Evidence of meeting #104 for International Trade in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was agreement.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Peter Fonseca Liberal Mississauga East—Cooksville, ON
Thank you very much, Chair.
Angelo and Claire, it's good to see you both here again. Angelo, please say hi to your parents who live in the great riding of Mississauga East—Cooksville.
Angelo, I want to ask you a number of questions. You brought up Mexico here. I'm sure Unifor has done a study and analysis on labour rights, on employment standards, etc., within Mexico. Have you done the same for the Mercosur countries?
National Representative, Unifor
We haven't done the same for the Mercosur countries yet. We do have relationships with a number of the South American trade unions, good relations. I know there are some discussions afoot about trying to pull these organizations together to get a better read bilaterally and multilaterally on what some of the major issues are. We should have that as this process unfolds, but right now to present to you, no.
Liberal
Peter Fonseca Liberal Mississauga East—Cooksville, ON
There's a reason I ask. Be it Mexico or now with the Mercosur countries, you talk about a bottom line position. Can you outline for us those priorities, those provisions that you would want to see in any agreement going forward?
National Representative, Unifor
There's a lot of detail to this. I'll give you some high-level pieces and I'll give you an example of what's happening in Brazil right now.
One of the core things we have on the books right now that Canada and many other nations have agreed to are core conventions in the International Labour Organization. Technically, every country should be abiding by the letter of those conventions, and the issue is that if they don't, there is no enforceability mechanism in place at the ILO, or any multilateral body, to actually make sure these countries are upholding those rights. Those are rights in fundamental things like collective bargaining, the right to organize, freedom of association, minimum ages of work, and so forth.
As a baseline, we have called for in the NAFTA a full ratification of those conventions and making them enforceable under the terms of the new agreement. This is something that social society, civil society, and Mercosur have talked about with respect to their social declaration. In addition, there are areas we want to see explored that cover gender aspects of work in trade agreements, which a lot of countries have signalled their interest in but really are refusing to put teeth to with respect to binding conditions as part of trade. We can expand that to include indigenous rights, environmental rights, and so forth. I think it's catalogued nicely in our NAFTA submission, but those are some of the high-level pieces.
I'll tell you one thing. In Brazil, under the new government of Temer, one of the first orders of business was to institute a fairly robust labour law reform package, similar to what's going on in Mexico right now. The point of that labour reform is couched in the spirit of labour market flexibility, competition, but it truly gets at the erosion of rights for workers, their rights to unionize, and many of the civil society organizations we work with are claiming that those reforms would actually put Brazil out of step with these ILO conventions. This can't happen. If we want truly fair, balanced trade and true competition, we can't have the undermining of workers' rights.
I hope that answers your question.
Liberal
Peter Fonseca Liberal Mississauga East—Cooksville, ON
Yes. Thank you, Angelo.
Claire, I want to ask you a question. I had the opportunity to meet with the grain growers, great people advocating for the sector, many of them from Saskatchewan, who were in to see me to talk about Asia. In particular, they talked about China. Can I get your thoughts for CAFTA's, your organization's, ideas on where the government should go with China? I hear a lot of push-back from the opposition in terms of doing trade with China.
Executive Director, Canadian Agri-Food Trade Alliance
There are a lot of non-tariff barrier issues with China, but it's our second export market at this point, a market valued at close to $6 billion. Certainly, a potential free trade agreement with China has the possibility to boost our exports to the world's second-largest economy. China is poised to be the world's largest importer of ag and food products by 2020, so we need to have rules for trade there with that country.
China has demonstrated that it's open to freer trade with free trade agreements with Australia, New Zealand, and other countries. In terms of ag and food products, the results have been substantial. If those countries have been able to do so, we certainly should be able to get there as well. We encourage the government to launch FTA talks with China, and certainly they should consider this before a potential Mercosur agreement.
Liberal
Peter Fonseca Liberal Mississauga East—Cooksville, ON
That's what I heard loud and clear from your members.
I am hearing what you're saying with Mercosur. Maybe you don't see as much of an opportunity as you do with Asia. Maybe our focus should continue to be with Asia. We are trying to...yes, Chair.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Mark Eyking
I didn't assume you were going into a question. Were you just making a comment?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Mark Eyking
That wraps up our time and our first meeting on Mercosur. I thank the witnesses for joining us today. When we finish this report, we will send you a copy and we look forward to that.
The meeting is adjourned.