Improves Food Safety

• Amending the Canadian Food Inspection Agency mandate to remove any obligation to promote Canadian agri-business, ensuring the focus is on food safety and food safety only, with enhanced resources for inspection and monitoring.
• Ensuring the quality and wholesomeness of food by strengthening the monitoring of pesticides, herbicides, fungicides, growth hormones, non-therapeutic antibiotics and insecticides in food production, processing and storage, with the goal of an orderly reduction in detectable residues of these substances until they reach undetectable limits.
• Establishing federally funded, community-guided school lunch programs across Canada to ensure that our children have daily access to healthy local food and can learn about sustainable food production and healthy eating.
• Strengthening Plant Protection and Health of Animals Programs with measures to ensure the integrity of farm food products.
• Improving and strengthening the Canadian Organic Standard.
• Providing transitional assistance for those switching to certified organic farming practices.
• Ensuring that no animal by-products are used in ruminant animal feed.
• Introducing testing for BSE.

Provides Food Security

• Moving towards regional food self-sufficiency across Canada, as we begin the shift to organic agriculture as the dominant model of production.
• Supporting the “200 kilometer diet” and locally grown food through expansion of farmers’ markets and local culinary tourism activities.
• Promoting roof top gardens, cultivation of green urban space for agriculture, food production in cities and suburbs, and community gardens.
• Protecting the right of farmers to save their own seed.
• Promoting heritage seed banks and seed exchange programs.

Prevents Corporate Control of the Food Supply

• Reforming agriculture regulations to challenge corporate concentration.
• Ensuring that farm support payments are farm-based (not production-based) to encourage more farms and more farmers.
• Encouraging organic farming methods to improve farm profitability and sustainability.

Learn More: http://elizabethmaymp.ca/vision-green/p1.15

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Not so:

Elizabeth May: Mr. Speaker, we were told by the parliamentary secretary that the budget would show new money for the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. I think what we have here is a case of bait and switch.

If we go to page 168 of the budget, we will see the figure of $51.2 million in new resources under “Strengthening Food Safety” in big letters. That $51.2 million is over two years, split between three different agencies: the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, Health Canada and the Public Health Agency. By my reckoning, that is about $8 million a year if it is distributed evenly.

If we go to the fine print on page 261, we see $2 million less this year, $10 million less the next year and on an ongoing basis $56 million less.

There was the suggestion by the parliamentary secretary when she was speaking that there was $100 million new dollars to the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, but she referred to the 2011 budget.

I have the 2012 budget which clearly shows that the funding for the Canadian Food Inspection Agency is to go down year on year to a $56 million decline, holding steady by 2014.

Following the listeriosis outbreak in 2008, which claimed 22 lives due to contaminated meat products described rather euphemistically as “luncheon meat” and served to seniors in institutions, Minister of Agriculture Gerry Ritz established a public inquiry under Sheila Weatherill, former head of Edmonton’s health department.  The Weatherill Report detailed a culture of complacency and made over 40 recommendations.  In the October 3, 2012 emergency debate, the government claimed all recommendations had been implemented.  It is clear from reviewing those recommendations that they have not been followed.  It is also clear the lessons were not learned.

Elizabeth May: Mr. Speaker, there has been a tremendous amount of confusion tonight between various parties claiming for themselves different facts…

I want to put this to my friend.

The Weatherill Report made a couple of observations that seem not to have been acted on. One of them is found at page 4 of the Weatherill Report, and this is referring to listeriosis. She said: “There was a lack of a sense of urgency at the outset of the outbreak”.

I think we are seeing that again. We are seeing misinformation and delays. The reality of the current crisis is that we do not seem to have learned from the last one.

The Weatherill Report’s starting point was that the concentration of meat production in a handful of giant operations made the system inherently less safe.  But neither Weatherill nor anyone else in the House of Commons seems to think that the model itself is the problem:

Elizabeth May: Mr. Speaker, I want to take this debate to a different level and I want to quote from the Weatherill Report. I think in addition to the fact that we have lost food inspectors and we are concerned about food safety, we may not be addressing the big picture. I just want to cite this from the Weatherill Report:

“The risks of food borne illness are also greater than ever before. Large-scale farming and food processing, the impacts of globalization with foods around the world all contribute to increased opportunities for contamination. These same trends make it harder to trace the source.”

I look at this one plant processing between 2,000 and 5,000 cattle a day, up to 40% of all the beef in Canada, and ask if perhaps the industrialized, concentrated corporate food model is not about food, but about corporate profits, and we would be better to support local farmers, local abattoirs and local processing.

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There are a zillion reasons to support local agriculture – reducing greenhouse gases (shipping apples to BC from New Zealand doesn’t seem to make any sense), supporting our local economy, being sure our children are eating healthy food, taking good care of the land on which it is grown.  And now we have another reason. The E.coli outbreak at the XL slaughter house in Brooks, Alberta, shown a spotlight on the risks of going for the opposite of local — one giant facility slaughtering up to 5,000 cattle a day.

