House of Commons photoWon his last election, in 2015, with 35% of the vote.
Public Services and Procurement February 6th, 2017
Mr. Speaker, it has been over three months since the government's own deadline to fix Phoenix, and 7,000 cases from the original backlog still have not been fixed, leaving Canadians waiting to get paid. In addition, there have been 185,000 Phoenix complaints in the last six months.
The government refused to delay implementing Phoenix until it was corrected. When will the government end this boondoggle and pay our federal employees properly and on time?
Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement Implementation Act February 6th, 2017
Madam Speaker, that is an excellent question, and I will pick up where he left off, which is to observe that the current government, like the previous government, is blinded by an ideology that says that all of these so-called free trade deals are good no matter what and that we do not really need to worry about the details or the specific trade-offs being made.
It is very true that the Liberal government has made some huge concessions under CETA on supply management and in other areas. One of my concerns is that those concessions are automatically being extended to the United States under Bill C-30, which puts us in an even weaker position in potentially having to renegotiate NAFTA with the Trump administration. I would much rather go into those negotiations without having made these concessions so that we could actually push for the things Canadians want, such as the removal of the chapter 11 investor-state provisions and the removal of the proportionality clause that might limit our options as to where we export our energy resources going forward.
Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement Implementation Act February 6th, 2017
Madam Speaker, the member across the way points out that with this legislation, we will already have entrenched many aspects of CETA, and that is precisely my concern. We would be in a much stronger bargaining position dealing with Britain after it is out of the EU and after it is desperate to get into some trade deals than we are in negotiating with the entire European Union, as is currently the case.
The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of International Trade said in the House on Friday that CETA would provide a baseline for negotiations with a post-Brexit U.K. I am submitting that it is a bad baseline and that we could do better in negotiating with the U.K. after Brexit.
Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement Implementation Act February 6th, 2017
Madam Speaker, the House has heard a great deal of debate on CETA. Throughout these discussions, the NDP has pointed out some critical problems with the agreement. It is likely to worsen Canada's trade deficit. It is likely to harm key sectors of our economy. It is likely to make it easier for temporary foreign workers to come into our country. It is going to extend pharmaceutical patents, driving up the cost of prescription drugs for our provincial health care systems as well as for individual Canadians. It will expose our democratic laws, regulations, and public policies to more challenges under the investor-state provisions.
I do not want to repeat all of those points. What I would like to do in today's speech is look at CETA from a different perspective. I want to look at it from the perspective of its implications for future Canadian negotiations. In particular, I want to look at our likely negotiations with a post-Brexit United Kingdom. I want to look at our potential renegotiation of NAFTA with the United States. Finally, I want to look at the negotiations we have, within our country, with corporate Canada.
In terms of the United Kingdom leaving the European Union, a big question is what that means for CETA. It is a question the NDP has been asking throughout this debate, because of course, the United Kingdom is the one major economy in the EU with which Canada currently enjoys a trade surplus.
I was interested to note on Friday that a Conservative colleague, the member for Sarnia—Lambton, actually asked that question during question period and did not get much of a response from the government. What the parliamentary secretary to the minister of international trade said was:
If CETA is passed by the EU, we will have a deal with the U.K. until things unfold in that country. Canada, of course, has an interest in maintaining access to the significant U.K. marketplace, and we believe very strongly that CETA provides an excellent baseline for future negotiations.
Here we have the government actually acknowledging that CETA is not a done deal, that it is unclear whether or how it might apply to the United Kingdom, and that in all likelihood, Canada would have to enter into new negotiations with the U.K. after the Brexit process plays out. Why, then, would we want to establish that baseline now? Will this be a baseline from which we make further concessions in negotiations with the United Kingdom?
It seems to me that after Brexit, the United Kingdom will actually be under pressure to formulate new trade agreements. It will no longer be part of free trade deals through the EU, and the British will be the ones who really need to make concessions to get trade deals. Why would Canada set the baseline now? Would it not be more prudent to see what happens with Brexit and then negotiate with Britain from a position of strength? Agreeing to CETA before Brexit has played out actually puts Canada in a much weaker position for prospective negotiations with the United Kingdom.
The second thing I want to consider is negotiations with the United States about the North American Free Trade Agreement. It is really important to recognize that under NAFTA currently, there is a concept of most favoured nation treatment, so when we make concessions to Europe through CETA, we are automatically making those same concessions to the United States. Indeed, in Bill C-30, we find that it does exactly that. It provides concessions not just to the EU but to all trade agreement investors. For example, when CETA extends patent protections, it does not just do it for European pharmaceutical companies; it does it for American pharmaceutical companies as well. Of course, we do not get anything in exchange from the United States for that concession. It just happens automatically.
