Evidence of meeting #11 for Economic Relationship between Canada and the United States in the 43rd Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was workers.
A video is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Bloc
Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay Bloc Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I'll probably go back to my previous question. I think Mr. Strickland answered the first question and told me that I could come back to the second. So that's what I'll do.
Should we adopt the equivalent of the Buy American Act or something similar, if possible? Clearly, every economy is unique to its country. Therefore, we would probably not have the authority to adopt a copy-and-paste version of the Buy American Act in Canada.
But could we possibly pass some sort of legislation that would put our businesses first? Could we also pass something similar to the Small Business Act that would put SMEs first?
In short, would it be possible for us to have a purchasing and contracting policy that would allow us to give priority to Canadian and Quebec companies?
Executive Director, Canada's Building Trades Unions
I think there's certainly room for that kind of conversation. I do know, for example, that on many large infrastructure projects with federal funding there are buy Canadian requirements, particularly on transit projects and so on.
Further to Jerry's point, I think anything that can support the reindustrialization of Canada is a good thing. For construction workers, we do all the maintenance in all of these automotive plants and steel plants, so we have a vested interest in the reindustrialization of Canada as well. I think there's room for that.
Of course, as you know, MP Simon-Pierre, when we're dealing with the U.S. we're dealing with the largest economy in the world. We talk about China, but the U.S. is still the largest economy in the world. We have to be very careful about what kind of practices we put into place so as not to jeopardize that relationship. For over 100 years there has been a pattern of very colourful and windy relationships when it comes to trade with our U.S. counterparts.
To answer your question, I think there's room for that discussion. We can look at things that are in place already and maybe amplify it, but we have to be cautious not to jeopardize the overall relationship.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Raj Saini
Thank you, Mr. Savard-Tremblay.
For the final questions, we'll go to Mr. Green for two and a half minutes, please.
NDP
Matthew Green NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
Thank you.
I just want to say that I share the observations of Mr. Dias about our $100-billion COVID recovery opportunity and certainly share his perspectives. He referenced 2009—
The Clerk of the Committee Ms. Erica Pereira
I'm sorry to interrupt, Mr. Green. Could you please lower your microphone?
NDP
NDP
Matthew Green NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
I just wanted to say that I noted and shared the observations of Mr. Dias that we do have a $100-billion opportunity here before us in COVID recovery. When he talked about 2009, he joined, I would imagine, a group of labour and civil society organizations on a joint statement about public procurement—this is not new—and they talked about the recession at that time, that it was justified for that type of taxpayer-funded stimulus.
Mr. Dias, you referenced that Canada makes up only 4% of U.S. contracts. I'd be interested to know if you know what the reverse is in terms of the percentage of American procurement on Canadian projects. Would you care to comment on what would be some of the advantages and disadvantages for Canadian firms and workers if we were to attach buy Canadian conditions to the $100-billion COVID recovery for funding of domestic public infrastructure projects?
National President, Unifor
That's a heck of a question.
The 4% that Canada had won in 2015 was of the contracts that were awarded outside the U.S. It was $700 million, period, which is two-fifths of nothing. We've never had this huge amount of money that was ever really sourced for federal contracts.
The way the U.S. works—and you know this—is that the majority of the money goes from the federal government to the states, and so the WTO rules don't kick in as they relate to the individual states' procurements. That's how we end up getting shut out.
But the bottom line is that we have to concentrate on what we can control, and we can't control the Biden administration's determination to buy American. Ultimately, and I said it earlier, he is going to wrestle back the narrative from the Trump administration, so I see it getting worse before it gets better. We have to deal with that simple reality.
What can we control? We can control $100 billion worth, period. So we need to make sure that we put about $100 billion worth of government procurement into keeping Canadians employed. The fact that we spent a billion dollars to have trains for Via built in California by Siemens makes absolutely no sense. Those are the types of mistakes we've made. We've always inherited this boy scout attitude. If you take a look at the Canadian content provisions in transit, they're much lower than they are in the United States. Why? It doesn't make any sense to me.
If the U.S. is going to have a 70% content, why in the world can't we have a 70% content here in Canada? We need to play by the same rules as others.
NDP
Matthew Green NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
Rest assured, sir, I'm no boy scout, so we're good on that end.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Raj Saini
Thank you, Mr. Green. I appreciate that.
I want to thank the witnesses in no particular order except for how they appear on my screen: Mr. DiCaro, Mr. Neumann, Ms. Gingrich, Mr. Strickland, Mr. Dias, and I guess that's it.
Thank you all very much for taking the time to meet with us on this Thursday evening. I extend my deep appreciation to you for enlightening us on this issue and helping us with our deliberations during this study. Everybody have a great weekend.
The meeting is adjourned.
