Debates of Oct. 29th, 2018

Canada-Israel Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act

[Jim Eglinski, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Madam Speaker, the minister just spoke about the significant potential and offers of diverse commercial opportunities for Canadian businesses, but we need to communicate with businesses. We need to ensure small and large businesses in Canada understand what CIFTA is all about.

I wonder if the minister could explain to me what program is in place or is anticipated to be put in place to educate and inform small businesses across Canada.

[Jim Carr]

Madam Speaker, it is extremely important. Historically, we have left too much on the table and have not encouraged enough, made aware enough or nurtured enough small and medium-sized enterprises to take full advantage of these opportunities, so we will do more. Over the coming months, we will talk to Canadians about how we will do more, understanding exactly what the hon. member has highlighted in a very important way, that first comes awareness and then comes capacity. Our government will help with both.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Madam Speaker, I just want to clarify the question I posed to the minister a moment ago. He seemed to think it was about restricting the geographical scope of CIFTA, but that is not what I was asking. I want the businesses and people in Gaza and the West Bank to benefit from CIFTA as well. I was just asking that we live up to our international obligations in our own policies and do what Europe has been doing for the last three years, which is asking Israel to label those export products so that we know whether they come from the occupied territories or the State of Israel.

[Jim Carr]

Madam Speaker, as I said in response to the last question, CIFTA contemplates no change.

[Dean Allison, Conservative, Niagara West, ON]

Madam Speaker, I want to seek unanimous consent to split my time with my colleague from Thornhill. We talked to some of the parties about that to see if it would be okay.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

Does the member have unanimous consent to split his time with his colleague?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[Dean Allison, Conservative, Niagara West, ON]

Madam Speaker, I also want to extend my condolences, sympathies and utter outrage at what happened to the Jewish community in Pittsburgh. My heart goes out to those in Pittsburgh and to the greater Jewish community. It is absolutely reprehensible that anyone would come into a place of worship, a place so sacred, and do what happened. This was a very heinous crime. I just want them to know that they have our support here on this side of the House, as has been mentioned by all members in the House today.

I want to start by saying that the Conservatives will support Bill C-85, the modernized Canada-Israel Free Trade Agreement. This agreement was overwhelmingly negotiated by our former Conservative government. In October 2011, we began the consultation with Canadians. In January 2014, Prime Minister Harper and Prime Minister Netanyahu announced the launch of the CIFTA negotiations. In July 2015, Canada and Israel announced the successful conclusion of the revised agreement.

Amendments to the original deal included four updated chapters: dispute settlement, good market access, governance and rules of origin. The agreement also added seven new chapters: e-commerce, environment, intellectual property, labour, sanitary and phytosanitary measures, technical barriers to trade, and trade facilitation.

The modernized CIFTA breaks down many old barriers. It creates new export opportunities for Canadian agriculture and agrifood. It creates new opportunities for our fish and seafood companies in the Israeli market. As members can see, we are very proud to have been the main drivers of this agreement.

Israel is our closest partner in the region and also the only democracy in the region. Israel's economy is a very modern and advanced one. Our two countries enjoy an excellent commercial relationship. Since the original agreement came into force over 20 years ago, trade between our two countries has tripled, totalling $1.7 billion in 2017.

Israel's market has a lot of potential and offers many opportunities for our Canadian businesses. Israel is also placed in a very economically strategic region in the Middle East. With one of the best educated populations in the world, a solid industrial and scientific base, and abundant natural resources, specifically in the agricultural and agri-tech sectors, Israel makes for a great partner in trade.

It is also important to mention that this agreement will further strengthen Canada's support for Israel, which should be very important to all of us. As we bring Canada and Israel closer through this trade deal, we begin to see a very positive pattern for Conservatives when it comes to negotiating free trade deals, a pattern of Conservative-negotiated agreements.

Conservatives negotiated the original NAFTA, the Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement, CETA with the Europeans, and now the modernization of CIFTA. The biggest free trade agreements were done under Conservative governments. We are very proud of that.

We are also very proud of the member for Abbotsford, who worked tirelessly to complete the negotiations on CIFTA, the TPP, and CETA. I have tremendous respect for him on a personal level, and of course, as the former international trade minister.

I have to say that although this agreement will likely pass without much delay, there is a greater concern Canadians have with the Liberal government when it comes to the economy. That concern is about competitiveness.

