidences of rural crime happening,” said Bill Campbell, the president of KAP. “We've compiled some data and had a webinar (about the issue of) trespassing. We spoke with some government officials, lawyers and RCMP officials, and obtained quite a bit of clarity about this whole conversation.”
KAP’s submission highlights members’ concerns and outlines some potential solutions or changes that the government could make, said Campbell.
“We need to get a handle on some of these issues so that citizens and producers feel safe in rural Manitoba,” Campbell told Farms.com.
Changes to the legislation would follow what Saskatchewan and Alberta have done in modernizing property rights, said Campbell.
“We made farmers’ opinions well known to the government and, hopefully, (officials) will deal with the positive changes that are needed,” he said.
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