Grant Robertson from National Farmers Union-Ontario has some comments today in Canada’s Sun Times newspaper about the investigation into Maple Leaf listeria outbreak.  In part, he says:

“The Maple Leaf Listeria outbreak pulled back the curtain on an inspection system that was no longer serving Canadians. It revealed a government agenda of removing inspections and a minister not up to the job of working in farmers’ interests, in my view.

“On June 18 the federal Subcommittee of Food Safety released its report into the listerosis deaths caused by tainted meat from the Maple Leaf plant and into food safety in general.

“It seems to me as though the government was more concerned about covering a posterior part of their collective anatomies than really getting down to brass tacks on how to fix a system that clearly has problems.

“And if the deaths of 22 Canadians were not enough to send the government signals that there are serious problems then it is hard to understand what it would take. Many of the 21 recommendations in the dissenting report basically boil down to recommending the government should actually do the job Canadians expect and a bunch of motherhood statements.

“Missing from the report is any sense that food inspection should be completely independent of government and political considerations and not take place in a self-policing environment on the plant floor. “

Check out the rest in The Sun Times.