Bill C-24 (Historical)

Canada-Peru Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act

An Act to implement the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru, the Agreement on the Environment between Canada and the Republic of Peru and the Agreement on Labour Cooperation between Canada and the Republic of Peru

This enactment implements the Free Trade Agreement and the related agreements on the environment and labour cooperation entered into between Canada and the Republic of Peru and signed at Lima on May 29, 2008.
The general provisions of the enactment specify that no recourse may be taken on the basis of the provisions of Part 1 of the enactment or any order made under that Part, or the provisions of the Free Trade Agreement or the related agreements themselves, without the consent of the Attorney General of Canada.
Part 1 of the enactment approves the Free Trade Agreement and the related agreements and provides for the payment by Canada of its share of the expenditures associated with the operation of the institutional aspects of the Free Trade Agreement and the power of the Governor in Council to make orders for carrying out the provisions of the enactment.
Part 2 of the enactment amends existing laws in order to bring them into conformity with Canada’s obligations under the Free Trade Agreement and the related agreement on labour cooperation.

Canada-Peru Free Trade Agreement

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Carleton—Mississippi Mills, ON]

moved that the bill be read the third time and passed.

[Gerald Keddy, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of International Trade]

Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to rise today to speak to Bill C-24, the Canada-Peru free trade agreement.

As members know, our Conservative government's global commerce strategy includes a re-energized agenda of trade liberalization with our partners around the world. It will be this strategy that will help to lead Canada out of this recession that is affecting every country in the world today.

As a trading nation, Canadian companies, Canadian producers and Canadian investors need access to international markets to stay competitive. We have entered an age of fierce global competition, as emerging economies continue climbing the value chain and establishing themselves in an ever-widening range of sectors.

In this time of economic uncertainty, with a slowdown in the U.S. economy, our top commercial partner, and ongoing turbulence in international financial markets, Canadian exporters and investors will continue to be affected.

We have done a good job of riding out the storm, thanks largely to Canada's strengths, like low unemployment, the strongest fiscal situation in the G7, a sound borrowing system and our endowment of natural resources that continue to be in demand the world over.

However, it is extremely clear that we must remain vigilant. Our Conservative government must continue to fight protectionist measures around the world and continue taking steps to ensure Canadian companies remain competitive, maintain their markets and have access to new opportunities.

The Prime Minister and the Minister of International Trade understand the challenge. The Prime Minister has committed to playing an active role in the Americas and to building strategic relationships with key partners in our neighbourhood.

Peru is a leader in Latin America, a lynchpin in the political and economic stability of the region. It has been an economic engine with a GDP growth rate of 9.8% in 2008, the top of Latin American countries and higher than that experienced by China or India.

Peru also has a solid outward orientation. A leader in trade liberalization, Peru is currently pursuing trade negotiations with a number of countries.

As it stands, Canadian exporters are at an immediate risk of losing markets in Peru due to the entry into force of a trade promotion agreement with the United States on February 1 of this year.

Peru has also recently completed trade negotiations with China and EFTA and is negotiating with the EU, South Korea, Mexico and Thailand.

As members can see, Peru has a very robust international trade agenda. It is an economic engine in the Americas. It is beneficial to Peru and beneficial to Canada that we see this free trade agreement go forward.

Our firms and Canadian workers deserve trade agreements that address this situation and allow them to compete in international markets on a level playing field. We need partners like Peru, especially as we move forward on engaging with like-minded countries throughout the Americas.

Canadians will benefit. Peru is already an established and growing market for our businesses. In 2008, two-way merchandise trade between our countries totalled $2.8 billion.

With this new agreement, our nations are taking a critical step to intensify our commercial relationship in the years ahead and to create new opportunities for citizens in both countries to prosper.

Upon its implementation, Peru will eliminate tariffs on nearly all current Canadian exports, including wheat, pulses and mining equipment.

It should be noted that some opposition parties have been holding up a number of these free trade agreements. At the same time, they propose that they continue to support Canadian business and Canadian opportunity, especially Canadian exports because we are an exporting nation.

In wheat and barley alone, in two free trade agreements between Colombia and Peru, roughly $250 million of Canadian trade is at risk because these agreements have not passed through the House yet.

Perhaps the members who are intent on holding up these agreements and at the same time are saying that they support Canadian industry, should take a look at this one industry alone where a quarter of a billion dollars are at risk because of opposition shenanigans, quite frankly, in holding them up.

Upon its implementation, Peru will eliminate tariffs on nearly all Canadian exports, including wheat, pulses and mining equipment. Again, that is worth repeating. A variety of paper products, machinery and equipment will also enjoy the same benefit.

The Canada-Peru free trade agreement also provides a great opportunity to take our current trade in services to a new level in the years ahead. In 2006, the most recent year where statistics are available, Canada exported $33 million worth of commercial services to Peru. This new agreement provides a wonderful opportunity to grow this number in the years ahead and continue boosting the level of cross-border trade enjoyed by our two countries.

Canadian investors, too, have a significant presence in the Peruvian market. Even before this agreement, our countries made a firm commitment to enhancing two-way investments through a joint foreign investment promotion and protection agreement, or FIPPA, which entered into force in 2007. Canada is one of Peru's largest overall foreign investors, with an estimated $2.35 billion worth of investment stock in Peru in 2008, led by the mining and the financial sectors.

This FTA builds on the existing FIPPA and gains new ground for Canadian investors. Specifically, it includes strong obligations that will, first, ensure the free transfer of capital related to investments, protect against unlawful expropriation and provide for non-discriminatory treatment of Canadian investors. In short, we have levelled the playing field.

It also provides for an effective, binding and impartial dispute settlement mechanism. In other words, the agreement provides the security, stability and predictability that investors need. Our government procurement agreement guarantees Canadian suppliers the right to bid on a broad range of goods, services and construction contracts carried out by Peru's federal government entities.

It is no wonder that Canadian businesses in a number of sectors have been strong advocates of this agreement. Their support has been crucial throughout the negotiating process that began in June 2007. The result is something we can all be proud of. With this new agreement, our nations are taking a critical step to intensify our commercial relationships in the years ahead and to create new opportunities for citizens in both countries to prosper.

We have negotiated a high quality and comprehensive free trade agreement, covering everything from market access to goods to cross-border trade and services, to investment and government procurement. Canadian exporter service providers and investors will benefit, and the agreement will create new opportunities for Canadian businesses and producers in the Peruvian market.

However, an effective should do more than eliminate tariffs. It should also tackle the non-tariff barriers that keep a trade relationship from reaching its full potential. With this agreement, that is just what we have done, by including new measures to ensure greater transparency, including better predictability of incoming regulations, and the right by industry to be consulted at an early stage in the development of regulations, promoting the use of international standards and creating a mechanism to promptly address problems.

We are taking action on a number of fronts to unlock the trade potential inherent in the Canada-Peru relationship but this agreement is significant for other reasons as well. This agreement is also accompanied by important side agreements that demonstrate our joint commitment to corporate social responsibility, the rights of workers and preserving the natural environment.

Many Canadian companies and the Canadian government are at the forefront of efforts to ensure accountability and transparency through renewed commitments to principles of good corporate citizenship, both domestically and internationally.

The Canadian government encourages and expects Canadian companies operating abroad to respect all applicable laws and international standards and to conduct their activities in a socially and environmentally responsible manner, recognizing that responsible business conduct reinforces the positive effect that trade and investment can have on labour rights, the environment and competitiveness.

This complements the Conservative government's recently announced corporate social responsibility strategy that will increase the competitiveness of the Canadian extractive sector operating abroad by enhancing its ability to manage social and environmental risk. Our nations recognize that prosperity must not come at the expense of the environment and workers' rights.

This agreement paves the way for significant dialogue in other areas of mutual interest, including poverty reduction and trade related co-operation. We share a belief with Peru that open markets and international trade are the best hope for fostering development of our common security in the hemisphere. In fact, this approach builds on our successful experience with free trade partners, such as the United States, Mexico, Chile and Costa Rica.

We recognize that prosperity cannot take hold without security or in the absence of freedom and the rule of law brought about through the pursuit of democratic governance. A good, healthy democracy cannot function without a sound underpinning of personal security and the chance to improve living standards through increased trade and investment. That is why our Conservative government is committed to working closely with partners like Peru to influence positive change throughout the region and promote the principles of sound governance, security and prosperity.

Taken together, these agreements mark a new chapter in the Canada-Peru relationship, one that will forge an even stronger bond between our nations in the years ahead. They also mark yet another milestone in Canada's trade policy. In this day of fierce global competition and overall economic uncertainty, I am proud to say that we are taking the measures necessary to continue creating a resilient and competitive Canadian economy in the years ahead.

We need to move expeditiously to help our businesses grow. As I noted, the United States already has preferred access to Peru's markets for their exports and government procurement. Canadian companies deserve to compete on a level playing field. I ask for the support of all hon. members of this place as we continue these efforts and create new opportunities for all Canadians to thrive and prosper in the global economy.

In closing, I would say that since coming to government, in 2006, we have pursued a very ambitious free trade agreement, especially in the Americas. There is a tremendous amount of Canadian direct investment abroad in the Americas. Quite frankly, this is our neighbourhood. This is the continent that Canada is part of: North America and South America. It only makes sense that we have closer ties.

Unfortunately, that was not seen as a priority by the previous government, so we have a lot of ground to make up. We have a huge opportunity. There are a number of countries throughout Central America, the Caribbean and South America that are looking to enhance ties with Canada and improve the situation they find their own countries in.

These are growing economies with some challenges, and we recognize that. For us to turn our backs on these critical relationships at this time would not be good foreign policy, it would not be good trade policy and it would indicate that we do not have a clear understanding of what is going on in Central America and South America.

The opportunity is huge and the benefits are great. The benefits are great, not just for Canada but for our partners in Central America, South America and the Caribbean. Again, I would implore all my colleagues in the House to support this agreement. It is a good agreement, one that will help carry Canada into the future and ensure and protect Canadian and Peruvian jobs and opportunities.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I was pleased to hear in the parliamentary secretary's comments a renewed commitment to corporate social responsibility. I think that is welcome news.

I wonder whether the parliamentary secretary is aware that there was a parliamentary report by the foreign affairs committee in 2005 that was followed up by round tables in 2007 to which his government did not respond. The round table's report was retabled in 2009, to which his government did not respond. It was then followed by my private member's bill, Bill C-300. Only lately has the government got religion, in March of this year, with a proposal that has the appearance of doing something but in fact is doing very little and may actually be counterproductive.

Some of the initiatives in that press release are actually good, and I encourage the government to pursue those. However, the ones that are most objectionable are the ones having to do with the actual investigative power of the councillor.

Would the hon. parliament secretary commit to incorporating the CSR obligations or responsibilities in the press release and the mandate of the new councillor into Bill C-300 as this bill goes forward?

[Gerald Keddy, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margaret's, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate that the hon. member supports the government initiatives in corporate social responsibility. We certainly have come further and more quickly than any government in the history of this country.

Unfortunately, the member has convinced a number of his colleagues that the way his bill is written would benefit corporate social responsibility and enhance it, and nothing is further from the truth.

There is the whole issue when we are looking at corporate social responsibility of extraterritoriality and the ability for Canadians to enforce our laws in foreign jurisdictions. That is simply not appropriate and it is not applicable.

The other assumption that the hon. member's bill makes is that all the NGOs' statements and the negative statements and every press release the member reads about Canada's mining sector, our extractive sector, which is the biggest extractive sector in the world by far, operating in over 100 countries, are true.

I visited a mine in Honduras that the NGO said was not practising good social responsibility and found out from being on the ground there, in a little town called San Andrés, which used to have 1,200 people and now has about 30,000 people because they have come there for jobs and opportunity and to work in the mine, a community that had no doctor, no facilities at all--one could go to the priest after one was dead--now has a hospital that is operated by the mining company there.

We had a former member of Parliament, Alexa McDonough, who never visited the town, never visited the mine, but put a report out condemning them for corporate social responsibility. In fact when one actually visits the place, it was untrue. I cannot put it any clearer than that.

I am extremely aware of corporate social responsibility. We have appointed a councillor for corporate social responsibility. We will put an office in place, probably in Montreal, for corporate social responsibility, where the NGOs and industry alike can meet and find out information about Canadian mining operations abroad.

We will continue to work with all members of the House in a proactive way to ensure and support corporate social responsibility. But let us be clear: the whole issue of extraterritoriality has to be addressed.

One of the members in this member's own party said very clearly that although well intended it was unfortunate that the bill was brought forward because it is misguided.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to what my hon. colleague was saying. I do represent probably one of the largest mining regions in the world, and the issue of holding to account is certainly an issue.

In terms of the very rosy picture he is painting, my concern with the deal with Peru is that labour rights are not in the agreement; that is in a side agreement. Peru has a notorious record in terms of labour rights. I would hope he would at least admit that.

In terms of environmental protection, it is all well and good to say we are going to set up some office in Montreal, but the agreement should clearly spell it out, and not in a side agreement, the commitments, obligations and triggers that will be invoked if there are issues.

Once again, in terms of the rights of the investors we see the kind of chapter 11 provisions that existed under NAFTA. Any corporate operation is able to take action, and yet labour groups and environmental groups are not. Why is it that we see a very clear protection of corporate interest in this agreement without the clear commitments to labour and environment?

If we had those clear commitments, I think the member would find a lot more interest in working with the development in Peru and making sure that our export economy works. However, when we see them shunted off to side agreements it is very hard for us in the House to take the government seriously when it comes to its Pollyannaish claims about respecting labour and respecting the environment.

[Gerald Keddy, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margaret's, NS]

Pollyannaish is an interesting turn of a phrase.

Mr. Speaker, the reality is, regardless of how the hon. member would want to mislead the public and this House, for the member for Timmins—James Bay the reality is that on labour rights—

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, I would ask for a bit of common respect in this House. For him to say that I am trying to mislead the House is to call me a liar on this. I am asking what is in the provisions of the document. He can disagree with me, but I would ask him to retract that comment.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

The Chair has generally ruled that the word “mislead” is not the same as suggested by the hon. member for Timmins—James Bay; the words “deliberately misleading” are out of order. He did not suggest that the hon. member deliberately misled the House at all, and if he had, he would have been asked to retract such a statement.

I do not think that anything the parliamentary secretary has said up until now has been out of order. He can respond as he will to the submission by the hon. member for Timmins—James Bay on this point.

[Gerald Keddy, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margaret's, NS]

Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the comment that I have not been out of order up to now. I hope by the time I finish my statements today, I will not be out of order either.

Quite frankly, the labour rights and environmental side agreements to this agreement are the strongest we have ever signed. This is a trade agreement. This agreement is really not meant to cover labour and the environment, but we have expanded our trade agreements. We accept the fact that labour and environmental rights are a part of a new era of corporate social responsibility and a new era in trade agreements, especially with countries where their labour and environmental processes may not be as advanced as ours. These are very solid protections for labour and the environment.

I find it interesting. The opposition members say that we have signed a separate agreement on labour and a separate agreement on the environment, which have strength of their own. However, had we put them in the main agreement, they would have said that they meant nothing because they were only one line. Yet they have a force of their own, separate of trade. Because we have done that, however, those members say they are just an addition and they do not mean anything. No matter how we did it, NDP members would not be satisfied. Therefore, I am not going to pretend to satisfy them.

However, I will explain to them, one more time, that these are the strongest additions and protections for labour and environmental processes of any agreement ever signed in the history of Canada.

We have already looked at the rights for the environment and labour. When we look at the rights for investors, they need to have some protections. Let us be clear. What we have is a rules-based process to settle disputes. That is much better than gunboat diplomacy, which apparently those members would like to see us apply. I do not agree with that.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-24, the Canada-Peru free trade agreement implementation act. The bill seeks to implement the free trade agreement, the agreement on labour co-operation and the agreement on the environment entered into by Canada with the Republic of Peru on May 29, 2008.

The bill is extremely important to Canada's agriculture sector. While the agreement has potential for many of our farm products, it is critical to our wheat and durum industries, to our pulse and specialty crop industries, to beef and to pork and to potatoes. We know about the tremendous potatoes that come from the province of Prince Edward Island. I can see my colleague from Manitoba is jealous of the kind of potatoes we produce in Prince Edward Island, and I understand why.

Before I get into all the reasons why this is so important to farmers, there is a point I would like to raise on corporate social responsibility.

My colleague from Scarborough—Guildwood earlier raised the point. Peru is cited in the strategy of the Government of Canada on corporate social responsibility for the Canadian international extractive sector. Peru is also cited as a country where the Canadian International Development Agency has worked extensively with the government, mining companies and affected communities to develop and promote regulatory requirements for social and environmental management.

The Canada-Peru FTA also includes corporate social responsibility provisions encouraging the promotion of principles and of responsible business, and that is an important point to make. We feel very strongly about corporate social responsibility and we have some very grave concerns about the trade agreement with Colombia. However, on this side of the House, we believe Peru is doing much better.

On the human rights side, it is clear that some human rights issues remain in Peru. In its 2008 report, Amnesty International recognized that important steps had been taken to bring to justice those responsible for human rights violations during the years of armed conflict between 1980 and 2000. In terms of violent crime in Peru, the country's homicide rate now stands at 5.7 per hundred thousand, which is still too high, but it is among the lowest in South America. Those are some steps forward.

I know there will be some who will say that human rights are still a concern and we understand that. However, when the agreement is settled with Peru, I would encourage the Government of Canada to continue its emphasis in discussions about good human rights standards to ensure that CIDA does its part in Peru as well.

I believe we can do both. We can improve trade to the benefit of both countries, the citizens of Canada and the citizens of Peru. We can also improve human rights in the Republic of Peru for the benefit of Peru and certainly the globe.

I might mention as well that there are side agreements on labour co-operation and the environment, and that is important. I will agree with my NDP colleague, however, that it would better if they were encompassed in the agreement as a whole rather than being in side agreements, but it is a step forward. More and more we see the United States negotiating agreements that include the environment and labour as part of those agreements.

If environment and labour are not part of those agreements, we are allowing people and industries in other countries to abuse the environment. We give them a competitive advantage. We allow them to undermine labour standards and give their countries and those industries a labour, wage or benefit advantage. That is not what we want to see happen. We have to bring up the standard globally and that is what we must work toward.

There is certainly economic risk if we do not ratify this agreement, especially as it relates to the agriculture sector. Since 2005, Peru has concluded free trade agreements with the United States, Chile, Thailand, Singapore and the Mercosur region, which is Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay. The United States Congress has ratified the U.S.-Peru free trade agreement. In fact, that just entered into force on February 1 of this year.

If Canada fails to implement a Canada-Peru free trade agreement, Canadian businesses will be at an economic disadvantage compared to their foreign competitors. One stark example of this concern is the export of wheat. We produce wheat in abundance in our country. We have one of the greatest selling agencies in the world, the Canadian Wheat Board, which the government hates to admit.

The wheat exports of the United States have recently benefited from the U.S.-Peru free trade agreement, immediately receiving duty-free treatment. Without a free trade agreement, Canada's exports of wheat, which comprise 38% of Canada's total exports to Peru, will continue to face a 17% tariff. This would place Canadian wheat at a very substantial disadvantage. We cannot allow those negative consequences to happen by opposing this agreement.

Let me turn to why the agreement is so important for Canadian farmers. Perhaps the best way for me to do that is to turn to the presentations that farm leaders have presented to either government or parliamentary committees.

I will turn first to a letter by Larry Hill. He is the president of the Canadian Wheat Board. In his letter to the chair of the Standing Committee on International Trade, he said:

It's important that the legislation is passed in a timely manner so as to avoid western Canadian farmers being placed at a disadvantage into this important Latin American market.

Wheat and durum are Canada's number one export to Peru. Under the agreement, Canadian wheat, durum and barley will receive tariff-free access upon implementation. While there is currently no tariff, applied tariffs have historically averaged 15%. The tariff was temporarily removed during last year's high price period, but is likely to be reinstated now that prices are declining.

Mr. Hill went on to say:

Peru is a key, fast-growing Latin American market for western Canadian farmers. CWB exports to Peru average 410,000 tonnes of wheat and 18,400 tonnes of barley annually. In 2008, Canadian sales were worth $134 million Cdn for wheat and barley farmers.

In February 2009, the U.S. and Peru implemented a Trade Promotion Agreement, resulting in guaranteed tariff-free access for American wheat and barley into Peru. Without a similar agreement, Canadian wheat and barley will be placed at a real commercial disadvantage, likely resulting in lost sales. It is imperative that the Canadian agreement be implemented prior to Peru reinstating its tariffs.

In that letter, Mr. Hill mentions how important the market is and the amount of wheat that we export into that country.

I was in Ecuador a number of years ago and spoke with the president of Bonita Bananas. Ecuador is a big importer of Canadian hard red spring wheat mainly. He told me that Ecuador imported somewhere around $72 million of Canadian wheat on average each year.

The United States signed an agreement with Ecuador and to a great extent we have been displaced from that market. We cannot afford to lose that market. Our most important market, as we consistently tell the government, is the market that we have. We have to maintain that market.

There are concerns from some agricultural producers that Canada was unable to secure the same favourable conditions in tariff reductions as the United States, particularly in beef and pork products. Still, even Canadian beef and pork producers want us to ratify the Canada-Peru FTA as they believe that imperfect tariff reductions are better than no tariff reductions at all.

Even with these concerns, the president of the Canadian Federation of Agriculture spelled out the concerns and benefits. He did that best when he was before the Standing Committee on International Trade on May 7. I would like to quote a few of his remarks, because he sums it up certainly better than I could in my words. Laurent Pellerin, the president of the Canadian Federation of Agriculture, said:

--I would like to say that this agreement should be implemented as quickly as possible. It is not a huge achievement with regard to the objectives of agricultural producers, but some improvements are worth implementing.

We are negotiating this agreement more or less at the same time as the United States, or a bit later. We believe, however, that we must negotiate parity with the United States in future negotiations or free trade agreements and contracts with countries like Peru. Unfortunately, in the case of Peru, Canada is far from achieving the same thing as the United States. We recognize that the Peruvian market is probably more significant for the United States than it is for Canada, but all the same, parity would have been a very desirable goal.

It is too bad that the American negotiators perhaps negotiated a little tougher than our negotiators. In any event, it is a step forward. He went on to say:

In the case of Peru, the United States will have shorter tariff elimination periods, and in some cases, tariff-free access, and in others higher quotas. Even if Canada negotiated something better than our current conditions, because the Americans negotiated tariff reductions and completely free access before us, the market or business will favour American products over ours. This is something we must bear in mind.

He went on to talk about the beef industry. Again I will quote his remarks because he is the representative of the industry and his words bear merit. He talked about how important the Peruvian market is for beef and pork, but that again, the Americans have a substantial advantage. He said:

A great deal of fresh, chilled and frozen beef offal is traded between Canada and Peru. In this sector, the tariffs will be eliminated simultaneously for both Canada and the United States, but it should be noted that the quota or volume exported by the United States is twice as large as Canada's. So once again, the agreement will favour the U.S. market.

In the long term, both Canada and the United States will achieve duty-free access for pork carcasses and cuts. However, in the short and medium term, the agreement is definitely more favourable for the Americans and could seriously affect the products from Canada because there again, the tariffs on U.S. pork will be eliminated by the beginning of the 5th year, whereas for Canada they will not be eliminated until the 17th year.

He went on to state:

Still in the pork sector, the quota for cuts in the offal category, including pig fat and bellies, will start at 325 tonnes per year and increase to 504 tonnes in year 10. Once again, these are not large quantities. However, the Canadian Pork Council has told us that this agreement must be supported, since a deal with slightly increasing quotas is better than no deal at all with a risk of retaliation. They agree with these measures.

In other words, the Canadian Pork Council agrees.

Mr. Pellerin went on to say, “Canada is extremely present on the potato market as well”, an area that I am certainly most familiar with. He said, “Duty-free access strongly favours the United States over Canada, particularly during the first nine years”. I must remind my friend from Manitoba again that when I am talking about potatoes, Prince Edward Island still remains the biggest potato producer. That small province remains the biggest potato producer in this country. This is very important to us in Prince Edward Island.

Mr. Pellerin went on to say:

Tariffs on fresh and chilled potatoes, other than seed, will be eliminated immediately for the United States. As for tariffs on Canadian potatoes, they are subject to a gradual reduction and will be eliminated as of year 10. There again, our small Peruvian market may be replaced by American products, which will be more competitive because they will have duty-free access.

My point is this. Yes, the agreement is important but even with this trade agreement that the Canadian government has negotiated with Peru and the implementation act that we are talking about in the House, the Americans, it is sad to say, still have advantages in that market. Yes, it is a step forward, but it is not as big a step as we would certainly like to see.

The last point raised by Mr. Pellerin concerned frozen potatoes. He said, “I don't need to name the large Canadian companies in this sector, because you already know them”. They would be McCain, Cavendish, et cetera. He said:

Canada is very active on this market as well, and Canadian potato farmers count on this market, especially the frozen french fry market. If the agreement is signed, tariffs on frozen potatoes from the United States will be eliminated immediately, whereas the tariffs on Canadian potatoes will be eliminated gradually, reaching zero in year 10 of the agreement. This market could potentially be attractive for Canada, but you will understand that over the next 10 years, the United States will have a major competitive advantage in the potato sector, and so this is not a major gain for Canada.

All that to say, yes, certainly the agreement is important. It is very important especially to the agricultural industry in Canada, wheat and durum, beef and pork, pulse and specialty crops and certainly potatoes. But even with the agreement the Canadian government has failed to negotiate the same advantages as the Americans have negotiated. That is a sad commentary.

The Canada-Peru free trade agreement is certainly supported by a lot of the agricultural industries, and I mentioned the Canadian Wheat Board, pulse growers, et cetera. It is also supported by quite a number of business groups, such as the Canadian Chamber of Commerce and resource organizations such as the Mining Association of Canada.

A reduction in Peru's tariffs could certainly contribute toward increasing the competitiveness of Canadian exports, whether they are industrial goods or agricultural goods.

Therefore, the Canada-Peru free trade agreement is a step forward. As I said in the beginning, in corporate social responsibility, the safeguards are there. The labour and human rights issues are improving. For those reasons the bill is an important bill and I welcome it in the House.

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake, MB]

Mr. Speaker, in his intervention, the member for Malpeque talked about how important this agreement is for our agriculture industry.

The Minister of International Trade and the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food, with the support of their parliamentary secretaries, have put a lot of work into developing these trade agreements which are critically important to agriculture across Canada.

As chair of the Canadian section of the Interparliamentary Forum of the Americas, I follow quite closely how important the Americas are to the relationship with Canada, whether that is from a standpoint of commerce and trade, or on the other side, when I wear my other cap, from an environmental standpoint and social responsibility, and as more and more American states want to have a closer relationship, from a democratic standpoint, with Canada.

Recently I met with the Ambassador of Peru. We talked about the many values that we share and that are mutually respected in both our countries, such as democracy, the rule of law and the free market.

The member for Malpeque talked about all the organizations that have come out quite strongly in favour of this free trade agreement with Peru and want us in the House of Commons and the Senate to deal with it in a rather rapid fashion. Despite some of the concerns that the member has laid out, and I take those at face value, that our American competitors may still have some advantages, the member did say that this is a major step forward. It is a step that we need to take if we are to continue to level the playing field between Canada and our other international competitors. We have to have access to markets. We have to have a mechanism to reduce tariffs, especially if they are over quota in those particular marketplaces.

He mentioned that the Grain Growers of Canada favour this. The Canadian Agri-Food Trade Alliance are on side. The real voice of the cattle industry, the Canadian Cattlemen's Association and the Canadian Pork Council want to see this brought into place as quickly as possible. As well, the Canadian Wheat Board, which he mentioned, wants us to move forward.

In my province of Manitoba we grow a great deal of potatoes. It is one of the largest potato-producing provinces in Canada, and produces, in my opinion, the best potatoes in the country.

The pulse growers in Manitoba and across Canada need to have access to these Latin American markets. When we start talking about the sales of beans and peas and pulses, the Latin American market is the number one marketplace for those growers and we have to make sure that we have the opportunity to export.

I am glad the member mentioned the importance of agriculture. I am hoping that he will come back and say that the Liberals are in support of the agreement and that we will be moving forward on it as quickly as possible.

I would also like him to comment on why we were not seeing any of these agreements brought into play over the 13 years when he sat on the government side and functioned as a parliamentary secretary to the minister of agriculture.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for Selkirk—Interlake for his remarks. In fact, I agree with most of what he said, but certainly not all. If he is growing good potatoes in Manitoba, they must be from Prince Edward Island seed. We know that.

I cannot emphasize enough, as I said in my remarks and as the member for Selkirk—Interlake said in his, that it is critical that this agreement be implemented quickly. I personally see this agreement being quite substantially different from the Canada-Colombia agreement, mainly on the human rights side. There have been tremendous gains in human rights and corporate social responsibility in Peru that we do not see on the Colombia side of the agreement, and we ought to be very concerned about that in this House.

The member asked why these agreements were not signed when the Liberals were in government, the party that balanced the books, had 10 surpluses. In two short years the Conservative government has driven the country into the biggest deficit in Canadian history. That is the sad part of the Conservative government, that in two short years it has basically driven this country away from its tremendous potential with well balanced books and the moneys that were put into research and development for the Canadian people. Now, that has all been squandered away. What we see is the red ink into the future on account of Conservative mismanagement and incompetence in terms of the economy. I had to mention that.

However, in terms of the trade agreements themselves, all that is really happening here, finally, and it differs from how the Conservatives have taken our fiscal position that we left them in and drove it into the ground and put the country into debt into the future, is that they are building on the good work that the Liberal government has done on these trade agreements.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I like the hon. member, but I do question the Liberal's logic of rubber-stamping everything the Conservatives bring forward on trade.

We had the disastrous softwood lumber sellout that the Liberals helped push through Parliament. It cost tens of thousands of jobs, plus over $1 billion in fines that are coming. Canadian taxpayers are going to have to cover these fines because of the irresponsibility of the government. We had the shipbuilding sellout that the Liberals rubber-stamped, as well, even though hundreds of shipyard workers from Liberal-held ridings were writing to Parliament saying, “Don't pass this agreement”.

Now, we have this egregious agreement with murderous paramilitary thugs and drug lords in Colombia, and the Canada-Peru agreement that the hon. member admits even people are writing in saying it is an inferior agreement to what the U.S. signed with Peru.

This blanket rubber-stamping of everything the Conservative government brings forward on trade, I simply do not understand because it is in not in Canada's interest. Canadians are losing jobs because of these ill-favoured and irresponsible agreements.

Why do the Liberals rubber-stamp everything the Conservatives bring forward?

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Mr. Speaker, I will answer the questions from the member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley directly in a moment.

First, however, I must point out that the biggest rubber-stamp in Canada for why we have this man as Prime Minister and that party on the government side is the leader of the NDP. He is the man. At the time when we had early learning and child care, he ended up supporting the Conservatives when we were in opposition, so we lost that agreement on early learning and child care.

[An hon. member]

You lost the election.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Of course we lost the election, we know that. But it was his party's support for agreements that were already in place that has given the Prime Minister the opportunity to drive this country into debt as he has and undermined the early learning and child care agreements.

Now to his question, the fact of the matter is we are a global trader, we are an exporting nation, and we have to move forward with trade agreements. This is a step in the right direction. It is especially important to the agriculture industry and we need to give the agriculture industry opportunities as well.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-24, An Act to implement the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru, the Agreement on the Environment between Canada and the Republic of Peru and the Agreement on Labour Cooperation between Canada and the Republic of Peru, be read the third time and passed.

[Claude Guimond, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise to take part in today's debate on the implementation of the free trade agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru. I had the opportunity to examine this matter with other colleagues on the Standing Committee on International Trade. We heard some very interesting evidence, which gave us a good overview of the issues surrounding this bill.

Based on what I learned during those meetings, there is very little that is specific to Peru's situation in particular. The agreement in question seems, instead, to reflect a broader vision of what Canada hopes to adopt as its trade policy in the Americas. In that sense, my criticisms of the agreement with Peru are very similar to the criticisms I might express concerning the free-trade agreement with Colombia, which has also been brought to our attention recently.

First of all, in both cases, there was a flagrant lack of transparency when the Conservative government began negotiations with those two countries. That kind of approach is becoming quite common, and we could very easily imagine that this will unfortunately become the norm when it comes to trade agreements. I find it truly appalling that a government can present Parliament with agreements that have already been negotiated and concluded, presenting parliamentarians with a done deal. That is definitely not the best way to serve democracy.

That being said, I must also mention that, for the Bloc Québécois, this kind of agreement poses an essential problem, namely, the preference shown for bilateral agreements. In addition to weakening potential multilateral negotiations, we believe that agreements signed in a piecemeal fashion, such as this one, are more likely to tip the scales in favour of the stronger side. Such an imbalance can easily arise when we negotiate with a country whose economic size is so different from ours.

Despite its strong performance in terms of economic growth in recent years, Peru is still considered a developing country. That means that, even though that country shows great potential and is rich in many aspects, it nevertheless still has many shortcomings in the areas of labour and environmental standards. That country does not satisfy the same criteria as Canada in those areas.

Despite what the government says, we are certain that Peru will not be able to solve its development problems by engaging in free trade with a country like Canada. Increased exports are no guarantee of better wealth distribution or greater well-being for all segments of the population.

In addition, a free trade agreement would have only a minor impact on Quebec's economy. Quebec's exports to Peru account for only 0.14% of its total exports, which is a very small proportion. This is not much incentive for us to want to enter into a trade agreement at any cost, without looking at the other factors involved.

The strong presence of Canadian mining companies in Peru is one of the factors we need to take a close look at. As long as agreements contain no real policy to hold these companies accountable, there will be concerns about their content. A great deal of effort has been made to change this situation. Many stakeholders who are concerned about this issue, including representatives of the extractive industry, have met to find solutions and make recommendations to the government.

They have taken this very seriously.

I would mention the work of the National Roundtables on Corporate Social Responsibility and the Canadian Extractive Industry in Developing Countries. Unfortunately, the government decided to do what it pleased and rejected all the proposals made by these roundtables.

Once again, we have to realize that the government does not care about the recommendations it receives. The current government rejected out of hand all the recommendations in the roundtables report I mentioned.

When asked to adopt mandatory social responsibility standards for Canadian mining companies abroad, the government decided to do the opposite and adopt voluntary standards. When asked to create an independent ombudsman who could conduct impartial investigations to validate complaints, the government created the office of the extractive sector corporate social responsibility counsellor, who reports directly to the minister and investigates only if authorized by the mining company. This is completely ridiculous. In other words, the government preferred to ignore all the recommendations it received and, by doing so, to benefit Canadian mining companies.

The Canadian government wasted a perfectly good opportunity to truly improve the living conditions of Peruvian workers. This same government says that it wants to help developing countries prosper only be selling them more goods at better prices. That does not work.

Therefore, at present, we still cannot rely on a truly independent organization to look into conflicts between workers and their employers. There has never been a truly level playing field between employer and employee and it is quite likely that the ratification of such an agreement between Canada and Peru will once again favour investors to the detriment of workers. That is what we will see, once again, in 2009. These types of agreements are thoroughly unacceptable for workers in developing countries.

