:
I call the meeting to order.
Welcome to meeting number 34 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food.
Pursuant to the order of reference of Wednesday, March 10, and the motion adopted by the committee on April 15, the committee is resuming its study of Bill , an act to amend the Health of Animals Act
Today's meeting is taking place in a hybrid format pursuant to the House order of January 25. Members are attending in person in the room, and remotely, using the Zoom application. The proceedings will be made available via the House of Commons website. Just so that you are aware, the webcast will always show the person speaking rather than the entire committee.
I'd like to take this opportunity to remind all participants at this meeting that screenshots or taking photos of your screen are not permitted.
[Translation]
To ensure that the meeting runs smoothly, I would like to share some rules with you.
Before you speak, please wait for me to recognize you. If you are participating in the meeting via video conference, click on the microphone to unmute it. The microphones of participants in the room will, as usual, be monitored by the proceedings and verification officer.
I remind you that all comments from members and witnesses should be directed to the chair.
When you do not have the floor, please mute your microphone.
[English]
We will now welcome our witnesses for the first hour.
As an individual, we have Dr. Deb Stark. We also have, from the Canadian Federation of Agriculture, Keith Currie, first vice-president.
Welcome to our meeting. We'll start with opening statements.
Dr. Stark, you have five minutes for an opening statement. The floor is yours.
:
Great. Thank you very much.
I am pleased to accept the invitation to appear before this committee as you consider Bill , an act to amend the Health of Animals Act.
I want to start by emphasizing that I'm here because I was invited and I wish to be helpful. It's very important to me that it's clear that my comments do not represent the view of any of the organizations that I'm involved with now or have been involved with in the past.
When I received this invitation and I asked why you wanted to talk to me, I was told it was because of my long-standing experience in various organizations. With that in mind, I thought I might take a minute and share some of my background.
I am a veterinarian by training. I spent most of my career in the Government of Ontario, including serving as Ontario’s first chief veterinary officer and, at another time, the deputy minister of the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs. Also, at various times, I was the manager of the ministry’s animal welfare programs and the assistant deputy minister in charge of the food safety programs. I'm now serving on several not-for-profit boards, including the Canadian Agri-Food Policy Institute, or CAPI; the University of Guelph; and Ontario Genomics. I'm also the chair of the Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada departmental audit committee.
I would stop here, but I assume your first question might be, “What do you think about the bill?” I offer the following comments.
First, I want to thank you for your due diligence. Conversations on issues around animal diseases, farmer mental health and protecting the welfare of both people and animals are all important. Canadian agriculture plays an important role in global food security, in mitigating the impacts of climate change and in contributing to our economic success. Study after study has concluded that having an effective and efficient regulatory framework is important to this sector, so it's very good that you're closely scrutinizing these proposed changes.
I know some of your members have asked if the problem is truly about a gap in the legislative or regulatory framework, or if it's more about the application of the existing rules. I confess that I have that question as well. I don't know the answer, but I think it's important to think about that.
I also know that some members have asked about the ability to enforce the provisions in this bill, and I think that's another important question. Farmers expect to follow rules. They expect others to do the same and to suffer consequences when they do not. I don't think it's going to help any farmer's mental health if expectations rise because this bill passes and then nothing really changes.
I think it's important to acknowledge that the activity this bill is trying to prevent stems from a core tension. In its 2020 survey of Canadians, the Canadian Centre for Food Integrity reported that one-third of those surveyed were concerned about the humane treatment of animals. Perhaps most of those people just want to be reassured, but I know some of them are concerned with specific practices on the farm. I know others are completely against any kind of livestock and poultry production.
Change can be, and has been, driven by the farmers themselves, as research leads to better animal care; by consumers, through the choices they make in the marketplace; and of course by the activism of others. Animal agriculture isn't unique in this regard, and I don't think any of these drivers is going away soon.
These points being made, I want to to conclude with my first comment. I don't think I have to tell this committee that our food production system is a Canadian success story. As long as the world chooses to eat meat, Canada can be a good place to raise animals. Canadian farmers deserve a regulatory environment that protects their animals, them and their assets.
Thank you very much.
Welcome to the committee members.
The Canadian Federation of Agriculture, or CFA, and its members understand the critical importance of maintaining a safe and reliable food supply and protecting the safety of those who feed us. As such, CFA is in support of Bill , an act to amend the Health of Animals Act.
Farmers and ranchers work hard to provide a safe and sustainable food supply for all Canadians. It is becoming increasingly difficult for farmers and agricultural owners to effectively produce food, fibre and fuel due to ever-increasing trespassing events. Farms and farming operations have come under increasing threat from trespassers and activists who illegally enter property, barns and buildings, which cause significant disruptions to the entire agri-food sector.