I had a great time at an auction on Salt Spring Island this fall to support the building of a local abattoir. The local abattoir is needed to allow the production of Salt Spring Island lamb. The alternative is to add the huge financial burden of trucking the lambs by ferry to an abattoir up island. Considering I became a vegetarian when I was eight and adopted a pet lamb, I never really saw myself as someone willing to donate for an abattoir. However, with what is going on in the increasingly industrialized, corporate concentrated world of food production, I am ready to chain myself to the next cannery or abattoir I see being shut down. Of course, food contamination can occur in large or small operations. But in small operations, the impact is limited and local and quickly traced. Public health was compromised in the XL case because the key federal agency took nearly two weeks to sort out what products were contaminated and because the scale of the outfit made them hesitate for fear of undermining the image of Canadian beef. We need to fight for local agriculture, for local farmers making a decent living and to assure Canadians that the food we put on the table is safe.   

In This Issue…

• Centre for Plant Health Saved!
• XL Foods – a Few Facts on the Biggest Food Recall in Canadian History
• XL Foods – Moments from the Emergency Debate in the House of Commons – October 3, 2012
• Town Halls Coming in January
• National Food Policy Vision: to Improve Food Safety, Security, and Sovereignty
• Statement on Remembrance Day
• Your opinion matters!
• Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal Awards Ceremony

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Witnesses on October 30th came from the Canadian Meat Council, the Retail Council of Canada, the Dairy Farmers of Canada, and the Canadian Association of Regulated Importers. Each made comments on their impressions of S-11 and answered members questions. Some of the witnesses submitted amendments to the legislation that they thought would improve its overall quality and effectiveness.

During the October 30th meeting Malcolm Allen introduced a motion to allocate a budget of $5 790.00 for the committee’s study of Bill S-11, available here. It was seconded by Vice-Chair Frank Valeriote and was carried by the committee.

The second meeting saw witnesses from from a number of organizations involved directly in the agricultural and agrifoods sector. A witness from the Canadian Association of Importers and Exporters spoke negatively about a number of sections in Bill S-11 that AIECanada thought would hurt importers and exporters of food commodities.

In response to this, Vice-Chair Frank Valeriote introduced a motion to extend the committee’s study of Bill S-11 for two more meetings in order to adequately investigate the witness’ reports and to hear from witnesses from the Department of Agriculture and CFIA. Following this, Randy Hoback moved to suspend the debate on this motion until the in camera portion of the committee meeting.

Once in camera, the committee agreed that amendments to Bill S-11 would have to be submitted to the clerk no later than Monday, November 5th 2012, and that a clause-by-clause consideration of the bill occur on Thursday, November 8th. The Chair of the committee will then report the bill back to the House of Commons by the same date. The committee’s decision can be found here.

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The risks of foodborne illness are also greater than ever before. Large scale farming and food processing…impacts of globalization…with access to foods from around the world, all contribute to increased opportunities for contamination. These same trends make it harder to trace the source….

I look at this one plant processing between 2,000 and 5,000 cattle a day, up to 40% of all the beef in Canada, and ask if perhaps the industrialized, concentrated corporate food model is not about food but about corporate profits and we would be better to support local farmers, local abattoirs and local processing

Hon. Ted Menzies: Mr. Speaker, there are a lot of nonfactual comments in that. We have a system in place to deal with the processes we have in place. It is all wonderful to think that we can go back to only providing food for a 10 mile radius around our homes. That would be a bit of a challenge in downtown Toronto.

We have a safe system that deals with our modern way of producing food, whether it is apples, strawberries or beef. The world moves on and the CFIA has moved on to meet that. We have recognized that.

I would like to correct the hon. member. We actually have more meat inspectors than we had in 2006, 700 more. That sort of rhetoric is what frightens people. That is not helpful. We need to reassure people that the plant is closed. There is no more meat coming out of that plant until the CFIA says that it is safe to do so.

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There has been a tremendous amount of confusion tonight between various parties claiming for themselves different facts. I have gone through budget 2012 and tried to figure it out.

There was the suggestion by the parliamentary secretary that there was $100 million in new funding to the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, but she referred to the 2011 budget. I have the 2012 budget, which clearly shows that the funding for the Canadian Food Inspection Agency is to go down year on year to a $56 million decline, holding steady by 2014. Again, the money that went up was to three different agencies for a two-year period: $52 million over two years split three ways. Potentially it was as much as $8 million to CFIA, while that agency’s funding is going down steadily.

I want to put this to my friend. The Weatherill report made a couple of observations that seem not to have been acted on. One of them is found on page iv of the Weatherill report, and this is referring to listeriosis. It says there was a “lack of a sense of urgency at the outset of the outbreak”.

