For years, Canada’s political classes have built careers on complaints that the country is too centralized and needs to be regionalized.
Never mind that Canadian provinces have far more constitutional powers and practical jurisdiction than do states in most other political federations.
Never mind that Canada must be one of the few countries in the world without a national education system which teaches national history and values. The provinces dish up their own parochial view of history and values.
Yet to hear provincial politicians talk, you would imagine this to be the most rigidly centralized country since the Soviet Union. To listen to federal politicians agree with them and offer more “devolution,” you would wonder if maybe they are correct.
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Federal-provincial negotiations have ceased to be give and take. They are all “take” for the provinces. A generation of federal governments have acquiesced with tax points, power transfers and rarely a demand in return.
So it is nothing short of a minor miracle of federalism that the food inspection system is moving in the opposite direction.
Led by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency but with full involvement of provincial and territorial officials, the food inspection system is moving away from the traditional Canadian system of patchwork standards, province by province.
The goal is national standards for food inspection and regulation, whether in plants licensed federally, provincially or municipally.
A national dairy code already has been written and approved. Meat plant and retail store food safety rules now are being negotiated.
Other sectors will be included later.
John Taylor of Manitoba’s agriculture department, co-chair of the Canadian food inspection system implementation group, predicts national standards will be universal within years.
Cliff Munroe of Alberta Agriculture has said inspection standards should be harmonized between provinces. “We need more consistency.”
Such a sentiment would be considered heresy in many other policy fields.
There are reasons for this different food inspection approach, sensible reasons.
Agriculture is a shared jurisdiction between Ottawa and the provinces and co-operation is the norm more often than not. In food safety, the higher the standard, the more likely customers will be comfortable. In food inspection, federal standards are the highest in the country.
Still, common sense has not always been enough incentive to encourage provinces to accept the logic of national standards.
The food inspection system stands as a welcome exception.
Every minister in this perpetually challenged country likes to brag that what their department does enhances national unity. This is one case in which the brag does not ring hollow.
CFIA and the federal bureaucracy is leading. The provinces are acknowledging the limitations of local standards.
A national thread for once is strengthened, rather than frayed.