Once-peaceful protests have now escalated into trespassing, invasions, breaking and entering into barns and other livestock facilities, theft, and harassment. The issue has now evolved to activities that create potential damage and liability far beyond the traditional, such as biosecurity breaches on livestock operations. Biosecurity breaches of crop production operations often go unnoticed. There is food tampering, damage from people intruding in confined spaces and impacting the welfare of animals; activists moving animals off site; and sit-ins and protests around processing plants. We see the obstruction of trucks and drivers hauling our livestock to and from farm and livestock processing facilities, as well as the release of animals from production facilities for fur bearing animals and hogs, for example. There is trespassing and intrusive behaviour on fish farms.
These incidents distress farmers, their families and employees and threaten the health of livestock and crops. When activists breach biosecurity protocols, this ultimately puts the entire food system at risk. While current trespassing laws, regulations, fines and penalties may have been adequate to deal with nuisance trespassing in years past, the current new era of activism sees well-orchestrated and planned events that result in uninvited and unwelcome trespassers on farm properties, yards, buildings and processing plants. The number of people with a specific focused agenda are increasing at an alarming rate. It's intended to cause economic stress for the producer.
While trespassing laws are typically under the jurisdiction of provinces, often provincial statutes are not enough of a deterrent for people who commit trespass offences. Bill will complement provincial legislation as an indicator of the severity of these offences and that protecting the agri-food industry is critical. Charges, when laid, are often dropped by the court system as they are considered minor infractions.
While the CFA does support the passage of this bill—and we urge all parliamentarians to get behind it—we do have some suggestions for some changes.
The proposed section 9.1 of the bill currently reads:
No person shall, without lawful authority or excuse, enter a building or other enclosed place in which animals are kept knowing that or being reckless as to whether entering such a place could result in the exposure of the animals to a disease or toxic substance that is capable of affecting or contaminating them.
This seems to indicate that unless you are fully aware that you are willfully reckless, the violation is excusable. A recent incident on an Ottawa-area mink farm where somebody had broke in and entered had the judge acquit them of a mischief charge because, although they entered the building illegally, no harm came to the animals. In the judge's mind, there was no violation.
We would like to see that change, so that it says that no person “without lawful authority, enter a building or an enclosed place in which animals are kept, to prevent the exposure of the animals to a disease or toxic substance that is capable of affecting or contaminating them”. As well, add in anyone “who aids or abets” someone in this should “be considered party to that contravention”.
As you heard Dr. Stark mention, mental health is becoming a big issue around activism. Farmers already face a wide variety of daily stressors that affect their mental wellness, whether it be weather, environment, market fluctuations, farm labour and social isolation, just to name a few. Trespass and activism are now an additional growing source of stress. Continuing to allow on-farm trespassing and barn break-ins to occur is not only threatening the viability of Canadian agriculture, but also posing a serious threat to farmers' mental health and well-being.
Bill recognizes the mental health crisis in agriculture and aims to support farmers and farming businesses by introducing new protections against trespassing and biosecurity breaches.
I should also add that livestock transporters and processing facilities are also under a similar tremendous mental stress from activism and activists.
I'll leave it at that, and I'll close, leaving more time for our witnesses to ask questions of me. I look forward to the conversation.
Thank you.
:
Thank you very much, Mr. Currie.
Now, just before I go one, I want to welcome Mr. Barlow, sponsor of the bill, as a committee member today, and also my Atlantic colleague, MP Andy Fillmore.
Welcome to both of you, including the rest of the committee.
We'll start with our first round of questions at six minutes each, beginning with the sponsor himself, Mr. John Barlow.
:
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
It's good to see so many of my agriculture committee colleagues once again. Welcome to Mr. Fillmore as well.
Mr. Currie, I'd like to start with you if that's okay. I appreciate your testimony here. What we heard at the last meeting was CFIA officials' saying that enforcing Bill would be difficult with current resources. I think what the CFIA failed to mention during their testimony is that the burden is not entirely on them. They have the Public Prosecution Service of Canada, which is is something that they are doing already. There are enforcement officials at CFIA, which include inspectors and veterinary inspectors as part of the CFIA legislation. It also includes the enforcement and investigation service investigators who are already doing this type of work.
To go with your testimony, Mr. Currie, I would believe that if this pandemic has shown us anything, it's that when something is prioritized by the government and officials are given the right direction, what is sometimes considered a difficult problem certainly becomes possible. Would you not agree with how important this issue is and that the federal government should show leadership on this issue, and not just defer this to the provinces when it's convenient to do so? This is something that the federal government needs to show leadership on.
:
Thank you, Mr. Barlow, for the question, and the answer is “absolutely”.
