I think that provides Canada with a great opportunity, in fact, to be planning and figuring out longer-term agendas. None of our trade agreement negotiations have gone quickly. I did my Ph.D. thesis—actually, Chris did too—on the Canada-U.S. auto pact. It took a really long time and involved many false starts, but that piece of forward-looking trade and industrial policy still continues to shape the way we do business in the auto sector 51 years later. I think we have been given a bit of an opportunity to think and plan and find a leadership role.
At the same time, Canada has its own things to look after. I was delighted that last week the interprovincial trade agreement was released. It has some very good things in it, but it could be better—exclusion of wine and spirits, for example; there's a lot of room for work there. On softwood lumber, it's very difficult to come to a resolution when the four provincial entities that are most involved in the negotiation have different policies and different perspectives. It's very easy for the U.S. to pick Canada off.
Similarly, even though Chris and I are violently in agreement on almost everything, I'm going to depart a little bit on China. Canada can no longer continue to focus on just one market and just one economy, and the economic benefits for Canada with China, particularly in the agrifood sector with canola, are so significant that it is worth the risk of embarking on those negotiations independently.
I affirm that there's a risk. China does not play by recognizable international trade rules; the asymmetry is huge. At the same time, China is easier to work with when you're within a rules-based framework than outside a rules-based framework. I commend Canada for having a conversation with China about increasing the rigour and the scope of the rules that govern our bilateral trade. I would hope, as Chris warns, that this process is a way to feed and support North American trade, much as Canada's early negotiations with the European Union helped to condition the negotiations the U.S. is I think continuing to have on its free trade agreement with the EU.