44th Parl. 1st Sess.
October 23, 2023 11:00AM
Mr. Speaker, I like how my colleague touched on the fact that when this type of legislation and these types of agreements come before the House, it is necessary for us, as parliamentarians, to do wide consultation with stakeholders.
I have been a member of the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food for five and a half years now. One of the concerns brought up to our committee by Chicken Farmers of Canada was the Ukraine remission order that allowed Ukrainian poultry to come into Canada.
It is not that Chicken Farmers of Canada does not want to support our Ukrainian allies, but it felt that more time was needed to ensure that the high standards we have in Canada, especially with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, were in place. Before we had such a system, it felt it was rushed too quickly.
Could my colleague expand on that one notable example? Perhaps there is more that he knows on why with these kinds of agreements, while we know they are being done in good faith and for good reason, we still, as parliamentarians, owe it to the Canadian public and to stakeholders to ensure we iron out all those very fine details because of the unintended consequences.
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Mr. Speaker, I could not agree more. In the particular circumstances of that remission order, I agree. I was certainly consulted on that. Chicken farmers were not against supporting Ukraine, but it looked like that was rushed and not all details were looked at. I did talk about that in my speech.
I still remember my contracts professor in my first year of law school saying that the devil was always in the details. We do not look at things in broad strokes if we want to be a good lawyer. We have to get down into the nitty-gritty.
When we look at this agreement, which is somewhere in the range of 600 pages, and we are asked to rush this through, that is how mistakes happen. That is how we end up with agreements with unintended consequences by not scrutinizing them.
It is the job of parliamentarians to scrutinize this and reach out to stakeholder groups that will also be looking at this. They will ensure they look at those details. We should ensure that work gets done.
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Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to see such enthusiasm for this bill today. We know that there is no shortage of emergencies, including the housing crisis and the climate crisis, but these topics are not on the government's agenda.
My colleague mentioned several interesting things in his speech. We know that we are not reinventing the wheel today; we are modernizing the Canada-Ukraine Free Trade Agreement, which has been in effect since 2017. The fact is that trade with our trade partner Ukraine has grown significantly.
I have a question for my colleague. There was a whole saga in the House about the standing ovation for a former SS soldier, in yet another blunder committed on the world stage by the federal government, or rather the Liberal government. That all happened in conjunction with the presidential visit, when he was here to sign the agreement on September 22.
It seems to me, or rather I am quite convinced, that the government deliberately waited for President Zelenskyy to come to the House before implementing the new agreement. We are hearing that it is really urgent for us to study this bill today as a priority, and that it must take precedence over the housing crisis, the cost of living crisis and the climate crisis.
I would like to hear my colleague's thoughts on something. Does he think the government could have done this sooner? Does he think the government deliberately waited for President Zelenskyy's visit to try to restore its image after all the blunders we have seen, such as Chinese interference and the conflict between Canada and India?
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Mr. Speaker, I do not know what the motives are. I do know that this agreement was signed much earlier. If it had been tabled in Parliament earlier, we would certainly have had more debate and more time to scrutinize this particular piece of legislation.
The members of the Liberal Party were chirping when I was speaking about taking the time to study something. There is an old adage saying that a lawyer who represents himself has a fool for a client. A government that thinks it can do no wrong and has birthed the perfect agreement is also a fool because mistakes are made. We know that. We know that with respect to beef and pork access to the EU. The Liberals thought they had a deal with a side letter that was going to resolve all kinds of things, but in fact it did not. There is no access, effectively, for beef and pork.
Parliament should do its work. I wish this bill had been brought to Parliament sooner so that there would not be the rush the government is making to get it through Parliament.
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Mr. Speaker, let there be no doubt about the aggressive approach this government has had, virtually since 2015, in recognizing the importance of international trade and how it supports Canada's middle class. In fact, no government in the history of Canada has signed off on more trade agreements than this government. That is a fact.
The member opposite, at the beginning of his speech, said they did this, they did that and they had this in the making. It was this government that ultimately signed and brought to a conclusion a number of deals that have been critically important for fostering more trade between Canada and countries around the world, whether it is the United States, Mexico or those in Europe and Asia.
Would the member not recognize that this is yet another agreement modifying an agreement signed off by the current Deputy Prime Minister a number of years ago and is a positive step forward that both Canada and Ukraine will benefit from?