As I mentioned in my opening remarks, I think this bill really complements current provincial legislation. It strengthens both provincial and federal legislation on protecting farms, farmers, farm families and farm employees. As I mentioned, this new era of activism has really ramped up. It's well planned. It's well orchestrated, and activists know what they're doing. To your point, what's happening is that our enforcement is not happening on the farm or at facilities. It just simply isn't. Part of it is because police do not have enough tools in the tool box. They also don't believe that the court system will look at this properly and actually convict people. If they're not going to convict people, then they don't want to lay charges and have to put the whole system through the process of going through the courts only to have it dropped, much like the recent case I referred to on the mink farm in the Ottawa area.
I think that if there are a lot of teeth in the legislation, that will, first of all, prove to be a deterrent, and also, if there activism and break-ins are happening, the police also will be confident in laying charges that something will happen as it goes through the court system. Hence, it will also require some education of the entire penal system to make sure that people understand what it is we're dealing with back out on the farm.
:
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I do want to thank both witnesses for being before the committee.
Certainly, I think all committee members agree with the objectives of the bill, but we may not necessarily agree with how to get to that particular point.
I did have a question for Dr. Stark—and I'm not going to ask which hat you're going to wear—with regard to biosecurity, and how that has evolved over the last 20 to 30 years. I know that when I was seven years old, which was 30 years ago, I didn't have to wear special equipment walking onto a farm. Now I have to wear special equipment to go onto farms in my own riding.
What risks or dangers do strangers walking onto a farm present for biosecurity?
:
Thank you very much for the question. Again, I'm not wearing a hat of any particular organization. I'm here with my hatless head today.
You're right that biosecurity expectations have changed. People used to welcome people into their barns. It was seen as a sign of friendliness. As you say now, the signs are up, the doors are closed, and before you can get into barns, you are expected to change clothes, go through disinfection procedures, and things like that.
That being said, the risk really comes if whoever is coming in has been exposed to a disease somewhere else. It's really hard, and this is one of the challenges. If you haven't been near any sick animals, and if you haven't been near any particular disease agent, then you are really not likely bringing it on to the farm. It's when you have been near those animals, or those agents, that the risk increases.
Unfortunately, we don't always know. That's the problem, and that's why farmers have implemented standards that have to apply to everybody, because they can't take a chance with your knowing whether or not you've been near a sick animal or been exposed to a virus. We can't take that chance.
Therefore, the standards are set. Mostly, they are kind of consistent across the country, but lots of them are implemented at the provincial level through various organizations, like the dairy farmers or the pork producers, setting up standards that work for their particular situation. Then they move out across the country that way.
I hope that answers your question.
:
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I thank the witnesses for being with us and for giving us their time at this meeting.
Mr. Currie, there are obviously a host of questions I would like to ask. You have proposed that section 9.1 of Bill be amended. Could you repeat what you proposed?
If I understand correctly, you are proposing to remove the part that says “[...] knowing that or being reckless as to whether entering such a place could result in the exposure of the animals to a disease [...]”, because someone could claim that they didn't know there was a risk, and not be subject to a fine. Did I understand correctly?
This “I didn't know better” excuse is being used quite frequently in the court, and many of our judges in particular are stating that “because there was potentially no harm done, we can acquit you of this mischief charge that's being presented”. I keep referencing the mink farm case just outside of Ottawa because it's recent, where that very reason was used by the judge: “Yes, the person got into the building, but no damage was caused, so therefore I am going to acquit of that charge.”
What we are proposing is a slight change to proposed section 9.1 just to say this: “No person shall, without lawful authority, enter a building or other enclosed place in which animals are kept, to prevent the exposure of the animals to a disease or toxic substance that is capable of affecting or contaminating them”.
It's a simple change to take away that “nothing happened so therefore I'm not guilty” aspect of the bill.
:
I understand what you are saying and I also feel that way sometimes. Thank you.
From what we heard from the witnesses who appeared, the problem is that the current regulations, whether they are provincial or federal, force producers to establish proof as to the consequences of the intrusion, which can be difficult to do. For example, if a disease appears sometime after the intrusion, it's very difficult to make the connection between the two.
Don't you think that if just being on farm property became a violation, that might simplify the job? If that mere presence could be punished, couldn't the problem be avoided?
:
Thank you, Chair, and thank you to both of our witnesses for helping us with our understanding of Bill .
Mr. Currie, maybe I will start with you.
In your opening statement you used the word “trespass” a lot, and you mentioned that activists have become a lot bolder in their activities. A lot of these acts have now transgressed to break and enter, property damage and so on.
In your mind, do you think Bill C-205 is primarily designed to stop trespassing, or biosecurity? Which comes top of mind for you as the priority of the bill?
