By: Sarah Schmidt, Vancouver Sun

OTTAWA — The federal government has appointed the top bureaucrat at Agriculture Canada to lead Ottawa’s overhaul of food safety after an investigation into last year’s deadly listeriosis outbreak called for an independent expert to direct the effort.

Sheila Weatherill zeroed in on a “vacuum in senior leadership” among government officials during her sweeping independent investigation earlier this year into the outbreak that cost 22 Canadians their lives.

And in her final report presented to Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz in July, Weatherill called on the clerk of the privy council, the bureaucratic wing of the Prime Minister’s Office, to appoint an “independent expert” to lead a review involving top bureaucrats at Health Canada, the Public Health Agency of Canada and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency to sort out the roles of federal departments and agencies in food safety.

The clerk, Wayne Wouters, has tapped the bureaucratic right-hand of Ritz, John Knubley, to lead the special committee of deputy ministers, said a spokeswoman for the clerk, declining further comment.

Ritz, who is responsible for CFIA and whose president reports directly to him, took the government lead during last year’s listeriosis outbreak and promised to implement every recommendation put forward by Weatherill.

In a statement, Ritz said his deputy minister of agriculture is an independent expert on the file, so the appointment means the “recommendation has been fulfilled.”

“Privy Council’s naming of Deputy Minister John Knubley ensures he is able to independently provide expert analysis that will be reported directly to the Clerk,” Ritz said in a statement.

University of Manitoba microbiologist Rick Holley, a member of CFIA’s academic advisory panel on food safety, said this is a stretch.

“The perception I think in most circles would be that appointment doesn’t give the independence that was intended in the original recommendation by Sheila Weatherill. That’s my suspicion here. My preference would be another choice be made.”

Holley said the appointment “wouldn’t have to be outside” government, but it shouldn’t come from within the agriculture ministry, which is tasked with devising policies and programs to achieve security of the food system and whose minister held daily briefings about the government response during the outbreak.

“My preference would actually be to see an appointment from the Auditor General’s office. They would not be a party to any of the baggage that currently exists and the difficulties associated between the public health and the food regulatory interface, which in and of itself is a singular problem that needs resolution.”

Weatherill also recommended that CFIA, “supported by independent experts,” initiate a comprehensive review of the agency’s organizational structure and decision-making processes. The public health agency should do the same, Weatherill recommended.

Neither agency responded Thursday to clarify whether the independent experts appointed in these cases are external to government or external to the agency.

© Vancouver Sun