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Mr. Speaker, eight out of 10 people know one can make up statistics about anything. That is effectively what this member is doing in saying they have done the most. Anyone can make up statements about anything.
It is great that they came to the trade party, but they came to the trade party late. I still recall their vehement opposition to free trade with the United States. I led in my speech with what they said about the one final line they would like to change, and they erased the border between Canada and the United States. The member is saying not to go back in time, yet every time we talk about things, they talk about former prime minister Harper, from 2006. It is typically Liberal: They want it their way one way but everybody else has to have it a different way.
I am glad this free trade agreement has been modernized. I look forward to looking at it, examining it and doing the due diligence that it seems like parliamentarians want to do, whether they are in the NDP or the Bloc. The only members who do not seem to want to study this agreement are the Liberals, because as usual, in their arrogance, they believe they have birthed the perfect child and nothing could be wrong with it. We want to verify if that is true.
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Mr. Speaker, my colleague did an excellent job of highlighting the Liberal failure to support Ukraine in the area of energy security. European countries vitally need the natural resources that Canada is ready to produce and sell.
Last summer, we had emergency hearings at the foreign affairs committee because, instead of supporting the sale of Canadian energy to Europe, the Liberal government gave a sanctions exemption to allow a turbine to be sent to facilitate the export of Russian gas to Germany. We were more interested in facilitating the sale of Russian gas to Germany than in helping to relieve European dependence on Russian natural resources by providing Canadian resources as an alternative.
Could the member share more about the Conservative vision for Canada to be a leader in supporting global energy security by enabling our European allies to no longer be dependent on imports from Russia?
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Mr. Speaker, that was a great question, the best one so far. The issue the member raised with respect to the export of those turbines was a shameful affront to Ukraine. The Liberal government and Liberal members should be ashamed of that.
If we look at LNG exports to the European market, the United States is at 26%, Qatar is at 24% and Russia is at 20%. Canada could absolutely fill that need if we had a government that recognized that LNG exports are good for lowering emissions, are good for the Canadian economy and would be very good at disrupting the Russian war machine.
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Mr. Speaker, I rise today in the House to speak to Bill C‑57, which seeks to modernize the 2017 Canada-Ukraine Free Trade Agreement, or CUFTA. I rise as the Bloc Québécois international trade critic, and I am pleased to speak on behalf of my political party today.
I just want to remind the House that our party is continuing a tradition, because Quebec's independence movement has been advocating for free trade since the 1980s with a view to exiting the Canadian economic framework, which is too narrow. It has been a quite a deal for our SMEs, whose expertise is as valuable as it is diverse. I should note, however, that our position is not categorical: A trade agreement may be bad, and it is what it contains that determines whether or not we support it. If an agreement is going to be harmful to our key sectors, commodify our public services to an unreasonable degree, give multinationals the upper hand or hurt the environment or workers' rights, we would not support it merely because we believe in the virtues of international trade.
In the present case, I will say right now that we will be voting in favour of the principle of the modernized 2023 agreement, since we are still at the principle stage. However, we have a major concern about something that I will talk about a bit later, something that we will be urging the government to commit to changing.
Let us first look at the context. We are talking about modernizing an agreement that dates back to 2017, but we could basically call it a new agreement. The 2017 CUFTA, which was essentially negotiated by Stephen Harper's Conservative government, was mostly about extending a hand of friendship to Ukraine, a symbolic stance, since trade with Ukraine was rather marginal at the time. The negotiations ended in the summer of 2015, just before the election, but the agreement was signed by the current government during the Ukrainian Prime Minister's visit to Ottawa in 2016 and it took effect in 2017. The Bloc Québécois supported that agreement. Given that we wanted to move forward quickly since Ukraine was looking for international support, the 2017 CUFTA was pretty bare-bones. More work could have been done, particularly with regard to the implementation mechanisms that were meant to ensure compliance with the agreement. They were rather weak.
