House of Commons Hansard #161 of the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was bullying.
Gerry Ritz ConservativeMinister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and Minister for the Canadian Wheat Board
Mr. Speaker, regardless of what happens in the plant, CFIA officials are on the ground there, doing their work, doing their due diligence to make sure that any food produced out of there will be safe.
We will continue to do that. These are science-based decisions, not political choices.
Thomas Mulcair NDPLeader of the Opposition
Mr. Speaker, I cannot believe my ears!
On September 13, Canada stopped exporting beef from XL Foods to the United States. The minister had determined that the beef from XL Foods was not safe enough to be consumed by the Americans. The same Minister of Agriculture allowed the same tainted beef to be sold freely in Canada for another two weeks. That is what he is responsible for: for jeopardizing the lives of Canadians when he knew that this meat was tainted.
How can the Minister of Agriculture still hold his position in light of such negligence?
Gerry Ritz ConservativeMinister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and Minister for the Canadian Wheat Board
Mr. Speaker, my job as minister is to ensure that the Canadian Food Inspection Agency has the capacity and the regulatory powers that it needs to move forward when situations like this occur.
We are going to have, later this week, as I understand, coming from the other place, Bill S-11, the safe food for Canadians act. I certainly hope the NDP will support that and move that through in an expeditious way.
Thomas Mulcair NDPLeader of the Opposition
Mr. Speaker, it has been 42 days since this crisis began. There are 15 confirmed cases of E. coli poisoning and still no accountability.
This crisis is putting the hammer to farmers and ranchers across Canada. Thousands of workers have been laid off, inspections halted and the minister refers to all of this as a “private sector business decision”.
What the minister still does not get, four years after his last crisis, is that his job was and is to regulate that business in the public interest. When will the Minister of Agriculture take responsibility and resign?
Gerry Ritz ConservativeMinister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and Minister for the Canadian Wheat Board
Mr. Speaker, as I just said, my job as minister is to make sure that CFIA has the regulatory power and the capacity to do its job.
These are professional individuals who are in that plant doing their due diligence to make sure that any food that should come out of that plant at some time in the future will be safe for Canadians.
Malcolm Allen NDP Welland, ON
Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives cut millions from food safety agencies. They throw away $32 million on government advertising and propaganda. That is their priority.
The minister said there was never a shortage of inspectors. Canadians now know that claims of an additional 700 meat inspectors is just another tall tale made up by the Conservative government, another failure for it to take responsibility.
If there were always enough inspectors, why did the minister add more inspectors to the XL line this weekend? Why will he not admit that there were not enough inspectors in that plant?
Gerry Ritz ConservativeMinister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and Minister for the Canadian Wheat Board
Mr. Speaker, even the XL food workers union in that plant claim that there were enough inspectors doing their job, doing their due diligence.
What we want to do is to keep incrementally building the capacity of the CFIA to move forward in this regard. Every time we come forward with budgetary responses, more money, more inspectors, the NDP votes against it. That is shameful.
Malcolm Allen NDP Welland, ON
Mr. Speaker, what is in the budget is more money for advertising to simply talk about Canada's action plan and not enough for meat inspectors in this country. That is the reality of voting against the budget.
Over 1,000 Canadians are now laid off. Cattle producers across western Canada are hurting. XL management is blaming CFIA for delays. This is the largest meat recall in Canadian history.
What will it take for this minister to actually tell us: what about these layoffs? Why is the company blaming CFIA? The minister blames a “private sector business decision” for the problems.
How can the minister be so cavalier about food safety and about an industry that employs so many people?
Gerry Ritz ConservativeMinister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and Minister for the Canadian Wheat Board
Mr. Speaker, I guess the best answer for that is from Gil McGowan, president of the Alberta Federation of Labour, who said:
I certainly hope the CFIA will only certify the plant once it is confident the company has completed all of the changes needed to assure public safety.
That is exactly what we are doing.
Marc Garneau Liberal Westmount—Ville-Marie, QC
Mr. Speaker, the E. coli crisis is a direct result of the government's mismanagement of food inspection in Canada. As a result, we have 15 Canadians who are sick, cattle ranchers who cannot sell their cattle, job losses and serious damage to the Canadian brand. This is a failure at the very highest level.
Will the Prime Minister ensure that the CFIA has the necessary resources to ensure that Canadians' food is safe to eat, and to reassure them of that?
Gerry Ritz ConservativeMinister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and Minister for the Canadian Wheat Board
Mr. Speaker, that is exactly what we are doing, budget after budget. We table estimates. We table the supplementary estimates. We are constantly rebuilding the capacity of the CFIA after the Liberals pulled hundreds of millions of dollars and hundreds of inspectors out during their decade adrift.
Marc Garneau Liberal Westmount—Ville-Marie, QC
Mr. Speaker, we now know of 15 Canadians in four provinces who have become sick because of E. coli tainted meat. In all this time, during what is the largest beef recall in the history of Canada, the Minister of Health has kept mum.
Will the Minister of Health stand up and realize that public health is her responsibility and that she has a duty to communicate with Canadians?
Gerry Ritz ConservativeMinister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and Minister for the Canadian Wheat Board
Mr. Speaker, this is a government that takes food safety very seriously. We continue to build the capacity of both the CFIA and the Public Health Agency of Canada. Of course, it takes voters on all sides of the House to make those types of initiatives move forward.
