Finance committee  Over 20,000 Canadian jobs and $7 billion in production are at stake. Both the Canada Border Services Agency and the Canadian International Trade Tribunal play key roles in restoring market-based trade. It is vital to Canadian industry that these agencies be adequately resourced

Finance committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My name is Ron Watkins. I'm president of the Canadian Steel Producers Association, and we welcome this opportunity to present our recommendations for budget 2013. The CSPA represents Canada's steel producing industry. The steel producing industry employ

Finance committee  Perhaps I can start. First of all, thank you, Mr. Chair, for that advice. We're certainly aware of that argument. That is why, from our point of view, it's important, not simply for our own industry but for the manufacturing base, to have access to this kind of provision. You

Finance committee  Innovation to improve manufacturing productivity requires more than just equipment and technology. It also rests critically on ensuring that companies have a highly skilled work force to operate in an advanced technological environment of modern steelmaking. To this end, we propo

Finance committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good morning, members of the committee. My name is Ron Watkins. I'm president of the Canadian Steel Producers Association, representing Canada's primary steel and steel pipe and tube producers. Our industry employs over 25,000 Canadian men and women in

Environment committee  The World Steel Association, which is the global industry association, has a very aggressive program called the CO2 breakthrough program. It is looking at technologies like carbon capture and storage, which is potentially applicable in our industry. I think it's often thought of

Environment committee  To elaborate on the points by my colleagues, clearly there's that issue of Canada versus U.S., and if we were put in a position where we had to, in essence, either face a carbon tax in the U.S. or buy carbon credits to somehow match up, that has a direct economic consequence for

Environment committee  For us, it was 20% absolute; 25% intensity.

Environment committee  It is indeed difficult. To the point on fixed emissions, in our sector it's over 60%, so it would be very challenging indeed.

Environment committee  My estimate is that in normal times, so to speak, it would be in the range of 30,000 people. The indirect jobs would reach back to sectors like mining and even transportation. For example, we're the biggest user of the St. Lawrence Seaway system, so the indirect impacts would als

Environment committee  No, it's just the number for China.

Environment committee  We haven't done that specific calculation. We have had a look at the Turning the Corner plan; we at least tried to get an estimate of what the cost exposure would be, so to speak, of the obligations this would have imposed on us. And even at much lower carbon prices than $200, it

Environment committee  To come back to what I was mentioning earlier, energy is a key input cost for steel producing, whichever method we use, so to the extent that you have much higher energy costs in Canada compared to the U.S., say, or compared to China, for example, that would clearly have a direct

Environment committee  Yes, we have discussed the aspects of climate change policy with the United Steel Workers, which is a principal union in our industry. We have not discussed specifically Bill C-311, but in terms of the issues and the concerns that I've brought forward in this discussion, we've eq

Environment committee  I'm not sure what their ultimate position would be, for example, on Bill C-311. As I say, we talk to them about the importance of addressing the competitiveness concerns, the sectoral--