What we have before us today is a real trade agreement. Bill C‑57 is 15 pages long and merely amends Canadian legislation to align it with the agreement's requirements so that the government can go ahead and ratify it. Bill C‑57's clauses are largely technical, as most of them change references to the 2017 CUFTA or other agreements, replacing them with references to the modernized 2023 agreement for consistency. It also authorizes the establishment, recognizes the authority and allows for the funding of the various institutional mechanisms provided for in the agreement, including the secretariat responsible for overseeing the agreement and the various dispute settlement bodies.
The modernized 2023 agreement is a comprehensive agreement. We are talking about 1,000 pages. It contains 30 chapters covering trade in goods and services—including special provisions in a number of areas—as well as investment, government procurement, sanitary and phytosanitary measures, labour law and environmental law. It also includes provisions to favour SMEs or businesses owned and operated by women and indigenous people. It casts the net wide.
For starters, we were pleased to see that the content of the June 2022 order was not included in this agreement. Countries in difficulty or at war are often exempted from Canadian tariffs, but this was the first time supply management was included. Ukraine became totally, or almost totally, exempt from supply management in relation to Canada and its borders. Chicken farmers were very concerned, and for a year, they suffered the ill effects of that access. It was unacceptable. There was no reason for this to happen, especially given the rather ridiculous reasoning behind it. For example, it was alleged, on the basis of studies from several years ago, that there is no bird flu in Ukraine. However, we know that viruses can mutate and that one of the main sources of bird flu in Europe is Poland, which is right next door. Until proven otherwise, birds, such as chickens, do not respect borders. They are not screened at the border. If there were a major outbreak in Poland, it would be surprising if there were no cases, contrary to what was being said in Ukraine.
In short, this agreement covers the components of trade and various related sectors likely to impact trade. Among its 30 chapters, 11 are new since the 2017 CUFTA. The “Cross-Border Trade in Services” chapter sets out the rules applicable to services. The chapter entitled “Development and Administration of Measures” ensures that administrative practices are predictable and consistent. The “Investment” chapter protects investments and replaces the 1994 bilateral agreement for the protection of investments.
The annexes on services and investment non-conforming measures complement the chapter on cross-border trade in services. They clarify its application in specific areas and list the exceptions that both countries wish to retain.
The “Temporary Entry for Business Persons” chapter is a necessary provision for business to occur between the two countries. It did not appear in the 2017 CUFTA.
Although the “Telecommunications” chapter does not completely open up access to the telecommunications market, it guarantees access to the telecommunications infrastructure. It does not cover broadcasting and therefore has no impact on cultural policy. Fortunately, the cultural exemption, as we call it, remains intact, and a good thing too, because we certainly would have fought this provision if it violated the cultural exemption.
The “Financial Services” chapter, which complements the chapter on cross-border trade in services, sets out the rules applicable to financial services without completely opening up the market. The Canadian banking market remains essentially protected. This chapter sets out the rules that facilitate the use of financial services in the other country and the simple flow of capital.
Three chapters are being added to the 2017 CUFTA concerning the participation of certain groups in trade, specifically SMEs, women and indigenous people. This allows preferential measures to be put in place.
There is also the chapter entitled “Good Regulatory Practices”, which codifies the manner in which regulations are adopted to ensure transparency and predictability.
Eight of the chapters in the 2017 CUFTA are being amended. The chapter entitled “Rules of Origin and Origin Procedures” relaxes the rules of origin for products containing materials that come from a country with which a free trade agreement has been concluded. The chapter entitled “Digital Trade” clarifies the rules that apply to electronically transmitted data to ensure more efficient flow. The chapter entitled “Competition Policy” clarifies the competition rules that could hinder trade, particularly in the case of Ukraine, where mass privatization occurred after the fall of the U.S.S.R. State monopolies were replaced by private quasi-monopolies that were difficult to break into. The agreement will help address that. The chapter entitled “Designated Monopolies and State-Owned Enterprises” includes the provisions of the 2017 CUFTA, but in a separate chapter to facilitate its implementation.
The chapter entitled “Government Procurement” was in the 2017 CUFTA, but in the form of a statement of intent only. The new agreement includes provisions from the WTO Agreement on Government Procurement, which takes it away from the WTO's dispute settlement bodies, which have been paralyzed for years, and gives it instead to the panels under the Canada-Ukraine agreement. This chapter is very important, considering the huge contracts that will be awarded for rebuilding Ukraine, presumably in the near future, as soon as the war is over, which we hope is not too long from now.
