Bill C-13

An Act to implement the Protocol on the Accession of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership

This enactment implements the Protocol on the Accession of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, done at Auckland and Bandar Seri Begawan on July 16, 2023, by updating how that Agreement is defined or referred to in certain Acts and by amending other Acts to bring them into conformity with Canada’s obligations under that Agreement and Protocol.

An Act to Implement the Protocol on the Accession of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership

[The Deputy Speaker, Tom Kmiec]

I want to remind members using “you” to not speak directly to the member but through the Chair.

The member for Edmonton Southeast.

[Jagsharan Singh Mahal, Conservative, Edmonton Southeast, AB]

Mr. Speaker, we know that the member opposite is famous for twisting myths around to sound like they are real. I said that during Stephen Harper's time, we signed 15 trade agreements with 51 countries. That is a fact. The member does not have anything to refer to saying that my information is incorrect or is not well informed, so I encourage him to come up with the facts and the sources he is relying upon.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague, my almost-neighbour from Edmonton, made a great comment.

One of the issues that has come up a lot today is about the need to reduce red tape. According to StatsCan, as well as the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, there are currently well over 300,000 individual regulations in Canada right now. Of course, here come the Liberals to the rescue, creating another bureaucracy to fight bureaucracy: a department of red tape reduction that employs well over 30 employees. Last year it managed to cut 89 regulations, so we have only 320,900 to go.

I wonder if the member could comment about how the government's focus seems to be on adding bureaucracy rather than reducing bureaucracy and red tape, which would actually get our economy and productivity going.

[Jagsharan Singh Mahal, Conservative, Edmonton Southeast, AB]

Mr. Speaker, that was a wonderful question. My take on the Liberals' stand of adding bureaucracy is that it gives them more airtime to make statements and slogans. If there is less bureaucracy, then time has to be spent on actual results. When we cannot get results, all we have to rely upon are slogans and statements.

[Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot—Acton, QC]

Mr. Speaker, when it comes to trade agreements such as the ones we have just studied in committee, the Conservatives often get all worked up and rightly accuse the government of not knowing how to negotiate. However, by supporting the amendments I proposed, they would have had the opportunity to change that and correct certain mistakes.

Why did the Conservatives not do that, preferring instead to fall obediently into line behind the government in this fine Liberal-Conservative coalition?

[Jagsharan Singh Mahal, Conservative, Edmonton Southeast, AB]

Mr. Speaker, we are supporting the bill, as I said in my speech, with great displeasure. We know that the bill needs further amendments, and we know that there is room for further ratification that needs to be done. I look forward to the Liberal government's making sure that the agreement, when it comes into effect, is balanced for both the U.K. and Canada.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I was actually here when the EU agreement was signed with 27 countries. It was a Liberal government that signed it.

Can the member opposite tell us, does he believe it was a Liberal government that signed the EU agreement, or was it the Conservatives?

[Jagsharan Singh Mahal, Conservative, Edmonton Southeast, AB]

Mr. Speaker, again, if we go into the details, it was the Harper government. It was the Conservative government that laid out all the framework for that agreement to be signed.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to rise today to speak to Bill C-13, legislation that would implement the protocol on the accession of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership. At its core, the bill would update Canadian legislation so the United Kingdom can formally join the CPTPP trade agreement so Canada can meet its obligations under that accession protocol.

I will begin by acknowledging the broader context in which this legislation is being debated.

Canada's economy is deeply tied to international trade, as members are well aware. Millions of jobs in this country depend on exports and on our ability to access global markets. Over the past several years, we have been reminded about how fragile global supply chains can be and how risky it can be for Canada to rely too heavily on a single trading partner. We acknowledge, as New Democrats, that diversifying our trade relationships matters, that strengthening economic co-operation with democratic allies matters, and that building resilient, rules-based trading systems is in Canada's long-term interest.

The United Kingdom is an important partner in that effort. It is a G7 country, one of the world's largest economies and a nation with which Canada shares deep historical ties, cultural connections and long-standing diplomatic relationships. Expanding trade opportunities between Canada and the United Kingdom has the potential to support Canadian exporters, encourage investment and reinforce the global rules-based trading system at a time when that system is facing increasing pressure. It is for those reasons that there is value in strengthening our economic partnership with the United Kingdom.

However, supporting trade diversification does not mean giving the government a blank cheque. Parliament has a responsibility to ensure that trade agreements serve Canadians fairly, protect our public interests and deliver real benefits for workers, farmers and communities across this country. On that front, Bill C-13 raises several important concerns that must be addressed.

The first concern is transparency. Under the Government of Canada's policy on tabling treaties in Parliament, when the government introduces implementing legislation for a new free trade agreement, it is required to table an economic impact assessment outlining the projected costs and benefits of the agreement. This policy exists for a simple reason, which is that members of Parliament cannot make informed decisions about trade agreements without understanding their economic implications.