:
Thank you for the question.
I'm not sure that I would prioritize one over the other, for the following reasons: Biosecurity is incredibly important for the protection of our animals, but the act of trespassing in itself is something that's creating a tremendous amount of stress to our farm families and employers, as I mentioned.
What I'm fearful of is that someone might decide to take the law into their own hands—and that would scare me even more—because they don't feel there's adequate protection, through the law, regulations, legislation, to help protect them. Both trespassing and biosecurity are big, big issues here.
:
Thank you for that clarification.
Across Canada, as you know, we have had some instances on farms—notably, mink farms —where it's been employees who have accidentally brought in a disease to the animals. They were there with lawful authority and excuse, and through their actions—they may not have been following proper protocols—they accidentally transferred a disease to the population.
Bill uses that language of being there with “lawful authority or excuse”.
Do you think there's room to amend this bill so that employees are held to the same standards, or if that's not in your view the correct path to take, what should we be doing to ensure that standards are uniform, whether you're a protester or a farm employee?
Maybe, Dr. Stark, I'll turn to you if you want to maybe add some comments on that last question.
Before you do, in our previous meeting on this bill we did have the chief veterinarian for the CFIA give testimony, Dr. Komal. He testified that scientific literature provides little evidence that farm trespassers have transmitted pathogens. He said that human beings would have to have close, prolonged contact with animals in order to transmit a disease.
If you have any comments on the previous question I asked Mr. Currie, as well as any commentary on what Dr. Komal told this committee, I would appreciate that.
:
I would start by saying that I agree with Dr. Komal. I am not up to date on the science, but I certainly respect him and his position, and I don't think he would make that comment to this committee without making sure of his facts. His point about the exposure is kind of the point I was trying to make, that in order to transmit a disease, you have to be near a sick animal to pick up that virus, and then move it.
Mr. Currie is right. Some of them move through the air and some of them can transfer really easily. I do not want to discount that there are some viruses that move like that, but certainly not all of them do. Generally you have to be pretty close and then move it through.
On the difference between an employee versus someone who comes onto the farm, the only thing I would say is that, generally, we expect employers to deal with their employees so that if there is a breach in following farm protocol, I would expect that it would be the farm manager or owner dealing with that, as opposed to using any kind of a tool such as this.
:
Thank you, Dr. Stark. Sorry to cut you off.
Thank you, Mr. MacGregor.
Committee members, we looked at the time frame we have. If we extend between 10 and 15 minutes we can get the full....
Do I have the consent of the committee to finish the second round, which would be roughly 15 minutes, and then it will probably push our next one to maybe 10 extra minutes? Are we all good with that?
Some hon. members: Agreed.
The Chair: Let's start the second round.
Mr. Epp, you have five minutes.
Thank you to our witnesses, Dr. Stark, and it should be “Dr. Currie”, for your excellent testimony.
I'd like to start with you, Dr. Stark. It's good to see you again.
As has been mentioned, we heard from the officials that this legislation is not particularly necessary, as all of this is covered under provincial trespassing laws and that this could potentially muddle provincial-federal relations or federal-provincial jurisdiction.
You mentioned in your testimony some core tensions. I know that with some of your “hats” in the past, you've had to deal with some of these core tensions.
How do provincial officials presently work with the CFIA when they're investigating offences? Would that relationship change and be strengthened with the passage of this act?
I guess I'm supposed to address the chair, but it is nice to see you again, Dave.
I can mostly speak from Ontario, but certainly provinces talk. The federal-provincial ag departments talk frequently enough, so I think I can represent most of the provincial colleagues when I say that the working relationship on the ground is very good.
Agriculture is a shared jurisdiction, and areas like food safety and animal health don't respect provincial and federal boundaries. The diseases don't care whose jurisdiction it is, and so officials need to work hand in hand to make sure the system works well.
On what would change if this bill were in place, I think I'd go back to it depending on what kind of resources the CFIA is given. If the CFIA is fully resourced and given the mandate to take control and enforce it all themselves, it may make very little difference.
History would suggest that there would probably be some kind of a outreach to the provincial officials, trying to figure out who was on the ground and closer to the farms. Certainly provincial officials are usually more close on the farm, and more on the ground, quite frankly, so we probably would try to work with them.
Picking up on MP Alistair MacGregor's question, I would note here that Dr. Komol testified that it takes time for disease to be transmitted, yet we also know that protesters are moving from farm to farm. We had that happen when protesters from B.C. entered a farm in Alberta, and we had a virus transmitted to a Quebec hog farm. You talked about exactly that concern.
We also have an issue with perception. I know how the addition of perception of conflict of interest changed the legislation. I think we have an issue of perception here as well, with people entering the farm.
Could you comment on that, please?
