Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for his intervention, because even I was having trouble hearing what I was saying. So many people on both sides of the House were talking that I could hardly express the views and the principles I wanted to bring forward.
It is a pleasure to rise in the House to speak to the motion put forward by my hon. colleague from Joliette, on behalf of the Bloc Quebecois, the government to “put in place an open and ongoing process to keep parliament informed of negotiations to establish a free trade area of the Americas so as to allow parliamentarians to debate it and civil society to be consulted before parliament approves it”. Of course, I also support the amendment moved by the member for Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot.
Why are we asking today for a more open negotiating process to establish a free trade area of the Americas?
For many different reasons, because it is quite normal to hope that our fellow citizens and non-governmental organizations will be able to take part in the debate that will help us reach in the future, somewhere around 2005 according to what was agreed upon during the weekend, a free trade deal with a human touch, which will reflect a number of the fundamental principles of our modern societies as well as the consensus developed here, in Canada.
I will deal mainly with the importance of protecting the environment in the context of globalization, free market and free trade, and also of protecting the environment when it comes to the creation of the free trade area of the Americas.
We should think back to the period when NAFTA was negotiated and signed. At the time, it was described as one of the greener international trade agreements.
Environmental clauses in NAFTA were the result of the perseverance, involvement and determination of non-governmental organizations to include a number of clauses to protect the environment. We should recall that back in 1993 NAFTA did include a number of environmental principles and clauses.
Clearly, at the face of the preamble of NAFTA, there is a bias in favour of sustainable development, environmental protection and compliance with environmental standards and regulations.
The NAFTA preamble was clearly pro-environment, and that in itself is significant. Had these principles been stated in an environmental agreement, it would have been understandable, but they were stated in a trade agreement. It was a step in the right direction.
NAFTA contained a number of provisions including one that said environmental standards had to be higher than those recommended by international environmental organizations. This makes it possible for a signatory state that wants to raise its environmental standards above and beyond what had been agreed to internationally to do so. That was very clearly stated in the agreement.
Another aspect was the fact that under NAFTA there would be no lowering of environmental standards to attract investors and investments. Why is that? There was a provision preventing a signatory country from creating, through this free trade agreement, what was called a polluter's paradise, from lowering its environmental standards to attract investors. That was clearly stated in the North American Free Trade Agreement.
Of course, all that added to the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation, which created the Commission for Environmental Cooperation, was the culmination of environmental cooperation between Canada, the United States and Mexico.
NAFTA has obvious flaws. We talked about chapter 11, and we must keep talking about it. The Prime Minister and the Minister for International Trade were telling us today that there were very few challenges under chapter 11 of NAFTA, that it is all in the opposition's head.
From an environmental standpoint, it is totally false. Let us consider what happened with Sun Belt Water Inc. This California based company sued the government of British Columbia because it would not allow it to export bulk water from Canada. The Prime Minister and the Minister for International Trade were telling us that there were no problems, but that was one.
Another case in point concerns Ethyl Corporation, a company that got $30 billion in compensation because the federal government wanted to pass here, in this House, a bill banning the use of a gasoline additive called MMT.
It was not an act that the company was challenging, but rather a bill that was brought before us, the parliamentarians, but had yet to be passed in the House when it was challenged in court. The company received $30 billion in compensation.
We are told that the chapter 11 investor-state dispute mechanism is not a problem. Quite the opposite, since the situation with the Ethyl Corporation has clearly shown that our law making authority, as parliamentarians, could be limited.
The minister was not clear on the issue. Are we shoving chapter 11 aside? Do we really want to protect the environment? The government will have to answer those questions.
At the summit in Quebec City, we would have liked to see the government make a firm commitment on three or four environmental issues. We would have been pleased with that. First, regarding the environment, that the federal government would not accept anything less that what was agreed upon in NAFTA.
Could the Minister for International Trade take all the necessary steps to assure the House that the Quebec and Canadian environmental legislation will not be challenged in court by large corporations, as was done under the North American Free Trade Agreement?
First and foremost, the Bloc Quebecois wants to ensure that there are provisions preventing large companies from challenging the environmental legislation in court. How ironic that we, in the opposition, are the ones who want to protect the Canadian environmental legislation. The environment minister is letting the international trade minister negotiate an agreement that does not only deal with trade, but also with the environment and public health.
We also would like to have the international agreements on the environment, the Basel convention and the Montreal protocol on the ozone layer be honoured in the free trade area of the Americas and in the agreement likely to be signed in 2005. We will not ask the Government of Canada to have the Kyoto protocol honoured. I think that would be a bit much to ask of it, since it did not even deign to ratify it.
So, this is what we expected from this government. Of course, the government decided to exclude the Minister of the Environment from discussions. I could talk about this for a long time yet.
However, what we might have wished from the Minister of the Environment, a few weeks away from the summit of the Americas, was a reiteration before the 34 environment ministers in Montreal of his intention to honour the Kyoto protocol. In meeting with the 34 environment ministers, he refused to sign the Montreal declaration on climate change. That says a mouthful about where we are going in terms of negotiations in 2005 for the free trade area.
We will be watching and will make sure, in the coming weeks and months, that the North American Free Trade Agreement, and especially the free trade area of the Americas, contain provisions on the environment.