The chapters on the environment and labour, which were also statements of intent in the 2017 CUFTA, will now be binding.
Now let us talk about the chapter entitled “Transparency, Anti-Corruption, and Responsible Business Conduct”. The 2017 CUFTA contained anti-corruption measures. The 2023 agreement adds provisions on responsible business conduct. We know that the government is boasting about this chapter. This section encourages businesses to adopt internationally recognized guidelines and principles of responsible business conduct and corporate social responsibility, but these codes are purely voluntary. It is merely a fine principle. It is completely empty. There is nothing in it but encouragement to follow lofty principles. There is no body to oversee or verify compliance with this chapter.
In other words, we should disregard the siren songs of the Liberals, who are bragging that this chapter will do even more to help in the fight against corruption in Ukraine. That concludes the overview of the new and amended chapters.
Now, there are some potentially predictable effects that would encourage us to support the principle of this agreement. Even though trade between Canada and Ukraine is up by one-third since the 2017 agreement was signed, Ukraine remains a small trading partner for Canada. In 2022, the value of Canada's merchandise exports to Ukraine was $150.2 million, or 0.02% of the $760 billion in goods Canada exported last year, even in the context of a country at war. The top three exports to Ukraine were motor vehicles and parts, fish and seafood, and pharmaceutical products. Again in 2022, imports from Ukraine were valued at $271.2 million, or 0.04% of the $780 billion in Canadian imports. Canada's top imports from Ukraine were animal and vegetable fats and oils, iron and steel, and electrical machinery and equipment.
The trade impact of this new agreement will therefore be marginal, especially given that most of the goods and services are already subject to free trade, because, until proven otherwise, like Ukraine, we are still part of the World Trade Organization. However, this agreement will bring greater predictability than the previous 2017 agreement, which should make things easier.
I will point out that the 2023 agreement provides one extra year of guaranteed access to the Ukrainian market for 20,000 metric tonnes of Canadian pork, a major production sector for Quebec. These provisions should please pork producers. The chapter on government procurement could also become very important during Ukraine's post-war reconstruction, especially for Quebec engineering firms, some of which are very successful internationally. They could be enlisted to help rebuild the country's infrastructure. Dam building, for instance, is an area where our expertise is internationally recognized.
I will now address the concerns we have. As usual, the main one is transparency. Parliament's ability to amend Bill C-57, the subject of today's debate, is fairly limited. Amendments must relate only to the bill and cannot affect the agreement itself. This limitation of parliamentary powers is not exclusive to the Canada-Ukraine agreement; indeed, the people's elected representatives in this House, the issue of a monarchical culture, have very little involvement in international treaties. Their power is limited to saying yes or no to whatever the government has signed. We have this agreement before us and there is very little we can do. We cannot say that one item or another needs to be improved or that we are opposed to certain aspects. It is just not possible. We cannot influence the contents of these agreements in any way. By the same token, while provinces are responsible for implementing the parts of the treaty that pertain to their jurisdictions, they are not involved in the negotiations, as opposed to what is done in Europe, for instance, where member states play an integral part. Even if the treaty is with the European Union, negotiations happen with the parliaments of member states.
Again, these democratic shortcomings are not exclusive to the Canada-Ukraine agreement. The entire Canadian approach to signing treaties has to be reviewed. Regardless of the issue or political stripe, governments do not really appreciate it when their opponents look too closely at what they do. When it comes to trade agreements, secrecy is in order. Canada, with its deep-seated monarchical traditions, keeps the treaties it signs in the dark, afraid that they might turn to ashes like vampires if they see the light of day. As a member of Parliament, I have had the unfortunate opportunity to experience that first-hand. In November and December 2020, at the Standing Committee on International Trade, we were forced to examine the Canada-United Kingdom free trade agreement without seeing the text of the agreement. During that sad bit of absurd theatre, we had witnesses, experts and groups telling us about an agreement about which they knew as much as we did as elected representatives, which is nothing at all.
When Canada's foreign affairs department was created in 1909, the minister was supposed to table before Parliament an annual report on the department's operations. This report would logically include an overview of Canada's international discussions and commitments.
