U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood criticized Toyota on Tuesday for slow handling of safety problems with its gas pedals.

It took government pressure to force Toyota to recall millions of its most popular vehicles, LaHood told The Associated Press in an interview.

U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood says Toyota was slow to deal with safety problems with its gas pedals. (Cliff Owen/Associated Press)

He said Toyota was "a little safety deaf" during its investigation into the problem. The company was so resistant that it took a trip from federal safety officials to Japan to "wake them up" to the seriousness of the pedal problems, he said.

"They should have taken it seriously from the very beginning, when we first started discussing it with them," LaHood told the news agency. "Maybe they were a little safety deaf in their North American office until we went to Japan.

"If it had not been for the work of [the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration] pushing Toyota to make the recall, travelling to Japan, meeting with the top officials of Toyota in Japan and telling them that their folks in the United States seem to be a little safety deaf when it came to us talking to them, I don't know if the recall would be taking place."

Sales drop 10.4 per cent

LaHood's comments came as Toyota reported its Canadian sales fell 10.4 per cent in January.

The drop came amid a massive recall and halt on sales of some of its most popular vehicles.

Of the eight models affected by the recall, 8,246 were sold, down 14.8 per cent from January 2009. The drop was partly compensated for by increases in Toyota's luxury Lexus division, which reported its best ever January, with 953 models sold, up 62.1 per cent.

Analysts say the Toyota sales decline will likely continue through February as the automaker deals with the fallout of the faulty pedal design, which forced it to recall 270,000 vehicles in Canada and millions more worldwide.

Toyota's troubles appear to have helped its rivals, with the exception of Honda Canada. Just three months ago, Toyota claimed first place in the Canadian market for the first time in its history, with about 14 per cent of the market. It has lost ground since then and now holds 11 per cent. General Motors is the leader with 18 per cent.

Toyota reported its Canadian sales fell 10.4 per cent in January. (Associated Press)

Hyundai Auto Canada reported its best January ever, selling more than 6,000 vehicles and beating last January's sales numbers by more than 32 per cent. Ford Motor Canada said its sales rose six per cent in January, to 11,553, compared with 10,933 in the same period a year earlier. Car sales were up 0.8 per cent to 2,281 and truck sales rose seven per cent to 9,272.

Kia Canada's sales grew to 2,416 vehicles, a 32.4 per cent increase. Nissan Canada Inc. said it sold 4,975 vehicles, up nearly 17 per cent from January 2009, and Mercedes-Benz Canada sold 1,693, an increase of 33.5 per cent.

On Tuesday, Honda Canada reported combined January sales of 6,393 vehicles by the Honda and Acura divisions. This was a 15 per cent decline over last year.

Dennis DesRosiers of DesRosiers Automotive Consultants described the results in a commentary as "disappointing," given total sales of 81,581 cars and light trucks.

More normal levels, he said, would be from 90,000 to 110,000 a month. His calculation of average sales of cars and light trucks over the last six months fell in January compared with December and is now tracking below 1.5 million vehicles.

Given that last year was such a poor year for sales and many analysts expected a stronger rebound, DesRosiers said, for the six-month average to stay at that level "would be very bad news for the automotive sector in Canada."

DesRosiers said the industry shouldn't read too much "into this early market performance." March to June will be the "make or break months" for the industry, he said.

With files from The Associated Press and The Canadian Press