The document that I have chosen to analyze is the “Report of Royal Commission to Enquire into Alleged Complaints Relating to Weighing of Butter and Cheese in Montreal” (Hodgson et al., 1913, pp. 1). The report was published in 1913 responds to issues with the sale of cheese and butter produced in Central Canada, much of which was exported to Britian. It included recommendations as to how the issues could be remedied and how the quality of cheese exports to Britian could be improved.
The manner in which the investigation was undertaken during the Royal Commission appeared to be influenced by the identifies of the authors, who were English-speaking members of the British Commonwealth (Hodgson et al., 1913). Several recommendations from the report were included in The Dairy Industry Act, which marked the early stages of regulation in an industry which today is heavily regulated. Additionally, during the time period in which the Royal Commission’s report was published, government in Canada was still in its infancy. Social programs were pretty much nonexistent and regulations were minimal (Finkel, 2006; Hodgson et al., 1913). The dairy industry was growing in Canada and was seen as an important industry in the eyes of the government (Barnes, 2001; Hodgson et al., 1913).
Document overview
Following claims from both buyers and sellers that Canadian cheese and butter was being sold with inaccurate weights labeled, a Royal Commission was established to investigate and come up with recommendations as to how these issues could be remedied. The Royal Commission found that the selling of inaccurately weighted cheese was in fact taking place and their findings illustrate this was due to a combination of factors. The main cause was the use of faulty scales used by producers when weighing the cheese. In fact, they “…found that in ninety per cent of the factories they personally examined, the scales were out of order.” (Hodgson et al., 1913, pp. 8). Additionally, they discovered that many dairy farmers were using poor production methods and seemed to lack experience in cheesemaking, but also that some had been intentionally misrepresenting the weight of the cheese they were selling. There were no issues found with the
weighing of butter. The Report of the Royal Commission concluded with several
recommendations: increase the frequency of inspections at cheese production facilities, ban the type of scales which were being improperly used for weighing cheese and require that cheese cannot be exported until it has aged at least 10 days (Hodgson et al., 1913, pp. 8).
Historical context
During the time period when the Royal Commission took place, food producers in Canada were largely left to their own domain to produce quality products, the quality of which was determined by market demand and less so by food regulations (Hodgson et al., 1913). This builds on an important point which is that the role of government in the lives of Canadians was still in its infancy. In fact, income tax did not even exist at the time of the Royal Commission. It was only
implemented in 1917 after WW1 (Elsbeth, 2017). Additionally, “Apart from workmen’s compensation, no major social program was implemented in Canada before 1914.” (Finkel, 2006, pp. 90).
In the decades prior to the Royal Commission, the business model of cheesemaking had undergone a change, shifting from primarily production at family farms to a more commercialized model, where cheesemaking no longer took place in the farms where the milk was produced, but in cheesemaking factories instead (Goodchild, 2017). Despite this increasing corporatization, cheesemakers did not invest a lot in technology and did not commonly use standardized cheesemaking methods (Hodgson et al., 1913).
“In 1901, Ontario and Quebec produced over 32 million pounds of butter and 212 million pounds of cheese in factories. Exports of butter in these two provinces rose to nearly 35 million pounds in 1903, while cheese exports were recorded at some 230 million pounds.” (Barnes, 2001, pp. 391). Additionally, “By 1901, dairy products were the country’s third most valuable export.” (Goodchild, 2017). These quotes illustrate the importance of the dairy industry at the time as a major source of employment and economic growth in Central Canada. Given this historical context, the government was heavily invested in the success of the industry which was vocalized in the Royal Commission’s report (Hodgson et al., 1913).
Ideational and or governmental context
Using Béland’s (2019) definitions of ideas/ideation, I believe that the authors of the Royal Commission’s report were influenced by their identities as English-speaking members of the British Commonwealth who still felt a close connection to the Monarch. This is supported by their emphasis on exporting cheese and butter to Britian, as well as their concern of New Zealand and Australia as competitors – two other English-speaking countries who were dairy exporters.