In terms of the protection of investments, there are some very significant benefits for Canadian companies doing business in Peru. The provisions that protect their interests are taken straight out of chapter 11 of NAFTA, which has given rise to a number of legal proceedings in which we are involved. In short, these proceedings seek to place the interests of private companies on the same footing as the interest of a state in legislating for the common good. Giving the advantage to investors is completely reprehensible and goes against our very understanding of democracy and fair trade. This is a chapter that should be re-opened and not reproduced. Unfortunately, it has been reproduced too often of late.

There are other problems, as we are also concerned about the dispute resolution process.

The mechanism provides that a company considering that a government has violated the investment provisions can take direct action against the government before an arbitration tribunal. The tribunals hearing the disputes are set up to hear a specific dispute. The deliberations of the arbitrators and their decisions are secret, unless both parties to the dispute decide otherwise.

Let us imagine what would happen with workers and a major mining company. The code of silence would apply.

Instead of this mechanism, we would prefer to resolve disputes using a multilateral and centralized method, and not on a case-by-case basis. The Bloc Québécois is proposing constructive solutions. The Bloc is in favour of free trade and is in favour of multilateral agreements.

Furthermore, it really is too bad that the most controversial parts of this agreement are the most difficult to tackle, since they are an integral part of the agreement and unless we can change them, we will have to reject the whole agreement. The parts on which some progress has been made and which should be emphasized more must be treated the same way. This is the case for advances made in terms of labour and the environment.

To start with, the fact that the measures on these two issues were treated in the same way just shows that they were secondary concerns in this agreement. We would have liked these measures to be included in the body of the text of the agreement. That way, they would have had much greater authority over the agreement. Once again, we have made proposals. It is unfortunate that, for a lot of issues that have a direct impact on people's quality of life, we need to depend on the goodwill of the parties involved. Unfortunately, experience shows that a company's goodwill goes more easily with measures that can help their own investments. Measures to protect the environment and workers can be costly and do not yield instant benefits. That is why the government has a role to play.

We cannot be at the mercy of purely commercial interests. When we trade with another country, we cannot look only at the impact on our balance of trade. There are also lives at stake and the well-being of millions of workers and people who live in these countries. We need to take this into account, think about it, and do something about it.

I would like to tell the House about an interesting proposal put forward recently during a meeting of the Standing Committee on International Trade. This interesting proposal was put forward by the secretary-treasurer of the Canadian Labour Congress. After explaining how the current model of concluding free-trade agreements has failed so far—which he demonstrated very clearly—he talked about a new way of practising trade. I really like this new model, and so does the Bloc Québécois. He proposed the idea of concluding fair-trade agreements as opposed to free-trade agreements based purely on commercial trade. As I was saying, I quite like the idea, in the sense that it is understood that the agreement must be beneficial for both partner countries, for merchants in Canada, Quebec and Peru, for workers in Canada, Quebec and Peru and for farmers in Canada, Quebec and Peru. It must be fair. Such a fair-trade model would serve to reinforce social norms, and protect environmental and labour standards in both countries.

The main difference is this: with fair trade, the focus is on the social aspect and not on lower customs tariffs meant to increase exports. I think this proposal deserves our attention. It deserves our consideration, for this agreement and for all future free-trade agreements with other countries.

In our current approach, the primary goals of our negotiators are simply to seek out greater diversity in trade partners and expand the list of potential markets for Canadian products in Latin America. Clearly, achieving those objectives could be in the Quebec's economic interest, but the lack of overall vision shown by this government in matters of trade policy is worrisome.

The Bloc Québécois is effectively seeking a change in Canada's trade priorities. Canada should now shift its focus from trade liberalization to creating a more level playing field. With respect to the agreement with Peru, we believe that, on the one hand, it opens many doors to Canadian investments in mining in Peru but, on the other hand, it does not include adequate provisions to protect workers and preserve the environment. We also believe that, in the absence of any real policy to hold Canadian mining companies operating abroad accountable, it would be morally wrong to approve a free trade agreement with Peru, in light of that country's poor record on mine work.

As I said earlier, it can obviously be interesting for Canada to have an investment protection mechanism, as Canadian companies established in Peru stand to benefit from strong protection for their investments under this free trade agreement. This agreement will allow Canadian companies involved in mining, for instance, and whose human rights record is less than stellar to sue the Peruvian government, should it ever implement legislation that affects their profits. Substantial compensation is provided for in the event of nationalization or expropriation. In other words, the power to legislate as it sees fit within its jurisdiction is taken away from the state.

The Bloc Québécois objects to the Conservative government's strategy of piecemeal trade deals and advocates a multilateral approach. The current economic crisis is proof enough that the market economy cannot run properly without rules. That is what people are finding everywhere, even south of the border, in the United States. The market economy as we know it has to change. For that to happen, we need responsible governments capable of thinking more in fair trade terms than strictly free market terms.

That is what the Bloc Québécois has been trying to make this House and every committee we sit on understand.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Madam Speaker, I listened with great interest to the remarks of my hon. colleague from Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques. We work together on the Standing Committee on International Trade, where he is doing very good work.

We have had our differences in the past on issues such the softwood lumber deal, which has caused thousands of jobs to be lost in Quebec and which, sadly, the Bloc Québécois has supported. Another sellout agreement was signed with respect to shipbuilding, in spite of the fact that dozens of workers from shipbuilding plants in Lévis wrote to the Bloc warning that it would cause job losses and that they should not support it. So, we have had our differences. My personal opinion is that the Bloc Québécois made the wrong decision, but it will have to justify the position it took on that issue.

Today, we are on the same page, and I greatly appreciated the remarks made by the hon. member for Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, who has provided a very good critique of the agreement.

My question deals with the comments made earlier today by the parliamentary secretary about labour and environment rights provisions not being important and trade being what matters. Until now, the government always said it was trying to ensure that labour and environmental laws were protected.

Today, however, it has shown a bit more of its true colours, saying it was not important.

Could my hon. colleague comment on these remarks by the parliamentary secretary?

[Claude Guimond, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his good comments and kind words. I also greatly enjoy working with my colleague on international trade matters.

As I mentioned in my speech, we completely disagree with what the parliamentary secretary said this morning. We must review the rules of international trade and how we do business. In my speech, I mentioned what the Secretary-Treasurer of the Canadian Labour Congress told us. He said that it was time to change our practices and to include, in our agreements, fair trade provisions. We need forums and organizations with the means to verify and evaluate what takes place when free trade agreements such as this one with Peru are implemented.

We are forced to make decisions about this agreement, and others as well, without examining what will happen in Peru and Canada. We have no statistics. Thus, we are presented with a fait accompli, once again, and that is absolutely deplorable. My NDP colleague and I will work hard to ensure that the House includes such provisions in future agreements in order to ascertain what happens with these agreements.

[Jean-Claude D'Amours, Liberal, Madawaska—Restigouche, NB]

Madam Speaker, I am quite surprised to hear this. I really had no idea that the Bloc Québécois would be against this Canada-Peru free trade agreement, and especially the MPs from ridings on the New Brunswick border.

I will give an example. Not too long ago, a company called Atlantic Yarns shut down in my riding, in the Atholville area in New Brunswick, on the Quebec border, near Pointe-à-la-Croix and Matapédia. Several dozen or even a hundred employees lost their jobs because it took too long to establish this Canada-Peru free trade agreement.

Today, I hear the Bloc member saying that we should not move forward with this agreement. However, to my knowledge, citizens of his province, Quebec, worked for Atlantic Yarns in Atholville. I am surprised, because even the plant union is in favour of the agreement, because it knows this could be one way to save the plant.

We know that the NDP is against it. Nevertheless, I would like my Bloc Québécois colleague to think about what I said. Instead of rejecting this agreement why does he not look at the positive side and the jobs that could have been saved and that could be created? In our case, jobs were lost and people from his own province perhaps also lost their jobs. I would like him to think about that and to comment on what I said.

[Claude Guimond, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Madam Speaker, I want to reassure the hon. member from New Brunswick, who represents a riding that neighbours mine. I want to tell him not to worry about all the thinking done by the Bloc Québécois before adopting a stand on current agreements relating to free trade and international trade.

The Bloc Québécois supports free trade agreements. However, we have a lot of issues with bilateral free trade agreements that are concluded without thinking a bit further, without thinking about what is going to happen, without thinking about miners in Peru. Canadian mining companies will come barging in with laws and agreements that will allow them to negotiate a lower quality of life for mine workers.

I firmly believe that it is unfortunate that workers are losing their jobs. Workers in my riding are losing their jobs and that is very unfortunate, but I believe they really understand what is happening. I am also convinced that these people are in favour of fairer trade.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Madam Speaker, I have a question for my colleague. Before holding the prestigious position of member of Parliament, my colleague was an official with the Union des producteurs agricoles du Québec and an expert on supply management. Therefore, he is very familiar with the five products protected by supply management systems in Canada, and particularly in Quebec. These products include milk, poultry and eggs. These are important issues when the time comes to negotiate agreements and treaties.

The message that the Bloc Québécois wanted to deliver is that we must look at what is happening. As regards agriculture and international agreements, if the government had bothered to look at how important and how well managed that sector is—including in Quebec—it would have realized that Canada should have used it in all its agreements. This is to say that, before presenting such treaties, we must be aware of their long term effects, both here and in the other country that signs them.

I wonder if my colleague could tell us about his experience as a supply management expert.

[Claude Guimond, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank the member for this opportunity to speak on agriculture, something I am passionate about, being a farmer myself.

I listened to the debate on this agreement this morning. I was somewhat taken aback by comments made during the debate. The member for Malpeque, who is also the agriculture critic, if I am not mistaken, quoted Laurent Pellerin, the president of the Canadian Federation of Agriculture. He said that Mr. Pellerin supported the agreement with Peru and that it was a great deal for the producers in Quebec and Canada. I have my doubts about that.

When he appeared before the Standing Committee on International Trade, Mr. Pellerin said about this agreement between Canada and Peru, “Ce n'est pas le Pérou—it's not Peru”, meaning that it was not very significant. Certainly it is an export issue. This morning, the member for Malpeque talked about the potato producers in his riding. There is indeed a great deal of expertise there, but we are also talking about western Canadian wheat and about pork. It might mean only a few containers. We do not even have figures. We have no idea of how much is involved, but much is being made about the importance of exporting a few tons.

In closing, as a farmer, let me say that what producers in Canada, Quebec or Peru want is to be able to earn a decent living from agriculture, and not be flooded with export products. We want to produce and make a fair living.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Madam Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to speak to Bill C-24, An Act to implement the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru, the Agreement on the Environment between Canada and the Republic of Peru and the Agreement on Labour Cooperation between Canada and the Republic of Peru.

I would like to start with what is positive. What is positive in this agreement, and obviously most Liberals and Conservatives are completely unaware of this, is that this is an NDP-amended document that is being brought into the House today. Why is that important? It is important because certainly as long as I have been in the House, for five years, we have been hearing a litany, both from the former Liberal government and the current Conservative government that trade agreement implementation bills were unamendable.

That has been a refrain from the Liberals since time immemorial, saying we cannot touch these agreements. Even though every parliament, congress and legislature elsewhere in the world does it regularly, for five years and even longer, Madam Speaker, as you well know, given your knowledge of parliamentary history, we have had Liberals and Conservatives saying we cannot touch these bills. Most notably and most recently that was with the shipbuilding sellout bill, with EFTA, where the NDP brought forward amendments to carve out our shipbuilding sector so it could survive. With the longest coastline in the world it would be important to have a shipbuilding industry, but Conservatives and Liberals said no, we cannot amend the implementation bill.

We now have a principle today in the House, which will rest for time immemorial, that Parliament does have the right and does have the obligation to look at a trade implementation bill and to make the necessary amendments and changes. For that, I think this is an important precedent. Obviously the Conservatives may not have tried to jib the fact that the bill has been amended with what they have been saying for years, and Liberals obviously did not think about the consequences to changing their particular statements, but the reality is the bill is amended and that establishes a whole new precedent for future bills.

We went through the softwood sellout, and I was told consistently, and our caucus was told consistently, that we cannot change the softwood sellout implementation bill. We knew that it would cost thousands of jobs, hundreds of millions of dollars to Canadians, that it was an appallingly shortsighted and irresponsible bill, but we were told by Liberals and Conservatives that we cannot touch it.

More recently, with the shipbuilding sellout, the EFTA bill, the NDP fought in the House day after day, read letters from hundreds of shipyard workers in Nova Scotia, British Columbia, Quebec and elsewhere, who were writing to members of Parliament to say, do not be irresponsible, do not sell out our shipbuilding industry, please carve out shipbuilding from the agreement. Liberals and Conservative said the same thing again. They said we cannot touch an implementation bill.

Today we have the answer to that. Yes, we can touch an implementation bill, and we can amend it. This will carry forward to all further debates on trade issues. Unfortunately, the Conservatives being Conservatives, and Liberals being Liberals, they did not take all the NDP amendments, including the amendment that asked for a five-year review clause. That is unfortunate. For that and a whole bunch of other reasons, as witnesses before the trade committee said very clearly, this is an inferior bill. It is an inferior treaty for Canada to what the United States negotiated with Peru and what the U.S. Congress did in changing the implementation legislation.

We have an inferior bill. That is the only word that describes it. It is inferior on labour and environmental protections to what the United States Congress put into the U.S.-Peru bill. It is inferior in terms even of access to the Peruvian market for Canadian agricultural exports. We have an inferior bill. The only really good thing we can say about it is that it is NDP-amended, establishing a precedent that will carry on forevermore. Madam Speaker, the next time a Conservative or a Liberal stands in the House and says trade implementation bills are unamendable, we have the answer. We have the precedent, and for that I am thankful.

What do we have in Bill C-24, the inferior Canada-Peru trade deal being put forward? A number of other speakers have already spoken to the inadequacies of any labour or environmental protections that were put in the side agreements. We had testimony before the international trade committee that was very clear on that. What we have is simply an attempt to draft side legislation as a sort of symbolic attempt to look at labour and environmental issues.

It is not included in the agreement. The U.S. Congress took its trade bill, toughened it up, and made it much stronger to actually protect Peruvians from the Peruvian government. It put in place the kind of ILO protections, the International Labour Organization protections, that most Canadians would want to see. We want to look at fair trade agreements that actually raise the quality of life and enhance environment protection, not push them down, for a number of reasons. One is that this is clearly an inferior bill.

Is that a problem? It is because witnesses who came forward even earlier this week to the trade committee, such as Maxwell Cameron from the University of British Columbia, said that currently, Peru is refusing to keep its obligations under the International Labour Organization treaties.

Even before this bill is implemented, we already have the Peruvian government breaking its word on other issues. It has already broken and refused to keep its commitments under the ILO. We have a government that is putting forward an exceedingly weak labour side agreement, which is essentially nothing but symbolic, and it is doing this knowing that even if it were not tougher, the Peruvian government would not be willing to keep its commitment under the ILO.

Therefore, we really have no mechanism that pushes to increase labour standards in Peru or increase environmental standards. The line of the government, up until today actually, has been, “We are really trying to do something good for the people of Peru, as well as ensure a market for our exports”. The parliamentary secretary came clean today. He said it was not important, that we are not actually looking at labour standards or the environment in this agreement. It is all about trade.

From that standpoint as well, the reason why the NDP is saying no to this inferior agreement is because the government had no intention of raising labour standards or labour rights, or raising environmental standards. The government says it is part of a broader trade strategy.

We then have to look at how our trade strategy is going so far. What has the government done on trade?

We had the egregiously bad softwood sellout, which most Canadians opposed. The Liberals and Conservatives ganged together, and I regret to say my colleagues from the Bloc as well, to vote the softwood sellout through, which instantly triggered the loss of thousands of jobs. Within the first week of implementation, 4,000 jobs were lost in the softwood sector. We immediately slammed the door on any possibility of softwood exports, and that hemorrhaging of softwood jobs continues today with tens of thousands of jobs lost.

In addition, because of the anti-circumvention clause that the NDP warned the trade committee about and warned Conservatives and Liberals about, and we warned them in the House as well, we now are facing, first, penalties of nearly $70 million that Canadian taxpayers have to cough up in fines under this ridiculously bad agreement. We now have, from testimony we heard just a few weeks ago, pending fines of over $1 billion. Assuming that we lose the next two cases, Canadian taxpayers will have to cough up $1 billion for an egregiously bad agreement that cost us thousands of jobs. One does not have to be thick-headed to understand that this was an appallingly bad agreement and that the Conservatives, with Liberal support, rammed it through.

Their first step on trade policy was an appallingly bad step that was taken by David Emerson, the former Liberal minister who crossed over to the Conservatives, and who brought with him the same stupid approach on trade. As a result, thousands of Canadian families have lost breadwinners.

What did the Conservatives bring in next? Next, they brought the shipbuilding sellout through the EFTA. They were told by every single member who participated at the trade committee, from the shipbuilding industry, whether from management or ownership or from the workers, that it would kill our shipbuilding industry, that it would undermine our shipbuilding industry, and that our shipbuilding industry would be unable to live with the clauses that were negotiated when there was no shipbuilding policy in place at all.

It is a shipbuilding sellout. The Conservatives and Liberals, again, despite the fact that there is universal condemnation of the agreement from the shipbuilding industry, rammed it through. That is strike two. On trade policy, the government has absolutely no understanding. We are talking about trade illiterates.

What we have now is what I guess we would all strike three, a clearly inferior agreement to what was negotiated between the U.S. and Peru, and what the U.S. Congress was able to do as well in terms of amending the agreement to actually enforce real and effective labour and environmental standards.

There is more. What the Conservatives want to bring forward now is a privileged trading relationship with the government of Colombia, whose president, according to U.S. defence intelligence briefings, documents that were declassified recently, was a friend of Pablo Escobar and closely linked with the Medellin cartel, drug lords.

That was not all he did. Subsequent to that, according to evidence and testimony presented just a few weeks ago, he has also been involved in the murder and massacre by paramilitaries of civilians in Colombia, and most recently involved in influence peddling scandals and overt surveillance by the secret police in Colombia of opposition leaders and judges.

We are talking about a country that has the worst human rights record on the planet, over four million displaced people, forced displacement by the paramilitaries, and the government wants to roll out the red carpet and give a special privileged trading relationship to an administration that is connected to murderous paramilitary thugs and drug lords. It is unbelievable. It would only be believable if we were to look at how egregiously bad the softwood lumber sellout was and then compare it. Then we would realize it.

We are talking about a government that has absolutely no idea what it is doing and what is worse, the Conservatives are telling their base that they want a privileged trading relationship with an administration connected to drug lords and murderous paramilitary thugs. Does anyone think any Conservative would actually want to do that? Of course not. From the membership of the--

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

Order. On a point of order, the hon. member for Selkirk—Interlake.

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake, MB]

Madam Speaker, as you know, we are at third reading of Bill C-24. Comments by members have to be relevant and very specific to the matter at hand. We are talking about Peru. The member has gone off on other tangents talking about trading relationships with other countries in Latin America and the United States. I would ask the Speaker to bring the member back to focus on the Peruvian deal that is before the House at this time.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

On that point of order, there is indeed a rule of relevance. Especially at third reading, it is more important to debate the contents of the bill. I would invite my colleague to focus on the bill in his closing remarks.

The hon. member has five minutes remaining in his time.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Madam Speaker, it is very relevant trade policy. We will have much time to condemn the links that the government has brought forward.

In my last few minutes I will come back to the Canada-Peru trade agreement bill. It has also been clearly identified as an inferior agreement, even by those who may give lip service to supporting this deal. We will save Colombia for another time.

What we have is essentially an inferior agreement. It is an agreement that is inferior on labour rights and environmental rights. It does not provide any of the protections that up until today the government purported to provide. We have to look at what the government said was its major reason for putting forward this agreement. It believes in a trade strategy. It obviously has not looked at the evidence.

In most cases, the bilaterals we have signed so far have led to a reduction of exports from Canada. We did increase the imports from those countries with which we signed the bilaterals, but we have to do our homework. If the government has not been able to look at the results of the bilaterals it has signed thus far, it is not doing its homework as it sits down to negotiate what in this case is an inferior agreement.

Exports go down. What is wrong with that picture? It is very simple. Putting aside all of the other issues we have talked about, such as the sellout of our own industries and the complete lack of concern for human rights, the government does not get trade strategy right. We heard testimony just a few weeks ago that the Canadian government provides $3.4 million in Canadian product promotion support for the entire U.S. market. The Australian government provides half a billion dollars.

We provide $3.4 million for our major trading partner. That is ridiculously small. It means that, because there is no overall trade strategy, we will continue to see what we have seen since the government has come to power, even with this inferior agreement, a completely aimless lack of focus on trade and now, as we saw a few months ago, the largest trade deficit in 30 years. That is incompetence. That is simple irresponsibility. That is a lack of understanding of how to put a winning trade strategy in place.

The government seems willing to do the ribbon cutting, even with the government of Colombia, yet it is not willing to do the hard work of actually increasing Canadian exports. What has been the net result? We have seen this over the last 20 years. StatsCan is very clear and tells us what the results have been. Most Canadian families are earning less now than they were 20 years ago. Certainly, it has helped corporate lawyers and CEOs. Their incomes have skyrocketed and now the wealthiest 20% in Canada take more than half of all real income.

However, for everybody else, the middle class, working class and poor Canadians, their real incomes have declined over 20 years. It is in large part due to the Conservatives following the same failed trade strategy that the Liberals put into place. One would think that somebody like DFAIT would actually say, “Hold on. This is not really working too well, is it? We are seeing real income sink. We are seeing exports fall after we signed bilaterals. There has to be a problem here”.

However, there does not seem to be any change from the ribbon-cutting approach to trade that we have seen with both the former Liberal government and the current Conservative government.

What we have in the Canada-Peru agreement is essentially investor-state provisions. They are the same failed provisions in chapter 11 that are leading to actions as we saw with Ethyl Corporation and as we are now seeing with Quebec and the outlawing of 2,4-D. Corporate CEOs can use those chapter 11 provisions and rights to ensure that they can push and control certain aspects of democratic override—

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

Order, please. I would ask for the side bar discussions to occur in the lobby, please.

The hon. member for Burnaby--New Westminster.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am not surprised at the interruptions from Conservatives. It is difficult to have to listen to a trade strategy that they clearly do not seem to grasp. If they had, a lot more Canadians would be at work today.

We have chapter 11 provisions. We have that reinforcement of CEOs. We do not have the labour protections. We do not have the environmental protections. That is why we are voting no to Bill C-24.

[Cathy McLeod, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Madam Speaker, I listened with interest to what my colleague across the aisle had to say. I found it quite stunning to hear what he said.

I have communities that are very impacted by the softwood lumber agreement. They have said that they are grateful for it, that it has helped save the few jobs that are there.

As we look at opening trade opportunities internationally, my community is very thankful, during these difficult times, that we are looking at opportunities to expand trade and exports.

How can the hon. member possibly face his constituents when he consistently votes against job and trade opportunities that will help service his community?

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Madam Speaker, I love Kamloops and I will be going there very shortly when the next announcement of penalties levied against Canada under the softwood lumber sell-out are announced. It could be in the range of $400 million.

I will be very glad to go to Kamloops and talk with the member's constituents about why they are coughing up that money because of the irresponsibility of the government.

That is exactly the problem. The hemorrhaging of jobs we have seen and the loss of jobs right across the country is because Conservatives do not understand the connection between a very strong trade strategy and economic growth as opposed to ribbon cutting.

I know, having been in Kamloops a number of times, that the people in Kamloops have suffered as much from the softwood lumber sell-out as the people in Burnaby—New Westminster. In our case, three mills have closed and 2,000 jobs have been lost because the government has been incredibly irresponsible in signing trade agreements without any understanding of the implications.

Therefore, I will be very glad to go to Kamloops and talk with her constituents about why they will have to cough up hundreds of millions of dollars in fines, in addition to the jobs they have lost, because the government has been so irresponsible.

[John Rafferty, NDP, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

Madam Speaker, my hon. friend continually talked about an inferior trade deal. Was there any possibility at any time to make this a superior trade deal?

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Madam Speaker, the member is terrific and energetic and one of the top rookies in the House.

Absolutely there was an opportunity to make this a superior trade deal. That takes two things. The first is to put in place a fair trade agenda, rather than this George Bush style free trade agenda. In fact, we have the only government in the western world that still relies on the old George Bush free trade rhetoric. We know how well that went over in the United States. Millions of jobs were lost and there was a strong reaction to what the George Bush Republican administration put in place for free trade. A fair trade agenda would have meant stronger negotiating.

We also have to get New Democrats negotiating these agreements. As the hon. member knows, New Democrats are very tough negotiators. They do not sell out Canada. They do not simply want to sign and cut the ribbon. In any labour negotiations we know full well that we get better deals for ordinary Canadians when the NDP pushes at the table.

If we have an NDP administration pushing for fair trade agreements, we can get superior agreements that lead to economic development, increased trade and a pulling up of labour standards and environmental standards, which is what the vast majority of Canadians want to see, not this old rhetoric from the Conservatives and Liberals of George Bush style Republican free trade.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to speak on behalf of the Bloc Québécois about Bill C-24, an act to implement the free trade agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru, the agreement on the environment between Canada and the Republic of Peru and the agreement on labour cooperation between Canada and the Republic of Peru.

The Bloc Québécois is opposed to the Conservative government's strategy, which consists in making piecemeal agreements. Instead, we support a multilateral approach. The current economic crisis clearly shows that a market economy can work properly only if it is regulated and stabilized through an institutional, political and ethical framework. Rather than signing piecemeal agreements, Canada should work within the WTO to ensure that the rules governing international trade are the same for everyone.

The Bloc Québécois believes that trade can contribute to the prosperity of nations and, in that sense, that it can be a major social and economic development tool. However, this can only be the case if trade agreements include measures that will ensure sustainable development and that will promote the development of the populations involved. The Canada-Peru free trade agreement includes a clause to protect investments that is patterned on NAFTA's chapter 11 and that will allow businesses to sue governments. To include a chapter protecting investments could impede Peru's social and economic development.

Peru is a minor trading partner for Quebec. Quebec's exports to Peru represent 0.14% of total exports from Quebec, and Quebec has a $174 million negative trade balance.

Canada's main business activity in Peru is in the mining sector, and Peru's track record on worker protection in that sector is hardly a glowing one. In the absence of any real policy to hold Canadian mining companies accountable, ratifying this agreement will allow those companies to expand their activities without being subject to any rules or consequences when they pollute or when they flout human rights. Given the provisions of this bill, it should come as no surprise that the Bloc Québécois is opposed to it.

The investment protection agreement in the free trade agreement with Peru is a copy of chapter 11 of NAFTA, which allows investors from member states in the North American Free Trade Zone to claim compensation from governments of another party to NAFTA when they believe they have incurred a loss as a result of the adoption of regulatory measures that modify existing business operating conditions. The regulatory or legislative changes must, however, be such that they can be considered to be direct or indirect expropriation or a measure tantamount to an expropriation. NAFTA is the only major free trade agreement to which Canada is a party that contains such broad provisions regarding the treatment to be granted to investors from other parties.

Because the free trade agreement with Peru contains a similar clause, the Bloc Québécois believes that it is not in Quebec's interests to adhere to the agreement and is opposed to ratifying it. In fact, the free circulation of goods can hardly not go hand in hand with the free circulation of capital. Where specific provisions are not incorporated into free trade agreements, bilateral agreements generally provide for the protection of investments coming from the other party. All such agreements contain substantially similar provisions, that is, a neutral arbitration procedure in the event of disputes between the foreign investor and the host state of the investment. There are currently over 1,800 bilateral agreements of this type in the world.

The provisions of chapter 11 of NAFTA governing investments have been called into question. They are at the root of numerous proceedings that have been brought against various governments in Mexico, the United States and Canada and sometimes result in millions of dollars in compensation being awarded. In a nutshell, chapter 11 defines a complete scheme to govern investments. In addition, the definition of investments is very broad. Some of the provisions of that chapter, including the concept of expropriation, have generated numerous proceedings. In addition, the current trend is toward extending that concept to encompass lost profits.

I can provide a number of examples of litigation related to NAFTA chapter 11. Pope and Talbot, Inc. v. Government of Canada involved softwood lumber quotas.

The government expropriated the company.

The company claimed that its rights had been violated on five NAFTA provisions: national treatment, most favoured nations treatment, minimum standard of treatment, performance requirements and expropriation.

According to the suit, the government expropriated the company because the allocation of the quotas caused the company to lose profits. The government did not meet performance requirements because the quota system favours the provinces not affected by the system. The government did not meet the minimum standard of treatment because the allocation of quotas was unfair and inequitable, and had been done secretively.

It is clear that in Quebec, for instance, there are lumber quotas for forestry companies. Since a large part of the forest belongs to the state, the Quebec government, the quotas are allocated to the company. Once again, in this case, in an interim award in June, the tribunal determined that Canada was consistent with its obligations respecting performance requirements and expropriation, and the tribunal did not rule on the other issues.

Madam Speaker, I hear the fire alarm.

Suspension of Sitting

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

We will suspend the business of the House for a few moments because of the fire alarm. We will resume as soon as possible.

(The sitting of the House was suspended at 1:20 p.m.)

(The House resumed at 1:43 p.m.)

Sitting Resumed

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

It being 1:43 p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's order paper.

The House resumed from May 29 consideration of the motion that Bill C-24, An Act to implement the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru, the Agreement on the Environment between Canada and the Republic of Peru and the Agreement on Labour Cooperation between Canada and the Republic of Peru, be read the third time and passed.

Canada-Peru Free Trade Agreement Act

[Serge Cardin, Bloc, Sherbrooke, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is with pleasure and conviction that I rise again to speak to Bill C-24, An Act to implement the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru, the Agreement on the Environment between Canada and the Republic of Peru and the Agreement on Labour Cooperation between Canada and the Republic of Peru.

Once again, the environmental and labour issues are being dealt with in side agreements, which aim for the minimum requirements established by the country with which we are signing the agreement rather than promoting the environmental and labour rights and laws in that country. Every free trade agreement always contains a section on investment. We agree that there should be a minimum of protection for foreign investment and that it should be properly regulated. However, there must be limits on the powers given by agreements, for example NAFTA's chapter 11.

We are in an era of innovation. We must innovate not only in the sciences, social sciences and business, but also in free trade agreements. We are discussing bilateral agreements. We must be innovative and promote environmental rights, labour rights and, in some countries, human rights.

This innovation could start today, in the free trade agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru, simply by our telling the government to redo its homework. The government must do it again and innovate in terms of bilateral free trade agreements, as in this case.

An aside, if I may. The Bloc Québécois strongly advocates multilateral agreements. It must be pointed out that, in this sort of agreement, the same set of rules applies to everyone. Even the WTO must protect human rights, labour rights and environmental rights. That is the end of my aside.

The government talks of liberalizing trade. An American author said that increasing the freedom of trade index by 1% could and would increase trade. Hence the mad race by all countries to establish agreements with other countries to liberalize trade. However, we must never lose sight of the fact that freedom must also rhyme with responsibility. When the government makes an agreement with another country it must be responsible for its actions and for the decisions and agreements it makes. They can create a multitude of problems for people in emerging countries who want to improve their situation.

We see this responsibility clearly in the mining sector, among others. At the moment, Canada's mining companies operating abroad cause damage to the environment and displace many people. They are responsible only under the environmental laws of the other countries. This agreement does not promote environmental rights strongly enough to ensure our mining companies are responsible. Their responsibility is voluntary, to all intents and purposes. It is why a significant number of mining companies from around the world incorporate in Canada, for then they are not responsible for their actions abroad.

Thus they can save a lot of money. But they create catastrophes as well, and they should be responsible for them. If I have the time, I will come back to the subject of mines.

In my remarks, unlike in the speeches we often hear, I would like to return to the testimony given before the Standing Committee on International Trade. This testimony was heard long after the agreement was signed and long after the parties had indicated what stands they would take on this bill.

I have notes on a number of witnesses, but not all, because I could have spent an entire day on it. A number of things were said in committee that most of the Liberal and Conservative members did not hear, unfortunately. Perhaps it would be a good idea to tell them that this might be the perfect opportunity for this agreement to become the model of agreements for Canada in the future. We oppose this agreement and hope to have the support of the majority of members in this House in order to innovate. Although we would prefer multilateral agreements, when bilateral agreements are made, they must be made in the best possible way.

For example, I will quote a witness who appeared in committee on May 7, the president of the Canadian Federation of Agriculture, which is the largest agricultural association in Canada with over 200,000 producers. In Quebec, there is an expression that the witness used at the beginning of his testimony. He said that this agreement ce n'est pas le Pérou, meaning that this agreement is not perfect, it is not a cure-all for all of the current trade problems or irritants. But it is being signed with Peru.

The president said that it is obviously not perfect, far from it. But he and his producers would still like it to move forward as quickly as possible. He also criticized the negotiators. I would make a distinction. There are negotiators who negotiate. Often, the negotiators negotiate what the government asks them to negotiate. The negotiators focus on things chosen by the government. The negotiators also negotiate by leaving out some aspects, because the government has asked them to leave them out. The government asks the negotiators to sign, at any cost, almost any condition, whether or not it is favourable to the people, to entrepreneurs and to businesspeople. He criticized the negotiators because, according to him, if we compare this agreement with the one signed with the United States, the reduction was faster in the United States than in Canada. The quotas were also much larger and there was no most favoured nation clause. He said that some sectors benefited more—grains, wheat, barley and pulses. Of course, some sectors lost out. We never saw an impact study from the government or the negotiators. According to them, some sectors stand to gain, and others stand to lose. However, we have never seen an impact study and projections of these impacts, not only for the business of people who export, or for the benefit of some who import, but also for all workers in Quebec and Canada.

Impact studies would tell us what will happen in a given industry or in a given sector and what the gains and losses will be. We should also ask ourselves what our priorities are and why. We never had impact studies on free trade agreements. We are not asking anyone to tell the future by looking into a crystal ball. In fact, it is obvious that there are not too many crystal balls around. I know a government that went from a zero deficit to a $50 billion deficit in a span of a few weeks or a few months. So we do not really need a crystal ball.

There are various other products, but I will not name them.

Of course, the president of the Canadian Federation of Agriculture was aware of deficiencies with regard to labour and environmental laws. He still argues that even though our farmers do not enjoy the same treatment as American farmers and even though progress is slow, we should sign the agreement. Again, there has not been any impact studies on producers and farmers, nor on the population as a whole whose quality of life we must look to improve to a certain extent. For example, to show the difference, in the United States, the tariff on certain products, including pork, will be eliminated within five years. However, in Canada, it will take 17 years. So the difference is quite substantial.

The president of the federation told us also that the federation agreed to multilateral negotiations. That being said, he kept repeating that negotiators would have to adjust, but also that ,in turn, it would be mostly up to the government to adjust.

We heard from other witnesses, including the Canadian Wheat Board. The wheat sector is obviously among the biggest winners.

I mentioned pork. I want to show the relative importance of that agreement for Canadian pork, for instance, on international markets. Director General Jacques Pomerleau said:

Knowing that we would never get what the Americans received, our negotiators became very creative in ensuring that we would still get some benefits. They accepted a longer tariff elimination period, 17 years instead of ten, but they were able to get for us a duty-free quota that will allow our exporters to better position themselves at the very beginning. We have to admit that this quota of 325 tonnes, that will progressively extend to 504 tonnes over 10 years, is relatively small for an industry that exports over one million tonnes every year.

