NEWS: Summit deal a toxic brew, CCPA warns

September 24, 2007

As reported by the Ottawa Citizen on September 24, 2007, "An unpublicized agreement signed at last month's Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP) summit at Montebello puts Canada on course for a single North American regime for regulating industrial chemicals, says a study being released today."

The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives 7-page study, "More Than Jellybeans: The SPP Regulatory Framework Agreement and Its Impact on Chemicals Regulation".

The article states, "In his study, Mr. Campbell notes that the North American Competitiveness Council, a trilateral group of CEOs, recommended harmonizing lists of hazardous industrial chemicals in a report to SPP ministers last February. The NACC report said the chemicals listed in Canada's Domestic Substances List and the U.S. Toxic Substances Control Act differ and prevent some U.S. products from being sold in Canada."

"That would almost certainly lead to weaker Canadian controls over hazardous chemicals in the future...The unpublicized agreement, titled Regulatory Co-operation in the Area of Chemicals, appears on the American government's SPP website, but not on Canadian government sites."

Brent Patterson, Director of Organizing and Campaigns, The Council of Canadians