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In 1995, when globalization was in full swing, the legislation governing the department was amended to give the minister a freer hand by granting him jurisdiction over international trade to the detriment of the institution of Parliament. The requirement to submit an annual report was abolished. A Parliament worthy of its name should have procedures to increase democratic control over agreements. The Bloc Québécois tabled seven bills on this between 1999 and 2004.
The other irritants in this agreement are the investor-state dispute settlement provisions. They are in there. This mechanism allows foreign multinationals, foreign investors to sue a state if a policy hampers their ability to turn a profit. This is extremely serious. These types of dispute settlement mechanisms found their way into each and every agreement when signing such agreements was all the rage during the aggressive, triumphant neoliberal years, but it is very serious that Canada is continuing to persistently accept, negotiate and encourage these kinds of agreements.
There are a few things we need to remember about this. These are clauses that have enabled multinationals to sue governments over increases in minimum wage, environmental measures, taxes on soft drinks to counter obesity epidemics in certain countries and moratoriums on drilling. These are protection clauses, a legal tool available to foreign investors to undermine the government's ability to act by leaving the perpetual threat of legal recourse from foreign companies dangling overhead. It is a threat to national sovereignty. It makes it increasingly difficult for governments to legislate on issues such as social justice, the environment, working conditions and public health if a transnational company believes its right to profit has been infringed. This is censorship of the democratic will.
According to a 2013 UN report, states won these suits 42% of the time and corporations, 31% of the time. The remaining disputes were settled out of court. This means that plaintiffs were able to override the political will of states in 58% of cases either in part, through agreements, or in whole, by winning their case. This quantitative figure, however, overlooks one important factor, namely, the pressure put on states by investor protection clauses. States give up on certain policies early in the discussion and decision-making process to avoid being sued. They self-censor for fear of ending up in court.
In 2014, a report by the European Union's Directorate-General for External Policies stated that these investor-state dispute settlement mechanisms were indeed a public policy roadblock. I remind members that this is the Bloc Québécois's fight. In 2021, I presented a motion that led my committee to undertake a study on the impact of these mechanisms. At our last convention, opposing these mechanisms became part of our platform.
After a health crisis, there is no reason for Canada to stubbornly continue to support such provisions, especially since they were removed from the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement, or CUSMA. They were included in NAFTA, but removed from CUSMA. Why continue to defend the sovereignty of multinationals and the right to profit, rather than democratic rights and the sovereignty of states?
In the specific case of Ukraine, let me first point out that it will be a rather fragile post-war state. Even though there are opportunities for Quebec and Canadian companies, do we want to colonize that country with a mechanism that could be embarrassing for Ukraine and could incite it to adopt certain measures, because it would be afraid of the backlash from Canadian and Quebec companies looking to make a profit?
At the same time, allowing a company to sue a foreign country directly without obtaining the consent of its home country could have consequences for us. In the case of Ukraine, we know that it has sanctioned several of its own citizens for collaborating with Russia. These sanctions could go as far as seizing their assets. If these Ukrainian citizens who collaborated with Russia also have investments here, and Ottawa decides to mimic the Ukrainian government and seize their assets here, the federal government could be sued for discriminatory expropriation under the agreement.
I will close by urging the government to move forward with an exchange of letters if this agreement is adopted in order to remove this dangerous and unique provision.
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Mr. Speaker, this is much like the legislation a few years back that was signed off on. It seemed to have received virtually unanimous support of the House, very close to it, and there was a high sense of co-operation in trying to get that legislation through. The legislation now before us would be a modernization of that legislation.
The member talked about how the province of Quebec could really benefit by this, and jurisdictions all over Canada would, in fact, benefit. The member made reference, for example, to the pork industry. Manitoba is very much into the pork industry and also would benefit, not only in that sector but also in other areas. In Canada, there are 1.3 million-plus estimated people of Ukrainian heritage, not to mention the hundreds of thousands, perhaps into the millions, of other Canadians who are following what is taking place in Ukraine today.
My question to the member is this: Would he not agree that this legislation would be in good part a win-win for both nations? Now is a great time to try to see this legislation pass, before the end of the year. Would he not agree that this would be a good thing to see happen?
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Mr. Speaker, in response to my colleague's question, I can say that there is indeed some good. We support the principle and we have no interest in dragging out or disrupting the natural process. Indeed, sooner would be better.