Another thing Bill C-30 does is raise the threshold for foreign investment reviews of proposed foreign takeovers to $1.5 billion. It does this not just for proposed takeovers by European investors but also for proposed takeovers by American investors. This is a concession we are making to the United States without getting anything back in return on softwood lumber, on steel, on buy American, or on any of the other trade issues we might have with our neighbours to the south. It strikes me that rather than making these concessions to the United States preemptively through Bill C-30, it would be far more prudent to see what happens with Trump and with our potential renegotiation of NAFTA so that if we need to make concessions, we can get something for them. We can bargain rather than just give the U.S. these concessions as part of a deal with Europe. That is another reason to defeat this legislation.
The third type of negotiation I would like to speak to are the negotiations that are constantly going on between the Canadian state and corporate Canada, because one aspect of extending investor-state provisions through these different international agreements is that Canadian companies want to have access to the same special commercial tribunals so that they are able to directly challenge and sue over laws, regulations, and public policies they may not like. The more we extend these investor-state provisions, the more we invite Canadian companies to demand a similar basis on which to challenge our own democratic domestic policies.
We are starting to see this kind of thinking bubble up in the Conservative leadership race. Just last week, we had two candidates for the Conservative leadership, the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle and the member for Beauce, tripping over each other to try to adopt radical libertarian positions. The member for Regina—Qu'Appelle said that we should entrench private property rights in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The member for Beauce was very quick to agree with this concept. We can see the linkage of this with trade deals by looking at the way another Conservative MP reacted to this proposal. The member for Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston stated:
The lack of constitutional protection for the private property rights of Canadians means that the rights of Canadians can be treated as second-class under NAFTA. Canadians deserve the same property rights that foreign companies enjoy in Canada, and shouldn’t be second-class in their own country.
We have this argument that because there are investor-state provisions in trade deals, they should be extended to all Canadian companies and property owners. What would that mean in practice? We can forget about any kind of land use planning for starters, but we can also forget about building any type of major public infrastructure that would traverse lots of different property. Imagine trying to build or even twin an existing highway if every landowner along the route essentially could veto it because their private property rights were entrenched in the Constitution. The power of expropriation is an extremely important thing if we want to get infrastructure built.
We have heard a lot of rhetoric in favour of pipelines from the Conservatives. Good luck building any pipelines after private property rights are entrenched in the Constitution. That is something the Conservative leadership candidates need to think about.
Bill C-30 would weaken Canada's negotiating position with a post-Brexit Britain. It would weaken Canada's negotiating position on NAFTA with the United States. It would also lead us down this goofy path of entrenching private property rights in the Constitution. For all those reasons, I urge my fellow MPs to defeat this bill.
Steel Industry February 3rd, 2017
Mr. Speaker, the Liberal government recently approved two major pipeline projects without knowing where or how the pipe would be produced. Making a ton of steel in China and shipping it here emits five times as much carbon as making it at the Evraz steel mill in Regina. Unlike imported pipe, we can test Canadian-made pipe throughout the manufacturing process.
Fortunately, Enbridge will use pipe made in Regina for its Line 3 replacement project. Unfortunately, Kinder Morgan has not indicated where it will source pipe for the Trans Mountain expansion.
A new review process for pipelines should consider the pipe supplier's emissions and reliability. Doing so would favour Canadian-made steel and support good jobs at Evraz in Regina.
Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement Implementation Act February 3rd, 2017
Mr. Speaker, the member opposite suggested that European countries have very similar wages and labour standards as Canada. I am wondering if my colleague from Essex could explain to the House the risk of vessels flagged in places of convenience, like Cyprus or Malta, coming in with very low-wage workers and if she might also speak a bit about the level of wages and labour conditions in a number of eastern European countries that are members of the EU.
Questions on the Order Paper January 30th, 2017
With regard to the approval of Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain Expansion Project: what measures, if any, do the government and the National Energy Board plan to take to ensure that it be built with Canadian-made steel?
Canada-Ukraine Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act December 13th, 2016
Mr. Speaker, we have spoken a lot about the investor-state provisions of trade agreements, but the member is quite right to point out that there are also many of these bilateral investment treaties that entail many of the same problems, many of the same challenges. The problem, really, is that it empowers foreign corporations to directly challenge our democratic laws, regulations, and policies, not in front of the court system, which is open and transparent, but before these secretive, commercial tribunals that meet behind closed doors.
I absolutely agree that this is a huge problem, whether it is through investor-state provisions in a trade agreement or whether it is through a bilateral investment protection agreement.
Canada-Ukraine Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act December 13th, 2016
Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Winnipeg North is unusually magnanimous today, and I greatly appreciate his kind question.
He did sort of broaden NDP support for this trade agreement to a general statement in favour of free trade deals helping the middle class. I think this is an important distinction between the NDP and the government. While the government believes that any and all of these trade deals are a good thing and should be blindly supported, we in the NDP think it is very important to look at the specifics of the agreement and evaluate it on that basis.
It is for that reason that we had some very serious concerns with CETA, but we do not find those concerns present in this agreement. In fact, we see good reasons to support it.
Canada-Ukraine Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act December 13th, 2016
Mr. Speaker, of all the Canadian provinces, Manitoba and Saskatchewan are the two that have the highest population share of Ukrainian ancestry. It is certainly a heritage of which we are extremely proud.