:
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I want to thank both of our witnesses for being here for this great discussion. It's very welcome, and I appreciate that.
I would like to begin my questioning with Dr. Stark.
As we mentioned before, laws are usually meant to change things, and I'm not exactly clear what gap we're trying to fix. As mentioned a number of times, a number of provinces, including mine in Ontario—and Dr. Stark, you mentioned that—already have existing provincial laws.
I know that laws like this in the U.S., and bills like these, have been struck down in six states, and they're being challenged in Ontario right now. We have local trespassing and private property laws, which already address the break-ins or illegal entries on a farm.
We've heard in some testimony, and after questioning witnesses, that we see cases of intrusion on farms where producers do not address the complaints to the proper local authorities.
In your opinion, Dr. Stark, what are the barriers to using the means that are already available to farmers to ensure safety? What makes them not call the local authorities?
Mr. Currie, I will address you again.
We talked earlier about the people who say this bill would stifle whistleblowers, and I asked you what you would say to them.
Currently, what are the existing regulatory mechanisms that your members can use? For example, if someone suspects that animals are being abused on a farm, do they necessarily have to wait until an offence is committed to report that? Is there another way to do this?
:
Thank you, Dr. Stark, and Mr. MacGregor.
Unfortunately, that's all the time we have. It was a very interesting conversation.
I want to thank Dr. Deb Stark for appearing as an individual. Thanks for your experience and knowledge.
Of course, Mr. Currie with the Federation of Agriculture, thank you so much for your help on this study as well.
With that, we'll break for a couple of minutes and then we'll be right back with the second panel. We'll suspend just for time to change the panel.
Thank you.
:
We will now welcome the second panel of witnesses.
We have Dr. Jean-Pierre Vaillancourt, full professor at the University of Montreal, appearing as an individual.
Welcome to our committee, Dr. Vaillancourt.
We also welcome Rick Bergmann, chair of the board of directors of the Canadian Pork Council, as well as René Roy, first vice-chair of the board of directors.
We welcome you both to our committee.
We also welcome David Duval, president of the Éleveurs de porcs du Québec.
We will give you each five minutes to make your presentation.
Dr. Vaillancourt, you have the floor.
I'm going to be fairly brief, since I provided a document. I will speak in French, but I will respond in English to questions that are asked in English.
In my brief, I mentioned three points. I will add a fourth. When there is intrusion into facilities, there are risks to animal welfare. We don't always know what the consequences of intrusion will be, depending on the species, but some animals can get injured and stressed to the point where their immune systems are affected and then they have more infections or infection-related problems.
For example, a person who doesn't know how to move around a poultry facility may very well kill some of them, because the poultry might crowd into corners and panic. We see this and we see it in swine production as well, where sows can get upset and crush their young.
Infectious diseases are one of the risks, among others. Contrary to what I heard a few minutes ago, you don't have to be near an infected animal to infect others. I can talk about this later.
Every visit carries a risk, including reportable diseases such as African swine fever and avian influenza, which is highly pathogenic. This is well documented. Obviously, diseases are not brought in every time there is an intrusion.
The risk is also well documented for endemic diseases, such as porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome, or PRRS. In addition, infectious bronchitis and laryngotracheitis, for example, are other diseases that can have an impact.
There is also a risk to the people themselves. People who enter the premises of a farm and don't know what they're doing can become contaminated with bacteria, such as salmonella, or campylobacteriosis or Q fever. There are different situations where they can even injure themselves.
The fourth point I would like to make is based on my experience as a professor at North Carolina State University, in the U.S. On September 11, 2001, when the Department of Homeland Security was created, I was approached by a member of congress who told me that while the towers were falling in New York City, two farms in the Midwest were victims of bioterrorism. It was not al-Qaeda that did it, it was people who purposely contaminated two farms because they were angry at a farmer. So there is that possibility as well.
We often think of people who act to further animal rights, want to protect them or free them, but there are also people who are willing to go quite far in the opposite direction.
Let me give you the example of the former sister-in-law of a rancher in North Carolina, who decided one night when it was 40o C in July to turn off the water because she was angry at the producer. Thousands of birds then died within hours.
So there can be consequences due to the transmission of infectious pathogens, but there can also be other problems that are not necessarily infectious and can also be caused by people who don't belong on the farm premises.
I would also like to make a comment. We read the text of a Quebec veterinarian who, by the way, lacks veterinary ethics. In fact, he has been singled out for this, because he is not shy about stating that veterinarians who work in animal production lack ethics. He is a militant antispeciesist vegan activist.
You may be a bona fide veterinarian, but you have to be careful. He is an extremist whom I denounce.
I will stop now to give others time to speak.
Thank you for your attention.