Canadians are worried that the Prime Minister and the Liberals are making our economy uncompetitive. While our neighbours to the south are cutting corporate taxes and getting rid of massive amounts of burdensome red tape, the Prime Minister keeps raising taxes and adding more red tape to everything he touches. He is raising taxes everywhere he can. He is putting in ridiculous regulations and massive roadblocks that serve to kill pipeline construction and many of its offshoot jobs.

This is no secret. In fact, he admits it every day in question period and every time he speaks around the country. He just sugar-coats it, smiles for the cameras, and relies on his pals in the media to sell it.

Let us take the carbon tax as an example. Last week, the Prime Minister announced that he will be forcing Canadians living in Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and New Brunswick to pay his carbon tax. While he claims that he will return 90% of all the money he collects, Conservatives know that the Prime Minister and his Liberals are simply looking for more ways to sustain this massive debt and out-of-control deficits.

Unless large and developing countries reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, global emissions will not decrease. Let me repeat that one more time: Unless large and developing countries reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, global emissions will not decrease. The Prime Minister's carbon tax will not save the environment. It will only hurt Canada's economy, Canada's small businesses, and Canadian families.

Canadians are not fooled by the carbon tax. They know the Prime Minister's carbon tax is a tax plan dressed up like an emissions plan. Canadians see it for what it is, another tax or an election gimmick. Only the Liberals could argue that a new tax will mean money in our pockets while also reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

To make matters worse, the Prime Minister is personally withholding documents that show the true cost of the carbon tax, both for families and businesses. The reality is that the Prime Minister's carbon tax will make everything more expensive, from driving to work to feeding our families to filling our gas tanks. Canadians will see through this election gimmick, and we will hold the government and the Prime Minister to account for it.

I know the Liberals will keep on repeating the same old tired message they have been repeating, a message that asks for our plan. I would like to be very clear. The Liberals do not have an environment plan. They have a tax plan, an election gimmick. It is another tax. It is nothing more. However, they have no plan to lower emissions. We believe that it is more important to arrive at a plan that will actually reduce global emissions, and that takes time to carefully consider. I would also like to be very clear that we will be unveiling a detailed and comprehensive environmental plan before the next election.

On top of taxing Canadians more through the carbon tax, the Prime Minister and the Liberals are working against Canadian jobs in the oil and gas sector, making our economy even more uncompetitive.

The Liberals have no plan to get the Trans Mountain expansion built. Thousands of workers have already lost their jobs because of the Prime Minister's failure to get any pipelines built. Canadians have lost their jobs because of the Liberals' damaging anti-energy policies. This cannot continue. The Liberals' anti-energy policies have driven more than $100 billion of investment out of Canada in the last two years. Talk about being uncompetitive; this is totally unacceptable.

The Federal Court of Appeal gave the Liberals clear direction to address their failure to properly consult with indigenous communities on the Trans Mountain expansion. However, instead of following those directions, the Liberals announced that they will launch another process, with no timeline, that will only further delay construction.

Canadian families cannot wait until next year for a plan. For the workers and communities affected by the Prime Minister's failure, every day counts. Getting the Trans Mountain expansion built should be the Prime Minister's top priority. What exactly is going on? He spent nearly $4.5 billion of taxpayers' money on the existing pipeline and still cannot tell workers when construction will start, how much it will cost or when it will be completed. The pipeline is crucial for workers across Canada, including the 43 first nation communities that have benefit agreements worth over $400 million, which now hang in the balance.

It seems like the Prime Minister is doing everything he can to phase out our energy sector. We just have to look at Bill C-69. This Liberal bill would again fail Canadian workers and the Canadian resource sector, making us even more uncompetitive. It would kill future resource development, drive jobs and investment out of the country and do nothing to enhance environmental protection.

Before the current Prime Minister became thePrime Minister , there were three private companies willing to invest more than $30 billion to build three nation-building pipelines that would have created tens of thousands of jobs and generated billions in economic activity. The Prime Minister killed two of them and put the Trans Mountain expansion on life support. Bill C-69 would block all future pipelines.

When the Prime Minister says he wants to phase out the oil sands, Canadians should believe him. In the last two years, over $100 billion of investment in the energy sector has been cancelled by the Liberal government. Over 100,000 good-paying, high-quality jobs in the resource sector have been lost. Under the current Prime Minister, energy investment in Canada has seen its biggest decline in over 70 years. Now the Bank of Canada predicts no new energy investment in Canada until after 2019.

The current Liberal government seems incapable of doing anything but raising taxes, creating red tape, and getting in the way of the energy sector. Our country's competitiveness is at stake, and the Liberals do not seem to care.