There are little aberrations like that. Others, like the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, are very much in favour. The only thing, really, is that we do not want to be overtaken by other countries that could sign a FTA with Peru, among others. The same holds true for other agreements. Because Colombia and the United States were negotiating an agreement that did not get Congress approval, Canada raced like mad. It was intent on signing and implementing an agreement before the United States did. This was crucial to the government, even if it meant doing so at the expense of Colombia or human rights. Globally, a mad race was on, with businesses from all countries trying to globalize, as we do. Soon, every country on this planet will have bilateral free trade agreements with the 199 other countries. Naturally, variances and differences will develop. Why not focus primarily on multilateral agreements? I think it would be the most sensible way to go.

I was talking about environmental laws earlier. The Canadian Environmental Law Association was represented in evidence given before a committee on May 26, 2009. Ms. McClenaghan, executive director and counsel in that association, criticized the fact that investors can access the states. She said it was a serious problem. Particularly when we talk about investors, we must of course refer to the investment agreement that echoes chapter 11 of NAFTA whereby investors have access to the state, which could be problematic. We know that investors can sue countries for various reasons under the major heading of expropriation, which includes two elements. There is direct expropriation, that is, in the true sense of the word, and indirect expropriation, which, no matter what happens, relates to a business' loss of anticipated profits.

To give an example of such a free-trade agreement, Ms. McClenaghan referred to the agreement between Australia and the United States whereby no investors had access to the state. It was also a model of social and environmental protection. In terms of labour laws and occupational health and safety, Canadian businesses are operating in a country where little attention is paid to people's rights.

I must briefly come back to the topic of mining. Regarding mining companies and corporate responsibility, we have motion M-283, moved by the hon. Liberal member for Pierrefonds—Dollard, and Bill C-300 introduced by the hon. member for Scarborough—Guildwood. The Bloc Québécois supports both items—the motion and the bill—because their goal is to make mining companies accept greater responsibility in countries like Peru and Colombia. If the Liberals are to be consistent with their bill and their motion, they must also, for that reason, vote against the Canada-Peru Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act. I therefore call on all Liberal members, including those from Quebec, and all members to vote against this implementation act.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with considerable interest to my colleague, the hon. member for Sherbrooke. I work a lot with him on the Standing Committee on International Trade. I am happy of course with the Bloc position. The same cannot unfortunately be said for the softwood lumber agreement and the sellout agreement on shipbuilding. The Bloc unfortunately voted in favour of these two bills, which led and is leading to job losses in Quebec. It is too bad, but it does not matter, the Bloc is on the same wavelength as the NDP now and everyone can be glad.

I do in fact have a question for my colleague from Sherbrooke. He spoke eloquently on the subject of labour rights. As we all know, Peru is unable at the moment even to honour all its WTO obligations. Agreements already signed to permit unionized labour, to entitle people to organize under the protection of a collective agreement, all these protections, which should exist internationally, have been ignored by the Peruvian government. We heard that in testimony before the committee. It is unfortunate. It undermines the credibility of this agreement. If it provides no protection and if the Peruvian government is in the process of rejecting all the agreements it has signed, questions need to be asked. What real protection does the agreement provide?

I wanted to put these questions to my colleague from Sherbrooke. Does he see any sort of protection at all in this agreement for people seeking the protection of a collective agreement?

[Serge Cardin, Bloc, Sherbrooke, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I do indeed work with the member for Burnaby—New Westminster. We are not, obviously, going to start quibbling over who follows whom or who is on the same wavelength as whom. We agree on some fundamental principles and considerations, but not others. Overall, however, as regards this agreement, this implementation legislation, we oppose this free trade agreement.

Naturally, as we have criticized it and will continue to do so, this is not the right approach. This is a time for innovation and not for including these side agreements. And they are just that, off on the side, separate. So they will never be part of the main agreement. They must be included in the main agreement along with clear aims and obligations. Good intentions are set out in the side agreements and warrant a response at least. Is there agreement with the ILO principle and international environmental rights? Who can say not? No one. And yet, when ask ourselves whether these agreements will enable us to improve legislation on labour in Colombia or on human or environmental rights, obviously everyone—at least half of the members on this side of the House—believes we should not proceed because labour and environmental rights along with the agreements on investments would not improve the situation in the country we are doing business with. With a good trade or economic agreement, both sides emerge as winners, especially their peoples.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate my colleague on his excellent speech on the Canada-Peru agreement, which is somewhat similar to the Canada-Colombia agreement. The agreement allows mining to occur in situations where, often, neither the country nor the investors respect human or environmental rights or labour standards. This bilateral agreement also includes chapter 11, which protects investors from future policies that could help workers in countries with mining activity.

This morning, the House considered Bill C-306, and the Liberals and Conservatives spoke against it. That bill would have created jobs here at home, in our regions. The bill would have strengthened our position vis-à-vis free trade agreements with the United States, but they were against it anyway.

I would like my colleague to comment on the corporate social responsibility motion moved by a Liberal Party member and supported by the Liberals. Why does he think the Liberals voted for a foreign corporate social responsibility motion, then turned around and voted for bills that do not respect workers' rights?

[Serge Cardin, Bloc, Sherbrooke, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague is perfectly right. There is indeed a discrepancy. There is a problem and I would even say that it is a serious problem. That is where we find more or less the same direction followed by government negotiators in free trade agreements and, let us face it, that direction comes from the government.

Whether we are talking about side agreements on labour or environmental laws or about the chapter on investment, they are just good intentions that hide a huge possibility of wrongdoing and abuse.

There is a fundamental problem if the Liberal Party wants, on one hand, to make mining companies and oil and gas companies accountable with its bill and, on the other hand, to vote in favour of implementing the free trade agreement with Peru. There is the truth, and then there is make-believe. Right now, there is every indication that, both in the motion and in the bill, it is just make-believe. We know full well that they think they will form the government, which means that they must also please large corporations.

So there is a significant gap between what is the truth and what is make-believe. If the Liberals bring forward a motion on mining companies and oil and gas companies and a bill to make them accountable, then accountability must also be included in this free trade agreement. The time has come to step away from what the Canadian government has done historically in free trade agreements. I strongly suggest to the Liberal Party to vote against this agreement if it wants to follow its own motion and its own bill.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, we see nothing about workers' rights in this agreement. We have been hearing that this agreement is inferior to the one negotiated by the United States and the American Congress.

My question is quite simple. If workers have fewer rights and there is less protection for the environment, it is an inferior agreement.

Why does the member for Sherbrooke believe that the Liberals are prepared nevertheless to support this agreement, which is clearly inferior to the one that the U.S. and the American Congress were able to negotiate and amend subsequently?

[Serge Cardin, Bloc, Sherbrooke, QC]

Mr. Speaker, that is a fundamental question. First, what are the Conservative government's motives behind its instructions to its negotiators for negotiating agreements of this type? One word comes to mind, but it is unparliamentary. Second, what are the Liberals' motives for not putting a stop to these types of agreements? During his speech on the Colombia agreement, the Liberal Party critic for international trade raised the fact that it was because his party was aspiring to power. Does that mean that you have to set aside your values in order to be in power?

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise this morning to voice my opposition to Bill C-24.

One of the things I was reminded of as I sat here is that in the early to mid 1980s we started a free trade agreement with the United States. I recall that a certain Conservative member said it was like sleeping with an elephant and if the elephant rolled over we would be in some difficulty.

That particular debate went on, and ultimately the free trade agreement was signed. Then the elephant rolled over and from 1988 to 1990 Canada lost 524,000 manufacturing jobs. We have progressed, some people might say, to NAFTA, and the repercussions are still being felt.

What I see as a change in this proposed agreement is that we are somewhat of a dominant partner in this one. With that dominant partner status comes a responsibility. As a nation, we could have been taking the lead on the environment and labour rights in this particular country. We know that many of the South American countries have some tremendous problems in the area of human rights. The records are disastrous down there.

Bill C-24 is a bill to implement the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru, the Agreement on the Environment between Canada and the Republic of Peru and the Agreement on Labour Cooperation between Canada and the Republic of Peru. With regard to labour cooperation, we had an opportunity to enhance the labour standards in this country by setting benchmarks that should have been in the agreement.

Nobody in this place will dispute the necessity of trade. We all understand that Canada is a trading nation. Canada has taken a leadership role in human rights in the world for many generations now, and it is highly regarded and respected. This is a lost opportunity. We had an opportunity to similarly move the benchmark forward in the negotiations around the free trade agreement with Colombia. As we know, Colombia has the worst human rights record on the face of the earth. Some will say, and I am sure they are sincere, that by having trade and having an agreement with Colombia, Peru and other countries, that this will enhance and bring forward their human rights. Personally, I believe we should have been pressing for human rights prior to even entering into negotiations.

Members may recall that there was a report prepared on the corporate and social responsibility. In fact I believe the member from Sherbrooke commented on it in his remarks. Well, that particular report never made it to this House. That report was returned to the government a year ago last November. It was talking about situations, particularly of Canadian enterprises operating in South America and other countries.

There has been a question in our communities as to why that was never tabled in this House. Why was that document not brought forward? The NGOs, the civil society and other people came together across this country to prepare it. I think the evidence is now here as to why the government would not want the corporate and social responsibility document tabled; it is because it would directly impact on these two agreements.

From time to time in our offices we are visited by guests from other countries. Just last week we had a young woman, Yessika Morales, who visited us from Colombia. Yessika's father was shot and killed by the paramilitaries in 2001. She came to us with her concerns about that particular trade agreement with Colombia.

They have a great fear in that part of the world. In no way am I suggesting Canadian companies are directly complicit, but in South America, if a corporation from any part of the world working there were to be something like King Henry when he said, “Will nobody rid me of this troublesome monk?” and Thomas Becket died, in a similar fashion, if the executive board or the executives of a mining corporation or other enterprise were to suggest that there is any kind of problem with a labour leader, that labour leader would be gone.

The example is Colombia, where 2,690 trade unionists have died since 1986. Some people ask how I know that is part of that; it's because in the same period about 17,000 people died. Amnesty International's Human Rights Watch and others have documented these cases.

We had a great opportunity with this dominant position that I referred to before to take our place as an international leader on human rights, to sustain that position and to move forward to help countries like Peru. We failed to do it.

In the particular agreement, once again, labour rights and environment rights are side agreements. I come from the labour movement, and in my time I was part of the negotiations between Bell Canada and the union, on the union side. During negotiations in 1988, and then again in 1990, we went to the employer with our list of our proposals and the employer would have a list of their proposals. It is interesting that ours were called demands and theirs were called proposals, but that is another issue. At some point in the negotiations we reached a place where we said we could not resolve this. But we had to have something. In that case, the employer wrote a letter of intent.

That was all well and good. When the collective agreement was signed and we were back in the workplace and workers' rights seemed to be impinged, we went to the union and said we wanted to grieve. The union said it was sorry it could not because that was only a letter of intent; it was not binding.

These side agreements are exactly the same thing as this letter of intent. It is a nice way of masking that we do not have any powerful, sustainable actions we can take to protect the environment in Peru, or protect the workers' rights, or the workers' lives, in many cases. It is very troubling when we look at an agreement of this nature.

I will give some credit to the government, because it has moved somewhat away from the Bush agreements of the past. We would probably find that some of those have been getting a very rough ride in the Congress of the United States, but it has moved somewhat past that. Still, it does not do what is needed to protect the workers of this country. As we demean or lower the rights of any nation in the world, it takes the rights of all nations and lowers them.

It is important to consider who will benefit from trade agreements of this nature. I will give an example of one company, the Bank of Nova Scotia, that will be moving to higher investments in Peru. I am sure that on the investment front there will be some reciprocal trade that happens, and it is to the benefit of the countries involved.

I must point out, Peru is not a major trading partner with Canada to begin with. Our two-way merchandise trade between the two countries only reached $2.8 billion in 2008, and Canadian imports were over $2 billion, of which 50% was from Canadian gold companies operating in Peru.

I go back again for a moment to corporate social responsibility. That highlights the importance of having a framework of the responsibilities we expect of Canadian companies when they operate in a nation like Peru, whether we have a trade deal or not.

With that initial trade deal, the negotiations were started as far back as 2002, under Mr. Chrétien and the Liberals at the time. They first held discussions with Peru, Colombia, Ecuador and Bolivia. Our trade minister in 2007 launched the formal trade talks with Peru, and the government signed in May 2008.

There are critics around the world on trade issues and trade agreements. Mary Tharin, from the COHA, Council on Hemispheric Affairs, was talking about the U.S.-Peru free trade agreement, and she suggested the agreement has given the president of Peru the excuse to start dismantling labour rights and what regulations they do have on the environment in Peru.

From my perspective, the good news is that since the president started doing that, his approval rating has dropped or has almost vanished. However, we are not talking about a democracy like Canada when we are talking about the impact that would have on him and how that might sway him not to proceed to a greater degree of damaging those particular rights.

In the United States in 2007, there was a considerable debate and, as indicated, some compromise was made and it approved a free trade agreement with Peru designed to drastically reduce import-export tariffs, hypothetically putting an end to protectionism on both sides.

We hear the government saying that we cannot have a buy Canadian strategy because that would be protectionist in this worst of times. As the member from Winnipeg pointed out earlier in his remarks, in 1927 the United States undertook protectionism, if we want to call it that, but it was buy American where procurements of local governments and state governments were intended to spend their taxpayer money on, heaven forbid, American goods, which is, in my opinion, precisely what we should be doing in this country.

The approval for that free trade agreement in the United States has been delayed by both the Senate and the House of Representatives due to concerns, mostly on the part of the congressional democrats, I would say, about Peru's environmental and labour standards. It took quite a while for that to ultimately get resolved.

Despite the free trade agreement's conditions, which state that labour standards must not be lowered, a number of President Garcia's recent decrees have put the country's public service workers in jeopardy. In May, the Federation of State Employees got to the point where they felt desperate enough to organize a strike.

The whole problem is that these agreements are about trade at all costs. We should think about that for a moment. Yes, I said in my opening remarks that trade is important, and we all accept the necessity of trade, but Canada as a country has always been a country that took principled stands, a country that stood up for human rights and for the values that are necessary to sustain a healthy country.

Tomorrow there will be a demonstration outside of this place by a group of labour unions and labour activists. As we close in on June 6, the anniversary of D-Day, we are reminded how the veterans of this country fought in the war against Nazi Germany to have Canadians sustained and have the right to demonstrate outside of this place.

Canada has gone far and wide to protect the rights of citizens in other countries and in our own country and has done a wonderful job in doing so. However, when we move to agreements with nations with questionable human rights records and questionable records on the environment and we fail, as the dominant partner in those negotiations, to improve areas of the environment, environmental regulation, labour laws and rights, then we fail as a nation.

I am really troubled that in the two agreements, the agreement with Peru and, more particularly, the agreement with Colombia, I think our government has failed us. In the particular case of the free trade agreement with Colombia, I am quite ashamed of the fact that we would even negotiate with a government that is as tied to the drug trade as that nation is.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I have had the benefit of four years working with the Commission for Environmental Cooperation under the NAFTA. After two decades of recommendations by public advisory boards actually appointed by the present government and the governments of Mexico and the United States calling for stricter adherence to the environmental agreements and, in fact, taking a step further in incorporating the side labour and environmental agreements into the agreement, could the hon. member please speak to the issue of whether or not it is appropriate that we are still side-barring environmental impacts and labour rights in our trade negotiations?

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, as I indicated in my remarks, I have a history in the labour movement with negotiations. The very failure of having a letter of intent in a collective agreement is worse than not having something in the agreement that states what is needed. It is masking over the fact. These side agreements are doing something very similar. They are not addressing the issues in a substantive way to move the mark forward on the environment, human rights or labour rights in this case.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I wish to compliment my hon. colleague on his excellent remarks. I know that he comes from a labour background, which means that he is very sensitive to issues affecting human rights and the environment.

I partly agree with him when he says that this type of agreement is smoke and mirrors. The economic benefits to Canada from agreements with countries like Peru and Colombia, where human rights and workers rights are ignored and no efforts are made to improve social conditions, will be extremely minimal.

There is something I do not get, though. That trade has little impact on our economy, but at the same time we are very soft on the great, big country with which we do a lot of trade, namely the United States. Trading with the United States has much more of an impact on our economy.

This morning, a bill was introduced, which both the official opposition party and the ruling party have spoken against. Our borders are currently closed, and there are protections for the buyer's market in place. In my opinion, these are very important issues, much more important to our economy and our employment situation than the Canada-Peru agreement, whose impact is much less significant.

I would like to hear the hon. member on that.

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, in regard to the bill we debated here this morning about a buy Canadian strategy, I indicated in my remarks that the U.S. started such a strategy in 1927. Americans buy locally and are proud to buy American products. We should be proud to buy Canadian products.

In my riding of Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, we have been decimated on the manufacturing front. It is tragic at times to see the flow of vehicles crossing the border into the United States to purchase there and then come back. All my life I have spoken to my friends about buying Canadian. Hamilton used to be the textile capital of Canada but it is no longer there. Steel is at risk in Hamilton, although at this point indications are that it is because of the market downturn, but still, all in all it is a major concern.

I am not opposed to having a free trade agreement with any nation so long as we set a standard in that agreement and that we ensure the agreement enhances environmental regulation and human rights. Where human rights are in question, we should never be signing the agreement until we are satisfied that there is a basic fundamental set of human rights in any given country.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Mr. Speaker, in looking at this agreement, one of the concerns expressed has to do with a decree by the Peruvian government, legislative decree 1015, which was designed to facilitate the privatization and stripping away of communal lands held by indigenous people, allowing them to perform the subsistence farming that supports their communities.

That particular decree was pushed back but many others are coming forward from the same government. Our government seems to feel that those decrees are business as usual or that doing business with the Peruvian government is just fine. As I said, these new laws are meant to facilitate the expropriation of the country's land.

Interestingly enough, a similar thing happened some years ago in Colombia where that government, in order to facilitate trade agreements with the United States, privatized land. It took land away from the indigenous people who were farming it. In the case of some of the people living in the mountains, some of the territories had gold mines on them. Canada, of course, jumped on the gravy train on this one. Essentially, these people were stripped of a livelihood that was centuries old. Canadian and American mining companies went in and simply grabbed whatever they could.

Like the people of Peru, those people stood their ground. They literally stood at the entrances of their villages and told the junta and death squads that they could not enter. They did not care whose businesses the junta and deaths squads felt they were protecting. They were not going to allow them to enter and kill their children.

This whole reality in terms of how we deal with South America seems to be repeated in this Peruvian agreement. I wonder if the member, as a human rights expert, could comment on what we are seeing with regard to these trade deals and the abuse of human rights.

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, a tragedy is unfolding in South America in regard to the displacement of people and the disappearance of trade unionists. It is interesting how we hear that they were not murdered but that they have disappeared. It happens to tens of thousands of them across South America. The tragedy is that when a dominant nation, such as Canada, goes into negotiations with a particular country, a lot of things start happening in preparation for that agreement.

The people on the farms are quelled by leaders saying that they should be moved off and out of the way before the agreement is signed. Trade unionists disappear. I used the example earlier of Yessika Hoyos Morales' father who disappeared in 2001. Four years later, a colonel quietly told her that his death squad had killed him. This is horrific.

As a nation, in any trade agreement we have a responsibility and our government has a responsibility to enhance human rights wherever we travel, to set that example worldwide and to live it every day in the protection of our own human rights, labour rights and environmental rights and those of any nation with which we do business.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am very interested in participating in the debate on Bill C-24, An Act to implement the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru, the Agreement on the Environment between Canada and the Republic of Peru and the Agreement on Labour Cooperation between Canada and the Republic of Peru, but I also have some serious concerns.

When we look at the debate surrounding this free trade agreement with Peru, it is clear that there are few things that are specific to this Latin American country. In other words, this agreement is part of the trade policy the federal government has been pushing in the Americas for the past few years. So, some of the criticisms I will make today will sometimes be similar to criticisms I could make of the agreement with Columbia, which we saw recently.

In both cases, the Conservative government presented Parliament with agreements that had already been signed and negotiated before Parliament even had a chance to examine them and make recommendations or changes. That is a disgrace. I participated in a mission to Columbia with the member for Sherbrooke. We met with unions, community groups, grassroots groups, business leaders and others and they made a number of important comments. If the government had really taken the time to examine this agreement and the report put out by the Standing Committee on International Trade, I am not sure that this agreement would be before the House today.

On January 28, 2008, the federal government announced that it had signed a free trade agreement with Peru, once again presenting parliamentarians with a fait accompli. As representatives of the people of Quebec and Canada, we cannot accept this sign of contempt, this negligent attitude toward democracy that the Conservative Party demonstrates when it presents us with this sort of agreement that has been signed without any substantive debate.

In my opinion, this contempt for institutions is certainly not the best way to serve democracy. I deplore the fact that the Liberals sanction such behaviour by the Conservatives. They want to take over the government in the next election, so they should know that we cannot accept this sort of thing.

That said, the Bloc Québécois is strongly opposed to this implementation bill because it does not meet a number of criteria and objectives that, in the Bloc's view, must be met before free trade agreements are signed, especially with developing countries.

In the interests of international solidarity, we have a responsibility as parliamentarians to condemn bilateral free trade agreements that go against workers' rights, the environment and even some countries' ability to maintain their sovereignty. We condemned the bill to implement the free trade agreement with Colombia, as I mentioned, and we are condemning this one as well today.

Not so long ago, I was reading a great American writer, Joseph Stiglitz, who said that the problem with bilateral agreements is that often, stronger countries exploit weaker ones. This is less likely to happen with multilateral agreements.

That is the danger of these agreements. Often, they come back to haunt us. If, during the negotiating process, Canada does not respect the rights of foreign workers and developing countries, it very often finds itself exploiting people in very difficult conditions. Companies are not always environmentally friendly. They take their operations offshore and cut jobs here at home because it is easier for them to engage in their economic activities if they do not respect certain social conditions, certain working conditions and the environment.

The Bloc Québécois has always maintained that trade can contribute to the socio-economic prosperity of nations. However, this can only be the case if trade agreements include measures that ensure sustainable development, respect for the environment and the development of the populations involved. That is particularly true when these bilateral agreements involve a developed country and a developing country, such as the treaty with Peru.

The free trade agreement with Peru includes a clause to protect investments that is patterned on NAFTA's chapter 11 and that will allow businesses to sue governments. To include a chapter protecting investments could impede Peru's social and economic development. So, any legislation that prevents an investor from fully enjoying his investment could lead to court action and compensation. We are essentially giving the upper hand to foreign investors, who will dictate the social, economic, cultural and environmental policies of the country that welcomes them. That is not normal.

Imagine an environmental law that would prevent a polluter from enjoying his polluting investment, such as in the mining sector. The act would not be struck down because an environmental provision would allow the state to maintain it, but it could be deemed as requiring payment of compensation. Moreover, the agreement has the effect of raising the amount of compensation to be paid. Indeed, in the case of expropriation, not only does the state find itself forced to pay the value of the investment—that is the initial amount invested—but also all the revenues that the investor anticipated from his investment.

In other words, in this chapter 11, compensation also applies to lost profits. That is shameful. With such agreements, the sky is the limit. This government seems to want to promote these agreements, instead of multilateral treaties. This opens the door to court action, and the amounts involved would be so high that they would deter the state from passing any legislation that may upset multinational companies that carry on operations on its territory.

Since the Peruvian economy is the more vulnerable one, it is more likely to suffer the consequences of a clause protecting investments. In Canada, which is a developed country, the impact will not be as significant, particularly since there are not many Peruvian investments here. The situation is quite different in Peru. For example, a Canadian multinational will be able to legitimately challenge any environmental law passed by the Peruvian government, on the ground that the legislation prevents it from benefiting from its investment.

Considering that Canadian investments in Peru are primarily in the mining sector, which is a great polluter, there is cause for concern. Indeed, Peru's mining potential is significant, and over 80 Canadian mining companies are present in that country. Canada is the number one investor in Peru's mining sector. Given the poor track record of Canadian mining companies, and a total lack of will on the part of the Canadian government to regulate their operations, protecting the additional investments of these companies through a new chapter 11 is definitely not the best thing to do to improve the social, environmental and economic conditions of Peruvian workers. Moreover, I do not see how this could have a positive impact on the economy of Berthier—Maskinongé and of Quebec as a whole.

In a nutshell, we are afraid that measures to protect investments provide disproportionate protection for Canadian investors as opposed to local people and the environment. Obviously, Peru can enact legislation and make regulations to govern the activities of mining companies.

But the danger lies in the fact that the Peruvian government does not have the resources or infrastructure needed for proper oversight of the companies’ activities inside that country.

The Bloc Québécois is opposed to this agreement. We are not opposed to protecting our companies’ investments abroad, but this must not be done at the expense of the rights and needs of the local people. Because Canada’s primary interest is in investments in the mining sector, the Bloc Québécois believes we need to adopt a real policy to hold Canadian mining companies accountable. I am not talking about a disguised policy like one of the motions the Liberals introduced in the House not so long ago. They lectured us on the whole question of corporate social responsibility abroad and they vote in favour of agreements like these with Peru or Colombia. We need a real social responsibility policy, one adopted here in this House, an aggressive policy that means that when we sign bilateral agreements, that being something we are somewhat opposed to, preferring multilateral agreements, at least chapter 11 will not apply.

In 2007, the Bloc Québécois called on the federal government, as recommended in the Report of the Advisory Group for the National Roundtables, to adopt mandatory standards and accountability measures relating to the activities of mining companies abroad. This issue has been going on for a long time. Those measures should be accompanied by penalties for companies that do not comply, for example by eliminating their entitlement to tax benefits, loan guarantees and other forms of federal government assistance. Not only are these companies often operating in very particular situations, but they are also financially supported by our governments. In March, unfortunately, the Conservative government rejected a large majority of the recommendations we had made. The Conservative government has decided that social responsibility standards will be voluntary instead of mandatory.

The Liberals support the free trade agreement, in spite of all the speeches they make in this House where they say they support respect for the environment and corporate social responsibility abroad.

If we do not have an accountability policy, the mining companies will be able to expand their activities and will be subject to no rules and liable to no consequences when they pollute or they threaten human rights.

I also want to mention the dispute settlement mechanism in this agreement. The mechanism provides that a company that feels that a government has violated the investment provisions can institute proceedings directly against that government before an arbitration tribunal. We have a lot of questions about the dispute settlement mechanism in this chapter. The tribunals hearing the disputes are set up to hear a specific dispute. The deliberations of the arbitrators and their decisions are secret, unless both parties to the dispute decide otherwise. It is quite something.

Although the free trade agreement with Peru has a number of improvements in terms of transparency—this has to be said and we pointed a few of them out—the Bloc Québécois still feels that disputes should be settled on a centralized, multilateral basis involving the different countries that signed the bilateral agreements, rather than on a case-by-case basis.

We cannot accept the fact that multinational companies not only have special privileges in comparison with the host society in general but can also institute legal proceedings against a national government before special tribunals.

Our opposition to this free trade agreement is not based solely on the way investments are protected. We think that the government’s strategy of concluding individual trade agreements makes it impossible to establish a fair trading relationship that benefits everyone.

We cannot enrich ourselves by exploiting people because, as I have said, that comes back to haunt us every time.

We put downward pressure on wages in other regions. If people are kept in poverty with terrible working conditions, the downward pressure is felt by working people around the world. If companies are allowed to exploit people now, they will come back here in another form to do business and put downward pressure on the working conditions of our workers.

The government is currently negotiating free trade agreements with some 20 countries, in addition to the agreement it signed with the four countries of the European Free Trade Association. We supported this agreement. We are not against all agreements. This one was economically beneficial and respected workers’ rights and environmental legislation. It had major benefits for Quebeckers and all Canadians. For these reasons, we supported it. We are not opposed to every kind of agreement.

No studies have been done, though, showing whether these bilateral agreements are beneficial. Regardless of whether they are good or not, the Liberals and Conservatives are ready to sign more of them even though it is still impossible to determine whether they have been beneficial.

Last year, I sat as a member of the Standing Committee on International Trade. We invited government experts and we asked them what the benefits would be for Quebec and Canada. We wanted to know if this agreement was fair and if workers were going to benefit from it, or if it was going to result in job losses. The government is often unable to provide an answer to that question and it signs free trade agreements with other countries, without knowing the economic, social and political consequences of these treaties. That is unbelievable.

As I mentioned, I was with the member for Sherbrooke during the discussions on the agreement with Colombia. The government spent money to send a parliamentary delegation, to meet officials in that country, and to see what was going on there in the context of this agreement. However, the agreement was signed before the government read the committee's report. That is strange. It does not matter whether the agreement is good or bad, the Liberals sign it.

In a report presented by the Standing Committee on International Trade, the Conservative government even considered signing a free trade agreement with China. Just imagine: a bilateral agreement with China. What would be the economic spinoffs here?

In my riding, the manufacturing, furniture and textile sectors have felt that impact. There was talk of a new bilateral agreement. When it comes to international trade, this government does not seem to have a clear direction, along with objectives to ensure economic viability and respect for individuals, environmental standards and workers from all over the world, and not just Quebec or Canada.

These agreements weaken the multilateral approach. Bilateral agreements with developing countries should be avoided, because they often lead to agreements that put richer countries at an advantage over poorer countries. This is not from me, but Mr. Stiglitz, a former adviser to the Clinton administration and the author of many books, who condemns these bilateral agreements. This is the situation that we are experiencing with this accord and with the one with Colombia.

Since I only have one minute left, I am going to conclude.

I do not believe that these treaties will have a major economic impact in Quebec, particularly the agreement with Peru, or the one with Colombia. Instead, we should work a lot harder to get respect from our big American partner, and we should stand up to it regarding some issues.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I have been listening carefully to what the Bloc member has been alluding to and I have been trying to understand the thesis with respect to how he views free trade agreements. I would like to think they are fair trade agreements to some extent. He has argued that because there is no strong multilateral framework, these bilateral agreements will supersede issues as they relate to the environment, human rights and so on. I think the House is impressed with the knowledge the member has, but my question is, is there any other alternative?

When Brazil and Canada were engaged in an aerospace situation with respect to Embraer and Bombardier, there was a charge that the Government of Canada was unfairly benefiting one of our industries. Through the WTO, Canada was able to bring attention to that issue. There was a degree of voluntary acceptance with respect to the findings.

The House is seized with the argument that the member has put forward. However, without these kinds of agreements with the Caribbean countries of the CARICOM, and without the ability to stimulate capital transfers and investments in those countries, where would those countries be? My colleague has argued that this $2.8 billion balance is favourable to mining interests and so on.

Given that there can be strong human rights legislation in Peru, and I would argue that the Peruvians have capability in the area of labour jurisdiction and labour law, does entering into these kinds of agreements with Canada not give more protection to those countries?

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for his question.

My answer is that we are signing bilateral agreements with countries where living, economic and social conditions are often pretty tough. Our mining companies, as my colleague and I both know, frequently fail to respect workers' rights and environmental standards.

That is why we cannot support this kind of agreement. My colleague mentioned the WTO, which offers a number of recourse options because it includes many countries and the rules are well-defined. Bilateral agreements can cover anything at all, and that is why we are saying that respect for the people and countries involved is not always included. In multilateral agreements, however, there are both rich and poor countries, so there are rules and the negotiations cover more issues. I think that makes it easier to respect all of the people involved.

When I speak here in the House, I often mention the fact that we have gone through some tough situations with the Americans. Just think of the softwood lumber issue and our partially closed borders. It is a kind of protectionism. When our truckers cannot cross the border freely to export goods, that affects the cost of production. But it does not look as though the government is interested in dealing with these situations. The government is hiding its agenda and trying to convince people that agreements with Colombia and Peru will support our economic growth. I am not so sure about that. We have seen the numbers, which suggest that the impact on our economy is negligible. All it will do is protect foreign investors in the mining sector. Fine, we are not against that, but the economic impact would be minimal, in our opinion.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am very concerned with the number of issues in regard to this agreement, perhaps because I and many of my colleagues here have lived through the less than stellar agreements of the past, such as the free trade agreement and the North American Free Trade Agreement. In both of those cases we have seen Canadian workers and labour rights in Canada decline. We are living in a reality where Canadians are suffering quite significantly because of the North American Free Trade Agreement. Despite all of the claims that it was somehow going to improve employment and improve our standard of living, we see a rapid and quite disastrous decline.

In this free trade agreement with Peru, we see that new laws have been put forward, decrees by the government, which it says is to modernize the public sector. Unfortunately this so-called modernization seems more punitive than positive. In fact these new rules have given the National Civil Service Authority the right to negotiate with workers in Peru and skip the collective bargaining process entirely.

I wonder if the member could please comment on the fact that collective bargaining is being undermined and how important collective bargaining is to the rights of workers.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his excellent question.

I would like to reply by quoting Joseph Stiglitz, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in economics. She surely is very familiar with him. He has written a number of books about trade relations and globalization. He is very interested in matters pertaining to working conditions and the negotiation of collective agreements for the most disadvantaged. When he received his honorary doctorate from Université de Louvain on February 3, 2003, Joseph Stiglitz—an author who I often read—said, “As our interdependence has increased, we have discovered that we need rules to govern the process of globalization and to create institutions to help it function. Unfortunately, these rules are too often established by the rich countries to serve their own interests and especially individual interests within these countries.”

That is basically what my colleague is saying. These agreements place a great deal of pressure on countries. In Colombia, we have seen that unions cannot necessarily negotiate their working conditions. Furthermore, they have even been threatened. People have been assassinated for negotiating their working conditions. I do not believe that this promotes good working relations or good conditions for the local population.

[Serge Cardin, Bloc, Sherbrooke, QC]

Mr. Speaker, first I would like to congratulate the member for Berthier—Maskinongé on his speech.

Towards the end of his speech, he alluded to the fact that free trade agreements negotiated by the government have never required, prior to being adopted, a status report to determine the real impact on certain industries, or even certain industrial sectors, in order to have an idea of what might happen. In committee, an amendment was proposed asking the government for a report, within five years after the signing of a free trade agreement, on what had taken place or what should be changed. The proposal was rejected by the Liberals and the Conservatives. What does my colleague think of the government's lack of vision?

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, as we were saying, progress reports and committee reports are not being complied with. As parliamentarians, we should, as a minimum, be able to see the impact of an agreement on employment and on the economy, to see if that type of agreement is beneficial, to see if conditions within the agreement are respected even though they may be standard within these types of agreements, to have a follow-up on all these issues.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise to speak to this bill today.

It is of utmost importance not only to Canadian workers and Canadian society but obviously to Peruvian workers and Peruvian society as well.

Quite often the government, as well as their new coalition partners, the Liberals, is really fond of talking about rules-based agreements. When one thinks of those terms, it sounds rather magnanimous, we are going to have rules. The first thing that comes to mind is that somehow the rules will be even-handed, because most of us grew up playing games that had rules in them that were about fairness, equity and making sure that those who were not as gifted as others when it came to the games we were going to play could be included. So we developed rules for that.

Here we have this agreement that is based on rules, but we have to ask the fundamental question, “Who set the rules and for whom were they set?” When we look at this particular agreement, the rules are set but clearly they are set for one group to dominate another. We did not learn anything from NAFTA's chapter 11. We might have learned to do it a little bit better in the sense of making sure that those who could take advantage could take advantage even more.

