Good afternoon. We would like to begin by thanking you for this invitation.
Attac Québec, Action citoyenne pour la justice fiscale, sociale et écologique, aims to establish democratic control of financial markets and their institutions.
I'm the president of that association and responsible for the free trade file, which I've been interested in for over 20 years. I've written and coordinated three books on the subject.
We believe that rules-based international trade is fundamental. However, it raises the question of what those rules are and who benefits from them.
The rules that have been put in place since the 1990s haven't really served the interests of the people around the world. Drafted in free trade agreements that were negotiated in secret, without consultation with enough civil society actors, the rules have been designed to benefit large transnational corporations, often to shield them from other rules that they should have followed to pay their taxes, protect the environment and provide decent work. As a result, the track record for the years of free trade, under the rules set out in the trade agreements, isn't stellar. It includes weak economic growth, an increase in inequality, major environmental degradation, job losses caused by competition among workers, and a significant decline in purchasing power for the middle class and society's most disadvantaged. Faced with significant losses of quality of life, many voters turn to the far-right parties that feed off the dissatisfaction caused by free trade agreements. Too many people feel abandoned and helpless.
Donald Trump got elected, particularly in his first term, by winning a majority of votes in regions devastated by the consequences of free trade agreements, an evil he readily identified. Now that Trump has returned to power, he refuses to abide by the established rules that produced those results so that he can enforce his own, even more disastrous rules that leave his trading partners baffled.
In the face of the Trump administration's unpredictable tariffs and, above all, its intimidating negotiating style, Canada has to stick to fundamental values, give nothing in advance and provide a firm counter-example in negotiations. By breaking the rules, Trump gets more in a few weeks than other countries do after years of negotiation. The worst thing to do is to cave in to him in advance. For example, hastily abandoning the digital services tax, which we believe to be essential, has done far more harm than good and hasn't changed the President of the United States' attitude.
Faced with Trump, Canada has to adopt a stance that enables it to fully uphold what it believes in and to not give in to a contagion effect when it comes to the U.S. government's most questionable measures. It has to develop rules that enable it to better protect the environment and take action on climate justice. It has to fully maintain supply management. It has to protect culture and reaffirm its commitment to the principle of cultural diversity. It also has to break with rules that have been harmful, such as the investor-state dispute settlement under the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement, or CUSMA, and regulatory co-operation, terms that make it possible to question regulations that are often necessary. The Canadian government has to resist any weakening of health and safety rules. It should apply all of this in its ongoing negotiations with Ecuador, Mercosur and Indonesia.
Our neighbour to the south certainly has particularly unpredictable behaviour, so much so that the agreements that seemed to be the strongest, such as CUSMA, are under threat. However, the worst attitude to take would be to give in to intimidation and bind our future to the wishes of an extremist president, whose support from his own population is weak and who will not be in office forever.
I look forward to your questions.