Bill C-57

Canada-Ukraine Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, 2023

An Act to implement the 2023 Free Trade Agreement between Canada and Ukraine

This enactment implements the Canada–Ukraine Free Trade Agreement, done at Ottawa on September 22, 2023.
Among other things, the enactment
(a) sets out rules of interpretation;
(b) specifies that no recourse is to be taken on the basis of sections 9 to 15 or any order made under those sections, or on the basis of the provisions of that Agreement, without the consent of the Attorney General of Canada;
(c) approves that Agreement;
(d) provides for the payment by Canada of its share of the expenditures associated with the operation of the institutional and administrative aspects of that Agreement;
(e) gives the Governor in Council the power to make orders in accordance with that Agreement;
(f) requires the Minister for International Trade to ensure that Canadian companies operating in Ukraine comply with the principles and guidelines referred to in the Agreement; and
(g) amends certain Acts to give effect to Canada’s obligations under that Agreement.
Finally, the enactment repeals the Canada–Ukraine Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act that was enacted in 2017.

Canada Labour Code

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

Mr. Speaker, we do extend our most sincere condolences to the member and his family.

It is interesting trying to draw Conservatives out on how they are going to vote. Here we have labour and others who want to see this legislation pass to committee. I have listened closely to the member opposite, and I cannot tell exactly what the Conservative Party is going to do on this. This is Bill C-58.

Just last week, we had debate on Bill C-57, the Canada-Ukraine trade agreement. The Ukrainian heritage community was very excited about that legislation and wanted the House to pass that legislation. Like today, we were left wondering why it was that the Conservative Party did not seem to support Ukraine.

Can the member give a clear indication as to why he voted against the Canada-Ukraine trade agreement?

Government Business No. 30—Proceedings on Bill C-56

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

Madam Speaker, I would like to ask you to remind the member of the bill we are talking about today. It is Bill C-56. I believe he is talking about Bill C-57, which was passed—

International Trade

[Mona Fortier, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my question has to do with Bill C‑57. Russia's invasion of Ukraine has cost thousands of people their lives, and it continues to jeopardize the stability of the entire region and the world.

Unfortunately, this week, the leader of the official opposition and the Conservative members voted against the free trade agreement between Canada and Ukraine. We are talking about an agreement that the President of Ukraine clearly indicated would serve as a basis for rebuilding Ukraine. The Conservatives have turned their backs on Ukraine and democracy; they have embraced Russian propaganda.

I would ask the Minister of Finance to reaffirm Canada's strong support for Ukraine.

Canada-Ukraine Free Trade Agreement

[Terry Duguid, Liberal, Winnipeg South, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am profoundly disappointed that the Leader of the Opposition has forced his Conservative caucus to betray the people of Ukraine in voting against Bill C-57, the Canada-Ukraine free trade agreement.

This agreement represents a commitment to shared values and democratic principles and is a crucial step toward strengthening prosperity for both Canada and Ukraine.

It is a bill that should have been supported unanimously, to show our solidarity with Ukraine and our commitment to help them rebuild as they fight a brutal and illegal invasion by Russia. Our government will always prioritize the best interests of all Canadians and recognize that trade agreements are not obstacles but bridges to a more prosperous and interconnected future.

The vote on Bill C-57 is the clearest demonstration yet that, when it comes to standing in solidarity with the people of Ukraine, the Conservative Party cannot be trusted. It is not worth the risk.

Slava Ukraini.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

I think it's important that we deal with the issue, and I cannot stay beyond one o'clock.

Mr. Seeback has introduced a motion.

Is there any further debate on the motion?

Not seeing any debate, we'll read out the motion again:

That the committee recommend to the House that it be granted the power during its consideration of Bill C-57, An Act to implement the 2023 Free Trade Agreement between Canada and Ukraine; in light of the fact that the Liberal Government granted a waiver exemption to allow for the export of a turbine from Canada that was then used to export Russian gas; to expand the scope of the study of the Bill in order to facilitate Canadian LNG and other energy expertise to further assist Ukraine; and to support expanded munitions production in Canada; and increasing munition and weapons exports to Ukraine and support the development of weapons and munitions manufacturing capabilities in Ukraine by Canadian industry.

We will have a vote.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I have a motion that I would like to move.

Madam Clerk, would you please distribute that motion to the committee?

I move:

That the committee recommend to the House that it be granted the power during its consideration of Bill C-57, An Act to implement the 2023 Free Trade Agreement between Canada and Ukraine; in light of the fact that the Liberal Government granted a waiver exemption to allow for the export of a turbine from Canada that was then used to export Russian gas; to expand the scope of the study of the Bill in order to facilitate Canadian LNG and other energy expertise to further assist Ukraine; and to support expanded munitions production in Canada; and increasing munition and weapons exports to Ukraine and support the development of weapons and munitions manufacturing capabilities in Ukraine by Canadian industry.

