The Rural Voice, 1989-11, Page 39„rr
Tony Morris, a farm management
advisor based in Mildmay, has been
assisting with the case since the fall of
1986. He stresses that the Wrights have
managed their farm well. If their records
hadn't been so good, he says, they would
have had a much tougher time stating
their case in court.
and lab tests, and finally after switch-
ing feed companies in April of 1985
and finding their cattle returning to
health (gaining more than 2.5 daily),
the Wrights took the case to court.
The District Court judge found
New Life Mills liable for the damage
caused to the Wrights' operation, cit-
ing a breach of contract and negligent
representations to Jack Wright by New
Life employees. The use of refuse
screenings rather than Western wheat
screenings and the presence of four
times the amount of Rumensin al-
lowed in feed by Agriculture Canada's
Medicated Ingredients Brochure were
aspects of evidence heard by the court.
But since the appeal was launched
by New Life in June, and with the
Bank of Montreal suggesting that the
Wrights sell off 200 acres to pay their
loan, the Wrights are between the pro-
verbial rock and hard place. "I'm at a
standstill,” says Jack.
And while the settlement could
have put the Wrights back in business,
health problems — Jack's had five
heart attacks in the past four years,
The Wright farm in Huron County.
Shirley has developed an ulcer — and
a stopped -up cash flow mean that the
bank loan at 13 1/2 per cent interest is
overtaking the award of $186,566,
even if the Wrights do get the money.
And the Wrights don't want to sell.
They want to farm.
Jack Wright has been farming for
29 years — the place was his grand-
father's before him. Despite a bam
fire in 1978 which took 200 head of
cattle and put an end to dairying, by
1981 the Wrights had three barns for
feeder cattle, owned all their land, a
complete line of equipment, and owed
the bank only $26,000. The Wrights
were known for promptly paying their
bills and had a good relationship with
their banker. "I have never in 29 years
bought a new tractor," Jack says.
Farm management specialist Tony
Morris stresses the Wrights' good
financial management. If their records
hadn't been so good, he says, they
would have had a much tougher time
stating their case in court.
After their experience of the past
five years, the Wrights say they are
fighting for two reasons: one, they'd
lose everything if they didn't, and two,
there's a principle involved. They call
their struggle a "David and Goliath"
confrontation.
"If it had been a mistake I had
made," Jack says, "that would be a
different thing."
Not that Jack didn't suffer what
Tony Morris calls the "farmer's syn-
drome." He blamed himself. "It took
quite a while to convince him that it
wasn't his fault," Morris says.
"I accused myself," Jack says. "I
said to myself, 'I should have seen this
sooner.' But it wasn't a matter of
neglect."
"It's been a nightmare."
"You have no way of expressing
to anyone ... the kind of stress that a
family goes through," adds Shirley,
who watched Jack pace nights as he
tried to pinpoint what was going
wrong in the hams. The Wrights have
three daughters, two of them married,
and the family was there to help
throughout the months it took to
prepare and present their case.
But Jack Wright, who may suffer
from "farmer's syndrome," also shares
something of that other trait so often
ascribed to farmers: optimism. "I
have no doubt in my mind that I'm
going to win the appeal and carry on."
How? He doesn't know. But, says
Tony Morris, "There has to be some
way of getting support to try to keep
this thing alive."
The Wrights say they hope that
their fight will benefit other farmers.
They caution that there aren't enough
safeguards on the delivery of feed.
"The farmer is basically very trust-
ing," adds Tony Morris, who says that
not only should farmers be more cau-
tious, but that feed mills should be a
little more careful and that Agriculture
Canada might need to police the feed
system a little more.
The Wrights recommend that
farmers take extra trouble to know
what's in the feed they purchase,
particularly when buying pelleted feed
because it's hard to tell what's in it.
They also recommend that farmers
periodically keep samples of the feed
being trucked in to their farms. And
they're concerned about the effect that
NOVEMBER 1989 37