International Trade Committee on Jan. 31st, 2017

[Gerry Ritz, Conservative, Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK]

I understand that, but—

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Excuse me, I shouldn't really allow you guys to debate back and forth. There seemed to be a good flow, but it's not really the procedure we should follow.

So, Ms. Ramsey, maybe you'll speak and then you'll go through the chair. Go ahead.

[Tracey Ramsey, NDP, Essex, ON]

This is exactly the same procedure that took place around the agreement with Colombia. This is an established practice that's happened before, and that happened after the fact. I would like to ask Ms. Hillman to continue her thoughts on whether this is possible and reasonable at this point.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Go ahead, Ms. Hillman, and then we'll go to Mr. Ritz.

[Kirsten Hillman]

This is actually different from what happened with Colombia. In the Colombia agreement, there was a Canada-Colombia international.... We agreed with Colombia to have bilateral human rights reporting. The obligation is on Colombia to do an assessment and report to its parliament, and for Canada to do an assessment and report to its parliament. That was enshrined in an international agreement with Colombia and implemented through the implementing legislation. As I understand this proposal, it's different.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Mr. Ritz, do you have more comments?

[Gerry Ritz, Conservative, Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK]

Yes, and you're getting to the point, Ms. Hillman, that this is coming after the fact. It's not part of the agreement. It would be an addendum to the agreement, and we would have to have consensus from Ukraine to actually do this as well. We couldn't enforce this on them.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

We have Mr. Peterson and then Ms. Ramsey.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Ms. Hillman, so there's a stand-alone agreement with Colombia. Just for clarity, is this sort of clause found in that companion treaty and not in the agreement itself?

[Kirsten Hillman]

There is a stand-alone agreement that sets up the bilateral obligations to conduct these reviews and to report to Parliament. For Canada it is implemented in law through the implementing legislation, as every other aspect of the international commitments between us and Colombia is implemented. My understanding of the proposal here is that it is a stand-alone proposal without any hook within the treaty itself.

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

Under that agreement, who undertakes these assessments? Ms. Ramsey's amendment proposes a third party or an independent review. Under the Colombia-Canada one, which body undertakes those assessments now?

[Kirsten Hillman]

The Colombian government does on its side, and the Canadian government does on our side.

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

Okay, so that's another distinction then as well.

Thank you, Ms. Hillman.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Mr. Hoback, we'll go to Ms. Ramsey for final comments, and then we'll go to you.

[Tracey Ramsey, NDP, Essex, ON]

Again I ask you, Ms. Hillman, is this possible in this agreement? Is this something we could do in this agreement without changing the spirit of the agreement, with the understanding that we need to have an eye towards human rights, and that an independent review would enable that perspective not potentially be influenced by the government? It would be something the minister would put out to report back to Parliament. Is it possible, and do you view this amendment as being something that could be implemented?

[Kirsten Hillman]

At this stage we could not impose any obligations on Ukraine without going back to Ukraine and negotiating that change. If this proposal is not suggesting any obligations on Ukraine per se, the legal advice we have says that if the obligations are solely on us without any Ukrainian government commitments, then it would be possible.

One thing I would add, not directly in answer to the question, however, is that this has obviously not been discussed with Ukraine, and this kind of reporting requirement was never raised with Ukraine. So I think that is something that's important to flag.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Mr. Hoback.

[Randy Hoback, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Ms. Hillman.

Actually, that raises another question and a comment. Because it has not been discussed previously with Ukraine, something like this would possibly be viewed as diplomatically problematic; yet there's nothing in any committee in the future asking to look at human rights in Ukraine without that being tied to the actual trade agreement. So in theory, a year from now, the foreign affairs subcommittee on human rights could go ahead and do this type of work. There's no requirement to actually have it in this legislation for that to happen, so why would we go through the diplomatic row that could possibly happen if we were to submit this in there? Why wouldn't we just look at it on a year-by-year basis? Maybe sometimes we might want to do a review two or three times a year depending on what we see going on in Ukraine. Plus I don't see any enforcement factors, so if we do a review and we don't like the results, what does it do to have impact on the agreement? Or if we do a review with Colombia and it has results we don't like, because it's part of the agreement, there are actually implications. There's no way we can add this to this legislation and give it teeth to actually do anything with it, so other than providing window dressing, you're doing nothing. In fact, you'd have more teeth if you took it to the appropriate committee and reviewed it there.

You haven't gotten agreement from the Ukrainians to be part of this review process, so you have no ability, if you don't like what you see from the review process, to take action. Is that fair to say?

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Go ahead, Ms. Hillman.

[Randy Hoback, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

In 30 seconds or less.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Kirsten Hillman]

I guess I would go back to my comments. It's never been raised with Ukraine. There are no commitments that have ever been discussed with them for their participation in this, so this would be, as drafted, and I think as proposed, a unilateral action on the part of the government in relation to human rights effects of this agreement—whether or not there are effects on human rights flowing directly from this trade agreement.

This isn't directly in response to your question, but I do think it is important to recognize that Canada has very deep and multi-faceted co-operation with Ukraine in the area of human rights. That includes monitoring of the programs we have in place. The foreign affairs committee was recently in Ukraine and received information on the human rights programming that the government undertakes. We participate through the UN, for example. We're about to participate in the review of Ukraine on the multilateral front in the area of human rights.

So that kind of work with the Ukraine is happening as well.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Thanks, Ms. Hillman.

I'm going to try to wrap this up. I'll go to Mr. Peterson, and then we'll have the final comments from Ms. Ramsey.

Go ahead, Mr. Peterson.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Just to follow up on what my colleague Mr. Hoback was alluding to, my fear of doing this now is that it may be seen as unnecessary criticism of Ukraine at this stage. Presumably the negotiations took place. They did; we know they took place. Presumably all the issues that we wanted to consider and contemplate were addressed and, at the end of the day, the agreement was reached.

My understanding is that this is the entire agreement that the parties agreed to. To insert something like this at the last hour—after the fact, to be perfectly frank—I think sends the wrong message from a diplomatic standpoint and from a relationship standpoint between Canada and Ukraine. I don't think it would go over well, in my humble opinion.

That said, I also think some parts of the agreement do deal with anti-corruption legislation and things of that nature and do hold Ukrainian and government players to the same standards we're held to here in Canada. It wasn't as if the parties didn't already think about this. Presumably they did, and this is the agreement they arrived at. To insert something after the fact, that may already have been considered, I don't think is appropriate. Frankly, I don't think it sends a good message.

This agreement, as we heard at the committee, is not only a trade agreement. It also clearly demonstrates the friendship between the two countries, and I don't think we should risk any aspect of that component of the agreement.

That said, I just don't see how I can support the amendment at this time.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Thank you, Mr. Peterson.

For some final comments before we go to a vote, go ahead, Ms. Ramsey.