FAIT Committee Meeting

STANDING COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS AND INTERNATIONAL TRADE

COMITÉ PERMANENT DES AFFAIRES ÉTRANGÈRES ET DU COMMERCE INTERNATIONAL

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Tuesday, April 3, 2001

• 0914

[English]

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier (Brampton West—Mississauga, Lib.)): I call to order the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade, pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), the Summit of the Americas and the FTAA.

We will be hearing witnesses from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, Bruce Campbell....

Mr. Campbell isn't here yet, but we do have—Mr. Obhrai.

Mr. Deepak Obhrai (Calgary East, Canadian Alliance): On a point of order to pass a motion, we are looking for unanimous consent to call the minister here on the estimates.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Excuse me, that's not a point of order. That can come later.

Mr. Deepak Obhrai: When later?

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Well, later on in the meeting, when we have quorum.

Mr. Deepak Obhrai: We don't have quorum?

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): We have quorum for hearing witnesses, but not for taking motions.

Mr. Deepak Obhrai: Okay.

• 0915

Mr. Pat O'Brien (London—Fanshawe, Lib.): He just wants to add a third one on.

Mr. Gary Lunn (Saanich—Gulf Islands, Canadian Alliance): The Canadian International Development Agency.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Excuse me, Mr. Barr, I'm sorry for that interruption.

We have Gerry Barr, president and CEO of the Canadian Council for International Cooperation, and Robert Pilon, executive vice-president of the Coalition pour la diversité culturelle.

Welcome. We'll start with you, Mr. Barr.

Mr. Gerry Barr (President and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Council for International Cooperation): Thank you very much, Madame Beaumier.

The Canadian Council for International Cooperation is a network and coalition of agencies working for the elimination of poverty around the world. As agencies that have partners throughout the world themselves working with marginalized groups, we have a close-up look at the impact of trade arrangements on those living in poverty, and we have become preoccupied with how those trading arrangements affect and impact our partners. This is particularly true, of course, with respect to the FTAA and the current negotiation in the hemisphere.

There is a kind of story that is involved in this trade discussion, and in our view it works like this: first you have trade liberalization; trade liberalization generates increased trade; increased trade in turn generates economic growth; and economic growth will quite invariably engender a decrease in levels of poverty. You find this story, this view of the cycle of events, in the public discourse. I think Minister Pettigrew is the one from whom you might most quickly find that story. Tony Blair floated that story when he visited recently. I think it's important, though, to observe and to begin to reflect on the fact that this story doesn't work.

New investment in trade has produced economic growth in the Americas over the last decade, but it has produced economic growth in the context of increasing disparity and an increase in the extent and intensity of poverty in the region. Albert Berry, at the University of Toronto, has done some work on this, noticing that there's an increase in income disparity at the same time as countries in the region have undertaken trade liberalization measures. The Pan American Health Organization and the Inter-American Development Bank have both noticed the disconnect between economic growth and greater equality in the Americas.

The reason it's important to notice this is because it underscores the need for a trade arrangement that actually will move us towards poverty reduction. But there is something profoundly wrong with the picture we're getting at the moment.

When it comes to the FTAA, the key here is that the most effective indicator and predictor of people's ability to benefit from economic growth is the extent to which there is equitable distribution of wealth, or relative equality in the distribution of income, as a going-in condition to that trade arrangement. This, however, is a really big restraint when it comes to the FTAA, because Latin America is, unhappily, the world leader when it comes to inequality of distribution.

There are more than 200 million people living in poverty in Latin America and the Caribbean today. An illustrative case of the failure of liberalization to impact poverty is, of course, Mexico under NAFTA. Poverty rose from 50% in 1981 to 66% in 1994 as Mexico prepared itself to enter NAFTA. Poverty continued to rise following NAFTA, along with economic growth and regular increases of investment.

• 0920

The number of indigent poor, our absolute poor—this is the “dollar a day or less” category—leapt in the post-NAFTA period in Mexico from 17 million in the decade straddling the NAFTA period to 17 million of absolute poor in 1988, or 20% of the population, to 26 million in 1998, or 35% of the population—a terrific increase in the intensity of poverty in the region.

We think there is a kind of negligence principle at work here, which I characterize as sort of the precautionary principle of civil society. The negligence principle is this: when trade negotiators fashion arrangements that fail to take people and the poor into account, it will, in its application, hurt them. That's our rule.

There are, unhappily, ample examples of how this has happened both world wide and in the Americas. I am going to speak about three examples: agriculture, human rights, and the capacity of government to represent the public interest. Then I'll go on to make a few observations about the NAFTA process itself.

Agriculture is of course a key sector, first from the point of view of food security. Second, in low-income countries around the world, agriculture provides the livelihood of 70% to 80% of the people, so it is terribly strategic. A 1999 FAO study of 14 developing countries found that, following the Uruguay Round, virtually all those countries saw the value of agricultural products grown in the countries in question diminish in the face of northern imports; exports were virtually flat; poverty was created; and there was marginalization and displacement of small producers.

Let's think about Mexico, to come closer to home. In the post-NAFTA period, three million corn farmers faced an almost 50% decline in the value of their crop. As a result, between 700,000 to 800,000 corn growers are faced with marginalization, and it is a story that is not over yet.

A less kind of “Olympian” example, if I may put it that way, but still a very poignant one, occurred in Jamaica, where 3,000 dairy producers have been sidelined by imports of subsidized milk powder from the EU. Ironically, the EU is a world price leader in milk powder, even though the farm-gate price of milk in Europe is among the highest in the world. This encounter between the heavily subsidized export economy of Europe and the Jamaican economy resulted in half a million litres of raw milk being dumped on the ground in Jamaica in 1999.

Let's think about human rights for a moment. In the area of trade and market-related human rights, there is a lot that is problematic coming out of these arrangements, more than the obvious example of one million Mexican workers in the infamous maquiladoras in Mexico. There is not one functioning independent union after decades of operations in those areas. This is, of course, because of a very conscious and specific arrangement to exclude such unions.

Overall in the Americas, however, you can forget about unions or even a formal job. Most workers end up in the informal economy: 85 out of 100 jobs created in the Americas are created in the informal sector, in the grey market—with an economy so micro it is barely possible to measure.

If you are lucky enough to end up in the formal sector, then you are faced with what is now famously called “flexibilization” measures, which make unionization more precarious, erode social benefits and guarantees, and loosen health and safety laws. This is most obviously underway in Argentina, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Chile.

Let's think a little about the government's capacity to represent the public interest, in the context of the framework that is created by the restrictions embedded in trade arrangements.

• 0925

In Brazil, since 1996, there have been laws to ensure the production of generic anti-retrovirals for the treatment of HIV/AIDS patients, which have saved countless lives. This policy and the activity flowing from it is reckoned to have reduced AIDS-related deaths by 50% since 1996—50%. Financially, it is reckoned to have saved $442 million in the period between 1997 and 1999 in the costs of hospitalization and other associated medical costs.

I would invite you to set this within the context of a developing country's budget imperatives—$442 million. It is plus or minus 20% of Canada's global annual international aid package—one decision in one sector in one country with respect to one activity, plus or minus 20% of Canada's global international aid package.

But of course this is in peril, because of intellectual property rights, because of TRIPS measures. The U.S. is now pressing a case at the WTO to shut down Brazil's generic drug manufacturing activity. It can be of no comfort to the people in Brazil, or to people in the rest of the region, that the FTAA is in every case “WTO plus”.

Broadly, there has been an evolution in trade arrangements. They started around border issues, around tariffs and export subsidies, that sort of thing, and then migrated quite significantly until they reached their current form. Now we see negotiations emerging around services and investment, things like national treatment, intellectual property rights, which affect all sorts of sectors of involvement in economies—telecommunications, postal services, hydro, financial services, public health and education, resource policy. You name it, it's there.

This means there is a kind of encompassment process where wider and wider constituencies are drawn in. These are people who are likely to be affected by these decisions but who are themselves unlikely to have any access to the decision-making process or to the bargaining table itself.

And that is, finally, at the end of the day, what you see in Quebec. You have people showing up from many groups—labour, women's organizations, aboriginal people, farmers, and others—and on the other side, a very carefully invited, facilitated involvement of the business community in the business forum of the Americas. This is in contrast to the civil society, which, despite a keen engagement in the process since 1994 through its attempts to create and provide consultative content, has had the back of the hand.

Is this gang an anti-trade gang? It is not. Pretty much universally the view is held that trade can be a powerful engine for development and for poverty reduction, but if it is going to be that, it needs to connect trade arrangements with development imperatives.

We need to take into account development impacts and social effects. We need to address debt. There are nine low-income developing countries in the hemisphere. Four of them are highly indebted countries, the HIPC countries. We need to allow for public and cooperative initiatives, marketing boards, performance requirements with respect to investment in order to be able to launch regional development strategies and policies.

These things, of course, were critical for Canada in its own development; they were seminal policy tools and instruments to advance the public interest and ensure a developed economy in Canada. But they are impossible, restricted, forbidden, in the context of the FTAA. Here the proper image is of someone climbing up the ladder to the second floor, then kicking the ladder away after getting up there. And that's it. Now there's a new arrangement: no more ladders.

• 0930

I'm conscious that I may be closing in on my time, but there are recommendations we have. If there were trading arrangements that would keep these sorts of things in mind, they'd probably include things like the recognition of the principle of food security as a central idea, allowing steps to support small-holder agriculturalists; on intellectual property rights, there is clearly a major revamping needed.