Yes, walking completed Conservative free trade agreements across the finish line is a good thing. They seem to be doing that, and we appreciate it. Whether it is the TPP, CETA or the modernized CIFTA, the government seems to understand the value of the free trade agreements that we, the Conservatives, helped arrange and worked on. However, it is important to understand that unless the Liberals stop raising taxes and creating out-of-control regulatory burdens, we will not be able to produce anything to trade with anyone. There needs to be a shift in thinking on the part of this anti-energy government. We hope this shift will start soon.

Let us hope that the modernized CIFTA is the beginning of some pragmatic thinking for the Liberals. CIFTA was a great achievement when concluded by our former Conservative government, and it is still very much worthy of supporting now.

As great friends of Israel, my Conservative colleagues and I will be supporting this agreement when it comes to a vote later.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Madam Speaker, I listened to my hon. colleague with great pleasure.

We got to sit together on the Standing Committee on International Trade. It is great to hear that the Conservatives are going to support the Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement, despite the negative comments.

I want to remind the House that pollution pricing and economic development go hand in hand with protecting the environment. Since we took office, 500,000 jobs have been created. Furthermore, the unemployment rate is at a 40-year low. Our pipeline network was not expanded during the 10 years that the previous government was in power.

I want to come back to the Canada-Israel Free Trade Agreement, which came into effect on January 1, 1997. What we are talking about today is an update. During our meetings, the Standing Committee on International Trade often discussed dispute settlement and rules of origin. Seven new chapters have been added to this free trade agreement. E-commerce did not exist back in 1997.

I would like to hear my hon. colleague's thoughts on these issues.

[Dean Allison, Conservative, Niagara West, ON]

Madam Speaker, it was a pleasure sitting with my colleague on the trade committee, and we miss her now that she is not there anymore.

In terms of the new chapter, as I mentioned, there were some seven new chapters that we had already negotiated. There are some additional ones that the government introduced. E-commerce is certainly important. We look at anything that was added there. At the end of the day, this strengthens the agreement. That is why we started the process of modernizing it. We felt that things like e-commerce and the digital economy were important, as well as discussions around IP, regulatory co-operation, and a number of other initiatives as well.

[Kevin Waugh, Conservative, Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK]

Madam Speaker, it is important to note that my province has really benefited from trade with Israel, but we of course were the first province in the country to object to the carbon tax. Here is why. Saskatchewan's exports to Israel have increased 30% over the last five years. One of Saskatchewan's exports to Israel is lentils. Those exports have risen by 82% since 2013. One can see why my province is really against this carbon tax, because we know that our producers in the province of Saskatchewan will pay for the carbon tax and thus there will be no more trade like we have today with the country of Israel.

[Dean Allison, Conservative, Niagara West, ON]

Madam Speaker, one of the challenges we have with the rhetoric from the government on the carbon tax is it saying that the tax is not going to cost anything and that we will get money back in our pockets. The reality is that rural communities are going to pay a disproportionate amount of the carbon tax.

Let me explain this because we do not have any subways in Niagara, just as I am sure there are no subways in the member's riding in Saskatchewan. We do have some buses in the city, but not in rural parts. At the end of the day, the only options available for parents to get their kids to dance lessons or games is to drive the family car. The carbon tax punishes disproportionately rural people and suburban moms who are trying to get their kids to and from events and have to depend on driving their car pretty much everywhere.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL]

Madam Speaker, the member tied pricing on pollution and carbon issues with the amendment or the bringing forward of the agreement. Israel's green tax reform is successfully shifting demand toward less polluting vehicles, proving the efficiency of economic incentives in changing behaviour. I wonder how much the member vehemently disagrees with Israel's successful green tax on vehicles.

[Dean Allison, Conservative, Niagara West, ON]

Madam Speaker, as I mentioned, one of the greatest challenges in trying to reduce emissions worldwide is when we have large emitters and developing countries that are not paying anything. When we look at the fact that we contribute around one per cent or 1.5% to global emissions and look at strictly using this tax to change that, we see that it will disproportionately punish people who live in rural communities. That was the point I was trying to make.

[Peter Kent, Conservative, Thornhill, ON]

Madam Speaker, it is an honour to speak to Bill C-85, an act that would amend and strengthen a free trade agreement between Canada and the only democracy in the Middle East. I speak with particularly passionate solidarity with Jews in Israel, around the world and in my riding of Thornhill tonight because this debate is taking place in the shadow of the hate-driven outrage in Pittsburgh on the weekend. I will speak more directly of that in a few moments.

