International Trade Committee on Oct. 30th, 2018

[Peter Fonseca, Liberal, Mississauga East—Cooksville, ON]

I don't know if you have every MP here on the Hill, but you definitely have the government fired up. It's all good.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Peter Fonseca, Liberal, Mississauga East—Cooksville, ON]

I wanted to ask you the same thing around the remission. Is that something you're looking at? Would that affect you? Would that be something you can access?

[Terry Witzel]

Go ahead and answer, Colin.

[Colin Kirvan]

No. To be blunt, our biggest issue is trying to get the steel costs normalized, to be honest.

When we're dealing with our inputs, that's what our business is focused on. We're 18% up and 22% on the spot market right now and it's killing us. We have to get that issue specifically handled. Would the remission process help us with our barbecue parts coming up? Yes, but that's not going to solve the bigger issue. That's where we're focused right now.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Thank you, Mr. Fonseca. That ends the first round.

We have some time here, I think, for just two questions. I'm going to have four minutes for the Liberals and four for the Conservatives.

Go ahead, Mr. Peterson. You have four minutes.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to the witnesses for being here today.

It's always important to take a step back and look at the section 232 as put in by the American president because he considers your products a national security threat, which I think we can all agree is ridiculous. I don't think anyone here agrees with that assessment by the president, but we have to live in the times that we live in, and we're coping the best we can. I appreciate hearing your personal stories.

I think, Mr. Dodds, you said that your MP helped you as well.

[Thomas Dodds]

Yes, he did, and more so, it was the mayor of the Town of Perth. Mayor Fenik unfortunately had gone through having another industry recently announce a closure, so he was quick to come right to our door and offer support, and he actually came to Ottawa for some of our visits.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

It's good to hear those local stories. It's good to hear them as MPs. I know that our friends in B.C. said that Joyce Murray helped them. I think Scott Reid is your MP, Mr. Dodds.

[Thomas Dodds]

That's correct.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

It's good to hear that he's able to help you as well. The root of our role is to help our constituents. I'm glad to hear that these stories are happening.

I want to talk a bit to Broil King—I have limited time here—and touch on a couple of other things that you mentioned. I think you guys have the brand “made in North America”. Is that correct?

[Colin Kirvan]

It's what we're using on our point-of-sale material.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Yes, I've seen the U.S. and Canadian flags—

[Colin Kirvan]

Yes.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

—which is good, I think.

You mentioned that if we could promote Canadian goods, that would also be helpful in the industry as a whole. Do you see that as a marketing mechanism that the Canadian government can help in? How do you see the role that we could play to help with that?

[Colin Kirvan]

Yes, I certainly do. One thing we've found as a result of some of this trade tension, which really has happened globally now, is that Canadian products still in a lot of ways hold a stronger value than those of our counterparts in the U.S.

To be completely honest, the “made in North America” logo sold very nicely for us in Europe, while today we're getting asked by customers if we have to have that logo or if we could just have “made in Canada”. They're worried about some of the backlash at the consumer level due to some of these issues that are happening.

In that respect, I think there's a benefit.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Okay.

Mr. Dodds, you supply automotive in some of your products as well. Is that correct?

[Thomas Dodds]

That is correct. As I say, in terms of our products, the airbags hold a container that's stainless steel wire. Seat frames have stainless steel in them. Exhaust systems, braidable hoses, they're all stainless steel.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Obviously, none of your customers want these increased costs passed down to them.

[Thomas Dodds]

No. Again, they can't pass it on, especially in automotive, which is such a tight supply chain as it is.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

You must have a good relationship with your customers. How are you dealing with what must be a difficult situation?

[Thomas Dodds]

To say that maybe their patience is getting thin is probably a bit of an understatement. Early on, our Canadian customers.... At the end of the day, they're all very supportive, but they just can't wait any longer for us to resolve certain things. They have to find other solutions for their own business. It's tough that we're all lumped together in this, but at the same time, hopefully we get out of it together.

In terms of our U.S. customers, again, some of them have gone through the section 232 exclusion process. I think the last time I checked, there were 40,000 requests for exclusion. I can't speak to how that process goes and how efficient it was or has not been, but at the end of the day, for 95% of the products we supply to the U.S. for those types of customers, they're still facing 25% duty going back into the U.S. That's from product that started in the U.S.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

It crosses twice so they get you twice.

[Thomas Dodds]

Exactly.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

That's difficult.

Thank you, everyone.