One of our great premiers, Roy Romanow, was of Ukrainian ancestry. He often told stories about his father emigrating from the Ukraine and working on the railroad, so there is a lot of excellent common heritage there. Mr. Romanow himself has made many great contributions to this country, first and foremost as premier of Saskatchewan, but before that he played a critical role in the patriation of the Constitution. After his time as premier, he also chaired a very important report on the future of public medicare in Canada. He would be just one example of an important Ukrainian Canadian from Saskatchewan.
Another example, from the same realm, was a fellow named Ed Tchorzewski, who was perhaps a bit less known nationally. He was a deputy premier of Saskatchewan. Unfortunately, he passed away recently, but his son, Dion Tchorzewski, continues as a very active lawyer in Regina and a very important member of the community.
I would like to turn to the trade agreement with Ukraine we are considering today. I would like to note that I rose in this House both on Friday and on Monday to speak against the comprehensive economic and trade agreement between Canada and the European Union. I made two main points in opposition to that deal. The first had to do with trade flows. I made the point that Canada has a deep trade deficit with the European Union, and in fact, that trade deficit is even deeper if we exclude the United Kingdom, which is leaving the EU in the wake of the Brexit vote. I made the point that simply amplifying or trying to amplify trade flows between Canada and what is left of the European Union would likely result in an even larger trade deficit, which would be a detraction from Canadian output and employment. That was one critique of CETA: its potential negative consequences in terms of trade flows.
My other critique of CETA was its investor-state provisions, which have very little to do with trade and everything to do with empowering foreign corporations to directly challenge our democratic laws, regulations, and public policies through a special, secretive commercial tribunal process, which CETA would apply to the municipal level of government for the first time.
As I said, my objections to CETA were the current pattern of trade between Canada and the EU as well as the investor-state provisions.
The reason the NDP is pleased to support this trade agreement with the Ukraine is that there would be a very different pattern of trade present. Currently, Canada runs a significant trade surplus with the Ukraine, and there is every reason to believe that this liberalization of trade could actually improve that trade surplus and could actually add to Canadian output and employment in modest but important ways. We think this agreement could actually be positive in terms of its effect on Canadian trade flows. That is the first important distinction between this deal and CETA.
The other important distinction, as my colleague from Elmwood—Transcona already explained very well, is that this deal does not include these pernicious investor-state provisions that would allow foreign investors to sue the Canadian government when our public interest regulations interfere with some sort of potential future or hoped-for profit. A major problem with CETA is that it would carry on these investor-state provisions and would impose them at the municipal level. The agreement with the Ukraine does not include those provisions, so we are happy to support it as a trade agreement.
Having said all that, I want to also express some concerns about the situation in the Ukraine and its potential ramifications for trade with Canada.
To be blunt, in Ukraine there is a lack of human rights, a lack of labour rights, and a lack environmental protections. Those can have some very negative consequences for trade flows. One example I would cite is that Ukraine has been a major source of steel dumping in world markets. There is a large-scale industry in Ukraine. It is really not subject to a lot of labour standards or environmental rules. The Canadian International Trade Tribunal has applied anti-dumping duties on Ukrainian steel. Just a few months ago, it renewed those duties, because it found that the problem still persisted that Ukrainian steel coming into Canada was very much underpriced.
I do not want to give the sense that everything is well with trade between Canada and Ukraine, but we see this agreement as a potentially useful tool to remedy that situation, in part because the agreement would allow Canada to continue to use those trade remedies to deal with the underpricing of Ukrainian steel.
I mentioned that there are a lot of people of Ukrainian origin in Regina. There are also a lot of people in Regina who work for a steel mill, so one of the things that is important to me about the agreement is the fact that it preserves Canada's ability to use trade remedies to correct some of the problems we see with Ukrainian steel imports.
Beyond steel, given the problems with human and labour rights in Ukraine, it is very important that the agreement also be accompanied by a human rights assessment. That is something the NDP is going to be proposing when the bill is before committee. We think it is very important, in supporting the agreement, to also support a robust human rights assessment to make sure that the benefits of trade are actually helping the people of Ukraine and are not just lining the pockets of oligarchs.
To sum up, there is a very proud Ukrainian heritage in our country, especially in the prairie provinces, especially in Saskatchewan. I think, for example, of the Regina Walsh Acres NDP Ukrainian banquet. It is a fantastic event in the northern part of my riding that I am often keen to attend. It is always a fantastic meal, with great dancing. It is a great social event.
In terms of the trade deal itself, the NDP is pleased to support it, because we have a constructive trade relationship with Ukraine. We run a trade surplus. We see the possibility that the agreement could actually add to Canadian output and employment while at the same time helping with Ukraine's economic development.
We are also happy to support the agreement because it actually is a trade agreement. It does not include these investor-state provisions that would allow foreign corporations to directly challenge our laws, regulations, and public policies.
Finally, we salute the fact that the agreement preserves Canada's ability to use trade remedy provisions when necessary to deal with some of the problems that exist with Ukrainian products, like steel, coming into Canada.