First, I will speak to Bill C-85. Canada's original formal free trade agreement with Israel came into force in 1997. Negotiations to update it began under Prime Minister Harper in 2014. The legislation we have before us today is the culmination of that work. It has taken a little longer perhaps than necessary under the Liberal government, and it does contain predictable elements of Liberal virtue signalling, but overall it is a good, strong agreement agreement that contains the chapters our Conservative government considered essential to bringing the original free trade agreement to address the realities of the 21st century.

Unlike the most recent updated but diminished trade agreement with another democratic ally clumsily achieved in desperation at the 11th hour with great give and little get, this free trade agreement would truly be a win-win for both Canada and Israel. This updated deal would expand market access for both Canada and Israel. It would include new chapters related to intellectual property, e-commerce and labour, and would preserve and protect a provision that recognizes Israel's customs laws, the one that accepts that all merchandise from the West Bank—manufactured goods, produce, and wine—can be sold in Canada marked with the label “Product of Israel”.

Now, the Liberals defer responsibility for this determination to the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, but it is clearly a matter of international trade law.

As we did while in government, the Conservatives are pleased to enthusiastically endorse this reality, which not only provides quality products to the Canadian marketplace but also provides good jobs, fair wages and broader opportunities for Palestinians, opportunities that should improve the economic and social environment for an eventual negotiated peace agreement, which would see Israelis and Palestinians living side by side in a peaceful co-existence that has, for most of the past century, been obstructed by tyrants and terrorists who would rather continue the futile, tragic, hateful obsession with eliminating the State of Israel and the Jewish population with it.

I have been to Israel, the West Bank, Gaza and the neighbouring countries of the Levant many times over the years. My first visit was to have been in June 1967, as a journalist assigned to cover the 1967 Arab-Israeli War. However, that conflict was so short, six days, and Israel so decisively defeated the Egyptian, Syrian and Jordanian forces, and in the process liberated the Old City of Jerusalem that our crew's assignment was cancelled before we could get to the region.

Therefore, my first visit to Israel did not occur until October 1973, during the fourth Arab-Israeli war, launched by Syria and Egypt on the holiest day of the Jewish year, the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur. That was when I first really understood the vulnerability of this tiny democratic country.

Very early each morning during the war, our crew would go to Beit Sokolov, the journalists' house in central Tel Aviv, to be assigned a military officer to accompany us to either the northern front on the Golan Heights, or on other days, to the Egyptian front, across the Gaza Strip through the Mitla or Gidi passes on to the Sinai desert battlefield. For a young Canadian journalist accustomed to vast spaces between provincial, let alone national, borders, it came as a shocking realization that in covering war in tiny Israel, it was only a matter of hours to either front.

The Yom Kippur War was, as all conflicts are, a costly and deadly war for all parties. It was the closest that Israel's enemies in the Arab world came to achieving their obsessive, destructive objective. In fact, only last minute emergency resupply of aircraft and ammunition from the United States turned the tide.

I still have powerful memories of the dogfights over the Golan; being strafed near Quneitra; crossing the Suez Canal on a Bailey bridge with General Sharon's tank column, part of the encirclement and capture of the Egyptian Sixth Army; the truce negotiations at kilometre 101 between the Israeli and Egyptian generals; and of sitting on Mount Hermon on the night of October 25, 1973, waiting to see whether the truce between Syria and Israel would hold and the fighting stop.

It did, although over the decades since, we have seen lesser conflicts: the Lebanon wars, the Palestinian intifadas, the Gaza war and, until today, Iran's proxy-sponsoring of continued terrorist rocketing and attempted terrorist infiltration from Gaza. In fact, this past weekend, we saw dozens of rockets fired from Gaza by Islamic Jihad on orders from Iran's Quds Force, coincidentally only hours before the hate-driven, deadliest attack on a Jewish community in North America at Pittsburgh's Tree of Life Synagogue. Most of the rockets from Gaza were intercepted, shot down by Israel's Iron Dome defence system. Israel responded with air strikes against 80 sites across Gaza.

In North America, in my home riding of Thornhill and across Canada, as across the United States, there have been heartfelt condolences offered to victims of the weekend atrocity, and today, to the victims of the Pittsburgh murder, declarations of unity against hate and plans for multi-faith vigils. Nonetheless, this weekend's events are a terrible reminder that Israel and Jewish communities in the diaspora remain under constant threat from individuals and organizations that would destroy it and destroy them.

