Bill C-100 (Historical)

An Act to implement the Agreement between Canada, the United States of America and the United Mexican States

This enactment implements the Agreement between Canada, the United States of America and the United Mexican States, done at Buenos Aires on November 30, 2018.
The general provisions of the enactment set out rules of interpretation and specify that no recourse is to be taken on the basis of sections 9 to 19 or any order made under those sections, or on the basis of the provisions of the Agreement, without the consent of the Attorney General of Canada.
Part 1 approves the Agreement, provides for the payment by Canada of its share of the expenditures associated with the operation of the institutional and administrative aspects of the Agreement and gives the Governor in Council the power to make orders in accordance with the Agreement.
Part 2 amends certain Acts to bring them into conformity with Canada’s obligations under the Agreement.
Part 3 contains coordinating amendments and the coming into force provisions.

Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement Implementation Act

[Randy Hoback, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

Madam Speaker, I need to straighten out the record. The parliamentary secretary said that his government saved the TPP. The reality is that it was signed, and if we had passed it, we would not have had to renegotiate NAFTA. What happened? The government stalled. The Liberals dragged their feet. They kept hesitating. They kept making it impossible for the U.S. to move forward. If the Liberal government had embraced it and ratified it, we would not be talking about NAFTA today. That is the reality.

The Liberals have upset many of our trade partners around the world: China, Saudi Arabia, the Philippines. Which country has the Prime Minister travelled to where he has not upset someone?

The reality is that this agreement is not perfect, but it would provide stability, and business communities want stability.

Our structural steel is going to face tariffs in August. Our softwood lumber has tariffs right now. What are the Liberals going to do to solve those problems once they ratify this deal?

[Omar Alghabra, Liberal, Mississauga Centre, ON]

Madam Speaker, I have a lot of respect for my colleague, but I find it interesting that he is doubling down on the old TPP. I find it interesting that he has taken the side of the Saudi Arabian government over the Chinese government. I find it interesting that he is saying that we should not be upholding our own laws or values. I am really—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Carol Hughes]

The hon. member for Prince Albert had an opportunity to ask the question. If he has other questions or comments, then he should wait for the opportunity to be recognized again.

The hon. parliamentary secretary.

[Omar Alghabra, Liberal, Mississauga Centre, ON]

Madam Speaker, when we are defending Canadian interests and values around the world, my hon. colleague should support us in that effort. Yes, we have disagreements domestically, but I wish he would not take the side of the Saudis or the Chinese government's side.

Our government has proven that we will continue to defend Canadians' interests. We will continue to defend the interests of the middle class. All of our trade negotiation results have proven that. We have a million jobs to speak for that, we have the lowest poverty rate in Canada's history to speak for those results and I am very proud of our government's record.

[Marjolaine Boutin-Sweet, NDP, Hochelaga, QC]

Madam Speaker, for some time now, the NDP has been calling on the government to establish a national pharmacare program that would cover everything.

However, the agreement we are currently discussing, and that the government wants to get signed quickly, includes patent extensions that would make pharmacare even harder and more expensive to implement.

Does my colleague not think that this kind of clause in the agreement with the United States and Mexico will hinder the implementation of a pharmacare program?

[Omar Alghabra, Liberal, Mississauga Centre, ON]

No, Madam Speaker, I disagree with my hon. colleague. We have seen this before. Twenty-five or 30 years ago, the New Democrats were dead set against the original NAFTA. They said the sky was going to fall and that we were going to lose so many jobs. It has been proven that free trade is good for Canadians. Today, once again, they are trying to scare Canadians, again claim that the sky is going to fall and that drugs are going to be so expensive. It is not true. The short answer to her question is no.

[Colin Carrie, Conservative, Oshawa, ON]

Madam Speaker, I want to ask the same question my colleague asked. He was quite right.

I am going to read from an article by Bill Curry on November 19, 2015. This was 13 or 14 months before Mr. Trump was even sworn in. Mr. Obama was in Manila and stated, “We are both soon to be signatories of the TPP agreement.” In other words, as my colleague said, we would not have had these problems if the Liberals had actually moved ahead on it. Mr. Obama was the most progressive president around and now, by doing this, there seems to be no leverage for the outstanding issues, like my colleague said, on steel, softwood lumber and the Buy American clause.