Bill S-11 is coming across from the Senate this week, we understand. I am hopeful that the Liberals here will pass that expeditiously.
Marc Garneau Liberal Westmount—Ville-Marie, QC
Mr. Speaker, Canada has one of the highest rates of bullying in the industrialized world. Evidence shows that victims of bullying face serious long-term physical and psychological harm or death. I am talking about bullying here. Amanda Todd's suicide last week is tragic proof. This is a public health issue and we must act now.
Will the Prime Minister commit to a strategy of public education, prevention, harm reduction, and identification and punishment of perpetrators?
Rob Nicholson ConservativeMinister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada
Mr. Speaker, we are doing that. Certainly, our thoughts and prayers go out to the families who have been victimized by this kind of activity. This is condemned by everyone.
I am looking forward to the reports of both parliamentary committees that are having a look at this. We want to have a look at that.
I know Health Canada is promoting awareness in this particular area. The RCMP has set up the website deal.org. There is cybertip.ca. All of these are initiatives to tackle this terrible problem. We all have a stake in it. We all want to fix it.
Ruth Ellen Brosseau NDP Berthier—Maskinongé, QC
Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Agriculture is ignoring his responsibilities. He is choosing to protect his reputation instead of protecting Canadians. He is hiding behind the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. He uses a technicality as an excuse every time he is asked about the details of this tainted meat issue.
The Americans stepped in on September 13 to protect their citizens. Can the minister tell us how many Canadians have become sick since September 13?
Gerry Ritz ConservativeMinister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and Minister for the Canadian Wheat Board
Mr. Speaker, that is a well-known number. Fifteen people have taken ill. They have all recovered, gone home and gone about their lives. That is the good side.
From the work side, this government takes food safety very seriously. We continue to build the capacity of the CFIA and the Public Health Agency of Canada to respond to these types of situations as they occur. We continually add to their budgetary capacity and the NDP constantly votes against that.
Ruth Ellen Brosseau NDP Berthier—Maskinongé, QC
Mr. Speaker, the fact that people became sick is not serious? It is not a problem? I do not understand.
They make cuts to food inspection, but they spend millions of dollars on their own advertising. That is their priority. Canadians do not want a minister who is much more interested in saving his own skin than in accepting his responsibility. Since the beginning of the crisis, he has been bragging about having hired tons of inspectors, but he has failed to provide details on the nature of the work carried out by those inspectors or on where they are conducting their activities.
Will the minister release the list of these inspectors?
Gerry Ritz ConservativeMinister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and Minister for the Canadian Wheat Board
Mr. Speaker, it is well known that we have increased the inspection capacity at the plant in question by some 20% in the last few years. We continue to do that on an as-needed basis across this great country.
The CFIA is very professional. It takes its job very seriously. We keep giving it the capacity, budgetary and manpower-wise, to get that important job done.
Anne-Marie Day NDP Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC
Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Agriculture is not the only one improvising. The Minister of Human Resources is no slouch in that department either.
Not so long ago, the Conservatives declared that the new working while on claim provisions were not in any way detrimental to Canadians. The Conservatives finally admitted that there is a problem the Friday evening before Thanksgiving. However, instead of solving the problem, they decided to apply a band-aid to a deep wound.
When will they come up with a real solution instead of a two-tiered system?
Diane Finley ConservativeMinister of Human Resources and Skills Development
Mr. Speaker, our priorities are economic growth, job creation and long-term prosperity for Canadians. That is why we made changes to encourage the unemployed to work two, three, or four days a week while receiving employment insurance benefits. We made changes in order to help people who received benefits and worked last year transition to the new program.
Anne-Marie Day NDP Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC
Mr. Speaker, the reality is that the method will only apply to those who received benefits between August 2011 and August 2012. All others will be taken hostage by the new program. Experts and workers are confused. In addition to choosing the program that suits them right now, workers must choose a program for the next two years.
If the minister is really listening to the people, why is she making the program more complex rather than solving the real problems?
Diane Finley ConservativeMinister of Human Resources and Skills Development
Mr. Speaker, our goal, our priority, is job creation, economic growth and long-term prosperity for Canadians. We want to make sure that those who are drawing employment insurance benefits are not discouraged from working two, three, four days a week while they are on claim. To do that we want to make sure they are better off.
We did make some minor changes to the new pilot program to help those who were in that situation last year, while they were working on claim, transition to the new program where they will be encouraged and rewarded for working extra days while on claim.
Chris Charlton NDP Hamilton Mountain, ON
Mr. Speaker, all fall the parliamentary secretary for human resources claimed that all workers would benefit from the working while on claim program. Then, just before Thanksgiving, the minister threw her under the bus, agreed with the NDP and finally conceded that there were problems with her program. Unfortunately, her fix only allows a few to opt for the old rules. Most will still see their income clawed back 50% right from the very first dollar.
Why is the minister creating a two-tiered system? Why will she not just fix the mess that she created?
Diane Finley ConservativeMinister of Human Resources and Skills Development
Mr. Speaker, what we are doing is helping those who are on employment insurance find new jobs and get back to work. We are helping them by providing more job alerts, more information about jobs in their skill range and in their geographic areas, but also making sure that if they work two, three, four days a week that they are better off than if they do not.
Under the old plan if someone worked one day, yes, they got to keep their earnings, but beyond that everything was clawed back dollar for dollar. We need their talents and skills at work. The new program will help them do that. We are helping people who were on the program before to transition.