Thank you for this opportunity to appear before the House of Commons. Bill is very important for Canadian pork producers. My name is Rick Bergmann. I'm a producer from Manitoba, and today I'm joined by René Roy, a producer from Quebec.
The Canadian Pork Council’s on-farm program, called Canadian pork excellence, is based on HACCP principles. Food safety and biosecurity are all intertwined, and the adoption of stringent biosecurity protocols is a vital component of every producer’s plan to keep their animals healthy and safe.
Pork producers are investing significant amounts of money to improve infrastructure, including significant improvements in barns, traceability and measures to limit who can access a hog barn, all to improve biosecurity controls. At the end of the day, the focus is to keep animals safe.
Still, unauthorized entries onto our hog farms are one of the greatest threats to biosecurity. Over the past several years, as I'm sure is not new to you, we have seen an alarming increase in unauthorized entry on farms, with individuals illegally entering our barns and other farm properties. That is very disturbing. These incidents put us, animals, and the entire food supply at risk. The reason we have so many stringent controls over the access to our barns is to reduce the devastating risks that several diseases could have for the industry.
Using my own farm as an example, a disease like PED or PRRS would cost my farm, which is not a large farm, between $260,000 and $320,000, very significant money, a significant cost and detriment.
The most concerning is African swine fever, which is an industry-killing disease. The cost of responding to and recovering from an ASF outbreak would be measured in billions of dollars for all our producers combined. Biosecurity is our best defence against the disease, and unauthorized entries put us all at risk.
I invite René Roy, my colleague, to say a few words at this time.
Our investments in time, energy and money are not enough to prevent unauthorized entries. Bill provides a means to deter trespassers who might expose animals to unnecessary stress, potential disease or toxic substances.
We underscore our commitment to being transparent with consumers in Canada and around the world. Transparency is essential for consumers to have confidence in how pork is produced, including ensuring that producers are living up to the high standards they set for animal health and welfare.
Bill is not an attempt to limit transparency on our farms but an attempt to protect animal health and welfare. We regularly speak to Canadians from coast to coast. We make it one of our top priorities to answer all people’s questions about how pork is produced, including questions on animal welfare.
Passing Bill will provide confidence to producers that their animals will not be put at risk by illegal trespassers who do not care or respect pigs, their health and welfare, and the health and welfare of their family pork producers.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Ladies and gentlemen members of the House, good afternoon.
I am extremely pleased to appear before you today to represent Quebec pork producers and to speak to you about the issues related to the bill, which should be passed.
Our organization represents more than 1,700 producers, who market seven million processed hogs in Quebec per year. Quebec is the largest pork producing province, and our sector is the second largest agri-food sector in Quebec. Hog production in Quebec contributes $1.13 billion annually to GDP and generates $1.8 billion in farm gate sales. Hog farms employ some 14,000 people, and more than 30,000 families make their living from the Quebec pork industry. Quebec farmers are proud to meet 80% of the local demand for fresh meat, with Quebec's self-sufficiency rate for pork at around 400%. By comparison, the self-sufficiency rate for blueberries is about 300%, for cranberries it is 490%, and for maple syrup 1300%.
We are therefore very proud to export most of our production to other countries, mainly to countries where natural resources cannot allow for sustainable farming like ours in Quebec. Between 2009 and 2020, the value of Quebec's pork exports rose from $975 million to $2.1 billion. This is an impressive average annual growth rate of 7.25%.
This is in keeping with the Zero Hunger Challenge and the Responsible Consumption and Production goals of the United Nations 2030 Agenda, to which Canada has signed on. All of this is to tell you that the pork industry and other agricultural industries in Canada are extremely important and must be protected by legislation.
Of course, hog producers face many risks, as we heard earlier, risks involving diseases that must be avoided at all costs. I don't know if any of you have ever visited a hog farm, but in most cases, not just anyone can enter. Before entering, you have to sign a register. You must change your boots and clothes, shower, keep to a sanitary area and respect the biosecurity rules, as well as animal welfare inside the farm. These rules are important. It took several years to put them in place with the different stakeholders who supported us in this regard.
So the biosecurity rules are very much present and very much followed. It's mainly about the health of the animals. On the farm, the pigs' environment is calm and stress-free. Welfare standards even recommend toys and music for the animals.
When a group of agitated people rush inside our farms, the animal is definitely experiencing stress. This does not just apply to pigs. It's the same for rabbits and other animals, which can even die instantly when people who ignore these rules enter these farms. So the consequences of breaking and entering are many. The stress on the producers is also enormous, as we saw recently on a farm. I personally know the family that operates that farm, a young family that just got into pork production in 2019.