What we have inside this agreement is indeed still that style of chapter investor protection that we all have come to recognize does not work well. If it does not work well and the rules are not working for Canadians and for other trading partners who sign on to those agreements, then why indeed would we continue to make them part of the rules, why would we not amend them or change them drastically to make sure that they are not in there.

In fact, we can see in other more modern agreements, and my colleagues in this House quite often tend to use the term fair trade, that they still use fair trade with chapter 11-type agreements. Whereas a fairer trade would actually eliminate those types of provisions and deal on a more even-handed basis with all participants in trade, including workers, the environment, civil society and communities as a whole. However, that gets lost in this agreement.

One may well ask, “Well, who sets the rules?” In this particular case, the government of this country bargained this agreement with the government of Peru. Did it have ability to do that? Yes. Does it have the moral authority to do that? Well, in Peru, I would suggest the Peruvian government does not. President Garcia's most recent poll ratings are 19%. One can say, “Well, a poll is a poll”. That gages public sentiment at least. And the public sentiment clearly shows that less than one in five Peruvians agree with the leadership of that government.

If the Peruvian government is about to set the rules for Peru in the labour movement, for workers and general society, and four out of five or 80% of the population is not in agreement with that government, is it going to be setting rules that really are about fairness for all of those citizens of that country? I think that when one does the arithmetic, one would have to come to the conclusion that no, that is not the case.

Here we have a rules-based agreement being set up by a group, in this particular case the Peruvian government, that really has no moral authority to do so. Consequently, how do we know what the Peruvian government is saying to us is really representative of what Peruvians are saying to their government? I think we have to doubt, very much, what exactly it is saying to us.

We need to look no further than what the Peruvian authorities do in their actions inside their own government, inside the country, for us to take a look to see if indeed we should believe the things they are telling us they will do, when indeed inside the country itself they are doing the opposite of what they are telling us they will do.

As my colleagues pointed out earlier, there is this question of how the Peruvian government treats trade unions, especially in the public sector, where basically it is taking away the right of collective bargaining; however, one of the rules in the rules-based agreement is to protect collective bargaining.

The Garcia government says “We are going to protect that type of right. We are going to enshrine it as a piece off to the side of the agreement”, and I will get back to talking about why it should be in rather than outside the agreement, but yet by its deeds it is actually taking rights away from collective bargaining and from workers in general.

So, here we have the government of Peru saying one thing, and some folks would use the old acronym “talk is cheap” when it is saying one thing, but when it gets to doing the walk and doing the deed, we can see the dastardly deed it does when it takes rights away from workers, takes collective bargaining away from workers, and it puts processes in place that would affect those workers, the very workers that it is supposed to represent. This is a government that is supposed to protect its workers, as we should be protecting ours. But then again that is a debate of probably another bill for another day as to how well the current government and the preceding one actually protected workers in our international trade agreements. One could argue, I would say, very successfully that that did not happen in this country either.

So, when we look at that sense of where workers are in Peru and the fact that only 9% are really covered by unions and that minimum wages cover a certain portion of the population, we would say that does not seem so bad, that it looks like it is going to up. In fact, I believe the statistics state it went up to $176 a month. I know that is a very paltry sum in this country, but that is a different society. But then again, if we delve much deeper and we actually look at what is the minimum wage and who does it cover, we find by the very deed that it in fact covers very few people at all because the vast majority of folks work in what is called an informal economy.

Here we might have called that under the table or the grey market, which usually is a market where people go out and work to subsidize an already established income. They have a job but maybe they work on the side. Dare I say it, the grey economy is usually to avoid taxes in this country.

However, the informal economy in Peru is the majority of the economy, where wages are not the paltry $176 a month but are $20 to $30 a month, which is not quite 15% of the minimum wage.

We all know that minimum wage is really established as the floor. But really what we have is folks not living on the floor but living underneath it. The vast majority of them, indeed, are living underneath it. And here we have this agreement, entered into by the current government and the government of Peru, to somehow do something to help folks who are below the floor when we see the government is not enacting legislation to help them rise up even though it says in the agreement that it will definitely do that.

So when one looks at what is said in agreements and the words that are written there, it is the deeds that are done by government that actually tell us whether the words will true or they will ring hollow.

In the case of the Garcia government, clearly they ring hollow, and the echo is deafening. They do not protect the workers in Peru nor civil society in Peru. Large tracks of the indigenous population in Peru are saying they do not want this agreement, that it is not good for the Peruvians.

I would argue it is not necessarily good for Canadians either, in certain aspects, because it did not get rid of the chapter 11 situation. It did not get rid of that whole sense of investor rights. I would call it investor privilege because the labour organizations and workers in this country do not get treated on an equal footing. If we cannot equate the two and we cannot make them equal, then we cannot have fair trade. It will always be free trade for some and an obligatory trade for others, those of us who have to live under the rules and those who get to write the rules. That will never make agreements fair for all of us who participate in them.

So, when we look at this agreement, and there are a number of folks who have, and we are looking at the implementation of this agreement, not the debate of the agreement, obviously, but simply the implementation of it, we ask, “Is this in the best interests of those who are there?”

My colleague from Scarborough—Guildwood has a private member's bill before the House that talks about mining companies and talks about how they should behave in a manner that is fair and equitable, similar to what they do in this country, when they are in South America, and places like Peru.

In my riding office, I have received literally thousands of signature cards from young people, their parents, grandparents, and in some cases their great grandparents who are saying that until the government can make sure that workers in Peru and other parts of the hemisphere are treated fairly and the same way they are treated in Canada for the same corporations, then we shouldn't enter into these agreements. By signing these cards, they are saying they do not agree with this agreement. They do not agree that this agreement is actually a good model for Peruvian workers in Peruvian society.

When there is an outpouring of support which was not generated by me as the MP but by civil society in my riding and there is a private member's bill that talks about that, and is supported by literally tens of thousands across this country, that should tell us something about what people feel and intrinsically know is not a good deal, and so should we.

As parliamentarians we should know it is not a good deal. We should know that we should have labour and environmental standards. Why are we any different than the U.S. when it actually signed a deal, albeit flawed? The U.S. signed a deal and enshrined the labour and environmental standards in the body of the collective agreement. I call it a collective agreement because it is bargained between two countries.

Normally, in collective bargaining, when something is intrinsically important to the parties, it is put in the body of the agreement because that it is how it is defined and enshrined as being that important. It is not put in as a side piece or an addendum. It is not added on at the back. It is not referred to in a chart. It is put in the body of the agreement because that is the weight given to it.

When we look at this agreement, what do we find in the body of it? We find the usual platitudes of the back and forth between two governments and, of course, investors' rights enshrined in the heart of the agreement. We do not find that as an addendum or a chart. We do not find it stapled to the back of the agreement. Yet, when it comes to the fundamental situation of labour and workers' rights, it is tacked on at the back.

Let us look at the environment, the very place in which we live. We have all heard the horror stories about environmental degradation throughout the entire world and Peru is not immune to that. It is, indeed, in the same situation as other countries where environmental degradation has taken place against their best interests and wishes in a lot of cases. Why would we not have enshrined that in the heart of the agreement? We tacked that one on the back as well.

When the question is raised as to why it is not in the body of the agreement, the answer is, “Trust us, we have your best interests at heart”. Again, those are words and the words “trust us” from the Peruvian government are not matched by the very deeds it talks about when indigenous people are being forced off their lands. There was an attempt by the Garcia government to change the constitution so there would be a different voting structure to remove people, which was eventually lost in a constitutional challenge.

Good for those who challenged it through the Peruvian constitution and said the president of the country could not do that. Unfortunately for them, the constitutional courts upheld it and said no, the government would have to enshrine and secure all of the pieces, which takes two-thirds of a vote to remove people who would give up land willingly.

If we left it to Garcia to do, he would have removed indigenous people in favour of mining corporations. In fact, he was quoted one time as telling a mining company not to worry, he would take care of it, the company would get its land claim and be able to set up its mine. He forgot to ask the folks who actually owned and lived on the land if that is what they wanted. Until this particular point, they said no. That mine has not established itself yet and good for the indigenous folks who live and farm there.

From the NDP's perspective, when it comes to Canadian agriculture, we did not get the same deal that the Americans got. If we were to look at some of the pieces that may be of benefit to Canadian agriculture, there were certainly some issues around the grains and pulse sectors.

When it comes to the red meat sector, we did not get the same access that Americans did. Why would we sign a deal that is inferior to the Americans? On one side, we are unable to get the open access to the markets, which the government says it wants, yet it is willing to sign a deal that does not open the market the way it wants it to.

There is the old adage that half a loaf is better than none, but I would argue half a loaf that has gone bad is probably worse than none. At least if we start at the beginning, we have an opportunity to craft something that makes sense and that is a positive benefit for all the parties. In this case, it seems the bill will not do that.

We did not get the open markets. The Peruvian government says that it will do certain things and then it restricts things when it comes to workers. It agrees to a settlement process that states a fine might have to be paid, yet it turns a blind eye. It reminds me of one of the old Monty Python skits of nudge, nudge, wink, wink. It has become one of things that is between the mining corporations and those who will benefit directly from this agreement. It has become the nudge, nudge, wink, wink of an agreement.

The government pretends it has this agreement, that it will include a piece about labour and environmental standards in the agreement and that we should not worry because we it will not have to walk the walk. It then will be able to tell its friends and international labour organizations that it has this as part of the agreement, but that is not the case. It is simply an add-on.

The Americans did not do that because the agreement would be held up in the U.S. Congress. They enshrined the labour and environmental pieces inside the agreement to ensure it would pass through the House of Representatives. It is still flawed because those provisions about the same penalties still apply and no one is certain how that penalty will be exacted and enforced because there are no teeth when it comes to those pieces.

That is the problem. The investor piece gets an arbitration panel, gets to make charges before it. Yet with the labour and environment pieces, there may be a fine. Again, this is a flawed agreement that is weighted on one side and not on the other.

One has to wonder if this is the future for us. Will we continue down this path of constantly opening up free markets and free agreements that are not fair or balanced? It would seem that is the case. It seems we have not learned anything from the previous ones. We have learned to perhaps placate those of us who say those are wrong-headed agreements, but we have never learned to fundamentally change the direction so we develop fair trade agreements.

If we are not going to do that, why would we sign flawed agreements? That is a fundamental question that all members should ask themselves. If we know the agreements are flawed, and I have heard many members say that it is not exactly what we want, or not quite what they would like to see, why sign it? Why not take it back and start again? Why not listen to those parties who have said that it is flawed and have given suggestions how to fix it? It is not just a question of opposing for opposition's sake. It is saying that it is flawed and here are some fixes.

The Peruvian population is saying the same. There are things we need to do to fix it and we are willing to come forward to give the governments the opportunity to fix it. The agreement could have a number of propositions that will enhance the bill and make it fair for both countries so we can trade.

It should never be confused that somehow those who oppose free trade agreements, especially those that have chapter 11 enshrined in them, are opposed to trade. It is not the case. We all understand that trade takes place on this globe and it is one of the things we have done for centuries. We will always continue to do that. However, we should not allow ourselves to sign flawed agreements that will either not benefit Canadians or those of our reciprocal trade partners. We should never stoop to taking advantage of those who find themselves in precarious situations. It should be about even-handedness and ultimately about fairness.

That fairness will drive equality for both partners and ultimately then, and only then, will we have trade agreements that all of us, I believe, unanimously could stand up and support. We should strive to be there because that would be equitable and fair for all the parties and for the world.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, Canada exports about $390 million worth of merchandise to Peru and we import $2.5 billion. That gives an idea of the dimensions about which we are talking. There is a trade deficit. Peru has also entered into trade agreements with the United States, Chile, Thailand, Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay and Singapore. The member is well aware that not to participate in a trade agreement with Peru will put Canadian business at a substantial disadvantage. In fact, wheat sales are an example.

The member has raised some interesting points about the chapter 11 side deal and the environmental side deal. If we continue to expect to have 100% of what we want every time we do a trade deal, we will never be able to negotiate meaningful trade relationships that will help our economy and help us to ensure the trade deal operates in a manner which is fair to all stakeholders.

Is the member seriously suggesting that we should not enter into trade agreements, which clearly are to the advantage of Canadian business, simply because we want to look at some other areas outside the trade umbrella that we think, as boy scouts, we should look at? Is that his view is?

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, one could argue that the only boy scouts around here are those who sit in government now and the others who sat in government before them. When they bargained the North American Free Trade Agreement, they gave away everything, including the forestry agreement, then they lost nearly every challenge to the Americans since. Therefore, one might argue that the boy scouts were those two governments and they gave things away.

We need to look at the sense of this fairness aspect to trade policy. Trade policy is about not taking advantage of one country over another. That is the intent. That is the spirit of the policy when we enter into it.

My hon. colleague talks about how much we send to Peru through the business route and how much Peru sends back to us. However, I remind my colleague that the majority of that dollar value out of Peru is raw resources and a lot of it is gold. It comes out of Peru as gold, not as finished products, and heads north and a lot of it heads back into the country to be reprocessed. We are extracting raw materials from Peru and quite often bringing them into the northern hemisphere to reprocess them into finished product of one dimension or another.

In a lot of ways Peru reminds me of Canada in its infancy 150 years ago, when we used to extract things. Some might say that this is what is happening to us again because we seem to be extracting raw materials and sending them out of the country to let someone else do things for us.

We see both things happening. Peru's industries are extraction industries, which are Canadian held in most cases. Without a question, Canadian mining corporations are some of the best in the world. They have gone to all these different countries to set up mining operations, and they have done that in Peru. They are extracting that raw material from Peru and sending it elsewhere to be processed.

The figures are somewhat skewed. They do not really give a true indication of what type of trade goes back and forth between this country and Peru. I remind the hon. member that numbers can look bad or good depending on how one tries to frame them. In this case it may look like there is a trade imbalance between us and Peru, but then again, by the time we finish the product, it may be indeed more valuable.

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I heard the member speak about the Canadian mining companies in Peru. In my earlier remarks, I talked about the corporate social responsibility report that was never tabled in the House. A year has passed since that report was completed. It is very concerning to civil society and those of us who are concerned about the approach Canadian companies take in different countries.

Last week, Yessika Hoyos Morales was next door. Her father was a trade unionist who was assassinated in Colombia. I understand she was scheduled to speak before the trade committee and the door was closed to her. I have to wonder why in the world that would happen in Canada, a place that champions human rights.

We were very fortunate, and I want to give credit to all members of the Subcommittee on Human Rights, because, by consensus, this woman was added to our agenda at the last minute. However, it strikes me as strange that one of our committees would do such a thing.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I wish I could answer that for my colleague. I wish I could give him an answer that makes sense and that would be representative of the House, but clearly does not make sense.

One would hope that we would want to hear from someone who has intimate knowledge of what happens in the southern hemisphere. As much as Peru is not identical to Colombia with regard to trade policy and internal operations, there are indeed lessons to be learned and things that we could have learned. Unfortunately, the committee had an opportunity to learn and it turned it down.

For those who made that decision to turn her down, they should always remember that learning is always a positive thing, regardless of whether they think they believe in the piece or not. There is always value is learning new things and having them validated. Unfortunately, in this case, the young woman was not heard by the committee and that did an injustice to the House. More important, it did an injustice to those members who said no.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the previous Bloc speaker had an interesting thesis in which he argued that bilateral treaties of this ilk should be superseded by a broader multilateral regime that would deal with environmental and social responsibility issues and so on.

Rather than focusing on the bilateral relationship with respect to sidebar agreements, would he not back the Bloc member in terms of looking at the International Court of Justice, the International Labour Organization tribunal and those multilateral regimes that would deal with the kinds of issues he has raised, rather than suggest that a government should not enter into, in the better interests of its citizens, the kinds of agreements for the kinds of reasons as put forward by some of my colleagues?

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, people always have to be careful about acronyms because they can get caught up in them. The ILO has clearly stated what it believes should be the minimum standards when it comes to labour. Indeed, the Canadian Labour Congress is calling for those standards.

The difficulty is we have added it as an addendum. We did not enshrine it in the agreement. We could have. We cannot say that no one else has done it, that we would be the first to do it and that we could not get it done. The Americans did it. That begs a simple question. Why did we not? It was not that the Peruvians did not want to do it. They did it with the Americans, who are a trading partner of ours. The Americans have the same sorts of rules that we do because we entered into NAFTA with them. It is not as if Peru was to find that as a foreign piece. It just simply did not want to do it and our government said okay. I do not believe the Conservative government actually believes in enshrining labour rights inside the agreement.

The fundamental question we should ask is this. Was it really the Peruvian government that said no, or was it the government across the way that simply said that it was not important enough to do? Did it say it did not care, that would not put it in the agreement? However, when there was some pressure, it then tacked it on the back of the agreement.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-24, An Act to implement the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru, the Agreement on the Environment between Canada and the Republic of Peru and the Agreement on Labour Cooperation between Canada and the Republic of Peru, be read the third time and passed.

[Ron Cannan, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I move:

That this question be now put.

[Francine Lalonde, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-24 proposes to implement the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru, the Agreement on the Environment between Canada and the Republic of Peru and the Agreement on Labour Cooperation between Canada and the Republic of Peru.

I will explain the position of the Bloc Québécois, which will oppose this bill to implement an agreement with the Republic of Peru.

I will first quote from the statement by the Canadian Labour Congress, Peruvian central labour organizations, the Coordination of Andean central labour organizations and the Trade Union Confederation of the Americas, or TUCA, on the free trade agreement and the agreement on labour cooperation between Canada and Peru.

I found it interesting, because we have seen the new democratic American Congress force President Bush to review the agreement he had already negotiated with Peru—not by himself, of course, but through others—because Congress wanted that agreement to provide for greater rights, particularly for workers, and a greater social safety net. That was done.

Are these amendments enough for us to support this free trade agreement? No, and I will explain why.

Here is, first, an excerpt from the statement:

Based on their collective experience of free trade and investment agreements like the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), the Free Trade Agreement between the United States of America and Peru and the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and Peru, the above-mentioned organizations [the ones I mentioned a moment ago] state that they profoundly disapprove of this kind of agreements that put the rights of investors before human rights, labour law and the social, economic, cultural and democratic rights of the people. These agreements are designed to be entered into by nations with comparable levels of development—

That is why a free trade agreement served as a basis for the establishment of the European Union. The declaration continues:

—and therefore ignore existing disparities between the economies of nations like Peru and those of nations like the United States of America and Canada, whose development is a hundred times greater than that of nations like Peru.

Clearly, those who made this statement also disagree with the signing of the United States-Peru agreement.

The Canada-Peru Free Trade Agreement and the Canada-Peru Agreement on Labour Cooperation were negotiated in record time, and no civil society or labour organizations were consulted, nor were any analyses conducted on the effect they would have on the sectors of production, employment, human and labour rights, and the environment of both countries.

These agreements were negotiated in record time, without any consultations or analyses of the consequences.

Experience has shown that these types of agreements compromise the democratic process by giving more power to companies than to citizens and governments. They make the creation of an unregulated free market easier and more widespread, and encourage the adoption of economic, social and labour policies that make the job situation more precarious. That increases poverty, social exclusion and negative impact on the environment, particularly in Peru. Since we are experiencing a global economic crisis, this is not an appropriate time to be signing this type of agreement.

As indicated in Labour's Platform for the Americas, which was adopted by labour organizations of the entire western hemisphere, in order to be considered acceptable, all international trade agreements must have a primary objective of creating decent jobs and sustainable development. The agreement must protect the fundamental labour standards that can be implemented in the signatory countries.

Experience suggests that it is unlikely that the labour provisions [which I spoke of earlier] in trade agreements, whether they are side deals or the main agreements, will lead to concrete improvements to the situation of workers. Trade agreements like NAFTA are not intended to improve labour standards, and there is no indication that they can become a means to ensure labour rights.

We urge the Parliament of Canada to refuse to ratify the Canada-Peru FTA until there has been a full assessment of the economic and social impacts it will likely have on capital mobility, wages, employment stability, working conditions and the environment in both countries and steps have been taken to make up for any deficiency.

The Bloc Québécois is opposed to implementing this free trade agreement not only on these grounds, but also because the Bloc Québécois is against the government's strategy of making piecemeal trade agreements. The Bloc Québécois prefers the multilateral approach. Multilateral is a word that may seem complicated, because it is not used on a daily basis, but Latin scholars will know that it means a strategy that includes all the parties, on different sides.

The current economic crisis clearly shows that a market economy can work properly only if it is regulated and stabilized through an institutional, political and ethical framework. Canada should work within the International Labour Organization to ensure that the rules governing international trade are the same for everyone.

The Bloc Québécois believes that trade can contribute to the prosperity of nations. That does not mean that trade and trade agreements automatically profit everyone. It is important to see whom these trade agreements benefit. However, ordinary people can benefit only if these trade agreements include measures that will ensure sustainable development and that will promote the development of the populations involved.

However, I must point out that the Canada-Peru free trade agreement includes a clause to protect investments that is patterned on NAFTA's chapter 11 and that will allow businesses to sue governments. I will talk about this later, but I want to say that the Canada-U.S. free trade agreement, which has been in force for a number of years, has promoted development in Canada and the United States. That free trade agreement included an investment clause, but it was nothing like the clause in NAFTA. It was mainly because of that investment clause that the Bloc Québécois campaigned hard against the free trade agreement of the Americas.

In fact, the presence of a chapter to protect investments such as one patterned on chapter 11 might interfere with Peru’s social and economic development rather than helping it to develop, as is hoped.

Peru is a minor trading partner for Quebec. Quebec’s exports to Peru represent only 0.14% of total exports from Quebec. It is therefore a small partner and Quebec does not stand to lose.

It must be added that Canada’s main business activity in Peru is in the mining sector. Unfortunately, Peru’s track record on worker protection in that sector is hardly a glowing one. So the agreement does not contain any real policy to hold Canadian mining companies accountable. We talk about it here and there, and the government commissioned a substantial report on the need to impose constraints on mining companies that are created in Canada and everywhere in the world.

Ratifying this agreement will enable mining companies to expand their activities without being liable to any consequences for their actions when they pollute or when they flout human rights.

In Peru, this agreement will not help the situation of people in need, and it will especially not help the Peruvians most desperate to defend their rights, the indigenous people. There are about 600,000 indigenous people in Peru, in the Amazon region, who are subject to enormous inequality, and yet they are the ones most affected by this agreement between Canada and Peru, from what I understand. The mines and the extraction companies that operate facilities in the tropical forest or in areas where the indigenous people live will destroy their habitat without offering any compensation and without consideration, as is generally the case. The indigenous people, for whom it is already difficult to defend their rights, will find themselves in an even worse situation.

Is that our business? Yes. We cannot tell the Peruvians to look after the indigenous people there. Quite the contrary. We know that various products like oil are extracted there. Other products are extracted from mines by various companies. There are also the forestry companies.

Those companies certainly do not come bearing gifts for the indigenous people; quite the contrary. The agreement, which provides for there to be a significant increase in investments, cannot help but please the government, regardless of its feelings about the people there otherwise. I do not want to meddle in this, but I simply want to point out that Canadians have a responsibility in negotiating this kind of agreement, which will enable extraction companies to displace populations who have no means to defend themselves.

To provide an idea of the situation they are in, I thought I would tell the House about some of the documentation I have seen.

There was a study, for example, on inequalities in infant mortality rates. Infants born near the national capital of Peru have first year survival rates that are more than two times higher than the national average. These are children born near the capital. Children born in the forest or the Sierra region, especially in the south, have rates that are almost two times lower than the national average. These inequalities in the infant mortality rates are the result of social inequality, which itself reflects the different rates of inclusion in the social system. This study was a few years old, but there is nothing to indicate it cannot be used today to understand the plight of the indigenous peoples.

The government and Peru's Indian communities are meeting this week in Lima, the capital, against a backdrop of mounting tensions in the northeast, where a state of emergency was decreed pursuant to indigenous demonstrations against the oil concessions granted to the Franco-British multinational, Perenco.

The president of the Interethnic Association for the Development of the Peruvian Jungle, Mr. Pizango, described this decree as an act of aggression. Pizango and a number of Indian leaders are going to meet with Prime Minister Simon today, but without any apparent hope of making progress. “The government, and not just the government, has always treated us like second-class citizens”, Pizango said. His organization represents 65 different ethnic groups living in 1,350 communities with a total population of 600,000 located in the east Amazon part of Peru.

There have been blockades for a month now of roads, rivers and airports in the north to get the decrees I mentioned rescinded. According to the indigenous communities, the controls over mining, petroleum, forest and water development on their ancestral lands are being weakened. Between three and ten demonstrators were hurt on Sunday. On Monday, the International Federation of Human Rights supported the demands of the indigenous peoples and called for the withdrawal of these decrees as well.

One of the reasons I have been fighting the free trade agreement is that it allows all Canadian investors—who may be fine individuals—to pursue and to step up the exploitation of sub-surface resources in these sensitive regions, which need to be protected, along with the people who live there.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the member whether she is aware of the geopolitical drivers or events that have driven the agenda in favour of this agreement at this time. It seems that the government is very eager to get this agreement signed. In her mind, what is driving this whole agenda?

[Francine Lalonde, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Mr. Speaker, that is an interesting question. I cannot say that I have an exact answer. However, the logical answer is important, since it is the American policy that seems to be driving this. It is clear that the Prime Minister wanted to negotiate a free trade agreement on the heels of the American agreement. Now the conditions have changed and I hope that Canada will revise its policy. The Bloc Québécois does not want this agreement to be ratified.

[Raynald Blais, Bloc, Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened very carefully to what the hon. member for La Pointe-de-l'Île had to say.

I would like to ask her if I am right or wrong. We just discussed a free trade agreement with Colombia and now Peru. It seems to me that the negotiations were not open or transparent enough to believe that these agreements are in the best interest of the people of Colombia, Peru or Canada. I am left with the impression that only the resources matter. It is as though we are seeing a new colonialism and returning to imperialism, which is a form of colonialism. That is my impression. Does the hon. member feel the same? Can she comment on that?

[Francine Lalonde, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Mr. Speaker, that is an interesting question. As I have often said, as the Bloc has often said, and as others have no doubt written, free trade agreements are negotiated between countries and among groups of countries that are more or less similar economically and socially. They are not negotiated between a rich country and a poor one. If they were, it is likely that the country benefiting would not be the one that ought to in terms of social justice.

Upon closer examination of the two agreements in question, what stands out is the fact that we are committing to increasing mining investment. One might think that would help develop the country, but we have looked at a number of cases and it is clear that groups of people are often displaced and forced to give up their traditional livelihoods, after which they cannot find new ways to make a living. Either there are no provisions restricting investors' actions or there are none protecting workers and allowing them to unionize. Even if there were, it is extremely difficult to make sure that the rules are being followed when we are so far away.

My colleague used some strong language, but he was right. This situation is a kind of new colonialism.

[Megan Leslie, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, the member for La Pointe-de-l'Île raised the question of who benefits from this agreement. Is it ordinary people?

I have in my hand a copy of a press release from some critics of the America-Peru free trade agreement. These critics are ordinary people. They are workers.

They point out some of the problems with the U.S.-Peru agreement. They list that foreign investors based in Peru would have the right to question domestic laws and get compensation if those laws undermine corporate profits. They cite that nothing would change for the 33,000 slave labourers cutting down the Amazon rainforest. They cite that subsistence farmers would be forced off their land because cheap U.S. food produced by agribusiness would undercut their prices. They say that this is what happened with NAFTA and it resulted in millions of poor Mexicans leaving their farms.

That is the example in the U.S. Does the member see any hope for things being different if we do have a Canada-Peru free trade agreement?

[Francine Lalonde, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I see no reason why things would be any different. Canada wants this agreement because of the provisions that favour investors. I did not discuss chapter 11 of NAFTA, which we fought, but which is basically copied in this agreement. It is hard to understand why a developing country would sign such an agreement, and that is not just our opinion.

If a company is harmed by any law seeking to improve working conditions or social laws and can calculate the impact on its bottom line, it can sue the government. It does not have to wait for one government to take up the matter with the other. No, the company itself can go to court to have its case heard. That has happened a number of times. Not only does that lead to the consequences I mentioned earlier, but it interferes with the government's ability to improve workers' living conditions and other social conditions.

[Monique Guay, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would quickly like to add something in order to give my colleague the opportunity to reply since there is little time remaining.

I would like to know if she has some concerns with regard to workers, and especially children? We know that children are often forced to work in absolutely horrible conditions. I would like her to comment on that. It is important, the country's future is at stake.

[Francine Lalonde, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for her question.

I spoke earlier about children born in the forest compared to those born in urban areas. The situation has perhaps improved somewhat. However, the situation of children in these work areas, in general, is totally unacceptable. The problems caused by the use of chemical products, the fact that they are thrown out onto the streets, the fact that their parents cannot work and earn a living in healthy and safe conditions—all of this affects them. Children are the ones who suffer the most.

[Megan Leslie, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have this opportunity to speak to Bill C-24.

Bill C-24 is an act to implement the free trade agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru. There are two side agreements, the agreement on the environment between Canada and the Republic of Peru, as well as the agreement on labour cooperation between Canada and the Republic of Peru.

If we start with a bit of background, a little of the history of how we got to debate this bill, it is actually the implementation legislation for the Canada-Peru free trade agreement. Canada is following the United States, which completed an FTA with Peru under the Bush administration in December 2007. This was in spite of strong opposition from trade unions, from civil society and from democrats who viewed this bill as an expansion of NAFTA.

Free trade negotiations with Peru date back to 2002, when the Chrétien Liberals first held discussions with the Andean community. The Andean community is Peru, Colombia, Ecuador and Bolivia.

On June 7, 2007, then minister David Emerson announced the formal launch of free trade negotiations with Peru, and this government signed the bilateral agreement in May 2008.

The NDP opposes NAFTA-style treaties that put big business interests before workers and the environment at all costs and that have increased inequality and decreased quality of life for the majority of working families.

In the case of Canada-Peru, our concern is that a larger and much more economically developed country would take advantage of a country from the global south and that large corporate interests would end up shaping the so-called free trade architecture to serve their needs and not the interests of the public or the interests of the two trading nations.

My colleagues from the NDP and from the Bloc have spoken to some of the problems with this bill. They have spoken to the problems from the labour perspective, the problems with the impact on the environment and the problems regarding human rights. I think they have spoken the truth. Their words have been eloquent, as well as compelling.

I would like to speak to a possible solution. New Democrats are not anti-trade. Trade is good, but the trade we want to see is fair trade.

In question period, I have heard the stock answers from the ministers and the Prime Minister to our questions. The Prime Minister as of late has been answering so many questions with the response that it used to be that the NDP stood for something and now it is clear that the NDP stands for nothing. If I only had a nickel for every time I have heard that answer to a question that deserves a real answer.

We do stand for something. We stand for trade that is fair, that takes into account workers and farmers, that takes into account the environment, communities, wildlife. It is fairly easy for me to talk about what fair trade would look like and not as some pie in the sky theory or some untested utopia; it is something that is real, and it is something that works.

I have an example of fair trade right in my backyard in Nova Scotia. Just Us! Coffee Roasters Co-op is Canada's first fair trade coffee roaster. It is located in Wolfville, Nova Scotia. It is not in my riding, but it is not too far away.

Actually, it is in the riding of the Liberal member for Kings—Hants. I strongly encourage this member, who happens to be the Liberal international trade critic, to go there, in his riding, to meet with the folks from Just Us! Coffee Roasters Co-op, because they will be able to present him with a different view on international trade, one that is innovative and one that works.

Just Us! has a very firm belief in people and planet before profits. That is its motto. It is a fair trade coffee roaster.

What does fair trade mean? It is an innovative model for international trade. It offers not only a fair price to the workers but respect and empowerment for global south producers.

This little coffee co-op is a great example for us to look at. It has coffee, tea, sugar and chocolate. All of its products are grown naturally, without chemicals, and they are grown to enhance the well-being of farmers, communities, the environment and wildlife.

Imagine a world where governments signed fair trade agreements that kept to these principles. Imagine a North American fair trade agreement. Imagine a Canada-Colombia fair trade agreement.

Fair trade is a trading partnership. It is based on dialogue, transparency and respect, and it seeks greater equity in international trade. It contributes to sustainable development by offering better trading conditions to, and securing the rights of, marginalized producers and workers, especially in the global south.

Fair trade organizations, which are backed by consumers, are engaged actively in supporting producers. They are engaged actively in awareness-raising and in campaigning for change in the rules and practices of conventional international trade.

The strategic intent of fair trade is threefold: first, to deliberately work with marginalized producers and workers in order to help them move from a position of vulnerability to one of security and economic self-sufficiency; second, to empower producers and workers as stakeholders in their own organizations; and third, to actively play a wider role in the global arena to achieve greater equity in international trade.

To put it more simply, fair trade is an alliance between producers and consumers that cuts through the middlemen. In the process it empowers producers, it gives them greater dignity, and a fairer price for their product. It provides consumers with high quality products they know are sustainable from a social and ecological point of view.

I commend Just Us! for leading by example. It was the first. We are really proud that it is a Nova Scotian company. It is interesting to note that when I go around Nova Scotia, I can go to the smallest coffee shop or the biggest chain and they are all serving Just Us! coffee. I invite members to room 519 of the Confederation Building, my office, where it is always stocked with Just Us! coffee. I am very proud to support its work in ensuring fair trade for our coffee growers.

This operation is located just off the highway in Wolfville, which is outside my riding. I am in the Annapolis Valley fairly often and I always try to stop by. There is actually a fair trade museum in the shop. It is quite something to see because it tells a story of fair trade from the perspective of farmers, women, the elderly and children. It is a really innovative way of looking at history and the museum tells a wonderful story. Congratulations to Just Us! for leading by example and also for trying to educate us, for trying to make us conscious consumers, and for trying to make us conscious and conscientious trade negotiators.

Let me go back to the agreement.

The Canada-Peru agreement is a somewhat improved copy of the outdated Bush-style approach to trade. It still puts big business before people. There is no effective human rights or enforcement of human rights. It pays lip service to environmental protection without any real tough measures or dispute resolution mechanisms.

These types of NAFTA copycat agreements are meant for trade between highly industrialized and highly developed countries, but Peru is a developing nation. We do not like to use that word, but Peru is still working on industrialization and still developing economically.

This trade deal will not help Peru grow sustainably. It will not help increase the standard of living for its citizens. Instead, it is going to open up the country to exploitation by multinational corporations like, sadly, Canadian gold companies. Canadian corporations are very active and large investors in the natural resource sector in Peru.

The fact that this trade deal will not help Peru grow sustainably and increase its standard of living implicates us. We are complicit. Not only are we not helping Peru, but we are making sure that it does not grow sustainably, that it does not advance economically.

I am sure if we talked to Canadians on the street and asked, “What do you think about free trade?” Many people are probably going to say, “Yes, trade is a good thing. I'm all for it”, but if we took the time to actually explain what the implications of these trade deals are, I am sure we would get a different answer. Canadians are compassionate to each other and they are compassionate with their international friends and partners. I am pretty sure that Canadians would support fair trade over free trade given the option.

This free trade regime is strongly opposed by civil society groups, trade unions, environmental groups, and citizens from both Canada and Peru. This trade deal was negotiated in record time without any consultations with trade unions, environmental groups, civil society or citizens.