Could the parliamentary secretary please let us know how he is going to resolve those issues now that he has given away this leverage?

[Omar Alghabra, Liberal, Mississauga Centre, ON]

Once again, Madam Speaker, I find it strange. Regardless of what Conservatives think of the TPP, and I disagree with him, the U.S. pulled out of the TPP. The claim is that if we had ratified the TPP, it would have solved so many problems, but the U.S. pulled out the TPP.

To answer his question, I can point to our record. Our Prime Minister, the Minister of International Trade Diversification, the Minister of Intergovernmental and Northern Affairs and Internal Trade and the Minister of Foreign Affairs have proven that we will stand firm to defend Canadian interests and Canadian jobs.

[Paul Manly, Green, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Madam Speaker, it is an honour to stand here today and engage in the debate on NAFTA.

Many of my constituents in Nanaimo—Ladysmith will know that I am very passionate about trade issues and concerned about international trade and investment agreements.

First of all, I want to say that the Green Party of Canada supports trade. We think it is a vital part of our economy. However, what we want to see in trade agreements is respect for environmental regulations, labour standards, health and safety standards, and consumer protections. These things should be increased in trade agreements, the way that the European Union does. Countries that enter the European Union must increase their standards and regulations to meet the highest standards in the union. We think that those kinds of approaches to international trade are important.

About 15 years ago, I was focused on a lot of local issues and worked on films about local water. Somebody had asked me if I knew anything about the Security and Prosperity Partnership, the SPP, and I did not. Therefore, I went off to Ottawa to go to the people summit and learn about the SPP.

I went to Montebello to document the protests that were happening there, and I happened to videotape three police officers who were dressed as radicals with masks on who were attacking their own riot squad. They were unmasked in the process, and all of their boots matched with those of the riot squad. This raised questions for me about why the police would be involved in this kind of incitement, and I have footage of them banging rocks into shields, etc. I wondered why they would be involved in this kind of incitement at a peaceful protest, and they were later proven to be police officers.

I became interested in the Security and Prosperity Partnership and started to dig in. What I found was that in this process there was a deep integration of Canada, the United States and Mexico as part of a fortress North America after 9/11. It also included integration of our regulatory standards. I looked into who was negotiating on behalf of Canada for these regulatory standards. There were 20 corporations for each of three countries, Mexico, the United States and Canada. There were some great Canadian corporations representing Canada in this negotiation process, such as Home Depot Canada, Walmart Canada, Chevron Canada and Ford Canada.

I started to study trade agreements a little more and found that there really was no involvement of civil society in these agreements. These were corporate agreements. Therefore, I really appreciate in this new version of NAFTA that the government has involved labour organizations and environmental organizations as part of the negotiating process, and I see that as progress. This is what we need to be doing in our negotiations on international trade and investment. They cannot just be secretive processes where only the corporations and the bureaucrats are involved. We need people who represent consumers, workers and environmentalists so that we have a fair process that can look at all aspects of trade and make sure that our regulations and standards are protected.

One of the others things I learned working on this film was about investor-state dispute settlements. Chapter 11 in NAFTA was the first time that a developed country had signed on to this process. It was something that the Europeans had used with their former colonial states to kind of keep corporate control over mineral extraction, etc. However, when I looked into Chapter 11, there were cases such as Ethyl Corporation, which got $5 million when Canada blocked the use of MMT, an additive that was a neurotoxin in gasoline. Ethyl Corporation said that it was an unfair trade practice to ban it. There are also things in these investment chapters such as indirect expropriation, and we all know what expropriation is; national treatment; as well as most favoured nation status. These are all things that are used by corporations to challenge our laws and policies. Therefore, I was really happy to see that the investor-state dispute settlement was taken out of the new NAFTA.

Let us look at cases like Bilcon, where a foreign corporation is challenging our environmental assessment process and getting $7 million for doing nothing. It is not a process that makes sense. We see this used as a big stick by mining companies to get developed countries to accept mining and extraction projects.

