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moved that the bill be read the third time and passed.
He said: Mr. Speaker, it is an honour and a privilege to rise in the House today and speak again to my private member's bill, Bill C-275, an act to amend the Health of Animals Act. I would like to thank all the members of the agriculture and agri-food committee who participated in the study of this bill and worked with our witnesses and stakeholders to try to bring this forward.
I do want to take a moment to thank all of the stakeholders who have supported this bill from the beginning: the Canadian Federation of Agriculture, the Canadian Cattle Association, the Canadian Meat Council, the Canadian Pork Council, Dairy Farmers of Canada, Egg Farmers of Canada, Turkey Farmers of Canada, the National Cattle Feeders' Association, Alberta Farm Animal Care and Canada's Accredited Zoos and Aquariums.
During the committee discussion, we did have one amendment to this legislation, which included removing the words “knowing that or being reckless as to”. This is some clarification for my colleagues in the Liberal Party and NDP and I do appreciate their participation.
The second amendment was to lower some of the penalties as part of this for unlawful trespassers, but one amendment to remove penalties for groups and organizations that encourage this unlawful behaviour was not successful. It is not surprising that animal activist groups wanted these penalties removed from this legislation. These groups encourage this unlawful behaviour, which is a fundraising mechanism for them. For example, in the United States alone last year, these groups raised more than $800 million and organized more than 500 attacks on farms across the United States. We do not have specific statistics in terms of fundraising and numbers in Canada, but we do know that Canada ranks seventh in the world in the number of attacks on farms by animal activist groups.
These producers and farm families are subjected to vandalism, cyber-attacks, tampering on farm and arson, but, most important, relentless intimidation and harassment. This takes its toll on farm families across Canada. It jeopardizes the biosecurity on farms and certainly the health and welfare of our livestock. Most important, we heard at committee that these illegal intrusions have a long-lasting impact on the mental health of our farm families.
We had a hog farmer from B.C., Mr. Binnendyk. His family went through having 200 protesters on his family farm. I want to quote Mr. Binnendyk's comments at committee. He said:
[I]t affected us as a family,...for a number of years it was basically like you were...being watched. We used to be proud to be hog producers. Now we don't tell anyone. The perception that people have about us has all been spread by lies and stuff that are not true. It takes the fun out of what you do.
There aren't many farmers left, especially in B.C. There used to be 300 [hog] producers in the nineties. I do believe there are now [only] four or five producers left. It's a dwindling...industry, [to be] sure.
We also had Megz Reynolds, who is the executive director of The Do More Agriculture Foundation, which is an important advocacy group for mental health on farms. I want to quote some comments from Ms. Reynolds as well, from committee. She said:
[These] people showing up and trespassing [and protesting] are not whistle-blowers. They don't necessarily understand what that farmer needs [or what they] do to take care of that animal and what that animal means to that farmer.
I've talked to farmers, men, across Canada, and they tear up when they talk about having to cull a full barn in response to [a] disease....
I talked to a producer in Saskatchewan, and she does not feel safe to send her children out to fix fences by themselves because of the perceived risk from protesters. These are actual things happening on farms today, where in rural Canada our farm families do not feel safe on the land that they have nurtured and cared for, in many cases for generations.
I cannot be more crystal clear about this point in this legislation: This bill would not hinder in any way an individual's right to protest on public property. This bill would not prevent whistle-blowers from coming forward when they see standards of care not being met. In fact, whistle-blowers would be protected under this proposed legislation because they would be lawfully allowed to be on the premise with the animals.
Canadian farmers and ranchers have a moral and legal obligation to look after their animals. Farmers operate in a highly regulated system, and the environment and strict codes of conduct must be followed to ensure the health, safety and welfare of farm animals.
It was also highlighted at committee in testimony that people are showing up on farms who are not whistle-blowers. Activists are not whistle-blowers. True whistle-blowers are family members, employees, veterinarians and professionals like CFIA inspectors who understand the nuances of animal husbandry. They understand the livestock industry. They know what they are looking for if standards are not being met.
Members from all parties recounted situations in their ridings where they saw these activities happening and the impact that it had on our farmers and constituents. What worried me, from some of the testimony at committee, is how brazen some of these activists have become. They are putting not only farmers and farm animals at risk, but also the public. We saw an animal rights group in Montreal hang three dead hog carcasses from an overpass. The consequences of that could have been devastating.
We heard from a farmer in Ontario who was attacked by ransomware. His farm and his operation were held hostage unless he admitted publicly that he was mistreating his animals, which we know was utterly false. Mr. Binnendyk said there used to be 300 hog farmers in B.C., and now there is only a handful. The activist campaigns will work to end animal agriculture if there is not a strong deterrent in place.
