”
Calling the meeting"an enormous disappointment,” Coutinho wrote, “After eight months of discussion the government presented the group with proposals that were incomplete and had the appearance of being written on the back of a napkin."In an interview Wednesday, Coutinho said the government is still pushing the idea of a subsidy for bottlers, something wine and grape growers are against.
Department spokeswoman Monica MacLean said the government’s proposal included an additional $1.6 million in direct payments for farm wineries bringing the total support to $6.6 million. Commercial wine bottlers would get direct payments capped up to $1 million per year, per producer. Since there are two commercial wine bottlers, they would receive up to $2 million in a fiscal year.