Evidence of meeting #37 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 question.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Assistant Deputy Minister, Trade Agreements and Negotiations, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
Right. There were different ways. We issued a Canada Gazette notice, and anybody could give their views, and many people did. We had various web-based updates. We also took meetings, not me but all of them. My team took meetings.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Trade Agreements and Negotiations, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
To my knowledge, nobody ever refused a meeting or a phone call, or whatever.
Conservative
Randy Hoback Conservative Prince Albert, SK
Okay.
If I were to ask you to submit a list of those who were told they couldn't participate, there would be no list to submit.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Trade Agreements and Negotiations, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
To my knowledge, none of my team ever refused to either meet or have a phone call, or anything.
Conservative
Randy Hoback Conservative Prince Albert, SK
There were people who wanted even more input and more knowledge. They had to sign a confidentiality agreement. Is that correct? Is “non-disclosure” a better word?
Assistant Deputy Minister, Trade Agreements and Negotiations, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
Right. Certain stakeholders or individuals signed confidentiality agreements. What's a good example of this? We had incredibly technical negotiations with the auto parts companies and associations, with respect to the rules of origin on autos. We really did need to have very technical, deep conversations. Because we were right in the middle of it, we had to talk to them about some of the dynamics and negotiations with our trading partners, which we had, as a government, committed to keep confidential. We made a commitment to keep certain details of the negotiations confidential to allow the trust necessary to negotiate.
Conservative
Assistant Deputy Minister, Trade Agreements and Negotiations, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
In those situations, it was in order to do our job properly and to consult properly with the affected industries. That's one example. Cultural industry is another example where we really had to get into the details of what was happening in the negotiations. In those situations, we asked them to sign those confidentiality agreements.
Conservative
Randy Hoback Conservative Prince Albert, SK
We've gone through the case of “we're either in or out”. We've gone through the consultation process. I give Mr. Lametti credit. You've done a lot of talking with people. The word “consulting” has probably been beaten to death on this file. If you talk to any of the witnesses we've had, you'll see it's the third or fourth time—or if you're talking Senate, the sixth time—that they've talked about the TPP. I think we've put that to rest.
This may be a little inside baseball, since I probably have only a minute left. I'm looking forward on this file, with what's going on in the U.S. Nobody knows what's going on in the U.S., and nobody will know until February or March, or who knows when. Have there been any discussions about proceeding with this deal without the U.S.? If the U.S. decides to pull out, changing the rules so that all the other countries say, “You know what? This is still a good deal for developing the rules for trade in Asian markets”.... Have there been any discussions about what that could possibly look like?
Assistant Deputy Minister, Trade Agreements and Negotiations, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
No.
Conservative
Randy Hoback Conservative Prince Albert, SK
Nothing at all? Okay.
All right.
Gerry, Dave, is there anything you guys want to add?
Conservative
Gerry Ritz Conservative Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK
I have one point.
There was a meeting of all the member countries last month in Japan. Our attendance was the chargé d'affaires, because we were in the midst of changing the ambassador over there. There was a general agreement that came out. The minister from Japan at that point said, “There is agreement to move forward. All countries are in. Some are maybe a little further ahead than others, but they all said they were going to expedite the process and get it done.”
Were you aware of those meetings and that result?
Assistant Deputy Minister, Trade Agreements and Negotiations, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
Yes. We were aware of the meetings. Dany, do you want to speak to that?
Liberal
Dany Carriere Deputy Chief Negotiator and Director, Trans-Pacific Partnership Division, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
I'll be quick.
That meeting was reported on afterwards. They went around the table and asked each country where it was at on ratification, and our chargé d'affaires was quite clear that this government has not yet taken a position and is carrying out consultations.
How the Japanese chose to present that afterwards was not in our control.
Liberal
NDP
Tracey Ramsey NDP Essex, ON
First, Mr. Downs, if you could table your full report to this committee, we would appreciate it. We see the 15-page document that we have, but I assume there is more to it. We would like to see the full report, the economic impact study.
My question now is about the labour mobility chapter. In the concerns that have been raised to us, there are four categories. The major issue has been about business visitors, which are defined as any citizen from a signatory nation.
There are also two things in the TPP that.... Canada has agreed not to:
(a) require labour certification tests [for these workers]
(b) impose or maintain any numerical restriction relating to temporary entry.
Why have we agreed to these provisions? Does that definition of business visitors then not include any citizen of a signatory country?
Assistant Deputy Minister, Trade Agreements and Negotiations, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
I'm going to let Sarah, who is the deep expert on this, answer your questions. She is getting her deep documents out.
Sarah Phillips Deputy Director, Services Trade Policy, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
I want to make sure I have the actual definition in front of me as we discuss this.
Certainly, being a citizen of a country is part of the requirement, but it is not the full requirement when it comes to how Canada has defined business visitors under that category. There are two requirements set out for being eligible as a business visitor.
The first deals with the source of the remuneration, which means that the individuals entering Canada must be receiving their pay from outside of Canada. Someone coming for a business meeting or a trade fair is an excellent example of what the business visitor category is intended to capture. The remuneration could be direct remuneration to that person or remuneration to a company for a contract. There is no flow of remuneration from Canada back to that host country.
The second element of the business visitor category is that “the principal place of business and the predominant place of accrual of profits remain outside Canada”, so the individual isn't constantly entering Canada on a daily basis, coming and doing most of the work in Canada and then going back at the end of the day, or at the end of the week, and perhaps compiling what was done. The principal place of business has to be outside of Canada.
A number of activities that are covered are listed under business visitors. This is meant to capture individuals coming for meetings or trade fairs.
NDP
Tracey Ramsey NDP Essex, ON
We've heard from a lot of building trades. Would skilled trades and building trades be included in there?
Deputy Director, Services Trade Policy, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
I guess if a building tradesperson were coming to a trade fair to see about new techniques, that would be covered, but not coming to perform paid work.
NDP
Tracey Ramsey NDP Essex, ON
The second part then is that we've agreed not to require labour certification tests for them and we've agreed not to impose a numerical restriction.
Deputy Director, Services Trade Policy, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
I would actually build on this. If you look at Canada's domestic regime in the area of business visitors, we don't currently require an LMIA for these individuals, and we don't require any quotas for these individuals. They're not required to have a work permit in our domestic regime because they're not considered to be entering the labour market.
If you're not being paid while you're in Canada, you're not considered to be entering the labour market, so you don't need the work permit. Those tests that we apply in a domestic regime under the temporary foreign worker program, for example, such as the labour market impact assessment wouldn't apply to those individuals.