It's ironic and interesting that, in so many other respects, free trade arrangements are about taking down and removing restrictions. When it comes to intellectual property rights and the interests of very large drug companies and others, it is all about building restraints and restrictions; that is what we see there, as well as—I think it's fair to argue—the appropriation of public knowledge.

With respect to investments, I've already mentioned performance requirements.

On the process side, we need to make some core observations. The whole overarching story of the negotiation with respect to the free trade area of the Americas has been one of exclusion and unequal access and a lack of transparency. As I mentioned earlier, there has been this sort of cosseted, carefully cultivated, invited, supported participation of the business community and the business forum of the Americas, and on the other side, an absolutely shut door for civil society.

One can argue that there are some cracks in this, that there is a kind of permeability beginning to appear in the process and a sort of listening going on now. To this we would say, it's about time and it's not nearly half enough.

There's a correction needed on the national stage as well. It needs to be observed that Canadians almost universally believe that a minimum of good governance requires the regular systematic review of, and parliamentary debates on, the national budget. Why? Because it is so pervasively consequential for all sorts of Canadians in all kinds of circumstances.

It is no less true for Canada's multilateral agenda, and yet we have nothing even looking like a debate around this. There should be regular review and parliamentary debate of Canada's multilateral agenda.

There are other things I can say, but I know Ms. Beaumier is becoming uncomfortable. I'll leave it there.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Thank you, although I really enjoyed it.

Mr. Pilon, please.

[Translation]

Mr. Robert Pilon (Executive Vice-President, Coalition for Cultural Diversity): Thank you.

First of all, I would like to thank committee members for inviting us to appear this morning.

The Coalition for Cultural Diversity is an alliance of 30 Canadian professional associations representing individuals from the cultural sector throughout Canada and representing artists, producers, writers and editors.

The small folder that we submitted contains the Coalition membership list, the Coalition's statement of principles, a press release on WTO negotiations that came out last week and the brief that we are presenting to you this morning.

The Coalition for Cultural Diversity is not, of course, opposed to international cultural exchanges. All artists and creators, regardless of whether they live here in Canada or elsewhere in the world, obviously would like to see their works reach as wide an audience as possible, including international dissemination of their works and creations. That is not where the problem lies. What is at issue is balance, and this is what I am going to be talking to you about this morning.

The debate on culture and international trade is not a new one. This issue was debated to great length here, in Canada, at the end of the eighties, when the first Free Trade Agreement was negotiated with the Americans. This issue raised its head again, at the close of the Uruguay Round negotiations in 1993-94, with the very vehement debate over cultural exemptions. The debate was on again in 1998, during the talks pertaining to MAI, the Multilateral Agreement on Investment.

Like it or not, this debate is unfortunately raising its head once again, to a certain extent. Paradoxically, it is our neighbours, the Americans, who have begun the debate again. Unfortunately, the newspapers are giving the issue very little press. The American government submitted proposals to both the WTO and the FTAA negotiating tables. Proposals were tabled with the WTO in December and with the FTAA last fall, but they were not made public until January.

• 0935

In both cases, the American administration has put culture back on the negotiating table. Culture had been taken off the negotiating table during the WTO and GATT negotiations back in 1993, but the American administration is at it again. Under these proposals, the U.S. government wants culture and cultural policies to be subject to the same constraints, disciplines and usual rules found in international trade agreements, such as national treatment, market access and the most-favored-nation clause. The Americans are proposing that cultural goods and services be more or less subject, with a few exceptions, to the same rules as a pen, a watch or an automobile part, that they be deemed to be goods just like any others.

We have now reached a turning point. Contrary to what we may think, negotiating began at the WTO despite the failure of Seattle. In the service sector, negotiations have been underway since last February. Several meetings have taken place, including an extremely important one last week, from March 28 to 30. We don't know the results of this meeting yet. Unfortunately, the process is not very transparent.

As for the FTAA, I think that everyone is now aware of the crucial meeting of 34 international trade ministers that will be taking place in Buenos Aires at the end of the week. Our minister, Mr. Pettigrew, will be attending. Important issues pertaining to the free trade area will be discussed at these meetings. If I understand correctly, what happens in Quebec is dependent on what happens in Buenos Aires. If not much happens in Buenos Aires, not much will happen in Quebec City.

Everybody is talking about the Quebec City Summit primarily because of the demonstrations, but perhaps we should be giving greater priority to what is going on in Buenos Aires this week. I am under the impression that it is really at Buenos Aires that trade will be discussed, and perhaps less so in Quebec City.

In a nutshell, I would simply like to—obviously, we have a 15-page document—go over the main points of our statement of principles.

Basically, the debate is about whether or not cultural goods and services, such as films, books, records, plays or television programs are goods and services just like any others. If the answer to this question is “yes”, then if that is the case, cultural goods and services must naturally be subject to the rules that apply to other goods. If the answer is “no”, then I think that the exchange and production of cultural goods and services should not be subject to the same rules that apply to the other goods and services.

My American neighbors are purporting that a film, a book, a record are goods just like any others. Should we be surprised by that? Absolutely not! If we were in their position, we would, to a certain extent, do exactly the same thing. We need to understand that the entertainment industry in the United States is a gigantic, huge industry. For the past three or four years now, entertainment has been their biggest export sector, generating revenues that exceed those of the aeronautics industry.

In most sectors, export revenues have outperformed the domestic market, particularly in the case of Hollywood productions. Currently, I believe that nearly 60% of the total revenue for Hollywood productions comes from foreign markets, the rest... [Editor's Note: Inaudible]

Fifteen years ago, we used to say that the Americans made money on their films from their domestic market and that the rest was, if I can use a colloquial expression, gravy. This is no longer the case today. For Hollywood majors, the revenues that are currently coming from foreign markets such as Canada, France, Peru and Korea are now an important component of the structure and production of their economy. So they are defending their interests. We should neither be surprised nor scandalized by their actions.

We and other countries that do not share the same point of view must ask ourselves some questions about our own interests, our economic interests, of course, but also our political interests. If the Americans view cultural goods and services as commodities just like any others, do we share their thoughts? This is the question that we must ask ourselves.

Consequently, we must immediately ask ourselves what role does a film, a book, a play, a record or a television program really play in our society?

• 0940

Is it important for us, in Canada, to have Canadian artists who write plays, television programs, songs, films or does this have no importance whatsoever? I think that this is the basic question that we have to ask ourselves. We in the Coalition believe that cultural goods and services play a fundamental social role.

Let's think about this for a few minutes. Every morning we get up and, throughout the entire day, so to speak, we are accompanied by music, the memories of a book that we read the day before, a television program that we saw, a movie that we want to see on the weekend because our friends have talked to us about it. Cultural goods and services accompany us constantly in our daily life. They play an essential role. They help us to live, to understand reality, to share problems, challenges, joys with our fellow citizens.

Try to imagine your daily life without any culture, or with culture that is exclusively foreign. That is not to say that foreign culture is not important, or that it is not good. That is not the question at hand. The question is whether or not we could imagine our life without Canadian or Quebec artists talking to us, showing us their vision and their interpretation of the world, at times introducing us to new ideas, challenging the established order, helping us develop a new social consensus and grapple with new issues, including globalization?

The Coalition thinks that cultural goods and services play a fundamental social role. The Coalition also believes that it is important that all communities, be it here in Canada or elsewhere, have access to a wide-ranging diversity. The very notion of culture is quite contrary to the notion of cultural homogeneity. Indeed, it is impossible to think and talk seriously about culture unless reference is made, at the same time, to cultural diversity.

If the fundamental role of culture is to help us understand and to experience social reality, and if the social reality is very complex, with social groups becoming increasingly more complex and diverse, it is important that culture itself be diverse so as to appeal to all components of society, in order to be able to reflect the social problems, the challenges, including the positive aspects as well. This diversity is, therefore, important. We cannot imagine culture being able to fulfil its role in society if we have access to only 10 or so films per year, 7 or 8 books and 3 or 4 records. We need a broad range of diversity, a cultural offering that is broad and diversified.

What does that mean, basically? Let's take the example of the Canadian film industry. In Canada, Canadian movies represent, on average, 2% of market share and, in Quebec, 5 or 6%. Some 98% of the films shown in Canada are of foreign origin. I am not saying that these are not good movies. That is not the question. The question revolves around balance. Is a ratio of 2% to 98% balanced? Can we say that Canadian reality is reflected in Canadian films when only 2% of the screens are showing Canadian films?

Furthermore, while it is important for Canadian citizens to have access to what is happening in the world and be able to understand it, particularly in the era of globalization, almost 95% of the 98% foreign films are American. Canadians have very little access to films that come from Spain, Italy, China or all the other countries.

It is often said that the Coalition has a protectionist attitude. Absolutely not. The Coalition wants citizens to have access to the widest range of diversity possible; and this wide range of diversity, according to my film industry example, is certainly not a situation whereby 2% of the market is Canadian and 98% American. That is not diversity. Diversity means a higher percentage of Canadian films and, even at that, this is not something that is automatic. This is not about saying that diversity will be achieved the day that Canadian films occupy 50.1% of the movie screens. In some countries this means 30%, 20%, 50%, 60%. The percentage varies according to the times, the creativity of the artists and many other factors.

• 0945

One thing is clear: the ratio of 2% to 98% is not a balanced ratio; this is not cultural diversity. And this applies to the other sectors.

The Chair (Mr. Bill Graham (Toronto Centre—Rosedale, Lib.)): I apologize for interrupting you, but I see that you are on page 5 of 12 pages.