I'd now like to speak to that motion, Madam Chair.

We are in a situation where certain members of the government are suggesting that Conservative members do not support Ukraine because we have a principled objection to certain things that are contained within the free trade agreement, one of which is a price on carbon, which is not in any of our other existing free trade agreements, and is, in fact, not in any free trade agreement Ukraine has ever signed. It's the first time it's ever been in that.

We think that there are many ways that this trade agreement could be enhanced to help Ukraine in the middle of the war, so I'm going to start with this first of all.

We are being told that we are hurting Ukraine by voting against a bad trade deal. What, in fact, has happened is that this Liberal government granted a waiver exemption to allow for the export of a gas turbine that was used to transport Russian gas. Think about that for a second. What funds Putin's war machine? What helps fund his war, his illegal, outrageous and barbaric war in Ukraine? It's gas, the revenues Russia gets from the sale of gas.

The Liberal government granted a waiver to export a turbine to help them do it. Then they have the audacity to say that we are hurting Ukraine on a vote that was inconsequential, because this bill has been referred to the committee. It's here. I don't know if Liberal members know that, but the free trade agreement is here at committee. The vote didn't hurt anything.

We are His Majesty's loyal opposition. We get to oppose bad pieces of legislation or bad trade agreements. When you insert a carbon tax, carbon price or carbon leakage into a trade agreement for the first time, we get to object, which is what we've done. It doesn't hurt Ukraine. The deal came to committee. The deal's most likely going to pass the House—the other parties are supporting it—because they all also have a carbon price—carbon tax—obsession. All the parties in the House of Commons are obsessed with taxing Canadians through carbon into poverty.

I agree that trade deals are about exports. Let's import and let's export, but you know what we shouldn't export? The misery of the carbon tax, the misery of the carbon tax that has two million Canadians going to a food bank in one month alone. Never in the history of Canada has this happened. Seven million Canadians are now cutting back on food because they can't afford to eat. We just heard from the pork producers, and the carbon tax is making pork more expensive. Why? They have to heat their barns. This can cost tens of thousands of dollars in carbon tax every single month. We should not be exporting that.

What's amazing is that the foreign affairs committee did a report in February 2023 wherein they recommended that there not be a waiver granted to Siemens to export that turbine. Guess what. The government did it anyway. When you look at what's hurt Ukraine, what's hurt Ukraine was exporting that turbine to give some more blood money to Vladimir Putin in his war.

There's a real opportunity here, Madam Chair. One of the things that Ukraine desperately needs is energy security in this war, and there's an article here, a very well-researched article on the issue, and one of the things it says right in the article is:

As Ukraine rebuilds and adapts to a new geopolitical reality, achieving energy security will be instrumental to put the country back on its feet—

What is not included in this free trade agreement is anything on LNG co-operation or energy security co-operation. This motion is going to allow us to expand the scope of the review of this to include these things. If Liberals actually want to make up for the fact that they exported a turbine that helped Vladimir Putin, they can now vote to expand the scope of this bill to allow for there to be chapters on energy security and LNG co-operation, which will actually help Ukraine.

The second part of this motion is with respect to munitions and weapons. Let me tell you this. Canada has not increased its exports of munitions to Ukraine from day one. Three thousand shells a month is where they started, and 3,000 is where we are today. There has been no increase whatsoever. Ukraine goes through 6,000 shells a day, every day. We are not increasing our exports of these. That should be something in this agreement.

How do we co-operate to increase the number of shells available to Ukraine? There's actually a formula in war. The number of artillery shells you can use reduces the number of lives you lose on the battlefield. By voting for this we are going to find a way to increase Canadian exports of munitions, which will directly benefit the Ukrainian armed forces and save Ukrainian lives, as opposed to exporting a turbine, which helped Vladimir Putin.

We could also absolutely be helping with weapons. In fact, in March of 2022 there was a Conservative proposal that we would send decommissioned LAVs to Ukraine to help in the war. Guess where they ended up. It was on the scrap heap. The Conservatives recommended exporting three hundred fighting vehicles to Ukraine to help them in the war. The Liberal government did not do that.

Madam Chair, the Liberals have a chance to redeem themselves. A similar motion came to this committee, and all Liberals voted against it. I was prepared to move a motion like this on the floor of the House of Commons today, but—guess what—you had to put it on notice. They played a little procedural game so the motion wouldn't be able to be debated today. The rubber hits the road today, Madam Chair.

Will these Liberals actually do something to help Ukraine or will they vote this down again?

I expect that's what they will do, because they're all talk and no action.

