Mr. Speaker, I am rising in the House today to express my profound opposition to this bill. My opposition is 100% premised on the failure to yet again address environmental issues in trade agreements.
Twenty years after signing NAFTA and the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation, we appear to have failed to learn any lessons. That is despite review after review of the failure to take the approach of making environment and labour issues simply a sidebar, non-binding part of these agreements. We have seen trade agreement after trade agreement come before Parliament, repeating the same mistakes and refusing to listen to the input provided by Canadian experts over the last 20 years on the failings of the NAFTA agreement.
Instead of strengthening the environmental provisions of our trade agreements, we are moving to water them down further. Despite the weaknesses of the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation, NAAEC, recommendation after recommendation to strengthen that agreement went in the opposite direction. The government has chosen to further downgrade any responsibilities for environmental protection either on this country or on the countries with which it signs trade agreements.
In place of non-binding side agreements, why did the government not take the environmental provisions and incorporate them into the text of the trade agreement? That is precisely what President Obama raised during the last election. His issue with the NAFTA agreement was this very issue. It was the fact that environmental and labour issues had been sidebarred. We should revisit these agreements, not to open up and provide for even freer trade without any limitations, but to reconsider them and make these environmental conditions binding.
The government seems to have an inability to understand that it is not economy versus environment. I had the privilege of attending meetings of world and industry leaders in several countries in Europe with the Minister of the Environment. We heard from world leaders and CEOs of major industries, including the major coal-fired power companies. They said that we must incorporate environmental considerations into our economic development. They said that we must shift to incorporating environmental considerations in any economic or trade policy.
The government has turned a blind eye. It has blinders on to what is happening in the rest of the world. We seem to have blinders on in our attitude toward negotiating trade agreements. We need to enter this century. We are mired in old concepts. It is incumbent upon the government to take this bill back, reconsider it, rewrite it and negotiate it with the Canadian public and the public of Peru.
The rest of the world agrees. We need to step up to the plate. We need to shift our economy into the new green economy. We need to make those kinds of negotiations open and transparent and include the very people who are impacted: our Canadian industry and our Canadian public.
Let me talk about some of the provisions of this sidebar agreement on environment to the Canada-Peru trade agreement proposed under the bill. That is what it is: a sidebar, non-binding document.
This agreement, as with similar agreements and the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation, does not demand or compel Canada or Peru to protect the environment. It merely encourages the parties to not weaken or derogate from their environmental or health laws or measures to attract or encourage investment or trade.
First, we are simply saying that it might not be a bad idea, as a sidebar, to give a thought from time to time to not downgrading our environmental and health standards to get a trade or investment advantage. That is absolutely reprehensible. This is the kind of measure that should be at the heart of any trade agreement Canada signs.
Second, this sidebar environmental consideration to the trade agreement, similar to the other trade agreements we have signed, commits Canada and encourages Peru to ensure environmental impact assessment processes are in place.
Forgive me if I hold back a deep laugh. We have just witnessed in this Parliament the demise of federal environmental impact assessment laws, and we have the gall to propose signing off an agreement where we will hold Peru to account for implementing environmental impact assessment laws. I think we better step back and take a look at the record of our country before we make recommendations to other nations that are looking to trade with us and benefit from our experience.
The provisions are non-binding and non-enforceable. They provide for absolutely no recourse or penalties if they are not abided by, unlike, as the previous hon. member mentioned, the provisions in the agreement where a private business can file a legal action for compensation should we not abide by these agreements. There is absolutely no mechanism in these sidebar agreements to hold either government to account for abrogating its environmental assessment or environmental standard setting laws or for the failure to enforce those laws.
We have mentioned the record of the government in relegating our 30 years of development of strong, laudable environmental laws to mere red tape. Is that the lesson we are taking to the table with Peru? Is that the example we are setting? Is that our expectation of Peru? Sure it should go ahead and pass environmental impact assessment laws, set environmental standards, but do as we say, not as we do.