Another issue with this free trade agreement is the structure of it. It actually is in three parts. This is a bill about all these different parts of a free trade agreement. Why are things not all in one package? Why do we have these separate parts?

There is the main text of the FTA. Then there is a labour side agreement and an environmental protection side agreement. Labour and environment I would think would be fundamental issues to any trade agreement, yet they are put in these side agreements. They are on the side. They are not central to what is happening.

The CPFTA does not include tough labour standards. The labour provisions are in the side agreement. They are outside of the main text and they are without any vigorous enforcement mechanism. Trade unions in Peru have expressed concern because Peruvian labour law and arguably human rights law is deficient in several areas.

If we look at environmental protection by addressing the environment in a side agreement there is no effective enforcement mechanism to force Canada or Peru to respect environmental rights.

The Canada-Peru agreement on the environment commits both countries to pursuing environmental co-operation which sounds nice and to work to improve their environmental laws and policies which sounds nice, but it can only ask their parties to enforce their own domestic law. Pretty please, will ya? If they do not, there is not necessarily a consequence. Therefore, it is hard to imagine how this actually is going to be effective.

We can look at the situation in the U.S. and learn from it. Sometimes we learn from the successes, sometimes we learn from the failures, and I would argue that this time we should be looking to the failures to try to learn.

I have a great article by a woman named Mary Tharin. She is a research associate from the Council on Hemispheric Relations. She wrote an article in October 2008 entitled “Can Free Trade be Fair? Lessons from the Peru-U.S. Free Trade Agreement”.

I would encourage members to have a look at this article because it really does take the U.S. experience and draw out the lessons on this agreement. She notes that the United States has been complicit in Peru's legal and economic deterioration. That is a fact that needs to be taken into account before any further FTAs can be signed. She said in her article:

The Peruvian government is beginning to unravel as corruption charges and scandals threaten to completely discredit the already unpopular leadership of President Alan Garcia.

She talks in this article about how Garcia's minister of mines and energy as well as other top energy and state oil folks were fired in response to allegations of favouring a foreign energy company in exchange for bribes. Garcia also has a history of putting economic growth before the welfare of the population in Peru, before the welfare of the people. For years the Garcia administration has been manipulating Peruvian law in an attempt to draw foreign investment while at the same time completely failing to alleviate domestic poverty and therefore sacrificing the government's legitimacy in the eyes of the people of Peru.

However, Ms. Tharin argues that the United States, instead of taking a stand against Garcia's mishandling of the economy--because it could do that, it could stand up and say, “No, this is not the way we conduct business and we don't want to do business with a country that behaves this way”--has actually contributed to the problem by signing trade agreements with this unpopular government.

An approval of this FTA in the U.S. had been delayed in both the senate and the house, due to concerns mostly on the part of congressional Democrats about how Peru's environmental and labour protections would be affected by the agreement. Those are just a few of the problems with this agreement.

In closing, I think it would be incumbent upon all of us in this House to vote against this bill, considering the human rights violations that have been spoken about by my colleagues, the labour issues that have been spoken about and the environmental issues. We should be looking to what has happened in the U.S. and taking our cue from the failures there with this agreement. We should be looking to the successes that we can see with fair trade right here in Canada, right there in my home province of Nova Scotia.

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I could not help but notice that when the member for Halifax was speaking, she seemed to be emotionally charged, and that she needed to go to her water from time to time. It struck me that when people from so many countries in the 20th century came to Canada to get away from human rights violations, pier 21 in Halifax would have been one of the very first places they would have seen. This member represents the very area where that pier is located and where we have memorialized those trips. Today we are debating human rights and labour rights, and the violations that have gone on in Peru and the situation there today. Seeing that passion is very touching.

However, the reality is that when we talk about labour rights, there is a tendency, to which I am to some degree guilty of because I came from the labour movement of Hamilton, with such a proud history, to focus and frame many arguments from the perspective of organized labour and the people who have been fortunate enough to have a union. What does the member see as the situation for non-union workers in Peru?

[Megan Leslie, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, as far as this agreement goes, there has been a lot of criticism and a lot of outspokenness, which is amazing, from organized labour, whether it is organized labour in Peru or organized labour in Canada, and rightly so. They have problems with this agreement. The problems that labour has with this agreement are significant.

However, there is a much larger problem, I think, that plagues the majority of Peru's population. I actually have an excerpt from a 2007 human rights report and I believe in that human rights report it was found that only 9% of Peru's population actually is unionized. So, we have to think about that. If there are problems with labour law, if there are human rights violations of workers, how will these workers be able to collectively protest?

If they are just scattershot, and probably many of them are working in the underground economy, they do not really have the ability to collectively protest when labour laws are changed. Even more than that, this human rights report that I was looking at says that more than 70% of Peru's workforce is in the informal sector. That means that any regulations about minimum wage or working conditions are not even going to cover them, so concerns over labour law almost seem to be a moot point when we consider these folks who are working in the informal sector.

[Frank Valeriote, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I very much appreciated the comments made by the member for Halifax about the matter of fair trade versus free trade. She did mention a particular coffee trading company in Halifax. I am curious. Can she explain why, under the former Liberal government, when the member for Kings—Hants was attempting to secure $300,000 for Just Us! Coffee Roasters Co-op from the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, her party, the NDP, would not support the application for funding?

[Megan Leslie, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I was not around when that was happening so, unfortunately, I do not have an answer, but I will look into it.

Whether a company gets money secured from ACOA or any other funding body is one thing, but what we are not doing here is looking to the model that works. How it started is irrelevant. What really matters at this point is that it is working. It is working and yet we have this public discourse and this discourse in the House that if people question free trade, they are off their rocker and cannot possibly be supportive of business, development or economic progress, which is completely not the case. This is a very successful company that is run as a co-operative. It took these values that we hold core to us as Canadians and turned it into a successful business model.

Despite having these successes right here in front of us, we are still going back to these old models and we are fear-mongering saying that if people speak out against this free trade then they must be against Canada developing and becoming economically secure. However, that is not the case at all and the examples are right here in our backyard.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the hon. member for Halifax a question.

We have had free trade agreements with other countries, such as the U.S.A. and Mexico, and we have seen what has happened to our auto industries and jobs moving to Mexico for cheaper labour. We have seen what has happened with our forest industry where trees have been cut and put on ships to be shipped overseas. We saw what happened to John Deere, a very profitable company in southern Ontario that moved to Mexico. In my riding we have seen Vale Inco transfer profitable and well-paying jobs from Sudbury to Brazil.

Could the hon. member tell me how many Canadian workers will lose their jobs if this agreement is signed?

[Megan Leslie, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, if I had a crystal ball and could see into the future I am sure that whatever the number is it would be pretty grim.

Earlier today, one of our colleagues spoke about how a company in Winnipeg and a company in Quebec lost the contract for building buses to Germany over the fact that they were underbid by $60,000, something that our colleague argued would be about the price of a set of tires for these buses. It just makes no sense.

We need to keep jobs here in Canada. Our workers need to be paid fairly. We have human rights standards, labour codes and minimum wages and we need to keep a lot of those jobs here.

Some people have said that the Canada-Peru labour standards agreement that is tacked onto the side, which I was talking about, is actually an improvement on NAFTA, so, hurray, we have won.

NAFTA just focused on the enforcement of labour standards, while each trading partner retained full regulatory control to establish or modify its labour and employment standards. This agreement is more substantive because it seeks to prohibit violating core international labour standards. It is trying to say that we do not approve of this, that we need to stick with international labour standards. It is making the attempt but there is absolutely no empirical evidence that this kind of enforcement mechanism even works.

It is great that we a little bit more language in there but where is the proof that this will do anything? Where is the proof that this will help workers in Canada and in Peru? There is no empirical evidence at all.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I was wondering how the member would better approach this whole area with Peru than the government has. Does she think there are any amendments that could make this agreement a little more palatable, because at the end of the day the Liberals will be voting with the government and this will go through, with only the Bloc and the NDP opposed?

Does she consider any possible amendments that could make this agreement a little more palatable given the circumstances that we find ourselves in right now?

[Megan Leslie, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, that is a good question. Is this amendable? I think we have a duty to consider amendments that take into account labour standards and environmental clauses. However, the best thing to do at this point is to hoof it out and actually have people engage with the agreement process. What about the workers? What about environmental advocates? What about women? What about seniors? Why are we not talking to the people who will be affected rather than just the gold mining companies that will reap great profits?

We should be looking at amendments but in a perfect world we would start from scratch.

[The Acting Speaker, Barry Devolin]

It is my duty pursuant to Standing Order 38 to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, Foreign Affairs; the hon. member for Vancouver Quadra, Science and Technology; the hon. member for Cape Breton—Canso, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

[Christiane Gagnon, Bloc, Québec, QC]

Mr. Speaker, we are at the second reading stage of Bill C-24, An Act to implement the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru, the Agreement on the Environment between Canada and the Republic of Peru and the Agreement on Labour Cooperation between Canada and the Republic of Peru. That is the bill now before the House of Commons.

I would start by saying that the Bloc Québécois is opposed to the implementation of these three agreements. The reasons why we refuse to support these bilateral agreements are as follows.

First, the Bloc Québécois disagrees with the bilateral aspect of the agreement. We prefer that multilateral agreements be entered into, for several reasons. Second, there is the fact that there are no measures to guarantee sustainable development and to ensure that the peoples affected are able to thrive. And third, the presence of an investment protection clause will enable Canadian businesses that believe their rights have been violated to sue the government of Peru, and this could plainly interfere with Peru’s social and economic development. The Bloc places greater weight on Peru’s social and economic development, and calls for constraints to be placed on businesses with economic involvement in that country.

So there is no policy to hold mining companies accountable. This is in fact Canada’s main business activity in Peru. People from various ridings have sent us postcards telling us about working conditions in the mining companies, of which there are many in Peru. That is its main economic activity.

Today, I would like to expand on two points, the first being the bilateral aspect of these agreements, as opposed to negotiating and implementing multilateral agreements. These bilateral agreements make it possible to negotiate piecemeal treaties that generally do not guarantee respect for certain fundamental rights.

I would also like to address the question of holding Canadian companies abroad accountable, and more specifically mining companies, as I said earlier.

When bilateral agreements or treaties are signed, it clearly shows that multilateralism is being abandoned in favour of bilateralism. It is much easier to achieve a bilateral agreement, because there are only two parties involved. When a country gives preference to bilateral agreements over multilateral agreements, it is easy for it to sign piecemeal agreements, based on what works to its benefit. This tactic is widely used by the United States. If you are unable to reach agreement with all of the other countries in relation to treaties and negotiations, you negotiate with each of them individually, hoping that this will enable you to derive as many benefits as possible from the agreement and make the fewest possible concessions.

Clearly, the Prime Minister's government has also decided to drop the multilateral approach in trade and is tempted to do the same in foreign affairs. The proof is that it is currently negotiating with 22 countries individually to conclude free trade agreements. Negotiating with a country individually means that agreements can be concluded piecemeal, that is, outside the institutional and international trade framework. While this type of agreement permits freer trade, it does not usually include rules to civilize that trade. And this is where the Bloc disagrees with bilateral agreements, because they do not set standards for certain companies developing business in certain countries. Often, certain environmental and human rights constraints are ignored. So, this sort of agreement, like the one before us today and the one negotiated with Colombia, totally disregards environmental, human rights and labour rights standards

The Bloc cannot accept this sort of trade, which lowers the standards for rights and the environment.

I think people can understand that. In Quebec, we are very attuned to human rights, and many environmental groups have told us about their fears over this agreement between Peru and Canada.

In addition, the violation of labour rights and human rights in these countries strikes us as a form of unfair practice. Other countries have worked hard to control certain business practices. For example, child labour and forced labour, combined with the denial of such fundamental rights as the freedom of association, make it more advantageous economically for our businesses to set up in these countries, as the labour costs are lower.

Businesses operate in other countries because they do not have all these constraints—such as freedom of association—and thus benefit from worker isolation and the fact that workers cannot defend their rights.

The member for Halifax was saying earlier that a report on labour in Peru indicated that 7% or 9% of Peruvian workers were unionized. That shows that a lot of employees are left on their own and work for companies without protection.

How can they get ahead when they are mistreated with long hours of work and certain work practices that used to be found in Quebec and Canada in the days when companies ignored human rights? Here again, these businesses, rather than operate in Quebec and Canada, head elsewhere, and Peru is not the only destination chosen by a number of Quebec and Canadian companies.

If this government were sensitive to the local population, it would first work within the WTO, the international trade structure, to ensure that the same regulations governing international trade applied to everyone according to what is commercially desirable for the two countries and not adopted piecemeal. This is why the Bloc cannot support this bill. It is just piecemeal and fails to take into account the rules governing international trade according to what is commercially desirable for both countries.

At the very least, if the government were also serious about respecting the environment and the rights of local populations, it would include clauses in its bilateral trade negotiations requiring compliance with international environmental, human rights and labour law standards. This was not done, though, in the agreement we have in this bill. The bill just implements the agreement. It therefore totally disregards these protections, which were not included in the agreement.

In order to provide a concrete example of the latitude there is in negotiating bilateral agreements and to show how important it is for certain standards on the environment, workers’ rights and human rights to be included in the treaty, I want to address a more specific aspect of the trade between Canada and Peru. It will show that these kinds of bilateral agreements do not necessarily include standards or do not include any at all.

As I mentioned earlier, the mining industry is Canada’s main commercial interest in Peru, where it exploits natural resources. Canadian investment in the Peruvian mining sector is around $5 billion, which makes Canada the largest investor in mine exploration in Peru. More than 80 Canadian companies are involved. That is an awful lot of Canadian companies active in Peru.

The Canada-Peru Free Trade Agreement is far from equitable: it tends to give more protection to the Canadian companies that invest in the mining sector, to the detriment of local populations, workers and the environment. There is an obvious danger that the measures to protect investors will be disproportionately in their favour.

Environmental and human rights organizations are very worried.

I think they have reasons to be worried about this treaty, and they are not the only ones. Hundreds of people all over Quebec and in my riding among others have written to their member to voice their concern that Canadian mining companies are not being held responsible abroad, especially in Peru.

Most of them referred to a report tabled in 2007 as a result of the National Roundtables on Corporate Social Responsibility and the Canadian Extractive industry in Developing Countries. Civil society, the government and industry were all represented.

Although concerns were expressed about the extent to which mining companies respect human rights and the environment, a number of recommendations were also made, especially in order to create more transparent mechanisms for handling allegations of rights violations. Canada chose to ignore them. It is disgraceful that the elected government of Canada is not more sensitive to working conditions and the environment.

In fact, this is obvious here, when the government answers questions on employment insurance and on environmental issues, for example. The government's attitude is very clear. It shows complete disregard for certain consequences on the environment, or on the living conditions of many workers who are losing their jobs, who do not qualify for employment insurance, and who will have to go on welfare. As we know, the number of unemployed people is increasing. In a period of economic crisis, the government should be much more sensitive to these two realities.

As was mentioned in a document written by students from UQAM's international clinic for the defence of human rights, Canada refuses to incorporate clauses that would protect workers' rights and human rights in bilateral free trade agreements. It is not just us who are debating this issue. Civil society is also worried. It is aware of this issue. When we see the government's attitude regarding this issue, we cannot support this agreement. Canada also states that it is up to the host country, the one in which mining companies operate, to ensure that human rights are respected.

How can we leave the protection of human rights to the host country, when we know that some countries cannot provide that protection? Canada should be a leader, it should show the way to other countries, and it should not condone such practices.

This attitude and this transfer of responsibility to the host country create a problem, because in countries where violations of human rights are likely to occur, the justice system is often questionable. In the case of Peru specifically, we fear that this state may very well not have the resources or the infrastructure required to ensure the proper monitoring of mining companies operating on its territory.

Since we can obviously not presume to know how efficiently the justice system is going to work in the host country, Canada should take measures to ensure that mining companies act responsibly. We are not against mining companies doing business abroad. The problem is their behaviour. The Bloc Québécois has always been in favour of mandatory standards and accountability measures for these companies.

Even here, we often have a hard time making companies, and even the government, assume certain responsibilities. Some may act irresponsibly towards the environment, for example by dumping contaminants in lakes. The Department of National Defence itself is targeted, because of what is now considered far from acceptable behaviour, namely the contamination of water by dumping TCE into the groundwater.

This contaminated the well water in Shannon. I will come back to this issue later on this week.

With respect to the recommendations from the National Roundtables on Corporate Social Responsibility and the Canadian Extractive Industry in Developing Countries that I referred to earlier, the Bloc Québécois believes that Canada must first form an all-party committee made up of representatives from the extractive industry and others, who would advise the federal government on creating and implementing a Canadian corporate social responsibility framework for mining companies. There would be three measures.

The first measure would be mandatory corporate social responsibility standards that Canadian mining companies would have to respect when working abroad. The second would be punitive measures for offending companies. For example, they could be no longer entitled to tax breaks, loan guarantees or other forms of government aid. This would be one way to bring certain companies into line, if they are not good citizens abroad. The third measure would be an independent ombudsman who would conduct impartial investigations to determine whether or not complaints are founded.

The demands of civil society, which are the same as ours, are clear. Bilateral agreements like the one we are debating today must guarantee that these standards will be adhered to. But instead of living up to our international reputation as a defender and advocate of human rights, this government decided to make the responsibility standards for Canadian mining companies working abroad voluntary and not compulsory.

Members know what happens when we count on people to act of their own free will. A company is attracted to profits. It wants to work quickly, wants to give people a lot of work and use certain people, even children, who work cheaply. We cannot count on companies to do things voluntarily. We must make these standards compulsory and not expect that these industries will toe the line if the profit is attractive.

We have also been told that a committee has been set up, an Office of the Extractive Sector Corporate Social Responsibility Counsellor, created last March. But it is far from independent, since it reports to the minister and its capacity to investigate is extremely limited. It can investigate the complaints it receives only if the mining company agrees to such an investigation. Here again, it is clear that this will not work. Do you think that a mining corporation that flouts all of its civic obligations will want an investigation into its own case of straying from the path of responsibility? Under such conditions, the mining company will not agree to an investigation into its own wrongdoing. Given this masquerade of measures, it is clear how little this government wants to make mining companies abroad accountable, and clear how it is jettisoning its responsibility to adopt instruments and standards on the subject. Hence, it is not surprising to see that such standards do not figure in this treaty.

On this point the Bloc Québécois is categorical. In the absence of a genuine policy on mining company accountability, the ratification of this agreement will allow these corporations to extend their operations without being subject to any rule or consequences when they pollute or flout human rights.

I know I will not have time to deal with this, but I also know that with chapter 11, the companies are still being given a certain amount of latitude. They will have the right to challenge a government that has the audacity to bar their road through programs or policies, whether on the environment or other areas. A company could feel wronged by a government that does not give it the opportunity to make enough profits, or does not respect its development, out of possible concern for the fate of its population. This makes no sense. It is in chapter 11. This would permit such companies to prosecute the government. There have been many cases where governments—including the Canadian government—have been prosecuted, and been obliged to pay millions of dollars in damages to companies that felt persecuted—poor little companies— by governments that were a little bolder than the companies themselves.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, we know the legislation will probably pass the House with the support of the Liberals and the government, with the Bloc and NDP voting against it. Does the member think there are any amendments that possibly could be introduced to make the legislation more palatable? We would like to adopt a different approach.

I am sure the Bloc and NDP would have a totally different approach to a free trade agreement, but on this specific legislation, are there any amendments that she thinks could be made to make this more palatable?

[Christiane Gagnon, Bloc, Québec, QC]

Mr. Speaker, first of all, measures are needed to ensure sustainable development and the development of local populations. They have to abolish the clause to protect investments that would allow Canadian businesses to sue the Peruvian government if they believe their rights have been violated. What is needed is a policy to hold mining companies accountable, since that is the main canadian business activity in Peru. The entire bill is problematic.

This government favours concluding bilateral agreements that do not take into account certain protective measures that are included in multilateral treaties. Everything involved in concluding multilateral treaties must be taken into account. A great deal of effort will be needed to change the attitude of the Liberals and the Conservatives, who can be lumped together in the same category, and want to protect companies working abroad. However, we must have a social conscience, first and foremost.

[Serge Cardin, Bloc, Sherbrooke, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague from Québec for her speech.

I listened to her very carefully and she talked about the mining industry. As we know, two Liberal members have presented two measures, namely, motion M-293 from the hon. member for Pierrefonds—Dollard, and Bill C-300 from the hon. member for Scarborough—Guildwood. Both measures relate to corporate responsibility in the mining sector.

The Liberals are getting ready to vote for the free trade agreement between Canada and Peru, even though they know very well that the investment agreement based on chapter 11 allows mining companies to sue the state if it improves its legislation concerning the environment, workers' rights and occupational health and safety. They want to liberalize trade, but with such liberalism comes responsibility. How can the Liberals bring forward motions and bills to improve corporate responsibility among mining companies on the one hand, and on the other hand, accept and support such a free trade agreement, when the government should be sent back to the drawing board and forced to take a new approach to free trade agreements?

[Christiane Gagnon, Bloc, Québec, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague is quite right. This is not the first time we have seen this sort of contradiction or paradox here in the House. We are standing behind companies that violate environmental or human rights laws. We are giving them the right to go to those countries and we are giving them all the tools they may need to hamstring a government that may wish, for example, to stop the use of hazardous waste sites.

My colleague is quite right. The Liberals should go back to the drawing board and have a hard look at their actions, specifically in this matter. We often tend to believe that the Liberals are strong social democrats. However, their attitude is often similar to that of the Conservatives.

[Marc Garneau, Liberal, Westmount—Ville-Marie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to my colleague and I would like to ask her a question. What contradiction or paradox does she see in an approach that favours free trade with another country and, at the same time, acceptance by Canadian mines of their social responsibilities?

[Christiane Gagnon, Bloc, Québec, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am tempted to say to my Liberal colleague that it is the Liberals who are not accepting their responsibilities. We are not opposed to corporations being developed abroad. What we want is for the government to establish a framework that would impose certain rules on corporations. We defend rights in this country and they are the same rights that should exist elsewhere.

If the rules were established from the outset, corporations might find it less lucrative to go elsewhere and take advantage of the fact that workers and the environment are not protected. When corporations work abroad, they should fulfill certain obligations.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, does the hon. member have any experiences that she can share from observing our experience under NAFTA and the side agreement on environmental protection? Do we appear to have learned anything in the crafting of later agreements, including this one?

[Christiane Gagnon, Bloc, Québec, QC]

Mr. Speaker, chapter 11 of NAFTA was critical in giving companies full discretion to sue governments. Many court actions come to mind. For example, Ethyl Corporation, an American company, sued the Canadian government for banning the use of a fuel additive. The $250 million lawsuit lasted two or three years. Even if a settlement was eventually reached, $13 million still had to be paid out.

There have been many other cases like that. In the Metalclad Corporation case, legal action was instigated after access to a toxic waste disposal site was denied. Again, this was a $16.7 million U.S. action for damages. British Columbia was the one involved in that case. Many examples could be given of the discretion that chapter 11 of NAFTA affords companies to sue governments.

However, setting limits would be desirable, for instance by prohibiting the export of a fuel additive for environmental reasons.

Members of the Liberal Party profess to support the environment. It would come as no surprise from the Conservative Party, but it is rather troubling to see the Liberal Party pursuing today the same objective as the Conservatives. Yes, we must ensure that our companies have some discretion in order to be able to grow, but not at any price, especially nowadays. More and more citizens are increasingly aware of various issues like the environment. There is also the economic crisis, which disrupts things and causes people's attitudes to change. Change will come when proactive political parties which are not afraid to tell it like it is are in power.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I am rising in the House today to express my profound opposition to this bill. My opposition is 100% premised on the failure to yet again address environmental issues in trade agreements.

Twenty years after signing NAFTA and the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation, we appear to have failed to learn any lessons. That is despite review after review of the failure to take the approach of making environment and labour issues simply a sidebar, non-binding part of these agreements. We have seen trade agreement after trade agreement come before Parliament, repeating the same mistakes and refusing to listen to the input provided by Canadian experts over the last 20 years on the failings of the NAFTA agreement.

Instead of strengthening the environmental provisions of our trade agreements, we are moving to water them down further. Despite the weaknesses of the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation, NAAEC, recommendation after recommendation to strengthen that agreement went in the opposite direction. The government has chosen to further downgrade any responsibilities for environmental protection either on this country or on the countries with which it signs trade agreements.

In place of non-binding side agreements, why did the government not take the environmental provisions and incorporate them into the text of the trade agreement? That is precisely what President Obama raised during the last election. His issue with the NAFTA agreement was this very issue. It was the fact that environmental and labour issues had been sidebarred. We should revisit these agreements, not to open up and provide for even freer trade without any limitations, but to reconsider them and make these environmental conditions binding.

The government seems to have an inability to understand that it is not economy versus environment. I had the privilege of attending meetings of world and industry leaders in several countries in Europe with the Minister of the Environment. We heard from world leaders and CEOs of major industries, including the major coal-fired power companies. They said that we must incorporate environmental considerations into our economic development. They said that we must shift to incorporating environmental considerations in any economic or trade policy.

The government has turned a blind eye. It has blinders on to what is happening in the rest of the world. We seem to have blinders on in our attitude toward negotiating trade agreements. We need to enter this century. We are mired in old concepts. It is incumbent upon the government to take this bill back, reconsider it, rewrite it and negotiate it with the Canadian public and the public of Peru.

The rest of the world agrees. We need to step up to the plate. We need to shift our economy into the new green economy. We need to make those kinds of negotiations open and transparent and include the very people who are impacted: our Canadian industry and our Canadian public.

Let me talk about some of the provisions of this sidebar agreement on environment to the Canada-Peru trade agreement proposed under the bill. That is what it is: a sidebar, non-binding document.

This agreement, as with similar agreements and the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation, does not demand or compel Canada or Peru to protect the environment. It merely encourages the parties to not weaken or derogate from their environmental or health laws or measures to attract or encourage investment or trade.

First, we are simply saying that it might not be a bad idea, as a sidebar, to give a thought from time to time to not downgrading our environmental and health standards to get a trade or investment advantage. That is absolutely reprehensible. This is the kind of measure that should be at the heart of any trade agreement Canada signs.

Second, this sidebar environmental consideration to the trade agreement, similar to the other trade agreements we have signed, commits Canada and encourages Peru to ensure environmental impact assessment processes are in place.

Forgive me if I hold back a deep laugh. We have just witnessed in this Parliament the demise of federal environmental impact assessment laws, and we have the gall to propose signing off an agreement where we will hold Peru to account for implementing environmental impact assessment laws. I think we better step back and take a look at the record of our country before we make recommendations to other nations that are looking to trade with us and benefit from our experience.

The provisions are non-binding and non-enforceable. They provide for absolutely no recourse or penalties if they are not abided by, unlike, as the previous hon. member mentioned, the provisions in the agreement where a private business can file a legal action for compensation should we not abide by these agreements. There is absolutely no mechanism in these sidebar agreements to hold either government to account for abrogating its environmental assessment or environmental standard setting laws or for the failure to enforce those laws.

We have mentioned the record of the government in relegating our 30 years of development of strong, laudable environmental laws to mere red tape. Is that the lesson we are taking to the table with Peru? Is that the example we are setting? Is that our expectation of Peru? Sure it should go ahead and pass environmental impact assessment laws, set environmental standards, but do as we say, not as we do.

The sidebar agreement also commits, not requires, Canada and Peru to comply with and effectively enforce their respective domestic environmental laws. As above, we have witnessed the actions of this federal government in the failure to enforce its own environmental impact assessment law on its own expenditures.

One of the backbones of federal environmental law is that all expenditures by the federal government will undergo a careful assessment to ensure they are not having an unnecessary and reprehensible environmental effect. What did our government do? It moved behind closed doors, with no public notice and no opportunity for public comment, to rescind and exempt major federal expenditures and project development from environmental impact assessments. Is that what we can expect on this provision of this sidebar agreement?

Another foundation of these sidebar environmental agreements that we have seen with the United States, with Europe and now this one, is the commitment to transparency and participation. This sidebar agreement, mirroring the North American agreement on environmental cooperation, commits Canada and Peru to increased transparency and public participation in the making of our environmental laws and policies. Let us witness the decision by the Minister of the Environment to waive even the notice requirement when he exempted massive projects from environmental impact assessment regulations. Can we expect something different here?

Witness the continued dialogue with the United States on energy and climate change held behind closed doors. Having participated last week in the world dialogue of business leaders and another world dialogue among nations on innovative technology and the urgent need to address climate change, did this occur behind closed doors? No. It was a live broadcast on webcam.

However, when we come back to Canada and our dialogue with our neighbour on what we are going to do jointly on addressing energy issues, energy security for this country and climate change, we go behind closed doors. Is this what we can expect to witness in the Peru-Canada agreement? It looks like it.

Witness the refusal of the government to finally bring forth the negotiated action plan on addressing air pollution, which was long promised by the government and unaddressed, and the failure to bring that proposal before the public, before this Parliament, so we can review it.

Where does it sit? It is on the minister's desk, again turning a blind eye to years of voluntary commitment by business leaders and the environmental community and ignoring the effort to provide input to the government.

Under the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation, the Government of Canada, the Government of Mexico and the Government of the United States made a very bold decision. They included mechanisms whereby there would be public advisory councils. The joint public advisory committee, to advise the North American council of environment ministers, was also established under that agreement. The agreement also provides for national advisory councils to advise the environment minister with respect to the three countries.

What has the Canadian government done? It simply allowed the organizations to die. No new appointments have been made under its control. Is this what we can expect under the Canada-Peru trade agreement? Is this what we can expect under the non-binding, ever friendly environmental side agreement? I would hope not, but experience shows otherwise.

Despite the review after review commissioned by independent experts on the relationship between trade and environment, on extensive analysis of how well the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation has effectively delivered on the commitments to protect environment as we practise trade, what have we learned from those reviews? Apparently very little. We do not see major changes advancing the consideration of environmental protection in this agreement. For that reason, we must oppose it.

Another clear mechanism in the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation is the right of citizens of North America to file a complaint of failure by any of the three countries to effectively enforce their environmental laws. The successive governments of Canada have undermined that process. Instead of embracing this agreement and treating it with the seriousness that the European Community has treated its environment commission, and respecting the direction, the directives and the policies of that commission, our governments have chosen to implode and undermine the very process set up to allow for the transparency. There is delay after delay, interruptions of reviews, and dragging out the process. Even despite that, when the secretariat of the North American commission has come forward with a very thoughtful, independently prepared report, the recommendations simply gather dust.

Have we learned any clear lessons? I guess the lessons we have learned are that the government is turning a blind eye to what we have learned over these 20 years.

I find it extremely regrettable. I think that Canada, in reaching out to other nations, reaching out to nations in South America, Latin America, European nations and Asian nations, could be setting the bar. We could be setting the example for future treaties of this kind. We could be coming to the table and demanding that environmental measures be incorporated into the text of these agreements, that our environmental commitments become enforceable and binding and that there be clear penalties that can be imposed on a nation that abrogates those provisions.

Therefore, I stand clearly in opposition to this agreement. It is with great regret that the government has not taken this opportunity to take the bold, progressive step to make the statement that environmental protection is actually part of any economic development for the future of this country.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, as the member knows, the United States-Peru agreement includes labour and environmental agreements, but within the agreement. Whereas this particular agreement leaves labour and environment as side bar issues.

The question I have is this. Why would Canada not get as good an agreement as the U.S. did with its U.S.-Peru agreement?

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, indeed it is most disappointing that we have chosen to take a different path than the path taken by the United States in forging its trade agreement with Peru. Clearly it is practising what it has preached. It is actually taking what were once sidebar agreements in the NAFTA and apparently incorporating them into the binding text of its trade agreements.

It raises the question of what is going behind closed doors at the United States-Canada dialogue on energy, security and climate change. Perhaps the United States is actually proposing that we move forward with these types of measures. If that is the case, it is indeed a sad day for Canada.

I implore the Government of Canada to open up that dialogue so that Canadians can participate and that Canadian interests are put at the forefront in the negotiation of these agreement.

[Colin Carrie, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health]

Mr. Speaker, I listened intently and I did notice a theme throughout the hon. member's speech. It seems to be a paternalistic theme and a theme of disrespect.

One thing the NDP forgets is that the countries involved in these free trade agreements are actually democracies. In other words, here in Canada, whether the NDP likes it or not, Canadians have a democratic right to elect a government based on a platform, the same as Peru and the same as other countries where we are negotiating free trade agreements. One of the things that political parties run on is a platform, and some political parties actually run on a platform to help promote free trade. This happens to be the case between the two countries we are discussing now, Canada and Peru.

I am wondering why the NDP has such disrespect for a democratically elected government. That was put forth by the people of Peru and the people of Canada in this negotiation. These two democratically elected governments came to an agreement that would benefit both countries. I am wondering why she has such a paternalistic attitude towards these democracies and how she can explain that disrespect.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the only evidence of paternalism I see in this House is evidenced by the minority Conservative government to the will of the House.

I ran on a platform of making sure we give due consideration to the rights of workers and our protected environment in any future trade agreements. I find it absolutely incredulous that the member would make a suggestion that we would be paternalistic in suggesting certain measures in the agreement.

Any measures in that agreement would apply equally to Canada and to Peru. In signing on to the agreement we would be undertaking that we will effectively enforce our environmental laws and we will ensure that workers' rights will be protected here.

What we have found under the NAFTA and the sidebar agreement is that far more complaints have been filed against Canada than any of the three nations in its failure to effectively enforce environmental laws.

[Serge Cardin, Bloc, Sherbrooke, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pity that I cannot respond directly to the Conservative member who asked a question of my colleague in the NDP. If there is a party that lacks respect in this House, it is surely the government. This can be seen from the way it proceeds with free trade agreements. This government has never tabled any reports or impact assessments on free trade negotiations. The members of the committee and this Parliament have never been able to see an impact assessment for any of the agreements it has negotiated. Worse still, in committee we have proposed amendments and the Liberals and Conservatives have voted against them. Given that we cannot get impact assessments, we have asked to at least have some follow-up on the free trade agreements. That way we might be able to prove to the Conservatives and the Liberals that there are some negative aspects.

I would like to know whether my colleague would agree to having the side agreements that are being established—whether on human rights, particularly in Colombia, or labour rights and environmental protection—incorporated directly into the main agreement, not for the appearance of good will, but to formalize things and demand that workers’ rights, occupational health and safety rights, and environmental protection not be further diluted but improved and augmented.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, many studies were commissioned by both the Council of Environment Ministers and the Secretariat of the Commission for Environmental Cooperation. It is incumbent upon the government to obtain and review those reports and take into consideration the profound recommendations. There has been article after article critiquing the way we entered into the NAFTA and the failure to incorporate labour and environmental standards into that agreement.

The government is turning a blind eye to any independent analysis. The main question that needs to be raised is in whose interests this agreement is being signed.

[Serge Cardin, Bloc, Sherbrooke, QC]

Mr. Speaker, her colleague who sits on the Standing Committee on International Trade surely must have told her that it would be best if the government went back to the drawing board. I imagine that my colleague is in favour of the government reviewing the way it does its free trade agreements, and going back to the drawing board.

