Brad Wall continues beef with A&W’s hamburgers

Premier Brad Wall and restaurant chain A&W continue to beef over what is in their hamburgers.

In August, Wall called out the fast food restaurant on Twitter for not exclusively using Canadian beef in their burgers.

Exclusively Cdn beef burgers avail at your fav local restaurants & @McD_Canada @WendysCanada @HarveysCanada. @AWCanada? Not quite yet #hope

— Brad Wall (@PremierBradWall) August 23, 2017

On Monday, the chain responded to the premier’s tweet, indicating they do use Canadian beef, but not enough “matches our standards” – referring to the A&W claim it only uses beef raised without the use of steroids and hormones.

Wall proceeded to retweet and respond to it, showing his support for Canadian beef.

So most Canadian beef is below your standards? Interesting, I have always thought it's the best beef in the world. https://t.co/FJwoPudTsm

— Brad Wall (@PremierBradWall) September 5, 2017

On the 980 CJME Morning Show Wednesday, Wall stated he is undertaking this campaign against A&W’s advertising strategy because of the effects it could have on marketing around the science of agriculture.

“Down the road, if we’re not careful, could it affect canola that we grow that might be GMO?”

Wall claimed that in beef raised without hormones, there is still 1.5 nanograms of hormones per 100 grams of beef. That number only increase slightly, to 2.2 nanograms, in beef from cattle that were given hormones.

“So the bottom line is this: every bit of beef’s got hormones in it,” Wall said.

The premier also claimed the bun A&W serves with its burger has more than 51,000 nanograms of hormones per three ounces of bread, and french fries have about 500 nanograms.

Wall said the campaign has nothing to do with health or science.

“It’s about marketing. It’s sort of the urban hipster movement and it plays on folks’ fears that if I have beef, a burger that is raised by a conventional ranch in Canada where they don’t just grass feed their animals, somehow it’s not as healthy. It is simply not the case.”

Wall added he misses being able to have a papa burger and did mention there are many A&W franchises providing employment across the province.