The fallout from the XL Foods E. coli disaster last year reverberated through Ottawa and the food industry with a report that showed flaws throughout the system.
Not surprisingly, the Gerry-in-Wonderland government saw the report as good news.
They’ve spent money, passed legislation and are fixing the flaws, so this report proves they are on the right track.
Canadian Food Inspection Agency president George Da Pont took the same stance before the House of Commons agriculture committee. The incidence of E. coli contamination is falling, budgets are being enhanced and training is being funded, he said
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“I don’t think you can say the system is failing,” he said.
The expert panel report acknowledged that Canada’s food safety system has a worldwide reputation but my my, did it find failures in this instance that could point to broader weaknesses. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link.
But the Conservatives appear to have dodged the responsibility bullet.
In a period of political bad news for the Conservative government (Senate scandals, an MP resignation because the once-principled Conservative party can’t recognize itself in the mirror anymore and evidence of broad government data collection on citizens), they were lucky mainstream media have such a fleeting interest in food issues.
“XL food crisis could have been avoided,” was the typical headline, and then coverage moved on.
Lucky Conservatives. Lucky meat packing industry.
In fact, the report by a panel led by former British Columbia chief veterinary officer Ronald Lewis was a disturbing look at a meat system and a government that did not seem to have learned much from the 2008 listeriosis food poisoning in a Maple Leaf Toronto plant that killed more than 20 Canadian consumers.
Despite a detailed how-to-avoid-this-again report from Alberta commissioner Sheila Weatherill and a very effective mea culpa performance by Maple Leaf president Michael McCain, the 2012 XL incident was a classic case of what not to do.
Company executives were amateurs trying to play in the big leagues, ignoring evidence of contamination, willfully sending contaminated product into the marketplace and playing hard-to-get when CFIA inspectors wanted information.
The result was contaminated food in the market that should not, need not, have been allowed.
As the recalls continued until it became the largest beef recall in Canadian history, the Canadian Meat Council worried that it was going too far by including whole muscle cuts because it could create future problems for the industry.
CFIA inspectors embedded in the Brooks, Alta., plant were perhaps too close to the action, not noticing the dirty machines, not demanding better accounting, not swimming in a “culture of food safety” as they should have been.
There were many more flaws that do not fit into a defined newspaper space, but suffice it to say that no section of the meat and regulatory sector wear well the XL episode.
The government says it is fixing the problems with new inspection verification teams, but then it said the problems would be fixed after Maple Leaf.
The jury, at least this jury member, is still out.
