Posts tagged Sheila Weatherill

Immediate action on food safety needs to be taken

By KIRSTY DUNCAN, CAROLYN BENNETT AND WAYNE EASTER Owen Sound Sun Times
Canadians have been fed a new vocabulary by the federal government: “global synchronized economic downturn,” “recalibration,” and “listeria outbreak.”  [More...]

Minister defends food inspection system

By Sarah Schmidt, Canwest News Service
Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz defended Canada’s food-safety system yesterday after internal records surfaced showing the Canadian Food Inspection Agency is scrambling to maintain an increased presence at meat processing plants to adhere to American food-safety standards.  [More...]

U.S. had to force Canada to beef up meat inspections: union

The Canadian Press
The union representing the country’s food inspectors says Canada increased its meat-plant inspection schedule only after complaints from the United States.  [More...]

Questions raised about gap in food inspection standards

By Gloria Galloway, Globe and Mail
As investigators probe an unusual number of listeriosis cases in Ontario this year alongside a new tainted-meat recall, food inspectors have raised fresh questions about gaps between Canadian and U.S. food safety regimes.  [More...]

U.S. regulations forcing more meat inspections in Canada

By Sarah Schmidt, Canwest News Service
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency is scrambling to maintain an increased presence at dozens of large meat-processing plants after auditors from the United States Department of Agriculture found inspections were too infrequent to meet U.S. food-safety standards, newly released internal records show.  [More...]

Listeriosis cases linked to deli meat

By Sarah Schmidt, Canwest News Service
Ontario’s chief medical officer confirmed Friday a genetic match between listeriosis cases and contaminated deli meat produced at a federally regulated meat plant — the first match since Canada was rocked in the summer of 2008 with a deadly outbreak.  [More...]

Video: Chris Olsen on Maple Leaf recall

CTV British Columbia

Feeling queasy

Ottawa Citizen Editorial 
It has been 18 months since 22 Canadians died after eating tainted meat and, despite government assurances that food safety systems are more effective than ever, consumers ought to be skeptical.  [More...]

Government gets failing grade on food safety

By Christina Spencer, Parliamentary Bureau SUN News Service
OTTAWA — The union representing federal meat inspectors has given the government a failing grade for moving too slowly to boost food safety since the listeriosis outbreak of 2008 that killed at least 22 people.  [More]

Food inspection agency hasn’t acted on safety recommendations: report

By Sarah Schmidt, Canwest News Service
OTTAWA — The Canadian Food Inspection Agency on Wednesday received a failing grade from its own meat inspectors for not acting on the “vast majority” of recommendations made six months ago to improve food safety. [More]

Federal Government gets failing grade on food safety

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Ottawa – Inaction on food safety has earned the federal government a failing grade six months after the Prime Minister’s special investigator Sheila Weatherill tabled recommendations on how to prevent a repeat of the Maple Leaf Foods listeriosis outbreak which killed 22 people and sickened many more.
A mid-term report card on the government’s [...]

Independence of food safety probe questioned

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 [...]

Report on the listeriosis outbreak released – 57 recommendations made

Food safety investigation falls short

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Inspector shortage compromising food safety
Ottawa – Many of Sheila Weatherill’s recommendations make a constructive and valuable contribution to improving the safety of food in Canada and should be implemented immediately, even though it appears that the CFIA and others in government have either withheld information or misled her, according to the union representing [...]