However, I want to reiterate what I was saying at the end: I do not want our reservations to be diminished. I am calling on the government to commit to us, whether through an exchange of letters or through other means, that it will remove the investor-state dispute settlement mechanism, as worded in the agreement.
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Mr. Speaker, we have a situation with the government where international relations are a mess. Our relationship with India is a mess. We just had the Quint, five members of the G7, write a letter condemning Hamas, without even asking Canada. Canada was not even an afterthought in the writing of that letter.
I want to ask the member, given the government's track record with respect to its relationships with other countries and its bungled negotiation of the free trade agreement with the United States, how we can trust the government to implement an agreement, in terms of free trade, with Ukraine.
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Mr. Speaker, our level of confidence in this government is as low as the official opposition's. We sometimes wonder whether the government truly deserves our trust.
In this case, one of the irritants is transparency and, frankly, the Conservatives are no better in that regard when they are in power. There are models out there in the world. It is not necessary to present an agreement like this and tell us that it is urgent, that we have to adopt it, take it or leave it, and that we cannot change it. Conservatives are no better when they are in power. It is part of Canada's monarchic culture, but it does not have to be that way.
In other countries, for example, in the United States, they have a habit of consulting their elected representatives. The European Union is also in the habit of holding debates. We are the elected representatives of the people. Before sending a negotiator out into the world, we should be given an opportunity to share our views, to be asked what we do not want to see included, what we would like to see as part of the negotiations, what our fundamental values and interests are within this negotiation process. It is the Canadian culture of transparency in trade agreements that needs a thorough overhaul, and this one is highly problematic.
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Mr. Speaker, we Quebeckers have worked really hard to protect supply management. My colleague from Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot in particular has taken up that fight. The minister seemed to be saying this morning that supply-managed sectors would be excluded and therefore protected. There is definitely a lack of transparency. There are still many aspects of this bill that are worrisome.
Can my colleague reiterate the importance of making the risk of prosecution the same for multinationals as for countries? What does he think should be done next to ensure that we get our fair share and that we can monitor the government's lack of transparency?
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Mr. Speaker, we can rest easy about the supply management aspect, because the text excludes those sectors. There is nothing that resembles the order the government made on the sly, somewhat surreptitiously, in 2022. We can rest assured on that front.
As for the power of multinationals, we will assess how much flexibility we have because, as I said, there is very little we can change. However, that would be part of it, based on our understanding of the bill at this stage, and we will be able to delve into this further in committee. If it is in the bill, there is nothing to stop us from rejecting this provision during the clause-by-clause study in committee, while supporting the agreement overall. I will vote against this provision, but that does not stop me from reiterating my request to the government for a commitment to remove this provision.
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Mr. Speaker, I would point out the fact that Canada is very fortunate. We have a team of negotiators who have a great deal of experience, years and years of it. I would suggest that Canada is probably second to no other nation in the world in terms of its ability to negotiate. We have always taken the position that it has to be in Canada's best interest first and foremost.
The member seems to be very concerned about the government's going it alone. I would provide some assurances that through the agreements in the past, a few dozen agreements, we have witnessed a team that has achieved a good deal for Canada. Canada has been consulted by the many different stakeholders.
Would the member not agree that at some point in time, we have to allow the negotiators to do their job and get the agreement, and that we cannot change the agreement after it has been signed off on?
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Mr. Speaker, I am not sure how to unpack everything I just heard.
First, yes, in its agreements, Canada has some experience in undermining supply management three times, failing to protect aluminum in CUSMA, not pushing for our interests and fundamental values multiple times, and hiding several things from us.
To the question from my colleague who says that we should allow the negotiators to do their job, I say, of course. I never suggested that elected members be sent to negotiate in the negotiators' place, that goes without saying. That idea never even crossed my mind. I do not think that the United States or the European Union are bad negotiators, yet they consult those who have been elected by the people. When the member says that nothing can be changed once the agreement is signed, what option do we have other than to fight the agreement? We cannot say that we are 75% in favour and 25% against the agreement and then choose what we will take and what we will leave. In other words, we have to take all or nothing. We cannot cherry-pick here. I call this a miscarriage of democracy.