In my opinion, we cannot let this opportunity pass by. Things must be done differently starting today: we must partner with emerging countries so that their citizens can truly benefit from that partnership and not be exploited by Canadian firms like the mining companies.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, contrary to the earlier question from the member opposite, it is not paternalistic to bring to the table sage advice and learnings from previous experience. It is for precisely that reason that it is necessary for the government to bring forward these documents and share them with the other nations, particularly emerging nations, so they can learn from the mistakes made previously.

Why do we want to keep repeating the same mistakes over and over? This countries does not seem to want to follow the path taken by other nations. We are doing it on environment, on climate change and now we are doing it on trade. We are regressing instead of progressing. It is absolutely incumbent upon the government and the parties that are negotiating this agreement to revisit the agreement and move us into this century.

[Monique Guay, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is rather paradoxical. I had the opportunity to go to Peru with the Minister of Labour, who at the time was a Liberal minister. I was able to see the situation of the workers in Peru and that of the children, who work for nothing and do not even have shoes on their feet to work. I could speak at length about this, but I will return to it. I would like to state the position of the Bloc Québécois, which is against the Conservative government’s strategy of concluding trade agreements on a piecemeal basis. We prefer the multilateral approach.

The present economic crisis shows us that a market economy cannot function properly unless it is regulated and stabilized by an institutional, political and ethical framework. Instead of making piecemeal agreements, Canada must work within the WTO to ensure that the rules that govern international trade are the same for all, without exception. We are also now talking about a free trade agreement with Colombia, concerning which I will also speak a little later.

We believe that trade can contribute to the enrichment of peoples, and in that sense can be an important instrument of socio-economic development. For that to happen, however, trade agreements must contain measures to guarantee that the populations concerned can develop sustainably and thrive, in other words, to guarantee workers’ rights and human rights. The free trade agreement with Peru contains an investor protection clause, copied from chapter 11 of NAFTA, which will permit companies to prosecute governments. The presence of a chapter on investor protection could constitute an impediment to the social and economic development of Peru.

As we all know, Canada’s principal commercial activity in Peru is mining. Peru does not have a glowing record on protecting the workers in that sector because it does not have the resources. In the absence of a genuine accountability policy for Canadian mining companies, ratification of this agreement will permit those companies to extend their operations without being subject to any rules or consequences when they pollute the environment or flout human rights.

We will therefore be voting against this bill. Nor must it be forgotten that we are at third reading, a stage at which it is impossible to amend the bill. The attempt was made in committee. The Bloc Québécois and the NDP tried to find out more. Everything was done on the sly. It is worrying when things are not put clearly on the table, when documents are not clear, when we do not have access to certain documents and we do not feel that we are being listened to. Instead they want to pass this bill as quickly as possible to get the Canadian economy rolling in another country, because we are in an economic crisis and we have to make money to repay the debt and see that our companies make money. It all appears to be based on worry.

I would like to talk about chapter 11 of NAFTA. We have been through highs and lows on this subject. To set the context, NAFTA chapter 11 on investment permits investors in a member country of the North American free trade area to claim compensation from the government of another party to NAFTA when they feel they have been prejudiced by the adoption of regulatory measures that modify their company's operating conditions. These regulatory or legislative modifications must, however, be comparable to direct or indirect expropriation or to a measure equivalent to expropriation.

NAFTA is the only major free trade agreement binding on Canada that contains such extensive provisions on the treatment to be given to investors in the other parties. Since the free trade agreement with Peru contains a similar clause, the Bloc Québécois considers that it is not in Quebec’s interest to support such an agreement, and we shall oppose ratification of the agreement with Peru.

In reality, it is difficult for the free movement of goods not to be accompanied by the free movement of capital.

When specific provisions are not incorporated in free trade agreements, bilateral agreements generally provide for the protection of investments coming from the other party, and all these agreements contain substantially similar provisions, that is, a neutral arbitration procedure in the event of a dispute between the foreign investor and the host state of the investment. There are presently over 1,800 bilateral agreements of this type in the world.

The provisions of chapter 11 of NAFTA governing investments have been called into question. They are the source of numerous proceedings that have been brought against various governments in Mexico, the United States and Canada. They sometimes result in millions of dollars in compensation being awarded. We need only think of the whole softwood lumber saga. I went to the United States several times myself to meet with American senators and representatives to make them aware of our problem and tell them that it was not true that we were subsidizing softwood lumber. They used chapter 11 against us, and that cost us millions of dollars more. We have to be careful.

In short, for the Bloc Québécois, chapter 11 defines an entire investment regime. The definition of investment is very broad, perhaps far too broad. Some of the provisions of that chapter, including the concept of expropriation, have generated numerous proceedings. In addition, the current trend is toward extending that concept to encompass lost profits.

I have a number of examples here. I was speaking earlier about the softwood lumber quotas. There is one legal action on the banning of MMT, another resulting from the prohibition of a toxic waste landfill site, and many others. We have many examples of proceedings.

In addition, many questions are raised about the dispute settlement mechanism provided for in this chapter. That mechanism provides that a company that considers a government to be contravening the investment provisions may bring an action directly against that state before an arbitral tribunal. The arbitration tribunals that hear these disputes are formed to hear a specific dispute. The deliberations of these arbitrators and their decisions are secret, unless both parties to the dispute decide otherwise.

Once again, everything is done in secret, behind closed doors. Even if an agreement is reached that does the least possible harm to either party, we are still talking about millions of dollars that have to be spent to settle a dispute, and that dispute can drag on for years.

While the free trade agreement with Peru contains certain advances in terms of transparency—something we do not deny—the Bloc Québécois feels that disputes should be settled on a multilateral and centralized basis, instead of case by case between the different states that sign bilateral agreements.

In fact, the NAFTA provisions on investment are similar to the ones in the proposed free trade agreement with Peru. They give very broad powers to businesses and give us concern as to the ultimate sovereignty of governments and their ability to take measures to protect the health of people and the quality of their environment.

The Bloc Québécois will therefore oppose this agreement. I have shown what chapter 11 means. As I said earlier, I had the opportunity to go to Peru with a Liberal Minister of Labour, and I saw the working conditions of the people who live there. I also saw the conditions of the indigenous people. Certainly, if you go to Lima, the country's capital, you will see a completely different reality than if you go into the mountains and meet with the indigenous people who are born there. It is a completely different reality. These are people who have no way of defending themselves. They have no unions.

They can be made to work for starvation wages. As I said earlier, children who are actually barefoot are going to be made to work. That is a fact; I am not exaggerating. Adults who have no resources and will have no choice but to work for starvation wages are going to be made to work, and our wealthy mining companies, which make bags of money around the world, will exploit them, which is unacceptable.

Once they have finished exploiting them and emptied the mine, they will work the ore elsewhere. But they will leave the mining site in a sorry state. They may have contaminated the water table, in which case the water will no longer be potable.

Peruvians already have serious drinking water problems. In fact, they have serious education, health and environment problems. Yet we are sending companies into Peru that, under this agreement, are not required to follow strict rules. Their compliance will be voluntary. I cannot get over it. I have sat in this Parliament for 16 years, and I know that voluntary measures inevitably lead nowhere.

We have seen it in every aspect, including the environment and labour, and it is not working. We have to force these companies to abide by stringent and specific rules, and we have to make sure they follow them. It is all very well to make rules, but there also has to be monitoring and an authority to do the monitoring. There are non-governmental agencies that can monitor, but that is all there is.

Canada has responsibilities to these countries. When it sends its companies to do development there, it has to make sure that this does not serve only the companies’ interests, that they are not the only ones that make money, and that the host country also benefits properly, which means that it benefits in environmental terms.

We now have methods of extracting ore and working in mines that are much better for the environment than they were in the past. We have to know how to use these resources. Obviously, the mining companies want to go as fast and as cheaply as possible, and will want everything to be as profitable as possible for them, because they are not forced to follow rules and the measures are voluntary. Well, voluntary measures lead nowhere, and will not help Peru to develop. That is what is troubling us about this agreement.

In Canada today, there are mining companies already being blamed because they do not do their work properly and they exploit people, they exploit young people and children. These companies exploit the people and the environment, and then they leave and go on their merry way. When there is no more ore and no more money to be made, the country is the one with the problem then, but it does not have the resources it needs to remedy the environmental situation.

When the environment is destroyed, it can be expensive to try to restore an acceptable environment. We talk about acceptability. The country may not even have the resources to think about investing in the environment. Very often, the country invests in essentials and tries to save its people before investing in the environment.

I have seen children there who simply did not eat and who slept in cardboard boxes. We, citizens of wealthy countries, who have a roof over our head, we need to go there and see how they live. I am not persuaded that when mining companies set up facilities there and exploit their resources it will mean that those people will not still be living in little cardboard boxes.

When this agreement was negotiated, on the sly, as I pointed out before, we should really have made sure that stringent constraints and monitoring methods were included, for overseeing work done there.

Perhaps then we would not see children and families living in cardboard boxes, but rather families making money with the prospect of forming a union. We can help them. We have expertise here. We can also send them this expertise when we send the mining companies. We cannot send only big business and not provide resources to the people in the host countries. These countries really do not have a lot of resources, and we, for our part, go there to exploit them. We lead them to believe that they will make money, but in the end they are the ones who pay the price, once more.

The same is true in the case of Colombia. There are emerald mines there, and we know the value of emeralds. When the mining companies get there, they will work them thoroughly and make a lot of money. How can these countries defend themselves against big companies, the multinationals making a lot of money? They can afford lawyers and court cases lasting five or ten years. The host country is poor and does not necessarily have the means to contend with these multinationals. So, we must help them. We are going there. There must be very strict rules to ensure that their environment, their life, the life of their children, the life of the indigenous people and the beauty are not destroyed. Peru is a magnificent country. If operations begin without a thought to the environment, whole landscapes may be destroyed there and waterways essential to the life of the country may be rerouted.

My concerns are real. I am even more concerned when I think of Peru, because we can see the agreement was negotiated on the sly. They do not want to give us information. They keep everything hidden. We do not know how it will be operated. We also see that only Bloc and NDP members are interested in discussing the matter.

We are really on the wrong track. This is 2009. There is a worldwide economic crisis to overcome. It affects these countries too. It is having a huge impact on them. In addition, we are running the risk of destroying what little they have managed to build over the years, in terms of the environment and labour with the help of NGOs and in terms of drinking water, culture and agricultural development. If we come lumbering in and destroy all that, there will be nothing left. We will have to live with the horror of saying it is our fault. It is in fact the fault of the Conservative government, not of the Bloc. Unfortunately, there are not enough of us to defeat this agreement and renegotiate it more intelligently. The Conservative government will have to take the flack.

We can imagine the impression this will leave internationally. We can imagine what people will think of Canada and what these so-called will voluntary measures will do to our international reputation.

Of course, we will oppose this agreement. I sincerely hope that this people does not suffer from the mismanagement of the Conservative government, which is sending mining companies to develop there unrestricted.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask my colleague in the Bloc a question. Free trade agreements are usually negotiated by and for the rich. We have a good example of that here in Canada with the softwood lumber agreement negotiated with the United States. Rich Americans got everything and we lost $1 million. John Deere, another very profitable company, is in Mexico now.

I would like to ask my colleague from the Bloc whether it would be worthwhile sending this bill to committee or whether the House of Commons should just immediately vote it down.

[Monique Guay, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, we are at third reading, and at this stage, a bill cannot be sent back to committee or amended any more. There is nothing more we can do. We have reached the end. We can only talk about it here in the House and make people aware of what our position is. We are boxed in and our hands are tied. Nothing more can be done, other than to inform the people listening to us about what is happening.

We get information from our fellow citizens. We are currently getting postcards on the free trade agreement with Peru. There is a large Peruvian community in my riding that is very aware of this issue. I have received telephone calls telling me how concerned they are about the free trade agreement because it does not contain any measures on respect for the environment, human rights or labour rights.

Thus, we are at third reading and we are stuck with this bill. We have to vote for or against it. We have decided to vote against it and the NDP will certainly adhere to the same position. It is our task to show that the Conservative government and the Liberals, who will vote in favour, are making a monumental mistake by voting for such a poorly written agreement.

[Serge Cardin, Bloc, Sherbrooke, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to congratulate my colleague on her remarks and especially on her sensitivity to the situation that could arise. The agreement that has been signed does not make it possible to force Canadian companies that invest in Peru to improve their records on labour rights and the environment. Companies that are globalizing their investments obviously think Peru is more profitable than Canada. These profits will often be derived from working conditions and the environment, especially in the case of mining companies or oil and gas operations.

The government needs to be sent back now to do its homework. Therefore, we should vote against this implementing legislation. We should also ask the Liberals not to be two-faced and to uphold the values they are really most attached to if they want to return to power some day. If they want to return to power, they really should abide by those values.

[Monique Guay, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I totally agree with my colleague. One cannot speak from both sides of the mouth at the same time. One cannot talk about environmental protection on one hand, and then accept an agreement as badly written as this one. The Liberals should do their homework. If they vote with us against the bill, the agreement will be rejected. If they vote for the bill, they will have the shameful task of defending their position later on. I find their position appalling because they will destroy instead of building.

Of course, when multinationals and mining companies go into countries like Peru, they should contribute to the improvement of the population's standard of living. Oftentimes, that is not what we see because people in those countries do not have the means they need to defend themselves. In this case, the agreement does not give them those means. There will be only voluntary measures. That is unacceptable and it must be denounced. A great many of us will vote against the bill.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member spoke eloquently about the government's claims and about the effects of this so-called free trade agreement. In fact, the government claims that the agreement will improve the economic situation of Peruvians. However, as the member clearly said, poverty is rampant in Peru. Only improvements in workers' rights could eventually raise the development level of the country.

Does the member see in the agreement any single measure that could guarantee Peruvian workers some rights that could lead to economic development and improve their economic condition? I would also like to know how she reacted when she learned, as all hon. members in this House should know, that the Peruvian government even refused to respect its own signature on the International Labour Organization treaty. In other words, the government of Peru already reneged on past commitments aimed at guaranteeing the rights of the workers. Does the agreement include measures to prevent that from happening again or will it perpetuate the problem we see with the Peruvian government refusing to recognize the rights of the workers?

[Monique Guay, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is clear that this will simply perpetuate the problem and the situation will get worse. It cannot improve, particularly when there has already been a signature opposing labour rights.

Imagine that a union tries to organize in Peru to protect mine workers, when the government has already refused to sign. At present there is absolutely nothing in this agreement to allow a union, an environmental group or any group that would be good for the country to take action and speak out against what is going on. They could have some power to respond and to make the company engaging in misconduct respond.

It is a waste of time from the outset. It is too bad. It is sad to see, but that is the decision made by the Conservative government, supported by the Liberals. We will remind them of it in the election campaign. Have no fear about that.

[Colin Carrie, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health]

Mr. Speaker, I could not help but listen to the member's response, saying that this is a decision of the Conservative government. This is a decision of the democratically elected governments of Canada and the democratically elected government of Peru.

The sadness here is the Bloc member, who claims to support democracy, standing in this House and saying that even though two governments have come to a decision on trade, the Bloc members will vote it down and disrespect that decision.

As we see historically with free trade agreements, when Canadian companies go into other countries they raise the bar and provide jobs. What I am hearing from that member and other members in the House is that they immediately start to disrespect Canadian companies that have a wonderful reputation around the world by saying that our companies are out there exploiting people in these other countries, which is entirely disrespectful.

What does the member have against Canadian companies and Quebec companies going out into the world to provide jobs for people and raise their standard of living? Why do the Bloc members not respect the democratic right of these countries to make trade agreements in order to raise the bar for all citizens involved?

[Monique Guay, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, yes, they were democratically elected. I understand that quite well, but they are a minority. As long as they are a minority, that is how it will be. We will always have our say, and I too was democratically elected here to this House,just like all the members from all parties. I think we do not need to keep bringing that up.

We have nothing against the companies, except that we know, and we have the evidence, that there are problems with Canadian mining companies all over the world. They have engaged in bad exploitation.

Why is there nothing in this free trade agreement with Peru about requirements to avoid these situations? On the contrary: preference is given to adopting voluntary measures, well never mind that, just say openly that you are going to exploit.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to follow my colleague for Rivière-du-Nord and her learned presentation. We share many of the concerns raised by my colleague. This is the second time today I have spoken to an issue brought forward by my colleague for Rivière-du-Nord. She is having a very illustrious day in the House of Commons today.

The position of the NDP has always been that we are not opposed to free trade providing that it is fair trade. We sounded the alarm in the 1980s when the first free trade agreement was introduced. We cautioned people that the globalization of capital was not some force of nature, that it was not like gravity or the conservation of mass. This is a choice made by nation-states on behalf of corporations. The free trade agreement and the NAFTA became like a charter of rights and freedoms for corporations to move freely and override the sovereignty of nation-states.

What we cautioned then, we continue to caution today, which is that there is an erosion of sovereignty associated with the free trade agreements that we have entered into so frequently and freely since the early 1980s when the first FTA was put into effect.

Mr. Speaker, you know that I am a socialist and a trade unionist and you should also know that I am a fiercely proud Canadian nationalist. As such, on all of those fronts, we are dedicated to a multilateral point of view. We are dedicated to elevating the standards of wages and working conditions for people all over the world, not just for Canadian workers but for the international movement of workers' rights. The international solidarity of workers' rights is alive and well. In fact, it is the free trade agreements entered into so freely by nation-states around the world that have revitalized the importance of workers coming together through their free trade unions, where such free trade unions are allowed, and through the international plenary umbrella of international organizations of those unions.

It seems that we alone are standing to try and caution people about the predictable consequences of some of the causes associated with what are called free trade agreements, such as the one we are contemplating today.

The international trade critic for the NDP, my colleague for Burnaby—New Westminster, has been a tireless champion of these issues. Again, this is not to be negative and try to criticize the concept of freer trade, tearing down barriers to trade or some of the non-tariff barriers to trade. Granted, we want the free movement of capital and of goods and services. We even want the free movement of people around the world. However, we also suggest that when there is the globalization of capital there must also be the globalization of labour rights, human rights and environmental standards. We want to harmonize at the highest common denominator, not the lowest, and that has been the actual empirical evidence in many of the free trade agreements that we have now had the luxury of time to study.

The old yarn put forward by the neo-Conservative movement that a rising tide lifts all boats, is not in fact true. If our boat has a hole in it, it does not rise with the tide. It simply stays down. We watched this movement propel itself around the world and, frankly, capitalism does not had a very good name lately.

When I announce that I am a socialist, I guess it is no surprise because we are all socialists now. We just bought General Motors. I always thought that one of the signs of the apocalypse would be when General Motors went bankrupt. Is that not when the four horsemen appear on the horizon and there is darkness at the break of noon when GM goes bankrupt?

[An hon. member]

It is the four horsepower.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

The four horsepower of the apocalypse. That is very good.

The fact is that we now have Marxism realized. We own the means of production and we did not have to fire a single shot. It is really quite phenomenal what went on today.

We have always cautioned people that unfettered capitalism has no conscience. I do not blame it for that, just like a shark cannot be blamed for having no conscience. It simply swims through the water and gobbles and gobbles because that is what it does.

It is up to us because we have the moral conscience. It is up to people to apply morality to capitalism and that is what we seek to do when these free trade agreements come through. Some of us need to rise up in the spirit of true democracy, contrary to what my colleague implied, that those of us who raise legitimate concerns are somehow less than democratic. We do not respect the unfettered right of the Conservative minority government to enter into free trade agreements without scrutiny, oversight and due diligence by duly elected members of Parliament in this chamber. That would be an affront to democracy, if there were any associated with this.

My Bloc colleague from Rivière-du-Nord pointed out earlier that one of our serious legitimate concerns about this free trade agreement and others is the investor rights that it gives to corporations. The chapter 11 rights were unheard of until they were introduced in the NAFTA agreement. These rights give a corporation nation-state status so it can sue a duly elected government for inconveniencing its ability to commercialize a certain product.

That was horrifying to us. We blew the whistle and sounded the alarm in 1988. We warned people that this was folly and that it would lead to untold complications. I will give one example from a few years ago and example of one that is going on currently involving MMT.

The people of Canada decided that the gasoline additive MMT was too poisonous to be exposed to and that we did not want it put into gasoline in this country. We were sued because this decision interfered with the ability of Ethyl Corporation to sell its product in Canada. It sued Canada for lost opportunity and it won. We paid the corporation for the inconvenience. We had to shell out $13.5 million to Ethyl Corporation because we as a nation decided we did not want MMT in our air supply and in our children's organs.

I will give the House a more recent example. The province of Quebec, quite rightly, wanted to ban the cosmetic nonessential use of pesticides in homes, gardens, schoolyards, on golf courses, et cetera. This was the right thing to do given that we now know that exposure to chemical pesticides can lead to a number of cancers, birth defects and problems in reproductive health. However, believe it or not, Dow Chemical, the manufacturer of many of these chemical pesticides, is now suing the Government of Quebec for having the temerity to do what it thought was right for its citizens.

That is fundamentally wrong on so many levels that I can hardly express them, but this is the very same concept we are now introducing in this free trade agreement with the people of Peru.

The good people of Peru will find themselves stripped of some of their sovereignty to chart their own destiny in a matter so vital and so fundamental as public health. The same investor right clauses can be applied should their democratically elected government decide to curtail the ability of one of the Canadian mining companies operating there or impose stringent standards on the operation of those companies. Those companies can sue because this interfered with their ability to commercialize that product.

That is just one of the concerns that we have that warrants further debate. I regret we are now at the stage of debate on this bill where we do not have the opportunity for further amendment. All I can do is express our dissatisfaction with this and our legitimate concerns.

The NDP, advocating on behalf of workers around the world, has tried to introduce what we call our corporate social responsibility bill, a bill put forward by my former colleague and the former leader of our party, Ed Broadbent. It was taken over by the next leader of our party, the former member for Halifax, Alexa McDonough.

For a decade or more, we have been trying to introduce something that would recognize the problems in the free trade agreement. If we are going to give a charter of rights to businesses and to corporations, then we need to offset those rights with what we call the extension of corporate social responsibility of Canadian companies when acting abroad.

The rules that apply to them when they are within the domestic jurisdiction where they come from should apply to them when they act and operate outside this jurisdiction. That way we would truly be elevating the labour and environmental standards of those other companies with which we trade because we would export not only the business operation, but we would export their modus operandi of how they conduct themselves as well.

These companies should not be able to form and incorporate in this country and then when they conduct themselves abroad, go to the lowest common denominator or standards, health and safety standards, labour standards and environmental standards, that are often far lower than what we would require a company to adhere to in this country.

We noticed when the Canada-Peru free trade agreement was first signed, the president of Peru, Alan Garcia, was optimistic that Canada, having a greater production outcome, would share some of that outcome. He said that Canada had a production output 12 times greater than Peru's and bought $600 billion worth of goods from other countries. He was therefore optimistic that Canada, by virtue of this trade agreement, would add more Peruvian wood, mining products and farming and manufactured products to the list.

At the same time, critics of the current president and the regime spoke out against the free trade agreement and against the president's administration, pointing out that the president's approval ratings had sunk as popular support for his policies continued to vanish. An international commentator said:

The Peruvian government is beginning to unravel as corruption charges and scandals threaten to completely discredit the already unpopular leadership of President Alan García. The minister of Mines and Energy as well as other top energy and state oil officials have been fired in response to allegations of favoring a foreign energy company...in exchange for bribes.

The regime that we are entering into an agreement with is falling apart. I speak now on behalf of the working people in Peru. It could well be that the Peruvian government does not have the mandate to enter into this agreement from the people of Peru any more than this minority Conservative government has the absolute mandate of the people of Canada to enter into this agreement.

We should remind ourselves that it was not long ago that bribery was such a common business practice in international trade, et cetera. Until the mid-1990s, the Government of Canada allowed companies to write off bribes as a tax deduction. This only changed in the mid to late 1990s after Canadians were horrified. The companies pushed back and said that it was the way business was done when they operated abroad. They have to grease the wheels of commerce with bribes and therefore it is a legitimate business expense. Until recently, the Government of Canada accepted this.

Revenue Canada has been under a lot of scrutiny lately with the Oliphant inquiry into the Mulroney-Schreiber Airbus affair. Many of us were horrified at some of the things Revenue Canada deemed to be acceptable. When we pay our taxes diligently, not exactly eagerly, and then the former prime minister of Canada, after not paying taxes for nine years on money he received in a brown paper bag in a hotel room, finally decides to come clean with Revenue Canada and it arbitrarily decides that he only has to pay taxes on 50% of what he failed to declare all those years earlier, the credibility of Revenue Canada comes into question.

I was even more horrified to learn today that the practice was only stopped by Revenue Canada last November. When this whole situation began to surface, Revenue Canada quickly stopped the practice and covered up its tracks.

That does not explain what happened to the former privacy commissioner, George Radwanski, who owned $650,000 in back taxes and 24 hours before he started a job, which paid $250,000 a year, Revenue Canada forgave him all the back taxes on the basis that it was not possible to retrieve.

Those are the kinds of decisions that Revenue Canada makes from time to time. It makes Canadians really question if there is not two tax systems in our country, one for the rich and the connected, someone who has connections with the PMO, and the rest of us.

This free trade agreement is fraught with concerns. We felt obliged to oppose the agreement when it was first introduced. My colleague, the member for Burnaby—New Westminster, at every stage of debate and through the committee stage, made efforts to amend the free trade agreement so it would be in a form of which we could be proud.

Those of us who want fair trade do not object to free trade, as long as it meets those basic tests. We do not want the huge imbalance that exists, an imbalance that would act as a charter of rights for corporations to override the sovereignty of a nation state and completely give them carte blanche to conduct themselves in any way they saw fit without a considered attempt to elevate the standards of conditions in the places where they settle.

My colleague from Rivière-du-Nord said that one of the faults of the bill was that it set guidelines for voluntary compliance, by suggesting these companies should conduct themselves in a certain way will make it so. I am sorry, but we do not buy that. It is just not credible. We should judge people by what they do, not by what they say.

We find ourselves in the middle of an economic downturn. Some people are saying that it is the end of an era of a certain ideology and certain economic policies. Some people are calling for a new Bretton Woods. Some people are calling for a new internationalism, coming out of the ashes of what began as the globalization movement.

The champions of the globalization of capital saw it as a panacea, that all we had to do was increase and improve lines of trade with countries and they would automatically come and be harmonized at some western standards.

That has not been the case at all. These things will not happen by accident. These things will not happen because there has been no collective agreement, which is one of the goals, one of the objectives. When businesses come to governments looking for a licence to operate in a certain way, it is up to us then to inject and insert those secondary objectives into the activities that they have under way. They have one goal and one goal only, and it is the profit motive. There is nothing wrong with that. That is what businesses do. They seek to maximize profits for their shareholders.

We are here with a different mandate, a different set of rules. We are here with different goals. If our goals are to elevate the standards of wages, living conditions and social conditions of fellow workers around the world and if we use these opportunities to achieve those secondary goals and objectives, we can do more than just enable free trade. We can mandate fair trade and then we will realize those noble objectives of elevating the standards of the people with whom we are trading.

What we want for ourselves, we wish for all people. That is one of the founding principles of the party to which I belong. As a socialist and a trade unionist, it is my obligation, every chance we get, to try to elevate those standards of my colleagues around the world, my brothers and sisters in the international labour movement. It is through trade agreements we can achieve those things, but not if we let them slide by in a substandard way like this.

[Jim Abbott, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of International Cooperation]

Mr. Speaker, as the member well knows, he and I have managed to find ourselves on different sides of many issues, but I respect the fact that he and I have also had occasion to work together for the kind of common good to which he has spoken. He would also know there is currently a private member's bill before the committee, which was passed by the House, Bill C-300 on the issue of corporate social responsibility.

We have been studying it as recently as this afternoon and the thing that has been most interesting is the aggressive action that the Government of Canada is currently undertaking with respect to corporate social responsibility.

I put to the committee today the concept that there was not one person in the House, and probably not one person in Canada, who was not serious about wanting all of our corporations to be involved in the world with the concept of corporate social responsibility.

The only thing I would suggest for my friend is this. An awful lot of the time I have been in the House and have taken occasion to listen to the speeches of the NDP, it always seems so dower, so down and so negative. we cannot do this and we cannot do that and those great big greedy corporations. There is all this negativism.

What the Government of Canada wants to do with this Peru free trade agreement, as with other free trade agreements, is to open up the possibility for Canada and Canadian workers to have more opportunity in the world because Canada is such a free trading nation.

Would my friend not want to put on a more positive face, a bit more of a smile, rather than always being concerned about being dragged down? Canadians are the most productive creative people in the world. We are a nation that can carry our own and we can carry these things to Peru and to other countries to help them bring themselves up to a higher level.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for his thoughtful remarks. I should tell him that one of the reasons the NDP enjoys its third majority government in Manitoba is that we have taken the hair shirt off the NDP. We have become a lot more fun, and the member would be happy to know that.

We are all in favour of good corporate citizenship. I know he is not speaking on behalf of corporate Canada, but we do take the member at his word, that most Canadians would expect Canadian businesses to conduct themselves in a way that his honourable when they operate outside of the domestic jurisdiction.

That has not always been the case. There is nothing particularly binding on them. We find the environmental standards, the labour standards and the health and safety standards in other countries sorely lacking. It is difficult for small countries or developing nations to impose stringent health and safety, environmental and labour standards because they are so desperate to attract investment.

This is the contradiction we have heard. This is the quandary in which they find themselves. I am not trying to imply the government of Peru is corrupt, although I did cite some sources that implied the current leadership is under a lot of stress because of bribery and corruption charges, but even in those countries where there is well-meaning leadership, they would look to the harmonization of labour standards and environmental standards as a huge benefit and a huge gain. However, there is nothing in these agreements that would make that so, other than the implied goodwill of the corporations.

As I said in my remarks, capital has no conscience. We have to impose a conscience on them.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, in his speech, the NDP member referred to President Garcia as somewhat of a supplemental factor in this agreement. We know that the president is widely challenged in his country in relation to the indigenous people, who want to protect their environment and their biodiversity. Peru is signing multiple bilateral agreements in this regard. It will in fact be signing one with Canada.

As we know, this is somewhat like the agreement signed with Colombia under the Uribe government, when we had rather serious suspicions that that government did not respect union rights. We have seen the murders that have occurred. We went to that country with the NDP member and we met with community and grassroots groups. There are a lot of abuses committed against workers. From that perspective, another agreement signed with President Garcia has also been criticized, as the member mentioned.

Why does this Conservative government still want to sign agreements with rogue countries when we are trying to promote a healthy environment and a healthy planet? We want to combat climate change and preserve our water and land, but we sign agreements that allow companies to degrade the land and jeopardize the quality of life and air and water quality in other countries. I would like to hear from my colleague on that subject.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague is correct and these very things have been pointed out to us by labour leaders in the United States, who pointed out that in regard to the United States-Peru free trade agreement, which was about a year ago, we are following the U.S. almost step for step in Colombia and Peru. It seemed that when the Bush administration signed agreements with Peru and Colombia, all of a sudden it became necessary for the Conservative government here to follow suit with the same kind of substandard agreements.

A very prominent labour leader, the head of the teamsters union in the United States, pointed out that it was outrageous that Congress and the Bush administration had approved yet another job-killing trade agreement at a time when American families were seeing their jobs shipped overseas, their food and toys tainted, their wages on the decline, and their houses foreclosed upon. Workers here and in Peru deserve better.

If we take out the word America and insert the word Canada, the same applies to this country too. We could not possibly pick a worse time to impose a free trade agreement that will have downward pressure on Canadian standards because of harmonization. The globalization of trade has resulted in us lowering our standards, not developing nations raising theirs.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Winnipeg Centre and I were criticized just a few moments ago by a Conservative member for being too diligent and taking our work too seriously, but of course we have actually read the agreement. I know the hon. member for Winnipeg Centre has, and we have seen, as testimony has also indicated, that it is a vastly inferior agreement to that which the U.S. government initially negotiated, and which then was gutted, rebuilt and amended by U.S. Congress.

My question for the member for Winnipeg Centre, who is a wise member, one of the most active in the House, is this. The Conservatives blew it on the softwood sellout, costing us thousands of jobs. They brought forward this Colombia trade deal, which is essentially privileged access by a regime that is tied, cheek by cheek and jowl by jowl, with murderous paramilitary thugs and drug lords. Now they bring forward this bill which is considered an inferior version of bills that have been negotiated.

We have record trade deficits and most Canadians have actually lost real income over the past 20 years. Why do the Conservatives always seem to get trade issues wrong? Why do they not have an overall strategy that actually works for economic development, both here in Canada and abroad?

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague poses a compelling question. I would only answer, in the brief time I have, by saying that the Conservatives seem guided more by ideology than by reason, logic, economics or empirical evidence.

There is a belief on their part that free trade will solve all of our ills the world over. What they fail to understand is that free trade benefits corporations. It benefits wealthier nations, but it even puts wealthier nations at risk in that the harmonization that has taken place has been terribly hard on our manufacturing sector. It has been dragging us down, frankly.

Unfettered free market capitalism is passé. It has gone the way of the dodo bird. We need regulation. We need guidelines and objectives. We need that triple bottom line, if you will, for everything that we do that will elevate--

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Terrebonne--Blainville.

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

Mr. Speaker, today we are discussing the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru, the Agreement on the Environment between Canada and the Republic of Peru and the Agreement on Labour Cooperation between Canada and the Republic of Peru. I want to start by saying that the Bloc Québécois will oppose this bill and this agreement because we have no guarantee that the agreement is worded strongly enough and contains a framework to protect the environment and human rights in Peru.

The third point I want to make is that this free trade agreement with Peru contains a similar clause to chapter 11 of NAFTA. This chapter, which relates to investments, allows investors from member states in the North American Free Trade Zone to claim compensation from the government of another party to NAFTA when they believe they have incurred a loss as a result of the adoption of regulatory measures that modify existing business operating conditions. What does that mean? It means that if, for example, a country decides to introduce legislation that would force a company doing business in that country to adopt other procedures that might seem harmful to the business, it could sue the government of that country.

NAFTA is the only major free trade agreement to which Canada is a party that contains such broad provisions regarding the treatment to be granted to investors from other parties. The provisions of chapter 11 of NAFTA governing investments have been called into question. They are the source of numerous proceedings that have been brought against various governments in Mexico, the United States and Canada. They sometimes result in several million dollars in compensation being awarded.

I said earlier that chapter 11 defines a complete scheme to govern investments and that the definition of investments is very broad. That is why the provisions of this chapter have given rise to many lawsuits pertaining to the concept of expropriation.

In a way, the NAFTA provisions laid the groundwork. They are similar to the provisions in the proposed Canada-Peru free trade agreement, which will give companies a great deal of power. Ultimately, we are concerned about the sovereignty of governments and their ability to take measures to protect the health of people and the quality of the environment. Will it be possible for Peru to protect people's health and the quality of their environment? We doubt it.

The Bloc Québécois is well aware of the need for free trade. We support investment protection agreements, but we are not prepared to accept bad agreements at any cost, and we feel that this agreement is a bad one.

Foreign direct investment is soaring.

Every now and then, a Canadian company decides to settle abroad, where the government may decide to nationalize it. In order to create a predictable environment, to ensure that a foreign investor will not lose his nationalized business without compensation, and to give some assurances to companies, states sign treaties to protect investments. We think this is perfectly normal, and we accept that such provisions be included in these treaties.