This brings me to happier recollections of visits to Israel as a member of Parliament and as a minister, as a member of Prime Minister Harper's historic visit to Israel and his powerful restatement of Canada's commitment to Israel, through fire and water. As Prime Minister Harper said in his speech in the Knesset, “to [really] understand the special relationship between Israel and Canada, [we] must look beyond trade...to the personal ties of friendship and [of] kinship”. He paid tribute to the people of Israel, saying and applauding, their “courage in war”, their “generosity in peace, and the bloom that the desert has yielded”. Stephen Harper is still a champion of Israel today, if from a different dimension.

The Conservatives, under a new leader, are equally committed to this deep relationship and still hold to the pledge to stand with Israel through fire and water. Our leader, the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle, has vowed to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel when we regain government in 2019. He has clearly restated, without equivocation or ambiguity, that Canada's Conservatives have been and always will be a strong voice for Israel and the Canadian Jewish community; that Israel is one of Canada's strongest allies, a beacon of pluralism and democratic principles in a turbulent part of the world; and that Canada's Conservatives recognize the obvious fact that Israel, like every other sovereign nation, has a right to determine where its capital is located, and that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel.

Let me close by restating my enthusiastic support for Bill C-85, an act to amend and to strengthen a free trade agreement between Canada and the only democracy in the Middle East.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Madam Speaker, let me start by extending my condolences and very best wishes and prayers. It was absolutely abhorrent what we witnessed in a synagogue over the weekend.

Having said that, I want to look at the bigger picture in terms of trade. Israel has been a partner of Canada for many years. It does not matter which political entity is in the House; we all recognize the valuable contributions that Israel has made in many different areas. It seems to be a continuation that the minister responsible for introducing the bill made reference to the number of trade agreements and how trade agreements enable companies here in Canada to build upon that special relationship that enables us to ultimately have more markets.

I wonder if my colleague across the way will talk about not only the symbolism but also the reality of how a trade agreement or the changes to the trade agreement that we are seeing today in the Canada-Israel agreement would in fact benefit Canada's middle class and give us a healthier, stronger economy, as it would for Israel too.

[Peter Kent, Conservative, Thornhill, ON]

Madam Speaker, I appreciate my colleague's shared concern and disgust at the events in the synagogue in Pittsburgh, the continuing threats to our holy places of all faiths in Canada and the amount of time, effort, security and money that needs to be expended to guarantee the security of these vulnerable holy meeting places.

On the member's point about the benefits of trade, it is indeed with trade agreements like the agreement originally signed with Israel in 1997, which we are building upon with Bill C-85 today, that enable the growth of trade between countries and opportunities in either partner country with regard to developing trade relationships.

When Prime Minister Netanyahu visited Canada a few years ago in talks with our government, both he and Prime Minister Harper, and I am sure the Prime Minister today, recognized that there was a great deal more opportunity to be taken advantage of with respect to growth and mutual benefit than we had seen, even today, with the growth in the last two decades. Certainly—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

I am sorry. I know this is a topic of great interest, but I have to allow at least one more question.

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Rivière-des-Mille-Îles.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Madam Speaker, I too would like to express my sincere condolences to the people of Pittsburgh and the Jewish community. There is quite a large Jewish community in my riding too, and I would like to extend my condolences to its members as well.

My colleague called this a win-win agreement for Canada and Israel. Israel's economy is very well developed in terms of e-commerce and artificial intelligence, and Montreal is home to an AI supercluster, after all.

Can my hon. colleague comment on that in light of the new chapter on e-commerce in this new agreement?

[Peter Kent, Conservative, Thornhill, ON]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for her question.

The science and technology accomplishments in Israel at the great universities, like the Technion, Haifa University, Tel Aviv University, the Bar-Ilan University and the co-operation with Canadian universities in Toronto and Montreal in the development of artificial intelligence is spectacular, and there is great opportunity. There are incubator companies operating in Thornhill today that were born of technological advance brought from Israel and its universities to be commercialized, developed and shared with the world.

There is also a negative side to artificial intelligence, which we are looking at with respect to the Cambridge Analytica scandal and the dangers of social media. However, there are also great and wonderful benefits to be developed and shared with the world.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Madam Speaker, this is my first chance to rise in the House to offer comment on the horrific hate crimes that occurred in Pittsburgh recently.