However, the law doesn't see it that way, not in Quebec nor in other provinces. If you look at the laws in Quebec and in some Canadian provinces, you don't find anything that deals specifically with livestock. We have to try to defend ourselves with general laws in the Criminal Code or the Civil Code, and that is extremely difficult and costly for us.
This bill sends a clear message, from coast to coast: you don't go onto a farm without permission, period. It's not a matter of whether the farmer has put up a sign, put up a gate, or locked his doors. You don't have the right to enter a farm, it doesn't happen without permission.
This bill is essential and is in line with the demands made by hog farmers in Quebec and Canada, and by my colleagues in all other agricultural sectors over the years.
We also need to think about the threat posed by African swine fever. This is a disease that has decimated half of China's livestock industry in recent years. In Quebec, it would be devastating, as it would be throughout Canada.
It was mostly international travellers who contaminated farms in the rest of the world, whether in Germany, Belgium or elsewhere.
We need to be extremely careful. A single case detected in Canada would jeopardize the survival of Canada's 7,000 pork producers. Quebec and Canada would lose an important economic sector, and achieving various objectives would become very difficult.
This disease is just one example of why unauthorized entries into a farm should be regulated in the manner proposed by Bill .
This legislative proposal is essential to the survival of a strong and economically important agricultural sector.
Thank you for your attention.
I want to thank all the witnesses for their testimony today.
My first question is for Mr. Duval.
Mr. Duval, I want to start by apologizing, because my French isn't very good.
You referred to the protests taking place on farms in Quebec. Some federal and provincial members and ministers, as well as other stakeholders, were looking for a solution to this problem.
Where was the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, or RCMP?
Wasn't it possible to ask the police to take action?
:
My apologies. I have to keep moving on. I'd be particularly interested in seeing the evidence around police not having the ability to intervene or feeling like they couldn't intervene. I think that's really relevant to this study, so thank you.
Mr. Bergmann, I'll turn to you and Mr. Roy.
Mr. Roy talked about deterrents. When we look at what Mr. Barlow has brought forward, and I think it's laudable in intent, my concern is that when I look at the proposed legislation, it really puts an onus that there had to be an intent to breach the biosecurity element on a farm.
Have you had individuals come on your farm? Did they have any awareness about the Criminal Code, or other types of legislation, that is trying to restrict this type of activity beyond biosecurity?
Can you speak to that?
:
Mr. Bergmann, I'm not disagreeing. I know that you as a pork farmer, and many others across the country, are doing incredible work on animal safety. That is not in question, I don't think, with the members of this committee.
What I have concerns about is that when I look at this particular piece of legislation, there is an onus that there has to be an intent to breach the biosecurity elements. I don't own a farm, and I haven't been privy to a sit-in from a particular group of protestors or activists who have concerns.
My concern is that activists could be mindful of the biosecurity element and sit-in, or really argue in front of any type of court that the intent, reckless or otherwise, was not there. It's about the teeth of this particular legislation.
I don't know if Mr. Roy wants to elaborate on that. Do you see any concerns there?
:
Basically, there's indeed a loophole.
When the police arrived on the scene, they wondered on what charge they could remove the protesters and still follow the law. They can't remove someone from a house if the law doesn't give them the authority to do so. There was absolutely nothing that they could do to get the protesters out.
Fortunately, the protesters ended up deciding to leave, since they had already been in the building for seven or eight hours. If they had wanted to stay there, they could have done so, since nothing was stopping them.
Nothing in the current legislation is adapted to the agriculture sector.
You spoke about the mental health aspect. In particular, you said that people have given up farming, which is quite terrible.
In addition, as a result of a break-in, there were reportedly cases of livestock diseases, and water was allegedly poured into a fuel tank.
Can you talk about these aspects and the difficulty of establishing the causal link, in terms of the evidence, between the break-in and the aftermath?
:
Across Canada, there are a number of whistleblowers on hog farms. Whenever a small issue arises, several people get involved. Technicians make weekly visits to the farms and agronomists and veterinarians come to check the feed and the substances injected into the animals. For each animal, a treatment record must be kept for a given period. The assessments conducted by these people are verified at the end of the year by an external auditor. This auditor may cause them to lose their veterinarian or agronomist designation if they fail to meet the criteria of the verifications conducted. If producers don't do their job properly, they may be subject to penalties such as the revocation of their right to sell their animals in a slaughterhouse inspected by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, or CFIA.
Next there are the processors and the CFIA, which conducts a check every time an animal enters the slaughterhouse. If there's any suspicion that an animal may have been mistreated in some manner, or if the animal has red spots or a mark on its back that looks unusual, the CFIA immediately calls the producer; the department of agriculture, fisheries and food, or MAPAQ; and Les Éleveurs de porcs du Québec, which I represent, to report the case. This can happen occasionally. However, there's almost always an immediate reason or recommendation, such as a repair that must be done or a pen that needs cleaning.