However, over the past few years, we have seen such an incredible shift, because of NAFTA's chapter 11, that we are now wondering. We are very cautious with processes, chapters and clauses that may look like the provisions in NAFTA's chapter 11.

Under that chapter, foreign investors are allowed to go before international tribunals and challenge the expropriation, which may reduce their profits and result in a court action. If investors can prove that they are losing money because of a new act, or a new way of doing things by the government of the host country, they can get compensation by going before the courts. The important thing here is that the amount of the suit is not limited to the value of the investment, but includes all possible future profits. In other words, these investors can literally ruin a government, and that is totally abusive.

This chapter has been condemned time and again by many countries, by various organizations, and by the Bloc Québécois. Still, Ottawa continues to sign bilateral agreements that are patterned on this infamous chapter 11 in NAFTA. The government is on the offensive again and is negotiating numerous such agreements. We believe that the Conservative government is headed in the wrong direction and should instead take better care of the public good and of human rights.

A few years ago, the National Roundtables on Corporate Social Responsibility and the Canadian Extractive Industry in Developing Countries took place. Many Canadian mining companies are responsible and respectful, but quite a few, many of which I could name, are not. While negotiations for the Canada-Colombia free trade agreement were underway, it was clear that plenty of Canadian mining companies could not have cared less about aboriginal rights, environmental rights or human rights. They set up operations in various countries, take advantage of conditions there, such as military juntas and corrupt governments, and exploit those countries for profit.

We also have to consider human rights in Peru. Peru is one of Canada's smaller trading partners, and the mining sector is the primary trade driver. We know that Peru has a pretty poor track record when it comes to protecting workers in that industry.

Earlier, I mentioned the National Roundtables on Corporate Social Responsibility and the Canadian Extractive Industry in Developing Countries.

The national roundtables reported on what was going on. We all know the Canadian mining companies. We know their names. We know that a book has been written about their activities. They did everything in their power to get the book off the market; they even sued the authors in the hope that their activities would not be made known to the general public.

Canadian mining companies are the biggest foreign investors. Canada does not have any rules about what responsible companies should do, so they do as they please. We know that. We want to know what will happen if we have a bilateral agreement that does not impose any restrictions whatsoever on mining companies, an agreement that allows them to do whatever they like in countries like Peru, which do not have the means or even the ability to set rules and standards. Given the context, we cannot accept a country-to-country agreement with no guarantees.

One of the main reasons Canadian investors are attracted to Peru is the country's natural resources, particularly its mining resources. Canadian investment in Peru's mining sector is $5 billion, give or take. More than 80 Canadian mining companies are doing mining exploration in Peru. Canada leads investment in mining exploration and exploitation in Peru.

It was asked earlier why Canada is concluding a free trade agreement with Peru. It is very clear. It is to protect Canadian mining companies. It is not simply to do the right thing or for philanthropic reasons. It is to cover its own behind, to protect its own interests. We have nothing against that. However, the framework is too general. The free trade agreement with Peru gives greater protection to Canadian companies that invest in the mining sector. However, our fear is that the investment protection measures provide disproportionate protection to investors at the expense of local populations and the environment.

How many times have we watched as Canadian mining companies have displaced local populations, preventing them from reuniting, and polluted rivers? In Colombia in particular, rivers have run pink.

We know that Peru can protect itself, but it is still considered a developing country. It does not have the ability at this time. Also, not protecting workers' rights is standard practice in certain countries. The workers are small fry. They are considered worthless. Child labour often exists in these kinds of countries.

The Bloc Québécois would like to see mandatory standards and accountability measures imposed on the activities of mining companies working abroad. We would have liked to see the formation of a committee to advise the federal government, just as the national roundtables advisory group recommended. The minister at the time, the current international trade minister, practically refused and stonewalled.

It was recommended that a multiparty committee be formed, made up of representatives from the mining industry, to advise the federal government. I say “advise” because this government continues to do whatever it likes, no matter what anyone says, no matter what Canadians say. It stubbornly pursues its agenda without thinking about the fact that some people might be able to suggest a more acceptable approach. These people were calling for mandatory standards.

Mr. Speaker, how much time do I have left?

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

The member for Terrebonne—Blainville will have four minutes to finish her speech when the House resumes consideration of this bill.

The House resumed from June 1 consideration of the motion that Bill C-24, An Act to implement the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru, the Agreement on the Environment between Canada and the Republic of Peru and the Agreement on Labour Cooperation between Canada and the Republic of Peru, be read the third time and passed, and of the motion that this question be now put.

Canada-Peru Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act

[Libby Davies, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House today to speak to Bill C-24, which is the free trade agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru.

First of all, I want to thank all of my NDP colleagues who have spoken so forcefully in the House over the last few days on this bill. I think the concerns we have raised in the House about this agreement very much reflect what we have heard right across the country.

I have to say that often when we debate legislation in this House, the various bills before us, sometimes there is a sense that not many people are watching what is going on, that things just go through and nobody is paying attention. On this particular issue of the trade agreement between Canada and Peru, as well as the one that is to come back to the House which is the Canada-Colombia trade agreement, there is a huge constituency out there watching what happens to this bill.

There are people who are organized both in the labour movement and in civil society, people who work on human rights, who work with NGOs in Peru, Latin America and elsewhere who are very concerned that this trade agreement is going to go through.

I would like to make that point first of all. I am very proud of the fact that the NDP caucus has stood so strongly against this bill because we understand that this trade bill, like so many other trade bills that we have seen over the years, of the so-called free trade agreements, are agreements that basically put the vested interests of multinational corporations ahead of public interest, ahead of the interests of labour rights, and ahead of the interests of strong environmental standards.

Even though we are now at the final stage, we are happy that our colleagues in the Bloc are also standing together with us to try to stop this bill. We think it is very important that we do due diligence, that we expose the flaws of this bill, and that we alert more Canadians to the fact that our government conducts these kinds of negotiations basically in secret, behind closed doors, and comes out with these free trade agreements with various other nation states that really, in the bigger picture, are not in the public interest.

I find it ironic that on the one hand we often find that these trade agreements are based on the premise that these multinational corporations want governments to have as little to do as possible with regulating and overseeing what should be done in terms of trade or labour standards or the environment or social standards, and that the underpinning of this agreement, and so many like them, whether it is the North America free trade agreement, the agreement that we had in the House a few years ago dealing with the FTA that was the subject of many demonstrations in Quebec City, is to basically transfer power from democratically elected governments to corporations.

When we see things like chapter 11, which is contained in NAFTA, being mirrored in this agreement, and of course will be included in the Canada-Colombia trade agreement, that confers nation state rights to multinational corporations, we are looking at a fundamental violation of the democratic principles of a democratically elected government.

I think that is why so many people take issue with these trade agreements. I find it ironic that while on the one hand there is so much pressure from these private interests globally, as well as here within our own country, to adopt these agreements, on the other hand we see huge corporations, like General Motors just yesterday expecting to have massive bailouts of over $10 billion Canadian. We see the Canadian government coming forward and saying “Oh, yes, of course, no question that is going to happen”.

It seems to me that there is a huge contradiction here, that on the one hand we have had this globalized regime that has been a race to the bottom, where we have seen these trade agreements undermine very basic human rights of workers and of people generally, and on the other hand those corporations want a hands-off kind of approach from government.

However, when they are in trouble, they are the first in the line-up to say that they want the government to be there with these massive line-ups. That kind of point is not lost on us.

As one of my colleagues said, it is the old adage that the former leader of the NDP, David Lewis, pointed out of the corporate welfare bums. Those kinds of contradictions exist and we are very mindful of that when we debate these trade agreements.

It is important to us in the NDP to advocate for fair trade agreements and trade agreements that do not put labour standards and environmental standards in some kind of side agreement. It used to be that they were not even mentioned at all. I can remember attending many demonstrations and forums where a huge amount of organizing was done by the Canadian Labour Congress, federations of labour across the country and by NGOs to bring forward this issue of the need to ensure that trade agreements place on par the question of labour rights, environmental rights and social rights.

Historically, those rights were not even part of the agenda. Now we are beginning to see, particularly in this one with Peru, that there are side agreements. However, when we examine this agreement that is before us, we believe that to have a side agreement is completely inadequate. There should be strong labour standards and environmental standards contained within the agreement.

I think this really speaks to the heart of the matter. We certainly support and understand that trade needs to take place between nations but the rules by which that happens and what it is that we consider to be the priorities have been completely negated and missed in the agreement that is before us.

I would also point out that the actual bill before us is enabling legislation. If we had the ability to amend the agreement, if we could send it to committee and if we could deconstruct it and make the amendments that are needed, maybe we would be looking at a different situation.

Unfortunately, with the bill that we are now debating, Bill C-24, because it is enabling legislation, it is basically a take it or leave it proposition. Therefore, we have no recourse but to say that this agreement, as it was negotiated by the Canadian government, should not be approved by Parliament.

We are glad that it has come forward and that we actually have the opportunity to vote on the agreement but, in our opinion, the agreement is very flawed. It is basically a copycat agreement of NAFTA. We feel that this mirrors the outdated George Bush style approach to trade. As the situation financially changes, as we see the global crisis in capitalism, such as the situation with General Motors, then, surely to God, what we are doing with these trade agreements should also be changing. We should be recognizing that these agreements, as they have been negotiated in the past, are not even serving the corporate interests any more. Even those corporate interests are now in trouble, but they are certainly not serving the interest of average people.

When it comes to the situation in Peru, a lot of evidence shows how workers have been disaffected and how they have minimal rights. Therefore, we are insistent that this trade agreement should put at the top of the agenda the inclusion of those labour rights. We care about workers, whether it is here in Canada, Peru or in any other country, but to have this race to the bottom where workers pay the price and Canadians lose their jobs is a situation that we find intolerable.

We are against this bill. We believe there is very strong public support to defeat this agreement, to go back to the table and to renegotiate something that is based on fair labour standards, on protection for the environment and on protection for social conditions.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Madam Speaker, I would like to congratulate the hon. member on her excellent speech. The Bloc Québécois has long been concerned with the issue of the social and environmental responsibility of Canadian companies abroad, and most particularly Canadian mining companies.

Canada and some mining companies maintain that mining operations in the southern hemisphere provide a means of fighting poverty. We often hear the argument that mining is a benefit to populations in the southern hemisphere. However, we believe that quite the opposite is true. Indeed, under chapter 11 of NAFTA, mining companies can exert pressure on the social, economic, and cultural policies of the governments of these countries.

Can my colleague explain to the House how this agreement will be detrimental to the progress of these developing populations?

[Libby Davies, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Madam Speaker, my colleague from the Bloc is entirely right. There is a very negative history when it comes to Canadian mining companies, whether it is in Peru, Colombia or in other countries. In fact, there is a very strong movement within our own country to hold these companies to account for operating in a way that undermines local conditions and violates workers' rights.

The illusion that those companies are somehow there to help that developing country is a fallacy that we now understand, which is another indication of why this agreement is so flawed. This agreement does nothing to address the harmful practices of those Canadian corporations. They are exploiting labour and the environment and we want it stopped. Unfortunately, it will not be stopped by this trade agreement. It will only be made worse.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Madam Speaker, I would like to follow up on the answer the member just gave.

The bill does nothing to address the labour difficulties in labour law in Peru, so let us stop any effort to improve our competitive trading position in Peru, which is in a trade deficit situation, so we can demonstrate our concern about labour practices.

At the same time, however, since the United States and a number of other countries have already signed these agreements with Peru, it means that Canadian businesses will not be competitive and we will lose that business and lose jobs in Canada.

The question is quite simple. Is it our role here to balance the needs to create jobs or retain jobs in Canada or to demonstrate that we are concerned about labour laws and practices in Peru?

[Libby Davies, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Madam Speaker, as I pointed out before, the bill before us today does not allow us to amend the agreement. We either support it or we do not. We think that the agreement is fundamentally flawed.

Our position in the NDP is that we defend and advocate for good quality jobs here in Canada. Heck, we do that day after day in the House, which is more than I can say the Liberals have done, but we do not do that at the expense of labour rights in other countries. That is why these trade deals are so important in terms of examining what is really going on. For example, in the U.S.-Peru deal, the environment and labour sections are not side agreements but are part of the agreement. Why do we not have that in Canada? Why have we relegated them to side agreements where the compliance mechanisms are very minimal?

This is not an issue of pitting one against the other. This is saying that if we have trade agreements, we need to ensure they protect Canadian interests but, at the same time, that they do not violate the rights of workers in other countries. What kind of position is that? It is quite shocking that the Liberals are going along with this but they do have a history of promoting and advocating these kinds of agreements. We are not prepared to do that. We are prepared to say that we want fair trade agreements that respect labour rights both in Canada and in Peru.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Madam Speaker, it is an honour for me to speak to this bill. As I have already indicated, the Bloc Québécois does not support this free trade agreement, basically because it does not meet a number of criteria and objectives that are necessary when concluding trade agreements that will create fairer, more equitable trade, rather than trade that fosters inequalities.

We believe that all new free trade agreements must contain clauses requiring that minimum standards concerning human rights, labour rights and respect for the environment be met. The free trade agreement with Peru, for example, would open many doors to Canadian investments in mining in Peru, but it does not include adequate provisions to protect workers and the environment.

There is no doubt that Canada is a leader in the mining sector. The federal government uses tax credits and financial and logistical aid to support companies operating abroad. The current federal government promotes Canadian companies' activities, but does not seem too concerned about whether any particular company complies with minimum human rights and environmental standards. The federal government, with support from the Liberals, of course, refused to adopt mandatory social responsibility standards for Canadian mining companies operating abroad.

It is ironic, if not downright pathetic, to see the Liberals oppose the adoption of mandatory standards even though they are in opposition. People say that when the Liberals are in opposition, they have a New Democratic agenda, but when they are in power, they have a Conservative agenda.

On the one hand, they support this agreement, but on the other, they introduced two legislative measures this session: Bill C-300, An Act respecting Corporate Accountability for the Activities of Mining, Oil or Gas in Developing Countries, by the member for Scarborough—Guildwood; and Motion M-283 on the social responsibility of the Canadian extractive industry in developing countries, by the member for Pierrefonds—Dollard. Despite supporting the agreements with Colombia and Peru, they have introduced motions to support and, as they put it, encourage companies to respect the environment and labour rights abroad. They introduce bills like that, then they turn around and vote in favour of agreements between Canada and Colombia or Canada and Peru. That is a major contradiction. I would like to expand on that.

Take Bill C-300, which the Liberals introduced in the House. The purpose of the bill was to ensure that Canadian mining companies behaved responsibly and complied with international human rights and environmental standards. The Liberals introduced that bill, but now they are voting for the Canada-Peru agreement and the Canada-Colombia agreement. Unbelievable. That is a basic contradiction. That is what I call political hypocrisy. It is unthinkable that a party could take such positions.

For some years now, a number of Canadian mining companies have been directly or indirectly associated with forced population displacements—it happened in Colombia—significant environmental damage, support to repressive regimes, serious human rights violations and sometimes even assassinations, as has occurred with many union members working in Colombia, for example. That is why Bill C-300 was introduced and that is why the Bloc will support the Liberals' bill.

That is why the Bloc Québécois has always defended the need to impose standards of social responsibility on companies operating abroad. But the federal government has always defended the principle of laissez-faire, preferring a voluntary approach.

I would like to point out that the Liberals have not taken a consistent position in this House. It is disgraceful for the Liberals to be voting in favour of this agreement. I would like the Liberal members to explain their logic because I have a great deal of difficulty understanding it.

They support the Conservatives and refuse to include mandatory standards in the agreement with Peru when there is clearly a need to adopt mandatory standards for the social responsibilities of Canadian mining companies. Now they are presenting these two legislative measures. It is a contradiction.

What can we say about the Liberals in this debate? I hope they will go and hide. Fortunately, stupidity and ridicule are not deadly; otherwise there would not be many Liberals left in this House. I would say they are being devious in this matter. I have been listening to them since yesterday and I am amazed.

As I was saying, rather than imposing mandatory standards, the government continues, on the contrary, to believe in the myth that Canadian companies act responsibly. It naively continues to defend the idea that a voluntary commitment is enough to guarantee that the activities of Canadian companies abroad will be conducted in a responsible manner.

It is important to remind the Conservative and Liberal members that the radical reforms imposed by the government of Alberto Fujimori between 1990 and 2000 reduced the size of the state and undermined its capacity to intervene effectively and to impose standards over its entire territory. We must not forget that.

Since then, yes there have been reinvestments, and Peru is currently in a phase of good economic growth. We must, however, consider Peru a developing country.

The Canadian government is responsible for ensuring that its legislation does not run counter to the needs of the populations concerned. Development must be sustainable, fair and equitable. It must be harmonious and respect local populations.

It is not enough just to say that our legislation creates jobs or stimulates local economies. This is why the Bloc Québécois has always favoured the adoption of mandatory standards and accountability measures with respect to the activities of mining companies in other countries.

This bill does not even reflect the recommendations by committees whose representatives had been to the field. The industry has studied the matter. By turning its back on the numerous recommendations by industry and civil society contained in the report by the advisory group to the National Roundtables on Corporate Social Responsibility, in which all parliamentarians took part and which dealt with the Canadian extractive industry in developing countries, the Canadian government has made itself complicit in the human rights abuses and environmental damages caused by the actions of certain offending companies. I cannot accept that.

This is why the Bloc Québécois is voting against these agreements. A trade system that results in the exploitation of developing countries is not viable.

Contrary to what the government may say, increasing exports through a free trade agreement between Canada and Peru will not automatically resolve the economic inequalities, social problems and poverty related to that country's development.

Including in the agreement a clause protecting investments, patterned on NAFTA's chapter 11, will allow businesses to sue the government. This clause will, I am sure, limit the Peruvian state's capacity to ensure equitable social and economic development for its population.

In this context, the free trade agreement with Peru contains some basic elements that prevent us from supporting this bill.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Madam Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his speech.

I do not understand why the two parties disagree. Is there a lack of communication or a real difference of opinion? There are at least three good reasons to support this agreement. First of all, there is a need for free trade, especially since the global problems are affecting both the province of Quebec and the rest of Canada. There has been only one free trade agreement in recent years, but more are needed to improve the economic situation.

Another reason to support this agreement is the pursuit of social justice. Like the Bloc Québécois and the NDP members, I am on a quest for social justice. I went to Peru and worked with Canadian Food for the Hungry. We must make a commitment to resolve the problems and NGOs cannot do it alone. They need help from companies and other Canadians.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Madam Speaker, I will not applaud those remarks, because I find them very naive. A study was conducted in Peru in 2004. The figures I have show that 97 disputes between communities and mining companies were reported. Some 60% of Canadian companies in Peru work in the mining sector. These disputes related to issues of access to lands and the destruction of the environment. In Colombia, thousands of people have been displaced because companies are taking away their lands and displacing populations in order to mine there.

We support free trade, but free trade that is fair and equitable, and that fosters sustainable development while respecting all local populations.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Madam Speaker, I want to ask my colleague if he has any concerns that labour standards and environmental standards are not part of the main agreement but part of side agreements in this Canada-Peru free trade agreement.

Some analysts have noted that while there is a similarity between this agreement and the one that the United States entered into with Peru, in the United States agreement environmental and labour standards are part of the main agreement. They also point out that the Canadian environmental standards agreement is much weaker than what the Americans have in their agreement but that this has not slowed President Garcia from making changes to the environmental policies of Peru that do not help the environment and have been very detrimental to the people of Peru.

Given those problems, I am wondering if he could comment on those particular issues and the problems associated with the Canadian agreement in this regard.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Madam Speaker, my NDP colleague is also alluding to chapter 11 of NAFTA, which was reproduced in this agreement. The Bloc Québécois is in favour of multilateral rather than bilateral agreements. Under a multilateral agreement, companies must adhere more closely to these standards. There are things that could be done but that are not being talked about with regard to this agreement. We need a fair and equitable agreement that would require mining companies to report annually on their activities abroad and comply with the standards. An independent ombudsman office could be created to receive complaints about the activities of non-compliant Canadian companies abroad.

There is nothing in this agreement that talks about the recommendations we made. A tripartite committee could be formed to monitor compliance with the standards. This committee would be made up of representatives of government, civil society and the extractive industry. There are ways to mine in compliance with environmental standards. There are even mining techniques that create less pollution. But there is nothing about any of this in this agreement with Peru.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Madam Speaker, members have all received substantial input from various stakeholders and constituents about trade deals, probably more about the proposed deal with Colombia, but also about the Peru agreement. There is a form letter that starts, “I'm shocked and dismayed”, which has been going around.

Much of the debate that has taken place with regard to this particular bill, Bill C-24, the Canada-Peru Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, has been dealing with the more substantive concerns that Canadians have about entering into agreements with countries that have reputations on human rights issues that cause them concern, particularly with Colombia and the cocaine trade.

Having been a member of Parliament for some 15 years, one of the key lessons I learned from former Prime Minister Jean Chrétien was that it is very, very difficult, if not impossible, to achieve several objectives in terms of promoting Canadian values and interests at the same time. Sometimes we have to take a complex situation and deal with it separately.

Former Prime Minister Chrétien said that if we wanted him to be a boy scout, go to China and tell the Chinese what they should do about human rights, that would not do any good because then he would be out of the loop. Canada's trade relationship with China would become impaired and there would be consequences for being a boy scout where he could not do anything. He said that he would rather be at the table. He would want to be there, show them how Canada works, share the value system we have and show them we are concerned about and look for every opportunity to advocate for human rights issues, for environmental issues, for fair and free trade issues.

These bills raise all these kinds of concerns. On the Colombia deal, the Standing Committee on International Trade would probably say we should have a human rights assessment. That human rights assessment would show that there is a terrible drug trade and a lot of nastiness going on there. The human rights situation is terrible compared to Canada and this is really unacceptable.

This is a wonderful thing to do when we are talking about doing more business with that country. It rubs in its face the realities that we know. I understand it is important to keep the message in front of the world about the challenges that many countries have, whether they are human rights issues or environmental issues, or corruption, which is rampant. If we did a human rights assessment on all countries that we traded with and they did not pass the smell test, as it were, then we would say we will not trade with them.

Why do we not look at China? Would China pass a human rights assessment? Probably not. Would India pass a human rights assessment? Probably not. Would Colombia? Probably not.

How about the United States? There has been a lot of debate in this place about torture and tactics and even accusing people in this chamber who have views that in certain circumstances we need more aggressive techniques to get information from terrorists. It is totally unacceptable to many members in this place even to think that maybe there is a scenario under which more aggressive techniques should take place. I think the consensus would be that there should be no human rights abuses, no torture.

If we are to apply the same criteria that we want to apply to Peru about having a human rights assessment before we consider trading or expanding trade, that means we have to reconsider our trading relationship with our largest trading partner, the United States.

It is bizarre and it is probably a stretch, but it can be argued. I wanted to speak today because I receive so many communications from people who have been told that this is terrible and we should not be doing business with these people. Most of them unfortunately do not understand that we already have a trading relationship with all of these countries. We already do trade.

With regard to Peru itself, we have a significant trade deficit. We have $390 million in exports to Peru, including cereals, paper, technical instruments and machinery, but we import from Peru about $2.5 billion, mostly in minerals such as gold, zinc and copper ores, as well as animal feed and vegetables.

We have to ask ourselves whether or not Canada is prepared, notwithstanding the current recession and the economic climate, to sacrifice doing more business, growing our economy and creating jobs for the opportunity to say to them that the way they run their country, the laws that they have with regard to human rights, labour and the environment are the kinds of things that we have a problem with, and we would rather forgo the additional business with them because we are good boy scouts. We are the messenger. We would like to do trade with them but they have not passed our test.

That seems to be overly simplistic but if we listen to the debate that has gone on for some days now, it always comes back to the need for fair trade practices. We need responsible and fair labour practices. We need respect for the environment.

When I look at Canada's situation on the environment, who are we to lecture somebody else about our priority with regard to the environment? Who is Canada to lecture them, when our own government first of all cancelled every program that was set up to get Canadians onside to start dealing with greenhouse gas emissions and the consequences of global warming, which are horrendous?

The government also wants to set standards which tend to protect and insulate current industries and current practices. It came up with one scheme which said that they could pollute up to the same levels that they are doing right now. If they are going to produce more oil, for instance, as long as the incremental pollution and greenhouse gas emissions created are no greater than they are already averaging, then that is okay. In other words, the current level of pollution is acceptable. That is the position of the current government, to go ahead and pollute at the same levels.

Anybody who knows anything about the environment knows that at our current rate the damage is going to be tremendous. The book Sea Sick talks about phytoplankton and that the carbons being assimilated and dissolved into the water are reducing and killing the growth of phytoplankton. These are the kinds of things I wanted to raise because the seas are more sacred than the land, and if the seas go, the land is going to go right after them.

We have some serious problems on the environment, but I wanted to rise and say that we should not try to achieve all objectives every time we have a deal or relationship with another country. We do some trade now. Other countries have already entered into similar trade agreements. They have a competitive advantage over Canada. If we do not enter this deal, if we do not deal with those tariffs that we presently are facing, even the existing exports into Peru will disappear because we cannot be price competitive. That would cost jobs in Canada.

We have to think more carefully about what our objectives are.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Madam Speaker, I was listening to our colleague, whom we very much appreciate in the House and who often speaks. However, I do not necessarily always agree with his positions.

I would like him to explain why the Liberal Party—which may form the government in future, because it aspires to power—voted in favour of Motion M-283?

This motion says that “the government should act immediately to implement the measures of the Advisory Group report “National Roundtables on Corporate Social Responsibility and the Canadian Extractive Industry in Developing Countries” by creating, in an appropriate legal framework and with the funds needed, an independent ombudsman office with the power to receive and investigate complaints”.

You are familiar with the motion, and you voted for it. This agreement contains no provision that has to do with any funds, even though the motion called for providing funds. Yet you will vote in favour of the free trade agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru. I would like to hear what you have to say about this.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

I would like to remind the hon. member that he should address the chair. The hon. member for Mississauga South.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Madam Speaker, this is precisely the point. I do not think there are many people in this place who do not believe in having a national round table or an international round table forum to discuss how we can address the issues that are being raised by that private member's motion by the member for Scarborough—Guildwood. Yes, I support it.

It is a definable, focused effort to do something concrete in regard to, for instance, mining standards, et cetera, and dealing with those who invest in things and destroy the environment. It does not have anything to do with trade, though. If we link that with something else and say that we will not do something unless something else is fixed, there are three or four issues on the table as well as the trading issues that this bill deals with, and if one of those things should fail, then the whole thing would fail.

The question for the House to consider is whether or not we should sacrifice trade, jobs and opportunities to continue to influence our actions and the actions of other countries with regard to commercial activity which negatively impacts the environment.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Madam Speaker, I understood that there is a value in engaging the people of Peru or any other country just by being at the table even with outside agreements. Furthermore, this agreement contemplates side agreements that would bolster the whole human rights, social justice, environment and labour rights issues that have been raised by my colleagues from the Bloc and the NDP

Could my colleague from the Liberal Party confirm my understanding?

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Madam Speaker, the member has it correct. Every relationship that we have with countries around the world provides opportunities on a number of fronts, whether they be economic, trade, labour, or the environment. Certainly international relations are extremely important.

To the extent that we become the critic of those who do not have the values or the standards that we have and whose laws are not the same as ours, all that can do is impair the relationship and make it even more difficult for us to be successful in terms of persuading, negotiating or dealing with a variety of subjects.

I would like to make one last point which I did not get a chance to make in my speech. It has to do with the whole question of side agreements as opposed to dealing with the matters in the main agreement.

I am not convinced right now, and I hope that some hon. members will rise and explain it to the House, why a side agreement is less binding and less effective than an agreement which combines all of the elements. NAFTA as an example has those side agreements. We are participants there.

If we have a model in which we deal with these various agreements and they are working in other jurisdictions, why would we argue that this would be less effective an agreement just because there are side agreements? I do not believe that is the case, but I am interested in some argument.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, I am very pleased to speak to Bill C-24, an act to implement the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru, the Agreement on the Environment between Canada and the Republic of Peru and the Agreement on Labour Cooperation between Canada and the Republic of Peru.

Bill C-24 is the implementation legislation for the Canada-Peru free trade agreement, which consists of three parts: the main free trade agreement text, the labour side agreement and an environmental protection side agreement. It preceded and is nearly identical to the Canada-Colombia free trade agreement. Bill C-24 is also structurally identical to Bill C-23, the implementation legislation for the Canada-Colombia free trade agreement.

Canada is following the United States, which completed the free trade agreement with Peru under the Bush administration in December 2007, in spite of strong opposition from trade unions, civil society and Democrats who viewed the deal as an expansion of the North American Free Trade Agreement, NAFTA. Free trade negotiations with Peru date back to 2002 when the Chrétien Liberals first held discussions with the Andean community. That group consists of Peru, Colombia, Ecuador and Bolivia. On June 7, 2007, then minister David Emerson announced the formal launch of free trade negotiations with Peru. The Conservative government signed the bilateral agreement in May 2008.

The NDP opposes the NAFTA-style treaties that put big business interests before workers and the environment at all costs. That has increased the inequality and decreased the quality of life for the majority of working families.

In the case of the Canada-Peru agreement, our concern is that a much larger and more developed economy will take advantage of a developing one and that large corporate interests will end up shaping the so-called free trade architecture to serve their needs and not the public interests of the two trading nations. The worst aspects of the free trade agreement are similar to those found in the Canada-Colombia agreement.

The Canada-Peru free trade agreement does not include tough labour standards. The labour provisions are in a side agreement outside of the main text and without any vigorous enforcement mechanism. That is the key to this.

Trade unions in Peru have expressed concern as Peruvian labour law is deficient in several areas. By addressing the environment in a side agreement, there is no effective enforcement mechanism to force Canada or Peru to respect environmental rights.

Canada, in the recent budget, took away some of the environmental protections under the Navigable Waters Protection Act that we previously had in this country. It is not just a one-way street. In this case, we are looking at the country of Peru and saying that it is not living up to standards and it is racing to the bottom, but we have examples on our side where it could be argued that we are doing the same thing in terms of racing to the bottom.

The Canada-Peru agreement on the environment commits both countries to pursue environmental co-operation and to improve environmental laws and policies, but it can only ask both parties to enforce their domestic laws. If they do not, there is no necessary consequence.

In terms of the investment chapter, it has been a major concern of the members of the Bloc who support the NDP in voting against this bill. The investment chapter has been copied from the North American Free Trade Agreement. We have had some experience over the years with how that works. As for chapter 11 investor rights, the Canada-Peru free trade agreement provides powerful rights to private companies to sue governments over their public policy, enforceable through investor state arbitration panels.

We have seen, through experience with the North American Free Trade Agreement, how this type of corporate rights regime undermines the legitimate role of government in protecting and improving the lives of its citizens and the environment. In some free trade agreements investors are essentially put on the same level as that of the state and this puts the state in a defensive position. Just yesterday, one of my colleagues mentioned some examples under the NAFTA where the government is being challenged by investors who are not happy with their treatment under the agreement.

While Parliament cannot modify the treaty itself, Bill C-24 is just enabling legislation and the final jurisdiction over treaties lies with cabinet. We would like the government to stop the bill and renegotiate the problematic parts but that, of course, is not likely to happen. That is our major concern with this legislation.

I would like to address a question asked by a member a few minutes ago.

The Americans are moving perhaps a year or two ahead of us in this area. They have passed their own free trade agreement with Peru. However, unlike the Canadian agreement, environmental and labour standards were included right in their bill. One could argue that the Americans had a better constructed bill than we have here.

Their experience so far has not been good because a race to the bottom is developing where Peru has issued decrees and has reduced its standards. Any analysis that I have read, particularly from the American point of view, shows that the agreement they signed is not working favourably for the poor people and the working people of Peru.

Surely we should learn something from the American experience. They have two years on us. They have a better agreement but it is not being enforced properly in terms of pulling both countries up. What it is doing is pulling them down, specifically Peru.

Before we go much further with this, we should direct our negotiators to at least move our agreement up to the higher standard of the American agreement and maybe get some improvements on the American agreement that would benefit the working people in Peru.

We have a number of good examples that we have accessed from people who have looked at how the U.S. free trade agreement with Peru has been working. We can take the example of teamster president, Jimmy Hoffa Jr., who has made several observations about the U.S.-Peru agreement. He has said that nothing will change for the 33,000 slave labourers cutting down the Amazonian rain forest. He has said that subsistent farmers will be forced off their land because cheap U.S. food produced by agri-business will undercut their prices. The same thing happened with the North American Free Trade Agreement which has resulted in millions of poor Mexicans leaving their farms.

How anyone in this Parliament could see it is as progress and an improvement to the country and to the world to take a group of people, who have been working on their farms for hundreds of years, and force them off their land and force them to buy subsidized imported food and get away from growing their own food, is beyond me

The previous speaker from the Liberal Party was essentially condoning the race to the bottom approach. He said that we could not question any country's practices because we will scare it off and it will not want to trade with us. I have news for him. People all over the world want to trade.

When a few protestors from my own province of Manitoba go to environmental commission hearings in Minnesota to complain about our hydro development up north, when it really is not a serious problem in my opinion, our government takes that very seriously. Why? It is because we want to keep selling power to the United States. A few protesters can have a big influence on our government policy in Manitoba. One or two people showing up at environmental commission hearings--

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

The hon. member may continue his comments during questions and comments. The hon. Minister of Justice.

[Rob Nicholson, Conservative, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Madam Speaker, a constituent of mine just recently asked me a question about another one of these trade debates. He asked whether it was the position of the NDP to oppose all trade agreements. I said that was pretty well the evidence on all these things. It has a long record in an era when sometimes people say that political parties or individuals may not be consistent. This is certainly a consistency of the New Democratic Party.

I remember the NDP's ferocious objections to the North American Free Trade Agreement. It has been very consistent. We will never hear NDP members stand and say that they were wrong and that trade between Canada, the United States and Mexico has grown exponentially over the last 20 years. In fact, they probably still complain about that free trade agreement.

It can pretty well be summed up that the NDP is prepared to help other countries but it always needs to be a hand out, never a hand up. Anything that might promote trade, help people to become prosperous, to get them working and to expand trade is something the NDP is always opposed to.

We know the NDP were against the Auto Pact, which was very important. Could the hon. member tell me if there is any trade agreement that has ever been concluded that they would support?

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, those are very silly comments from the member.

I spent a few minutes in my speech suggesting to the member that the United States signed probably a better agreement with Peru two years ago and that we should look at that experience to see how it has developed. In the case of the United States, it was smart enough to include labour and environmental standards as part of the agreement, not as side agreements, which is why we assume it has a better agreement.

I think it is incumbent upon the government to pay some attention. It is not too late to get its trade negotiators out there to try to at least elevate our agreement up to the level and as good as what the United States has had for the last two years. I was pointing out to the member that we have evidence that even that higher standard is not working. The Peruvian administration is racing to the bottom, changing the laws and forcing farmers off their land.

The member, obviously, was not listening to my comments on that. Yes, we do support trade and we support fair trade agreements. The Bloc members have been telling that member for the last few days the very same thing. We support fair trade. What is so complicated about that concept?

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Madam Speaker, my colleague's speech speaks well about why we have been asking for fair trade and not a free trade agreement.

