International Trade committee  Those kinds of programs are not actually part of the NAFTA, but we would hope that the U.S. would recognize the efficiencies to both parties with those kinds of programs. We certainly have a lot of Americans travelling to Canada for business purposes or other purposes as well. It

International Trade committee  The U.S. has proposed that all products in the production of an automobile be subject to tracing. Under the current NAFTA, there was a list of products that are subject to tracing, and the others are not subject to it. Subjecting all products to tracing would increase the costs t

International Trade committee  Towards expanding the market access?

International Trade committee  Yes, that's exactly right. We met with our auto manufacturers and our auto parts suppliers. We also met with representatives of U.S. auto manufacturers, U.S. auto parts suppliers, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and U.S. unions. All of them were as opposed to the U.S. proposal as w

International Trade committee  It takes a number of different approaches. We have approaches that deal with issues right at the border, with customs and trade facilitation, to ensure that getting through customs and claiming preferences under NAFTA and all of those processes are as simple and automatic as poss

International Trade committee  Well, I think this is one of the issues we're struggling with: what does the U.S. need for a win? I think we can certainly bring a lot of creativity to the table in developing outcomes that we think could certainly be characterized as a U.S. win or as a North American win. We c

International Trade committee  Yes, that's right. We do have a number of provisions in CETA that are aimed squarely at those kinds of non-tariff barriers that you've mentioned. We have mutual recognition of processes, mutual recognition of standards, and those are the kinds of issues that increasingly are real

International Trade committee  It takes a significant amount of our time, but we felt from the beginning that unless we entirely understood the interests of our stakeholders, we were not going to be very effective at the table. We have to understand at a fine level of detail what they are looking for, what the

International Trade committee  There would be nothing in the agreement, if we manage to finalize it, that would pose any kind of threat to our official languages or any kind of effect on it at all. When we get to a final agreement, assuming that we do, it will be equally legally valid in English and in French.

International Trade committee  Absolutely.

International Trade committee  Yes. That's exactly the kind of argument we've been making at the table. Whether it's the sunset clause or their specific proposal on autos, the U.S. proposals would render the North American market much less competitive than it is now in relation to the rest of the world. At t

International Trade committee  This has been something we've been spending a lot of time on. I'll just say as an aside that I worked on the Mexico seed potato issue probably more than 20 years ago, so it's an issue that's been long-standing and an ongoing challenge at many points in time. What we're trying t

International Trade committee  We have already agreed on a chapter on small and medium-sized business enterprises, and we have had a lot of positive reaction on those other areas as well. I think it's one of those areas where we do have very common objectives across the three parties. We all have small busines

International Trade committee  At this point, the two issues are being dealt with separately. The NAFTA negotiations are one area, and the softwood lumber negotiations—at this point, at least—are being dealt with separately. That's the kind of path that's been followed over the last large number of years, as y

International Trade committee  Culture is certainly an important issue in the negotiations for us. It is in every negotiation that we participate in and it's of particular importance with respect to any negotiation with the U.S. We have put forward a proposal for a general exemption for culture in the NAFTA n