The requirement was introduced after repeated calls for greater transparency in trade negotiations. In fact, in 2020, the government committed to strengthening parliamentary oversight of trade agreements by ensuring that economic impact assessments would accompany implementing legislation. However, in the case of Bill C-13, no economic impact assessment has been tabled. This undermines accountability and weakens the ability of the House to properly scrutinize the agreement before us.

The second concern we have relates to the ongoing barriers faced by Canadian agricultural producers in accessing the United Kingdom market. For years, and we heard this in the House today repeatedly, Canadian beef and pork producers have raised concerns about the United Kingdom's sanitary and phytosanitary regulations. These rules relate to food safety and to animal and plant health, but in practice, they function as non-tariff barriers that prevent Canadian products from entering the U.K. market.

Despite years of discussions, consultations and negotiations, these barriers remain largely unchanged. This needs to be fixed. The result is a trading relationship that is far from reciprocal. In fact, the numbers tell a very clear story: There were no Canadian beef exports to the United Kingdom in 2024 and none in 2025. At the same time, imports of U.K. beef into Canada have increased significantly. They rose from $16.6 million in 2023 to $42.5 million in 2024, representing an increase of more than 150% in a single year. This is not the outcome Canadian producers were promised when the negotiations began.

Organizations representing Canada's agricultural sector, including the Canadian Cattle Association, the Canadian Pork Council and the Canadian Meat Council, have all raised serious concerns about the lack of meaningful market access. They need to be consulted.

Canadian farmers and ranchers operate under some of the highest food safety standards in the world. They produce high-quality products that are competitive in markets around the globe, and they deserve fair and reciprocal access to markets, especially when Canada is opening its own market to imports. Without meaningful access to the U.K. market, the benefits of this agreement will remain limited for many Canadian producers.

The third concern relates to investor-state dispute settlement provisions, commonly known as ISDS. These provisions allow foreign investors to challenge government policies through international arbitration if they believe those policies harm their investments. Under NAFTA, Canada faced numerous ISDS claims from foreign investors. More than 60% of the cases filed against Canada under NAFTA were linked to environmental or natural resource measures. That is deeply concerning.

These experiences raise serious questions about the impact of ISDS provisions on the government's ability to regulate in the public interest. That is one of the reasons Canada removed the ISDS from the renegotiated Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement, CUSMA.

In the case of Bill C-13, the government has not secured a side letter with the United Kingdom to exclude ISDS provisions between our two countries. This is particularly puzzling because the United Kingdom has already signed such side letters with Australia and New Zealand in their agreements. Canada could have negotiated the same arrangement, and we hope it will. Instead, these provisions remain in place.

A coalition of civil society organizations, labour unions and academics from both Canada and the United Kingdom has called on the government to remove ISDS protections from this agreement. We are hoping that the government will act. If Canada has already recognized these risks in other agreements, then it is reasonable to expect the government to address them here as well.

We have heard a lot today that there is another issue connected to Canada's relationship with the United Kingdom that deserves attention in this debate. It is a decades-long issue of fairness that affects tens of thousands of seniors living here in Canada. I am referring to the problem of frozen British pensions. At the outset, I want to thank Ian Andexser from Nanaimo, the chair of the Canadian Alliance of British Pensioners, for his leadership on this issue, as well as all those who are members of that organization.

More than 100,000 British pensioners live in Canada and receive a state pension from the United Kingdom. Those pensions are frozen at the rate the pensioners first received when they retired or when they moved abroad. For over 70 years, unlike British pensioners living in the United States, Israel, Turkey, the Philippines, the European Union or several other countries, British pensioners here in Canada do not receive annual cost of living increases. This is unfair.

Canada itself does not treat pensioners this way when they move overseas. Whether a Canadian retiree lives in Vancouver, in London, or in Sydney, Australia, their CPP benefits continue to increase with inflation. The U.K.'s policy stands in stark contrast to that. The consequences are very real for many seniors. As inflation rises and living costs increase, the purchasing power of frozen pensions declines year after year.

Some seniors are struggling to afford basic necessities such as food, heating and medication. I think about Anne Puckridge, a 100-year-old veteran, who is receiving literally less than half of her pension because she chose to retire in Canada. While pensioners in the U.K. receive 176 pounds a week, the freeze means she is getting only 72 pounds a week. Like Anne, many were unaware of this policy before they moved to Canada. We know that a third of women who are over the age of 65 in this country are living in poverty.

People like Anne who spent decades contributing to the U.K. pension system, believing their retirement income would follow them wherever they chose to live, which it should have, have instead discovered too late that their pension would never increase. Because these pensions remain frozen, many seniors eventually rely on Canadian income support programs, including the guaranteed income supplement. In effect, Canadian taxpayers end up helping to fill the gap created by the U.K. government's policy. Estimates suggest this situation costs Canada hundreds of millions of dollars a year.