The world was horrified to see an anti-Semitic attack on the Tree Of Life synagogue, where 11 innocent people were murdered in a place of worship. I would like to send my deepest sympathies to the families of the victims, the Jewish community in Pittsburgh, the Jewish community in Canada and, frankly, all over the world. We stand resolutely against such an atrocity. We also stand resolutely against discrimination and intolerance in all of its forms: anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, misogyny, homophobia, racism and intolerance, however it is expressed and wherever it is seen.

As representatives of our communities in this chamber and as leaders and politicians, we must condemn, in unequivocal terms, not only these acts of hatred, but also the words that so often form the pretext and context that make committing these actions a little easier for people to contemplate.

I want to talk about the Canada-Israel Free Trade Agreement in two major ways. First, I want to talk about the agreement itself and some of its promising aspects. Second, I want to talk about its impact on the Palestinian community in Israel and what ought to be part of our progressive trade policy in that respect.

The modernized Canada-Israel Free Trade Agreement, called CIFTA, emanates from a background in which Canada and Israel enjoy a rich and fruitful commercial relationship, with room to grow our trade ties and our ties in every other respect, culturally, socially, economically and politically.

Since the original Canada-Israel Free Trade Agreement came into force over two decades ago, two-way merchandise trade has more than tripled, totalling $1.7 billion in 2017. Israel's economy has significant potential and offers diverse commercial opportunities for Canadian businesses, given its strategic location in the Middle East, solid industrial and scientific base, abundant natural resources, particularly in the agricultural and agri-tech sectors, and its well-educated, dynamic population.

A modernized CIFTA will enable Canadian companies to take greater advantage of these opportunities with expanded market access and by creating more predictable conditions. The modernized agreement also reinforces Canada's broader engagement with Israel.

Some of the highlights of this agreement are as follows.

It will create more favourable conditions for exporters through important non-tariff commitments and will establish mechanisms under which Canada and Israel can co-operate to address and seek to resolve unjustified non-tariff barriers that may arise.

The modernized agreement contains provisions related to the protection and enforcement of intellectual property rights, which will assist Canadian IP rights holders to do business with greater confidence in the Israeli market.

The revised goods market access chapter will provide new and improved market access for Canada, particularly in the areas of agriculture, agri-food and fish and seafood products. Changes to the rules of origin reflect many aspects of Canada's current approach, including recognizing the presence of global value chains and the integrated nature of North American production, as well as streamlining the provisions for obtaining preferential tariff treatment.

Interestingly, there is a labour chapter, which is a first for Israel in a free trade agreement. This will help to ensure that high labour standards are maintained, with recourse to labour-specific, enforceable, binding dispute settlement mechanisms, where non-compliance can lead to monetary penalties.

The environment chapter is another first for Israel and will ensure environmental protections are maintained, with recourse to a chapter-specific dispute resolution practice.

There is an innovative chapter on small and medium enterprises that will improve transparency and commits both parties to co-operate with a view to removing barriers and improving access for SMEs to engage in trade.

There is also a corporate social responsibility article that references voluntary OECD guidelines for multinational enterprises in broad application to this agreement. With respect to that clause, the New Democrats would prefer to see a corporate social responsibility chapter that actually has some binding teeth to it and does not rely on a voluntary mechanism. However, we can explore that when the agreement gets to committee.

Most of all, the modernized CIFTA will provide new and improved market access for virtually 100%, up from 90%, of current exports of agricultural agri-food, fish and seafood products. In the agricultural and agri-food sector, 92% of Canadian exports will enter Israel duty free in unlimited quantities under the modernized CIFTA, up from the current level of 83%. In short, the agreement offers the potential for deeper, broader and more prosperous commercial relations between our two countries. In that respect, we all should support this.

However, I and my party have serious concerns with the agreement and with the bill. There are no human rights protections in the bill and no recognition of the rights of Palestinians living in their sovereign territories occupied by Israel. Canadians expect their government to sign trade deals that respect human rights, international law and our foreign affairs policies. Put succinctly, the bill does not conform to these expectations. Without them, the Canadian government is not respecting Canada's commitment to a peaceful and just settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The agreement appears to cover products made in Israeli settlements in occupied territories. Neither Canada nor the United Nations recognizes these settlements as part of Israel. In fact, these settlements are illegal. They clearly violate the fourth Geneva convention, which prohibits the settlement of territories acquired by war and the movement of indigenous people in those territories, among other things. In fact, there is virtual global unanimity that the territories seized and occupied since 1967 by Israel, the West Bank, Golan Heights, Gaza and East Jerusalem are not part of Israel, but form the basis of a sovereign Palestinian state. Indeed, those territories are a fraction of the land awarded to the Palestinian people by the United Nations partition of 1947.