Mr. Robert Pilon: I will speed up.

The Chair: You have already gone well beyond your time. I am starting to get a little bit worried.

Mr. Robert Pilon: Give me three minutes, Mr. Graham, and I will conclude.

Ms. Francine Lalonde (Mercier, BQ): The first witness went well beyond his time. And there are three of them, not four.

The Chair: But he has already taken up 12 minutes and he is on page 5 out of a 12-page document. That means that he is going to need 25 minutes in order to conclude. This is why I am making a little...

Mr. Robert Pilon: All right. Thank you for the warning, Mr. Chairman.

The Chair: The signal.

Mr. Robert Pilon: I will try to speed up.

Culture plays an important role and, as such, cannot be treated as any other commodity. Its role is to provide citizens with a diversity of products, cultural services that are both local and foreign. How can we do that? This is where cultural policy plays a fundamental role. The smaller the country—and Canada, with its population of 30 million people, is not a big country—the more important is the role played by cultural policy. I am not saying that the State should set itself up as producers, creators. That is not at all what I am saying. The State is there to provide support and to compensate for any imbalances that the market cannot resolve. If it were left entirely up to the market to develop cultural products, we would not have any diversified cultural products. Cultural policies are there to support the artists, producers, writers and editors.

And this is even truer in the age of globalization. Here are two examples of this imbalance that we find in the market: the average sales figures of the big record producers total $5 billion and more per year, whereas the average sales figures for Canadian- owned record producers, Canadian small and medium size businesses, amount to less than $1 million, and the gap is growing every year. Clearly, globalization has resulted in this type of gap and is causing it to grow ever wider.

In the film sector, the average production budget for a Canadian film is less than $3 million. The average budget for a Hollywood production is $55 million—it has doubled over the past 10 years—plus $27 million for marketing. The average budget for the 100 or so films turned out in Hollywood is, therefore, $82 million.

Without the assistance, without the financial support, without the measures such as the quotas, ownership rules and cultural policies—we would not—if I can use the expression—even be in the game at all. Canada has implemented such measures and is perceived as a model for its cultural policies, which are imitated throughout the world. For instance, the CRTC has been imitated by many countries, most recently by South Africa and by other countries. These measures, as well as others, are being challenged by our American neighbors. Our American neighbors are basically contending that our cultural policies are discriminatory, that they are contrary to the usual rules of the international trade agreements because they restrict market access.

I will give you the example of the song quotas. In Canada, radio stations must ensure that their programs include 35% Canadian content and francophone stations have a quota whereby they must ensure that 65% of the songs played are in French. This is a file that I know very well. Some of you know that I worked for ADISQ for more than 10 years. Every year the Americans publish a 450-page compendium, a list of all commercial policies that they feel are discriminatory. This compendium was released last Friday. You can find it on the Internet site of the American department concerned. If you look at the chapter on Canada, you will see that our radio content quotas have been denounced by the Americans as being discriminatory measures—there are four pages devoted to this topic—and they also denounce similar measures in Brazil, Korea, France, Italy, for the television content quotas, etc. There is nothing surprising about that. As far as they are concerned, these policies restrict their access to the Canadian market, the Italian market, the French market, the Korean market. So when they say that they are putting culture back on the table, they mean that they want to subject our cultural policies to the rules of international trade. If we agree to that, most of our cultural policies will be dismantled because they will be found to be contrary to the philosophy and usual rules of trade agreements.

• 0950

In conclusion, I will address recent events. As I was saying, important meetings are taking place this spring: last week in Geneva, this week in Buenos Aires and after that in Quebec City.

The Canadian government has adopted positions of principle that the Coalition deems excellent. We have listed them on page 10 of our brief, page 9 of the English version, I believe. On the WTO side, the Canadian government has stated that until a new international treaty on cultural diversity is developed—and I could discuss this further in response to your questions later—Canada will make no commitment that would restrict its leeway on cultural policy at the WTO.

On the FTAA side, something extremely interesting was done. Last fall, Canada proposed a draft preamble for the future FTAA treaty which states that if this preamble is accepted by the others, the 34 countries involved will make a commitment to recognizing that they must retain their ability to preserve, develop and implement their respective cultural policies in order to reinforce cultural diversity, given the essential role that cultural products and services play in the national identity. So in terms of the principles, we all agree. That's fine.

Things will really heat up now. Much as we are delighted with the positions of principle taken by the Canadian government up until now, I can't hide the fact that among the 30 member associations of our coalition, there is a great deal of anxiety, because we know that our American neighbours have considerable economic interests at stake. We're aware of the pressure they exert, that they are capable of exerting—one just has to look at what's going on in softwood lumber right now—and we're worried, very worried, and we urge the government to remain extremely firm. It's one thing to affirm a position of principle on paper; it's quite another thing to stick to one's guns when the American negotiator is seated in front of you and you have to maintain principles and ensure that clauses in the treaty don't eventually restrict our ability to have a film policy, a publishing policy, a music policy. Otherwise, we must give up on cultural diversity in Canada.

Thank you very much.

The Chair: Thank you very much, Mr. Pilon.

I will now give the floor to

[English]

Mr. Campbell from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives.

Mr. Campbell.

Mr. Bruce Campbell (Executive Director, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives): Thank you, Mr. Chair, and good morning. Thank you for inviting me to appear before you this morning.

I do not have a brief, but I should say that we have published, in the last week, something called Inside the Fortress—What's going on at the FTAA negotiations. It was done by one of my colleagues. He can't be here today. He's from our B.C. office. If this committee is planning to travel, I would recommend that you invite him to testify before you. I do have copies of the publication and I can leave them with the clerk after this session.

In one sense we can only speculate on the negotiations, without having seen a draft text, but on the other hand we know that the FTAA is not going to deviate terribly much from NAFTA. NAFTA is the template. Its basic principles and provisions will be reproduced in the final FTAA agreement, if in fact one is reached. So in this sense speculation isn't such a risky business.

At the outset, although it's not going to be the focus of my remarks, I want to say that I share the democracy concerns of many of those who have come before you and have expressed these concerns eloquently. And of course they're prominent in the media discourse these days.

What I want to do is focus on another theme and one that I think is getting little attention, namely that of employment and income.

• 0955

NAFTA and its prior incarnation have been around for 12 years. We can assess its impact and come to a conclusion about whether we want to extend and renegotiate it as FTAA or whether we want to fundamentally reform or indeed abandon the NAFTA itself.

First, the negotiation of the FTAA. Apart from the fact that this government seems ideologically committed to pushing through a deal and is, in Team Canada fashion, pushing market opportunities for Canadian exporters and investors, I'm not sure I see what the national interest is here.

Canada has less than 1% of its trade with Latin America and the Caribbean. The vast bulk of our exports, as you know, are with the United States. The situation isn't much different when it comes to investment.

In terms of power politics, the bargaining dynamics here are almost as lopsided as they were with NAFTA. The U.S. economy is three and a half times the size of the combined economies of the other 33 countries of the hemisphere. So I would ask, does the government expect a better outcome in the FTAA negotiation than we got the last time in the NAFTA?

Will we get a better deal on U.S. countervail and anti-dumping rules to prevent another softwood lumber debacle? No. Will we get a better deal on intellectual property to balance off corporate profits with public interest concerns? No. Will we get effective environment and labour side agreements to lessen the downward pressure on wages and standards? No. We may even get ones that are less effective compared to what we have now, or none at all.

Will we get an effective exemption for the cultural sector? It's not likely. Will we get an effective social exemption to protect public health care and education from privatization? Hardly. Will there be a weakening, or better still removal, of investor-state dispute mechanisms to prevent corporations from attacking environmental and other regulations in the public interest? There may be some minor tinkering, but I wouldn't hope for much. Will we get the demands of human rights advocates that global and hemispheric conventions on human rights not be trumped by the corporate rights provisions of an FTAA? I wouldn't hold my breath.

Meanwhile, the United States has already targeted in this round Canadian supply-managed agriculture, the Wheat Board, crown corporations, the expansion and further deregulation of the North American energy market, cultural industries, and a broad range of concessions on services, including greater access for U.S. health care companies.

So it seems to me that there is little to gain and a lot to lose. I would ask again, what does the government want from this deal, and what is the government prepared to trade away in order to get a deal?

Now I'll go to the impact of NAFTA on employment and incomes, as the template for the FTAA. I want to run through a series of facts that characterize the free trade era thus far.

Canada-U.S. trade, exports and imports, have expanded massively. Exports now count for almost one half of business sector output, up from less than a third in 1988. Imports grew even faster, from less than one third to over one half of business sector output. Trade became even more heavily concentrated with the U.S. Cross-border investment also grew rapidly in both directions.

Economic growth and per-capita income in the nineties registered its worst performance of any decade since the 1930s. We only started to see some light in the last few years. Average unemployment in the nineties was higher than any decade since the 1930s. Overall income inequality grew in the latter half of the nineties, for the first time in the post-war era. Manufacturing employment, hard hit by restructuring and monetary policy austerity in the early nineties, by the end of the decade had yet to regain its 1989 employment level.

• 1000

So what has NAFTA's role been in all of this? I'm not going to get into the dynamics of how NAFTA affects employment and incomes; there isn't time. Let me just say that the conventional wisdom among free trade supporters, to the extent that they acknowledge the grim economic reality we've been through, is that they claim it would have been even worse without NAFTA in place. The export boom, they argue, created jobs that offset in part employment losses elsewhere in the economy.