Consideration of Government Business No. 30

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. In light of the member's comments saying that he apparently wants to do more for Ukraine, I wonder if there would be unanimous consent for the adoption of a motion put on notice by the member for Dufferin—Caledon, which is that there be an instruction to the Standing Committee on International Trade that, during its consideration of Bill C-57, an act to implement the 2023 free trade agreement between Canada and Ukraine, the committee be granted the power to expand the scope of the bill in order to support expanded munitions production in Canada and increasing munitions exports to Ukraine, and support the development of weapons and munitions manufacturing capabilities in Ukraine by Canadian industry.

I hope there would be unanimous consent for the adoption of that motion so that we could move forward.

[The Chair (Hon. Judy A. Sgro (Humber River—Black Creek, Lib.)), Liberal, Judy Sgro]

I'm calling the meeting to order.

This is meeting number 83 of the Standing Committee on International Trade.

Today's meeting is taking place in a hybrid format, pursuant to the Standing Orders. Therefore, members are attending in person in the room and remotely using the Zoom application.

I need to make a few comments for the benefit of witnesses and members.

Please wait until I recognize you by name before speaking. For those online, please mute yourself when you are not speaking. As a reminder, all comments should be addressed through the chair. If any technical issues arise, please inform me immediately. We may need to suspend in order to deal with any issues. I ask that all participants be careful when handling the earpieces in order to prevent feedback.

I need to remind members, as well, that the deadline to submit amendments to Bill C-57 is this coming Friday by noon. Amendments must be submitted to the clerk in writing. The legislative counsel, Penny Becklumb, is available to assist members to ensure that the amendments are properly drafted.

Welcome to our witnesses. Thank you for coming in a few minutes earlier. It's very much appreciated.

Today we have, from the Canadian Pork Council, René Roy, chair, and Stephen Heckbert, executive director, by video conference. From Finica Food Specialties Limited, a friend of the committee who has been here before, we have Joe Dal Ferro, the president. From United Steelworkers Union, we have George Soule, legislative staff representative. Welcome to you all.

We will start with opening remarks of up to five minutes and then we will proceed with questions.

Mr. Roy and Mr. Heckbert, I invite you to make an opening statement of up to five minutes, please.

Canada-Ukraine Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, 2023

[The Speaker, Liberal, Greg Fergus]

It being 3:20 p.m., the House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded division on the motion at second reading stage of Bill C-57.

Call in the members.

The House resumed from November 20, 2023, consideration of the motion that Bill C-57, An Act to implement the 2023 Free Trade Agreement between Canada and Ukraine, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

To our witnesses, you are free to leave at any time, or you can remain on until we go into committee business, if you like. We are going to deal with....

Thank you, Mr. Trew.

I apologize to the witnesses, but the committee is doing important work. Sometimes it goes in a different direction, but it's all going to the same place.

I'm going to read this out, so we make sure that it's clearly understood. It reads:

That the committee recommend to the House that it be granted the power during its consideration of Bill C-57, An Act to implement the 2023 Free Trade Agreement between Canada and Ukraine, to expand the scope of the study of the bill in order to support expanded munitions production in Canada and increasing munitions exports to Ukraine and support the development of weapons and munitions manufacturing capabilities in Ukraine by Canadian industry.

Mr. Seeback has asked for a recorded vote.

(Motion negatived: nays 7; yeas 4)

Thank you very much.

We will now go into committee business. We will need to suspend for approximately 10 minutes, because we have translators who are doing it remotely and they require a 10-minute adjournment, possibly.

We will suspend for a few minutes.

[Proceedings continue in camera]

[Maninder Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton East, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

We've heard from multiple parties that this is intended to delay Bill C-57, the support that Ukraine and the ambassador asked for. I think it's important to put that on the record. I think it's clear where our party stands, and we should vote today.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Mr. Miao, before you speak, I just want to make sure that everybody is clear on what the motion says. It says:

That the committee recommend to the House that it be granted

—it being the committee—

the power during its consideration of Bill C-57, An Act to implement the 2023 Free Trade Agreement between Canada and Ukraine, to expand the scope of the study of the bill in order to support expanded munitions production in Canada and increasing munitions exports to Ukraine and support the development of weapons and munitions manufacturing capabilities in Ukraine by Canadian industry.

I just want to make sure that everybody is clear on what it says. It asks the House to grant the committee the power during its consideration to expand the scope.

It's a motion that would go to the House for adoption by the House, so the committee would then be able to expand the scope. I just want to make sure that everybody is clear on what it is going to accomplish.

Go ahead, Mr. Miao.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I appreciate the opportunity to speak today at the trade committee on this important motion to support our allies in Ukraine in their fight for freedom and victory, which undertakes to allow amendments to this bill that would support the expansion of munitions exports to Ukraine.

