International Trade Committee on Nov. 7th, 2006

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Thank you, Mr. Menzies.

Monsieur LeBlanc.

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

Mr. Chairman, Mr. Menzies has correctly described the Maritime Lumber Bureau's concern with respect to this clause. They simply want to make sure the language of the legislation correctly reflects the language of the agreement. You will note that the Maritime Lumber Bureau's amendment uses exactly the same wording as the first Liberal amendment, L-1. Obviously, if this amendment to clause 10 is passed—and we certainly support it in its entirety—then L-1 would be withdrawn because it is identical to CPC-1 by Mr. Casey.

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Mr. Menzies.

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

Speaking on behalf of Mr. Casey, I'm sure we would accept that, as both are representing Maritime lumber interests.

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Very good.

Mr. Julian.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Chair, we're speaking to CPC-1 on page 5, which changes subclause 10(1). What Mr. Menzies' introduction was referring to wasn't clear. Since he had spoken some time before, it is important to clarify that. He is speaking to the amendment that says “Subject to the exclusions provided for in subsection 10.1(1), every person who exports a soft-”.... Is that the amendment he is speaking to?

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

It is indeed.

And your time has been running for 30 seconds, Mr. Julian.

Go ahead.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

I'm aware of that, Mr. Chair.

I like to clarify these things, even if you do punish members who ask questions of the panel or who ask questions of you for clarification. This is legislation that has enormous consequences. We've seen that in clause 6. I think it is to the shame of the committee that 11 of the 12 members did not understand what they were voting on, that essentially what we were doing is taking the legal victories that we had and turning them around into legal language that is actually a net loss for Canada.

When we go to clause 10, Mr. Chair, the NDP has been supporting for some time the Maritime exclusion. We were surprised and dismayed that in the drafting of this bill, as with the other errors that we have already seen in clause 6, an egregious error, clause 10 was very clearly a massive drafting error. There is no doubt about that, in the same way the softwood sellout was done rapidly and poorly and resulted in strong capitulation.

We see in Bill C-24 that the drafting was done so rapidly that the Maritime exclusion became a nil-level exemption. It was something that could have come back later on, because it was included within the text of Bill C-24. And because of the vagueness of the language, it could come back to bite the Maritime lumber industry significantly. So, Mr. Chair, there is no doubt that this needs to be substantially amended; it needs to be fixed.

The problem we're having as a committee, Mr. Chair, is that this is only one of a whole host of problems that exist and that the members of the lumber community want to see addressed. The problem is, Mr. Chair, as a committee we're not hearing from any of those. We've had one day of witnesses, and once those witnesses started to raise these serious concerns, the committee shut down any possibility of having other interventions. Again this morning, with the first nations, shut them down. We don't want to hear from them.

The Maritime lumber exclusion is only one of a host of problems with Bill C-24.

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Mr. Julian, your time is up.

Is there any other debate on this amendment?

We will go to the recorded division on this amendment. It is amendment CPC-1, on page 5 of our amendment booklet.

I call the question.

[Helena Guergis, Conservative, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

I abstain.

(Amendment agreed to: yeas 10; nays 0 [See Minutes of Proceedings])

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Okay, Mr. Julian. The Liberal amendment has been withdrawn. Amendment NDP-4, which is on page 7 of our amendment booklet...would you like to move that, Mr. Julian, or do you want to skip over it?

Mr. Julian, you are correct. We'll come back to your amendment when we're through the grouping here. So we will now go to the amendment on page 6.

Yes, Mr. Julian, on a point of order.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

We may have our differences sometimes, but you were bang on in calling amendment NDP-4, because that is the next amendment that is up. We then move from there to Mr. Casey's and Mr. LeBlanc's amendments, but NDP-4 is the next amendment up. You're absolutely right.

