Mr. Speaker, I was sad to hear, just a few moments ago, the Minister of State (Finance), who I have a lot of respect for, say that this was a minor problem. It is fair to say that from the perspective of the family of five-year-old Elijah who experienced liver failure and severe sickness as a result of this contamination and from the perspective of the 12, 15 or 20 families affected, we really do not know how many yet, it is not a minor problem at all. It is a very serious problem.
I would like to thank the member for Berthier—Maskinongé for her comments in the House. I simply do not accept the sense that I am getting from the government that this is not its responsibility and that somehow it is someone else's fault, the CFIA's fault, the opposition's fault or some other dark force's fault, and not its fault that as a result of the cuts that we have been speaking to tonight a couple dozen families now have someone with severe sickness. It is not anyone else's fault. It is the government's responsibility to ensure that our systems are safe and the food that we eat is safe. What has happened over the last few weeks is that those systems have failed.
I would like to take a few moments to explain what I feel is the smoking gun for what has transpired over the last few weeks. The member for Welland was very detailed in his presentation. He went over every week of the outbreak as families fell sick, as the recalls seemed to cascade, one on top of the other, and the government seemed incapable of acting effectively. The important date is September 13. I know there are a lot of people across the country listening to this debate tonight so it is important to explain what happened on September 13 and how that has had an impact on our food systems overall.
On September 13, as the member for Welland spoke about just a few minutes ago, the CFIA removed XL. It is a plant that I have visited. I stood with the workers outside that plant just a few years ago with the member for Hamilton Centre. I visited that plant and know the workers and the plant well. On that date, the U.S. permit was pulled. XL was banned from exporting meat to the United States because of contamination. Obviously, there were fears then that exporting that meat would make people in the United States sick.
There was no recall in Canada. There was no protection for Canadian families. Other Canadian families have gotten sick since that date. However, that very same day, September 13, 2012, as the export permit was pulled due to fears of U.S. families getting sick, the meat continued to be shipped into Canada.
On September 13, as well, 481 employees in CFIA received affected notices, which are potential layoff and transfer notices. The very same day we have an outbreak of enormous proportions, such as we have never seen before in our meat supply in Canada, and that is the day that the government chose to send out to nearly 500 CFIA employees notices indicating they will be either laid off or transferred out of CFIA.
That is incredible. It is incredible that the very day we are seeing this tragedy unfold, the Conservative government says it is going to cut back even further. We have heard a lot tonight about what the government has done around cutbacks and how that may have contributed to the tragedy we see before us.
Let us look at what has actually happened over the past few years since the listeriosis outbreak. When we talk about meat hygiene and slaughter program inspectors at that plant, there was no increase in the number of positions.