With some political manoeuvring and old-fashioned arm twisting, the federal Liberal government has defeated a bill that would have established a principle that all food containing genetically modified material should be labelled.
Defeat of the private member’s bill by a vote of 126-91 takes the GM labelling issue off the political front burner for now. However, the vote also led pro-labelling activists to argue that they have the momentum and that their opponents staved off defeat rather than won a victory.
“I think it buys them some time to sort out how they want to deal with this issue,” Winnipeg New Democrat and GMO skeptic Judy Wasylycia-Leis said.
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“But clearly, more and more of them are recognizing that there is a public demand for this.”
The vote was welcomed by farm leaders and biotechnology industry officials who lobbied hard to have the bill defeated.
In the days leading to the vote, they hired an Ottawa lobby firm to bombard MPs with warnings about the dire consequences of mandatory labelling.
“MPs made the right choice,” the Canadian Federation of Agriculture said in a statement after the vote.
“It is clear that Canadians want a public debate on genetically modified foods,” said CFA president Bob Friesen.
“Canadian agricultural producers welcome that debate.”
But voluntary labels are a better and less costly option, he said.
It was the same line of argument used by the government in a “talking points” document distributed to Liberal MPs before the vote.
It said the bill, introduced by Liberal MP Charles Caccia, was the wrong approach but MPs would be allowed to have hearings on a better way to deal with the public demand for more information about GM content. Four ministers asked the health committee to hold public hearings this winter and report to Parliament by June 2002.
“I think that line of argument, and sending it to committee, changed the vote of many Liberals,” said Wasylycia-Leis.
“It was a calculated, deliberate decision to avoid having this issue dealt with by Parliament now.”
But the government paid a political price.
By sending the issue to the health committee for hearings, the government essentially gave Caccia what he wanted – a public forum to make the argument in favour of mandatory labelling.
Supporters of labelling will try to make the committee focus on the fact that in surveys nine in 10 Canadians say they favour labelling.
It also could add to the momentum pro-labelling activists were feeling after the Oct. 17 vote.
In the House of Commons lobby that evening, former Bloc Québecois MP and labelling campaigner Helene Alarie smiled at the result.
“We’re getting closer all the time,” she said.
Between a pre-election vote on the same issue Oct. 19, 2000 and the latest vote Oct. 17, 2001, an additional 30 MPs joined the side of mandatory labelling.
The 91 MPs in favour of Caccia’s bill were the most ever for such a bill.
Some members of all parties voted for it, including New Democratic Party leader Alexa McDonough, Progressive Conservative leader Joe Clark and former Canadian Alliance interim leader Deborah Grey, now a member of a coalition with the Conservatives.
On the government side, a number of prominent MPs defied the government line to vote for the bill, including the prime minister’s parliamentary secretary Joe Jordan.
Health minister Allan Rock was absent for the vote, although he had said earlier he supports mandatory labelling, in defiance of government policy.