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Mr. Speaker, I am proud to rise today to speak to Bill C-57, the new Canada-Ukraine free trade agreement. This bill would update the agreement made in 2017. Much has happened in the past six years, as we all know.
First, I would like to speak a bit about the original agreement, as it forms the core of the present one, then cover some of the changes outlined in Bill C-57. I will wrap up with some comments about how free trade agreements are presented to Parliament for the debate that they deserve.
The NDP is very much in favour of free trade agreements. We hear catcalls from both sides every time we debate free trade agreements here, saying that the NDP is always against them. We are not. We have voted for free trade agreements in the past and we voted for the Ukraine free trade agreement when it was presented. Our main caveat for these agreements is that they be designed to protect and create Canadian jobs, protect the ability of Canadian governments at all levels to care for our environment, and promote the well-being of our citizens. The measure of success of free trade deals must not be just the profits made by Canadian companies. It must also include measures of good labour agreements, both here and in the countries we are making deals with, and measures of good environmental and human rights laws on both sides as well.
These agreements must be beneficial to the people of both countries involved. I have to say that this new agreement with Ukraine and the bill before us that would implement that agreement seem to do a good job in that direction. The Canada-Ukraine friendship is very special. In fact, when Ukraine declared its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, Canada was the first western country to recognize that act. Today, there are more than 1.3 million Canadians of Ukrainian heritage. They are very proud of that heritage and their cultural traditions.
Canada has consistently supported Ukraine's development and reform efforts, providing over $460 million in international assistance between 2014 and 2021. Of course, Canada and Canadians have been strong supporters of Ukraine since the illegal invasion by Russia in February 2022. Since then, Canada has committed over $8.9 billion in assistance, including financial, development, humanitarian, military security, stabilization and immigration aid.
With respect to trade, Canada issued remission orders to temporarily open up trade with Ukraine, allowing supply managed products, such as poultry, to enter Canada. We have heard some concerns about these remission orders in the international trade and agriculture committees, but I think it is fair to say that Canadians are happy to help Ukraine in any way during these horrific times in their struggles.
I would like to step back a bit in time and spend some time talking about the original agreement. I would like to thank Tracey Ramsey, who is the former member for Essex, the NDP international trade critic when the first Canada-Ukraine free trade agreement was debated and came into effect. Tracey was and remains a passionate defender of Canadian workers, and she took her role very seriously. She recommended that the NDP support the original Canada-Ukraine free trade agreement because it upheld those basic principles I mentioned previously.
The Canada-Ukraine trade relationship is relatively small. Ukraine represents less than 1% of the total Canadian global exports. Following the signature of the original trade agreement, Canada's non-coal exports to Ukraine grew by 28.5% between 2016 and 2019. Total merchandise trade reached an all-time high of $447 million in 2021, although that of course declined in 2022 because of the illegal invasion.
The original free trade agreement eliminated most of the tariffs on Canadian imports to Ukraine and Ukrainian imports to Canada. Canadian exporters have largely welcomed the deal. Canadian products that benefit from the free trade agreement include iron and steel, industrial machinery, pulses, canola oil, and fish and seafood.
While the original free trade agreement includes a state-to-state dispute settlement mechanism, it did not include the investor-state dispute settlement system, ISDS provisions. It is important to note that these provisions actually existed before the free trade agreement came into place because in 1995, Canada and Ukraine signed a Foreign Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement, which included these investor-state provisions.
The NDP, in general, does not like ISDS provisions because they allow foreign corporations to literally tell Canadian governments at all levels how they should be protecting their environment or protecting their people. We believe that is an infringement on our sovereignty and we think that ISDS provisions do not have a place in any foreign free trade agreement. We are happy to see that the new Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement did not include them. They were in both the Canada-Europe trade agreement and the CPTPP. We believe that foreign investors should be obligated to go through domestic courts before being granted access to a special court where they can sue our governments, and that should be done at the state-to-state level.
New Democrats analyze trade deals as a whole. As I say, we have supported trade deals in the past, including the Ukraine agreement and the South Korea deal.
The original Canada-Ukraine Free Trade Agreement entered into force in 2017. It has a review clause that it be reviewed within two years of entry into force with a regard to expanding it and that was done. In 2019, Canada and Ukraine agreed to modernize the free trade agreement with expanded sections. There were public consultations held in the winter of 2020, but those consultations did not seem to include the Parliament of Canada. I will talk more about that later.
