(Return tabled) Question No. 20 Mr. Alex Atamanenko: With regard to the horse slaughter industry in Canada: (a) what was the reason for the temporary halt, initiated by European Union (EU) officials, to horse meat imports from Canada on October 12, 2012; (b) has Canada participated in talks with EU officials regarding the safety of horse meat from Canada since that time, (i) if so, what topics were discussed, (ii) what conclusions were reached; (c) what restrictions effective in 2013 will be imposed upon the Canadian horse meat industry by the EU, (i) what is the anticipated impact of these restrictions on the frequency and type of dru ...[+++]g residue testing on horse meat in Canada as well as on the data required on Equine Information Documents (EIDs), (ii) will the restrictions on prohibited/non-permitted drugs be further tightened; (d) is there any oversight by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) on transport drivers and horse meat dealers listed on EIDs as current owners to check for a history of violations of the United States Department of Agriculture, Ministry of Transport, or CFIA transport regulations, (i) does the CFIA enhance its scrutiny of such violators or conduct follow-up investigations on those who have been flagged for violations, (ii) is this information shared with any other inter-connected government agency either in Canada or in the United States; (e) how often do CFIA inspectors do a visual inspection of the transports that arrive at the slaughter plants to ensure that the horses have been transported safely; (f) how many transport violations concerning horse slaughter transportation have been issued to transport drivers within the last five years, (i) how many warnings of violations have been issued, (ii) if the warnings have been ignored, how does the CFIA restrict or prohibit those transport drivers from conducting business in Canada; (g) how often does the CFIA conduct inspections of feedlots and how many warnings or violations were ...

In particular, Article 33(9) of the ‘beef and veal’ Regulation (EC) No 1254/1999, lays down that "the payment of the refund for exports of live animals shall be subject to compliance with the provisions established in Community legislation concerning animal welfare and, in particular, the protection of animals during transport".

Animal transport/meat quality minimising stress inducing factors on cattle during handling and transport to improve animal welfare and meat quality

The monitoring authority's computer system is up and running only for live animals, but is still being developed to deal with meat.

ANNEX I Important measures taken in relation to BSE (a) Community measures (i) export ban on live animals from the UK to the other Member States with the exception of calves under six months under the condition that they are slaughtered before the age of six months (March 1990); (ii) export ban on specified offals (brains, spinal cord, thymus, tonsils, spleen and intestines) from the UK to the other Member States (April 1990); (iii) export of meat from the UK to the other Member States: - from animals under the age of 30 months: no restrictions (first measure 1 March 1990 - latest decision February 1995); - from animals over the age o ...[+++]f 30 months coming from a herd with no case of BSE during the last six years: no restrictions (decisions as above); - from animals over the age of 30 months coming from a herd with a case of BSE during the last six years: to be accompanied by a health certificate stating "fresh deboned bovine meat in the form of muscle from which the adherent tissues, including obvious nervous and lymphatic tissues, have been removed" (decisions as above); (iv) ban in the Community on the feeding of mammalian protein to ruminants (June 1994); (v) tightening of rules on rendering of ruminant waste in order to inactivate the BSE agent (June 1994) (b) UK measures: (i) ban on the feeding of ruminant protein to ruminants (July 1988); (ii) ban on specified bovine offals (SBOs) (November 1989); ( i i i ) strengthening of the specified bovine offals ban (August 1995); (iv) ban on the feeding of mammalian protein to all farm animals (March 1996) (c) Member State level: - import ban on meat- and bone-meal from the United Kingdom (d) Community export ban on bovine animals, bovine meat and meat products, etc., and on mammalian-derived meat- and bone-meal from the UK to other Member States and third countries (March 1996).

The Lower Saxony authorities would agree to test pigs before vaccination so that only healthy animals were vaccinated and to prohibit all exports of live animals and non-heat treated meat and meat products from the vaccination zone for six months.