Good afternoon, committee members. We'll be using the full five minutes, so please hold off on any questions.
The Windsor-Essex chamber represents 800 businesses large and small, with combined sales in the billions, who have member employees numbering more than 25,000. This includes Atlas Tube, whose parent company is Zekelman Industries. It employs 220 people, exports $250 million of product per year, is the largest employer in Harrow, and is the most efficient producer of structural tubing in the world. Atlas Tube buys more steel than any auto company in Canada, and parent company Zekelman Industries is the largest private buyer of flat rolled steel in North America at 2.5 million tonnes, equivalent to the entire output of Stelco.
Our fundamental question to the committee is: how we can expect our business community, such as Atlas Tube and their employees—our middle class, our community—to compete against government-owned enterprises in China? They have employment and production quotas, have little regard for profits or losses, manipulate the currency, use cheap coal emitting 15 times as much CO2 as Canada per tonne, and dump steel into Canada, displacing our employers and middle class.
Our trade deficit with China is approaching $50 billion. The chamber here says China is not a market economy. I guess the question for the committee, especially for those from the governing party, is: do you believe that China should be given market economy status?
In September 2016, chambers across Canada representing 400,000 businesses passed a resolution for a steel manufacturing strategy from the Canadian government to combat steel dumping into Canada. The current process to address dumping of steel is too lengthy, too expensive, and has too many loopholes. So here we are today.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.