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Mr. Julian, because the Liberal amendment was withdrawn, we actually are on your motion now following the order. You are on your toes, Mr. Julian, so please continue.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Despite the fact that I disagree with a lot of your rulings, you are on your toes as well today, though I would appreciate a little more respect for the time allocation.

Coming back to this in clause 10, it is an amendment of the initial date that is contained within the softwood agreement and in Bill C-24. What we have right now, Mr. Chair, is a date set at September 30, 2006. There is no doubt that this date has to be changed. What is the logical date that would need to be put in that is not going to be harmful to softwood communities across the country?

Mr. Chair, what has indeed happened, as we saw with the incredible confusion around mid-October, is that the AD and CV duties continued to be collected at the border in the United States past the “put into effect” date of the softwood lumber agreement.

Even though we have not adopted this legislation, it's important for folks to note that this government has just rammed in a deal, even though it's unravelling as we speak. The reality is that this was imposed when the date for the actual putting into effect of the agreement came. There were two duties being levied, and depending on whom you speak to, that continued for a number of days. As you know, we raised these questions at the committee hearings when the government officials were here, to find out exactly what the last date was that the illegal AD and CV duties were collected. We do not know at this point when those double duty collections actually ended, Mr. Chair.

Because of that, and because of the incredible strain that softwood companies have been under, what we need to do is set a date that actually respects their ability to work through the process, their ability as companies to try to right the wrongs of this egregiously bad agreement. The date that makes sense is the end of October.

To this day, we don't know exactly when the AD and CV duty collection ended. We do know when the duty collection started for these self-imposed penalties that are actually higher than the illegal American tariffs. We went from a 10.8% tariff to a 15% tariff overnight, Mr. Chair, and we saw what the results of that were: thousands of lost jobs.

In Abitibi-Témiscamingue, the Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean regions, and on the North Shore, some 1,700 jobs have been lost in one week alone. Across the country, 4,000 jobs have been lost since this Agreement came into effect.

This disastrous result is due to the badly botched...

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Mr. Julian, your time is up. Thank you.

Is there any other discussion on NDP-4, which is on page 7 of the package?

Ms. Guergis.

[Helena Guergis, Conservative, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

We do not support this amendment. Canada and the United States agreed to change the effective date of the softwood lumber agreement from October 1 to October 12. It is therefore necessary to make several amendments to Bill C-24 to ensure that Canada meets its obligations to collect the charge as of October 12. The proposed amendment would establish November 1 as the effective date when Canada would begin collection of the charge. The government's motion would establish the correct date of October 12. So we do not support this amendment.

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

We'll go to the recorded division on NDP-4.

Mr. Temelkovski.

[Lui Temelkovski, Liberal, Oak Ridges—Markham, ON]

Is that a subamendment that Madame Guergis just...?

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

No, she was just speaking against Mr. Julian's amendment.

[Lui Temelkovski, Liberal, Oak Ridges—Markham, ON]

Give us some clarity on the dates, please.

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Who would like to do that?

Mr. Seebach.

[Dennis Seebach]

Thank you, Chair.

As has been noted at these committee hearings before, the Government of the United States issued a notice to cease collecting the AD and CV duties at the end of October 11. On October 12, there were no CV and AD duties. We do have information from our counterparts at United States Customs and Border Protection that on the morning of October 12, a number of duties were collected. They've been isolated and they will be returned 100% to those exporters.

It was a matter of timing and getting the notice out to all the border points across the Canada–U.S. border late on October 11, and there were a few mistakes made in the morning of October 12. Our information is that it was the only morning that this instance happened, and those moneys will be returned to the exporters 100%.

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Thank you, Mr. Seebach.

Go ahead, Mr. Temelkovski. You have time.

[Lui Temelkovski, Liberal, Oak Ridges—Markham, ON]

If we change this from September 30 to October 31, how will that affect it?

[Dennis Seebach]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

It would impact it by bringing the entry into force date to November 1, and it would mean that from October 12 to October 31, no export charges would be collected.