This trade agreement appears to fail to distinguish between the State of Israel and these occupied Palestinian territories. This is unjustifiable and perplexing. The European Union has, since 2015, required products from the occupied territories to be labelled as such, yet article 1.4.1(b) of CIFTA stipulates instead that the agreement applies to “the territory where its customs laws are applied.”

Under the terms of the 1994 Paris protocol, Israel and Palestine are part of a customs union under which Israel collects duties on goods destined for the Palestinian territories. However, the existence of a customs union does not change the fact that the West Bank, where illegal Israeli settlements have proliferated, remain occupied territory and legally part of Israel.

As stated, Palestinians have been under Israeli military occupation since 1967. That is 51 years. The Canadian government's own policy does not recognize permanent Israeli control over these territories and stipulates that Israeli settlements, occupation and control violate the fourth Geneva convention and many UN Security Council resolutions.

As stated as recently as 2016 at the United Nations Security Council:

The Security Council...Reaffirms that the establishment by Israel of settlements in the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem, has no legal validity and constitutes a flagrant violation under international law and a major obstacle to the achievement of the two-State solution and a just, lasting and comprehensive peace;

It went on, though, to call upon all states, including Canada, “to distinguish, in their relevant dealings, between the territory of the State of Israel and the territories occupied since 1967.”

I am gravely concerned that this agreement fails this international commitment. It puts us afoul of international law. Products made in the occupied territories in Palestine must be labelled as such. To fail to do so amounts to a countenance of illegal annexation of territory.

More broadly, I wish to speak for the millions of Canadians who want to see peace in this region and the creation of secure and sovereign states of Israel and Palestine living side by side in peace. I have had the privilege of visiting this region twice as a parliamentarian, both in Israel and in Palestine, and the unvarnished reality is clear to those who care to view it objectively. Israel has not only not complied with its obligations under the Geneva Convention, it has, over time, steadily and consistently increased its illegal settlements in Palestine. After 51 years, this is not an occupation; it is an annexation. It continues an illegal blockade of Gaza by air, land and sea creating what has been called “the world's largest open-air prison” and creating the conditions for what every NGO and international body that is working in Gaza has called a large-scale humanitarian disaster, leading to malnutrition, economic deprivation and death.

The Israeli military routinely violates the rights of Palestinians on a daily basis, including applying military law to children, of whom some 500 languish in Israeli jails in flagrant contravention of international law. The Israelis routinely deny Palestinians equal access to water, power, building permits and free movement. I myself suffered the indignity, along with my Palestinian hosts, of being denied entrance into cities on the West Bank at Israeli checkpoints. There is a series of Israeli checkpoints throughout the West Bank which every day force Palestinians to be separated from their families, their workplaces, their cities and their farms.

Many Canadians now ask: Why is the Canadian government not taking effective action to press Israel and Palestine to abide by their international commitments, conventions and law and sit down and negotiate a just resolution to their conflict? If Russia's occupation of Crimea is worthy of sanctions, why is Israel not treated the same when we regard it by our own official policy, and the United Nations and the global consensus as being in total occupation of Palestinian territory? If we do not want to encourage violent conflict, why do we not put economic pressure on Israel or offer Canadian resources to provide a platform for peace talks?

In the end, again, like most Canadians, I wish for a safe, secure, sovereign Israel and Palestine, living in peace and friendship and mutual co-operation. The NDP has been working toward this end for many decades. We will continue to work toward this goal in the future, but if we sign a trade agreement with one side to this dispute, in this case Israel, and permit and facilitate the production of goods and services in occupied territories to be passed off as products and services of Israel in violation of the UN Security Council admonition, in violation of the United Nations resolutions that have been passed over the decade, in violation of conventions to which Canada is a signatory, this cannot be something that this Parliament can support.

We all want to see increased commercial, political, social and cultural relations with Israel, but we also want to see those very same relationship benefits extended to the Palestinians. However, I think as parliamentarians, we do a disservice to this chamber and to Canada's position in the world when we fail to recognize that there is an occupying force in an occupying territory that our own government regards as being illegal under international law.

By signing this agreement and putting this agreement before the House without recognizing that fact, I fear pushes the parties further away from peace instead of pushing them toward the just resolution that all Canadians, and frankly the majority of Israelis and Palestinians, I believe want to see.