I've recently contributed a Canadian analysis as part of a forthcoming publication by the Economic Policy Institute in Washington. There are perspectives from each of the NAFTA partners on seven years of NAFTA, and in our case, 12 years of NAFTA-FTA. It's due out in a week or two, and I can make copies available to the committee once it's published.

I want to close by highlighting two points from this study. In preparing my analysis I came across some rather startling evidence: the rapid trade expansion we've experienced under NAFTA has in fact had adverse employment impacts on Canada from a rather surprising source. While the business sector exports grew quickly, imports also grew rapidly. A major effect of this expanding trade was a concurrent rise in the import content per unit of exports and a fall in the domestic content per unit of exports. What did this mean for jobs? The evidence shows that while employment in export industries rose, the number of jobs displaced or destroyed by rising imports rose even faster. Hence, there was a net displacement of jobs. This is really contrary to the conventional wisdom about trade and job creation.

The second point is on the impact of wages, etc., at the bargaining table. I'd like to share some evidence from the U.S. study, because it's relevant to Canada, even though such a study has not been done here. It demonstrates how corporations have been using NAFTA and the threat of plant closure and relocation at the bargaining table to depress wages and in particular to thwart union organizing.

For example, a survey of hundreds of organizing drives found that threats occurred in two-thirds of organizing drives in mobile U.S. industries like manufacturing. It also found that while 51% of union organizing drives were successful in areas where no threats were made by the employer, only 32% of organizing drives were successful where threats were in fact made. This is a concrete demonstration of how competitive pressure under NAFTA rules works to depress wages and working conditions.

In conclusion, let me just say that we've been living with free trade for awhile now and we should be able to answer the question, has it delivered the goods? Has it delivered its promise, for those of you who recall, made back in 1988-89 that it would usher in a new era of prosperity for all Canadians? My answer to that, and I think it's clear, is certainly not. The answer is no. Then I would ask the second question: what then should Canadians be asked to believe in terms of the promise for the FTAA?

Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you very much, Mr. Campbell.

I wonder if I could ask you a question. You gave us a list of where Canada might try to get a better deal in the FTAA than NAFTA. You gave us a list of U.S.-targeted sectors, and I got health care, crown corporations, cultural protection, health, and education protection. Is that the complete list?

• 1005

Mr. Bruce Campbell: Agriculture.

The Chair: Agriculture.

Mr. Bruce Campbell: There are a number of areas under that umbrella—supply-managed agriculture, and the Wheat Board is targeted.

The Chair: That was helpful, actually. I thought that was a very helpful way of putting it. But where do—

Mr. Bruce Campbell: It's not an exhaustive list.

The Chair: That's what scares me.

Mr. Bruce Campbell: Yes.

The Chair: But where would you have obtained that information as to the U.S. position on that?

Mr. Bruce Campbell: Well, I received a lot of it from my colleagues who do the research. Some of it is available in the media. The U.S. trade representatives regularly publish lists of negotiating objectives. Statements on negotiating positions have already been made on the U.S. side—

The Chair: On the USTR website.

Mr. Bruce Campbell: Yes, there is that as well.

The Chair: Thanks very much. I'm just trying to get some extra help for our researchers, too.

Mr. Bruce Campbell: Yes. I don't do the kind of research that I used to, so I have to rely on my colleagues.

The Chair: Thank you very much, sir.

We'll go to questions now.

Mr. Obhrai.

Mr. Deepak Obhrai: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Those were interesting observations on very wide topics. One is talking about the advantages—what we have gained from NAFTA. The other is talking about poverty in third world countries. The third is talking about cultural diversity. We have a huge variety here, so I don't think I will have enough time to ask all of you some questions.

I have just a general observation to Gerry first.

Most of the arguments that have come from the groups that have real issues—and these are legitimate issues. I will not argue about issues. They all say that they're in support of free trade. They all say trade is fine, but it has created disparity, that is, all disparity is blamed on trade.

Now, we know that governments in the third world countries, which you are talking about, do not have the resources to allocate to do many of the things you have asked. They don't. That's a given fact. So the investment that comes into a country is what would create an overall prosperity for the country. The flow of that income going around benefiting the others would have, at the end of the day, a cumulative effect to move the country forward.

My problem is that you want to put roadblocks into the trade arena by saying that everything you need—the social advancement a country needs—somehow has to come from trade, not leaving the responsibility to the governments out there. Yet those governments do not have the money, so they are looking for this investment, which in turn, of course, leads me to my next question about NAFTA not being an advantage to Canada. Similarly, you are expecting government to put forward this money, and government does not have infinite resources; it has constrained resources. Your overall answer to this whole thing is that NAFTA has not been advantageous to Canada. Many will differ with you.

But you have said the economy is rebalancing itself. There are some losses. There are some gains going to the other side. There are technological advances. There are other advances that create all these dynamics, such as an older population getting older. This whole thing is blamed on one thing, so it creates a little question here about trade.

• 1010

I would like your comment on that in retrospect. Don't just blame everything on trade. There are other issues—other places. Culturally, I'll talk to you when I have time.

The Chair: We won't have time because you've taken most of your time in your question.

Maybe Mr. Barr and Mr. Campbell could quickly answer that, because we're supposed to limit the questions and answers to five minutes. We're into four minutes already. I'm just letting you know that. It's a difficult format.

Mr. Gerry Barr: Probably the most core point to make is that we're not, of course, saying that there aren't, at some level, benefits to economic growth and trade. What we're saying is that the benefits of economic growth and trade are unevenly distributed, both within countries and between them. There are really quite vast, great disparities. So the investment you speak of, for example, which may follow on increased trade, may have the result, in some respects, of positioning assets and—at some levels and seen in one way—of strengthening the economy of some southern countries. But at the same time, because of the restrictions and restraints associated with that increase in trade, it will take away options for southern governments.

You spoke of the resources southern governments have in order to undertake programs of social development, regional development—that sort of thing. It's quite true that southern governments are resource strapped.

The point we would make is that with FTAA, you trade one devil for another in a sense. You may not be so resource strapped, but you will have stripped away your options to engage in public initiatives.

The Chair: Do you want to add something to that, Mr. Campbell?

Mr. Bruce Campbell: Yes. I would like to make one point on your question. Apparently, the U.S. has made public all of its negotiating positions in key FTAA areas. I believe that's available on the website, so in that area it's probably a good example for Canada.

I'm a firm believer in the mixed economy—in a balance between the market and regulation. I believe that the NAFTA model has tilted the balance too far—way too far—in the direction of a market model, and because it happens to be in the form of a treaty, it locks it in, so it restricts choices. It restricts choices for future governments, and in that sense it's an erosion of democracy and of parliamentarians' capacity to make choices in the best interests of the economic and social development of their country. That's my broad criticism of NAFTA.

Of course, you can't look at NAFTA in isolation. You have to look at it in conjunction with the whole host of policies, because they interact. They mutually support and reinforce each other and their effect is cumulative.

I list a series of effects or things that have happened in the Canadian economy in the 1990s. There's no dispute over those. The relationship between them and NAFTA, of course, may be argued.

I made the point specifically on the question of jobs and imports and exports. What I said—and I'll repeat—is that the evidence that I've uncovered is that jobs created by the increase in exports have been outweighed in the 1990s by the jobs displaced from the increase in imports. That, I think, is pretty convincing evidence that there hasn't been a job boom associated with the expansion of trade under NAFTA. The source of that information is quite surprising. It comes from the Government of Canada.

The Chair: Thank you. That's interesting.

Madame Lalonde.

[Translation]

Ms. Francine Lalonde: Good morning. I would like to thank all three of you for your very interesting presentations. Since this is the first time that we have a witness discussing culture, you will forgive me if I direct my questions mostly to Mr. Pilon.

• 1015

First of all, I would like you to state, for the record and for our audience, who will be appearing with the coalition, Mr. Pilon.

Secondly, I'll get straight to the point. Given how extremely important it is that governments be able to maintain their ability to have cultural policies, the position that you have developed together with governments who have expressed interest in this area is, in a way, to exclude cultural goods and services as clearly as possible from these agreements. However, I know that this way of doing things is not the same depending on whether one is talking about the WTO, which operates on the basis of a positive list, and which deals only with what is expressly mentioned, or the NAFTA and, we believe, the Free Trade Area of the Americas, where the situation will be different. While it will operate on the basis of a positive list, the Free Trade Area of the Americans bills itself as a general trade agreement, which is why it will be necessary to have another instrument to preserve cultural decisions, which are expressed as exemptions and exclusions.

At the end of your brief, you expressed your fears and concerns. I would like you to discuss these further, because you specifically said that up until now, on principle, things were fine, but that the real debate was going to start now.

Mr. Robert Pilon: Thank you, Ms. Lalonde.

This is for the clerk. I don't know whether it's possible for this to be considered an appendix to our brief, but we have tabled the list of members of our coalition. I can cite a few of them but there are 30 associations and that would take quite a while. They are organizations like the Association of Canadian Publishers; the Association nationale des éditeurs de livres; the Association des réalisateurs et réalisatrices du Québec; the Canadian Association of Film Distributors and Exporters; the Canadian Association of Broadcasters; the Directors Guild of Canada; the Writers Guild of Canada, and so on. In fact, all the key associations, both creative artists and producer-publishers, for the francophone and anglophone markets, are members of the Coalition.

