Sask. accusing federal employees of trespassing to get water samples

The Saskatchewan government has questions for the federal government about water samples.

A letter to federal Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault, Jeremy Cockrill — Saskatchewan’s minister responsible for the Water Security Agency — asks why federal employees allegedly took water samples from farms in the Pense, Mossbank and Pilot Butte areas recently without asking for permission from the farmers.

“The letter is, ‘What are you doing? Please tell us and if you don’t tell us and you continue to do this, then there’s consequences to that,’ ” Cockrill told The Canadian Press.

The letter lays out the penalties for trespassing under Saskatchewan laws.

“When these federal employees were approached by one producer and asked why they were there, they communicated that they were there to test for pesticide residue and for nitrates,” Cockrill said in an interview with the wire service.

The letter says the testers were in clearly marked Government of Canada vehicles and accessed water supplies on private lands.

“The lands and water body, a producer’s dugout, are both privately owned,” it read. “Government of Canada representatives did not request permission to enter from the landowner, nor did they seek permission to perform testing or advise landowners of any other purpose or necessity for attendance.”

In the letter, Cockrill demands an explanation since water quality management is a provincial matter.

He wrote the testing “has created unnecessary fear and disruption to our citizens while also displaying a disappointing act of bad faith.”

He also asks what authority the employees were acting under when they entered the farmers’ land without seeking permission.

Cockrill said the feds should stop going onto farmers’ land without asking permission, stop testing, and tell the Water Security Agency what’s going on.

The federal

— With files from The Canadian Press

We are demanding an explanation from federal Minister @s_guilbeault on why his department is trespassing on private land without the owners’ permission to take water samples from dugouts. We have received reports of this occurring in several places throughout Saskatchewan. pic.twitter.com/CDKUtSkPhM

— Jeremy Cockrill (@jeremycockrill) August 21, 2022