New Democrats look forward to moving this agreement to committee where we can discuss these issues in more detail, where we can offer the kinds of amendments to the bill that we think are absolutely essential to bring it into compliance with Canada's legal and political obligations, and where we can actually be a force as a middle power in this world to help the parties achieve peace and mutual benefit as they live side by side in that region.

I thank the House for the opportunity to talk to this important bill. I look forward to questions from my colleagues.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, I regret that I did not hear all of my colleague's speech. I wonder if I might have found even more to disagree with than in the part that I heard.

I do want to ask the member if he could respond to an observation that I think both of us had when we were part of a recent visit to the West Bank by the Canada-Palestine Parliamentary Friendship Group.

It was interesting for me to observe that everybody we talked to on that trip, if asked that question, expressed opposition to the idea of BDS. They recognized the interconnectedness of the economies between Israel and the Palestinian territory that more trade, more commercial opportunity benefits all the people living in that region. In the process of supporting a two-state solution, as I think all parties in the House do, we should not be shy about boldly moving forward with greater trade and investment because it would benefit Israel, it would benefit Canada and it would benefit the Palestinian people.

Would the member agree with me that this indeed was our observation on this trip and that BDS, because it does not advance anybody's interest, is really a non-starter when it comes to the region, and therefore we should move forward with greater trade relations?

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Madam Speaker, I do wish the member would have listened to my entire speech. He may have agreed with more than he may think.

He must have been talking to different people than I was. When I was talking to people in Ramallah, Hebron, Bethlehem and also in Jerusalem, I talked to people on both sides of this issue, from former members of the Knesset, who are working toward peace, to people that are working in the Palestinian government.

I do not think anybody really wants to see BDS applied, but the fact remains that we are talking about an occupation, unless the member and the Conservative Party break with international consensus and think there is no occupation of Palestinian land. People who have actually been to the West Bank have seen with their own eyes that there is a military occupation of Palestinian territory in full violation of the fourth Geneva Convention. The entire world recognizes that but I am not sure the Conservative Party does. If that is the case, then one has to ask what tools exist at our disposal to help persuade an occupying force to cease that occupation.

As I said in the case of Russia occupying Crimea, the Conservatives have no problem whatsoever calling for full sanctions on Russia, as they should, because Russia has violated the sovereignty of another country and is in illegal occupation of Crimea. Israel equally is in illegal occupation of Palestinian territories, but my friend in the Conservative Party does not seem to think that any steps need to be taken to put pressure on Israel.

If we do not want there to be violence, and nobody does, if we do not want a violent resolution to this, if we want the parties to sit down at a table, then a legitimate question arises as to how we can put pressure on the parties to do that when they clearly are not interested in doing that. I believe pressure needs to be put on the Palestinian side as well.

I did hear from the Palestinian authorities I spoke to that they were willing to meet any time, anywhere, and without preconditions. I would call upon them to honour that commitment and sit down with the Israelis so that there could be a peaceful resolution to this issue.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Madam Speaker, this legislation would modernize a trade agreement that is already in place between Canada and Israel. It will expand business opportunities. There are some fantastic gender issues that are being dealt with in this modernization of the agreement. Labour and environmental issues are also being dealt with.

My understanding is that a number of years ago the NDP did not support the original agreement. With the modernization aspect of this agreement, is the NDP inclined to support the trade agreement with Canada and Israel?

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Madam Speaker, it is the position of the New Democrats that we will be supporting this agreement at second reading, so that we can advance this agreement to committee where we can work on what we consider to be some of the shortcomings of this bill.

My hon. colleague is quite right that there are some very positive provisions in this agreement, including some novel and innovative chapters on gender, the environment and labour, as I pointed out in my speech.

Again, the fundamental problem with this bill, though, is that it still fails to distinguish between products and services that are made on the West Bank, that are made in occupied territories. If those products and services are permitted to be passed off as products and services from the State of Israel, then what we are doing is we are violating our own Canadian policy, which is that we do not recognize the occupation of those lands to be legitimate. We view those as part of sovereign Palestinian territory.

In that respect, by passing this bill without having those sections amended or cured, we run the risk of actually deepening the intractable problem between these parties instead of helping. That is something that New Democrats do not wish to do. We wish to use trade policy as a means to improve humanitarian, human rights, environmental, labour, and corporate and commercial conditions in the world. That is what we will be working to do at committee.