Ms. Lalonde, you raised questions which are indeed extremely important. I know that these issues are sometimes highly technical. We try to avoid that, but at the same time we don't want to completely disregard technical issues. Indeed, the WTO negotiations structure is different. We don't exactly know yet what the negotiating structure of the FTAA will be. That has to be looked at as well. The Americans have proposed a structure that we call top down. Apparently Brazil is totally opposed to that and Canada's position on the negotiations structure is not clear.

Let's talk a bit about the WTO. At the WTO, the negotiations structure on services and what we call the GATS, is a positive list or bottom up structure, which allows countries to state whether or not they are liberalizing a given sector—that was the case at the end of the 1993-94 negotiations. Following the Uruguay Round, the vast majority of countries refused to liberalize the cultural services sector and thus, these countries were able to preserve most of their policies in the service sector.

Indeed, a count conducted by an expert in 1998 found that out of 136 countries, only 19 had committed to liberalization in this area. Allow me to say that this is practical, it's a good thing, but it's fragile. There's too much of a tendency to consider that this is a cultural exception. It is not a cultural exception. It is a de facto exception, but it is not a de jure one. There is no exemption clause or cultural exception listed in the General Agreement on Trade and Services, contrary to what exists in NAFTA, even though the NAFTA clause is not very good.

So the Americans' strategy, of course—and we are going to see it now—is to proceed on a country-by-country basis. Pressures are exerted on a given country. For example, in the past few years, they concentrated their efforts on the new countries, the former East Bloc countries that are entering the WTO, which are Moldavia, the Ukraine and others, to get them to make commitments to liberalizing the cultural sector. Often these relatively fragile countries have agreed. They have exerted pressure every time a new country enters the WTO.

• 1020

In these negotiations, pressure will be exerted one country at a time. The consequences of that are disastrous. Let me give you the example of New Zealand.

In 1993, New Zealand agreed to liberalize its cultural sector. In New Zealand, there were quotas for New Zealand content on television. They had to give up their local content quotas on television. Recently, in New Zealand, they realized that this was a terrible situation. The New Zealand government is considering restoring content quotas on television and radio. In the document published Friday on the USTR Web site which I was discussing earlier, New Zealand is warned that restoring content quotas on radio and television is contrary to their WTO commitments.

Commitments made on a country-by-country basis and other things of that ilk are fragile. This is why we are proposing a new international treaty outside the international trade organizations—that is also the view of the Canadian government, and it is supported by the government of Quebec. This is the new instrument on cultural diversity that would settle these issues once and for all. These matters would not be subject to the usual rules found in an international trade agreement.

Developing a new international treaty can take five to ten years. That is why in the meantime, we must work with what we have. With regard to the WTO, that means that we must continue to benefit as much as possible from a negotiation structure that allows us not to make any commitments while remaining aware that there will be strong pressures exerted and that we must resist them.

With regard to the FTAA, the committee can play a very important role. Beyond the positions of principle taken by the government, there is a lot of leeway in the FTAA because we have a cultural exemption clause in NAFTA. It's not a very good clause because it is accompanied by a retaliatory clause, but at least we have that much. What will the FTAA be if not a sort of an extension of NAFTA? So what will happen to the NAFTA cultural exemption clause? No one has answered that question yet. Will it be maintained? Will it be improved? Will it deteriorate? We don't know.

Canada has also signed other trade agreements. It has signed such agreements with Israel and with Chile. In those trade agreements, there are genuine cultural exemption clauses that are not accompanied by retaliatory clauses.

To our mind, the ideal short-term solution, that is in the coming few years, in the absence of a new international treaty specifically on cultural diversity, would be to include an exemption clause in the FTAA, similar to the one we have in the Canada-Chile agreement. Of course, we are realistic. We know that it would be extremely difficult to get the Americans to agree to that. So we have to examine all other possible options. Another option may be to have a negotiation structure within the FTAA similar to the one we have in the WTO with regard to services, a positive-list type of structure, that would allow a country to refuse to make commitments in a given sector.

We have to examine all options right now, but we must above all work on two things. We must accelerate the work currently done by Canada and other countries on an international level to implement a new international treaty. With regard to the WTO, that's fine. It's clear and we know what we have to do. But with regard to the FTAA, we really have to brainstorm. Experts and parliamentarians like you have an important job to do in the coming months to find the best way to maintain our right to have cultural policies in the very specific context of the FTAA negotiations. The FTAA is in many ways an extension of NAFTA which did contain a cultural exemption clause that was nevertheless not perfect. It is a complex situation.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Pilon.

Mr. O'Brien.

[English]

Mr. Pat O'Brien: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I listened with interest to the presentations. I've got three or four questions. I'll try to get them in quickly.

Mr. Barr, I have to confess I found some of your language hyperbolic—civil society's had the back of the hand, an absolutely shut door. You backtracked a bit and said there had been some listening there. That leads me to my first question. I wonder if Mr. Barr is aware that the Government of Canada has held fairly wide consultations with civil society. Mr. Chairman, as you know, this committee held hearings before the election. It's obviously holding hearings now, where there's a preponderance of submissions from civil society groups. I wonder if Mr. Barr's aware of the government's funding of the parallel society and the consultations that have been held.

• 1025

I would add a note, Mr. Chairman, on the events yesterday and something that bothers me about the civil society inputs. We had a group of people who were going to go into the Pearson Building and “liberate the text”. For me, that's a euphemism for “trespass in a building that's not a public building and steal government documents”. That's how I see it. I just don't think it serves a constructive dialogue when we use euphemisms and hyperbole. I don't think civil society has had the back of the hand, quite the contrary. But I'd be interested in Mr. Barr's view on that. That's the first question.

The second question is a take-off from Mr. Obhrai's question. Is there not significant evidence that increased globalized and liberalized trade has helped some countries to achieve democracy? Isn't that an argument for helping countries like Mexico, which have not been democracies—certainly not very valid ones—until very recently, deal with their income disparity? I agree with Mr. Obhrai. Surely there's some responsibility for a national government to deal with the income problems within its own country. That's my second question.

My third point is just a comment. I recently attended in the U.K. a ministerial round table with EU ministers on liberalized trade and less developed countries. Their comment from that—and this is development ministers from the EU—is that the status quo is unacceptable and that the solution is to move forward with more liberalized, globalized trade, with the necessary help for the less developed and developing countries. The solution is not to maintain the status quo or to go backward in time. It seems to me that is a somewhat naive argument I'm hearing from some individuals and groups. I'd be interested in your comment on that.

Lastly, Mr. Chairman, I have to give Mr. Campbell a chance. Is he really telling us that free trade has increased the unemployment situation in Canada? He says he has evidence coming from the Canadian government itself. I have a request to him, then, that at least by the end of the week he table that information with the committee, because I want to see it. If that's really what he's saying to us, how do you account for the decrease in unemployment from 11.5%, when this government came to office, to below 7% at times—I'm not sure exactly where it sits now, around 7%? So if I heard you correctly and free trade has caused unemployment to increase, how do you explain the fairly significant decrease?

Those are my questions. Thanks, Mr. Chair.

The Chair: We'll start with Mr. Barr, then we'll go to Mr. Campbell.

Mr. Gerry Barr: That's two for me and two for Bruce. Is that correct?

Mr. Pat O'Brien: I think it was three and one, but go ahead. I don't care.

Mr. Gerry Barr: Three and one. Okay.

First, with respect to consultation, there's certainly no doubt that there's been a good deal of that, particularly on the Canada side. The point that I would make to you—

Mr. Pat O'Brien: It's not the back of the hand, then.

Mr. Gerry Barr: This is a process that began in 1994. Civil society has been regularly showing up and regularly presenting throughout the hemisphere, at ministerial meetings, at heads of state meetings. It has been doing so with great deliberation and with a tremendous level of systematic energy. The problem here is not that there is nothing in the way of attentiveness. There is some attentiveness, but there is nothing in the way of consultation. That is to say, the distinction here is that there is no accountable dialogue between the players. There is no significant and systematic feedback with respect to the input civil society manages to get, when it manages to get it. There is a complete block of any regular and uniform avenue for participation in the process. And the way to characterize that is to think about the business forum of the Americas, a very specialized avenue for participation completely denied to labour, environmental, and social justice organizations, and others.

• 1030

Mr. Pat O'Brien: I have to interject there, Mr. Chairman, for clarity. Are you speaking in the Canadian context, the Canadian—

Mr. Gerry Barr: We're back to the question about process, and I say there's the hemispheric process—

Mr. Pat O'Brien: Right.

Mr. Gerry Barr: —and Canada is a co-designer of that—and then there is what is happening in Canada. On the Canada side, I think the weaknesses would be as follows. First, the text of the agreement is not there, and that limits profoundly the extent of consultation it is possible to have. Second, with respect to Canada's position, only five of nine negotiating positions have been circulated.

As to the funding with respect to the parallel summit, a great deal is made of this, and I don't doubt that it is highly appreciated. But I think it's very important that parliamentarians and parliamentary spokespersons not overrate the extent of the participation. It is, if I'm not mistaken, $200,000 of a very large budget.

Mr. Pat O'Brien: Fair enough, but I also think—

Mr. Gerry Barr: It is a significant participation, but by no means pays for the alternative summit.

Mr. Pat O'Brien: But it's hardly the “back of the hand”.

Mr. Gerry Barr: I don't know. What is $200,000 compared to the sponsorship list and the access purchase plan that was offered to the business community? If I remember correctly, it was $1.5 million for a company like, say, Alcan, to sponsor the Prime Minister's gala at reception events. So $200,000, in that context, is pretty modest stuff.