Canadian and Ukrainian officials conducted negotiations from May 2022 to April 2023. The new agreement includes more chapters on a broader array of services and business. It covers professional services like engineering, legal, computer services and telecommunications. It covers investment. It covers temporary entry for business persons. There are other sections that promote more broad interactions around trade and commerce. These are chapters that are included in other free trade agreements that Canada has with other countries and we welcome them here.
The agreement also has an updated environment chapter, which is subject to dispute settlement, aiming to ensure parties do not lower the levels of environmental protection to attract trade or investment. Again, that is obviously an important part of trade agreements. Trade agreements should raise the level of the standard of living of people in both countries in commercial and financial terms, but also in terms of their environment, human rights and labour dealings.
This bill has an updated labour chapter, which is again subject to dispute settlement provisions. It aims to improve labour standards and working conditions in both countries.
As I say, the NDP in general supports this kind of free trade agreement. Whether we support this bill or not, I would like to say here that, unfortunately, this bill was tabled only last Tuesday and I have not had time to bring it before the NDP caucus for discussion, which happens on Wednesdays, as we all know. This is a big, complex agreement and the NDP caucus likes to discuss all legislation before we decide whether we will support it.
We think it is important to allow Parliament to have input into trade negotiations before they begin. It is also important to allow ample notice once the treaties are signed for debate in this place before they are ratified. When the first Canada-Ukraine free trade agreement was tabled, the government followed that policy. It tabled the enabling legislation along with an explanatory memorandum and a final environmental assessment more than 21 sitting days after tabling the treaty. However, the government did not follow any of these standard procedures when introducing CETA, the Canada-Europe trade agreement. We were happy when it followed those procedures in the previous first version of the Canada-Ukraine agreement, but it seems that the government has forgotten those policies with this new agreement.
When the government negotiated CETA and CPTPP, Canadians were kept in the dark about what was being negotiated. When we finally learned what was on the table, the deal was already finalized, and the government said that there was absolutely no way to change anything at that point. It is not too much to ask for input on these important policies. The United States Congress has the right and ability to debate what the priorities of their country will be before entering into free trade negotiations.
The member for Elmwood—Transcona wrote a letter, in December 2019, to the Minister of International Trade, who is now the Minister of Finance, regarding increased transparency around the negotiations for the new Canada-U.S.-Mexico free trade agreement. In response to that letter, the minister agreed, on February 19, 2020, to change the policy on tabling treaties in Parliament. Those changes:
To require that a notice of intent to enter into negotiations towards a new free trade agreement be tabled in the House of Commons at least 90 calendar days prior to the commencement of negotiations. Under normal parliamentary procedures, the notice of intent would be referred to the [committee on international trade].
To require objectives for negotiations towards a new free trade agreement to be tabled in the House of Commons at least 30 calendar days prior to the commencement of negotiations. Under normal parliamentary procedures, those objectives would be referred to the [committee on international trade].
As I mentioned previously, there were discussions with some stakeholders about the scope of changes to this free trade agreement in the winter of 2020, but as far as I can tell, and we have done some research on this, the matter was never referred to the international trade committee or tabled in the House.
The government also seems to have broken standard policies on introducing implementation legislation for free trade agreements and other treaties. There should be 21 sitting days between the tabling of treaties and tabling of legislation, and that did not happen with this agreement. On top of that, as I mentioned, the minister tabled this legislation last Tuesday and here we are debating it on Monday. This is a big, complicated bill. There was no opportunity for opposition parties to discuss this in caucus last Wednesday.
To conclude, the NDP is very much in favour of free trade. We supported the original version of this agreement with Ukraine and we will be discussing this new legislation in caucus on Wednesday. I urge the minister and her government to follow the standard policies on how to introduce treaties and implement legislation before Parliament. These are not minor details; these are important points on how Canadians expect us here in this place to hold the government to account.
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Mr. Speaker, the member mentioned that the NDP voted in favour of trade agreements in the past and will be reviewing this one on Wednesday, but does he believe that this agreement in Bill C-57 will make life better for workers both in Canada and in Ukraine and vote in favour?
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