We need to do something about softwood lumber. That is an important issue in my community.

I am also concerned about the extension of patents for pharmaceuticals from eight years to 10 years for biologics and how that will affect the cost of drugs. We see many people, seniors in particular, who are having to make decisions about what they spend their money on: rent, food or pharmaceuticals.

Article 22, the state-owned chapter, has a carve-out for the Trans Mountain expansion project. That is a concern for me as well.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Anthony Rota]

The hon. member for Nanaimo—Ladysmith will have four minutes coming to him when we come back to the debate later on this evening. He will have five minutes for questions and comments as well.

It being 5:30, the House will now proceed to consideration of Private Members' Business as listed on today's Order Paper.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-100, An Act to implement the Agreement between Canada, the United States of America and the United Mexican States, be read the second time and referred to a committee, and of the amendment.

[The Speaker, Geoff Regan]

The hon. member for Nanaimo—Ladysmith has four minutes remaining in his speech.

[Paul Manly, Green, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to stand again to speak to the new NAFTA. I appreciate the Liberal Party giving me some time to speak about this.

When I left off, I was talking about investor-state dispute settlement and my appreciation that this part of NAFTA was removed. I know it will take three years for it to be completely removed and that some corporations will still be able to use that provision against Canadian laws and policies that get in the way of their profits.

I think it is time to get rid of investor-state provisions in all our trade agreements. It is undemocratic, and it undermines our sovereignty. As we have seen in many cases, such as in Bilcon v. Canada, three arbitration lawyers, whose only interest is keeping the system going, sit in a room and make decisions on our environmental assessment process.

In Bilcon v. Canada, there was a proposed quarry at Digby Neck. The community came out and experts came out and talked about the problems with the quarry. It was an area where the endangered North Atlantic right whales had their calving grounds. There was tourism for whale watching. There was lobster fishing. The community did not want the quarry. When the environmental assessment review panel ruled against Bilcon, after years of environmental assessments, Bilcon was able to take the dispute to a NAFTA panel. Bilcon wanted $470 million. It walked away with $7 million. That is outrageous. Using these kinds of processes to challenge our laws and policies is antithetical to democracy.

Investor-state provisions are being used in developing countries to force through extraction projects or to make developing countries pay through the nose.

A good example of this is Crystallex, a Canadian mining development company. It challenged Venezuela using investor-state provisions after Venezuela decided, on behalf of its indigenous population, that the Crystallex mine would not be in the interest of the indigenous population. It was a threat to the environment. Tenor Capital paid for the arbitration lawyers and invested $30 million. Crystallex ended up getting $1.2 billion in a settlement in this investor-state dispute, and Tenor Capital walked away with a 1,000% return, or $300 million. It is obscene.

I could give members example after example of these kinds of situations. I am glad this is out of NAFTA.

I am also glad to see that the proportionality clause is gone. Under this clause, we had to continue to export the same amount of energy to the United States, on average, as we had in the previous three years.

However, as I was saying earlier, there are a few things that disappoint me about the new NAFTA.

First is the extension of biological patents for pharmaceutical drugs. This is important for products like insulin and for people who have Crohn's disease. People are already struggling with the cost of pharmaceutical drugs. We need drug costs to come down. We must have a national pharmacare program rather than more money for big pharma.

Second is article 22, the carve-out for the Trans Mountain expansion. It looks to me as though it will continue to be a state-owned corporation, which is concerning.

Third is having bovine growth hormone in the American milk and dairy products we will import.

I am thankful for the opportunity to speak to the bill.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I am very proud of the fact that we have had a government in the last three and a half years that has recognized the true value of trade. The trade agreement between Canada and Mexico further supports the fact that Canada is a trading nation. Having these trade agreements helps facilitate and secure markets. That helps Canada's middle class and those aspiring to become a part of it. It helps drive our economy. We are looking for new trade with new nations and with our best friends to the south.

Would the Green Party be in a position at some point in time where it would support a trade agreement or would it be more inclined to take the same approach to trade as the New Democrats?