OTTAWA – A senior federal bureaucrat last week defended the objectivity of a government-industry committee considering the implications of allowing sale of a dairy growth hormone in Canada.
Dr. Brian Morrisey, assistant deputy agriculture minister, faced several MPs who were skeptical about the role and mandate of the task force established by the government when it announced a delay in allowing bovine somatotropin (BST) onto the market.
“I am satisfied we are doing the best job we can do,” he said in testimony before the Commons agriculture committee Dec. 14.
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Other members of his task force, representing pharmaceutical companies anxious to sell BST, dairy farmers, dairy processors and consumers, agreed with the assessment, although several said they wished more was being done to educate consumers about the drug.
Research under way
Morrisey said the task force is having research work done on the acceptance of BST in the United States, on health issues, on animal genetics and on the potential costs to the Canadian dairy industry.
It is to report to the government by spring.
However, his assurances did not satisfy one of the most adamant parliamentary critics of BST.
Liberal Wayne Easter, a Prince Edward Island dairy farmer, said later he still is not convinced the task force is considering objectively the benefits of not having BST in Canada.
He complained the task force has contracted out research work to the academics and bureaucrats who already have shown themselves to have a bias in favor of the hormone.
And he wondered aloud who was demanding the product, other than Monsanto Canada Inc. and Eli Lilly Canada Inc. who stand to make money from its manufacture and sale.
Easter said he is going to recommend to the government that the terms of reference for the task force be broadened to consider the issue of whether the drug is needed, what damage it could do to supply management and whether Canada could benefit by being able to advertise its dairy herd and milk products as a BST-free product in the world.
He was called before the Commons committee was an allegation by Kempton Matte, president of the National Dairy Council of Canada, that the group was sworn to secrecy and that he was afraid the fix is in to approve BST.
Morrisey told MPs the task force members are not “sworn to secrecy”, leading Liberal and pro-BST MP Bernie Collins to complain that MPs had been swayed by an unfounded rumor.