In fact, they did not even mention any other countries, although there were presumably other countries that Canadian dairy producers were exporting to and non-English-speaking countries that they were competing with. However, it is unclear to what extent this lens ultimately influenced the Royal Commission’s recommendations, as they related to technical issues with dairy production, such as the weighing of cheese (Hodgson et al., 1913).
Contemporary Impact
A year after the document’s publication, The Dairy Industry Act was created and included several of the recommendations from the Royal Commission’s report (Hodgson et al., 1913). The recommendation which was originally implemented and is now present in the Canadian Dairy Commission Act, is the right for government inspectors to regularly investigate production facilities. The report appeared to be the beginning of the regulatory expansion of the dairy industry. Unlike The Dairy Industry Act which lays out specific product requirements that need to be met in order to sell to consumers, the Canadian Dairy Commission Act gives the Commission wide ranging authority and discretion over the products that dairy farmers produce, acting as a powerful intermediary between producers and consumers (Canadian Dairy Commission Act, 1985; The Dairy Industry Act, 1914). Most notably, the Commission exercises its authority through the implementation of supply quotas (Canadian Dairy Commission Act, 1985). This style of dairy regulation is commonly referred to as “supply management” (Government of Canada, 2021).
Given that the Dairy Industry Act went on to become part of a larger act, with considerable changes made, it is difficult to determine how much of an influence the act alone has had on public administration in Canada. What I believe it does is illustrate is the idea that the dairy industry is of critical importance to Canada, which was illustrated in the Royal Commission’s report (Hodgson et al., 1913). Despite the environmental concerns associated with dairy farming and the protections not afforded to many other industries in our economy, the Canadian
government always remains steadfast in their support for the industry. In fact, all current major federal party leaders have voiced their support for maintaining the supply management system (Al Mallees, 2024; Boztas, 2023). I would argue that this is evident of the power that the dairy industry wields.
References
Al Mallees, N. (2024, March 13). Supply management a ‘sacred cow,’ but politicians want more competition. Global News. https://globalnews.ca/news/10356123/supply-managementcanada/
Barnes, R. C. (2001). The Rise of Corporatist Regulation in the English and Canadian Dairy Industries. Social Science History 25(3), pp. 381-406. https://muse-jhuedu.proxy.library.carleton.ca/article/32183
Béland, D. (2019). How ideas and institutions shape the politics of public policy. Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108634700
Boztas, S. (2023, January 16). Have we reached ‘peak meat’? Why one country is trying to limit its number of livestock. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jan/16/netherlands-european-unionregulations-livestock
Canadian Dairy Commission Act. (R.S.C., 1985, c. C-15). https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/PDF/C15.pdf
Elsbeth, H. (2017). Tax, order, and good government: a new political history of Canada, 1867-1917. McGill-Queen’s University Press.
Goodchild, H. (2017). The problem of milk in the nineteenth-century Ontario cheese industry: an envirotechnical approach to business history. Business History, 59(7), pp. 1081-1110. https://doi.org/10.1080/00076791.2016.1173031
Goodchild, H. (2021). The Reluctant Cheesemaker: Craft Work and Conflict in Ontario’s Nineteenth-Century Cooperative Cheese Industry. Social History, 54(111), pp. 261-282. https://doi.org/10.1353/his.2021.0043
Government of Canada. (2021, July 22). Canada’s dairy industry at a glance.
https://agriculture.canada.ca/en/sector/animal-industry/canadian-dairy-informationcentre/dairy-industry
Finkel, A. (2006). Social Policy and Practice in Canada: A History. Wilfrid Laurier University Press.
The Dairy Industry Act, 1914, and Regulations. (S.C. 1914, c. 7).
https://publications.gc.ca/collections/collection_2015/aac-aafc/A64-1-28-1920-eng.pdf
Hodgson, A. J., MacDonell, S. K., & Pringle, R. A. (1913). Report of Royal Commission to Enquire into Alleged Complaints Relating to Weighing Butter and Cheese in Montreal. https://epe.lac-bac.gc.ca/100/200/301/pco-bcp/commissions-ef/pringle1913-eng/pringle1913-eng.htm