Ontario: Thomas Canning taken to court

At the end of February, the regional press in Essex County (Ontario) revealed that major volumes of tomatoes, under contract to the Thomas Canning company and estimated at a worth of several million Canadian dollars, were abandoned in the fields during the latest growing season, due to delays in setting up new processing equipment.
Of the fourteen growers concerned, nine decided to launch a court case, claiming CAD 2.85 million in compensation for breach of contract. In the end, only part of the 30 000 tonnes contracted by Thomas Canning were paid, with some producers managing to limit their losses by selling part of the volumes to other processors or by activating the crop insurance policies taken out to this effect. The losses incurred by each grower range from CAD 254 000 to 395 000. According to the court file, it does not appear that the company or its officials have been served with the lawsuit.

In addition to this civil action claim, Thomas Canning has been cited in a separate federal court claim, were it must respond to accusations of fraudulent labeling on its products, particularly on products labeled "product of Canada" although they were processed from US tomatoes, as well as products using conventional tomatoes sold under the "organic" label. According to the documents filed with the Ontario courts by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, Thomas and his company have been accused of eleven offenses in violation of three federal laws: the food and drugs act, the consumer packaging and labeling act and the agricultural products act.
 
The situation is further complicated by the concomitance of the periods during which, in 2014, the Thomas Canning Company received a subsidy of CAD 3 million in order to "build a new state-of-the-art processing plant" for fruit and vegetables as well as the alleged fraudulent labeling issues happened (reportedly between 2013 and 2015). No factory extension ever occurred, as the funds were used to create or maintain jobs, give a remake to the Utopia brand, and open new markets in China and Nigeria. According to local sources, the new equipment is reported to have been operational end of October, too late to allow the company to process more than one quarter of the contracted volumes.
In these cases, the Ontario justice system will need to take precautions against the risk of a conflict of interest, as the judge of the High Court of Ontario, Bruce Thomas, likely to preside over the civil court case opposing growers and the company, is a close family member of the owners and leaders of the Thomas Canning factory from Maidstone.