Thank you.
Thank you for being here. It's good to see you once again.
After the completion of the Canada-U.S.-Mexico agreement in 2018, Minister Freeland, who was then international trade minister among other things, said she was very proud of the fact that we didn't include ISDS in CUSMA. She said, “ISDS elevates the rights of corporations over those of sovereign governments. In removing it, we have strengthened our government's right to regulate in the public interest, to protect public health and the environment”.
We've had a number of cases in Canada that have been very expensive to Canadians, and we've had a number of cases in foreign countries in the guise of protecting Canadian investments. As was mentioned, Ecuador, in the face of one of those, actually pulled out of its agreements, because it didn't like what it was seeing in terms of the effect that foreign governments could have on environmental and human rights legislation and work in Ecuador. Now we have a different government.
I'm just wondering why Canada has seemingly changed its mind on ISDS. The world seems to be going away from it, but we seem to be doubling down on it, especially in cases where we have the Canadian mining industry and some players in that. Why are we still so keen on it in this day, when there seems to be a movement away from it elsewhere?