I want to touch base on some of the comments by our other colleagues, and specifically the Minister of Justice, with regard to how free trade has actually worked. If free trade has worked so great in the U.S., why do we have thousands of people coming to Parliament Hill today to talk about forestry and the lack of attention that was given to that part of the agreement?

As well, a Liberal member talked about the greenhouse gas emissions. Under that party, we saw greenhouse gas emissions rise much higher.

Does my colleague think, as the Liberal member seems to think, that we should turn a blind eye to human rights when it comes to these free trade agreements?

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, the reality is that there are many ways to negotiate agreements and we want fair trade agreements. We want to take into account as many of the possibilities and eventualities that can happen, and whether that involves labour, environment or human rights issues, they should all be put into agreements because people want to trade. To get a sound trade agreement, people will agree to have decent standards if we require those in an agreement.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to have this opportunity to speak in this debate to Bill C-24, An Act to implement the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and the Republic of Peru, the Agreement on the Environment between Canada and the Republic of Peru and the Agreement on Labour Cooperation between Canada and the Republic of Peru.

Part of the context of our debate today is the fact that this morning and this afternoon thousands of members of the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union, CEP, my old union, will be gathering here on the Hill for a national day of protest to say that forestry workers fight back for jobs, pensions and families. I was a proud member of CEP Local 232.

One of the reasons this protest has been organized is because of the failure of free trade agreements between Canada and the United States and the failure of the softwood lumber agreement between Canada and the United States to protect the jobs of Canadian workers. That is one reason why thousands of people will be here in Ottawa today to protest the failure of Canada to protect Canadian jobs and Canadian workers through these types of trade agreements. That shows why it is so crucially important that we pay attention to these agreements as we sign them and as we develop them. I am glad that we have this opportunity to debate the Canada-Peru agreement here in the House today.

As my colleague from Elmwood—Transcona said, New Democrats support trade agreements but we would support fair trade agreements. We want to ensure they meet the social, environmental and labour goals of our country and that they support our democratic vision for our country and for countries around the world. We want to ensure that any agreement we enter into supports those standards.

I do not think that makes us Boy Scouts, as the member for Mississauga South indicated. I do not think the Boy Scouts would appreciate the way he slagged their intent to be honourable citizens. It does not make us Boy Scouts or naive to want to uphold those kinds of standards in these agreements. One might ask the member for Mississauga South if he is prepared to sell his soul for a mess of potage, which may be the other end of the coin when it comes to these kinds of agreements. This is a very appropriate time to give due diligence to these agreements and ensure they do what they say they will do.

We are very concerned and we always raise the context of labour rights, of environmental protections and the investor chapters of these agreements. This Canada-Peru trade deal is no different in those regards. We believe these agreements do put the interests of big business before workers and the environment and that is one reason why we do not support the agreement. We have not learned anything from the problems with NAFTA's chapter 11 on investor rights. We continue to be concerned that this would give corporate interests the ability to override the democratically elected representatives of the people of the country when it comes to corporate relations and some training relationships. These provisions have been maintained in this Canada-Peru agreement and it is one of our key concerns with that deal.

The other contextual setting that I want to give is with what happened with the U.S.-Peru free trade agreement, how that was implemented and its effects since it was signed in December 2007. It is important to understand what happened with that deal and to look at some of the differences between what the United States negotiated with Peru and what Canada has negotiated with Peru.

Some of this information comes from an article written by Mary Tharin, a research associate with the Council on Hemispheric Affairs. She has pointed out a number of problems since the negotiation of the U.S.-Peru free trade agreement. She claims, and backs it up with evidence, unlike other members of the House who seem to have opinions but no evidence, that the U.S.-Peru free trade agreement has been used by President Garcia of Peru as an excuse to dismantle environmental and labour standards that did exist, such as they were, in Peru, and that it has also led to further economic deterioration in Peru. Ms. Tharin says that this should be taken into consideration before other free trade agreements are signed by the United States. I think that is instructive for Canada before we enter into this agreement with Peru.

She also notes that corruption is a serious issue with the Garcia government and that there is a long and continuing history of scandals in that government, especially scandals of corporate interests and the involvement of the government and leading officials with bribery and whatnot. That context is an important one for us to struggle with as well. Do we enter into agreements that cannot guarantee the force and supremacy of law and get bound up in these terrible scandals related to the development issues of their country?

The article goes on to talk about how President Garcia has been implementing and changing the legislative framework of Peru to accommodate the U.S.-Peru free trade agreement. He has been doing it by the use of legislative decrees. In fact, in the first six months after the agreement was signed, he enacted a total of 102 legislative decrees designed to harmonize national laws with the conditions laid down in the free trade agreement between Peru and the United States.

It is interesting to note that the Peruvian Constitutional Commission has recently declared about 40% of those decrees to be unconstitutional, which again brings into question the Garcia government's commitment to the constitution, law and background framework of this agreement. There has been considerable comment in Peru, via the Peruvian press as well as politicians and activists, that the government has used these decrees to the detriment of labour, the environment, the agricultural industry and indigenous rights there.

One of the most controversial of the legislative decrees was decree 1015, which was passed in May 2008. That decree was designed to facilitate the privatization and stripping away of communal lands held by indigenous and subsistence farming communities. Any of us who know anything about Peru know that communal land is essential to the Peruvian understanding and the traditional way of life in Peru.

Previously, the law in Peru required a two-thirds majority in congress to authorize any land sales from these communally held lands. However, decree 1015 lowered this requirement to a simple majority in a clear attempt to encourage those kinds of sales and subsequent exploitation of the land by foreign and domestic entrepreneurs. That is one of the key changes that came about, despite the agreement between the United States and Peru.

Another legislative decree, 1064, eliminates the ability of landowners to negotiate with oil and mining companies over the use of their land. Before that decree, companies had to reach an agreement with property owners in order to buy or rent their land for commercial use. Only if negotiations failed could companies turn to the government, specifically the ministry of mines and energy, to force owners to sell their land. Decree 1064 cuts out landowners completely, leaving the entire negotiation process in the hands of government.

Certainly, by our standards, this would be a significant backward step in how landowners and traditional communal landowners in Peru deal with the negotiations with oil and mining companies. In the context where Canadians are increasingly aware of the activities of Canadian corporations overseas and requiring stronger measures around corporate social responsibility, I do not think the lowering of this standard in Peru says good things about our ability to enter into an appropriate agreement between Canada and Peru for trade.

Another decree, 1090, is known as the forest and wildlife law. It allows President Garcia to remove barriers that protected the country's national forest. It redefines national forest patrimony and lists protections against logging and other forms of exploitation. There is considerable comment in Peru, and among opposition critics as well, that talks about how this decree reduces transparency and eliminates input from civil society.

This also all happens in a context where the environmental standards negotiated by the United States are stronger in its agreement than they are in the agreement that Canada has negotiated with Peru. That is another key reason why we should be very concerned about this agreement. It is why I and my New Democratic colleagues will not be supporting the legislation and the agreement between Canada and Peru.

[Ron Cannan, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise and acknowledge my colleague, the member for Burnaby—Douglas, from beautiful British Columbia.

As a member of the Standing Committee on International Trade, the Canada-Peru trade agreement was something we spent a great deal of effort and time on to ensure the agreement would not only help the folks of Peru but Canadian businesses as well.

As alluded to by the hon. member, the softwood lumber agreement is something that the Forest Products Association of Canada, FPAC, stood firmly behind. If we did not have that agreement in place, the situation would be even more dire than it is today.

We are facing a global economic crisis. A few weeks ago I had a chance to travel to Finland to look at the forest industry there. It is hurting as well, so we are working together. We need to help Canadian businesses expand markets.

I am proud of previous Minister Emerson and our present Minister of International Trade, who is broadening opportunities in Latin America.

On this agreement, the hon. member talked about human rights and labour agreements, which is something that is very near and dear to me. He does not have a monopoly on this compassion and caring factor. Our government is concerned about that and that is why we have entered into some of the most strongest and stringent labour and environmental side agreements.

How is this agreement different than the agreement of the United States, given that we have instituted these tough regulations?

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am glad the member raised the whole discussion of labour rights in Peru because I did not get a chance to address that in my speech. This will give me the opportunity to note that the Garcia government has also continued its legislative decrees in a number of areas related to labour rights, which have been very controversial.

Peru has a very small organized labour community. Public servants are one area where the existing labour rights have been jeopardized since the signing of the agreement between the United States and Peru. Despite the arrangements it made to support labour rights in its agreement, things like punitive evaluations of current employees have been introduced into the labour standards for the unionized public service in Peru. This has been done outside of the collective bargaining process. It has eliminated not only the ability of Peruvian public servants to collective bargain, but it has also eliminated respect for the collective bargaining process.

Most Peruvians participate in what is called the informal labour market and this is a very significant issue for the majority of Peruvians. Even though there have been increases decreed by the Government of Peru, these have been unenforceable because there are no significant labour laws to do that kind of work.

It shows the kind of context where we try use some kind of lip service, and that is all we can consider it, because these agreements do not seem to have any enforceable measures to improve the adherence to the existing labour law in countries or see any improvements to those labour laws that protect the rights of workers in these countries.

The United States was unable to do that through its agreement. I do not have much faith that Canada's agreement will be able to do that for the labour standards that we are seeking to uphold and improve between Canada and Peru.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, the member has eloquently described how the American free trade agreement with Peru is superior and stronger than the current Canadian agreement that has been signed. Even in spite of that, the leadership in Peru has continued with a race to the bottom in environmental and labour areas. The government should pay attention to that and move quickly to try to renegotiate this agreement and stop this race to the bottom.

Would the member comment further on that?

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Madam Speaker, it goes back to the whole question that the member for Elmwood—Transcona raised about the need for fair trade agreements. That has become a slogan for the NDP. It is a standard we try to live up to in our review of these kinds of agreements. There has to be respect for the people of the country with which we deal, and we do not see that in many of these agreements. That is are our stand on this.

[Serge Cardin, Bloc, Sherbrooke, QC]

Madam Speaker, I believe this will be the last time I speak to this implementation bill. Practically, I owe this to the member for Kelowna—Lake Country, who of course has moved the previous question. Otherwise, I would not have been able to continue speaking on this bill.

It really is a huge undertaking to try to educate and teach some members of this House, be they Conservatives or Liberals. It has been said and we will keep saying it: in teaching, you have to repeat the message. I have a few minutes to repeat this message again.

All of them, Conservatives and Liberals alike, seem to be saying that we in the Bloc Québécois and the New Democratic Party are not in favour of our businesspeople and businesses being able to export and bring profits home to Quebec and Canada. The opposite is true, of course. In Quebec, we are great traders, and we certainly want to be able to pay for the social policies we adopt. Ordinarily we support these agreements. We always hope they will be multilateral, but in this case we are talking about a bilateral agreement between Peru and Canada.

Generally, the Bloc Québécois agrees with what is good for Quebec, but in this case, as in the other cases, no impact study has been done in connection with this free trade agreement, whether in terms of jobs in Canada, in Quebec or in Peru, in terms of workers’ rights or in terms of the environment.

Sometimes we wonder how the negotiators do their jobs if they have no impact study or, if they tell us they do not have one available, they surely have some minimal impact study so they can determine what the repercussions might be in the two countries.

I have always taken the position that when I engage in a business transaction with someone, I do not want to take advantage of that person, I want both parties to come out ahead in an economic transaction. That is also what I would like to see for all of the agreements signed by this House and implemented by legislation.

Yesterday, in debate on the implementation bill, a Conservative member made comments in which he repeated that two democratically elected parties held talks and decided to sign this agreement. But democracy is the power of the people. How were the people able to be heard and consulted, to speak out against the weaknesses in the agreement on various points, whether it be in relation to the investment agreement, the environment agreement, the labour cooperation agreement or the laws governing the accountability of our mining companies?

As well, the fundamental point for which the Bloc constantly fights is to bring us, instead, agreements that are under the umbrella of multilateralism. When I talked about democracy, agreements like these truly can result in a loss of sovereignty for some countries. This is particularly the case for the investment agreement. Certainly we have to protect someone who invests abroad against misconduct the other country or the other party might engage in. But when we say that a company abroad can have more rights than the people, that is a loss of sovereignty and a loss of democracy for the country in question.

This government also has a virtually knee-jerk reaction, particularly in an economic crisis like the one we are experiencing.

Its initial reflex reaction is to turn to less regulated markets, as in the case of the agreement with Colombia or the one with Peru. Things were not very complicated, on the other hand, in the case of the free trade agreement with the European Free Trade Association. The Bloc quickly supported it. We know that these agreements can be beneficial, but the parties have to be equals and the country we are negotiating with has to be able to ensure human rights.

During my first speech on this bill, yesterday, I referred to the remarks of some of the witnesses who appeared before us in committee, but I did not have a chance to finish. I want to go over three of them.

First, Ms. Theresa McClenaghan told us that investor access to states was very problematic. We should not have this kind of thing in free trade agreements. She referred as well to sovereign rights—those of the other country, of course, but also the sovereign rights here in Canada and Quebec of local governments and the central government. We have a good example of this now with NAFTA and 2,4-D. That is a pesticide we do not want used on our lawns for aesthetic purposes. Well, the company is suing the Government of Quebec.

When a government can no longer legislate for health reasons or out of the precautionary principle, there is a major loss of sovereignty. This agreement on investment is faulty, just like the one with Peru.

She pointed, as an example, to the agreement between the United States and Australia, which gives no direct investor-state remedy. She said it could be a model of social and environmental protection. Ms. McClenaghan was representing the Canadian Environmental Law Association. Although she was speaking on behalf of an environmental organization, she spoke mostly about the problem posed by the agreement on investment. She said that we should just send the government back to do its homework because it had done an incomplete job. This agreement is hardly ideal from the point of view of protecting people everywhere in the countries involved.

We also heard Mr. Rowlinson, a lawyer representing the steelworkers' union. He said labour rights were the main problem in the agreement. It mentions labour rights, of course, but talks only about basic rights and principles without really getting down to the fact that these rights need to be fostered so that the other party also benefits from the agreement. What it says about labour rights is very simply based on what currently exists. The same is true of environmental rights. They too are based on what currently exists in that country.

Automatically, we think that the mining or oil or gas companies set up there because there are collateral benefits. They have the advantage of a much weaker labour rights base. So it costs them less. The same may be said for environmental rights, and so it costs less to operate mines in these countries.

This gentleman wanted these rights included in the main agreement and not in the side agreements or parallel agreements, which, by their very nature, never meet. They are totally separate and based always on the minimum.

There was also Mr. Cameron, a lawyer who came as an individual and who told us that Peru, like Mexico, was divided into two social classes—the one benefiting directly from these agreements and the bulk of the population, benefiting much less.

I would like to come back to this important principle, as one member has introduced a bill and another a motion to make the mining, gas and oil companies operate more responsibly. If they are aware of the importance of all that, they will understand that they must reject this government's measure and not vote in favour of this implementation act. They must have it set aside so the government can redo its homework. In the meantime, they will be able to get their motion and bill passed, and we will support them in this regard, but not with regard to the free trade agreement with Peru.

[Ron Cannan, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

Madam Speaker, my hon. colleague from Sherbrooke is also a member of the Standing Committee on International Trade. We have had the opportunity to travel together. I appreciate his comments, but obviously we have separate positions on this specific trade agreement,

I would like to ask the hon. member about a couple of sections that we talked about within the agreement. We had the reference to the strongest labour and environmental side agreements that the Canadian governments have signed in any trade agreements. In speaking to constituents, I was talking with one not too long ago who has been in business for many years in Peru.

Looking at the health, safety and environmental measures, which are part of article 809 of chapter eight, investment, it states:

The Parties recognize that it is inappropriate to encourage investment by relaxing domestic health, safety or environmental measures.

Article 810, corporate social responsibility, states:

Each Party should encourage enterprises operating within its territory or subject to its jurisdiction to voluntarily incorporate internationally recognized standards of corporate social responsibility in their internal policies...

We had the opportunity to visit Colombia. I know that businesses in Peru have corporate social responsibilities. Canadian companies are raising the bar.

How will leaving the status quo help increase quality of life and give opportunities to the people of Peru?

[Serge Cardin, Bloc, Sherbrooke, QC]

Madam Speaker, we are not calling for the status quo but, simply, for the government to resume negotiations and improve this free trade agreement. We refer to environmental and labour rights laws because the entire agreement honours only what already exists, the fundamentals. Our businesses, however, can take advantage of the gap between the fundamental conditions in Peru and those in Canada.

So the government would do well to renegotiate. Witnesses have said so clearly. The government's negotiators were not up to scratch. They did not manage to negotiate things that should have been negotiated, and the quality of what was negotiated left something to be desired. So it must redo its homework. We will support this free trade agreement with Peru when the government incorporates rights and the side agreements into the principal trade agreement and negotiates shorter periods. We know for a fact that the US has negotiated much shorter periods in connection with rights than those Canada and Peru negotiated.

So Canada must do its homework over, and the government's directives must be more specific so that we may promote labour and environmental rights.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Madam Speaker, I want to raise a question with my colleague from the Bloc that stems from a related bill in front of the House right now, Bill C-300, which addresses corporate social responsibility.

In light of my friend from the Conservative Party raising the issue, if we really want to deal with corporate social responsibility, I want to get his take on whether it would be better to have it embedded in a policy, not just for trade agreements and voluntary, which is the problem with this trade deal, but to have that kind of approach, that legislation, embedded in the Canadian governance model right across the board, for all companies.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

The hon. member has 30 seconds in reply.

[Serge Cardin, Bloc, Sherbrooke, QC]

Madam Speaker, the Bloc Québécois is, in principle, in favour of Motion M-293 on the accountability act and Bill C-300, which also deals with accountability.

We agree in principle. Canadian companies abroad should be made more responsible, so this is an important step. There may, however, still be a sizeable gap between the laws and regulations of the country with which we are negotiating a free trade agreement and our own laws and regulations.

Accountability should also impose severe regulations relating to protection of the environment of these foreign countries. I believe that these two aspects can, and must, complement each other.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Madam Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to rise to speak to Bill C-24.

Many have spoken of the concerns they have around this trade agreement. I think Canadians are listening carefully to the difference between what some call free trade and what we call fair trade. There is actually a shift in the debate around trade agreements and around how trade is done globally. I think we are going to see a change in the use of the term “free trade” because of the collective experience of countries with these agreements.

When we look at the details and drill down into some of these trade agreements, the notion that there is anything free is a misnomer. When we look at the give and the take, and what we end up with at the end of these trade agreements, many people have, quite rightly, been critical. I think we are going to move toward something more in line with a sectoral approach, that we really should not be doing these massive pieces of architecture to say that we are going to be all in or all out and give certain powers to certain sectors of society over others.

When we look at the experience with NAFTA, for instance, and chapter 11, and when we look at what was given up by Canadians to allow private corporations to meddle in the affairs of our governance, it actually undermines the fundamental premise of democracy. This is not free. This is actually a change of power where we end up with less and certain entities end up with more.

It has to do with the notion of sovereignty, as well. I think that most people would agree that our Parliament should be able to pass laws that are unfettered, in terms of outside interference, and be vigilant with respect to our obligations internationally, but also provide good governance for our citizens.

That is not the case when we look at the experience of chapter 11. In fact, not just people in this corner of the House have stated that but people outside who have critiqued these agreements have said that. That is one of the problems with this trade agreement. It continues down the ill-fated path of the chapter 11 experience. If we look at it, it really puts investors' rights over the rights of citizens. The fact that private companies can sue governments, with these chapter 11 provisions over our public policy choices, is a clear indication that there is something more than a free trade or an exchange or an opening of trade. It means that we are actually laying hands on certain people and giving them rights over others; in this case, private corporations.

I want to take that observation and align it with where Canadians are at and look at what is happening right now with another bill that is before us, Bill C-300, the corporate social responsibility bill. It is interesting. When people have critiqued Bill C-300, and I have a private member's bill that is similar to it and motions have been passed on corporate social responsibility, they have been concerned that extraterritorial provisions would be given to the Government of Canada over investments abroad in the extractive industries. It is interesting because when we take a look at chapter 11, what we are actually doing is legislating the rights of extraterritorial private interests to have influence on governance here. We do not hear them talk about that.

So, on the one hand we are saying we do not want to have too many rules for corporations when we are doing business overseas because that might interfere with the conduct of the business of certain countries, and on the other hand there is this chapter 11 cheque written out and handed over to private corporations with which we do these trade deals .

I think that is an important issue. I think Canadians want to know why these facets within these trade deals are being set. Who is benefiting? Is this helping the citizens of the countries with whom we are entering into these trade deals? I suspect not. I know that it is not. I think it is important because when we look at this trade deal, it again is reinforcing that.

When we look at this trade deal and we look at the side provisions on environment and labour, they are just that. They are side agreements. The language is voluntary. We cannot have voluntary human rights. Either human rights are embedded and we have strength in terms of support to ensure that those human rights are being granted or we do not. Having voluntary human rights, we might as well not bother. It really does a disservice to the whole concept and notion of human rights.

I can only think what John Diefenbaker would say to that. We have side agreements on human rights. I suspect that he would not be in favour of that notion and I think that is important.

I suspect that because the government thought there would be a furor over the lack of environmental and human rights provisions, it would do a little political inoculation and put a side agreement in, put a ribbon on it and everyone will be happy.

We on this side of the House see through that. We either have it embedded and strengthened with legislation or we do not bother. To have it on the side, as was mentioned by my colleague from the Conservative Party earlier in his intervention, makes it voluntary. It is like the response by the government to corporate social responsibility where it has taken a very robust report from both business and civil society about how we can do corporate responsibility and turned it into a suggestion box, that if we have a concern we can put the concern in this box and perhaps the government will deal with it. That is not good enough. We need to take this issue seriously because it affects the lives of ordinary people.

The trade agreement, sadly, is putting on the altar environmental protection and human rights protection for what? For profit. For the bottom line. As I said, I think people will see through that and we certainly do.

I would also like to point out where Canadians are in their view of where Canada should be when it comes to trade agreements. I want to reference a document that recently came out called “Back on the Map”. It is a very comprehensive overview of a study that was done for a new vision for Canada in the world. It was done recently by a non-partisan group called Canada's World during a national citizen's dialogue. The director is Shauna Sylvester whom I met with recently. She was pointing out to me the research that was done on what Canadians want to see in their foreign policy and in their trade agreements. One of the things in the research report said that Canadians wanted to see good governance as it relates to promoting good governance in trade deals. The report is based on researchers talking to Canadians about what they want to see in our foreign policy and trade deals.

They want to see the Government of Canada take a leadership role in convening and facilitating the reform of international financial development agencies; promoting fair trade practices and corporate social responsibility, particularly among Canadian companies with overseas operations; supporting a stronger voice for developing countries within international institutions; investing in public diplomacy; shielding effective programs from partisan politics; and instituting a federal process to help with that

What they want to see is Canadian governance in trade deals promoting fair trade, promoting corporate social responsibility and promoting the values that are embedded in our Canadian fabric, not to hand over to certain companies and interests a blank cheque to decide what they want to do with it and undermine not only our democracy but the interests of those in the country of origin; in this case Peru.

For those reasons our party will not be supporting this trade deal. I wish that we would have the support of the Liberals to oppose this trade deal because it is not good enough.

[Ron Cannan, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

Madam Speaker, as a member of the trade committee, I understand the importance of free trade as I believe all members of the House do. We talk about fair trade, but we have to look at it from a different perspective and ask what fair trade means.

I have talked to many constituents about the importance of diversifying our trade around the world, and I know committee members have discussed this also with witnesses from across the country. Over 80% of our trade is with one trading partner and this has caused a lot of the economic downturn that we are seeing today.

We have the toughest side agreements with labour and environmental agreements. There are different ways of negotiating. The U.S. signed an agreement with Peru on February 1.

We talk about fair trade, but I would like to ask my colleague how this agreement is fair to Canadian businesses? They are at a competitive disadvantage every day that goes by. Quebec farmers and Prairie farmers are losing business. Businesses across the country are losing business.

How is it fair by delaying and dithering, and dodging the fact that we need to expand our market share because this agreement is going to help Canadian businesses?

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Madam Speaker, I want to correct the member on something. The side agreements have been noted as being inferior to the agreement that the Americans have negotiated with Peru.

We on this side of the House think Canada can do better. Canada has had a solid history in the past on human rights, on labour rights and hopefully environmental rights. It is not good enough to have inferior side agreements on these kinds of critical issues.

I also want to underline the importance of getting it right. Trade agreements are about values as well as about trade. We cannot rush to get an agreement done that will leave behind our values.

Joe Clark put it well at the foreign affairs committee recently when he said that we can have trade agreements but we need to be able to pronounce our values to the world. If we give up our values in trade agreements, then our reputation is sullied with respect to diplomacy and our place in the world.

We on this side of the House think the government has to get it right. It has to take the time to get it right and protect the values that are so important to all Canadians, and to the people of Peru for that matter. The government has to make sure that due diligence is done.

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Madam Speaker, my colleague is absolutely right. We should not be turning a blind eye with regard to the environment and human rights.

The U.S. had over two years with respect to its agreement with Peru and it obviously has a lot of flaws. The president of Peru, Alan Garcia Perez, actually did 102 legislative decrees on the agreement. The concerns are, based on these decrees, that they are actually unconstitutional. The activists have basically indicated that the agreement is detrimental to labour, the environment, the agriculture industry, and indigenous rights.

Perhaps my colleague could explain a bit more about why it is important that we make sure that we get it right.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Madam Speaker, I am going to reference yet again not my point of view or my party's point of view, but the point of view of Canadians. I want to reference a comprehensive study that was recently done on the point of view of Canadians. That is important data for all of us. This review was done by Canada's World, which is a centre for dialogue in British Columbia.

Canadians want the federal government to make Canadian companies responsible for environmental damage when carrying out overseas operations. They want the federal government to pass mandatory, not voluntary, regulations for Canadian corporations overseas on human rights and environmental standards. That is what Canadians think.

I am asking the government to please listen to Canadians as well as members in this place and put this agreement aside because it is not right. Canadian values are not in this agreement.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to follow my learned colleague from Ottawa Centre in this debate.

Quite frankly, this is the kind of debate we need to have in the House about the government's trade agenda, which is simply a carbon copy of the Liberals' trade agenda. On its trade agenda, the government essentially has shown that it is appallingly weak in negotiating and has shown an inability to set any objectives in line with what Canadians strongly believe they need to see in trade policy. The vast majority of Canadians are fair traders. They want to see a balanced approach on trade that actually provides for improvement in environmental standards, human rights and labour rights. They also want to see a trade strategy that allows for domestic growth and jobs here at home. They get neither with this bill, tragically.

Most Canadian families earn less now than they did when the Canada-U.S. free trade agreement was implemented back in 1989. We have seen an erosion for the vast majority of Canadian families. They are earning less. The ones who have profited are chief executives and corporate lawyers. They have seen their family income increase dramatically. The wealthiest Canadians now take more than half of all income in Canada, but for most Canadians in the middle class, Canadians in the lower middle class and the poorest Canadians, they have seen a substantial erosion in their income.

We are also facing a record trade deficit. Essentially we export raw materials to create jobs in other countries and we import increasingly the manufactured products that used to be manufactured here in Canada. How does the Canada-Peru free trade agreement change this? It does not change it at all. Fundamentally, even under the former Liberal government, most of the bilateral agreements that we have signed have led to a fall in exports. We simply import more from the country of origin, often with no standards applied, no labour standards, no minimum wage standards, but our exports actually fall.

To pretend that this bill is in any way part of any sort of comprehensive economic strategy is simply false. It is not the objective of the government. The objective of the government appears to be, more than anything else, just fancy ribbon cutting. Signing a trade deal has a lot of pomp and circumstance. People put their signatures on a piece of paper. They get to come to the House to say that they are doing something, but when most bilaterals have led to a fall in exports, when most Canadian families are earning less, we have to wonder. We have to think that somebody in the Conservative government would actually look at the results, would actually monitor what is going on and take measures to put in place a more comprehensive export strategy. That has not been done.

As we have cited in the House before, the Conservative government is just as bad as the former Liberal government. It is the same old, same old. One does not change the other's strategy. We are just as bad under the Conservatives as we were under the Liberals for actually providing any sort of product promotion support outside of Canada.

For the entire United States market, where 85% of our exports go right now, the Canadian federal government has a combined product promotion budget of $3.4 million for this massive United States of America market of 300 million citizens. I will repeat that figure, because it is stunning in its cheapness, that $3.4 million is the entire federal government product promotion support budget for the entire United States of America market. Is that unbelievable? Yes it is, but it is unfortunately true.

The government has no trade strategy. It provides no product promotion support. It seems incapable of understanding even the rudimentary elements of what a fair trade strategy would be.

In the OECD countries, in the United States, the debate is increasingly on fair trade as opposed to George Bush style unregulated free trade. In election after election, fair trade is winning out. People around the world want a balanced fair trade approach and not this radical, extremist, George Bush style, unregulated free trade approach. As a result of that, we are seeing elections such as the recent one in the United States where governments are changed and that agenda is stopped.

That is the approach the government has taken until now. Let us look at the specifics of Bill C-24.

The NDP voted against the softwood sellout that killed tens of thousands of jobs in Canada. We voted against the shipbuilding sellout that every single worker, manager and owner within the shipbuilding industry implored Parliament not to pass without a carve-out. The NDP proposed the carve-out and the Liberals and the Conservatives banded together. The Liberals drove the getaway car for the Conservatives and essentially adopted a bill they knew would kill the shipbuilding industry in Canada. It is a shame. We have the longest coastline in the world and we just voted a few months ago to kill progressively our shipbuilding industry.

The NDP voted against the Canada-Colombia trade deal, an egregiously bad deal. One cannot imagine how it was conceived. That regime is connected to murderous paramilitary thugs and drug lords and the government wants to give it preferential trade access to Canada. That is absolutely absurd. We will debate that if the government ever brings it back before the House.

I think the government was as embarrassed as we in the NDP were that it even proposed such an appalling concept as rewarding a regime with massive human rights violations and connections to murderous paramilitary thugs and drug lords who killed hundreds of people last year. The president has had connections with them since his initial days as the mayor of Medellin, Colombia when the Medellin cartel ran the place. In any event, we will debate the Colombia trade deal when it comes forward.

The Peru trade deal provides no protection for the environment and no protection on labour rights. The Peruvian government has essentially refused to put its signature on International Labour Organization agreements and the government does nothing with regard to the superficial, symbolic labour side deal to address that issue.

Now we find within the Peru agreement the same chapter 11 provisions that have been rejected by every other country on earth since NAFTA was implemented. The United States moved away from it. Every other country has moved away from it.

The investor state provisions allow corporate CEOs to override democratic decision making, whether it is on the labour code or environmental standards. Corporate CEOs can actually get compensation for any public measure that is taken in the public interest. It is a cash cow. They can go to governments and get millions of dollars for nothing, simply because the government has made a decision that is in the best interests of its citizens.

In Bill C-24 there are enhanced investor state provisions that allow corporate CEOs to milk the government in Peru. We learned just last week that there was a nationwide strike among Peruvian workers because in the northeastern Amazon region of Peru, a package of laws has been passed that will open up the lands of that region to mining and drilling without consultation with local communities.

There is a chapter 11 on steroids in Bill C-24. There is no protection for environmental standards or labour standards, and now there is legislation by the Peruvian government that allows mining CEOs to override local democratic decision making. Regardless of what anyone's political stripe is, one would think that every member of the House would understand that democratic decision making is the very essence of democracy. Once we give extraordinary rights to corporate CEOs to override that and get millions of dollars in compensation for nothing, we are doing something that is profoundly unfair to the people of Peru.

For all of those reasons, the NDP is speaking out against this agreement, but we continue to press the government to actually negotiate fair trade agreements. It is not a complicated concept. It means actually raising living standards in Canada and abroad. That is done by establishing tough environmental standards, tough labour standards and human rights. The NDP will be voting no on this bill.

[Jean-Pierre Blackburn, Conservative, Minister of National Revenue and Minister of State (Agriculture)]

Mr. Speaker, I have listened to the hon. member's speech, as well as those from several representatives of the Bloc Québécois.

The hon. member said that it was not good for the Canadian economy to have a free trade agreement with Peru and other countries. If our country produced goods just to meet the needs of Canadians, does he think that he and I and those watching us would have a more prosperous life? The answer is no.

Canada's strength is that we are very productive and in a position to export our products throughout the world, which gives us an economy that is far stronger than that of other countries.

That said, I travelled to Peru when I was Minister of Labour to discuss, among other things, the side agreement on labour rights. From my discussions with my Peruvian counterpart, the labour minister of the day, as well as other representatives of that country, I understood how well Canada was perceived internationally as far as workers' rights are concerned. I also understood the leadership role Canada could play in these countries.

The hon. member is likely not aware that between 50% and 60% of companies in Peru are currently not registered with the state, which means that the state does not collect any kind of taxes and is unaware of working conditions. With this agreement, businesses will now have to be registered and this will be to the advantage of the people of Peru and the workers. What is more, the agreement respects—

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

The hon. member for Burnaby—New Westminster.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I really liked the minister's question. I also like his region, Saguenay—Lac-St-Jean, where I lived for several years.

The people of that region understand that it does not come down to a choice between no trade at all and the bad trade agreements negotiated by this government. They understand that our borders will not close if we do not sign these agreements. My argument, as I said before, is that most of the time, bilateral agreements actually reduce exports. There is an ethical issue in this, and a lack of strategy.

Signing this agreement will not create prosperity here in Canada, that is for sure. The fact that the government is signing an agreement with the Government of Colombia, a country where union members are killed on an almost-weekly basis, where people disappear every day and where the regime is linked to paramilitary organizations and drug dealers, shows just how sincere—

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

Questions and comments.

The hon. member for Berthier—Maskinongé.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate my colleague on his excellent speech. I am not surprised that the Conservatives plan to vote in favour of the agreement. After all, they have already signed it. It is in line with their right-wing ideology, as we have seen in other trade agreements.

However, I am surprised that the Liberals will be voting for the agreement. They tabled Bill C-300 in the House, a bill to ensure that Canadian mining companies behave responsibly in terms of workers' rights and the environment. They also moved Motion M-283, with which I am sure my colleague is familiar, to implement the recommendations of the National Roundtables on Corporate Social Responsibility and the Canadian Extractive Industry in Developing Countries advisory group.

I would like my colleague to comment on that. In his opinion, why did the Liberals vote in favour of those two measures if they are voting against—

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

The hon. member for Burnaby—New Westminster.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, that is actually a very good question.

In this House, over the past three years, the Liberals have supported the Conservatives 72 consecutive times. The Conservatives have been kept in power by the Liberals. There is no difference: the Liberals and the Conservatives have the same beliefs.

However, from time to time and in a superficial manner, the Liberals present bills to prove that they disagree.

They voted for the softwood lumber agreement, which resulted in the loss of thousands of jobs. They also voted for the agreement that sold out the shipbuilding industry. The Liberals say they will vote in favour of the agreement with Colombia—

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

Order. Is the House ready for the question?

[Some hon. members]

Question.

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

The question is on the motion that this question be now put. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

All those opposed will please say nay.

[Some hon. members]

Nay.

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

In my opinion, the nays have it.

And five or more members having risen:

Call in the members.

And the bells having rung:

This vote stands deferred until Wednesday at the end of government orders.