Mr. Pat O'Brien: We're talking about taxpayers' dollars, as compared to private dollars, but anyhow—

Mr. Gerry Barr: We're talking about the sale of access.

Mr. Pat O'Brien: Could we get you to address my other questions?

The Chair: You're going to have to hurry, because we're well over your time. Ms. Davies has been waiting patiently.

Mr. Gerry Barr: I'm happy to go on. Is there significant evidence that globalized trade has helped achieve democracy? There is certainly evidence that connectivity between the nations of the hemisphere has been useful. The example would be the role taken by the Organization of American States and, to some extent, Canada concerning the recent crisis in Peru, with respect to its governance. And there's no doubt some positive steps have been taken there. As to whether this means there is significant evidence that globalization has helped achieve democracy, I would say, no, there isn't. And if you have the evidence, I would welcome it. There have certainly been changes in governance in the region. Whether this is attributable to growing economies and trade liberalization is, I think, completely another matter.

About the status quo, you were talking about—

The Chair: We're going to have to go to Mr. Campbell—

Mr. Gerry Barr: That's fine. Sure.

The Chair: —because we're going to more than double your time. The members set time limits, nobody observes them, and then they complain to the chair because I don't keep to them. So it's kind of a crazy problem, but anyway....

Mr. Campbell.

Mr. Bruce Campbell: I'll try to be brief, though I could go on for some time over this question.

The fact is, if you look at the decade as a whole, it's not been a good one on the unemployment side. If I were to look at the nineties and what policies contributed most to the dismal employment situation, I'd have to say, on the macro-economic policy side, monetary austerity, certainly in the first part of the decade, and in the latter part, fiscal retrenchment, which was quite severe, more severe than in any other major industrialized country in the post-war era. Those are the two main causes, but I would also submit that there is a relationship between macro-policy and NAFTA. Not that it was an inevitable connection, but policy-makers had NAFTA and issues of competitiveness in the NAFTA environment very much in mind when they made their decisions about monetary policy and fiscal policy.

• 1035

We also know that the manufacturing sector in particular was devastated in the early 1990s and that free-trade-driven restructuring and monetary policy were interacting. There has since been a very slow recovery, but as of the end of the decade, manufacturing employment was still below its 1989 level.

The evidence I came across that surprised me actually comes from a study that was commissioned by Industry Canada. It covers the period 1989 to 1997, so it's not totally up to date, but it's eight years of the FTA and NAFTA. Here's what I found: employment, both direct and indirect, in export industries rose from 19.6% of total business sector employment—when I say business sector I mean everything except the public sector—in 1989 to 28.3% in 1997. However, the rapid rise in imports displaced, or destroyed, even more employment. The job-displacing effect of imports rose steadily from an equivalent of 21.1% of total business employment in 1989 to 32.7% of total business employment in 1997. If you want to convert that into absolute jobs, which I did, between 1989 and 1997—

The Chair: How long do you think you'll be? You could perhaps file the report.

Mr. Bruce Campbell: Sure.

The Chair: We've already used 12 minutes—

Mr. Bruce Campbell: That's fine. I thought it was important to cite the report—

The Chair: It's not your fault. I'm not suggesting it is. It's just that—

Mr. Pat O'Brien: I ask that it be tabled, Mr. Chairman.

My question was pretty simple—

The Chair: My problem with the report is that it's obviously going to be subject to interpretation.

Mr. Pat O'Brien: That's right.

The Chair: One person is going to take the figure and say, but what would have happened if we hadn't had NAFTA?

Mr. Pat O'Brien: That's right. Mr. Chairman—

The Chair: Maybe you could let us have the report, and then the members could deal with it—

Mr. Pat O'Brien: If I might finish on this point, I appreciate Mr. Campbell noting in his comments that it only goes up to 1997, because—

Ms. Libby Davies (Vancouver East, NDP): I have a point of order. Hasn't he gone over his time?

Mr. Pat O'Brien: —the three best years of turnaround have occurred since 1997.

To Ms. Davies, I would invite her to come here when her colleague Svend Robinson is here. If the only way you can get your questions asked is to use the Robinson method of constantly interrupting witnesses, speak to your own colleague before you speak to me.

Ms. Libby Davies: I'm not interrupting the witnesses. You did that, Mr. O'Brien—

Mr. Pat O'Brien: I invite you to speak to your own colleague Mr. Robinson before you come to the committee and preach to the rest of us.

Ms. Libby Davies: I believe you're violating the rules of the—

Mr. Pat O'Brien: I believe you should speak to Mr. Robinson.

Ms. Libby Davies: Oh, I do, frequently.

The Chair: Order.

Mr. Pat O'Brien: He obviously is the rudest person I've ever seen at this committee, and maybe the rest of us are going to have to follow his method if that's the way he behaves and he gets away with it.

The Chair: I hope we won't necessarily have to do that.

We're now going to turn to Ms. Davies to let her demonstrate how independent she is in the way in which she conducts herself.

Ms. Libby Davies: Thank you very much, Chairperson.

First of all, I'd like to thank the witnesses for coming. I thought each of you made an excellent presentation. We hear so much about how the FTAA is a wonderful thing, so it's very important to have witnesses come to the committee who can present a very true picture of what are the problems.

Beginning with a point of language, I thought it was actually a very creative use to describe the liberation of the text for an exercise that was really to gain full disclosure of what Canada is aiming to do allegedly in the public interest. Talking about language, the really brilliant choice of words is the whole notion of free trade in the first place.

I think from the evidence you've presented today, it becomes stronger and stronger that this free trade, whether it's NAFTA or now of the Americas, and trade liberalization generally are certainly free for corporate powers and really an unfettered regime, but it really places everybody else at huge risk.

I wanted to focus on a couple of the points that Mr. Barr and Mr. Campbell made.

• 1040

For Mr. Barr, I think something that does not get nearly enough debate is the growing inequality in wealth distribution. Surely, a very fundamental component of what happens around trade rules is what kind of income distribution takes place. We seldom talk about this. I was very interested to hear your evidence about how in some of the countries—and I think you noted Mexico in particular—income inequality has actually increased, not decreased. Of course, that is true in Canada as well.

For Mr. Campbell, there is the analysis of what the impact has been on employment and on working conditions.

We hear so much that these trade agreements are inevitable, that this is the only course a society can follow. I think we're very used to feeling the pressure of almost blackmail around investment. In fact, you talked about this in terms of corporations that put pressure on municipal governments or national governments to withdraw plants, funds, or investment.

The issue I wanted to really get at is that we should be talking about fair trade that involves a subnational level and that includes food security, income security, protection for the environment, and democratic control. If we were to begin that process, what are some of the elements you would be looking for to build on the notion of fair trade that actually looks at wealth distribution as something that should be more equalized so that we don't have growing inequality?

If the three witnesses would like to comment on that, I'd be pleased to hear from them.

Mr. Gerry Barr: If there were an agreement that took development objectives into account, it would be a fundamentally different kind of critter than the agreement that is currently in front of trade negotiators, even tentatively, for the FTAA. There would be room for the principle of food security. There would be room for the community management of public knowledge and traditional knowledge. There would be measures that would allow for performance requirements on overseas and foreign investment. It would be more of a development pact type of arrangement. Perhaps one could think of that as an alternative way of doing it.

Overwhelmingly, the critics of the deal are not taking the position that a trade agreement is a bad thing. They're taking the position that a bad trade agreement is a bad thing and that a trade agreement that does not take the poor and development objectives into account, particularly in a country where the majority of the population is challenged by poverty, is a bad thing.

If I may, the government is making a good deal now of the democracy clause, the thought being that progress can be made if we have a provision that provides that you need to have some sort of protocol for an electoral process and the orderly transfer of power arrangements in order to be part of the trade agreement. I think most people looking at this from our side of the fence, if I can put it that way, would say that this is not an unimportant thing to do, but as a democracy clause it is woefully inadequate. Democracy is also about rights and asserting the pre-eminence of human rights and, I would argue, some of the protocols with regard to sustainable development over trade arrangements, so that when there is a collision between the two, human rights will trump and not trade rules. The principle here is that it is bad to make a law that can be effectively enforced only through the breaking of, or the diminishing of fidelity to, another law.

• 1045

We really need to address this, and it is not yet addressed in the trade agreement, not even by half. There's a great deal of work left to do on the democracy clause.

The Chair: Mr. Campbell.

Mr. Bruce Campbell: I would certainly agree with what Gerry has said.

You know, if we're looking at a completely different type of agreement, a development agreement or whatever, obviously it depends—you know, “Give me the power and I can fashion an agreement”. That's quite different, and has a whole different set of priorities. Underlying these agreements are different sets of priorities, and they reflect relations of power between nations and corporations and workers and governments—governments that want to intervene, at least.

I can think of a whole array of provisions I would include in such an agreement. It would be a long list on the industrial policy side. We've lost the ability to have a whole array of performance requirements attached to investments so that investments coming in, whether foreign or domestic, can be nudged and shaped in ways that are best in terms of the public interest.

The classic example is the Auto Pact. That type of industrial policy is not permitted any more. Fortunately, we have a strong auto industry now, and it's not going to affect us, but other countries that want to do that, or want to transfer technology in such a way that an indigenous technology structure emerges to protect strategic sectors....

One of the things the Liberal government wanted to do back in the early nineties was have, as its condition for approving NAFTA, a common regime on subsidy rules. Those don't exist. There's big competition amongst the 90 jurisdictions on the continent to see who can offer the best subsidies to companies that are....

