Agriculture Committee on Nov. 6th, 2025

[Jacques Gourde, Conservative, Lévis—Lotbinière, QC]

Thank you to all the witnesses.

That's all for me, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Michael Coteau]

Thank you very much.

We'll go to MP Dandurand of the Liberals for five minutes.

[Marianne Dandurand, Liberal, Compton—Stanstead, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Ms. Bawden, I'd like to talk about your former mandate at the Canadian Food Inspection Agency.

Could you tell us what you were responsible for when you were the redress officer?

[Merril Bawden]

Certainly. The complaints and appeals office, as it was called under the chief redress officer, was established to review complaints related to service quality, administrative errors and process concerns with relation to regulatory decisions.

It did not have the authority to reverse or alter decisions; instead, stakeholders looking to challenge a regulatory decision would be required to pursue formal legal mechanisms, such as judicial review.

[Marianne Dandurand, Liberal, Compton—Stanstead, QC]

Thank you.

Do the tasks you did at the time still exist? Is what you dealt with managed by other positions within the Canadian Food Inspection Agency?

[Merril Bawden]

There are mechanisms in place, and I will defer to my colleague, Ms. MacDonald, to speak to the escalation process within operations branch for how a complaint would be addressed in the current context.

[Pamela MacDonald]

Thank you.

If a complaint comes in and needs to be escalated through the existing process, stakeholders are able to leverage what we call the chain of command. They can speak to the managerial hierarchy that exists in the region, and they can speak to the senior director, an arm's-length executive in each area who doesn't have line accountability for the inspectors but has the delegated authority to be able to make an inspection decision and, in fact, overturn one if it becomes necessary.

The stakeholders can escalate their complaints up to the vice-president and even, in some cases, to our president if they so choose. Each of those layers has accountability and an ability to respond to complaints.

[Marianne Dandurand, Liberal, Compton—Stanstead, QC]

Thank you, ladies.

Ms. Mailloux, you've heard about how it works.

Is that the kind of thing an ombud does as well? Are an ombud's tasks similar to that?

[Nadine Mailloux]

What we do generally reflects the practice of ombuds. I'm a legislative ombud. It's important to point out that I'm not in contact with any department at the City of Montreal; I report to the municipal council. There is no interference from the City in terms of the decisions I make about a complaint.

When a complaint is received, we have access to all the documents and information held by the City. Based on that information, and with the assistance of our legal team, we review the complaint and come to conclusions that will determine whether or not the complaint is founded. Then we make recommendations to the City.

Obviously, we hold discussions with City authorities. However, at no point in the process is there any interference by the authorities with respect to the outcome of the complaint in question.

[Marianne Dandurand, Liberal, Compton—Stanstead, QC]

Thank you.

Were there more internal processes in the various jobs you held? You talk about an external, independent process. Have you ever seen internal processes such as the one used at the Canadian Food Inspection Agency?

[Nadine Mailloux]

I've seen internal processes, and I don't think it's a bad thing to have a process for expressing everyday dissatisfaction—quite the contrary. I do think that organizations would be well served, on an everyday basis, to try to resolve matters through internal proceedings.

We consider ourselves external to the City. Actually, I prefer to say independent because we are all employees of the City of Montreal. I report to city council. When I'm looking at a file, I'm not looking at a decision that I or my colleague made. I'm looking at a decision from completely outside the decision-making process that led to that decision and that is potentially the source of dissatisfaction. It gives me a fresh, but above all, disinterested take on the review.

Having an internal process—

[The Chair, Liberal, Michael Coteau]

I'm going to have to jump in. I apologize. I gave you an extra 20 seconds.

Mr. Perron, you have two and a half minutes.

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'll go back to the CFIA on labelling. The previous witness talked about gene-edited seeds. I was saying that, in our opinion, products need to be labelled because people want to know what they're buying. Farmers also want to know what they're buying. Organic producers want to be able to certify their production. The same goes for cloned meat.

You decided to allow the sale of cloned meat. However, you seem to be leaning towards not labelling it. In my opinion, that is a failure of one of your transparency responsibilities. It's odd because, in the context of this study, a lot of people on the ground came to tell us that they found it lacking in transparency.

What would you say to that?

[Pamela MacDonald]

I'm here to speak about our complaints and appeals office and answer questions associated with what the process looks like now. What I can offer is that we have a group called “Ask CFIA”, which is there to provide support to and answer questions from stakeholders and consumers pertaining to labelling, so that they can understand what the regulations and any changes that have been put in place mean to them and their businesses.

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Thank you for your answer, but it's not very clear.

If there is a group in charge of labelling, I think it's about time we sent them a memo notifying them that certain things slip right through, I'm afraid.

You say we're here to talk about the complaints office, so let's talk about it. A number of agricultural producers complain that inspections are uneven and vary depending on the inspector who comes in and on the day. There seems to be inequality in what is being demanded, or a vagueness in the standards.

I imagine you're aware of this. You receive complaints through your internal complaint system. You've been telling us for a while now that people are handling this.

How do you deal with those types of complaints?

Is there an internal process to compare the work of your inspectors to see if some are stricter than others? It doesn't seem to be fair.

[Pamela MacDonald]

We have the inspector general's office, which is responsible for overseeing the quality of inspection and delivery. It has verification officers who will go out and conduct a verification audit, if you will, of the inspectors as they do their duties and then compare it to the guidance that is written. I can confirm that inspectors are to follow the same four steps for their inspections. They prepare for the inspection, conduct the inspection, communicate the results and conduct follow-ups to ensure that any corrective measures have been taken.

However, because of the wide variety of products that we inspect, whether they be food, plant or animal, there are sometimes differences in the information that is asked for to be able to verify compliance.

[The Chair, Liberal, Michael Coteau]

Thank you very much.

We're going to do a quick round of one minute each, because I know there are a couple of wrap-up questions that people would like to ask.

Mr. Epp, you have one minute.

[Dave Epp, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My colleague tabled the statistics on the results from complaints up until the dissolution of the redress office. Can you please table with this committee the last five years' worth of internal complaints and how they've been handled, what the resolutions were, the numbers, etc.? Thank you.

Secondly, are you aware of the report the CFIB, the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, has done on the service the business community feels it receives from CFIA?

[Pamela MacDonald]

No. I cannot speak to that.

[Dave Epp, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

I can share with the committee that the top-line results are that 58% of the business community is not happy with the service standards. It is publicly available.

I would encourage you to address the CFIA, because there's a lot of data in there on specific areas of service complaints involving the business community.

[The Chair, Liberal, Michael Coteau]

Thank you.

Mr. Connors, you have one minute.

[Paul Connors, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

My question is for Mr. Barber.

This question will come from industry people, and I'm wondering what your response is: Is an ombudsman another layer of bureaucratic red tape?

[Tom Barber]

No. Absolutely not. Whether or not you choose to come to the ombudsman is completely the choice of the member of the public. We're here if you need us. If you don't want to use us, then you're free to try to resolve the issue on your own.

[The Chair, Liberal, Michael Coteau]

Mr. Perron, you have one minute.

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'll go back to the CFIA.

The two ombuds we have with us today seem to me to be quite lovely and brilliant people who have a positive influence on the organizations they oversee.

Do you think it would be a good idea to create an ombud position for the CFIA to handle complaints, such as those from agricultural producers about illegal inspections?