I think we are seeing that again. We are seeing misinformation and delays. The reality of the current crisis is that we do not seem to have learned from the last one.

Bob Zimmer: Mr. Speaker, again, speaking about the concerns for the Canadian public and the concerns about inspection, on this side of the House, we want to reassure Canadians that the inspection agency has caught the outbreak.

We are dealing with it as we speak and responding to it as it needs to be responded to. This is why the agency exists. It is to do this very thing and catch these potential outbreaks as they enter the market. It has done what it is supposed to do. Unfortunately, it happened. Of course, we wish it would not have happened.

To speak to the member’s question, I think she just added further confusion for all the people who are watching tonight. I do not think she made it any clearer. Again, I will speak to the fact that we have added 700 food inspectors since 2006. It is pretty simple. It includes 170 meat inspectors. At XL Foods there has been an increase of inspection staff there.

In essence, CFIA did catch it. It is still there and, again, we wish this did not happen. However, the CFIA has done its job and caught it. I think CFIA is doing what it is supposed to do.

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If we go to page 168 of the budget, we will see the figure of $51.2 million in new resources under “Strengthening Food Safety” in big letters. That $51.2 million is over two years, split between three different agencies: the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, Health Canada and the Public Health Agency. By my reckoning, that is about $8 million a year if it were distributed evenly.

If we go to the fine print on page 261, which my friend from Welland noticed, we see $2 million less this year, $10 million less the next year and on an ongoing basis $56 million less. Does my hon. friend agree with me that there is less money for the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, relying on the facts in the budget?

Malcolm Allen: Mr. Speaker, as much as the other side continues to say that opposition members do not read its budget, lo and behold, we do.

There is one thing I can say about being a Glaswegian, that when it comes to numbers and money I am always looking. I will always find if someone is trying to shortchange someone else, because a nickel or penny to us Scots is expensive, and we are going to hunt for it.

I found that the budget intends to give less on an ongoing basis, as we head forward. Yes, my colleague is correct. It is written in tiny print, but I do wear glasses and if I have to really work at it, I shift the bad lens to the bad eye to make it look bigger and I can actually see it. That is how I am actually read that tiny print.

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I  submitted amendments to redress the changes, as did Liberal and NDP MPs, but, there was no willingness on the part of the Harper Conservatives to reconsider food safety and controls on prescription drugs.  No surprise.  As we all know, the 425 page bill passed into law at break-neck speed without a single amendment at committee or report stage.

The buzz-words stayed the same as Bill C-38 waded into reducing consumer access to information, and potentially reducing the safety of our foods and drugs.

The changes are to “streamline” the approval of new food additives, ingredients and food modifications.  The industry leaders in food retailing heralded the changes.  According to the industry association, Food and Consumer Products of Canada, Canada has been lagging behind other countries due to our onerous regulations.  What dire negative impact is there as a result of undue regulation of food safety?  Apparently, Canadians have been suffering as regulations have been “seriously limiting consumer choice in the marketplace.” I wonder if these guys have been in the “marketplace” lately.  The array of consumer choice for everything from toothpaste to olive oil is dizzying.  But apparently, Canadians are deprived of “choice.”

So thanks to C-38, a range of decisions that used to run the normal course of regulation-making will no longer receive the public and Parliamentary oversight implicit in promulgating regulations.  Decisions are reduced to non-regulatory lists and the minister of health can approve new food products, as long as a previous assessment of the additive was made for other products. “Interim marketing authorizations” can be granted without moving through regulation.  And unlike the previous law, the interim authorization could remain in place indefinitely.

Meanwhile, regulations of food safety with regard to contamination with hazardous substances have been relaxed. The requirement that the Minister had to conclude that “the food would not be harmful to the health of the purchaser or consumer” has been removed.  This will allow the minister to allow the sale of products with levels of pesticides, veterinary drugs or food additives without determining first that the food would not be harmful.  There was no explanation for removing this protection.

In the area of prescription drugs, regulations were also removed.  The minister will no longer have to post proposed new prescription drugs to the Canada Gazette.  The minister will establish a “list that sets out prescription drugs, classes of prescription drugs or both.” And the list is “not a regulation within the meaning of the Statutory Instruments Act.”  More great streamlining for Big Pharma.

What Canadian consumers really want is more product information.  Canadians want labels to allow us to differentiate between products containing genetically modified organisms and those without.  We want the label information to tell us more clearly what parts of prepared food products are locally grown, or at least grown in Canada.

These areas require attention.  Meanwhile, the Harper Conservatives are relaxing food and drug safety regulation in the interest of rushing new food and pharmaceutical products to, what they apparently conceive, as a barren and lonely marketplace, where Canadians yearn for the next new clean-minty-whitening-with green swirls-stand up by itself tube of toothpaste.

Elizabeth May is the Member of Parliament for Saanich-Gulf Islands and Leader of the Green Party of Canada.
Originally printed in the Hill Times.

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