Another area is intellectual property. I would fashion a completely different intellectual property regime that would balance corporate interests with the interests of public social interest, with traditional practitioners of medicine and so forth.

As well, I would fashion an agreement that would not take away the rights governments have to regulate short-term capital flows, as in a Tobin tax, for example. We know the U.S. is targeting that, and NAFTA constrains the ability to regulate capital flows in and out to combat capital flight, and that type of thing.

So it's an endless list. If you really want to look at alternatives, I think there's a rich storehouse of possibilities.

The Chair: Thank you.

Monsieur Patry.

[Translation]

Mr. Bernard Patry (Pierrefonds—Dollard, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I would like to thank our guests here this morning. The briefs were excellent. I have two questions for Mr. Pilon and one for Mr. Barr.

Mr. Pilon, in your brief and especially in your conclusion here this morning, you stated that you were very pleased with the two statements of principle issued by the Canadian government. The first was unveiled last December and the second on March 14, that is last month. You added that you could see that the government was concerned about transparency and genuine co-operation.

You add, and I quote:

The Coalition would also like to indicate the particularly active and consistent support provided by the Quebec government for the above-stated principles.

You have given a list of the statements, and you state:

[...] these statements of principles by the Canadian government [...] are basically the same principles as those espoused by the Coalition in its position:

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My question is simple. In this very specific area, diversity is cultural. In your view, does the Canadian position reflect the Quebec position well? That is my first question.

My second question is along the same lines as what Ms. Lalonde asked. In your brief, you state:

A general consensus is developing around the world in support of the right of states to define and implement cultural policies, which are essential to support cultural diversity.

Elsewhere in your brief, you talk about the joint statements between Canada and France and France and Quebec, the Francophonie Summit in Moncton, the International Network on Cultural Policy in Oaxaca, Mexico, the Council of Europe, and the Spanish-American Summit of Heads of State and Heads of Government. You list all of them. On the basis of that consensus, you recommend, as you have said, an international agreement to define clearly the principles of diversity and to entrench state rights. My question is simple. The idea is a good one. We need to go further. It is a very interesting idea. Is there support for it outside Canada? Are people talking around the world about having an international approach to this?

[English]

My question is for Mr. Barr. When you talked at the beginning, you seemed to be against free trade. That was the first impression I had. But at the end, answering a question from my colleague, Mr. O'Brien, you mentioned that five of the nine sections of the negotiations have been circulated, and so on.

Look at what's happened in Mexico recently. It's the first time we've seen a democratic government elected. Since Pinochet has gone, the country of Chile is booming with an elected president. My question is very simple. Do you agree or not that in these countries, Mexico and Chile, free trade is little bit responsible for good government and civil society, good democracy? Is it part of that? And if you feel that free trade is not the solution for the poor countries, what is the solution?

[Translation]

Thank you.

The Chair: Mister Pilon, please.

Mr. Robert Pilon: It would seem so, Mr. Patry. Yes, it seems that Quebec and Ottawa agree in principle on this issue. I think that we can be happy about that. I remember that Ms. Maltais, the former Minister of Culture in Quebec, said that we were on the same wavelength. She said that in a speech, I believe, at an international conference. I think that we should be glad.

That said, I think that it is up to the Quebec government to express where its views are different. I think there are some areas. Some may be important, among other things, concerning the development of a new international treaty. I do not have precise information, but I have the impression that the Quebec government was a little bit more specific, somewhat less ambiguous about the role this new treaty should have. The Quebec government talked about the possibility of having UNESCO involved, but without taking up a clear position.

This idea of a new international treaty is still quite new, but we felt that it was important to bring up because it is clear that Quebec, out of all the provinces, is the one that has highly developed cultural policies in all sectors. There are not as many cultural policies in all provinces. I believe that they have special interests at stake, like the federal government does, and they went to bat for them. We felt that was important to point out.

With respect to the new treaty, I would say that this concept first came up in a report by the advisory committee to the Minister of International Trade, the SAGIT, which stands for Sectoral Advisory Group on International Trade, submitted in February 1999. Since I am also a member of the SAGIT, my signature is on that report.

We were talking about relationships between Quebec and Ottawa. In fact, the first government in Canada to come up with the original concept and support it was the Quebec government in June 1999. In October 1999, the federal government also supported it. There are experts working on the issue. One of them is Professor Yvan Bernier from Laval University, and there are others, such as Peter Grant from Toronto. This will lead to results. I think that we should point out...

The Chair: Our committee decided to support your proposal as well.

Mr. Robert Pilon: Yes, you are quite right.

The Chair: This committee pushed. We completely supported...

Mr. Robert Pilon: You are quite right. It was in the report of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade in the spring or summer of 1999, was it not? This committee supported it.

I think that there is something that we should keep in mind: the Minister of Canadian Heritage, Sheila Copps, created an international network in 1998 on cultural policy that is a kind of international network of ministers of culture from countries around the world. This network met in Ottawa, in Mexico a year and a half ago, in Greece last September and will hold its next meeting in Switzerland this coming September. The Quebec Minister of Culture attended these meetings. Ms. Maltais took part in the last meetings. She was in Mexico and also in Santorin. The network holds discussions to try to sell, if I can put it that way, this idea of a new international treaty to other countries. It is true that progress is slow.

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I feel that the situation is urgent. We need to speed up this work. What has been done is good, but we need to speed things up regarding this new international treaty because it is a matter of credibility. If we get to the negotiating table in Geneva or Washington for the FTAA and say to our American neighbours that culture will not be discussed here but rather in a later meeting, they will ask us sooner or later just where we are prepared to discuss it. They will ask us where our treaty is. I think that we are going to need to put a lot more energy and resources into the process to be able to move more quickly and develop this new international treaty so that we can resolve these issues once and for all.

I believe that we can potentially count on support from both government and cultural circles around the world. The issue we are discussing this morning is not specific to Canada or Quebec. It is also an issue in Korea, Peru, Chile, France and Italy. Cultural sectors, and in many cases governments as well, share the concerns that we have here, and I think that it is a question of energy, boldness and innovation. We need to go forward, to sell this idea to get culture once and for all out of international trade agreements.

In the FTAA agreement—I will end on this—the only reference to culture that I would like to see is a sentence in the preamble. The rest of it should be settled outside the agreement.

This afternoon, if I understand correctly, Mr. Marc Lortie, who is the sherpa for the Summit, will appear here. It is not my place to suggest questions to you. I had an opportunity recently to ask Mr. Lortie this question, but it will be interesting to see whether, in the final declaration by the Heads of State at the Quebec Summit, there will be any mention of culture and cultural diversity. It seems that there will be. In which chapter will it be dealt with? In connection with trade and prosperity? In connection with human potential?

At this point, I think that we need to keep all our options open. It is clear that no deal will be closed in Quebec City, especially with the Americans, regarding the absolute right of states to maintain and develop their policies. I am not naive enough to think that that will happen. But let us keep all our options open. We must not close the door on anything by coming up with a statement that defines cultural diversity too narrowly or too vaguely. The concept of cultural diversity should be broad enough to include the right of states to have policies on film, books, recordings, music.

If the concept of cultural diversity is restricted to that of multiculturalism—and I have nothing against the latter, so that is not the problem—or if it is limited to the idea of protecting the rights of cultural minorities, our hands will be tied and we will pay a very high price when we get to the real negotiations. So we should not start with a definition of cultural diversity in the declaration by heads of State in Quebec City that is too restrictive or too limiting.

[English]

The Chair: Mr. Barr.

Mr. Gerry Barr: I know we're restricted for time, so I won't take a lot of it, but I think it would be helpful to make the point that, from our point of view, at least, there really is no effective exoskeleton for democracy worldwide. There is no external structure that creates democracy. Democracy comes from internal social process, from struggle, of course, and from negotiations within countries. To the extent that there is good governance now in the region, good governance is coming from good social process and from forward-moving social process on the ground more than anywhere else.

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In fact, if you look at the agreements we now have, both WTO and NAFTA, and if you imagine the impact of FTAA, I would argue that the provisions of those agreements will generate restrictions on democratic rights, not the other way around—trade unions, for example, the extent to which workers are locked in maquiladoras or export-processing zone frameworks where rights are routinely denied, working conditions are profoundly dangerous, and there is little prospect of independent union representation, health and access. I've already mentioned the example of Brazil.

I'd leave you with those as examples of the restraint and restriction of rights instead of their amplification and strengthening.

The Chair: Thank you.

Colleagues, it is 11 a.m. The clerk tells me we can go on a few minutes longer, and I know Madame Lalonde wants to ask a question. I don't know whether Madame Marleau does. I have a couple of—

Ms. Libby Davies: I have to go to another committee.

The Chair: I think most members have other things to do, but maybe while the parliamentary secretary is here I'd make a point that he would want to know.

Mr. O'Brien, you will recall that when Mr. Manning was here, you discussed this matter of the amount of money that has been funded. In fact, the figures are $300,000 from the federal government and $200,000 from the Quebec government. Those are the accurate figures on that.

Other members have to go on, but I want to ask one quick question of Mr. Barr, and one of Mr. Pilon.

Mr. Barr, one of the problems I have with a lot of the witnesses who come before us—and I don't say, is the glass half empty or half full. When the Canadian Council for International Cooperation, which represents all the NGOs, comes before us and paints such a bleak picture, that there's nothing good here, I ask, is there nothing in there that's positive?