Opponents of this bill will say there is no proof of animal activism spreading disease. There are two problems with that argument. First, they are missing the whole point of our current situation. It is short-sighted to have an argument that justifies unlawful behaviour that could lead to unimaginable consequences on a farm. Second, it is completely false. We had one incident in Quebec with an outbreak of rotavirus, a disease not seen in almost 40 years, after trespassers were on a hog farm there. Trespassers also went on a mink farm in Ontario, which spread distemper throughout the community, again as a result of trespassing.
Another argument is that some provinces have trespassing and biosecurity laws in place. That is true, but only Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario, Manitoba and P.E.I. That means the vast majority of provinces and territories do not have this type of legislation in place. I think it is very important that we show leadership from a national perspective, a federal government perspective, that says we understand the importance of biosecurity on farms, the importance of food security and the fact that public protests have a place but that place is not private property.
Most importantly, what this bill talks about is ensuring that biosecurity protocols on farm are adhered to and protect our food security from diseases like the avian flu, African swine fever, and foot and mouth disease, which pose very real threats to Canadian agriculture. In 2014, the Fraser Valley had 10 farms with avian flu outbreaks, and almost 200,000 animals had to be euthanized. The worst outbreak was in 2004, when 17 million birds had to be euthanized. That outbreak eventually cost the industry about $300 million in losses. In the aftermath, a number of changes occurred to ensure that biosecurity protocols were more strict and were adhered to.
In the most recent outbreak of avian flu, which we had this past year, 7.6 million birds had to be euthanized. The provinces of B.C., Alberta, Quebec, Ontario and Saskatchewan were the hardest hit. Farmers are still trying to recover from this outbreak, replacing flocks, cleaning out barns and getting their operations back up.
Cammy Lockwood, the owner-operator of Lockwood Farms on Vancouver Island, who, ironically, has free-range chickens and sells eco eggs, talked about the importance of this legislation for protecting their farms from trespassers who very well could be bringing the avian flu virus onto their farms. They have very strict protocols.
Many of us as parliamentarians have visited farms in our ridings or neighbouring ridings and understand that many times we have to wear booties, hairnets and haz-mat suits and have to clean our shoes before and after leaving farms. When we travel, we are asked if we have visited a farm in the last two weeks. That is important for not spreading viruses, but that is how easy it is to spread them and it cannot be overlooked.
One example is African swine fever, which thankfully we have not had in Canada. Unfortunately, it is not a matter of if, but likely a matter of when it will come to Canada. When the first case of African swine fever occurred in China in 2018, it spread to every single province in that country in less than a year. It has since spread to the Asia-Pacific, central Asia and eastern Europe and has now been detected in the Dominican Republic.
Although it is not a food risk, 100% of animals that come down with African swine fever have to be put down. If an outbreak were to happen in Canada, it would be absolutely devastating. Our Canadian pork industry has a $24-billion economic footprint in Canada. It employs more than 45,000 people, and almost 70% of our production, which is worth $4.25 billion, is exported to markets around the world.
Unfortunately, many of us in Canada understand and still feel the ramifications of bovine spongiform encephalopathy, BSC, which happened more than 20 years ago. It cost our cattle industry and was very impactful in my riding of Foothills. I know it was much the same for my Alberta colleagues.
It cost us almost $10 billion. In western Canada we lost 3,000 ranches. The vast majority of those ranches have never come back. Our animal herd in Canada is significantly lower 25 years later. It shows us the very real consequences of an animal-borne disease and what it can do to our industries across Canada. This is very real. It can happen. We do not want it to happen again.
If there are any lessons we can take, I look back to what happened over only the last couple of years with COVID. I think if any of us had a chance to go back in time, we would have done things differently. We would have been much better prepared to ensure we had the resources in place to protect Canada. We cannot make that same mistake.
Members can imagine the consequences if we had an animal-borne virus pandemic in Canada with any of these types of diseases. That is why strengthening the biosecurity of our farms is so critical, which is what this legislation is focused on doing. Certainly, these groups are raising money off of these endeavours and threatening the mental health of our farmers.
Most importantly, I hope my colleagues in the House will support protecting the biosecurity of farms and our food security here in Canada and around the world. I look forward to their questions.
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Mr. Speaker, the member brings up a very good point. Many Canadians do not understand the decades of work that goes into building up the genetics, whether it is beef, pork or in the feathers' barns. It is not something one can replace overnight. We are certainly seeing that with the avian flu, where it is taking months to get the numbers back up. When it comes to bovine spongiform encephalopathy in Alberta, or BSE, many of those farms are 20 years past and still have not built up their herd numbers from 25 years ago. It sometimes takes a generation to get the genetics back to where it was.
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