International Trade Committee on Dec. 7th, 2023

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

Thank you for that.

The reason I ask is that everyone seems to be in agreement with that statement. What we have heard—and it's backed by further evidence from before—is that replacement workers prolong strikes or lockouts, because it takes the focus off the table. We're not getting serious negotiations. That's an issue, and it prolongs things. There is evidence again and again throughout Canadian history.

I put this on the floor. If we do not want to see long-term strikes or lockouts, and they're happening under the current system, we ought to be changing it so there is a focus at that table that everyone agrees to.

While I have the floor, I just want to mention as well about Canada's reputation. I'm also co-chair of the Canada-Japan...and as such have quite a bit of dialogue with politicians from Asia, as well as businesses. They were here just recently at the end of August and September. They view Canada as a very reliable partner, especially with Russia's illegal war against Ukraine, and with what China is doing in the South China Sea and the East China Sea..

It's not just the Japanese. The people in the area are very excited about the Indo-Pacific strategy, because they're identifying not only peace and security but opportunities for trade.

One of the questions I would have for the group is about the capacity of our west coast ports, because they really want to do more deals with Canada. They see us as having a great reputation. We're stable. We're like-minded on democracy and capitalism. What is the capacity? Do we need to invest more in infrastructure to make sure we can meet the needs of our friends from very ASEAN countries—the Philippines or Japan—as they're looking for more safety and security and coming to Canada? What is our capacity?

As well, what are any of the threats? I always think of SWOT—strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. One of the people here had identified some of the climate changes that are happening, including rising or lowering sea levels and fires.

I'm going to start with Mr. McEwan, because I think he was one of the people who talked about weather events and such and how they could disrupt supply chains.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you, Mr. Sheehan, but you've run out of time.

Maybe if the other witnesses, in answering somebody else's question, want to throw in a point, that will be up to them.

Monsieur Blanchette-Joncas, you have two and a half minutes, please.

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

I'm sorry, Chair. On a point of order, could the witnesses put it in writing?

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Yes. If any of the witnesses would like to answer Mr. Sheehan, send it to the clerk, please, for all committee members.

Thank you.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Let me set the record straight once again. I heard some comments from my colleagues, particularly from Mr. Jeneroux, who thinks that I don't know much because I'm new to the committee.

I would like the analysts to remind us who introduced and who supported Bill C‑29, An Act to provide for the resumption and continuation of operations at the Port of Montreal. The bill was introduced for first reading on April 27, 2021, and passed during the second session of the 43rd Parliament. It was special legislation.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

On a point of order, Madam Chair, it's not for the member to ask analysts to answer questions during a committee study.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you, Mr. Seeback. I was just about to say that.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

I understand that it's hard to respond when faced with the truth, Madam Chair.

Here's the situation. People are spreading misinformation. When they're confronted with the truth, they raise points of order and they don't want the analysts to help us with our work.

I have no choice but to ensure that the people in this room and the people tuning in receive the correct information. Bill C‑29 passed third reading on April 29, 2021. As you might expect, it received royal assent. This special bill was introduced by the government, meaning the Liberal party, with the support of its friends in the Conservative party. It's troubling when one of my colleagues tries to make me look ignorant because I'm new to the committee, and tells me that his party doesn't support special legislation. It's very dangerous.

I'll turn to Mr. Murray. We can't ask the analysts questions, but we can certainly ask the witnesses questions.

Mr. Murray, you were involved in the labour dispute covered by this special legislation. Do you remember who introduced this bill? Who supported it? We mustn't believe that things were done automatically. It was a minority government.

[Michel Murray]

You're bringing up a very bad memory for the longshore workers of the Port of Montreal.

This bill was introduced by Filomena Tassi, who was the labour minister at the time. It was supported by the Conservatives. We had the chance to speak with the Conservatives. They helped us remove the final offer selection arbitration, the worst thing in labour relations.

I spoke to people around the table at the time. We managed to remove this item from the bill. I want to thank everyone involved in the process.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Cannings, go ahead for two and a half minutes.

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

Thank you.

I'd like to turn to Mr. McEwan. You made a good case as to why mining is important now. One of your members, Teck Resources, has a big smelter in my riding that's very important for all the reasons you said, plus it's one of the biggest employers in my riding.

I also want to ask you what your members face when it comes to the whole supply chain. Shipping ports, obviously, are important, but I'm just wondering. Rail service, especially, seems to be critical for mining. It deals in big heavy stuff that has to be transported.

To get through the narrative that all the problems with supply chain issues seem to come down to workers who want a fair share of profits, I want to ask you about the other issues facing your members when it comes to supply chains.

[Tim McEwan]

Sure. Thanks for the question, Mr. Cannings.

Our members, as I said in my opening remarks, in the past few years—as we all have—have faced supply chain challenges from the pandemic and from the wildfires and the atmospheric rivers. There were supply chain disruptions as a result of the atmospheric rivers particularly.

Mr. Sheehan spoke to this earlier. As we think about the trade opportunities in the Indo-Pacific, we need to ensure—particularly in British Columbia—that our roads, rails and ports are resilient in the face of those challenges, so we've advocated to both orders of government the need for investment in those areas.

In respect of the strike situation last summer, our position would be that we do support free and collective bargaining and we do believe the best outcomes are achieved at a bargaining table, but we also support business continuity. It's absolutely critical that the waterfront in our west coast ports be accessible and be fluid to support the export of our commodities and the inbound materials we need in order to operate.