When I look at it, I agree with you that there are problems with the trade agreements. I thought your exposition was that one of the problems is that trade agreements constrain what governments can do. I agree with that. I watch that every day as a legislator, and we've run into it on the magazine case, when it comes to culture and other issues. So we're not naive enough not to think that in transferring to international organizations we lose sovereignty.

We recognize that, but the question is, do we gain more by pooling our interests when we might lose our benefit of being able to control it anyway?

So when I look at the Quebec summit, I take some comfort in the democracy clause in part I, and a lot of comfort in the discussions that are taking place in part III about the social issues in the other American countries and how we can help—the efforts that are being made regarding connectivity, trying to bridge the digital gap. It seems to me that at the Quebec summit, we're bringing the governments to the table for the first time and saying, look, you can't just look at trade deals; you have to look at the holistic health of the whole of the Americas.

It may not be perfect and we may not be doing it right, but it seems to me there may be something more positive in there than perhaps you're letting me believe. I want to get your reaction on that reflection.

[Translation]

Mr. Pilon, I would like to ask you a question about culture.

It seems to me that the issue of cultural protection is different from that of human rights protection, etc. For example, the big problem that we in the committee have when we talk about protecting human rights is what sanctions could be imposed. For example, we could not punish a human rights offence by reducing access to markets.

We had a lot of problems with Mr. Allmand and two other witnesses who came before us. What could we do to protect human rights that does not involve international trade sanctions, since that approach is not very practical?

Where cultural protection is concerned, I feel that the issue is really about what we could put in the preamble of the agreement in order to protect cultural diversity. That is what we need to do; otherwise, we will have a lot of problems.

I would really like to hear your thoughts on this. Could you send the committee the wording that you would like to see in such an agreement regarding protection for the cultural sector?

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All the witnesses who come here tell us that they have not seen the agreement and that they would like to see the text, but none of them has told us what wording should be in the agreement. So we do not have the benefit of hearing the witnesses' positions on this. If you could give us that, it would help us a lot.

I am sorry for taking up so much time. I am doing exactly what I tell others not to do.

[English]

So Mr. Barr is first, and then Monsieur Pilon.

Mr. Barr, am I being a little too harsh on you by saying you don't ever see anything good in life?

Mr. Gerry Barr: I think your argument is that I'm being too harsh.

I'd like to start by saying, look, the chorus of criticism, which is extraordinarily loud now throughout the region, not simply in Canada but hemispherically, is aimed at resecuring accountability, and at some level, at re-establishing the process as legitimate, because there is a feeling that there is a failure of accountability, that decisions are being made without really due regard to the impacts those decisions are having in the social sphere.

There is a fair amount of social promising going on in the process. There are, of course, the social baskets—there was the Santiago plan of action. I would just characterize that as a great deal of promising and very little in the way of performance.

I think there is additionally a conceptual failure in the approach here. It appears as if there is a sense that poverty and a wide range of the social questions can be resolved outside the context, not that they ought not to be addressed—everybody seems to agree on that—but that they can be addressed outside the framework of the trade agreement. But it is the trade agreement and the trade portion of the agreement itself that has such a supremely effective impact both on the democratic options of governments, and concretely, as I think we have illustrated, on the economic lives of people.

We would look for a trade agreement that makes it clear that there is a primacy of human rights and social commitments over trade law.

One might think of a piece of language that was aimed at the enforcement measures of the agreement so that in the framework of, for example, a chapter 11 type of assault, a country might be able to argue effectively that where a remedy would compromise its ability to meet its obligations under a range of multilateral agreements and rights conventions to which it was a party, it ought not to be held to the enforcement procedure. Or where a remedy requested could be demonstrated to create a disincentive for a national government to meet its obligations, it would set aside the enforcement procedure as a result.

That kind of procedure I would take as evidence of really earnest, good thinking on the part of trade negotiators and an attempt to grapple with this question of the social accountability of these trade deals.

Unhappily, it is not there at the moment, and while it is not there, the effects of these kinds of agreements are more than in evidence, and the consequences are really quite extreme. Both I and all our members think so.

The Chair: Thank you very much.

Mr. Pilon.

[Translation]

Mr. Robert Pilon: There are three things.

First of all, Mr. Graham, there is indeed some confusion about the expression “cultural diversity”. If you do an Internet search using “cultural diversity”, you get anything and everything. Depending on whether the expression is being used in its narrow or broad sense, or whether the focus is on its sociological, ethnological or anthropological meaning, it can cover anything, including the right to protect minority languages around the world, the right to protect Aboriginal cultures and issues relating to sexual orientation. It is extremely broad. That is why we prefer to use the expression “diversity of cultural expression”.

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As a citizen, I believe that all the other issues are very legitimate, but, unfortunately, it is inconceivable that the treaty will cover everything. It is a bit unrealistic to think that way.

In any case, the lobbies or interest groups in those sectors, for example, those that advocate protection for Aboriginal languages around the world, those combatting racism, those dealing with sexual orientation issues, are fighting their own battle and want their own declaration, their own international treaty. I think we need to concentrate on a treaty that will enable states and governments to develop their cultural policies. Let us be clear. That means policies on theatre and museums, of course, but it also means cultural policies for cultural industries, such as the film, publishing and recording industries. That is very important.

In terms of the FTAA, the paragraph in the draft preamble seems very good to me, speaking generally and in terms of the principles. The big question is what stage this draft preamble is at now. Will it be discussed in Buenos Aires a few days from now or not? Have other countries proposed wording that contradicts this draft? It appears not to be the case.

I do not know whether you have had the chance to question or call as a witness Mr. Claude Carrière, chief FTAA negotiator, to whom I recently put that question. Apparently, there are no other countries. But will other countries propose different wording? As it stands, the principles are set out clearly. I will not hide my fear, Mr. Chairman, that the end result will be watered down wording that refers to the notion of cultural diversity, human rights, and so on. Those are all good things, but the key words in that sentence are the right for countries to have cultural policies: right, countries, cultural policies. It is extremely important. Otherwise, it becomes apple pie, a very, very vague idea.

Our American neighbours are bound to want the most watered down definition of cultural diversity possible. We therefore need a precise definition in order to keep and further develop our cultural policies on film, books, and music, among others.

The Chair: If I understood correctly, Mr. Pilon, Mr. Valenti has not invited you to the dinner in California. You are not a friend of Mr. Valenti.

Mr. Robert Pilon: Mr. Chairman, we have to understand here in Canada that Mr. Valenti is doing his job. We have our own job to do.

The Chair: Very good answer.

A short question, Ms. Lalonde.

Ms. Francine Lalonde: It is a short question along the same lines as what you just said.

NAFTA contains countervailing measures. There is some recognition of a State's right to take steps to promote national culture, but it is also possible to take countervailing action. Does that not largely defeat the purpose of a strongly worded preamble?

In this regard, is it not cause for concern that even on the Net... Yet another reason, this morning, for having the text, Mr. Chairman. We looked at the department's site this morning, and there is still nothing on services. The Americans have said they want the negotiations to cover cultural goods and services, but Canada still has nothing; its position on services is unavailable.

In light of that and the existence of retaliatory measures under NAFTA, do we not have very solid grounds not only for concern, but also to push the person who is currently responsible for Canada and the negotiators? In this regard, I think we are going to do our duty, Mr. Chairman. I would like to know what Mr. Pilon, Mr. Barr and Mr. Campbell think about that, because I am sure it is of interest to them too.

The Chair: Very briefly, please, Mr. Pilon.

Mr. Robert Pilon: Certainly, Ms. Lalonde, we will be even more reassured when we see a Canadian proposal on services, investment and subsidies, among other things. For subsidies, I think that is it.

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For the time being, I can only take Mr. Pettigrew's word that Canada wants to retain its ability to maintain, develop and implement cultural policies to such an extent that Canada would even be willing to put that in the draft preamble to be signed by all 34 countries.

That said, we will remain watchful, and I think parliamentarians must also be watchful and stay tuned. In my opinion, it is not merely a matter of the bona fides of the politicians who are telling us this. The issue is whether they are able to resist the enormous pressure the Americans will bring to bear on this matter, given the economic stakes this represents for them.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Pilon. We are so watchful that we stayed much longer then scheduled at our meeting this morning.

[English]

I want to thank all the witnesses for coming. It was very interesting. We appreciate very much what you have to say.

Mr. Barr and Mr. Campbell, often I think those who criticize the free trade agreement.... The committee is getting a sense that many people are quite frustrated. You were saying that you feel there's lots of listening but not much back-and-forth.

If you have a look at our report, I think we try to reflect these concerns, and we do our best as parliamentarians. That's why I think it's important that hearings like this be on the television so that those members of the public, who are following the summit of Quebec and have great interest, have an opportunity to hear what you have to say. They have an opportunity to hear our views, and I think that's important.

For that, I rather regret the fact that this afternoon's hearing, colleagues, which will have Mr. Lortie, will unfortunately not be televised. We couldn't fit the government officials into this room this afternoon, but I just want to say we're having Mr. Lortie this afternoon. That will be available on our Internet site, as usual, for anybody in the audience who's interested.

Thursday morning we will have our last session on the summit hearings, which will take place here, again, in the television room. For the audience that is watching, they can find out more information about the lead-up to the summit.

So thank you very much, witnesses, for coming. We appreciate it. Colleagues, we're adjourned until 3:30 p.m., when we'll have Mr. Lortie and the government officials. It's not here in this room; it's room 269, West Block.

Thank you very much.

[Translation]

Thank you very much. See you this afternoon.

The meeting is adjourned.