Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with my colleague from Vancouver East who comes from the province where the forestry industry, workers and their communities have been hardest hit by this ongoing softwood lumber crisis.
I listened carefully to the comments of the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for International Trade. I do not question for a moment that the parliamentary secretary shares with members on the opposition side the frustrations about this continuing, unresolved dispute.
I do not question whether he is concerned about the impact that it is having on forestry workers and their families. Christmas is coming and some 16,000 workers have already lost their jobs in British Columbia alone. They do not having any idea about what will happen in the future. In fact they are losing hope for any possibility of getting up off their knees and working in the industry in which they have proven themselves to be highly skilled and competitive.
I share with those workers the incredible frustration they feel when government members, including the Prime Minister, the trade minister and the parliamentary secretary, I am sorry to say, wring their hands and speak about how meritorious is the Canadian position.
The government only deals with the symptoms. It is not willing to talk about the underlying causes, the root problems, the reasons we are in this difficult situation yet again. People are losing their homes and communities. They are literally faced with personal bankruptcy and in many cases family breakdown because of the pressures involved.
It is high time for the government to speak about the reasons we are in this situation with the U.S. We will continue to be harassed as we have been time and time again unless we face the real problem: that we do not have a fair trade deal with the U.S. We will continue to face that kind of harassment until we have proper trade dispute mechanisms that can deal with this kind of unwarranted, unfair attack or until we are able to be highly competitive in various sectors.
I had an opportunity to question the Prime Minister earlier this afternoon on his tough talk yesterday about finally getting up off his knees and standing up to the Americans on softwood lumber. Unfortunately it turns out that it appears to be a very temporary tough talk. Temporary indeed. It is not the first time we have heard this.
The Prime Minister met with President George Bush after his election. He boasted that he had stood up to the American president on the issue of softwood lumber. Yet, to the embarrassment of not just the Prime Minister but all Canadians, the American president's own staff came forward and said that he actually did not say those things to the American president.
Once again we end up being a laughing stock. We end up being seen on the one hand as saying that we are prepared to fight for our forestry industry, our workers, their families and communities and on the other hand we backpedal like Olympic cyclists when it comes to following through on the concerns. That kind of bluffing and rhetoric, not backed up with solid actions, is a source of frustration.
I was asked if I identify with the incredible frustration that those forestry workers and their families are feeling and facing at this time. Darned right I do.
We have to begin to recognize that 16,000 jobs have already been lost in British Columbia alone. The prediction is that 30,000 jobs will be lost in that province. We know what a devastating blow that is to those families and to the entire economy. Some 50% of the impact is predicted to rip through British Columbia, but let us make no mistake. There will be a devastating impact on other communities across the country.
Two weeks ago the government was talking as if it were on the verge of signing a new deal on softwood lumber. It appeared to be ready to step up to the plate and insist that the supposed free trade deal into which Canada entered in 1989 would be the start of a free trade deal relating to softwood lumber.
The fact of the matter is that we have been hit with an even more punitive measure of an unwarranted 19.5% duty on the already imposed dumping levy of 12.5%. That cripples many of our lumber mills and forestry industry in many parts of the country.
The reality is that the so-called free trade for which we paid a very heavy price over the years has turned out to be no such thing. We remember the sales pitch for the free trade agreement. This party stood alone, but there was also a lot of talk from the Liberals that they too were opposed to that flawed free trade agreement. Members will recall that in the early 1980s the U.S. tried and failed to get countervailing duties levied against Canadian lumber exports to the U.S.
Ronald Reagan agreed to curb lumber imports from Canada when he was trying to get fast track authority from the U.S. congress. The U.S. set about putting in place a punitive tariff and warned that free trade talks would be in peril. The Mulroney government quickly succumbed to those pressures and agreed to impose an export tax of 15% on Canadian softwood lumber that remained in place for five years until 1991.
In 1992 the U.S. imposed a 6.5% tax on Canadian softwood lumber which Canada appealed to a NAFTA panel. Canada won the appeal but still the U.S. pressure remained. The current Prime Minister, like Brian Mulroney, surrendered to U.S. power and agreed in 1996 to an escalating penalty on shipments in excess of 14.7 billion square feet.
IWA President Dave Haggard had it absolutely right when he said “We cannot capitulate our way into an acceptable agreement with the Americans”.
It seems that when we win these disputes in international tribunals we lose. Why is this? It is because the U.S. is prepared to ignore, challenge or tie up in endless adjudication any case which it deems contrary to its domestic political interests. Softwood lumber has always been a powerful lever for U.S. harassment in Canada.
Six months ago U.S. lumber interests were threatening to seek punitive duties of up to 40%. Then they upped the threat to 76% with the full support of Bush's trade representative Robert Zoellick who extols the benefits of free trade while advancing protectionism.
We have again heard the trade minister and the Prime Minister huffing and puffing that Canada won those rounds before international tribunals. Yet we have ended up having to pay again for the privilege of free trade in softwood lumber.
There could be no better way to sum up what the current situation is and what the best advice is to the government than to quote one of the B.C. forestry workers who came to state his solidarity and support for the NDP against this harassment of our softwood lumber industry. He said that negotiating on our knees is not working and it is high time that Canada stood up to the Americans.