1997, c. 6

[Assented to March 20, 1997]

An Act to establish the Canadian Food Inspection Agency and to repeal and amend other Acts as a consequence

WHEREAS the Government of Canada wishes to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of federal inspection and related services for food and animal and plant health by consolidating them;

WHEREAS the consolidation of those services under a single food inspection agency will contribute to consumer protection and facilitate a more uniform and consistent approach to safety and quality standards and risk-based inspection systems;

WHEREAS the Government of Canada wishes to have that food inspection agency deliver those services in a cost effective manner;

WHEREAS the Government of Canada wishes to promote trade and commerce;

AND WHEREAS the Government of Canada wishes to pursue a greater degree of collaboration and consultation between federal departments and with other orders of government in this area;

NOW, THEREFORE, Her Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate and House of Commons of Canada, enacts as follows:

1. This Act may be cited as the Canadian Food Inspection Agency Act.

2. The definitions in this section apply in this Act.

“Agency” means the Canadian Food Inspection Agency established by section 3.

“Minister” means the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food.

3. There is hereby established a body corporate called the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, which may exercise powers only as an agent of Her Majesty in right of Canada.

4. (1) The Minister is responsible for and has the overall direction of the Agency.

(2) The Minister may delegate to any person any power, duty or function conferred on the Minister under this Act or any Act or provision that the Agency enforces or administers by virtue of section 11, except the power to make regulations and the power to delegate under this subsection.

5. The Governor in Council shall appoint a President and an Executive Vice-president of the Agency to hold office during pleasure for a term not exceeding five years, which term may be renewed for one or more further terms.

6. (1) The President is chief executive officer of the Agency and has supervision over and direction of its work and staff. The President has the rank and all the powers of a deputy head of a Department.

(2) The Executive Vice-president shall exercise such powers and perform such duties and functions as the President may assign and shall act as President if that office is vacant or if the President is absent or incapacitated.

7. The President may delegate to any person any power, duty or function conferred on the President under this Act or any other enactment.

8. The President and Executive Vice-president shall be paid such remuneration as is fixed by the Governor in Council.

9. The head office of the Agency shall be in the National Capital Region, as described in the schedule to the National Capital Act.

10. (1) The Minister shall appoint an advisory board of not more than twelve members to hold office during pleasure for a term not exceeding three years, which term may be renewed for one or more further terms.

(2) The board shall advise the Minister on any matter within the responsibilities of the Agency.

(3) The Minister may appoint any person with relevant knowledge or experience to the advisory board, including persons from the agriculture, fisheries, food processing, food distribution and public health sectors, consumer groups or provincial or municipal governments.

(4) The Minister shall appoint one of the members as Chairperson of the advisory board.

(5) Each member of the advisory board shall be paid such fees for his or her services as are fixed by the Minister.

(6) Each member of the advisory board shall be reimbursed for reasonable travel and living expenses incurred by the member in the course of performing duties under this Act while absent from his or her ordinary place of residence.

(7) The Chairperson may determine the times and places at which the advisory board will meet.

11. (1) The Agency is responsible for the administration and enforcement of the Agriculture and Agri-Food Administrative Monetary Penalties Act, Canada Agricultural Products Act, Feeds Act, Fertilizers Act, Fish Inspection Act, Health of Animals Act, Meat Inspection Act, Plant Breeders’ Rights Act, Plant Protection Act and Seeds Act.

(2) The Agency is responsible for the enforcement of the Consumer Packaging and Labelling Act as it relates to food, as that term is defined in section 2 of the Food and Drugs Act.

(3) The Agency is responsible for

(a) the enforcement of the Food and Drugs Act as it relates to food, as defined in section 2 of that Act; and

(b) the administration of the provisions of the Food and Drugs Act as they relate to food, as defined in section 2 of that Act, except those provisions that relate to public health, safety or nutrition.

(4) The Minister of Health is responsible for establishing policies and standards relating to the safety and nutritional quality of food sold in Canada and assessing the effectiveness of the Agency’s activities related to food safety.

(5) The Canada Border Services Agency is responsible for the enforcement of the program legislation referred to in paragraph (b) of the definition “program legislation” in section 2 of the Canada Border Services Agency Act as that program legislation relates to the delivery of passenger and initial import inspection services performed at airports and other Canadian border points other than import service centres.

1997, c. 6, s. 11; 2005, c. 38, s. 53.

12. The Agency is a separate agency under the Public Service Labour Relations Act.

1997, c. 6, s. 12; 2003, c. 22, s. 135.