When it comes to discussions about Ukraine, we see a lot of instances of what has come to be called “performative allyship”—people wanting to show they're on Ukraine's side but not actually focusing on the things Ukraine needs most. Ukrainians are not asking for a carbon tax. Ukrainians are asking for weapons. Ukraine needs to win this war. That means they need the munitions and equipment that, in many cases, Canada could make available, in order to allow them to secure victory.

There is nothing currently in Bill C-57 that deals with munitions exports. Conservatives are preparing substantial, serious amendments to this legislation that would make the sale of vital munitions to Ukraine much easier. This would have a concrete impact in terms of helping the Ukrainian people win this war. Again, we need to put aside the performative allyship and focus instead on the things Ukraine really needs, which are weapons, munitions and materiel that will concretely allow them to achieve victory as soon as possible.

I would like to see the same review standards for arms exports that apply to our existing NATO partners applied to Ukraine. This is currently not the case. There are different review standards subject to so-called “open-policy” countries—easier review standards than those applied to Ukraine. We should be applying as little red tape as possible to munitions exports to Ukraine, so weapons get there as quickly as possible. We can be supplying surplus military equipment that we're not using here in Canada to Ukraine and, in the process, use this as an opportunity to modernize our own equipment.

We should be encouraging EDC and BDC to support efforts by Canadian defence manufacturers to partner with Ukraine's defence industry. We should be making long-term commitments to defence productions that will allow us not only to develop the munitions vital for our own security here but also to support Ukraine.

Let's focus on victory for Ukraine. Victory for Ukraine means weapons. It means munitions. It means helping Ukraine get the equipment it needs. This motion would allow us to expand the scope of amendments that can be made to Bill C-57, so we can include that critical content around munitions development and exports to help Ukraine win the war.

This is what matters for Ukraine. This is where the rubber hits the road. This will be an important test if the committee is prepared to focus on meeting Ukraine's needs instead of simply using a trade deal to talk about the carbon tax. Let's focus on what Ukraine really needs, which is urgently getting munitions in the hands of the Ukrainian people, so they can effectively continue to defend themselves.

Thank you.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

With that in mind, Madam Chair, I'm now going to move a motion. I've given a copy of the motion to the clerk. Could the clerk distribute that motion now?

I'm going to move:

That the committee recommend to the House that it be granted the power during its consideration of Bill C-57, An Act to implement the 2023 Free Trade Agreement between Canada and Ukraine, to expand the scope of the study of the bill in order to support expanded munitions production in Canada and increasing munitions exports to Ukraine and support the development of weapons and munitions manufacturing capabilities in Ukraine by Canadian industry.

Madam Chair, as we have heard throughout the prestudy of this legislation, the government has choices to make on what it includes in trade agreements.

As I was saying in my question, you can add things into trade agreements that we've never seen before. For example, in this trade agreement, there are references to carbon pricing and carbon leakage. There are references to the United Nations sustainable development goals. These are things that have never been put into a trade agreement between Canada and any of its trading partners.

Obviously, the government gets to make choices. The government can say that it is going to have this new type of trade agreement and that it's going to put certain things into this trade agreement that have never been put into a trade agreement before.

If you're doing that, Madam Chair, then you actually have the ability to put other things into a trade agreement that you've never put into a trade agreement. You can't have one or the other. If you're putting new things in, you can put other new things in.

What we've heard repeatedly at this committee from witnesses is that there are things that could have been included in this trade agreement that would have been beneficial to Ukraine during this time of war. For example, we've talked about LNG. Ukraine has the third-largest proven LNG reserves in Europe. The further development of those could certainly defund Putin's war machine.

Conservatives think that should absolutely have been included in the trade agreement. If you're including some things in a trade agreement, like carbon pricing and carbon leakage, you can include other things in a trade agreement, like the development of LNG reserves.

This government made a clear choice to put carbon taxes and carbon leakage into a trade agreement for a country in the middle of a war, as opposed to putting in something that could actually help them in the war, which is LNG development or—and I now turn to my motion—expanded munitions production in Canada and increased munitions exports to Ukraine.

In the course of this war, an incredible quantity of munitions is being expended by Ukraine in the defence of its country—a valiant defence, I might add. No one thought Ukraine would be able to stop the second-largest military in the world. They've done it heroically and they've done it with the challenge of having enough artillery munitions and other munitions to defend their country and in fact perform counterattacks.

Therefore, I say we should take the time at this committee to expand the scope of what we're doing to include not just.... I'm not going to go down the road of LNG, energy co-operation and other things which, quite frankly, I think we should expand the scope to look at. I'm going to narrowly focus this motion today on munitions production in Canada. We should be increasing munitions production so that we can export to Ukraine and increase those exports. We should also be thinking about how we could help Ukraine itself increase its munitions production.

I think this is something we should be doing at the committee. We should expand the scope of what we're studying to add things like this into our study.

Thank you, Madam Chair.