International Trade Committee on Nov. 7th, 2023

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

It was mentioned that Ukraine was considering getting into the CPTPP. The U.K. is doing that right now. When the U.K. announced that, New Zealand and Australia signed side letters with the U.K., taking that part of the CPTPP out of their bilateral agreements, but Canada didn't do that. If the ISDS is more, as you said, for countries like Canada that are worried about third world countries and their court systems and practices, why did we not remove that from our agreement with the U.K., as we have with the United States?

[Bruce Christie]

Mr. Chair, actually, in the case of the CPTPP, the ISDS provisions were already found in the original TPP agreement that we ratified after the United States left the agreement. Canada chose not to sign additional side letters with the U.K. or any other party to the original agreement that exempted ISDS provisions.

In terms of moving forward with ISDS, since the ISDS provisions were already found in the U.K. accession to the CPTPP, we chose to leave them there. However, as we move forward in negotiations with the U.K. on a bilateral free trade agreement, we are not seeking ISDS provisions in that agreement.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

If there are disputes between a Canadian company in the U.K., or vice versa, they won't be able to access ISDS provisions at all, despite what it says in the CPTPP.

[Bruce Christie]

They certainly would in the CPTPP, but under an eventual bilateral agreement, they could not. In the case of the Canada-U.K. agreement, they would have to seek recourse through domestic courts.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

I have just one final question. With the U.K. accession to the CPTPP, I've been led to believe that it would eventually require a vote here in Parliament. Is that the case, or is it just a done deal?

[Bruce Christie]

The Government of Canada would have to table legislation in Parliament, through a bill, for Canada to be able to ratify the U.K. accession to the CPTPP.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Do you have any idea when that might happen?

[Bruce Christie]

No, I do not.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Okay.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Kyle Seeback]

You have 30 seconds.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

I will cede my time.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Kyle Seeback]

Excellent.

Then we will move on to Mr. Martel for five minutes.

[Richard Martel, Conservative, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Christie, thank you for being with us.

I'm going to try to speak slowly because I would like good translation.

First, I would like to reiterate that the Conservatives support Ukraine and free trade. I would also like to say that the first free trade agreement was reached under a Conservative government.

We know that the reconstruction of Ukraine will require a huge amount of energy. In your discussions with Ukraine, did you talk about energy?

[Bruce Christie]

We didn't discuss energy specifically in the negotiation. However, those provisions are covered in both the market access chapter and the services chapter. Those provisions to promote energy security or to ensure market access for any energy services or products are covered by the agreement. However, we didn't discuss energy security specifically.

[Richard Martel, Conservative, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

Ukraine currently depends on Russia for its energy needs. For my part, I find it surprising that Canada is not supplying liquefied natural gas, or LNG, when it is in a position to do so.

In Europe, they talk about that all the time. During a trip to Germany and throughout Europe, I was told that Canada is fortunate to have access to liquefied natural gas.

You said that once the agreement is signed, it will be possible to add certain elements to it. For example, if Canada were allowed to export liquefied natural gas to Ukraine, this could be added to the agreement.

Did I understand correctly?

[Bruce Christie]

There's nothing preventing the export of natural gas from Canada to Ukraine or from Ukraine to Canada. We simply don't have the infrastructure in place to facilitate those exports, but there's nothing in the agreement that prevents those exports from taking place.

[Richard Martel, Conservative, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

You say that Canada does not have the required infrastructure in place. However, in my riding, we had a great project, GNL Québec; everything was in place to export liquefied natural gas to Europe. Unfortunately, we did not get a strong signal from our government at that time.

You talked about carbon pricing. Have you analyzed the impact of the carbon tax on post-war reconstruction?

[Bruce Christie]

We haven't done that type of analysis in terms of how a potential carbon tax would have an impact on future reconstruction efforts in Ukraine.

[Richard Martel, Conservative, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

Do you find it worrisome that 70% of the coal imported by Ukraine is currently coming from Russia? How can you explain the fact that Ukraine is having so much difficulty overcoming this dependence?

[Bruce Christie]

I'm not really in a position to comment on Ukraine's imports of coal from Russia. That's a situation that's obviously changing.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Kyle Seeback]

Thank you, Mr. Martel.

We will move to Mr. Sheehan for five minutes.

[Terry Sheehan, Liberal, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Through you to the panel, first of all, thank you for your work on this extremely important trade agreement.

The updated, modernized CUFTA has some very strong and enforceable provisions related to labour. Can you delve into how this will benefit workers and labour?

[Bruce Christie]

Absolutely.

As I think I mentioned in answer to a previous question, as we engaged in these modernization discussions, we explained to Ukraine that Canada had developed more rigorous provisions in our labour chapter, provisions that are subject to dispute settlement. At various points along the road, we asked Ukraine if they were prepared to take on the higher standard provisions that Canada has been negotiating in the labour chapter of the CPTPP, in CUSMA and in CETA, and the Ukrainians continued to demonstrate that they didn't want Canada to weaken our typical standards or rules in order to accommodate them. They were striving for the future and, therefore, they wanted to negotiate a labour chapter based on the higher standard provisions Canada has.

As I mentioned, these provisions are fully subject to dispute settlement with binding obligations. There is a feature of a non-derogation clause that prohibits parties from weakening or reducing protections afforded in their respective labour laws by taking measures to promote trade and investment. There's also a prohibition on any goods produced in whole or in part through forced labour. There's also a commitment to adhere to all of the core conventions of the International Labour Organization. Also, there's a stand-alone provision addressing violence against workers.

Those are the features of this chapter.

[Terry Sheehan, Liberal, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Thank you.

The modernized agreement also updates and improves the financial services section, and I've reviewed that. We have some folks in the Soo who are doing some interesting things over in that region and in Ontario for that matter.

Can you tell us how the updated modernized agreement creates a level playing field for both countries?

[Bruce Christie]

The new provisions provide more general rules that are tailored to the unique nature of the financial sectors in both Canada and Ukraine. The chapter includes core obligations such as market access, as I mentioned earlier, and also supports to key trade policy considerations such as affording national treatment and most favoured nation status to financial services crossing both borders. There are also new commitments on electronic payments and the processing of applications. It also includes a more robust prudential exception to ensure our financial sector regulators in order to preserve the integrity and stability of our financial system.

As I believe I mentioned earlier, we've given Ukraine a 10-year period to transition from its existing commitments it took at the WTO in the financial services sector to the proposed commitments in the modernized CUFTA chapter.