We take action, and this makes the farmers' job extremely precise. Many people interact and none of them can circumvent the process and hope to not get caught. It's very clear to us that no one can avoid the verification process.
:
Thank you, Chair, and thank you to our witnesses.
Professor Vaillancourt, maybe I will start with you. I did appreciate in your opening statement how you took the time to also illustrate that there are other dangers to the uninitiated entering a barn. There's heavy equipment. Livestock are large animals, and when they're spooked they can move unexpectedly and cause serious injury to humans, who are often quite a bit smaller.
I've been looking at the parent legislation, the existing Health of Animals Act. There are provisions in there such as section 9, keeping diseased animals; section 10, bringing diseased animals to market; section 11, selling or disposing of diseased animals; and section 12, throwing carcasses into water. It appears that the existing sections of the Health of Animals Act can apply equally to farmers and farm employees if they engage in this type of behaviour, whereas Bill as it's written seems to exclusively concentrate on someone who is there without lawful authority or excuse.
You are an expert in biosecurity. Do you think Bill needs to be broadened so that it is in line with other sections of the existing act, so that employees and farmers are held to the same standards in promoting general biosecurity?
:
CFIA already does something. I worked on that. We have established some guidelines.
I think this should be left not only at the provincial level, but also quite a bit at the company farm level. Each farm is different. We need to custom design these biosecurity measures and we need to favour them. We need to provide positive incentives and all that, but this has to be done close to where the action is.
The federal government can help by maybe assisting in some ways at the local level, but I'm not convinced, other than to establish some norms, which we have done. However, if I had a wish, I would say that when we established these norms at the federal level, they were one-size-fits-all. We had in mind a backyard flock and a 200,000 egg-layer operation. They're not the same. If we have primary breeding stock in Ontario in particular that's not protected because we do not have regulations regarding distances between production sites, for example, at the federal level that might be of interest.
:
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair, and thanks to our witnesses for being here again.
Mr. Duval, I just wanted to start with you. It's certainly heartbreaking when you talk about a farm family who has quit the industry. We certainly cannot afford that when we're trying to attract young, new farmers to the industry. You mentioned the lack of response by the RCMP. In the incident that happened with friends of mine here, it was in fact the protestors who phoned the RCMP because they wanted the RCMP to protect them, and they knew there would be very few consequences, if any.
To counter some of the questions by my colleagues, I would point out that the CFIA has the enforcement and inspection services, the investigators and specialists, in place right now to enforce CFIA regulations. They also have the public prosecution services to follow through. It's not that the CFIA doesn't have the authority or the resources. It just doesn't seem that they are taking this as seriously as they should. Do you not think that if we made this a priority for the CFIA and their investigators, the presence of Bill would serve as a better deterrent compared with what the RCMP or local police officers are doing now?
:
The CFIA investigators would have a much better knowledge of what they're dealing with than maybe the local RCMP police service.
To Mr. Vaillancourt, thank you very much for the great information you provided in your testimony.
What we've heard from many producers, specifically the pork producers who were today concerned about African swine fever for example.... In this context, I think what we've learned from the COVID pandemic is the incredibly devastating impact a virus can have on our economy.
Are we prepared for an outbreak of African swine fever, and should we be proactive with a deterrent such as Bill to ensure that we take every measure possible to safeguard the biosecurity of our farms?
:
That is a great question. Thank you for that.
The one that sticks out in my mind is.... In western Canada, we have the Hutterite colonies, which like to keep to themselves. A situation where there is an activist group that is so aggressive that it would actually go to people who really want to stay among themselves and don't want to really interact, to me, is an extreme concern because it tells us, again, that when people select the farms, they're being strategic. It's just a form of bullying, which is very inappropriate.
There are more and more cases—to your point—and it's very concerning to hear when there is selection of those who would be considered more timid because activists feel that they can get away with more things with these folks. It's very unfortunately.
:
Thank you, Mr. MacGregor.
[Translation]
This concludes our discussion with the second panel.
[English]
I thank, as an individual, Dr. Jean-Pierre Vaillancourt.
[Translation]
Dr. Vaillancourt, thank you for appearing before the committee.
I also want to thank Rick Bergmann and René Roy from the Canadian Pork Council.
[English]
Thank you so much for being here.
[Translation]
I also want to thank David Duval from Les Éleveurs de porcs du Québec.
[English]
Thank you to all of our committee members. Also, thank you to our staff and interpreters. They do a fantastic job. Sometimes we forget to mention them.
That will be all for this meeting. We shall see you at the next one.
[Translation]
The meeting is adjourned.