Evidence of meeting #12 for International Trade in the 43rd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was cusma.
A video is available from Parliament.
Bloc
Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay Bloc Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC
I'd like to continue my conversation with Mr. Peréz about the environmental aspect.
As everyone knows, and as someone pointed out earlier, the United States did not sign the Paris agreement. You said that the environmental agreements mentioned in the chapter on the environment date back to NAFTA.
As the standing committee that will be studying future agreements, we need to think about that. When we sign an agreement with a country that is a signatory to the Paris agreement, must the new agreement explicitly state that all of the provisions have to comply with the Paris agreement?
International Policy Analyst, Climate Action Network Canada
Yes, that's exactly right.
International Policy Analyst, Climate Action Network Canada
Actually, I think it should go a bit further than that.
International Policy Analyst, Climate Action Network Canada
As I said in my opening remarks, we need to think carefully, just as we do when we sign free trade agreements. A free trade agreement can be suspended if parties don't abide by the provisions.
This aspect needs to be added when we're talking about how states that sign free trade agreements respect their environmental and climate-related commitments in the Paris agreement. I would say yes to your first point, but I would take it further and look at how suspension can be used to strengthen these measures.
Bloc
Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay Bloc Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC
Let me make sure I understand. You're saying that, if a trade situation fails to comply with environmental standards, free trade in that sector would be suspended?
International Policy Analyst, Climate Action Network Canada
The EU is a perfect example. A significant number of EU countries have proposed that a free trade agreement with a third party be suspended. A state can suspend the entire agreement, not just the environmental chapter, when the other party fails to uphold its obligations under the nationally determined contributions in the Paris agreement.
Those discussions are already under way. I think suspension would be a last resort, but many other measures ranging from the option you proposed to suspension can be taken to ensure that both parties commit to honouring their commitments and to making their targets under the agreement much more ambitious.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Judy Sgro
Thank you very much, Mr. Peréz. I'm sorry I have to interrupt. My apologies.
On to Mr. Blaikie.
NDP
Daniel Blaikie NDP Elmwood—Transcona, MB
Thank you very much.
Mr. Tully, I want to engage you a little bit more on the subject of reciprocity. I think that's maybe a more comfortable notion for New Democrats. In a lot of cases, we have tended to be critical of free trade.
I don't think your story is unique. We have heard from cattle producers, for instance, under CETA, who thought they were going to have unfettered market access. Indeed, dairy farmers were asked to make sacrifices in order to open that market access. Now we find out there are objections to some of the sanitizing practices here in North America, so they don't actually get that market access to Europe.
Do you think it's fair to say that governments of different stripes have been overly enthusiastic about the idea of free trade and have let that sometimes blind them to the realities of what our trading partners are doing?
Executive Vice-President, DECAST
From my perspective, from what's happened in the past, free trade agreements struck between different countries have always left openings, and those openings are taken advantage of time and time again to—as in the case of the dairy farmers—hit different sectors with some little clause that makes it difficult for them to truly have free trade.
NDP
Daniel Blaikie NDP Elmwood—Transcona, MB
Maybe I'm wrong about this, but Canada seems unique in offering pretty much unfettered market access under the auspices of a trade agreement, and in not really responding when trading partners don't provide that same access. Domestically, we're told as a political argument that “Oh well, these sacrifices are justified because we're getting equal market access”, and then in fact we hear....
Are there a lot of people in the United States saying that they can't get access to the Canadian market, that those tricky Canadians are blocking them, and likewise with Europe? I'm interested to know who your counterparts are across international borders who would be feeling the same way about Canada that Canadian businesses are feeling about some of our trading partners.
Executive Vice-President, DECAST
I agree with your first statement when you say that we Canadians tend to be too nice and we open our doors so that everything can come in. I sit as the chairman of the American Concrete Pressure Pipe Association, and I'm also the chairman of the Canadian Concrete Pipe & Precast Association.
From the American Concrete Pressure Pipe Association, I'll give you a bit of the feedback I get from my counterparts who are the presidents or senior vice-presidents of our competitors from the U.S. They laugh at us. They know that they can come here openly, and they know that we don't have a hope in hell of going down there. That's my struggle.
Executive Vice-President, DECAST
You can hear my frustration a bit because of that.
Executive Vice-President, DECAST
I've talked myself hoarse at the municipal level. I've gone in front of numerous councils and said, “Just give us fairness.” That's all we're asking for. We're not asking to be protectionist. We're asking them to react and to react quickly when things are put in place that restrict our trade.
Just be equal—
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Judy Sgro
Thank you very much. This completes that round.
Are there any other questions?
Mr. Fast.
Conservative
Ed Fast Conservative Abbotsford, BC
Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you for the opportunity to ask a few questions.
First of all, I have a clarification for the record.
Mr. Dhaliwal suggested that about $125-billion worth of infrastructure investment has gone into our economy. In fact, the most recent report from the PBO, the Parliamentary Budget Officer, says it's less than $14-billion worth. This is a 2018 report, and only $14 billion worth of infrastructure investment had actually gone into our economy. Quite frankly, I don't think the figure is that much higher since then; we would have seen a much more significant economic boost.
I have a question for you, Mr. Tully. Thank you for appearing.
The North American Free Trade Agreement could have addressed buy America provisions. This has been an ongoing problem and friction between our two countries, with the United States imposing restrictions on the opportunity for Canadian companies to participate in large infrastructure projects, while we as Canadians don't reciprocate with those kinds of restrictions on American companies doing business up here. The North American Free Trade Agreement was the perfect opportunity to fix this problem.
Are you disappointed that the agreement didn't address this issue?
Executive Vice-President, DECAST
Absolutely, and like I said, there are these windows of opportunity to come in and make some little side agreements or agreements that affect it.
Buy America goes back decades, but to not address that and to say that Mexico and Canada are exempt from any of these clauses, that to me seems.... Maybe I'm naive, but when I originally got into this business and got involved with that, I thought, “Oh, free trade, everything is open.” Then you start seeing these little side agreements that are out there and you go, “Well, maybe it's not quite so free.” That's a huge struggle. If it could have been agreed, or if were simple to do that, it would be fantastic.
February 26th, 2020 / 4:50 p.m.
Conservative
Ed Fast Conservative Abbotsford, BC
When the Prime Minister spread his arms wide open and said, "Donald Trump, I'd be glad to renegotiate NAFTA", I took him at his word when he said he was going to bring back a better deal than we had before. Sadly, the economic impact statement that was just released doesn't compare what Canada will be getting under the new agreement with what we had under the current NAFTA. It says it's the difference between what Canada would get under the new agreement and what we would have if there were no NAFTA at all, which is not the standard that was set when the TPP was negotiated. It's not the standard set for economic impact assessments when the CPTPP was negotiated. In fact, in my time as trade minister, I don't believe we ever used that as the benchmark. We always compared the new agreement to what it was like before that agreement was signed.
It's very disappointing to me that in this agreement that was supposed to be a win-win-win—those are the Prime Minister's words—we have an agreement that by any measure is actually less favourable to Canada. When the American officials talk about it, they say they finally got a much better deal out of this, implying that Canada is the loser. We lost an opportunity to address buy American provisions that continue to plague our bilateral relationship.
I have a question for Mr. Jacobi. Thank you for being so patient in waiting for this.