13. (1) The President has the authority to appoint the employees of the Agency.

(2) The President may set the terms and conditions of employment for employees of the Agency and assign duties to them.

(3) The President may designate any person or class of persons as inspectors, analysts, graders, veterinary inspectors or other officers for the enforcement or administration of any Act or provision that the Agency enforces or administers by virtue of section 11, in respect of any matter referred to in the designation.

14. (1) The Agency may enter into contracts, memoranda of understanding and other agreements with a department or agency of the Government of Canada or the government of a province and with any other person or organization in the name of Her Majesty in right of Canada or in its own name.

(2) In exercising its responsibilities, the Agency may negotiate and enter into arrangements for the implementation of technical requirements for the international movement of products or other things regulated under an Act or provision that the Agency enforces or administers by virtue of section 11.

15. Actions, suits or other legal proceedings in respect of any right or obligation acquired or incurred by the Agency, whether in its own name or in the name of Her Majesty in right of Canada, may be brought or taken by or against the Agency in the name of the Agency in any court that would have jurisdiction if the Agency were not an agent of Her Majesty.

16. Notwithstanding section 9 of the Department of Public Works and Government Services Act, the Agency may, with the approval of the Governor in Council given on the recommendation of the Treasury Board, procure goods and services, including legal services, from outside the federal public administration.

1997, c. 6, s. 16; 2003, c. 22, s. 224(E).

17. The Agency may license, sell or otherwise make available any patent, copyright, industrial design, trade-mark or other similar property right that is vested in Her Majesty in right of Canada under any Act or provision that the Agency enforces or administers by virtue of section 11.

18. The Agency may apply to a judge of a court of competent jurisdiction for an interim injunction enjoining any person from contravening an Act or provision that the Agency enforces or administers by virtue of section 11, whether or not a prosecution has been instituted in respect of that contravention.

19. (1) Where the Minister believes on reasonable grounds that a product regulated under an Act or provision that the Agency enforces or administers by virtue of section 11 poses a risk to public, animal or plant health, the Minister may, by notice served on any person selling, marketing or distributing the product, order that the product be recalled or sent to a place designated by the Minister.

(2) Any person who contravenes a recall order referred to in subsection (1) is guilty of an offence and liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding $50,000 or to a term of imprisonment not exceeding six months or to both.

(3) For greater certainty, a recall order is not a statutory instrument for the purposes of the Statutory Instruments Act, but no person shall be convicted of an offence under subsection (2) unless the person was notified of the order.

20. The Minister may, with the approval of the Governor in Council given on the recommendation of the Minister of Finance, enter into an agreement with one or more provincial governments for the provision of services or the carrying out of activities within the responsibilities of the Agency, in common with those governments.

21. The agreement referred to in section 20 may authorize the Minister, jointly with one or more provincial governments, to have a corporation incorporated under the Canada Business Corporations Act, the Canada Corporations Act or an equivalent provincial statute, or to acquire shares or participate in any corporation, in order to implement the agreement.

22. (1) As soon as possible after the Agency is established and at least once every five years after that, the Agency must submit a corporate business plan to the Minister for approval and the Minister must table a copy of the plan in each House of Parliament on any of the first fifteen days on which that House is sitting after the Minister approves the plan.

(2) The corporate business plan must include a statement of

(a) the Agency’s objectives for the period to which the plan relates and for each year in that period;

(b) the strategies that the Agency intends to use to achieve its objectives, including operational, financial and human resource strategies;

(c) the Agency’s expected performance over that period; and

(d) the Agency’s operating and capital budgets for each year of that period.

(3) The Agency may update its corporate business plan in its annual report.

23. (1) The President must, before September 30 of each year following the Agency’s first full year of operations, submit an annual report on the operations of the Agency for the preceding year to the Minister and the Minister must table a copy of the report in each House of Parliament on any of the first fifteen days on which that House is sitting after the Minister receives the report.

(2) The annual report must include

(a) the financial statements of the Agency and the Auditor General of Canada’s opinion on them;

(b) information about the Agency’s performance with respect to the objectives established in the corporate business plan and a summary statement of the assessment by the Auditor General of Canada of the fairness and reliability of that information; and

(c) any other information that the Minister or the Treasury Board may require to be included in it.

24. (1) Subject to the regulations, the Minister may fix the fees to be paid for a service or the use of a facility provided by the Agency.

(2) Fees fixed under subsection (1) may not exceed the cost to Her Majesty in right of Canada of providing the service or the use of the facility.