A strike of any duration—or a lockout, for that matter—should not be tolerated, and that's why the section 106 review is timely—to figure out what the tools are that can be deployed when we bargain to impasse and what the timing points are around the deployment of those kinds of tools.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much.

We'll go on to Mr. Seeback for five minutes, please.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I was really happy that Mr. Sheehan decided to bring up the question of infrastructure with respect to our trade infrastructure.

I have a paper from the Canada West Foundation that talks about the port of Vancouver strike. In that paper, they say that in 2013 Canada had the 10th-best global trade infrastructure in the world and that, as of 2023, it has the 32nd-best trade infrastructure. Canada's trade infrastructure, after eight years of this Liberal government, has plummeted from 10th to 32nd.

I was wondering if any of the witnesses today would like to comment on whether or not there is a desperate need for trade infrastructure here in Canada.

[Bruce Rodgers]

I'll jump in on that one initially.

We believe there is. There's a significant impact overall. On the earlier comment about the expansion progress and whether we have capacity, we know that the Roberts Bank terminal 2 project in Vancouver is going to add 1.6 million containers into that port sometime in 2030.

Part of the problem Canada has is the amount of time it takes for some of these projects to be approved and put into place. When the Roberts Bank terminal 2 expansion project was first presented.... It's going to take 20 years from concept until actually starting to operate, which is far too long. We can't wait that long.

What we are doing now and how we're trying to position it, knowing that there are going to be 1.6 million more containers in about the next seven to eight years, is, do we have the right infrastructure? Do we have the rail connections? Do we have the roads? Do we have the terminal operations? Do we have the land available? All of these things have to be taken into consideration now.

We can't wait until the container terminal is built and the containers hit the ground to try to figure out what we do with them. We're well aware of it well in advance, and we have to start taking those initiatives today.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

Mr. Ballantyne, do you want to add to that?

[Robert Ballantyne]

I agree with everything Bruce has said in his comments. He was very eloquent in what he had to say, as he always is.

I would just add that this is a continuing issue that needs to be addressed by the private sector and by government going forward.

We've seen things in the past that have been somewhat imaginative and good. For example, CN and CP operate between Kamloops and Vancouver collectively. I think the eastbound trains of CN and CP all run on CP, and the westbound trains run on CN. That was a smart move. That was done quite a long time ago—several decades ago—and that kind of thing is important.

There does need to be continued investment in all of the links in the supply chain.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

We have Mr. Sidhu, please, for five minutes.

[Maninder Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton East, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thanks to our witnesses for taking the time to be with us this morning. My first question is for Ms. Kuzeljevich.

Many of your members are based in the Peel region. I know that many of my constituents work at the good companies that your association represents. I also had the pleasure of working in the trade industry for 13 years before my journey into politics here, so I'm very familiar with and appreciative of your work and the work that your members do.

Could you share with the committee your feedback on what you were hearing in real time during the labour negotiations? How quickly did your members bounce back?

[Julia Kuzeljevich]

That's an important question because one major issue we faced was a lack of information. There was a concerted effort on the part of Transport Canada to get stakeholders on a daily call, which was immensely helpful. However, there was a good degree of silence behind some of the negotiations taking place, and there was a lack of cohesive information. One day it was on and then one day it was off. One day there were threats of layoffs at one of the railways and the next day that was off.

Relaying that information back to our members is part of my job and it became problematic because there seemed to be this lack of transparency. Understandably, when negotiations take place we can't hear all about it, but there needs to be a mechanism to deliver that information we talked about. What could make the negotiation process better for all the stakeholders is relaying some sort of concrete information back to the affected stakeholders within a reasonable time frame.

Our members were affected by that uncertainty. Although we can't calculate it, there is definitely an uncertainty cost to the length of time that these negotiations and decisions take.

On one of the earlier questions, an improvement could be determining a timeline around these negotiations.

[Maninder Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton East, ON]

I understand that, in the coming April 2024, your organization will hold the 75th anniversary conference with the theme “Leading the Path Forward”.

Could you provide the committee with an overview of this event and the value of bringing the industry together to help shape the future of supply chains in Canada?

[Julia Kuzeljevich]

Thanks for the opportunity to promote the conference. We are really thrilled to be an association that prides itself on working well and collaboratively with our other sister associations such as the FMA. We do not like to point fingers. We don't want to be reactive. We want to be proactive.

The conference is meant to gather all of our members and associate members. Amongst them are major air, truck and marine carriers across the country, all of our sister associations, employer associations, unions and all the people involved in making the supply chain fluid and providing continuity.

[Maninder Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton East, ON]

Thank you.

My next question is for Ms. Martin.

As you know, Canada exports almost 70% of its pork production and 50% of its beef production to more than 90 countries.

Could you share with our committee your organization's position on free trade and how agreements like the modernized Canada-Ukraine free trade agreement can help your industry reach more markets and expand their reach?

[Lauren Martin]

We are certainly in favour of free trade.

I can illustrate a little bit as to why Canada's red meat supply chain exports as much as it does, when there are Canadians here at home who enjoy our products as well. It is because different markets in the world enjoy different aspects of our products. Some things that Canadians don't eat are enjoyed by other consumers elsewhere. It allows us to get a better price for our product and, overall, be a better industry for it, which allows us to offer prices more competitively to Canadians here at home.