Mr. Speaker, I am very appreciative of the intervention by the member for Comox-Alberni. I share his concern and the government shares his concern for the maintenance of Canada's riches, Canada's natural resources.
I also have some particular interest in this subject because it touches an area in which professionally I have given it some attention. It is of course true that sovereignty is the basic constituent element of a state and sovereignty extends to its territory, its land, the resources of that land both under and above it, fixtures, to the air space above, and to the territorial sea. It is elementary that sovereignty cannot be derogated from except by the sovereign personality himself.
So to this extent Canada retains full sovereign rights unless we ourselves choose freely to contract out of those and that would be an obligation entered into under international law. It is a fact that we have led in the international law related to protection of natural resources, our own and also those of other countries. We have been interested in clean air. We have pioneered the treaties and the protection of the atmosphere. We have led the way in the proper utilization of the law of the sea, and its protection from pollution.
Also, I may say in pursuance of this, because not all states have accepted our high standards, we have not merely negotiated and led the way to international treaties and multilateral treaties extending protection of the law of the sea, but we have negotiated bilateral treaties with numbers of other countries when the international or multilateral action was slow in coming. For example, we have extended zones of 200 miles from our coast, the better to exercise these international law norms.
I mention this simply to say that Canadians have led in this area. It was something very much in our minds when we negotiated specific agreements with the United States in relation to the Great Lakes, in relation to international waters, international rivers. It was also very much in our minds when we negotiated the North American Free Trade Agreement, the trilateral agreement with Mexico and the United States.
It happens that during the election campaign in October 1993 this issue was raised in the public debates: Is there any derogation from Canada's control over its natural resources, over its water in particular by virtue of the NAFTA agreement. This was something to which all candidates, certainly in my part of the country, addressed themselves. The answer is very clear: There is nothing in the NAFTA agreement itself derogating in any way from our sovereign powers over our water resources.
However there is a point in international diplomacy and international law in which for greater security one acts inaccord with the Latin phrase, Mr. Speaker, and you and I both deplore, as Lord Justice Denning called the attempt to fetter law by recourse to Latinisms. I will quote the Latin phrase ex abundanti cautela but I will repeat it in its essential, for greater assurance. I said to those who asked me then: I will seek a clarifying statement that makes assurance doubly sure. Immediately after the election and in fact during the campaign, I asked the Prime Minister if we could address ourselves to this and this is what has been done.
A trilateral agreement was signed by the Prime Minister of Canada, the President of the United States and the President of Mexico. It is what is called a joint declaration. Annexed to the NAFTA agreement is the joint declaration of December 2, 1993. It says it very clearly and recites what is in any case I think as a matter of interpretation clear in the NAFTA agreement itself.
The statement annexed to NAFTA establishes that NAFTA creates no rights to the natural water resources of any party to the agreement. Unless water in any form is entered into commerce and becomes a good or a product it is not covered by the provisions of any trade agreement including the NAFTA. I could read the balance of this but I think therein is the essential.
What is the legal status of a joint declaration of this sort, a statement annexed to the NAFTA agreement? I do not want to bore you with technicalities but the fact is that what are called by various names, joint declarations, agreed interpretations, joint statements, provided they are signed by the parties to the agreement become part of the agreement.
The best known example of this is of course the SALT I treaty, the strategic arms limitation treaty of 1972 between the United States and the Soviet Union. It has many, perhaps 30 such declarations and agreed interpretations annexed to it, and they are binding in terms of interpretation of the treaty.
I would simply say this to the hon. member for Comox-Alberni. We are sensitive to his concern, which we share, for the preservation of our great natural resources, for the preservation of our water. There is nothing in NAFTA, nothing in any international agreement to which Canada is party derogating from our retention of full sovereign rights over water within Canada, whether it be in lakes or whether it be in the water supplies on mountain slopes unless and until it enters into a commercial form, which means in this context, bottled. In this situation it will not be subject to NAFTA arrangements. There is no recourse to any one of the NAFTA arbitral or dispute settlement procedures.
I do not see any reason to go beyond this at this stage. However, the government may at some future stage wish to make declarations for purposes of Canadian internal needs of this sort. However in international law we are fully protected. Our sovereign rights are fully preserved.
On that basis I would simply say again that I welcome the expression of sentiment by the member for Comox-Alberni. I share his views. I believe all members of the government do. I do not believe though that there is any need for any further action to be taken at this stage. I thank him again for his thoughtful intervention.