Successive Canadian governments have raised this issue with the United Kingdom repeatedly, and each time the U.K. has declined. That raises an important question: If Canada is strengthening trade relations with the United Kingdom and deepening our economic partnership through agreements like this one, why is this long-standing injustice not being addressed as part of those negotiations? Trade negotiations are moments of leverage. They provide opportunities to resolve long-standing disputes and secure fair outcomes exactly like this one, yet once again the government appears to have failed to use that leverage.

Bill C-13 represents an important step in Canada's trade relationship with the United Kingdom. Trade diversification matters. Building stronger partnerships with trusted allies matters. Strengthening the global trading system matters, but Parliament must ensure these agreements are fair, transparent and in the public interest.

This means providing the economic analysis needed for informed decision-making. It means ensuring Canadian producers receive meaningful access to international markets. It means protecting democratic policy-making by addressing problematic investor-state dispute resolution settlement provisions, and it means standing up for fairness for the tens of thousands of seniors in Canada affected by the U.K.'s frozen pension policy.

Trade agreements should reflect more than economic opportunity. They should reflect fairness, reciprocity and respect for the people whose lives are shaped by these policies.

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

Mr. Speaker, the issue of non-tariff restrictions has come up a great deal throughout the debate. It is important to put it into the perspective that, unfortunately, even within provinces we have non-tariff-related restrictions that hamper freer trade among Canada. The federal government is working on that.

Unfortunately, there are the same sorts of restrictions, whether it is with the EU or the U.K. For example, whether someone is a pork producer or cattle producer here in Canada or the United States, there are restrictions overseas that create those non-trade barriers and cause restrictions. The government will continue to work on that, but we still support the need to have this particular agreement.

Does the member actually support the principle of trade and this specific agreement?

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Mr. Speaker, as I outlined at the beginning, we of course support trade, and we put conditions on how we support trade. It cannot be a blank cheque from the government. We also believe in reciprocity. We outlined, regarding the pork producers and the beef producers, that it is not reciprocal. These countries are getting access to our market, but we are not getting the same access to their markets. That is unfair. That actually has to be addressed when we negotiate. Of course, there are issues outside of this that we need to have at the table, like the British pension issue that I talked about. These issues all need to be part of the conversation, but we need to make sure it is fair.

[Alexis Deschênes, Bloc, Gaspésie—Les Îles-de-la-Madeleine—Listuguj, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I think we share a lot of the same concerns about Bill C-13.

My question is about investor-state dispute settlement and the tension between our legitimate need to ensure national sovereignty, in other words, that everyone who does business here is working within the same laws, and this kind of parallel mechanism that international trade agreements often tend to put in place.

What are my colleague's thoughts about this mechanism that will allow investors from the United Kingdom to bypass our courts and our common law systems by going directly to an arbitration mechanism?

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague from the Bloc raises a really important point. It is something I hopefully addressed, for the most part, in my speech, but he is absolutely right. This exposes Canada when it comes to the environment and when it comes to sovereignty here at home. We were able to get those ISDS, or investor-state dispute settlement, provisions removed from CUSMA. It should be something we could also negotiate in this agreement. I do not understand why the government is not putting that in as part of this agreement. I am glad to see the Bloc and the New Democrats advocating for this, so that this is dealt with and there is a responsible way forward when it comes to Bill C-13.

[Tako Van Popta, Conservative, Langley Township—Fraser Heights, BC]

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-13 is about bringing the United Kingdom into the comprehensive trade agreement with the Pacific. The member for Courtenay—Alberni mentioned frozen pensions for U.K. pensioners who decide to retire here in Canada. It seems deeply unfair, particularly since the U.K. does not do that for other countries like the United States. As a matter of fact, it seems to be picking on Commonwealth countries. This agreement seems like the perfect opportunity to resolve that problem, yet the Prime Minister has failed to do that.

I would like to hear the member's comments on what that says about the Prime Minister's ability, or perhaps lack thereof, to negotiate good deals for Canada.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Mr. Speaker, like I said earlier, U.K. pensioners living in the United States, Israel, Turkey, the Philippines and the European Union are actually not penalized like this. Their pensions are not frozen. They are indexed, just like our pensions are for Canadians who are retiring abroad. However, for some reason, Canada has not been able to get an agreement with the U.K. The Prime Minister supposedly has this great relationship with the U.K. He should be able to negotiate this unfairness and this unjust policy by the U.K. government.

Like I said earlier, a third of Canadian women over the age of 65 are living in poverty. This is absolutely a critical step to addressing that and this injustice. I hope that the government will take it seriously. This is an opportune moment, when it comes to a trade agreement, to address irritants like this that are impacting the lives of British citizens who are living here in Canada.