25. Subject to the regulations, the Minister may fix fees in respect of products, rights and privileges provided by the Agency.

26. (1) Before fixing a fee under section 24 or 25, the Minister must consult with any persons or organizations that the Minister considers to be interested in the matter.

(2) The Minister must publish any fee fixed under section 24 or 25 in the Canada Gazette within thirty days after fixing it.

(3) Any fee fixed under section 24 or 25 stands permanently referred to the Committee referred to in section 19 of the Statutory Instruments Act, to be reviewed and scrutinized as if it were a statutory instrument.

27. The Treasury Board may make regulations for the purposes of sections 24 to 26.

28. The Agency may enter into an agreement with any person, provincial government or other authority respecting the collection of fees fixed under this Act or any other Act that the Agency enforces or administers by virtue of subsection 11(1) and, notwithstanding subsections 17(1) and (4) of the Financial Administration Act, authorizing that person, government or authority to withhold amounts from those fees.

29. (1) The Minister may remit all or part of any fee fixed under section 24 or 25 or under any Act that the Agency enforces or administers by virtue of subsection 11(1), and the interest on it.

(2) The Minister may withdraw or withhold a service, use of a facility, a product or conferral of a right or privilege within the responsibilities of the Agency, from any person who fails to pay the fee fixed for it if, in the Minister’s opinion, it is consistent with public health and safety.

30. In carrying out its responsibilities, the Agency may spend money that Parliament appropriates to it and revenues received by it through the conduct of its operations, including

(a) payments for the sale, exchange, lease, loan, transfer or other disposition of personal or movable property;

(a.1) payments for the sale, lease or other disposition or transfer of real or immovable property;

(b) fees for the provision of a service or use of a facility or for a product, right or privilege; and

(c) refunds of expenditures made in the previous fiscal year.

31. The Agency must keep books of account and records prepared according to generally accepted accounting principles.

32. The Auditor General of Canada shall annually

(a) audit and provide an opinion on the financial statements of the Agency;

(b) provide an assessment of the fairness and reliability of the information about the Agency’s performance as set out in the annual report of the Agency; and

(c) provide a report to the President and to the Minister on the audit, opinion and assessment.

32.1 The provisions made by any appropriation Act for the fiscal year in which this section comes into force or a subsequent fiscal year, based on the Estimates for that year, to defray the charges and expenses of the public service of Canada within the Departments of Agriculture and Agri-Food, Fisheries and Oceans and Health in relation to any matter for which the Agency is responsible by virtue of section 11 are deemed to be an amount appropriated for defraying the charges and expenses of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency in such amount as the Treasury Board may, on the recommendations of the Ministers of Agriculture and Agri-Food, Fisheries and Oceans and Health, determine.

33. (1) On the coming into force of subsection 13(1), employees deployed to the Agency, or appointed to it by the Public Service Commission, are deemed to have been appointed by the President and continue to be employed by the Agency with the same tenure of office.

(2) On the coming into force of subsection 13(1), a competition being conducted or an appointment being made under the Public Service Employment Act shall continue to be conducted or made as if that section had not come into force.

34. An eligibility list made under the Public Service Employment Act that is valid on the coming into force of subsection 13(1) of this Act continues to be valid for the period provided for by subsection 17(2) of that Act, but that period may not be extended.

35. (1) An appeal commenced under section 21 of the Public Service Employment Act and not finally disposed of on the coming into force of subsection 13(1) of this Act shall be dealt with and disposed of in accordance with that Act as if that subsection had not come into force.

(2) Any recourse commenced under the Public Service Employment Act that has not been finally dealt with on the coming into force of subsection 13(1) of this Act shall be dealt with and disposed of in accordance with that Act as if that subsection had not come into force.

36. Every inspector, analyst, grader, veterinary inspector or other officer appointed or designated under an Act referred to in section 11 to enforce or administer any Act or provision that the Agency enforces or administers by virtue of that section is deemed to be designated by the President under subsection 13(3), according to the terms of the original designation or appointment.

37. to 89. [Amendments]

90. and 91. [Amendments]

92. [Repeal]

*93. This Act, or any provision of this Act, or any provision of any Act enacted or amended by this Act, comes into force on a day or days to be fixed by order of the Governor in Council.

* [Note: Act, except subsection 13(1) and section 31, in force April 1, 1997, see SI/97-37; subsection 13(1) in force April 1, 1998, see SI/97-122; section 31 in force March 31, 2000, see SI/2000-21.]