The sidebar agreement also commits, not requires, Canada and Peru to comply with and effectively enforce their respective domestic environmental laws. As above, we have witnessed the actions of this federal government in the failure to enforce its own environmental impact assessment law on its own expenditures.
One of the backbones of federal environmental law is that all expenditures by the federal government will undergo a careful assessment to ensure they are not having an unnecessary and reprehensible environmental effect. What did our government do? It moved behind closed doors, with no public notice and no opportunity for public comment, to rescind and exempt major federal expenditures and project development from environmental impact assessments. Is that what we can expect on this provision of this sidebar agreement?
Another foundation of these sidebar environmental agreements that we have seen with the United States, with Europe and now this one, is the commitment to transparency and participation. This sidebar agreement, mirroring the North American agreement on environmental cooperation, commits Canada and Peru to increased transparency and public participation in the making of our environmental laws and policies. Let us witness the decision by the Minister of the Environment to waive even the notice requirement when he exempted massive projects from environmental impact assessment regulations. Can we expect something different here?
Witness the continued dialogue with the United States on energy and climate change held behind closed doors. Having participated last week in the world dialogue of business leaders and another world dialogue among nations on innovative technology and the urgent need to address climate change, did this occur behind closed doors? No. It was a live broadcast on webcam.
However, when we come back to Canada and our dialogue with our neighbour on what we are going to do jointly on addressing energy issues, energy security for this country and climate change, we go behind closed doors. Is this what we can expect to witness in the Peru-Canada agreement? It looks like it.
Witness the refusal of the government to finally bring forth the negotiated action plan on addressing air pollution, which was long promised by the government and unaddressed, and the failure to bring that proposal before the public, before this Parliament, so we can review it.
Where does it sit? It is on the minister's desk, again turning a blind eye to years of voluntary commitment by business leaders and the environmental community and ignoring the effort to provide input to the government.
Under the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation, the Government of Canada, the Government of Mexico and the Government of the United States made a very bold decision. They included mechanisms whereby there would be public advisory councils. The joint public advisory committee, to advise the North American council of environment ministers, was also established under that agreement. The agreement also provides for national advisory councils to advise the environment minister with respect to the three countries.
What has the Canadian government done? It simply allowed the organizations to die. No new appointments have been made under its control. Is this what we can expect under the Canada-Peru trade agreement? Is this what we can expect under the non-binding, ever friendly environmental side agreement? I would hope not, but experience shows otherwise.
Despite the review after review commissioned by independent experts on the relationship between trade and environment, on extensive analysis of how well the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation has effectively delivered on the commitments to protect environment as we practise trade, what have we learned from those reviews? Apparently very little. We do not see major changes advancing the consideration of environmental protection in this agreement. For that reason, we must oppose it.
Another clear mechanism in the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation is the right of citizens of North America to file a complaint of failure by any of the three countries to effectively enforce their environmental laws. The successive governments of Canada have undermined that process. Instead of embracing this agreement and treating it with the seriousness that the European Community has treated its environment commission, and respecting the direction, the directives and the policies of that commission, our governments have chosen to implode and undermine the very process set up to allow for the transparency. There is delay after delay, interruptions of reviews, and dragging out the process. Even despite that, when the secretariat of the North American commission has come forward with a very thoughtful, independently prepared report, the recommendations simply gather dust.
Have we learned any clear lessons? I guess the lessons we have learned are that the government is turning a blind eye to what we have learned over these 20 years.
I find it extremely regrettable. I think that Canada, in reaching out to other nations, reaching out to nations in South America, Latin America, European nations and Asian nations, could be setting the bar. We could be setting the example for future treaties of this kind. We could be coming to the table and demanding that environmental measures be incorporated into the text of these agreements, that our environmental commitments become enforceable and binding and that there be clear penalties that can be imposed on a nation that abrogates those provisions.
Therefore, I stand clearly in opposition to this agreement. It is with great regret that the government has not taken this opportunity to take the bold, progressive step to make the statement that environmental protection is actually part of any economic development for the future of this country.
