Thank you very much.
I hope you can hear me. My name is Mark Rowlinson. I'm counsel to United Steelworkers, but I'm also a member of the international labour rights committee of the Canadian Association of Labour Lawyers, on whose behalf I appear before you this afternoon.
The Canadian Association of Labour Lawyers is an association of over 350 progressive lawyers who represent workers, trade unions, professionals in other associations in a wide range of legal matters across Canada. Over the last 15 years, CALL has been actively working to promote labour rights in the Americas, and we have been an active participant in the litigation and consultation processes set up under the labour side agreements first of NAFTA.
CALL last appeared before this same committee on this same issue—that is to say, Canada-Colombia free trade—in the spring of 2008, during the hearings that led to this committee's June 2008 report entitled Human Rights, the Environment and Free Trade with Colombia. I have a copy here, and I'm sure you're all well familiar with it.
We thank the committee for giving us an opportunity to testify again, now that we have a copy of the proposed trade agreements and the implementing legislation. My presentation today will consist of three parts.
First, I wish to make a few observations regarding the current labour rights situation in Colombia. Second, I will provide CALL's view on the labour provisions contained in the proposed trade agreements, and in that part, my presentation will be a very much briefer version of the brief that was presented to you, I believe, by Gauri Sreenivasan from CICC at last Thursday's hearings. Finally, I will provide our views on the amendment or addition--proposed by, as I understand it, the Liberal trade critic--that would require, again as I understand it, a human rights update report to be delivered to Parliament on an annual basis in respect of the Canada-Colombia free trade agreement.
First, I have a few recent observations regarding labour rights violations in Colombia. Violations of fundamental labour rights and violence committed against unionized workers are obviously amongst Colombia's foremost human rights challenges. To this day, Colombia remains the most dangerous place in the world to be a trade unionist, accounting for a majority of the murders of trade unionists around the world.
According to the latest figures provided by Colombia's National Labour School, since 1986 there have been 2,789 trade unionists murdered in Colombia. While there has undeniably been a decline in that murder rate since 2001, the decline has ended in recent years. In 2007, Colombia's National Labour School reported that 39 trade unionists were murdered. In 2008, 49 murders were reported, an increase of 18%; and just recently it was reported that in 2009, 47 trade unionists were murdered—essentially the same figure as 2008. In other words, while there was a precipitous decline in the middle part of this first decade of the new century, that decline has ended.
I know that you've heard from the Colombian government, which suggested that last year only 28 trade unionists were murdered. From our perspective, it doesn't really matter whether it's 28 or 48. The reality is that it's still far too many. And the reality is that more trade unionists are murdered in Colombia than anywhere else on this continent.
The 2009 figures are especially concerning, given that in 2008 the government began showcasing improvements in the human rights situation to counter opposition to both the U.S.-Colombia FTA and the Canada-Colombia FTA. It is obviously the case that murder and the threat of murder will have a chilling effect on trade union activity in Colombia. The question this committee has to ask is that if workers fear for their lives when deciding to exercise fundamental labour rights, how can they can effectively share in the potential benefits of trade?
Importantly, it continues to be the case that impunity rates for these labour rights violations remain largely unchanged, with a 3% conviction rate. This level of impunity creates very little incentive for perpetrators to cease their actions. Furthermore, trade union density in Colombia also continues to fall. I know that this committee has heard different accounts of trade union density statistics in Colombia. Again, the National Labour School recently reported that in 2009, trade union density rates were around 4.2%. Again, they continue to fall. They're down from 13.5% from 20 or 30 years ago.
President Uribe argues that his administration has taken extraordinary steps to counter the violence against trade unionists, devoting new resources, including judges to address labour cases as well as additional funding to the attorney general's office for investigation and prosecution.
Such resources are of course appreciated, but the abuses and persecution of trade unionists and human rights defenders persist. As an organization of labour lawyers, CALL is very concerned about the protection of human rights defenders in Colombia who are faced with regular threats and intimidation. Indeed, in the March 2010 report on the human rights situation in Colombia, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights reported that in 2009 there was actually an increase in intimidation and death threats against human rights defenders and social and community leaders, as well as against members of marginalized groups.
In short, in our view, the labour rights and human rights situation in Colombia remains dire. It was still the case again in 2009 that 60% of the trade unionists killed in the Americas were killed in Colombia.
The question then becomes whether there is anything in the Canada-Colombia trade agreement that is going to address these labour rights violations.
It's been our experience that trade agreements are not written to improve labour standards, and there is, frankly, little evidence that such agreements can become vehicles for the enforcement of labour rights. On the contrary, the market access and investor rights provisions of the text of the agreement could serve to increase the rate of labour rights violations because of the structural impediments to union freedoms in Colombia and the gap between legislation and practice in Colombian society.
The labour provisions found in the Canada-Colombia FTA generally follow the pattern that we see in existing hemispheric trade agreements, specifically the NAFTA labour side agreement, the Canada-Costa Rica FTA, and most recently the Canada-Peru FTA. There is a general consensus among the trade union movements in both Canada and Colombia that the protections found in these trade agreements negotiated thus far have left much to be desired. The enforcement provisions are generally weak and ineffective, and the agreements tend to focus on the enforcement of existing statutes rather than on raising labour standards.
I want to make this point: if you look at the labour rights situation in Mexico since the NAFTA labour rights agreement was entered into, it has arguably become worse. We have close relationships with the Mexican trade union movement, and the reality is that NAFTA has done nothing to improve trade union rights in Mexico. In fact, they're presently in a worse crisis than they have ever had, so there's no evidence that the NAFTA labour side agreement has led to improvements in labour rights in Mexico. The experience has been the opposite, and there is no reason to believe that this agreement with Colombia would not have the same effect.
The Canada-Colombia FTA provisions represent an evolution of--and, I will concede, an improvement over--the existing NAFTA labour side agreement. Article 1 of the labour side agreement affirms that each party shall ensure that its laws provide protection for the internationally recognized labour principles contained in the 1998 ILO declaration, together with the ILO's decent work agenda. As such, this article contains greater substantive labour rights than those found in the NAFTA labour side agreement. However, article 2 of the Canada-Colombia labour side agreement, the non-derogation clause, only prohibits the violation of ILO standards when it can be demonstrated that the violation was done to encourage trade or investment. This is an arguable limitation on the substantive obligations of the parties.
Where the agreement becomes particularly problematic, of course....
Should I speak more slowly?